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finished_summaries/shmoop/Twelfth Night, or What You Will/section_13_part_0.txt

Twelfth Night, or What You Will.act 3.scene 4

act 3, scene 4

{"name": "Act 3, Scene 4", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210415161814/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/twelfth-night/summary/act-3-scene-4", "summary": "In her garden, Olivia frets about whether or not \"Cesario\" will come back for a little visit. Then she asks Maria where Malvolio is. Maria tells Olivia that Malvolio's on his way, but he's acting like he's possessed by demons--he's been smiling a lot and for no good reason. When Malvolio enters in a ridiculous get-up and a silly grin on his face, Olivia asks what the heck's wrong with him. She wants to know why he's smiling like an idiot when she's in such a sad mood. Malvolio continues to act like a fool--slobbering on Olivia's hand, talking nonsense, and insulting Maria. When Malvolio quotes lines from the forged letter, Olivia has no idea what he's talking about and thinks he's totally lost his mind. Malvolio presses on and asks Olivia if she remembers telling him to wear yellow stockings and cross-garters. When a servant enters and announces that \"Cesario\" has arrived, Olivia tells Maria to fetch Toby and company to look after Malvolio so she can rush off to greet \"Cesario.\" Malvolio's left alone and tells us that he thinks Olivia is totally into him--he can't wait to carry out the instructions of the letter by being rude to Sir Toby. Sir Toby and Fabian enter and pretend to think Malvolio's possessed and needs an exorcism. Malvolio tells them to get lost , but Maria says, see guys, I told you his body's been taken over by a devil. Malvolio is totally confused by the crew's behavior, especially when Fabian suggests they get a urine sample and make Malvolio say his prayers. Malvolio tells them to get lost and runs away, leaving the crew to comment about how delicious their prank is. They decide to chase after Malvolio and lock him up in a dark room that will make Malvolio go crazy. Just then, Sir Andrew Aguecheek enters with the letter he has written to challenge \"Cesario\" to a duel. Toby reads the hilariously insulting letter aloud and assures Aguecheek that he'll deliver the note to \"Cesario.\" In the meantime, Aguecheek should go hide in the orchard. When \"Cesario\" shows up, Aguecheek should jump out from behind a tree, draw his sword, and say something scary to \"Cesario.\" Aguecheek runs off to the orchard and Toby tells Fabian and Maria that he's not going to deliver Aguecheek's silly letter. Instead, Toby's going to deliver a verbal message to \"Cesario.\" Since both \"Cesario\" and Aguecheek are wimps, they'll both be shaking in their boots at the thought of fighting each other. Olivia and \"Cesario\" enter just then, but Toby and crew run off to work out the details of their plan before confronting \"Cesario.\" This gives Olivia a chance to be alone with the luscious \"boy.\" Olivia says she knows \"Cesario\" isn't into her, but she just can't help herself. She accuses \"Cesario\" of having a \"heart of stone.\" \"Cesario\" replies that Duke Orsino feels just as sad as Olivia does--unrequited love is a bummer for everyone and Orsino still wants Olivia. Olivia begs \"Cesario\" to wear her miniature and to come back to Olivia's place tomorrow so Olivia can try to seduce \"him\" again. After Olivia leaves, Toby Belch and Fabian enter again and tell \"Cesario\" that someone's in the garden waiting to beat him into a pulp. \"Cesario's\" terrified and insists that \"he\" isn't a fighter. Too bad, says Toby, whip out your sword! \"Cesario\" asks Fabian for help. Fabian lies and says he'll try to help smooth things over so \"Cesario\" doesn't get a beat down. Meanwhile, Sir Toby goes into the orchard and tells Aguecheek that \"Cesario\" is crazy and can't wait to fight him. Aguecheek is terrified and tries to back out but Toby tells him it's too late--he better get ready to rumble because \"Cesario\" is ready to go. Sir Andrew tells Toby to tell \"Cesario\" that Sir Andrew will give him his horse if \"Cesario\" doesn't beat him up. OK, says, Toby, who runs over to \"Cesario\" and says Sir Andrew's ready to mop the floor with him. Toby forces \"Cesario\" and Aguecheek together and the two draw their swords. Just then, Antonio enters and thinks that \"Cesario\" is his boy, Sebastian. Antonio's scared for his boy \"Sebastian\" and tries to break up the fight. He and Toby trade insults and draw their swords. \"Cesario\" and Aguecheek put their swords away and Aguecheek promises \"Cesario\" his horse. Then, the cops show up to arrest Antonio, who has been recognized as one of the pirates who stole from the Duke. Since Antonio thinks that \"Cesario\" is Sebastian, he asks \"him\" to return the money he gave him earlier so he can buy his way out of jail. \"Cesario\" has no idea what Antonio's talking about but, being a nice person, \"Cesario\" gives him some money anyway. Antonio is hurt because he thinks Sebastian has hung him out to dry. He can't believe Sebastian would screw him over like this, after everything Antonio's done for him. He goes off about how he saved Sebastian from drowning, has been a devoted and loving friend, and then calls Sebastian a devil. The cops couldn't care less about any of this drama and they haul Antonio off to the clink. Meanwhile, it finally occurs to Viola that Antonio has mistaken her for her twin brother, Sebastian, since the siblings look so much alike. This gives Viola some hope that Sebastian is still alive and didn't drown at sea after all. Viola, still disguised as \"Cesario,\" keeps this info to herself. After \"Cesario\" runs off stage, Toby, Fabian, and the cowardly Aguecheek hang back and talk trash about what a wimp \"Cesario\" has turned out to be. Aguecheek pretends like he wasn't shaking in his boots two minutes ago and says he ought to run after \"Cesario\" and beat him down. Toby Belch eggs on Aguecheek and they run off after \"Cesario.\"", "analysis": ""}

SCENE IV. OLIVIA'S garden. [Enter OLIVIA and MARIA.] OLIVIA. I have sent after him. He says he'll come; How shall I feast him? what bestow on him? For youth is bought more oft than begged or borrowed. I speak too loud.-- Where's Malvolio?--He is sad and civil, And suits well for a servant with my fortunes;-- Where is Malvolio? MARIA. He's coming, madam: But in very strange manner. He is sure possessed. OLIVIA. Why, what's the matter? does he rave? MARIA. No, madam, he does nothing but smile: your ladyship were best to have some guard about you if he come; For, sure, the man is tainted in his wits. OLIVIA. Go call him hither.--I'm as mad as he, If sad and merry madness equal be.-- [Enter MALVOLIO.] How now, Malvolio? MALVOLIO. Sweet lady, ho, ho. [Smiles fantastically.] OLIVIA. Smil'st thou? I sent for thee upon a sad occasion. MALVOLIO. Sad, lady? I could be sad: this does make some obstruction in the blood, this cross-gartering. But what of that? If it please the eye of one, it is with me as the very true sonnet is: 'Please one and please all.' OLIVIA. Why, how dost thou, man? what is the matter with thee? MALVOLIO. Not black in my mind, though yellow in my legs. It did come to his hands, and commands shall be executed. I think we do know the sweet Roman hand. OLIVIA. Wilt thou go to bed, Malvolio? MALVOLIO. To bed? ay, sweetheart; and I'll come to thee. OLIVIA. God comfort thee! Why dost thou smile so, and kiss thy hand so oft? MARIA. How do you, Malvolio? MALVOLIO. At your request? Yes; nightingales answer daws. MARIA. Why appear you with this ridiculous boldness before my lady? MALVOLIO. 'Be not afraid of greatness':--'twas well writ. OLIVIA. What meanest thou by that, Malvolio? MALVOLIO. 'Some are born great,'-- OLIVIA. Ha? MALVOLIO. 'Some achieve greatness,'-- OLIVIA. What say'st thou? MALVOLIO. 'And some have greatness thrust upon them.' OLIVIA. Heaven restore thee! MALVOLIO. 'Remember who commended thy yellow stockings;'-- OLIVIA. Thy yellow stockings? MALVOLIO. 'And wished to see thee cross-gartered.' OLIVIA. Cross-gartered? MALVOLIO. 'Go to: thou an made, if thou desirest to be so:'-- OLIVIA. Am I made? MALVOLIO. 'If not, let me see thee a servant still.' OLIVIA. Why, this is very midsummer madness. [Enter Servant.] SERVANT. Madam, the young gentleman of the Count Orsino's is returned; I could hardly entreat him back; he attends your ladyship's pleasure. OLIVIA. I'll come to him. [Exit Servant.] Good Maria, let this fellow be looked to. Where's my cousin Toby? Let some of my people have a special care of him; I would not have him miscarry for the half of my dowry. [Exeunt OLIVIA and MARIA.] MALVOLIO. O, ho! do you come near me now? No worse man than Sir Toby to look to me? This concurs directly with the letter: she sends him on purpose, that I may appear stubborn to him; for she incites me to that in the letter. 'Cast thy humble slough,' says she;--'be opposite with a kinsman, surly with servants,--let thy tongue tang with arguments of state,--put thyself into the trick of singularity;--and consequently, sets down the manner how; as, a sad face, a reverend carriage, a slow tongue, in the habit of some sir of note, and so forth. I have limed her; but it is Jove's doing, and Jove make me thankful! And, when she went away now, 'Let this fellow be looked to;' Fellow! not Malvolio, nor after my degree, but fellow. Why, everything adheres together; that no dram of a scruple, no scruple of a scruple, no obstacle, no incredulous or unsafe circumstance,--What can be said? Nothing, that can be, can come between me and the full prospect of my hopes. Well, Jove, not I, is the doer of this, and he is to be thanked. [Re-enter MARIA, with SIR TOBY BELCH and FABIAN.] SIR TOBY. Which way is he, in the name of sanctity? If all the devils of hell be drawn in little, and Legion himself possessed him, yet I'll speak to him. FABIAN. Here he is, here he is:--How is't with you, sir? how is't with you, man? MALVOLIO. Go off; I discard you; let me enjoy my private; go off. MARIA. Lo, how hollow the fiend speaks within him! did not I tell you?--Sir Toby, my lady prays you to have a care of him. MALVOLIO. Ah, ha! does she so? SIR TOBY. Go to, go to; peace, peace, we must deal gently with him; let me alone. How do you, Malvolio? how is't with you? What, man! defy the devil: consider, he's an enemy to mankind. MALVOLIO. Do you know what you say? MARIA. La you, an you speak ill of the devil, how he takes it at heart! Pray God he be not bewitched. FABIAN. Carry his water to the wise woman. MARIA. Marry, and it shall be done to-morrow morning, if I live. My lady would not lose him for more than I'll say. MALVOLIO. How now, mistress! MARIA. O lord! SIR TOBY. Pr'ythee hold thy peace; this is not the way. Do you not see you move him? let me alone with him. FABIAN. No way but gentleness; gently, gently: the fiend is rough, and will not be roughly used. SIR TOBY. Why, how now, my bawcock? how dost thou, chuck. MALVOLIO. Sir? SIR TOBY. Ay, Biddy, come with me. What, man! 'tis not for gravity to play at cherry-pit with Satan. Hang him, foul collier! MARIA. Get him to say his prayers; good Sir Toby, get him to pray. MALVOLIO. My prayers, minx? MARIA. No, I warrant you, he will not hear of godliness. MALVOLIO. Go, hang yourselves all! you are idle shallow things: I am not of your element; you shall know more hereafter. [Exit.] SIR TOBY. Is't possible? FABIAN. If this were played upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction. SIR TOBY. His very genius hath taken the infection of the device, man. MARIA. Nay, pursue him now; lest the device take air and taint. FABIAN. Why, we shall make him mad indeed. MARIA. The house will be the quieter. SIR TOBY. Come, we'll have him in a dark room and bound. My niece is already in the belief that he's mad; we may carry it thus, for our pleasure and his penance, till our very pastime, tired out of breath, prompt us to have mercy on him: at which time we will bring the device to the bar, and crown thee for a finder of madmen. But see, but see. [Enter SIR ANDREW AGUE-CHEEK.] FABIAN. More matter for a May morning. SIR ANDREW. Here's the challenge, read it; I warrant there's vinegar and pepper in't. FABIAN. Is't so saucy? SIR ANDREW. Ay, is't, I warrant him; do but read. SIR TOBY. Give me. [Reads.] 'Youth, whatsoever thou art, thou art but a scurvy fellow.' FABIAN. Good and valiant. SIR TOBY. 'Wonder not, nor admire not in thy mind, why I do call thee so, for I will show thee no reason for't.' FABIAN. A good note: that keeps you from the blow of the law. SIR TOBY. 'Thou comest to the Lady Olivia, and in my sight she uses thee kindly: but thou liest in thy throat; that is not the matter I challenge thee for.' FABIAN. Very brief, and to exceeding good senseless. SIR TOBY. 'I will waylay thee going home; where if it be thy chance to kill me,'-- FABIAN. Good. SIR TOBY. 'Thou kill'st me like a rogue and a villain.' FABIAN. Still you keep o' the windy side of the law. Good. SIR TOBY. 'Fare thee well; and God have mercy upon one of our souls! He may have mercy upon mine; but my hope is better, and so look to thyself. Thy friend, as thou usest him, and thy sworn enemy, Andrew Ague-Cheek.' If this letter move him not, his legs cannot: I'll give't him. MARIA. You may have very fit occasion for't; he is now in some commerce with my lady, and will by and by depart. SIR TOBY. Go, Sir Andrew; scout me for him at the corner of the orchard, like a bum-bailiff; so soon as ever thou seest him, draw; and as thou drawest, swear horrible; for it comes to pass oft that a terrible oath, with a swaggering accent sharply twanged off, gives manhood more approbation than ever proof itself would have earned him. Away. SIR ANDREW. Nay, let me alone for swearing. [Exit.] SIR TOBY. Now will not I deliver his letter; for the behaviour of the young gentleman gives him out to be of good capacity and breeding; his employment between his lord and my niece confirms no less; therefore this letter, being so excellently ignorant, will breed no terror in the youth: he will find it comes from a clodpole. But, sir, I will deliver his challenge by word of mouth, set upon Ague-cheek notable report of valour, and drive the gentleman,--as I know his youth will aptly receive it,--into a most hideous opinion of his rage, skill, fury, and impetuosity. This will so fright them both that they will kill one another by the look, like cockatrices. [Enter OLIVIA and VIOLA.] FABIAN. Here he comes with your niece; give them way till he take leave, and presently after him. SIR TOBY. I will meditate the while upon some horrid message for a challenge. [Exeunt SIR TOBY, FABIAN, and MARIA.] OLIVIA. I have said too much unto a heart of stone, And laid mine honour too unchary on it: There's something in me that reproves my fault; But such a headstrong potent fault it is That it but mocks reproof. VIOLA. With the same 'haviour that your passion bears Goes on my master's griefs. OLIVIA. Here, wear this jewel for me; 'tis my picture; Refuse it not; it hath no tongue to vex you: And, I beseech you, come again to-morrow. What shall you ask of me that I'll deny, That, honour saved, may upon asking give? VIOLA. Nothing but this, your true love for my master. OLIVIA. How with mine honour may I give him that Which I have given to you? VIOLA. I will acquit you. OLIVIA. Well, come again to-morrow. Fare thee well; A fiend like thee might bear my soul to hell. [Exit.] [Re-enter SIR TOBY BELCH and SIR FABIAN.] SIR TOBY. Gentleman, God save thee. VIOLA. And you, sir. SIR TOBY. That defence thou hast, betake thee to't. Of what nature the wrongs are thou hast done him, I know not; but thy intercepter, full of despite, bloody as the hunter, attends thee at the orchard end: dismount thy tuck, be yare in thy preparation, for thy assailant is quick, skilful, and deadly. VIOLA. You mistake, sir; I am sure no man hath any quarrel to me; my remembrance is very free and clear from any image of offence done to any man. SIR TOBY. You'll find it otherwise, I assure you: therefore, if you hold your life at any price, betake you to your guard; for your opposite hath in him what youth, strength, skill, and wrath, can furnish man withal. VIOLA. I pray you, sir, what is he? SIR TOBY. He is knight, dubbed with unhacked rapier and on carpet consideration; but he is a devil in private brawl; souls and bodies hath he divorced three; and his incensement at this moment is so implacable that satisfaction can be none but by pangs of death and sepulchre: hob, nob is his word; give't or take't. VIOLA. I will return again into the house and desire some conduct of the lady. I am no fighter. I have heard of some kind of men that put quarrels purposely on others to taste their valour: belike this is a man of that quirk. SIR TOBY. Sir, no; his indignation derives itself out of a very competent injury; therefore, get you on and give him his desire. Back you shall not to the house, unless you undertake that with me which with as much safety you might answer him: therefore on, or strip your sword stark naked; for meddle you must, that's certain, or forswear to wear iron about you. VIOLA. This is as uncivil as strange. I beseech you, do me this courteous office as to know of the knight what my offence to him is; it is something of my negligence, nothing of my purpose. SIR TOBY. I Will do so. Signior Fabian, stay you by this gentleman till my return. [Exit SIR TOBY.] VIOLA. Pray you, sir, do you know of this matter? FABIAN. I know the knight is incensed against you, even to a mortal arbitrement; but nothing of the circumstance more. VIOLA. I beseech you, what manner of man is he? FABIAN. Nothing of that wonderful promise, to read him by his form, as you are like to find him in the proof of his valour. He is indeed, sir, the most skilful, bloody, and fatal opposite that you could possibly have found in any part of Illyria. Will you walk towards him? I will make your peace with him if I can. VIOLA. I shall be much bound to you for't. I am one that would rather go with sir priest than sir knight: I care not who knows so much of my mettle. [Exeunt.] [Re-enter SIR TOBY With SIR ANDREW.] SIR TOBY. Why, man, he's a very devil; I have not seen such a virago. I had a pass with him, rapier, scabbard, and all, and he gives me the stuck-in with such a mortal motion that it is inevitable; and on the answer, he pays you as surely as your feet hit the ground they step on. They say he has been fencer to the Sophy. SIR ANDREW. Pox on't, I'll not meddle with him. SIR TOBY. Ay, but he will not now be pacified: Fabian can scarce hold him yonder. SIR ANDREW. Plague on't; an I thought he had been valiant, and so cunning in fence, I'd have seen him damned ere I'd have challenged him. Let him let the matter slip and I'll give him my horse, grey Capilet. SIR TOBY. I'll make the motion. Stand here, make a good show on't; this shall end without the perdition of souls. [Aside.] Marry, I'll ride your horse as well as I ride you. [Re-enter FABIAN and VIOLA.] I have his horse [To FABIAN.] to take up the quarrel; I have persuaded him the youth's a devil. FABIAN. He is as horribly conceited of him; and pants and looks pale, as if a bear were at his heels. SIR TOBY. There's no remedy, sir: he will fight with you for's oath sake: marry, he hath better bethought him of his quarrel, and he finds that now scarce to be worth talking of: therefore, draw for the supportance of his vow; he protests he will not hurt you. VIOLA. [Aside] Pray God defend me! A little thing would make me tell them how much I lack of a man. FABIAN. Give ground if you see him furious. SIR TOBY. Come, Sir Andrew, there's no remedy; the gentleman will, for his honour's sake, have one bout with you: he cannot by the duello avoid it; but he has promised me, as he is a gentleman and a soldier, he will not hurt you. Come on: to't. SIR ANDREW. Pray God he keep his oath! [Draws.] [Enter ANTONIO.] VIOLA. I do assure you 'tis against my will. [Draws.] ANTONIO. Put up your sword:--if this young gentleman Have done offence, I take the fault on me; If you offend him, I for him defy you. [Drawing.] SIR TOBY. You, sir! why, what are you? ANTONIO. One, sir, that for his love dares yet do more Than you have heard him brag to you he will. SIR TOBY. Nay, if you be an undertaker, I am for you. [Draws.] [Enter two Officers.] FABIAN. O good Sir Toby, hold; here come the officers. SIR TOBY. [To ANTONIO] I'll be with you anon. VIOLA. [To Sir Andrew.] Pray, sir, put your sword up, if you please. SIR ANDREW. Marry, will I, sir; and for that I promised you, I'll be as good as my word. He will bear you easily and reins well. FIRST OFFICER. This is the man; do thy office. SECOND OFFICER. Antonio, I arrest thee at the suit Of Count Orsino. ANTONIO. You do mistake me, sir. FIRST OFFICER. No, sir, no jot; I know your favour well, Though now you have no sea-cap on your head.-- Take him away; he knows I know him well. ANTONIO. I Must obey.--This comes with seeking you; But there's no remedy; I shall answer it. What will you do? Now my necessity Makes me to ask you for my purse. It grieves me Much more for what I cannot do for you Than what befalls myself. You stand amazed; But be of comfort. SECOND OFFICER. Come, sir, away. ANTONIO. I must entreat of you some of that money. VIOLA. What money, sir? For the fair kindness you have showed me here, And part being prompted by your present trouble, Out of my lean and low ability I'll lend you something; my having is not much; I'll make division of my present with you: Hold, there is half my coffer. ANTONIO. Will you deny me now? Is't possible that my deserts to you Can lack persuasion? Do not tempt my misery, Lest that it make me so unsound a man As to upbraid you with those kindnesses That I have done for you. VIOLA. I know of none, Nor know I you by voice or any feature: I hate ingratitude more in a man Than lying, vainness, babbling, drunkenness, Or any taint of vice whose strong corruption Inhabits our frail blood. ANTONIO. O heavens themselves! SECOND OFFICER. Come, sir, I pray you go. ANTONIO. Let me speak a little. This youth that you see here I snatched one half out of the jaws of death, Relieved him with such sanctity of love,-- And to his image, which methought did promise Most venerable worth, did I devotion. FIRST OFFICER. What's that to us? The time goes by; away. ANTONIO. But O how vile an idol proves this god! Thou hast, Sebastian, done good feature shame. In nature there's no blemish but the mind; None can be call'd deform'd but the unkind: Virtue is beauty; but the beauteous-evil Are empty trunks, o'erflourished by the devil. FIRST OFFICER. The man grows mad; away with him. Come, come, sir. ANTONIO. Lead me on. [Exeunt Officers with ANTONIO.] VIOLA. Methinks his words do from such passion fly That he believes himself; so do not I. Prove true, imagination; O prove true, That I, dear brother, be now ta'en for you! SIR TOBY. Come hither, knight; come hither, Fabian; we'll whisper o'er a couplet or two of most sage saws. VIOLA. He named Sebastian; I my brother know Yet living in my glass; even such and so In favour was my brother; and he went Still in this fashion, colour, ornament, For him I imitate. O, if it prove, Tempests are kind, and salt waves fresh in love! [Exit.] SIR TOBY. A very dishonest paltry boy, and more a coward than a hare: his dishonesty appears in leaving his friend here in necessity, and denying him; and for his cowardship, ask Fabian. FABIAN. A coward, a most devout coward, religious in it. SIR ANDREW. 'Slid, I'll after him again and beat him. SIR TOBY. Do, cuff him soundly, but never draw thy sword. SIR ANDREW. And I do not,-- [Exit.] FABIAN. Come, let's see the event. SIR TOBY. I dare lay any money 'twill be nothing yet. [Exeunt.]

Act 3, Scene 4

https://web.archive.org/web/20210415161814/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/twelfth-night/summary/act-3-scene-4

In her garden, Olivia frets about whether or not "Cesario" will come back for a little visit. Then she asks Maria where Malvolio is. Maria tells Olivia that Malvolio's on his way, but he's acting like he's possessed by demons--he's been smiling a lot and for no good reason. When Malvolio enters in a ridiculous get-up and a silly grin on his face, Olivia asks what the heck's wrong with him. She wants to know why he's smiling like an idiot when she's in such a sad mood. Malvolio continues to act like a fool--slobbering on Olivia's hand, talking nonsense, and insulting Maria. When Malvolio quotes lines from the forged letter, Olivia has no idea what he's talking about and thinks he's totally lost his mind. Malvolio presses on and asks Olivia if she remembers telling him to wear yellow stockings and cross-garters. When a servant enters and announces that "Cesario" has arrived, Olivia tells Maria to fetch Toby and company to look after Malvolio so she can rush off to greet "Cesario." Malvolio's left alone and tells us that he thinks Olivia is totally into him--he can't wait to carry out the instructions of the letter by being rude to Sir Toby. Sir Toby and Fabian enter and pretend to think Malvolio's possessed and needs an exorcism. Malvolio tells them to get lost , but Maria says, see guys, I told you his body's been taken over by a devil. Malvolio is totally confused by the crew's behavior, especially when Fabian suggests they get a urine sample and make Malvolio say his prayers. Malvolio tells them to get lost and runs away, leaving the crew to comment about how delicious their prank is. They decide to chase after Malvolio and lock him up in a dark room that will make Malvolio go crazy. Just then, Sir Andrew Aguecheek enters with the letter he has written to challenge "Cesario" to a duel. Toby reads the hilariously insulting letter aloud and assures Aguecheek that he'll deliver the note to "Cesario." In the meantime, Aguecheek should go hide in the orchard. When "Cesario" shows up, Aguecheek should jump out from behind a tree, draw his sword, and say something scary to "Cesario." Aguecheek runs off to the orchard and Toby tells Fabian and Maria that he's not going to deliver Aguecheek's silly letter. Instead, Toby's going to deliver a verbal message to "Cesario." Since both "Cesario" and Aguecheek are wimps, they'll both be shaking in their boots at the thought of fighting each other. Olivia and "Cesario" enter just then, but Toby and crew run off to work out the details of their plan before confronting "Cesario." This gives Olivia a chance to be alone with the luscious "boy." Olivia says she knows "Cesario" isn't into her, but she just can't help herself. She accuses "Cesario" of having a "heart of stone." "Cesario" replies that Duke Orsino feels just as sad as Olivia does--unrequited love is a bummer for everyone and Orsino still wants Olivia. Olivia begs "Cesario" to wear her miniature and to come back to Olivia's place tomorrow so Olivia can try to seduce "him" again. After Olivia leaves, Toby Belch and Fabian enter again and tell "Cesario" that someone's in the garden waiting to beat him into a pulp. "Cesario's" terrified and insists that "he" isn't a fighter. Too bad, says Toby, whip out your sword! "Cesario" asks Fabian for help. Fabian lies and says he'll try to help smooth things over so "Cesario" doesn't get a beat down. Meanwhile, Sir Toby goes into the orchard and tells Aguecheek that "Cesario" is crazy and can't wait to fight him. Aguecheek is terrified and tries to back out but Toby tells him it's too late--he better get ready to rumble because "Cesario" is ready to go. Sir Andrew tells Toby to tell "Cesario" that Sir Andrew will give him his horse if "Cesario" doesn't beat him up. OK, says, Toby, who runs over to "Cesario" and says Sir Andrew's ready to mop the floor with him. Toby forces "Cesario" and Aguecheek together and the two draw their swords. Just then, Antonio enters and thinks that "Cesario" is his boy, Sebastian. Antonio's scared for his boy "Sebastian" and tries to break up the fight. He and Toby trade insults and draw their swords. "Cesario" and Aguecheek put their swords away and Aguecheek promises "Cesario" his horse. Then, the cops show up to arrest Antonio, who has been recognized as one of the pirates who stole from the Duke. Since Antonio thinks that "Cesario" is Sebastian, he asks "him" to return the money he gave him earlier so he can buy his way out of jail. "Cesario" has no idea what Antonio's talking about but, being a nice person, "Cesario" gives him some money anyway. Antonio is hurt because he thinks Sebastian has hung him out to dry. He can't believe Sebastian would screw him over like this, after everything Antonio's done for him. He goes off about how he saved Sebastian from drowning, has been a devoted and loving friend, and then calls Sebastian a devil. The cops couldn't care less about any of this drama and they haul Antonio off to the clink. Meanwhile, it finally occurs to Viola that Antonio has mistaken her for her twin brother, Sebastian, since the siblings look so much alike. This gives Viola some hope that Sebastian is still alive and didn't drown at sea after all. Viola, still disguised as "Cesario," keeps this info to herself. After "Cesario" runs off stage, Toby, Fabian, and the cowardly Aguecheek hang back and talk trash about what a wimp "Cesario" has turned out to be. Aguecheek pretends like he wasn't shaking in his boots two minutes ago and says he ought to run after "Cesario" and beat him down. Toby Belch eggs on Aguecheek and they run off after "Cesario."

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/28.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_27_part_0.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 28

chapter 28

{"name": "Phase IV: \"The Consequence,\" Chapter Twenty-Eight", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210424232301/http://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary/chapter-28", "summary": "A few days later, Angel asks why Tess said \"no\" so definitely, even after she's admitted that she loves him. Tess says that she's not a fine lady, and makes up various other excuses about not being good enough, etc. Tess almost wishes someone would tell him about her past, because she sure can't bring herself to do it. But no one around there knows about it. He keeps pressing her, and she's afraid of giving in. Finally she promises to tell him all her reasons, and all her history. Angel laughs, because what kinds of \"experiences\" can a seemingly inexperienced young girl like Tess have? She's not laughing, though, and says she'll tell him everything on Sunday. She's so agitated that she can't go help with the milking, and shuts herself up in her room, going back and forth between hope and fear. She wants to say yes, but thinks she shouldn't.", "analysis": ""}

Her refusal, though unexpected, did not permanently daunt Clare. His experience of women was great enough for him to be aware that the negative often meant nothing more than the preface to the affirmative; and it was little enough for him not to know that in the manner of the present negative there lay a great exception to the dallyings of coyness. That she had already permitted him to make love to her he read as an additional assurance, not fully trowing that in the fields and pastures to "sigh gratis" is by no means deemed waste; love-making being here more often accepted inconsiderately and for its own sweet sake than in the carking, anxious homes of the ambitious, where a girl's craving for an establishment paralyzes her healthy thought of a passion as an end. "Tess, why did you say 'no' in such a positive way?" he asked her in the course of a few days. She started. "Don't ask me. I told you why--partly. I am not good enough--not worthy enough." "How? Not fine lady enough?" "Yes--something like that," murmured she. "Your friends would scorn me." "Indeed, you mistake them--my father and mother. As for my brothers, I don't care--" He clasped his fingers behind her back to keep her from slipping away. "Now--you did not mean it, sweet?--I am sure you did not! You have made me so restless that I cannot read, or play, or do anything. I am in no hurry, Tess, but I want to know--to hear from your own warm lips--that you will some day be mine--any time you may choose; but some day?" She could only shake her head and look away from him. Clare regarded her attentively, conned the characters of her face as if they had been hieroglyphics. The denial seemed real. "Then I ought not to hold you in this way--ought I? I have no right to you--no right to seek out where you are, or walk with you! Honestly, Tess, do you love any other man?" "How can you ask?" she said, with continued self-suppression. "I almost know that you do not. But then, why do you repulse me?" "I don't repulse you. I like you to--tell me you love me; and you may always tell me so as you go about with me--and never offend me." "But you will not accept me as a husband?" "Ah--that's different--it is for your good, indeed, my dearest! O, believe me, it is only for your sake! I don't like to give myself the great happiness o' promising to be yours in that way--because--because I am SURE I ought not to do it." "But you will make me happy!" "Ah--you think so, but you don't know!" At such times as this, apprehending the grounds of her refusal to be her modest sense of incompetence in matters social and polite, he would say that she was wonderfully well-informed and versatile--which was certainly true, her natural quickness and her admiration for him having led her to pick up his vocabulary, his accent, and fragments of his knowledge, to a surprising extent. After these tender contests and her victory she would go away by herself under the remotest cow, if at milking-time, or into the sedge or into her room, if at a leisure interval, and mourn silently, not a minute after an apparently phlegmatic negative. The struggle was so fearful; her own heart was so strongly on the side of his--two ardent hearts against one poor little conscience-- that she tried to fortify her resolution by every means in her power. She had come to Talbothays with a made-up mind. On no account could she agree to a step which might afterwards cause bitter rueing to her husband for his blindness in wedding her. And she held that what her conscience had decided for her when her mind was unbiassed ought not to be overruled now. "Why don't somebody tell him all about me?" she said. "It was only forty miles off--why hasn't it reached here? Somebody must know!" Yet nobody seemed to know; nobody told him. For two or three days no more was said. She guessed from the sad countenances of her chamber companions that they regarded her not only as the favourite, but as the chosen; but they could see for themselves that she did not put herself in his way. Tess had never before known a time in which the thread of her life was so distinctly twisted of two strands, positive pleasure and positive pain. At the next cheese-making the pair were again left alone together. The dairyman himself had been lending a hand; but Mr Crick, as well as his wife, seemed latterly to have acquired a suspicion of mutual interest between these two; though they walked so circumspectly that suspicion was but of the faintest. Anyhow, the dairyman left them to themselves. They were breaking up the masses of curd before putting them into the vats. The operation resembled the act of crumbling bread on a large scale; and amid the immaculate whiteness of the curds Tess Durbeyfield's hands showed themselves of the pinkness of the rose. Angel, who was filling the vats with his handful, suddenly ceased, and laid his hands flat upon hers. Her sleeves were rolled far above the elbow, and bending lower he kissed the inside vein of her soft arm. Although the early September weather was sultry, her arm, from her dabbling in the curds, was as cold and damp to his mouth as a new-gathered mushroom, and tasted of the whey. But she was such a sheaf of susceptibilities that her pulse was accelerated by the touch, her blood driven to her finder-ends, and the cool arms flushed hot. Then, as though her heart had said, "Is coyness longer necessary? Truth is truth between man and woman, as between man and man," she lifted her eyes and they beamed devotedly into his, as her lip rose in a tender half-smile. "Do you know why I did that, Tess?" he said. "Because you love me very much!" "Yes, and as a preliminary to a new entreaty." "Not AGAIN!" She looked a sudden fear that her resistance might break down under her own desire. "O, Tessy!" he went on, "I CANNOT think why you are so tantalizing. Why do you disappoint me so? You seem almost like a coquette, upon my life you do--a coquette of the first urban water! They blow hot and blow cold, just as you do, and it is the very last sort of thing to expect to find in a retreat like Talbothays. ... And yet, dearest," he quickly added, observing now the remark had cut her, "I know you to be the most honest, spotless creature that ever lived. So how can I suppose you a flirt? Tess, why don't you like the idea of being my wife, if you love me as you seem to do?" "I have never said I don't like the idea, and I never could say it; because--it isn't true!" The stress now getting beyond endurance, her lip quivered, and she was obliged to go away. Clare was so pained and perplexed that he ran after and caught her in the passage. "Tell me, tell me!" he said, passionately clasping her, in forgetfulness of his curdy hands: "do tell me that you won't belong to anybody but me!" "I will, I will tell you!" she exclaimed. "And I will give you a complete answer, if you will let me go now. I will tell you my experiences--all about myself--all!" "Your experiences, dear; yes, certainly; any number." He expressed assent in loving satire, looking into her face. "My Tess, no doubt, almost as many experiences as that wild convolvulus out there on the garden hedge, that opened itself this morning for the first time. Tell me anything, but don't use that wretched expression any more about not being worthy of me." "I will try--not! And I'll give you my reasons to-morrow--next week." "Say on Sunday?" "Yes, on Sunday." At last she got away, and did not stop in her retreat till she was in the thicket of pollard willows at the lower side of the barton, where she could be quite unseen. Here Tess flung herself down upon the rustling undergrowth of spear-grass, as upon a bed, and remained crouching in palpitating misery broken by momentary shoots of joy, which her fears about the ending could not altogether suppress. In reality, she was drifting into acquiescence. Every see-saw of her breath, every wave of her blood, every pulse singing in her ears, was a voice that joined with nature in revolt against her scrupulousness. Reckless, inconsiderate acceptance of him; to close with him at the altar, revealing nothing, and chancing discovery; to snatch ripe pleasure before the iron teeth of pain could have time to shut upon her: that was what love counselled; and in almost a terror of ecstasy Tess divined that, despite her many months of lonely self-chastisement, wrestlings, communings, schemes to lead a future of austere isolation, love's counsel would prevail. The afternoon advanced, and still she remained among the willows. She heard the rattle of taking down the pails from the forked stands; the "waow-waow!" which accompanied the getting together of the cows. But she did not go to the milking. They would see her agitation; and the dairyman, thinking the cause to be love alone, would good-naturedly tease her; and that harassment could not be borne. Her lover must have guessed her overwrought state, and invented some excuse for her non-appearance, for no inquiries were made or calls given. At half-past six the sun settled down upon the levels with the aspect of a great forge in the heavens; and presently a monstrous pumpkin-like moon arose on the other hand. The pollard willows, tortured out of their natural shape by incessant choppings, became spiny-haired monsters as they stood up against it. She went in and upstairs without a light. It was now Wednesday. Thursday came, and Angel looked thoughtfully at her from a distance, but intruded in no way upon her. The indoor milkmaids, Marian and the rest, seemed to guess that something definite was afoot, for they did not force any remarks upon her in the bedchamber. Friday passed; Saturday. To-morrow was the day. "I shall give way--I shall say yes--I shall let myself marry him--I cannot help it!" she jealously panted, with her hot face to the pillow that night, on hearing one of the other girls sigh his name in her sleep. "I can't bear to let anybody have him but me! Yet it is a wrong to him, and may kill him when he knows! O my heart--O--O--O!"

Phase IV: "The Consequence," Chapter Twenty-Eight

https://web.archive.org/web/20210424232301/http://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary/chapter-28

A few days later, Angel asks why Tess said "no" so definitely, even after she's admitted that she loves him. Tess says that she's not a fine lady, and makes up various other excuses about not being good enough, etc. Tess almost wishes someone would tell him about her past, because she sure can't bring herself to do it. But no one around there knows about it. He keeps pressing her, and she's afraid of giving in. Finally she promises to tell him all her reasons, and all her history. Angel laughs, because what kinds of "experiences" can a seemingly inexperienced young girl like Tess have? She's not laughing, though, and says she'll tell him everything on Sunday. She's so agitated that she can't go help with the milking, and shuts herself up in her room, going back and forth between hope and fear. She wants to say yes, but thinks she shouldn't.

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/21.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_3_part_6.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapter xxi

chapter xxi

{"name": "Chapter XXI", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase3-chapter16-24", "summary": "One day the butter fails to solidify and the superstitious Mrs. Crick declares that someone must be in love. Mr. Crick insists that the churn was damaged after a former worker, who \"deceived\" a local girl and got her pregnant, hid in the churn from the girl's angry mother. The others laugh but Tess is horrified and doesn't understand how the others fail to see the sadness in the situation. She leaves the barn and the butter begins to solidify, to everyone's relief", "analysis": ""}

There was a great stir in the milk-house just after breakfast. The churn revolved as usual, but the butter would not come. Whenever this happened the dairy was paralyzed. Squish, squash echoed the milk in the great cylinder, but never arose the sound they waited for. Dairyman Crick and his wife, the milkmaids Tess, Marian, Retty Priddle, Izz Huett, and the married ones from the cottages; also Mr Clare, Jonathan Kail, old Deborah, and the rest, stood gazing hopelessly at the churn; and the boy who kept the horse going outside put on moon-like eyes to show his sense of the situation. Even the melancholy horse himself seemed to look in at the window in inquiring despair at each walk round. "'Tis years since I went to Conjuror Trendle's son in Egdon--years!" said the dairyman bitterly. "And he was nothing to what his father had been. I have said fifty times, if I have said once, that I DON'T believe in en; though 'a do cast folks' waters very true. But I shall have to go to 'n if he's alive. O yes, I shall have to go to 'n, if this sort of thing continnys!" Even Mr Clare began to feel tragical at the dairyman's desperation. "Conjuror Fall, t'other side of Casterbridge, that they used to call 'Wide-O', was a very good man when I was a boy," said Jonathan Kail. "But he's rotten as touchwood by now." "My grandfather used to go to Conjuror Mynterne, out at Owlscombe, and a clever man a' were, so I've heard grandf'er say," continued Mr Crick. "But there's no such genuine folk about nowadays!" Mrs Crick's mind kept nearer to the matter in hand. "Perhaps somebody in the house is in love," she said tentatively. "I've heard tell in my younger days that that will cause it. Why, Crick--that maid we had years ago, do ye mind, and how the butter didn't come then--" "Ah yes, yes!--but that isn't the rights o't. It had nothing to do with the love-making. I can mind all about it--'twas the damage to the churn." He turned to Clare. "Jack Dollop, a 'hore's-bird of a fellow we had here as milker at one time, sir, courted a young woman over at Mellstock, and deceived her as he had deceived many afore. But he had another sort o' woman to reckon wi' this time, and it was not the girl herself. One Holy Thursday of all days in the almanack, we was here as we mid be now, only there was no churning in hand, when we zid the girl's mother coming up to the door, wi' a great brass-mounted umbrella in her hand that would ha' felled an ox, and saying 'Do Jack Dollop work here?--because I want him! I have a big bone to pick with he, I can assure 'n!' And some way behind her mother walked Jack's young woman, crying bitterly into her handkercher. 'O Lard, here's a time!' said Jack, looking out o' winder at 'em. 'She'll murder me! Where shall I get--where shall I--? Don't tell her where I be!' And with that he scrambled into the churn through the trap-door, and shut himself inside, just as the young woman's mother busted into the milk-house. 'The villain--where is he?' says she. 'I'll claw his face for'n, let me only catch him!' Well, she hunted about everywhere, ballyragging Jack by side and by seam, Jack lying a'most stifled inside the churn, and the poor maid--or young woman rather--standing at the door crying her eyes out. I shall never forget it, never! 'Twould have melted a marble stone! But she couldn't find him nowhere at all." The dairyman paused, and one or two words of comment came from the listeners. Dairyman Crick's stories often seemed to be ended when they were not really so, and strangers were betrayed into premature interjections of finality; though old friends knew better. The narrator went on-- "Well, how the old woman should have had the wit to guess it I could never tell, but she found out that he was inside that there churn. Without saying a word she took hold of the winch (it was turned by handpower then), and round she swung him, and Jack began to flop about inside. 'O Lard! stop the churn! let me out!' says he, popping out his head. 'I shall be churned into a pummy!' (He was a cowardly chap in his heart, as such men mostly be). 'Not till ye make amends for ravaging her virgin innocence!' says the old woman. 'Stop the churn you old witch!' screams he. 'You call me old witch, do ye, you deceiver!' says she, 'when ye ought to ha' been calling me mother-law these last five months!' And on went the churn, and Jack's bones rattled round again. Well, none of us ventured to interfere; and at last 'a promised to make it right wi' her. 'Yes--I'll be as good as my word!' he said. And so it ended that day." While the listeners were smiling their comments there was a quick movement behind their backs, and they looked round. Tess, pale-faced, had gone to the door. "How warm 'tis to-day!" she said, almost inaudibly. It was warm, and none of them connected her withdrawal with the reminiscences of the dairyman. He went forward and opened the door for her, saying with tender raillery-- "Why, maidy" (he frequently, with unconscious irony, gave her this pet name), "the prettiest milker I've got in my dairy; you mustn't get so fagged as this at the first breath of summer weather, or we shall be finely put to for want of 'ee by dog-days, shan't we, Mr Clare?" "I was faint--and--I think I am better out o' doors," she said mechanically; and disappeared outside. Fortunately for her the milk in the revolving churn at that moment changed its squashing for a decided flick-flack. "'Tis coming!" cried Mrs Crick, and the attention of all was called off from Tess. That fair sufferer soon recovered herself externally; but she remained much depressed all the afternoon. When the evening milking was done she did not care to be with the rest of them, and went out of doors, wandering along she knew not whither. She was wretched--O so wretched--at the perception that to her companions the dairyman's story had been rather a humorous narration than otherwise; none of them but herself seemed to see the sorrow of it; to a certainty, not one knew how cruelly it touched the tender place in her experience. The evening sun was now ugly to her, like a great inflamed wound in the sky. Only a solitary cracked-voice reed-sparrow greeted her from the bushes by the river, in a sad, machine-made tone, resembling that of a past friend whose friendship she had outworn. In these long June days the milkmaids, and, indeed, most of the household, went to bed at sunset or sooner, the morning work before milking being so early and heavy at a time of full pails. Tess usually accompanied her fellows upstairs. To-night, however, she was the first to go to their common chamber; and she had dozed when the other girls came in. She saw them undressing in the orange light of the vanished sun, which flushed their forms with its colour; she dozed again, but she was reawakened by their voices, and quietly turned her eyes towards them. Neither of her three chamber-companions had got into bed. They were standing in a group, in their nightgowns, barefooted, at the window, the last red rays of the west still warming their faces and necks and the walls around them. All were watching somebody in the garden with deep interest, their three faces close together: a jovial and round one, a pale one with dark hair, and a fair one whose tresses were auburn. "Don't push! You can see as well as I," said Retty, the auburn-haired and youngest girl, without removing her eyes from the window. "'Tis no use for you to be in love with him any more than me, Retty Priddle," said jolly-faced Marian, the eldest, slily. "His thoughts be of other cheeks than thine!" Retty Priddle still looked, and the others looked again. "There he is again!" cried Izz Huett, the pale girl with dark damp hair and keenly cut lips. "You needn't say anything, Izz," answered Retty. "For I zid you kissing his shade." "WHAT did you see her doing?" asked Marian. "Why--he was standing over the whey-tub to let off the whey, and the shade of his face came upon the wall behind, close to Izz, who was standing there filling a vat. She put her mouth against the wall and kissed the shade of his mouth; I zid her, though he didn't." "O Izz Huett!" said Marian. A rosy spot came into the middle of Izz Huett's cheek. "Well, there was no harm in it," she declared, with attempted coolness. "And if I be in love wi'en, so is Retty, too; and so be you, Marian, come to that." Marian's full face could not blush past its chronic pinkness. "I!" she said. "What a tale! Ah, there he is again! Dear eyes--dear face--dear Mr Clare!" "There--you've owned it!" "So have you--so have we all," said Marian, with the dry frankness of complete indifference to opinion. "It is silly to pretend otherwise amongst ourselves, though we need not own it to other folks. I would just marry 'n to-morrow!" "So would I--and more," murmured Izz Huett. "And I too," whispered the more timid Retty. The listener grew warm. "We can't all marry him," said Izz. "We shan't, either of us; which is worse still," said the eldest. "There he is again!" They all three blew him a silent kiss. "Why?" asked Retty quickly. "Because he likes Tess Durbeyfield best," said Marian, lowering her voice. "I have watched him every day, and have found it out." There was a reflective silence. "But she don't care anything for 'n?" at length breathed Retty. "Well--I sometimes think that too." "But how silly all this is!" said Izz Huett impatiently. "Of course he won't marry any one of us, or Tess either--a gentleman's son, who's going to be a great landowner and farmer abroad! More likely to ask us to come wi'en as farm-hands at so much a year!" One sighed, and another sighed, and Marian's plump figure sighed biggest of all. Somebody in bed hard by sighed too. Tears came into the eyes of Retty Priddle, the pretty red-haired youngest--the last bud of the Paridelles, so important in the county annals. They watched silently a little longer, their three faces still close together as before, and the triple hues of their hair mingling. But the unconscious Mr Clare had gone indoors, and they saw him no more; and, the shades beginning to deepen, they crept into their beds. In a few minutes they heard him ascend the ladder to his own room. Marian was soon snoring, but Izz did not drop into forgetfulness for a long time. Retty Priddle cried herself to sleep. The deeper-passioned Tess was very far from sleeping even then. This conversation was another of the bitter pills she had been obliged to swallow that day. Scarce the least feeling of jealousy arose in her breast. For that matter she knew herself to have the preference. Being more finely formed, better educated, and, though the youngest except Retty, more woman than either, she perceived that only the slightest ordinary care was necessary for holding her own in Angel Clare's heart against these her candid friends. But the grave question was, ought she to do this? There was, to be sure, hardly a ghost of a chance for either of them, in a serious sense; but there was, or had been, a chance of one or the other inspiring him with a passing fancy for her, and enjoying the pleasure of his attentions while he stayed here. Such unequal attachments had led to marriage; and she had heard from Mrs Crick that Mr Clare had one day asked, in a laughing way, what would be the use of his marrying a fine lady, and all the while ten thousand acres of Colonial pasture to feed, and cattle to rear, and corn to reap. A farm-woman would be the only sensible kind of wife for him. But whether Mr Clare had spoken seriously or not, why should she, who could never conscientiously allow any man to marry her now, and who had religiously determined that she never would be tempted to do so, draw off Mr Clare's attention from other women, for the brief happiness of sunning herself in his eyes while he remained at Talbothays?

Chapter XXI

https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase3-chapter16-24

One day the butter fails to solidify and the superstitious Mrs. Crick declares that someone must be in love. Mr. Crick insists that the churn was damaged after a former worker, who "deceived" a local girl and got her pregnant, hid in the churn from the girl's angry mother. The others laugh but Tess is horrified and doesn't understand how the others fail to see the sadness in the situation. She leaves the barn and the butter begins to solidify, to everyone's relief

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/52.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_6_part_7.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapter li

chapter li

{"name": "Chapter LI", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase6-chapter45-52", "summary": "As the family packs, Alec tells Tess about an ancient murder that occurred in the d'Urberville Coach and how the ancestors hear the coach when death approaches. He wants to take Tess to his garden home, arrange for the children to go to school and place Mrs. Durbeyfield tending the fowls in Tess's old job. Tess knows that would solve the family's problems but still manages to refuse him. By now Tess is angry at Angel and writes him a letter saying that she will never forgive him", "analysis": ""}

At length it was the eve of Old Lady-Day, and the agricultural world was in a fever of mobility such as only occurs at that particular date of the year. It is a day of fulfilment; agreements for outdoor service during the ensuing year, entered into at Candlemas, are to be now carried out. The labourers--or "work-folk", as they used to call themselves immemorially till the other word was introduced from without--who wish to remain no longer in old places are removing to the new farms. These annual migrations from farm to farm were on the increase here. When Tess's mother was a child the majority of the field-folk about Marlott had remained all their lives on one farm, which had been the home also of their fathers and grandfathers; but latterly the desire for yearly removal had risen to a high pitch. With the younger families it was a pleasant excitement which might possibly be an advantage. The Egypt of one family was the Land of Promise to the family who saw it from a distance, till by residence there it became it turn their Egypt also; and so they changed and changed. However, all the mutations so increasingly discernible in village life did not originate entirely in the agricultural unrest. A depopulation was also going on. The village had formerly contained, side by side with the argicultural labourers, an interesting and better-informed class, ranking distinctly above the former--the class to which Tess's father and mother had belonged--and including the carpenter, the smith, the shoemaker, the huckster, together with nondescript workers other than farm-labourers; a set of people who owed a certain stability of aim and conduct to the fact of their being lifeholders like Tess's father, or copyholders, or occasionally, small freeholders. But as the long holdings fell in, they were seldom again let to similar tenants, and were mostly pulled down, if not absolutely required by the farmer for his hands. Cottagers who were not directly employed on the land were looked upon with disfavour, and the banishment of some starved the trade of others, who were thus obliged to follow. These families, who had formed the backbone of the village life in the past, who were the depositaries of the village traditions, had to seek refuge in the large centres; the process, humorously designated by statisticians as "the tendency of the rural population towards the large towns", being really the tendency of water to flow uphill when forced by machinery. The cottage accommodation at Marlott having been in this manner considerably curtailed by demolitions, every house which remained standing was required by the agriculturist for his work-people. Ever since the occurrence of the event which had cast such a shadow over Tess's life, the Durbeyfield family (whose descent was not credited) had been tacitly looked on as one which would have to go when their lease ended, if only in the interests of morality. It was, indeed, quite true that the household had not been shining examples either of temperance, soberness, or chastity. The father, and even the mother, had got drunk at times, the younger children seldom had gone to church, and the eldest daughter had made queer unions. By some means the village had to be kept pure. So on this, the first Lady-Day on which the Durbeyfields were expellable, the house, being roomy, was required for a carter with a large family; and Widow Joan, her daughters Tess and 'Liza-Lu, the boy Abraham, and the younger children had to go elsewhere. On the evening preceding their removal it was getting dark betimes by reason of a drizzling rain which blurred the sky. As it was the last night they would spend in the village which had been their home and birthplace, Mrs Durbeyfield, 'Liza-Lu, and Abraham had gone out to bid some friends goodbye, and Tess was keeping house till they should return. She was kneeling in the window-bench, her face close to the casement, where an outer pane of rain-water was sliding down the inner pane of glass. Her eyes rested on the web of a spider, probably starved long ago, which had been mistakenly placed in a corner where no flies ever came, and shivered in the slight draught through the casement. Tess was reflecting on the position of the household, in which she perceived her own evil influence. Had she not come home, her mother and the children might probably have been allowed to stay on as weekly tenants. But she had been observed almost immediately on her return by some people of scrupulous character and great influence: they had seen her idling in the churchyard, restoring as well as she could with a little trowel a baby's obliterated grave. By this means they had found that she was living here again; her mother was scolded for "harbouring" her; sharp retorts had ensued from Joan, who had independently offered to leave at once; she had been taken at her word; and here was the result. "I ought never to have come home," said Tess to herself, bitterly. She was so intent upon these thoughts that she hardly at first took note of a man in a white mackintosh whom she saw riding down the street. Possibly it was owing to her face being near to the pane that he saw her so quickly, and directed his horse so close to the cottage-front that his hoofs were almost upon the narrow border for plants growing under the wall. It was not till he touched the window with his riding-crop that she observed him. The rain had nearly ceased, and she opened the casement in obedience to his gesture. "Didn't you see me?" asked d'Urberville. "I was not attending," she said. "I heard you, I believe, though I fancied it was a carriage and horses. I was in a sort of dream." "Ah! you heard the d'Urberville Coach, perhaps. You know the legend, I suppose?" "No. My--somebody was going to tell it me once, but didn't." "If you are a genuine d'Urberville I ought not to tell you either, I suppose. As for me, I'm a sham one, so it doesn't matter. It is rather dismal. It is that this sound of a non-existent coach can only be heard by one of d'Urberville blood, and it is held to be of ill-omen to the one who hears it. It has to do with a murder, committed by one of the family, centuries ago." "Now you have begun it, finish it." "Very well. One of the family is said to have abducted some beautiful woman, who tried to escape from the coach in which he was carrying her off, and in the struggle he killed her--or she killed him--I forget which. Such is one version of the tale... I see that your tubs and buckets are packed. Going away, aren't you?" "Yes, to-morrow--Old Lady Day." "I heard you were, but could hardly believe it; it seems so sudden. Why is it?" "Father's was the last life on the property, and when that dropped we had no further right to stay. Though we might, perhaps, have stayed as weekly tenants--if it had not been for me." "What about you?" "I am not a--proper woman." D'Urberville's face flushed. "What a blasted shame! Miserable snobs! May their dirty souls be burnt to cinders!" he exclaimed in tones of ironic resentment. "That's why you are going, is it? Turned out?" "We are not turned out exactly; but as they said we should have to go soon, it was best to go now everybody was moving, because there are better chances." "Where are you going to?" "Kingsbere. We have taken rooms there. Mother is so foolish about father's people that she will go there." "But your mother's family are not fit for lodgings, and in a little hole of a town like that. Now why not come to my garden-house at Trantridge? There are hardly any poultry now, since my mother's death; but there's the house, as you know it, and the garden. It can be whitewashed in a day, and your mother can live there quite comfortably; and I will put the children to a good school. Really I ought to do something for you!" "But we have already taken the rooms at Kingsbere!" she declared. "And we can wait there--" "Wait--what for? For that nice husband, no doubt. Now look here, Tess, I know what men are, and, bearing in mind the _grounds_ of your separation, I am quite positive he will never make it up with you. Now, though I have been your enemy, I am your friend, even if you won't believe it. Come to this cottage of mine. We'll get up a regular colony of fowls, and your mother can attend to them excellently; and the children can go to school." Tess breathed more and more quickly, and at length she said-- "How do I know that you would do all this? Your views may change--and then--we should be--my mother would be--homeless again." "O no--no. I would guarantee you against such as that in writing, if necessary. Think it over." Tess shook her head. But d'Urberville persisted; she had seldom seen him so determined; he would not take a negative. "Please just tell your mother," he said, in emphatic tones. "It is her business to judge--not yours. I shall get the house swept out and whitened to-morrow morning, and fires lit; and it will be dry by the evening, so that you can come straight there. Now mind, I shall expect you." Tess again shook her head, her throat swelling with complicated emotion. She could not look up at d'Urberville. "I owe you something for the past, you know," he resumed. "And you cured me, too, of that craze; so I am glad--" "I would rather you had kept the craze, so that you had kept the practice which went with it!" "I am glad of this opportunity of repaying you a little. To-morrow I shall expect to hear your mother's goods unloading... Give me your hand on it now--dear, beautiful Tess!" With the last sentence he had dropped his voice to a murmur, and put his hand in at the half-open casement. With stormy eyes she pulled the stay-bar quickly, and, in doing so, caught his arm between the casement and the stone mullion. "Damnation--you are very cruel!" he said, snatching out his arm. "No, no!--I know you didn't do it on purpose. Well I shall expect you, or your mother and children at least." "I shall not come--I have plenty of money!" she cried. "Where?" "At my father-in-law's, if I ask for it." "IF you ask for it. But you won't, Tess; I know you; you'll never ask for it--you'll starve first!" With these words he rode off. Just at the corner of the street he met the man with the paint-pot, who asked him if he had deserted the brethren. "You go to the devil!" said d'Urberville. Tess remained where she was a long while, till a sudden rebellious sense of injustice caused the region of her eyes to swell with the rush of hot tears thither. Her husband, Angel Clare himself, had, like others, dealt out hard measure to her; surely he had! She had never before admitted such a thought; but he had surely! Never in her life--she could swear it from the bottom of her soul--had she ever intended to do wrong; yet these hard judgements had come. Whatever her sins, they were not sins of intention, but of inadvertence, and why should she have been punished so persistently? She passionately seized the first piece of paper that came to hand, and scribbled the following lines: O why have you treated me so monstrously, Angel! I do not deserve it. I have thought it all over carefully, and I can never, never forgive you! You know that I did not intend to wrong you--why have you so wronged me? You are cruel, cruel indeed! I will try to forget you. It is all injustice I have received at your hands! T. She watched till the postman passed by, ran out to him with her epistle, and then again took her listless place inside the window-panes. It was just as well to write like that as to write tenderly. How could he give way to entreaty? The facts had not changed: there was no new event to alter his opinion. It grew darker, the fire-light shining over the room. The two biggest of the younger children had gone out with their mother; the four smallest, their ages ranging from three-and-a-half years to eleven, all in black frocks, were gathered round the hearth babbling their own little subjects. Tess at length joined them, without lighting a candle. "This is the last night that we shall sleep here, dears, in the house where we were born," she said quickly. "We ought to think of it, oughtn't we?" They all became silent; with the impressibility of their age they were ready to burst into tears at the picture of finality she had conjured up, though all the day hitherto they had been rejoicing in the idea of a new place. Tess changed the subject. "Sing to me, dears," she said. "What shall we sing?" "Anything you know; I don't mind." There was a momentary pause; it was broken, first, in one little tentative note; then a second voice strengthened it, and a third and a fourth chimed in unison, with words they had learnt at the Sunday-school-- Here we suffer grief and pain, Here we meet to part again; In Heaven we part no more. The four sang on with the phlegmatic passivity of persons who had long ago settled the question, and there being no mistake about it, felt that further thought was not required. With features strained hard to enunciate the syllables they continued to regard the centre of the flickering fire, the notes of the youngest straying over into the pauses of the rest. Tess turned from them, and went to the window again. Darkness had now fallen without, but she put her face to the pane as though to peer into the gloom. It was really to hide her tears. If she could only believe what the children were singing; if she were only sure, how different all would now be; how confidently she would leave them to Providence and their future kingdom! But, in default of that, it behoved her to do something; to be their Providence; for to Tess, as to not a few millions of others, there was ghastly satire in the poet's lines-- Not in utter nakedness But trailing clouds of glory do we come. To her and her like, birth itself was an ordeal of degrading personal compulsion, whose gratuitousness nothing in the result seemed to justify, and at best could only palliate. In the shades of the wet road she soon discerned her mother with tall 'Liza-Lu and Abraham. Mrs Durbeyfield's pattens clicked up to the door, and Tess opened it. "I see the tracks of a horse outside the window," said Joan. "Hev somebody called?" "No," said Tess. The children by the fire looked gravely at her, and one murmured-- "Why, Tess, the gentleman a-horseback!" "He didn't call," said Tess. "He spoke to me in passing." "Who was the gentleman?" asked the mother. "Your husband?" "No. He'll never, never come," answered Tess in stony hopelessness. "Then who was it?" "Oh, you needn't ask. You've seen him before, and so have I." "Ah! What did he say?" said Joan curiously. "I will tell you when we are settled in our lodging at Kingsbere to-morrow--every word." It was not her husband, she had said. Yet a consciousness that in a physical sense this man alone was her husband seemed to weigh on her more and more.

Chapter LI

https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase6-chapter45-52

As the family packs, Alec tells Tess about an ancient murder that occurred in the d'Urberville Coach and how the ancestors hear the coach when death approaches. He wants to take Tess to his garden home, arrange for the children to go to school and place Mrs. Durbeyfield tending the fowls in Tess's old job. Tess knows that would solve the family's problems but still manages to refuse him. By now Tess is angry at Angel and writes him a letter saying that she will never forgive him

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/03.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_2_part_0.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapter 3

chapter 3

{"name": "Chapter 3", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210304030722/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/picture-dorian-gray/summary/chapter-3", "summary": "The next day, Lord Henry goes to visit his crotchety old uncle George, with the intent of finding out about Dorian's background. It seems that Uncle George is something of a society gossip, underneath his gruff exterior. We learn that Dorian's the grandson of one Lord Kelso, an old acquaintance of Uncle George's; Dorian's mother, Kelso's daughter, was Lady Margaret Devereux, who was incredibly beautiful. Lady Margaret apparently fell passionately in love and married a guy far below her social rank, and rumor has it that Lord Kelso arranged for his son-in-law to be killed in a duel. Uncle George imagines that Lord Kelso probably left his grandson a huge fortune when he died--so Dorian's probably rolling in dough . The conversation veers off into idle gossip about some guy named Dartmoor and his American fiancee. Lord Henry heads out and walks over to Aunt Agatha's house for lunch. As he walks, he muses over the tragic, romantic story of Dorian's parents. He thinks again about how very marvelous and special Dorian is, and decides that he wants to do for Dorian what Dorian did for Basil--that is, change the way the boy sees the world entirely. Lord Henry notices that, in his thoughtful daze, he's passed his aunt's house. When he finally reaches his destination, he's late, and gets told off by Aunt Agatha. The dining room is full of notable visitors, including the Duchess of Harley, Sir Thomas Burdon , and Mr. Erskine , among other luminaries. Dorian is also there. The conversation here is also about Dartmoor and his American sweetheart. The genteel gathering is rather puzzled by Americans, especially by American women, who are all the rage at the moment. Lord Henry quickly assumes control of the whole conversation, and entertains the table with his extravagant ideas. Everyone is totally charmed by him, none more than Dorian. The luncheon ends when the Duchess, followed by the other ladies, leaves. Mr. Erskine pulls Lord Henry aside, asking why he doesn't write a book; he invites Henry to come visit him at his home, Treadley, sometime. Even though he's supposed to hang out with Basil, Dorian asks if he can accompany Lord Henry, so he can listen to Henry talk some more. Henry agrees, but says that he's talked enough for today--the two friends go to the park to \"look at life.\"", "analysis": ""}

At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, a genial if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside world called selfish because it derived no particular benefit from him, but who was considered generous by Society as he fed the people who amused him. His father had been our ambassador at Madrid when Isabella was young and Prim unthought of, but had retired from the diplomatic service in a capricious moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at Paris, a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled by reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English of his dispatches, and his inordinate passion for pleasure. The son, who had been his father's secretary, had resigned along with his chief, somewhat foolishly as was thought at the time, and on succeeding some months later to the title, had set himself to the serious study of the great aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town houses, but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, and took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention to the management of his collieries in the Midland counties, excusing himself for this taint of industry on the ground that the one advantage of having coal was that it enabled a gentleman to afford the decency of burning wood on his own hearth. In politics he was a Tory, except when the Tories were in office, during which period he roundly abused them for being a pack of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. Only England could have produced him, and he always said that the country was going to the dogs. His principles were out of date, but there was a good deal to be said for his prejudices. When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over _The Times_. "Well, Harry," said the old gentleman, "what brings you out so early? I thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible till five." "Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get something out of you." "Money, I suppose," said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. "Well, sit down and tell me all about it. Young people, nowadays, imagine that money is everything." "Yes," murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; "and when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. It is only people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one lives charmingly upon it. Besides, I always deal with Dartmoor's tradesmen, and consequently they never bother me. What I want is information: not useful information, of course; useless information." "Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, Harry, although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. When I was in the Diplomatic, things were much better. But I hear they let them in now by examination. What can you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure humbug from beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite enough, and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for him." "Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George," said Lord Henry languidly. "Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?" asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy white eyebrows. "That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, I know who he is. He is the last Lord Kelso's grandson. His mother was a Devereux, Lady Margaret Devereux. I want you to tell me about his mother. What was she like? Whom did she marry? You have known nearly everybody in your time, so you might have known her. I am very much interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have only just met him." "Kelso's grandson!" echoed the old gentleman. "Kelso's grandson! ... Of course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her christening. She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret Devereux, and made all the men frantic by running away with a penniless young fellow--a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or something of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if it happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. They said Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, to insult his son-in-law in public--paid him, sir, to do it, paid him--and that the fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. The thing was hushed up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club for some time afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. The girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? I had forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, he must be a good-looking chap." "He is very good-looking," assented Lord Henry. "I hope he will fall into proper hands," continued the old man. "He should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso did the right thing by him. His mother had money, too. All the Selby property came to her, through her grandfather. Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him a mean dog. He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, I was ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. They made quite a story of it. I didn't dare show my face at Court for a month. I hope he treated his grandson better than he did the jarvies." "I don't know," answered Lord Henry. "I fancy that the boy will be well off. He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. And ... his mother was very beautiful?" "Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, Harry. What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could understand. She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was mad after her. She was romantic, though. All the women of that family were. The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed at him, and there wasn't a girl in London at the time who wasn't after him. And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is this humbug your father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an American? Ain't English girls good enough for him?" "It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George." "I'll back English women against the world, Harry," said Lord Fermor, striking the table with his fist. "The betting is on the Americans." "They don't last, I am told," muttered his uncle. "A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a steeplechase. They take things flying. I don't think Dartmoor has a chance." "Who are her people?" grumbled the old gentleman. "Has she got any?" Lord Henry shook his head. "American girls are as clever at concealing their parents, as English women are at concealing their past," he said, rising to go. "They are pork-packers, I suppose?" "I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor's sake. I am told that pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, after politics." "Is she pretty?" "She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. It is the secret of their charm." "Why can't these American women stay in their own country? They are always telling us that it is the paradise for women." "It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively anxious to get out of it," said Lord Henry. "Good-bye, Uncle George. I shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me the information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my new friends, and nothing about my old ones." "Where are you lunching, Harry?" "At Aunt Agatha's. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. He is her latest _protege_." "Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks that I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads." "All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their distinguishing characteristic." The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his servant. Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street and turned his steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. So that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. Crudely as it had been told to him, it had yet stirred him by its suggestion of a strange, almost modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything for a mad passion. A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a hideous, treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then a child born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, the boy left to solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. Yes; it was an interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might blow.... And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, as with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades staining to a richer rose the wakening wonder of his face. Talking to him was like playing upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every touch and thrill of the bow.... There was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of influence. No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into another as though it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there was a real joy in that--perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited and vulgar as our own, an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and grossly common in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, or could be fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his, and the white purity of boyhood, and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for us. There was nothing that one could not do with him. He could be made a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was that such beauty was destined to fade! ... And Basil? From a psychological point of view, how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence of one who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt in dim woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, because in his soul who sought for her there had been wakened that wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful things revealed; the mere shapes and patterns of things becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, as though they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist in thought, who had first analyzed it? Was it not Buonarotti who had carved it in the coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own century it was strange.... Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray what, without knowing it, the lad was to the painter who had fashioned the wonderful portrait. He would seek to dominate him--had already, indeed, half done so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. There was something fascinating in this son of love and death. Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick and passed into the dining-room. "Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from the end of the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, a lady of admirable good-nature and good temper, much liked by every one who knew her, and of those ample architectural proportions that in women who are not duchesses are described by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, on her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, who followed his leader in public life and in private life followed the best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, in accordance with a wise and well-known rule. The post on her left was occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable charm and culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, having, as he explained once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he had to say before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, one of his aunt's oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book. Fortunately for him she had on the other side Lord Faudel, a most intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a ministerial statement in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in that intensely earnest manner which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which none of them ever quite escape. "We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, nodding pleasantly to him across the table. "Do you think he will really marry this fascinating young person?" "I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess." "How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should interfere." "I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. "My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas." "Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess, raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. "American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail. The duchess looked puzzled. "Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means anything that he says." "When America was discovered," said the Radical member--and he began to give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised her privilege of interruption. "I wish to goodness it never had been discovered at all!" she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance nowadays. It is most unfair." "Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," said Mr. Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely been detected." "Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. I wish I could afford to do the same." "They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," chuckled Sir Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes. "Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" inquired the duchess. "They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced against that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled all over it in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, are extremely civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it." "But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?" asked Mr. Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey." Sir Thomas waved his hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans." "How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. It is hitting below the intellect." "I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. "I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. "Paradoxes are all very well in their way...." rejoined the baronet. "Was that a paradox?" asked Mr. Erskine. "I did not think so. Perhaps it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become acrobats, we can judge them." "Dear me!" said Lady Agatha, "how you men argue! I am sure I never can make out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with you. Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up the East End? I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would love his playing." "I want him to play to me," cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked down the table and caught a bright answering glance. "But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel," continued Lady Agatha. "I can sympathize with everything except suffering," said Lord Henry, shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathize with that. It is too ugly, too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life's sores, the better." "Still, the East End is a very important problem," remarked Sir Thomas with a grave shake of the head. "Quite so," answered the young lord. "It is the problem of slavery, and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves." The politician looked at him keenly. "What change do you propose, then?" he asked. Lord Henry laughed. "I don't desire to change anything in England except the weather," he answered. "I am quite content with philosophic contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should appeal to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is not emotional." "But we have such grave responsibilities," ventured Mrs. Vandeleur timidly. "Terribly grave," echoed Lady Agatha. Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. "Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the caveman had known how to laugh, history would have been different." "You are really very comforting," warbled the duchess. "I have always felt rather guilty when I came to see your dear aunt, for I take no interest at all in the East End. For the future I shall be able to look her in the face without a blush." "A blush is very becoming, Duchess," remarked Lord Henry. "Only when one is young," she answered. "When an old woman like myself blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would tell me how to become young again." He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error that you committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, looking at her across the table. "A great many, I fear," she cried. "Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back one's youth, one has merely to repeat one's follies." "A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice." "A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. Lady Agatha shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened. "Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes." A laugh ran round the table. He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into the air and transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; made it iridescent with fancy and winged it with paradox. The praise of folly, as he went on, soared into a philosophy, and philosophy herself became young, and catching the mad music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her wine-stained robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the hills of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. Facts fled before her like frightened forest things. Her white feet trod the huge press at which wise Omar sits, till the seething grape-juice rose round her bare limbs in waves of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over the vat's black, dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary improvisation. He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was one whose temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give his wit keenness and to lend colour to his imagination. He was brilliant, fantastic, irresponsible. He charmed his listeners out of themselves, and they followed his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze off him, but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing each other over his lips and wonder growing grave in his darkening eyes. At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room in the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was waiting. She wrung her hands in mock despair. "How annoying!" she cried. "I must go. I have to call for my husband at the club, to take him to some absurd meeting at Willis's Rooms, where he is going to be in the chair. If I am late he is sure to be furious, and I couldn't have a scene in this bonnet. It is far too fragile. A harsh word would ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. Good-bye, Lord Henry, you are quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. I am sure I don't know what to say about your views. You must come and dine with us some night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?" "For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess," said Lord Henry with a bow. "Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you," she cried; "so mind you come"; and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the other ladies. When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, and taking a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. "You talk books away," he said; "why don't you write one?" "I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. I should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public in England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. Of all people in the world the English have the least sense of the beauty of literature." "I fear you are right," answered Mr. Erskine. "I myself used to have literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. And now, my dear young friend, if you will allow me to call you so, may I ask if you really meant all that you said to us at lunch?" "I quite forget what I said," smiled Lord Henry. "Was it all very bad?" "Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, and if anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you as being primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you about life. The generation into which I was born was tedious. Some day, when you are tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound to me your philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am fortunate enough to possess." "I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. It has a perfect host, and a perfect library." "You will complete it," answered the old gentleman with a courteous bow. "And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there." "All of you, Mr. Erskine?" "Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English Academy of Letters." Lord Henry laughed and rose. "I am going to the park," he cried. As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. "Let me come with you," he murmured. "But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him," answered Lord Henry. "I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. Do let me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? No one talks so wonderfully as you do." "Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day," said Lord Henry, smiling. "All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with me, if you care to."

Chapter 3

https://web.archive.org/web/20210304030722/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/picture-dorian-gray/summary/chapter-3

The next day, Lord Henry goes to visit his crotchety old uncle George, with the intent of finding out about Dorian's background. It seems that Uncle George is something of a society gossip, underneath his gruff exterior. We learn that Dorian's the grandson of one Lord Kelso, an old acquaintance of Uncle George's; Dorian's mother, Kelso's daughter, was Lady Margaret Devereux, who was incredibly beautiful. Lady Margaret apparently fell passionately in love and married a guy far below her social rank, and rumor has it that Lord Kelso arranged for his son-in-law to be killed in a duel. Uncle George imagines that Lord Kelso probably left his grandson a huge fortune when he died--so Dorian's probably rolling in dough . The conversation veers off into idle gossip about some guy named Dartmoor and his American fiancee. Lord Henry heads out and walks over to Aunt Agatha's house for lunch. As he walks, he muses over the tragic, romantic story of Dorian's parents. He thinks again about how very marvelous and special Dorian is, and decides that he wants to do for Dorian what Dorian did for Basil--that is, change the way the boy sees the world entirely. Lord Henry notices that, in his thoughtful daze, he's passed his aunt's house. When he finally reaches his destination, he's late, and gets told off by Aunt Agatha. The dining room is full of notable visitors, including the Duchess of Harley, Sir Thomas Burdon , and Mr. Erskine , among other luminaries. Dorian is also there. The conversation here is also about Dartmoor and his American sweetheart. The genteel gathering is rather puzzled by Americans, especially by American women, who are all the rage at the moment. Lord Henry quickly assumes control of the whole conversation, and entertains the table with his extravagant ideas. Everyone is totally charmed by him, none more than Dorian. The luncheon ends when the Duchess, followed by the other ladies, leaves. Mr. Erskine pulls Lord Henry aside, asking why he doesn't write a book; he invites Henry to come visit him at his home, Treadley, sometime. Even though he's supposed to hang out with Basil, Dorian asks if he can accompany Lord Henry, so he can listen to Henry talk some more. Henry agrees, but says that he's talked enough for today--the two friends go to the park to "look at life."

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/5658-chapters/15.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Lord Jim/section_14_part_0.txt

Lord Jim.chapter 15

chapter 15

{"name": "Chapter 15", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210118112654/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/lord-jim/summary/chapter-15", "summary": "Despite his distrust of Jim's choices, Marlow decides to help the guy. He tracks him down and the two return to Marlow's hotel, where Jim is totally in shock. Our resident good guy Marlow starts a letter-writing campaign on Jim's behalf. He writes to just about anyone he can think of who can help get Jim a job.", "analysis": ""}

'I did not start in search of Jim at once, only because I had really an appointment which I could not neglect. Then, as ill-luck would have it, in my agent's office I was fastened upon by a fellow fresh from Madagascar with a little scheme for a wonderful piece of business. It had something to do with cattle and cartridges and a Prince Ravonalo something; but the pivot of the whole affair was the stupidity of some admiral--Admiral Pierre, I think. Everything turned on that, and the chap couldn't find words strong enough to express his confidence. He had globular eyes starting out of his head with a fishy glitter, bumps on his forehead, and wore his long hair brushed back without a parting. He had a favourite phrase which he kept on repeating triumphantly, "The minimum of risk with the maximum of profit is my motto. What?" He made my head ache, spoiled my tiffin, but got his own out of me all right; and as soon as I had shaken him off, I made straight for the water-side. I caught sight of Jim leaning over the parapet of the quay. Three native boatmen quarrelling over five annas were making an awful row at his elbow. He didn't hear me come up, but spun round as if the slight contact of my finger had released a catch. "I was looking," he stammered. I don't remember what I said, not much anyhow, but he made no difficulty in following me to the hotel. 'He followed me as manageable as a little child, with an obedient air, with no sort of manifestation, rather as though he had been waiting for me there to come along and carry him off. I need not have been so surprised as I was at his tractability. On all the round earth, which to some seems so big and that others affect to consider as rather smaller than a mustard-seed, he had no place where he could--what shall I say?--where he could withdraw. That's it! Withdraw--be alone with his loneliness. He walked by my side very calm, glancing here and there, and once turned his head to look after a Sidiboy fireman in a cutaway coat and yellowish trousers, whose black face had silky gleams like a lump of anthracite coal. I doubt, however, whether he saw anything, or even remained all the time aware of my companionship, because if I had not edged him to the left here, or pulled him to the right there, I believe he would have gone straight before him in any direction till stopped by a wall or some other obstacle. I steered him into my bedroom, and sat down at once to write letters. This was the only place in the world (unless, perhaps, the Walpole Reef--but that was not so handy) where he could have it out with himself without being bothered by the rest of the universe. The damned thing--as he had expressed it--had not made him invisible, but I behaved exactly as though he were. No sooner in my chair I bent over my writing-desk like a medieval scribe, and, but for the movement of the hand holding the pen, remained anxiously quiet. I can't say I was frightened; but I certainly kept as still as if there had been something dangerous in the room, that at the first hint of a movement on my part would be provoked to pounce upon me. There was not much in the room--you know how these bedrooms are--a sort of four-poster bedstead under a mosquito-net, two or three chairs, the table I was writing at, a bare floor. A glass door opened on an upstairs verandah, and he stood with his face to it, having a hard time with all possible privacy. Dusk fell; I lit a candle with the greatest economy of movement and as much prudence as though it were an illegal proceeding. There is no doubt that he had a very hard time of it, and so had I, even to the point, I must own, of wishing him to the devil, or on Walpole Reef at least. It occurred to me once or twice that, after all, Chester was, perhaps, the man to deal effectively with such a disaster. That strange idealist had found a practical use for it at once--unerringly, as it were. It was enough to make one suspect that, maybe, he really could see the true aspect of things that appeared mysterious or utterly hopeless to less imaginative persons. I wrote and wrote; I liquidated all the arrears of my correspondence, and then went on writing to people who had no reason whatever to expect from me a gossipy letter about nothing at all. At times I stole a sidelong glance. He was rooted to the spot, but convulsive shudders ran down his back; his shoulders would heave suddenly. He was fighting, he was fighting--mostly for his breath, as it seemed. The massive shadows, cast all one way from the straight flame of the candle, seemed possessed of gloomy consciousness; the immobility of the furniture had to my furtive eye an air of attention. I was becoming fanciful in the midst of my industrious scribbling; and though, when the scratching of my pen stopped for a moment, there was complete silence and stillness in the room, I suffered from that profound disturbance and confusion of thought which is caused by a violent and menacing uproar--of a heavy gale at sea, for instance. Some of you may know what I mean: that mingled anxiety, distress, and irritation with a sort of craven feeling creeping in--not pleasant to acknowledge, but which gives a quite special merit to one's endurance. I don't claim any merit for standing the stress of Jim's emotions; I could take refuge in the letters; I could have written to strangers if necessary. Suddenly, as I was taking up a fresh sheet of notepaper, I heard a low sound, the first sound that, since we had been shut up together, had come to my ears in the dim stillness of the room. I remained with my head down, with my hand arrested. Those who have kept vigil by a sick-bed have heard such faint sounds in the stillness of the night watches, sounds wrung from a racked body, from a weary soul. He pushed the glass door with such force that all the panes rang: he stepped out, and I held my breath, straining my ears without knowing what else I expected to hear. He was really taking too much to heart an empty formality which to Chester's rigorous criticism seemed unworthy the notice of a man who could see things as they were. An empty formality; a piece of parchment. Well, well. As to an inaccessible guano deposit, that was another story altogether. One could intelligibly break one's heart over that. A feeble burst of many voices mingled with the tinkle of silver and glass floated up from the dining-room below; through the open door the outer edge of the light from my candle fell on his back faintly; beyond all was black; he stood on the brink of a vast obscurity, like a lonely figure by the shore of a sombre and hopeless ocean. There was the Walpole Reef in it--to be sure--a speck in the dark void, a straw for the drowning man. My compassion for him took the shape of the thought that I wouldn't have liked his people to see him at that moment. I found it trying myself. His back was no longer shaken by his gasps; he stood straight as an arrow, faintly visible and still; and the meaning of this stillness sank to the bottom of my soul like lead into the water, and made it so heavy that for a second I wished heartily that the only course left open for me was to pay for his funeral. Even the law had done with him. To bury him would have been such an easy kindness! It would have been so much in accordance with the wisdom of life, which consists in putting out of sight all the reminders of our folly, of our weakness, of our mortality; all that makes against our efficiency--the memory of our failures, the hints of our undying fears, the bodies of our dead friends. Perhaps he did take it too much to heart. And if so then--Chester's offer. . . . At this point I took up a fresh sheet and began to write resolutely. There was nothing but myself between him and the dark ocean. I had a sense of responsibility. If I spoke, would that motionless and suffering youth leap into the obscurity--clutch at the straw? I found out how difficult it may be sometimes to make a sound. There is a weird power in a spoken word. And why the devil not? I was asking myself persistently while I drove on with my writing. All at once, on the blank page, under the very point of the pen, the two figures of Chester and his antique partner, very distinct and complete, would dodge into view with stride and gestures, as if reproduced in the field of some optical toy. I would watch them for a while. No! They were too phantasmal and extravagant to enter into any one's fate. And a word carries far--very far--deals destruction through time as the bullets go flying through space. I said nothing; and he, out there with his back to the light, as if bound and gagged by all the invisible foes of man, made no stir and made no sound.'

Chapter 15

https://web.archive.org/web/20210118112654/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/lord-jim/summary/chapter-15

Despite his distrust of Jim's choices, Marlow decides to help the guy. He tracks him down and the two return to Marlow's hotel, where Jim is totally in shock. Our resident good guy Marlow starts a letter-writing campaign on Jim's behalf. He writes to just about anyone he can think of who can help get Jim a job.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/66.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_65_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 10.chapter 4

book 10, chapter 4

{"name": "Book 10, Chapter 4", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-10-chapter-4", "summary": "When Alyosha comes out, Kolya gives him the back story on his relationship with Ilyusha. When Ilyusha first arrived at school, he was picked on by the kids. But Kolya appreciated his fighting spirit and defended him, and Ilyusha took to following Kolya around. One day, Smerdyakov told Ilyusha that it would be really cool if he placed a pin in a piece of bread and gave it to a dog. This dog - the same Zhuchka that everyone's searching high and low for - eats the bread and runs off squealing in pain. Filled with remorse, Ilyusha breaks down in tears before Kolya. Kolya isn't having any of that \"sentimental slop\" and sends Smurov to tell Ilyusha that he's breaking off their friendship for a short time. Without Kolya's protection, Ilyusha is again pestered by the other kids, which led to the stabbing and stone throwing described in Book 4, Chapter 3.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter IV. The Lost Dog Kolya leaned against the fence with an air of dignity, waiting for Alyosha to appear. Yes, he had long wanted to meet him. He had heard a great deal about him from the boys, but hitherto he had always maintained an appearance of disdainful indifference when he was mentioned, and he had even "criticized" what he heard about Alyosha. But secretly he had a great longing to make his acquaintance; there was something sympathetic and attractive in all he was told about Alyosha. So the present moment was important: to begin with, he had to show himself at his best, to show his independence, "Or he'll think of me as thirteen and take me for a boy, like the rest of them. And what are these boys to him? I shall ask him when I get to know him. It's a pity I am so short, though. Tuzikov is younger than I am, yet he is half a head taller. But I have a clever face. I am not good-looking. I know I'm hideous, but I've a clever face. I mustn't talk too freely; if I fall into his arms all at once, he may think--Tfoo! how horrible if he should think--!" Such were the thoughts that excited Kolya while he was doing his utmost to assume the most independent air. What distressed him most was his being so short; he did not mind so much his "hideous" face, as being so short. On the wall in a corner at home he had the year before made a pencil-mark to show his height, and every two months since he anxiously measured himself against it to see how much he had gained. But alas! he grew very slowly, and this sometimes reduced him almost to despair. His face was in reality by no means "hideous"; on the contrary, it was rather attractive, with a fair, pale skin, freckled. His small, lively gray eyes had a fearless look, and often glowed with feeling. He had rather high cheekbones; small, very red, but not very thick, lips; his nose was small and unmistakably turned up. "I've a regular pug nose, a regular pug nose," Kolya used to mutter to himself when he looked in the looking-glass, and he always left it with indignation. "But perhaps I haven't got a clever face?" he sometimes thought, doubtful even of that. But it must not be supposed that his mind was preoccupied with his face and his height. On the contrary, however bitter the moments before the looking-glass were to him, he quickly forgot them, and forgot them for a long time, "abandoning himself entirely to ideas and to real life," as he formulated it to himself. Alyosha came out quickly and hastened up to Kolya. Before he reached him, Kolya could see that he looked delighted. "Can he be so glad to see me?" Kolya wondered, feeling pleased. We may note here, in passing, that Alyosha's appearance had undergone a complete change since we saw him last. He had abandoned his cassock and was wearing now a well-cut coat, a soft, round hat, and his hair had been cropped short. All this was very becoming to him, and he looked quite handsome. His charming face always had a good-humored expression; but there was a gentleness and serenity in his good-humor. To Kolya's surprise, Alyosha came out to him just as he was, without an overcoat. He had evidently come in haste. He held out his hand to Kolya at once. "Here you are at last! How anxious we've been to see you!" "There were reasons which you shall know directly. Anyway, I am glad to make your acquaintance. I've long been hoping for an opportunity, and have heard a great deal about you," Kolya muttered, a little breathless. "We should have met anyway. I've heard a great deal about you, too; but you've been a long time coming here." "Tell me, how are things going?" "Ilusha is very ill. He is certainly dying." "How awful! You must admit that medicine is a fraud, Karamazov," cried Kolya warmly. "Ilusha has mentioned you often, very often, even in his sleep, in delirium, you know. One can see that you used to be very, very dear to him ... before the incident ... with the knife.... Then there's another reason.... Tell me, is that your dog?" "Yes, Perezvon." "Not Zhutchka?" Alyosha looked at Kolya with eyes full of pity. "Is she lost for ever?" "I know you would all like it to be Zhutchka. I've heard all about it." Kolya smiled mysteriously. "Listen, Karamazov, I'll tell you all about it. That's what I came for; that's what I asked you to come out here for, to explain the whole episode to you before we go in," he began with animation. "You see, Karamazov, Ilusha came into the preparatory class last spring. Well, you know what our preparatory class is--a lot of small boys. They began teasing Ilusha at once. I am two classes higher up, and, of course, I only look on at them from a distance. I saw the boy was weak and small, but he wouldn't give in to them; he fought with them. I saw he was proud, and his eyes were full of fire. I like children like that. And they teased him all the more. The worst of it was he was horribly dressed at the time, his breeches were too small for him, and there were holes in his boots. They worried him about it; they jeered at him. That I can't stand. I stood up for him at once, and gave it to them hot. I beat them, but they adore me, do you know, Karamazov?" Kolya boasted impulsively; "but I am always fond of children. I've two chickens in my hands at home now--that's what detained me to-day. So they left off beating Ilusha and I took him under my protection. I saw the boy was proud. I tell you that, the boy was proud; but in the end he became slavishly devoted to me: he did my slightest bidding, obeyed me as though I were God, tried to copy me. In the intervals between the classes he used to run to me at once, and I'd go about with him. On Sundays, too. They always laugh when an older boy makes friends with a younger one like that; but that's a prejudice. If it's my fancy, that's enough. I am teaching him, developing him. Why shouldn't I develop him if I like him? Here you, Karamazov, have taken up with all these nestlings. I see you want to influence the younger generation--to develop them, to be of use to them, and I assure you this trait in your character, which I knew by hearsay, attracted me more than anything. Let us get to the point, though. I noticed that there was a sort of softness and sentimentality coming over the boy, and you know I have a positive hatred of this sheepish sentimentality, and I have had it from a baby. There were contradictions in him, too: he was proud, but he was slavishly devoted to me, and yet all at once his eyes would flash and he'd refuse to agree with me; he'd argue, fly into a rage. I used sometimes to propound certain ideas; I could see that it was not so much that he disagreed with the ideas, but that he was simply rebelling against me, because I was cool in responding to his endearments. And so, in order to train him properly, the tenderer he was, the colder I became. I did it on purpose: that was my idea. My object was to form his character, to lick him into shape, to make a man of him ... and besides ... no doubt, you understand me at a word. Suddenly I noticed for three days in succession he was downcast and dejected, not because of my coldness, but for something else, something more important. I wondered what the tragedy was. I have pumped him and found out that he had somehow got to know Smerdyakov, who was footman to your late father--it was before his death, of course--and he taught the little fool a silly trick--that is, a brutal, nasty trick. He told him to take a piece of bread, to stick a pin in it, and throw it to one of those hungry dogs who snap up anything without biting it, and then to watch and see what would happen. So they prepared a piece of bread like that and threw it to Zhutchka, that shaggy dog there's been such a fuss about. The people of the house it belonged to never fed it at all, though it barked all day. (Do you like that stupid barking, Karamazov? I can't stand it.) So it rushed at the bread, swallowed it, and began to squeal; it turned round and round and ran away, squealing as it ran out of sight. That was Ilusha's own account of it. He confessed it to me, and cried bitterly. He hugged me, shaking all over. He kept on repeating 'He ran away squealing': the sight of that haunted him. He was tormented by remorse, I could see that. I took it seriously. I determined to give him a lesson for other things as well. So I must confess I wasn't quite straightforward, and pretended to be more indignant perhaps than I was. 'You've done a nasty thing,' I said, 'you are a scoundrel. I won't tell of it, of course, but I shall have nothing more to do with you for a time. I'll think it over and let you know through Smurov'--that's the boy who's just come with me; he's always ready to do anything for me--'whether I will have anything to do with you in the future or whether I give you up for good as a scoundrel.' He was tremendously upset. I must own I felt I'd gone too far as I spoke, but there was no help for it. I did what I thought best at the time. A day or two after, I sent Smurov to tell him that I would not speak to him again. That's what we call it when two schoolfellows refuse to have anything more to do with one another. Secretly I only meant to send him to Coventry for a few days and then, if I saw signs of repentance, to hold out my hand to him again. That was my intention. But what do you think happened? He heard Smurov's message, his eyes flashed. 'Tell Krassotkin from me,' he cried, 'that I will throw bread with pins to all the dogs--all--all of them!' 'So he's going in for a little temper. We must smoke it out of him.' And I began to treat him with contempt; whenever I met him I turned away or smiled sarcastically. And just then that affair with his father happened. You remember? You must realize that he was fearfully worked up by what had happened already. The boys, seeing I'd given him up, set on him and taunted him, shouting, 'Wisp of tow, wisp of tow!' And he had soon regular skirmishes with them, which I am very sorry for. They seem to have given him one very bad beating. One day he flew at them all as they were coming out of school. I stood a few yards off, looking on. And, I swear, I don't remember that I laughed; it was quite the other way, I felt awfully sorry for him, in another minute I would have run up to take his part. But he suddenly met my eyes. I don't know what he fancied; but he pulled out a penknife, rushed at me, and struck at my thigh, here in my right leg. I didn't move. I don't mind owning I am plucky sometimes, Karamazov. I simply looked at him contemptuously, as though to say, 'This is how you repay all my kindness! Do it again, if you like, I'm at your service.' But he didn't stab me again; he broke down, he was frightened at what he had done, he threw away the knife, burst out crying, and ran away. I did not sneak on him, of course, and I made them all keep quiet, so it shouldn't come to the ears of the masters. I didn't even tell my mother till it had healed up. And the wound was a mere scratch. And then I heard that the same day he'd been throwing stones and had bitten your finger--but you understand now what a state he was in! Well, it can't be helped: it was stupid of me not to come and forgive him--that is, to make it up with him--when he was taken ill. I am sorry for it now. But I had a special reason. So now I've told you all about it ... but I'm afraid it was stupid of me." "Oh, what a pity," exclaimed Alyosha, with feeling, "that I didn't know before what terms you were on with him, or I'd have come to you long ago to beg you to go to him with me. Would you believe it, when he was feverish he talked about you in delirium. I didn't know how much you were to him! And you've really not succeeded in finding that dog? His father and the boys have been hunting all over the town for it. Would you believe it, since he's been ill, I've three times heard him repeat with tears, 'It's because I killed Zhutchka, father, that I am ill now. God is punishing me for it.' He can't get that idea out of his head. And if the dog were found and proved to be alive, one might almost fancy the joy would cure him. We have all rested our hopes on you." "Tell me, what made you hope that I should be the one to find him?" Kolya asked, with great curiosity. "Why did you reckon on me rather than any one else?" "There was a report that you were looking for the dog, and that you would bring it when you'd found it. Smurov said something of the sort. We've all been trying to persuade Ilusha that the dog is alive, that it's been seen. The boys brought him a live hare; he just looked at it, with a faint smile, and asked them to set it free in the fields. And so we did. His father has just this moment come back, bringing him a mastiff pup, hoping to comfort him with that; but I think it only makes it worse." "Tell me, Karamazov, what sort of man is the father? I know him, but what do you make of him--a mountebank, a buffoon?" "Oh, no; there are people of deep feeling who have been somehow crushed. Buffoonery in them is a form of resentful irony against those to whom they daren't speak the truth, from having been for years humiliated and intimidated by them. Believe me, Krassotkin, that sort of buffoonery is sometimes tragic in the extreme. His whole life now is centered in Ilusha, and if Ilusha dies, he will either go mad with grief or kill himself. I feel almost certain of that when I look at him now." "I understand you, Karamazov. I see you understand human nature," Kolya added, with feeling. "And as soon as I saw you with a dog, I thought it was Zhutchka you were bringing." "Wait a bit, Karamazov, perhaps we shall find it yet; but this is Perezvon. I'll let him go in now and perhaps it will amuse Ilusha more than the mastiff pup. Wait a bit, Karamazov, you will know something in a minute. But, I say, I am keeping you here!" Kolya cried suddenly. "You've no overcoat on in this bitter cold. You see what an egoist I am. Oh, we are all egoists, Karamazov!" "Don't trouble; it is cold, but I don't often catch cold. Let us go in, though, and, by the way, what is your name? I know you are called Kolya, but what else?" "Nikolay--Nikolay Ivanovitch Krassotkin, or, as they say in official documents, 'Krassotkin son.' " Kolya laughed for some reason, but added suddenly, "Of course I hate my name Nikolay." "Why so?" "It's so trivial, so ordinary." "You are thirteen?" asked Alyosha. "No, fourteen--that is, I shall be fourteen very soon, in a fortnight. I'll confess one weakness of mine, Karamazov, just to you, since it's our first meeting, so that you may understand my character at once. I hate being asked my age, more than that ... and in fact ... there's a libelous story going about me, that last week I played robbers with the preparatory boys. It's a fact that I did play with them, but it's a perfect libel to say I did it for my own amusement. I have reasons for believing that you've heard the story; but I wasn't playing for my own amusement, it was for the sake of the children, because they couldn't think of anything to do by themselves. But they've always got some silly tale. This is an awful town for gossip, I can tell you." "But what if you had been playing for your own amusement, what's the harm?" "Come, I say, for my own amusement! You don't play horses, do you?" "But you must look at it like this," said Alyosha, smiling. "Grown-up people go to the theater and there the adventures of all sorts of heroes are represented--sometimes there are robbers and battles, too--and isn't that just the same thing, in a different form, of course? And young people's games of soldiers or robbers in their playtime are also art in its first stage. You know, they spring from the growing artistic instincts of the young. And sometimes these games are much better than performances in the theater, the only difference is that people go there to look at the actors, while in these games the young people are the actors themselves. But that's only natural." "You think so? Is that your idea?" Kolya looked at him intently. "Oh, you know, that's rather an interesting view. When I go home, I'll think it over. I'll admit I thought I might learn something from you. I've come to learn of you, Karamazov," Kolya concluded, in a voice full of spontaneous feeling. "And I of you," said Alyosha, smiling and pressing his hand. Kolya was much pleased with Alyosha. What struck him most was that he treated him exactly like an equal and that he talked to him just as if he were "quite grown up." "I'll show you something directly, Karamazov; it's a theatrical performance, too," he said, laughing nervously. "That's why I've come." "Let us go first to the people of the house, on the left. All the boys leave their coats in there, because the room is small and hot." "Oh, I'm only coming in for a minute. I'll keep on my overcoat. Perezvon will stay here in the passage and be dead. _Ici_, Perezvon, lie down and be dead! You see how he's dead. I'll go in first and explore, then I'll whistle to him when I think fit, and you'll see, he'll dash in like mad. Only Smurov must not forget to open the door at the moment. I'll arrange it all and you'll see something."

Book 10, Chapter 4

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-10-chapter-4

When Alyosha comes out, Kolya gives him the back story on his relationship with Ilyusha. When Ilyusha first arrived at school, he was picked on by the kids. But Kolya appreciated his fighting spirit and defended him, and Ilyusha took to following Kolya around. One day, Smerdyakov told Ilyusha that it would be really cool if he placed a pin in a piece of bread and gave it to a dog. This dog - the same Zhuchka that everyone's searching high and low for - eats the bread and runs off squealing in pain. Filled with remorse, Ilyusha breaks down in tears before Kolya. Kolya isn't having any of that "sentimental slop" and sends Smurov to tell Ilyusha that he's breaking off their friendship for a short time. Without Kolya's protection, Ilyusha is again pestered by the other kids, which led to the stabbing and stone throwing described in Book 4, Chapter 3.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/107-chapters/chapters_54_to_57.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Far from the Madding Crowd/section_8_part_0.txt

Far from the Madding Crowd.chapters 54-57

chapters 54-57

{"name": "Chapters 54-Conclusion", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210108004047/https://www.gradesaver.com/far-from-the-madding-crowd/study-guide/summary-chapters-54-conclusion", "summary": "After his arrest, Boldwood pleads guilty and is sentenced to death. However, it is discovered that in his house there are many dresses and jewelry purchased for Bathsheba and set aside for their eventual marriage. Many of the local townspeople argue that he should be found insane, and thus not criminally responsible. In March, the judges meet to determine whether or not the sentence should be commuted, and Boldwood is sentenced to life in prison. Bathsheba recovers very slowly from the traumatic events of Christmas. In August, she encounters Gabriel while she is visiting Troy's grave; she has had him buried in the same grave with Fanny. Gabriel surprises her by saying that he is planning to move to California in the spring, and she objects that she will be lost without his help at the farm. She becomes more and more distraught to think of losing him as the months pass, and in the winter, he gives her formal notice that he will be leaving before the end of March. That night she goes to his cottage and asks if he is leaving because she has offended him. He explains that he is not going to leave England, but he is going to be leasing Boldwood's farm beginning in March. He notes that this doesn't mean he couldn't still work for her at the same time, but he is uncomfortable since rumors have started that he hopes to marry her and thinks it would be better if he did not work for her anymore. Bathsheba's objections spark Gabriel's curiosity, and he admits that of course he still loves her. The two of them joyfully realize that they mutually love each other. A short time later, Bathsheba agrees to marry him, and the two marry in a small, private ceremony with only a few close friends present. Gabriel comes to live with her at the Everdene farm, and the novel ends with an optimistic view of a happy and loving marriage for them.", "analysis": "The traumatic and violent events of the Christmas party seem to soften many of the characters into a new acceptance of their fates. Boldwood meekly accepts the legal punishment, but evidence of his insanity allows for him to be granted the small mercy of imprisonment. The discovery of the items he has purchased and set aside for Bathsheba reveals his obsessive hope: given that she only confirmed their engagement the night of the party, he must have been purchasing these items well before he knew whether or not she would agree to marry him. The discovery also reveals his fixation on wealth and status: when he tried to envision how he could best please Bathsheba, Boldwood assumed jewels and fine clothes must be the key to her heart. With Boldwood and Troy both out of the picture, Bathsheba can finally live without the distraction of men trying to woo her. By this stage in the novel, however, it seems that some of her ambition and zest for life has been lost. She plays a less and less active role in managing the farm. Even when she learns that Gabriel plans to leave, she is not outraged and indignant so much as lost and afraid. She knows she depends on him both professionally and personally, and is afraid of what she will do without him. Bathsheba does show some of her drive towards bold action by going to Gabriel's cottage the night after he hands in his resignation. It would be considered quite improper for a woman to go alone to a man's home after dark, even though as a widow Bathsheba now has more freedom than she did as an unmarried woman. The two have always seemed to communicate honestly and freely, and Bathsheba seeks out that frankness by trying to determine why Gabriel feels compelled to leave. However, what becomes clear is that the two have actually misunderstood each other. Bathsheba took Gabriel's unwillingness to ask about her feelings as a sign that he no longer cared for her, while he assumed that her initial answer had been a final one. The establishment of a romantic relationship, and then the marriage between the two seems to signal that partnerships best arise out of mutual respect and getting to know one another over a long span of time while working towards shared goals. The marriage seems to show some promising signs of being egalitarian in that it is rooted in the partnership of running the farm, and Gabriel will be moving in to Bathsheba's house. At the same time, for the marriage to come about Bathsheba seems to need to have been tamed by her experience of loss and betrayal. She is no longer the proud and willful woman she was at the beginning of the novel, and it is only once she becomes more docile and more resigned to requiring the assistance of a man that she can accept a relationship with Gabriel. In the end, \"in allowing Oak the positions of both phallic male and castrated male, while awarding Bathsheba the contradictory position of powerful and dependent female, Hardy denies power and sexuality to neither sex\" ."}

AFTER THE SHOCK Boldwood passed into the high road and turned in the direction of Casterbridge. Here he walked at an even, steady pace over Yalbury Hill, along the dead level beyond, mounted Mellstock Hill, and between eleven and twelve o'clock crossed the Moor into the town. The streets were nearly deserted now, and the waving lamp-flames only lighted up rows of grey shop-shutters, and strips of white paving upon which his step echoed as his passed along. He turned to the right, and halted before an archway of heavy stonework, which was closed by an iron studded pair of doors. This was the entrance to the gaol, and over it a lamp was fixed, the light enabling the wretched traveller to find a bell-pull. The small wicket at last opened, and a porter appeared. Boldwood stepped forward, and said something in a low tone, when, after a delay, another man came. Boldwood entered, and the door was closed behind him, and he walked the world no more. Long before this time Weatherbury had been thoroughly aroused, and the wild deed which had terminated Boldwood's merrymaking became known to all. Of those out of the house Oak was one of the first to hear of the catastrophe, and when he entered the room, which was about five minutes after Boldwood's exit, the scene was terrible. All the female guests were huddled aghast against the walls like sheep in a storm, and the men were bewildered as to what to do. As for Bathsheba, she had changed. She was sitting on the floor beside the body of Troy, his head pillowed in her lap, where she had herself lifted it. With one hand she held her handkerchief to his breast and covered the wound, though scarcely a single drop of blood had flowed, and with the other she tightly clasped one of his. The household convulsion had made her herself again. The temporary coma had ceased, and activity had come with the necessity for it. Deeds of endurance, which seem ordinary in philosophy, are rare in conduct, and Bathsheba was astonishing all around her now, for her philosophy was her conduct, and she seldom thought practicable what she did not practise. She was of the stuff of which great men's mothers are made. She was indispensable to high generation, hated at tea parties, feared in shops, and loved at crises. Troy recumbent in his wife's lap formed now the sole spectacle in the middle of the spacious room. "Gabriel," she said, automatically, when he entered, turning up a face of which only the well-known lines remained to tell him it was hers, all else in the picture having faded quite. "Ride to Casterbridge instantly for a surgeon. It is, I believe, useless, but go. Mr. Boldwood has shot my husband." Her statement of the fact in such quiet and simple words came with more force than a tragic declamation, and had somewhat the effect of setting the distorted images in each mind present into proper focus. Oak, almost before he had comprehended anything beyond the briefest abstract of the event, hurried out of the room, saddled a horse and rode away. Not till he had ridden more than a mile did it occur to him that he would have done better by sending some other man on this errand, remaining himself in the house. What had become of Boldwood? He should have been looked after. Was he mad--had there been a quarrel? Then how had Troy got there? Where had he come from? How did this remarkable reappearance effect itself when he was supposed by many to be at the bottom of the sea? Oak had in some slight measure been prepared for the presence of Troy by hearing a rumour of his return just before entering Boldwood's house; but before he had weighed that information, this fatal event had been superimposed. However, it was too late now to think of sending another messenger, and he rode on, in the excitement of these self-inquiries not discerning, when about three miles from Casterbridge, a square-figured pedestrian passing along under the dark hedge in the same direction as his own. The miles necessary to be traversed, and other hindrances incidental to the lateness of the hour and the darkness of the night, delayed the arrival of Mr. Aldritch, the surgeon; and more than three hours passed between the time at which the shot was fired and that of his entering the house. Oak was additionally detained in Casterbridge through having to give notice to the authorities of what had happened; and he then found that Boldwood had also entered the town, and delivered himself up. In the meantime the surgeon, having hastened into the hall at Boldwood's, found it in darkness and quite deserted. He went on to the back of the house, where he discovered in the kitchen an old man, of whom he made inquiries. "She's had him took away to her own house, sir," said his informant. "Who has?" said the doctor. "Mrs. Troy. 'A was quite dead, sir." This was astonishing information. "She had no right to do that," said the doctor. "There will have to be an inquest, and she should have waited to know what to do." "Yes, sir; it was hinted to her that she had better wait till the law was known. But she said law was nothing to her, and she wouldn't let her dear husband's corpse bide neglected for folks to stare at for all the crowners in England." Mr. Aldritch drove at once back again up the hill to Bathsheba's. The first person he met was poor Liddy, who seemed literally to have dwindled smaller in these few latter hours. "What has been done?" he said. "I don't know, sir," said Liddy, with suspended breath. "My mistress has done it all." "Where is she?" "Upstairs with him, sir. When he was brought home and taken upstairs, she said she wanted no further help from the men. And then she called me, and made me fill the bath, and after that told me I had better go and lie down because I looked so ill. Then she locked herself into the room alone with him, and would not let a nurse come in, or anybody at all. But I thought I'd wait in the next room in case she should want me. I heard her moving about inside for more than an hour, but she only came out once, and that was for more candles, because hers had burnt down into the socket. She said we were to let her know when you or Mr. Thirdly came, sir." Oak entered with the parson at this moment, and they all went upstairs together, preceded by Liddy Smallbury. Everything was silent as the grave when they paused on the landing. Liddy knocked, and Bathsheba's dress was heard rustling across the room: the key turned in the lock, and she opened the door. Her looks were calm and nearly rigid, like a slightly animated bust of Melpomene. "Oh, Mr. Aldritch, you have come at last," she murmured from her lips merely, and threw back the door. "Ah, and Mr. Thirdly. Well, all is done, and anybody in the world may see him now." She then passed by him, crossed the landing, and entered another room. Looking into the chamber of death she had vacated they saw by the light of the candles which were on the drawers a tall straight shape lying at the further end of the bedroom, wrapped in white. Everything around was quite orderly. The doctor went in, and after a few minutes returned to the landing again, where Oak and the parson still waited. "It is all done, indeed, as she says," remarked Mr. Aldritch, in a subdued voice. "The body has been undressed and properly laid out in grave clothes. Gracious Heaven--this mere girl! She must have the nerve of a stoic!" "The heart of a wife merely," floated in a whisper about the ears of the three, and turning they saw Bathsheba in the midst of them. Then, as if at that instant to prove that her fortitude had been more of will than of spontaneity, she silently sank down between them and was a shapeless heap of drapery on the floor. The simple consciousness that superhuman strain was no longer required had at once put a period to her power to continue it. They took her away into a further room, and the medical attendance which had been useless in Troy's case was invaluable in Bathsheba's, who fell into a series of fainting-fits that had a serious aspect for a time. The sufferer was got to bed, and Oak, finding from the bulletins that nothing really dreadful was to be apprehended on her score, left the house. Liddy kept watch in Bathsheba's chamber, where she heard her mistress, moaning in whispers through the dull slow hours of that wretched night: "Oh it is my fault--how can I live! O Heaven, how can I live!" THE MARCH FOLLOWING--"BATHSHEBA BOLDWOOD" We pass rapidly on into the month of March, to a breezy day without sunshine, frost, or dew. On Yalbury Hill, about midway between Weatherbury and Casterbridge, where the turnpike road passes over the crest, a numerous concourse of people had gathered, the eyes of the greater number being frequently stretched afar in a northerly direction. The groups consisted of a throng of idlers, a party of javelin-men, and two trumpeters, and in the midst were carriages, one of which contained the high sheriff. With the idlers, many of whom had mounted to the top of a cutting formed for the road, were several Weatherbury men and boys--among others Poorgrass, Coggan, and Cain Ball. At the end of half-an-hour a faint dust was seen in the expected quarter, and shortly after a travelling-carriage, bringing one of the two judges on the Western Circuit, came up the hill and halted on the top. The judge changed carriages whilst a flourish was blown by the big-cheeked trumpeters, and a procession being formed of the vehicles and javelin-men, they all proceeded towards the town, excepting the Weatherbury men, who as soon as they had seen the judge move off returned home again to their work. "Joseph, I seed you squeezing close to the carriage," said Coggan, as they walked. "Did ye notice my lord judge's face?" "I did," said Poorgrass. "I looked hard at en, as if I would read his very soul; and there was mercy in his eyes--or to speak with the exact truth required of us at this solemn time, in the eye that was towards me." "Well, I hope for the best," said Coggan, "though bad that must be. However, I shan't go to the trial, and I'd advise the rest of ye that bain't wanted to bide away. 'Twill disturb his mind more than anything to see us there staring at him as if he were a show." "The very thing I said this morning," observed Joseph, "'Justice is come to weigh him in the balances,' I said in my reflectious way, 'and if he's found wanting, so be it unto him,' and a bystander said 'Hear, hear! A man who can talk like that ought to be heard.' But I don't like dwelling upon it, for my few words are my few words, and not much; though the speech of some men is rumoured abroad as though by nature formed for such." "So 'tis, Joseph. And now, neighbours, as I said, every man bide at home." The resolution was adhered to; and all waited anxiously for the news next day. Their suspense was diverted, however, by a discovery which was made in the afternoon, throwing more light on Boldwood's conduct and condition than any details which had preceded it. That he had been from the time of Greenhill Fair until the fatal Christmas Eve in excited and unusual moods was known to those who had been intimate with him; but nobody imagined that there had shown in him unequivocal symptoms of the mental derangement which Bathsheba and Oak, alone of all others and at different times, had momentarily suspected. In a locked closet was now discovered an extraordinary collection of articles. There were several sets of ladies' dresses in the piece, of sundry expensive materials; silks and satins, poplins and velvets, all of colours which from Bathsheba's style of dress might have been judged to be her favourites. There were two muffs, sable and ermine. Above all there was a case of jewellery, containing four heavy gold bracelets and several lockets and rings, all of fine quality and manufacture. These things had been bought in Bath and other towns from time to time, and brought home by stealth. They were all carefully packed in paper, and each package was labelled "Bathsheba Boldwood," a date being subjoined six years in advance in every instance. These somewhat pathetic evidences of a mind crazed with care and love were the subject of discourse in Warren's malt-house when Oak entered from Casterbridge with tidings of sentence. He came in the afternoon, and his face, as the kiln glow shone upon it, told the tale sufficiently well. Boldwood, as every one supposed he would do, had pleaded guilty, and had been sentenced to death. The conviction that Boldwood had not been morally responsible for his later acts now became general. Facts elicited previous to the trial had pointed strongly in the same direction, but they had not been of sufficient weight to lead to an order for an examination into the state of Boldwood's mind. It was astonishing, now that a presumption of insanity was raised, how many collateral circumstances were remembered to which a condition of mental disease seemed to afford the only explanation--among others, the unprecedented neglect of his corn stacks in the previous summer. A petition was addressed to the Home Secretary, advancing the circumstances which appeared to justify a request for a reconsideration of the sentence. It was not "numerously signed" by the inhabitants of Casterbridge, as is usual in such cases, for Boldwood had never made many friends over the counter. The shops thought it very natural that a man who, by importing direct from the producer, had daringly set aside the first great principle of provincial existence, namely that God made country villages to supply customers to county towns, should have confused ideas about the Decalogue. The prompters were a few merciful men who had perhaps too feelingly considered the facts latterly unearthed, and the result was that evidence was taken which it was hoped might remove the crime in a moral point of view, out of the category of wilful murder, and lead it to be regarded as a sheer outcome of madness. The upshot of the petition was waited for in Weatherbury with solicitous interest. The execution had been fixed for eight o'clock on a Saturday morning about a fortnight after the sentence was passed, and up to Friday afternoon no answer had been received. At that time Gabriel came from Casterbridge Gaol, whither he had been to wish Boldwood good-bye, and turned down a by-street to avoid the town. When past the last house he heard a hammering, and lifting his bowed head he looked back for a moment. Over the chimneys he could see the upper part of the gaol entrance, rich and glowing in the afternoon sun, and some moving figures were there. They were carpenters lifting a post into a vertical position within the parapet. He withdrew his eyes quickly, and hastened on. It was dark when he reached home, and half the village was out to meet him. "No tidings," Gabriel said, wearily. "And I'm afraid there's no hope. I've been with him more than two hours." "Do ye think he REALLY was out of his mind when he did it?" said Smallbury. "I can't honestly say that I do," Oak replied. "However, that we can talk of another time. Has there been any change in mistress this afternoon?" "None at all." "Is she downstairs?" "No. And getting on so nicely as she was too. She's but very little better now again than she was at Christmas. She keeps on asking if you be come, and if there's news, till one's wearied out wi' answering her. Shall I go and say you've come?" "No," said Oak. "There's a chance yet; but I couldn't stay in town any longer--after seeing him too. So Laban--Laban is here, isn't he?" "Yes," said Tall. "What I've arranged is, that you shall ride to town the last thing to-night; leave here about nine, and wait a while there, getting home about twelve. If nothing has been received by eleven to-night, they say there's no chance at all." "I do so hope his life will be spared," said Liddy. "If it is not, she'll go out of her mind too. Poor thing; her sufferings have been dreadful; she deserves anybody's pity." "Is she altered much?" said Coggan. "If you haven't seen poor mistress since Christmas, you wouldn't know her," said Liddy. "Her eyes are so miserable that she's not the same woman. Only two years ago she was a romping girl, and now she's this!" Laban departed as directed, and at eleven o'clock that night several of the villagers strolled along the road to Casterbridge and awaited his arrival--among them Oak, and nearly all the rest of Bathsheba's men. Gabriel's anxiety was great that Boldwood might be saved, even though in his conscience he felt that he ought to die; for there had been qualities in the farmer which Oak loved. At last, when they all were weary the tramp of a horse was heard in the distance-- First dead, as if on turf it trode, Then, clattering on the village road In other pace than forth he yode. "We shall soon know now, one way or other." said Coggan, and they all stepped down from the bank on which they had been standing into the road, and the rider pranced into the midst of them. "Is that you, Laban?" said Gabriel. "Yes--'tis come. He's not to die. 'Tis confinement during Her Majesty's pleasure." "Hurrah!" said Coggan, with a swelling heart. "God's above the devil yet!" BEAUTY IN LONELINESS--AFTER ALL Bathsheba revived with the spring. The utter prostration that had followed the low fever from which she had suffered diminished perceptibly when all uncertainty upon every subject had come to an end. But she remained alone now for the greater part of her time, and stayed in the house, or at furthest went into the garden. She shunned every one, even Liddy, and could be brought to make no confidences, and to ask for no sympathy. As the summer drew on she passed more of her time in the open air, and began to examine into farming matters from sheer necessity, though she never rode out or personally superintended as at former times. One Friday evening in August she walked a little way along the road and entered the village for the first time since the sombre event of the preceding Christmas. None of the old colour had as yet come to her cheek, and its absolute paleness was heightened by the jet black of her gown, till it appeared preternatural. When she reached a little shop at the other end of the place, which stood nearly opposite to the churchyard, Bathsheba heard singing inside the church, and she knew that the singers were practising. She crossed the road, opened the gate, and entered the graveyard, the high sills of the church windows effectually screening her from the eyes of those gathered within. Her stealthy walk was to the nook wherein Troy had worked at planting flowers upon Fanny Robin's grave, and she came to the marble tombstone. A motion of satisfaction enlivened her face as she read the complete inscription. First came the words of Troy himself:-- ERECTED BY FRANCIS TROY IN BELOVED MEMORY OF FANNY ROBIN, WHO DIED OCTOBER 9, 18--, AGED 20 YEARS Underneath this was now inscribed in new letters:-- IN THE SAME GRAVE LIE THE REMAINS OF THE AFORESAID FRANCIS TROY, WHO DIED DECEMBER 24TH, 18--, AGED 26 YEARS Whilst she stood and read and meditated the tones of the organ began again in the church, and she went with the same light step round to the porch and listened. The door was closed, and the choir was learning a new hymn. Bathsheba was stirred by emotions which latterly she had assumed to be altogether dead within her. The little attenuated voices of the children brought to her ear in distinct utterance the words they sang without thought or comprehension-- Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom, Lead Thou me on. Bathsheba's feeling was always to some extent dependent upon her whim, as is the case with many other women. Something big came into her throat and an uprising to her eyes--and she thought that she would allow the imminent tears to flow if they wished. They did flow and plenteously, and one fell upon the stone bench beside her. Once that she had begun to cry for she hardly knew what, she could not leave off for crowding thoughts she knew too well. She would have given anything in the world to be, as those children were, unconcerned at the meaning of their words, because too innocent to feel the necessity for any such expression. All the impassioned scenes of her brief experience seemed to revive with added emotion at that moment, and those scenes which had been without emotion during enactment had emotion then. Yet grief came to her rather as a luxury than as the scourge of former times. Owing to Bathsheba's face being buried in her hands she did not notice a form which came quietly into the porch, and on seeing her, first moved as if to retreat, then paused and regarded her. Bathsheba did not raise her head for some time, and when she looked round her face was wet, and her eyes drowned and dim. "Mr. Oak," exclaimed she, disconcerted, "how long have you been here?" "A few minutes, ma'am," said Oak, respectfully. "Are you going in?" said Bathsheba; and there came from within the church as from a prompter-- I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears, Pride ruled my will: remember not past years. "I was," said Gabriel. "I am one of the bass singers, you know. I have sung bass for several months." "Indeed: I wasn't aware of that. I'll leave you, then." Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile, sang the children. "Don't let me drive you away, mistress. I think I won't go in to-night." "Oh no--you don't drive me away." Then they stood in a state of some embarrassment, Bathsheba trying to wipe her dreadfully drenched and inflamed face without his noticing her. At length Oak said, "I've not seen you--I mean spoken to you--since ever so long, have I?" But he feared to bring distressing memories back, and interrupted himself with: "Were you going into church?" "No," she said. "I came to see the tombstone privately--to see if they had cut the inscription as I wished. Mr. Oak, you needn't mind speaking to me, if you wish to, on the matter which is in both our minds at this moment." "And have they done it as you wished?" said Oak. "Yes. Come and see it, if you have not already." So together they went and read the tomb. "Eight months ago!" Gabriel murmured when he saw the date. "It seems like yesterday to me." "And to me as if it were years ago--long years, and I had been dead between. And now I am going home, Mr. Oak." Oak walked after her. "I wanted to name a small matter to you as soon as I could," he said, with hesitation. "Merely about business, and I think I may just mention it now, if you'll allow me." "Oh yes, certainly." "It is that I may soon have to give up the management of your farm, Mrs. Troy. The fact is, I am thinking of leaving England--not yet, you know--next spring." "Leaving England!" she said, in surprise and genuine disappointment. "Why, Gabriel, what are you going to do that for?" "Well, I've thought it best," Oak stammered out. "California is the spot I've had in my mind to try." "But it is understood everywhere that you are going to take poor Mr. Boldwood's farm on your own account." "I've had the refusal o' it 'tis true; but nothing is settled yet, and I have reasons for giving up. I shall finish out my year there as manager for the trustees, but no more." "And what shall I do without you? Oh, Gabriel, I don't think you ought to go away. You've been with me so long--through bright times and dark times--such old friends as we are--that it seems unkind almost. I had fancied that if you leased the other farm as master, you might still give a helping look across at mine. And now going away!" "I would have willingly." "Yet now that I am more helpless than ever you go away!" "Yes, that's the ill fortune o' it," said Gabriel, in a distressed tone. "And it is because of that very helplessness that I feel bound to go. Good afternoon, ma'am" he concluded, in evident anxiety to get away, and at once went out of the churchyard by a path she could follow on no pretence whatever. Bathsheba went home, her mind occupied with a new trouble, which being rather harassing than deadly was calculated to do good by diverting her from the chronic gloom of her life. She was set thinking a great deal about Oak and of his wish to shun her; and there occurred to Bathsheba several incidents of her latter intercourse with him, which, trivial when singly viewed, amounted together to a perceptible disinclination for her society. It broke upon her at length as a great pain that her last old disciple was about to forsake her and flee. He who had believed in her and argued on her side when all the rest of the world was against her, had at last like the others become weary and neglectful of the old cause, and was leaving her to fight her battles alone. Three weeks went on, and more evidence of his want of interest in her was forthcoming. She noticed that instead of entering the small parlour or office where the farm accounts were kept, and waiting, or leaving a memorandum as he had hitherto done during her seclusion, Oak never came at all when she was likely to be there, only entering at unseasonable hours when her presence in that part of the house was least to be expected. Whenever he wanted directions he sent a message, or note with neither heading nor signature, to which she was obliged to reply in the same offhand style. Poor Bathsheba began to suffer now from the most torturing sting of all--a sensation that she was despised. The autumn wore away gloomily enough amid these melancholy conjectures, and Christmas-day came, completing a year of her legal widowhood, and two years and a quarter of her life alone. On examining her heart it appeared beyond measure strange that the subject of which the season might have been supposed suggestive--the event in the hall at Boldwood's--was not agitating her at all; but instead, an agonizing conviction that everybody abjured her--for what she could not tell--and that Oak was the ringleader of the recusants. Coming out of church that day she looked round in hope that Oak, whose bass voice she had heard rolling out from the gallery overhead in a most unconcerned manner, might chance to linger in her path in the old way. There he was, as usual, coming down the path behind her. But on seeing Bathsheba turn, he looked aside, and as soon as he got beyond the gate, and there was the barest excuse for a divergence, he made one, and vanished. The next morning brought the culminating stroke; she had been expecting it long. It was a formal notice by letter from him that he should not renew his engagement with her for the following Lady-day. Bathsheba actually sat and cried over this letter most bitterly. She was aggrieved and wounded that the possession of hopeless love from Gabriel, which she had grown to regard as her inalienable right for life, should have been withdrawn just at his own pleasure in this way. She was bewildered too by the prospect of having to rely on her own resources again: it seemed to herself that she never could again acquire energy sufficient to go to market, barter, and sell. Since Troy's death Oak had attended all sales and fairs for her, transacting her business at the same time with his own. What should she do now? Her life was becoming a desolation. So desolate was Bathsheba this evening, that in an absolute hunger for pity and sympathy, and miserable in that she appeared to have outlived the only true friendship she had ever owned, she put on her bonnet and cloak and went down to Oak's house just after sunset, guided on her way by the pale primrose rays of a crescent moon a few days old. A lively firelight shone from the window, but nobody was visible in the room. She tapped nervously, and then thought it doubtful if it were right for a single woman to call upon a bachelor who lived alone, although he was her manager, and she might be supposed to call on business without any real impropriety. Gabriel opened the door, and the moon shone upon his forehead. "Mr. Oak," said Bathsheba, faintly. "Yes; I am Mr. Oak," said Gabriel. "Who have I the honour--O how stupid of me, not to know you, mistress!" "I shall not be your mistress much longer, shall I Gabriel?" she said, in pathetic tones. "Well, no. I suppose--But come in, ma'am. Oh--and I'll get a light," Oak replied, with some awkwardness. "No; not on my account." "It is so seldom that I get a lady visitor that I'm afraid I haven't proper accommodation. Will you sit down, please? Here's a chair, and there's one, too. I am sorry that my chairs all have wood seats, and are rather hard, but I--was thinking of getting some new ones." Oak placed two or three for her. "They are quite easy enough for me." So down she sat, and down sat he, the fire dancing in their faces, and upon the old furniture, all a-sheenen Wi' long years o' handlen, [3] [Footnote 3: W. Barnes] that formed Oak's array of household possessions, which sent back a dancing reflection in reply. It was very odd to these two persons, who knew each other passing well, that the mere circumstance of their meeting in a new place and in a new way should make them so awkward and constrained. In the fields, or at her house, there had never been any embarrassment; but now that Oak had become the entertainer their lives seemed to be moved back again to the days when they were strangers. "You'll think it strange that I have come, but--" "Oh no; not at all." "But I thought--Gabriel, I have been uneasy in the belief that I have offended you, and that you are going away on that account. It grieved me very much and I couldn't help coming." "Offended me! As if you could do that, Bathsheba!" "Haven't I?" she asked, gladly. "But, what are you going away for else?" "I am not going to emigrate, you know; I wasn't aware that you would wish me not to when I told 'ee or I shouldn't ha' thought of doing it," he said, simply. "I have arranged for Little Weatherbury Farm and shall have it in my own hands at Lady-day. You know I've had a share in it for some time. Still, that wouldn't prevent my attending to your business as before, hadn't it been that things have been said about us." "What?" said Bathsheba, in surprise. "Things said about you and me! What are they?" "I cannot tell you." "It would be wiser if you were to, I think. You have played the part of mentor to me many times, and I don't see why you should fear to do it now." "It is nothing that you have done, this time. The top and tail o't is this--that I am sniffing about here, and waiting for poor Boldwood's farm, with a thought of getting you some day." "Getting me! What does that mean?" "Marrying of 'ee, in plain British. You asked me to tell, so you mustn't blame me." Bathsheba did not look quite so alarmed as if a cannon had been discharged by her ear, which was what Oak had expected. "Marrying me! I didn't know it was that you meant," she said, quietly. "Such a thing as that is too absurd--too soon--to think of, by far!" "Yes; of course, it is too absurd. I don't desire any such thing; I should think that was plain enough by this time. Surely, surely you be the last person in the world I think of marrying. It is too absurd, as you say." "'Too--s-s-soon' were the words I used." "I must beg your pardon for correcting you, but you said, 'too absurd,' and so do I." "I beg your pardon too!" she returned, with tears in her eyes. "'Too soon' was what I said. But it doesn't matter a bit--not at all--but I only meant, 'too soon.' Indeed, I didn't, Mr. Oak, and you must believe me!" Gabriel looked her long in the face, but the firelight being faint there was not much to be seen. "Bathsheba," he said, tenderly and in surprise, and coming closer: "if I only knew one thing--whether you would allow me to love you and win you, and marry you after all--if I only knew that!" "But you never will know," she murmured. "Why?" "Because you never ask." "Oh--Oh!" said Gabriel, with a low laugh of joyousness. "My own dear--" "You ought not to have sent me that harsh letter this morning," she interrupted. "It shows you didn't care a bit about me, and were ready to desert me like all the rest of them! It was very cruel of you, considering I was the first sweetheart that you ever had, and you were the first I ever had; and I shall not forget it!" "Now, Bathsheba, was ever anybody so provoking," he said, laughing. "You know it was purely that I, as an unmarried man, carrying on a business for you as a very taking young woman, had a proper hard part to play--more particular that people knew I had a sort of feeling for 'ee; and I fancied, from the way we were mentioned together, that it might injure your good name. Nobody knows the heat and fret I have been caused by it." "And was that all?" "All." "Oh, how glad I am I came!" she exclaimed, thankfully, as she rose from her seat. "I have thought so much more of you since I fancied you did not want even to see me again. But I must be going now, or I shall be missed. Why Gabriel," she said, with a slight laugh, as they went to the door, "it seems exactly as if I had come courting you--how dreadful!" "And quite right too," said Oak. "I've danced at your skittish heels, my beautiful Bathsheba, for many a long mile, and many a long day; and it is hard to begrudge me this one visit." He accompanied her up the hill, explaining to her the details of his forthcoming tenure of the other farm. They spoke very little of their mutual feeling; pretty phrases and warm expressions being probably unnecessary between such tried friends. Theirs was that substantial affection which arises (if any arises at all) when the two who are thrown together begin first by knowing the rougher sides of each other's character, and not the best till further on, the romance growing up in the interstices of a mass of hard prosaic reality. This good-fellowship--_camaraderie_--usually occurring through similarity of pursuits, is unfortunately seldom superadded to love between the sexes, because men and women associate, not in their labours, but in their pleasures merely. Where, however, happy circumstance permits its development, the compounded feeling proves itself to be the only love which is strong as death--that love which many waters cannot quench, nor the floods drown, beside which the passion usually called by the name is evanescent as steam. A FOGGY NIGHT AND MORNING--CONCLUSION "The most private, secret, plainest wedding that it is possible to have." Those had been Bathsheba's words to Oak one evening, some time after the event of the preceding f, and he meditated a full hour by the clock upon how to carry out her wishes to the letter. "A license--O yes, it must be a license," he said to himself at last. "Very well, then; first, a license." On a dark night, a few days later, Oak came with mysterious steps from the surrogate's door, in Casterbridge. On the way home he heard a heavy tread in front of him, and, overtaking the man, found him to be Coggan. They walked together into the village until they came to a little lane behind the church, leading down to the cottage of Laban Tall, who had lately been installed as clerk of the parish, and was yet in mortal terror at church on Sundays when he heard his lone voice among certain hard words of the Psalms, whither no man ventured to follow him. "Well, good-night, Coggan," said Oak, "I'm going down this way." "Oh!" said Coggan, surprised; "what's going on to-night then, make so bold Mr. Oak?" It seemed rather ungenerous not to tell Coggan, under the circumstances, for Coggan had been true as steel all through the time of Gabriel's unhappiness about Bathsheba, and Gabriel said, "You can keep a secret, Coggan?" "You've proved me, and you know." "Yes, I have, and I do know. Well, then, mistress and I mean to get married to-morrow morning." "Heaven's high tower! And yet I've thought of such a thing from time to time; true, I have. But keeping it so close! Well, there, 'tis no consarn of of mine, and I wish 'ee joy o' her." "Thank you, Coggan. But I assure 'ee that this great hush is not what I wished for at all, or what either of us would have wished if it hadn't been for certain things that would make a gay wedding seem hardly the thing. Bathsheba has a great wish that all the parish shall not be in church, looking at her--she's shy-like and nervous about it, in fact--so I be doing this to humour her." "Ay, I see: quite right, too, I suppose I must say. And you be now going down to the clerk." "Yes; you may as well come with me." "I am afeard your labour in keeping it close will be throwed away," said Coggan, as they walked along. "Labe Tall's old woman will horn it all over parish in half-an-hour." "So she will, upon my life; I never thought of that," said Oak, pausing. "Yet I must tell him to-night, I suppose, for he's working so far off, and leaves early." "I'll tell 'ee how we could tackle her," said Coggan. "I'll knock and ask to speak to Laban outside the door, you standing in the background. Then he'll come out, and you can tell yer tale. She'll never guess what I want en for; and I'll make up a few words about the farm-work, as a blind." This scheme was considered feasible; and Coggan advanced boldly, and rapped at Mrs. Tall's door. Mrs. Tall herself opened it. "I wanted to have a word with Laban." "He's not at home, and won't be this side of eleven o'clock. He've been forced to go over to Yalbury since shutting out work. I shall do quite as well." "I hardly think you will. Stop a moment;" and Coggan stepped round the corner of the porch to consult Oak. "Who's t'other man, then?" said Mrs. Tall. "Only a friend," said Coggan. "Say he's wanted to meet mistress near church-hatch to-morrow morning at ten," said Oak, in a whisper. "That he must come without fail, and wear his best clothes." "The clothes will floor us as safe as houses!" said Coggan. "It can't be helped," said Oak. "Tell her." So Coggan delivered the message. "Mind, het or wet, blow or snow, he must come," added Jan. "'Tis very particular, indeed. The fact is, 'tis to witness her sign some law-work about taking shares wi' another farmer for a long span o' years. There, that's what 'tis, and now I've told 'ee, Mother Tall, in a way I shouldn't ha' done if I hadn't loved 'ee so hopeless well." Coggan retired before she could ask any further; and next they called at the vicar's in a manner which excited no curiosity at all. Then Gabriel went home, and prepared for the morrow. "Liddy," said Bathsheba, on going to bed that night, "I want you to call me at seven o'clock to-morrow, In case I shouldn't wake." "But you always do wake afore then, ma'am." "Yes, but I have something important to do, which I'll tell you of when the time comes, and it's best to make sure." Bathsheba, however, awoke voluntarily at four, nor could she by any contrivance get to sleep again. About six, being quite positive that her watch had stopped during the night, she could wait no longer. She went and tapped at Liddy's door, and after some labour awoke her. "But I thought it was I who had to call you?" said the bewildered Liddy. "And it isn't six yet." "Indeed it is; how can you tell such a story, Liddy? I know it must be ever so much past seven. Come to my room as soon as you can; I want you to give my hair a good brushing." When Liddy came to Bathsheba's room her mistress was already waiting. Liddy could not understand this extraordinary promptness. "Whatever IS going on, ma'am?" she said. "Well, I'll tell you," said Bathsheba, with a mischievous smile in her bright eyes. "Farmer Oak is coming here to dine with me to-day!" "Farmer Oak--and nobody else?--you two alone?" "Yes." "But is it safe, ma'am, after what's been said?" asked her companion, dubiously. "A woman's good name is such a perishable article that--" Bathsheba laughed with a flushed cheek, and whispered in Liddy's ear, although there was nobody present. Then Liddy stared and exclaimed, "Souls alive, what news! It makes my heart go quite bumpity-bump!" "It makes mine rather furious, too," said Bathsheba. "However, there's no getting out of it now!" It was a damp disagreeable morning. Nevertheless, at twenty minutes to ten o'clock, Oak came out of his house, and Went up the hill side With that sort of stride A man puts out when walking in search of a bride, and knocked Bathsheba's door. Ten minutes later a large and a smaller umbrella might have been seen moving from the same door, and through the mist along the road to the church. The distance was not more than a quarter of a mile, and these two sensible persons deemed it unnecessary to drive. An observer must have been very close indeed to discover that the forms under the umbrellas were those of Oak and Bathsheba, arm-in-arm for the first time in their lives, Oak in a greatcoat extending to his knees, and Bathsheba in a cloak that reached her clogs. Yet, though so plainly dressed, there was a certain rejuvenated appearance about her:-- As though a rose should shut and be a bud again. Repose had again incarnadined her cheeks; and having, at Gabriel's request, arranged her hair this morning as she had worn it years ago on Norcombe Hill, she seemed in his eyes remarkably like a girl of that fascinating dream, which, considering that she was now only three or four-and-twenty, was perhaps not very wonderful. In the church were Tall, Liddy, and the parson, and in a remarkably short space of time the deed was done. The two sat down very quietly to tea in Bathsheba's parlour in the evening of the same day, for it had been arranged that Farmer Oak should go there to live, since he had as yet neither money, house, nor furniture worthy of the name, though he was on a sure way towards them, whilst Bathsheba was, comparatively, in a plethora of all three. Just as Bathsheba was pouring out a cup of tea, their ears were greeted by the firing of a cannon, followed by what seemed like a tremendous blowing of trumpets, in the front of the house. "There!" said Oak, laughing, "I knew those fellows were up to something, by the look on their faces" Oak took up the light and went into the porch, followed by Bathsheba with a shawl over her head. The rays fell upon a group of male figures gathered upon the gravel in front, who, when they saw the newly-married couple in the porch, set up a loud "Hurrah!" and at the same moment bang again went the cannon in the background, followed by a hideous clang of music from a drum, tambourine, clarionet, serpent, hautboy, tenor-viol, and double-bass--the only remaining relics of the true and original Weatherbury band--venerable worm-eaten instruments, which had celebrated in their own persons the victories of Marlborough, under the fingers of the forefathers of those who played them now. The performers came forward, and marched up to the front. "Those bright boys, Mark Clark and Jan, are at the bottom of all this," said Oak. "Come in, souls, and have something to eat and drink wi' me and my wife." "Not to-night," said Mr. Clark, with evident self-denial. "Thank ye all the same; but we'll call at a more seemly time. However, we couldn't think of letting the day pass without a note of admiration of some sort. If ye could send a drop of som'at down to Warren's, why so it is. Here's long life and happiness to neighbour Oak and his comely bride!" "Thank ye; thank ye all," said Gabriel. "A bit and a drop shall be sent to Warren's for ye at once. I had a thought that we might very likely get a salute of some sort from our old friends, and I was saying so to my wife but now." "Faith," said Coggan, in a critical tone, turning to his companions, "the man hev learnt to say 'my wife' in a wonderful naterel way, considering how very youthful he is in wedlock as yet--hey, neighbours all?" "I never heerd a skilful old married feller of twenty years' standing pipe 'my wife' in a more used note than 'a did," said Jacob Smallbury. "It might have been a little more true to nater if't had been spoke a little chillier, but that wasn't to be expected just now." "That improvement will come wi' time," said Jan, twirling his eye. Then Oak laughed, and Bathsheba smiled (for she never laughed readily now), and their friends turned to go. "Yes; I suppose that's the size o't," said Joseph Poorgrass with a cheerful sigh as they moved away; "and I wish him joy o' her; though I were once or twice upon saying to-day with holy Hosea, in my scripture manner, which is my second nature, 'Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone.' But since 'tis as 'tis, why, it might have been worse, and I feel my thanks accordingly."

Chapters 54-Conclusion

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After his arrest, Boldwood pleads guilty and is sentenced to death. However, it is discovered that in his house there are many dresses and jewelry purchased for Bathsheba and set aside for their eventual marriage. Many of the local townspeople argue that he should be found insane, and thus not criminally responsible. In March, the judges meet to determine whether or not the sentence should be commuted, and Boldwood is sentenced to life in prison. Bathsheba recovers very slowly from the traumatic events of Christmas. In August, she encounters Gabriel while she is visiting Troy's grave; she has had him buried in the same grave with Fanny. Gabriel surprises her by saying that he is planning to move to California in the spring, and she objects that she will be lost without his help at the farm. She becomes more and more distraught to think of losing him as the months pass, and in the winter, he gives her formal notice that he will be leaving before the end of March. That night she goes to his cottage and asks if he is leaving because she has offended him. He explains that he is not going to leave England, but he is going to be leasing Boldwood's farm beginning in March. He notes that this doesn't mean he couldn't still work for her at the same time, but he is uncomfortable since rumors have started that he hopes to marry her and thinks it would be better if he did not work for her anymore. Bathsheba's objections spark Gabriel's curiosity, and he admits that of course he still loves her. The two of them joyfully realize that they mutually love each other. A short time later, Bathsheba agrees to marry him, and the two marry in a small, private ceremony with only a few close friends present. Gabriel comes to live with her at the Everdene farm, and the novel ends with an optimistic view of a happy and loving marriage for them.

The traumatic and violent events of the Christmas party seem to soften many of the characters into a new acceptance of their fates. Boldwood meekly accepts the legal punishment, but evidence of his insanity allows for him to be granted the small mercy of imprisonment. The discovery of the items he has purchased and set aside for Bathsheba reveals his obsessive hope: given that she only confirmed their engagement the night of the party, he must have been purchasing these items well before he knew whether or not she would agree to marry him. The discovery also reveals his fixation on wealth and status: when he tried to envision how he could best please Bathsheba, Boldwood assumed jewels and fine clothes must be the key to her heart. With Boldwood and Troy both out of the picture, Bathsheba can finally live without the distraction of men trying to woo her. By this stage in the novel, however, it seems that some of her ambition and zest for life has been lost. She plays a less and less active role in managing the farm. Even when she learns that Gabriel plans to leave, she is not outraged and indignant so much as lost and afraid. She knows she depends on him both professionally and personally, and is afraid of what she will do without him. Bathsheba does show some of her drive towards bold action by going to Gabriel's cottage the night after he hands in his resignation. It would be considered quite improper for a woman to go alone to a man's home after dark, even though as a widow Bathsheba now has more freedom than she did as an unmarried woman. The two have always seemed to communicate honestly and freely, and Bathsheba seeks out that frankness by trying to determine why Gabriel feels compelled to leave. However, what becomes clear is that the two have actually misunderstood each other. Bathsheba took Gabriel's unwillingness to ask about her feelings as a sign that he no longer cared for her, while he assumed that her initial answer had been a final one. The establishment of a romantic relationship, and then the marriage between the two seems to signal that partnerships best arise out of mutual respect and getting to know one another over a long span of time while working towards shared goals. The marriage seems to show some promising signs of being egalitarian in that it is rooted in the partnership of running the farm, and Gabriel will be moving in to Bathsheba's house. At the same time, for the marriage to come about Bathsheba seems to need to have been tamed by her experience of loss and betrayal. She is no longer the proud and willful woman she was at the beginning of the novel, and it is only once she becomes more docile and more resigned to requiring the assistance of a man that she can accept a relationship with Gabriel. In the end, "in allowing Oak the positions of both phallic male and castrated male, while awarding Bathsheba the contradictory position of powerful and dependent female, Hardy denies power and sexuality to neither sex" .

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The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra.act iv.scene v

act iv, scene v

{"name": "Act IV, Scene v", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210116191009/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/antony-cleopatra/summary/act-iv-scene-v", "summary": "At Antony's camp, a wounded soldier conferences with Antony and Eros. Antony admits he wishes he had followed the advice to fight first on land, and not at sea. The soldier, saucy, suggests that maybe if they'd fought on land in the first place, the kings and the man that left this morning might still be on their side. Antony asks who it was that left, only to hear the sad news that his dear friend Enobarbus has joined Caesar's camp. Ouch. Eros points out Enobarbus left his treasure behind. Antony, a bit shocked, orders that Enobarbus's clothes and treasure be sent after him, with a kind note from Antony, wishing that Enobarbus should never again feel forced to change masters. Antony is disappointed in himself, saying his bad fortune has led honest men to become traitors.", "analysis": ""}

SCENE V. Alexandria. ANTONY'S camp Trumpets sound. Enter ANTONY and EROS, a SOLDIER meeting them SOLDIER. The gods make this a happy day to Antony! ANTONY. Would thou and those thy scars had once prevail'd To make me fight at land! SOLDIER. Hadst thou done so, The kings that have revolted, and the soldier That has this morning left thee, would have still Followed thy heels. ANTONY. Who's gone this morning? SOLDIER. Who? One ever near thee. Call for Enobarbus, He shall not hear thee; or from Caesar's camp Say 'I am none of thine.' ANTONY. What say'st thou? SOLDIER. Sir, He is with Caesar. EROS. Sir, his chests and treasure He has not with him. ANTONY. Is he gone? SOLDIER. Most certain. ANTONY. Go, Eros, send his treasure after; do it; Detain no jot, I charge thee. Write to him- I will subscribe- gentle adieus and greetings; Say that I wish he never find more cause To change a master. O, my fortunes have Corrupted honest men! Dispatch. Enobarbus! Exeunt ACT_4|SC_6

Act IV, Scene v

https://web.archive.org/web/20210116191009/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/antony-cleopatra/summary/act-iv-scene-v

At Antony's camp, a wounded soldier conferences with Antony and Eros. Antony admits he wishes he had followed the advice to fight first on land, and not at sea. The soldier, saucy, suggests that maybe if they'd fought on land in the first place, the kings and the man that left this morning might still be on their side. Antony asks who it was that left, only to hear the sad news that his dear friend Enobarbus has joined Caesar's camp. Ouch. Eros points out Enobarbus left his treasure behind. Antony, a bit shocked, orders that Enobarbus's clothes and treasure be sent after him, with a kind note from Antony, wishing that Enobarbus should never again feel forced to change masters. Antony is disappointed in himself, saying his bad fortune has led honest men to become traitors.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/18.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_3_part_5.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 3.chapter 5

book 3, chapter 5

{"name": "book 3, Chapter 5", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section4/", "summary": "The Confession of an Ardent Heart. Heels Up\" Dmitri asks Alyosha to tell Katerina that the engagement is officially off. He also asks Alyosha to procure 3,000 rubles from their father so that he can pay Katerina back and ease his conscience. Dmitri knows that Fyodor Pavlovich has 3,000 rubles readily available because Fyodor Pavlovich has assembled that very sum of money in the hopes of buying Grushenka's affections", "analysis": ""}

Chapter V. The Confession Of A Passionate Heart--"Heels Up" "Now," said Alyosha, "I understand the first half." "You understand the first half. That half is a drama, and it was played out there. The second half is a tragedy, and it is being acted here." "And I understand nothing of that second half so far," said Alyosha. "And I? Do you suppose I understand it?" "Stop, Dmitri. There's one important question. Tell me, you were betrothed, you are betrothed still?" "We weren't betrothed at once, not for three months after that adventure. The next day I told myself that the incident was closed, concluded, that there would be no sequel. It seemed to me caddish to make her an offer. On her side she gave no sign of life for the six weeks that she remained in the town; except, indeed, for one action. The day after her visit the maid-servant slipped round with an envelope addressed to me. I tore it open: it contained the change out of the banknote. Only four thousand five hundred roubles was needed, but there was a discount of about two hundred on changing it. She only sent me about two hundred and sixty. I don't remember exactly, but not a note, not a word of explanation. I searched the packet for a pencil mark--n-nothing! Well, I spent the rest of the money on such an orgy that the new major was obliged to reprimand me. "Well, the lieutenant-colonel produced the battalion money, to the astonishment of every one, for nobody believed that he had the money untouched. He'd no sooner paid it than he fell ill, took to his bed, and, three weeks later, softening of the brain set in, and he died five days afterwards. He was buried with military honors, for he had not had time to receive his discharge. Ten days after his funeral, Katerina Ivanovna, with her aunt and sister, went to Moscow. And, behold, on the very day they went away (I hadn't seen them, didn't see them off or take leave) I received a tiny note, a sheet of thin blue paper, and on it only one line in pencil: 'I will write to you. Wait. K.' And that was all. "I'll explain the rest now, in two words. In Moscow their fortunes changed with the swiftness of lightning and the unexpectedness of an Arabian fairy-tale. That general's widow, their nearest relation, suddenly lost the two nieces who were her heiresses and next-of-kin--both died in the same week of small-pox. The old lady, prostrated with grief, welcomed Katya as a daughter, as her one hope, clutched at her, altered her will in Katya's favor. But that concerned the future. Meanwhile she gave her, for present use, eighty thousand roubles, as a marriage portion, to do what she liked with. She was an hysterical woman. I saw something of her in Moscow, later. "Well, suddenly I received by post four thousand five hundred roubles. I was speechless with surprise, as you may suppose. Three days later came the promised letter. I have it with me now. You must read it. She offers to be my wife, offers herself to me. 'I love you madly,' she says, 'even if you don't love me, never mind. Be my husband. Don't be afraid. I won't hamper you in any way. I will be your chattel. I will be the carpet under your feet. I want to love you for ever. I want to save you from yourself.' Alyosha, I am not worthy to repeat those lines in my vulgar words and in my vulgar tone, my everlastingly vulgar tone, that I can never cure myself of. That letter stabs me even now. Do you think I don't mind--that I don't mind still? I wrote her an answer at once, as it was impossible for me to go to Moscow. I wrote to her with tears. One thing I shall be ashamed of for ever. I referred to her being rich and having a dowry while I was only a stuck-up beggar! I mentioned money! I ought to have borne it in silence, but it slipped from my pen. Then I wrote at once to Ivan, and told him all I could about it in a letter of six pages, and sent him to her. Why do you look like that? Why are you staring at me? Yes, Ivan fell in love with her; he's in love with her still. I know that. I did a stupid thing, in the world's opinion; but perhaps that one stupid thing may be the saving of us all now. Oo! Don't you see what a lot she thinks of Ivan, how she respects him? When she compares us, do you suppose she can love a man like me, especially after all that has happened here?" "But I am convinced that she does love a man like you, and not a man like him." "She loves her own _virtue_, not me." The words broke involuntarily, and almost malignantly, from Dmitri. He laughed, but a minute later his eyes gleamed, he flushed crimson and struck the table violently with his fist. "I swear, Alyosha," he cried, with intense and genuine anger at himself; "you may not believe me, but as God is holy, and as Christ is God, I swear that though I smiled at her lofty sentiments just now, I know that I am a million times baser in soul than she, and that these lofty sentiments of hers are as sincere as a heavenly angel's. That's the tragedy of it--that I know that for certain. What if any one does show off a bit? Don't I do it myself? And yet I'm sincere, I'm sincere. As for Ivan, I can understand how he must be cursing nature now--with his intellect, too! To see the preference given--to whom, to what? To a monster who, though he is betrothed and all eyes are fixed on him, can't restrain his debaucheries--and before the very eyes of his betrothed! And a man like me is preferred, while he is rejected. And why? Because a girl wants to sacrifice her life and destiny out of gratitude. It's ridiculous! I've never said a word of this to Ivan, and Ivan of course has never dropped a hint of the sort to me. But destiny will be accomplished, and the best man will hold his ground while the undeserving one will vanish into his back- alley for ever--his filthy back-alley, his beloved back-alley, where he is at home and where he will sink in filth and stench at his own free will and with enjoyment. I've been talking foolishly. I've no words left. I use them at random, but it will be as I have said. I shall drown in the back- alley, and she will marry Ivan." "Stop, Dmitri," Alyosha interrupted again with great anxiety. "There's one thing you haven't made clear yet: you are still betrothed all the same, aren't you? How can you break off the engagement if she, your betrothed, doesn't want to?" "Yes, formally and solemnly betrothed. It was all done on my arrival in Moscow, with great ceremony, with ikons, all in fine style. The general's wife blessed us, and--would you believe it?--congratulated Katya. 'You've made a good choice,' she said, 'I see right through him.' And--would you believe it?--she didn't like Ivan, and hardly greeted him. I had a lot of talk with Katya in Moscow. I told her about myself--sincerely, honorably. She listened to everything. There was sweet confusion, There were tender words. Though there were proud words, too. She wrung out of me a mighty promise to reform. I gave my promise, and here--" "What?" "Why, I called to you and brought you out here to-day, this very day--remember it--to send you--this very day again--to Katerina Ivanovna, and--" "What?" "To tell her that I shall never come to see her again. Say, 'He sends you his compliments.' " "But is that possible?" "That's just the reason I'm sending you, in my place, because it's impossible. And, how could I tell her myself?" "And where are you going?" "To the back-alley." "To Grushenka, then!" Alyosha exclaimed mournfully, clasping his hands. "Can Rakitin really have told the truth? I thought that you had just visited her, and that was all." "Can a betrothed man pay such visits? Is such a thing possible and with such a betrothed, and before the eyes of all the world? Confound it, I have some honor! As soon as I began visiting Grushenka, I ceased to be betrothed, and to be an honest man. I understand that. Why do you look at me? You see, I went in the first place to beat her. I had heard, and I know for a fact now, that that captain, father's agent, had given Grushenka an I.O.U. of mine for her to sue me for payment, so as to put an end to me. They wanted to scare me. I went to beat her. I had had a glimpse of her before. She doesn't strike one at first sight. I knew about her old merchant, who's lying ill now, paralyzed; but he's leaving her a decent little sum. I knew, too, that she was fond of money, that she hoarded it, and lent it at a wicked rate of interest, that she's a merciless cheat and swindler. I went to beat her, and I stayed. The storm broke--it struck me down like the plague. I'm plague-stricken still, and I know that everything is over, that there will never be anything more for me. The cycle of the ages is accomplished. That's my position. And though I'm a beggar, as fate would have it, I had three thousand just then in my pocket. I drove with Grushenka to Mokroe, a place twenty-five versts from here. I got gypsies there and champagne and made all the peasants there drunk on it, and all the women and girls. I sent the thousands flying. In three days' time I was stripped bare, but a hero. Do you suppose the hero had gained his end? Not a sign of it from her. I tell you that rogue, Grushenka, has a supple curve all over her body. You can see it in her little foot, even in her little toe. I saw it, and kissed it, but that was all, I swear! 'I'll marry you if you like,' she said, 'you're a beggar, you know. Say that you won't beat me, and will let me do anything I choose, and perhaps I will marry you.' She laughed, and she's laughing still!" Dmitri leapt up with a sort of fury. He seemed all at once as though he were drunk. His eyes became suddenly bloodshot. "And do you really mean to marry her?" "At once, if she will. And if she won't, I shall stay all the same. I'll be the porter at her gate. Alyosha!" he cried. He stopped short before him, and taking him by the shoulders began shaking him violently. "Do you know, you innocent boy, that this is all delirium, senseless delirium, for there's a tragedy here. Let me tell you, Alexey, that I may be a low man, with low and degraded passions, but a thief and a pickpocket Dmitri Karamazov never can be. Well, then; let me tell you that I am a thief and a pickpocket. That very morning, just before I went to beat Grushenka, Katerina Ivanovna sent for me, and in strict secrecy (why I don't know, I suppose she had some reason) asked me to go to the chief town of the province and to post three thousand roubles to Agafya Ivanovna in Moscow, so that nothing should be known of it in the town here. So I had that three thousand roubles in my pocket when I went to see Grushenka, and it was that money we spent at Mokroe. Afterwards I pretended I had been to the town, but did not show her the post office receipt. I said I had sent the money and would bring the receipt, and so far I haven't brought it. I've forgotten it. Now what do you think you're going to her to-day to say? 'He sends his compliments,' and she'll ask you, 'What about the money?' You might still have said to her, 'He's a degraded sensualist, and a low creature, with uncontrolled passions. He didn't send your money then, but wasted it, because, like a low brute, he couldn't control himself.' But still you might have added, 'He isn't a thief though. Here is your three thousand; he sends it back. Send it yourself to Agafya Ivanovna. But he told me to say "he sends his compliments." ' But, as it is, she will ask, 'But where is the money?' " "Mitya, you are unhappy, yes! But not as unhappy as you think. Don't worry yourself to death with despair." "What, do you suppose I'd shoot myself because I can't get three thousand to pay back? That's just it. I shan't shoot myself. I haven't the strength now. Afterwards, perhaps. But now I'm going to Grushenka. I don't care what happens." "And what then?" "I'll be her husband if she deigns to have me, and when lovers come, I'll go into the next room. I'll clean her friends' goloshes, blow up their samovar, run their errands." "Katerina Ivanovna will understand it all," Alyosha said solemnly. "She'll understand how great this trouble is and will forgive. She has a lofty mind, and no one could be more unhappy than you. She'll see that for herself." "She won't forgive everything," said Dmitri, with a grin. "There's something in it, brother, that no woman could forgive. Do you know what would be the best thing to do?" "What?" "Pay back the three thousand." "Where can we get it from? I say, I have two thousand. Ivan will give you another thousand--that makes three. Take it and pay it back." "And when would you get it, your three thousand? You're not of age, besides, and you must--you absolutely must--take my farewell to her to-day, with the money or without it, for I can't drag on any longer, things have come to such a pass. To-morrow is too late. I shall send you to father." "To father?" "Yes, to father first. Ask him for three thousand." "But, Mitya, he won't give it." "As though he would! I know he won't. Do you know the meaning of despair, Alexey?" "Yes." "Listen. Legally he owes me nothing. I've had it all from him, I know that. But morally he owes me something, doesn't he? You know he started with twenty-eight thousand of my mother's money and made a hundred thousand with it. Let him give me back only three out of the twenty-eight thousand, and he'll draw my soul out of hell, and it will atone for many of his sins. For that three thousand--I give you my solemn word--I'll make an end of everything, and he shall hear nothing more of me. For the last time I give him the chance to be a father. Tell him God Himself sends him this chance." "Mitya, he won't give it for anything." "I know he won't. I know it perfectly well. Now, especially. That's not all. I know something more. Now, only a few days ago, perhaps only yesterday he found out for the first time _in earnest_ (underline _in earnest_) that Grushenka is really perhaps not joking, and really means to marry me. He knows her nature; he knows the cat. And do you suppose he's going to give me money to help to bring that about when he's crazy about her himself? And that's not all, either. I can tell you more than that. I know that for the last five days he has had three thousand drawn out of the bank, changed into notes of a hundred roubles, packed into a large envelope, sealed with five seals, and tied across with red tape. You see how well I know all about it! On the envelope is written: 'To my angel, Grushenka, when she will come to me.' He scrawled it himself in silence and in secret, and no one knows that the money's there except the valet, Smerdyakov, whom he trusts like himself. So now he has been expecting Grushenka for the last three or four days; he hopes she'll come for the money. He has sent her word of it, and she has sent him word that perhaps she'll come. And if she does go to the old man, can I marry her after that? You understand now why I'm here in secret and what I'm on the watch for." "For her?" "Yes, for her. Foma has a room in the house of these sluts here. Foma comes from our parts; he was a soldier in our regiment. He does jobs for them. He's watchman at night and goes grouse-shooting in the day-time; and that's how he lives. I've established myself in his room. Neither he nor the women of the house know the secret--that is, that I am on the watch here." "No one but Smerdyakov knows, then?" "No one else. He will let me know if she goes to the old man." "It was he told you about the money, then?" "Yes. It's a dead secret. Even Ivan doesn't know about the money, or anything. The old man is sending Ivan to Tchermashnya on a two or three days' journey. A purchaser has turned up for the copse: he'll give eight thousand for the timber. So the old man keeps asking Ivan to help him by going to arrange it. It will take him two or three days. That's what the old man wants, so that Grushenka can come while he's away." "Then he's expecting Grushenka to-day?" "No, she won't come to-day; there are signs. She's certain not to come," cried Mitya suddenly. "Smerdyakov thinks so, too. Father's drinking now. He's sitting at table with Ivan. Go to him, Alyosha, and ask for the three thousand." "Mitya, dear, what's the matter with you?" cried Alyosha, jumping up from his place, and looking keenly at his brother's frenzied face. For one moment the thought struck him that Dmitri was mad. "What is it? I'm not insane," said Dmitri, looking intently and earnestly at him. "No fear. I am sending you to father, and I know what I'm saying. I believe in miracles." "In miracles?" "In a miracle of Divine Providence. God knows my heart. He sees my despair. He sees the whole picture. Surely He won't let something awful happen. Alyosha, I believe in miracles. Go!" "I am going. Tell me, will you wait for me here?" "Yes. I know it will take some time. You can't go at him point blank. He's drunk now. I'll wait three hours--four, five, six, seven. Only remember you must go to Katerina Ivanovna to-day, if it has to be at midnight, _with the money or without the money_, and say, 'He sends his compliments to you.' I want you to say that verse to her: 'He sends his compliments to you.' " "Mitya! And what if Grushenka comes to-day--if not to-day, to-morrow, or the next day?" "Grushenka? I shall see her. I shall rush out and prevent it." "And if--" "If there's an if, it will be murder. I couldn't endure it." "Who will be murdered?" "The old man. I shan't kill her." "Brother, what are you saying?" "Oh, I don't know.... I don't know. Perhaps I shan't kill, and perhaps I shall. I'm afraid that he will suddenly become so loathsome to me with his face at that moment. I hate his ugly throat, his nose, his eyes, his shameless snigger. I feel a physical repulsion. That's what I'm afraid of. That's what may be too much for me." "I'll go, Mitya. I believe that God will order things for the best, that nothing awful may happen." "And I will sit and wait for the miracle. And if it doesn't come to pass--" Alyosha went thoughtfully towards his father's house.

book 3, Chapter 5

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section4/

The Confession of an Ardent Heart. Heels Up" Dmitri asks Alyosha to tell Katerina that the engagement is officially off. He also asks Alyosha to procure 3,000 rubles from their father so that he can pay Katerina back and ease his conscience. Dmitri knows that Fyodor Pavlovich has 3,000 rubles readily available because Fyodor Pavlovich has assembled that very sum of money in the hopes of buying Grushenka's affections

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/23042-chapters/1.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Tempest/section_0_part_0.txt

The Tempest.act 1.scene 1

act 1, scene 1

{"name": "Act 1, Scene 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210411014001/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tempest/summary/act-1-scene-1", "summary": "A ship is being bombarded by thunder, lightning and rain--in short--a tempest that seems worse than the big storm in King Lear. Boat crew members try to keep everything afloat for their passengers, who are, as follows: Alonso , Sebastian , Antonio , Ferdinand , and Gonzalo . Basically, it's a hubbub of courtly figures putzing around while the experienced sailors are trying to save everyone from drowning. Drowning is likely in this storm, since the ship is described as \"leaky as an unstaunched wench.\" The King and Prince take the advice of the sailors and go below deck to pray while Antonio, Sebastian, and Gonzalo stay above. Gonzalo has already exchanged words with the boatswain, who was testy to the royals. Antonio and Sebastian show their nasty dispositions, calling the boatswain an uncharitable dog and a whoreson. Yowch. While everyone's busy being friendly, a mariner demands that everyone should get busy and pray because \"all's lost!\" The boat splits and everyone seems to go their separate ways into the water. Brain Snack: Shakespeare has always liked to insert a good shipwreck into his plays but the wreck in The Tempest may have been inspired by a real-life accident at sea. In 1609, the Sea Venture was on its way from England to Jamestown when it wrecked in the Bermudas. The crew was thought to be lost forever but managed to survive on an uninhabited island for about nine months--to everyone's shock and dismay, the crew built two new ships and sailed on to Jamestown.", "analysis": ""}

ACT I. SCENE I. On a ship at sea: a tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard._ _Enter _a Ship-Master_ and _a Boatswain_._ _Mast._ Boatswain! _Boats._ Here, master: what cheer? _Mast._ Good, speak to the mariners: fall to't, yarely, or we run ourselves aground: bestir, bestir. [_Exit._ _Enter _Mariners_._ _Boats._ Heigh, my hearts! cheerly, cheerly, my hearts! 5 yare, yare! Take in the topsail. Tend to the master's whistle. Blow, till thou burst thy wind, if room enough! _Enter ALONSO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, FERDINAND, GONZALO, and others._ _Alon._ Good boatswain, have care. Where's the master? Play the men. _Boats._ I pray now, keep below. 10 _Ant._ Where is the master, boatswain? _Boats._ Do you not hear him? You mar our labour: keep your cabins: you do assist the storm. _Gon._ Nay, good, be patient. _Boats._ When the sea is. Hence! What cares these 15 roarers for the name of king? To cabin: silence! trouble us not. _Gon._ Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard. _Boats._ None that I more love than myself. You are a Counsellor; if you can command these elements to silence, 20 and work the peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more; use your authority: if you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make yourself ready in your cabin for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap. Cheerly, good hearts! Out of our way, I say. [_Exit._ 25 _Gon._ I have great comfort from this fellow: methinks he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging: make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage. If he be not born to be hanged, our case 30 is miserable. [_Exeunt._ _Re-enter Boatswain._ _Boats._ Down with the topmast! yare! lower, lower! Bring her to try with main-course. [_A cry within._] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather or our office. 35 _Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO._ Yet again! what do you here? Shall we give o'er, and drown? Have you a mind to sink? _Seb._ A pox o' your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog! _Boats._ Work you, then. 40 _Ant._ Hang, cur! hang, you whoreson, insolent noise-maker. We are less afraid to be drowned than thou art. _Gon._ I'll warrant him for drowning; though the ship were no stronger than a nutshell, and as leaky as an unstanched wench. 45 _Boats._ Lay her a-hold, a-hold! set her two courses off to sea again; lay her off. _Enter _Mariners_ wet._ _Mariners._ All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost! _Boats._ What, must our mouths be cold? _Gon._ The king and prince at prayers! let's assist them, 50 For our case is as theirs. _Seb._ I'm out of patience. _Ant._ We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards: This wide-chapp'd rascal,--would thou mightst lie drowning The washing of ten tides! _Gon._ He'll be hang'd yet, Though every drop of water swear against it, 55 And gape at widest to glut him. [_A confused noise within:_ "Mercy on us!"-- "We split, we split!"-- "Farewell my wife and children!"-- "Farewell, brother!"-- "We split, we split, we split!"] _Ant._ Let's all sink with the king. 60 _Seb._ Let's take leave of him. [_Exeunt Ant. and Seb._ _Gon._ Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground, long heath, brown furze, any thing. The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death. [_Exeunt._ 65 Notes: I, 1. SC. I. On a ship at sea] Pope. Enter ... Boatswain] Collier MS. adds 'shaking off wet.' 3: _Good,_] Rowe. _Good:_ Ff. _Good._ Collier. 7: _till thou burst thy wind_] _till thou burst, wind_ Johnson conj. _till thou burst thee, wind_ Steevens conj. 8: Capell adds stage direction [Exeunt Mariners aloft. 11: _boatswain_] Pope. _boson_ Ff. 11-18: Verse. S. Walker conj. 15: _cares_] _care_ Rowe. See note (I). 31: [Exeunt] Theobald. [Exit. Ff. 33: _Bring her to try_] F4. _Bring her to Try_ F1 F2 F3. _Bring her to. Try_ Story conj. 33-35: Text as in Capell. _A plague_--A cry within. Enter Sebastian, Anthonio, and Gonzalo. _upon this howling._ Ff. 34-37: Verse. S. Walker conj. 43: _for_] _from_ Theobald. 46: _two courses off to sea_] _two courses; off to sea_ Steevens (Holt conj.). 46: [Enter...] [Re-enter... Dyce. 47: [Exeunt. Theobald. 50: _at_] _are at_ Rowe. 50-54: Printed as prose in Ff. 56: _to glut_] _t' englut_ Johnson conj. 57: See note (II). 59: _Farewell, brother!_] _Brother, farewell!_ Theobald. 60: _with the_] Rowe. _with'_ F1 F2. _with_ F3 F4. 61: [Exeunt A. and S.] [Exit. Ff. 63: _furze_ Rowe. _firrs_ F1 F2 F3. _firs_ F4. _long heath, brown furze_] _ling, heath, broom, furze_ Hanmer.] 65: [Exeunt] [Exit F1, om. F2 F3 F4.]

Act 1, Scene 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20210411014001/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tempest/summary/act-1-scene-1

A ship is being bombarded by thunder, lightning and rain--in short--a tempest that seems worse than the big storm in King Lear. Boat crew members try to keep everything afloat for their passengers, who are, as follows: Alonso , Sebastian , Antonio , Ferdinand , and Gonzalo . Basically, it's a hubbub of courtly figures putzing around while the experienced sailors are trying to save everyone from drowning. Drowning is likely in this storm, since the ship is described as "leaky as an unstaunched wench." The King and Prince take the advice of the sailors and go below deck to pray while Antonio, Sebastian, and Gonzalo stay above. Gonzalo has already exchanged words with the boatswain, who was testy to the royals. Antonio and Sebastian show their nasty dispositions, calling the boatswain an uncharitable dog and a whoreson. Yowch. While everyone's busy being friendly, a mariner demands that everyone should get busy and pray because "all's lost!" The boat splits and everyone seems to go their separate ways into the water. Brain Snack: Shakespeare has always liked to insert a good shipwreck into his plays but the wreck in The Tempest may have been inspired by a real-life accident at sea. In 1609, the Sea Venture was on its way from England to Jamestown when it wrecked in the Bermudas. The crew was thought to be lost forever but managed to survive on an uninhabited island for about nine months--to everyone's shock and dismay, the crew built two new ships and sailed on to Jamestown.

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/30.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_4_part_6.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapter xxx

chapter xxx

{"name": "Chapter XXX", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase4-chapter25-34", "summary": "Mrs. Crick arranges for Tess and Angel to be alone by asking them to deliver the milk in the very early morning. When Angel tells Tess they are passing near the ancestral home of the ancient d'Urbervilles family, she tells him that she herself is a descendent of the noble family. He is pleased and realizes that this will make her much more appealing to his family. Tess finally agrees to his proposal and tells him about her family. After she mentions the village of Marlott, Angel suddenly remembers her and that he did not ask her to be his partner in the May Day dance. Tess says \"but you would not dance with me. Oh, I hope that will not be an ill omen to us now\"", "analysis": ""}

In the diminishing daylight they went along the level roadway through the meads, which stretched away into gray miles, and were backed in the extreme edge of distance by the swarthy and abrupt slopes of Egdon Heath. On its summit stood clumps and stretches of fir-trees, whose notched tips appeared like battlemented towers crowning black-fronted castles of enchantment. They were so absorbed in the sense of being close to each other that they did not begin talking for a long while, the silence being broken only by the clucking of the milk in the tall cans behind them. The lane they followed was so solitary that the hazel nuts had remained on the boughs till they slipped from their shells, and the blackberries hung in heavy clusters. Every now and then Angel would fling the lash of his whip round one of these, pluck it off, and give it to his companion. The dull sky soon began to tell its meaning by sending down herald-drops of rain, and the stagnant air of the day changed into a fitful breeze which played about their faces. The quick-silvery glaze on the rivers and pools vanished; from broad mirrors of light they changed to lustreless sheets of lead, with a surface like a rasp. But that spectacle did not affect her preoccupation. Her countenance, a natural carnation slightly embrowned by the season, had deepened its tinge with the beating of the rain-drops; and her hair, which the pressure of the cows' flanks had, as usual, caused to tumble down from its fastenings and stray beyond the curtain of her calico bonnet, was made clammy by the moisture, till it hardly was better than seaweed. "I ought not to have come, I suppose," she murmured, looking at the sky. "I am sorry for the rain," said he. "But how glad I am to have you here!" Remote Egdon disappeared by degree behind the liquid gauze. The evening grew darker, and the roads being crossed by gates, it was not safe to drive faster than at a walking pace. The air was rather chill. "I am so afraid you will get cold, with nothing upon your arms and shoulders," he said. "Creep close to me, and perhaps the drizzle won't hurt you much. I should be sorrier still if I did not think that the rain might be helping me." She imperceptibly crept closer, and he wrapped round them both a large piece of sail-cloth, which was sometimes used to keep the sun off the milk-cans. Tess held it from slipping off him as well as herself, Clare's hands being occupied. "Now we are all right again. Ah--no we are not! It runs down into my neck a little, and it must still more into yours. That's better. Your arms are like wet marble, Tess. Wipe them in the cloth. Now, if you stay quiet, you will not get another drop. Well, dear--about that question of mine--that long-standing question?" The only reply that he could hear for a little while was the smack of the horse's hoofs on the moistening road, and the cluck of the milk in the cans behind them. "Do you remember what you said?" "I do," she replied. "Before we get home, mind." "I'll try." He said no more then. As they drove on, the fragment of an old manor house of Caroline date rose against the sky, and was in due course passed and left behind. "That," he observed, to entertain her, "is an interesting old place--one of the several seats which belonged to an ancient Norman family formerly of great influence in this county, the d'Urbervilles. I never pass one of their residences without thinking of them. There is something very sad in the extinction of a family of renown, even if it was fierce, domineering, feudal renown." "Yes," said Tess. They crept along towards a point in the expanse of shade just at hand at which a feeble light was beginning to assert its presence, a spot where, by day, a fitful white streak of steam at intervals upon the dark green background denoted intermittent moments of contact between their secluded world and modern life. Modern life stretched out its steam feeler to this point three or four times a day, touched the native existences, and quickly withdrew its feeler again, as if what it touched had been uncongenial. They reached the feeble light, which came from the smoky lamp of a little railway station; a poor enough terrestrial star, yet in one sense of more importance to Talbothays Dairy and mankind than the celestial ones to which it stood in such humiliating contrast. The cans of new milk were unladen in the rain, Tess getting a little shelter from a neighbouring holly tree. Then there was the hissing of a train, which drew up almost silently upon the wet rails, and the milk was rapidly swung can by can into the truck. The light of the engine flashed for a second upon Tess Durbeyfield's figure, motionless under the great holly tree. No object could have looked more foreign to the gleaming cranks and wheels than this unsophisticated girl, with the round bare arms, the rainy face and hair, the suspended attitude of a friendly leopard at pause, the print gown of no date or fashion, and the cotton bonnet drooping on her brow. She mounted again beside her lover, with a mute obedience characteristic of impassioned natures at times, and when they had wrapped themselves up over head and ears in the sailcloth again, they plunged back into the now thick night. Tess was so receptive that the few minutes of contact with the whirl of material progress lingered in her thought. "Londoners will drink it at their breakfasts to-morrow, won't they?" she asked. "Strange people that we have never seen." "Yes--I suppose they will. Though not as we send it. When its strength has been lowered, so that it may not get up into their heads." "Noble men and noble women, ambassadors and centurions, ladies and tradeswomen, and babies who have never seen a cow." "Well, yes; perhaps; particularly centurions." "Who don't know anything of us, and where it comes from; or think how we two drove miles across the moor to-night in the rain that it might reach 'em in time?" "We did not drive entirely on account of these precious Londoners; we drove a little on our own--on account of that anxious matter which you will, I am sure, set at rest, dear Tess. Now, permit me to put it in this way. You belong to me already, you know; your heart, I mean. Does it not?" "You know as well as I. O yes--yes!" "Then, if your heart does, why not your hand?" "My only reason was on account of you--on account of a question. I have something to tell you--" "But suppose it to be entirely for my happiness, and my worldly convenience also?" "O yes; if it is for your happiness and worldly convenience. But my life before I came here--I want--" "Well, it is for my convenience as well as my happiness. If I have a very large farm, either English or colonial, you will be invaluable as a wife to me; better than a woman out of the largest mansion in the country. So please--please, dear Tessy, disabuse your mind of the feeling that you will stand in my way." "But my history. I want you to know it--you must let me tell you--you will not like me so well!" "Tell it if you wish to, dearest. This precious history then. Yes, I was born at so and so, Anno Domini--" "I was born at Marlott," she said, catching at his words as a help, lightly as they were spoken. "And I grew up there. And I was in the Sixth Standard when I left school, and they said I had great aptness, and should make a good teacher, so it was settled that I should be one. But there was trouble in my family; father was not very industrious, and he drank a little." "Yes, yes. Poor child! Nothing new." He pressed her more closely to his side. "And then--there is something very unusual about it--about me. I--I was--" Tess's breath quickened. "Yes, dearest. Never mind." "I--I--am not a Durbeyfield, but a d'Urberville--a descendant of the same family as those that owned the old house we passed. And--we are all gone to nothing!" "A d'Urberville!--Indeed! And is that all the trouble, dear Tess?" "Yes," she answered faintly. "Well--why should I love you less after knowing this?" "I was told by the dairyman that you hated old families." He laughed. "Well, it is true, in one sense. I do hate the aristocratic principle of blood before everything, and do think that as reasoners the only pedigrees we ought to respect are those spiritual ones of the wise and virtuous, without regard to corporal paternity. But I am extremely interested in this news--you can have no idea how interested I am! Are you not interested yourself in being one of that well-known line?" "No. I have thought it sad--especially since coming here, and knowing that many of the hills and fields I see once belonged to my father's people. But other hills and field belonged to Retty's people, and perhaps others to Marian's, so that I don't value it particularly." "Yes--it is surprising how many of the present tillers of the soil were once owners of it, and I sometimes wonder that a certain school of politicians don't make capital of the circumstance; but they don't seem to know it... I wonder that I did not see the resemblance of your name to d'Urberville, and trace the manifest corruption. And this was the carking secret!" She had not told. At the last moment her courage had failed her; she feared his blame for not telling him sooner; and her instinct of self-preservation was stronger than her candour. "Of course," continued the unwitting Clare, "I should have been glad to know you to be descended exclusively from the long-suffering, dumb, unrecorded rank and file of the English nation, and not from the self-seeking few who made themselves powerful at the expense of the rest. But I am corrupted away from that by my affection for you, Tess (he laughed as he spoke), and made selfish likewise. For your own sake I rejoice in your descent. Society is hopelessly snobbish, and this fact of your extraction may make an appreciable difference to its acceptance of you as my wife, after I have made you the well-read woman that I mean to make you. My mother too, poor soul, will think so much better of you on account of it. Tess, you must spell your name correctly--d'Urberville--from this very day." "I like the other way rather best." "But you MUST, dearest! Good heavens, why dozens of mushroom millionaires would jump at such a possession! By the bye, there's one of that kidney who has taken the name--where have I heard of him?--Up in the neighbourhood of The Chase, I think. Why, he is the very man who had that rumpus with my father I told you of. What an odd coincidence!" "Angel, I think I would rather not take the name! It is unlucky, perhaps!" She was agitated. "Now then, Mistress Teresa d'Urberville, I have you. Take my name, and so you will escape yours! The secret is out, so why should you any longer refuse me?" "If it is SURE to make you happy to have me as your wife, and you feel that you do wish to marry me, VERY, VERY much--" "I do, dearest, of course!" "I mean, that it is only your wanting me very much, and being hardly able to keep alive without me, whatever my offences, that would make me feel I ought to say I will." "You will--you do say it, I know! You will be mine for ever and ever." He clasped her close and kissed her. "Yes!" She had no sooner said it than she burst into a dry hard sobbing, so violent that it seemed to rend her. Tess was not a hysterical girl by any means, and he was surprised. "Why do you cry, dearest?" "I can't tell--quite!--I am so glad to think--of being yours, and making you happy!" "But this does not seem very much like gladness, my Tessy!" "I mean--I cry because I have broken down in my vow! I said I would die unmarried!" "But, if you love me you would like me to be your husband?" "Yes, yes, yes! But O, I sometimes wish I had never been born!" "Now, my dear Tess, if I did not know that you are very much excited, and very inexperienced, I should say that remark was not very complimentary. How came you to wish that if you care for me? Do you care for me? I wish you would prove it in some way." "How can I prove it more than I have done?" she cried, in a distraction of tenderness. "Will this prove it more?" She clasped his neck, and for the first time Clare learnt what an impassioned woman's kisses were like upon the lips of one whom she loved with all her heart and soul, as Tess loved him. "There--now do you believe?" she asked, flushed, and wiping her eyes. "Yes. I never really doubted--never, never!" So they drove on through the gloom, forming one bundle inside the sail-cloth, the horse going as he would, and the rain driving against them. She had consented. She might as well have agreed at first. The "appetite for joy" which pervades all creation, that tremendous force which sways humanity to its purpose, as the tide sways the helpless weed, was not to be controlled by vague lucubrations over the social rubric. "I must write to my mother," she said. "You don't mind my doing that?" "Of course not, dear child. You are a child to me, Tess, not to know how very proper it is to write to your mother at such a time, and how wrong it would be in me to object. Where does she live?" "At the same place--Marlott. On the further side of Blackmoor Vale." "Ah, then I HAVE seen you before this summer--" "Yes; at that dance on the green; but you would not dance with me. O, I hope that is of no ill-omen for us now!"

Chapter XXX

https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase4-chapter25-34

Mrs. Crick arranges for Tess and Angel to be alone by asking them to deliver the milk in the very early morning. When Angel tells Tess they are passing near the ancestral home of the ancient d'Urbervilles family, she tells him that she herself is a descendent of the noble family. He is pleased and realizes that this will make her much more appealing to his family. Tess finally agrees to his proposal and tells him about her family. After she mentions the village of Marlott, Angel suddenly remembers her and that he did not ask her to be his partner in the May Day dance. Tess says "but you would not dance with me. Oh, I hope that will not be an ill omen to us now"

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/88.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_14_part_9.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 12.chapter 9

book 12, chapter 9

{"name": "book 12, Chapter 9", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section15/", "summary": "Psychology at Full Steam. The Galloping Troika. The Finale of the Prosecutor's Speech Kirrillovich exhorts the jury to punish Dmitri to defend the cause of justice in Russia, and to annihilate the perpetrator of the most hateful crime imaginable--the murder of a father by a son", "analysis": ""}

Chapter IX. The Galloping Troika. The End Of The Prosecutor's Speech. Ippolit Kirillovitch had chosen the historical method of exposition, beloved by all nervous orators, who find in its limitation a check on their own eager rhetoric. At this moment in his speech he went off into a dissertation on Grushenka's "first lover," and brought forward several interesting thoughts on this theme. "Karamazov, who had been frantically jealous of every one, collapsed, so to speak, and effaced himself at once before this first lover. What makes it all the more strange is that he seems to have hardly thought of this formidable rival. But he had looked upon him as a remote danger, and Karamazov always lives in the present. Possibly he regarded him as a fiction. But his wounded heart grasped instantly that the woman had been concealing this new rival and deceiving him, because he was anything but a fiction to her, because he was the one hope of her life. Grasping this instantly, he resigned himself. "Gentlemen of the jury, I cannot help dwelling on this unexpected trait in the prisoner's character. He suddenly evinces an irresistible desire for justice, a respect for woman and a recognition of her right to love. And all this at the very moment when he had stained his hands with his father's blood for her sake! It is true that the blood he had shed was already crying out for vengeance, for, after having ruined his soul and his life in this world, he was forced to ask himself at that same instant what he was and what he could be now to her, to that being, dearer to him than his own soul, in comparison with that former lover who had returned penitent, with new love, to the woman he had once betrayed, with honorable offers, with the promise of a reformed and happy life. And he, luckless man, what could he give her now, what could he offer her? "Karamazov felt all this, knew that all ways were barred to him by his crime and that he was a criminal under sentence, and not a man with life before him! This thought crushed him. And so he instantly flew to one frantic plan, which, to a man of Karamazov's character, must have appeared the one inevitable way out of his terrible position. That way out was suicide. He ran for the pistols he had left in pledge with his friend Perhotin and on the way, as he ran, he pulled out of his pocket the money, for the sake of which he had stained his hands with his father's gore. Oh, now he needed money more than ever. Karamazov would die, Karamazov would shoot himself and it should be remembered! To be sure, he was a poet and had burnt the candle at both ends all his life. 'To her, to her! and there, oh, there I will give a feast to the whole world, such as never was before, that will be remembered and talked of long after! In the midst of shouts of wild merriment, reckless gypsy songs and dances I shall raise the glass and drink to the woman I adore and her new-found happiness! And then, on the spot, at her feet, I shall dash out my brains before her and punish myself! She will remember Mitya Karamazov sometimes, she will see how Mitya loved her, she will feel for Mitya!' "Here we see in excess a love of effect, a romantic despair and sentimentality, and the wild recklessness of the Karamazovs. Yes, but there is something else, gentlemen of the jury, something that cries out in the soul, throbs incessantly in the mind, and poisons the heart unto death--that _something_ is conscience, gentlemen of the jury, its judgment, its terrible torments! The pistol will settle everything, the pistol is the only way out! But _beyond_--I don't know whether Karamazov wondered at that moment 'What lies beyond,' and whether Karamazov could, like Hamlet, wonder 'What lies beyond.' No, gentlemen of the jury, they have their Hamlets, but we still have our Karamazovs!" Here Ippolit Kirillovitch drew a minute picture of Mitya's preparations, the scene at Perhotin's, at the shop, with the drivers. He quoted numerous words and actions, confirmed by witnesses, and the picture made a terrible impression on the audience. The guilt of this harassed and desperate man stood out clear and convincing, when the facts were brought together. "What need had he of precaution? Two or three times he almost confessed, hinted at it, all but spoke out." (Then followed the evidence given by witnesses.) "He even cried out to the peasant who drove him, 'Do you know, you are driving a murderer!' But it was impossible for him to speak out, he had to get to Mokroe and there to finish his romance. But what was awaiting the luckless man? Almost from the first minute at Mokroe he saw that his invincible rival was perhaps by no means so invincible, that the toast to their new-found happiness was not desired and would not be acceptable. But you know the facts, gentlemen of the jury, from the preliminary inquiry. Karamazov's triumph over his rival was complete and his soul passed into quite a new phase, perhaps the most terrible phase through which his soul has passed or will pass. "One may say with certainty, gentlemen of the jury," the prosecutor continued, "that outraged nature and the criminal heart bring their own vengeance more completely than any earthly justice. What's more, justice and punishment on earth positively alleviate the punishment of nature and are, indeed, essential to the soul of the criminal at such moments, as its salvation from despair. For I cannot imagine the horror and moral suffering of Karamazov when he learnt that she loved him, that for his sake she had rejected her first lover, that she was summoning him, Mitya, to a new life, that she was promising him happiness--and when? When everything was over for him and nothing was possible! "By the way, I will note in parenthesis a point of importance for the light it throws on the prisoner's position at the moment. This woman, this love of his, had been till the last moment, till the very instant of his arrest, a being unattainable, passionately desired by him but unattainable. Yet why did he not shoot himself then, why did he relinquish his design and even forget where his pistol was? It was just that passionate desire for love and the hope of satisfying it that restrained him. Throughout their revels he kept close to his adored mistress, who was at the banquet with him and was more charming and fascinating to him than ever--he did not leave her side, abasing himself in his homage before her. "His passion might well, for a moment, stifle not only the fear of arrest, but even the torments of conscience. For a moment, oh, only for a moment! I can picture the state of mind of the criminal hopelessly enslaved by these influences--first, the influence of drink, of noise and excitement, of the thud of the dance and the scream of the song, and of her, flushed with wine, singing and dancing and laughing to him! Secondly, the hope in the background that the fatal end might still be far off, that not till next morning, at least, they would come and take him. So he had a few hours and that's much, very much! In a few hours one can think of many things. I imagine that he felt something like what criminals feel when they are being taken to the scaffold. They have another long, long street to pass down and at walking pace, past thousands of people. Then there will be a turning into another street and only at the end of that street the dread place of execution! I fancy that at the beginning of the journey the condemned man, sitting on his shameful cart, must feel that he has infinite life still before him. The houses recede, the cart moves on--oh, that's nothing, it's still far to the turning into the second street and he still looks boldly to right and to left at those thousands of callously curious people with their eyes fixed on him, and he still fancies that he is just such a man as they. But now the turning comes to the next street. Oh, that's nothing, nothing, there's still a whole street before him, and however many houses have been passed, he will still think there are many left. And so to the very end, to the very scaffold. "This I imagine is how it was with Karamazov then. 'They've not had time yet,' he must have thought, 'I may still find some way out, oh, there's still time to make some plan of defense, and now, now--she is so fascinating!' "His soul was full of confusion and dread, but he managed, however, to put aside half his money and hide it somewhere--I cannot otherwise explain the disappearance of quite half of the three thousand he had just taken from his father's pillow. He had been in Mokroe more than once before, he had caroused there for two days together already, he knew the old big house with all its passages and outbuildings. I imagine that part of the money was hidden in that house, not long before the arrest, in some crevice, under some floor, in some corner, under the roof. With what object? I shall be asked. Why, the catastrophe may take place at once, of course; he hadn't yet considered how to meet it, he hadn't the time, his head was throbbing and his heart was with _her_, but money--money was indispensable in any case! With money a man is always a man. Perhaps such foresight at such a moment may strike you as unnatural? But he assures us himself that a month before, at a critical and exciting moment, he had halved his money and sewn it up in a little bag. And though that was not true, as we shall prove directly, it shows the idea was a familiar one to Karamazov, he had contemplated it. What's more, when he declared at the inquiry that he had put fifteen hundred roubles in a bag (which never existed) he may have invented that little bag on the inspiration of the moment, because he had two hours before divided his money and hidden half of it at Mokroe till morning, in case of emergency, simply not to have it on himself. Two extremes, gentlemen of the jury, remember that Karamazov can contemplate two extremes and both at once. "We have looked in the house, but we haven't found the money. It may still be there or it may have disappeared next day and be in the prisoner's hands now. In any case he was at her side, on his knees before her, she was lying on the bed, he had his hands stretched out to her and he had so entirely forgotten everything that he did not even hear the men coming to arrest him. He hadn't time to prepare any line of defense in his mind. He was caught unawares and confronted with his judges, the arbiters of his destiny. "Gentlemen of the jury, there are moments in the execution of our duties when it is terrible for us to face a man, terrible on his account, too! The moments of contemplating that animal fear, when the criminal sees that all is lost, but still struggles, still means to struggle, the moments when every instinct of self-preservation rises up in him at once and he looks at you with questioning and suffering eyes, studies you, your face, your thoughts, uncertain on which side you will strike, and his distracted mind frames thousands of plans in an instant, but he is still afraid to speak, afraid of giving himself away! This purgatory of the spirit, this animal thirst for self-preservation, these humiliating moments of the human soul, are awful, and sometimes arouse horror and compassion for the criminal even in the lawyer. And this was what we all witnessed then. "At first he was thunderstruck and in his terror dropped some very compromising phrases. 'Blood! I've deserved it!' But he quickly restrained himself. He had not prepared what he was to say, what answer he was to make, he had nothing but a bare denial ready. 'I am not guilty of my father's death.' That was his fence for the moment and behind it he hoped to throw up a barricade of some sort. His first compromising exclamations he hastened to explain by declaring that he was responsible for the death of the servant Grigory only. 'Of that bloodshed I am guilty, but who has killed my father, gentlemen, who has killed him? Who can have killed him, _if not I_?' Do you hear, he asked us that, us, who had come to ask him that question! Do you hear that phrase uttered with such premature haste--'if not I'--the animal cunning, the naivete, the Karamazov impatience of it? 'I didn't kill him and you mustn't think I did! I wanted to kill him, gentlemen, I wanted to kill him,' he hastens to admit (he was in a hurry, in a terrible hurry), 'but still I am not guilty, it is not I murdered him.' He concedes to us that he wanted to murder him, as though to say, you can see for yourselves how truthful I am, so you'll believe all the sooner that I didn't murder him. Oh, in such cases the criminal is often amazingly shallow and credulous. "At that point one of the lawyers asked him, as it were incidentally, the most simple question, 'Wasn't it Smerdyakov killed him?' Then, as we expected, he was horribly angry at our having anticipated him and caught him unawares, before he had time to pave the way to choose and snatch the moment when it would be most natural to bring in Smerdyakov's name. He rushed at once to the other extreme, as he always does, and began to assure us that Smerdyakov could not have killed him, was not capable of it. But don't believe him, that was only his cunning; he didn't really give up the idea of Smerdyakov; on the contrary, he meant to bring him forward again; for, indeed, he had no one else to bring forward, but he would do that later, because for the moment that line was spoiled for him. He would bring him forward perhaps next day, or even a few days later, choosing an opportunity to cry out to us, 'You know I was more skeptical about Smerdyakov than you, you remember that yourselves, but now I am convinced. He killed him, he must have done!' And for the present he falls back upon a gloomy and irritable denial. Impatience and anger prompted him, however, to the most inept and incredible explanation of how he looked into his father's window and how he respectfully withdrew. The worst of it was that he was unaware of the position of affairs, of the evidence given by Grigory. "We proceeded to search him. The search angered, but encouraged him, the whole three thousand had not been found on him, only half of it. And no doubt only at that moment of angry silence, the fiction of the little bag first occurred to him. No doubt he was conscious himself of the improbability of the story and strove painfully to make it sound more likely, to weave it into a romance that would sound plausible. In such cases the first duty, the chief task of the investigating lawyers, is to prevent the criminal being prepared, to pounce upon him unexpectedly so that he may blurt out his cherished ideas in all their simplicity, improbability and inconsistency. The criminal can only be made to speak by the sudden and apparently incidental communication of some new fact, of some circumstance of great importance in the case, of which he had no previous idea and could not have foreseen. We had such a fact in readiness--that was Grigory's evidence about the open door through which the prisoner had run out. He had completely forgotten about that door and had not even suspected that Grigory could have seen it. "The effect of it was amazing. He leapt up and shouted to us, 'Then Smerdyakov murdered him, it was Smerdyakov!' and so betrayed the basis of the defense he was keeping back, and betrayed it in its most improbable shape, for Smerdyakov could only have committed the murder after he had knocked Grigory down and run away. When we told him that Grigory saw the door was open before he fell down, and had heard Smerdyakov behind the screen as he came out of his bedroom--Karamazov was positively crushed. My esteemed and witty colleague, Nikolay Parfenovitch, told me afterwards that he was almost moved to tears at the sight of him. And to improve matters, the prisoner hastened to tell us about the much-talked-of little bag--so be it, you shall hear this romance! "Gentlemen of the jury, I have told you already why I consider this romance not only an absurdity, but the most improbable invention that could have been brought forward in the circumstances. If one tried for a bet to invent the most unlikely story, one could hardly find anything more incredible. The worst of such stories is that the triumphant romancers can always be put to confusion and crushed by the very details in which real life is so rich and which these unhappy and involuntary story-tellers neglect as insignificant trifles. Oh, they have no thought to spare for such details, their minds are concentrated on their grand invention as a whole, and fancy any one daring to pull them up for a trifle! But that's how they are caught. The prisoner was asked the question, 'Where did you get the stuff for your little bag and who made it for you?' 'I made it myself.' 'And where did you get the linen?' The prisoner was positively offended, he thought it almost insulting to ask him such a trivial question, and would you believe it, his resentment was genuine! But they are all like that. 'I tore it off my shirt.' 'Then we shall find that shirt among your linen to-morrow, with a piece torn off.' And only fancy, gentlemen of the jury, if we really had found that torn shirt (and how could we have failed to find it in his chest of drawers or trunk?) that would have been a fact, a material fact in support of his statement! But he was incapable of that reflection. 'I don't remember, it may not have been off my shirt, I sewed it up in one of my landlady's caps.' 'What sort of a cap?' 'It was an old cotton rag of hers lying about.' 'And do you remember that clearly?' 'No, I don't.' And he was angry, very angry, and yet imagine not remembering it! At the most terrible moments of man's life, for instance when he is being led to execution, he remembers just such trifles. He will forget anything but some green roof that has flashed past him on the road, or a jackdaw on a cross--that he will remember. He concealed the making of that little bag from his household, he must have remembered his humiliating fear that some one might come in and find him needle in hand, how at the slightest sound he slipped behind the screen (there is a screen in his lodgings). "But, gentlemen of the jury, why do I tell you all this, all these details, trifles?" cried Ippolit Kirillovitch suddenly. "Just because the prisoner still persists in these absurdities to this moment. He has not explained anything since that fatal night two months ago, he has not added one actual illuminating fact to his former fantastic statements; all those are trivialities. 'You must believe it on my honor.' Oh, we are glad to believe it, we are eager to believe it, even if only on his word of honor! Are we jackals thirsting for human blood? Show us a single fact in the prisoner's favor and we shall rejoice; but let it be a substantial, real fact, and not a conclusion drawn from the prisoner's expression by his own brother, or that when he beat himself on the breast he must have meant to point to the little bag, in the darkness, too. We shall rejoice at the new fact, we shall be the first to repudiate our charge, we shall hasten to repudiate it. But now justice cries out and we persist, we cannot repudiate anything." Ippolit Kirillovitch passed to his final peroration. He looked as though he was in a fever, he spoke of the blood that cried for vengeance, the blood of the father murdered by his son, with the base motive of robbery! He pointed to the tragic and glaring consistency of the facts. "And whatever you may hear from the talented and celebrated counsel for the defense," Ippolit Kirillovitch could not resist adding, "whatever eloquent and touching appeals may be made to your sensibilities, remember that at this moment you are in a temple of justice. Remember that you are the champions of our justice, the champions of our holy Russia, of her principles, her family, everything that she holds sacred! Yes, you represent Russia here at this moment, and your verdict will be heard not in this hall only but will reecho throughout the whole of Russia, and all Russia will hear you, as her champions and her judges, and she will be encouraged or disheartened by your verdict. Do not disappoint Russia and her expectations. Our fatal troika dashes on in her headlong flight perhaps to destruction and in all Russia for long past men have stretched out imploring hands and called a halt to its furious reckless course. And if other nations stand aside from that troika that may be, not from respect, as the poet would fain believe, but simply from horror. From horror, perhaps from disgust. And well it is that they stand aside, but maybe they will cease one day to do so and will form a firm wall confronting the hurrying apparition and will check the frenzied rush of our lawlessness, for the sake of their own safety, enlightenment and civilization. Already we have heard voices of alarm from Europe, they already begin to sound. Do not tempt them! Do not heap up their growing hatred by a sentence justifying the murder of a father by his son!" Though Ippolit Kirillovitch was genuinely moved, he wound up his speech with this rhetorical appeal--and the effect produced by him was extraordinary. When he had finished his speech, he went out hurriedly and, as I have mentioned before, almost fainted in the adjoining room. There was no applause in the court, but serious persons were pleased. The ladies were not so well satisfied, though even they were pleased with his eloquence, especially as they had no apprehensions as to the upshot of the trial and had full trust in Fetyukovitch. "He will speak at last and of course carry all before him." Every one looked at Mitya; he sat silent through the whole of the prosecutor's speech, clenching his teeth, with his hands clasped, and his head bowed. Only from time to time he raised his head and listened, especially when Grushenka was spoken of. When the prosecutor mentioned Rakitin's opinion of her, a smile of contempt and anger passed over his face and he murmured rather audibly, "The Bernards!" When Ippolit Kirillovitch described how he had questioned and tortured him at Mokroe, Mitya raised his head and listened with intense curiosity. At one point he seemed about to jump up and cry out, but controlled himself and only shrugged his shoulders disdainfully. People talked afterwards of the end of the speech, of the prosecutor's feat in examining the prisoner at Mokroe, and jeered at Ippolit Kirillovitch. "The man could not resist boasting of his cleverness," they said. The court was adjourned, but only for a short interval, a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes at most. There was a hum of conversation and exclamations in the audience. I remember some of them. "A weighty speech," a gentleman in one group observed gravely. "He brought in too much psychology," said another voice. "But it was all true, the absolute truth!" "Yes, he is first rate at it." "He summed it all up." "Yes, he summed us up, too," chimed in another voice. "Do you remember, at the beginning of his speech, making out we were all like Fyodor Pavlovitch?" "And at the end, too. But that was all rot." "And obscure too." "He was a little too much carried away." "It's unjust, it's unjust." "No, it was smartly done, anyway. He's had long to wait, but he's had his say, ha ha!" "What will the counsel for the defense say?" In another group I heard: "He had no business to make a thrust at the Petersburg man like that; 'appealing to your sensibilities'--do you remember?" "Yes, that was awkward of him." "He was in too great a hurry." "He is a nervous man." "We laugh, but what must the prisoner be feeling?" "Yes, what must it be for Mitya?" In a third group: "What lady is that, the fat one, with the lorgnette, sitting at the end?" "She is a general's wife, divorced, I know her." "That's why she has the lorgnette." "She is not good for much." "Oh, no, she is a piquante little woman." "Two places beyond her there is a little fair woman, she is prettier." "They caught him smartly at Mokroe, didn't they, eh?" "Oh, it was smart enough. We've heard it before, how often he has told the story at people's houses!" "And he couldn't resist doing it now. That's vanity." "He is a man with a grievance, he he!" "Yes, and quick to take offense. And there was too much rhetoric, such long sentences." "Yes, he tries to alarm us, he kept trying to alarm us. Do you remember about the troika? Something about 'They have Hamlets, but we have, so far, only Karamazovs!' That was cleverly said!" "That was to propitiate the liberals. He is afraid of them." "Yes, and he is afraid of the lawyer, too." "Yes, what will Fetyukovitch say?" "Whatever he says, he won't get round our peasants." "Don't you think so?" A fourth group: "What he said about the troika was good, that piece about the other nations." "And that was true what he said about other nations not standing it." "What do you mean?" "Why, in the English Parliament a Member got up last week and speaking about the Nihilists asked the Ministry whether it was not high time to intervene, to educate this barbarous people. Ippolit was thinking of him, I know he was. He was talking about that last week." "Not an easy job." "Not an easy job? Why not?" "Why, we'd shut up Kronstadt and not let them have any corn. Where would they get it?" "In America. They get it from America now." "Nonsense!" But the bell rang, all rushed to their places. Fetyukovitch mounted the tribune.

book 12, Chapter 9

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section15/

Psychology at Full Steam. The Galloping Troika. The Finale of the Prosecutor's Speech Kirrillovich exhorts the jury to punish Dmitri to defend the cause of justice in Russia, and to annihilate the perpetrator of the most hateful crime imaginable--the murder of a father by a son

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/27.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Sense and Sensibility/section_26_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 27

chapter 27

{"name": "Chapter 27", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210421140324/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/sense-and-sensibility/summary/chapter-27", "summary": "Mrs. Jennings remarks casually that it's too bad the weather is so nice - it must be keeping anyone interested in hunting at home in the country. Marianne is heartened by this idea - after all, Willoughby loves to hunt, so maybe he's still home at Combe Magna. She's suddenly in a good mood. Elinor, hoping to distract Mrs. Jennings, says that surely Lady Middleton and Sir John will come by the end of the week. She silently observes that Marianne will doubtless write to Willoughby in the country. The ladies spend the morning visiting various friends of Mrs. Jennings's, and Marianne spends the whole time observing the weather. Elinor finds her sister's behavior both hilarious and worrying. Everything is quite pleasant in Mrs. Jennings' home, and the girls are fairly content, at least for now. Colonel Brandon comes to visit practically every day, and Elinor worries about how hard he's fallen for Marianne. He's obviously more in love with her than ever. After about a week of this, Willoughby shows up - unfortunately, he stops by when nobody's around, and leaves his calling card behind as proof of his visit. Marianne freaks out, and Elinor reassures her that he'll visit again the next day. However, the next morning, Marianne stays home, but nobody comes to visit. A note arrives, and Marianne rudely snatches it up. Unfortunately, it's not from Willoughby. The letter, which is actually for Mrs. Jennings, informs them that the Middletons have finally arrived. Lady Middleton invites them to dinner the next evening, as various things prevent them from visiting the Jennings abode themselves. Elinor persuades Marianne to go along, even though she'd rather stay home and wait for Willoughby to call. Sir John seems to be the same in town and in the country - as usual, he's invited a ton of people over for a raging party, including the Palmers, and a bunch of other folks. Mr. Palmer says a cursory and awkward hello. In general, the evening seems pretty disappointing, especially because Willoughby isn't there. When they arrive home, Mrs. Jennings lets slip the fact that Willoughby was invited to the party - but just didn't show. Marianne is shocked and hurt. She immediately writes another letter to him in the morning. Elinor writes to her mother, seeking help on the Willoughby front. Colonel Brandon shows up as soon as Elinor finishes her letter, and Marianne flees the room before he enters. Colonel Brandon is actually relieved to just find Elinor - apparently, he has something to tell her in private. He brings up the topic of Willoughby, commenting that it's a well-known fact that he and Marianne are engaged. Elinor assures him that it's not that well-known - after all, even she and her mother don't know it for sure. The colonel says that he's heard it from many people, including Mrs. Jennings, the Palmers, and the Middletons. He has come to see if the engagement is absolutely, 100% for sure or not. Elinor answers that she's not surprised by the rumors, though Marianne hasn't told her anything. Colonel Brandon simply wishes the couple the greatest happiness, and leaves without another word. Elinor is saddened by this conversation, but torn between her pity for Colonel Brandon, and her desire to see the whole Willoughby/Marianne issue resolved.", "analysis": ""}

"If this open weather holds much longer," said Mrs. Jennings, when they met at breakfast the following morning, "Sir John will not like leaving Barton next week; 'tis a sad thing for sportsmen to lose a day's pleasure. Poor souls! I always pity them when they do; they seem to take it so much to heart." "That is true," cried Marianne, in a cheerful voice, and walking to the window as she spoke, to examine the day. "I had not thought of that. This weather will keep many sportsmen in the country." It was a lucky recollection, all her good spirits were restored by it. "It is charming weather for THEM indeed," she continued, as she sat down to the breakfast table with a happy countenance. "How much they must enjoy it! But" (with a little return of anxiety) "it cannot be expected to last long. At this time of the year, and after such a series of rain, we shall certainly have very little more of it. Frosts will soon set in, and in all probability with severity. In another day or two perhaps; this extreme mildness can hardly last longer--nay, perhaps it may freeze tonight!" "At any rate," said Elinor, wishing to prevent Mrs. Jennings from seeing her sister's thoughts as clearly as she did, "I dare say we shall have Sir John and Lady Middleton in town by the end of next week." "Ay, my dear, I'll warrant you we do. Mary always has her own way." "And now," silently conjectured Elinor, "she will write to Combe by this day's post." But if she DID, the letter was written and sent away with a privacy which eluded all her watchfulness to ascertain the fact. Whatever the truth of it might be, and far as Elinor was from feeling thorough contentment about it, yet while she saw Marianne in spirits, she could not be very uncomfortable herself. And Marianne was in spirits; happy in the mildness of the weather, and still happier in her expectation of a frost. The morning was chiefly spent in leaving cards at the houses of Mrs. Jennings's acquaintance to inform them of her being in town; and Marianne was all the time busy in observing the direction of the wind, watching the variations of the sky and imagining an alteration in the air. "Don't you find it colder than it was in the morning, Elinor? There seems to me a very decided difference. I can hardly keep my hands warm even in my muff. It was not so yesterday, I think. The clouds seem parting too, the sun will be out in a moment, and we shall have a clear afternoon." Elinor was alternately diverted and pained; but Marianne persevered, and saw every night in the brightness of the fire, and every morning in the appearance of the atmosphere, the certain symptoms of approaching frost. The Miss Dashwoods had no greater reason to be dissatisfied with Mrs. Jennings's style of living, and set of acquaintance, than with her behaviour to themselves, which was invariably kind. Every thing in her household arrangements was conducted on the most liberal plan, and excepting a few old city friends, whom, to Lady Middleton's regret, she had never dropped, she visited no one to whom an introduction could at all discompose the feelings of her young companions. Pleased to find herself more comfortably situated in that particular than she had expected, Elinor was very willing to compound for the want of much real enjoyment from any of their evening parties, which, whether at home or abroad, formed only for cards, could have little to amuse her. Colonel Brandon, who had a general invitation to the house, was with them almost every day; he came to look at Marianne and talk to Elinor, who often derived more satisfaction from conversing with him than from any other daily occurrence, but who saw at the same time with much concern his continued regard for her sister. She feared it was a strengthening regard. It grieved her to see the earnestness with which he often watched Marianne, and his spirits were certainly worse than when at Barton. About a week after their arrival, it became certain that Willoughby was also arrived. His card was on the table when they came in from the morning's drive. "Good God!" cried Marianne, "he has been here while we were out." Elinor, rejoiced to be assured of his being in London, now ventured to say, "Depend upon it, he will call again tomorrow." But Marianne seemed hardly to hear her, and on Mrs. Jennings's entrance, escaped with the precious card. This event, while it raised the spirits of Elinor, restored to those of her sister all, and more than all, their former agitation. From this moment her mind was never quiet; the expectation of seeing him every hour of the day, made her unfit for any thing. She insisted on being left behind, the next morning, when the others went out. Elinor's thoughts were full of what might be passing in Berkeley Street during their absence; but a moment's glance at her sister when they returned was enough to inform her, that Willoughby had paid no second visit there. A note was just then brought in, and laid on the table. "For me!" cried Marianne, stepping hastily forward. "No, ma'am, for my mistress." But Marianne, not convinced, took it instantly up. "It is indeed for Mrs. Jennings; how provoking!" "You are expecting a letter, then?" said Elinor, unable to be longer silent. "Yes, a little--not much." After a short pause. "You have no confidence in me, Marianne." "Nay, Elinor, this reproach from YOU--you who have confidence in no one!" "Me!" returned Elinor in some confusion; "indeed, Marianne, I have nothing to tell." "Nor I," answered Marianne with energy, "our situations then are alike. We have neither of us any thing to tell; you, because you do not communicate, and I, because I conceal nothing." Elinor, distressed by this charge of reserve in herself, which she was not at liberty to do away, knew not how, under such circumstances, to press for greater openness in Marianne. Mrs. Jennings soon appeared, and the note being given her, she read it aloud. It was from Lady Middleton, announcing their arrival in Conduit Street the night before, and requesting the company of her mother and cousins the following evening. Business on Sir John's part, and a violent cold on her own, prevented their calling in Berkeley Street. The invitation was accepted; but when the hour of appointment drew near, necessary as it was in common civility to Mrs. Jennings, that they should both attend her on such a visit, Elinor had some difficulty in persuading her sister to go, for still she had seen nothing of Willoughby; and therefore was not more indisposed for amusement abroad, than unwilling to run the risk of his calling again in her absence. Elinor found, when the evening was over, that disposition is not materially altered by a change of abode, for although scarcely settled in town, Sir John had contrived to collect around him, nearly twenty young people, and to amuse them with a ball. This was an affair, however, of which Lady Middleton did not approve. In the country, an unpremeditated dance was very allowable; but in London, where the reputation of elegance was more important and less easily attained, it was risking too much for the gratification of a few girls, to have it known that Lady Middleton had given a small dance of eight or nine couple, with two violins, and a mere side-board collation. Mr. and Mrs. Palmer were of the party; from the former, whom they had not seen before since their arrival in town, as he was careful to avoid the appearance of any attention to his mother-in-law, and therefore never came near her, they received no mark of recognition on their entrance. He looked at them slightly, without seeming to know who they were, and merely nodded to Mrs. Jennings from the other side of the room. Marianne gave one glance round the apartment as she entered: it was enough--HE was not there--and she sat down, equally ill-disposed to receive or communicate pleasure. After they had been assembled about an hour, Mr. Palmer sauntered towards the Miss Dashwoods to express his surprise on seeing them in town, though Colonel Brandon had been first informed of their arrival at his house, and he had himself said something very droll on hearing that they were to come. "I thought you were both in Devonshire," said he. "Did you?" replied Elinor. "When do you go back again?" "I do not know." And thus ended their discourse. Never had Marianne been so unwilling to dance in her life, as she was that evening, and never so much fatigued by the exercise. She complained of it as they returned to Berkeley Street. "Aye, aye," said Mrs. Jennings, "we know the reason of all that very well; if a certain person who shall be nameless, had been there, you would not have been a bit tired: and to say the truth it was not very pretty of him not to give you the meeting when he was invited." "Invited!" cried Marianne. "So my daughter Middleton told me, for it seems Sir John met him somewhere in the street this morning." Marianne said no more, but looked exceedingly hurt. Impatient in this situation to be doing something that might lead to her sister's relief, Elinor resolved to write the next morning to her mother, and hoped by awakening her fears for the health of Marianne, to procure those inquiries which had been so long delayed; and she was still more eagerly bent on this measure by perceiving after breakfast on the morrow, that Marianne was again writing to Willoughby, for she could not suppose it to be to any other person. About the middle of the day, Mrs. Jennings went out by herself on business, and Elinor began her letter directly, while Marianne, too restless for employment, too anxious for conversation, walked from one window to the other, or sat down by the fire in melancholy meditation. Elinor was very earnest in her application to her mother, relating all that had passed, her suspicions of Willoughby's inconstancy, urging her by every plea of duty and affection to demand from Marianne an account of her real situation with respect to him. Her letter was scarcely finished, when a rap foretold a visitor, and Colonel Brandon was announced. Marianne, who had seen him from the window, and who hated company of any kind, left the room before he entered it. He looked more than usually grave, and though expressing satisfaction at finding Miss Dashwood alone, as if he had somewhat in particular to tell her, sat for some time without saying a word. Elinor, persuaded that he had some communication to make in which her sister was concerned, impatiently expected its opening. It was not the first time of her feeling the same kind of conviction; for, more than once before, beginning with the observation of "your sister looks unwell to-day," or "your sister seems out of spirits," he had appeared on the point, either of disclosing, or of inquiring, something particular about her. After a pause of several minutes, their silence was broken, by his asking her in a voice of some agitation, when he was to congratulate her on the acquisition of a brother? Elinor was not prepared for such a question, and having no answer ready, was obliged to adopt the simple and common expedient, of asking what he meant? He tried to smile as he replied, "your sister's engagement to Mr. Willoughby is very generally known." "It cannot be generally known," returned Elinor, "for her own family do not know it." He looked surprised and said, "I beg your pardon, I am afraid my inquiry has been impertinent; but I had not supposed any secrecy intended, as they openly correspond, and their marriage is universally talked of." "How can that be? By whom can you have heard it mentioned?" "By many--by some of whom you know nothing, by others with whom you are most intimate, Mrs. Jennings, Mrs. Palmer, and the Middletons. But still I might not have believed it, for where the mind is perhaps rather unwilling to be convinced, it will always find something to support its doubts, if I had not, when the servant let me in today, accidentally seen a letter in his hand, directed to Mr. Willoughby in your sister's writing. I came to inquire, but I was convinced before I could ask the question. Is every thing finally settled? Is it impossible to-? But I have no right, and I could have no chance of succeeding. Excuse me, Miss Dashwood. I believe I have been wrong in saying so much, but I hardly know what to do, and on your prudence I have the strongest dependence. Tell me that it is all absolutely resolved on, that any attempt, that in short concealment, if concealment be possible, is all that remains." These words, which conveyed to Elinor a direct avowal of his love for her sister, affected her very much. She was not immediately able to say anything, and even when her spirits were recovered, she debated for a short time, on the answer it would be most proper to give. The real state of things between Willoughby and her sister was so little known to herself, that in endeavouring to explain it, she might be as liable to say too much as too little. Yet as she was convinced that Marianne's affection for Willoughby, could leave no hope of Colonel Brandon's success, whatever the event of that affection might be, and at the same time wished to shield her conduct from censure, she thought it most prudent and kind, after some consideration, to say more than she really knew or believed. She acknowledged, therefore, that though she had never been informed by themselves of the terms on which they stood with each other, of their mutual affection she had no doubt, and of their correspondence she was not astonished to hear. He listened to her with silent attention, and on her ceasing to speak, rose directly from his seat, and after saying in a voice of emotion, "to your sister I wish all imaginable happiness; to Willoughby that he may endeavour to deserve her,"--took leave, and went away. Elinor derived no comfortable feelings from this conversation, to lessen the uneasiness of her mind on other points; she was left, on the contrary, with a melancholy impression of Colonel Brandon's unhappiness, and was prevented even from wishing it removed, by her anxiety for the very event that must confirm it.

Chapter 27

https://web.archive.org/web/20210421140324/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/sense-and-sensibility/summary/chapter-27

Mrs. Jennings remarks casually that it's too bad the weather is so nice - it must be keeping anyone interested in hunting at home in the country. Marianne is heartened by this idea - after all, Willoughby loves to hunt, so maybe he's still home at Combe Magna. She's suddenly in a good mood. Elinor, hoping to distract Mrs. Jennings, says that surely Lady Middleton and Sir John will come by the end of the week. She silently observes that Marianne will doubtless write to Willoughby in the country. The ladies spend the morning visiting various friends of Mrs. Jennings's, and Marianne spends the whole time observing the weather. Elinor finds her sister's behavior both hilarious and worrying. Everything is quite pleasant in Mrs. Jennings' home, and the girls are fairly content, at least for now. Colonel Brandon comes to visit practically every day, and Elinor worries about how hard he's fallen for Marianne. He's obviously more in love with her than ever. After about a week of this, Willoughby shows up - unfortunately, he stops by when nobody's around, and leaves his calling card behind as proof of his visit. Marianne freaks out, and Elinor reassures her that he'll visit again the next day. However, the next morning, Marianne stays home, but nobody comes to visit. A note arrives, and Marianne rudely snatches it up. Unfortunately, it's not from Willoughby. The letter, which is actually for Mrs. Jennings, informs them that the Middletons have finally arrived. Lady Middleton invites them to dinner the next evening, as various things prevent them from visiting the Jennings abode themselves. Elinor persuades Marianne to go along, even though she'd rather stay home and wait for Willoughby to call. Sir John seems to be the same in town and in the country - as usual, he's invited a ton of people over for a raging party, including the Palmers, and a bunch of other folks. Mr. Palmer says a cursory and awkward hello. In general, the evening seems pretty disappointing, especially because Willoughby isn't there. When they arrive home, Mrs. Jennings lets slip the fact that Willoughby was invited to the party - but just didn't show. Marianne is shocked and hurt. She immediately writes another letter to him in the morning. Elinor writes to her mother, seeking help on the Willoughby front. Colonel Brandon shows up as soon as Elinor finishes her letter, and Marianne flees the room before he enters. Colonel Brandon is actually relieved to just find Elinor - apparently, he has something to tell her in private. He brings up the topic of Willoughby, commenting that it's a well-known fact that he and Marianne are engaged. Elinor assures him that it's not that well-known - after all, even she and her mother don't know it for sure. The colonel says that he's heard it from many people, including Mrs. Jennings, the Palmers, and the Middletons. He has come to see if the engagement is absolutely, 100% for sure or not. Elinor answers that she's not surprised by the rumors, though Marianne hasn't told her anything. Colonel Brandon simply wishes the couple the greatest happiness, and leaves without another word. Elinor is saddened by this conversation, but torn between her pity for Colonel Brandon, and her desire to see the whole Willoughby/Marianne issue resolved.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/16.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Prince/section_14_part_0.txt

The Prince.chapter 16

chapter 16

{"name": "Chapter 16", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201108110625/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-prince/summary-and-analysis/chapter-16", "summary": "A reputation for generosity is thought to be desirable, but developing it can be dangerous. Generosity exercised in truly virtuous ways is never seen by others, so if you want to be thought of as a generous ruler, you must keep up a lavish public display. To support this habit, a prince must raise taxes and squeeze money from his subjects. Generosity of this sort benefits few and harms many. The prince's subjects will hate him, and no one will respect him because he is poor. Therefore, a wise prince will not mind being called a miser, because stinginess is a vice that allows him to reign. If a prince is giving away other people's property, he can afford to be generous, but if he is giving away his own resources, he will become grasping and hated or poor and despised.", "analysis": "After teasing the reader with shocking revelations in Chapter 15, Machiavelli comes away sounding thoroughly conservative in this chapter, discussing the supposed virtue of generosity. His focus is on the appearance of generosity and what one must do to develop one's public image. True generosity, he notes, would not get a prince a reputation for being generous, because no one would see it. This is an important distinction. Machiavelli does not say that true generosity is bad. What concerns him is the kind of forced display that a prince must put on to develop a public image as a generous man. Supporting lavish displays eventually makes a prince poor, forcing him to exploit his subjects' resources. This does real harm to everyone, including the prince. Thus the supposed virtue is no virtue at all. He does qualify this observation by saying that new princes who are trying to gain power must be seen to be generous, but after they have power, they should immediately curtail their spending. He offers good examples: Both Louis XII of France and Ferdinand of Spain were noted for their thrifty habits, and both were energetic conquerors. On the subject of conquerors, Machiavelli makes the interesting observation that because armies live off looting and extortion, a leader of armies had better be generous or his soldiers may decide to leave. According to Machiavelli, this is desirable, because the property involved is not the prince's or his subjects', and therefore the integrity of the state is not harmed. Glossary Caesar Julius Caesar had a reputation for generosity that contributed to his popularity. He was assassinated in 44 B.C., only a year after his triumphal return to Rome from a series of military victories."}

Commencing then with the first of the above-named characteristics, I say that it would be well to be reputed liberal. Nevertheless, liberality exercised in a way that does not bring you the reputation for it, injures you; for if one exercises it honestly and as it should be exercised, it may not become known, and you will not avoid the reproach of its opposite. Therefore, any one wishing to maintain among men the name of liberal is obliged to avoid no attribute of magnificence; so that a prince thus inclined will consume in such acts all his property, and will be compelled in the end, if he wish to maintain the name of liberal, to unduly weigh down his people, and tax them, and do everything he can to get money. This will soon make him odious to his subjects, and becoming poor he will be little valued by any one; thus, with his liberality, having offended many and rewarded few, he is affected by the very first trouble and imperilled by whatever may be the first danger; recognizing this himself, and wishing to draw back from it, he runs at once into the reproach of being miserly. Therefore, a prince, not being able to exercise this virtue of liberality in such a way that it is recognized, except to his cost, if he is wise he ought not to fear the reputation of being mean, for in time he will come to be more considered than if liberal, seeing that with his economy his revenues are enough, that he can defend himself against all attacks, and is able to engage in enterprises without burdening his people; thus it comes to pass that he exercises liberality towards all from whom he does not take, who are numberless, and meanness towards those to whom he does not give, who are few. We have not seen great things done in our time except by those who have been considered mean; the rest have failed. Pope Julius the Second was assisted in reaching the papacy by a reputation for liberality, yet he did not strive afterwards to keep it up, when he made war on the King of France; and he made many wars without imposing any extraordinary tax on his subjects, for he supplied his additional expenses out of his long thriftiness. The present King of Spain would not have undertaken or conquered in so many enterprises if he had been reputed liberal. A prince, therefore, provided that he has not to rob his subjects, that he can defend himself, that he does not become poor and abject, that he is not forced to become rapacious, ought to hold of little account a reputation for being mean, for it is one of those vices which will enable him to govern. And if any one should say: Caesar obtained empire by liberality, and many others have reached the highest positions by having been liberal, and by being considered so, I answer: Either you are a prince in fact, or in a way to become one. In the first case this liberality is dangerous, in the second it is very necessary to be considered liberal; and Caesar was one of those who wished to become pre-eminent in Rome; but if he had survived after becoming so, and had not moderated his expenses, he would have destroyed his government. And if any one should reply: Many have been princes, and have done great things with armies, who have been considered very liberal, I reply: Either a prince spends that which is his own or his subjects' or else that of others. In the first case he ought to be sparing, in the second he ought not to neglect any opportunity for liberality. And to the prince who goes forth with his army, supporting it by pillage, sack, and extortion, handling that which belongs to others, this liberality is necessary, otherwise he would not be followed by soldiers. And of that which is neither yours nor your subjects' you can be a ready giver, as were Cyrus, Caesar, and Alexander; because it does not take away your reputation if you squander that of others, but adds to it; it is only squandering your own that injures you. And there is nothing wastes so rapidly as liberality, for even whilst you exercise it you lose the power to do so, and so become either poor or despised, or else, in avoiding poverty, rapacious and hated. And a prince should guard himself, above all things, against being despised and hated; and liberality leads you to both. Therefore it is wiser to have a reputation for meanness which brings reproach without hatred, than to be compelled through seeking a reputation for liberality to incur a name for rapacity which begets reproach with hatred.

Chapter 16

https://web.archive.org/web/20201108110625/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-prince/summary-and-analysis/chapter-16

A reputation for generosity is thought to be desirable, but developing it can be dangerous. Generosity exercised in truly virtuous ways is never seen by others, so if you want to be thought of as a generous ruler, you must keep up a lavish public display. To support this habit, a prince must raise taxes and squeeze money from his subjects. Generosity of this sort benefits few and harms many. The prince's subjects will hate him, and no one will respect him because he is poor. Therefore, a wise prince will not mind being called a miser, because stinginess is a vice that allows him to reign. If a prince is giving away other people's property, he can afford to be generous, but if he is giving away his own resources, he will become grasping and hated or poor and despised.

After teasing the reader with shocking revelations in Chapter 15, Machiavelli comes away sounding thoroughly conservative in this chapter, discussing the supposed virtue of generosity. His focus is on the appearance of generosity and what one must do to develop one's public image. True generosity, he notes, would not get a prince a reputation for being generous, because no one would see it. This is an important distinction. Machiavelli does not say that true generosity is bad. What concerns him is the kind of forced display that a prince must put on to develop a public image as a generous man. Supporting lavish displays eventually makes a prince poor, forcing him to exploit his subjects' resources. This does real harm to everyone, including the prince. Thus the supposed virtue is no virtue at all. He does qualify this observation by saying that new princes who are trying to gain power must be seen to be generous, but after they have power, they should immediately curtail their spending. He offers good examples: Both Louis XII of France and Ferdinand of Spain were noted for their thrifty habits, and both were energetic conquerors. On the subject of conquerors, Machiavelli makes the interesting observation that because armies live off looting and extortion, a leader of armies had better be generous or his soldiers may decide to leave. According to Machiavelli, this is desirable, because the property involved is not the prince's or his subjects', and therefore the integrity of the state is not harmed. Glossary Caesar Julius Caesar had a reputation for generosity that contributed to his popularity. He was assassinated in 44 B.C., only a year after his triumphal return to Rome from a series of military victories.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/46.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_44_part_0.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 45

chapter 45

{"name": "Phase VI: \"The Convert,\" Chapter Forty-Five", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210424232301/http://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary/chapter-45", "summary": "Tess is rooted to the spot: she hasn't seen or heard from Alec since she left Trantridge four years before, and here he is, clearly a convert, giving a rabble-rousing sermon in the village square about how sinful he used to be. She's unconvinced of his sincerity, and then wonders if maybe it could be true. It wouldn't be the first time. But then she moves to leave, and he sees her. He's momentarily distracted by her beauty, and Tess walks away quickly. After a while, he comes up behind her on the road. He says that he followed after her to see what he could do for her, since he had done such horrible things to her before. Her appearance had distracted him, it's true, but God had helped him through it to finish his sermon. Tess asks how he came to become a preacher. Alec tells her about this great, earnest minister named Mr. Clare... Yes, Tess tells him, she's heard of him somewhere. Alec starts to tell her about his sudden conversion, but Tess doesn't believe in sudden conversions. It's too quick, she argues--and it's unfair for people like him to make other people miserable, and then to decide it's time to start thinking about getting right with God. Alec is miffed, and asks why she doesn't believe in conversions like that. Tess says it's because \"a better man\" than he is doesn't believe in them. She means Angel, of course, but she doesn't tell Alec whom she means. Alec doesn't say much in response, but, after staring at Tess, asks her to put her veil down--her beauty is just blinding, and he doesn't want to relapse into his old wicked ways. They walk on along the road together, and Alec asks Tess about what's happened to her over the last four years. Tess tells him the only thing that related at all to him--that she'd had his baby, and that it had died. Alec is shocked that she hadn't told him sooner. As they're about to part ways, he makes her swear never to \"tempt\" him with her womanly wiles. As if she'd want to, she says, but she promises anyway. She walks along back towards the farm, and comes along a young woman talking with a young man --the man is clearly hitting on the woman, and the woman is less enthusiastic about it than the guy is. The woman turns out to be Izz Huett; the man is someone she knows from home, who has followed her out here because he's been in love with her for the last couple of years. Izz still isn't over her crush on Angel, though, so she doesn't really answer the man's proposals one way or the other.", "analysis": ""}

Till this moment she had never seen or heard from d'Urberville since her departure from Trantridge. The rencounter came at a heavy moment, one of all moments calculated to permit its impact with the least emotional shock. But such was unreasoning memory that, though he stood there openly and palpably a converted man, who was sorrowing for his past irregularities, a fear overcame her, paralyzing her movement so that she neither retreated nor advanced. To think of what emanated from that countenance when she saw it last, and to behold it now! ... There was the same handsome unpleasantness of mien, but now he wore neatly trimmed, old-fashioned whiskers, the sable moustache having disappeared; and his dress was half-clerical, a modification which had changed his expression sufficiently to abstract the dandyism from his features, and to hinder for a second her belief in his identity. To Tess's sense there was, just at first, a ghastly _bizarrerie_, a grim incongruity, in the march of these solemn words of Scripture out of such a mouth. This too familiar intonation, less than four years earlier, had brought to her ears expressions of such divergent purpose that her heart became quite sick at the irony of the contrast. It was less a reform than a transfiguration. The former curves of sensuousness were now modulated to lines of devotional passion. The lip-shapes that had meant seductiveness were now made to express supplication; the glow on the cheek that yesterday could be translated as riotousness was evangelized to-day into the splendour of pious rhetoric; animalism had become fanaticism; Paganism, Paulinism; the bold rolling eye that had flashed upon her form in the old time with such mastery now beamed with the rude energy of a theolatry that was almost ferocious. Those black angularities which his face had used to put on when his wishes were thwarted now did duty in picturing the incorrigible backslider who would insist upon turning again to his wallowing in the mire. The lineaments, as such, seemed to complain. They had been diverted from their hereditary connotation to signify impressions for which Nature did not intend them. Strange that their very elevation was a misapplication, that to raise seemed to falsify. Yet could it be so? She would admit the ungenerous sentiment no longer. D'Urberville was not the first wicked man who had turned away from his wickedness to save his soul alive, and why should she deem it unnatural in him? It was but the usage of thought which had been jarred in her at hearing good new words in bad old notes. The greater the sinner, the greater the saint; it was not necessary to dive far into Christian history to discover that. Such impressions as these moved her vaguely, and without strict definiteness. As soon as the nerveless pause of her surprise would allow her to stir, her impulse was to pass on out of his sight. He had obviously not discerned her yet in her position against the sun. But the moment that she moved again he recognized her. The effect upon her old lover was electric, far stronger than the effect of his presence upon her. His fire, the tumultuous ring of his eloquence, seemed to go out of him. His lip struggled and trembled under the words that lay upon it; but deliver them it could not as long as she faced him. His eyes, after their first glance upon her face, hung confusedly in every other direction but hers, but came back in a desperate leap every few seconds. This paralysis lasted, however, but a short time; for Tess's energies returned with the atrophy of his, and she walked as fast as she was able past the barn and onward. As soon as she could reflect, it appalled her, this change in their relative platforms. He who had wrought her undoing was now on the side of the Spirit, while she remained unregenerate. And, as in the legend, it had resulted that her Cyprian image had suddenly appeared upon his altar, whereby the fire of the priest had been well nigh extinguished. She went on without turning her head. Her back seemed to be endowed with a sensitiveness to ocular beams--even her clothing--so alive was she to a fancied gaze which might be resting upon her from the outside of that barn. All the way along to this point her heart had been heavy with an inactive sorrow; now there was a change in the quality of its trouble. That hunger for affection too long withheld was for the time displaced by an almost physical sense of an implacable past which still engirdled her. It intensified her consciousness of error to a practical despair; the break of continuity between her earlier and present existence, which she had hoped for, had not, after all, taken place. Bygones would never be complete bygones till she was a bygone herself. Thus absorbed, she recrossed the northern part of Long-Ash Lane at right angles, and presently saw before her the road ascending whitely to the upland along whose margin the remainder of her journey lay. Its dry pale surface stretched severely onward, unbroken by a single figure, vehicle, or mark, save some occasional brown horse-droppings which dotted its cold aridity here and there. While slowly breasting this ascent Tess became conscious of footsteps behind her, and turning she saw approaching that well-known form--so strangely accoutred as the Methodist--the one personage in all the world she wished not to encounter alone on this side of the grave. There was not much time, however, for thought or elusion, and she yielded as calmly as she could to the necessity of letting him overtake her. She saw that he was excited, less by the speed of his walk than by the feelings within him. "Tess!" he said. She slackened speed without looking round. "Tess!" he repeated. "It is I--Alec d'Urberville." She then looked back at him, and he came up. "I see it is," she answered coldly. "Well--is that all? Yet I deserve no more! Of course," he added, with a slight laugh, "there is something of the ridiculous to your eyes in seeing me like this. But--I must put up with that. ... I heard you had gone away; nobody knew where. Tess, you wonder why I have followed you?" "I do, rather; and I would that you had not, with all my heart!" "Yes--you may well say it," he returned grimly, as they moved onward together, she with unwilling tread. "But don't mistake me; I beg this because you may have been led to do so in noticing--if you did notice it--how your sudden appearance unnerved me down there. It was but a momentary faltering; and considering what you have been to me, it was natural enough. But will helped me through it--though perhaps you think me a humbug for saying it--and immediately afterwards I felt that of all persons in the world whom it was my duty and desire to save from the wrath to come--sneer if you like--the woman whom I had so grievously wronged was that person. I have come with that sole purpose in view--nothing more." There was the smallest vein of scorn in her words of rejoinder: "Have you saved yourself? Charity begins at home, they say." "_I_ have done nothing!" said he indifferently. "Heaven, as I have been telling my hearers, has done all. No amount of contempt that you can pour upon me, Tess, will equal what I have poured upon myself--the old Adam of my former years! Well, it is a strange story; believe it or not; but I can tell you the means by which my conversion was brought about, and I hope you will be interested enough at least to listen. Have you ever heard the name of the parson of Emminster--you must have done do?--old Mr Clare; one of the most earnest of his school; one of the few intense men left in the Church; not so intense as the extreme wing of Christian believers with which I have thrown in my lot, but quite an exception among the Established clergy, the younger of whom are gradually attenuating the true doctrines by their sophistries, till they are but the shadow of what they were. I only differ from him on the question of Church and State--the interpretation of the text, 'Come out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord'--that's all. He is one who, I firmly believe, has been the humble means of saving more souls in this country than any other man you can name. You have heard of him?" "I have," she said. "He came to Trantridge two or three years ago to preach on behalf of some missionary society; and I, wretched fellow that I was, insulted him when, in his disinterestedness, he tried to reason with me and show me the way. He did not resent my conduct, he simply said that some day I should receive the first-fruits of the Spirit--that those who came to scoff sometimes remained to pray. There was a strange magic in his words. They sank into my mind. But the loss of my mother hit me most; and by degrees I was brought to see daylight. Since then my one desire has been to hand on the true view to others, and that is what I was trying to do to-day; though it is only lately that I have preached hereabout. The first months of my ministry have been spent in the North of England among strangers, where I preferred to make my earliest clumsy attempts, so as to acquire courage before undergoing that severest of all tests of one's sincerity, addressing those who have known one, and have been one's companions in the days of darkness. If you could only know, Tess, the pleasure of having a good slap at yourself, I am sure--" "Don't go on with it!" she cried passionately, as she turned away from him to a stile by the wayside, on which she bent herself. "I can't believe in such sudden things! I feel indignant with you for talking to me like this, when you know--when you know what harm you've done me! You, and those like you, take your fill of pleasure on earth by making the life of such as me bitter and black with sorrow; and then it is a fine thing, when you have had enough of that, to think of securing your pleasure in heaven by becoming converted! Out upon such--I don't believe in you--I hate it!" "Tess," he insisted; "don't speak so! It came to me like a jolly new idea! And you don't believe me? What don't you believe?" "Your conversion. Your scheme of religion." "Why?" She dropped her voice. "Because a better man than you does not believe in such." "What a woman's reason! Who is this better man?" "I cannot tell you." "Well," he declared, a resentment beneath his words seeming ready to spring out at a moment's notice, "God forbid that I should say I am a good man--and you know I don't say any such thing. I am new to goodness, truly; but newcomers see furthest sometimes." "Yes," she replied sadly. "But I cannot believe in your conversion to a new spirit. Such flashes as you feel, Alec, I fear don't last!" Thus speaking she turned from the stile over which she had been leaning, and faced him; whereupon his eyes, falling casually upon the familiar countenance and form, remained contemplating her. The inferior man was quiet in him now; but it was surely not extracted, nor even entirely subdued. "Don't look at me like that!" he said abruptly. Tess, who had been quite unconscious of her action and mien, instantly withdrew the large dark gaze of her eyes, stammering with a flush, "I beg your pardon!" And there was revived in her the wretched sentiment which had often come to her before, that in inhabiting the fleshly tabernacle with which Nature had endowed her she was somehow doing wrong. "No, no! Don't beg my pardon. But since you wear a veil to hide your good looks, why don't you keep it down?" She pulled down the veil, saying hastily, "It was mostly to keep off the wind." "It may seem harsh of me to dictate like this," he went on; "but it is better that I should not look too often on you. It might be dangerous." "Ssh!" said Tess. "Well, women's faces have had too much power over me already for me not to fear them! An evangelist has nothing to do with such as they; and it reminds me of the old times that I would forget!" After this their conversation dwindled to a casual remark now and then as they rambled onward, Tess inwardly wondering how far he was going with her, and not liking to send him back by positive mandate. Frequently when they came to a gate or stile they found painted thereon in red or blue letters some text of Scripture, and she asked him if he knew who had been at the pains to blazon these announcements. He told her that the man was employed by himself and others who were working with him in that district, to paint these reminders that no means might be left untried which might move the hearts of a wicked generation. At length the road touched the spot called "Cross-in-Hand." Of all spots on the bleached and desolate upland this was the most forlorn. It was so far removed from the charm which is sought in landscape by artists and view-lovers as to reach a new kind of beauty, a negative beauty of tragic tone. The place took its name from a stone pillar which stood there, a strange rude monolith, from a stratum unknown in any local quarry, on which was roughly carved a human hand. Differing accounts were given of its history and purport. Some authorities stated that a devotional cross had once formed the complete erection thereon, of which the present relic was but the stump; others that the stone as it stood was entire, and that it had been fixed there to mark a boundary or place of meeting. Anyhow, whatever the origin of the relic, there was and is something sinister, or solemn, according to mood, in the scene amid which it stands; something tending to impress the most phlegmatic passer-by. "I think I must leave you now," he remarked, as they drew near to this spot. "I have to preach at Abbot's-Cernel at six this evening, and my way lies across to the right from here. And you upset me somewhat too, Tessy--I cannot, will not, say why. I must go away and get strength. ... How is it that you speak so fluently now? Who has taught you such good English?" "I have learnt things in my troubles," she said evasively. "What troubles have you had?" She told him of the first one--the only one that related to him. D'Urberville was struck mute. "I knew nothing of this till now!" he next murmured. "Why didn't you write to me when you felt your trouble coming on?" She did not reply; and he broke the silence by adding: "Well--you will see me again." "No," she answered. "Do not again come near me!" "I will think. But before we part come here." He stepped up to the pillar. "This was once a Holy Cross. Relics are not in my creed; but I fear you at moments--far more than you need fear me at present; and to lessen my fear, put your hand upon that stone hand, and swear that you will never tempt me--by your charms or ways." "Good God--how can you ask what is so unnecessary! All that is furthest from my thought!" "Yes--but swear it." Tess, half frightened, gave way to his importunity; placed her hand upon the stone and swore. "I am sorry you are not a believer," he continued; "that some unbeliever should have got hold of you and unsettled your mind. But no more now. At home at least I can pray for you; and I will; and who knows what may not happen? I'm off. Goodbye!" He turned to a hunting-gate in the hedge and, without letting his eyes again rest upon her, leapt over and struck out across the down in the direction of Abbot's-Cernel. As he walked his pace showed perturbation, and by-and-by, as if instigated by a former thought, he drew from his pocket a small book, between the leaves of which was folded a letter, worn and soiled, as from much re-reading. D'Urberville opened the letter. It was dated several months before this time, and was signed by Parson Clare. The letter began by expressing the writer's unfeigned joy at d'Urberville's conversion, and thanked him for his kindness in communicating with the parson on the subject. It expressed Mr Clare's warm assurance of forgiveness for d'Urberville's former conduct and his interest in the young man's plans for the future. He, Mr Clare, would much have liked to see d'Urberville in the Church to whose ministry he had devoted so many years of his own life, and would have helped him to enter a theological college to that end; but since his correspondent had possibly not cared to do this on account of the delay it would have entailed, he was not the man to insist upon its paramount importance. Every man must work as he could best work, and in the method towards which he felt impelled by the Spirit. D'Urberville read and re-read this letter, and seemed to quiz himself cynically. He also read some passages from memoranda as he walked till his face assumed a calm, and apparently the image of Tess no longer troubled his mind. She meanwhile had kept along the edge of the hill by which lay her nearest way home. Within the distance of a mile she met a solitary shepherd. "What is the meaning of that old stone I have passed?" she asked of him. "Was it ever a Holy Cross?" "Cross--no; 'twer not a cross! 'Tis a thing of ill-omen, Miss. It was put up in wuld times by the relations of a malefactor who was tortured there by nailing his hand to a post and afterwards hung. The bones lie underneath. They say he sold his soul to the devil, and that he walks at times." She felt the _petite mort_ at this unexpectedly gruesome information, and left the solitary man behind her. It was dusk when she drew near to Flintcomb-Ash, and in the lane at the entrance to the hamlet she approached a girl and her lover without their observing her. They were talking no secrets, and the clear unconcerned voice of the young woman, in response to the warmer accents of the man, spread into the chilly air as the one soothing thing within the dusky horizon, full of a stagnant obscurity upon which nothing else intruded. For a moment the voices cheered the heart of Tess, till she reasoned that this interview had its origin, on one side or the other, in the same attraction which had been the prelude to her own tribulation. When she came close, the girl turned serenely and recognized her, the young man walking off in embarrassment. The woman was Izz Huett, whose interest in Tess's excursion immediately superseded her own proceedings. Tess did not explain very clearly its results, and Izz, who was a girl of tact, began to speak of her own little affair, a phase of which Tess had just witnessed. "He is Amby Seedling, the chap who used to sometimes come and help at Talbothays," she explained indifferently. "He actually inquired and found out that I had come here, and has followed me. He says he's been in love wi' me these two years. But I've hardly answered him."

Phase VI: "The Convert," Chapter Forty-Five

https://web.archive.org/web/20210424232301/http://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary/chapter-45

Tess is rooted to the spot: she hasn't seen or heard from Alec since she left Trantridge four years before, and here he is, clearly a convert, giving a rabble-rousing sermon in the village square about how sinful he used to be. She's unconvinced of his sincerity, and then wonders if maybe it could be true. It wouldn't be the first time. But then she moves to leave, and he sees her. He's momentarily distracted by her beauty, and Tess walks away quickly. After a while, he comes up behind her on the road. He says that he followed after her to see what he could do for her, since he had done such horrible things to her before. Her appearance had distracted him, it's true, but God had helped him through it to finish his sermon. Tess asks how he came to become a preacher. Alec tells her about this great, earnest minister named Mr. Clare... Yes, Tess tells him, she's heard of him somewhere. Alec starts to tell her about his sudden conversion, but Tess doesn't believe in sudden conversions. It's too quick, she argues--and it's unfair for people like him to make other people miserable, and then to decide it's time to start thinking about getting right with God. Alec is miffed, and asks why she doesn't believe in conversions like that. Tess says it's because "a better man" than he is doesn't believe in them. She means Angel, of course, but she doesn't tell Alec whom she means. Alec doesn't say much in response, but, after staring at Tess, asks her to put her veil down--her beauty is just blinding, and he doesn't want to relapse into his old wicked ways. They walk on along the road together, and Alec asks Tess about what's happened to her over the last four years. Tess tells him the only thing that related at all to him--that she'd had his baby, and that it had died. Alec is shocked that she hadn't told him sooner. As they're about to part ways, he makes her swear never to "tempt" him with her womanly wiles. As if she'd want to, she says, but she promises anyway. She walks along back towards the farm, and comes along a young woman talking with a young man --the man is clearly hitting on the woman, and the woman is less enthusiastic about it than the guy is. The woman turns out to be Izz Huett; the man is someone she knows from home, who has followed her out here because he's been in love with her for the last couple of years. Izz still isn't over her crush on Angel, though, so she doesn't really answer the man's proposals one way or the other.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/5658-chapters/09.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Lord Jim/section_8_part_0.txt

Lord Jim.chapter 9

chapter 9

{"name": "Chapter 9", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210118112654/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/lord-jim/summary/chapter-9", "summary": "After his laughing fit, Jim continues his narrative, leaving us to wonder what in the world that was all about. He describes how the crew members verbally abused him as they struggled with the lifeboat. In the chaos, the second engineer has broken his arm . As the men work frantically to free a lifeboat, Jim succumbs to complete and utter panic. All he can think about is his impending death and the pilgrims aboard who might wake up and riot. It gets worse: a squall, or storm, is approaching. This is so not good. Finally, they get the lifeboat free and push it overboard. This is the moment when some of the passengers begin to wake up. Uh oh. As the crew members are scrambling to reach the now floating lifeboat, the third engineer of the Patna, George, drops dead from a heart attack. The crew jump overboard to the boat and yell for George to join them. Guess they didn't notice the dude's dead. Finally, Jim jumps overboard, too. So much for women and children first, folks.", "analysis": ""}

'"I was saying to myself, 'Sink--curse you! Sink!'" These were the words with which he began again. He wanted it over. He was severely left alone, and he formulated in his head this address to the ship in a tone of imprecation, while at the same time he enjoyed the privilege of witnessing scenes--as far as I can judge--of low comedy. They were still at that bolt. The skipper was ordering, "Get under and try to lift"; and the others naturally shirked. You understand that to be squeezed flat under the keel of a boat wasn't a desirable position to be caught in if the ship went down suddenly. "Why don't you--you the strongest?" whined the little engineer. "Gott-for-dam! I am too thick," spluttered the skipper in despair. It was funny enough to make angels weep. They stood idle for a moment, and suddenly the chief engineer rushed again at Jim. '"Come and help, man! Are you mad to throw your only chance away? Come and help, man! Man! Look there--look!" 'And at last Jim looked astern where the other pointed with maniacal insistence. He saw a silent black squall which had eaten up already one-third of the sky. You know how these squalls come up there about that time of the year. First you see a darkening of the horizon--no more; then a cloud rises opaque like a wall. A straight edge of vapour lined with sickly whitish gleams flies up from the southwest, swallowing the stars in whole constellations; its shadow flies over the waters, and confounds sea and sky into one abyss of obscurity. And all is still. No thunder, no wind, no sound; not a flicker of lightning. Then in the tenebrous immensity a livid arch appears; a swell or two like undulations of the very darkness run past, and suddenly, wind and rain strike together with a peculiar impetuosity as if they had burst through something solid. Such a cloud had come up while they weren't looking. They had just noticed it, and were perfectly justified in surmising that if in absolute stillness there was some chance for the ship to keep afloat a few minutes longer, the least disturbance of the sea would make an end of her instantly. Her first nod to the swell that precedes the burst of such a squall would be also her last, would become a plunge, would, so to speak, be prolonged into a long dive, down, down to the bottom. Hence these new capers of their fright, these new antics in which they displayed their extreme aversion to die. '"It was black, black," pursued Jim with moody steadiness. "It had sneaked upon us from behind. The infernal thing! I suppose there had been at the back of my head some hope yet. I don't know. But that was all over anyhow. It maddened me to see myself caught like this. I was angry, as though I had been trapped. I _was_ trapped! The night was hot, too, I remember. Not a breath of air." 'He remembered so well that, gasping in the chair, he seemed to sweat and choke before my eyes. No doubt it maddened him; it knocked him over afresh--in a manner of speaking--but it made him also remember that important purpose which had sent him rushing on that bridge only to slip clean out of his mind. He had intended to cut the lifeboats clear of the ship. He whipped out his knife and went to work slashing as though he had seen nothing, had heard nothing, had known of no one on board. They thought him hopelessly wrong-headed and crazy, but dared not protest noisily against this useless loss of time. When he had done he returned to the very same spot from which he had started. The chief was there, ready with a clutch at him to whisper close to his head, scathingly, as though he wanted to bite his ear-- '"You silly fool! do you think you'll get the ghost of a show when all that lot of brutes is in the water? Why, they will batter your head for you from these boats." 'He wrung his hands, ignored, at Jim's elbow. The skipper kept up a nervous shuffle in one place and mumbled, "Hammer! hammer! Mein Gott! Get a hammer." 'The little engineer whimpered like a child, but, broken arm and all, he turned out the least craven of the lot as it seems, and, actually, mustered enough pluck to run an errand to the engine-room. No trifle, it must be owned in fairness to him. Jim told me he darted desperate looks like a cornered man, gave one low wail, and dashed off. He was back instantly clambering, hammer in hand, and without a pause flung himself at the bolt. The others gave up Jim at once and ran off to assist. He heard the tap, tap of the hammer, the sound of the released chock falling over. The boat was clear. Only then he turned to look--only then. But he kept his distance--he kept his distance. He wanted me to know he had kept his distance; that there was nothing in common between him and these men--who had the hammer. Nothing whatever. It is more than probable he thought himself cut off from them by a space that could not be traversed, by an obstacle that could not be overcome, by a chasm without bottom. He was as far as he could get from them--the whole breadth of the ship. 'His feet were glued to that remote spot and his eyes to their indistinct group bowed together and swaying strangely in the common torment of fear. A hand-lamp lashed to a stanchion above a little table rigged up on the bridge--the Patna had no chart-room amidships--threw a light on their labouring shoulders, on their arched and bobbing backs. They pushed at the bow of the boat; they pushed out into the night; they pushed, and would no more look back at him. They had given him up as if indeed he had been too far, too hopelessly separated from themselves, to be worth an appealing word, a glance, or a sign. They had no leisure to look back upon his passive heroism, to feel the sting of his abstention. The boat was heavy; they pushed at the bow with no breath to spare for an encouraging word: but the turmoil of terror that had scattered their self-command like chaff before the wind, converted their desperate exertions into a bit of fooling, upon my word, fit for knockabout clowns in a farce. They pushed with their hands, with their heads, they pushed for dear life with all the weight of their bodies, they pushed with all the might of their souls--only no sooner had they succeeded in canting the stem clear of the davit than they would leave off like one man and start a wild scramble into her. As a natural consequence the boat would swing in abruptly, driving them back, helpless and jostling against each other. They would stand nonplussed for a while, exchanging in fierce whispers all the infamous names they could call to mind, and go at it again. Three times this occurred. He described it to me with morose thoughtfulness. He hadn't lost a single movement of that comic business. "I loathed them. I hated them. I had to look at all that," he said without emphasis, turning upon me a sombrely watchful glance. "Was ever there any one so shamefully tried?" 'He took his head in his hands for a moment, like a man driven to distraction by some unspeakable outrage. These were things he could not explain to the court--and not even to me; but I would have been little fitted for the reception of his confidences had I not been able at times to understand the pauses between the words. In this assault upon his fortitude there was the jeering intention of a spiteful and vile vengeance; there was an element of burlesque in his ordeal--a degradation of funny grimaces in the approach of death or dishonour. 'He related facts which I have not forgotten, but at this distance of time I couldn't recall his very words: I only remember that he managed wonderfully to convey the brooding rancour of his mind into the bare recital of events. Twice, he told me, he shut his eyes in the certitude that the end was upon him already, and twice he had to open them again. Each time he noted the darkening of the great stillness. The shadow of the silent cloud had fallen upon the ship from the zenith, and seemed to have extinguished every sound of her teeming life. He could no longer hear the voices under the awnings. He told me that each time he closed his eyes a flash of thought showed him that crowd of bodies, laid out for death, as plain as daylight. When he opened them, it was to see the dim struggle of four men fighting like mad with a stubborn boat. "They would fall back before it time after time, stand swearing at each other, and suddenly make another rush in a bunch. . . . Enough to make you die laughing," he commented with downcast eyes; then raising them for a moment to my face with a dismal smile, "I ought to have a merry life of it, by God! for I shall see that funny sight a good many times yet before I die." His eyes fell again. "See and hear. . . . See and hear," he repeated twice, at long intervals, filled by vacant staring. 'He roused himself. '"I made up my mind to keep my eyes shut," he said, "and I couldn't. I couldn't, and I don't care who knows it. Let them go through that kind of thing before they talk. Just let them--and do better--that's all. The second time my eyelids flew open and my mouth too. I had felt the ship move. She just dipped her bows--and lifted them gently--and slow! everlastingly slow; and ever so little. She hadn't done that much for days. The cloud had raced ahead, and this first swell seemed to travel upon a sea of lead. There was no life in that stir. It managed, though, to knock over something in my head. What would you have done? You are sure of yourself--aren't you? What would you do if you felt now--this minute--the house here move, just move a little under your chair. Leap! By heavens! you would take one spring from where you sit and land in that clump of bushes yonder." 'He flung his arm out at the night beyond the stone balustrade. I held my peace. He looked at me very steadily, very severe. There could be no mistake: I was being bullied now, and it behoved me to make no sign lest by a gesture or a word I should be drawn into a fatal admission about myself which would have had some bearing on the case. I was not disposed to take any risk of that sort. Don't forget I had him before me, and really he was too much like one of us not to be dangerous. But if you want to know I don't mind telling you that I did, with a rapid glance, estimate the distance to the mass of denser blackness in the middle of the grass-plot before the verandah. He exaggerated. I would have landed short by several feet--and that's the only thing of which I am fairly certain. 'The last moment had come, as he thought, and he did not move. His feet remained glued to the planks if his thoughts were knocking about loose in his head. It was at this moment too that he saw one of the men around the boat step backwards suddenly, clutch at the air with raised arms, totter and collapse. He didn't exactly fall, he only slid gently into a sitting posture, all hunched up, and with his shoulders propped against the side of the engine-room skylight. "That was the donkey-man. A haggard, white-faced chap with a ragged moustache. Acted third engineer," he explained. '"Dead," I said. We had heard something of that in court. '"So they say," he pronounced with sombre indifference. "Of course I never knew. Weak heart. The man had been complaining of being out of sorts for some time before. Excitement. Over-exertion. Devil only knows. Ha! ha! ha! It was easy to see he did not want to die either. Droll, isn't it? May I be shot if he hadn't been fooled into killing himself! Fooled--neither more nor less. Fooled into it, by heavens! just as I . . . Ah! If he had only kept still; if he had only told them to go to the devil when they came to rush him out of his bunk because the ship was sinking! If he had only stood by with his hands in his pockets and called them names!" 'He got up, shook his fist, glared at me, and sat down. '"A chance missed, eh?" I murmured. '"Why don't you laugh?" he said. "A joke hatched in hell. Weak heart! . . . I wish sometimes mine had been." 'This irritated me. "Do you?" I exclaimed with deep-rooted irony. "Yes! Can't _you_ understand?" he cried. "I don't know what more you could wish for," I said angrily. He gave me an utterly uncomprehending glance. This shaft had also gone wide of the mark, and he was not the man to bother about stray arrows. Upon my word, he was too unsuspecting; he was not fair game. I was glad that my missile had been thrown away,--that he had not even heard the twang of the bow. 'Of course he could not know at the time the man was dead. The next minute--his last on board--was crowded with a tumult of events and sensations which beat about him like the sea upon a rock. I use the simile advisedly, because from his relation I am forced to believe he had preserved through it all a strange illusion of passiveness, as though he had not acted but had suffered himself to be handled by the infernal powers who had selected him for the victim of their practical joke. The first thing that came to him was the grinding surge of the heavy davits swinging out at last--a jar which seemed to enter his body from the deck through the soles of his feet, and travel up his spine to the crown of his head. Then, the squall being very near now, another and a heavier swell lifted the passive hull in a threatening heave that checked his breath, while his brain and his heart together were pierced as with daggers by panic-stricken screams. "Let go! For God's sake, let go! Let go! She's going." Following upon that the boat-falls ripped through the blocks, and a lot of men began to talk in startled tones under the awnings. "When these beggars did break out, their yelps were enough to wake the dead," he said. Next, after the splashing shock of the boat literally dropped in the water, came the hollow noises of stamping and tumbling in her, mingled with confused shouts: "Unhook! Unhook! Shove! Unhook! Shove for your life! Here's the squall down on us. . . ." He heard, high above his head, the faint muttering of the wind; he heard below his feet a cry of pain. A lost voice alongside started cursing a swivel hook. The ship began to buzz fore and aft like a disturbed hive, and, as quietly as he was telling me of all this--because just then he was very quiet in attitude, in face, in voice--he went on to say without the slightest warning as it were, "I stumbled over his legs." 'This was the first I heard of his having moved at all. I could not restrain a grunt of surprise. Something had started him off at last, but of the exact moment, of the cause that tore him out of his immobility, he knew no more than the uprooted tree knows of the wind that laid it low. All this had come to him: the sounds, the sights, the legs of the dead man--by Jove! The infernal joke was being crammed devilishly down his throat, but--look you--he was not going to admit of any sort of swallowing motion in his gullet. It's extraordinary how he could cast upon you the spirit of his illusion. I listened as if to a tale of black magic at work upon a corpse. '"He went over sideways, very gently, and this is the last thing I remember seeing on board," he continued. "I did not care what he did. It looked as though he were picking himself up: I thought he was picking himself up, of course: I expected him to bolt past me over the rail and drop into the boat after the others. I could hear them knocking about down there, and a voice as if crying up a shaft called out 'George!' Then three voices together raised a yell. They came to me separately: one bleated, another screamed, one howled. Ough!" 'He shivered a little, and I beheld him rise slowly as if a steady hand from above had been pulling him out of the chair by his hair. Up, slowly--to his full height, and when his knees had locked stiff the hand let him go, and he swayed a little on his feet. There was a suggestion of awful stillness in his face, in his movements, in his very voice when he said "They shouted"--and involuntarily I pricked up my ears for the ghost of that shout that would be heard directly through the false effect of silence. "There were eight hundred people in that ship," he said, impaling me to the back of my seat with an awful blank stare. "Eight hundred living people, and they were yelling after the one dead man to come down and be saved. 'Jump, George! Jump! Oh, jump!' I stood by with my hand on the davit. I was very quiet. It had come over pitch dark. You could see neither sky nor sea. I heard the boat alongside go bump, bump, and not another sound down there for a while, but the ship under me was full of talking noises. Suddenly the skipper howled 'Mein Gott! The squall! The squall! Shove off!' With the first hiss of rain, and the first gust of wind, they screamed, 'Jump, George! We'll catch you! Jump!' The ship began a slow plunge; the rain swept over her like a broken sea; my cap flew off my head; my breath was driven back into my throat. I heard as if I had been on the top of a tower another wild screech, 'Geo-o-o-orge! Oh, jump!' She was going down, down, head first under me. . . ." 'He raised his hand deliberately to his face, and made picking motions with his fingers as though he had been bothered with cobwebs, and afterwards he looked into the open palm for quite half a second before he blurted out-- '"I had jumped . . ." He checked himself, averted his gaze. . . . "It seems," he added. 'His clear blue eyes turned to me with a piteous stare, and looking at him standing before me, dumfounded and hurt, I was oppressed by a sad sense of resigned wisdom, mingled with the amused and profound pity of an old man helpless before a childish disaster. '"Looks like it," I muttered. '"I knew nothing about it till I looked up," he explained hastily. And that's possible, too. You had to listen to him as you would to a small boy in trouble. He didn't know. It had happened somehow. It would never happen again. He had landed partly on somebody and fallen across a thwart. He felt as though all his ribs on his left side must be broken; then he rolled over, and saw vaguely the ship he had deserted uprising above him, with the red side-light glowing large in the rain like a fire on the brow of a hill seen through a mist. "She seemed higher than a wall; she loomed like a cliff over the boat . . . I wished I could die," he cried. "There was no going back. It was as if I had jumped into a well--into an everlasting deep hole. . . ."'

Chapter 9

https://web.archive.org/web/20210118112654/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/lord-jim/summary/chapter-9

After his laughing fit, Jim continues his narrative, leaving us to wonder what in the world that was all about. He describes how the crew members verbally abused him as they struggled with the lifeboat. In the chaos, the second engineer has broken his arm . As the men work frantically to free a lifeboat, Jim succumbs to complete and utter panic. All he can think about is his impending death and the pilgrims aboard who might wake up and riot. It gets worse: a squall, or storm, is approaching. This is so not good. Finally, they get the lifeboat free and push it overboard. This is the moment when some of the passengers begin to wake up. Uh oh. As the crew members are scrambling to reach the now floating lifeboat, the third engineer of the Patna, George, drops dead from a heart attack. The crew jump overboard to the boat and yell for George to join them. Guess they didn't notice the dude's dead. Finally, Jim jumps overboard, too. So much for women and children first, folks.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/73.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_13_part_5.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 11.chapter 4

book 11, chapter 4

{"name": "book 11, Chapter 4", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section14/", "summary": "A Hymn and a Secret Alyosha goes to the prison, where Rakitin has just visited Dmitri. Perplexed, Alyosha asks Dmitri about the visit, and Dmitri says Rakitin wants to write an article alleging that, because of his circumstances, Dmitri could not have helped but kill his father. Dmitri says he holds Rakitin in contempt, but allows him to visit so he can laugh at his ideas. Sobering, Dmitri tells Alyosha that even though he is not guilty of the crime of which he is accused, he has come to terms with the burden of sin he has created for himself and longs to do penance and redeem himself. He is only afraid that Grushenka will not be allowed to travel with him to his exile in Siberia, and that without her, he will lack the strength necessary for his spiritual renewal. Dmitri says that Ivan has recently offered him a plan for his escape, even though Ivan believes Dmitri to be guilty of the murder. This plan is the secret that they have been keeping from Grushenka. Tormented with grief and guilt, Dmitri refuses to escape before the trial. He asks Alyosha what he believes, and Alyosha says that he has never believed Dmitri to be guilty. This declaration from his younger brother fills Dmitri with courage and hope", "analysis": ""}

Chapter IV. A Hymn And A Secret It was quite late (days are short in November) when Alyosha rang at the prison gate. It was beginning to get dusk. But Alyosha knew that he would be admitted without difficulty. Things were managed in our little town, as everywhere else. At first, of course, on the conclusion of the preliminary inquiry, relations and a few other persons could only obtain interviews with Mitya by going through certain inevitable formalities. But later, though the formalities were not relaxed, exceptions were made for some, at least, of Mitya's visitors. So much so, that sometimes the interviews with the prisoner in the room set aside for the purpose were practically _tete-a-tete_. These exceptions, however, were few in number; only Grushenka, Alyosha and Rakitin were treated like this. But the captain of the police, Mihail Mihailovitch, was very favorably disposed to Grushenka. His abuse of her at Mokroe weighed on the old man's conscience, and when he learned the whole story, he completely changed his view of her. And strange to say, though he was firmly persuaded of his guilt, yet after Mitya was once in prison, the old man came to take a more and more lenient view of him. "He was a man of good heart, perhaps," he thought, "who had come to grief from drinking and dissipation." His first horror had been succeeded by pity. As for Alyosha, the police captain was very fond of him and had known him for a long time. Rakitin, who had of late taken to coming very often to see the prisoner, was one of the most intimate acquaintances of the "police captain's young ladies," as he called them, and was always hanging about their house. He gave lessons in the house of the prison superintendent, too, who, though scrupulous in the performance of his duties, was a kind- hearted old man. Alyosha, again, had an intimate acquaintance of long standing with the superintendent, who was fond of talking to him, generally on sacred subjects. He respected Ivan Fyodorovitch, and stood in awe of his opinion, though he was a great philosopher himself; "self- taught," of course. But Alyosha had an irresistible attraction for him. During the last year the old man had taken to studying the Apocryphal Gospels, and constantly talked over his impressions with his young friend. He used to come and see him in the monastery and discussed for hours together with him and with the monks. So even if Alyosha were late at the prison, he had only to go to the superintendent and everything was made easy. Besides, every one in the prison, down to the humblest warder, had grown used to Alyosha. The sentry, of course, did not trouble him so long as the authorities were satisfied. When Mitya was summoned from his cell, he always went downstairs, to the place set aside for interviews. As Alyosha entered the room he came upon Rakitin, who was just taking leave of Mitya. They were both talking loudly. Mitya was laughing heartily as he saw him out, while Rakitin seemed grumbling. Rakitin did not like meeting Alyosha, especially of late. He scarcely spoke to him, and bowed to him stiffly. Seeing Alyosha enter now, he frowned and looked away, as though he were entirely absorbed in buttoning his big, warm, fur-trimmed overcoat. Then he began looking at once for his umbrella. "I must mind not to forget my belongings," he muttered, simply to say something. "Mind you don't forget other people's belongings," said Mitya, as a joke, and laughed at once at his own wit. Rakitin fired up instantly. "You'd better give that advice to your own family, who've always been a slave-driving lot, and not to Rakitin," he cried, suddenly trembling with anger. "What's the matter? I was joking," cried Mitya. "Damn it all! They are all like that," he turned to Alyosha, nodding towards Rakitin's hurriedly retreating figure. "He was sitting here, laughing and cheerful, and all at once he boils up like that. He didn't even nod to you. Have you broken with him completely? Why are you so late? I've not been simply waiting, but thirsting for you the whole morning. But never mind. We'll make up for it now." "Why does he come here so often? Surely you are not such great friends?" asked Alyosha. He, too, nodded at the door through which Rakitin had disappeared. "Great friends with Rakitin? No, not as much as that. Is it likely--a pig like that? He considers I am ... a blackguard. They can't understand a joke either, that's the worst of such people. They never understand a joke, and their souls are dry, dry and flat; they remind me of prison walls when I was first brought here. But he is a clever fellow, very clever. Well, Alexey, it's all over with me now." He sat down on the bench and made Alyosha sit down beside him. "Yes, the trial's to-morrow. Are you so hopeless, brother?" Alyosha said, with an apprehensive feeling. "What are you talking about?" said Mitya, looking at him rather uncertainly. "Oh, you mean the trial! Damn it all! Till now we've been talking of things that don't matter, about this trial, but I haven't said a word to you about the chief thing. Yes, the trial is to-morrow; but it wasn't the trial I meant, when I said it was all over with me. Why do you look at me so critically?" "What do you mean, Mitya?" "Ideas, ideas, that's all! Ethics! What is ethics?" "Ethics?" asked Alyosha, wondering. "Yes; is it a science?" "Yes, there is such a science ... but ... I confess I can't explain to you what sort of science it is." "Rakitin knows. Rakitin knows a lot, damn him! He's not going to be a monk. He means to go to Petersburg. There he'll go in for criticism of an elevating tendency. Who knows, he may be of use and make his own career, too. Ough! they are first-rate, these people, at making a career! Damn ethics, I am done for, Alexey, I am, you man of God! I love you more than any one. It makes my heart yearn to look at you. Who was Karl Bernard?" "Karl Bernard?" Alyosha was surprised again. "No, not Karl. Stay, I made a mistake. Claude Bernard. What was he? Chemist or what?" "He must be a savant," answered Alyosha; "but I confess I can't tell you much about him, either. I've heard of him as a savant, but what sort I don't know." "Well, damn him, then! I don't know either," swore Mitya. "A scoundrel of some sort, most likely. They are all scoundrels. And Rakitin will make his way. Rakitin will get on anywhere; he is another Bernard. Ugh, these Bernards! They are all over the place." "But what is the matter?" Alyosha asked insistently. "He wants to write an article about me, about my case, and so begin his literary career. That's what he comes for; he said so himself. He wants to prove some theory. He wants to say 'he couldn't help murdering his father, he was corrupted by his environment,' and so on. He explained it all to me. He is going to put in a tinge of Socialism, he says. But there, damn the fellow, he can put in a tinge if he likes, I don't care. He can't bear Ivan, he hates him. He's not fond of you, either. But I don't turn him out, for he is a clever fellow. Awfully conceited, though. I said to him just now, 'The Karamazovs are not blackguards, but philosophers; for all true Russians are philosophers, and though you've studied, you are not a philosopher--you are a low fellow.' He laughed, so maliciously. And I said to him, '_De ideabus non est disputandum_.' Isn't that rather good? I can set up for being a classic, you see!" Mitya laughed suddenly. "Why is it all over with you? You said so just now," Alyosha interposed. "Why is it all over with me? H'm!... The fact of it is ... if you take it as a whole, I am sorry to lose God--that's why it is." "What do you mean by 'sorry to lose God'?" "Imagine: inside, in the nerves, in the head--that is, these nerves are there in the brain ... (damn them!) there are sort of little tails, the little tails of those nerves, and as soon as they begin quivering ... that is, you see, I look at something with my eyes and then they begin quivering, those little tails ... and when they quiver, then an image appears ... it doesn't appear at once, but an instant, a second, passes ... and then something like a moment appears; that is, not a moment--devil take the moment!--but an image; that is, an object, or an action, damn it! That's why I see and then think, because of those tails, not at all because I've got a soul, and that I am some sort of image and likeness. All that is nonsense! Rakitin explained it all to me yesterday, brother, and it simply bowled me over. It's magnificent, Alyosha, this science! A new man's arising--that I understand.... And yet I am sorry to lose God!" "Well, that's a good thing, anyway," said Alyosha. "That I am sorry to lose God? It's chemistry, brother, chemistry! There's no help for it, your reverence, you must make way for chemistry. And Rakitin does dislike God. Ough! doesn't he dislike Him! That's the sore point with all of them. But they conceal it. They tell lies. They pretend. 'Will you preach this in your reviews?' I asked him. 'Oh, well, if I did it openly, they won't let it through,' he said. He laughed. 'But what will become of men then?' I asked him, 'without God and immortal life? All things are lawful then, they can do what they like?' 'Didn't you know?' he said laughing, 'a clever man can do what he likes,' he said. 'A clever man knows his way about, but you've put your foot in it, committing a murder, and now you are rotting in prison.' He says that to my face! A regular pig! I used to kick such people out, but now I listen to them. He talks a lot of sense, too. Writes well. He began reading me an article last week. I copied out three lines of it. Wait a minute. Here it is." Mitya hurriedly pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket and read: " 'In order to determine this question, it is above all essential to put one's personality in contradiction to one's reality.' Do you understand that?" "No, I don't," said Alyosha. He looked at Mitya and listened to him with curiosity. "I don't understand either. It's dark and obscure, but intellectual. 'Every one writes like that now,' he says, 'it's the effect of their environment.' They are afraid of the environment. He writes poetry, too, the rascal. He's written in honor of Madame Hohlakov's foot. Ha ha ha!" "I've heard about it," said Alyosha. "Have you? And have you heard the poem?" "No." "I've got it. Here it is. I'll read it to you. You don't know--I haven't told you--there's quite a story about it. He's a rascal! Three weeks ago he began to tease me. 'You've got yourself into a mess, like a fool, for the sake of three thousand, but I'm going to collar a hundred and fifty thousand. I am going to marry a widow and buy a house in Petersburg.' And he told me he was courting Madame Hohlakov. She hadn't much brains in her youth, and now at forty she has lost what she had. 'But she's awfully sentimental,' he says; 'that's how I shall get hold of her. When I marry her, I shall take her to Petersburg and there I shall start a newspaper.' And his mouth was simply watering, the beast, not for the widow, but for the hundred and fifty thousand. And he made me believe it. He came to see me every day. 'She is coming round,' he declared. He was beaming with delight. And then, all of a sudden, he was turned out of the house. Perhotin's carrying everything before him, bravo! I could kiss the silly old noodle for turning him out of the house. And he had written this doggerel. 'It's the first time I've soiled my hands with writing poetry,' he said. 'It's to win her heart, so it's in a good cause. When I get hold of the silly woman's fortune, I can be of great social utility.' They have this social justification for every nasty thing they do! 'Anyway it's better than your Pushkin's poetry,' he said, 'for I've managed to advocate enlightenment even in that.' I understand what he means about Pushkin, I quite see that, if he really was a man of talent and only wrote about women's feet. But wasn't Rakitin stuck up about his doggerel! The vanity of these fellows! 'On the convalescence of the swollen foot of the object of my affections'--he thought of that for a title. He's a waggish fellow. A captivating little foot, Though swollen and red and tender! The doctors come and plasters put, But still they cannot mend her. Yet, 'tis not for her foot I dread-- A theme for Pushkin's muse more fit-- It's not her foot, it is her head: I tremble for her loss of wit! For as her foot swells, strange to say, Her intellect is on the wane-- Oh, for some remedy I pray That may restore both foot and brain! He is a pig, a regular pig, but he's very arch, the rascal! And he really has put in a progressive idea. And wasn't he angry when she kicked him out! He was gnashing his teeth!" "He's taken his revenge already," said Alyosha. "He's written a paragraph about Madame Hohlakov." And Alyosha told him briefly about the paragraph in _Gossip_. "That's his doing, that's his doing!" Mitya assented, frowning. "That's him! These paragraphs ... I know ... the insulting things that have been written about Grushenka, for instance.... And about Katya, too.... H'm!" He walked across the room with a harassed air. "Brother, I cannot stay long," Alyosha said, after a pause. "To-morrow will be a great and awful day for you, the judgment of God will be accomplished ... I am amazed at you, you walk about here, talking of I don't know what ..." "No, don't be amazed at me," Mitya broke in warmly. "Am I to talk of that stinking dog? Of the murderer? We've talked enough of him. I don't want to say more of the stinking son of Stinking Lizaveta! God will kill him, you will see. Hush!" He went up to Alyosha excitedly and kissed him. His eyes glowed. "Rakitin wouldn't understand it," he began in a sort of exaltation; "but you, you'll understand it all. That's why I was thirsting for you. You see, there's so much I've been wanting to tell you for ever so long, here, within these peeling walls, but I haven't said a word about what matters most; the moment never seems to have come. Now I can wait no longer. I must pour out my heart to you. Brother, these last two months I've found in myself a new man. A new man has risen up in me. He was hidden in me, but would never have come to the surface, if it hadn't been for this blow from heaven. I am afraid! And what do I care if I spend twenty years in the mines, breaking ore with a hammer? I am not a bit afraid of that--it's something else I am afraid of now: that that new man may leave me. Even there, in the mines, under-ground, I may find a human heart in another convict and murderer by my side, and I may make friends with him, for even there one may live and love and suffer. One may thaw and revive a frozen heart in that convict, one may wait upon him for years, and at last bring up from the dark depths a lofty soul, a feeling, suffering creature; one may bring forth an angel, create a hero! There are so many of them, hundreds of them, and we are all to blame for them. Why was it I dreamed of that 'babe' at such a moment? 'Why is the babe so poor?' That was a sign to me at that moment. It's for the babe I'm going. Because we are all responsible for all. For all the 'babes,' for there are big children as well as little children. All are 'babes.' I go for all, because some one must go for all. I didn't kill father, but I've got to go. I accept it. It's all come to me here, here, within these peeling walls. There are numbers of them there, hundreds of them underground, with hammers in their hands. Oh, yes, we shall be in chains and there will be no freedom, but then, in our great sorrow, we shall rise again to joy, without which man cannot live nor God exist, for God gives joy: it's His privilege--a grand one. Ah, man should be dissolved in prayer! What should I be underground there without God? Rakitin's laughing! If they drive God from the earth, we shall shelter Him underground. One cannot exist in prison without God; it's even more impossible than out of prison. And then we men underground will sing from the bowels of the earth a glorious hymn to God, with Whom is joy. Hail to God and His joy! I love Him!" Mitya was almost gasping for breath as he uttered his wild speech. He turned pale, his lips quivered, and tears rolled down his cheeks. "Yes, life is full, there is life even underground," he began again. "You wouldn't believe, Alexey, how I want to live now, what a thirst for existence and consciousness has sprung up in me within these peeling walls. Rakitin doesn't understand that; all he cares about is building a house and letting flats. But I've been longing for you. And what is suffering? I am not afraid of it, even if it were beyond reckoning. I am not afraid of it now. I was afraid of it before. Do you know, perhaps I won't answer at the trial at all.... And I seem to have such strength in me now, that I think I could stand anything, any suffering, only to be able to say and to repeat to myself every moment, 'I exist.' In thousands of agonies--I exist. I'm tormented on the rack--but I exist! Though I sit alone on a pillar--I exist! I see the sun, and if I don't see the sun, I know it's there. And there's a whole life in that, in knowing that the sun is there. Alyosha, my angel, all these philosophies are the death of me. Damn them! Brother Ivan--" "What of brother Ivan?" interrupted Alyosha, but Mitya did not hear. "You see, I never had any of these doubts before, but it was all hidden away in me. It was perhaps just because ideas I did not understand were surging up in me, that I used to drink and fight and rage. It was to stifle them in myself, to still them, to smother them. Ivan is not Rakitin, there is an idea in him. Ivan is a sphinx and is silent; he is always silent. It's God that's worrying me. That's the only thing that's worrying me. What if He doesn't exist? What if Rakitin's right--that it's an idea made up by men? Then if He doesn't exist, man is the chief of the earth, of the universe. Magnificent! Only how is he going to be good without God? That's the question. I always come back to that. For whom is man going to love then? To whom will he be thankful? To whom will he sing the hymn? Rakitin laughs. Rakitin says that one can love humanity without God. Well, only a sniveling idiot can maintain that. I can't understand it. Life's easy for Rakitin. 'You'd better think about the extension of civic rights, or even of keeping down the price of meat. You will show your love for humanity more simply and directly by that, than by philosophy.' I answered him, 'Well, but you, without a God, are more likely to raise the price of meat, if it suits you, and make a rouble on every copeck.' He lost his temper. But after all, what is goodness? Answer me that, Alexey. Goodness is one thing with me and another with a Chinaman, so it's a relative thing. Or isn't it? Is it not relative? A treacherous question! You won't laugh if I tell you it's kept me awake two nights. I only wonder now how people can live and think nothing about it. Vanity! Ivan has no God. He has an idea. It's beyond me. But he is silent. I believe he is a free-mason. I asked him, but he is silent. I wanted to drink from the springs of his soul--he was silent. But once he did drop a word." "What did he say?" Alyosha took it up quickly. "I said to him, 'Then everything is lawful, if it is so?' He frowned. 'Fyodor Pavlovitch, our papa,' he said, 'was a pig, but his ideas were right enough.' That was what he dropped. That was all he said. That was going one better than Rakitin." "Yes," Alyosha assented bitterly. "When was he with you?" "Of that later; now I must speak of something else. I have said nothing about Ivan to you before. I put it off to the last. When my business here is over and the verdict has been given, then I'll tell you something. I'll tell you everything. We've something tremendous on hand.... And you shall be my judge in it. But don't begin about that now; be silent. You talk of to-morrow, of the trial; but, would you believe it, I know nothing about it." "Have you talked to the counsel?" "What's the use of the counsel? I told him all about it. He's a soft, city-bred rogue--a Bernard! But he doesn't believe me--not a bit of it. Only imagine, he believes I did it. I see it. 'In that case,' I asked him, 'why have you come to defend me?' Hang them all! They've got a doctor down, too, want to prove I'm mad. I won't have that! Katerina Ivanovna wants to do her 'duty' to the end, whatever the strain!" Mitya smiled bitterly. "The cat! Hard-hearted creature! She knows that I said of her at Mokroe that she was a woman of 'great wrath.' They repeated it. Yes, the facts against me have grown numerous as the sands of the sea. Grigory sticks to his point. Grigory's honest, but a fool. Many people are honest because they are fools: that's Rakitin's idea. Grigory's my enemy. And there are some people who are better as foes than friends. I mean Katerina Ivanovna. I am afraid, oh, I am afraid she will tell how she bowed to the ground after that four thousand. She'll pay it back to the last farthing. I don't want her sacrifice; they'll put me to shame at the trial. I wonder how I can stand it. Go to her, Alyosha, ask her not to speak of that in the court, can't you? But damn it all, it doesn't matter! I shall get through somehow. I don't pity her. It's her own doing. She deserves what she gets. I shall have my own story to tell, Alexey." He smiled bitterly again. "Only ... only Grusha, Grusha! Good Lord! Why should she have such suffering to bear?" he exclaimed suddenly, with tears. "Grusha's killing me; the thought of her's killing me, killing me. She was with me just now...." "She told me she was very much grieved by you to-day." "I know. Confound my temper! It was jealousy. I was sorry, I kissed her as she was going. I didn't ask her forgiveness." "Why didn't you?" exclaimed Alyosha. Suddenly Mitya laughed almost mirthfully. "God preserve you, my dear boy, from ever asking forgiveness for a fault from a woman you love. From one you love especially, however greatly you may have been in fault. For a woman--devil only knows what to make of a woman! I know something about them, anyway. But try acknowledging you are in fault to a woman. Say, 'I am sorry, forgive me,' and a shower of reproaches will follow! Nothing will make her forgive you simply and directly, she'll humble you to the dust, bring forward things that have never happened, recall everything, forget nothing, add something of her own, and only then forgive you. And even the best, the best of them do it. She'll scrape up all the scrapings and load them on your head. They are ready to flay you alive, I tell you, every one of them, all these angels without whom we cannot live! I tell you plainly and openly, dear boy, every decent man ought to be under some woman's thumb. That's my conviction--not conviction, but feeling. A man ought to be magnanimous, and it's no disgrace to a man! No disgrace to a hero, not even a Caesar! But don't ever beg her pardon all the same for anything. Remember that rule given you by your brother Mitya, who's come to ruin through women. No, I'd better make it up to Grusha somehow, without begging pardon. I worship her, Alexey, worship her. Only she doesn't see it. No, she still thinks I don't love her enough. And she tortures me, tortures me with her love. The past was nothing! In the past it was only those infernal curves of hers that tortured me, but now I've taken all her soul into my soul and through her I've become a man myself. Will they marry us? If they don't, I shall die of jealousy. I imagine something every day.... What did she say to you about me?" Alyosha repeated all Grushenka had said to him that day. Mitya listened, made him repeat things, and seemed pleased. "Then she is not angry at my being jealous?" he exclaimed. "She is a regular woman! 'I've a fierce heart myself!' Ah, I love such fierce hearts, though I can't bear any one's being jealous of me. I can't endure it. We shall fight. But I shall love her, I shall love her infinitely. Will they marry us? Do they let convicts marry? That's the question. And without her I can't exist...." Mitya walked frowning across the room. It was almost dark. He suddenly seemed terribly worried. "So there's a secret, she says, a secret? We have got up a plot against her, and Katya is mixed up in it, she thinks. No, my good Grushenka, that's not it. You are very wide of the mark, in your foolish feminine way. Alyosha, darling, well, here goes! I'll tell you our secret!" He looked round, went close up quickly to Alyosha, who was standing before him, and whispered to him with an air of mystery, though in reality no one could hear them: the old warder was dozing in the corner, and not a word could reach the ears of the soldiers on guard. "I will tell you all our secret," Mitya whispered hurriedly. "I meant to tell you later, for how could I decide on anything without you? You are everything to me. Though I say that Ivan is superior to us, you are my angel. It's your decision will decide it. Perhaps it's you that is superior and not Ivan. You see, it's a question of conscience, question of the higher conscience--the secret is so important that I can't settle it myself, and I've put it off till I could speak to you. But anyway it's too early to decide now, for we must wait for the verdict. As soon as the verdict is given, you shall decide my fate. Don't decide it now. I'll tell you now. You listen, but don't decide. Stand and keep quiet. I won't tell you everything. I'll only tell you the idea, without details, and you keep quiet. Not a question, not a movement. You agree? But, goodness, what shall I do with your eyes? I'm afraid your eyes will tell me your decision, even if you don't speak. Oo! I'm afraid! Alyosha, listen! Ivan suggests my _escaping_. I won't tell you the details: it's all been thought out: it can all be arranged. Hush, don't decide. I should go to America with Grusha. You know I can't live without Grusha! What if they won't let her follow me to Siberia? Do they let convicts get married? Ivan thinks not. And without Grusha what should I do there underground with a hammer? I should only smash my skull with the hammer! But, on the other hand, my conscience? I should have run away from suffering. A sign has come, I reject the sign. I have a way of salvation and I turn my back on it. Ivan says that in America, 'with the good-will,' I can be of more use than underground. But what becomes of our hymn from underground? What's America? America is vanity again! And there's a lot of swindling in America, too, I expect. I should have run away from crucifixion! I tell you, you know, Alexey, because you are the only person who can understand this. There's no one else. It's folly, madness to others, all I've told you of the hymn. They'll say I'm out of my mind or a fool. I am not out of my mind and I am not a fool. Ivan understands about the hymn, too. He understands, only he doesn't answer--he doesn't speak. He doesn't believe in the hymn. Don't speak, don't speak. I see how you look! You have already decided. Don't decide, spare me! I can't live without Grusha. Wait till after the trial!" Mitya ended beside himself. He held Alyosha with both hands on his shoulders, and his yearning, feverish eyes were fixed on his brother's. "They don't let convicts marry, do they?" he repeated for the third time in a supplicating voice. Alyosha listened with extreme surprise and was deeply moved. "Tell me one thing," he said. "Is Ivan very keen on it, and whose idea was it?" "His, his, and he is very keen on it. He didn't come to see me at first, then he suddenly came a week ago and he began about it straight away. He is awfully keen on it. He doesn't ask me, but orders me to escape. He doesn't doubt of my obeying him, though I showed him all my heart as I have to you, and told him about the hymn, too. He told me he'd arrange it; he's found out about everything. But of that later. He's simply set on it. It's all a matter of money: he'll pay ten thousand for escape and give me twenty thousand for America. And he says we can arrange a magnificent escape for ten thousand." "And he told you on no account to tell me?" Alyosha asked again. "To tell no one, and especially not you; on no account to tell you. He is afraid, no doubt, that you'll stand before me as my conscience. Don't tell him I told you. Don't tell him, for anything." "You are right," Alyosha pronounced; "it's impossible to decide anything before the trial is over. After the trial you'll decide of yourself. Then you'll find that new man in yourself and he will decide." "A new man, or a Bernard who'll decide _a la_ Bernard, for I believe I'm a contemptible Bernard myself," said Mitya, with a bitter grin. "But, brother, have you no hope then of being acquitted?" Mitya shrugged his shoulders nervously and shook his head. "Alyosha, darling, it's time you were going," he said, with a sudden haste. "There's the superintendent shouting in the yard. He'll be here directly. We are late; it's irregular. Embrace me quickly. Kiss me! Sign me with the cross, darling, for the cross I have to bear to-morrow." They embraced and kissed. "Ivan," said Mitya suddenly, "suggests my escaping; but, of course, he believes I did it." A mournful smile came on to his lips. "Have you asked him whether he believes it?" asked Alyosha. "No, I haven't. I wanted to, but I couldn't. I hadn't the courage. But I saw it from his eyes. Well, good-by!" Once more they kissed hurriedly, and Alyosha was just going out, when Mitya suddenly called him back. "Stand facing me! That's right!" And again he seized Alyosha, putting both hands on his shoulders. His face became suddenly quite pale, so that it was dreadfully apparent, even through the gathering darkness. His lips twitched, his eyes fastened upon Alyosha. "Alyosha, tell me the whole truth, as you would before God. Do you believe I did it? Do you, do you in yourself, believe it? The whole truth, don't lie!" he cried desperately. Everything seemed heaving before Alyosha, and he felt something like a stab at his heart. "Hush! What do you mean?" he faltered helplessly. "The whole truth, the whole, don't lie!" repeated Mitya. "I've never for one instant believed that you were the murderer!" broke in a shaking voice from Alyosha's breast, and he raised his right hand in the air, as though calling God to witness his words. Mitya's whole face was lighted up with bliss. "Thank you!" he articulated slowly, as though letting a sigh escape him after fainting. "Now you have given me new life. Would you believe it, till this moment I've been afraid to ask you, you, even you. Well, go! You've given me strength for to-morrow. God bless you! Come, go along! Love Ivan!" was Mitya's last word. Alyosha went out in tears. Such distrustfulness in Mitya, such lack of confidence even to him, to Alyosha--all this suddenly opened before Alyosha an unsuspected depth of hopeless grief and despair in the soul of his unhappy brother. Intense, infinite compassion overwhelmed him instantly. There was a poignant ache in his torn heart. "Love Ivan!"--he suddenly recalled Mitya's words. And he was going to Ivan. He badly wanted to see Ivan all day. He was as much worried about Ivan as about Mitya, and more than ever now.

book 11, Chapter 4

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section14/

A Hymn and a Secret Alyosha goes to the prison, where Rakitin has just visited Dmitri. Perplexed, Alyosha asks Dmitri about the visit, and Dmitri says Rakitin wants to write an article alleging that, because of his circumstances, Dmitri could not have helped but kill his father. Dmitri says he holds Rakitin in contempt, but allows him to visit so he can laugh at his ideas. Sobering, Dmitri tells Alyosha that even though he is not guilty of the crime of which he is accused, he has come to terms with the burden of sin he has created for himself and longs to do penance and redeem himself. He is only afraid that Grushenka will not be allowed to travel with him to his exile in Siberia, and that without her, he will lack the strength necessary for his spiritual renewal. Dmitri says that Ivan has recently offered him a plan for his escape, even though Ivan believes Dmitri to be guilty of the murder. This plan is the secret that they have been keeping from Grushenka. Tormented with grief and guilt, Dmitri refuses to escape before the trial. He asks Alyosha what he believes, and Alyosha says that he has never believed Dmitri to be guilty. This declaration from his younger brother fills Dmitri with courage and hope

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/69.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_68_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 10.chapter 7

book 10, chapter 7

{"name": "Book 10, Chapter 7", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-10-chapter-7", "summary": "OK, this is maybe the saddest part of the whole book, so get your Kleenex ready. The famous doctor, who obviously thinks he is way too important to visit a poor family like the Snegiryovs, condescendingly states that the only way the family can be saved is if they move - Ilyusha to Sicily, the daughter and the mother to the Caucasus, and the mother to Paris. His contempt angers Kolya, who threatens the doctor with an attack from Perezvon, but Alyosha calms Kolya down. Kolya returns to the room and the doctor leaves in a huff. Snegiryov tries to reassure Ilyusha, but Ilyusha already knows that nothing can be done and that there's no cure. He pulls both Kolya and Snegiryov to his tiny, consumptive body in a hug. Everybody is crying at this point. He tells Snegiryov that when he dies - sniff - Snegiryov should find another boy to be friends with - sniff - and just please don't ever forget him - sniff - just visit his grave once in a while. Sob. Kolya can't fight the tears, so he leaves the room. Kolya heads home, and Alyosha leaves as well.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter VII. Ilusha The doctor came out of the room again, muffled in his fur coat and with his cap on his head. His face looked almost angry and disgusted, as though he were afraid of getting dirty. He cast a cursory glance round the passage, looking sternly at Alyosha and Kolya as he did so. Alyosha waved from the door to the coachman, and the carriage that had brought the doctor drove up. The captain darted out after the doctor, and, bowing apologetically, stopped him to get the last word. The poor fellow looked utterly crushed; there was a scared look in his eyes. "Your Excellency, your Excellency ... is it possible?" he began, but could not go on and clasped his hands in despair. Yet he still gazed imploringly at the doctor, as though a word from him might still change the poor boy's fate. "I can't help it, I am not God!" the doctor answered offhand, though with the customary impressiveness. "Doctor ... your Excellency ... and will it be soon, soon?" "You must be prepared for anything," said the doctor in emphatic and incisive tones, and dropping his eyes, he was about to step out to the coach. "Your Excellency, for Christ's sake!" the terror-stricken captain stopped him again. "Your Excellency! but can nothing, absolutely nothing save him now?" "It's not in my hands now," said the doctor impatiently, "but h'm!..." he stopped suddenly. "If you could, for instance ... send ... your patient ... at once, without delay" (the words "at once, without delay," the doctor uttered with an almost wrathful sternness that made the captain start) "to Syracuse, the change to the new be-ne-ficial climatic conditions might possibly effect--" "To Syracuse!" cried the captain, unable to grasp what was said. "Syracuse is in Sicily," Kolya jerked out suddenly in explanation. The doctor looked at him. "Sicily! your Excellency," faltered the captain, "but you've seen"--he spread out his hands, indicating his surroundings--"mamma and my family?" "N--no, Sicily is not the place for the family, the family should go to Caucasus in the early spring ... your daughter must go to the Caucasus, and your wife ... after a course of the waters in the Caucasus for her rheumatism ... must be sent straight to Paris to the mental specialist Lepelletier; I could give you a note to him, and then ... there might be a change--" "Doctor, doctor! But you see!" The captain flung wide his hands again despairingly, indicating the bare wooden walls of the passage. "Well, that's not my business," grinned the doctor. "I have only told you the answer of medical science to your question as to possible treatment. As for the rest, to my regret--" "Don't be afraid, apothecary, my dog won't bite you," Kolya rapped out loudly, noticing the doctor's rather uneasy glance at Perezvon, who was standing in the doorway. There was a wrathful note in Kolya's voice. He used the word apothecary instead of doctor on purpose, and, as he explained afterwards, used it "to insult him." "What's that?" The doctor flung up his head, staring with surprise at Kolya. "Who's this?" he addressed Alyosha, as though asking him to explain. "It's Perezvon's master, don't worry about me," Kolya said incisively again. "Perezvon?"(7) repeated the doctor, perplexed. "He hears the bell, but where it is he cannot tell. Good-by, we shall meet in Syracuse." "Who's this? Who's this?" The doctor flew into a terrible rage. "He is a schoolboy, doctor, he is a mischievous boy; take no notice of him," said Alyosha, frowning and speaking quickly. "Kolya, hold your tongue!" he cried to Krassotkin. "Take no notice of him, doctor," he repeated, rather impatiently. "He wants a thrashing, a good thrashing!" The doctor stamped in a perfect fury. "And you know, apothecary, my Perezvon might bite!" said Kolya, turning pale, with quivering voice and flashing eyes. "_Ici_, Perezvon!" "Kolya, if you say another word, I'll have nothing more to do with you," Alyosha cried peremptorily. "There is only one man in the world who can command Nikolay Krassotkin--this is the man"; Kolya pointed to Alyosha. "I obey him, good- by!" He stepped forward, opened the door, and quickly went into the inner room. Perezvon flew after him. The doctor stood still for five seconds in amazement, looking at Alyosha; then, with a curse, he went out quickly to the carriage, repeating aloud, "This is ... this is ... I don't know what it is!" The captain darted forward to help him into the carriage. Alyosha followed Kolya into the room. He was already by Ilusha's bedside. The sick boy was holding his hand and calling for his father. A minute later the captain, too, came back. "Father, father, come ... we ..." Ilusha faltered in violent excitement, but apparently unable to go on, he flung his wasted arms round his father and Kolya, uniting them in one embrace, and hugging them as tightly as he could. The captain suddenly began to shake with dumb sobs, and Kolya's lips and chin twitched. "Father, father! How sorry I am for you!" Ilusha moaned bitterly. "Ilusha ... darling ... the doctor said ... you would be all right ... we shall be happy ... the doctor ..." the captain began. "Ah, father! I know what the new doctor said to you about me.... I saw!" cried Ilusha, and again he hugged them both with all his strength, hiding his face on his father's shoulder. "Father, don't cry, and when I die get a good boy, another one ... choose one of them all, a good one, call him Ilusha and love him instead of me...." "Hush, old man, you'll get well," Krassotkin cried suddenly, in a voice that sounded angry. "But don't ever forget me, father," Ilusha went on, "come to my grave ... and, father, bury me by our big stone, where we used to go for our walk, and come to me there with Krassotkin in the evening ... and Perezvon ... I shall expect you.... Father, father!" His voice broke. They were all three silent, still embracing. Nina was crying quietly in her chair, and at last seeing them all crying, "mamma," too, burst into tears. "Ilusha! Ilusha!" she exclaimed. Krassotkin suddenly released himself from Ilusha's embrace. "Good-by, old man, mother expects me back to dinner," he said quickly. "What a pity I did not tell her! She will be dreadfully anxious.... But after dinner I'll come back to you for the whole day, for the whole evening, and I'll tell you all sorts of things, all sorts of things. And I'll bring Perezvon, but now I will take him with me, because he will begin to howl when I am away and bother you. Good-by!" And he ran out into the passage. He didn't want to cry, but in the passage he burst into tears. Alyosha found him crying. "Kolya, you must be sure to keep your word and come, or he will be terribly disappointed," Alyosha said emphatically. "I will! Oh, how I curse myself for not having come before!" muttered Kolya, crying, and no longer ashamed of it. At that moment the captain flew out of the room, and at once closed the door behind him. His face looked frenzied, his lips were trembling. He stood before the two and flung up his arms. "I don't want a good boy! I don't want another boy!" he muttered in a wild whisper, clenching his teeth. "If I forget thee, Jerusalem, may my tongue--" He broke off with a sob and sank on his knees before the wooden bench. Pressing his fists against his head, he began sobbing with absurd whimpering cries, doing his utmost that his cries should not be heard in the room. Kolya ran out into the street. "Good-by, Karamazov? Will you come yourself?" he cried sharply and angrily to Alyosha. "I will certainly come in the evening." "What was that he said about Jerusalem?... What did he mean by that?" "It's from the Bible. 'If I forget thee, Jerusalem,' that is, if I forget all that is most precious to me, if I let anything take its place, then may--" "I understand, that's enough! Mind you come! _Ici_, Perezvon!" he cried with positive ferocity to the dog, and with rapid strides he went home.

Book 10, Chapter 7

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-10-chapter-7

OK, this is maybe the saddest part of the whole book, so get your Kleenex ready. The famous doctor, who obviously thinks he is way too important to visit a poor family like the Snegiryovs, condescendingly states that the only way the family can be saved is if they move - Ilyusha to Sicily, the daughter and the mother to the Caucasus, and the mother to Paris. His contempt angers Kolya, who threatens the doctor with an attack from Perezvon, but Alyosha calms Kolya down. Kolya returns to the room and the doctor leaves in a huff. Snegiryov tries to reassure Ilyusha, but Ilyusha already knows that nothing can be done and that there's no cure. He pulls both Kolya and Snegiryov to his tiny, consumptive body in a hug. Everybody is crying at this point. He tells Snegiryov that when he dies - sniff - Snegiryov should find another boy to be friends with - sniff - and just please don't ever forget him - sniff - just visit his grave once in a while. Sob. Kolya can't fight the tears, so he leaves the room. Kolya heads home, and Alyosha leaves as well.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/23042-chapters/5.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/The Tempest/section_2_part_1.txt

The Tempest.act 3.scene 1

act 3, scene 1

{"name": "act 3, Scene 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210309152602/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-tempest/study-guide/summary-act-iii", "summary": "Ferdinand has been made to take Caliban's place as a servant, despite his royal status; and though he does not like Prospero, he does the work because it will benefit his new love, Miranda. Ferdinand and Miranda express their love for each other, and both express their desire to be marriedthough they have known each other for less than a day", "analysis": ""}

ACT III. SCENE I. _Before PROSPERO'S cell._ _Enter FERDINAND, bearing a log._ _Fer._ There be some sports are painful, and their labour Delight in them sets off: some kinds of baseness Are nobly undergone, and most poor matters Point to rich ends. This my mean task Would be as heavy to me as odious, but 5 The mistress which I serve quickens what's dead, And makes my labours pleasures: O, she is Ten times more gentle than her father's crabbed. And he's composed of harshness. I must remove Some thousands of these logs, and pile them up, 10 Upon a sore injunction: my sweet mistress Weeps when she sees me work, and says, such baseness Had never like executor. I forget: But these sweet thoughts do even refresh my labours, Most busy lest, when I do it. _Enter MIRANDA; and PROSPERO at a distance, unseen._ _Mir._ Alas, now, pray you, 15 Work not so hard: I would the lightning had Burnt up those logs that you are enjoin'd to pile! Pray, set it down, and rest you: when this burns, 'Twill weep for having wearied you. My father Is hard at study; pray, now, rest yourself; 20 He's safe for these three hours. _Fer._ O most dear mistress, The sun will set before I shall discharge What I must strive to do. _Mir._ If you'll sit down, I'll bear your logs the while: pray, give me that; I'll carry it to the pile. _Fer._ No, precious creature; 25 I had rather crack my sinews, break my back, Than you should such dishonour undergo, While I sit lazy by. _Mir._ It would become me As well as it does you: and I should do it With much more ease; for my good will is to it, 30 And yours it is against. _Pros._ Poor worm, thou art infected! This visitation shows it. _Mir._ You look wearily. _Fer._ No, noble mistress; 'tis fresh morning with me When you are by at night. I do beseech you,-- Chiefly that I might set it in my prayers,-- 35 What is your name? _Mir._ Miranda. --O my father, I have broke your hest to say so! _Fer._ Admired Miranda! Indeed the top of admiration! worth What's dearest to the world! Full many a lady I have eyed with best regard, and many a time 40 The harmony of their tongues hath into bondage Brought my too diligent ear: for several virtues Have I liked several women; never any With so full soul, but some defect in her Did quarrel with the noblest grace she owed, 45 And put it to the foil: but you, O you, So perfect and so peerless, are created Of every creature's best! _Mir._ I do not know One of my sex; no woman's face remember, Save, from my glass, mine own; nor have I seen 50 More that I may call men than you, good friend, And my dear father: how features are abroad, I am skilless of; but, by my modesty, The jewel in my dower, I would not wish Any companion in the world but you; 55 Nor can imagination form a shape, Besides yourself, to like of. But I prattle Something too wildly, and my father's precepts I therein do forget. _Fer._ I am, in my condition, A prince, Miranda; I do think, a king; 60 I would, not so!--and would no more endure This wooden slavery than to suffer The flesh-fly blow my mouth. Hear my soul speak: The very instant that I saw you, did My heart fly to your service; there resides, 65 To make me slave to it; and for your sake Am I this patient log-man. _Mir._ Do you love me? _Fer._ O heaven, O earth, bear witness to this sound, And crown what I profess with kind event, If I speak true! if hollowly, invert 70 What best is boded me to mischief! I, Beyond all limit of what else i' the world, Do love, prize, honour you. _Mir._ I am a fool To weep at what I am glad of. _Pros._ Fair encounter Of two most rare affections! Heavens rain grace 75 On that which breeds between 'em! _Fer._ Wherefore weep you? _Mir._ At mine unworthiness, that dare not offer What I desire to give; and much less take What I shall die to want. But this is trifling; And all the more it seeks to hide itself, 80 The bigger bulk it shows. Hence, bashful cunning! And prompt me, plain and holy innocence! I am your wife, if you will marry me; If not, I'll die your maid: to be your fellow You may deny me; but I'll be your servant, 85 Whether you will or no. _Fer._ My mistress, dearest; And I thus humble ever. _Mir._ My husband, then? _Fer._ Ay, with a heart as willing As bondage e'er of freedom: here's my hand. _Mir._ And mine, with my heart in't: and now farewell 90 Till half an hour hence. _Fer._ A thousand thousand! [_Exeunt Fer. and Mir. severally._ _Pros._ So glad of this as they I cannot be, Who are surprised withal; but my rejoicing At nothing can be more. I'll to my book; For yet, ere supper-time, must I perform 95 Much business appertaining. [_Exit._ Notes: III, 1. 1: _and_] _but_ Pope. 2: _sets_] Rowe. _set_ Ff. 4, 5: _my ... odious_] _my mean task would be As heavy to me as 'tis odious_ Pope. 9: _remove_] _move_ Pope. 14: _labours_] _labour_ Hanmer. 15: _Most busy lest_] F1. _Most busy least_ F2 F3 F4. _Least busy_ Pope. _Most busie-less_ Theobald._ Most busiest_ Holt White conj. _Most busy felt_ Staunton. _Most busy still_ Staunton conj. _Most busy-blest_ Collier MS. _Most busiliest_ Bullock conj. _Most busy lest, when I do_ (_doe_ F1 F2 F3) _it_] _Most busy when least I do it_ Brae conj. _Most busiest when idlest_ Spedding conj. _Most busy left when idlest_ Edd. conj. See note (XIII). at a distance, unseen] Rowe. 17: _you are_] F1. _thou art_ F2 F3 F4. 31: _it is_] _is it_ Steevens conj. (ed. 1, 2, and 3). om. Steevens (ed. 4) (Farmer conj.). 34, 35: _I do beseech you,--Chiefly_] _I do beseech you Chiefly_ Ff. 59: _I therein do_] _I do_ Pope. _Therein_ Steevens. 62: _wooden_] _wodden_ F1. _than to_] _than I would_ Pope. 72: _what else_] _aught else_ Malone conj. (withdrawn). 80: _seeks_] _seekd_ F3 F4. 88: _as_] F1. _so_ F2 F3 F4. 91: _severally_] Capell. 93: _withal_] Theobald. _with all_ Ff.

act 3, Scene 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20210309152602/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-tempest/study-guide/summary-act-iii

Ferdinand has been made to take Caliban's place as a servant, despite his royal status; and though he does not like Prospero, he does the work because it will benefit his new love, Miranda. Ferdinand and Miranda express their love for each other, and both express their desire to be marriedthough they have known each other for less than a day

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/29.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_28_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 29

chapter 29

{"name": "Chapter 29", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility45.asp", "summary": "On waking up the next morning, Elinor finds Marianne sobbing and writing a letter to Willoughby. Since Marianne refuses to reveal anything to her sister, Elinor leaves her alone. After breakfast, Marianne receives a letter from Willoughby. The letter creates even more pain for Marianne than did his behavior at the party. Willoughby denies ever having loved Marianne and returns all the letters she had written him in the past, as well as the lock of hair he had taken from her. Elinor reads the letter and condemns Willoughby for his heartlessness. She also reads the three letters Marianne had written earlier, in which she professed her love for Willoughby and expressed her eagerness to meet him. Marianne feels that others might have poisoned Willoughby's mind against her. However, she is not able to excuse his hypocrisy and indifference. Weighed down by sorrow, she expresses a desire to go back to Barton to meet her mother. Elinor asks her to wait for some more time.", "analysis": "Notes Jane Austen convincingly portrays a woman passionately in love, one who has been thwarted by her lover. Marianne is shattered by Willoughby's attitude. Unable to suppress her feelings, she writes one more letter to him, asking him to justify his behavior during the previous evening. Willoughby's reply wounds her tortured heart all the more. He neither expresses regret nor apologizes for his behavior at the party. His words express only cruelty. Marianne's last hope fails. She breaks down in front of her sister and asks her to take her home. She wants to go away from the city, which has given her nothing but anxiety and pain. Elinor, who generally excuses people for their lapses, finds Willoughby's behavior atrocious. He has used her sister shamelessly and discarded her at his convenience. She condemns him for his villainy. Again, her response is entirely justified. CHAPTER 30 Summary The news spreads like wild fire. Mrs. Jennings, returning back from her visit, gives them the news about Willoughby's engagement to Miss Grey. She takes pity on Marianne and tries to soothe her wounded heart. In the evening, during dinner, she gives more information about Miss Grey. Willoughby's fiancee is a fashionable and wealthy woman, inheriting fifty thousand pounds; but she is common in her looks. The news distresses Marianne all the more. Shortly afterwards, Colonel Brandon enters the scene. He has also heard about Willoughby and his engagement. He shows his concern for Marianne and inquires about her reaction. Notes Mrs. Jennings is one of the most likeable characters in this novel. She loves teasing young people in love, but at the same time, is sympathetic to those who have been wronged by love. Her generous heart goes out to Marianne. She curses Willoughby and consoles Marianne. However, her concern for Marianne is an added irritant: by fussing over the girl, Mrs. Jennings only increases her agitation. But the old lady is quite unaware of this. The chapter relates how news spreads like wild fire, thanks to the women busy in gossiping. Just a short while after Marianne and Elinor learn of Willoughby's engagement, Mrs. Jennings comes home with the news: \"Mrs. Taylor told me of it half an hour ago, and she was told it by a particular friend of Miss Grey herself, else I am sure I would not have believed it.\" The old lady also provides all the details about Miss Grey. In the evening Colonel Brandon comes to share the news he has heard in a stationer's shop in Pall Mall. He reveals, \"Two ladies were waiting for their carriage, and one of them was giving the other an account of the intended match, in a voice so little attempting concealment, that it was impossible for me not to hear all.\" This also hints that the Colonel is a gentleman who does not pursue gossip. CHAPTER 31 Summary Elinor tries her best to lift Marianne from her depression by talking to her. Shortly afterwards, they receive a letter from their mother. Mrs. Dashwood, unaware of the recent developments, asks Marianne to explain her relationship with Willoughby. Her letter, full of wishes and hope, moves Marianne, who wants to go see her mother all the more. Colonel Brandon calls on them again. He recounts his past to Elinor. He also talks about Eliza Brandon and her daughter, Miss Williams. He relates how Willoughby had once played with the girl's heart, and after managing to seduce her, had left her in the lurch. Notes Marianne is still in love with Willoughby and nurtures a hope that he may repent and come back to her. Thus, when Mrs. Jennings brings a letter for them, Marianne imagines it to be a letter of repentance from Willoughby. Marianne is emotional and prejudiced. She does not take kindly to Mrs. Jennings' genuine sympathy or generosity. In her opinion, all that the old lady wants is \"gossip, and she only likes me now because I supply it. \" She also considers Colonel Brandon as an intruder who enjoys interfering in others' affairs. She remarks: \"A man who has nothing to do with his own time, has no conscience in his intrusion on that of others.\" Marianne lacks a mature understanding of human nature. Immersed in her own sorrow, she fails to notice the genuine concern that others may have. Colonel Brandon clears the suspicions regarding his reputation by revealing his past to Elinor. Miss Williams is not his natural daughter, as most people imagine, but Eliza Brandon's. He had once loved Eliza Brandon, but she was forced to marry his brother. The marriage was unhappy, and Eliza had several extra- marital affairs. Colonel Brandon ultimately became the guardian of Eliza Williams, the daughter that resulted from the first of these affairs. His love for Marianne makes him confide in Elinor. He also exposes the deceptive nature and base character of Willoughby. Willoughby behaved in a disreputable manner with Miss Williams but has refused to acknowledge his mistake. He deserves to be punished, but the Colonel has been generous enough to pardon him."}

Before the house-maid had lit their fire the next day, or the sun gained any power over a cold, gloomy morning in January, Marianne, only half dressed, was kneeling against one of the window-seats for the sake of all the little light she could command from it, and writing as fast as a continual flow of tears would permit her. In this situation, Elinor, roused from sleep by her agitation and sobs, first perceived her; and after observing her for a few moments with silent anxiety, said, in a tone of the most considerate gentleness, "Marianne, may I ask-?" "No, Elinor," she replied, "ask nothing; you will soon know all." The sort of desperate calmness with which this was said, lasted no longer than while she spoke, and was immediately followed by a return of the same excessive affliction. It was some minutes before she could go on with her letter, and the frequent bursts of grief which still obliged her, at intervals, to withhold her pen, were proofs enough of her feeling how more than probable it was that she was writing for the last time to Willoughby. Elinor paid her every quiet and unobtrusive attention in her power; and she would have tried to sooth and tranquilize her still more, had not Marianne entreated her, with all the eagerness of the most nervous irritability, not to speak to her for the world. In such circumstances, it was better for both that they should not be long together; and the restless state of Marianne's mind not only prevented her from remaining in the room a moment after she was dressed, but requiring at once solitude and continual change of place, made her wander about the house till breakfast time, avoiding the sight of every body. At breakfast she neither ate, nor attempted to eat any thing; and Elinor's attention was then all employed, not in urging her, not in pitying her, nor in appearing to regard her, but in endeavouring to engage Mrs. Jennings's notice entirely to herself. As this was a favourite meal with Mrs. Jennings, it lasted a considerable time, and they were just setting themselves, after it, round the common working table, when a letter was delivered to Marianne, which she eagerly caught from the servant, and, turning of a death-like paleness, instantly ran out of the room. Elinor, who saw as plainly by this, as if she had seen the direction, that it must come from Willoughby, felt immediately such a sickness at heart as made her hardly able to hold up her head, and sat in such a general tremour as made her fear it impossible to escape Mrs. Jennings's notice. That good lady, however, saw only that Marianne had received a letter from Willoughby, which appeared to her a very good joke, and which she treated accordingly, by hoping, with a laugh, that she would find it to her liking. Of Elinor's distress, she was too busily employed in measuring lengths of worsted for her rug, to see any thing at all; and calmly continuing her talk, as soon as Marianne disappeared, she said, "Upon my word, I never saw a young woman so desperately in love in my life! MY girls were nothing to her, and yet they used to be foolish enough; but as for Miss Marianne, she is quite an altered creature. I hope, from the bottom of my heart, he won't keep her waiting much longer, for it is quite grievous to see her look so ill and forlorn. Pray, when are they to be married?" Elinor, though never less disposed to speak than at that moment, obliged herself to answer such an attack as this, and, therefore, trying to smile, replied, "And have you really, Ma'am, talked yourself into a persuasion of my sister's being engaged to Mr. Willoughby? I thought it had been only a joke, but so serious a question seems to imply more; and I must beg, therefore, that you will not deceive yourself any longer. I do assure you that nothing would surprise me more than to hear of their being going to be married." "For shame, for shame, Miss Dashwood! how can you talk so? Don't we all know that it must be a match, that they were over head and ears in love with each other from the first moment they met? Did not I see them together in Devonshire every day, and all day long; and did not I know that your sister came to town with me on purpose to buy wedding clothes? Come, come, this won't do. Because you are so sly about it yourself, you think nobody else has any senses; but it is no such thing, I can tell you, for it has been known all over town this ever so long. I tell every body of it and so does Charlotte." "Indeed, Ma'am," said Elinor, very seriously, "you are mistaken. Indeed, you are doing a very unkind thing in spreading the report, and you will find that you have though you will not believe me now." Mrs. Jennings laughed again, but Elinor had not spirits to say more, and eager at all events to know what Willoughby had written, hurried away to their room, where, on opening the door, she saw Marianne stretched on the bed, almost choked by grief, one letter in her hand, and two or three others laying by her. Elinor drew near, but without saying a word; and seating herself on the bed, took her hand, kissed her affectionately several times, and then gave way to a burst of tears, which at first was scarcely less violent than Marianne's. The latter, though unable to speak, seemed to feel all the tenderness of this behaviour, and after some time thus spent in joint affliction, she put all the letters into Elinor's hands; and then covering her face with her handkerchief, almost screamed with agony. Elinor, who knew that such grief, shocking as it was to witness it, must have its course, watched by her till this excess of suffering had somewhat spent itself, and then turning eagerly to Willoughby's letter, read as follows: "Bond Street, January. "MY DEAR MADAM, "I have just had the honour of receiving your letter, for which I beg to return my sincere acknowledgments. I am much concerned to find there was anything in my behaviour last night that did not meet your approbation; and though I am quite at a loss to discover in what point I could be so unfortunate as to offend you, I entreat your forgiveness of what I can assure you to have been perfectly unintentional. I shall never reflect on my former acquaintance with your family in Devonshire without the most grateful pleasure, and flatter myself it will not be broken by any mistake or misapprehension of my actions. My esteem for your whole family is very sincere; but if I have been so unfortunate as to give rise to a belief of more than I felt, or meant to express, I shall reproach myself for not having been more guarded in my professions of that esteem. That I should ever have meant more you will allow to be impossible, when you understand that my affections have been long engaged elsewhere, and it will not be many weeks, I believe, before this engagement is fulfilled. It is with great regret that I obey your commands in returning the letters with which I have been honoured from you, and the lock of hair, which you so obligingly bestowed on me. "I am, dear Madam, "Your most obedient "humble servant, "JOHN WILLOUGHBY." With what indignation such a letter as this must be read by Miss Dashwood, may be imagined. Though aware, before she began it, that it must bring a confession of his inconstancy, and confirm their separation for ever, she was not aware that such language could be suffered to announce it; nor could she have supposed Willoughby capable of departing so far from the appearance of every honourable and delicate feeling--so far from the common decorum of a gentleman, as to send a letter so impudently cruel: a letter which, instead of bringing with his desire of a release any professions of regret, acknowledged no breach of faith, denied all peculiar affection whatever--a letter of which every line was an insult, and which proclaimed its writer to be deep in hardened villainy. She paused over it for some time with indignant astonishment; then read it again and again; but every perusal only served to increase her abhorrence of the man, and so bitter were her feelings against him, that she dared not trust herself to speak, lest she might wound Marianne still deeper by treating their disengagement, not as a loss to her of any possible good but as an escape from the worst and most irremediable of all evils, a connection, for life, with an unprincipled man, as a deliverance the most real, a blessing the most important. In her earnest meditations on the contents of the letter, on the depravity of that mind which could dictate it, and probably, on the very different mind of a very different person, who had no other connection whatever with the affair than what her heart gave him with every thing that passed, Elinor forgot the immediate distress of her sister, forgot that she had three letters on her lap yet unread, and so entirely forgot how long she had been in the room, that when on hearing a carriage drive up to the door, she went to the window to see who could be coming so unreasonably early, she was all astonishment to perceive Mrs. Jennings's chariot, which she knew had not been ordered till one. Determined not to quit Marianne, though hopeless of contributing, at present, to her ease, she hurried away to excuse herself from attending Mrs. Jennings, on account of her sister being indisposed. Mrs. Jennings, with a thoroughly good-humoured concern for its cause, admitted the excuse most readily, and Elinor, after seeing her safe off, returned to Marianne, whom she found attempting to rise from the bed, and whom she reached just in time to prevent her from falling on the floor, faint and giddy from a long want of proper rest and food; for it was many days since she had any appetite, and many nights since she had really slept; and now, when her mind was no longer supported by the fever of suspense, the consequence of all this was felt in an aching head, a weakened stomach, and a general nervous faintness. A glass of wine, which Elinor procured for her directly, made her more comfortable, and she was at last able to express some sense of her kindness, by saying, "Poor Elinor! how unhappy I make you!" "I only wish," replied her sister, "there were any thing I COULD do, which might be of comfort to you." This, as every thing else would have been, was too much for Marianne, who could only exclaim, in the anguish of her heart, "Oh! Elinor, I am miserable, indeed," before her voice was entirely lost in sobs. Elinor could no longer witness this torrent of unresisted grief in silence. "Exert yourself, dear Marianne," she cried, "if you would not kill yourself and all who love you. Think of your mother; think of her misery while YOU suffer: for her sake you must exert yourself." "I cannot, I cannot," cried Marianne; "leave me, leave me, if I distress you; leave me, hate me, forget me! but do not torture me so. Oh! how easy for those, who have no sorrow of their own to talk of exertion! Happy, happy Elinor, YOU cannot have an idea of what I suffer." "Do you call ME happy, Marianne? Ah! if you knew!--And can you believe me to be so, while I see you so wretched!" "Forgive me, forgive me," throwing her arms round her sister's neck; "I know you feel for me; I know what a heart you have; but yet you are--you must be happy; Edward loves you--what, oh what, can do away such happiness as that?" "Many, many circumstances," said Elinor, solemnly. "No, no, no," cried Marianne wildly, "he loves you, and only you. You CAN have no grief." "I can have no pleasure while I see you in this state." "And you will never see me otherwise. Mine is a misery which nothing can do away." "You must not talk so, Marianne. Have you no comforts? no friends? Is your loss such as leaves no opening for consolation? Much as you suffer now, think of what you would have suffered if the discovery of his character had been delayed to a later period--if your engagement had been carried on for months and months, as it might have been, before he chose to put an end to it. Every additional day of unhappy confidence, on your side, would have made the blow more dreadful." "Engagement!" cried Marianne, "there has been no engagement." "No engagement!" "No, he is not so unworthy as you believe him. He has broken no faith with me." "But he told you that he loved you." "Yes--no--never absolutely. It was every day implied, but never professedly declared. Sometimes I thought it had been--but it never was." "Yet you wrote to him?"-- "Yes--could that be wrong after all that had passed?-- But I cannot talk." Elinor said no more, and turning again to the three letters which now raised a much stronger curiosity than before, directly ran over the contents of all. The first, which was what her sister had sent him on their arrival in town, was to this effect. Berkeley Street, January. "How surprised you will be, Willoughby, on receiving this; and I think you will feel something more than surprise, when you know that I am in town. An opportunity of coming hither, though with Mrs. Jennings, was a temptation we could not resist. I wish you may receive this in time to come here to-night, but I will not depend on it. At any rate I shall expect you to-morrow. For the present, adieu. "M.D." Her second note, which had been written on the morning after the dance at the Middletons', was in these words:-- "I cannot express my disappointment in having missed you the day before yesterday, nor my astonishment at not having received any answer to a note which I sent you above a week ago. I have been expecting to hear from you, and still more to see you, every hour of the day. Pray call again as soon as possible, and explain the reason of my having expected this in vain. You had better come earlier another time, because we are generally out by one. We were last night at Lady Middleton's, where there was a dance. I have been told that you were asked to be of the party. But could it be so? You must be very much altered indeed since we parted, if that could be the case, and you not there. But I will not suppose this possible, and I hope very soon to receive your personal assurance of its being otherwise. "M.D." The contents of her last note to him were these:-- "What am I to imagine, Willoughby, by your behaviour last night? Again I demand an explanation of it. I was prepared to meet you with the pleasure which our separation naturally produced, with the familiarity which our intimacy at Barton appeared to me to justify. I was repulsed indeed! I have passed a wretched night in endeavouring to excuse a conduct which can scarcely be called less than insulting; but though I have not yet been able to form any reasonable apology for your behaviour, I am perfectly ready to hear your justification of it. You have perhaps been misinformed, or purposely deceived, in something concerning me, which may have lowered me in your opinion. Tell me what it is, explain the grounds on which you acted, and I shall be satisfied, in being able to satisfy you. It would grieve me indeed to be obliged to think ill of you; but if I am to do it, if I am to learn that you are not what we have hitherto believed you, that your regard for us all was insincere, that your behaviour to me was intended only to deceive, let it be told as soon as possible. My feelings are at present in a state of dreadful indecision; I wish to acquit you, but certainty on either side will be ease to what I now suffer. If your sentiments are no longer what they were, you will return my notes, and the lock of my hair which is in your possession. "M.D." That such letters, so full of affection and confidence, could have been so answered, Elinor, for Willoughby's sake, would have been unwilling to believe. But her condemnation of him did not blind her to the impropriety of their having been written at all; and she was silently grieving over the imprudence which had hazarded such unsolicited proofs of tenderness, not warranted by anything preceding, and most severely condemned by the event, when Marianne, perceiving that she had finished the letters, observed to her that they contained nothing but what any one would have written in the same situation. "I felt myself," she added, "to be as solemnly engaged to him, as if the strictest legal covenant had bound us to each other." "I can believe it," said Elinor; "but unfortunately he did not feel the same." "He DID feel the same, Elinor--for weeks and weeks he felt it. I know he did. Whatever may have changed him now, (and nothing but the blackest art employed against me can have done it), I was once as dear to him as my own soul could wish. This lock of hair, which now he can so readily give up, was begged of me with the most earnest supplication. Had you seen his look, his manner, had you heard his voice at that moment! Have you forgot the last evening of our being together at Barton? The morning that we parted too! When he told me that it might be many weeks before we met again--his distress--can I ever forget his distress?" For a moment or two she could say no more; but when this emotion had passed away, she added, in a firmer tone, "Elinor, I have been cruelly used; but not by Willoughby." "Dearest Marianne, who but himself? By whom can he have been instigated?" "By all the world, rather than by his own heart. I could rather believe every creature of my acquaintance leagued together to ruin me in his opinion, than believe his nature capable of such cruelty. This woman of whom he writes--whoever she be--or any one, in short, but your own dear self, mama, and Edward, may have been so barbarous to bely me. Beyond you three, is there a creature in the world whom I would not rather suspect of evil than Willoughby, whose heart I know so well?" Elinor would not contend, and only replied, "Whoever may have been so detestably your enemy, let them be cheated of their malignant triumph, my dear sister, by seeing how nobly the consciousness of your own innocence and good intentions supports your spirits. It is a reasonable and laudable pride which resists such malevolence." "No, no," cried Marianne, "misery such as mine has no pride. I care not who knows that I am wretched. The triumph of seeing me so may be open to all the world. Elinor, Elinor, they who suffer little may be proud and independent as they like--may resist insult, or return mortification--but I cannot. I must feel--I must be wretched--and they are welcome to enjoy the consciousness of it that can." "But for my mother's sake and mine--" "I would do more than for my own. But to appear happy when I am so miserable--Oh! who can require it?" Again they were both silent. Elinor was employed in walking thoughtfully from the fire to the window, from the window to the fire, without knowing that she received warmth from one, or discerning objects through the other; and Marianne, seated at the foot of the bed, with her head leaning against one of its posts, again took up Willoughby's letter, and, after shuddering over every sentence, exclaimed-- "It is too much! Oh, Willoughby, Willoughby, could this be yours! Cruel, cruel--nothing can acquit you. Elinor, nothing can. Whatever he might have heard against me--ought he not to have suspended his belief? ought he not to have told me of it, to have given me the power of clearing myself? 'The lock of hair, (repeating it from the letter,) which you so obligingly bestowed on me'--That is unpardonable. Willoughby, where was your heart when you wrote those words? Oh, barbarously insolent!--Elinor, can he be justified?" "No, Marianne, in no possible way." "And yet this woman--who knows what her art may have been?--how long it may have been premeditated, and how deeply contrived by her!--Who is she?--Who can she be?--Whom did I ever hear him talk of as young and attractive among his female acquaintance?--Oh! no one, no one--he talked to me only of myself." Another pause ensued; Marianne was greatly agitated, and it ended thus. "Elinor, I must go home. I must go and comfort mama. Can not we be gone to-morrow?" "To-morrow, Marianne!" "Yes, why should I stay here? I came only for Willoughby's sake--and now who cares for me? Who regards me?" "It would be impossible to go to-morrow. We owe Mrs. Jennings much more than civility; and civility of the commonest kind must prevent such a hasty removal as that." "Well then, another day or two, perhaps; but I cannot stay here long, I cannot stay to endure the questions and remarks of all these people. The Middletons and Palmers--how am I to bear their pity? The pity of such a woman as Lady Middleton! Oh, what would HE say to that!" Elinor advised her to lie down again, and for a moment she did so; but no attitude could give her ease; and in restless pain of mind and body she moved from one posture to another, till growing more and more hysterical, her sister could with difficulty keep her on the bed at all, and for some time was fearful of being constrained to call for assistance. Some lavender drops, however, which she was at length persuaded to take, were of use; and from that time till Mrs. Jennings returned, she continued on the bed quiet and motionless.

Chapter 29

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility45.asp

On waking up the next morning, Elinor finds Marianne sobbing and writing a letter to Willoughby. Since Marianne refuses to reveal anything to her sister, Elinor leaves her alone. After breakfast, Marianne receives a letter from Willoughby. The letter creates even more pain for Marianne than did his behavior at the party. Willoughby denies ever having loved Marianne and returns all the letters she had written him in the past, as well as the lock of hair he had taken from her. Elinor reads the letter and condemns Willoughby for his heartlessness. She also reads the three letters Marianne had written earlier, in which she professed her love for Willoughby and expressed her eagerness to meet him. Marianne feels that others might have poisoned Willoughby's mind against her. However, she is not able to excuse his hypocrisy and indifference. Weighed down by sorrow, she expresses a desire to go back to Barton to meet her mother. Elinor asks her to wait for some more time.

Notes Jane Austen convincingly portrays a woman passionately in love, one who has been thwarted by her lover. Marianne is shattered by Willoughby's attitude. Unable to suppress her feelings, she writes one more letter to him, asking him to justify his behavior during the previous evening. Willoughby's reply wounds her tortured heart all the more. He neither expresses regret nor apologizes for his behavior at the party. His words express only cruelty. Marianne's last hope fails. She breaks down in front of her sister and asks her to take her home. She wants to go away from the city, which has given her nothing but anxiety and pain. Elinor, who generally excuses people for their lapses, finds Willoughby's behavior atrocious. He has used her sister shamelessly and discarded her at his convenience. She condemns him for his villainy. Again, her response is entirely justified. CHAPTER 30 Summary The news spreads like wild fire. Mrs. Jennings, returning back from her visit, gives them the news about Willoughby's engagement to Miss Grey. She takes pity on Marianne and tries to soothe her wounded heart. In the evening, during dinner, she gives more information about Miss Grey. Willoughby's fiancee is a fashionable and wealthy woman, inheriting fifty thousand pounds; but she is common in her looks. The news distresses Marianne all the more. Shortly afterwards, Colonel Brandon enters the scene. He has also heard about Willoughby and his engagement. He shows his concern for Marianne and inquires about her reaction. Notes Mrs. Jennings is one of the most likeable characters in this novel. She loves teasing young people in love, but at the same time, is sympathetic to those who have been wronged by love. Her generous heart goes out to Marianne. She curses Willoughby and consoles Marianne. However, her concern for Marianne is an added irritant: by fussing over the girl, Mrs. Jennings only increases her agitation. But the old lady is quite unaware of this. The chapter relates how news spreads like wild fire, thanks to the women busy in gossiping. Just a short while after Marianne and Elinor learn of Willoughby's engagement, Mrs. Jennings comes home with the news: "Mrs. Taylor told me of it half an hour ago, and she was told it by a particular friend of Miss Grey herself, else I am sure I would not have believed it." The old lady also provides all the details about Miss Grey. In the evening Colonel Brandon comes to share the news he has heard in a stationer's shop in Pall Mall. He reveals, "Two ladies were waiting for their carriage, and one of them was giving the other an account of the intended match, in a voice so little attempting concealment, that it was impossible for me not to hear all." This also hints that the Colonel is a gentleman who does not pursue gossip. CHAPTER 31 Summary Elinor tries her best to lift Marianne from her depression by talking to her. Shortly afterwards, they receive a letter from their mother. Mrs. Dashwood, unaware of the recent developments, asks Marianne to explain her relationship with Willoughby. Her letter, full of wishes and hope, moves Marianne, who wants to go see her mother all the more. Colonel Brandon calls on them again. He recounts his past to Elinor. He also talks about Eliza Brandon and her daughter, Miss Williams. He relates how Willoughby had once played with the girl's heart, and after managing to seduce her, had left her in the lurch. Notes Marianne is still in love with Willoughby and nurtures a hope that he may repent and come back to her. Thus, when Mrs. Jennings brings a letter for them, Marianne imagines it to be a letter of repentance from Willoughby. Marianne is emotional and prejudiced. She does not take kindly to Mrs. Jennings' genuine sympathy or generosity. In her opinion, all that the old lady wants is "gossip, and she only likes me now because I supply it. " She also considers Colonel Brandon as an intruder who enjoys interfering in others' affairs. She remarks: "A man who has nothing to do with his own time, has no conscience in his intrusion on that of others." Marianne lacks a mature understanding of human nature. Immersed in her own sorrow, she fails to notice the genuine concern that others may have. Colonel Brandon clears the suspicions regarding his reputation by revealing his past to Elinor. Miss Williams is not his natural daughter, as most people imagine, but Eliza Brandon's. He had once loved Eliza Brandon, but she was forced to marry his brother. The marriage was unhappy, and Eliza had several extra- marital affairs. Colonel Brandon ultimately became the guardian of Eliza Williams, the daughter that resulted from the first of these affairs. His love for Marianne makes him confide in Elinor. He also exposes the deceptive nature and base character of Willoughby. Willoughby behaved in a disreputable manner with Miss Williams but has refused to acknowledge his mistake. He deserves to be punished, but the Colonel has been generous enough to pardon him.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/107-chapters/16.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Far from the Madding Crowd/section_15_part_0.txt

Far from the Madding Crowd.chapter 16

chapter 16

{"name": "Chapter 16", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201101052914/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/f/far-from-the-madding-crowd/summary-and-analysis/chapter-16", "summary": "A small congregation at All Saints' Church was startled by the clash of spurs at the close of a weekday service. A cavalry soldier strode into the chapel and spoke to the curate. \"'Tis a wedding!\" murmured one of the women, brightening. \"Let's wait!\" Through the open door from the vestry they heard the creaking mechanism of the clock indicating half-past eleven. No one appeared, and there was tittering and giggling. So again at the three-quarter hour. \"I wonder where the woman is,\" a voice whispered. This was repeated at the full hour. As the angry sergeant was about to leave, Fanny arrived, breathless, to explain that she had been waiting at All Souls', which she had mistaken for All Saints'. She suggested that they meet again the next day, but Troy refused to go through such a performance a second time. Fanny, trembling, asked when the wedding would be. \"'Ah, when? God knows!' he said, with a light irony, and turning from her, walked rapidly away.\"", "analysis": "Troy is infuriated by his humiliation before the old women and takes out his rage on poor, confused Fanny. Her reaction to his anger is near terror. Though we have seen little of Troy, Fanny's actions do provide some clues to his nature."}

ALL SAINTS' AND ALL SOULS' On a week-day morning a small congregation, consisting mainly of women and girls, rose from its knees in the mouldy nave of a church called All Saints', in the distant barrack-town before-mentioned, at the end of a service without a sermon. They were about to disperse, when a smart footstep, entering the porch and coming up the central passage, arrested their attention. The step echoed with a ring unusual in a church; it was the clink of spurs. Everybody looked. A young cavalry soldier in a red uniform, with the three chevrons of a sergeant upon his sleeve, strode up the aisle, with an embarrassment which was only the more marked by the intense vigour of his step, and by the determination upon his face to show none. A slight flush had mounted his cheek by the time he had run the gauntlet between these women; but, passing on through the chancel arch, he never paused till he came close to the altar railing. Here for a moment he stood alone. The officiating curate, who had not yet doffed his surplice, perceived the new-comer, and followed him to the communion-space. He whispered to the soldier, and then beckoned to the clerk, who in his turn whispered to an elderly woman, apparently his wife, and they also went up the chancel steps. "'Tis a wedding!" murmured some of the women, brightening. "Let's wait!" The majority again sat down. There was a creaking of machinery behind, and some of the young ones turned their heads. From the interior face of the west wall of the tower projected a little canopy with a quarter-jack and small bell beneath it, the automaton being driven by the same clock machinery that struck the large bell in the tower. Between the tower and the church was a close screen, the door of which was kept shut during services, hiding this grotesque clockwork from sight. At present, however, the door was open, and the egress of the jack, the blows on the bell, and the mannikin's retreat into the nook again, were visible to many, and audible throughout the church. The jack had struck half-past eleven. "Where's the woman?" whispered some of the spectators. The young sergeant stood still with the abnormal rigidity of the old pillars around. He faced the south-east, and was as silent as he was still. The silence grew to be a noticeable thing as the minutes went on, and nobody else appeared, and not a soul moved. The rattle of the quarter-jack again from its niche, its blows for three-quarters, its fussy retreat, were almost painfully abrupt, and caused many of the congregation to start palpably. "I wonder where the woman is!" a voice whispered again. There began now that slight shifting of feet, that artificial coughing among several, which betrays a nervous suspense. At length there was a titter. But the soldier never moved. There he stood, his face to the south-east, upright as a column, his cap in his hand. The clock ticked on. The women threw off their nervousness, and titters and giggling became more frequent. Then came a dead silence. Every one was waiting for the end. Some persons may have noticed how extraordinarily the striking of quarters seems to quicken the flight of time. It was hardly credible that the jack had not got wrong with the minutes when the rattle began again, the puppet emerged, and the four quarters were struck fitfully as before. One could almost be positive that there was a malicious leer upon the hideous creature's face, and a mischievous delight in its twitchings. Then followed the dull and remote resonance of the twelve heavy strokes in the tower above. The women were impressed, and there was no giggle this time. The clergyman glided into the vestry, and the clerk vanished. The sergeant had not yet turned; every woman in the church was waiting to see his face, and he appeared to know it. At last he did turn, and stalked resolutely down the nave, braving them all, with a compressed lip. Two bowed and toothless old almsmen then looked at each other and chuckled, innocently enough; but the sound had a strange weird effect in that place. Opposite to the church was a paved square, around which several overhanging wood buildings of old time cast a picturesque shade. The young man on leaving the door went to cross the square, when, in the middle, he met a little woman. The expression of her face, which had been one of intense anxiety, sank at the sight of his nearly to terror. "Well?" he said, in a suppressed passion, fixedly looking at her. "Oh, Frank--I made a mistake!--I thought that church with the spire was All Saints', and I was at the door at half-past eleven to a minute as you said. I waited till a quarter to twelve, and found then that I was in All Souls'. But I wasn't much frightened, for I thought it could be to-morrow as well." "You fool, for so fooling me! But say no more." "Shall it be to-morrow, Frank?" she asked blankly. "To-morrow!" and he gave vent to a hoarse laugh. "I don't go through that experience again for some time, I warrant you!" "But after all," she expostulated in a trembling voice, "the mistake was not such a terrible thing! Now, dear Frank, when shall it be?" "Ah, when? God knows!" he said, with a light irony, and turning from her walked rapidly away.

Chapter 16

https://web.archive.org/web/20201101052914/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/f/far-from-the-madding-crowd/summary-and-analysis/chapter-16

A small congregation at All Saints' Church was startled by the clash of spurs at the close of a weekday service. A cavalry soldier strode into the chapel and spoke to the curate. "'Tis a wedding!" murmured one of the women, brightening. "Let's wait!" Through the open door from the vestry they heard the creaking mechanism of the clock indicating half-past eleven. No one appeared, and there was tittering and giggling. So again at the three-quarter hour. "I wonder where the woman is," a voice whispered. This was repeated at the full hour. As the angry sergeant was about to leave, Fanny arrived, breathless, to explain that she had been waiting at All Souls', which she had mistaken for All Saints'. She suggested that they meet again the next day, but Troy refused to go through such a performance a second time. Fanny, trembling, asked when the wedding would be. "'Ah, when? God knows!' he said, with a light irony, and turning from her, walked rapidly away."

Troy is infuriated by his humiliation before the old women and takes out his rage on poor, confused Fanny. Her reaction to his anger is near terror. Though we have seen little of Troy, Fanny's actions do provide some clues to his nature.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/44747-chapters/73.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Red and the Black/section_72_part_0.txt

The Red and the Black.part 2.chapter 43

part 2, chapter 43

{"name": "Part 2, Chapter 43", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20200920104425/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/red-and-the-black/summary/part-2-chapter-43", "summary": "Julien awakes from a nap to the feeling of tears falling on his hand. Madame de Renal is standing over him. She begs him to appeal his conviction. Julien realizes how much he still loves Madame. He agrees to appeal as long as she comes to visit him every day. It turns out that the letter Madame de Renal sent the Marquis de La Mole about her affair with Julien wasn't actually written by her. A young priest wrote it and made her copy it in her own hand. Madame offers to kill herself if this will make Julien happy. He says he'll only appeal his sentence if she promises not to do this.", "analysis": ""}

CHAPTER LXXIII When he was deep asleep an hour afterwards, he was woken up by feeling tears flow over his hand. "Oh, it is Mathilde again," he thought, only half awake. "She has come again, faithful to her tactics of attacking my resolution by her sentimentalism." Bored by the prospect of this new scene of hackneyed pathos he did not open his eyes. The verses of Belphgor, as he ran away from his wife, came into his mind. He heard a strange sigh. He opened his eyes. It was madame de Renal. "Ah, so I see you again before I die, or is it an illusion," he exclaimed as he threw himself at her feet. "But, forgive me, madame, you must look upon me as a mere murderer," he said, immediately, as he recovered himself. "Monsieur, I have come to entreat you to appeal; I know you do not want to...." her sobs choked her; she was unable to speak. "Deign to forgive me." "If you want me to forgive you," she said to him, getting up and throwing herself into his arms, "appeal immediately against your death sentence." Julien covered her with kisses. "Will you come and see me every day during those two months?" "I swear it--every day, unless my husband forbids me." "I will sign it," exclaimed Julien. "What! you really forgive me! Is it possible?" He clasped her in his arms; he was mad. She gave a little cry. "It is nothing," she said to him. "You hurt me." "Your shoulder," exclaimed Julien, bursting into tears. He drew back a little, and covered her hands with kisses of fire. "Who could have prophesied this, dear, the last time I saw you in your room at Verrieres?" "Who could have prophesied then that I should write that infamous letter to M. de la Mole?" "Know that I have always loved you, and that I have never loved anyone but you." "Is it possible?" cried Madame de Renal, who was delighted in her turn. She leant on Julien, who was on his knees, and they cried silently for a long time. Julien had never experienced moments like this at any period of his whole life. "And how about that young madame Michelet?" said Madame de Renal, a long time afterwards when they were able to speak. "Or rather, that mademoiselle de la Mole? for I am really beginning to believe in that strange romance." "It is only superficially true," answered Julien. "She is my wife, but she is not my mistress." After interrupting each other a hundred times over, they managed with great difficulty to explain to each other what they did not know. The letter written to M. de la Mole had been drafted by the young priest who directed Madame de Renal's conscience, and had been subsequently copied by her, "What a horrible thing religion has made me do," she said to him, "and even so I softened the most awful passages in the letter." Julien's ecstatic happiness proved the fulness of her forgiveness. He had never been so mad with love. "And yet I regard myself as devout," madame de Renal went on to say to him in the ensuing conversation. "I believe sincerely in God! I equally believe, and I even have full proof of it, that the crime which I am committing is an awful one, and yet the very minute I see you, even after you have fired two pistol shots at me--" and at this point, in spite of her resistance, Julien covered her with kisses. "Leave me alone," she continued, "I want to argue with you, I am frightened lest I should forget.... The very minute I see you all my duties disappear. I have nothing but love for you, dear, or rather, the word love is too weak. I feel for you what I ought only to feel for God; a mixture of respect, love, obedience.... As a matter of fact, I don't know what you inspire me with.... If you were to tell me to stab the gaoler with a knife, the crime would be committed before I had given it a thought. Explain this very clearly to me before I leave you. I want to see down to the bottom of my heart; for we shall take leave of each other in two months.... By the bye, shall we take leave of each other?" she said to him with a smile. "I take back my words," exclaimed Julien, getting up, "I shall not appeal from my death sentence, if you try, either by poison, knife, pistol, charcoal, or any other means whatsoever, to put an end to your life, or make any attempt upon it." Madame de Renal's expression suddenly changed. The most lively tenderness was succeeded by a mood of deep meditation. "Supposing we were to die at once," she said to him. "Who knows what one will find in the other life," answered Julien, "perhaps torment, perhaps nothing at all. Cannot we pass two delicious months together? Two months means a good many days. I shall never have been so happy." "You will never have been so happy?" "Never," repeated Julien ecstatically, "and I am talking to you just as I should talk to myself. May God save me from exaggerating." "Words like that are a command," she said with a timid melancholy smile. "Well, you will swear by the love you have for me, to make no attempt either direct or indirect, upon your life ... remember," he added, "that you must live for my son, whom Mathilde will hand over to lackeys as soon as she is marquise de Croisenois." "I swear," she answered coldly, "but I want to take away your notice of appeal, drawn and signed by yourself. I will go myself to M. the procureur-general." "Be careful, you will compromise yourself." "After having taken the step of coming to see you in your prison, I shall be a heroine of local scandal for Besancon, and the whole of Franche-Comte," she said very dejectedly. "I have crossed the bounds of austere modesty.... I am a woman who has lost her honour; it is true that it is for your sake...." Her tone was so sad that Julien embraced her with a happiness which was quite novel to him. It was no longer the intoxication of love, it was extreme gratitude. He had just realised for the first time the full extent of the sacrifice which she had made for him. Some charitable soul, no doubt informed M. de Renal of the long visits which his wife paid to Julien's prison; for at the end of three days he sent her his carriage with the express order to return to Verrieres immediately. This cruel separation had been a bad beginning for Julien's day. He was informed two or three hours later that a certain intriguing priest (who had, however, never managed to make any headway among the Jesuits of Besancon) had, since the morning, established himself in the street outside the prison gates. It was raining a great deal, and the man out there was pretending to play the martyr. Julien was in a weak mood, and this piece of stupidity annoyed him deeply. In the morning, he had already refused this priest's visit, but the man had taken it into his head to confess Julien, and to win a name for himself among the young women of Besancon by all the confidences which he would pretend to have received from him. He declared in a loud voice that he would pass the day and the night by the prison gates. "God has sent me to touch the heart of this apostate ..." and the lower classes, who are always curious to see a scene, began to make a crowd. "Yes, my brothers," he said to them, "I will pass the day here and the night, as well as all the days and all the nights which will follow. The Holy Ghost has spoken to me. I am commissioned from above; I am the man who must save the soul of young Sorel. Do you join in my prayers, etc." Julien had a horror of scandal, and of anything which could attract attention to him. He thought of seizing the opportunity of escaping from the world incognito; but he had some hope of seeing madame de Renal again, and he was desperately in love. The prison gates were situated in one of the most populous streets. His soul was tortured by the idea of this filthy priest attracting a crowd and creating a scandal--"and doubtless he is repeating my name at every single minute!" This moment was more painful than death. He called the turnkey who was devoted to him, and sent sent him two or three times at intervals of one hour to see if the priest was still by the prison gates. "Monsieur," said the turnkey to him on each occasion, "he is on both his knees in the mud; he is praying at the top of his voice, and saying litanies for your soul. "The impudent fellow," thought Julien. At this moment he actually heard a dull buzz. It was the responses of the people to the litanies. His patience was strained to the utmost when he saw the turnkey himself move his lips while he repeated the Latin words. "They are beginning to say," added the turnkey, "that you must have a very hardened heart to refuse the help of this holy man." "Oh my country, how barbarous you still are!" exclaimed Julien, beside himself with anger. And he continued his train of thought aloud, without giving a thought to the turn-key's presence. "The man wants an article in the paper about him, and that's a way in which he will certainly get it. "Oh you cursed provincials! At Paris I should not be subjected to all these annoyances. There they are more skilled in their charlatanism. "Show in the holy priest," he said at last to the turnkey, and great streams of sweat flowed down his forehead. The turnkey made the sign of the cross and went out rejoicing. The holy priest turned out to be very ugly, he was even dirtier than he was ugly. The cold rain intensified the obscurity and dampness of the cell. The priest wanted to embrace Julien, and began to wax pathetic as he spoke to him. The basest hypocrisy was only too palpable; Julien had never been so angry in his whole life. A quarter of an hour after the priest had come in Julien felt an absolute coward. Death appeared horrible to him for the first time. He began to think about the state of decomposition which his body would be in two days after the execution, etc., etc. He was on the point of betraying himself by some sign of weakness or throwing himself on the priest and strangling him with his chain, when it occurred to him to beg the holy man to go and say a good forty franc mass for him on that very day. It was twelve o'clock, so the priest took himself off.

Part 2, Chapter 43

https://web.archive.org/web/20200920104425/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/red-and-the-black/summary/part-2-chapter-43

Julien awakes from a nap to the feeling of tears falling on his hand. Madame de Renal is standing over him. She begs him to appeal his conviction. Julien realizes how much he still loves Madame. He agrees to appeal as long as she comes to visit him every day. It turns out that the letter Madame de Renal sent the Marquis de La Mole about her affair with Julien wasn't actually written by her. A young priest wrote it and made her copy it in her own hand. Madame offers to kill herself if this will make Julien happy. He says he'll only appeal his sentence if she promises not to do this.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/44747-chapters/part_2_chapters_5_to_7.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Red and the Black/section_10_part_0.txt

The Red and the Black.part 2.chapters 5-7

chapters 5-7

{"name": "Chapters 5-7", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201128052739/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/the-red-and-the-black/summary-and-analysis/part-2-chapters-57", "summary": "After several months, Julien has made his services very valuable to M. de la Mole although, socially, he has fallen from favor in the household. He applies himself tirelessly to his work, and to escape the discouragement that his exile causes him to feel, he devotes his leisure time entirely to fencing and riding. Norbert is estranged from him, and Mme. de la Mole finds Julien's impetuosity and sensitivity repugnant to decorum. Julien is offended by a rude individual in a cafe one day, and he immediately challenges the man to a duel. Going the following morning to the address indicated on the offender's card, Julien finds, to his surprise, that the Chevalier de Beauvoisis, whose name is on the card, is the master of the coachman who had offended Julien. Julien promptly punishes the coachman for his insolence, and the chevalier agrees to a duel. Julien is slightly wounded, but the new acquaintance soon becomes friendship. The chevalier is a model aristocrat whom Julien imitates in manners and attitude, accompanying him to the opera. In order to escape the ridicule that would result from public knowledge that he had dueled with a sawyer's son, the chevalier spreads the rumor that Julien is the natural son of a close friend of the Marquis de la Mole. The latter, upon hearing this rumor, is greatly amused. Bedridden with gout, the Marquis de la Mole is reduced to the company of Julien during the absence of his family. The marquis discovers in Julien a man of ideas and of quick wit. The marquis makes Julien a gift of a blue coat, and when Julien visits him in the evenings wearing the garment, the marquis treats him as an equal. Julien introduces efficiency into the marquis' business affairs, and his innovations are so much appreciated that the marquis wants to reward him with a gift of money. This Julien declines, pretending that the gift would ruin the relationship with the man in blue since it is to that man and not to the man in black that it is made. Recognizing the inborn nobility of Julien, the marquis devises a plan to confer upon him the cross of the Legion d'Honneur, which will constitute an exterior acknowledgment of Julien's inner nobility. He sends Julien to England, where he is introduced to various notables in the highest circles. Upon his return, Julien is told that when he wears his decoration, he will be, in the eyes of the marquis, the son of the Duc de Retz, a friend of the marquis. The decoration makes Julien more confident. A visit is paid to Julien by Valenod, recently made a baron. Valenod has replaced Renal as mayor of Verrieres. Ironically, Valenod was the ultra candidate, and Renal the candidate of the liberals. The marquis agrees to receive the mayor and intends even to encourage his political career. Benefiting from his more intimate relationship with the marquis, Julien succeeds in having his own father named director of the workhouse and Cholin named as director of the lottery. Julien learns later that his intervention has thwarted the candidacy of an honest man, M. Gros, who, Julien recognizes, really deserved and needed the appointment to the lottery post. This causes Julien some remorse, which is quickly stilled, however, by a rationalization that expediency sometimes brings about injustice.", "analysis": "These chapters constitute a further stage in the education of Julien, specifically as the protege of M. de la Mole. Chapter 5 is preparatory to the subsequent development of the father-son relationship in that it points up Julien's success and failure: success as a prized secretary, failure as a social creature in this blase aristocracy in which he moves. Note again Stendhal's tenderly ironic treatment of his hero in the cafe scene. Stendhal will make a fool of Julien by exploiting his hero's basically contradictory nature, causing his impetuosity to play out another mock-heroic adventure. Julien is \"unmasked\" by a less glorious counterpart: the \"gentleman\" whom he challenges turns out to be a lackey, like himself. Typically, however, Stendhal takes care not to exploit the ridiculousness that would be inherent in such a situation. Stendhal permits himself to make light of Julien, delicately, but the reader may not take this liberty. The same restraint is apparent in the handling of the encounter with the chevalier. Instead of taking offense, the latter, another of the \"happy few,\" befriends Julien and plays the role of fairy godfather. Stendhal calls to our attention the resemblance between the two cafe scenes. He utilizes repeatedly the recurrence of similar situations at different points of the narration, and such a device is particularly effective in a novel describing the formation of an individual. An event that repeats itself calls our attention to the distance covered by the character. In this instance, we note that Julien's pride has not weakened but that he is now more highly placed on the social ladder. The duel episode serves also to further the relationship between Julien and the marquis. The rumor of noble but illegitimate birth circulated by the chevalier \"suggests\" to the marquis, without his own awareness of it, the action he takes to confer a kind of nobility on Julien in Chapter 7. By the end of Chapter 6, the fatherly interest felt by the marquis in Julien has progressed to the point where the marquis wants actively to \"form\" his secretary. Hence, he stations Julien at the opera to study another spectacle, the impressive entry and departure of the aristocracy, in order that Julien may imitate their ways and rid himself of his remaining provincialisins. Betraying his negligence in plot manipulation and preparation, Stendhal feels obliged, in Chapter 7, to justify the familiar tone in which the marquis has just addressed Julien at the end of the preceding chapter. Such an intervention Stendhal would no doubt justify by evoking his realistic pretention and his definition of the novel -- he is not inventing, he is only reporting the truth, and this detail he had forgotten to mention. Stendhal indicates to the reader to what extent Julien has actually replaced Norbert as a worthy son for the marquis, both in the eyes of the latter and in those of Stendhal. \"Play acting\" recurs as a theme in these chapters, and the deliberate insincerity that it implies is a necessary quality of the nobility to which Julien aspires. The marquis, another fairy godfather, intervenes as for Cinderella, outfitting Julien and casting him in a dual role. A truly noble soul is capable of effecting metamorphosis by will. Thus, the marquis is \"magically\" empowered to transform Julien into the gentleman in the blue coat by night and into the black-coated secretary by day. That Julien is making progress is obvious by the fact that he surpasses his master's performance. By proudly refusing the well deserved gift, Julien intimates that the marquis is violating the rules he has established himself. This performance inspires the marquis to bring about the next transformation: Julien's diplomatic mission to London, which will serve as a pretext for a decoration. Julien's frequenting London's high society is the culminating phase in the stage of his formation related in these chapters. Valenod's reappearance and his victory over Renal serve to remind the reader of the changing fortunes on the political scene. Valenod's ascendancy had been predicted in Chapter 1 of Part II. Stendhal is careful to note that antipathy and rivalry still exist between Julien and Valenod. This fact will be utilized in the ultimate determination of Julien's fate. The close of Chapter 7 reminds us that Julien's experiences have taken their toll on his principles and innocence. In short, he is being corrupted, but, fortunately, this change is reversible. In the incident in question, Julien has occasion only to rationalize his remorse. One cannot help but wonder which would have won out, expediency or principle, had Julien known earlier that Gros was also aspiring to the position in which Julien's intervention has established Cholin."}

CHAPTER XXXV SENSIBILITY AND A GREAT PIOUS LADY An idea which has any life in it seems like a crudity, so accustomed are they to colourless expression. Woe to him who introduces new ideas into his conversation! --_Faublas_. This was the stage Julien had reached, when after several months of probation the steward of the household handed him the third quarter of his wages. M. de la Mole had entrusted him with the administration of his estates in Brittany and Normandy. Julien made frequent journeys there. He had chief control of the correspondence relating to the famous lawsuit with the abbe de Frilair. M. Pirard had instructed him. On the data of the short notes which the marquis would scribble on the margin of all the various paper which were addressed to him, Julien would compose answers which were nearly all signed. At the Theology School his professors complained of his lack of industry, but they did not fail to regard him as one of their most distinguished pupils. This varied work, tackled as it was with all the ardour of suffering ambition, soon robbed Julien of that fresh complexion which he had brought from the provinces. His pallor constituted one of his merits in the eyes of his comrades, the young seminarist; he found them much less malicious, much less ready to bow down to a silver crown than those of Besancon; they thought he was consumptive. The marquis had given him a horse. Julien fearing that he might meet people during his rides on horseback, had given out that this exercise had been prescribed by the doctors. The abbe Pirard had taken him into several Jansenist Societies. Julien was astonished; the idea of religion was indissolubly connected in his mind with the ideas of hypocrisy and covetousness. He admired those austere pious men who never gave a thought to their income. Several Jansenists became friendly with him and would give him advice. A new world opened before him. At the Jansenists he got to know a comte Altamira, who was nearly six feet high, was a Liberal, a believer, and had been condemned to death in his own country. He was struck by the strange contrast of devoutness and love of liberty. Julien's relations with the young comte had become cool. Norbert had thought that he answered the jokes of his friends with too much sharpness. Julien had committed one or two breaches of social etiquette and vowed to himself that he would never speak to mademoiselle Mathilde. They were always perfectly polite to him in the Hotel de la Mole but he felt himself quite lost. His provincial common sense explained this result by the vulgar proverb _Tout beau tout nouveau_. He gradually came to have a little more penetration than during his first days, or it may have been that the first glamour of Parisian urbanity had passed off. As soon as he left off working, he fell a prey to a mortal boredom. He was experiencing the withering effects of that admirable politeness so typical of good society, which is so perfectly modulated to every degree of the social hierarchy. No doubt the provinces can be reproached with a commonness and lack of polish in their tone; but they show a certain amount of passion, when they answer you. Julien's self-respect was never wounded at the Hotel de la Mole, but he often felt at the end of the day as though he would like to cry. A cafe-waiter in the provinces will take an interest in you if you happen to have some accident as you enter his cafe, but if this accident has everything about it which is disagreeable to your vanity, he will repeat ten times in succession the very word which tortures you, as he tells you how sorry he is. At Paris they make a point of laughing in secret, but you always remain a stranger. We pass in silence over a number of little episodes which would have made Julien ridiculous, if he had not been to some extent above ridicule. A foolish sensibility resulted in his committing innumerable acts of bad taste. All his pleasures were precautions; he practiced pistol shooting every day, he was one of the promising pupils of the most famous maitres d'armes. As soon as he had an instant to himself, instead of employing it in reading as he did before, he would rush off to the riding school and ask for the most vicious horses. When he went out with the master of the riding school he was almost invariably thrown. The marquis found him convenient by reason of his persistent industry, his silence and his intelligence, and gradually took him into his confidence with regard to all his affairs, which were in any way difficult to unravel. The marquis was a sagacious business man on all those occasions when his lofty ambition gave him some respite; having special information within his reach, he would speculate successfully on the Exchange. He would buy mansions and forests; but he would easily lose his temper. He would give away hundreds of louis, and would go to law for a few hundred francs. Rich men with a lofty spirit have recourse to business not so much for results as for distraction. The marquis needed a chief of staff who would put all his money affairs into clear and lucid order. Madame de la Mole, although of so even a character, sometimes made fun of Julien. Great ladies have a horror of those unexpected incidents which are produced by a sensitive character; they constitute the opposite pole of etiquette. On two or three occasions the marquis took his part. "If he is ridiculous in your salon, he triumphs in his office." Julien on his side thought he had caught the marquise's secret. She deigned to manifest an interest in everything the minute the Baron de la Joumate was announced. He was a cold individual with an expressionless physiognomy. He was tall, thin, ugly, very well dressed, passed his life in his chateau, and generally speaking said nothing about anything. Such was his outlook on life. Madame de la Mole would have been happy for the first time in her life if she could have made him her daughter's husband. CHAPTER XXXVI PRONUNCIATION If fatuity is pardonable it is in one's first youth, for it is then the exaggeration of an amiable thing. It needs an air of love, gaiety, nonchalance. But fatuity coupled with self-importance; fatuity with a solemn and self-sufficient manner! This extravagance of stupidity was reserved for the XIXth century. Such are the persons who want to unchain the _hydra of revolutions_!--LE JOHANNISBURG, _Pamphlet_. Considering that he was a new arrival who was too disdainful to put any questions, Julien did not fall into unduly great mistakes. One day when he was forced into a cafe in the Rue St. Honore by a sudden shower, a big man in a beaver coat, surprised by his gloomy look, looked at him in return just as mademoiselle Amanda's lover had done before at Besancon. Julien had reproached himself too often for having endured the other insult to put up with this stare. He asked for an explanation. The man in the tail-coat immediately addressed him in the lowest and most insulting language. All the people in the cafe surrounded them. The passers-by stopped before the door. Julien always carried some little pistols as a matter of precaution. His hand was grasping them nervously in his pocket. Nevertheless he behaved wisely and confined himself to repeating to his man "Monsieur, your address, I despise you." The persistency in which he kept repeating these six words eventually impressed the crowd. "By Jove, the other who's talking all to himself ought to give him his address," they exclaimed. The man in the tail-coat hearing this repeated several times, flung five or six cards in Julien's face. Fortunately none of them hit him in the face; he had mentally resolved not to use his pistols except in the event of his being hit. The man went away, though not without turning round from time to time to shake his fist and hurl insults at him. Julien was bathed in sweat. "So," he said angrily to himself, "the meanest of mankind has it in his power to affect me as much as this. How am I to kill so humiliating a sensitiveness?" Where was he to find a second? He did not have a single friend. He had several acquaintances, but they all regularly left him after six weeks of social intercourse. "I am unsociable," he thought, and "I am now cruelly punished for it." Finally it occurred to him to rout out an old lieutenant of the 96th, named Lievin, a poor devil with whom he often used to fence. Julien was frank with him. "I am quite willing to be your second," said Lievin, "but on one condition. If you fail to wound your man you will fight with me straight away." "Agreed," said Julien quite delighted; and they went to find M. de Beauvoisis at the address indicated on his card at the end of the Faubourg Saint Germain. It was seven o'clock in the morning. It was only when he was being ushered in, that Julien thought that it might quite well be the young relation of Madame de Renal, who had once been employed at the Rome or Naples Embassy, and who had given the singer Geronimo a letter of introduction. Julien gave one of the cards which had been flung at him the previous evening together with one of his own to a tall valet. He and his second were kept waiting for a good three-quarters of an hour. Eventually they were ushered in to a elegantly furnished apartment. They found there a tall young man who was dressed like a doll. His features presented the perfection and the lack of expression of Greek beauty. His head, which was remarkably straight, had the finest blonde hair. It was dressed with great care and not a single hair was out of place. "It was to have his hair done like this, that is why this damned fop has kept us waiting," thought the lieutenant of the 96th. The variegated dressing gown, the morning trousers, everything down to the embroidered slippers was correct. He was marvellously well-groomed. His blank and aristocratic physiognomy betokened rare and orthodox ideas; the ideal of a Metternichian diplomatist. Napoleon as well did not like to have in his entourage officers who thought. Julien, to whom his lieutenant of the 96th had explained, that keeping him waiting was an additional insult after having thrown his card so rudely in his face, entered brusquely M. de Beauvoisis' room. He intended to be insolent, but at the same time to exhibit good form. Julien was so astonished by the niceness of M. de Beauvoisis' manners and by the combination of formality, self-importance, and self-satisfaction in his demeanour, by the admirable elegance of everything that surrounded him, that he abandoned immediately all idea of being insolent. It was not his man of the day before. His astonishment was so great at meeting so distinguished a person, instead of the rude creature whom he was looking for, that he could not find a single word to say. He presented one of the cards which had been thrown at him. "That's my name," said the young diplomat, not at all impressed by Julien's black suit at seven o'clock in the morning, "but I do not understand the honour." His manner of pronouncing these last words revived a little of Julien's bad temper. "I have come to fight you, monsieur," and he explained in a few words the whole matter. M. Charles de Beauvoisis, after mature reflection, was fairly satisfied with the cut of Julien's black suit. "It comes from Staub, that's clear," he said to himself, as he heard him speak. "That waistcoat is in good taste. Those boots are all right, but on the other hand just think of wearing a black suit in the early morning! It must be to have a better chance of not being hit," said the chevalier de Beauvoisis to himself. After he had given himself this explanation he became again perfectly polite to Julien, and almost treated him as an equal. The conversation was fairly lengthy, for the matter was a delicate one, but eventually Julien could not refuse to acknowledge the actual facts. The perfectly mannered young man before him did not bear any resemblance to the vulgar fellow who had insulted him the previous day. Julien felt an invincible repugnance towards him. He noted the self-sufficiency of the chevalier de Beauvoisis, for that was the name by which he had referred to himself, shocked as he was when Julien called him simply "Monsieur." He admired his gravity which, though tinged with a certain modest fatuity, he never abandoned for a single moment. He was astonished at his singular manner of moving his tongue as he pronounced his words, but after all, this did not present the slightest excuse for picking a quarrel. The young diplomatist very graciously offered to fight, but the ex-lieutenant of the 96th, who had been sitting down for an hour with his legs wide apart, his hands on his thigh, and his elbows stuck out, decided that his friend, monsieur de Sorel, was not the kind to go and pick a quarrel with a man because someone else had stolen that man's visiting cards. Julien went out in a very bad temper. The chevalier de Beauvoisis' carriage was waiting for him in the courtyard before the steps. By chance Julien raised his eyes and recognised in the coachman his man of the day before. Seeing him, catching hold of him by his big jacket, tumbling him down from his seat, and horse-whipping him thoroughly took scarcely a moment. Two lackeys tried to defend their comrade. Julien received some blows from their fists. At the same moment, he cocked one of his little pistols and fired on them. They took to flight. All this took about a minute. The chevalier de Beauvoisis descended the staircase with the most pleasing gravity, repeating with his lordly pronunciation, "What is this, what is this." He was manifestly very curious, but his diplomatic importance would not allow him to evince any greater interest. When he knew what it was all about, a certain haughtiness tried to assert itself in that expression of slightly playful nonchalance which should never leave a diplomatist's face. The lieutenant of the 96th began to realise that M. de Beauvoisis was anxious to fight. He was also diplomatic enough to wish to reserve for his friend the advantage of taking the initiative. "This time," he exclaimed, "there is ground for duel." "I think there's enough," answered the diplomat. "Turn that rascal out," he said to his lackeys. "Let someone else get up." The door of the carriage was open. The chevalier insisted on doing the honours to Julien and his friend. They sent for a friend of M. de Beauvoisis, who chose them a quiet place. The conversation on their way went as a matter of fact very well indeed. The only extraordinary feature was the diplomatist in a dressing-gown. "These gentlemen, although very noble, are by no means as boring," thought Julien, "as the people who come and dine at M. de la Mole's, and I can see why," he added a moment afterwards. "They allow themselves to be indecent." They talked about the dancers that the public had distinguished with its favour at the ballet presented the night before. The two gentlemen alluded to some spicy anecdotes of which Julien and his second, the lieutenant of the 96th, were absolutely ignorant. Julien was not stupid enough to pretend to know them. He confessed his ignorance with a good grace. This frankness pleased the chevalier's friend. He told him these stories with the greatest detail and extremely well. One thing astonished Julien inordinately. The carriage was pulled up for a moment by an altar which was being built in the middle of the street for the procession of Corpus Christi Day. The two gentlemen indulged in the luxury of several jests. According to them, the cure was the son of an archbishop. Such a joke would never have been heard in the house of M. de la Mole, who was trying to be made a duke. The duel was over in a minute. Julien got a ball in his arm. They bandaged it with handkerchiefs which they wetted with brandy, and the chevalier de Beauvoisis requested Julien with great politeness to allow him to take him home in the same carriage that had brought him. When Julien gave the name of M. de la Mole's hotel, the young diplomat and his friend exchanged looks. Julien's fiacre was here, but they found these gentlemen's conversation more entertaining than that of the good lieutenant of the 96th. "By Jove, so a duel is only that," thought Julien. "What luck I found that coachman again. How unhappy I should have been if I had had to put up with that insult as well." The amusing conversation had scarcely been interrupted. Julien realised that the affectation of diplomatists is good for something. "So ennui," he said himself, "is not a necessary incident of conversation among well-born people. These gentlemen make fun of the Corpus Christi procession and dare to tell extremely obscene anecdotes, and what is more, with picturesque details. The only thing they really lack is the ability to discuss politics logically, and that lack is more than compensated by their graceful tone, and the perfect aptness of their expressions." Julien experienced a lively inclination for them. "How happy I should be to see them often." They had scarcely taken leave of each other before the chevalier de Beauvoisis had enquiries made. They were not brilliant. He was very curious to know his man. Could he decently pay a call on him? The little information he had succeeded in obtaining from him was not of an encouraging character. "Oh, this is awful," he said to his second. "I can't possibly own up to having fought a duel with a mere secretary of M. de la Mole, simply because my coachman stole my visiting cards." "There is no doubt that all this may make you look ridiculous." That very evening the chevalier de Beauvoisis and his friend said everywhere that this M. Sorel who was, moreover, quite a charming young man, was a natural son of an intimate friend of the marquis de la Mole. This statement was readily accepted. Once it was established, the young diplomatist and friend deigned to call several times on Julien during the fortnight. Julien owned to them that he had only been to the Opera once in his life. "That is awful," said one, "that is the only place one does go to. Your first visit must be when they are playing the '_Comte Ory_.'" The chevalier de Beauvoisis introduced him at the opera to the famous singer Geronimo, who was then enjoying an immense success. Julien almost paid court to the chevalier. His mixture of self-respect, mysterious self-importance, and fatuous youthfulness fascinated him. The chevalier, for example, would stammer a little, simply because he had the honour of seeing frequently a very noble lord who had this defect. Julien had never before found combined in one and the same person the drollery which amuses, and those perfect manners which should be the object of a poor provincial's imitation. He was seen at the opera with the chevalier de Beauvoisis. This association got him talked about. "Well," said M. de la Mole to him one day, "so here you are, the natural son of a rich gentleman of Franche-Comte, an intimate friend of mine." The marquis cut Julien short as he started to protest that he had not in any way contributed to obtaining any credence for this rumour. "M. de Beauvoisis did not fancy having fought a duel with the son of a carpenter." "I know it, I know it," said M. de la Mole. "It is my business now to give some consistency to this story which rather suits me. But I have one favour to ask of you, which will only cost you a bare half-hour of your time. Go and watch every opera day at half-past eleven all the people in society coming out in the vestibule. I still see you have certain provincial mannerisms. You must rid yourself of them. Besides it would do no harm to know, at any rate by sight, some of the great personages to whom I may one day send you on a commission. Call in at the box office to get identified. Admission has been secured for you." CHAPTER XXXVII AN ATTACK OF GOUT And I got advancement, not on my merit, but because my master had the gout.--_Bertolotti_. The reader is perhaps surprised by this free and almost friendly tone. We had forgotten to say that the marquis had been confined to his house for six weeks by the gout. Mademoiselle de la Mole and her mother were at Hyeres near the marquise's mother. The comte Norbert only saw his father at stray moments. They got on very well, but had nothing to say to each other. M. de la Mole, reduced to Julien's society, was astonished to find that he possessed ideas. He made him read the papers to him. Soon the young secretary was competent to pick out the interesting passages. There was a new paper which the marquis abhorred. He had sworn never to read it, and spoke about it every day. Julien laughed. In his irritation against the present time, the marquis made him read Livy aloud. The improvised translation of the Latin text amused him. The marquis said one day in that tone of excessive politeness which frequently tried Julien's patience, "Allow me to present you with a blue suit, my dear Sorel. When you find it convenient to wear it and to come and see me, I shall look upon you as the younger brother of the comte de Chaulnes, that is to say, the son of my friend the old Duke." Julien did not quite gather what it was all about, but he tried a visit in the blue suit that very evening. The marquis treated him like an equal. Julien had a spirit capable of appreciating true politeness, but he had no idea of nuances. Before this freak of the marquis's he would have sworn that it was impossible for him to have been treated with more consideration. "What an admirable talent," said Julien to himself. When he got up to go, the marquis apologised for not being able to accompany him by reason of his gout. Julien was preoccupied by this strange idea. "Perhaps he is making fun of me," he thought. He went to ask advice of the abbe Pirard, who being less polite than the marquis, made no other answer except to whistle and change the subject. Julien presented himself to the marquis the next morning in his black suit, with his letter case and his letters for signature. He was received in the old way, but when he wore the blue suit that evening, the marquis's tone was quite different, and absolutely as polite as on the previous day. "As you are not exactly bored," said the marquis to him, "by these visits which you are kind enough to pay to a poor old man, you must tell him about all the little incidents of your life, but you must be frank and think of nothing except narrating them clearly and in an amusing way. For one must amuse oneself," continued the marquis. "That's the only reality in life. I can't have my life saved in a battle every day, or get a present of a million francs every day, but if I had Rivarol here by my sofa he would rid me every day of an hour of suffering and boredom. I saw a lot of him at Hamburg during the emigration." And the marquis told Julien the stories of Rivarol and the inhabitants of Hamburg who needed the combined efforts of four individuals to understand an epigram. M. de la Mole, being reduced to the society of this little abbe, tried to teach him. He put Julien's pride on its mettle. As he was asked to speak the truth, Julien resolved to tell everything, but to suppress two things, his fanatical admiration for the name which irritated the marquis, and that complete scepticism, which was not particularly appropriate to a prospective cure. His little affair with the chevalier de Beauvoisis came in very handy. The marquis laughed till the tears came into his eyes at the scene in the cafe in the Rue St. Honore with the coachman who had loaded him with sordid insults. The occasion was marked by a complete frankness between the marquis and the protege. M. de la Mole became interested in this singular character. At the beginning he had encouraged Julian's droll blunders in order to enjoy laughing at them. Soon he found it more interesting to correct very gently this young man's false outlook on life. "All other provincials who come to Paris admire everything," thought the marquis. "This one hates everything. They have too much affectation; he has not affectation enough; and fools take him for a fool." The attack of gout was protracted by the great winter cold and lasted some months. "One gets quite attached to a fine spaniel," thought the marquis. "Why should I be so ashamed of being attached to this little abbe? He is original. I treat him as a son. Well, where's the bother? The whim, if it lasts, will cost me a diamond and five hundred louis in my will." Once the marquis had realised his protege's strength of character, he entrusted him with some new business every day. Julien noticed with alarm that this great lord would often give him inconsistent orders with regard to the same matter. That might compromise him seriously. Julien now made a point whenever he worked with him, of bringing a register with him in which he wrote his instructions which the marquis initialled. Julien had now a clerk who would transcribe the instructions relating to each matter in a separate book. This book also contained a copy of all the letters. This idea seemed at first absolutely boring and ridiculous, but in two months the marquis appreciated its advantages. Julien suggested to him that he should take a clerk out of a banker's who was to keep proper book-keeping accounts of all the receipts and of all the expenses of the estates which Julien had been charged to administer. These measures so enlightened the marquis as to his own affairs that he could indulge the pleasure of undertaking two or three speculations without the help of his nominee who always robbed him. "Take three thousand francs for yourself," he said one day to his young steward. "Monsieur, I should lay myself open to calumny." "What do you want then?" retorted the marquis irritably. "Perhaps you will be kind enough to make out a statement of account and enter it in your own hand in the book. That order will give me a sum of 3,000 francs. Besides it's M. the abbe Pirard who had the idea of all this exactness in accounts." The marquis wrote out his instructions in the register with the bored air of the Marquis de Moncade listening to the accounts of his steward M. Poisson. Business was never talked when Julien appeared in the evening in his blue suit. The kindness of the marquis was so flattering to the self-respect of our hero, which was always morbidly sensitive, that in spite of himself, he soon came to feel a kind of attachment for this nice old man. It is not that Julien was a man of sensibility as the phrase is understood at Paris, but he was not a monster, and no one since the death of the old major had talked to him with so much kindness. He observed that the marquis showed a politeness and consideration for his own personal feelings which he had never found in the old surgeon. He now realised that the surgeon was much prouder of his cross than was the marquis of his blue ribbon. The marquis's father had been a great lord. One day, at the end of a morning audience for the transaction of business, when the black suit was worn, Julien happened to amuse the marquis who kept him for a couple of hours, and insisted on giving him some banknotes which his nominee had just brought from the house. "I hope M. le Marquis, that I am not deviating from the profound respect which I owe you, if I beg you to allow me to say a word." "Speak, my friend." "M. le Marquis will deign to allow me to refuse this gift. It is not meant for the man in the black suit, and it would completely spoil those manners which you have kindly put up with in the man in the blue suit." He saluted with much respect and went out without looking at his employer. This incident amused the marquis. He told it in the evening to the abbe Pirard. "I must confess one thing to you, my dear abbe. I know Julien's birth, and I authorise you not to regard this confidence as a secret." His conduct this morning is noble, thought the marquis, so I will ennoble him myself. Some time afterwards the marquis was able to go out. "Go and pass a couple of months at London," he said to Julien. "Ordinary and special couriers will bring you the letters I have received, together with my notes. You will write out the answers and send them back to me, putting each letter inside the answer. I have ascertained that the delay will be no more than five days." As he took the post down the Calais route, Julien was astonished at the triviality of the alleged business on which he had been sent. We will say nothing about the feeling of hate and almost horror with which he touched English soil. His mad passion for Bonaparte is already known. He saw in every officer a Sir Hudson Low, in every great noble a Lord Bathurst, ordering the infamies of St. Helena and being recompensed by six years of office. At London he really got to know the meaning of sublime fatuity. He had struck up a friendship with some young Russian nobles who initiated him. "Your future is assured, my dear Sorel," they said to him. "You naturally have that cold demeanour, _a thousand leagues away from the sensation one has at the moment_, that we have been making such efforts to acquire." "You have not understood your century," said the Prince Korasoff to him. "Always do the opposite of what is expected of you. On my honour there you have the sole religion of the period. Don't be foolish or affected, for then follies and affectations will be expected of you, and the maxim will not longer prove true." Julien covered himself with glory one day in the Salon of the Duke of Fitz-Folke who had invited him to dinner together with the Prince Korasoff. They waited for an hour. The way in which Julien conducted himself in the middle of twenty people who were waiting is still quoted as a precedent among the young secretaries of the London Embassy. His demeanour was unimpeachable. In spite of his friends, the dandies, he made a point of seeing the celebrated Philip Vane, the one philosopher that England has had since Locke. He found him finishing his seventh year in prison. The aristocracy doesn't joke in this country, thought Julien. Moreover Vane is disgraced, calumniated, etc. Julien found him in cheery spirits. The rage of the aristocracy prevented him from being bored. "There's the only merry man I've seen in England," thought Julien to himself, as he left the prison. "The idea which tyrants find most useful is the idea of God," Vane had said to him. We suppress the rest of the system as being cynical. "What amusing notion do you bring me from England?" said M. la Mole to him on his return. He was silent. "What notion do you bring me, amusing or otherwise?" repeated the marquis sharply. "In the first place," said Julien, "The sanest Englishman is mad one hour every day. He is visited by the Demon of Suicide who is the local God. "In the second place, intellect and genius lose twenty-five per cent. of their value when they disembark in England. "In the third place, nothing in the world is so beautiful, so admirable, so touching, as the English landscapes." "Now it is my turn," said the marquis. "In the first place, why do you go and say at the ball at the Russian Ambassador's that there were three hundred thousand young men of twenty in France who passionately desire war? Do you think that is nice for the kings?" "One doesn't know what to do when talking to great diplomats," said Julien. "They have a mania for starting serious discussions. If one confines oneself to the commonplaces of the papers, one is taken for a fool. If one indulges in some original truth, they are astonished and at a loss for an answer, and get you informed by the first Secretary of the Embassy at seven o'clock next day that your conduct has been unbecoming." "Not bad," said the marquis laughing. "Anyway I will wager Monsieur Deep-one that you have not guessed what you went to do in England." "Pardon me," answered Julien. "I went there to dine once a week with the king's ambassador, who is the most polite of men." "You went to fetch this cross you see here," said the marquis to him. "I do not want to make you leave off your black suit, and I have got accustomed to the more amusing tone I have assumed with the man who wears the blue suit. So understand this until further orders. When I see this cross, you will be my friend, the Duke of Chaulne's younger son, who has been employed in the diplomatic service the last six months without having any idea of it. Observe," added the marquis very seriously, cutting short all manifestations of thanks, "that I do not want you to forget your place. That is always a mistake and a misfortune both for patron and for dependent. When my lawsuits bore you, or when you no longer suit me, I will ask a good living like that of our good friend the abbe Pirard's for you, and nothing more," added the marquis dryly. This put Julien's pride at its ease. He talked much more. He did not so frequently think himself insulted and aimed at by those phrases which are susceptible of some interpretation which is scarcely polite, and which anybody may give utterance to in the course of an animated conversation. This cross earned him a singular visit. It was that of the baron de Valenod, who came to Paris to thank the Minister for his barony, and arrive at an understanding with him. He was going to be nominated mayor of Verrieres, and to supersede M. de Renal. Julien did not fail to smile to himself when M. Valenod gave him to understand that they had just found out that M. de Renal was a Jacobin. The fact was that the new baron was the ministerial candidate at the election for which they were all getting ready, and that it was M. de Renal who was the Liberal candidate at the great electoral college of the department, which was, in fact, very ultra. It was in vain that Julien tried to learn something about madame de Renal. The baron seemed to remember their former rivalry, and was impenetrable. He concluded by canvassing Julien for his father's vote at the election which was going to take place. Julien promised to write. "You ought, monsieur le Chevalier, to present me to M. the marquis de la Mole." "I ought, as a matter of fact," thought Julien. "But a rascal like that!" "As a matter of fact," he answered, "I am too small a personage in the Hotel de la Mole to take it upon myself to introduce anyone." Julien told the marquis everything. In the evening he described Valenod's pretensions, as well as his deeds and feats since 1814. "Not only will you present the new baron to me," replied de la Mole, very seriously, "but I will invite him to dinner for the day after to-morrow. He will be one of our new prefects." "If that is the case, I ask for my father the post of director of the workhouse," answered Julien, coldly. "With pleasure," answered the marquis gaily. "It shall be granted. I was expecting a lecture. You are getting on." M. de Valenod informed Julien that the manager of the lottery office at Verrieres had just died. Julien thought it humorous to give that place to M. de Cholin, the old dotard whose petition he had once picked up in de la Mole's room. The marquis laughed heartily at the petition, which Julien recited as he made him sign the letter which requested that appointment of the minister of finance. M. de Cholin had scarcely been nominated, when Julien learnt that that post had been asked by the department for the celebrated geometrician, monsieur Gros. That generous man had an income of only 1400 francs, and every year had lent 600 to the late manager who had just died, to help him bring up his family. Julien was astonished at what he had done. "That's nothing," he said to himself. "It will be necessary to commit several other injustices if I mean to get on, and also to conceal them beneath pretty, sentimental speeches. Poor monsieur Gros! It is he who deserves the cross. It is I who have it, and I ought to conform to the spirit of the Government which gives it me."

Chapters 5-7

https://web.archive.org/web/20201128052739/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/the-red-and-the-black/summary-and-analysis/part-2-chapters-57

After several months, Julien has made his services very valuable to M. de la Mole although, socially, he has fallen from favor in the household. He applies himself tirelessly to his work, and to escape the discouragement that his exile causes him to feel, he devotes his leisure time entirely to fencing and riding. Norbert is estranged from him, and Mme. de la Mole finds Julien's impetuosity and sensitivity repugnant to decorum. Julien is offended by a rude individual in a cafe one day, and he immediately challenges the man to a duel. Going the following morning to the address indicated on the offender's card, Julien finds, to his surprise, that the Chevalier de Beauvoisis, whose name is on the card, is the master of the coachman who had offended Julien. Julien promptly punishes the coachman for his insolence, and the chevalier agrees to a duel. Julien is slightly wounded, but the new acquaintance soon becomes friendship. The chevalier is a model aristocrat whom Julien imitates in manners and attitude, accompanying him to the opera. In order to escape the ridicule that would result from public knowledge that he had dueled with a sawyer's son, the chevalier spreads the rumor that Julien is the natural son of a close friend of the Marquis de la Mole. The latter, upon hearing this rumor, is greatly amused. Bedridden with gout, the Marquis de la Mole is reduced to the company of Julien during the absence of his family. The marquis discovers in Julien a man of ideas and of quick wit. The marquis makes Julien a gift of a blue coat, and when Julien visits him in the evenings wearing the garment, the marquis treats him as an equal. Julien introduces efficiency into the marquis' business affairs, and his innovations are so much appreciated that the marquis wants to reward him with a gift of money. This Julien declines, pretending that the gift would ruin the relationship with the man in blue since it is to that man and not to the man in black that it is made. Recognizing the inborn nobility of Julien, the marquis devises a plan to confer upon him the cross of the Legion d'Honneur, which will constitute an exterior acknowledgment of Julien's inner nobility. He sends Julien to England, where he is introduced to various notables in the highest circles. Upon his return, Julien is told that when he wears his decoration, he will be, in the eyes of the marquis, the son of the Duc de Retz, a friend of the marquis. The decoration makes Julien more confident. A visit is paid to Julien by Valenod, recently made a baron. Valenod has replaced Renal as mayor of Verrieres. Ironically, Valenod was the ultra candidate, and Renal the candidate of the liberals. The marquis agrees to receive the mayor and intends even to encourage his political career. Benefiting from his more intimate relationship with the marquis, Julien succeeds in having his own father named director of the workhouse and Cholin named as director of the lottery. Julien learns later that his intervention has thwarted the candidacy of an honest man, M. Gros, who, Julien recognizes, really deserved and needed the appointment to the lottery post. This causes Julien some remorse, which is quickly stilled, however, by a rationalization that expediency sometimes brings about injustice.

These chapters constitute a further stage in the education of Julien, specifically as the protege of M. de la Mole. Chapter 5 is preparatory to the subsequent development of the father-son relationship in that it points up Julien's success and failure: success as a prized secretary, failure as a social creature in this blase aristocracy in which he moves. Note again Stendhal's tenderly ironic treatment of his hero in the cafe scene. Stendhal will make a fool of Julien by exploiting his hero's basically contradictory nature, causing his impetuosity to play out another mock-heroic adventure. Julien is "unmasked" by a less glorious counterpart: the "gentleman" whom he challenges turns out to be a lackey, like himself. Typically, however, Stendhal takes care not to exploit the ridiculousness that would be inherent in such a situation. Stendhal permits himself to make light of Julien, delicately, but the reader may not take this liberty. The same restraint is apparent in the handling of the encounter with the chevalier. Instead of taking offense, the latter, another of the "happy few," befriends Julien and plays the role of fairy godfather. Stendhal calls to our attention the resemblance between the two cafe scenes. He utilizes repeatedly the recurrence of similar situations at different points of the narration, and such a device is particularly effective in a novel describing the formation of an individual. An event that repeats itself calls our attention to the distance covered by the character. In this instance, we note that Julien's pride has not weakened but that he is now more highly placed on the social ladder. The duel episode serves also to further the relationship between Julien and the marquis. The rumor of noble but illegitimate birth circulated by the chevalier "suggests" to the marquis, without his own awareness of it, the action he takes to confer a kind of nobility on Julien in Chapter 7. By the end of Chapter 6, the fatherly interest felt by the marquis in Julien has progressed to the point where the marquis wants actively to "form" his secretary. Hence, he stations Julien at the opera to study another spectacle, the impressive entry and departure of the aristocracy, in order that Julien may imitate their ways and rid himself of his remaining provincialisins. Betraying his negligence in plot manipulation and preparation, Stendhal feels obliged, in Chapter 7, to justify the familiar tone in which the marquis has just addressed Julien at the end of the preceding chapter. Such an intervention Stendhal would no doubt justify by evoking his realistic pretention and his definition of the novel -- he is not inventing, he is only reporting the truth, and this detail he had forgotten to mention. Stendhal indicates to the reader to what extent Julien has actually replaced Norbert as a worthy son for the marquis, both in the eyes of the latter and in those of Stendhal. "Play acting" recurs as a theme in these chapters, and the deliberate insincerity that it implies is a necessary quality of the nobility to which Julien aspires. The marquis, another fairy godfather, intervenes as for Cinderella, outfitting Julien and casting him in a dual role. A truly noble soul is capable of effecting metamorphosis by will. Thus, the marquis is "magically" empowered to transform Julien into the gentleman in the blue coat by night and into the black-coated secretary by day. That Julien is making progress is obvious by the fact that he surpasses his master's performance. By proudly refusing the well deserved gift, Julien intimates that the marquis is violating the rules he has established himself. This performance inspires the marquis to bring about the next transformation: Julien's diplomatic mission to London, which will serve as a pretext for a decoration. Julien's frequenting London's high society is the culminating phase in the stage of his formation related in these chapters. Valenod's reappearance and his victory over Renal serve to remind the reader of the changing fortunes on the political scene. Valenod's ascendancy had been predicted in Chapter 1 of Part II. Stendhal is careful to note that antipathy and rivalry still exist between Julien and Valenod. This fact will be utilized in the ultimate determination of Julien's fate. The close of Chapter 7 reminds us that Julien's experiences have taken their toll on his principles and innocence. In short, he is being corrupted, but, fortunately, this change is reversible. In the incident in question, Julien has occasion only to rationalize his remorse. One cannot help but wonder which would have won out, expediency or principle, had Julien known earlier that Gros was also aspiring to the position in which Julien's intervention has established Cholin.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/23042-chapters/1.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Tempest/section_0_part_0.txt

The Tempest.act 1.scene 1

scene 1

{"name": "Scene 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219151049/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/the-tempest/summary-and-analysis/act-i-scene-1", "summary": "The Tempest opens in the midst of a fierce storm. The location is a ship at sea, with a royal party on board. As the sailors fight to save the ship, several of the royal passengers enter, and Alonso, the king, demands to know where the master is to be found. The boatswain, worried that the passengers will interfere, orders them to go below deck. The king's councilor, Gonzalo, reminds the boatswain that he is speaking to the king, but the boatswain points out that if the king really has so much power, he should use it to quell the storm. If he lacks this power, the royal party should go below decks, as the boatswain orders. The royal party exits, presumably to go below deck to seek shelter. Within moments, however, Antonio, Sebastian, and Gonzalo have returned topside again, much to the boatswain's annoyance. With Sebastian and Antonio cursing him, the boatswain continues in his efforts to save the ship. Soon, however, the sailors enter with laments that the ship is lost. Fearing that they will all soon die, Antonio, Sebastian, and Gonzalo elect to join the rest of the royal party below decks, where they will pray for their survival.", "analysis": "The opening confrontation between Gonzalo and the boatswain reveals one of the most important themes in The Tempest: class conflict, the discord between those who seize and hold power and those who are often the unwilling victims of power. When confronted by members of the royal party, the boatswain orders that they return below deck. He is performing his job, and to stop in response to Alonso's request for the master would be foolish. The boatswain cares little for Alonso's rank as king and asks, \"What cares these roarers for the name of king?\" . The king has no protection from the storm simply because of his rank, because the storm has little care for a man's social or political position. In response, Gonzalo urges the boatswain to remember that the king and his party are the passengers. The implication is that the boatswain should also remember that his social rank makes him subservient to the royal party, regardless of the circumstances. Gonzalo's words are a clear reminder that even in the midst of a storm, class or status remains an important part of life. However, the boatswain is not intimidated and responds that the royal party should \"use your authority,\" to stop the storm . As far as the boatswain is concerned, all men are equal in a storm and all equally at risk. Alonso seems to understand that the captain is the ship's final authority, at least initially. His original request for the master reflects his belief that the master is in charge of the ship, and that, as passengers, he and his retinue fall under the captain's authority. But alarm at the severity of the storm and frustration at the boatswain's order to go below decks causes the king's party to fall back on the rules of land -- the king is the final authority. The boatswain's telling Gonzalo that the king should use his authority to stop the storm is a reminder that the king has no authority under these circumstances. Although he can control men , even the king cannot control nature. The storm and the subsequent rebellion on ship is a metaphor for the rebellion occurring in English society. In the Elizabethan and Jacobean world, English society was defined by its class system, in which individuals were born into specific classes by divine right. In the natural order of things , therefore, the aristocracy is superior. Although the characters of The Tempest are depicted as Italian in origin, their experiences and conflicts are English. Indeed, the passengers, who never forget that they are socially superior to the crew, need to be reminded that, during a storm, the captain of the ship is the final authority. Furthermore, in the period just prior to the composition of The Tempest, English society had been rocked by political, social, and religious conflicts. The Gunpowder Plot , for example, serves as an illustration of the conflict between the Protestant James and his Catholic subjects. The goal of the Roman Catholic conspirators was to murder James and kill the members of both houses of Parliament; fortunately for James, the plot failed. The social unrest in England, however, was exacerbated by James' extravagant spending on court entertainment, especially the lavishly staged masques, and the contrast between the poor and the rich became even more evident. Although James subjects lived in severe poverty, their burden was increased as they were taxed to pay for the king's masques. In response, unrest grew and would erupt several years later into revolution. There are many tempests to be explored during the course of The Tempest. In addition to class conflict, there are also explorations into colonialism and a desire to find or create a utopian society. The storm scene that opens The Tempest establishes nature as an important element of the play and emphasizes the role of nature in society. Other tempests will be revealed in subsequent scenes, such as the emotional tempests that familial conflict creates ; the tempests of discord and of forbidden love . Finally, there are the tempests caused by the inherent conflict between generations. So, although The Tempest might correctly be called a romantic comedy, the title and the opening scene portend an exploration of conflicts more complex than romantic. Glossary yarely briskly or smartly. Here the boatswain is instructing the sailors to move quickly or the ship will be pushed aground by the storm. roarers noisy and unruly waves; here so called because they care little for royal rank. boatswain the ship's petty officer, in charge of the deck crew, the rigging, anchors, boats, and so on. drowning mark refers to a mole, located on the boatswain's face, the appearance of which was thought to portend a person's manner of death. In this case, the boatswain's mole appears to be the type that predicts a death by hanging. merely absolutely; altogether; here, it means that they are completely cheated of their lives by drunkards."}

ACT I. SCENE I. On a ship at sea: a tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard._ _Enter _a Ship-Master_ and _a Boatswain_._ _Mast._ Boatswain! _Boats._ Here, master: what cheer? _Mast._ Good, speak to the mariners: fall to't, yarely, or we run ourselves aground: bestir, bestir. [_Exit._ _Enter _Mariners_._ _Boats._ Heigh, my hearts! cheerly, cheerly, my hearts! 5 yare, yare! Take in the topsail. Tend to the master's whistle. Blow, till thou burst thy wind, if room enough! _Enter ALONSO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, FERDINAND, GONZALO, and others._ _Alon._ Good boatswain, have care. Where's the master? Play the men. _Boats._ I pray now, keep below. 10 _Ant._ Where is the master, boatswain? _Boats._ Do you not hear him? You mar our labour: keep your cabins: you do assist the storm. _Gon._ Nay, good, be patient. _Boats._ When the sea is. Hence! What cares these 15 roarers for the name of king? To cabin: silence! trouble us not. _Gon._ Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard. _Boats._ None that I more love than myself. You are a Counsellor; if you can command these elements to silence, 20 and work the peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more; use your authority: if you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make yourself ready in your cabin for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap. Cheerly, good hearts! Out of our way, I say. [_Exit._ 25 _Gon._ I have great comfort from this fellow: methinks he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging: make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage. If he be not born to be hanged, our case 30 is miserable. [_Exeunt._ _Re-enter Boatswain._ _Boats._ Down with the topmast! yare! lower, lower! Bring her to try with main-course. [_A cry within._] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather or our office. 35 _Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO._ Yet again! what do you here? Shall we give o'er, and drown? Have you a mind to sink? _Seb._ A pox o' your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog! _Boats._ Work you, then. 40 _Ant._ Hang, cur! hang, you whoreson, insolent noise-maker. We are less afraid to be drowned than thou art. _Gon._ I'll warrant him for drowning; though the ship were no stronger than a nutshell, and as leaky as an unstanched wench. 45 _Boats._ Lay her a-hold, a-hold! set her two courses off to sea again; lay her off. _Enter _Mariners_ wet._ _Mariners._ All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost! _Boats._ What, must our mouths be cold? _Gon._ The king and prince at prayers! let's assist them, 50 For our case is as theirs. _Seb._ I'm out of patience. _Ant._ We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards: This wide-chapp'd rascal,--would thou mightst lie drowning The washing of ten tides! _Gon._ He'll be hang'd yet, Though every drop of water swear against it, 55 And gape at widest to glut him. [_A confused noise within:_ "Mercy on us!"-- "We split, we split!"-- "Farewell my wife and children!"-- "Farewell, brother!"-- "We split, we split, we split!"] _Ant._ Let's all sink with the king. 60 _Seb._ Let's take leave of him. [_Exeunt Ant. and Seb._ _Gon._ Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground, long heath, brown furze, any thing. The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death. [_Exeunt._ 65 Notes: I, 1. SC. I. On a ship at sea] Pope. Enter ... Boatswain] Collier MS. adds 'shaking off wet.' 3: _Good,_] Rowe. _Good:_ Ff. _Good._ Collier. 7: _till thou burst thy wind_] _till thou burst, wind_ Johnson conj. _till thou burst thee, wind_ Steevens conj. 8: Capell adds stage direction [Exeunt Mariners aloft. 11: _boatswain_] Pope. _boson_ Ff. 11-18: Verse. S. Walker conj. 15: _cares_] _care_ Rowe. See note (I). 31: [Exeunt] Theobald. [Exit. Ff. 33: _Bring her to try_] F4. _Bring her to Try_ F1 F2 F3. _Bring her to. Try_ Story conj. 33-35: Text as in Capell. _A plague_--A cry within. Enter Sebastian, Anthonio, and Gonzalo. _upon this howling._ Ff. 34-37: Verse. S. Walker conj. 43: _for_] _from_ Theobald. 46: _two courses off to sea_] _two courses; off to sea_ Steevens (Holt conj.). 46: [Enter...] [Re-enter... Dyce. 47: [Exeunt. Theobald. 50: _at_] _are at_ Rowe. 50-54: Printed as prose in Ff. 56: _to glut_] _t' englut_ Johnson conj. 57: See note (II). 59: _Farewell, brother!_] _Brother, farewell!_ Theobald. 60: _with the_] Rowe. _with'_ F1 F2. _with_ F3 F4. 61: [Exeunt A. and S.] [Exit. Ff. 63: _furze_ Rowe. _firrs_ F1 F2 F3. _firs_ F4. _long heath, brown furze_] _ling, heath, broom, furze_ Hanmer.] 65: [Exeunt] [Exit F1, om. F2 F3 F4.]

Scene 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219151049/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/the-tempest/summary-and-analysis/act-i-scene-1

The Tempest opens in the midst of a fierce storm. The location is a ship at sea, with a royal party on board. As the sailors fight to save the ship, several of the royal passengers enter, and Alonso, the king, demands to know where the master is to be found. The boatswain, worried that the passengers will interfere, orders them to go below deck. The king's councilor, Gonzalo, reminds the boatswain that he is speaking to the king, but the boatswain points out that if the king really has so much power, he should use it to quell the storm. If he lacks this power, the royal party should go below decks, as the boatswain orders. The royal party exits, presumably to go below deck to seek shelter. Within moments, however, Antonio, Sebastian, and Gonzalo have returned topside again, much to the boatswain's annoyance. With Sebastian and Antonio cursing him, the boatswain continues in his efforts to save the ship. Soon, however, the sailors enter with laments that the ship is lost. Fearing that they will all soon die, Antonio, Sebastian, and Gonzalo elect to join the rest of the royal party below decks, where they will pray for their survival.

The opening confrontation between Gonzalo and the boatswain reveals one of the most important themes in The Tempest: class conflict, the discord between those who seize and hold power and those who are often the unwilling victims of power. When confronted by members of the royal party, the boatswain orders that they return below deck. He is performing his job, and to stop in response to Alonso's request for the master would be foolish. The boatswain cares little for Alonso's rank as king and asks, "What cares these roarers for the name of king?" . The king has no protection from the storm simply because of his rank, because the storm has little care for a man's social or political position. In response, Gonzalo urges the boatswain to remember that the king and his party are the passengers. The implication is that the boatswain should also remember that his social rank makes him subservient to the royal party, regardless of the circumstances. Gonzalo's words are a clear reminder that even in the midst of a storm, class or status remains an important part of life. However, the boatswain is not intimidated and responds that the royal party should "use your authority," to stop the storm . As far as the boatswain is concerned, all men are equal in a storm and all equally at risk. Alonso seems to understand that the captain is the ship's final authority, at least initially. His original request for the master reflects his belief that the master is in charge of the ship, and that, as passengers, he and his retinue fall under the captain's authority. But alarm at the severity of the storm and frustration at the boatswain's order to go below decks causes the king's party to fall back on the rules of land -- the king is the final authority. The boatswain's telling Gonzalo that the king should use his authority to stop the storm is a reminder that the king has no authority under these circumstances. Although he can control men , even the king cannot control nature. The storm and the subsequent rebellion on ship is a metaphor for the rebellion occurring in English society. In the Elizabethan and Jacobean world, English society was defined by its class system, in which individuals were born into specific classes by divine right. In the natural order of things , therefore, the aristocracy is superior. Although the characters of The Tempest are depicted as Italian in origin, their experiences and conflicts are English. Indeed, the passengers, who never forget that they are socially superior to the crew, need to be reminded that, during a storm, the captain of the ship is the final authority. Furthermore, in the period just prior to the composition of The Tempest, English society had been rocked by political, social, and religious conflicts. The Gunpowder Plot , for example, serves as an illustration of the conflict between the Protestant James and his Catholic subjects. The goal of the Roman Catholic conspirators was to murder James and kill the members of both houses of Parliament; fortunately for James, the plot failed. The social unrest in England, however, was exacerbated by James' extravagant spending on court entertainment, especially the lavishly staged masques, and the contrast between the poor and the rich became even more evident. Although James subjects lived in severe poverty, their burden was increased as they were taxed to pay for the king's masques. In response, unrest grew and would erupt several years later into revolution. There are many tempests to be explored during the course of The Tempest. In addition to class conflict, there are also explorations into colonialism and a desire to find or create a utopian society. The storm scene that opens The Tempest establishes nature as an important element of the play and emphasizes the role of nature in society. Other tempests will be revealed in subsequent scenes, such as the emotional tempests that familial conflict creates ; the tempests of discord and of forbidden love . Finally, there are the tempests caused by the inherent conflict between generations. So, although The Tempest might correctly be called a romantic comedy, the title and the opening scene portend an exploration of conflicts more complex than romantic. Glossary yarely briskly or smartly. Here the boatswain is instructing the sailors to move quickly or the ship will be pushed aground by the storm. roarers noisy and unruly waves; here so called because they care little for royal rank. boatswain the ship's petty officer, in charge of the deck crew, the rigging, anchors, boats, and so on. drowning mark refers to a mole, located on the boatswain's face, the appearance of which was thought to portend a person's manner of death. In this case, the boatswain's mole appears to be the type that predicts a death by hanging. merely absolutely; altogether; here, it means that they are completely cheated of their lives by drunkards.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/5658-chapters/18.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Lord Jim/section_17_part_0.txt

Lord Jim.chapter 18

chapter 18

{"name": "Chapter 18", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820051943/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmLordJim26.asp", "summary": "Six months later Marlow receives a letter from his friend, Mr. Denver, who has hired Jim to work at his rice mill. He praises Jim for his good temper, his good manners, his generosity, his wit, and his cleverness. Marlow is very happy to hear that Jim is doing well, for he has known all along that the young man is \"one of us.\" Before long, Marlow goes on a trip; when he returns, another letter is waiting for him from Mr. Denver. The letter states that Jim wrote a letter of apology, left it behind on the breakfast table, and disappeared; Denver is furious about the loss. Marlow continues through his mail and soon comes to a letter from Jim. The letter explains that the second engineer from the Patna was hired for a temporary job at the mill and made insinuations and threats to Jim. As a result, he felt he had to leave the mill. He has taken a temporary job as a water-clerk with Egstrom & Blake and needs a reference from Marlow. Although unhappy about Jim's new position, which Marlow thinks is beneath him, he sends the letter of reference. Marlow soon has the chance of seeing Jim at Egstrom & Blake. He seems happy and popular, and Marlow feels encouraged about the young man's future. Marlow asks him bluntly what the second engineer had said, whether he had told everyone about the Patna. Jim denies his having done anything like that; however, the man behaved very mysteriously whenever they met and tried to become close to Jim. One day when they were alone, the man threatened Jim about revealing the Patna affair. Jim decided to quit. He did not want to be reminded of his past. Jim's work at the shop of Egstrom & Blake is tolerable, even though the two owners do not work well together. Every day, from the time the shop opens until it closes, Blake, a little man with sleek, jetty hair and small, unhappy eyes, loudly scolds Egstrom, a heavy man who is always busy directing people and checking parcels. Jim thinks Egstrom is a good man. Six months later, Marlow goes back to Egstrom & Blake on his next trip to the south. As he approaches the store, he hears Blake's voice. Egstrom sees Marlow, greets him, and says that Jim left without an explanation about three weeks earlier; Egstrom is disappointed over the loss for Jim had been an excellent worker, his best water clerk. Jim disappeared on the same day that a steamer filled with pilgrims returned from the Red Sea. Marlow cautiously asks whether anything was said at that time about the Patna. Egstrom is surprised by Marlow's question, but he remembers that some people were talking about the Patna while Jim was having a sandwich and a glass of beer. Captain O' Brien remarked that he would hate being in the same room with the men who deserted the Patna. Jim immediately put down his sandwich and walked out. Egstrom asks what Jim is running away from? Marlow tells him that Jim was a mate of the Patna. Egstrom does not seem to be bothered by the information and says, \"who the devil cares.\" Obviously, the sensitive Jim is much harder on himself than others are hard on him. Egstrom does, however, say that Jim will never be able to run away from his past.", "analysis": ""}

'Six months afterwards my friend (he was a cynical, more than middle-aged bachelor, with a reputation for eccentricity, and owned a rice-mill) wrote to me, and judging, from the warmth of my recommendation, that I would like to hear, enlarged a little upon Jim's perfections. These were apparently of a quiet and effective sort. "Not having been able so far to find more in my heart than a resigned toleration for any individual of my kind, I have lived till now alone in a house that even in this steaming climate could be considered as too big for one man. I have had him to live with me for some time past. It seems I haven't made a mistake." It seemed to me on reading this letter that my friend had found in his heart more than tolerance for Jim--that there were the beginnings of active liking. Of course he stated his grounds in a characteristic way. For one thing, Jim kept his freshness in the climate. Had he been a girl--my friend wrote--one could have said he was blooming--blooming modestly--like a violet, not like some of these blatant tropical flowers. He had been in the house for six weeks, and had not as yet attempted to slap him on the back, or address him as "old boy," or try to make him feel a superannuated fossil. He had nothing of the exasperating young man's chatter. He was good-tempered, had not much to say for himself, was not clever by any means, thank goodness--wrote my friend. It appeared, however, that Jim was clever enough to be quietly appreciative of his wit, while, on the other hand, he amused him by his naiveness. "The dew is yet on him, and since I had the bright idea of giving him a room in the house and having him at meals I feel less withered myself. The other day he took it into his head to cross the room with no other purpose but to open a door for me; and I felt more in touch with mankind than I had been for years. Ridiculous, isn't it? Of course I guess there is something--some awful little scrape--which you know all about--but if I am sure that it is terribly heinous, I fancy one could manage to forgive it. For my part, I declare I am unable to imagine him guilty of anything much worse than robbing an orchard. Is it much worse? Perhaps you ought to have told me; but it is such a long time since we both turned saints that you may have forgotten we, too, had sinned in our time? It may be that some day I shall have to ask you, and then I shall expect to be told. I don't care to question him myself till I have some idea what it is. Moreover, it's too soon as yet. Let him open the door a few times more for me. . . ." Thus my friend. I was trebly pleased--at Jim's shaping so well, at the tone of the letter, at my own cleverness. Evidently I had known what I was doing. I had read characters aright, and so on. And what if something unexpected and wonderful were to come of it? That evening, reposing in a deck-chair under the shade of my own poop awning (it was in Hong-Kong harbour), I laid on Jim's behalf the first stone of a castle in Spain. 'I made a trip to the northward, and when I returned I found another letter from my friend waiting for me. It was the first envelope I tore open. "There are no spoons missing, as far as I know," ran the first line; "I haven't been interested enough to inquire. He is gone, leaving on the breakfast-table a formal little note of apology, which is either silly or heartless. Probably both--and it's all one to me. Allow me to say, lest you should have some more mysterious young men in reserve, that I have shut up shop, definitely and for ever. This is the last eccentricity I shall be guilty of. Do not imagine for a moment that I care a hang; but he is very much regretted at tennis-parties, and for my own sake I've told a plausible lie at the club. . . ." I flung the letter aside and started looking through the batch on my table, till I came upon Jim's handwriting. Would you believe it? One chance in a hundred! But it is always that hundredth chance! That little second engineer of the Patna had turned up in a more or less destitute state, and got a temporary job of looking after the machinery of the mill. "I couldn't stand the familiarity of the little beast," Jim wrote from a seaport seven hundred miles south of the place where he should have been in clover. "I am now for the time with Egstrom & Blake, ship-chandlers, as their--well--runner, to call the thing by its right name. For reference I gave them your name, which they know of course, and if you could write a word in my favour it would be a permanent employment." I was utterly crushed under the ruins of my castle, but of course I wrote as desired. Before the end of the year my new charter took me that way, and I had an opportunity of seeing him. 'He was still with Egstrom & Blake, and we met in what they called "our parlour" opening out of the store. He had that moment come in from boarding a ship, and confronted me head down, ready for a tussle. "What have you got to say for yourself?" I began as soon as we had shaken hands. "What I wrote you--nothing more," he said stubbornly. "Did the fellow blab--or what?" I asked. He looked up at me with a troubled smile. "Oh, no! He didn't. He made it a kind of confidential business between us. He was most damnably mysterious whenever I came over to the mill; he would wink at me in a respectful manner--as much as to say 'We know what we know.' Infernally fawning and familiar--and that sort of thing . . ." He threw himself into a chair and stared down his legs. "One day we happened to be alone and the fellow had the cheek to say, 'Well, Mr. James'--I was called Mr. James there as if I had been the son--'here we are together once more. This is better than the old ship--ain't it?' . . . Wasn't it appalling, eh? I looked at him, and he put on a knowing air. 'Don't you be uneasy, sir,' he says. 'I know a gentleman when I see one, and I know how a gentleman feels. I hope, though, you will be keeping me on this job. I had a hard time of it too, along of that rotten old Patna racket.' Jove! It was awful. I don't know what I should have said or done if I had not just then heard Mr. Denver calling me in the passage. It was tiffin-time, and we walked together across the yard and through the garden to the bungalow. He began to chaff me in his kindly way . . . I believe he liked me . . ." 'Jim was silent for a while. '"I know he liked me. That's what made it so hard. Such a splendid man! . . . That morning he slipped his hand under my arm. . . . He, too, was familiar with me." He burst into a short laugh, and dropped his chin on his breast. "Pah! When I remembered how that mean little beast had been talking to me," he began suddenly in a vibrating voice, "I couldn't bear to think of myself . . . I suppose you know . . ." I nodded. . . . "More like a father," he cried; his voice sank. "I would have had to tell him. I couldn't let it go on--could I?" "Well?" I murmured, after waiting a while. "I preferred to go," he said slowly; "this thing must be buried." 'We could hear in the shop Blake upbraiding Egstrom in an abusive, strained voice. They had been associated for many years, and every day from the moment the doors were opened to the last minute before closing, Blake, a little man with sleek, jetty hair and unhappy, beady eyes, could be heard rowing his partner incessantly with a sort of scathing and plaintive fury. The sound of that everlasting scolding was part of the place like the other fixtures; even strangers would very soon come to disregard it completely unless it be perhaps to mutter "Nuisance," or to get up suddenly and shut the door of the "parlour." Egstrom himself, a raw-boned, heavy Scandinavian, with a busy manner and immense blonde whiskers, went on directing his people, checking parcels, making out bills or writing letters at a stand-up desk in the shop, and comported himself in that clatter exactly as though he had been stone-deaf. Now and again he would emit a bothered perfunctory "Sssh," which neither produced nor was expected to produce the slightest effect. "They are very decent to me here," said Jim. "Blake's a little cad, but Egstrom's all right." He stood up quickly, and walking with measured steps to a tripod telescope standing in the window and pointed at the roadstead, he applied his eye to it. "There's that ship which has been becalmed outside all the morning has got a breeze now and is coming in," he remarked patiently; "I must go and board." We shook hands in silence, and he turned to go. "Jim!" I cried. He looked round with his hand on the lock. "You--you have thrown away something like a fortune." He came back to me all the way from the door. "Such a splendid old chap," he said. "How could I? How could I?" His lips twitched. "Here it does not matter." "Oh! you--you--" I began, and had to cast about for a suitable word, but before I became aware that there was no name that would just do, he was gone. I heard outside Egstrom's deep gentle voice saying cheerily, "That's the Sarah W. Granger, Jimmy. You must manage to be first aboard"; and directly Blake struck in, screaming after the manner of an outraged cockatoo, "Tell the captain we've got some of his mail here. That'll fetch him. D'ye hear, Mister What's-your-name?" And there was Jim answering Egstrom with something boyish in his tone. "All right. I'll make a race of it." He seemed to take refuge in the boat-sailing part of that sorry business. 'I did not see him again that trip, but on my next (I had a six months' charter) I went up to the store. Ten yards away from the door Blake's scolding met my ears, and when I came in he gave me a glance of utter wretchedness; Egstrom, all smiles, advanced, extending a large bony hand. "Glad to see you, captain. . . . Sssh. . . . Been thinking you were about due back here. What did you say, sir? . . . Sssh. . . . Oh! him! He has left us. Come into the parlour." . . . After the slam of the door Blake's strained voice became faint, as the voice of one scolding desperately in a wilderness. . . . "Put us to a great inconvenience, too. Used us badly--I must say . . ." "Where's he gone to? Do you know?" I asked. "No. It's no use asking either," said Egstrom, standing bewhiskered and obliging before me with his arms hanging down his sides clumsily, and a thin silver watch-chain looped very low on a rucked-up blue serge waistcoat. "A man like that don't go anywhere in particular." I was too concerned at the news to ask for the explanation of that pronouncement, and he went on. "He left--let's see--the very day a steamer with returning pilgrims from the Red Sea put in here with two blades of her propeller gone. Three weeks ago now." "Wasn't there something said about the Patna case?" I asked, fearing the worst. He gave a start, and looked at me as if I had been a sorcerer. "Why, yes! How do you know? Some of them were talking about it here. There was a captain or two, the manager of Vanlo's engineering shop at the harbour, two or three others, and myself. Jim was in here too, having a sandwich and a glass of beer; when we are busy--you see, captain--there's no time for a proper tiffin. He was standing by this table eating sandwiches, and the rest of us were round the telescope watching that steamer come in; and by-and-by Vanlo's manager began to talk about the chief of the Patna; he had done some repairs for him once, and from that he went on to tell us what an old ruin she was, and the money that had been made out of her. He came to mention her last voyage, and then we all struck in. Some said one thing and some another--not much--what you or any other man might say; and there was some laughing. Captain O'Brien of the Sarah W. Granger, a large, noisy old man with a stick--he was sitting listening to us in this arm-chair here--he let drive suddenly with his stick at the floor, and roars out, 'Skunks!' . . . Made us all jump. Vanlo's manager winks at us and asks, 'What's the matter, Captain O'Brien?' 'Matter! matter!' the old man began to shout; 'what are you Injuns laughing at? It's no laughing matter. It's a disgrace to human natur'--that's what it is. I would despise being seen in the same room with one of those men. Yes, sir!' He seemed to catch my eye like, and I had to speak out of civility. 'Skunks!' says I, 'of course, Captain O'Brien, and I wouldn't care to have them here myself, so you're quite safe in this room, Captain O'Brien. Have a little something cool to drink.' 'Dam' your drink, Egstrom,' says he, with a twinkle in his eye; 'when I want a drink I will shout for it. I am going to quit. It stinks here now.' At this all the others burst out laughing, and out they go after the old man. And then, sir, that blasted Jim he puts down the sandwich he had in his hand and walks round the table to me; there was his glass of beer poured out quite full. 'I am off,' he says--just like this. 'It isn't half-past one yet,' says I; 'you might snatch a smoke first.' I thought he meant it was time for him to go down to his work. When I understood what he was up to, my arms fell--so! Can't get a man like that every day, you know, sir; a regular devil for sailing a boat; ready to go out miles to sea to meet ships in any sort of weather. More than once a captain would come in here full of it, and the first thing he would say would be, 'That's a reckless sort of a lunatic you've got for water-clerk, Egstrom. I was feeling my way in at daylight under short canvas when there comes flying out of the mist right under my forefoot a boat half under water, sprays going over the mast-head, two frightened niggers on the bottom boards, a yelling fiend at the tiller. Hey! hey! Ship ahoy! ahoy! Captain! Hey! hey! Egstrom & Blake's man first to speak to you! Hey! hey! Egstrom & Blake! Hallo! hey! whoop! Kick the niggers--out reefs--a squall on at the time--shoots ahead whooping and yelling to me to make sail and he would give me a lead in--more like a demon than a man. Never saw a boat handled like that in all my life. Couldn't have been drunk--was he? Such a quiet, soft-spoken chap too--blush like a girl when he came on board. . . .' I tell you, Captain Marlow, nobody had a chance against us with a strange ship when Jim was out. The other ship-chandlers just kept their old customers, and . . ." 'Egstrom appeared overcome with emotion. '"Why, sir--it seemed as though he wouldn't mind going a hundred miles out to sea in an old shoe to nab a ship for the firm. If the business had been his own and all to make yet, he couldn't have done more in that way. And now . . . all at once . . . like this! Thinks I to myself: 'Oho! a rise in the screw--that's the trouble--is it?' 'All right,' says I, 'no need of all that fuss with me, Jimmy. Just mention your figure. Anything in reason.' He looks at me as if he wanted to swallow something that stuck in his throat. 'I can't stop with you.' 'What's that blooming joke?' I asks. He shakes his head, and I could see in his eye he was as good as gone already, sir. So I turned to him and slanged him till all was blue. 'What is it you're running away from?' I asks. 'Who has been getting at you? What scared you? You haven't as much sense as a rat; they don't clear out from a good ship. Where do you expect to get a better berth?--you this and you that.' I made him look sick, I can tell you. 'This business ain't going to sink,' says I. He gave a big jump. 'Good-bye,' he says, nodding at me like a lord; 'you ain't half a bad chap, Egstrom. I give you my word that if you knew my reasons you wouldn't care to keep me.' 'That's the biggest lie you ever told in your life,' says I; 'I know my own mind.' He made me so mad that I had to laugh. 'Can't you really stop long enough to drink this glass of beer here, you funny beggar, you?' I don't know what came over him; he didn't seem able to find the door; something comical, I can tell you, captain. I drank the beer myself. 'Well, if you're in such a hurry, here's luck to you in your own drink,' says I; 'only, you mark my words, if you keep up this game you'll very soon find that the earth ain't big enough to hold you--that's all.' He gave me one black look, and out he rushed with a face fit to scare little children." 'Egstrom snorted bitterly, and combed one auburn whisker with knotty fingers. "Haven't been able to get a man that was any good since. It's nothing but worry, worry, worry in business. And where might you have come across him, captain, if it's fair to ask?" '"He was the mate of the Patna that voyage," I said, feeling that I owed some explanation. For a time Egstrom remained very still, with his fingers plunged in the hair at the side of his face, and then exploded. "And who the devil cares about that?" "I daresay no one," I began . . . "And what the devil is he--anyhow--for to go on like this?" He stuffed suddenly his left whisker into his mouth and stood amazed. "Jee!" he exclaimed, "I told him the earth wouldn't be big enough to hold his caper."'

Chapter 18

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820051943/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmLordJim26.asp

Six months later Marlow receives a letter from his friend, Mr. Denver, who has hired Jim to work at his rice mill. He praises Jim for his good temper, his good manners, his generosity, his wit, and his cleverness. Marlow is very happy to hear that Jim is doing well, for he has known all along that the young man is "one of us." Before long, Marlow goes on a trip; when he returns, another letter is waiting for him from Mr. Denver. The letter states that Jim wrote a letter of apology, left it behind on the breakfast table, and disappeared; Denver is furious about the loss. Marlow continues through his mail and soon comes to a letter from Jim. The letter explains that the second engineer from the Patna was hired for a temporary job at the mill and made insinuations and threats to Jim. As a result, he felt he had to leave the mill. He has taken a temporary job as a water-clerk with Egstrom & Blake and needs a reference from Marlow. Although unhappy about Jim's new position, which Marlow thinks is beneath him, he sends the letter of reference. Marlow soon has the chance of seeing Jim at Egstrom & Blake. He seems happy and popular, and Marlow feels encouraged about the young man's future. Marlow asks him bluntly what the second engineer had said, whether he had told everyone about the Patna. Jim denies his having done anything like that; however, the man behaved very mysteriously whenever they met and tried to become close to Jim. One day when they were alone, the man threatened Jim about revealing the Patna affair. Jim decided to quit. He did not want to be reminded of his past. Jim's work at the shop of Egstrom & Blake is tolerable, even though the two owners do not work well together. Every day, from the time the shop opens until it closes, Blake, a little man with sleek, jetty hair and small, unhappy eyes, loudly scolds Egstrom, a heavy man who is always busy directing people and checking parcels. Jim thinks Egstrom is a good man. Six months later, Marlow goes back to Egstrom & Blake on his next trip to the south. As he approaches the store, he hears Blake's voice. Egstrom sees Marlow, greets him, and says that Jim left without an explanation about three weeks earlier; Egstrom is disappointed over the loss for Jim had been an excellent worker, his best water clerk. Jim disappeared on the same day that a steamer filled with pilgrims returned from the Red Sea. Marlow cautiously asks whether anything was said at that time about the Patna. Egstrom is surprised by Marlow's question, but he remembers that some people were talking about the Patna while Jim was having a sandwich and a glass of beer. Captain O' Brien remarked that he would hate being in the same room with the men who deserted the Patna. Jim immediately put down his sandwich and walked out. Egstrom asks what Jim is running away from? Marlow tells him that Jim was a mate of the Patna. Egstrom does not seem to be bothered by the information and says, "who the devil cares." Obviously, the sensitive Jim is much harder on himself than others are hard on him. Egstrom does, however, say that Jim will never be able to run away from his past.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/book_xi.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_14_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book xi.chapter i-chapter x

book xi

{"name": "Book XI", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219142226/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/b/the-brothers-karamazov/summary-and-analysis/part-4-book-xi", "summary": "During the two months since Dmitri was arrested, Grushenka has been ill. Now, as she begins to recover physically, there are also signs of a major spiritual recovery, of a complete \"spiritual transformation in her.\" Also, there is another change: she and Alyosha have become fast friends, and she confides to him that she and Dmitri have quarreled again. In addition, she fears that Dmitri is once again falling in love with Katerina Ivanova. What most concerns her, however, is that Dmitri and Ivan are concealing a secret from her. She pleads with Alyosha to discover what the secret is. Again, Alyosha promises to help a human being in trouble. On his way to question Dmitri, Alyosha stops and visits Lise, whom he finds feverish and excited. She tells him that she longs to be punished and castigated by God and says that she regularly prays to suffer torture, for she can no longer respect anything or anyone. She continuously feels possessed with a terrible urge to destroy. The young girl becomes hysterical as she confesses her secret thoughts and then suddenly sends Alyosha away. After he leaves, she does a curious thing: she intentionally slams the door on her fingers and calls herself a wretch. When Alyosha arrives at the prison where Dmitri is being held, he notices that Rakitin, a seminarian acquaintance, is leaving. He asks Dmitri about Rakitin's visit and is told that the seminarian hopes to write an article proving that Dmitri is the victim of an unhappy environment and that he could not help killing his father. Dmitri then explains to the puzzled Alyosha that he does not take Rakitin seriously, that he tolerates him only because he is amused by his \"advanced ideas.\" More seriously, Dmitri confesses that he now understands his responsibility for his past life and sins and that he is ready to suffer and do penance for his sins. He is sure that there can still be a full and rewarding life for him. Only one thing troubles him, however -- Grushenka. He is afraid that the authorities will not let her accompany him to Siberia and fears that, without Grushenka, he will be unable to face his years of punishment and thus will never be redeemed. Dmitri also tells Alyosha that Ivan has come to the prison and has given him a plan for escape. Of course, Dmitri says, Ivan believes him guilty of murder. He then turns to Alyosha and asks his brother's opinion. Never before has he had the courage to speak so candidly with Alyosha, and when he hears the young man say, \"I've never for one instant believed that you were the murderer,\" Dmitri is greatly relieved. He feels the power of a new life rising in him. Alyosha leaves Dmitri and goes to Katerina shortly thereafter. He finds Ivan just leaving, but his brother remains long enough to hear what Alyosha says concerning Dmitri. When Ivan leaves, Katerina becomes highly emotional and insists that Alyosha follow him; she is convinced that Ivan is going mad. Alyosha rushes to rejoin Ivan and learns yet another piece of news. Ivan says that Katerina has a \"document in her hands . . . that proves conclusively\" that Dmitri did indeed murder their father. Alyosha denies that such a document could exist, and Ivan then asks who the murderer is. Alyosha tells him, \"It wasn't you who killed Father,\" explaining that he is aware that Ivan has been accusing himself, but that God has sent Alyosha to Ivan to reassure him. Ivan is sickened by Alyosha's religious mysticism and leaves him abruptly. Ivan's nausea, however, is not due wholly to his brother's mysticism; the sickness begins earlier, almost simultaneously with his first visit to Smerdyakov. The servant is recovering in the hospital and maintains that his epileptic seizure on the night of the murder was real. He says further that he understood that Ivan went to Moscow because he suspected a murder was about to be committed and wanted to be far from the scene of the crime. Ivan answers that he will not reveal to the authorities that Smerdyakov is able to sham an epileptic seizure, and Smerdyakov counters by promising to say nothing of a certain conversation, their last before the murder. During Ivan's second visit with Smerdyakov, he demands to know what Smerdyakov meant by his strange statement about their last conversation prior to the murder. Smerdyakov explains that Ivan so desired his father's death, in order to come into a large portion of the inheritance, that he planned to leave and thereby silently assented to Fyodor's murder. Ivan leaves, bewildered, half realizing that he must share the guilt if Smerdyakov murdered Fyodor. He goes to see Katerina and explains his complicity and his guilt. Katerina is able to temporarily alleviate some of his anxiety. She shows him a letter that Dmitri wrote to her saying that, if necessary, he would kill Fyodor in order to repay the money he stole from her. This letter puts Ivan's mind at ease; Dmitri, not Smerdyakov, is surely the villain. Ivan does not see Smerdyakov again until the night before the trial, but by this time the Karamazov servant is tired of all pretense. He openly admits that it was he who killed Fyodor. He stoutly maintains, though, that he did not act alone; he acted only as an instrument of Ivan, saying, \"It was following your words I did it.\" He then explains in great detail how he accomplished the murder, continuously referring to the dual responsibility for the murder. Smerdyakov furthermore recalls all the philosophical discussions the two men have had and accuses Ivan of having given him the moral justification that made it possible. All this Ivan did, he says, besides leaving town and permitting the act. Stunned, Ivan returns to his lodgings; he plans to reveal at the trial the next day all that Smerdyakov has told him, but in his room he finds a devil. The apparition is dressed like a rather shoddy middle-aged gentleman and is full of cynical criticism. He forces Ivan to face the most terrifying aspects of his inner secrets, taunting him with his private fears and weaknesses until finally Ivan goes mad with rage and hurls a cup at the intruder. At that moment, he hears Alyosha knocking at the window. His brother brings the news that Smerdyakov has just hanged himself. Ivan is so upset by his \"devil\" that when he tries to tell Alyosha about the experience, he cannot. Alyosha discovers to his horror that Ivan is suffering a nervous breakdown. He stays the night to nurse his brother.", "analysis": "This book is concerned primarily with depicting Ivan's guilt and with detailing his duplicity in the murder of his father. Particularly, Dostoevsky emphasizes the three interviews with Smerdyakov and Ivan's conversation with his imaginary devil. Dostoevsky manipulates the attention of the reader away from the plot question of legal guilt and confronts him with the intricacies of Ivan's dilemma about metaphysical guilt. Also in Book XI, Dostoevsky provides necessary background concerning what has happened during the two months that Dmitri has been in jail. It is most important to the author's total view that one know that Grushenka has lain ill following Dmitri's arrest. One of Dostoevsky's prime concepts, prominent in all his novels, is that crime is often accompanied by illness. Besides Grushenka's falling ill after she realizes her role in the Karamazov crime, Ivan also falls desperately ill upon his realization of his involvement in the murder. Thus, in addition to coupling crime and illness, Dostoevsky is structuring a much more important tenet. Because Grushenka is ill and suffers, she becomes regenerated. Knowledge through suffering is one of the novel's prime equations. To underscore his presentation, Dostoevsky, as a contrast to the sensitive Grushenka, records the mincings of the whimsical and impish Lise. This young lady maintains that she needs to suffer in order to learn and that she likes to make other people suffer, but she is both shallow and superficial. She defines suffering, for example, as punishing children by eating pineapple compote before them. She punishes herself by slamming the door on her fingers! This destructive girl turns Dostoevsky's theories inside out and delights in reviling everyone and everything. Her perversity functions as a vivid contrast to Grushenka's more healthy and sound soul. Chapter 4 records Dmitri's continued regeneration. Currently, he ponders Ivan's offer of escape and the finances necessary to accomplish it. Earlier, he might have fled impulsively; now, however, he has developed into a type of Zossima-man. He feels that he is \"responsible for all.\" \"I go for all,\" he says, \"because one must go for all. I didn't kill Father, but I've got to go. I accept it.\" Furthermore, he now believes that life is full of enjoyment even if one must live imprisoned. His dilemma therefore is this: he wants to accept his suffering and looks forward to salvation through suffering, but he knows that he cannot withstand suffering unless Grushenka is beside him, serving as his inspiration. If he accepts Ivan's plan for escape, might he be rejecting his own salvation? Dmitri seeks help and explains to Alyosha that Ivan has planned the escape because he believes Dmitri to be guilty. Alyosha reassures his brother that he never believed him to be the murderer. Alyosha then searches for Ivan and finds that he is on the verge of a mental breakdown. During the first of Ivan's interviews with Smerdyakov, Ivan is told by the cook that he ran away because he already knew that violence was readying itself in the Karamazov house. Smerdyakov further reminds Ivan that the two of them are very much alike. Ivan accepts neither of these ideas, but he broods on them, and as he leaves he feels that there is \"an insulting significance in Smerdyakov's last words.\" It is this ambiguity that brings him back for a second interview. During this next interview, Smerdyakov accuses Ivan outright of desiring his father's death. \"You had a foreboding,\" he says, \"yet went away.\" This was, in effect, Ivan's open invitation for Smerdyakov to murder Fyodor. Ivan recoils and threatens to expose Smerdyakov to the police, but the servant is wily. He reminds Ivan that he also will be disgraced in the public eye and will be accused of being an accomplice. Ivan realizes the possibility of the cook's threat and slowly concedes that he is indeed guilty. Literally, technically, Smerdyakov is the murderer, but he, Ivan, must share the guilt. This realization weighs heavily on Ivan, and before long he is driven to despair. Then he reads the letter that Dmitri has written Katerina telling of his plans to murder his father and is even more confused. His anxiety finally subsides, but he cannot be sure now that Smerdyakov murdered Fyodor. He returns for a third interview. Now both Ivan and Smerdyakov are ill and no longer talk in riddles. Smerdyakov openly tells Ivan, \"You murdered him; you are the real murderer; I was only your instrument, your faithful servant, and it was following your words I did it.\" Smerdyakov also reminds Ivan of the philosophy that \"everything is lawful if there is no immortality\" and that Ivan consented by going away. \"By your consent to leave, you silently sanctioned doing it,\" he says. Ivan still cannot accept Smerdyakov as the murderer, however; as the facts stand, he is guilty, even if the servant did commit the deed. Ivan faces his own conscience that night in the form of a tormenting devil. The doppelganger is a witty, urbane, and clever aberration. He affirms nothing for the distraught Ivan, and at Ivan's every question, he merely asks another, often ridiculing Ivan's most private fears. At the end of Book XI, Alyosha arrives with the news of Smerdyakov's death, but Ivan is little concerned with the cook's fate. The realization of his own guilt has so shamed and confused him that realities have almost wholly dissolved."}

Book XI. Ivan Chapter I. At Grushenka's Alyosha went towards the cathedral square to the widow Morozov's house to see Grushenka, who had sent Fenya to him early in the morning with an urgent message begging him to come. Questioning Fenya, Alyosha learned that her mistress had been particularly distressed since the previous day. During the two months that had passed since Mitya's arrest, Alyosha had called frequently at the widow Morozov's house, both from his own inclination and to take messages for Mitya. Three days after Mitya's arrest, Grushenka was taken very ill and was ill for nearly five weeks. For one whole week she was unconscious. She was very much changed--thinner and a little sallow, though she had for the past fortnight been well enough to go out. But to Alyosha her face was even more attractive than before, and he liked to meet her eyes when he went in to her. A look of firmness and intelligent purpose had developed in her face. There were signs of a spiritual transformation in her, and a steadfast, fine and humble determination that nothing could shake could be discerned in her. There was a small vertical line between her brows which gave her charming face a look of concentrated thought, almost austere at the first glance. There was scarcely a trace of her former frivolity. It seemed strange to Alyosha, too, that in spite of the calamity that had overtaken the poor girl, betrothed to a man who had been arrested for a terrible crime, almost at the instant of their betrothal, in spite of her illness and the almost inevitable sentence hanging over Mitya, Grushenka had not yet lost her youthful cheerfulness. There was a soft light in the once proud eyes, though at times they gleamed with the old vindictive fire when she was visited by one disturbing thought stronger than ever in her heart. The object of that uneasiness was the same as ever--Katerina Ivanovna, of whom Grushenka had even raved when she lay in delirium. Alyosha knew that she was fearfully jealous of her. Yet Katerina Ivanovna had not once visited Mitya in his prison, though she might have done it whenever she liked. All this made a difficult problem for Alyosha, for he was the only person to whom Grushenka opened her heart and from whom she was continually asking advice. Sometimes he was unable to say anything. Full of anxiety he entered her lodging. She was at home. She had returned from seeing Mitya half an hour before, and from the rapid movement with which she leapt up from her chair to meet him he saw that she had been expecting him with great impatience. A pack of cards dealt for a game of "fools" lay on the table. A bed had been made up on the leather sofa on the other side and Maximov lay, half-reclining, on it. He wore a dressing- gown and a cotton nightcap, and was evidently ill and weak, though he was smiling blissfully. When the homeless old man returned with Grushenka from Mokroe two months before, he had simply stayed on and was still staying with her. He arrived with her in rain and sleet, sat down on the sofa, drenched and scared, and gazed mutely at her with a timid, appealing smile. Grushenka, who was in terrible grief and in the first stage of fever, almost forgot his existence in all she had to do the first half- hour after her arrival. Suddenly she chanced to look at him intently: he laughed a pitiful, helpless little laugh. She called Fenya and told her to give him something to eat. All that day he sat in the same place, almost without stirring. When it got dark and the shutters were closed, Fenya asked her mistress: "Is the gentleman going to stay the night, mistress?" "Yes; make him a bed on the sofa," answered Grushenka. Questioning him more in detail, Grushenka learned from him that he had literally nowhere to go, and that "Mr. Kalganov, my benefactor, told me straight that he wouldn't receive me again and gave me five roubles." "Well, God bless you, you'd better stay, then," Grushenka decided in her grief, smiling compassionately at him. Her smile wrung the old man's heart and his lips twitched with grateful tears. And so the destitute wanderer had stayed with her ever since. He did not leave the house even when she was ill. Fenya and her grandmother, the cook, did not turn him out, but went on serving him meals and making up his bed on the sofa. Grushenka had grown used to him, and coming back from seeing Mitya (whom she had begun to visit in prison before she was really well) she would sit down and begin talking to "Maximushka" about trifling matters, to keep her from thinking of her sorrow. The old man turned out to be a good story-teller on occasions, so that at last he became necessary to her. Grushenka saw scarcely any one else beside Alyosha, who did not come every day and never stayed long. Her old merchant lay seriously ill at this time, "at his last gasp" as they said in the town, and he did, in fact, die a week after Mitya's trial. Three weeks before his death, feeling the end approaching, he made his sons, their wives and children, come upstairs to him at last and bade them not leave him again. From that moment he gave strict orders to his servants not to admit Grushenka and to tell her if she came, "The master wishes you long life and happiness and tells you to forget him." But Grushenka sent almost every day to inquire after him. "You've come at last!" she cried, flinging down the cards and joyfully greeting Alyosha, "and Maximushka's been scaring me that perhaps you wouldn't come. Ah, how I need you! Sit down to the table. What will you have--coffee?" "Yes, please," said Alyosha, sitting down at the table. "I am very hungry." "That's right. Fenya, Fenya, coffee," cried Grushenka. "It's been made a long time ready for you. And bring some little pies, and mind they are hot. Do you know, we've had a storm over those pies to-day. I took them to the prison for him, and would you believe it, he threw them back to me: he would not eat them. He flung one of them on the floor and stamped on it. So I said to him: 'I shall leave them with the warder; if you don't eat them before evening, it will be that your venomous spite is enough for you!' With that I went away. We quarreled again, would you believe it? Whenever I go we quarrel." Grushenka said all this in one breath in her agitation. Maximov, feeling nervous, at once smiled and looked on the floor. "What did you quarrel about this time?" asked Alyosha. "I didn't expect it in the least. Only fancy, he is jealous of the Pole. 'Why are you keeping him?' he said. 'So you've begun keeping him.' He is jealous, jealous of me all the time, jealous eating and sleeping! He even took it into his head to be jealous of Kuzma last week." "But he knew about the Pole before?" "Yes, but there it is. He has known about him from the very beginning, but to-day he suddenly got up and began scolding about him. I am ashamed to repeat what he said. Silly fellow! Rakitin went in as I came out. Perhaps Rakitin is egging him on. What do you think?" she added carelessly. "He loves you, that's what it is: he loves you so much. And now he is particularly worried." "I should think he might be, with the trial to-morrow. And I went to him to say something about to-morrow, for I dread to think what's going to happen then. You say that he is worried, but how worried I am! And he talks about the Pole! He's too silly! He is not jealous of Maximushka yet, anyway." "My wife was dreadfully jealous over me, too," Maximov put in his word. "Jealous of you?" Grushenka laughed in spite of herself. "Of whom could she have been jealous?" "Of the servant girls." "Hold your tongue, Maximushka, I am in no laughing mood now; I feel angry. Don't ogle the pies. I shan't give you any; they are not good for you, and I won't give you any vodka either. I have to look after him, too, just as though I kept an almshouse," she laughed. "I don't deserve your kindness. I am a worthless creature," said Maximov, with tears in his voice. "You would do better to spend your kindness on people of more use than me." "Ech, every one is of use, Maximushka, and how can we tell who's of most use? If only that Pole didn't exist, Alyosha. He's taken it into his head to fall ill, too, to-day. I've been to see him also. And I shall send him some pies, too, on purpose. I hadn't sent him any, but Mitya accused me of it, so now I shall send some! Ah, here's Fenya with a letter! Yes, it's from the Poles--begging again!" Pan Mussyalovitch had indeed sent an extremely long and characteristically eloquent letter in which he begged her to lend him three roubles. In the letter was enclosed a receipt for the sum, with a promise to repay it within three months, signed by Pan Vrublevsky as well. Grushenka had received many such letters, accompanied by such receipts, from her former lover during the fortnight of her convalescence. But she knew that the two Poles had been to ask after her health during her illness. The first letter Grushenka got from them was a long one, written on large notepaper and with a big family crest on the seal. It was so obscure and rhetorical that Grushenka put it down before she had read half, unable to make head or tail of it. She could not attend to letters then. The first letter was followed next day by another in which Pan Mussyalovitch begged her for a loan of two thousand roubles for a very short period. Grushenka left that letter, too, unanswered. A whole series of letters had followed--one every day--all as pompous and rhetorical, but the loan asked for, gradually diminishing, dropped to a hundred roubles, then to twenty-five, to ten, and finally Grushenka received a letter in which both the Poles begged her for only one rouble and included a receipt signed by both. Then Grushenka suddenly felt sorry for them, and at dusk she went round herself to their lodging. She found the two Poles in great poverty, almost destitution, without food or fuel, without cigarettes, in debt to their landlady. The two hundred roubles they had carried off from Mitya at Mokroe had soon disappeared. But Grushenka was surprised at their meeting her with arrogant dignity and self-assertion, with the greatest punctilio and pompous speeches. Grushenka simply laughed, and gave her former admirer ten roubles. Then, laughing, she told Mitya of it and he was not in the least jealous. But ever since, the Poles had attached themselves to Grushenka and bombarded her daily with requests for money and she had always sent them small sums. And now that day Mitya had taken it into his head to be fearfully jealous. "Like a fool, I went round to him just for a minute, on the way to see Mitya, for he is ill, too, my Pole," Grushenka began again with nervous haste. "I was laughing, telling Mitya about it. 'Fancy,' I said, 'my Pole had the happy thought to sing his old songs to me to the guitar. He thought I would be touched and marry him!' Mitya leapt up swearing.... So, there, I'll send them the pies! Fenya, is it that little girl they've sent? Here, give her three roubles and pack a dozen pies up in a paper and tell her to take them. And you, Alyosha, be sure to tell Mitya that I did send them the pies." "I wouldn't tell him for anything," said Alyosha, smiling. "Ech! You think he is unhappy about it. Why, he's jealous on purpose. He doesn't care," said Grushenka bitterly. "On purpose?" queried Alyosha. "I tell you you are silly, Alyosha. You know nothing about it, with all your cleverness. I am not offended that he is jealous of a girl like me. I would be offended if he were not jealous. I am like that. I am not offended at jealousy. I have a fierce heart, too. I can be jealous myself. Only what offends me is that he doesn't love me at all. I tell you he is jealous now _on purpose_. Am I blind? Don't I see? He began talking to me just now of that woman, of Katerina, saying she was this and that, how she had ordered a doctor from Moscow for him, to try and save him; how she had ordered the best counsel, the most learned one, too. So he loves her, if he'll praise her to my face, more shame to him! He's treated me badly himself, so he attacked me, to make out I am in fault first and to throw it all on me. 'You were with your Pole before me, so I can't be blamed for Katerina,' that's what it amounts to. He wants to throw the whole blame on me. He attacked me on purpose, on purpose, I tell you, but I'll--" Grushenka could not finish saying what she would do. She hid her eyes in her handkerchief and sobbed violently. "He doesn't love Katerina Ivanovna," said Alyosha firmly. "Well, whether he loves her or not, I'll soon find out for myself," said Grushenka, with a menacing note in her voice, taking the handkerchief from her eyes. Her face was distorted. Alyosha saw sorrowfully that from being mild and serene, it had become sullen and spiteful. "Enough of this foolishness," she said suddenly; "it's not for that I sent for you. Alyosha, darling, to-morrow--what will happen to-morrow? That's what worries me! And it's only me it worries! I look at every one and no one is thinking of it. No one cares about it. Are you thinking about it even? To-morrow he'll be tried, you know. Tell me, how will he be tried? You know it's the valet, the valet killed him! Good heavens! Can they condemn him in place of the valet and will no one stand up for him? They haven't troubled the valet at all, have they?" "He's been severely cross-examined," observed Alyosha thoughtfully; "but every one came to the conclusion it was not he. Now he is lying very ill. He has been ill ever since that attack. Really ill," added Alyosha. "Oh, dear! couldn't you go to that counsel yourself and tell him the whole thing by yourself? He's been brought from Petersburg for three thousand roubles, they say." "We gave these three thousand together--Ivan, Katerina Ivanovna and I--but she paid two thousand for the doctor from Moscow herself. The counsel Fetyukovitch would have charged more, but the case has become known all over Russia; it's talked of in all the papers and journals. Fetyukovitch agreed to come more for the glory of the thing, because the case has become so notorious. I saw him yesterday." "Well? Did you talk to him?" Grushenka put in eagerly. "He listened and said nothing. He told me that he had already formed his opinion. But he promised to give my words consideration." "Consideration! Ah, they are swindlers! They'll ruin him. And why did she send for the doctor?" "As an expert. They want to prove that Mitya's mad and committed the murder when he didn't know what he was doing"; Alyosha smiled gently; "but Mitya won't agree to that." "Yes; but that would be the truth if he had killed him!" cried Grushenka. "He was mad then, perfectly mad, and that was my fault, wretch that I am! But, of course, he didn't do it, he didn't do it! And they are all against him, the whole town. Even Fenya's evidence went to prove he had done it. And the people at the shop, and that official, and at the tavern, too, before, people had heard him say so! They are all, all against him, all crying out against him." "Yes, there's a fearful accumulation of evidence," Alyosha observed grimly. "And Grigory--Grigory Vassilyevitch--sticks to his story that the door was open, persists that he saw it--there's no shaking him. I went and talked to him myself. He's rude about it, too." "Yes, that's perhaps the strongest evidence against him," said Alyosha. "And as for Mitya's being mad, he certainly seems like it now," Grushenka began with a peculiarly anxious and mysterious air. "Do you know, Alyosha, I've been wanting to talk to you about it for a long time. I go to him every day and simply wonder at him. Tell me, now, what do you suppose he's always talking about? He talks and talks and I can make nothing of it. I fancied he was talking of something intellectual that I couldn't understand in my foolishness. Only he suddenly began talking to me about a babe--that is, about some child. 'Why is the babe poor?' he said. 'It's for that babe I am going to Siberia now. I am not a murderer, but I must go to Siberia!' What that meant, what babe, I couldn't tell for the life of me. Only I cried when he said it, because he said it so nicely. He cried himself, and I cried, too. He suddenly kissed me and made the sign of the cross over me. What did it mean, Alyosha, tell me? What is this babe?" "It must be Rakitin, who's been going to see him lately," smiled Alyosha, "though ... that's not Rakitin's doing. I didn't see Mitya yesterday. I'll see him to-day." "No, it's not Rakitin; it's his brother Ivan Fyodorovitch upsetting him. It's his going to see him, that's what it is," Grushenka began, and suddenly broke off. Alyosha gazed at her in amazement. "Ivan's going? Has he been to see him? Mitya told me himself that Ivan hasn't been once." "There ... there! What a girl I am! Blurting things out!" exclaimed Grushenka, confused and suddenly blushing. "Stay, Alyosha, hush! Since I've said so much I'll tell the whole truth--he's been to see him twice, the first directly he arrived. He galloped here from Moscow at once, of course, before I was taken ill; and the second time was a week ago. He told Mitya not to tell you about it, under any circumstances; and not to tell any one, in fact. He came secretly." Alyosha sat plunged in thought, considering something. The news evidently impressed him. "Ivan doesn't talk to me of Mitya's case," he said slowly. "He's said very little to me these last two months. And whenever I go to see him, he seems vexed at my coming, so I've not been to him for the last three weeks. H'm!... if he was there a week ago ... there certainly has been a change in Mitya this week." "There has been a change," Grushenka assented quickly. "They have a secret, they have a secret! Mitya told me himself there was a secret, and such a secret that Mitya can't rest. Before then, he was cheerful--and, indeed, he is cheerful now--but when he shakes his head like that, you know, and strides about the room and keeps pulling at the hair on his right temple with his right hand, I know there is something on his mind worrying him.... I know! He was cheerful before, though, indeed, he is cheerful to-day." "But you said he was worried." "Yes, he is worried and yet cheerful. He keeps on being irritable for a minute and then cheerful and then irritable again. And you know, Alyosha, I am constantly wondering at him--with this awful thing hanging over him, he sometimes laughs at such trifles as though he were a baby himself." "And did he really tell you not to tell me about Ivan? Did he say, 'Don't tell him'?" "Yes, he told me, 'Don't tell him.' It's you that Mitya's most afraid of. Because it's a secret: he said himself it was a secret. Alyosha, darling, go to him and find out what their secret is and come and tell me," Grushenka besought him with sudden eagerness. "Set my mind at rest that I may know the worst that's in store for me. That's why I sent for you." "You think it's something to do with you? If it were, he wouldn't have told you there was a secret." "I don't know. Perhaps he wants to tell me, but doesn't dare to. He warns me. There is a secret, he tells me, but he won't tell me what it is." "What do you think yourself?" "What do I think? It's the end for me, that's what I think. They all three have been plotting my end, for Katerina's in it. It's all Katerina, it all comes from her. She is this and that, and that means that I am not. He tells me that beforehand--warns me. He is planning to throw me over, that's the whole secret. They've planned it together, the three of them--Mitya, Katerina, and Ivan Fyodorovitch. Alyosha, I've been wanting to ask you a long time. A week ago he suddenly told me that Ivan was in love with Katerina, because he often goes to see her. Did he tell me the truth or not? Tell me, on your conscience, tell me the worst." "I won't tell you a lie. Ivan is not in love with Katerina Ivanovna, I think." "Oh, that's what I thought! He is lying to me, shameless deceiver, that's what it is! And he was jealous of me just now, so as to put the blame on me afterwards. He is stupid, he can't disguise what he is doing; he is so open, you know.... But I'll give it to him, I'll give it to him! 'You believe I did it,' he said. He said that to me, to me. He reproached me with that! God forgive him! You wait, I'll make it hot for Katerina at the trial! I'll just say a word then ... I'll tell everything then!" And again she cried bitterly. "This I can tell you for certain, Grushenka," Alyosha said, getting up. "First, that he loves you, loves you more than any one in the world, and you only, believe me. I know. I do know. The second thing is that I don't want to worm his secret out of him, but if he'll tell me of himself to- day, I shall tell him straight out that I have promised to tell you. Then I'll come to you to-day, and tell you. Only ... I fancy ... Katerina Ivanovna has nothing to do with it, and that the secret is about something else. That's certain. It isn't likely it's about Katerina Ivanovna, it seems to me. Good-by for now." Alyosha shook hands with her. Grushenka was still crying. He saw that she put little faith in his consolation, but she was better for having had her sorrow out, for having spoken of it. He was sorry to leave her in such a state of mind, but he was in haste. He had a great many things to do still. Chapter II. The Injured Foot The first of these things was at the house of Madame Hohlakov, and he hurried there to get it over as quickly as possible and not be too late for Mitya. Madame Hohlakov had been slightly ailing for the last three weeks: her foot had for some reason swollen up, and though she was not in bed, she lay all day half-reclining on the couch in her boudoir, in a fascinating but decorous _deshabille_. Alyosha had once noted with innocent amusement that, in spite of her illness, Madame Hohlakov had begun to be rather dressy--top-knots, ribbons, loose wrappers, had made their appearance, and he had an inkling of the reason, though he dismissed such ideas from his mind as frivolous. During the last two months the young official, Perhotin, had become a regular visitor at the house. Alyosha had not called for four days and he was in haste to go straight to Lise, as it was with her he had to speak, for Lise had sent a maid to him the previous day, specially asking him to come to her "about something very important," a request which, for certain reasons, had interest for Alyosha. But while the maid went to take his name in to Lise, Madame Hohlakov heard of his arrival from some one, and immediately sent to beg him to come to her "just for one minute." Alyosha reflected that it was better to accede to the mamma's request, or else she would be sending down to Lise's room every minute that he was there. Madame Hohlakov was lying on a couch. She was particularly smartly dressed and was evidently in a state of extreme nervous excitement. She greeted Alyosha with cries of rapture. "It's ages, ages, perfect ages since I've seen you! It's a whole week--only think of it! Ah, but you were here only four days ago, on Wednesday. You have come to see Lise. I'm sure you meant to slip into her room on tiptoe, without my hearing you. My dear, dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, if you only knew how worried I am about her! But of that later, though that's the most important thing, of that later. Dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, I trust you implicitly with my Lise. Since the death of Father Zossima--God rest his soul!" (she crossed herself)--"I look upon you as a monk, though you look charming in your new suit. Where did you find such a tailor in these parts? No, no, that's not the chief thing--of that later. Forgive me for sometimes calling you Alyosha; an old woman like me may take liberties," she smiled coquettishly; "but that will do later, too. The important thing is that I shouldn't forget what is important. Please remind me of it yourself. As soon as my tongue runs away with me, you just say 'the important thing?' Ach! how do I know now what is of most importance? Ever since Lise took back her promise--her childish promise, Alexey Fyodorovitch--to marry you, you've realized, of course, that it was only the playful fancy of a sick child who had been so long confined to her chair--thank God, she can walk now!... that new doctor Katya sent for from Moscow for your unhappy brother, who will to-morrow--But why speak of to- morrow? I am ready to die at the very thought of to-morrow. Ready to die of curiosity.... That doctor was with us yesterday and saw Lise.... I paid him fifty roubles for the visit. But that's not the point, that's not the point again. You see, I'm mixing everything up. I am in such a hurry. Why am I in a hurry? I don't understand. It's awful how I seem growing unable to understand anything. Everything seems mixed up in a sort of tangle. I am afraid you are so bored you will jump up and run away, and that will be all I shall see of you. Goodness! Why are we sitting here and no coffee? Yulia, Glafira, coffee!" Alyosha made haste to thank her, and said that he had only just had coffee. "Where?" "At Agrafena Alexandrovna's." "At ... at that woman's? Ah, it's she has brought ruin on every one. I know nothing about it though. They say she has become a saint, though it's rather late in the day. She had better have done it before. What use is it now? Hush, hush, Alexey Fyodorovitch, for I have so much to say to you that I am afraid I shall tell you nothing. This awful trial ... I shall certainly go, I am making arrangements. I shall be carried there in my chair; besides I can sit up. I shall have people with me. And, you know, I am a witness. How shall I speak, how shall I speak? I don't know what I shall say. One has to take an oath, hasn't one?" "Yes; but I don't think you will be able to go." "I can sit up. Ah, you put me out! Ah! this trial, this savage act, and then they are all going to Siberia, some are getting married, and all this so quickly, so quickly, everything's changing, and at last--nothing. All grow old and have death to look forward to. Well, so be it! I am weary. This Katya, _cette charmante personne_, has disappointed all my hopes. Now she is going to follow one of your brothers to Siberia, and your other brother is going to follow her, and will live in the nearest town, and they will all torment one another. It drives me out of my mind. Worst of all--the publicity. The story has been told a million times over in all the papers in Moscow and Petersburg. Ah! yes, would you believe it, there's a paragraph that I was 'a dear friend' of your brother's ----, I can't repeat the horrid word. Just fancy, just fancy!" "Impossible! Where was the paragraph? What did it say?" "I'll show you directly. I got the paper and read it yesterday. Here, in the Petersburg paper _Gossip_. The paper began coming out this year. I am awfully fond of gossip, and I take it in, and now it pays me out--this is what gossip comes to! Here it is, here, this passage. Read it." And she handed Alyosha a sheet of newspaper which had been under her pillow. It was not exactly that she was upset, she seemed overwhelmed and perhaps everything really was mixed up in a tangle in her head. The paragraph was very typical, and must have been a great shock to her, but, fortunately perhaps, she was unable to keep her mind fixed on any one subject at that moment, and so might race off in a minute to something else and quite forget the newspaper. Alyosha was well aware that the story of the terrible case had spread all over Russia. And, good heavens! what wild rumors about his brother, about the Karamazovs, and about himself he had read in the course of those two months, among other equally credible items! One paper had even stated that he had gone into a monastery and become a monk, in horror at his brother's crime. Another contradicted this, and stated that he and his elder, Father Zossima, had broken into the monastery chest and "made tracks from the monastery." The present paragraph in the paper _Gossip_ was under the heading, "The Karamazov Case at Skotoprigonyevsk." (That, alas! was the name of our little town. I had hitherto kept it concealed.) It was brief, and Madame Hohlakov was not directly mentioned in it. No names appeared, in fact. It was merely stated that the criminal, whose approaching trial was making such a sensation--retired army captain, an idle swaggerer, and reactionary bully--was continually involved in amorous intrigues, and particularly popular with certain ladies "who were pining in solitude." One such lady, a pining widow, who tried to seem young though she had a grown-up daughter, was so fascinated by him that only two hours before the crime she offered him three thousand roubles, on condition that he would elope with her to the gold mines. But the criminal, counting on escaping punishment, had preferred to murder his father to get the three thousand rather than go off to Siberia with the middle-aged charms of his pining lady. This playful paragraph finished, of course, with an outburst of generous indignation at the wickedness of parricide and at the lately abolished institution of serfdom. Reading it with curiosity, Alyosha folded up the paper and handed it back to Madame Hohlakov. "Well, that must be me," she hurried on again. "Of course I am meant. Scarcely more than an hour before, I suggested gold mines to him, and here they talk of 'middle-aged charms' as though that were my motive! He writes that out of spite! God Almighty forgive him for the middle-aged charms, as I forgive him! You know it's-- Do you know who it is? It's your friend Rakitin." "Perhaps," said Alyosha, "though I've heard nothing about it." "It's he, it's he! No 'perhaps' about it. You know I turned him out of the house.... You know all that story, don't you?" "I know that you asked him not to visit you for the future, but why it was, I haven't heard ... from you, at least." "Ah, then you've heard it from him! He abuses me, I suppose, abuses me dreadfully?" "Yes, he does; but then he abuses every one. But why you've given him up I haven't heard from him either. I meet him very seldom now, indeed. We are not friends." "Well, then, I'll tell you all about it. There's no help for it, I'll confess, for there is one point in which I was perhaps to blame. Only a little, little point, so little that perhaps it doesn't count. You see, my dear boy"--Madame Hohlakov suddenly looked arch and a charming, though enigmatic, smile played about her lips--"you see, I suspect ... You must forgive me, Alyosha. I am like a mother to you.... No, no; quite the contrary. I speak to you now as though you were my father--mother's quite out of place. Well, it's as though I were confessing to Father Zossima, that's just it. I called you a monk just now. Well, that poor young man, your friend, Rakitin (Mercy on us! I can't be angry with him. I feel cross, but not very), that frivolous young man, would you believe it, seems to have taken it into his head to fall in love with me. I only noticed it later. At first--a month ago--he only began to come oftener to see me, almost every day; though, of course, we were acquainted before. I knew nothing about it ... and suddenly it dawned upon me, and I began to notice things with surprise. You know, two months ago, that modest, charming, excellent young man, Pyotr Ilyitch Perhotin, who's in the service here, began to be a regular visitor at the house. You met him here ever so many times yourself. And he is an excellent, earnest young man, isn't he? He comes once every three days, not every day (though I should be glad to see him every day), and always so well dressed. Altogether, I love young people, Alyosha, talented, modest, like you, and he has almost the mind of a statesman, he talks so charmingly, and I shall certainly, certainly try and get promotion for him. He is a future diplomat. On that awful day he almost saved me from death by coming in the night. And your friend Rakitin comes in such boots, and always stretches them out on the carpet.... He began hinting at his feelings, in fact, and one day, as he was going, he squeezed my hand terribly hard. My foot began to swell directly after he pressed my hand like that. He had met Pyotr Ilyitch here before, and would you believe it, he is always gibing at him, growling at him, for some reason. I simply looked at the way they went on together and laughed inwardly. So I was sitting here alone--no, I was laid up then. Well, I was lying here alone and suddenly Rakitin comes in, and only fancy! brought me some verses of his own composition--a short poem, on my bad foot: that is, he described my foot in a poem. Wait a minute--how did it go? A captivating little foot. It began somehow like that. I can never remember poetry. I've got it here. I'll show it to you later. But it's a charming thing--charming; and, you know, it's not only about the foot, it had a good moral, too, a charming idea, only I've forgotten it; in fact, it was just the thing for an album. So, of course, I thanked him, and he was evidently flattered. I'd hardly had time to thank him when in comes Pyotr Ilyitch, and Rakitin suddenly looked as black as night. I could see that Pyotr Ilyitch was in the way, for Rakitin certainly wanted to say something after giving me the verses. I had a presentiment of it; but Pyotr Ilyitch came in. I showed Pyotr Ilyitch the verses and didn't say who was the author. But I am convinced that he guessed, though he won't own it to this day, and declares he had no idea. But he says that on purpose. Pyotr Ilyitch began to laugh at once, and fell to criticizing it. 'Wretched doggerel,' he said they were, 'some divinity student must have written them,' and with such vehemence, such vehemence! Then, instead of laughing, your friend flew into a rage. 'Good gracious!' I thought, 'they'll fly at each other.' 'It was I who wrote them,' said he. 'I wrote them as a joke,' he said, 'for I think it degrading to write verses.... But they are good poetry. They want to put a monument to your Pushkin for writing about women's feet, while I wrote with a moral purpose, and you,' said he, 'are an advocate of serfdom. You've no humane ideas,' said he. 'You have no modern enlightened feelings, you are uninfluenced by progress, you are a mere official,' he said, 'and you take bribes.' Then I began screaming and imploring them. And, you know, Pyotr Ilyitch is anything but a coward. He at once took up the most gentlemanly tone, looked at him sarcastically, listened, and apologized. 'I'd no idea,' said he. 'I shouldn't have said it, if I had known. I should have praised it. Poets are all so irritable,' he said. In short, he laughed at him under cover of the most gentlemanly tone. He explained to me afterwards that it was all sarcastic. I thought he was in earnest. Only as I lay there, just as before you now, I thought, 'Would it, or would it not, be the proper thing for me to turn Rakitin out for shouting so rudely at a visitor in my house?' And, would you believe it, I lay here, shut my eyes, and wondered, would it be the proper thing or not. I kept worrying and worrying, and my heart began to beat, and I couldn't make up my mind whether to make an outcry or not. One voice seemed to be telling me, 'Speak,' and the other 'No, don't speak.' And no sooner had the second voice said that than I cried out, and fainted. Of course, there was a fuss. I got up suddenly and said to Rakitin, 'It's painful for me to say it, but I don't wish to see you in my house again.' So I turned him out. Ah! Alexey Fyodorovitch, I know myself I did wrong. I was putting it on. I wasn't angry with him at all, really; but I suddenly fancied--that was what did it--that it would be such a fine scene.... And yet, believe me, it was quite natural, for I really shed tears and cried for several days afterwards, and then suddenly, one afternoon, I forgot all about it. So it's a fortnight since he's been here, and I kept wondering whether he would come again. I wondered even yesterday, then suddenly last night came this _Gossip_. I read it and gasped. Who could have written it? He must have written it. He went home, sat down, wrote it on the spot, sent it, and they put it in. It was a fortnight ago, you see. But, Alyosha, it's awful how I keep talking and don't say what I want to say. Ah! the words come of themselves!" "It's very important for me to be in time to see my brother to-day," Alyosha faltered. "To be sure, to be sure! You bring it all back to me. Listen, what is an aberration?" "What aberration?" asked Alyosha, wondering. "In the legal sense. An aberration in which everything is pardonable. Whatever you do, you will be acquitted at once." "What do you mean?" "I'll tell you. This Katya ... Ah! she is a charming, charming creature, only I never can make out who it is she is in love with. She was with me some time ago and I couldn't get anything out of her. Especially as she won't talk to me except on the surface now. She is always talking about my health and nothing else, and she takes up such a tone with me, too. I simply said to myself, 'Well, so be it. I don't care'... Oh, yes. I was talking of aberration. This doctor has come. You know a doctor has come? Of course, you know it--the one who discovers madmen. You wrote for him. No, it wasn't you, but Katya. It's all Katya's doing. Well, you see, a man may be sitting perfectly sane and suddenly have an aberration. He may be conscious and know what he is doing and yet be in a state of aberration. And there's no doubt that Dmitri Fyodorovitch was suffering from aberration. They found out about aberration as soon as the law courts were reformed. It's all the good effect of the reformed law courts. The doctor has been here and questioned me about that evening, about the gold mines. 'How did he seem then?' he asked me. He must have been in a state of aberration. He came in shouting, 'Money, money, three thousand! Give me three thousand!' and then went away and immediately did the murder. 'I don't want to murder him,' he said, and he suddenly went and murdered him. That's why they'll acquit him, because he struggled against it and yet he murdered him." "But he didn't murder him," Alyosha interrupted rather sharply. He felt more and more sick with anxiety and impatience. "Yes, I know it was that old man Grigory murdered him." "Grigory?" cried Alyosha. "Yes, yes; it was Grigory. He lay as Dmitri Fyodorovitch struck him down, and then got up, saw the door open, went in and killed Fyodor Pavlovitch." "But why, why?" "Suffering from aberration. When he recovered from the blow Dmitri Fyodorovitch gave him on the head, he was suffering from aberration; he went and committed the murder. As for his saying he didn't, he very likely doesn't remember. Only, you know, it'll be better, ever so much better, if Dmitri Fyodorovitch murdered him. And that's how it must have been, though I say it was Grigory. It certainly was Dmitri Fyodorovitch, and that's better, ever so much better! Oh! not better that a son should have killed his father, I don't defend that. Children ought to honor their parents, and yet it would be better if it were he, as you'd have nothing to cry over then, for he did it when he was unconscious or rather when he was conscious, but did not know what he was doing. Let them acquit him--that's so humane, and would show what a blessing reformed law courts are. I knew nothing about it, but they say they have been so a long time. And when I heard it yesterday, I was so struck by it that I wanted to send for you at once. And if he is acquitted, make him come straight from the law courts to dinner with me, and I'll have a party of friends, and we'll drink to the reformed law courts. I don't believe he'd be dangerous; besides, I'll invite a great many friends, so that he could always be led out if he did anything. And then he might be made a justice of the peace or something in another town, for those who have been in trouble themselves make the best judges. And, besides, who isn't suffering from aberration nowadays?--you, I, all of us are in a state of aberration, and there are ever so many examples of it: a man sits singing a song, suddenly something annoys him, he takes a pistol and shoots the first person he comes across, and no one blames him for it. I read that lately, and all the doctors confirm it. The doctors are always confirming; they confirm anything. Why, my Lise is in a state of aberration. She made me cry again yesterday, and the day before, too, and to-day I suddenly realized that it's all due to aberration. Oh, Lise grieves me so! I believe she's quite mad. Why did she send for you? Did she send for you or did you come of yourself?" "Yes, she sent for me, and I am just going to her." Alyosha got up resolutely. "Oh, my dear, dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, perhaps that's what's most important," Madame Hohlakov cried, suddenly bursting into tears. "God knows I trust Lise to you with all my heart, and it's no matter her sending for you on the sly, without telling her mother. But forgive me, I can't trust my daughter so easily to your brother Ivan Fyodorovitch, though I still consider him the most chivalrous young man. But only fancy, he's been to see Lise and I knew nothing about it!" "How? What? When?" Alyosha was exceedingly surprised. He had not sat down again and listened standing. "I will tell you; that's perhaps why I asked you to come, for I don't know now why I did ask you to come. Well, Ivan Fyodorovitch has been to see me twice, since he came back from Moscow. First time he came as a friend to call on me, and the second time Katya was here and he came because he heard she was here. I didn't, of course, expect him to come often, knowing what a lot he has to do as it is, _vous comprenez, cette affaire et la mort terrible de votre papa_. But I suddenly heard he'd been here again, not to see me but to see Lise. That's six days ago now. He came, stayed five minutes, and went away. And I didn't hear of it till three days afterwards, from Glafira, so it was a great shock to me. I sent for Lise directly. She laughed. 'He thought you were asleep,' she said, 'and came in to me to ask after your health.' Of course, that's how it happened. But Lise, Lise, mercy on us, how she distresses me! Would you believe it, one night, four days ago, just after you saw her last time, and had gone away, she suddenly had a fit, screaming, shrieking, hysterics! Why is it I never have hysterics? Then, next day another fit, and the same thing on the third, and yesterday too, and then yesterday that aberration. She suddenly screamed out, 'I hate Ivan Fyodorovitch. I insist on your never letting him come to the house again.' I was struck dumb at these amazing words, and answered, 'On what grounds could I refuse to see such an excellent young man, a young man of such learning too, and so unfortunate?'--for all this business is a misfortune, isn't it? She suddenly burst out laughing at my words, and so rudely, you know. Well, I was pleased; I thought I had amused her and the fits would pass off, especially as I wanted to refuse to see Ivan Fyodorovitch anyway on account of his strange visits without my knowledge, and meant to ask him for an explanation. But early this morning Lise waked up and flew into a passion with Yulia and, would you believe it, slapped her in the face. That's monstrous; I am always polite to my servants. And an hour later she was hugging Yulia's feet and kissing them. She sent a message to me that she wasn't coming to me at all, and would never come and see me again, and when I dragged myself down to her, she rushed to kiss me, crying, and as she kissed me, she pushed me out of the room without saying a word, so I couldn't find out what was the matter. Now, dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, I rest all my hopes on you, and, of course, my whole life is in your hands. I simply beg you to go to Lise and find out everything from her, as you alone can, and come back and tell me--me, her mother, for you understand it will be the death of me, simply the death of me, if this goes on, or else I shall run away. I can stand no more. I have patience; but I may lose patience, and then ... then something awful will happen. Ah, dear me! At last, Pyotr Ilyitch!" cried Madame Hohlakov, beaming all over as she saw Perhotin enter the room. "You are late, you are late! Well, sit down, speak, put us out of suspense. What does the counsel say. Where are you off to, Alexey Fyodorovitch?" "To Lise." "Oh, yes. You won't forget, you won't forget what I asked you? It's a question of life and death!" "Of course, I won't forget, if I can ... but I am so late," muttered Alyosha, beating a hasty retreat. "No, be sure, be sure to come in; don't say 'If you can.' I shall die if you don't," Madame Hohlakov called after him, but Alyosha had already left the room. Chapter III. A Little Demon Going in to Lise, he found her half reclining in the invalid-chair, in which she had been wheeled when she was unable to walk. She did not move to meet him, but her sharp, keen eyes were simply riveted on his face. There was a feverish look in her eyes, her face was pale and yellow. Alyosha was amazed at the change that had taken place in her in three days. She was positively thinner. She did not hold out her hand to him. He touched the thin, long fingers which lay motionless on her dress, then he sat down facing her, without a word. "I know you are in a hurry to get to the prison," Lise said curtly, "and mamma's kept you there for hours; she's just been telling you about me and Yulia." "How do you know?" asked Alyosha. "I've been listening. Why do you stare at me? I want to listen and I do listen, there's no harm in that. I don't apologize." "You are upset about something?" "On the contrary, I am very happy. I've only just been reflecting for the thirtieth time what a good thing it is I refused you and shall not be your wife. You are not fit to be a husband. If I were to marry you and give you a note to take to the man I loved after you, you'd take it and be sure to give it to him and bring an answer back, too. If you were forty, you would still go on taking my love-letters for me." She suddenly laughed. "There is something spiteful and yet open-hearted about you," Alyosha smiled to her. "The open-heartedness consists in my not being ashamed of myself with you. What's more, I don't want to feel ashamed with you, just with you. Alyosha, why is it I don't respect you? I am very fond of you, but I don't respect you. If I respected you, I shouldn't talk to you without shame, should I?" "No." "But do you believe that I am not ashamed with you?" "No, I don't believe it." Lise laughed nervously again; she spoke rapidly. "I sent your brother, Dmitri Fyodorovitch, some sweets in prison. Alyosha, you know, you are quite pretty! I shall love you awfully for having so quickly allowed me not to love you." "Why did you send for me to-day, Lise?" "I wanted to tell you of a longing I have. I should like some one to torture me, marry me and then torture me, deceive me and go away. I don't want to be happy." "You are in love with disorder?" "Yes, I want disorder. I keep wanting to set fire to the house. I keep imagining how I'll creep up and set fire to the house on the sly; it must be on the sly. They'll try to put it out, but it'll go on burning. And I shall know and say nothing. Ah, what silliness! And how bored I am!" She waved her hand with a look of repulsion. "It's your luxurious life," said Alyosha, softly. "Is it better, then, to be poor?" "Yes, it is better." "That's what your monk taught you. That's not true. Let me be rich and all the rest poor, I'll eat sweets and drink cream and not give any to any one else. Ach, don't speak, don't say anything," she shook her hand at him, though Alyosha had not opened his mouth. "You've told me all that before, I know it all by heart. It bores me. If I am ever poor, I shall murder somebody, and even if I am rich, I may murder some one, perhaps--why do nothing! But do you know, I should like to reap, cut the rye? I'll marry you, and you shall become a peasant, a real peasant; we'll keep a colt, shall we? Do you know Kalganov?" "Yes." "He is always wandering about, dreaming. He says, 'Why live in real life? It's better to dream. One can dream the most delightful things, but real life is a bore.' But he'll be married soon for all that; he's been making love to me already. Can you spin tops?" "Yes." "Well, he's just like a top: he wants to be wound up and set spinning and then to be lashed, lashed, lashed with a whip. If I marry him, I'll keep him spinning all his life. You are not ashamed to be with me?" "No." "You are awfully cross, because I don't talk about holy things. I don't want to be holy. What will they do to one in the next world for the greatest sin? You must know all about that." "God will censure you." Alyosha was watching her steadily. "That's just what I should like. I would go up and they would censure me, and I would burst out laughing in their faces. I should dreadfully like to set fire to the house, Alyosha, to our house; you still don't believe me?" "Why? There are children of twelve years old, who have a longing to set fire to something and they do set things on fire, too. It's a sort of disease." "That's not true, that's not true; there may be children, but that's not what I mean." "You take evil for good; it's a passing crisis, it's the result of your illness, perhaps." "You do despise me, though! It's simply that I don't want to do good, I want to do evil, and it has nothing to do with illness." "Why do evil?" "So that everything might be destroyed. Ah, how nice it would be if everything were destroyed! You know, Alyosha, I sometimes think of doing a fearful lot of harm and everything bad, and I should do it for a long while on the sly and suddenly every one would find it out. Every one will stand round and point their fingers at me and I would look at them all. That would be awfully nice. Why would it be so nice, Alyosha?" "I don't know. It's a craving to destroy something good or, as you say, to set fire to something. It happens sometimes." "I not only say it, I shall do it." "I believe you." "Ah, how I love you for saying you believe me. And you are not lying one little bit. But perhaps you think that I am saying all this on purpose to annoy you?" "No, I don't think that ... though perhaps there is a little desire to do that in it, too." "There is a little. I never can tell lies to you," she declared, with a strange fire in her eyes. What struck Alyosha above everything was her earnestness. There was not a trace of humor or jesting in her face now, though, in old days, fun and gayety never deserted her even at her most "earnest" moments. "There are moments when people love crime," said Alyosha thoughtfully. "Yes, yes! You have uttered my thought; they love crime, every one loves crime, they love it always, not at some 'moments.' You know, it's as though people have made an agreement to lie about it and have lied about it ever since. They all declare that they hate evil, but secretly they all love it." "And are you still reading nasty books?" "Yes, I am. Mamma reads them and hides them under her pillow and I steal them." "Aren't you ashamed to destroy yourself?" "I want to destroy myself. There's a boy here, who lay down between the railway lines when the train was passing. Lucky fellow! Listen, your brother is being tried now for murdering his father and every one loves his having killed his father." "Loves his having killed his father?" "Yes, loves it; every one loves it! Everybody says it's so awful, but secretly they simply love it. I for one love it." "There is some truth in what you say about every one," said Alyosha softly. "Oh, what ideas you have!" Lise shrieked in delight. "And you a monk, too! You wouldn't believe how I respect you, Alyosha, for never telling lies. Oh, I must tell you a funny dream of mine. I sometimes dream of devils. It's night; I am in my room with a candle and suddenly there are devils all over the place, in all the corners, under the table, and they open the doors; there's a crowd of them behind the doors and they want to come and seize me. And they are just coming, just seizing me. But I suddenly cross myself and they all draw back, though they don't go away altogether, they stand at the doors and in the corners, waiting. And suddenly I have a frightful longing to revile God aloud, and so I begin, and then they come crowding back to me, delighted, and seize me again and I cross myself again and they all draw back. It's awful fun. it takes one's breath away." "I've had the same dream, too," said Alyosha suddenly. "Really?" cried Lise, surprised. "I say, Alyosha, don't laugh, that's awfully important. Could two different people have the same dream?" "It seems they can." "Alyosha, I tell you, it's awfully important," Lise went on, with really excessive amazement. "It's not the dream that's important, but your having the same dream as me. You never lie to me, don't lie now: is it true? You are not laughing?" "It's true." Lise seemed extraordinarily impressed and for half a minute she was silent. "Alyosha, come and see me, come and see me more often," she said suddenly, in a supplicating voice. "I'll always come to see you, all my life," answered Alyosha firmly. "You are the only person I can talk to, you know," Lise began again. "I talk to no one but myself and you. Only you in the whole world. And to you more readily than to myself. And I am not a bit ashamed with you, not a bit. Alyosha, why am I not ashamed with you, not a bit? Alyosha, is it true that at Easter the Jews steal a child and kill it?" "I don't know." "There's a book here in which I read about the trial of a Jew, who took a child of four years old and cut off the fingers from both hands, and then crucified him on the wall, hammered nails into him and crucified him, and afterwards, when he was tried, he said that the child died soon, within four hours. That was 'soon'! He said the child moaned, kept on moaning and he stood admiring it. That's nice!" "Nice?" "Nice; I sometimes imagine that it was I who crucified him. He would hang there moaning and I would sit opposite him eating pineapple _compote_. I am awfully fond of pineapple _compote_. Do you like it?" Alyosha looked at her in silence. Her pale, sallow face was suddenly contorted, her eyes burned. "You know, when I read about that Jew I shook with sobs all night. I kept fancying how the little thing cried and moaned (a child of four years old understands, you know), and all the while the thought of pineapple _compote_ haunted me. In the morning I wrote a letter to a certain person, begging him _particularly_ to come and see me. He came and I suddenly told him all about the child and the pineapple _compote_. _All_ about it, _all_, and said that it was nice. He laughed and said it really was nice. Then he got up and went away. He was only here five minutes. Did he despise me? Did he despise me? Tell me, tell me, Alyosha, did he despise me or not?" She sat up on the couch, with flashing eyes. "Tell me," Alyosha asked anxiously, "did you send for that person?" "Yes, I did." "Did you send him a letter?" "Yes." "Simply to ask about that, about that child?" "No, not about that at all. But when he came, I asked him about that at once. He answered, laughed, got up and went away." "That person behaved honorably," Alyosha murmured. "And did he despise me? Did he laugh at me?" "No, for perhaps he believes in the pineapple _compote_ himself. He is very ill now, too, Lise." "Yes, he does believe in it," said Lise, with flashing eyes. "He doesn't despise any one," Alyosha went on. "Only he does not believe any one. If he doesn't believe in people, of course, he does despise them." "Then he despises me, me?" "You, too." "Good," Lise seemed to grind her teeth. "When he went out laughing, I felt that it was nice to be despised. The child with fingers cut off is nice, and to be despised is nice...." And she laughed in Alyosha's face, a feverish malicious laugh. "Do you know, Alyosha, do you know, I should like--Alyosha, save me!" She suddenly jumped from the couch, rushed to him and seized him with both hands. "Save me!" she almost groaned. "Is there any one in the world I could tell what I've told you? I've told you the truth, the truth. I shall kill myself, because I loathe everything! I don't want to live, because I loathe everything! I loathe everything, everything. Alyosha, why don't you love me in the least?" she finished in a frenzy. "But I do love you!" answered Alyosha warmly. "And will you weep over me, will you?" "Yes." "Not because I won't be your wife, but simply weep for me?" "Yes." "Thank you! It's only your tears I want. Every one else may punish me and trample me under foot, every one, every one, not excepting _any one_. For I don't love any one. Do you hear, not any one! On the contrary, I hate him! Go, Alyosha; it's time you went to your brother"; she tore herself away from him suddenly. "How can I leave you like this?" said Alyosha, almost in alarm. "Go to your brother, the prison will be shut; go, here's your hat. Give my love to Mitya, go, go!" And she almost forcibly pushed Alyosha out of the door. He looked at her with pained surprise, when he was suddenly aware of a letter in his right hand, a tiny letter folded up tight and sealed. He glanced at it and instantly read the address, "To Ivan Fyodorovitch Karamazov." He looked quickly at Lise. Her face had become almost menacing. "Give it to him, you must give it to him!" she ordered him, trembling and beside herself. "To-day, at once, or I'll poison myself! That's why I sent for you." And she slammed the door quickly. The bolt clicked. Alyosha put the note in his pocket and went straight downstairs, without going back to Madame Hohlakov; forgetting her, in fact. As soon as Alyosha had gone, Lise unbolted the door, opened it a little, put her finger in the crack and slammed the door with all her might, pinching her finger. Ten seconds after, releasing her finger, she walked softly, slowly to her chair, sat up straight in it and looked intently at her blackened finger and at the blood that oozed from under the nail. Her lips were quivering and she kept whispering rapidly to herself: "I am a wretch, wretch, wretch, wretch!" Chapter IV. A Hymn And A Secret It was quite late (days are short in November) when Alyosha rang at the prison gate. It was beginning to get dusk. But Alyosha knew that he would be admitted without difficulty. Things were managed in our little town, as everywhere else. At first, of course, on the conclusion of the preliminary inquiry, relations and a few other persons could only obtain interviews with Mitya by going through certain inevitable formalities. But later, though the formalities were not relaxed, exceptions were made for some, at least, of Mitya's visitors. So much so, that sometimes the interviews with the prisoner in the room set aside for the purpose were practically _tete-a-tete_. These exceptions, however, were few in number; only Grushenka, Alyosha and Rakitin were treated like this. But the captain of the police, Mihail Mihailovitch, was very favorably disposed to Grushenka. His abuse of her at Mokroe weighed on the old man's conscience, and when he learned the whole story, he completely changed his view of her. And strange to say, though he was firmly persuaded of his guilt, yet after Mitya was once in prison, the old man came to take a more and more lenient view of him. "He was a man of good heart, perhaps," he thought, "who had come to grief from drinking and dissipation." His first horror had been succeeded by pity. As for Alyosha, the police captain was very fond of him and had known him for a long time. Rakitin, who had of late taken to coming very often to see the prisoner, was one of the most intimate acquaintances of the "police captain's young ladies," as he called them, and was always hanging about their house. He gave lessons in the house of the prison superintendent, too, who, though scrupulous in the performance of his duties, was a kind- hearted old man. Alyosha, again, had an intimate acquaintance of long standing with the superintendent, who was fond of talking to him, generally on sacred subjects. He respected Ivan Fyodorovitch, and stood in awe of his opinion, though he was a great philosopher himself; "self- taught," of course. But Alyosha had an irresistible attraction for him. During the last year the old man had taken to studying the Apocryphal Gospels, and constantly talked over his impressions with his young friend. He used to come and see him in the monastery and discussed for hours together with him and with the monks. So even if Alyosha were late at the prison, he had only to go to the superintendent and everything was made easy. Besides, every one in the prison, down to the humblest warder, had grown used to Alyosha. The sentry, of course, did not trouble him so long as the authorities were satisfied. When Mitya was summoned from his cell, he always went downstairs, to the place set aside for interviews. As Alyosha entered the room he came upon Rakitin, who was just taking leave of Mitya. They were both talking loudly. Mitya was laughing heartily as he saw him out, while Rakitin seemed grumbling. Rakitin did not like meeting Alyosha, especially of late. He scarcely spoke to him, and bowed to him stiffly. Seeing Alyosha enter now, he frowned and looked away, as though he were entirely absorbed in buttoning his big, warm, fur-trimmed overcoat. Then he began looking at once for his umbrella. "I must mind not to forget my belongings," he muttered, simply to say something. "Mind you don't forget other people's belongings," said Mitya, as a joke, and laughed at once at his own wit. Rakitin fired up instantly. "You'd better give that advice to your own family, who've always been a slave-driving lot, and not to Rakitin," he cried, suddenly trembling with anger. "What's the matter? I was joking," cried Mitya. "Damn it all! They are all like that," he turned to Alyosha, nodding towards Rakitin's hurriedly retreating figure. "He was sitting here, laughing and cheerful, and all at once he boils up like that. He didn't even nod to you. Have you broken with him completely? Why are you so late? I've not been simply waiting, but thirsting for you the whole morning. But never mind. We'll make up for it now." "Why does he come here so often? Surely you are not such great friends?" asked Alyosha. He, too, nodded at the door through which Rakitin had disappeared. "Great friends with Rakitin? No, not as much as that. Is it likely--a pig like that? He considers I am ... a blackguard. They can't understand a joke either, that's the worst of such people. They never understand a joke, and their souls are dry, dry and flat; they remind me of prison walls when I was first brought here. But he is a clever fellow, very clever. Well, Alexey, it's all over with me now." He sat down on the bench and made Alyosha sit down beside him. "Yes, the trial's to-morrow. Are you so hopeless, brother?" Alyosha said, with an apprehensive feeling. "What are you talking about?" said Mitya, looking at him rather uncertainly. "Oh, you mean the trial! Damn it all! Till now we've been talking of things that don't matter, about this trial, but I haven't said a word to you about the chief thing. Yes, the trial is to-morrow; but it wasn't the trial I meant, when I said it was all over with me. Why do you look at me so critically?" "What do you mean, Mitya?" "Ideas, ideas, that's all! Ethics! What is ethics?" "Ethics?" asked Alyosha, wondering. "Yes; is it a science?" "Yes, there is such a science ... but ... I confess I can't explain to you what sort of science it is." "Rakitin knows. Rakitin knows a lot, damn him! He's not going to be a monk. He means to go to Petersburg. There he'll go in for criticism of an elevating tendency. Who knows, he may be of use and make his own career, too. Ough! they are first-rate, these people, at making a career! Damn ethics, I am done for, Alexey, I am, you man of God! I love you more than any one. It makes my heart yearn to look at you. Who was Karl Bernard?" "Karl Bernard?" Alyosha was surprised again. "No, not Karl. Stay, I made a mistake. Claude Bernard. What was he? Chemist or what?" "He must be a savant," answered Alyosha; "but I confess I can't tell you much about him, either. I've heard of him as a savant, but what sort I don't know." "Well, damn him, then! I don't know either," swore Mitya. "A scoundrel of some sort, most likely. They are all scoundrels. And Rakitin will make his way. Rakitin will get on anywhere; he is another Bernard. Ugh, these Bernards! They are all over the place." "But what is the matter?" Alyosha asked insistently. "He wants to write an article about me, about my case, and so begin his literary career. That's what he comes for; he said so himself. He wants to prove some theory. He wants to say 'he couldn't help murdering his father, he was corrupted by his environment,' and so on. He explained it all to me. He is going to put in a tinge of Socialism, he says. But there, damn the fellow, he can put in a tinge if he likes, I don't care. He can't bear Ivan, he hates him. He's not fond of you, either. But I don't turn him out, for he is a clever fellow. Awfully conceited, though. I said to him just now, 'The Karamazovs are not blackguards, but philosophers; for all true Russians are philosophers, and though you've studied, you are not a philosopher--you are a low fellow.' He laughed, so maliciously. And I said to him, '_De ideabus non est disputandum_.' Isn't that rather good? I can set up for being a classic, you see!" Mitya laughed suddenly. "Why is it all over with you? You said so just now," Alyosha interposed. "Why is it all over with me? H'm!... The fact of it is ... if you take it as a whole, I am sorry to lose God--that's why it is." "What do you mean by 'sorry to lose God'?" "Imagine: inside, in the nerves, in the head--that is, these nerves are there in the brain ... (damn them!) there are sort of little tails, the little tails of those nerves, and as soon as they begin quivering ... that is, you see, I look at something with my eyes and then they begin quivering, those little tails ... and when they quiver, then an image appears ... it doesn't appear at once, but an instant, a second, passes ... and then something like a moment appears; that is, not a moment--devil take the moment!--but an image; that is, an object, or an action, damn it! That's why I see and then think, because of those tails, not at all because I've got a soul, and that I am some sort of image and likeness. All that is nonsense! Rakitin explained it all to me yesterday, brother, and it simply bowled me over. It's magnificent, Alyosha, this science! A new man's arising--that I understand.... And yet I am sorry to lose God!" "Well, that's a good thing, anyway," said Alyosha. "That I am sorry to lose God? It's chemistry, brother, chemistry! There's no help for it, your reverence, you must make way for chemistry. And Rakitin does dislike God. Ough! doesn't he dislike Him! That's the sore point with all of them. But they conceal it. They tell lies. They pretend. 'Will you preach this in your reviews?' I asked him. 'Oh, well, if I did it openly, they won't let it through,' he said. He laughed. 'But what will become of men then?' I asked him, 'without God and immortal life? All things are lawful then, they can do what they like?' 'Didn't you know?' he said laughing, 'a clever man can do what he likes,' he said. 'A clever man knows his way about, but you've put your foot in it, committing a murder, and now you are rotting in prison.' He says that to my face! A regular pig! I used to kick such people out, but now I listen to them. He talks a lot of sense, too. Writes well. He began reading me an article last week. I copied out three lines of it. Wait a minute. Here it is." Mitya hurriedly pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket and read: " 'In order to determine this question, it is above all essential to put one's personality in contradiction to one's reality.' Do you understand that?" "No, I don't," said Alyosha. He looked at Mitya and listened to him with curiosity. "I don't understand either. It's dark and obscure, but intellectual. 'Every one writes like that now,' he says, 'it's the effect of their environment.' They are afraid of the environment. He writes poetry, too, the rascal. He's written in honor of Madame Hohlakov's foot. Ha ha ha!" "I've heard about it," said Alyosha. "Have you? And have you heard the poem?" "No." "I've got it. Here it is. I'll read it to you. You don't know--I haven't told you--there's quite a story about it. He's a rascal! Three weeks ago he began to tease me. 'You've got yourself into a mess, like a fool, for the sake of three thousand, but I'm going to collar a hundred and fifty thousand. I am going to marry a widow and buy a house in Petersburg.' And he told me he was courting Madame Hohlakov. She hadn't much brains in her youth, and now at forty she has lost what she had. 'But she's awfully sentimental,' he says; 'that's how I shall get hold of her. When I marry her, I shall take her to Petersburg and there I shall start a newspaper.' And his mouth was simply watering, the beast, not for the widow, but for the hundred and fifty thousand. And he made me believe it. He came to see me every day. 'She is coming round,' he declared. He was beaming with delight. And then, all of a sudden, he was turned out of the house. Perhotin's carrying everything before him, bravo! I could kiss the silly old noodle for turning him out of the house. And he had written this doggerel. 'It's the first time I've soiled my hands with writing poetry,' he said. 'It's to win her heart, so it's in a good cause. When I get hold of the silly woman's fortune, I can be of great social utility.' They have this social justification for every nasty thing they do! 'Anyway it's better than your Pushkin's poetry,' he said, 'for I've managed to advocate enlightenment even in that.' I understand what he means about Pushkin, I quite see that, if he really was a man of talent and only wrote about women's feet. But wasn't Rakitin stuck up about his doggerel! The vanity of these fellows! 'On the convalescence of the swollen foot of the object of my affections'--he thought of that for a title. He's a waggish fellow. A captivating little foot, Though swollen and red and tender! The doctors come and plasters put, But still they cannot mend her. Yet, 'tis not for her foot I dread-- A theme for Pushkin's muse more fit-- It's not her foot, it is her head: I tremble for her loss of wit! For as her foot swells, strange to say, Her intellect is on the wane-- Oh, for some remedy I pray That may restore both foot and brain! He is a pig, a regular pig, but he's very arch, the rascal! And he really has put in a progressive idea. And wasn't he angry when she kicked him out! He was gnashing his teeth!" "He's taken his revenge already," said Alyosha. "He's written a paragraph about Madame Hohlakov." And Alyosha told him briefly about the paragraph in _Gossip_. "That's his doing, that's his doing!" Mitya assented, frowning. "That's him! These paragraphs ... I know ... the insulting things that have been written about Grushenka, for instance.... And about Katya, too.... H'm!" He walked across the room with a harassed air. "Brother, I cannot stay long," Alyosha said, after a pause. "To-morrow will be a great and awful day for you, the judgment of God will be accomplished ... I am amazed at you, you walk about here, talking of I don't know what ..." "No, don't be amazed at me," Mitya broke in warmly. "Am I to talk of that stinking dog? Of the murderer? We've talked enough of him. I don't want to say more of the stinking son of Stinking Lizaveta! God will kill him, you will see. Hush!" He went up to Alyosha excitedly and kissed him. His eyes glowed. "Rakitin wouldn't understand it," he began in a sort of exaltation; "but you, you'll understand it all. That's why I was thirsting for you. You see, there's so much I've been wanting to tell you for ever so long, here, within these peeling walls, but I haven't said a word about what matters most; the moment never seems to have come. Now I can wait no longer. I must pour out my heart to you. Brother, these last two months I've found in myself a new man. A new man has risen up in me. He was hidden in me, but would never have come to the surface, if it hadn't been for this blow from heaven. I am afraid! And what do I care if I spend twenty years in the mines, breaking ore with a hammer? I am not a bit afraid of that--it's something else I am afraid of now: that that new man may leave me. Even there, in the mines, under-ground, I may find a human heart in another convict and murderer by my side, and I may make friends with him, for even there one may live and love and suffer. One may thaw and revive a frozen heart in that convict, one may wait upon him for years, and at last bring up from the dark depths a lofty soul, a feeling, suffering creature; one may bring forth an angel, create a hero! There are so many of them, hundreds of them, and we are all to blame for them. Why was it I dreamed of that 'babe' at such a moment? 'Why is the babe so poor?' That was a sign to me at that moment. It's for the babe I'm going. Because we are all responsible for all. For all the 'babes,' for there are big children as well as little children. All are 'babes.' I go for all, because some one must go for all. I didn't kill father, but I've got to go. I accept it. It's all come to me here, here, within these peeling walls. There are numbers of them there, hundreds of them underground, with hammers in their hands. Oh, yes, we shall be in chains and there will be no freedom, but then, in our great sorrow, we shall rise again to joy, without which man cannot live nor God exist, for God gives joy: it's His privilege--a grand one. Ah, man should be dissolved in prayer! What should I be underground there without God? Rakitin's laughing! If they drive God from the earth, we shall shelter Him underground. One cannot exist in prison without God; it's even more impossible than out of prison. And then we men underground will sing from the bowels of the earth a glorious hymn to God, with Whom is joy. Hail to God and His joy! I love Him!" Mitya was almost gasping for breath as he uttered his wild speech. He turned pale, his lips quivered, and tears rolled down his cheeks. "Yes, life is full, there is life even underground," he began again. "You wouldn't believe, Alexey, how I want to live now, what a thirst for existence and consciousness has sprung up in me within these peeling walls. Rakitin doesn't understand that; all he cares about is building a house and letting flats. But I've been longing for you. And what is suffering? I am not afraid of it, even if it were beyond reckoning. I am not afraid of it now. I was afraid of it before. Do you know, perhaps I won't answer at the trial at all.... And I seem to have such strength in me now, that I think I could stand anything, any suffering, only to be able to say and to repeat to myself every moment, 'I exist.' In thousands of agonies--I exist. I'm tormented on the rack--but I exist! Though I sit alone on a pillar--I exist! I see the sun, and if I don't see the sun, I know it's there. And there's a whole life in that, in knowing that the sun is there. Alyosha, my angel, all these philosophies are the death of me. Damn them! Brother Ivan--" "What of brother Ivan?" interrupted Alyosha, but Mitya did not hear. "You see, I never had any of these doubts before, but it was all hidden away in me. It was perhaps just because ideas I did not understand were surging up in me, that I used to drink and fight and rage. It was to stifle them in myself, to still them, to smother them. Ivan is not Rakitin, there is an idea in him. Ivan is a sphinx and is silent; he is always silent. It's God that's worrying me. That's the only thing that's worrying me. What if He doesn't exist? What if Rakitin's right--that it's an idea made up by men? Then if He doesn't exist, man is the chief of the earth, of the universe. Magnificent! Only how is he going to be good without God? That's the question. I always come back to that. For whom is man going to love then? To whom will he be thankful? To whom will he sing the hymn? Rakitin laughs. Rakitin says that one can love humanity without God. Well, only a sniveling idiot can maintain that. I can't understand it. Life's easy for Rakitin. 'You'd better think about the extension of civic rights, or even of keeping down the price of meat. You will show your love for humanity more simply and directly by that, than by philosophy.' I answered him, 'Well, but you, without a God, are more likely to raise the price of meat, if it suits you, and make a rouble on every copeck.' He lost his temper. But after all, what is goodness? Answer me that, Alexey. Goodness is one thing with me and another with a Chinaman, so it's a relative thing. Or isn't it? Is it not relative? A treacherous question! You won't laugh if I tell you it's kept me awake two nights. I only wonder now how people can live and think nothing about it. Vanity! Ivan has no God. He has an idea. It's beyond me. But he is silent. I believe he is a free-mason. I asked him, but he is silent. I wanted to drink from the springs of his soul--he was silent. But once he did drop a word." "What did he say?" Alyosha took it up quickly. "I said to him, 'Then everything is lawful, if it is so?' He frowned. 'Fyodor Pavlovitch, our papa,' he said, 'was a pig, but his ideas were right enough.' That was what he dropped. That was all he said. That was going one better than Rakitin." "Yes," Alyosha assented bitterly. "When was he with you?" "Of that later; now I must speak of something else. I have said nothing about Ivan to you before. I put it off to the last. When my business here is over and the verdict has been given, then I'll tell you something. I'll tell you everything. We've something tremendous on hand.... And you shall be my judge in it. But don't begin about that now; be silent. You talk of to-morrow, of the trial; but, would you believe it, I know nothing about it." "Have you talked to the counsel?" "What's the use of the counsel? I told him all about it. He's a soft, city-bred rogue--a Bernard! But he doesn't believe me--not a bit of it. Only imagine, he believes I did it. I see it. 'In that case,' I asked him, 'why have you come to defend me?' Hang them all! They've got a doctor down, too, want to prove I'm mad. I won't have that! Katerina Ivanovna wants to do her 'duty' to the end, whatever the strain!" Mitya smiled bitterly. "The cat! Hard-hearted creature! She knows that I said of her at Mokroe that she was a woman of 'great wrath.' They repeated it. Yes, the facts against me have grown numerous as the sands of the sea. Grigory sticks to his point. Grigory's honest, but a fool. Many people are honest because they are fools: that's Rakitin's idea. Grigory's my enemy. And there are some people who are better as foes than friends. I mean Katerina Ivanovna. I am afraid, oh, I am afraid she will tell how she bowed to the ground after that four thousand. She'll pay it back to the last farthing. I don't want her sacrifice; they'll put me to shame at the trial. I wonder how I can stand it. Go to her, Alyosha, ask her not to speak of that in the court, can't you? But damn it all, it doesn't matter! I shall get through somehow. I don't pity her. It's her own doing. She deserves what she gets. I shall have my own story to tell, Alexey." He smiled bitterly again. "Only ... only Grusha, Grusha! Good Lord! Why should she have such suffering to bear?" he exclaimed suddenly, with tears. "Grusha's killing me; the thought of her's killing me, killing me. She was with me just now...." "She told me she was very much grieved by you to-day." "I know. Confound my temper! It was jealousy. I was sorry, I kissed her as she was going. I didn't ask her forgiveness." "Why didn't you?" exclaimed Alyosha. Suddenly Mitya laughed almost mirthfully. "God preserve you, my dear boy, from ever asking forgiveness for a fault from a woman you love. From one you love especially, however greatly you may have been in fault. For a woman--devil only knows what to make of a woman! I know something about them, anyway. But try acknowledging you are in fault to a woman. Say, 'I am sorry, forgive me,' and a shower of reproaches will follow! Nothing will make her forgive you simply and directly, she'll humble you to the dust, bring forward things that have never happened, recall everything, forget nothing, add something of her own, and only then forgive you. And even the best, the best of them do it. She'll scrape up all the scrapings and load them on your head. They are ready to flay you alive, I tell you, every one of them, all these angels without whom we cannot live! I tell you plainly and openly, dear boy, every decent man ought to be under some woman's thumb. That's my conviction--not conviction, but feeling. A man ought to be magnanimous, and it's no disgrace to a man! No disgrace to a hero, not even a Caesar! But don't ever beg her pardon all the same for anything. Remember that rule given you by your brother Mitya, who's come to ruin through women. No, I'd better make it up to Grusha somehow, without begging pardon. I worship her, Alexey, worship her. Only she doesn't see it. No, she still thinks I don't love her enough. And she tortures me, tortures me with her love. The past was nothing! In the past it was only those infernal curves of hers that tortured me, but now I've taken all her soul into my soul and through her I've become a man myself. Will they marry us? If they don't, I shall die of jealousy. I imagine something every day.... What did she say to you about me?" Alyosha repeated all Grushenka had said to him that day. Mitya listened, made him repeat things, and seemed pleased. "Then she is not angry at my being jealous?" he exclaimed. "She is a regular woman! 'I've a fierce heart myself!' Ah, I love such fierce hearts, though I can't bear any one's being jealous of me. I can't endure it. We shall fight. But I shall love her, I shall love her infinitely. Will they marry us? Do they let convicts marry? That's the question. And without her I can't exist...." Mitya walked frowning across the room. It was almost dark. He suddenly seemed terribly worried. "So there's a secret, she says, a secret? We have got up a plot against her, and Katya is mixed up in it, she thinks. No, my good Grushenka, that's not it. You are very wide of the mark, in your foolish feminine way. Alyosha, darling, well, here goes! I'll tell you our secret!" He looked round, went close up quickly to Alyosha, who was standing before him, and whispered to him with an air of mystery, though in reality no one could hear them: the old warder was dozing in the corner, and not a word could reach the ears of the soldiers on guard. "I will tell you all our secret," Mitya whispered hurriedly. "I meant to tell you later, for how could I decide on anything without you? You are everything to me. Though I say that Ivan is superior to us, you are my angel. It's your decision will decide it. Perhaps it's you that is superior and not Ivan. You see, it's a question of conscience, question of the higher conscience--the secret is so important that I can't settle it myself, and I've put it off till I could speak to you. But anyway it's too early to decide now, for we must wait for the verdict. As soon as the verdict is given, you shall decide my fate. Don't decide it now. I'll tell you now. You listen, but don't decide. Stand and keep quiet. I won't tell you everything. I'll only tell you the idea, without details, and you keep quiet. Not a question, not a movement. You agree? But, goodness, what shall I do with your eyes? I'm afraid your eyes will tell me your decision, even if you don't speak. Oo! I'm afraid! Alyosha, listen! Ivan suggests my _escaping_. I won't tell you the details: it's all been thought out: it can all be arranged. Hush, don't decide. I should go to America with Grusha. You know I can't live without Grusha! What if they won't let her follow me to Siberia? Do they let convicts get married? Ivan thinks not. And without Grusha what should I do there underground with a hammer? I should only smash my skull with the hammer! But, on the other hand, my conscience? I should have run away from suffering. A sign has come, I reject the sign. I have a way of salvation and I turn my back on it. Ivan says that in America, 'with the good-will,' I can be of more use than underground. But what becomes of our hymn from underground? What's America? America is vanity again! And there's a lot of swindling in America, too, I expect. I should have run away from crucifixion! I tell you, you know, Alexey, because you are the only person who can understand this. There's no one else. It's folly, madness to others, all I've told you of the hymn. They'll say I'm out of my mind or a fool. I am not out of my mind and I am not a fool. Ivan understands about the hymn, too. He understands, only he doesn't answer--he doesn't speak. He doesn't believe in the hymn. Don't speak, don't speak. I see how you look! You have already decided. Don't decide, spare me! I can't live without Grusha. Wait till after the trial!" Mitya ended beside himself. He held Alyosha with both hands on his shoulders, and his yearning, feverish eyes were fixed on his brother's. "They don't let convicts marry, do they?" he repeated for the third time in a supplicating voice. Alyosha listened with extreme surprise and was deeply moved. "Tell me one thing," he said. "Is Ivan very keen on it, and whose idea was it?" "His, his, and he is very keen on it. He didn't come to see me at first, then he suddenly came a week ago and he began about it straight away. He is awfully keen on it. He doesn't ask me, but orders me to escape. He doesn't doubt of my obeying him, though I showed him all my heart as I have to you, and told him about the hymn, too. He told me he'd arrange it; he's found out about everything. But of that later. He's simply set on it. It's all a matter of money: he'll pay ten thousand for escape and give me twenty thousand for America. And he says we can arrange a magnificent escape for ten thousand." "And he told you on no account to tell me?" Alyosha asked again. "To tell no one, and especially not you; on no account to tell you. He is afraid, no doubt, that you'll stand before me as my conscience. Don't tell him I told you. Don't tell him, for anything." "You are right," Alyosha pronounced; "it's impossible to decide anything before the trial is over. After the trial you'll decide of yourself. Then you'll find that new man in yourself and he will decide." "A new man, or a Bernard who'll decide _a la_ Bernard, for I believe I'm a contemptible Bernard myself," said Mitya, with a bitter grin. "But, brother, have you no hope then of being acquitted?" Mitya shrugged his shoulders nervously and shook his head. "Alyosha, darling, it's time you were going," he said, with a sudden haste. "There's the superintendent shouting in the yard. He'll be here directly. We are late; it's irregular. Embrace me quickly. Kiss me! Sign me with the cross, darling, for the cross I have to bear to-morrow." They embraced and kissed. "Ivan," said Mitya suddenly, "suggests my escaping; but, of course, he believes I did it." A mournful smile came on to his lips. "Have you asked him whether he believes it?" asked Alyosha. "No, I haven't. I wanted to, but I couldn't. I hadn't the courage. But I saw it from his eyes. Well, good-by!" Once more they kissed hurriedly, and Alyosha was just going out, when Mitya suddenly called him back. "Stand facing me! That's right!" And again he seized Alyosha, putting both hands on his shoulders. His face became suddenly quite pale, so that it was dreadfully apparent, even through the gathering darkness. His lips twitched, his eyes fastened upon Alyosha. "Alyosha, tell me the whole truth, as you would before God. Do you believe I did it? Do you, do you in yourself, believe it? The whole truth, don't lie!" he cried desperately. Everything seemed heaving before Alyosha, and he felt something like a stab at his heart. "Hush! What do you mean?" he faltered helplessly. "The whole truth, the whole, don't lie!" repeated Mitya. "I've never for one instant believed that you were the murderer!" broke in a shaking voice from Alyosha's breast, and he raised his right hand in the air, as though calling God to witness his words. Mitya's whole face was lighted up with bliss. "Thank you!" he articulated slowly, as though letting a sigh escape him after fainting. "Now you have given me new life. Would you believe it, till this moment I've been afraid to ask you, you, even you. Well, go! You've given me strength for to-morrow. God bless you! Come, go along! Love Ivan!" was Mitya's last word. Alyosha went out in tears. Such distrustfulness in Mitya, such lack of confidence even to him, to Alyosha--all this suddenly opened before Alyosha an unsuspected depth of hopeless grief and despair in the soul of his unhappy brother. Intense, infinite compassion overwhelmed him instantly. There was a poignant ache in his torn heart. "Love Ivan!"--he suddenly recalled Mitya's words. And he was going to Ivan. He badly wanted to see Ivan all day. He was as much worried about Ivan as about Mitya, and more than ever now. Chapter V. Not You, Not You! On the way to Ivan he had to pass the house where Katerina Ivanovna was living. There was light in the windows. He suddenly stopped and resolved to go in. He had not seen Katerina Ivanovna for more than a week. But now it struck him that Ivan might be with her, especially on the eve of the terrible day. Ringing, and mounting the staircase, which was dimly lighted by a Chinese lantern, he saw a man coming down, and as they met, he recognized him as his brother. So he was just coming from Katerina Ivanovna. "Ah, it's only you," said Ivan dryly. "Well, good-by! You are going to her?" "Yes." "I don't advise you to; she's upset and you'll upset her more." A door was instantly flung open above, and a voice cried suddenly: "No, no! Alexey Fyodorovitch, have you come from him?" "Yes, I have been with him." "Has he sent me any message? Come up, Alyosha, and you, Ivan Fyodorovitch, you must come back, you must. Do you hear?" There was such a peremptory note in Katya's voice that Ivan, after a moment's hesitation, made up his mind to go back with Alyosha. "She was listening," he murmured angrily to himself, but Alyosha heard it. "Excuse my keeping my greatcoat on," said Ivan, going into the drawing- room. "I won't sit down. I won't stay more than a minute." "Sit down, Alexey Fyodorovitch," said Katerina Ivanovna, though she remained standing. She had changed very little during this time, but there was an ominous gleam in her dark eyes. Alyosha remembered afterwards that she had struck him as particularly handsome at that moment. "What did he ask you to tell me?" "Only one thing," said Alyosha, looking her straight in the face, "that you would spare yourself and say nothing at the trial of what" (he was a little confused) "... passed between you ... at the time of your first acquaintance ... in that town." "Ah! that I bowed down to the ground for that money!" She broke into a bitter laugh. "Why, is he afraid for me or for himself? He asks me to spare--whom? Him or myself? Tell me, Alexey Fyodorovitch!" Alyosha watched her intently, trying to understand her. "Both yourself and him," he answered softly. "I am glad to hear it," she snapped out maliciously, and she suddenly blushed. "You don't know me yet, Alexey Fyodorovitch," she said menacingly. "And I don't know myself yet. Perhaps you'll want to trample me under foot after my examination to-morrow." "You will give your evidence honorably," said Alyosha; "that's all that's wanted." "Women are often dishonorable," she snarled. "Only an hour ago I was thinking I felt afraid to touch that monster ... as though he were a reptile ... but no, he is still a human being to me! But did he do it? Is he the murderer?" she cried, all of a sudden, hysterically, turning quickly to Ivan. Alyosha saw at once that she had asked Ivan that question before, perhaps only a moment before he came in, and not for the first time, but for the hundredth, and that they had ended by quarreling. "I've been to see Smerdyakov.... It was you, you who persuaded me that he murdered his father. It's only you I believed!" she continued, still addressing Ivan. He gave her a sort of strained smile. Alyosha started at her tone. He had not suspected such familiar intimacy between them. "Well, that's enough, anyway," Ivan cut short the conversation. "I am going. I'll come to-morrow." And turning at once, he walked out of the room and went straight downstairs. With an imperious gesture, Katerina Ivanovna seized Alyosha by both hands. "Follow him! Overtake him! Don't leave him alone for a minute!" she said, in a hurried whisper. "He's mad! Don't you know that he's mad? He is in a fever, nervous fever. The doctor told me so. Go, run after him...." Alyosha jumped up and ran after Ivan, who was not fifty paces ahead of him. "What do you want?" He turned quickly on Alyosha, seeing that he was running after him. "She told you to catch me up, because I'm mad. I know it all by heart," he added irritably. "She is mistaken, of course; but she is right that you are ill," said Alyosha. "I was looking at your face just now. You look very ill, Ivan." Ivan walked on without stopping. Alyosha followed him. "And do you know, Alexey Fyodorovitch, how people do go out of their mind?" Ivan asked in a voice suddenly quiet, without a trace of irritation, with a note of the simplest curiosity. "No, I don't. I suppose there are all kinds of insanity." "And can one observe that one's going mad oneself?" "I imagine one can't see oneself clearly in such circumstances," Alyosha answered with surprise. Ivan paused for half a minute. "If you want to talk to me, please change the subject," he said suddenly. "Oh, while I think of it, I have a letter for you," said Alyosha timidly, and he took Lise's note from his pocket and held it out to Ivan. They were just under a lamp-post. Ivan recognized the handwriting at once. "Ah, from that little demon!" he laughed maliciously, and, without opening the envelope, he tore it into bits and threw it in the air. The bits were scattered by the wind. "She's not sixteen yet, I believe, and already offering herself," he said contemptuously, striding along the street again. "How do you mean, offering herself?" exclaimed Alyosha. "As wanton women offer themselves, to be sure." "How can you, Ivan, how can you?" Alyosha cried warmly, in a grieved voice. "She is a child; you are insulting a child! She is ill; she is very ill, too. She is on the verge of insanity, too, perhaps.... I had hoped to hear something from you ... that would save her." "You'll hear nothing from me. If she is a child I am not her nurse. Be quiet, Alexey. Don't go on about her. I am not even thinking about it." They were silent again for a moment. "She will be praying all night now to the Mother of God to show her how to act to-morrow at the trial," he said sharply and angrily again. "You ... you mean Katerina Ivanovna?" "Yes. Whether she's to save Mitya or ruin him. She'll pray for light from above. She can't make up her mind for herself, you see. She has not had time to decide yet. She takes me for her nurse, too. She wants me to sing lullabies to her." "Katerina Ivanovna loves you, brother," said Alyosha sadly. "Perhaps; but I am not very keen on her." "She is suffering. Why do you ... sometimes say things to her that give her hope?" Alyosha went on, with timid reproach. "I know that you've given her hope. Forgive me for speaking to you like this," he added. "I can't behave to her as I ought--break off altogether and tell her so straight out," said Ivan, irritably. "I must wait till sentence is passed on the murderer. If I break off with her now, she will avenge herself on me by ruining that scoundrel to-morrow at the trial, for she hates him and knows she hates him. It's all a lie--lie upon lie! As long as I don't break off with her, she goes on hoping, and she won't ruin that monster, knowing how I want to get him out of trouble. If only that damned verdict would come!" The words "murderer" and "monster" echoed painfully in Alyosha's heart. "But how can she ruin Mitya?" he asked, pondering on Ivan's words. "What evidence can she give that would ruin Mitya?" "You don't know that yet. She's got a document in her hands, in Mitya's own writing, that proves conclusively that he did murder Fyodor Pavlovitch." "That's impossible!" cried Alyosha. "Why is it impossible? I've read it myself." "There can't be such a document!" Alyosha repeated warmly. "There can't be, because he's not the murderer. It's not he murdered father, not he!" Ivan suddenly stopped. "Who is the murderer then, according to you?" he asked, with apparent coldness. There was even a supercilious note in his voice. "You know who," Alyosha pronounced in a low, penetrating voice. "Who? You mean the myth about that crazy idiot, the epileptic, Smerdyakov?" Alyosha suddenly felt himself trembling all over. "You know who," broke helplessly from him. He could scarcely breathe. "Who? Who?" Ivan cried almost fiercely. All his restraint suddenly vanished. "I only know one thing," Alyosha went on, still almost in a whisper, "_it wasn't you_ killed father." " 'Not you'! What do you mean by 'not you'?" Ivan was thunderstruck. "It was not you killed father, not you!" Alyosha repeated firmly. The silence lasted for half a minute. "I know I didn't. Are you raving?" said Ivan, with a pale, distorted smile. His eyes were riveted on Alyosha. They were standing again under a lamp-post. "No, Ivan. You've told yourself several times that you are the murderer." "When did I say so? I was in Moscow.... When have I said so?" Ivan faltered helplessly. "You've said so to yourself many times, when you've been alone during these two dreadful months," Alyosha went on softly and distinctly as before. Yet he was speaking now, as it were, not of himself, not of his own will, but obeying some irresistible command. "You have accused yourself and have confessed to yourself that you are the murderer and no one else. But you didn't do it: you are mistaken: you are not the murderer. Do you hear? It was not you! God has sent me to tell you so." They were both silent. The silence lasted a whole long minute. They were both standing still, gazing into each other's eyes. They were both pale. Suddenly Ivan began trembling all over, and clutched Alyosha's shoulder. "You've been in my room!" he whispered hoarsely. "You've been there at night, when he came.... Confess ... have you seen him, have you seen him?" "Whom do you mean--Mitya?" Alyosha asked, bewildered. "Not him, damn the monster!" Ivan shouted, in a frenzy. "Do you know that he visits me? How did you find out? Speak!" "Who is _he_! I don't know whom you are talking about," Alyosha faltered, beginning to be alarmed. "Yes, you do know ... or how could you--? It's impossible that you don't know." Suddenly he seemed to check himself. He stood still and seemed to reflect. A strange grin contorted his lips. "Brother," Alyosha began again, in a shaking voice, "I have said this to you, because you'll believe my word, I know that. I tell you once and for all, it's not you. You hear, once for all! God has put it into my heart to say this to you, even though it may make you hate me from this hour." But by now Ivan had apparently regained his self-control. "Alexey Fyodorovitch," he said, with a cold smile, "I can't endure prophets and epileptics--messengers from God especially--and you know that only too well. I break off all relations with you from this moment and probably for ever. I beg you to leave me at this turning. It's the way to your lodgings, too. You'd better be particularly careful not to come to me to-day! Do you hear?" He turned and walked on with a firm step, not looking back. "Brother," Alyosha called after him, "if anything happens to you to-day, turn to me before any one!" But Ivan made no reply. Alyosha stood under the lamp-post at the cross roads, till Ivan had vanished into the darkness. Then he turned and walked slowly homewards. Both Alyosha and Ivan were living in lodgings; neither of them was willing to live in Fyodor Pavlovitch's empty house. Alyosha had a furnished room in the house of some working people. Ivan lived some distance from him. He had taken a roomy and fairly comfortable lodge attached to a fine house that belonged to a well-to-do lady, the widow of an official. But his only attendant was a deaf and rheumatic old crone who went to bed at six o'clock every evening and got up at six in the morning. Ivan had become remarkably indifferent to his comforts of late, and very fond of being alone. He did everything for himself in the one room he lived in, and rarely entered any of the other rooms in his abode. He reached the gate of the house and had his hand on the bell, when he suddenly stopped. He felt that he was trembling all over with anger. Suddenly he let go of the bell, turned back with a curse, and walked with rapid steps in the opposite direction. He walked a mile and a half to a tiny, slanting, wooden house, almost a hut, where Marya Kondratyevna, the neighbor who used to come to Fyodor Pavlovitch's kitchen for soup and to whom Smerdyakov had once sung his songs and played on the guitar, was now lodging. She had sold their little house, and was now living here with her mother. Smerdyakov, who was ill--almost dying--had been with them ever since Fyodor Pavlovitch's death. It was to him Ivan was going now, drawn by a sudden and irresistible prompting. Chapter VI. The First Interview With Smerdyakov This was the third time that Ivan had been to see Smerdyakov since his return from Moscow. The first time he had seen him and talked to him was on the first day of his arrival, then he had visited him once more, a fortnight later. But his visits had ended with that second one, so that it was now over a month since he had seen him. And he had scarcely heard anything of him. Ivan had only returned five days after his father's death, so that he was not present at the funeral, which took place the day before he came back. The cause of his delay was that Alyosha, not knowing his Moscow address, had to apply to Katerina Ivanovna to telegraph to him, and she, not knowing his address either, telegraphed to her sister and aunt, reckoning on Ivan's going to see them as soon as he arrived in Moscow. But he did not go to them till four days after his arrival. When he got the telegram, he had, of course, set off post-haste to our town. The first to meet him was Alyosha, and Ivan was greatly surprised to find that, in opposition to the general opinion of the town, he refused to entertain a suspicion against Mitya, and spoke openly of Smerdyakov as the murderer. Later on, after seeing the police captain and the prosecutor, and hearing the details of the charge and the arrest, he was still more surprised at Alyosha, and ascribed his opinion only to his exaggerated brotherly feeling and sympathy with Mitya, of whom Alyosha, as Ivan knew, was very fond. By the way, let us say a word or two of Ivan's feeling to his brother Dmitri. He positively disliked him; at most, felt sometimes a compassion for him, and even that was mixed with great contempt, almost repugnance. Mitya's whole personality, even his appearance, was extremely unattractive to him. Ivan looked with indignation on Katerina Ivanovna's love for his brother. Yet he went to see Mitya on the first day of his arrival, and that interview, far from shaking Ivan's belief in his guilt, positively strengthened it. He found his brother agitated, nervously excited. Mitya had been talkative, but very absent-minded and incoherent. He used violent language, accused Smerdyakov, and was fearfully muddled. He talked principally about the three thousand roubles, which he said had been "stolen" from him by his father. "The money was mine, it was my money," Mitya kept repeating. "Even if I had stolen it, I should have had the right." He hardly contested the evidence against him, and if he tried to turn a fact to his advantage, it was in an absurd and incoherent way. He hardly seemed to wish to defend himself to Ivan or any one else. Quite the contrary, he was angry and proudly scornful of the charges against him; he was continually firing up and abusing every one. He only laughed contemptuously at Grigory's evidence about the open door, and declared that it was "the devil that opened it." But he could not bring forward any coherent explanation of the fact. He even succeeded in insulting Ivan during their first interview, telling him sharply that it was not for people who declared that "everything was lawful," to suspect and question him. Altogether he was anything but friendly with Ivan on that occasion. Immediately after that interview with Mitya, Ivan went for the first time to see Smerdyakov. In the railway train on his way from Moscow, he kept thinking of Smerdyakov and of his last conversation with him on the evening before he went away. Many things seemed to him puzzling and suspicious. But when he gave his evidence to the investigating lawyer Ivan said nothing, for the time, of that conversation. He put that off till he had seen Smerdyakov, who was at that time in the hospital. Doctor Herzenstube and Varvinsky, the doctor he met in the hospital, confidently asserted in reply to Ivan's persistent questions, that Smerdyakov's epileptic attack was unmistakably genuine, and were surprised indeed at Ivan asking whether he might not have been shamming on the day of the catastrophe. They gave him to understand that the attack was an exceptional one, the fits persisting and recurring several times, so that the patient's life was positively in danger, and it was only now, after they had applied remedies, that they could assert with confidence that the patient would survive. "Though it might well be," added Doctor Herzenstube, "that his reason would be impaired for a considerable period, if not permanently." On Ivan's asking impatiently whether that meant that he was now mad, they told him that this was not yet the case, in the full sense of the word, but that certain abnormalities were perceptible. Ivan decided to find out for himself what those abnormalities were. At the hospital he was at once allowed to see the patient. Smerdyakov was lying on a truckle-bed in a separate ward. There was only one other bed in the room, and in it lay a tradesman of the town, swollen with dropsy, who was obviously almost dying; he could be no hindrance to their conversation. Smerdyakov grinned uncertainly on seeing Ivan, and for the first instant seemed nervous. So at least Ivan fancied. But that was only momentary. For the rest of the time he was struck, on the contrary, by Smerdyakov's composure. From the first glance Ivan had no doubt that he was very ill. He was very weak; he spoke slowly, seeming to move his tongue with difficulty; he was much thinner and sallower. Throughout the interview, which lasted twenty minutes, he kept complaining of headache and of pain in all his limbs. His thin emasculate face seemed to have become so tiny; his hair was ruffled, and his crest of curls in front stood up in a thin tuft. But in the left eye, which was screwed up and seemed to be insinuating something, Smerdyakov showed himself unchanged. "It's always worth while speaking to a clever man." Ivan was reminded of that at once. He sat down on the stool at his feet. Smerdyakov, with painful effort, shifted his position in bed, but he was not the first to speak. He remained dumb, and did not even look much interested. "Can you talk to me?" asked Ivan. "I won't tire you much." "Certainly I can," mumbled Smerdyakov, in a faint voice. "Has your honor been back long?" he added patronizingly, as though encouraging a nervous visitor. "I only arrived to-day.... To see the mess you are in here." Smerdyakov sighed. "Why do you sigh? You knew of it all along," Ivan blurted out. Smerdyakov was stolidly silent for a while. "How could I help knowing? It was clear beforehand. But how could I tell it would turn out like that?" "What would turn out? Don't prevaricate! You've foretold you'd have a fit; on the way down to the cellar, you know. You mentioned the very spot." "Have you said so at the examination yet?" Smerdyakov queried with composure. Ivan felt suddenly angry. "No, I haven't yet, but I certainly shall. You must explain a great deal to me, my man; and let me tell you, I am not going to let you play with me!" "Why should I play with you, when I put my whole trust in you, as in God Almighty?" said Smerdyakov, with the same composure, only for a moment closing his eyes. "In the first place," began Ivan, "I know that epileptic fits can't be told beforehand. I've inquired; don't try and take me in. You can't foretell the day and the hour. How was it you told me the day and the hour beforehand, and about the cellar, too? How could you tell that you would fall down the cellar stairs in a fit, if you didn't sham a fit on purpose?" "I had to go to the cellar anyway, several times a day, indeed," Smerdyakov drawled deliberately. "I fell from the garret just in the same way a year ago. It's quite true you can't tell the day and hour of a fit beforehand, but you can always have a presentiment of it." "But you did foretell the day and the hour!" "In regard to my epilepsy, sir, you had much better inquire of the doctors here. You can ask them whether it was a real fit or a sham; it's no use my saying any more about it." "And the cellar? How could you know beforehand of the cellar?" "You don't seem able to get over that cellar! As I was going down to the cellar, I was in terrible dread and doubt. What frightened me most was losing you and being left without defense in all the world. So I went down into the cellar thinking, 'Here, it'll come on directly, it'll strike me down directly, shall I fall?' And it was through this fear that I suddenly felt the spasm that always comes ... and so I went flying. All that and all my previous conversation with you at the gate the evening before, when I told you how frightened I was and spoke of the cellar, I told all that to Doctor Herzenstube and Nikolay Parfenovitch, the investigating lawyer, and it's all been written down in the protocol. And the doctor here, Mr. Varvinsky, maintained to all of them that it was just the thought of it brought it on, the apprehension that I might fall. It was just then that the fit seized me. And so they've written it down, that it's just how it must have happened, simply from my fear." As he finished, Smerdyakov drew a deep breath, as though exhausted. "Then you have said all that in your evidence?" said Ivan, somewhat taken aback. He had meant to frighten him with the threat of repeating their conversation, and it appeared that Smerdyakov had already reported it all himself. "What have I to be afraid of? Let them write down the whole truth," Smerdyakov pronounced firmly. "And have you told them every word of our conversation at the gate?" "No, not to say every word." "And did you tell them that you can sham fits, as you boasted then?" "No, I didn't tell them that either." "Tell me now, why did you send me then to Tchermashnya?" "I was afraid you'd go away to Moscow; Tchermashnya is nearer, anyway." "You are lying; you suggested my going away yourself; you told me to get out of the way of trouble." "That was simply out of affection and my sincere devotion to you, foreseeing trouble in the house, to spare you. Only I wanted to spare myself even more. That's why I told you to get out of harm's way, that you might understand that there would be trouble in the house, and would remain at home to protect your father." "You might have said it more directly, you blockhead!" Ivan suddenly fired up. "How could I have said it more directly then? It was simply my fear that made me speak, and you might have been angry, too. I might well have been apprehensive that Dmitri Fyodorovitch would make a scene and carry away that money, for he considered it as good as his own; but who could tell that it would end in a murder like this? I thought that he would only carry off the three thousand that lay under the master's mattress in the envelope, and you see, he's murdered him. How could you guess it either, sir?" "But if you say yourself that it couldn't be guessed, how could I have guessed and stayed at home? You contradict yourself!" said Ivan, pondering. "You might have guessed from my sending you to Tchermashnya and not to Moscow." "How could I guess it from that?" Smerdyakov seemed much exhausted, and again he was silent for a minute. "You might have guessed from the fact of my asking you not to go to Moscow, but to Tchermashnya, that I wanted to have you nearer, for Moscow's a long way off, and Dmitri Fyodorovitch, knowing you are not far off, would not be so bold. And if anything had happened, you might have come to protect me, too, for I warned you of Grigory Vassilyevitch's illness, and that I was afraid of having a fit. And when I explained those knocks to you, by means of which one could go in to the deceased, and that Dmitri Fyodorovitch knew them all through me, I thought that you would guess yourself that he would be sure to do something, and so wouldn't go to Tchermashnya even, but would stay." "He talks very coherently," thought Ivan, "though he does mumble; what's the derangement of his faculties that Herzenstube talked of?" "You are cunning with me, damn you!" he exclaimed, getting angry. "But I thought at the time that you quite guessed," Smerdyakov parried with the simplest air. "If I'd guessed, I should have stayed," cried Ivan. "Why, I thought that it was because you guessed, that you went away in such a hurry, only to get out of trouble, only to run away and save yourself in your fright." "You think that every one is as great a coward as yourself?" "Forgive me, I thought you were like me." "Of course, I ought to have guessed," Ivan said in agitation; "and I did guess there was some mischief brewing on your part ... only you are lying, you are lying again," he cried, suddenly recollecting. "Do you remember how you went up to the carriage and said to me, 'It's always worth while speaking to a clever man'? So you were glad I went away, since you praised me?" Smerdyakov sighed again and again. A trace of color came into his face. "If I was pleased," he articulated rather breathlessly, "it was simply because you agreed not to go to Moscow, but to Tchermashnya. For it was nearer, anyway. Only when I said these words to you, it was not by way of praise, but of reproach. You didn't understand it." "What reproach?" "Why, that foreseeing such a calamity you deserted your own father, and would not protect us, for I might have been taken up any time for stealing that three thousand." "Damn you!" Ivan swore again. "Stay, did you tell the prosecutor and the investigating lawyer about those knocks?" "I told them everything just as it was." Ivan wondered inwardly again. "If I thought of anything then," he began again, "it was solely of some wickedness on your part. Dmitri might kill him, but that he would steal--I did not believe that then.... But I was prepared for any wickedness from you. You told me yourself you could sham a fit. What did you say that for?" "It was just through my simplicity, and I never have shammed a fit on purpose in my life. And I only said so then to boast to you. It was just foolishness. I liked you so much then, and was open-hearted with you." "My brother directly accuses you of the murder and theft." "What else is left for him to do?" said Smerdyakov, with a bitter grin. "And who will believe him with all the proofs against him? Grigory Vassilyevitch saw the door open. What can he say after that? But never mind him! He is trembling to save himself." He slowly ceased speaking; then suddenly, as though on reflection, added: "And look here again. He wants to throw it on me and make out that it is the work of my hands--I've heard that already. But as to my being clever at shamming a fit: should I have told you beforehand that I could sham one, if I really had had such a design against your father? If I had been planning such a murder could I have been such a fool as to give such evidence against myself beforehand? And to his son, too! Upon my word! Is that likely? As if that could be, such a thing has never happened. No one hears this talk of ours now, except Providence itself, and if you were to tell of it to the prosecutor and Nikolay Parfenovitch you might defend me completely by doing so, for who would be likely to be such a criminal, if he is so open-hearted beforehand? Any one can see that." "Well," and Ivan got up to cut short the conversation, struck by Smerdyakov's last argument. "I don't suspect you at all, and I think it's absurd, indeed, to suspect you. On the contrary, I am grateful to you for setting my mind at rest. Now I am going, but I'll come again. Meanwhile, good-by. Get well. Is there anything you want?" "I am very thankful for everything. Marfa Ignatyevna does not forget me, and provides me anything I want, according to her kindness. Good people visit me every day." "Good-by. But I shan't say anything of your being able to sham a fit, and I don't advise you to, either," something made Ivan say suddenly. "I quite understand. And if you don't speak of that, I shall say nothing of that conversation of ours at the gate." Then it happened that Ivan went out, and only when he had gone a dozen steps along the corridor, he suddenly felt that there was an insulting significance in Smerdyakov's last words. He was almost on the point of turning back, but it was only a passing impulse, and muttering, "Nonsense!" he went out of the hospital. His chief feeling was one of relief at the fact that it was not Smerdyakov, but Mitya, who had committed the murder, though he might have been expected to feel the opposite. He did not want to analyze the reason for this feeling, and even felt a positive repugnance at prying into his sensations. He felt as though he wanted to make haste to forget something. In the following days he became convinced of Mitya's guilt, as he got to know all the weight of evidence against him. There was evidence of people of no importance, Fenya and her mother, for instance, but the effect of it was almost overpowering. As to Perhotin, the people at the tavern, and at Plotnikov's shop, as well as the witnesses at Mokroe, their evidence seemed conclusive. It was the details that were so damning. The secret of the knocks impressed the lawyers almost as much as Grigory's evidence as to the open door. Grigory's wife, Marfa, in answer to Ivan's questions, declared that Smerdyakov had been lying all night the other side of the partition wall. "He was not three paces from our bed," and that although she was a sound sleeper she waked several times and heard him moaning, "He was moaning the whole time, moaning continually." Talking to Herzenstube, and giving it as his opinion that Smerdyakov was not mad, but only rather weak, Ivan only evoked from the old man a subtle smile. "Do you know how he spends his time now?" he asked; "learning lists of French words by heart. He has an exercise-book under his pillow with the French words written out in Russian letters for him by some one, he he he!" Ivan ended by dismissing all doubts. He could not think of Dmitri without repulsion. Only one thing was strange, however. Alyosha persisted that Dmitri was not the murderer, and that "in all probability" Smerdyakov was. Ivan always felt that Alyosha's opinion meant a great deal to him, and so he was astonished at it now. Another thing that was strange was that Alyosha did not make any attempt to talk about Mitya with Ivan, that he never began on the subject and only answered his questions. This, too, struck Ivan particularly. But he was very much preoccupied at that time with something quite apart from that. On his return from Moscow, he abandoned himself hopelessly to his mad and consuming passion for Katerina Ivanovna. This is not the time to begin to speak of this new passion of Ivan's, which left its mark on all the rest of his life: this would furnish the subject for another novel, which I may perhaps never write. But I cannot omit to mention here that when Ivan, on leaving Katerina Ivanovna with Alyosha, as I've related already, told him, "I am not keen on her," it was an absolute lie: he loved her madly, though at times he hated her so that he might have murdered her. Many causes helped to bring about this feeling. Shattered by what had happened with Mitya, she rushed on Ivan's return to meet him as her one salvation. She was hurt, insulted and humiliated in her feelings. And here the man had come back to her, who had loved her so ardently before (oh! she knew that very well), and whose heart and intellect she considered so superior to her own. But the sternly virtuous girl did not abandon herself altogether to the man she loved, in spite of the Karamazov violence of his passions and the great fascination he had for her. She was continually tormented at the same time by remorse for having deserted Mitya, and in moments of discord and violent anger (and they were numerous) she told Ivan so plainly. This was what he had called to Alyosha "lies upon lies." There was, of course, much that was false in it, and that angered Ivan more than anything.... But of all this later. He did, in fact, for a time almost forget Smerdyakov's existence, and yet, a fortnight after his first visit to him, he began to be haunted by the same strange thoughts as before. It's enough to say that he was continually asking himself, why was it that on that last night in Fyodor Pavlovitch's house he had crept out on to the stairs like a thief and listened to hear what his father was doing below? Why had he recalled that afterwards with repulsion? Why next morning, had he been suddenly so depressed on the journey? Why, as he reached Moscow, had he said to himself, "I am a scoundrel"? And now he almost fancied that these tormenting thoughts would make him even forget Katerina Ivanovna, so completely did they take possession of him again. It was just after fancying this, that he met Alyosha in the street. He stopped him at once, and put a question to him: "Do you remember when Dmitri burst in after dinner and beat father, and afterwards I told you in the yard that I reserved 'the right to desire'?... Tell me, did you think then that I desired father's death or not?" "I did think so," answered Alyosha, softly. "It was so, too; it was not a matter of guessing. But didn't you fancy then that what I wished was just that 'one reptile should devour another'; that is, just that Dmitri should kill father, and as soon as possible ... and that I myself was even prepared to help to bring that about?" Alyosha turned rather pale, and looked silently into his brother's face. "Speak!" cried Ivan, "I want above everything to know what you thought then. I want the truth, the truth!" He drew a deep breath, looking angrily at Alyosha before his answer came. "Forgive me, I did think that, too, at the time," whispered Alyosha, and he did not add one softening phrase. "Thanks," snapped Ivan, and, leaving Alyosha, he went quickly on his way. From that time Alyosha noticed that Ivan began obviously to avoid him and seemed even to have taken a dislike to him, so much so that Alyosha gave up going to see him. Immediately after that meeting with him, Ivan had not gone home, but went straight to Smerdyakov again. Chapter VII. The Second Visit To Smerdyakov By that time Smerdyakov had been discharged from the hospital. Ivan knew his new lodging, the dilapidated little wooden house, divided in two by a passage on one side of which lived Marya Kondratyevna and her mother, and on the other, Smerdyakov. No one knew on what terms he lived with them, whether as a friend or as a lodger. It was supposed afterwards that he had come to stay with them as Marya Kondratyevna's betrothed, and was living there for a time without paying for board or lodging. Both mother and daughter had the greatest respect for him and looked upon him as greatly superior to themselves. Ivan knocked, and, on the door being opened, went straight into the passage. By Marya Kondratyevna's directions he went straight to the better room on the left, occupied by Smerdyakov. There was a tiled stove in the room and it was extremely hot. The walls were gay with blue paper, which was a good deal used however, and in the cracks under it cockroaches swarmed in amazing numbers, so that there was a continual rustling from them. The furniture was very scanty: two benches against each wall and two chairs by the table. The table of plain wood was covered with a cloth with pink patterns on it. There was a pot of geranium on each of the two little windows. In the corner there was a case of ikons. On the table stood a little copper samovar with many dents in it, and a tray with two cups. But Smerdyakov had finished tea and the samovar was out. He was sitting at the table on a bench. He was looking at an exercise-book and slowly writing with a pen. There was a bottle of ink by him and a flat iron candlestick, but with a composite candle. Ivan saw at once from Smerdyakov's face that he had completely recovered from his illness. His face was fresher, fuller, his hair stood up jauntily in front, and was plastered down at the sides. He was sitting in a parti-colored, wadded dressing-gown, rather dirty and frayed, however. He had spectacles on his nose, which Ivan had never seen him wearing before. This trifling circumstance suddenly redoubled Ivan's anger: "A creature like that and wearing spectacles!" Smerdyakov slowly raised his head and looked intently at his visitor through his spectacles; then he slowly took them off and rose from the bench, but by no means respectfully, almost lazily, doing the least possible required by common civility. All this struck Ivan instantly; he took it all in and noted it at once--most of all the look in Smerdyakov's eyes, positively malicious, churlish and haughty. "What do you want to intrude for?" it seemed to say; "we settled everything then; why have you come again?" Ivan could scarcely control himself. "It's hot here," he said, still standing, and unbuttoned his overcoat. "Take off your coat," Smerdyakov conceded. Ivan took off his coat and threw it on a bench with trembling hands. He took a chair, moved it quickly to the table and sat down. Smerdyakov managed to sit down on his bench before him. "To begin with, are we alone?" Ivan asked sternly and impulsively. "Can they overhear us in there?" "No one can hear anything. You've seen for yourself: there's a passage." "Listen, my good fellow; what was that you babbled, as I was leaving the hospital, that if I said nothing about your faculty of shamming fits, you wouldn't tell the investigating lawyer all our conversation at the gate? What do you mean by _all_? What could you mean by it? Were you threatening me? Have I entered into some sort of compact with you? Do you suppose I am afraid of you?" Ivan said this in a perfect fury, giving him to understand with obvious intention that he scorned any subterfuge or indirectness and meant to show his cards. Smerdyakov's eyes gleamed resentfully, his left eye winked, and he at once gave his answer, with his habitual composure and deliberation. "You want to have everything above-board; very well, you shall have it," he seemed to say. "This is what I meant then, and this is why I said that, that you, knowing beforehand of this murder of your own parent, left him to his fate, and that people mightn't after that conclude any evil about your feelings and perhaps of something else, too--that's what I promised not to tell the authorities." Though Smerdyakov spoke without haste and obviously controlling himself, yet there was something in his voice, determined and emphatic, resentful and insolently defiant. He stared impudently at Ivan. A mist passed before Ivan's eyes for the first moment. "How? What? Are you out of your mind?" "I'm perfectly in possession of all my faculties." "Do you suppose I _knew_ of the murder?" Ivan cried at last, and he brought his fist violently on the table. "What do you mean by 'something else, too'? Speak, scoundrel!" Smerdyakov was silent and still scanned Ivan with the same insolent stare. "Speak, you stinking rogue, what is that 'something else, too'?" "The 'something else' I meant was that you probably, too, were very desirous of your parent's death." Ivan jumped up and struck him with all his might on the shoulder, so that he fell back against the wall. In an instant his face was bathed in tears. Saying, "It's a shame, sir, to strike a sick man," he dried his eyes with a very dirty blue check handkerchief and sank into quiet weeping. A minute passed. "That's enough! Leave off," Ivan said peremptorily, sitting down again. "Don't put me out of all patience." Smerdyakov took the rag from his eyes. Every line of his puckered face reflected the insult he had just received. "So you thought then, you scoundrel, that together with Dmitri I meant to kill my father?" "I didn't know what thoughts were in your mind then," said Smerdyakov resentfully; "and so I stopped you then at the gate to sound you on that very point." "To sound what, what?" "Why, that very circumstance, whether you wanted your father to be murdered or not." What infuriated Ivan more than anything was the aggressive, insolent tone to which Smerdyakov persistently adhered. "It was you murdered him?" he cried suddenly. Smerdyakov smiled contemptuously. "You know of yourself, for a fact, that it wasn't I murdered him. And I should have thought that there was no need for a sensible man to speak of it again." "But why, why had you such a suspicion about me at the time?" "As you know already, it was simply from fear. For I was in such a position, shaking with fear, that I suspected every one. I resolved to sound you, too, for I thought if you wanted the same as your brother, then the business was as good as settled and I should be crushed like a fly, too." "Look here, you didn't say that a fortnight ago." "I meant the same when I talked to you in the hospital, only I thought you'd understand without wasting words, and that being such a sensible man you wouldn't care to talk of it openly." "What next! Come answer, answer, I insist: what was it ... what could I have done to put such a degrading suspicion into your mean soul?" "As for the murder, you couldn't have done that and didn't want to, but as for wanting some one else to do it, that was just what you did want." "And how coolly, how coolly he speaks! But why should I have wanted it; what grounds had I for wanting it?" "What grounds had you? What about the inheritance?" said Smerdyakov sarcastically, and, as it were, vindictively. "Why, after your parent's death there was at least forty thousand to come to each of you, and very likely more, but if Fyodor Pavlovitch got married then to that lady, Agrafena Alexandrovna, she would have had all his capital made over to her directly after the wedding, for she's plenty of sense, so that your parent would not have left you two roubles between the three of you. And were they far from a wedding, either? Not a hair's-breadth: that lady had only to lift her little finger and he would have run after her to church, with his tongue out." Ivan restrained himself with painful effort. "Very good," he commented at last. "You see, I haven't jumped up, I haven't knocked you down, I haven't killed you. Speak on. So, according to you, I had fixed on Dmitri to do it; I was reckoning on him?" "How could you help reckoning on him? If he killed him, then he would lose all the rights of a nobleman, his rank and property, and would go off to exile; so his share of the inheritance would come to you and your brother Alexey Fyodorovitch in equal parts; so you'd each have not forty, but sixty thousand each. There's not a doubt you did reckon on Dmitri Fyodorovitch." "What I put up with from you! Listen, scoundrel, if I had reckoned on any one then, it would have been on you, not on Dmitri, and I swear I did expect some wickedness from you ... at the time.... I remember my impression!" "I thought, too, for a minute, at the time, that you were reckoning on me as well," said Smerdyakov, with a sarcastic grin. "So that it was just by that more than anything you showed me what was in your mind. For if you had a foreboding about me and yet went away, you as good as said to me, 'You can murder my parent, I won't hinder you!' " "You scoundrel! So that's how you understood it!" "It was all that going to Tchermashnya. Why! You were meaning to go to Moscow and refused all your father's entreaties to go to Tchermashnya--and simply at a foolish word from me you consented at once! What reason had you to consent to Tchermashnya? Since you went to Tchermashnya with no reason, simply at my word, it shows that you must have expected something from me." "No, I swear I didn't!" shouted Ivan, grinding his teeth. "You didn't? Then you ought, as your father's son, to have had me taken to the lock-up and thrashed at once for my words then ... or at least, to have given me a punch in the face on the spot, but you were not a bit angry, if you please, and at once in a friendly way acted on my foolish word and went away, which was utterly absurd, for you ought to have stayed to save your parent's life. How could I help drawing my conclusions?" Ivan sat scowling, both his fists convulsively pressed on his knees. "Yes, I am sorry I didn't punch you in the face," he said with a bitter smile. "I couldn't have taken you to the lock-up just then. Who would have believed me and what charge could I bring against you? But the punch in the face ... oh, I'm sorry I didn't think of it. Though blows are forbidden, I should have pounded your ugly face to a jelly." Smerdyakov looked at him almost with relish. "In the ordinary occasions of life," he said in the same complacent and sententious tone in which he had taunted Grigory and argued with him about religion at Fyodor Pavlovitch's table, "in the ordinary occasions of life, blows on the face are forbidden nowadays by law, and people have given them up, but in exceptional occasions of life people still fly to blows, not only among us but all over the world, be it even the fullest Republic of France, just as in the time of Adam and Eve, and they never will leave off, but you, even in an exceptional case, did not dare." "What are you learning French words for?" Ivan nodded towards the exercise-book lying on the table. "Why shouldn't I learn them so as to improve my education, supposing that I may myself chance to go some day to those happy parts of Europe?" "Listen, monster." Ivan's eyes flashed and he trembled all over. "I am not afraid of your accusations; you can say what you like about me, and if I don't beat you to death, it's simply because I suspect you of that crime and I'll drag you to justice. I'll unmask you." "To my thinking, you'd better keep quiet, for what can you accuse me of, considering my absolute innocence? and who would believe you? Only if you begin, I shall tell everything, too, for I must defend myself." "Do you think I am afraid of you now?" "If the court doesn't believe all I've said to you just now, the public will, and you will be ashamed." "That's as much as to say, 'It's always worth while speaking to a sensible man,' eh?" snarled Ivan. "You hit the mark, indeed. And you'd better be sensible." Ivan got up, shaking all over with indignation, put on his coat, and without replying further to Smerdyakov, without even looking at him, walked quickly out of the cottage. The cool evening air refreshed him. There was a bright moon in the sky. A nightmare of ideas and sensations filled his soul. "Shall I go at once and give information against Smerdyakov? But what information can I give? He is not guilty, anyway. On the contrary, he'll accuse me. And in fact, why did I set off for Tchermashnya then? What for? What for?" Ivan asked himself. "Yes, of course, I was expecting something and he is right...." And he remembered for the hundredth time how, on the last night in his father's house, he had listened on the stairs. But he remembered it now with such anguish that he stood still on the spot as though he had been stabbed. "Yes, I expected it then, that's true! I wanted the murder, I did want the murder! Did I want the murder? Did I want it? I must kill Smerdyakov! If I don't dare kill Smerdyakov now, life is not worth living!" Ivan did not go home, but went straight to Katerina Ivanovna and alarmed her by his appearance. He was like a madman. He repeated all his conversation with Smerdyakov, every syllable of it. He couldn't be calmed, however much she tried to soothe him: he kept walking about the room, speaking strangely, disconnectedly. At last he sat down, put his elbows on the table, leaned his head on his hands and pronounced this strange sentence: "If it's not Dmitri, but Smerdyakov who's the murderer, I share his guilt, for I put him up to it. Whether I did, I don't know yet. But if he is the murderer, and not Dmitri, then, of course, I am the murderer, too." When Katerina Ivanovna heard that, she got up from her seat without a word, went to her writing-table, opened a box standing on it, took out a sheet of paper and laid it before Ivan. This was the document of which Ivan spoke to Alyosha later on as a "conclusive proof" that Dmitri had killed his father. It was the letter written by Mitya to Katerina Ivanovna when he was drunk, on the very evening he met Alyosha at the crossroads on the way to the monastery, after the scene at Katerina Ivanovna's, when Grushenka had insulted her. Then, parting from Alyosha, Mitya had rushed to Grushenka. I don't know whether he saw her, but in the evening he was at the "Metropolis," where he got thoroughly drunk. Then he asked for pen and paper and wrote a document of weighty consequences to himself. It was a wordy, disconnected, frantic letter, a drunken letter in fact. It was like the talk of a drunken man, who, on his return home, begins with extraordinary heat telling his wife or one of his household how he has just been insulted, what a rascal had just insulted him, what a fine fellow he is on the other hand, and how he will pay that scoundrel out; and all that at great length, with great excitement and incoherence, with drunken tears and blows on the table. The letter was written on a dirty piece of ordinary paper of the cheapest kind. It had been provided by the tavern and there were figures scrawled on the back of it. There was evidently not space enough for his drunken verbosity and Mitya not only filled the margins but had written the last line right across the rest. The letter ran as follows: FATAL KATYA: To-morrow I will get the money and repay your three thousand and farewell, woman of great wrath, but farewell, too, my love! Let us make an end! To-morrow I shall try and get it from every one, and if I can't borrow it, I give you my word of honor I shall go to my father and break his skull and take the money from under the pillow, if only Ivan has gone. If I have to go to Siberia for it, I'll give you back your three thousand. And farewell. I bow down to the ground before you, for I've been a scoundrel to you. Forgive me! No, better not forgive me, you'll be happier and so shall I! Better Siberia than your love, for I love another woman and you got to know her too well to-day, so how can you forgive? I will murder the man who's robbed me! I'll leave you all and go to the East so as to see no one again. Not _her_ either, for you are not my only tormentress; she is too. Farewell! P.S.--I write my curse, but I adore you! I hear it in my heart. One string is left, and it vibrates. Better tear my heart in two! I shall kill myself, but first of all that cur. I shall tear three thousand from him and fling it to you. Though I've been a scoundrel to you, I am not a thief! You can expect three thousand. The cur keeps it under his mattress, in pink ribbon. I am not a thief, but I'll murder my thief. Katya, don't look disdainful. Dmitri is not a thief! but a murderer! He has murdered his father and ruined himself to hold his ground, rather than endure your pride. And he doesn't love you. P.P.S.--I kiss your feet, farewell! P.P.P.S.--Katya, pray to God that some one'll give me the money. Then I shall not be steeped in gore, and if no one does--I shall! Kill me! Your slave and enemy, D. KARAMAZOV. When Ivan read this "document" he was convinced. So then it was his brother, not Smerdyakov. And if not Smerdyakov, then not he, Ivan. This letter at once assumed in his eyes the aspect of a logical proof. There could be no longer the slightest doubt of Mitya's guilt. The suspicion never occurred to Ivan, by the way, that Mitya might have committed the murder in conjunction with Smerdyakov, and, indeed, such a theory did not fit in with the facts. Ivan was completely reassured. The next morning he only thought of Smerdyakov and his gibes with contempt. A few days later he positively wondered how he could have been so horribly distressed at his suspicions. He resolved to dismiss him with contempt and forget him. So passed a month. He made no further inquiry about Smerdyakov, but twice he happened to hear that he was very ill and out of his mind. "He'll end in madness," the young doctor Varvinsky observed about him, and Ivan remembered this. During the last week of that month Ivan himself began to feel very ill. He went to consult the Moscow doctor who had been sent for by Katerina Ivanovna just before the trial. And just at that time his relations with Katerina Ivanovna became acutely strained. They were like two enemies in love with one another. Katerina Ivanovna's "returns" to Mitya, that is, her brief but violent revulsions of feeling in his favor, drove Ivan to perfect frenzy. Strange to say, until that last scene described above, when Alyosha came from Mitya to Katerina Ivanovna, Ivan had never once, during that month, heard her express a doubt of Mitya's guilt, in spite of those "returns" that were so hateful to him. It is remarkable, too, that while he felt that he hated Mitya more and more every day, he realized that it was not on account of Katya's "returns" that he hated him, but just _because he was the murderer of his father_. He was conscious of this and fully recognized it to himself. Nevertheless, he went to see Mitya ten days before the trial and proposed to him a plan of escape--a plan he had obviously thought over a long time. He was partly impelled to do this by a sore place still left in his heart from a phrase of Smerdyakov's, that it was to his, Ivan's, advantage that his brother should be convicted, as that would increase his inheritance and Alyosha's from forty to sixty thousand roubles. He determined to sacrifice thirty thousand on arranging Mitya's escape. On his return from seeing him, he was very mournful and dispirited; he suddenly began to feel that he was anxious for Mitya's escape, not only to heal that sore place by sacrificing thirty thousand, but for another reason. "Is it because I am as much a murderer at heart?" he asked himself. Something very deep down seemed burning and rankling in his soul. His pride above all suffered cruelly all that month. But of that later.... When, after his conversation with Alyosha, Ivan suddenly decided with his hand on the bell of his lodging to go to Smerdyakov, he obeyed a sudden and peculiar impulse of indignation. He suddenly remembered how Katerina Ivanovna had only just cried out to him in Alyosha's presence: "It was you, you, persuaded me of his" (that is, Mitya's) "guilt!" Ivan was thunderstruck when he recalled it. He had never once tried to persuade her that Mitya was the murderer; on the contrary, he had suspected himself in her presence, that time when he came back from Smerdyakov. It was _she_, she, who had produced that "document" and proved his brother's guilt. And now she suddenly exclaimed: "I've been at Smerdyakov's myself!" When had she been there? Ivan had known nothing of it. So she was not at all so sure of Mitya's guilt! And what could Smerdyakov have told her? What, what, had he said to her? His heart burned with violent anger. He could not understand how he could, half an hour before, have let those words pass and not have cried out at the moment. He let go of the bell and rushed off to Smerdyakov. "I shall kill him, perhaps, this time," he thought on the way. Chapter VIII. The Third And Last Interview With Smerdyakov When he was half-way there, the keen dry wind that had been blowing early that morning rose again, and a fine dry snow began falling thickly. It did not lie on the ground, but was whirled about by the wind, and soon there was a regular snowstorm. There were scarcely any lamp-posts in the part of the town where Smerdyakov lived. Ivan strode alone in the darkness, unconscious of the storm, instinctively picking out his way. His head ached and there was a painful throbbing in his temples. He felt that his hands were twitching convulsively. Not far from Marya Kondratyevna's cottage, Ivan suddenly came upon a solitary drunken little peasant. He was wearing a coarse and patched coat, and was walking in zigzags, grumbling and swearing to himself. Then suddenly he would begin singing in a husky drunken voice: "Ach, Vanka's gone to Petersburg; I won't wait till he comes back." But he broke off every time at the second line and began swearing again; then he would begin the same song again. Ivan felt an intense hatred for him before he had thought about him at all. Suddenly he realized his presence and felt an irresistible impulse to knock him down. At that moment they met, and the peasant with a violent lurch fell full tilt against Ivan, who pushed him back furiously. The peasant went flying backwards and fell like a log on the frozen ground. He uttered one plaintive "O--oh!" and then was silent. Ivan stepped up to him. He was lying on his back, without movement or consciousness. "He will be frozen," thought Ivan, and he went on his way to Smerdyakov's. In the passage, Marya Kondratyevna, who ran out to open the door with a candle in her hand, whispered that Smerdyakov was very ill, "It's not that he's laid up, but he seems not himself, and he even told us to take the tea away; he wouldn't have any." "Why, does he make a row?" asked Ivan coarsely. "Oh, dear, no, quite the contrary, he's very quiet. Only please don't talk to him too long," Marya Kondratyevna begged him. Ivan opened the door and stepped into the room. It was over-heated as before, but there were changes in the room. One of the benches at the side had been removed, and in its place had been put a large old mahogany leather sofa, on which a bed had been made up, with fairly clean white pillows. Smerdyakov was sitting on the sofa, wearing the same dressing-gown. The table had been brought out in front of the sofa, so that there was hardly room to move. On the table lay a thick book in yellow cover, but Smerdyakov was not reading it. He seemed to be sitting doing nothing. He met Ivan with a slow silent gaze, and was apparently not at all surprised at his coming. There was a great change in his face; he was much thinner and sallower. His eyes were sunken and there were blue marks under them. "Why, you really are ill?" Ivan stopped short. "I won't keep you long, I won't even take off my coat. Where can one sit down?" He went to the other end of the table, moved up a chair and sat down on it. "Why do you look at me without speaking? I've only come with one question, and I swear I won't go without an answer. Has the young lady, Katerina Ivanovna, been with you?" Smerdyakov still remained silent, looking quietly at Ivan as before. Suddenly, with a motion of his hand, he turned his face away. "What's the matter with you?" cried Ivan. "Nothing." "What do you mean by 'nothing'?" "Yes, she has. It's no matter to you. Let me alone." "No, I won't let you alone. Tell me, when was she here?" "Why, I'd quite forgotten about her," said Smerdyakov, with a scornful smile, and turning his face to Ivan again, he stared at him with a look of frenzied hatred, the same look that he had fixed on him at their last interview, a month before. "You seem very ill yourself, your face is sunken; you don't look like yourself," he said to Ivan. "Never mind my health, tell me what I ask you." "But why are your eyes so yellow? The whites are quite yellow. Are you so worried?" He smiled contemptuously and suddenly laughed outright. "Listen; I've told you I won't go away without an answer!" Ivan cried, intensely irritated. "Why do you keep pestering me? Why do you torment me?" said Smerdyakov, with a look of suffering. "Damn it! I've nothing to do with you. Just answer my question and I'll go away." "I've no answer to give you," said Smerdyakov, looking down again. "You may be sure I'll make you answer!" "Why are you so uneasy?" Smerdyakov stared at him, not simply with contempt, but almost with repulsion. "Is this because the trial begins to- morrow? Nothing will happen to you; can't you believe that at last? Go home, go to bed and sleep in peace, don't be afraid of anything." "I don't understand you.... What have I to be afraid of to-morrow?" Ivan articulated in astonishment, and suddenly a chill breath of fear did in fact pass over his soul. Smerdyakov measured him with his eyes. "You don't understand?" he drawled reproachfully. "It's a strange thing a sensible man should care to play such a farce!" Ivan looked at him speechless. The startling, incredibly supercilious tone of this man who had once been his valet, was extraordinary in itself. He had not taken such a tone even at their last interview. "I tell you, you've nothing to be afraid of. I won't say anything about you; there's no proof against you. I say, how your hands are trembling! Why are your fingers moving like that? Go home, _you_ did not murder him." Ivan started. He remembered Alyosha. "I know it was not I," he faltered. "Do you?" Smerdyakov caught him up again. Ivan jumped up and seized him by the shoulder. "Tell me everything, you viper! Tell me everything!" Smerdyakov was not in the least scared. He only riveted his eyes on Ivan with insane hatred. "Well, it was you who murdered him, if that's it," he whispered furiously. Ivan sank back on his chair, as though pondering something. He laughed malignantly. "You mean my going away. What you talked about last time?" "You stood before me last time and understood it all, and you understand it now." "All I understand is that you are mad." "Aren't you tired of it? Here we are face to face; what's the use of going on keeping up a farce to each other? Are you still trying to throw it all on me, to my face? _You_ murdered him; you are the real murderer, I was only your instrument, your faithful servant, and it was following your words I did it." "_Did_ it? Why, did you murder him?" Ivan turned cold. Something seemed to give way in his brain, and he shuddered all over with a cold shiver. Then Smerdyakov himself looked at him wonderingly; probably the genuineness of Ivan's horror struck him. "You don't mean to say you really did not know?" he faltered mistrustfully, looking with a forced smile into his eyes. Ivan still gazed at him, and seemed unable to speak. Ach, Vanka's gone to Petersburg; I won't wait till he comes back, suddenly echoed in his head. "Do you know, I am afraid that you are a dream, a phantom sitting before me," he muttered. "There's no phantom here, but only us two and one other. No doubt he is here, that third, between us." "Who is he? Who is here? What third person?" Ivan cried in alarm, looking about him, his eyes hastily searching in every corner. "That third is God Himself--Providence. He is the third beside us now. Only don't look for Him, you won't find Him." "It's a lie that you killed him!" Ivan cried madly. "You are mad, or teasing me again!" Smerdyakov, as before, watched him curiously, with no sign of fear. He could still scarcely get over his incredulity; he still fancied that Ivan knew everything and was trying to "throw it all on him to his face." "Wait a minute," he said at last in a weak voice, and suddenly bringing up his left leg from under the table, he began turning up his trouser leg. He was wearing long white stockings and slippers. Slowly he took off his garter and fumbled to the bottom of his stocking. Ivan gazed at him, and suddenly shuddered in a paroxysm of terror. "He's mad!" he cried, and rapidly jumping up, he drew back, so that he knocked his back against the wall and stood up against it, stiff and straight. He looked with insane terror at Smerdyakov, who, entirely unaffected by his terror, continued fumbling in his stocking, as though he were making an effort to get hold of something with his fingers and pull it out. At last he got hold of it and began pulling it out. Ivan saw that it was a piece of paper, or perhaps a roll of papers. Smerdyakov pulled it out and laid it on the table. "Here," he said quietly. "What is it?" asked Ivan, trembling. "Kindly look at it," Smerdyakov answered, still in the same low tone. Ivan stepped up to the table, took up the roll of paper and began unfolding it, but suddenly he drew back his fingers, as though from contact with a loathsome reptile. "Your hands keep twitching," observed Smerdyakov, and he deliberately unfolded the bundle himself. Under the wrapper were three packets of hundred-rouble notes. "They are all here, all the three thousand roubles; you need not count them. Take them," Smerdyakov suggested to Ivan, nodding at the notes. Ivan sank back in his chair. He was as white as a handkerchief. "You frightened me ... with your stocking," he said, with a strange grin. "Can you really not have known till now?" Smerdyakov asked once more. "No, I did not know. I kept thinking of Dmitri. Brother, brother! Ach!" He suddenly clutched his head in both hands. "Listen. Did you kill him alone? With my brother's help or without?" "It was only with you, with your help, I killed him, and Dmitri Fyodorovitch is quite innocent." "All right, all right. Talk about me later. Why do I keep on trembling? I can't speak properly." "You were bold enough then. You said 'everything was lawful,' and how frightened you are now," Smerdyakov muttered in surprise. "Won't you have some lemonade? I'll ask for some at once. It's very refreshing. Only I must hide this first." And again he motioned at the notes. He was just going to get up and call at the door to Marya Kondratyevna to make some lemonade and bring it them, but, looking for something to cover up the notes that she might not see them, he first took out his handkerchief, and as it turned out to be very dirty, took up the big yellow book that Ivan had noticed at first lying on the table, and put it over the notes. The book was _The Sayings of the Holy Father Isaac the Syrian_. Ivan read it mechanically. "I won't have any lemonade," he said. "Talk of me later. Sit down and tell me how you did it. Tell me all about it." "You'd better take off your greatcoat, or you'll be too hot." Ivan, as though he'd only just thought of it, took off his coat, and, without getting up from his chair, threw it on the bench. "Speak, please, speak." He seemed calmer. He waited, feeling sure that Smerdyakov would tell him _all_ about it. "How it was done?" sighed Smerdyakov. "It was done in a most natural way, following your very words." "Of my words later," Ivan broke in again, apparently with complete self- possession, firmly uttering his words, and not shouting as before. "Only tell me in detail how you did it. Everything, as it happened. Don't forget anything. The details, above everything, the details, I beg you." "You'd gone away, then I fell into the cellar." "In a fit or in a sham one?" "A sham one, naturally. I shammed it all. I went quietly down the steps to the very bottom and lay down quietly, and as I lay down I gave a scream, and struggled, till they carried me out." "Stay! And were you shamming all along, afterwards, and in the hospital?" "No, not at all. Next day, in the morning, before they took me to the hospital, I had a real attack and a more violent one than I've had for years. For two days I was quite unconscious." "All right, all right. Go on." "They laid me on the bed. I knew I'd be the other side of the partition, for whenever I was ill, Marfa Ignatyevna used to put me there, near them. She's always been very kind to me, from my birth up. At night I moaned, but quietly. I kept expecting Dmitri Fyodorovitch to come." "Expecting him? To come to you?" "Not to me. I expected him to come into the house, for I'd no doubt that he'd come that night, for being without me and getting no news, he'd be sure to come and climb over the fence, as he used to, and do something." "And if he hadn't come?" "Then nothing would have happened. I should never have brought myself to it without him." "All right, all right ... speak more intelligibly, don't hurry; above all, don't leave anything out!" "I expected him to kill Fyodor Pavlovitch. I thought that was certain, for I had prepared him for it ... during the last few days.... He knew about the knocks, that was the chief thing. With his suspiciousness and the fury which had been growing in him all those days, he was bound to get into the house by means of those taps. That was inevitable, so I was expecting him." "Stay," Ivan interrupted; "if he had killed him, he would have taken the money and carried it away; you must have considered that. What would you have got by it afterwards? I don't see." "But he would never have found the money. That was only what I told him, that the money was under the mattress. But that wasn't true. It had been lying in a box. And afterwards I suggested to Fyodor Pavlovitch, as I was the only person he trusted, to hide the envelope with the notes in the corner behind the ikons, for no one would have guessed that place, especially if they came in a hurry. So that's where the envelope lay, in the corner behind the ikons. It would have been absurd to keep it under the mattress; the box, anyway, could be locked. But all believe it was under the mattress. A stupid thing to believe. So if Dmitri Fyodorovitch had committed the murder, finding nothing, he would either have run away in a hurry, afraid of every sound, as always happens with murderers, or he would have been arrested. So I could always have clambered up to the ikons and have taken away the money next morning or even that night, and it would have all been put down to Dmitri Fyodorovitch. I could reckon upon that." "But what if he did not kill him, but only knocked him down?" "If he did not kill him, of course, I would not have ventured to take the money, and nothing would have happened. But I calculated that he would beat him senseless, and I should have time to take it then, and then I'd make out to Fyodor Pavlovitch that it was no one but Dmitri Fyodorovitch who had taken the money after beating him." "Stop ... I am getting mixed. Then it was Dmitri after all who killed him; you only took the money?" "No, he didn't kill him. Well, I might as well have told you now that he was the murderer.... But I don't want to lie to you now, because ... because if you really haven't understood till now, as I see for myself, and are not pretending, so as to throw your guilt on me to my very face, you are still responsible for it all, since you knew of the murder and charged me to do it, and went away knowing all about it. And so I want to prove to your face this evening that you are the only real murderer in the whole affair, and I am not the real murderer, though I did kill him. You are the rightful murderer." "Why, why, am I a murderer? Oh, God!" Ivan cried, unable to restrain himself at last, and forgetting that he had put off discussing himself till the end of the conversation. "You still mean that Tchermashnya? Stay, tell me, why did you want my consent, if you really took Tchermashnya for consent? How will you explain that now?" "Assured of your consent, I should have known that you wouldn't have made an outcry over those three thousand being lost, even if I'd been suspected, instead of Dmitri Fyodorovitch, or as his accomplice; on the contrary, you would have protected me from others.... And when you got your inheritance you would have rewarded me when you were able, all the rest of your life. For you'd have received your inheritance through me, seeing that if he had married Agrafena Alexandrovna, you wouldn't have had a farthing." "Ah! Then you intended to worry me all my life afterwards," snarled Ivan. "And what if I hadn't gone away then, but had informed against you?" "What could you have informed? That I persuaded you to go to Tchermashnya? That's all nonsense. Besides, after our conversation you would either have gone away or have stayed. If you had stayed, nothing would have happened. I should have known that you didn't want it done, and should have attempted nothing. As you went away, it meant you assured me that you wouldn't dare to inform against me at the trial, and that you'd overlook my having the three thousand. And, indeed, you couldn't have prosecuted me afterwards, because then I should have told it all in the court; that is, not that I had stolen the money or killed him--I shouldn't have said that--but that you'd put me up to the theft and the murder, though I didn't consent to it. That's why I needed your consent, so that you couldn't have cornered me afterwards, for what proof could you have had? I could always have cornered you, revealing your eagerness for your father's death, and I tell you the public would have believed it all, and you would have been ashamed for the rest of your life." "Was I then so eager, was I?" Ivan snarled again. "To be sure you were, and by your consent you silently sanctioned my doing it." Smerdyakov looked resolutely at Ivan. He was very weak and spoke slowly and wearily, but some hidden inner force urged him on. He evidently had some design. Ivan felt that. "Go on," he said. "Tell me what happened that night." "What more is there to tell! I lay there and I thought I heard the master shout. And before that Grigory Vassilyevitch had suddenly got up and came out, and he suddenly gave a scream, and then all was silence and darkness. I lay there waiting, my heart beating; I couldn't bear it. I got up at last, went out. I saw the window open on the left into the garden, and I stepped to the left to listen whether he was sitting there alive, and I heard the master moving about, sighing, so I knew he was alive. 'Ech!' I thought. I went to the window and shouted to the master, 'It's I.' And he shouted to me, 'He's been, he's been; he's run away.' He meant Dmitri Fyodorovitch had been. 'He's killed Grigory!' 'Where?' I whispered. 'There, in the corner,' he pointed. He was whispering, too. 'Wait a bit,' I said. I went to the corner of the garden to look, and there I came upon Grigory Vassilyevitch lying by the wall, covered with blood, senseless. So it's true that Dmitri Fyodorovitch has been here, was the thought that came into my head, and I determined on the spot to make an end of it, as Grigory Vassilyevitch, even if he were alive, would see nothing of it, as he lay there senseless. The only risk was that Marfa Ignatyevna might wake up. I felt that at the moment, but the longing to get it done came over me, till I could scarcely breathe. I went back to the window to the master and said, 'She's here, she's come; Agrafena Alexandrovna has come, wants to be let in.' And he started like a baby. 'Where is she?' he fairly gasped, but couldn't believe it. 'She's standing there,' said I. 'Open.' He looked out of the window at me, half believing and half distrustful, but afraid to open. 'Why, he is afraid of me now,' I thought. And it was funny. I bethought me to knock on the window-frame those taps we'd agreed upon as a signal that Grushenka had come, in his presence, before his eyes. He didn't seem to believe my word, but as soon as he heard the taps, he ran at once to open the door. He opened it. I would have gone in, but he stood in the way to prevent me passing. 'Where is she? Where is she?' He looked at me, all of a tremble. 'Well,' thought I, 'if he's so frightened of me as all that, it's a bad look out!' And my legs went weak with fright that he wouldn't let me in or would call out, or Marfa Ignatyevna would run up, or something else might happen. I don't remember now, but I must have stood pale, facing him. I whispered to him, 'Why, she's there, there, under the window; how is it you don't see her?' I said. 'Bring her then, bring her.' 'She's afraid,' said I; 'she was frightened at the noise, she's hidden in the bushes; go and call to her yourself from the study.' He ran to the window, put the candle in the window. 'Grushenka,' he cried, 'Grushenka, are you here?' Though he cried that, he didn't want to lean out of the window, he didn't want to move away from me, for he was panic-stricken; he was so frightened he didn't dare to turn his back on me. 'Why, here she is,' said I. I went up to the window and leaned right out of it. 'Here she is; she's in the bush, laughing at you, don't you see her?' He suddenly believed it; he was all of a shake--he was awfully crazy about her--and he leaned right out of the window. I snatched up that iron paper-weight from his table; do you remember, weighing about three pounds? I swung it and hit him on the top of the skull with the corner of it. He didn't even cry out. He only sank down suddenly, and I hit him again and a third time. And the third time I knew I'd broken his skull. He suddenly rolled on his back, face upwards, covered with blood. I looked round. There was no blood on me, not a spot. I wiped the paper-weight, put it back, went up to the ikons, took the money out of the envelope, and flung the envelope on the floor and the pink ribbon beside it. I went out into the garden all of a tremble, straight to the apple-tree with a hollow in it--you know that hollow. I'd marked it long before and put a rag and a piece of paper ready in it. I wrapped all the notes in the rag and stuffed it deep down in the hole. And there it stayed for over a fortnight. I took it out later, when I came out of the hospital. I went back to my bed, lay down and thought, 'If Grigory Vassilyevitch has been killed outright it may be a bad job for me, but if he is not killed and recovers, it will be first-rate, for then he'll bear witness that Dmitri Fyodorovitch has been here, and so he must have killed him and taken the money.' Then I began groaning with suspense and impatience, so as to wake Marfa Ignatyevna as soon as possible. At last she got up and she rushed to me, but when she saw Grigory Vassilyevitch was not there, she ran out, and I heard her scream in the garden. And that set it all going and set my mind at rest." He stopped. Ivan had listened all the time in dead silence without stirring or taking his eyes off him. As he told his story Smerdyakov glanced at him from time to time, but for the most part kept his eyes averted. When he had finished he was evidently agitated and was breathing hard. The perspiration stood out on his face. But it was impossible to tell whether it was remorse he was feeling, or what. "Stay," cried Ivan, pondering. "What about the door? If he only opened the door to you, how could Grigory have seen it open before? For Grigory saw it before you went." It was remarkable that Ivan spoke quite amicably, in a different tone, not angry as before, so if any one had opened the door at that moment and peeped in at them, he would certainly have concluded that they were talking peaceably about some ordinary, though interesting, subject. "As for that door and Grigory Vassilyevitch's having seen it open, that's only his fancy," said Smerdyakov, with a wry smile. "He is not a man, I assure you, but an obstinate mule. He didn't see it, but fancied he had seen it, and there's no shaking him. It's just our luck he took that notion into his head, for they can't fail to convict Dmitri Fyodorovitch after that." "Listen ..." said Ivan, beginning to seem bewildered again and making an effort to grasp something. "Listen. There are a lot of questions I want to ask you, but I forget them ... I keep forgetting and getting mixed up. Yes. Tell me this at least, why did you open the envelope and leave it there on the floor? Why didn't you simply carry off the envelope?... When you were telling me, I thought you spoke about it as though it were the right thing to do ... but why, I can't understand...." "I did that for a good reason. For if a man had known all about it, as I did for instance, if he'd seen those notes before, and perhaps had put them in that envelope himself, and had seen the envelope sealed up and addressed, with his own eyes, if such a man had done the murder, what should have made him tear open the envelope afterwards, especially in such desperate haste, since he'd know for certain the notes must be in the envelope? No, if the robber had been some one like me, he'd simply have put the envelope straight in his pocket and got away with it as fast as he could. But it'd be quite different with Dmitri Fyodorovitch. He only knew about the envelope by hearsay; he had never seen it, and if he'd found it, for instance, under the mattress, he'd have torn it open as quickly as possible to make sure the notes were in it. And he'd have thrown the envelope down, without having time to think that it would be evidence against him. Because he was not an habitual thief and had never directly stolen anything before, for he is a gentleman born, and if he did bring himself to steal, it would not be regular stealing, but simply taking what was his own, for he'd told the whole town he meant to before, and had even bragged aloud before every one that he'd go and take his property from Fyodor Pavlovitch. I didn't say that openly to the prosecutor when I was being examined, but quite the contrary, I brought him to it by a hint, as though I didn't see it myself, and as though he'd thought of it himself and I hadn't prompted him; so that Mr. Prosecutor's mouth positively watered at my suggestion." "But can you possibly have thought of all that on the spot?" cried Ivan, overcome with astonishment. He looked at Smerdyakov again with alarm. "Mercy on us! Could any one think of it all in such a desperate hurry? It was all thought out beforehand." "Well ... well, it was the devil helped you!" Ivan cried again. "No, you are not a fool, you are far cleverer than I thought...." He got up, obviously intending to walk across the room. He was in terrible distress. But as the table blocked his way, and there was hardly room to pass between the table and the wall, he only turned round where he stood and sat down again. Perhaps the impossibility of moving irritated him, as he suddenly cried out almost as furiously as before. "Listen, you miserable, contemptible creature! Don't you understand that if I haven't killed you, it's simply because I am keeping you to answer to-morrow at the trial. God sees," Ivan raised his hand, "perhaps I, too, was guilty; perhaps I really had a secret desire for my father's ... death, but I swear I was not as guilty as you think, and perhaps I didn't urge you on at all. No, no, I didn't urge you on! But no matter, I will give evidence against myself to-morrow at the trial. I'm determined to! I shall tell everything, everything. But we'll make our appearance together. And whatever you may say against me at the trial, whatever evidence you give, I'll face it; I am not afraid of you. I'll confirm it all myself! But you must confess, too! You must, you must; we'll go together. That's how it shall be!" Ivan said this solemnly and resolutely and from his flashing eyes alone it could be seen that it would be so. "You are ill, I see; you are quite ill. Your eyes are yellow," Smerdyakov commented, without the least irony, with apparent sympathy in fact. "We'll go together," Ivan repeated. "And if you won't go, no matter, I'll go alone." Smerdyakov paused as though pondering. "There'll be nothing of the sort, and you won't go," he concluded at last positively. "You don't understand me," Ivan exclaimed reproachfully. "You'll be too much ashamed, if you confess it all. And, what's more, it will be no use at all, for I shall say straight out that I never said anything of the sort to you, and that you are either ill (and it looks like it, too), or that you're so sorry for your brother that you are sacrificing yourself to save him and have invented it all against me, for you've always thought no more of me than if I'd been a fly. And who will believe you, and what single proof have you got?" "Listen, you showed me those notes just now to convince me." Smerdyakov lifted the book off the notes and laid it on one side. "Take that money away with you," Smerdyakov sighed. "Of course, I shall take it. But why do you give it to me, if you committed the murder for the sake of it?" Ivan looked at him with great surprise. "I don't want it," Smerdyakov articulated in a shaking voice, with a gesture of refusal. "I did have an idea of beginning a new life with that money in Moscow or, better still, abroad. I did dream of it, chiefly because 'all things are lawful.' That was quite right what you taught me, for you talked a lot to me about that. For if there's no everlasting God, there's no such thing as virtue, and there's no need of it. You were right there. So that's how I looked at it." "Did you come to that of yourself?" asked Ivan, with a wry smile. "With your guidance." "And now, I suppose, you believe in God, since you are giving back the money?" "No, I don't believe," whispered Smerdyakov. "Then why are you giving it back?" "Leave off ... that's enough!" Smerdyakov waved his hand again. "You used to say yourself that everything was lawful, so now why are you so upset, too? You even want to go and give evidence against yourself.... Only there'll be nothing of the sort! You won't go to give evidence," Smerdyakov decided with conviction. "You'll see," said Ivan. "It isn't possible. You are very clever. You are fond of money, I know that. You like to be respected, too, for you're very proud; you are far too fond of female charms, too, and you mind most of all about living in undisturbed comfort, without having to depend on any one--that's what you care most about. You won't want to spoil your life for ever by taking such a disgrace on yourself. You are like Fyodor Pavlovitch, you are more like him than any of his children; you've the same soul as he had." "You are not a fool," said Ivan, seeming struck. The blood rushed to his face. "You are serious now!" he observed, looking suddenly at Smerdyakov with a different expression. "It was your pride made you think I was a fool. Take the money." Ivan took the three rolls of notes and put them in his pocket without wrapping them in anything. "I shall show them at the court to-morrow," he said. "Nobody will believe you, as you've plenty of money of your own; you may simply have taken it out of your cash-box and brought it to the court." Ivan rose from his seat. "I repeat," he said, "the only reason I haven't killed you is that I need you for to-morrow, remember that, don't forget it!" "Well, kill me. Kill me now," Smerdyakov said, all at once looking strangely at Ivan. "You won't dare do that even!" he added, with a bitter smile. "You won't dare to do anything, you, who used to be so bold!" "Till to-morrow," cried Ivan, and moved to go out. "Stay a moment.... Show me those notes again." Ivan took out the notes and showed them to him. Smerdyakov looked at them for ten seconds. "Well, you can go," he said, with a wave of his hand. "Ivan Fyodorovitch!" he called after him again. "What do you want?" Ivan turned without stopping. "Good-by!" "Till to-morrow!" Ivan cried again, and he walked out of the cottage. The snowstorm was still raging. He walked the first few steps boldly, but suddenly began staggering. "It's something physical," he thought with a grin. Something like joy was springing up in his heart. He was conscious of unbounded resolution; he would make an end of the wavering that had so tortured him of late. His determination was taken, "and now it will not be changed," he thought with relief. At that moment he stumbled against something and almost fell down. Stopping short, he made out at his feet the peasant he had knocked down, still lying senseless and motionless. The snow had almost covered his face. Ivan seized him and lifted him in his arms. Seeing a light in the little house to the right he went up, knocked at the shutters, and asked the man to whom the house belonged to help him carry the peasant to the police-station, promising him three roubles. The man got ready and came out. I won't describe in detail how Ivan succeeded in his object, bringing the peasant to the police-station and arranging for a doctor to see him at once, providing with a liberal hand for the expenses. I will only say that this business took a whole hour, but Ivan was well content with it. His mind wandered and worked incessantly. "If I had not taken my decision so firmly for to-morrow," he reflected with satisfaction, "I should not have stayed a whole hour to look after the peasant, but should have passed by, without caring about his being frozen. I am quite capable of watching myself, by the way," he thought at the same instant, with still greater satisfaction, "although they have decided that I am going out of my mind!" Just as he reached his own house he stopped short, asking himself suddenly hadn't he better go at once to the prosecutor and tell him everything. He decided the question by turning back to the house. "Everything together to-morrow!" he whispered to himself, and, strange to say, almost all his gladness and self-satisfaction passed in one instant. As he entered his own room he felt something like a touch of ice on his heart, like a recollection or, more exactly, a reminder, of something agonizing and revolting that was in that room now, at that moment, and had been there before. He sank wearily on his sofa. The old woman brought him a samovar; he made tea, but did not touch it. He sat on the sofa and felt giddy. He felt that he was ill and helpless. He was beginning to drop asleep, but got up uneasily and walked across the room to shake off his drowsiness. At moments he fancied he was delirious, but it was not illness that he thought of most. Sitting down again, he began looking round, as though searching for something. This happened several times. At last his eyes were fastened intently on one point. Ivan smiled, but an angry flush suffused his face. He sat a long time in his place, his head propped on both arms, though he looked sideways at the same point, at the sofa that stood against the opposite wall. There was evidently something, some object, that irritated him there, worried him and tormented him. Chapter IX. The Devil. Ivan's Nightmare I am not a doctor, but yet I feel that the moment has come when I must inevitably give the reader some account of the nature of Ivan's illness. Anticipating events I can say at least one thing: he was at that moment on the very eve of an attack of brain fever. Though his health had long been affected, it had offered a stubborn resistance to the fever which in the end gained complete mastery over it. Though I know nothing of medicine, I venture to hazard the suggestion that he really had perhaps, by a terrible effort of will, succeeded in delaying the attack for a time, hoping, of course, to check it completely. He knew that he was unwell, but he loathed the thought of being ill at that fatal time, at the approaching crisis in his life, when he needed to have all his wits about him, to say what he had to say boldly and resolutely and "to justify himself to himself." He had, however, consulted the new doctor, who had been brought from Moscow by a fantastic notion of Katerina Ivanovna's to which I have referred already. After listening to him and examining him the doctor came to the conclusion that he was actually suffering from some disorder of the brain, and was not at all surprised by an admission which Ivan had reluctantly made him. "Hallucinations are quite likely in your condition," the doctor opined, "though it would be better to verify them ... you must take steps at once, without a moment's delay, or things will go badly with you." But Ivan did not follow this judicious advice and did not take to his bed to be nursed. "I am walking about, so I am strong enough, if I drop, it'll be different then, any one may nurse me who likes," he decided, dismissing the subject. And so he was sitting almost conscious himself of his delirium and, as I have said already, looking persistently at some object on the sofa against the opposite wall. Some one appeared to be sitting there, though goodness knows how he had come in, for he had not been in the room when Ivan came into it, on his return from Smerdyakov. This was a person or, more accurately speaking, a Russian gentleman of a particular kind, no longer young, _qui faisait la cinquantaine_, as the French say, with rather long, still thick, dark hair, slightly streaked with gray and a small pointed beard. He was wearing a brownish reefer jacket, rather shabby, evidently made by a good tailor though, and of a fashion at least three years old, that had been discarded by smart and well-to-do people for the last two years. His linen and his long scarf-like neck-tie were all such as are worn by people who aim at being stylish, but on closer inspection his linen was not over-clean and his wide scarf was very threadbare. The visitor's check trousers were of excellent cut, but were too light in color and too tight for the present fashion. His soft fluffy white hat was out of keeping with the season. In brief there was every appearance of gentility on straitened means. It looked as though the gentleman belonged to that class of idle landowners who used to flourish in the times of serfdom. He had unmistakably been, at some time, in good and fashionable society, had once had good connections, had possibly preserved them indeed, but, after a gay youth, becoming gradually impoverished on the abolition of serfdom, he had sunk into the position of a poor relation of the best class, wandering from one good old friend to another and received by them for his companionable and accommodating disposition and as being, after all, a gentleman who could be asked to sit down with any one, though, of course, not in a place of honor. Such gentlemen of accommodating temper and dependent position, who can tell a story, take a hand at cards, and who have a distinct aversion for any duties that may be forced upon them, are usually solitary creatures, either bachelors or widowers. Sometimes they have children, but if so, the children are always being brought up at a distance, at some aunt's, to whom these gentlemen never allude in good society, seeming ashamed of the relationship. They gradually lose sight of their children altogether, though at intervals they receive a birthday or Christmas letter from them and sometimes even answer it. The countenance of the unexpected visitor was not so much good-natured, as accommodating and ready to assume any amiable expression as occasion might arise. He had no watch, but he had a tortoise-shell lorgnette on a black ribbon. On the middle finger of his right hand was a massive gold ring with a cheap opal stone in it. Ivan was angrily silent and would not begin the conversation. The visitor waited and sat exactly like a poor relation who had come down from his room to keep his host company at tea, and was discreetly silent, seeing that his host was frowning and preoccupied. But he was ready for any affable conversation as soon as his host should begin it. All at once his face expressed a sudden solicitude. "I say," he began to Ivan, "excuse me, I only mention it to remind you. You went to Smerdyakov's to find out about Katerina Ivanovna, but you came away without finding out anything about her, you probably forgot--" "Ah, yes," broke from Ivan and his face grew gloomy with uneasiness. "Yes, I'd forgotten ... but it doesn't matter now, never mind, till to-morrow," he muttered to himself, "and you," he added, addressing his visitor, "I should have remembered that myself in a minute, for that was just what was tormenting me! Why do you interfere, as if I should believe that you prompted me, and that I didn't remember it of myself?" "Don't believe it then," said the gentleman, smiling amicably, "what's the good of believing against your will? Besides, proofs are no help to believing, especially material proofs. Thomas believed, not because he saw Christ risen, but because he wanted to believe, before he saw. Look at the spiritualists, for instance.... I am very fond of them ... only fancy, they imagine that they are serving the cause of religion, because the devils show them their horns from the other world. That, they say, is a material proof, so to speak, of the existence of another world. The other world and material proofs, what next! And if you come to that, does proving there's a devil prove that there's a God? I want to join an idealist society, I'll lead the opposition in it, I'll say I am a realist, but not a materialist, he he!" "Listen," Ivan suddenly got up from the table. "I seem to be delirious.... I am delirious, in fact, talk any nonsense you like, I don't care! You won't drive me to fury, as you did last time. But I feel somehow ashamed.... I want to walk about the room.... I sometimes don't see you and don't even hear your voice as I did last time, but I always guess what you are prating, for it's I, _I myself speaking, not you_. Only I don't know whether I was dreaming last time or whether I really saw you. I'll wet a towel and put it on my head and perhaps you'll vanish into air." Ivan went into the corner, took a towel, and did as he said, and with a wet towel on his head began walking up and down the room. "I am so glad you treat me so familiarly," the visitor began. "Fool," laughed Ivan, "do you suppose I should stand on ceremony with you? I am in good spirits now, though I've a pain in my forehead ... and in the top of my head ... only please don't talk philosophy, as you did last time. If you can't take yourself off, talk of something amusing. Talk gossip, you are a poor relation, you ought to talk gossip. What a nightmare to have! But I am not afraid of you. I'll get the better of you. I won't be taken to a mad-house!" "_C'est charmant_, poor relation. Yes, I am in my natural shape. For what am I on earth but a poor relation? By the way, I am listening to you and am rather surprised to find you are actually beginning to take me for something real, not simply your fancy, as you persisted in declaring last time--" "Never for one minute have I taken you for reality," Ivan cried with a sort of fury. "You are a lie, you are my illness, you are a phantom. It's only that I don't know how to destroy you and I see I must suffer for a time. You are my hallucination. You are the incarnation of myself, but only of one side of me ... of my thoughts and feelings, but only the nastiest and stupidest of them. From that point of view you might be of interest to me, if only I had time to waste on you--" "Excuse me, excuse me, I'll catch you. When you flew out at Alyosha under the lamp-post this evening and shouted to him, 'You learnt it from _him_! How do you know that _he_ visits me?' you were thinking of me then. So for one brief moment you did believe that I really exist," the gentleman laughed blandly. "Yes, that was a moment of weakness ... but I couldn't believe in you. I don't know whether I was asleep or awake last time. Perhaps I was only dreaming then and didn't see you really at all--" "And why were you so surly with Alyosha just now? He is a dear; I've treated him badly over Father Zossima." "Don't talk of Alyosha! How dare you, you flunkey!" Ivan laughed again. "You scold me, but you laugh--that's a good sign. But you are ever so much more polite than you were last time and I know why: that great resolution of yours--" "Don't speak of my resolution," cried Ivan, savagely. "I understand, I understand, _c'est noble, c'est charmant_, you are going to defend your brother and to sacrifice yourself ... _C'est chevaleresque_." "Hold your tongue, I'll kick you!" "I shan't be altogether sorry, for then my object will be attained. If you kick me, you must believe in my reality, for people don't kick ghosts. Joking apart, it doesn't matter to me, scold if you like, though it's better to be a trifle more polite even to me. 'Fool, flunkey!' what words!" "Scolding you, I scold myself," Ivan laughed again, "you are myself, myself, only with a different face. You just say what I am thinking ... and are incapable of saying anything new!" "If I am like you in my way of thinking, it's all to my credit," the gentleman declared, with delicacy and dignity. "You choose out only my worst thoughts, and what's more, the stupid ones. You are stupid and vulgar. You are awfully stupid. No, I can't put up with you! What am I to do, what am I to do?" Ivan said through his clenched teeth. "My dear friend, above all things I want to behave like a gentleman and to be recognized as such," the visitor began in an excess of deprecating and simple-hearted pride, typical of a poor relation. "I am poor, but ... I won't say very honest, but ... it's an axiom generally accepted in society that I am a fallen angel. I certainly can't conceive how I can ever have been an angel. If I ever was, it must have been so long ago that there's no harm in forgetting it. Now I only prize the reputation of being a gentlemanly person and live as I can, trying to make myself agreeable. I love men genuinely, I've been greatly calumniated! Here when I stay with you from time to time, my life gains a kind of reality and that's what I like most of all. You see, like you, I suffer from the fantastic and so I love the realism of earth. Here, with you, everything is circumscribed, here all is formulated and geometrical, while we have nothing but indeterminate equations! I wander about here dreaming. I like dreaming. Besides, on earth I become superstitious. Please don't laugh, that's just what I like, to become superstitious. I adopt all your habits here: I've grown fond of going to the public baths, would you believe it? and I go and steam myself with merchants and priests. What I dream of is becoming incarnate once for all and irrevocably in the form of some merchant's wife weighing eighteen stone, and of believing all she believes. My ideal is to go to church and offer a candle in simple-hearted faith, upon my word it is. Then there would be an end to my sufferings. I like being doctored too; in the spring there was an outbreak of smallpox and I went and was vaccinated in a foundling hospital--if only you knew how I enjoyed myself that day. I subscribed ten roubles in the cause of the Slavs!... But you are not listening. Do you know, you are not at all well this evening? I know you went yesterday to that doctor ... well, what about your health? What did the doctor say?" "Fool!" Ivan snapped out. "But you are clever, anyway. You are scolding again? I didn't ask out of sympathy. You needn't answer. Now rheumatism has come in again--" "Fool!" repeated Ivan. "You keep saying the same thing; but I had such an attack of rheumatism last year that I remember it to this day." "The devil have rheumatism!" "Why not, if I sometimes put on fleshly form? I put on fleshly form and I take the consequences. Satan _sum et nihil humanum a me alienum puto_." "What, what, Satan _sum et nihil humanum_ ... that's not bad for the devil!" "I am glad I've pleased you at last." "But you didn't get that from me." Ivan stopped suddenly, seeming struck. "That never entered my head, that's strange." "_C'est du nouveau, n'est-ce pas?_ This time I'll act honestly and explain to you. Listen, in dreams and especially in nightmares, from indigestion or anything, a man sees sometimes such artistic visions, such complex and real actuality, such events, even a whole world of events, woven into such a plot, with such unexpected details from the most exalted matters to the last button on a cuff, as I swear Leo Tolstoy has never invented. Yet such dreams are sometimes seen not by writers, but by the most ordinary people, officials, journalists, priests.... The subject is a complete enigma. A statesman confessed to me, indeed, that all his best ideas came to him when he was asleep. Well, that's how it is now, though I am your hallucination, yet just as in a nightmare, I say original things which had not entered your head before. So I don't repeat your ideas, yet I am only your nightmare, nothing more." "You are lying, your aim is to convince me you exist apart and are not my nightmare, and now you are asserting you are a dream." "My dear fellow, I've adopted a special method to-day, I'll explain it to you afterwards. Stay, where did I break off? Oh, yes! I caught cold then, only not here but yonder." "Where is yonder? Tell me, will you be here long? Can't you go away?" Ivan exclaimed almost in despair. He ceased walking to and fro, sat down on the sofa, leaned his elbows on the table again and held his head tight in both hands. He pulled the wet towel off and flung it away in vexation. It was evidently of no use. "Your nerves are out of order," observed the gentleman, with a carelessly easy, though perfectly polite, air. "You are angry with me even for being able to catch cold, though it happened in a most natural way. I was hurrying then to a diplomatic _soiree_ at the house of a lady of high rank in Petersburg, who was aiming at influence in the Ministry. Well, an evening suit, white tie, gloves, though I was God knows where and had to fly through space to reach your earth.... Of course, it took only an instant, but you know a ray of light from the sun takes full eight minutes, and fancy in an evening suit and open waistcoat. Spirits don't freeze, but when one's in fleshly form, well ... in brief, I didn't think, and set off, and you know in those ethereal spaces, in the water that is above the firmament, there's such a frost ... at least one can't call it frost, you can fancy, 150 degrees below zero! You know the game the village girls play--they invite the unwary to lick an ax in thirty degrees of frost, the tongue instantly freezes to it and the dupe tears the skin off, so it bleeds. But that's only in 30 degrees, in 150 degrees I imagine it would be enough to put your finger on the ax and it would be the end of it ... if only there could be an ax there." "And can there be an ax there?" Ivan interrupted, carelessly and disdainfully. He was exerting himself to the utmost not to believe in the delusion and not to sink into complete insanity. "An ax?" the guest interrupted in surprise. "Yes, what would become of an ax there?" Ivan cried suddenly, with a sort of savage and insistent obstinacy. "What would become of an ax in space? _Quelle idee!_ If it were to fall to any distance, it would begin, I think, flying round the earth without knowing why, like a satellite. The astronomers would calculate the rising and the setting of the ax, _Gatzuk_ would put it in his calendar, that's all." "You are stupid, awfully stupid," said Ivan peevishly. "Fib more cleverly or I won't listen. You want to get the better of me by realism, to convince me that you exist, but I don't want to believe you exist! I won't believe it!" "But I am not fibbing, it's all the truth; the truth is unhappily hardly ever amusing. I see you persist in expecting something big of me, and perhaps something fine. That's a great pity, for I only give what I can--" "Don't talk philosophy, you ass!" "Philosophy, indeed, when all my right side is numb and I am moaning and groaning. I've tried all the medical faculty: they can diagnose beautifully, they have the whole of your disease at their finger-tips, but they've no idea how to cure you. There was an enthusiastic little student here, 'You may die,' said he, 'but you'll know perfectly what disease you are dying of!' And then what a way they have sending people to specialists! 'We only diagnose,' they say, 'but go to such-and-such a specialist, he'll cure you.' The old doctor who used to cure all sorts of disease has completely disappeared, I assure you, now there are only specialists and they all advertise in the newspapers. If anything is wrong with your nose, they send you to Paris: there, they say, is a European specialist who cures noses. If you go to Paris, he'll look at your nose; I can only cure your right nostril, he'll tell you, for I don't cure the left nostril, that's not my speciality, but go to Vienna, there there's a specialist who will cure your left nostril. What are you to do? I fell back on popular remedies, a German doctor advised me to rub myself with honey and salt in the bath-house. Solely to get an extra bath I went, smeared myself all over and it did me no good at all. In despair I wrote to Count Mattei in Milan. He sent me a book and some drops, bless him, and, only fancy, Hoff's malt extract cured me! I bought it by accident, drank a bottle and a half of it, and I was ready to dance, it took it away completely. I made up my mind to write to the papers to thank him, I was prompted by a feeling of gratitude, and only fancy, it led to no end of a bother: not a single paper would take my letter. 'It would be very reactionary,' they said, 'no one will believe it. _Le diable n'existe point._ You'd better remain anonymous,' they advised me. What use is a letter of thanks if it's anonymous? I laughed with the men at the newspaper office; 'It's reactionary to believe in God in our days,' I said, 'but I am the devil, so I may be believed in.' 'We quite understand that,' they said. 'Who doesn't believe in the devil? Yet it won't do, it might injure our reputation. As a joke, if you like.' But I thought as a joke it wouldn't be very witty. So it wasn't printed. And do you know, I have felt sore about it to this day. My best feelings, gratitude, for instance, are literally denied me simply from my social position." "Philosophical reflections again?" Ivan snarled malignantly. "God preserve me from it, but one can't help complaining sometimes. I am a slandered man. You upbraid me every moment with being stupid. One can see you are young. My dear fellow, intelligence isn't the only thing! I have naturally a kind and merry heart. 'I also write vaudevilles of all sorts.' You seem to take me for Hlestakov grown old, but my fate is a far more serious one. Before time was, by some decree which I could never make out, I was pre-destined 'to deny' and yet I am genuinely good-hearted and not at all inclined to negation. 'No, you must go and deny, without denial there's no criticism and what would a journal be without a column of criticism?' Without criticism it would be nothing but one 'hosannah.' But nothing but hosannah is not enough for life, the hosannah must be tried in the crucible of doubt and so on, in the same style. But I don't meddle in that, I didn't create it, I am not answerable for it. Well, they've chosen their scapegoat, they've made me write the column of criticism and so life was made possible. We understand that comedy; I, for instance, simply ask for annihilation. No, live, I am told, for there'd be nothing without you. If everything in the universe were sensible, nothing would happen. There would be no events without you, and there must be events. So against the grain I serve to produce events and do what's irrational because I am commanded to. For all their indisputable intelligence, men take this farce as something serious, and that is their tragedy. They suffer, of course ... but then they live, they live a real life, not a fantastic one, for suffering is life. Without suffering what would be the pleasure of it? It would be transformed into an endless church service; it would be holy, but tedious. But what about me? I suffer, but still, I don't live. I am x in an indeterminate equation. I am a sort of phantom in life who has lost all beginning and end, and who has even forgotten his own name. You are laughing-- no, you are not laughing, you are angry again. You are for ever angry, all you care about is intelligence, but I repeat again that I would give away all this super-stellar life, all the ranks and honors, simply to be transformed into the soul of a merchant's wife weighing eighteen stone and set candles at God's shrine." "Then even you don't believe in God?" said Ivan, with a smile of hatred. "What can I say?--that is, if you are in earnest--" "Is there a God or not?" Ivan cried with the same savage intensity. "Ah, then you are in earnest! My dear fellow, upon my word I don't know. There! I've said it now!" "You don't know, but you see God? No, you are not some one apart, you are myself, you are I and nothing more! You are rubbish, you are my fancy!" "Well, if you like, I have the same philosophy as you, that would be true. _Je pense, donc je suis_, I know that for a fact; all the rest, all these worlds, God and even Satan--all that is not proved, to my mind. Does all that exist of itself, or is it only an emanation of myself, a logical development of my ego which alone has existed for ever: but I make haste to stop, for I believe you will be jumping up to beat me directly." "You'd better tell me some anecdote!" said Ivan miserably. "There is an anecdote precisely on our subject, or rather a legend, not an anecdote. You reproach me with unbelief, you see, you say, yet you don't believe. But, my dear fellow, I am not the only one like that. We are all in a muddle over there now and all through your science. Once there used to be atoms, five senses, four elements, and then everything hung together somehow. There were atoms in the ancient world even, but since we've learned that you've discovered the chemical molecule and protoplasm and the devil knows what, we had to lower our crest. There's a regular muddle, and, above all, superstition, scandal; there's as much scandal among us as among you, you know; a little more in fact, and spying, indeed, for we have our secret police department where private information is received. Well, this wild legend belongs to our middle ages--not yours, but ours--and no one believes it even among us, except the old ladies of eighteen stone, not your old ladies I mean, but ours. We've everything you have, I am revealing one of our secrets out of friendship for you; though it's forbidden. This legend is about Paradise. There was, they say, here on earth a thinker and philosopher. He rejected everything, 'laws, conscience, faith,' and, above all, the future life. He died; he expected to go straight to darkness and death and he found a future life before him. He was astounded and indignant. 'This is against my principles!' he said. And he was punished for that ... that is, you must excuse me, I am just repeating what I heard myself, it's only a legend ... he was sentenced to walk a quadrillion kilometers in the dark (we've adopted the metric system, you know) and when he has finished that quadrillion, the gates of heaven would be opened to him and he'll be forgiven--" "And what tortures have you in the other world besides the quadrillion kilometers?" asked Ivan, with a strange eagerness. "What tortures? Ah, don't ask. In old days we had all sorts, but now they have taken chiefly to moral punishments--'the stings of conscience' and all that nonsense. We got that, too, from you, from the softening of your manners. And who's the better for it? Only those who have got no conscience, for how can they be tortured by conscience when they have none? But decent people who have conscience and a sense of honor suffer for it. Reforms, when the ground has not been prepared for them, especially if they are institutions copied from abroad, do nothing but mischief! The ancient fire was better. Well, this man, who was condemned to the quadrillion kilometers, stood still, looked round and lay down across the road. 'I won't go, I refuse on principle!' Take the soul of an enlightened Russian atheist and mix it with the soul of the prophet Jonah, who sulked for three days and nights in the belly of the whale, and you get the character of that thinker who lay across the road." "What did he lie on there?" "Well, I suppose there was something to lie on. You are not laughing?" "Bravo!" cried Ivan, still with the same strange eagerness. Now he was listening with an unexpected curiosity. "Well, is he lying there now?" "That's the point, that he isn't. He lay there almost a thousand years and then he got up and went on." "What an ass!" cried Ivan, laughing nervously and still seeming to be pondering something intently. "Does it make any difference whether he lies there for ever or walks the quadrillion kilometers? It would take a billion years to walk it?" "Much more than that. I haven't got a pencil and paper or I could work it out. But he got there long ago, and that's where the story begins." "What, he got there? But how did he get the billion years to do it?" "Why, you keep thinking of our present earth! But our present earth may have been repeated a billion times. Why, it's become extinct, been frozen; cracked, broken to bits, disintegrated into its elements, again 'the water above the firmament,' then again a comet, again a sun, again from the sun it becomes earth--and the same sequence may have been repeated endlessly and exactly the same to every detail, most unseemly and insufferably tedious--" "Well, well, what happened when he arrived?" "Why, the moment the gates of Paradise were open and he walked in, before he had been there two seconds, by his watch (though to my thinking his watch must have long dissolved into its elements on the way), he cried out that those two seconds were worth walking not a quadrillion kilometers but a quadrillion of quadrillions, raised to the quadrillionth power! In fact, he sang 'hosannah' and overdid it so, that some persons there of lofty ideas wouldn't shake hands with him at first--he'd become too rapidly reactionary, they said. The Russian temperament. I repeat, it's a legend. I give it for what it's worth. So that's the sort of ideas we have on such subjects even now." "I've caught you!" Ivan cried, with an almost childish delight, as though he had succeeded in remembering something at last. "That anecdote about the quadrillion years, I made up myself! I was seventeen then, I was at the high school. I made up that anecdote and told it to a schoolfellow called Korovkin, it was at Moscow.... The anecdote is so characteristic that I couldn't have taken it from anywhere. I thought I'd forgotten it ... but I've unconsciously recalled it--I recalled it myself--it was not you telling it! Thousands of things are unconsciously remembered like that even when people are being taken to execution ... it's come back to me in a dream. You are that dream! You are a dream, not a living creature!" "From the vehemence with which you deny my existence," laughed the gentleman, "I am convinced that you believe in me." "Not in the slightest! I haven't a hundredth part of a grain of faith in you!" "But you have the thousandth of a grain. Homeopathic doses perhaps are the strongest. Confess that you have faith even to the ten-thousandth of a grain." "Not for one minute," cried Ivan furiously. "But I should like to believe in you," he added strangely. "Aha! There's an admission! But I am good-natured. I'll come to your assistance again. Listen, it was I caught you, not you me. I told you your anecdote you'd forgotten, on purpose, so as to destroy your faith in me completely." "You are lying. The object of your visit is to convince me of your existence!" "Just so. But hesitation, suspense, conflict between belief and disbelief--is sometimes such torture to a conscientious man, such as you are, that it's better to hang oneself at once. Knowing that you are inclined to believe in me, I administered some disbelief by telling you that anecdote. I lead you to belief and disbelief by turns, and I have my motive in it. It's the new method. As soon as you disbelieve in me completely, you'll begin assuring me to my face that I am not a dream but a reality. I know you. Then I shall have attained my object, which is an honorable one. I shall sow in you only a tiny grain of faith and it will grow into an oak-tree--and such an oak-tree that, sitting on it, you will long to enter the ranks of 'the hermits in the wilderness and the saintly women,' for that is what you are secretly longing for. You'll dine on locusts, you'll wander into the wilderness to save your soul!" "Then it's for the salvation of my soul you are working, is it, you scoundrel?" "One must do a good work sometimes. How ill-humored you are!" "Fool! did you ever tempt those holy men who ate locusts and prayed seventeen years in the wilderness till they were overgrown with moss?" "My dear fellow, I've done nothing else. One forgets the whole world and all the worlds, and sticks to one such saint, because he is a very precious diamond. One such soul, you know, is sometimes worth a whole constellation. We have our system of reckoning, you know. The conquest is priceless! And some of them, on my word, are not inferior to you in culture, though you won't believe it. They can contemplate such depths of belief and disbelief at the same moment that sometimes it really seems that they are within a hair's-breadth of being 'turned upside down,' as the actor Gorbunov says." "Well, did you get your nose pulled?"(8) "My dear fellow," observed the visitor sententiously, "it's better to get off with your nose pulled than without a nose at all. As an afflicted marquis observed not long ago (he must have been treated by a specialist) in confession to his spiritual father--a Jesuit. I was present, it was simply charming. 'Give me back my nose!' he said, and he beat his breast. 'My son,' said the priest evasively, 'all things are accomplished in accordance with the inscrutable decrees of Providence, and what seems a misfortune sometimes leads to extraordinary, though unapparent, benefits. If stern destiny has deprived you of your nose, it's to your advantage that no one can ever pull you by your nose.' 'Holy father, that's no comfort,' cried the despairing marquis. 'I'd be delighted to have my nose pulled every day of my life, if it were only in its proper place.' 'My son,' sighs the priest, 'you can't expect every blessing at once. This is murmuring against Providence, who even in this has not forgotten you, for if you repine as you repined just now, declaring you'd be glad to have your nose pulled for the rest of your life, your desire has already been fulfilled indirectly, for when you lost your nose, you were led by the nose.' " "Fool, how stupid!" cried Ivan. "My dear friend, I only wanted to amuse you. But I swear that's the genuine Jesuit casuistry and I swear that it all happened word for word as I've told you. It happened lately and gave me a great deal of trouble. The unhappy young man shot himself that very night when he got home. I was by his side till the very last moment. Those Jesuit confessionals are really my most delightful diversion at melancholy moments. Here's another incident that happened only the other day. A little blonde Norman girl of twenty--a buxom, unsophisticated beauty that would make your mouth water--comes to an old priest. She bends down and whispers her sin into the grating. 'Why, my daughter, have you fallen again already?' cries the priest. 'O Sancta Maria, what do I hear! Not the same man this time, how long is this going on? Aren't you ashamed!' '_Ah, mon pere_,' answers the sinner with tears of penitence, '_ca lui fait tant de plaisir, et a moi si peu de peine!_' Fancy, such an answer! I drew back. It was the cry of nature, better than innocence itself, if you like. I absolved her sin on the spot and was turning to go, but I was forced to turn back. I heard the priest at the grating making an appointment with her for the evening--though he was an old man hard as flint, he fell in an instant! It was nature, the truth of nature asserted its rights! What, you are turning up your nose again? Angry again? I don't know how to please you--" "Leave me alone, you are beating on my brain like a haunting nightmare," Ivan moaned miserably, helpless before his apparition. "I am bored with you, agonizingly and insufferably. I would give anything to be able to shake you off!" "I repeat, moderate your expectations, don't demand of me 'everything great and noble' and you'll see how well we shall get on," said the gentleman impressively. "You are really angry with me for not having appeared to you in a red glow, with thunder and lightning, with scorched wings, but have shown myself in such a modest form. You are wounded, in the first place, in your esthetic feelings, and, secondly, in your pride. How could such a vulgar devil visit such a great man as you! Yes, there is that romantic strain in you, that was so derided by Byelinsky. I can't help it, young man, as I got ready to come to you I did think as a joke of appearing in the figure of a retired general who had served in the Caucasus, with a star of the Lion and the Sun on my coat. But I was positively afraid of doing it, for you'd have thrashed me for daring to pin the Lion and the Sun on my coat, instead of, at least, the Polar Star or the Sirius. And you keep on saying I am stupid, but, mercy on us! I make no claim to be equal to you in intelligence. Mephistopheles declared to Faust that he desired evil, but did only good. Well, he can say what he likes, it's quite the opposite with me. I am perhaps the one man in all creation who loves the truth and genuinely desires good. I was there when the Word, Who died on the Cross, rose up into heaven bearing on His bosom the soul of the penitent thief. I heard the glad shrieks of the cherubim singing and shouting hosannah and the thunderous rapture of the seraphim which shook heaven and all creation, and I swear to you by all that's sacred, I longed to join the choir and shout hosannah with them all. The word had almost escaped me, had almost broken from my lips ... you know how susceptible and esthetically impressionable I am. But common sense--oh, a most unhappy trait in my character--kept me in due bounds and I let the moment pass! For what would have happened, I reflected, what would have happened after my hosannah? Everything on earth would have been extinguished at once and no events could have occurred. And so, solely from a sense of duty and my social position, I was forced to suppress the good moment and to stick to my nasty task. Somebody takes all the credit of what's good for Himself, and nothing but nastiness is left for me. But I don't envy the honor of a life of idle imposture, I am not ambitious. Why am I, of all creatures in the world, doomed to be cursed by all decent people and even to be kicked, for if I put on mortal form I am bound to take such consequences sometimes? I know, of course, there's a secret in it, but they won't tell me the secret for anything, for then perhaps, seeing the meaning of it, I might bawl hosannah, and the indispensable minus would disappear at once, and good sense would reign supreme throughout the whole world. And that, of course, would mean the end of everything, even of magazines and newspapers, for who would take them in? I know that at the end of all things I shall be reconciled. I, too, shall walk my quadrillion and learn the secret. But till that happens I am sulking and fulfill my destiny though it's against the grain--that is, to ruin thousands for the sake of saving one. How many souls have had to be ruined and how many honorable reputations destroyed for the sake of that one righteous man, Job, over whom they made such a fool of me in old days! Yes, till the secret is revealed, there are two sorts of truths for me--one, their truth, yonder, which I know nothing about so far, and the other my own. And there's no knowing which will turn out the better.... Are you asleep?" "I might well be," Ivan groaned angrily. "All my stupid ideas--outgrown, thrashed out long ago, and flung aside like a dead carcass--you present to me as something new!" "There's no pleasing you! And I thought I should fascinate you by my literary style. That hosannah in the skies really wasn't bad, was it? And then that ironical tone _a la_ Heine, eh?" "No, I was never such a flunkey! How then could my soul beget a flunkey like you?" "My dear fellow, I know a most charming and attractive young Russian gentleman, a young thinker and a great lover of literature and art, the author of a promising poem entitled _The Grand Inquisitor_. I was only thinking of him!" "I forbid you to speak of _The Grand Inquisitor_," cried Ivan, crimson with shame. "And the _Geological Cataclysm_. Do you remember? That was a poem, now!" "Hold your tongue, or I'll kill you!" "You'll kill me? No, excuse me, I will speak. I came to treat myself to that pleasure. Oh, I love the dreams of my ardent young friends, quivering with eagerness for life! 'There are new men,' you decided last spring, when you were meaning to come here, 'they propose to destroy everything and begin with cannibalism. Stupid fellows! they didn't ask my advice! I maintain that nothing need be destroyed, that we only need to destroy the idea of God in man, that's how we have to set to work. It's that, that we must begin with. Oh, blind race of men who have no understanding! As soon as men have all of them denied God--and I believe that period, analogous with geological periods, will come to pass--the old conception of the universe will fall of itself without cannibalism, and, what's more, the old morality, and everything will begin anew. Men will unite to take from life all it can give, but only for joy and happiness in the present world. Man will be lifted up with a spirit of divine Titanic pride and the man- god will appear. From hour to hour extending his conquest of nature infinitely by his will and his science, man will feel such lofty joy from hour to hour in doing it that it will make up for all his old dreams of the joys of heaven. Every one will know that he is mortal and will accept death proudly and serenely like a god. His pride will teach him that it's useless for him to repine at life's being a moment, and he will love his brother without need of reward. Love will be sufficient only for a moment of life, but the very consciousness of its momentariness will intensify its fire, which now is dissipated in dreams of eternal love beyond the grave'... and so on and so on in the same style. Charming!" Ivan sat with his eyes on the floor, and his hands pressed to his ears, but he began trembling all over. The voice continued. "The question now is, my young thinker reflected, is it possible that such a period will ever come? If it does, everything is determined and humanity is settled for ever. But as, owing to man's inveterate stupidity, this cannot come about for at least a thousand years, every one who recognizes the truth even now may legitimately order his life as he pleases, on the new principles. In that sense, 'all things are lawful' for him. What's more, even if this period never comes to pass, since there is anyway no God and no immortality, the new man may well become the man-god, even if he is the only one in the whole world, and promoted to his new position, he may lightheartedly overstep all the barriers of the old morality of the old slave-man, if necessary. There is no law for God. Where God stands, the place is holy. Where I stand will be at once the foremost place ... 'all things are lawful' and that's the end of it! That's all very charming; but if you want to swindle why do you want a moral sanction for doing it? But that's our modern Russian all over. He can't bring himself to swindle without a moral sanction. He is so in love with truth--" The visitor talked, obviously carried away by his own eloquence, speaking louder and louder and looking ironically at his host. But he did not succeed in finishing; Ivan suddenly snatched a glass from the table and flung it at the orator. "_Ah, mais c'est bete enfin_," cried the latter, jumping up from the sofa and shaking the drops of tea off himself. "He remembers Luther's inkstand! He takes me for a dream and throws glasses at a dream! It's like a woman! I suspected you were only pretending to stop up your ears." A loud, persistent knocking was suddenly heard at the window. Ivan jumped up from the sofa. "Do you hear? You'd better open," cried the visitor; "it's your brother Alyosha with the most interesting and surprising news, I'll be bound!" "Be silent, deceiver, I knew it was Alyosha, I felt he was coming, and of course he has not come for nothing; of course he brings 'news,' " Ivan exclaimed frantically. "Open, open to him. There's a snowstorm and he is your brother. _Monsieur sait-il le temps qu'il fait? C'est a ne pas mettre un chien dehors_." The knocking continued. Ivan wanted to rush to the window, but something seemed to fetter his arms and legs. He strained every effort to break his chains, but in vain. The knocking at the window grew louder and louder. At last the chains were broken and Ivan leapt up from the sofa. He looked round him wildly. Both candles had almost burnt out, the glass he had just thrown at his visitor stood before him on the table, and there was no one on the sofa opposite. The knocking on the window frame went on persistently, but it was by no means so loud as it had seemed in his dream; on the contrary, it was quite subdued. "It was not a dream! No, I swear it was not a dream, it all happened just now!" cried Ivan. He rushed to the window and opened the movable pane. "Alyosha, I told you not to come," he cried fiercely to his brother. "In two words, what do you want? In two words, do you hear?" "An hour ago Smerdyakov hanged himself," Alyosha answered from the yard. "Come round to the steps, I'll open at once," said Ivan, going to open the door to Alyosha. Chapter X. "It Was He Who Said That" Alyosha coming in told Ivan that a little over an hour ago Marya Kondratyevna had run to his rooms and informed him Smerdyakov had taken his own life. "I went in to clear away the samovar and he was hanging on a nail in the wall." On Alyosha's inquiring whether she had informed the police, she answered that she had told no one, "but I flew straight to you, I've run all the way." She seemed perfectly crazy, Alyosha reported, and was shaking like a leaf. When Alyosha ran with her to the cottage, he found Smerdyakov still hanging. On the table lay a note: "I destroy my life of my own will and desire, so as to throw no blame on any one." Alyosha left the note on the table and went straight to the police captain and told him all about it. "And from him I've come straight to you," said Alyosha, in conclusion, looking intently into Ivan's face. He had not taken his eyes off him while he told his story, as though struck by something in his expression. "Brother," he cried suddenly, "you must be terribly ill. You look and don't seem to understand what I tell you." "It's a good thing you came," said Ivan, as though brooding, and not hearing Alyosha's exclamation. "I knew he had hanged himself." "From whom?" "I don't know. But I knew. Did I know? Yes, he told me. He told me so just now." Ivan stood in the middle of the room, and still spoke in the same brooding tone, looking at the ground. "Who is _he_?" asked Alyosha, involuntarily looking round. "He's slipped away." Ivan raised his head and smiled softly. "He was afraid of you, of a dove like you. You are a 'pure cherub.' Dmitri calls you a cherub. Cherub!... the thunderous rapture of the seraphim. What are seraphim? Perhaps a whole constellation. But perhaps that constellation is only a chemical molecule. There's a constellation of the Lion and the Sun. Don't you know it?" "Brother, sit down," said Alyosha in alarm. "For goodness' sake, sit down on the sofa! You are delirious; put your head on the pillow, that's right. Would you like a wet towel on your head? Perhaps it will do you good." "Give me the towel: it's here on the chair. I just threw it down there." "It's not here. Don't worry yourself. I know where it is--here," said Alyosha, finding a clean towel, folded up and unused, by Ivan's dressing- table in the other corner of the room. Ivan looked strangely at the towel: recollection seemed to come back to him for an instant. "Stay"--he got up from the sofa--"an hour ago I took that new towel from there and wetted it. I wrapped it round my head and threw it down here ... How is it it's dry? There was no other." "You put that towel on your head?" asked Alyosha. "Yes, and walked up and down the room an hour ago ... Why have the candles burnt down so? What's the time?" "Nearly twelve." "No, no, no!" Ivan cried suddenly. "It was not a dream. He was here; he was sitting here, on that sofa. When you knocked at the window, I threw a glass at him ... this one. Wait a minute. I was asleep last time, but this dream was not a dream. It has happened before. I have dreams now, Alyosha ... yet they are not dreams, but reality. I walk about, talk and see ... though I am asleep. But he was sitting here, on that sofa there.... He is frightfully stupid, Alyosha, frightfully stupid." Ivan laughed suddenly and began pacing about the room. "Who is stupid? Of whom are you talking, brother?" Alyosha asked anxiously again. "The devil! He's taken to visiting me. He's been here twice, almost three times. He taunted me with being angry at his being a simple devil and not Satan, with scorched wings, in thunder and lightning. But he is not Satan: that's a lie. He is an impostor. He is simply a devil--a paltry, trivial devil. He goes to the baths. If you undressed him, you'd be sure to find he had a tail, long and smooth like a Danish dog's, a yard long, dun color.... Alyosha, you are cold. You've been in the snow. Would you like some tea? What? Is it cold? Shall I tell her to bring some? _C'est a ne pas mettre un chien dehors._..." Alyosha ran to the washing-stand, wetted the towel, persuaded Ivan to sit down again, and put the wet towel round his head. He sat down beside him. "What were you telling me just now about Lise?" Ivan began again. (He was becoming very talkative.) "I like Lise. I said something nasty about her. It was a lie. I like her ... I am afraid for Katya to-morrow. I am more afraid of her than of anything. On account of the future. She will cast me off to-morrow and trample me under foot. She thinks that I am ruining Mitya from jealousy on her account! Yes, she thinks that! But it's not so. To-morrow the cross, but not the gallows. No, I shan't hang myself. Do you know, I can never commit suicide, Alyosha. Is it because I am base? I am not a coward. Is it from love of life? How did I know that Smerdyakov had hanged himself? Yes, it was _he_ told me so." "And you are quite convinced that there has been some one here?" asked Alyosha. "Yes, on that sofa in the corner. You would have driven him away. You did drive him away: he disappeared when you arrived. I love your face, Alyosha. Did you know that I loved your face? And _he_ is myself, Alyosha. All that's base in me, all that's mean and contemptible. Yes, I am a romantic. He guessed it ... though it's a libel. He is frightfully stupid; but it's to his advantage. He has cunning, animal cunning--he knew how to infuriate me. He kept taunting me with believing in him, and that was how he made me listen to him. He fooled me like a boy. He told me a great deal that was true about myself, though. I should never have owned it to myself. Do you know, Alyosha," Ivan added in an intensely earnest and confidential tone, "I should be awfully glad to think that it was _he_ and not I." "He has worn you out," said Alyosha, looking compassionately at his brother. "He's been teasing me. And you know he does it so cleverly, so cleverly. 'Conscience! What is conscience? I make it up for myself. Why am I tormented by it? From habit. From the universal habit of mankind for the seven thousand years. So let us give it up, and we shall be gods.' It was he said that, it was he said that!" "And not you, not you?" Alyosha could not help crying, looking frankly at his brother. "Never mind him, anyway; have done with him and forget him. And let him take with him all that you curse now, and never come back!" "Yes, but he is spiteful. He laughed at me. He was impudent, Alyosha," Ivan said, with a shudder of offense. "But he was unfair to me, unfair to me about lots of things. He told lies about me to my face. 'Oh, you are going to perform an act of heroic virtue: to confess you murdered your father, that the valet murdered him at your instigation.' " "Brother," Alyosha interposed, "restrain yourself. It was not you murdered him. It's not true!" "That's what he says, he, and he knows it. 'You are going to perform an act of heroic virtue, and you don't believe in virtue; that's what tortures you and makes you angry, that's why you are so vindictive.' He said that to me about me and he knows what he says." "It's you say that, not he," exclaimed Alyosha mournfully, "and you say it because you are ill and delirious, tormenting yourself." "No, he knows what he says. 'You are going from pride,' he says. 'You'll stand up and say it was I killed him, and why do you writhe with horror? You are lying! I despise your opinion, I despise your horror!' He said that about me. 'And do you know you are longing for their praise--"he is a criminal, a murderer, but what a generous soul; he wanted to save his brother and he confessed." ' That's a lie, Alyosha!" Ivan cried suddenly, with flashing eyes. "I don't want the low rabble to praise me, I swear I don't! That's a lie! That's why I threw the glass at him and it broke against his ugly face." "Brother, calm yourself, stop!" Alyosha entreated him. "Yes, he knows how to torment one. He's cruel," Ivan went on, unheeding. "I had an inkling from the first what he came for. 'Granting that you go through pride, still you had a hope that Smerdyakov might be convicted and sent to Siberia, and Mitya would be acquitted, while you would only be punished with moral condemnation' ('Do you hear?' he laughed then)--'and some people will praise you. But now Smerdyakov's dead, he has hanged himself, and who'll believe you alone? But yet you are going, you are going, you'll go all the same, you've decided to go. What are you going for now?' That's awful, Alyosha. I can't endure such questions. Who dare ask me such questions?" "Brother," interposed Alyosha--his heart sank with terror, but he still seemed to hope to bring Ivan to reason--"how could he have told you of Smerdyakov's death before I came, when no one knew of it and there was no time for any one to know of it?" "He told me," said Ivan firmly, refusing to admit a doubt. "It was all he did talk about, if you come to that. 'And it would be all right if you believed in virtue,' he said. 'No matter if they disbelieve you, you are going for the sake of principle. But you are a little pig like Fyodor Pavlovitch, and what do you want with virtue? Why do you want to go meddling if your sacrifice is of no use to any one? Because you don't know yourself why you go! Oh, you'd give a great deal to know yourself why you go! And can you have made up your mind? You've not made up your mind. You'll sit all night deliberating whether to go or not. But you will go; you know you'll go. You know that whichever way you decide, the decision does not depend on you. You'll go because you won't dare not to go. Why won't you dare? You must guess that for yourself. That's a riddle for you!' He got up and went away. You came and he went. He called me a coward, Alyosha! _Le mot de l'enigme_ is that I am a coward. 'It is not for such eagles to soar above the earth.' It was he added that--he! And Smerdyakov said the same. He must be killed! Katya despises me. I've seen that for a month past. Even Lise will begin to despise me! 'You are going in order to be praised.' That's a brutal lie! And you despise me too, Alyosha. Now I am going to hate you again! And I hate the monster, too! I hate the monster! I don't want to save the monster. Let him rot in Siberia! He's begun singing a hymn! Oh, to-morrow I'll go, stand before them, and spit in their faces!" He jumped up in a frenzy, flung off the towel, and fell to pacing up and down the room again. Alyosha recalled what he had just said. "I seem to be sleeping awake.... I walk, I speak, I see, but I am asleep." It seemed to be just like that now. Alyosha did not leave him. The thought passed through his mind to run for a doctor, but he was afraid to leave his brother alone: there was no one to whom he could leave him. By degrees Ivan lost consciousness completely at last. He still went on talking, talking incessantly, but quite incoherently, and even articulated his words with difficulty. Suddenly he staggered violently; but Alyosha was in time to support him. Ivan let him lead him to his bed. Alyosha undressed him somehow and put him to bed. He sat watching over him for another two hours. The sick man slept soundly, without stirring, breathing softly and evenly. Alyosha took a pillow and lay down on the sofa, without undressing. As he fell asleep he prayed for Mitya and Ivan. He began to understand Ivan's illness. "The anguish of a proud determination. An earnest conscience!" God, in Whom he disbelieved, and His truth were gaining mastery over his heart, which still refused to submit. "Yes," the thought floated through Alyosha's head as it lay on the pillow, "yes, if Smerdyakov is dead, no one will believe Ivan's evidence; but he will go and give it." Alyosha smiled softly. "God will conquer!" he thought. "He will either rise up in the light of truth, or ... he'll perish in hate, revenging on himself and on every one his having served the cause he does not believe in," Alyosha added bitterly, and again he prayed for Ivan.

Book XI

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219142226/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/b/the-brothers-karamazov/summary-and-analysis/part-4-book-xi

During the two months since Dmitri was arrested, Grushenka has been ill. Now, as she begins to recover physically, there are also signs of a major spiritual recovery, of a complete "spiritual transformation in her." Also, there is another change: she and Alyosha have become fast friends, and she confides to him that she and Dmitri have quarreled again. In addition, she fears that Dmitri is once again falling in love with Katerina Ivanova. What most concerns her, however, is that Dmitri and Ivan are concealing a secret from her. She pleads with Alyosha to discover what the secret is. Again, Alyosha promises to help a human being in trouble. On his way to question Dmitri, Alyosha stops and visits Lise, whom he finds feverish and excited. She tells him that she longs to be punished and castigated by God and says that she regularly prays to suffer torture, for she can no longer respect anything or anyone. She continuously feels possessed with a terrible urge to destroy. The young girl becomes hysterical as she confesses her secret thoughts and then suddenly sends Alyosha away. After he leaves, she does a curious thing: she intentionally slams the door on her fingers and calls herself a wretch. When Alyosha arrives at the prison where Dmitri is being held, he notices that Rakitin, a seminarian acquaintance, is leaving. He asks Dmitri about Rakitin's visit and is told that the seminarian hopes to write an article proving that Dmitri is the victim of an unhappy environment and that he could not help killing his father. Dmitri then explains to the puzzled Alyosha that he does not take Rakitin seriously, that he tolerates him only because he is amused by his "advanced ideas." More seriously, Dmitri confesses that he now understands his responsibility for his past life and sins and that he is ready to suffer and do penance for his sins. He is sure that there can still be a full and rewarding life for him. Only one thing troubles him, however -- Grushenka. He is afraid that the authorities will not let her accompany him to Siberia and fears that, without Grushenka, he will be unable to face his years of punishment and thus will never be redeemed. Dmitri also tells Alyosha that Ivan has come to the prison and has given him a plan for escape. Of course, Dmitri says, Ivan believes him guilty of murder. He then turns to Alyosha and asks his brother's opinion. Never before has he had the courage to speak so candidly with Alyosha, and when he hears the young man say, "I've never for one instant believed that you were the murderer," Dmitri is greatly relieved. He feels the power of a new life rising in him. Alyosha leaves Dmitri and goes to Katerina shortly thereafter. He finds Ivan just leaving, but his brother remains long enough to hear what Alyosha says concerning Dmitri. When Ivan leaves, Katerina becomes highly emotional and insists that Alyosha follow him; she is convinced that Ivan is going mad. Alyosha rushes to rejoin Ivan and learns yet another piece of news. Ivan says that Katerina has a "document in her hands . . . that proves conclusively" that Dmitri did indeed murder their father. Alyosha denies that such a document could exist, and Ivan then asks who the murderer is. Alyosha tells him, "It wasn't you who killed Father," explaining that he is aware that Ivan has been accusing himself, but that God has sent Alyosha to Ivan to reassure him. Ivan is sickened by Alyosha's religious mysticism and leaves him abruptly. Ivan's nausea, however, is not due wholly to his brother's mysticism; the sickness begins earlier, almost simultaneously with his first visit to Smerdyakov. The servant is recovering in the hospital and maintains that his epileptic seizure on the night of the murder was real. He says further that he understood that Ivan went to Moscow because he suspected a murder was about to be committed and wanted to be far from the scene of the crime. Ivan answers that he will not reveal to the authorities that Smerdyakov is able to sham an epileptic seizure, and Smerdyakov counters by promising to say nothing of a certain conversation, their last before the murder. During Ivan's second visit with Smerdyakov, he demands to know what Smerdyakov meant by his strange statement about their last conversation prior to the murder. Smerdyakov explains that Ivan so desired his father's death, in order to come into a large portion of the inheritance, that he planned to leave and thereby silently assented to Fyodor's murder. Ivan leaves, bewildered, half realizing that he must share the guilt if Smerdyakov murdered Fyodor. He goes to see Katerina and explains his complicity and his guilt. Katerina is able to temporarily alleviate some of his anxiety. She shows him a letter that Dmitri wrote to her saying that, if necessary, he would kill Fyodor in order to repay the money he stole from her. This letter puts Ivan's mind at ease; Dmitri, not Smerdyakov, is surely the villain. Ivan does not see Smerdyakov again until the night before the trial, but by this time the Karamazov servant is tired of all pretense. He openly admits that it was he who killed Fyodor. He stoutly maintains, though, that he did not act alone; he acted only as an instrument of Ivan, saying, "It was following your words I did it." He then explains in great detail how he accomplished the murder, continuously referring to the dual responsibility for the murder. Smerdyakov furthermore recalls all the philosophical discussions the two men have had and accuses Ivan of having given him the moral justification that made it possible. All this Ivan did, he says, besides leaving town and permitting the act. Stunned, Ivan returns to his lodgings; he plans to reveal at the trial the next day all that Smerdyakov has told him, but in his room he finds a devil. The apparition is dressed like a rather shoddy middle-aged gentleman and is full of cynical criticism. He forces Ivan to face the most terrifying aspects of his inner secrets, taunting him with his private fears and weaknesses until finally Ivan goes mad with rage and hurls a cup at the intruder. At that moment, he hears Alyosha knocking at the window. His brother brings the news that Smerdyakov has just hanged himself. Ivan is so upset by his "devil" that when he tries to tell Alyosha about the experience, he cannot. Alyosha discovers to his horror that Ivan is suffering a nervous breakdown. He stays the night to nurse his brother.

This book is concerned primarily with depicting Ivan's guilt and with detailing his duplicity in the murder of his father. Particularly, Dostoevsky emphasizes the three interviews with Smerdyakov and Ivan's conversation with his imaginary devil. Dostoevsky manipulates the attention of the reader away from the plot question of legal guilt and confronts him with the intricacies of Ivan's dilemma about metaphysical guilt. Also in Book XI, Dostoevsky provides necessary background concerning what has happened during the two months that Dmitri has been in jail. It is most important to the author's total view that one know that Grushenka has lain ill following Dmitri's arrest. One of Dostoevsky's prime concepts, prominent in all his novels, is that crime is often accompanied by illness. Besides Grushenka's falling ill after she realizes her role in the Karamazov crime, Ivan also falls desperately ill upon his realization of his involvement in the murder. Thus, in addition to coupling crime and illness, Dostoevsky is structuring a much more important tenet. Because Grushenka is ill and suffers, she becomes regenerated. Knowledge through suffering is one of the novel's prime equations. To underscore his presentation, Dostoevsky, as a contrast to the sensitive Grushenka, records the mincings of the whimsical and impish Lise. This young lady maintains that she needs to suffer in order to learn and that she likes to make other people suffer, but she is both shallow and superficial. She defines suffering, for example, as punishing children by eating pineapple compote before them. She punishes herself by slamming the door on her fingers! This destructive girl turns Dostoevsky's theories inside out and delights in reviling everyone and everything. Her perversity functions as a vivid contrast to Grushenka's more healthy and sound soul. Chapter 4 records Dmitri's continued regeneration. Currently, he ponders Ivan's offer of escape and the finances necessary to accomplish it. Earlier, he might have fled impulsively; now, however, he has developed into a type of Zossima-man. He feels that he is "responsible for all." "I go for all," he says, "because one must go for all. I didn't kill Father, but I've got to go. I accept it." Furthermore, he now believes that life is full of enjoyment even if one must live imprisoned. His dilemma therefore is this: he wants to accept his suffering and looks forward to salvation through suffering, but he knows that he cannot withstand suffering unless Grushenka is beside him, serving as his inspiration. If he accepts Ivan's plan for escape, might he be rejecting his own salvation? Dmitri seeks help and explains to Alyosha that Ivan has planned the escape because he believes Dmitri to be guilty. Alyosha reassures his brother that he never believed him to be the murderer. Alyosha then searches for Ivan and finds that he is on the verge of a mental breakdown. During the first of Ivan's interviews with Smerdyakov, Ivan is told by the cook that he ran away because he already knew that violence was readying itself in the Karamazov house. Smerdyakov further reminds Ivan that the two of them are very much alike. Ivan accepts neither of these ideas, but he broods on them, and as he leaves he feels that there is "an insulting significance in Smerdyakov's last words." It is this ambiguity that brings him back for a second interview. During this next interview, Smerdyakov accuses Ivan outright of desiring his father's death. "You had a foreboding," he says, "yet went away." This was, in effect, Ivan's open invitation for Smerdyakov to murder Fyodor. Ivan recoils and threatens to expose Smerdyakov to the police, but the servant is wily. He reminds Ivan that he also will be disgraced in the public eye and will be accused of being an accomplice. Ivan realizes the possibility of the cook's threat and slowly concedes that he is indeed guilty. Literally, technically, Smerdyakov is the murderer, but he, Ivan, must share the guilt. This realization weighs heavily on Ivan, and before long he is driven to despair. Then he reads the letter that Dmitri has written Katerina telling of his plans to murder his father and is even more confused. His anxiety finally subsides, but he cannot be sure now that Smerdyakov murdered Fyodor. He returns for a third interview. Now both Ivan and Smerdyakov are ill and no longer talk in riddles. Smerdyakov openly tells Ivan, "You murdered him; you are the real murderer; I was only your instrument, your faithful servant, and it was following your words I did it." Smerdyakov also reminds Ivan of the philosophy that "everything is lawful if there is no immortality" and that Ivan consented by going away. "By your consent to leave, you silently sanctioned doing it," he says. Ivan still cannot accept Smerdyakov as the murderer, however; as the facts stand, he is guilty, even if the servant did commit the deed. Ivan faces his own conscience that night in the form of a tormenting devil. The doppelganger is a witty, urbane, and clever aberration. He affirms nothing for the distraught Ivan, and at Ivan's every question, he merely asks another, often ridiculing Ivan's most private fears. At the end of Book XI, Alyosha arrives with the news of Smerdyakov's death, but Ivan is little concerned with the cook's fate. The realization of his own guilt has so shamed and confused him that realities have almost wholly dissolved.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/06.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Prince/section_2_part_2.txt

The Prince.chapter vi

chapter vi

{"name": "Chapter VI", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210303115306/https://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/prince/section3/", "summary": "Concerning New Principalities Acquired by One's Own Arms and Ability eople are by nature changeable. It is easy to persuade them about some particular matter, but it is hard to hold them to that persuasion. Princes should strive to imitate the examples set by great rulers of the past, even if that means setting lofty goals. This way, if a prince fails to meet those lofty goals, his actions will nevertheless enhance his reputation as a great or powerful ruler. One way that rulers acquire states is through their own prowess, meaning their own abilities, rather than the good fortune of noble birth, inheritance, or lucky circumstances. Relying on one's personal prowess is a very difficult method of acquiring a state. However, a state acquired by a ruler's natural skill will prove easier to maintain control over. Examples of rulers who triumphed on the strength of their own powers include Moses, Cyrus, Romulus, and Theseus. Rulers who rely on prowess instead of fortune are generally more successful in holding power over states because they can meet the challenge of establishing a new order. Nothing is more dangerous or difficult than introducing a new order. This is because those who benefited from the old order will fiercely oppose the prince who tries to introduce a new order, whereas those who stand to benefit from the imposition of a new order will offer only lukewarm support. A prince who relies on his ability to persuade others to support him will be unable to succeed against such opposition. However, a prince who relies on his own prowess and can \"force the issue\" will usually succeed. At times, \"forc the issue\" might literally mean the use of force. This can be dangerous, but if the ruler succeeds in his use of force, he will become strong, secure, and respected", "analysis": ""}

Let no one be surprised if, in speaking of entirely new principalities as I shall do, I adduce the highest examples both of prince and of state; because men, walking almost always in paths beaten by others, and following by imitation their deeds, are yet unable to keep entirely to the ways of others or attain to the power of those they imitate. A wise man ought always to follow the paths beaten by great men, and to imitate those who have been supreme, so that if his ability does not equal theirs, at least it will savour of it. Let him act like the clever archers who, designing to hit the mark which yet appears too far distant, and knowing the limits to which the strength of their bow attains, take aim much higher than the mark, not to reach by their strength or arrow to so great a height, but to be able with the aid of so high an aim to hit the mark they wish to reach. I say, therefore, that in entirely new principalities, where there is a new prince, more or less difficulty is found in keeping them, accordingly as there is more or less ability in him who has acquired the state. Now, as the fact of becoming a prince from a private station presupposes either ability or fortune, it is clear that one or other of these things will mitigate in some degree many difficulties. Nevertheless, he who has relied least on fortune is established the strongest. Further, it facilitates matters when the prince, having no other state, is compelled to reside there in person. But to come to those who, by their own ability and not through fortune, have risen to be princes, I say that Moses, Cyrus, Romulus, Theseus, and such like are the most excellent examples. And although one may not discuss Moses, he having been a mere executor of the will of God, yet he ought to be admired, if only for that favour which made him worthy to speak with God. But in considering Cyrus and others who have acquired or founded kingdoms, all will be found admirable; and if their particular deeds and conduct shall be considered, they will not be found inferior to those of Moses, although he had so great a preceptor. And in examining their actions and lives one cannot see that they owed anything to fortune beyond opportunity, which brought them the material to mould into the form which seemed best to them. Without that opportunity their powers of mind would have been extinguished, and without those powers the opportunity would have come in vain. It was necessary, therefore, to Moses that he should find the people of Israel in Egypt enslaved and oppressed by the Egyptians, in order that they should be disposed to follow him so as to be delivered out of bondage. It was necessary that Romulus should not remain in Alba, and that he should be abandoned at his birth, in order that he should become King of Rome and founder of the fatherland. It was necessary that Cyrus should find the Persians discontented with the government of the Medes, and the Medes soft and effeminate through their long peace. Theseus could not have shown his ability had he not found the Athenians dispersed. These opportunities, therefore, made those men fortunate, and their high ability enabled them to recognize the opportunity whereby their country was ennobled and made famous. Those who by valorous ways become princes, like these men, acquire a principality with difficulty, but they keep it with ease. The difficulties they have in acquiring it rise in part from the new rules and methods which they are forced to introduce to establish their government and its security. And it ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things, because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new. This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them. Thus it happens that whenever those who are hostile have the opportunity to attack they do it like partisans, whilst the others defend lukewarmly, in such wise that the prince is endangered along with them. It is necessary, therefore, if we desire to discuss this matter thoroughly, to inquire whether these innovators can rely on themselves or have to depend on others: that is to say, whether, to consummate their enterprise, have they to use prayers or can they use force? In the first instance they always succeed badly, and never compass anything; but when they can rely on themselves and use force, then they are rarely endangered. Hence it is that all armed prophets have conquered, and the unarmed ones have been destroyed. Besides the reasons mentioned, the nature of the people is variable, and whilst it is easy to persuade them, it is difficult to fix them in that persuasion. And thus it is necessary to take such measures that, when they believe no longer, it may be possible to make them believe by force. If Moses, Cyrus, Theseus, and Romulus had been unarmed they could not have enforced their constitutions for long--as happened in our time to Fra Girolamo Savonarola, who was ruined with his new order of things immediately the multitude believed in him no longer, and he had no means of keeping steadfast those who believed or of making the unbelievers to believe. Therefore such as these have great difficulties in consummating their enterprise, for all their dangers are in the ascent, yet with ability they will overcome them; but when these are overcome, and those who envied them their success are exterminated, they will begin to be respected, and they will continue afterwards powerful, secure, honoured, and happy. To these great examples I wish to add a lesser one; still it bears some resemblance to them, and I wish it to suffice me for all of a like kind: it is Hiero the Syracusan.(*) This man rose from a private station to be Prince of Syracuse, nor did he, either, owe anything to fortune but opportunity; for the Syracusans, being oppressed, chose him for their captain, afterwards he was rewarded by being made their prince. He was of so great ability, even as a private citizen, that one who writes of him says he wanted nothing but a kingdom to be a king. This man abolished the old soldiery, organized the new, gave up old alliances, made new ones; and as he had his own soldiers and allies, on such foundations he was able to build any edifice: thus, whilst he had endured much trouble in acquiring, he had but little in keeping. (*) Hiero II, born about 307 B.C., died 216 B.C.

Chapter VI

https://web.archive.org/web/20210303115306/https://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/prince/section3/

Concerning New Principalities Acquired by One's Own Arms and Ability eople are by nature changeable. It is easy to persuade them about some particular matter, but it is hard to hold them to that persuasion. Princes should strive to imitate the examples set by great rulers of the past, even if that means setting lofty goals. This way, if a prince fails to meet those lofty goals, his actions will nevertheless enhance his reputation as a great or powerful ruler. One way that rulers acquire states is through their own prowess, meaning their own abilities, rather than the good fortune of noble birth, inheritance, or lucky circumstances. Relying on one's personal prowess is a very difficult method of acquiring a state. However, a state acquired by a ruler's natural skill will prove easier to maintain control over. Examples of rulers who triumphed on the strength of their own powers include Moses, Cyrus, Romulus, and Theseus. Rulers who rely on prowess instead of fortune are generally more successful in holding power over states because they can meet the challenge of establishing a new order. Nothing is more dangerous or difficult than introducing a new order. This is because those who benefited from the old order will fiercely oppose the prince who tries to introduce a new order, whereas those who stand to benefit from the imposition of a new order will offer only lukewarm support. A prince who relies on his ability to persuade others to support him will be unable to succeed against such opposition. However, a prince who relies on his own prowess and can "force the issue" will usually succeed. At times, "forc the issue" might literally mean the use of force. This can be dangerous, but if the ruler succeeds in his use of force, he will become strong, secure, and respected

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/6.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_1_part_1.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 2.chapter 1

book 2, chapter 1

{"name": "book 2, Chapter 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section2/", "summary": "They Arrive at the Monastery On a warm, clear day at the end of August, Fyodor Pavlovich and Ivan Karamazov arrive at the monastery for the meeting with Zosima. Pyotr Alexandrovich Miusov, the cousin of Fyodor Pavlovich's first wife who briefly adopted the young Dmitri, is with them, as is Kalganov, a young relative of Miusov's who is living with him while preparing to enter a university. None of the men knows much about religion. Miusov, an atheist, has not been in a church for three decades. The men look around the monastery curiously. Miusov detests Fyodor Pavlovich, who intentionally torments Miusov by mocking the monastery and pretending not to understand why Miusov, as an irreligious man, would care what the monks think of him. Miusov angrily chastises himself for letting Fyodor Pavlovich bother him, but Fyodor Pavlovich's crudeness and vulgarity are so exasperating to Miusov that he cannot control his irritation. Dmitri has not yet arrived, and the men are shown to Zosima's cell to wait. The little monk who escorts them tells them that they are all invited to lunch with the Father Superior of the monastery after their meeting", "analysis": ""}

Book II. An Unfortunate Gathering Chapter I. They Arrive At The Monastery It was a warm, bright day at the end of August. The interview with the elder had been fixed for half-past eleven, immediately after late mass. Our visitors did not take part in the service, but arrived just as it was over. First an elegant open carriage, drawn by two valuable horses, drove up with Miuesov and a distant relative of his, a young man of twenty, called Pyotr Fomitch Kalganov. This young man was preparing to enter the university. Miuesov, with whom he was staying for the time, was trying to persuade him to go abroad to the university of Zurich or Jena. The young man was still undecided. He was thoughtful and absent-minded. He was nice- looking, strongly built, and rather tall. There was a strange fixity in his gaze at times. Like all very absent-minded people he would sometimes stare at a person without seeing him. He was silent and rather awkward, but sometimes, when he was alone with any one, he became talkative and effusive, and would laugh at anything or nothing. But his animation vanished as quickly as it appeared. He was always well and even elaborately dressed; he had already some independent fortune and expectations of much more. He was a friend of Alyosha's. In an ancient, jolting, but roomy, hired carriage, with a pair of old pinkish-gray horses, a long way behind Miuesov's carriage, came Fyodor Pavlovitch, with his son Ivan. Dmitri was late, though he had been informed of the time the evening before. The visitors left their carriage at the hotel, outside the precincts, and went to the gates of the monastery on foot. Except Fyodor Pavlovitch, none of the party had ever seen the monastery, and Miuesov had probably not even been to church for thirty years. He looked about him with curiosity, together with assumed ease. But, except the church and the domestic buildings, though these too were ordinary enough, he found nothing of interest in the interior of the monastery. The last of the worshippers were coming out of the church, bareheaded and crossing themselves. Among the humbler people were a few of higher rank--two or three ladies and a very old general. They were all staying at the hotel. Our visitors were at once surrounded by beggars, but none of them gave them anything, except young Kalganov, who took a ten- copeck piece out of his purse, and, nervous and embarrassed--God knows why!--hurriedly gave it to an old woman, saying: "Divide it equally." None of his companions made any remark upon it, so that he had no reason to be embarrassed; but, perceiving this, he was even more overcome. It was strange that their arrival did not seem expected, and that they were not received with special honor, though one of them had recently made a donation of a thousand roubles, while another was a very wealthy and highly cultured landowner, upon whom all in the monastery were in a sense dependent, as a decision of the lawsuit might at any moment put their fishing rights in his hands. Yet no official personage met them. Miuesov looked absent-mindedly at the tombstones round the church, and was on the point of saying that the dead buried here must have paid a pretty penny for the right of lying in this "holy place," but refrained. His liberal irony was rapidly changing almost into anger. "Who the devil is there to ask in this imbecile place? We must find out, for time is passing," he observed suddenly, as though speaking to himself. All at once there came up a bald-headed, elderly man with ingratiating little eyes, wearing a full, summer overcoat. Lifting his hat, he introduced himself with a honeyed lisp as Maximov, a landowner of Tula. He at once entered into our visitors' difficulty. "Father Zossima lives in the hermitage, apart, four hundred paces from the monastery, the other side of the copse." "I know it's the other side of the copse," observed Fyodor Pavlovitch, "but we don't remember the way. It is a long time since we've been here." "This way, by this gate, and straight across the copse ... the copse. Come with me, won't you? I'll show you. I have to go.... I am going myself. This way, this way." They came out of the gate and turned towards the copse. Maximov, a man of sixty, ran rather than walked, turning sideways to stare at them all, with an incredible degree of nervous curiosity. His eyes looked starting out of his head. "You see, we have come to the elder upon business of our own," observed Miuesov severely. "That personage has granted us an audience, so to speak, and so, though we thank you for showing us the way, we cannot ask you to accompany us." "I've been there. I've been already; _un chevalier parfait_," and Maximov snapped his fingers in the air. "Who is a _chevalier_?" asked Miuesov. "The elder, the splendid elder, the elder! The honor and glory of the monastery, Zossima. Such an elder!" But his incoherent talk was cut short by a very pale, wan-looking monk of medium height, wearing a monk's cap, who overtook them. Fyodor Pavlovitch and Miuesov stopped. The monk, with an extremely courteous, profound bow, announced: "The Father Superior invites all of you gentlemen to dine with him after your visit to the hermitage. At one o'clock, not later. And you also," he added, addressing Maximov. "That I certainly will, without fail," cried Fyodor Pavlovitch, hugely delighted at the invitation. "And, believe me, we've all given our word to behave properly here.... And you, Pyotr Alexandrovitch, will you go, too?" "Yes, of course. What have I come for but to study all the customs here? The only obstacle to me is your company...." "Yes, Dmitri Fyodorovitch is non-existent as yet." "It would be a capital thing if he didn't turn up. Do you suppose I like all this business, and in your company, too? So we will come to dinner. Thank the Father Superior," he said to the monk. "No, it is my duty now to conduct you to the elder," answered the monk. "If so I'll go straight to the Father Superior--to the Father Superior," babbled Maximov. "The Father Superior is engaged just now. But as you please--" the monk hesitated. "Impertinent old man!" Miuesov observed aloud, while Maximov ran back to the monastery. "He's like von Sohn," Fyodor Pavlovitch said suddenly. "Is that all you can think of?... In what way is he like von Sohn? Have you ever seen von Sohn?" "I've seen his portrait. It's not the features, but something indefinable. He's a second von Sohn. I can always tell from the physiognomy." "Ah, I dare say you are a connoisseur in that. But, look here, Fyodor Pavlovitch, you said just now that we had given our word to behave properly. Remember it. I advise you to control yourself. But, if you begin to play the fool I don't intend to be associated with you here.... You see what a man he is"--he turned to the monk--"I'm afraid to go among decent people with him." A fine smile, not without a certain slyness, came on to the pale, bloodless lips of the monk, but he made no reply, and was evidently silent from a sense of his own dignity. Miuesov frowned more than ever. "Oh, devil take them all! An outer show elaborated through centuries, and nothing but charlatanism and nonsense underneath," flashed through Miuesov's mind. "Here's the hermitage. We've arrived," cried Fyodor Pavlovitch. "The gates are shut." And he repeatedly made the sign of the cross to the saints painted above and on the sides of the gates. "When you go to Rome you must do as the Romans do. Here in this hermitage there are twenty-five saints being saved. They look at one another, and eat cabbages. And not one woman goes in at this gate. That's what is remarkable. And that really is so. But I did hear that the elder receives ladies," he remarked suddenly to the monk. "Women of the people are here too now, lying in the portico there waiting. But for ladies of higher rank two rooms have been built adjoining the portico, but outside the precincts--you can see the windows--and the elder goes out to them by an inner passage when he is well enough. They are always outside the precincts. There is a Harkov lady, Madame Hohlakov, waiting there now with her sick daughter. Probably he has promised to come out to her, though of late he has been so weak that he has hardly shown himself even to the people." "So then there are loopholes, after all, to creep out of the hermitage to the ladies. Don't suppose, holy father, that I mean any harm. But do you know that at Athos not only the visits of women are not allowed, but no creature of the female sex--no hens, nor turkey-hens, nor cows." "Fyodor Pavlovitch, I warn you I shall go back and leave you here. They'll turn you out when I'm gone." "But I'm not interfering with you, Pyotr Alexandrovitch. Look," he cried suddenly, stepping within the precincts, "what a vale of roses they live in!" Though there were no roses now, there were numbers of rare and beautiful autumn flowers growing wherever there was space for them, and evidently tended by a skillful hand; there were flower-beds round the church, and between the tombs; and the one-storied wooden house where the elder lived was also surrounded with flowers. "And was it like this in the time of the last elder, Varsonofy? He didn't care for such elegance. They say he used to jump up and thrash even ladies with a stick," observed Fyodor Pavlovitch, as he went up the steps. "The elder Varsonofy did sometimes seem rather strange, but a great deal that's told is foolishness. He never thrashed any one," answered the monk. "Now, gentlemen, if you will wait a minute I will announce you." "Fyodor Pavlovitch, for the last time, your compact, do you hear? Behave properly or I will pay you out!" Miuesov had time to mutter again. "I can't think why you are so agitated," Fyodor Pavlovitch observed sarcastically. "Are you uneasy about your sins? They say he can tell by one's eyes what one has come about. And what a lot you think of their opinion! you, a Parisian, and so advanced. I'm surprised at you." But Miuesov had no time to reply to this sarcasm. They were asked to come in. He walked in, somewhat irritated. "Now, I know myself, I am annoyed, I shall lose my temper and begin to quarrel--and lower myself and my ideas," he reflected.

book 2, Chapter 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section2/

They Arrive at the Monastery On a warm, clear day at the end of August, Fyodor Pavlovich and Ivan Karamazov arrive at the monastery for the meeting with Zosima. Pyotr Alexandrovich Miusov, the cousin of Fyodor Pavlovich's first wife who briefly adopted the young Dmitri, is with them, as is Kalganov, a young relative of Miusov's who is living with him while preparing to enter a university. None of the men knows much about religion. Miusov, an atheist, has not been in a church for three decades. The men look around the monastery curiously. Miusov detests Fyodor Pavlovich, who intentionally torments Miusov by mocking the monastery and pretending not to understand why Miusov, as an irreligious man, would care what the monks think of him. Miusov angrily chastises himself for letting Fyodor Pavlovich bother him, but Fyodor Pavlovich's crudeness and vulgarity are so exasperating to Miusov that he cannot control his irritation. Dmitri has not yet arrived, and the men are shown to Zosima's cell to wait. The little monk who escorts them tells them that they are all invited to lunch with the Father Superior of the monastery after their meeting

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/107-chapters/chapters_16_to_23.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/Far from the Madding Crowd/section_3_part_0.txt

Far from the Madding Crowd.chapters 16-23

chapters 16-23

{"name": "", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210225000853/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/maddingcrowd/section4/", "summary": "In the interior of a church, several women watch a soldier enter and realize that a wedding is about to occur. As he waits for his bride to arrive, the clock strikes the quarter hour, and the women titter. Finally, after a full hour of waiting, the soldier leaves the church humiliated; just at that moment his bride runs across the square to meet him. She has been waiting at All Souls' rather than at All Saints' and has just realized her mistake. The two are Fanny Robin and Sergeant Troy. She asks him when they can reschedule their wedding, but he refuses to set a date. In the market place again, Boldwood sees Bathsheba Everdene as if for the first time. He finds her unbelievably beautiful and asks someone nearby whether she is generally considered handsome. Bathsheba notices his attention and regrets having sent the valentine. She decides to explain and apologize, but she realizes that he might misread her initiation of conversation as a sign of romantic interest. Chapter 18 gives us a little background about Boldwood. He is a confirmed bachelor, wealthy and well established at the neighboring farm. Hardy warns us that Boldwood's is not an \"ordinary nature\": the \"positives and negatives\" in his character balance only precariously, and he plunges easily into extreme emotions. The narrative focuses in on Bathsheba and Gabriel as they watch Boldwood from afar; Gabriel sees Bathsheba blush, and, remembering the valentine, he begins to suspect something between the pair. At a village-wide sheep-washing, Boldwood approaches Bathsheba, who tries to avoid him. He follows her off toward the river, and when they are alone, he proposes to her. She refuses, and he continues to try to persuade her, finally getting her to permit him to propose again later. Chapter 20 charts Bathsheba's reaction to Boldwood's offer. Hardy tells us that Bathsheba feels no \"wish whatever for the married state in the abstract.\" She also enjoys the independence of running a farm on her own. As she is considering the possibility, she approaches Gabriel and begins to ask him about what the farm workers had thought of her appearing together with Boldwood. The two of them quarrel when she asks his opinion of her conduct concerning the bachelor, and he tells her \"it is unworthy of any thoughtful, comely woman.\" She then accuses him of being jealous, but he tells her that he has long ago given up all thoughts marrying her. Finally, she orders him to leave the farm, and he agrees. Only one day after Gabriel's departure, the farm workers announce that another disaster has occurred--the sheep have eaten young clover, and their stomachs are expanding fatally. Only Gabriel knows how to perform the operation that can save them. Bathsheba sends him an order to come back. He replies by messenger that she will have to ask him properly, and she does so, writing, \"Do not desert me, Gabriel!\" He returns and saves all the sheep but one. Bathsheba regrets firing him, and he agrees to come back to the farm. During the annual sheep-shearing, the workers discuss Bathsheba and Boldwood, wondering if they will marry, and at the sheep-shearing supper, Bathsheba allows Boldwood to sit with her inside the house. At the very end of the supper, they are left alone together, and Bathsheba tells him that she will try to love him. She finally almost promises herself to him, saying that she may feel ready to marry by harvest-time.", "analysis": "Commentary This section of the novel sets up a number of different couples--Fanny and Troy, Bathsheba and Boldwood, and Bathsheba and Gabriel--and analyzes the dynamics of each. Many parallels can be drawn; for instance, much as a chance circumstance of Bathsheba deciding to send the valentine to Boldwood changes his life forever, Fanny's simple mistake about the church means that Troy refuses to marry her. By setting up several sets of relationships, Hardy explores the way chance generates a variety of fates from what were initially parallel circumstances. Hardy plays upon the traditional novel by choosing a heroine who has no abstract desire to get married. In some ways, Far From the Madding Crowd is a traditional novel of marriage in that a heroine is given a choice of two or more suitors, and at the end of the novel, she makes the \"correct\" choice. Yet a novel such as Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice or Sense and Sensibility focuses on a character who wants to find a husband; in contrast, Bathsheba's economic and emotional independence allow her the choice of not marrying, and she has an interest in maintaining the farm and preserving her freedom. Many of Hardy's female characters show similar independence and interest in work or scholarship. The scenes of sheep-shearing and sheep-washing present the farm workers as a kind of Greek chorus and also help to create a sense of the rituals built around the seasons of the farm."}

ALL SAINTS' AND ALL SOULS' On a week-day morning a small congregation, consisting mainly of women and girls, rose from its knees in the mouldy nave of a church called All Saints', in the distant barrack-town before-mentioned, at the end of a service without a sermon. They were about to disperse, when a smart footstep, entering the porch and coming up the central passage, arrested their attention. The step echoed with a ring unusual in a church; it was the clink of spurs. Everybody looked. A young cavalry soldier in a red uniform, with the three chevrons of a sergeant upon his sleeve, strode up the aisle, with an embarrassment which was only the more marked by the intense vigour of his step, and by the determination upon his face to show none. A slight flush had mounted his cheek by the time he had run the gauntlet between these women; but, passing on through the chancel arch, he never paused till he came close to the altar railing. Here for a moment he stood alone. The officiating curate, who had not yet doffed his surplice, perceived the new-comer, and followed him to the communion-space. He whispered to the soldier, and then beckoned to the clerk, who in his turn whispered to an elderly woman, apparently his wife, and they also went up the chancel steps. "'Tis a wedding!" murmured some of the women, brightening. "Let's wait!" The majority again sat down. There was a creaking of machinery behind, and some of the young ones turned their heads. From the interior face of the west wall of the tower projected a little canopy with a quarter-jack and small bell beneath it, the automaton being driven by the same clock machinery that struck the large bell in the tower. Between the tower and the church was a close screen, the door of which was kept shut during services, hiding this grotesque clockwork from sight. At present, however, the door was open, and the egress of the jack, the blows on the bell, and the mannikin's retreat into the nook again, were visible to many, and audible throughout the church. The jack had struck half-past eleven. "Where's the woman?" whispered some of the spectators. The young sergeant stood still with the abnormal rigidity of the old pillars around. He faced the south-east, and was as silent as he was still. The silence grew to be a noticeable thing as the minutes went on, and nobody else appeared, and not a soul moved. The rattle of the quarter-jack again from its niche, its blows for three-quarters, its fussy retreat, were almost painfully abrupt, and caused many of the congregation to start palpably. "I wonder where the woman is!" a voice whispered again. There began now that slight shifting of feet, that artificial coughing among several, which betrays a nervous suspense. At length there was a titter. But the soldier never moved. There he stood, his face to the south-east, upright as a column, his cap in his hand. The clock ticked on. The women threw off their nervousness, and titters and giggling became more frequent. Then came a dead silence. Every one was waiting for the end. Some persons may have noticed how extraordinarily the striking of quarters seems to quicken the flight of time. It was hardly credible that the jack had not got wrong with the minutes when the rattle began again, the puppet emerged, and the four quarters were struck fitfully as before. One could almost be positive that there was a malicious leer upon the hideous creature's face, and a mischievous delight in its twitchings. Then followed the dull and remote resonance of the twelve heavy strokes in the tower above. The women were impressed, and there was no giggle this time. The clergyman glided into the vestry, and the clerk vanished. The sergeant had not yet turned; every woman in the church was waiting to see his face, and he appeared to know it. At last he did turn, and stalked resolutely down the nave, braving them all, with a compressed lip. Two bowed and toothless old almsmen then looked at each other and chuckled, innocently enough; but the sound had a strange weird effect in that place. Opposite to the church was a paved square, around which several overhanging wood buildings of old time cast a picturesque shade. The young man on leaving the door went to cross the square, when, in the middle, he met a little woman. The expression of her face, which had been one of intense anxiety, sank at the sight of his nearly to terror. "Well?" he said, in a suppressed passion, fixedly looking at her. "Oh, Frank--I made a mistake!--I thought that church with the spire was All Saints', and I was at the door at half-past eleven to a minute as you said. I waited till a quarter to twelve, and found then that I was in All Souls'. But I wasn't much frightened, for I thought it could be to-morrow as well." "You fool, for so fooling me! But say no more." "Shall it be to-morrow, Frank?" she asked blankly. "To-morrow!" and he gave vent to a hoarse laugh. "I don't go through that experience again for some time, I warrant you!" "But after all," she expostulated in a trembling voice, "the mistake was not such a terrible thing! Now, dear Frank, when shall it be?" "Ah, when? God knows!" he said, with a light irony, and turning from her walked rapidly away. IN THE MARKET-PLACE On Saturday Boldwood was in Casterbridge market house as usual, when the disturber of his dreams entered and became visible to him. Adam had awakened from his deep sleep, and behold! there was Eve. The farmer took courage, and for the first time really looked at her. Material causes and emotional effects are not to be arranged in regular equation. The result from capital employed in the production of any movement of a mental nature is sometimes as tremendous as the cause itself is absurdly minute. When women are in a freakish mood, their usual intuition, either from carelessness or inherent defect, seemingly fails to teach them this, and hence it was that Bathsheba was fated to be astonished to-day. Boldwood looked at her--not slily, critically, or understandingly, but blankly at gaze, in the way a reaper looks up at a passing train--as something foreign to his element, and but dimly understood. To Boldwood women had been remote phenomena rather than necessary complements--comets of such uncertain aspect, movement, and permanence, that whether their orbits were as geometrical, unchangeable, and as subject to laws as his own, or as absolutely erratic as they superficially appeared, he had not deemed it his duty to consider. He saw her black hair, her correct facial curves and profile, and the roundness of her chin and throat. He saw then the side of her eyelids, eyes, and lashes, and the shape of her ear. Next he noticed her figure, her skirt, and the very soles of her shoes. Boldwood thought her beautiful, but wondered whether he was right in his thought, for it seemed impossible that this romance in the flesh, if so sweet as he imagined, could have been going on long without creating a commotion of delight among men, and provoking more inquiry than Bathsheba had done, even though that was not a little. To the best of his judgement neither nature nor art could improve this perfect one of an imperfect many. His heart began to move within him. Boldwood, it must be remembered, though forty years of age, had never before inspected a woman with the very centre and force of his glance; they had struck upon all his senses at wide angles. Was she really beautiful? He could not assure himself that his opinion was true even now. He furtively said to a neighbour, "Is Miss Everdene considered handsome?" "Oh yes; she was a good deal noticed the first time she came, if you remember. A very handsome girl indeed." A man is never more credulous than in receiving favourable opinions on the beauty of a woman he is half, or quite, in love with; a mere child's word on the point has the weight of an R.A.'s. Boldwood was satisfied now. And this charming woman had in effect said to him, "Marry me." Why should she have done that strange thing? Boldwood's blindness to the difference between approving of what circumstances suggest, and originating what they do not suggest, was well matched by Bathsheba's insensibility to the possibly great issues of little beginnings. She was at this moment coolly dealing with a dashing young farmer, adding up accounts with him as indifferently as if his face had been the pages of a ledger. It was evident that such a nature as his had no attraction for a woman of Bathsheba's taste. But Boldwood grew hot down to his hands with an incipient jealousy; he trod for the first time the threshold of "the injured lover's hell." His first impulse was to go and thrust himself between them. This could be done, but only in one way--by asking to see a sample of her corn. Boldwood renounced the idea. He could not make the request; it was debasing loveliness to ask it to buy and sell, and jarred with his conceptions of her. All this time Bathsheba was conscious of having broken into that dignified stronghold at last. His eyes, she knew, were following her everywhere. This was a triumph; and had it come naturally, such a triumph would have been the sweeter to her for this piquing delay. But it had been brought about by misdirected ingenuity, and she valued it only as she valued an artificial flower or a wax fruit. Being a woman with some good sense in reasoning on subjects wherein her heart was not involved, Bathsheba genuinely repented that a freak which had owed its existence as much to Liddy as to herself, should ever have been undertaken, to disturb the placidity of a man she respected too highly to deliberately tease. She that day nearly formed the intention of begging his pardon on the very next occasion of their meeting. The worst features of this arrangement were that, if he thought she ridiculed him, an apology would increase the offence by being disbelieved; and if he thought she wanted him to woo her, it would read like additional evidence of her forwardness. BOLDWOOD IN MEDITATION--REGRET Boldwood was tenant of what was called Little Weatherbury Farm, and his person was the nearest approach to aristocracy that this remoter quarter of the parish could boast of. Genteel strangers, whose god was their town, who might happen to be compelled to linger about this nook for a day, heard the sound of light wheels, and prayed to see good society, to the degree of a solitary lord, or squire at the very least, but it was only Mr. Boldwood going out for the day. They heard the sound of wheels yet once more, and were re-animated to expectancy: it was only Mr. Boldwood coming home again. His house stood recessed from the road, and the stables, which are to a farm what a fireplace is to a room, were behind, their lower portions being lost amid bushes of laurel. Inside the blue door, open half-way down, were to be seen at this time the backs and tails of half-a-dozen warm and contented horses standing in their stalls; and as thus viewed, they presented alternations of roan and bay, in shapes like a Moorish arch, the tail being a streak down the midst of each. Over these, and lost to the eye gazing in from the outer light, the mouths of the same animals could be heard busily sustaining the above-named warmth and plumpness by quantities of oats and hay. The restless and shadowy figure of a colt wandered about a loose-box at the end, whilst the steady grind of all the eaters was occasionally diversified by the rattle of a rope or the stamp of a foot. Pacing up and down at the heels of the animals was Farmer Boldwood himself. This place was his almonry and cloister in one: here, after looking to the feeding of his four-footed dependants, the celibate would walk and meditate of an evening till the moon's rays streamed in through the cobwebbed windows, or total darkness enveloped the scene. His square-framed perpendicularity showed more fully now than in the crowd and bustle of the market-house. In this meditative walk his foot met the floor with heel and toe simultaneously, and his fine reddish-fleshed face was bent downwards just enough to render obscure the still mouth and the well-rounded though rather prominent and broad chin. A few clear and thread-like horizontal lines were the only interruption to the otherwise smooth surface of his large forehead. The phases of Boldwood's life were ordinary enough, but his was not an ordinary nature. That stillness, which struck casual observers more than anything else in his character and habit, and seemed so precisely like the rest of inanition, may have been the perfect balance of enormous antagonistic forces--positives and negatives in fine adjustment. His equilibrium disturbed, he was in extremity at once. If an emotion possessed him at all, it ruled him; a feeling not mastering him was entirely latent. Stagnant or rapid, it was never slow. He was always hit mortally, or he was missed. He had no light and careless touches in his constitution, either for good or for evil. Stern in the outlines of action, mild in the details, he was serious throughout all. He saw no absurd sides to the follies of life, and thus, though not quite companionable in the eyes of merry men and scoffers, and those to whom all things show life as a jest, he was not intolerable to the earnest and those acquainted with grief. Being a man who read all the dramas of life seriously, if he failed to please when they were comedies, there was no frivolous treatment to reproach him for when they chanced to end tragically. Bathsheba was far from dreaming that the dark and silent shape upon which she had so carelessly thrown a seed was a hotbed of tropic intensity. Had she known Boldwood's moods, her blame would have been fearful, and the stain upon her heart ineradicable. Moreover, had she known her present power for good or evil over this man, she would have trembled at her responsibility. Luckily for her present, unluckily for her future tranquillity, her understanding had not yet told her what Boldwood was. Nobody knew entirely; for though it was possible to form guesses concerning his wild capabilities from old floodmarks faintly visible, he had never been seen at the high tides which caused them. Farmer Boldwood came to the stable-door and looked forth across the level fields. Beyond the first enclosure was a hedge, and on the other side of this a meadow belonging to Bathsheba's farm. It was now early spring--the time of going to grass with the sheep, when they have the first feed of the meadows, before these are laid up for mowing. The wind, which had been blowing east for several weeks, had veered to the southward, and the middle of spring had come abruptly--almost without a beginning. It was that period in the vernal quarter when we may suppose the Dryads to be waking for the season. The vegetable world begins to move and swell and the saps to rise, till in the completest silence of lone gardens and trackless plantations, where everything seems helpless and still after the bond and slavery of frost, there are bustlings, strainings, united thrusts, and pulls-all-together, in comparison with which the powerful tugs of cranes and pulleys in a noisy city are but pigmy efforts. Boldwood, looking into the distant meadows, saw there three figures. They were those of Miss Everdene, Shepherd Oak, and Cainy Ball. When Bathsheba's figure shone upon the farmer's eyes it lighted him up as the moon lights up a great tower. A man's body is as the shell, or the tablet, of his soul, as he is reserved or ingenuous, overflowing or self-contained. There was a change in Boldwood's exterior from its former impassibleness; and his face showed that he was now living outside his defences for the first time, and with a fearful sense of exposure. It is the usual experience of strong natures when they love. At last he arrived at a conclusion. It was to go across and inquire boldly of her. The insulation of his heart by reserve during these many years, without a channel of any kind for disposable emotion, had worked its effect. It has been observed more than once that the causes of love are chiefly subjective, and Boldwood was a living testimony to the truth of the proposition. No mother existed to absorb his devotion, no sister for his tenderness, no idle ties for sense. He became surcharged with the compound, which was genuine lover's love. He approached the gate of the meadow. Beyond it the ground was melodious with ripples, and the sky with larks; the low bleating of the flock mingling with both. Mistress and man were engaged in the operation of making a lamb "take," which is performed whenever an ewe has lost her own offspring, one of the twins of another ewe being given her as a substitute. Gabriel had skinned the dead lamb, and was tying the skin over the body of the live lamb, in the customary manner, whilst Bathsheba was holding open a little pen of four hurdles, into which the Mother and foisted lamb were driven, where they would remain till the old sheep conceived an affection for the young one. Bathsheba looked up at the completion of the manoeuvre and saw the farmer by the gate, where he was overhung by a willow tree in full bloom. Gabriel, to whom her face was as the uncertain glory of an April day, was ever regardful of its faintest changes, and instantly discerned thereon the mark of some influence from without, in the form of a keenly self-conscious reddening. He also turned and beheld Boldwood. At once connecting these signs with the letter Boldwood had shown him, Gabriel suspected her of some coquettish procedure begun by that means, and carried on since, he knew not how. Farmer Boldwood had read the pantomime denoting that they were aware of his presence, and the perception was as too much light turned upon his new sensibility. He was still in the road, and by moving on he hoped that neither would recognize that he had originally intended to enter the field. He passed by with an utter and overwhelming sensation of ignorance, shyness, and doubt. Perhaps in her manner there were signs that she wished to see him--perhaps not--he could not read a woman. The cabala of this erotic philosophy seemed to consist of the subtlest meanings expressed in misleading ways. Every turn, look, word, and accent contained a mystery quite distinct from its obvious import, and not one had ever been pondered by him until now. As for Bathsheba, she was not deceived into the belief that Farmer Boldwood had walked by on business or in idleness. She collected the probabilities of the case, and concluded that she was herself responsible for Boldwood's appearance there. It troubled her much to see what a great flame a little wildfire was likely to kindle. Bathsheba was no schemer for marriage, nor was she deliberately a trifler with the affections of men, and a censor's experience on seeing an actual flirt after observing her would have been a feeling of surprise that Bathsheba could be so different from such a one, and yet so like what a flirt is supposed to be. She resolved never again, by look or by sign, to interrupt the steady flow of this man's life. But a resolution to avoid an evil is seldom framed till the evil is so far advanced as to make avoidance impossible. THE SHEEP-WASHING--THE OFFER Boldwood did eventually call upon her. She was not at home. "Of course not," he murmured. In contemplating Bathsheba as a woman, he had forgotten the accidents of her position as an agriculturist--that being as much of a farmer, and as extensive a farmer, as himself, her probable whereabouts was out-of-doors at this time of the year. This, and the other oversights Boldwood was guilty of, were natural to the mood, and still more natural to the circumstances. The great aids to idealization in love were present here: occasional observation of her from a distance, and the absence of social intercourse with her--visual familiarity, oral strangeness. The smaller human elements were kept out of sight; the pettinesses that enter so largely into all earthly living and doing were disguised by the accident of lover and loved-one not being on visiting terms; and there was hardly awakened a thought in Boldwood that sorry household realities appertained to her, or that she, like all others, had moments of commonplace, when to be least plainly seen was to be most prettily remembered. Thus a mild sort of apotheosis took place in his fancy, whilst she still lived and breathed within his own horizon, a troubled creature like himself. It was the end of May when the farmer determined to be no longer repulsed by trivialities or distracted by suspense. He had by this time grown used to being in love; the passion now startled him less even when it tortured him more, and he felt himself adequate to the situation. On inquiring for her at her house they had told him she was at the sheep-washing, and he went off to seek her there. The sheep-washing pool was a perfectly circular basin of brickwork in the meadows, full of the clearest water. To birds on the wing its glassy surface, reflecting the light sky, must have been visible for miles around as a glistening Cyclops' eye in a green face. The grass about the margin at this season was a sight to remember long--in a minor sort of way. Its activity in sucking the moisture from the rich damp sod was almost a process observable by the eye. The outskirts of this level water-meadow were diversified by rounded and hollow pastures, where just now every flower that was not a buttercup was a daisy. The river slid along noiselessly as a shade, the swelling reeds and sedge forming a flexible palisade upon its moist brink. To the north of the mead were trees, the leaves of which were new, soft, and moist, not yet having stiffened and darkened under summer sun and drought, their colour being yellow beside a green--green beside a yellow. From the recesses of this knot of foliage the loud notes of three cuckoos were resounding through the still air. Boldwood went meditating down the slopes with his eyes on his boots, which the yellow pollen from the buttercups had bronzed in artistic gradations. A tributary of the main stream flowed through the basin of the pool by an inlet and outlet at opposite points of its diameter. Shepherd Oak, Jan Coggan, Moon, Poorgrass, Cain Ball, and several others were assembled here, all dripping wet to the very roots of their hair, and Bathsheba was standing by in a new riding-habit--the most elegant she had ever worn--the reins of her horse being looped over her arm. Flagons of cider were rolling about upon the green. The meek sheep were pushed into the pool by Coggan and Matthew Moon, who stood by the lower hatch, immersed to their waists; then Gabriel, who stood on the brink, thrust them under as they swam along, with an instrument like a crutch, formed for the purpose, and also for assisting the exhausted animals when the wool became saturated and they began to sink. They were let out against the stream, and through the upper opening, all impurities flowing away below. Cainy Ball and Joseph, who performed this latter operation, were if possible wetter than the rest; they resembled dolphins under a fountain, every protuberance and angle of their clothes dribbling forth a small rill. Boldwood came close and bade her good morning, with such constraint that she could not but think he had stepped across to the washing for its own sake, hoping not to find her there; more, she fancied his brow severe and his eye slighting. Bathsheba immediately contrived to withdraw, and glided along by the river till she was a stone's throw off. She heard footsteps brushing the grass, and had a consciousness that love was encircling her like a perfume. Instead of turning or waiting, Bathsheba went further among the high sedges, but Boldwood seemed determined, and pressed on till they were completely past the bend of the river. Here, without being seen, they could hear the splashing and shouts of the washers above. "Miss Everdene!" said the farmer. She trembled, turned, and said "Good morning." His tone was so utterly removed from all she had expected as a beginning. It was lowness and quiet accentuated: an emphasis of deep meanings, their form, at the same time, being scarcely expressed. Silence has sometimes a remarkable power of showing itself as the disembodied soul of feeling wandering without its carcase, and it is then more impressive than speech. In the same way, to say a little is often to tell more than to say a great deal. Boldwood told everything in that word. As the consciousness expands on learning that what was fancied to be the rumble of wheels is the reverberation of thunder, so did Bathsheba's at her intuitive conviction. "I feel--almost too much--to think," he said, with a solemn simplicity. "I have come to speak to you without preface. My life is not my own since I have beheld you clearly, Miss Everdene--I come to make you an offer of marriage." Bathsheba tried to preserve an absolutely neutral countenance, and all the motion she made was that of closing lips which had previously been a little parted. "I am now forty-one years old," he went on. "I may have been called a confirmed bachelor, and I was a confirmed bachelor. I had never any views of myself as a husband in my earlier days, nor have I made any calculation on the subject since I have been older. But we all change, and my change, in this matter, came with seeing you. I have felt lately, more and more, that my present way of living is bad in every respect. Beyond all things, I want you as my wife." "I feel, Mr. Boldwood, that though I respect you much, I do not feel--what would justify me to--in accepting your offer," she stammered. This giving back of dignity for dignity seemed to open the sluices of feeling that Boldwood had as yet kept closed. "My life is a burden without you," he exclaimed, in a low voice. "I want you--I want you to let me say I love you again and again!" Bathsheba answered nothing, and the horse upon her arm seemed so impressed that instead of cropping the herbage she looked up. "I think and hope you care enough for me to listen to what I have to tell!" Bathsheba's momentary impulse at hearing this was to ask why he thought that, till she remembered that, far from being a conceited assumption on Boldwood's part, it was but the natural conclusion of serious reflection based on deceptive premises of her own offering. "I wish I could say courteous flatteries to you," the farmer continued in an easier tone, "and put my rugged feeling into a graceful shape: but I have neither power nor patience to learn such things. I want you for my wife--so wildly that no other feeling can abide in me; but I should not have spoken out had I not been led to hope." "The valentine again! O that valentine!" she said to herself, but not a word to him. "If you can love me say so, Miss Everdene. If not--don't say no!" "Mr. Boldwood, it is painful to have to say I am surprised, so that I don't know how to answer you with propriety and respect--but am only just able to speak out my feeling--I mean my meaning; that I am afraid I can't marry you, much as I respect you. You are too dignified for me to suit you, sir." "But, Miss Everdene!" "I--I didn't--I know I ought never to have dreamt of sending that valentine--forgive me, sir--it was a wanton thing which no woman with any self-respect should have done. If you will only pardon my thoughtlessness, I promise never to--" "No, no, no. Don't say thoughtlessness! Make me think it was something more--that it was a sort of prophetic instinct--the beginning of a feeling that you would like me. You torture me to say it was done in thoughtlessness--I never thought of it in that light, and I can't endure it. Ah! I wish I knew how to win you! but that I can't do--I can only ask if I have already got you. If I have not, and it is not true that you have come unwittingly to me as I have to you, I can say no more." "I have not fallen in love with you, Mr. Boldwood--certainly I must say that." She allowed a very small smile to creep for the first time over her serious face in saying this, and the white row of upper teeth, and keenly-cut lips already noticed, suggested an idea of heartlessness, which was immediately contradicted by the pleasant eyes. "But you will just think--in kindness and condescension think--if you cannot bear with me as a husband! I fear I am too old for you, but believe me I will take more care of you than would many a man of your own age. I will protect and cherish you with all my strength--I will indeed! You shall have no cares--be worried by no household affairs, and live quite at ease, Miss Everdene. The dairy superintendence shall be done by a man--I can afford it well--you shall never have so much as to look out of doors at haymaking time, or to think of weather in the harvest. I rather cling to the chaise, because it is the same my poor father and mother drove, but if you don't like it I will sell it, and you shall have a pony-carriage of your own. I cannot say how far above every other idea and object on earth you seem to me--nobody knows--God only knows--how much you are to me!" Bathsheba's heart was young, and it swelled with sympathy for the deep-natured man who spoke so simply. "Don't say it! don't! I cannot bear you to feel so much, and me to feel nothing. And I am afraid they will notice us, Mr. Boldwood. Will you let the matter rest now? I cannot think collectedly. I did not know you were going to say this to me. Oh, I am wicked to have made you suffer so!" She was frightened as well as agitated at his vehemence. "Say then, that you don't absolutely refuse. Do not quite refuse?" "I can do nothing. I cannot answer." "I may speak to you again on the subject?" "Yes." "I may think of you?" "Yes, I suppose you may think of me." "And hope to obtain you?" "No--do not hope! Let us go on." "I will call upon you again to-morrow." "No--please not. Give me time." "Yes--I will give you any time," he said earnestly and gratefully. "I am happier now." "No--I beg you! Don't be happier if happiness only comes from my agreeing. Be neutral, Mr. Boldwood! I must think." "I will wait," he said. And then she turned away. Boldwood dropped his gaze to the ground, and stood long like a man who did not know where he was. Realities then returned upon him like the pain of a wound received in an excitement which eclipses it, and he, too, then went on. PERPLEXITY--GRINDING THE SHEARS--A QUARREL "He is so disinterested and kind to offer me all that I can desire," Bathsheba mused. Yet Farmer Boldwood, whether by nature kind or the reverse to kind, did not exercise kindness, here. The rarest offerings of the purest loves are but a self-indulgence, and no generosity at all. Bathsheba, not being the least in love with him, was eventually able to look calmly at his offer. It was one which many women of her own station in the neighbourhood, and not a few of higher rank, would have been wild to accept and proud to publish. In every point of view, ranging from politic to passionate, it was desirable that she, a lonely girl, should marry, and marry this earnest, well-to-do, and respected man. He was close to her doors: his standing was sufficient: his qualities were even supererogatory. Had she felt, which she did not, any wish whatever for the married state in the abstract, she could not reasonably have rejected him, being a woman who frequently appealed to her understanding for deliverance from her whims. Boldwood as a means to marriage was unexceptionable: she esteemed and liked him, yet she did not want him. It appears that ordinary men take wives because possession is not possible without marriage, and that ordinary women accept husbands because marriage is not possible without possession; with totally differing aims the method is the same on both sides. But the understood incentive on the woman's part was wanting here. Besides, Bathsheba's position as absolute mistress of a farm and house was a novel one, and the novelty had not yet begun to wear off. But a disquiet filled her which was somewhat to her credit, for it would have affected few. Beyond the mentioned reasons with which she combated her objections, she had a strong feeling that, having been the one who began the game, she ought in honesty to accept the consequences. Still the reluctance remained. She said in the same breath that it would be ungenerous not to marry Boldwood, and that she couldn't do it to save her life. Bathsheba's was an impulsive nature under a deliberative aspect. An Elizabeth in brain and a Mary Stuart in spirit, she often performed actions of the greatest temerity with a manner of extreme discretion. Many of her thoughts were perfect syllogisms; unluckily they always remained thoughts. Only a few were irrational assumptions; but, unfortunately, they were the ones which most frequently grew into deeds. The next day to that of the declaration she found Gabriel Oak at the bottom of her garden, grinding his shears for the sheep-shearing. All the surrounding cottages were more or less scenes of the same operation; the scurr of whetting spread into the sky from all parts of the village as from an armoury previous to a campaign. Peace and war kiss each other at their hours of preparation--sickles, scythes, shears, and pruning-hooks, ranking with swords, bayonets, and lances, in their common necessity for point and edge. Cainy Ball turned the handle of Gabriel's grindstone, his head performing a melancholy see-saw up and down with each turn of the wheel. Oak stood somewhat as Eros is represented when in the act of sharpening his arrows: his figure slightly bent, the weight of his body thrown over on the shears, and his head balanced side-ways, with a critical compression of the lips and contraction of the eyelids to crown the attitude. His mistress came up and looked upon them in silence for a minute or two; then she said-- "Cain, go to the lower mead and catch the bay mare. I'll turn the winch of the grindstone. I want to speak to you, Gabriel." Cain departed, and Bathsheba took the handle. Gabriel had glanced up in intense surprise, quelled its expression, and looked down again. Bathsheba turned the winch, and Gabriel applied the shears. The peculiar motion involved in turning a wheel has a wonderful tendency to benumb the mind. It is a sort of attenuated variety of Ixion's punishment, and contributes a dismal chapter to the history of gaols. The brain gets muddled, the head grows heavy, and the body's centre of gravity seems to settle by degrees in a leaden lump somewhere between the eyebrows and the crown. Bathsheba felt the unpleasant symptoms after two or three dozen turns. "Will you turn, Gabriel, and let me hold the shears?" she said. "My head is in a whirl, and I can't talk." Gabriel turned. Bathsheba then began, with some awkwardness, allowing her thoughts to stray occasionally from her story to attend to the shears, which required a little nicety in sharpening. "I wanted to ask you if the men made any observations on my going behind the sedge with Mr. Boldwood yesterday?" "Yes, they did," said Gabriel. "You don't hold the shears right, miss--I knew you wouldn't know the way--hold like this." He relinquished the winch, and inclosing her two hands completely in his own (taking each as we sometimes slap a child's hand in teaching him to write), grasped the shears with her. "Incline the edge so," he said. Hands and shears were inclined to suit the words, and held thus for a peculiarly long time by the instructor as he spoke. "That will do," exclaimed Bathsheba. "Loose my hands. I won't have them held! Turn the winch." Gabriel freed her hands quietly, retired to his handle, and the grinding went on. "Did the men think it odd?" she said again. "Odd was not the idea, miss." "What did they say?" "That Farmer Boldwood's name and your own were likely to be flung over pulpit together before the year was out." "I thought so by the look of them! Why, there's nothing in it. A more foolish remark was never made, and I want you to contradict it! that's what I came for." Gabriel looked incredulous and sad, but between his moments of incredulity, relieved. "They must have heard our conversation," she continued. "Well, then, Bathsheba!" said Oak, stopping the handle, and gazing into her face with astonishment. "Miss Everdene, you mean," she said, with dignity. "I mean this, that if Mr. Boldwood really spoke of marriage, I bain't going to tell a story and say he didn't to please you. I have already tried to please you too much for my own good!" Bathsheba regarded him with round-eyed perplexity. She did not know whether to pity him for disappointed love of her, or to be angry with him for having got over it--his tone being ambiguous. "I said I wanted you just to mention that it was not true I was going to be married to him," she murmured, with a slight decline in her assurance. "I can say that to them if you wish, Miss Everdene. And I could likewise give an opinion to 'ee on what you have done." "I daresay. But I don't want your opinion." "I suppose not," said Gabriel bitterly, and going on with his turning, his words rising and falling in a regular swell and cadence as he stooped or rose with the winch, which directed them, according to his position, perpendicularly into the earth, or horizontally along the garden, his eyes being fixed on a leaf upon the ground. With Bathsheba a hastened act was a rash act; but, as does not always happen, time gained was prudence insured. It must be added, however, that time was very seldom gained. At this period the single opinion in the parish on herself and her doings that she valued as sounder than her own was Gabriel Oak's. And the outspoken honesty of his character was such that on any subject, even that of her love for, or marriage with, another man, the same disinterestedness of opinion might be calculated on, and be had for the asking. Thoroughly convinced of the impossibility of his own suit, a high resolve constrained him not to injure that of another. This is a lover's most stoical virtue, as the lack of it is a lover's most venial sin. Knowing he would reply truly she asked the question, painful as she must have known the subject would be. Such is the selfishness of some charming women. Perhaps it was some excuse for her thus torturing honesty to her own advantage, that she had absolutely no other sound judgment within easy reach. "Well, what is your opinion of my conduct," she said, quietly. "That it is unworthy of any thoughtful, and meek, and comely woman." In an instant Bathsheba's face coloured with the angry crimson of a Danby sunset. But she forbore to utter this feeling, and the reticence of her tongue only made the loquacity of her face the more noticeable. The next thing Gabriel did was to make a mistake. "Perhaps you don't like the rudeness of my reprimanding you, for I know it is rudeness; but I thought it would do good." She instantly replied sarcastically-- "On the contrary, my opinion of you is so low, that I see in your abuse the praise of discerning people!" "I am glad you don't mind it, for I said it honestly and with every serious meaning." "I see. But, unfortunately, when you try not to speak in jest you are amusing--just as when you wish to avoid seriousness you sometimes say a sensible word." It was a hard hit, but Bathsheba had unmistakably lost her temper, and on that account Gabriel had never in his life kept his own better. He said nothing. She then broke out-- "I may ask, I suppose, where in particular my unworthiness lies? In my not marrying you, perhaps!" "Not by any means," said Gabriel quietly. "I have long given up thinking of that matter." "Or wishing it, I suppose," she said; and it was apparent that she expected an unhesitating denial of this supposition. Whatever Gabriel felt, he coolly echoed her words-- "Or wishing it either." A woman may be treated with a bitterness which is sweet to her, and with a rudeness which is not offensive. Bathsheba would have submitted to an indignant chastisement for her levity had Gabriel protested that he was loving her at the same time; the impetuosity of passion unrequited is bearable, even if it stings and anathematizes--there is a triumph in the humiliation, and a tenderness in the strife. This was what she had been expecting, and what she had not got. To be lectured because the lecturer saw her in the cold morning light of open-shuttered disillusion was exasperating. He had not finished, either. He continued in a more agitated voice:-- "My opinion is (since you ask it) that you are greatly to blame for playing pranks upon a man like Mr. Boldwood, merely as a pastime. Leading on a man you don't care for is not a praiseworthy action. And even, Miss Everdene, if you seriously inclined towards him, you might have let him find it out in some way of true loving-kindness, and not by sending him a valentine's letter." Bathsheba laid down the shears. "I cannot allow any man to--to criticise my private conduct!" she exclaimed. "Nor will I for a minute. So you'll please leave the farm at the end of the week!" It may have been a peculiarity--at any rate it was a fact--that when Bathsheba was swayed by an emotion of an earthly sort her lower lip trembled: when by a refined emotion, her upper or heavenward one. Her nether lip quivered now. "Very well, so I will," said Gabriel calmly. He had been held to her by a beautiful thread which it pained him to spoil by breaking, rather than by a chain he could not break. "I should be even better pleased to go at once," he added. "Go at once then, in Heaven's name!" said she, her eyes flashing at his, though never meeting them. "Don't let me see your face any more." "Very well, Miss Everdene--so it shall be." And he took his shears and went away from her in placid dignity, as Moses left the presence of Pharaoh. TROUBLES IN THE FOLD--A MESSAGE Gabriel Oak had ceased to feed the Weatherbury flock for about four-and-twenty hours, when on Sunday afternoon the elderly gentlemen Joseph Poorgrass, Matthew Moon, Fray, and half-a-dozen others, came running up to the house of the mistress of the Upper Farm. "Whatever IS the matter, men?" she said, meeting them at the door just as she was coming out on her way to church, and ceasing in a moment from the close compression of her two red lips, with which she had accompanied the exertion of pulling on a tight glove. "Sixty!" said Joseph Poorgrass. "Seventy!" said Moon. "Fifty-nine!" said Susan Tall's husband. "--Sheep have broke fence," said Fray. "--And got into a field of young clover," said Tall. "--Young clover!" said Moon. "--Clover!" said Joseph Poorgrass. "And they be getting blasted," said Henery Fray. "That they be," said Joseph. "And will all die as dead as nits, if they bain't got out and cured!" said Tall. Joseph's countenance was drawn into lines and puckers by his concern. Fray's forehead was wrinkled both perpendicularly and crosswise, after the pattern of a portcullis, expressive of a double despair. Laban Tall's lips were thin, and his face was rigid. Matthew's jaws sank, and his eyes turned whichever way the strongest muscle happened to pull them. "Yes," said Joseph, "and I was sitting at home, looking for Ephesians, and says I to myself, ''Tis nothing but Corinthians and Thessalonians in this danged Testament,' when who should come in but Henery there: 'Joseph,' he said, 'the sheep have blasted theirselves--'" With Bathsheba it was a moment when thought was speech and speech exclamation. Moreover, she had hardly recovered her equanimity since the disturbance which she had suffered from Oak's remarks. "That's enough--that's enough!--oh, you fools!" she cried, throwing the parasol and Prayer-book into the passage, and running out of doors in the direction signified. "To come to me, and not go and get them out directly! Oh, the stupid numskulls!" Her eyes were at their darkest and brightest now. Bathsheba's beauty belonging rather to the demonian than to the angelic school, she never looked so well as when she was angry--and particularly when the effect was heightened by a rather dashing velvet dress, carefully put on before a glass. All the ancient men ran in a jumbled throng after her to the clover-field, Joseph sinking down in the midst when about half-way, like an individual withering in a world which was more and more insupportable. Having once received the stimulus that her presence always gave them they went round among the sheep with a will. The majority of the afflicted animals were lying down, and could not be stirred. These were bodily lifted out, and the others driven into the adjoining field. Here, after the lapse of a few minutes, several more fell down, and lay helpless and livid as the rest. Bathsheba, with a sad, bursting heart, looked at these primest specimens of her prime flock as they rolled there-- Swoln with wind and the rank mist they drew. Many of them foamed at the mouth, their breathing being quick and short, whilst the bodies of all were fearfully distended. "Oh, what can I do, what can I do!" said Bathsheba, helplessly. "Sheep are such unfortunate animals!--there's always something happening to them! I never knew a flock pass a year without getting into some scrape or other." "There's only one way of saving them," said Tall. "What way? Tell me quick!" "They must be pierced in the side with a thing made on purpose." "Can you do it? Can I?" "No, ma'am. We can't, nor you neither. It must be done in a particular spot. If ye go to the right or left but an inch you stab the ewe and kill her. Not even a shepherd can do it, as a rule." "Then they must die," she said, in a resigned tone. "Only one man in the neighbourhood knows the way," said Joseph, now just come up. "He could cure 'em all if he were here." "Who is he? Let's get him!" "Shepherd Oak," said Matthew. "Ah, he's a clever man in talents!" "Ah, that he is so!" said Joseph Poorgrass. "True--he's the man," said Laban Tall. "How dare you name that man in my presence!" she said excitedly. "I told you never to allude to him, nor shall you if you stay with me. Ah!" she added, brightening, "Farmer Boldwood knows!" "O no, ma'am" said Matthew. "Two of his store ewes got into some vetches t'other day, and were just like these. He sent a man on horseback here post-haste for Gable, and Gable went and saved 'em. Farmer Boldwood hev got the thing they do it with. 'Tis a holler pipe, with a sharp pricker inside. Isn't it, Joseph?" "Ay--a holler pipe," echoed Joseph. "That's what 'tis." "Ay, sure--that's the machine," chimed in Henery Fray, reflectively, with an Oriental indifference to the flight of time. "Well," burst out Bathsheba, "don't stand there with your 'ayes' and your 'sures' talking at me! Get somebody to cure the sheep instantly!" All then stalked off in consternation, to get somebody as directed, without any idea of who it was to be. In a minute they had vanished through the gate, and she stood alone with the dying flock. "Never will I send for him--never!" she said firmly. One of the ewes here contracted its muscles horribly, extended itself, and jumped high into the air. The leap was an astonishing one. The ewe fell heavily, and lay still. Bathsheba went up to it. The sheep was dead. "Oh, what shall I do--what shall I do!" she again exclaimed, wringing her hands. "I won't send for him. No, I won't!" The most vigorous expression of a resolution does not always coincide with the greatest vigour of the resolution itself. It is often flung out as a sort of prop to support a decaying conviction which, whilst strong, required no enunciation to prove it so. The "No, I won't" of Bathsheba meant virtually, "I think I must." She followed her assistants through the gate, and lifted her hand to one of them. Laban answered to her signal. "Where is Oak staying?" "Across the valley at Nest Cottage!" "Jump on the bay mare, and ride across, and say he must return instantly--that I say so." Tall scrambled off to the field, and in two minutes was on Poll, the bay, bare-backed, and with only a halter by way of rein. He diminished down the hill. Bathsheba watched. So did all the rest. Tall cantered along the bridle-path through Sixteen Acres, Sheeplands, Middle Field, The Flats, Cappel's Piece, shrank almost to a point, crossed the bridge, and ascended from the valley through Springmead and Whitepits on the other side. The cottage to which Gabriel had retired before taking his final departure from the locality was visible as a white spot on the opposite hill, backed by blue firs. Bathsheba walked up and down. The men entered the field and endeavoured to ease the anguish of the dumb creatures by rubbing them. Nothing availed. Bathsheba continued walking. The horse was seen descending the hill, and the wearisome series had to be repeated in reverse order: Whitepits, Springmead, Cappel's Piece, The Flats, Middle Field, Sheeplands, Sixteen Acres. She hoped Tall had had presence of mind enough to give the mare up to Gabriel, and return himself on foot. The rider neared them. It was Tall. "Oh, what folly!" said Bathsheba. Gabriel was not visible anywhere. "Perhaps he is already gone!" she said. Tall came into the inclosure, and leapt off, his face tragic as Morton's after the battle of Shrewsbury. "Well?" said Bathsheba, unwilling to believe that her verbal _lettre-de-cachet_ could possibly have miscarried. "He says BEGGARS MUSTN'T BE CHOOSERS," replied Laban. "What!" said the young farmer, opening her eyes and drawing in her breath for an outburst. Joseph Poorgrass retired a few steps behind a hurdle. "He says he shall not come onless you request en to come civilly and in a proper manner, as becomes any 'ooman begging a favour." "Oh, oh, that's his answer! Where does he get his airs? Who am I, then, to be treated like that? Shall I beg to a man who has begged to me?" Another of the flock sprang into the air, and fell dead. The men looked grave, as if they suppressed opinion. Bathsheba turned aside, her eyes full of tears. The strait she was in through pride and shrewishness could not be disguised longer: she burst out crying bitterly; they all saw it; and she attempted no further concealment. "I wouldn't cry about it, miss," said William Smallbury, compassionately. "Why not ask him softer like? I'm sure he'd come then. Gable is a true man in that way." Bathsheba checked her grief and wiped her eyes. "Oh, it is a wicked cruelty to me--it is--it is!" she murmured. "And he drives me to do what I wouldn't; yes, he does!--Tall, come indoors." After this collapse, not very dignified for the head of an establishment, she went into the house, Tall at her heels. Here she sat down and hastily scribbled a note between the small convulsive sobs of convalescence which follow a fit of crying as a ground-swell follows a storm. The note was none the less polite for being written in a hurry. She held it at a distance, was about to fold it, then added these words at the bottom:-- "DO NOT DESERT ME, GABRIEL!" She looked a little redder in refolding it, and closed her lips, as if thereby to suspend till too late the action of conscience in examining whether such strategy were justifiable. The note was despatched as the message had been, and Bathsheba waited indoors for the result. It was an anxious quarter of an hour that intervened between the messenger's departure and the sound of the horse's tramp again outside. She could not watch this time, but, leaning over the old bureau at which she had written the letter, closed her eyes, as if to keep out both hope and fear. The case, however, was a promising one. Gabriel was not angry: he was simply neutral, although her first command had been so haughty. Such imperiousness would have damned a little less beauty; and on the other hand, such beauty would have redeemed a little less imperiousness. She went out when the horse was heard, and looked up. A mounted figure passed between her and the sky, and drew on towards the field of sheep, the rider turning his face in receding. Gabriel looked at her. It was a moment when a woman's eyes and tongue tell distinctly opposite tales. Bathsheba looked full of gratitude, and she said:-- "Oh, Gabriel, how could you serve me so unkindly!" Such a tenderly-shaped reproach for his previous delay was the one speech in the language that he could pardon for not being commendation of his readiness now. Gabriel murmured a confused reply, and hastened on. She knew from the look which sentence in her note had brought him. Bathsheba followed to the field. Gabriel was already among the turgid, prostrate forms. He had flung off his coat, rolled up his shirt-sleeves, and taken from his pocket the instrument of salvation. It was a small tube or trochar, with a lance passing down the inside; and Gabriel began to use it with a dexterity that would have graced a hospital surgeon. Passing his hand over the sheep's left flank, and selecting the proper point, he punctured the skin and rumen with the lance as it stood in the tube; then he suddenly withdrew the lance, retaining the tube in its place. A current of air rushed up the tube, forcible enough to have extinguished a candle held at the orifice. It has been said that mere ease after torment is delight for a time; and the countenances of these poor creatures expressed it now. Forty-nine operations were successfully performed. Owing to the great hurry necessitated by the far-gone state of some of the flock, Gabriel missed his aim in one case, and in one only--striking wide of the mark, and inflicting a mortal blow at once upon the suffering ewe. Four had died; three recovered without an operation. The total number of sheep which had thus strayed and injured themselves so dangerously was fifty-seven. When the love-led man had ceased from his labours, Bathsheba came and looked him in the face. "Gabriel, will you stay on with me?" she said, smiling winningly, and not troubling to bring her lips quite together again at the end, because there was going to be another smile soon. "I will," said Gabriel. And she smiled on him again. THE GREAT BARN AND THE SHEEP-SHEARERS Men thin away to insignificance and oblivion quite as often by not making the most of good spirits when they have them as by lacking good spirits when they are indispensable. Gabriel lately, for the first time since his prostration by misfortune, had been independent in thought and vigorous in action to a marked extent--conditions which, powerless without an opportunity as an opportunity without them is barren, would have given him a sure lift upwards when the favourable conjunction should have occurred. But this incurable loitering beside Bathsheba Everdene stole his time ruinously. The spring tides were going by without floating him off, and the neap might soon come which could not. It was the first day of June, and the sheep-shearing season culminated, the landscape, even to the leanest pasture, being all health and colour. Every green was young, every pore was open, and every stalk was swollen with racing currents of juice. God was palpably present in the country, and the devil had gone with the world to town. Flossy catkins of the later kinds, fern-sprouts like bishops' croziers, the square-headed moschatel, the odd cuckoo-pint,--like an apoplectic saint in a niche of malachite,--snow-white ladies'-smocks, the toothwort, approximating to human flesh, the enchanter's night-shade, and the black-petaled doleful-bells, were among the quainter objects of the vegetable world in and about Weatherbury at this teeming time; and of the animal, the metamorphosed figures of Mr. Jan Coggan, the master-shearer; the second and third shearers, who travelled in the exercise of their calling, and do not require definition by name; Henery Fray the fourth shearer, Susan Tall's husband the fifth, Joseph Poorgrass the sixth, young Cain Ball as assistant-shearer, and Gabriel Oak as general supervisor. None of these were clothed to any extent worth mentioning, each appearing to have hit in the matter of raiment the decent mean between a high and low caste Hindoo. An angularity of lineament, and a fixity of facial machinery in general, proclaimed that serious work was the order of the day. They sheared in the great barn, called for the nonce the Shearing-barn, which on ground-plan resembled a church with transepts. It not only emulated the form of the neighbouring church of the parish, but vied with it in antiquity. Whether the barn had ever formed one of a group of conventual buildings nobody seemed to be aware; no trace of such surroundings remained. The vast porches at the sides, lofty enough to admit a waggon laden to its highest with corn in the sheaf, were spanned by heavy-pointed arches of stone, broadly and boldly cut, whose very simplicity was the origin of a grandeur not apparent in erections where more ornament has been attempted. The dusky, filmed, chestnut roof, braced and tied in by huge collars, curves, and diagonals, was far nobler in design, because more wealthy in material, than nine-tenths of those in our modern churches. Along each side wall was a range of striding buttresses, throwing deep shadows on the spaces between them, which were perforated by lancet openings, combining in their proportions the precise requirements both of beauty and ventilation. One could say about this barn, what could hardly be said of either the church or the castle, akin to it in age and style, that the purpose which had dictated its original erection was the same with that to which it was still applied. Unlike and superior to either of those two typical remnants of mediaevalism, the old barn embodied practices which had suffered no mutilation at the hands of time. Here at least the spirit of the ancient builders was at one with the spirit of the modern beholder. Standing before this abraded pile, the eye regarded its present usage, the mind dwelt upon its past history, with a satisfied sense of functional continuity throughout--a feeling almost of gratitude, and quite of pride, at the permanence of the idea which had heaped it up. The fact that four centuries had neither proved it to be founded on a mistake, inspired any hatred of its purpose, nor given rise to any reaction that had battered it down, invested this simple grey effort of old minds with a repose, if not a grandeur, which a too curious reflection was apt to disturb in its ecclesiastical and military compeers. For once mediaevalism and modernism had a common stand-point. The lanceolate windows, the time-eaten archstones and chamfers, the orientation of the axis, the misty chestnut work of the rafters, referred to no exploded fortifying art or worn-out religious creed. The defence and salvation of the body by daily bread is still a study, a religion, and a desire. To-day the large side doors were thrown open towards the sun to admit a bountiful light to the immediate spot of the shearers' operations, which was the wood threshing-floor in the centre, formed of thick oak, black with age and polished by the beating of flails for many generations, till it had grown as slippery and as rich in hue as the state-room floors of an Elizabethan mansion. Here the shearers knelt, the sun slanting in upon their bleached shirts, tanned arms, and the polished shears they flourished, causing these to bristle with a thousand rays strong enough to blind a weak-eyed man. Beneath them a captive sheep lay panting, quickening its pants as misgiving merged in terror, till it quivered like the hot landscape outside. This picture of to-day in its frame of four hundred years ago did not produce that marked contrast between ancient and modern which is implied by the contrast of date. In comparison with cities, Weatherbury was immutable. The citizen's THEN is the rustic's NOW. In London, twenty or thirty-years ago are old times; in Paris ten years, or five; in Weatherbury three or four score years were included in the mere present, and nothing less than a century set a mark on its face or tone. Five decades hardly modified the cut of a gaiter, the embroidery of a smock-frock, by the breadth of a hair. Ten generations failed to alter the turn of a single phrase. In these Wessex nooks the busy outsider's ancient times are only old; his old times are still new; his present is futurity. So the barn was natural to the shearers, and the shearers were in harmony with the barn. The spacious ends of the building, answering ecclesiastically to nave and chancel extremities, were fenced off with hurdles, the sheep being all collected in a crowd within these two enclosures; and in one angle a catching-pen was formed, in which three or four sheep were continuously kept ready for the shearers to seize without loss of time. In the background, mellowed by tawny shade, were the three women, Maryann Money, and Temperance and Soberness Miller, gathering up the fleeces and twisting ropes of wool with a wimble for tying them round. They were indifferently well assisted by the old maltster, who, when the malting season from October to April had passed, made himself useful upon any of the bordering farmsteads. Behind all was Bathsheba, carefully watching the men to see that there was no cutting or wounding through carelessness, and that the animals were shorn close. Gabriel, who flitted and hovered under her bright eyes like a moth, did not shear continuously, half his time being spent in attending to the others and selecting the sheep for them. At the present moment he was engaged in handing round a mug of mild liquor, supplied from a barrel in the corner, and cut pieces of bread and cheese. Bathsheba, after throwing a glance here, a caution there, and lecturing one of the younger operators who had allowed his last finished sheep to go off among the flock without re-stamping it with her initials, came again to Gabriel, as he put down the luncheon to drag a frightened ewe to his shear-station, flinging it over upon its back with a dexterous twist of the arm. He lopped off the tresses about its head, and opened up the neck and collar, his mistress quietly looking on. "She blushes at the insult," murmured Bathsheba, watching the pink flush which arose and overspread the neck and shoulders of the ewe where they were left bare by the clicking shears--a flush which was enviable, for its delicacy, by many queens of coteries, and would have been creditable, for its promptness, to any woman in the world. Poor Gabriel's soul was fed with a luxury of content by having her over him, her eyes critically regarding his skilful shears, which apparently were going to gather up a piece of the flesh at every close, and yet never did so. Like Guildenstern, Oak was happy in that he was not over happy. He had no wish to converse with her: that his bright lady and himself formed one group, exclusively their own, and containing no others in the world, was enough. So the chatter was all on her side. There is a loquacity that tells nothing, which was Bathsheba's; and there is a silence which says much: that was Gabriel's. Full of this dim and temperate bliss, he went on to fling the ewe over upon her other side, covering her head with his knee, gradually running the shears line after line round her dewlap; thence about her flank and back, and finishing over the tail. "Well done, and done quickly!" said Bathsheba, looking at her watch as the last snip resounded. "How long, miss?" said Gabriel, wiping his brow. "Three-and-twenty minutes and a half since you took the first lock from its forehead. It is the first time that I have ever seen one done in less than half an hour." The clean, sleek creature arose from its fleece--how perfectly like Aphrodite rising from the foam should have been seen to be realized--looking startled and shy at the loss of its garment, which lay on the floor in one soft cloud, united throughout, the portion visible being the inner surface only, which, never before exposed, was white as snow, and without flaw or blemish of the minutest kind. "Cain Ball!" "Yes, Mister Oak; here I be!" Cainy now runs forward with the tar-pot. "B. E." is newly stamped upon the shorn skin, and away the simple dam leaps, panting, over the board into the shirtless flock outside. Then up comes Maryann; throws the loose locks into the middle of the fleece, rolls it up, and carries it into the background as three-and-a-half pounds of unadulterated warmth for the winter enjoyment of persons unknown and far away, who will, however, never experience the superlative comfort derivable from the wool as it here exists, new and pure--before the unctuousness of its nature whilst in a living state has dried, stiffened, and been washed out--rendering it just now as superior to anything WOOLLEN as cream is superior to milk-and-water. But heartless circumstance could not leave entire Gabriel's happiness of this morning. The rams, old ewes, and two-shear ewes had duly undergone their stripping, and the men were proceeding with the shear-lings and hogs, when Oak's belief that she was going to stand pleasantly by and time him through another performance was painfully interrupted by Farmer Boldwood's appearance in the extremest corner of the barn. Nobody seemed to have perceived his entry, but there he certainly was. Boldwood always carried with him a social atmosphere of his own, which everybody felt who came near him; and the talk, which Bathsheba's presence had somewhat suppressed, was now totally suspended. He crossed over towards Bathsheba, who turned to greet him with a carriage of perfect ease. He spoke to her in low tones, and she instinctively modulated her own to the same pitch, and her voice ultimately even caught the inflection of his. She was far from having a wish to appear mysteriously connected with him; but woman at the impressionable age gravitates to the larger body not only in her choice of words, which is apparent every day, but even in her shades of tone and humour, when the influence is great. What they conversed about was not audible to Gabriel, who was too independent to get near, though too concerned to disregard. The issue of their dialogue was the taking of her hand by the courteous farmer to help her over the spreading-board into the bright June sunlight outside. Standing beside the sheep already shorn, they went on talking again. Concerning the flock? Apparently not. Gabriel theorized, not without truth, that in quiet discussion of any matter within reach of the speakers' eyes, these are usually fixed upon it. Bathsheba demurely regarded a contemptible straw lying upon the ground, in a way which suggested less ovine criticism than womanly embarrassment. She became more or less red in the cheek, the blood wavering in uncertain flux and reflux over the sensitive space between ebb and flood. Gabriel sheared on, constrained and sad. She left Boldwood's side, and he walked up and down alone for nearly a quarter of an hour. Then she reappeared in her new riding-habit of myrtle green, which fitted her to the waist as a rind fits its fruit; and young Bob Coggan led on her mare, Boldwood fetching his own horse from the tree under which it had been tied. Oak's eyes could not forsake them; and in endeavouring to continue his shearing at the same time that he watched Boldwood's manner, he snipped the sheep in the groin. The animal plunged; Bathsheba instantly gazed towards it, and saw the blood. "Oh, Gabriel!" she exclaimed, with severe remonstrance, "you who are so strict with the other men--see what you are doing yourself!" To an outsider there was not much to complain of in this remark; but to Oak, who knew Bathsheba to be well aware that she herself was the cause of the poor ewe's wound, because she had wounded the ewe's shearer in a still more vital part, it had a sting which the abiding sense of his inferiority to both herself and Boldwood was not calculated to heal. But a manly resolve to recognize boldly that he had no longer a lover's interest in her, helped him occasionally to conceal a feeling. "Bottle!" he shouted, in an unmoved voice of routine. Cainy Ball ran up, the wound was anointed, and the shearing continued. Boldwood gently tossed Bathsheba into the saddle, and before they turned away she again spoke out to Oak with the same dominative and tantalizing graciousness. "I am going now to see Mr. Boldwood's Leicesters. Take my place in the barn, Gabriel, and keep the men carefully to their work." The horses' heads were put about, and they trotted away. Boldwood's deep attachment was a matter of great interest among all around him; but, after having been pointed out for so many years as the perfect exemplar of thriving bachelorship, his lapse was an anticlimax somewhat resembling that of St. John Long's death by consumption in the midst of his proofs that it was not a fatal disease. "That means matrimony," said Temperance Miller, following them out of sight with her eyes. "I reckon that's the size o't," said Coggan, working along without looking up. "Well, better wed over the mixen than over the moor," said Laban Tall, turning his sheep. Henery Fray spoke, exhibiting miserable eyes at the same time: "I don't see why a maid should take a husband when she's bold enough to fight her own battles, and don't want a home; for 'tis keeping another woman out. But let it be, for 'tis a pity he and she should trouble two houses." As usual with decided characters, Bathsheba invariably provoked the criticism of individuals like Henery Fray. Her emblazoned fault was to be too pronounced in her objections, and not sufficiently overt in her likings. We learn that it is not the rays which bodies absorb, but those which they reject, that give them the colours they are known by; and in the same way people are specialized by their dislikes and antagonisms, whilst their goodwill is looked upon as no attribute at all. Henery continued in a more complaisant mood: "I once hinted my mind to her on a few things, as nearly as a battered frame dared to do so to such a froward piece. You all know, neighbours, what a man I be, and how I come down with my powerful words when my pride is boiling wi' scarn?" "We do, we do, Henery." "So I said, 'Mistress Everdene, there's places empty, and there's gifted men willing; but the spite'--no, not the spite--I didn't say spite--'but the villainy of the contrarikind,' I said (meaning womankind), 'keeps 'em out.' That wasn't too strong for her, say?" "Passably well put." "Yes; and I would have said it, had death and salvation overtook me for it. Such is my spirit when I have a mind." "A true man, and proud as a lucifer." "You see the artfulness? Why, 'twas about being baily really; but I didn't put it so plain that she could understand my meaning, so I could lay it on all the stronger. That was my depth! ... However, let her marry an she will. Perhaps 'tis high time. I believe Farmer Boldwood kissed her behind the spear-bed at the sheep-washing t'other day--that I do." "What a lie!" said Gabriel. "Ah, neighbour Oak--how'st know?" said, Henery, mildly. "Because she told me all that passed," said Oak, with a pharisaical sense that he was not as other shearers in this matter. "Ye have a right to believe it," said Henery, with dudgeon; "a very true right. But I mid see a little distance into things! To be long-headed enough for a baily's place is a poor mere trifle--yet a trifle more than nothing. However, I look round upon life quite cool. Do you heed me, neighbours? My words, though made as simple as I can, mid be rather deep for some heads." "O yes, Henery, we quite heed ye." "A strange old piece, goodmen--whirled about from here to yonder, as if I were nothing! A little warped, too. But I have my depths; ha, and even my great depths! I might gird at a certain shepherd, brain to brain. But no--O no!" "A strange old piece, ye say!" interposed the maltster, in a querulous voice. "At the same time ye be no old man worth naming--no old man at all. Yer teeth bain't half gone yet; and what's a old man's standing if so be his teeth bain't gone? Weren't I stale in wedlock afore ye were out of arms? 'Tis a poor thing to be sixty, when there's people far past four-score--a boast weak as water." It was the unvarying custom in Weatherbury to sink minor differences when the maltster had to be pacified. "Weak as water! yes," said Jan Coggan. "Malter, we feel ye to be a wonderful veteran man, and nobody can gainsay it." "Nobody," said Joseph Poorgrass. "Ye be a very rare old spectacle, malter, and we all admire ye for that gift." "Ay, and as a young man, when my senses were in prosperity, I was likewise liked by a good-few who knowed me," said the maltster. "'Ithout doubt you was--'ithout doubt." The bent and hoary man was satisfied, and so apparently was Henery Fray. That matters should continue pleasant Maryann spoke, who, what with her brown complexion, and the working wrapper of rusty linsey, had at present the mellow hue of an old sketch in oils--notably some of Nicholas Poussin's:-- "Do anybody know of a crooked man, or a lame, or any second-hand fellow at all that would do for poor me?" said Maryann. "A perfect one I don't expect to get at my time of life. If I could hear of such a thing twould do me more good than toast and ale." Coggan furnished a suitable reply. Oak went on with his shearing, and said not another word. Pestilent moods had come, and teased away his quiet. Bathsheba had shown indications of anointing him above his fellows by installing him as the bailiff that the farm imperatively required. He did not covet the post relatively to the farm: in relation to herself, as beloved by him and unmarried to another, he had coveted it. His readings of her seemed now to be vapoury and indistinct. His lecture to her was, he thought, one of the absurdest mistakes. Far from coquetting with Boldwood, she had trifled with himself in thus feigning that she had trifled with another. He was inwardly convinced that, in accordance with the anticipations of his easy-going and worse-educated comrades, that day would see Boldwood the accepted husband of Miss Everdene. Gabriel at this time of his life had out-grown the instinctive dislike which every Christian boy has for reading the Bible, perusing it now quite frequently, and he inwardly said, "'I find more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets!'" This was mere exclamation--the froth of the storm. He adored Bathsheba just the same. "We workfolk shall have some lordly junketing to-night," said Cainy Ball, casting forth his thoughts in a new direction. "This morning I see 'em making the great puddens in the milking-pails--lumps of fat as big as yer thumb, Mister Oak! I've never seed such splendid large knobs of fat before in the days of my life--they never used to be bigger then a horse-bean. And there was a great black crock upon the brandish with his legs a-sticking out, but I don't know what was in within." "And there's two bushels of biffins for apple-pies," said Maryann. "Well, I hope to do my duty by it all," said Joseph Poorgrass, in a pleasant, masticating manner of anticipation. "Yes; victuals and drink is a cheerful thing, and gives nerves to the nerveless, if the form of words may be used. 'Tis the gospel of the body, without which we perish, so to speak it." EVENTIDE--A SECOND DECLARATION For the shearing-supper a long table was placed on the grass-plot beside the house, the end of the table being thrust over the sill of the wide parlour window and a foot or two into the room. Miss Everdene sat inside the window, facing down the table. She was thus at the head without mingling with the men. This evening Bathsheba was unusually excited, her red cheeks and lips contrasting lustrously with the mazy skeins of her shadowy hair. She seemed to expect assistance, and the seat at the bottom of the table was at her request left vacant until after they had begun the meal. She then asked Gabriel to take the place and the duties appertaining to that end, which he did with great readiness. At this moment Mr. Boldwood came in at the gate, and crossed the green to Bathsheba at the window. He apologized for his lateness: his arrival was evidently by arrangement. "Gabriel," said she, "will you move again, please, and let Mr. Boldwood come there?" Oak moved in silence back to his original seat. The gentleman-farmer was dressed in cheerful style, in a new coat and white waistcoat, quite contrasting with his usual sober suits of grey. Inwardy, too, he was blithe, and consequently chatty to an exceptional degree. So also was Bathsheba now that he had come, though the uninvited presence of Pennyways, the bailiff who had been dismissed for theft, disturbed her equanimity for a while. Supper being ended, Coggan began on his own private account, without reference to listeners:-- I've lost my love, and I care not, I've lost my love, and I care not; I shall soon have another That's better than t'other; I've lost my love, and I care not. This lyric, when concluded, was received with a silently appreciative gaze at the table, implying that the performance, like a work by those established authors who are independent of notices in the papers, was a well-known delight which required no applause. "Now, Master Poorgrass, your song!" said Coggan. "I be all but in liquor, and the gift is wanting in me," said Joseph, diminishing himself. "Nonsense; wou'st never be so ungrateful, Joseph--never!" said Coggan, expressing hurt feelings by an inflection of voice. "And mistress is looking hard at ye, as much as to say, 'Sing at once, Joseph Poorgrass.'" "Faith, so she is; well, I must suffer it! ... Just eye my features, and see if the tell-tale blood overheats me much, neighbours?" "No, yer blushes be quite reasonable," said Coggan. "I always tries to keep my colours from rising when a beauty's eyes get fixed on me," said Joseph, differently; "but if so be 'tis willed they do, they must." "Now, Joseph, your song, please," said Bathsheba, from the window. "Well, really, ma'am," he replied, in a yielding tone, "I don't know what to say. It would be a poor plain ballet of my own composure." "Hear, hear!" said the supper-party. Poorgrass, thus assured, trilled forth a flickering yet commendable piece of sentiment, the tune of which consisted of the key-note and another, the latter being the sound chiefly dwelt upon. This was so successful that he rashly plunged into a second in the same breath, after a few false starts:-- I sow'-ed th'-e ..... I sow'-ed ..... I sow'-ed th'-e seeds' of' love', I-it was' all' i'-in the'-e spring', I-in A'-pril', Ma'-ay, a'-nd sun'-ny' June', When sma'-all bi'-irds they' do' sing. "Well put out of hand," said Coggan, at the end of the verse. "'They do sing' was a very taking paragraph." "Ay; and there was a pretty place at 'seeds of love.' and 'twas well heaved out. Though 'love' is a nasty high corner when a man's voice is getting crazed. Next verse, Master Poorgrass." But during this rendering young Bob Coggan exhibited one of those anomalies which will afflict little people when other persons are particularly serious: in trying to check his laughter, he pushed down his throat as much of the tablecloth as he could get hold of, when, after continuing hermetically sealed for a short time, his mirth burst out through his nose. Joseph perceived it, and with hectic cheeks of indignation instantly ceased singing. Coggan boxed Bob's ears immediately. "Go on, Joseph--go on, and never mind the young scamp," said Coggan. "'Tis a very catching ballet. Now then again--the next bar; I'll help ye to flourish up the shrill notes where yer wind is rather wheezy:-- "Oh the wi'-il-lo'-ow tree' will' twist', And the wil'-low' tre'-ee wi'-ill twine'." But the singer could not be set going again. Bob Coggan was sent home for his ill manners, and tranquility was restored by Jacob Smallbury, who volunteered a ballad as inclusive and interminable as that with which the worthy toper old Silenus amused on a similar occasion the swains Chromis and Mnasylus, and other jolly dogs of his day. It was still the beaming time of evening, though night was stealthily making itself visible low down upon the ground, the western lines of light raking the earth without alighting upon it to any extent, or illuminating the dead levels at all. The sun had crept round the tree as a last effort before death, and then began to sink, the shearers' lower parts becoming steeped in embrowning twilight, whilst their heads and shoulders were still enjoying day, touched with a yellow of self-sustained brilliancy that seemed inherent rather than acquired. The sun went down in an ochreous mist; but they sat, and talked on, and grew as merry as the gods in Homer's heaven. Bathsheba still remained enthroned inside the window, and occupied herself in knitting, from which she sometimes looked up to view the fading scene outside. The slow twilight expanded and enveloped them completely before the signs of moving were shown. Gabriel suddenly missed Farmer Boldwood from his place at the bottom of the table. How long he had been gone Oak did not know; but he had apparently withdrawn into the encircling dusk. Whilst he was thinking of this, Liddy brought candles into the back part of the room overlooking the shearers, and their lively new flames shone down the table and over the men, and dispersed among the green shadows behind. Bathsheba's form, still in its original position, was now again distinct between their eyes and the light, which revealed that Boldwood had gone inside the room, and was sitting near her. Next came the question of the evening. Would Miss Everdene sing to them the song she always sang so charmingly--"The Banks of Allan Water"--before they went home? After a moment's consideration Bathsheba assented, beckoning to Gabriel, who hastened up into the coveted atmosphere. "Have you brought your flute?" she whispered. "Yes, miss." "Play to my singing, then." She stood up in the window-opening, facing the men, the candles behind her, Gabriel on her right hand, immediately outside the sash-frame. Boldwood had drawn up on her left, within the room. Her singing was soft and rather tremulous at first, but it soon swelled to a steady clearness. Subsequent events caused one of the verses to be remembered for many months, and even years, by more than one of those who were gathered there:-- For his bride a soldier sought her, And a winning tongue had he: On the banks of Allan Water None was gay as she! In addition to the dulcet piping of Gabriel's flute, Boldwood supplied a bass in his customary profound voice, uttering his notes so softly, however, as to abstain entirely from making anything like an ordinary duet of the song; they rather formed a rich unexplored shadow, which threw her tones into relief. The shearers reclined against each other as at suppers in the early ages of the world, and so silent and absorbed were they that her breathing could almost be heard between the bars; and at the end of the ballad, when the last tone loitered on to an inexpressible close, there arose that buzz of pleasure which is the attar of applause. It is scarcely necessary to state that Gabriel could not avoid noting the farmer's bearing to-night towards their entertainer. Yet there was nothing exceptional in his actions beyond what appertained to his time of performing them. It was when the rest were all looking away that Boldwood observed her; when they regarded her he turned aside; when they thanked or praised he was silent; when they were inattentive he murmured his thanks. The meaning lay in the difference between actions, none of which had any meaning of itself; and the necessity of being jealous, which lovers are troubled with, did not lead Oak to underestimate these signs. Bathsheba then wished them good-night, withdrew from the window, and retired to the back part of the room, Boldwood thereupon closing the sash and the shutters, and remaining inside with her. Oak wandered away under the quiet and scented trees. Recovering from the softer impressions produced by Bathsheba's voice, the shearers rose to leave, Coggan turning to Pennyways as he pushed back the bench to pass out:-- "I like to give praise where praise is due, and the man deserves it--that 'a do so," he remarked, looking at the worthy thief, as if he were the masterpiece of some world-renowned artist. "I'm sure I should never have believed it if we hadn't proved it, so to allude," hiccupped Joseph Poorgrass, "that every cup, every one of the best knives and forks, and every empty bottle be in their place as perfect now as at the beginning, and not one stole at all." "I'm sure I don't deserve half the praise you give me," said the virtuous thief, grimly. "Well, I'll say this for Pennyways," added Coggan, "that whenever he do really make up his mind to do a noble thing in the shape of a good action, as I could see by his face he did to-night afore sitting down, he's generally able to carry it out. Yes, I'm proud to say, neighbours, that he's stole nothing at all." "Well, 'tis an honest deed, and we thank ye for it, Pennyways," said Joseph; to which opinion the remainder of the company subscribed unanimously. At this time of departure, when nothing more was visible of the inside of the parlour than a thin and still chink of light between the shutters, a passionate scene was in course of enactment there. Miss Everdene and Boldwood were alone. Her cheeks had lost a great deal of their healthful fire from the very seriousness of her position; but her eye was bright with the excitement of a triumph--though it was a triumph which had rather been contemplated than desired. She was standing behind a low arm-chair, from which she had just risen, and he was kneeling in it--inclining himself over its back towards her, and holding her hand in both his own. His body moved restlessly, and it was with what Keats daintily calls a too happy happiness. This unwonted abstraction by love of all dignity from a man of whom it had ever seemed the chief component, was, in its distressing incongruity, a pain to her which quenched much of the pleasure she derived from the proof that she was idolized. "I will try to love you," she was saying, in a trembling voice quite unlike her usual self-confidence. "And if I can believe in any way that I shall make you a good wife I shall indeed be willing to marry you. But, Mr. Boldwood, hesitation on so high a matter is honourable in any woman, and I don't want to give a solemn promise to-night. I would rather ask you to wait a few weeks till I can see my situation better. "But you have every reason to believe that THEN--" "I have every reason to hope that at the end of the five or six weeks, between this time and harvest, that you say you are going to be away from home, I shall be able to promise to be your wife," she said, firmly. "But remember this distinctly, I don't promise yet." "It is enough; I don't ask more. I can wait on those dear words. And now, Miss Everdene, good-night!" "Good-night," she said, graciously--almost tenderly; and Boldwood withdrew with a serene smile. Bathsheba knew more of him now; he had entirely bared his heart before her, even until he had almost worn in her eyes the sorry look of a grand bird without the feathers that make it grand. She had been awe-struck at her past temerity, and was struggling to make amends without thinking whether the sin quite deserved the penalty she was schooling herself to pay. To have brought all this about her ears was terrible; but after a while the situation was not without a fearful joy. The facility with which even the most timid women sometimes acquire a relish for the dreadful when that is amalgamated with a little triumph, is marvellous.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210225000853/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/maddingcrowd/section4/

In the interior of a church, several women watch a soldier enter and realize that a wedding is about to occur. As he waits for his bride to arrive, the clock strikes the quarter hour, and the women titter. Finally, after a full hour of waiting, the soldier leaves the church humiliated; just at that moment his bride runs across the square to meet him. She has been waiting at All Souls' rather than at All Saints' and has just realized her mistake. The two are Fanny Robin and Sergeant Troy. She asks him when they can reschedule their wedding, but he refuses to set a date. In the market place again, Boldwood sees Bathsheba Everdene as if for the first time. He finds her unbelievably beautiful and asks someone nearby whether she is generally considered handsome. Bathsheba notices his attention and regrets having sent the valentine. She decides to explain and apologize, but she realizes that he might misread her initiation of conversation as a sign of romantic interest. Chapter 18 gives us a little background about Boldwood. He is a confirmed bachelor, wealthy and well established at the neighboring farm. Hardy warns us that Boldwood's is not an "ordinary nature": the "positives and negatives" in his character balance only precariously, and he plunges easily into extreme emotions. The narrative focuses in on Bathsheba and Gabriel as they watch Boldwood from afar; Gabriel sees Bathsheba blush, and, remembering the valentine, he begins to suspect something between the pair. At a village-wide sheep-washing, Boldwood approaches Bathsheba, who tries to avoid him. He follows her off toward the river, and when they are alone, he proposes to her. She refuses, and he continues to try to persuade her, finally getting her to permit him to propose again later. Chapter 20 charts Bathsheba's reaction to Boldwood's offer. Hardy tells us that Bathsheba feels no "wish whatever for the married state in the abstract." She also enjoys the independence of running a farm on her own. As she is considering the possibility, she approaches Gabriel and begins to ask him about what the farm workers had thought of her appearing together with Boldwood. The two of them quarrel when she asks his opinion of her conduct concerning the bachelor, and he tells her "it is unworthy of any thoughtful, comely woman." She then accuses him of being jealous, but he tells her that he has long ago given up all thoughts marrying her. Finally, she orders him to leave the farm, and he agrees. Only one day after Gabriel's departure, the farm workers announce that another disaster has occurred--the sheep have eaten young clover, and their stomachs are expanding fatally. Only Gabriel knows how to perform the operation that can save them. Bathsheba sends him an order to come back. He replies by messenger that she will have to ask him properly, and she does so, writing, "Do not desert me, Gabriel!" He returns and saves all the sheep but one. Bathsheba regrets firing him, and he agrees to come back to the farm. During the annual sheep-shearing, the workers discuss Bathsheba and Boldwood, wondering if they will marry, and at the sheep-shearing supper, Bathsheba allows Boldwood to sit with her inside the house. At the very end of the supper, they are left alone together, and Bathsheba tells him that she will try to love him. She finally almost promises herself to him, saying that she may feel ready to marry by harvest-time.

Commentary This section of the novel sets up a number of different couples--Fanny and Troy, Bathsheba and Boldwood, and Bathsheba and Gabriel--and analyzes the dynamics of each. Many parallels can be drawn; for instance, much as a chance circumstance of Bathsheba deciding to send the valentine to Boldwood changes his life forever, Fanny's simple mistake about the church means that Troy refuses to marry her. By setting up several sets of relationships, Hardy explores the way chance generates a variety of fates from what were initially parallel circumstances. Hardy plays upon the traditional novel by choosing a heroine who has no abstract desire to get married. In some ways, Far From the Madding Crowd is a traditional novel of marriage in that a heroine is given a choice of two or more suitors, and at the end of the novel, she makes the "correct" choice. Yet a novel such as Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice or Sense and Sensibility focuses on a character who wants to find a husband; in contrast, Bathsheba's economic and emotional independence allow her the choice of not marrying, and she has an interest in maintaining the farm and preserving her freedom. Many of Hardy's female characters show similar independence and interest in work or scholarship. The scenes of sheep-shearing and sheep-washing present the farm workers as a kind of Greek chorus and also help to create a sense of the rituals built around the seasons of the farm.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/02.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_0_part_2.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 2

chapter 2

{"name": "Chapter 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-1-chapters-1-11", "summary": "Durbeyfield was returning home during the May Day dance in which the younger women of Marlott walked in procession in white gowns, holding willow wands and white flowers. Among the girls is Tess Durbeyfield, the daughter of John. Tess is no more handsome than the other girls, but has large, innocent eyes. She sees her father riding in a carriage singing that he has a great family vault in Kingsbere and knighted forefathers. Tess reprimands her friends for mocking her father. At this time Tess is a mere vessel of emotion untinctured by experience. She still has the local dialect, but also can affect more educated speech. Three young onlookers of superior class watch the women in the procession. The three are brothers and consider asking the women to dance. Angel does not dance with Tess Durbeyfield, but among the girls he notices her the most and wishes that he asked her to dance, for she was so modest and soft.", "analysis": "Tess Durbeyfield, the titular character of the novel, is in this chapter introduced as an innocent, malleable and pure. As a member of the May Day procession, adorned in white, she symbolizes purity and virginity, while her physical characteristics equally suggest her innocence. Hardy suggests that this purity comes from lack of experience, foreshadowing her later development as a person and a character once she is exposed to different and more dangerous forces. However, despite this innocence and essential purity Tess is not a mere cipher: she does defend her father, confronting the other girls in the procession who disparage him. Angel is an equal symbol of purity and goodness, as shown by his name and his demeanor. He immediately realizes that Tess is special because of her innocence. Hardy also develops the issues of class introduced in the first chapter. Tess Durbeyfield comes from a lower class background, but she can affect a higher position because of her education. This fluidity of her class background will prove significant throughout the novel, for she can move from the upper to the lower classes"}

The village of Marlott lay amid the north-eastern undulations of the beautiful Vale of Blakemore, or Blackmoor, aforesaid, an engirdled and secluded region, for the most part untrodden as yet by tourist or landscape-painter, though within a four hours' journey from London. It is a vale whose acquaintance is best made by viewing it from the summits of the hills that surround it--except perhaps during the droughts of summer. An unguided ramble into its recesses in bad weather is apt to engender dissatisfaction with its narrow, tortuous, and miry ways. This fertile and sheltered tract of country, in which the fields are never brown and the springs never dry, is bounded on the south by the bold chalk ridge that embraces the prominences of Hambledon Hill, Bulbarrow, Nettlecombe-Tout, Dogbury, High Stoy, and Bubb Down. The traveller from the coast, who, after plodding northward for a score of miles over calcareous downs and corn-lands, suddenly reaches the verge of one of these escarpments, is surprised and delighted to behold, extended like a map beneath him, a country differing absolutely from that which he has passed through. Behind him the hills are open, the sun blazes down upon fields so large as to give an unenclosed character to the landscape, the lanes are white, the hedges low and plashed, the atmosphere colourless. Here, in the valley, the world seems to be constructed upon a smaller and more delicate scale; the fields are mere paddocks, so reduced that from this height their hedgerows appear a network of dark green threads overspreading the paler green of the grass. The atmosphere beneath is languorous, and is so tinged with azure that what artists call the middle distance partakes also of that hue, while the horizon beyond is of the deepest ultramarine. Arable lands are few and limited; with but slight exceptions the prospect is a broad rich mass of grass and trees, mantling minor hills and dales within the major. Such is the Vale of Blackmoor. The district is of historic, no less than of topographical interest. The Vale was known in former times as the Forest of White Hart, from a curious legend of King Henry III's reign, in which the killing by a certain Thomas de la Lynd of a beautiful white hart which the king had run down and spared, was made the occasion of a heavy fine. In those days, and till comparatively recent times, the country was densely wooded. Even now, traces of its earlier condition are to be found in the old oak copses and irregular belts of timber that yet survive upon its slopes, and the hollow-trunked trees that shade so many of its pastures. The forests have departed, but some old customs of their shades remain. Many, however, linger only in a metamorphosed or disguised form. The May-Day dance, for instance, was to be discerned on the afternoon under notice, in the guise of the club revel, or "club-walking," as it was there called. It was an interesting event to the younger inhabitants of Marlott, though its real interest was not observed by the participators in the ceremony. Its singularity lay less in the retention of a custom of walking in procession and dancing on each anniversary than in the members being solely women. In men's clubs such celebrations were, though expiring, less uncommon; but either the natural shyness of the softer sex, or a sarcastic attitude on the part of male relatives, had denuded such women's clubs as remained (if any other did) or this their glory and consummation. The club of Marlott alone lived to uphold the local Cerealia. It had walked for hundreds of years, if not as benefit-club, as votive sisterhood of some sort; and it walked still. The banded ones were all dressed in white gowns--a gay survival from Old Style days, when cheerfulness and May-time were synonyms--days before the habit of taking long views had reduced emotions to a monotonous average. Their first exhibition of themselves was in a processional march of two and two round the parish. Ideal and real clashed slightly as the sun lit up their figures against the green hedges and creeper-laced house-fronts; for, though the whole troop wore white garments, no two whites were alike among them. Some approached pure blanching; some had a bluish pallor; some worn by the older characters (which had possibly lain by folded for many a year) inclined to a cadaverous tint, and to a Georgian style. In addition to the distinction of a white frock, every woman and girl carried in her right hand a peeled willow wand, and in her left a bunch of white flowers. The peeling of the former, and the selection of the latter, had been an operation of personal care. There were a few middle-aged and even elderly women in the train, their silver-wiry hair and wrinkled faces, scourged by time and trouble, having almost a grotesque, certainly a pathetic, appearance in such a jaunty situation. In a true view, perhaps, there was more to be gathered and told of each anxious and experienced one, to whom the years were drawing nigh when she should say, "I have no pleasure in them," than of her juvenile comrades. But let the elder be passed over here for those under whose bodices the life throbbed quick and warm. The young girls formed, indeed, the majority of the band, and their heads of luxuriant hair reflected in the sunshine every tone of gold, and black, and brown. Some had beautiful eyes, others a beautiful nose, others a beautiful mouth and figure: few, if any, had all. A difficulty of arranging their lips in this crude exposure to public scrutiny, an inability to balance their heads, and to dissociate self-consciousness from their features, was apparent in them, and showed that they were genuine country girls, unaccustomed to many eyes. And as each and all of them were warmed without by the sun, so each had a private little sun for her soul to bask in; some dream, some affection, some hobby, at least some remote and distant hope which, though perhaps starving to nothing, still lived on, as hopes will. They were all cheerful, and many of them merry. They came round by The Pure Drop Inn, and were turning out of the high road to pass through a wicket-gate into the meadows, when one of the women said-- "The Load-a-Lord! Why, Tess Durbeyfield, if there isn't thy father riding hwome in a carriage!" A young member of the band turned her head at the exclamation. She was a fine and handsome girl--not handsomer than some others, possibly--but her mobile peony mouth and large innocent eyes added eloquence to colour and shape. She wore a red ribbon in her hair, and was the only one of the white company who could boast of such a pronounced adornment. As she looked round Durbeyfield was seen moving along the road in a chaise belonging to The Pure Drop, driven by a frizzle-headed brawny damsel with her gown-sleeves rolled above her elbows. This was the cheerful servant of that establishment, who, in her part of factotum, turned groom and ostler at times. Durbeyfield, leaning back, and with his eyes closed luxuriously, was waving his hand above his head, and singing in a slow recitative-- "I've-got-a-gr't-family-vault-at-Kingsbere--and knighted-forefathers-in-lead-coffins-there!" The clubbists tittered, except the girl called Tess--in whom a slow heat seemed to rise at the sense that her father was making himself foolish in their eyes. "He's tired, that's all," she said hastily, "and he has got a lift home, because our own horse has to rest to-day." "Bless thy simplicity, Tess," said her companions. "He's got his market-nitch. Haw-haw!" "Look here; I won't walk another inch with you, if you say any jokes about him!" Tess cried, and the colour upon her cheeks spread over her face and neck. In a moment her eyes grew moist, and her glance drooped to the ground. Perceiving that they had really pained her they said no more, and order again prevailed. Tess's pride would not allow her to turn her head again, to learn what her father's meaning was, if he had any; and thus she moved on with the whole body to the enclosure where there was to be dancing on the green. By the time the spot was reached she has recovered her equanimity, and tapped her neighbour with her wand and talked as usual. Tess Durbeyfield at this time of her life was a mere vessel of emotion untinctured by experience. The dialect was on her tongue to some extent, despite the village school: the characteristic intonation of that dialect for this district being the voicing approximately rendered by the syllable UR, probably as rich an utterance as any to be found in human speech. The pouted-up deep red mouth to which this syllable was native had hardly as yet settled into its definite shape, and her lower lip had a way of thrusting the middle of her top one upward, when they closed together after a word. Phases of her childhood lurked in her aspect still. As she walked along to-day, for all her bouncing handsome womanliness, you could sometimes see her twelfth year in her cheeks, or her ninth sparkling from her eyes; and even her fifth would flit over the curves of her mouth now and then. Yet few knew, and still fewer considered this. A small minority, mainly strangers, would look long at her in casually passing by, and grow momentarily fascinated by her freshness, and wonder if they would ever see her again: but to almost everybody she was a fine and picturesque country girl, and no more. Nothing was seen or heard further of Durbeyfield in his triumphal chariot under the conduct of the ostleress, and the club having entered the allotted space, dancing began. As there were no men in the company, the girls danced at first with each other, but when the hour for the close of labour drew on, the masculine inhabitants of the village, together with other idlers and pedestrians, gathered round the spot, and appeared inclined to negotiate for a partner. Among these on-lookers were three young men of a superior class, carrying small knapsacks strapped to their shoulders, and stout sticks in their hands. Their general likeness to each other, and their consecutive ages, would almost have suggested that they might be, what in fact they were, brothers. The eldest wore the white tie, high waistcoat, and thin-brimmed hat of the regulation curate; the second was the normal undergraduate; the appearance of the third and youngest would hardly have been sufficient to characterize him; there was an uncribbed, uncabined aspect in his eyes and attire, implying that he had hardly as yet found the entrance to his professional groove. That he was a desultory tentative student of something and everything might only have been predicted of him. These three brethren told casual acquaintance that they were spending their Whitsun holidays in a walking tour through the Vale of Blackmoor, their course being south-westerly from the town of Shaston on the north-east. They leant over the gate by the highway, and inquired as to the meaning of the dance and the white-frocked maids. The two elder of the brothers were plainly not intending to linger more than a moment, but the spectacle of a bevy of girls dancing without male partners seemed to amuse the third, and make him in no hurry to move on. He unstrapped his knapsack, put it, with his stick, on the hedge-bank, and opened the gate. "What are you going to do, Angel?" asked the eldest. "I am inclined to go and have a fling with them. Why not all of us--just for a minute or two--it will not detain us long?" "No--no; nonsense!" said the first. "Dancing in public with a troop of country hoydens--suppose we should be seen! Come along, or it will be dark before we get to Stourcastle, and there's no place we can sleep at nearer than that; besides, we must get through another chapter of _A Counterblast to Agnosticism_ before we turn in, now I have taken the trouble to bring the book." "All right--I'll overtake you and Cuthbert in five minutes; don't stop; I give my word that I will, Felix." The two elder reluctantly left him and walked on, taking their brother's knapsack to relieve him in following, and the youngest entered the field. "This is a thousand pities," he said gallantly, to two or three of the girls nearest him, as soon as there was a pause in the dance. "Where are your partners, my dears?" "They've not left off work yet," answered one of the boldest. "They'll be here by and by. Till then, will you be one, sir?" "Certainly. But what's one among so many!" "Better than none. 'Tis melancholy work facing and footing it to one of your own sort, and no clipsing and colling at all. Now, pick and choose." "'Ssh--don't be so for'ard!" said a shyer girl. The young man, thus invited, glanced them over, and attempted some discrimination; but, as the group were all so new to him, he could not very well exercise it. He took almost the first that came to hand, which was not the speaker, as she had expected; nor did it happen to be Tess Durbeyfield. Pedigree, ancestral skeletons, monumental record, the d'Urberville lineaments, did not help Tess in her life's battle as yet, even to the extent of attracting to her a dancing-partner over the heads of the commonest peasantry. So much for Norman blood unaided by Victorian lucre. The name of the eclipsing girl, whatever it was, has not been handed down; but she was envied by all as the first who enjoyed the luxury of a masculine partner that evening. Yet such was the force of example that the village young men, who had not hastened to enter the gate while no intruder was in the way, now dropped in quickly, and soon the couples became leavened with rustic youth to a marked extent, till at length the plainest woman in the club was no longer compelled to foot it on the masculine side of the figure. The church clock struck, when suddenly the student said that he must leave--he had been forgetting himself--he had to join his companions. As he fell out of the dance his eyes lighted on Tess Durbeyfield, whose own large orbs wore, to tell the truth, the faintest aspect of reproach that he had not chosen her. He, too, was sorry then that, owing to her backwardness, he had not observed her; and with that in his mind he left the pasture. On account of his long delay he started in a flying-run down the lane westward, and had soon passed the hollow and mounted the next rise. He had not yet overtaken his brothers, but he paused to get breath, and looked back. He could see the white figures of the girls in the green enclosure whirling about as they had whirled when he was among them. They seemed to have quite forgotten him already. All of them, except, perhaps, one. This white shape stood apart by the hedge alone. From her position he knew it to be the pretty maiden with whom he had not danced. Trifling as the matter was, he yet instinctively felt that she was hurt by his oversight. He wished that he had asked her; he wished that he had inquired her name. She was so modest, so expressive, she had looked so soft in her thin white gown that he felt he had acted stupidly. However, it could not be helped, and turning, and bending himself to a rapid walk, he dismissed the subject from his mind.

Chapter 2

https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-1-chapters-1-11

Durbeyfield was returning home during the May Day dance in which the younger women of Marlott walked in procession in white gowns, holding willow wands and white flowers. Among the girls is Tess Durbeyfield, the daughter of John. Tess is no more handsome than the other girls, but has large, innocent eyes. She sees her father riding in a carriage singing that he has a great family vault in Kingsbere and knighted forefathers. Tess reprimands her friends for mocking her father. At this time Tess is a mere vessel of emotion untinctured by experience. She still has the local dialect, but also can affect more educated speech. Three young onlookers of superior class watch the women in the procession. The three are brothers and consider asking the women to dance. Angel does not dance with Tess Durbeyfield, but among the girls he notices her the most and wishes that he asked her to dance, for she was so modest and soft.

Tess Durbeyfield, the titular character of the novel, is in this chapter introduced as an innocent, malleable and pure. As a member of the May Day procession, adorned in white, she symbolizes purity and virginity, while her physical characteristics equally suggest her innocence. Hardy suggests that this purity comes from lack of experience, foreshadowing her later development as a person and a character once she is exposed to different and more dangerous forces. However, despite this innocence and essential purity Tess is not a mere cipher: she does defend her father, confronting the other girls in the procession who disparage him. Angel is an equal symbol of purity and goodness, as shown by his name and his demeanor. He immediately realizes that Tess is special because of her innocence. Hardy also develops the issues of class introduced in the first chapter. Tess Durbeyfield comes from a lower class background, but she can affect a higher position because of her education. This fluidity of her class background will prove significant throughout the novel, for she can move from the upper to the lower classes

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/5658-chapters/31.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Lord Jim/section_30_part_0.txt

Lord Jim.chapter 31

chapter 31

{"name": "Chapter 31", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820051943/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmLordJim40.asp", "summary": "Marlow continues his narrative about Jim, returning to the day that Jim went to visit Doramin and told him about his plans for routing Sherif Ali. On the way, Jim saw Sherif Ali's men strutting through the market place and boasting of their master's friendship with Tungku Allang. It appeared that they were planning to join hands against the Bugis, who were terrified about what might happen to them. Jim felt relieved that he was going to beat them to the battle and knew that he could convince the Bugis to come to his assistance. He spent a large portion of the day telling Doramin of his plans and gaining the Bugis' agreement. When Jim returned to Cornelius' house in the evening, he was feeling almost lightheaded. He had been successful in convincing Doramin of his plan and now he knew its success depended totally upon him. He felt sure he would not fail. During the night Jim was awakened by Jewel. She gave him his gun and told him about four of Sherif Ali's men who were waiting to kill him. At first Jim was irritated, feeling this was another false alarm; he was also irritated at Jewel for being so nervous. Jewel, however, was insistent. She led him to an empty store building. At first Jim saw nothing. Then he noticed a pair of glowing eyes coming towards him. A half-dressed native held out a knife to attack Jim, who waited until the appropriate moment to fire his gun. His shot was perfect, and the native fell dead. Jim felt calm, but was proud of his bravery.", "analysis": "Notes This chapter brings out Jim's courage, as well as helplessness. He has the courage to fight danger without \"jumping ship,\" but he is helplessly caught in the love affair with Jewel. She is devoted to him, guarding his life through the night. Her faithfulness, almost a reversal of the theme of white supremacy, sways Jim. He is overpowered by her, just as he is overpowered by Patusan. One night Jewel wakes him and warns him about a plot to kill him. Jim takes up a gun and protects himself, killing one man. Jim's faith in himself is renewed and he shouts, \"Nothing can touch me.\" Jim is beginning to overcome some of his guilt and shame; at the same time, he is beginning to succumb to white supremacy, considering himself superior to others and foreshadowing that he cannot forever remain Tuan Jim."}

'You may imagine with what interest I listened. All these details were perceived to have some significance twenty-four hours later. In the morning Cornelius made no allusion to the events of the night. "I suppose you will come back to my poor house," he muttered, surlily, slinking up just as Jim was entering the canoe to go over to Doramin's campong. Jim only nodded, without looking at him. "You find it good fun, no doubt," muttered the other in a sour tone. Jim spent the day with the old nakhoda, preaching the necessity of vigorous action to the principal men of the Bugis community, who had been summoned for a big talk. He remembered with pleasure how very eloquent and persuasive he had been. "I managed to put some backbone into them that time, and no mistake," he said. Sherif Ali's last raid had swept the outskirts of the settlement, and some women belonging to the town had been carried off to the stockade. Sherif Ali's emissaries had been seen in the market-place the day before, strutting about haughtily in white cloaks, and boasting of the Rajah's friendship for their master. One of them stood forward in the shade of a tree, and, leaning on the long barrel of a rifle, exhorted the people to prayer and repentance, advising them to kill all the strangers in their midst, some of whom, he said, were infidels and others even worse--children of Satan in the guise of Moslems. It was reported that several of the Rajah's people amongst the listeners had loudly expressed their approbation. The terror amongst the common people was intense. Jim, immensely pleased with his day's work, crossed the river again before sunset. 'As he had got the Bugis irretrievably committed to action and had made himself responsible for success on his own head, he was so elated that in the lightness of his heart he absolutely tried to be civil with Cornelius. But Cornelius became wildly jovial in response, and it was almost more than he could stand, he says, to hear his little squeaks of false laughter, to see him wriggle and blink, and suddenly catch hold of his chin and crouch low over the table with a distracted stare. The girl did not show herself, and Jim retired early. When he rose to say good-night, Cornelius jumped up, knocking his chair over, and ducked out of sight as if to pick up something he had dropped. His good-night came huskily from under the table. Jim was amazed to see him emerge with a dropping jaw, and staring, stupidly frightened eyes. He clutched the edge of the table. "What's the matter? Are you unwell?" asked Jim. "Yes, yes, yes. A great colic in my stomach," says the other; and it is Jim's opinion that it was perfectly true. If so, it was, in view of his contemplated action, an abject sign of a still imperfect callousness for which he must be given all due credit. 'Be it as it may, Jim's slumbers were disturbed by a dream of heavens like brass resounding with a great voice, which called upon him to Awake! Awake! so loud that, notwithstanding his desperate determination to sleep on, he did wake up in reality. The glare of a red spluttering conflagration going on in mid-air fell on his eyes. Coils of black thick smoke curved round the head of some apparition, some unearthly being, all in white, with a severe, drawn, anxious face. After a second or so he recognised the girl. She was holding a dammar torch at arm's-length aloft, and in a persistent, urgent monotone she was repeating, "Get up! Get up! Get up!" 'Suddenly he leaped to his feet; at once she put into his hand a revolver, his own revolver, which had been hanging on a nail, but loaded this time. He gripped it in silence, bewildered, blinking in the light. He wondered what he could do for her. 'She asked rapidly and very low, "Can you face four men with this?" He laughed while narrating this part at the recollection of his polite alacrity. It seems he made a great display of it. "Certainly--of course--certainly--command me." He was not properly awake, and had a notion of being very civil in these extraordinary circumstances, of showing his unquestioning, devoted readiness. She left the room, and he followed her; in the passage they disturbed an old hag who did the casual cooking of the household, though she was so decrepit as to be hardly able to understand human speech. She got up and hobbled behind them, mumbling toothlessly. On the verandah a hammock of sail-cloth, belonging to Cornelius, swayed lightly to the touch of Jim's elbow. It was empty. 'The Patusan establishment, like all the posts of Stein's Trading Company, had originally consisted of four buildings. Two of them were represented by two heaps of sticks, broken bamboos, rotten thatch, over which the four corner-posts of hardwood leaned sadly at different angles: the principal storeroom, however, stood yet, facing the agent's house. It was an oblong hut, built of mud and clay; it had at one end a wide door of stout planking, which so far had not come off the hinges, and in one of the side walls there was a square aperture, a sort of window, with three wooden bars. Before descending the few steps the girl turned her face over her shoulder and said quickly, "You were to be set upon while you slept." Jim tells me he experienced a sense of deception. It was the old story. He was weary of these attempts upon his life. He had had his fill of these alarms. He was sick of them. He assured me he was angry with the girl for deceiving him. He had followed her under the impression that it was she who wanted his help, and now he had half a mind to turn on his heel and go back in disgust. "Do you know," he commented profoundly, "I rather think I was not quite myself for whole weeks on end about that time." "Oh yes. You were though," I couldn't help contradicting. 'But she moved on swiftly, and he followed her into the courtyard. All its fences had fallen in a long time ago; the neighbours' buffaloes would pace in the morning across the open space, snorting profoundly, without haste; the very jungle was invading it already. Jim and the girl stopped in the rank grass. The light in which they stood made a dense blackness all round, and only above their heads there was an opulent glitter of stars. He told me it was a beautiful night--quite cool, with a little stir of breeze from the river. It seems he noticed its friendly beauty. Remember this is a love story I am telling you now. A lovely night seemed to breathe on them a soft caress. The flame of the torch streamed now and then with a fluttering noise like a flag, and for a time this was the only sound. "They are in the storeroom waiting," whispered the girl; "they are waiting for the signal." "Who's to give it?" he asked. She shook the torch, which blazed up after a shower of sparks. "Only you have been sleeping so restlessly," she continued in a murmur; "I watched your sleep, too." "You!" he exclaimed, craning his neck to look about him. "You think I watched on this night only!" she said, with a sort of despairing indignation. 'He says it was as if he had received a blow on the chest. He gasped. He thought he had been an awful brute somehow, and he felt remorseful, touched, happy, elated. This, let me remind you again, is a love story; you can see it by the imbecility, not a repulsive imbecility, the exalted imbecility of these proceedings, this station in torchlight, as if they had come there on purpose to have it out for the edification of concealed murderers. If Sherif Ali's emissaries had been possessed--as Jim remarked--of a pennyworth of spunk, this was the time to make a rush. His heart was thumping--not with fear--but he seemed to hear the grass rustle, and he stepped smartly out of the light. Something dark, imperfectly seen, flitted rapidly out of sight. He called out in a strong voice, "Cornelius! O Cornelius!" A profound silence succeeded: his voice did not seem to have carried twenty feet. Again the girl was by his side. "Fly!" she said. The old woman was coming up; her broken figure hovered in crippled little jumps on the edge of the light; they heard her mumbling, and a light, moaning sigh. "Fly!" repeated the girl excitedly. "They are frightened now--this light--the voices. They know you are awake now--they know you are big, strong, fearless . . ." "If I am all that," he began; but she interrupted him: "Yes--to-night! But what of to-morrow night? Of the next night? Of the night after--of all the many, many nights? Can I be always watching?" A sobbing catch of her breath affected him beyond the power of words. 'He told me that he had never felt so small, so powerless--and as to courage, what was the good of it? he thought. He was so helpless that even flight seemed of no use; and though she kept on whispering, "Go to Doramin, go to Doramin," with feverish insistence, he realised that for him there was no refuge from that loneliness which centupled all his dangers except--in her. "I thought," he said to me, "that if I went away from her it would be the end of everything somehow." Only as they couldn't stop there for ever in the middle of that courtyard, he made up his mind to go and look into the storehouse. He let her follow him without thinking of any protest, as if they had been indissolubly united. "I am fearless--am I?" he muttered through his teeth. She restrained his arm. "Wait till you hear my voice," she said, and, torch in hand, ran lightly round the corner. He remained alone in the darkness, his face to the door: not a sound, not a breath came from the other side. The old hag let out a dreary groan somewhere behind his back. He heard a high-pitched almost screaming call from the girl. "Now! Push!" He pushed violently; the door swung with a creak and a clatter, disclosing to his intense astonishment the low dungeon-like interior illuminated by a lurid, wavering glare. A turmoil of smoke eddied down upon an empty wooden crate in the middle of the floor, a litter of rags and straw tried to soar, but only stirred feebly in the draught. She had thrust the light through the bars of the window. He saw her bare round arm extended and rigid, holding up the torch with the steadiness of an iron bracket. A conical ragged heap of old mats cumbered a distant corner almost to the ceiling, and that was all. 'He explained to me that he was bitterly disappointed at this. His fortitude had been tried by so many warnings, he had been for weeks surrounded by so many hints of danger, that he wanted the relief of some reality, of something tangible that he could meet. "It would have cleared the air for a couple of hours at least, if you know what I mean," he said to me. "Jove! I had been living for days with a stone on my chest." Now at last he had thought he would get hold of something, and--nothing! Not a trace, not a sign of anybody. He had raised his weapon as the door flew open, but now his arm fell. "Fire! Defend yourself," the girl outside cried in an agonising voice. She, being in the dark and with her arm thrust in to the shoulder through the small hole, couldn't see what was going on, and she dared not withdraw the torch now to run round. "There's nobody here!" yelled Jim contemptuously, but his impulse to burst into a resentful exasperated laugh died without a sound: he had perceived in the very act of turning away that he was exchanging glances with a pair of eyes in the heap of mats. He saw a shifting gleam of whites. "Come out!" he cried in a fury, a little doubtful, and a dark-faced head, a head without a body, shaped itself in the rubbish, a strangely detached head, that looked at him with a steady scowl. Next moment the whole mound stirred, and with a low grunt a man emerged swiftly, and bounded towards Jim. Behind him the mats as it were jumped and flew, his right arm was raised with a crooked elbow, and the dull blade of a kriss protruded from his fist held off, a little above his head. A cloth wound tight round his loins seemed dazzlingly white on his bronze skin; his naked body glistened as if wet. 'Jim noted all this. He told me he was experiencing a feeling of unutterable relief, of vengeful elation. He held his shot, he says, deliberately. He held it for the tenth part of a second, for three strides of the man--an unconscionable time. He held it for the pleasure of saying to himself, That's a dead man! He was absolutely positive and certain. He let him come on because it did not matter. A dead man, anyhow. He noticed the dilated nostrils, the wide eyes, the intent, eager stillness of the face, and then he fired. 'The explosion in that confined space was stunning. He stepped back a pace. He saw the man jerk his head up, fling his arms forward, and drop the kriss. He ascertained afterwards that he had shot him through the mouth, a little upwards, the bullet coming out high at the back of the skull. With the impetus of his rush the man drove straight on, his face suddenly gaping disfigured, with his hands open before him gropingly, as though blinded, and landed with terrific violence on his forehead, just short of Jim's bare toes. Jim says he didn't lose the smallest detail of all this. He found himself calm, appeased, without rancour, without uneasiness, as if the death of that man had atoned for everything. The place was getting very full of sooty smoke from the torch, in which the unswaying flame burned blood-red without a flicker. He walked in resolutely, striding over the dead body, and covered with his revolver another naked figure outlined vaguely at the other end. As he was about to pull the trigger, the man threw away with force a short heavy spear, and squatted submissively on his hams, his back to the wall and his clasped hands between his legs. "You want your life?" Jim said. The other made no sound. "How many more of you?" asked Jim again. "Two more, Tuan," said the man very softly, looking with big fascinated eyes into the muzzle of the revolver. Accordingly two more crawled from under the mats, holding out ostentatiously their empty hands.'

Chapter 31

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820051943/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmLordJim40.asp

Marlow continues his narrative about Jim, returning to the day that Jim went to visit Doramin and told him about his plans for routing Sherif Ali. On the way, Jim saw Sherif Ali's men strutting through the market place and boasting of their master's friendship with Tungku Allang. It appeared that they were planning to join hands against the Bugis, who were terrified about what might happen to them. Jim felt relieved that he was going to beat them to the battle and knew that he could convince the Bugis to come to his assistance. He spent a large portion of the day telling Doramin of his plans and gaining the Bugis' agreement. When Jim returned to Cornelius' house in the evening, he was feeling almost lightheaded. He had been successful in convincing Doramin of his plan and now he knew its success depended totally upon him. He felt sure he would not fail. During the night Jim was awakened by Jewel. She gave him his gun and told him about four of Sherif Ali's men who were waiting to kill him. At first Jim was irritated, feeling this was another false alarm; he was also irritated at Jewel for being so nervous. Jewel, however, was insistent. She led him to an empty store building. At first Jim saw nothing. Then he noticed a pair of glowing eyes coming towards him. A half-dressed native held out a knife to attack Jim, who waited until the appropriate moment to fire his gun. His shot was perfect, and the native fell dead. Jim felt calm, but was proud of his bravery.

Notes This chapter brings out Jim's courage, as well as helplessness. He has the courage to fight danger without "jumping ship," but he is helplessly caught in the love affair with Jewel. She is devoted to him, guarding his life through the night. Her faithfulness, almost a reversal of the theme of white supremacy, sways Jim. He is overpowered by her, just as he is overpowered by Patusan. One night Jewel wakes him and warns him about a plot to kill him. Jim takes up a gun and protects himself, killing one man. Jim's faith in himself is renewed and he shouts, "Nothing can touch me." Jim is beginning to overcome some of his guilt and shame; at the same time, he is beginning to succumb to white supremacy, considering himself superior to others and foreshadowing that he cannot forever remain Tuan Jim.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/12915-chapters/12.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The White Devil/section_11_part_0.txt

The White Devil.act 5.scene 2

act 5, scene 2

{"name": "Act 5, Scene 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210510044810/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/the-white-devil/summary/act-5-scene-2", "summary": "Cornelia and Marcello are alone. Cornelia asks Marcello if he's going to fight someone, and he says that it's just a rumor . Marcello looks at a crucifix and asks Cornelia if it was the same crucifix, belonging to his father, that Flamineo snapped a limb from when he was a baby. Cornelia says it was, but it's fixed now. Right then, Flamineo enters and stabs and murders Marcello. Cornelia cries for help. Flamineo yells at her, and says he'll send for a surgeon when he goes to a sanctuary. Lodovico, Hortensio, and Gasparo enter. As he dies, Marcello tells his mother to remember what Flamineo did to the crucifix. He says he's dying for his family's sins, and the excessive ambition of his siblings. He dies. Cornelia denies he's dead, while the others gently try to convince her that he is. Brachiano enters, wearing every piece of his armor except the beaver , along with Flamineo. Flamineo admits to Brachiano that he killed Marcello. Cornelia runs at Flamineo with a knife but drops it. She asks God to forgive him and hopes that he lives to repent for such a horrible sin. Cornelia helps cover up for Flamineo, not wanting to lose another son--she tells Brachiano that Marcello drew his sword first. Brachiano gives Flamineo a lease on his life: he'll need to renew it every day or else be hanged. He also tells everyone not to tell Vittoria about what happened. Meanwhile, Lodovico sprinkles poison on Brachiano's beaver. The Duke calls for the beaver, and Francisco notes, aside, that he calls for his own death. It's ironic, says Francisco, that the last \"good\" thing Brachiano did in his horrible life was to pardon a murder.", "analysis": ""}

SCENE II Enter Marcello and Cornelia Corn. I hear a whispering all about the court, You are to fight: who is your opposite? What is the quarrel? Marc. 'Tis an idle rumour. Corn. Will you dissemble? sure you do not well To fright me thus: you never look thus pale, But when you are most angry. I do charge you, Upon my blessing--nay, I 'll call the duke, And he shall school you. Marc. Publish not a fear, Which would convert to laughter: 'tis not so. Was not this crucifix my father's? Corn. Yes. Marc. I have heard you say, giving my brother suck He took the crucifix between his hands, [Enter Flamineo. And broke a limb off. Corn. Yes, but 'tis mended. Flam. I have brought your weapon back. [Flamineo runs Marcello through. Corn. Ha! Oh, my horror! Marc. You have brought it home, indeed. Corn. Help! Oh, he 's murder'd! Flam. Do you turn your gall up? I 'll to sanctuary, And send a surgeon to you. [Exit. Enter Lodovico, Hortensio, and Gasparo Hort. How! o' th' ground! Marc. Oh, mother, now remember what I told Of breaking of the crucifix! Farewell. There are some sins, which heaven doth duly punish In a whole family. This it is to rise By all dishonest means! Let all men know, That tree shall long time keep a steady foot, Whose branches spread no wider than the root. [Dies. Corn. Oh, my perpetual sorrow! Hort. Virtuous Marcello! He 's dead. Pray leave him, lady: come, you shall. Corn. Alas! he is not dead; he 's in a trance. Why, here 's nobody shall get anything by his death. Let me call him again, for God's sake! Lodo. I would you were deceived. Corn. Oh, you abuse me, you abuse me, you abuse me! how many have gone away thus, for lack of 'tendance! rear up 's head, rear up 's head! his bleeding inward will kill him. Hort. You see he is departed. Corn. Let me come to him; give me him as he is, if he be turn'd to earth; let me but give him one hearty kiss, and you shall put us both in one coffin. Fetch a looking-glass: see if his breath will not stain it; or pull out some feathers from my pillow, and lay them to his lips. Will you lose him for a little painstaking? Hort. Your kindest office is to pray for him. Corn. Alas! I would not pray for him yet. He may live to lay me i' th' ground, and pray for me, if you 'll let me come to him. Enter Brachiano, all armed, save the beaver, with Flamineo and others Brach. Was this your handiwork? Flam. It was my misfortune. Corn. He lies, he lies! he did not kill him: these have killed him, that would not let him be better looked to. Brach. Have comfort, my griev'd mother. Corn. Oh, you screech-owl! Hort. Forbear, good madam. Corn. Let me go, let me go. [She runs to Flamineo with her knife drawn, and coming to him lets it fall. The God of heaven forgive thee! Dost not wonder I pray for thee? I 'll tell thee what 's the reason, I have scarce breath to number twenty minutes; I 'd not spend that in cursing. Fare thee well: Half of thyself lies there; and mayst thou live To fill an hour-glass with his moulder'd ashes, To tell how thou shouldst spend the time to come In blessed repentance! Brach. Mother, pray tell me How came he by his death? what was the quarrel? Corn. Indeed, my younger boy presum'd too much Upon his manhood, gave him bitter words, Drew his sword first; and so, I know not how, For I was out of my wits, he fell with 's head Just in my bosom. Page. That is not true, madam. Corn. I pray thee, peace. One arrow 's graze'd already; it were vain T' lose this, for that will ne'er be found again. Brach. Go, bear the body to Cornelia's lodging: And we command that none acquaint our duchess With this sad accident. For you, Flamineo, Hark you, I will not grant your pardon. Flam. No? Brach. Only a lease of your life; and that shall last But for one day: thou shalt be forc'd each evening To renew it, or be hang'd. Flam. At your pleasure. [Lodovico sprinkles Brachiano's beaver with a poison. Enter Francisco Your will is law now, I 'll not meddle with it. Brach. You once did brave me in your sister's lodging: I 'll now keep you in awe for 't. Where 's our beaver? Fran. [Aside.] He calls for his destruction. Noble youth, I pity thy sad fate! Now to the barriers. This shall his passage to the black lake further; The last good deed he did, he pardon'd murder. [Exeunt.

Act 5, Scene 2

https://web.archive.org/web/20210510044810/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/the-white-devil/summary/act-5-scene-2

Cornelia and Marcello are alone. Cornelia asks Marcello if he's going to fight someone, and he says that it's just a rumor . Marcello looks at a crucifix and asks Cornelia if it was the same crucifix, belonging to his father, that Flamineo snapped a limb from when he was a baby. Cornelia says it was, but it's fixed now. Right then, Flamineo enters and stabs and murders Marcello. Cornelia cries for help. Flamineo yells at her, and says he'll send for a surgeon when he goes to a sanctuary. Lodovico, Hortensio, and Gasparo enter. As he dies, Marcello tells his mother to remember what Flamineo did to the crucifix. He says he's dying for his family's sins, and the excessive ambition of his siblings. He dies. Cornelia denies he's dead, while the others gently try to convince her that he is. Brachiano enters, wearing every piece of his armor except the beaver , along with Flamineo. Flamineo admits to Brachiano that he killed Marcello. Cornelia runs at Flamineo with a knife but drops it. She asks God to forgive him and hopes that he lives to repent for such a horrible sin. Cornelia helps cover up for Flamineo, not wanting to lose another son--she tells Brachiano that Marcello drew his sword first. Brachiano gives Flamineo a lease on his life: he'll need to renew it every day or else be hanged. He also tells everyone not to tell Vittoria about what happened. Meanwhile, Lodovico sprinkles poison on Brachiano's beaver. The Duke calls for the beaver, and Francisco notes, aside, that he calls for his own death. It's ironic, says Francisco, that the last "good" thing Brachiano did in his horrible life was to pardon a murder.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/16.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Prince/section_6_part_2.txt

The Prince.chapter xvi

chapter xvi

{"name": "Chapter XVI", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210303115306/https://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/prince/section7/", "summary": "Liberality and Parsimony Of all the things he must guard against, hatred and contempt come first, and liberality leads to both. Liberality, or generosity, is a quality that many men admire. But if a prince develops a reputation for generosity, he will ruin his state. A reputation for generosity requires outward lavishness, which eventually depletes all of the prince's resources. In the end, the prince will be forced to burden his people with excessive taxes in order to raise the money to maintain his reputation for generosity. Ultimately, the prince's liberality will make the people despise and resent him. Moreover, any prince who attempts to change his reputation for generosity will immediately develop a reputation for being a miser. A parsimonious, or ungenerous, prince may be perceived as miserly in the beginning, but he will eventually earn a reputation for generosity. A prince who is thrifty and frugal will eventually have enough funds to defend against aggression and fund projects without having to tax the people unduly. In history, the actions of Pope Julius II, the present king of France, and the present king of Spain all support the view that parsimony enables the prince to accomplish great things. Some might argue that successful leaders have come to power and sustained their rule by virtue of their generosity, such as Caesar. But if Caesar had not been killed, he would have found that maintaining his rule required moderating his spending. In sum, generosity is self-defeating. Generosity uses up resources and prevents further generosity. While parsimony might lead to ignominy, generosity will eventually lead to hatred", "analysis": ""}

Commencing then with the first of the above-named characteristics, I say that it would be well to be reputed liberal. Nevertheless, liberality exercised in a way that does not bring you the reputation for it, injures you; for if one exercises it honestly and as it should be exercised, it may not become known, and you will not avoid the reproach of its opposite. Therefore, any one wishing to maintain among men the name of liberal is obliged to avoid no attribute of magnificence; so that a prince thus inclined will consume in such acts all his property, and will be compelled in the end, if he wish to maintain the name of liberal, to unduly weigh down his people, and tax them, and do everything he can to get money. This will soon make him odious to his subjects, and becoming poor he will be little valued by any one; thus, with his liberality, having offended many and rewarded few, he is affected by the very first trouble and imperilled by whatever may be the first danger; recognizing this himself, and wishing to draw back from it, he runs at once into the reproach of being miserly. Therefore, a prince, not being able to exercise this virtue of liberality in such a way that it is recognized, except to his cost, if he is wise he ought not to fear the reputation of being mean, for in time he will come to be more considered than if liberal, seeing that with his economy his revenues are enough, that he can defend himself against all attacks, and is able to engage in enterprises without burdening his people; thus it comes to pass that he exercises liberality towards all from whom he does not take, who are numberless, and meanness towards those to whom he does not give, who are few. We have not seen great things done in our time except by those who have been considered mean; the rest have failed. Pope Julius the Second was assisted in reaching the papacy by a reputation for liberality, yet he did not strive afterwards to keep it up, when he made war on the King of France; and he made many wars without imposing any extraordinary tax on his subjects, for he supplied his additional expenses out of his long thriftiness. The present King of Spain would not have undertaken or conquered in so many enterprises if he had been reputed liberal. A prince, therefore, provided that he has not to rob his subjects, that he can defend himself, that he does not become poor and abject, that he is not forced to become rapacious, ought to hold of little account a reputation for being mean, for it is one of those vices which will enable him to govern. And if any one should say: Caesar obtained empire by liberality, and many others have reached the highest positions by having been liberal, and by being considered so, I answer: Either you are a prince in fact, or in a way to become one. In the first case this liberality is dangerous, in the second it is very necessary to be considered liberal; and Caesar was one of those who wished to become pre-eminent in Rome; but if he had survived after becoming so, and had not moderated his expenses, he would have destroyed his government. And if any one should reply: Many have been princes, and have done great things with armies, who have been considered very liberal, I reply: Either a prince spends that which is his own or his subjects' or else that of others. In the first case he ought to be sparing, in the second he ought not to neglect any opportunity for liberality. And to the prince who goes forth with his army, supporting it by pillage, sack, and extortion, handling that which belongs to others, this liberality is necessary, otherwise he would not be followed by soldiers. And of that which is neither yours nor your subjects' you can be a ready giver, as were Cyrus, Caesar, and Alexander; because it does not take away your reputation if you squander that of others, but adds to it; it is only squandering your own that injures you. And there is nothing wastes so rapidly as liberality, for even whilst you exercise it you lose the power to do so, and so become either poor or despised, or else, in avoiding poverty, rapacious and hated. And a prince should guard himself, above all things, against being despised and hated; and liberality leads you to both. Therefore it is wiser to have a reputation for meanness which brings reproach without hatred, than to be compelled through seeking a reputation for liberality to incur a name for rapacity which begets reproach with hatred.

Chapter XVI

https://web.archive.org/web/20210303115306/https://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/prince/section7/

Liberality and Parsimony Of all the things he must guard against, hatred and contempt come first, and liberality leads to both. Liberality, or generosity, is a quality that many men admire. But if a prince develops a reputation for generosity, he will ruin his state. A reputation for generosity requires outward lavishness, which eventually depletes all of the prince's resources. In the end, the prince will be forced to burden his people with excessive taxes in order to raise the money to maintain his reputation for generosity. Ultimately, the prince's liberality will make the people despise and resent him. Moreover, any prince who attempts to change his reputation for generosity will immediately develop a reputation for being a miser. A parsimonious, or ungenerous, prince may be perceived as miserly in the beginning, but he will eventually earn a reputation for generosity. A prince who is thrifty and frugal will eventually have enough funds to defend against aggression and fund projects without having to tax the people unduly. In history, the actions of Pope Julius II, the present king of France, and the present king of Spain all support the view that parsimony enables the prince to accomplish great things. Some might argue that successful leaders have come to power and sustained their rule by virtue of their generosity, such as Caesar. But if Caesar had not been killed, he would have found that maintaining his rule required moderating his spending. In sum, generosity is self-defeating. Generosity uses up resources and prevents further generosity. While parsimony might lead to ignominy, generosity will eventually lead to hatred

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/50.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_6_part_5.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapter xlix

chapter xlix

{"name": "Chapter XLIX", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase6-chapter45-52", "summary": "Angel's parents send the letter to their son in Brazil. His worried mother takes out her sorrow on Reverend Clare for not insisting that Angel attend Cambridge like his brothers. However, Reverend Clare feels no such regret but is saddened by the situation. A more mature Angel, who has forgiven Tess and regrets his hasty actions, is ready to come home, especially when an older man he admires tells him before he dies that he was wrong to abandon her. Meanwhile, Tess's sister Liza Lu arrives at Flintcomb-Ash to tell Tess that their mother has taken ill and to return home", "analysis": ""}

The appeal duly found its way to the breakfast-table of the quiet Vicarage to the westward, in that valley where the air is so soft and the soil so rich that the effort of growth requires but superficial aid by comparison with the tillage at Flintcomb-Ash, and where to Tess the human world seemed so different (though it was much the same). It was purely for security that she had been requested by Angel to send her communications through his father, whom he kept pretty well informed of his changing addresses in the country he had gone to exploit for himself with a heavy heart. "Now," said old Mr Clare to his wife, when he had read the envelope, "if Angel proposes leaving Rio for a visit home at the end of next month, as he told us that he hoped to do, I think this may hasten his plans; for I believe it to be from his wife." He breathed deeply at the thought of her; and the letter was redirected to be promptly sent on to Angel. "Dear fellow, I hope he will get home safely," murmured Mrs Clare. "To my dying day I shall feel that he has been ill-used. You should have sent him to Cambridge in spite of his want of faith and given him the same chance as the other boys had. He would have grown out of it under proper influence, and perhaps would have taken Orders after all. Church or no Church, it would have been fairer to him." This was the only wail with which Mrs Clare ever disturbed her husband's peace in respect to their sons. And she did not vent this often; for she was as considerate as she was devout, and knew that his mind too was troubled by doubts as to his justice in this matter. Only too often had she heard him lying awake at night, stifling sighs for Angel with prayers. But the uncompromising Evangelical did not even now hold that he would have been justified in giving his son, an unbeliever, the same academic advantages that he had given to the two others, when it was possible, if not probable, that those very advantages might have been used to decry the doctrines which he had made it his life's mission and desire to propagate, and the mission of his ordained sons likewise. To put with one hand a pedestal under the feet of the two faithful ones, and with the other to exalt the unfaithful by the same artificial means, he deemed to be alike inconsistent with his convictions, his position, and his hopes. Nevertheless, he loved his misnamed Angel, and in secret mourned over this treatment of him as Abraham might have mourned over the doomed Isaac while they went up the hill together. His silent self-generated regrets were far bitterer than the reproaches which his wife rendered audible. They blamed themselves for this unlucky marriage. If Angel had never been destined for a farmer he would never have been thrown with agricultural girls. They did not distinctly know what had separated him and his wife, nor the date on which the separation had taken place. At first they had supposed it must be something of the nature of a serious aversion. But in his later letters he occasionally alluded to the intention of coming home to fetch her; from which expressions they hoped the division might not owe its origin to anything so hopelessly permanent as that. He had told them that she was with her relatives, and in their doubts they had decided not to intrude into a situation which they knew no way of bettering. The eyes for which Tess's letter was intended were gazing at this time on a limitless expanse of country from the back of a mule which was bearing him from the interior of the South-American Continent towards the coast. His experiences of this strange land had been sad. The severe illness from which he had suffered shortly after his arrival had never wholly left him, and he had by degrees almost decided to relinquish his hope of farming here, though, as long as the bare possibility existed of his remaining, he kept this change of view a secret from his parents. The crowds of agricultural labourers who had come out to the country in his wake, dazzled by representations of easy independence, had suffered, died, and wasted away. He would see mothers from English farms trudging along with their infants in their arms, when the child would be stricken with fever and would die; the mother would pause to dig a hole in the loose earth with her bare hands, would bury the babe therein with the same natural grave-tools, shed one tear, and again trudge on. Angel's original intention had not been emigration to Brazil but a northern or eastern farm in his own country. He had come to this place in a fit of desperation, the Brazil movement among the English agriculturists having by chance coincided with his desire to escape from his past existence. During this time of absence he had mentally aged a dozen years. What arrested him now as of value in life was less its beauty than its pathos. Having long discredited the old systems of mysticism, he now began to discredit the old appraisements of morality. He thought they wanted readjusting. Who was the moral man? Still more pertinently, who was the moral woman? The beauty or ugliness of a character lay not only in its achievements, but in its aims and impulses; its true history lay, not among things done, but among things willed. How, then, about Tess? Viewing her in these lights, a regret for his hasty judgement began to oppress him. Did he reject her eternally, or did he not? He could no longer say that he would always reject her, and not to say that was in spirit to accept her now. This growing fondness for her memory coincided in point of time with her residence at Flintcomb-Ash, but it was before she had felt herself at liberty to trouble him with a word about her circumstances or her feelings. He was greatly perplexed; and in his perplexity as to her motives in withholding intelligence, he did not inquire. Thus her silence of docility was misinterpreted. How much it really said if he had understood!--that she adhered with literal exactness to orders which he had given and forgotten; that despite her natural fearlessness she asserted no rights, admitted his judgement to be in every respect the true one, and bent her head dumbly thereto. In the before-mentioned journey by mules through the interior of the country, another man rode beside him. Angel's companion was also an Englishman, bent on the same errand, though he came from another part of the island. They were both in a state of mental depression, and they spoke of home affairs. Confidence begat confidence. With that curious tendency evinced by men, more especially when in distant lands, to entrust to strangers details of their lives which they would on no account mention to friends, Angel admitted to this man as they rode along the sorrowful facts of his marriage. The stranger had sojourned in many more lands and among many more peoples than Angel; to his cosmopolitan mind such deviations from the social norm, so immense to domesticity, were no more than are the irregularities of vale and mountain-chain to the whole terrestrial curve. He viewed the matter in quite a different light from Angel; thought that what Tess had been was of no importance beside what she would be, and plainly told Clare that he was wrong in coming away from her. The next day they were drenched in a thunder-storm. Angel's companion was struck down with fever, and died by the week's end. Clare waited a few hours to bury him, and then went on his way. The cursory remarks of the large-minded stranger, of whom he knew absolutely nothing beyond a commonplace name, were sublimed by his death, and influenced Clare more than all the reasoned ethics of the philosophers. His own parochialism made him ashamed by its contrast. His inconsistencies rushed upon him in a flood. He had persistently elevated Hellenic Paganism at the expense of Christianity; yet in that civilization an illegal surrender was not certain disesteem. Surely then he might have regarded that abhorrence of the un-intact state, which he had inherited with the creed of mysticism, as at least open to correction when the result was due to treachery. A remorse struck into him. The words of Izz Huett, never quite stilled in his memory, came back to him. He had asked Izz if she loved him, and she had replied in the affirmative. Did she love him more than Tess did? No, she had replied; Tess would lay down her life for him, and she herself could do no more. He thought of Tess as she had appeared on the day of the wedding. How her eyes had lingered upon him; how she had hung upon his words as if they were a god's! And during the terrible evening over the hearth, when her simple soul uncovered itself to his, how pitiful her face had looked by the rays of the fire, in her inability to realize that his love and protection could possibly be withdrawn. Thus from being her critic he grew to be her advocate. Cynical things he had uttered to himself about her; but no man can be always a cynic and live; and he withdrew them. The mistake of expressing them had arisen from his allowing himself to be influenced by general principles to the disregard of the particular instance. But the reasoning is somewhat musty; lovers and husbands have gone over the ground before to-day. Clare had been harsh towards her; there is no doubt of it. Men are too often harsh with women they love or have loved; women with men. And yet these harshnesses are tenderness itself when compared with the universal harshness out of which they grow; the harshness of the position towards the temperament, of the means towards the aims, of to-day towards yesterday, of hereafter towards to-day. The historic interest of her family--that masterful line of d'Urbervilles--whom he had despised as a spent force, touched his sentiments now. Why had he not known the difference between the political value and the imaginative value of these things? In the latter aspect her d'Urberville descent was a fact of great dimensions; worthless to economics, it was a most useful ingredient to the dreamer, to the moralizer on declines and falls. It was a fact that would soon be forgotten--that bit of distinction in poor Tess's blood and name, and oblivion would fall upon her hereditary link with the marble monuments and leaded skeletons at Kingsbere. So does Time ruthlessly destroy his own romances. In recalling her face again and again, he thought now that he could see therein a flash of the dignity which must have graced her grand-dames; and the vision sent that _aura_ through his veins which he had formerly felt, and which left behind it a sense of sickness. Despite her not-inviolate past, what still abode in such a woman as Tess outvalued the freshness of her fellows. Was not the gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim better than the vintage of Abiezer? So spoke love renascent, preparing the way for Tess's devoted outpouring, which was then just being forwarded to him by his father; though owing to his distance inland it was to be a long time in reaching him. Meanwhile the writer's expectation that Angel would come in response to the entreaty was alternately great and small. What lessened it was that the facts of her life which had led to the parting had not changed--could never change; and that, if her presence had not attenuated them, her absence could not. Nevertheless she addressed her mind to the tender question of what she could do to please him best if he should arrive. Sighs were expended on the wish that she had taken more notice of the tunes he played on his harp, that she had inquired more curiously of him which were his favourite ballads among those the country-girls sang. She indirectly inquired of Amby Seedling, who had followed Izz from Talbothays, and by chance Amby remembered that, amongst the snatches of melody in which they had indulged at the dairyman's, to induce the cows to let down their milk, Clare had seemed to like "Cupid's Gardens", "I have parks, I have hounds", and "The break o' the day"; and had seemed not to care for "The Tailor's Breeches" and "Such a beauty I did grow", excellent ditties as they were. To perfect the ballads was now her whimsical desire. She practised them privately at odd moments, especially "The break o' the day": Arise, arise, arise! And pick your love a posy, All o' the sweetest flowers That in the garden grow. The turtle doves and sma' birds In every bough a-building, So early in the May-time At the break o' the day! It would have melted the heart of a stone to hear her singing these ditties whenever she worked apart from the rest of the girls in this cold dry time; the tears running down her cheeks all the while at the thought that perhaps he would not, after all, come to hear her, and the simple silly words of the songs resounding in painful mockery of the aching heart of the singer. Tess was so wrapt up in this fanciful dream that she seemed not to know how the season was advancing; that the days had lengthened, that Lady-Day was at hand, and would soon be followed by Old Lady-Day, the end of her term here. But before the quarter-day had quite come, something happened which made Tess think of far different matters. She was at her lodging as usual one evening, sitting in the downstairs room with the rest of the family, when somebody knocked at the door and inquired for Tess. Through the doorway she saw against the declining light a figure with the height of a woman and the breadth of a child, a tall, thin, girlish creature whom she did not recognize in the twilight till the girl said "Tess!" "What--is it 'Liza-Lu?" asked Tess, in startled accents. Her sister, whom a little over a year ago she had left at home as a child, had sprung up by a sudden shoot to a form of this presentation, of which as yet Lu seemed herself scarce able to understand the meaning. Her thin legs, visible below her once-long frock, now short by her growing, and her uncomfortable hands and arms revealed her youth and inexperience. "Yes, I have been traipsing about all day, Tess," said Lu, with unemotional gravity, "a-trying to find 'ee; and I'm very tired." "What is the matter at home?" "Mother is took very bad, and the doctor says she's dying, and as father is not very well neither, and says 'tis wrong for a man of such a high family as his to slave and drave at common labouring work, we don't know what to do." Tess stood in reverie a long time before she thought of asking 'Liza-Lu to come in and sit down. When she had done so, and 'Liza-Lu was having some tea, she came to a decision. It was imperative that she should go home. Her agreement did not end till Old Lady-Day, the sixth of April, but as the interval thereto was not a long one she resolved to run the risk of starting at once. To go that night would be a gain of twelve-hours; but her sister was too tired to undertake such a distance till the morrow. Tess ran down to where Marian and Izz lived, informed them of what had happened, and begged them to make the best of her case to the farmer. Returning, she got Lu a supper, and after that, having tucked the younger into her own bed, packed up as many of her belongings as would go into a withy basket, and started, directing Lu to follow her next morning.

Chapter XLIX

https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase6-chapter45-52

Angel's parents send the letter to their son in Brazil. His worried mother takes out her sorrow on Reverend Clare for not insisting that Angel attend Cambridge like his brothers. However, Reverend Clare feels no such regret but is saddened by the situation. A more mature Angel, who has forgiven Tess and regrets his hasty actions, is ready to come home, especially when an older man he admires tells him before he dies that he was wrong to abandon her. Meanwhile, Tess's sister Liza Lu arrives at Flintcomb-Ash to tell Tess that their mother has taken ill and to return home

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The Brothers Karamazov.book 2.chapter 6

book 2, chapter 6

{"name": "Book 2, Chapter 6", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-2-chapter-6", "summary": "When Dmitri enters, he gives a deep bow to Zosima and receives his blessing. Then he bows deeply to his father, who bows in such a way that even though he looks serious, he still looks like he's mocking Dmitri. Miusov can't let Ivan's argument in the previous chapter go. He tells the group that Ivan had also claimed that man only loves mankind because of a belief in immortality; a love for mankind is not something that comes naturally or is part of human nature. If you're an atheist and don't believe in immortality, then love for mankind is just hypocrisy: you should embrace egotism and do whatever you want. Ivan's point can be summed up in the phrase \"everything is permitted.\" Zosima remarks that these contradictions in Ivan's beliefs only indicate that Ivan is continuing to wrestle with these spiritual issues. He gives Ivan a blessing. This solemn moment is broken up by, you guessed it, Fyodor, who immediately jumps up and accuses Dmitri of trying to bilk him out of his money. He also tells Zosima that Dmitri has been cavorting with another woman even though he's already engaged to the daughter of his former colonel. Dmitri starts yelling back at his father, then the monks start exclaiming at the scandalous behavior of the two. Suddenly Zosima gets up and kneels before Dmitri, bows, and touches the floor with his forehead. He then asks everyone in the cell to forgive him. Overwhelmed, Dmitri rushes out of the room. Miusov attempts to excuse himself, but Fyodor says he's leaving. Miusov decides to stay and heads toward the Father Superior's with Ivan to have dinner.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter VI. Why Is Such A Man Alive? Dmitri Fyodorovitch, a young man of eight and twenty, of medium height and agreeable countenance, looked older than his years. He was muscular, and showed signs of considerable physical strength. Yet there was something not healthy in his face. It was rather thin, his cheeks were hollow, and there was an unhealthy sallowness in their color. His rather large, prominent, dark eyes had an expression of firm determination, and yet there was a vague look in them, too. Even when he was excited and talking irritably, his eyes somehow did not follow his mood, but betrayed something else, sometimes quite incongruous with what was passing. "It's hard to tell what he's thinking," those who talked to him sometimes declared. People who saw something pensive and sullen in his eyes were startled by his sudden laugh, which bore witness to mirthful and light- hearted thoughts at the very time when his eyes were so gloomy. A certain strained look in his face was easy to understand at this moment. Every one knew, or had heard of, the extremely restless and dissipated life which he had been leading of late, as well as of the violent anger to which he had been roused in his quarrels with his father. There were several stories current in the town about it. It is true that he was irascible by nature, "of an unstable and unbalanced mind," as our justice of the peace, Katchalnikov, happily described him. He was stylishly and irreproachably dressed in a carefully buttoned frock- coat. He wore black gloves and carried a top-hat. Having only lately left the army, he still had mustaches and no beard. His dark brown hair was cropped short, and combed forward on his temples. He had the long, determined stride of a military man. He stood still for a moment on the threshold, and glancing at the whole party went straight up to the elder, guessing him to be their host. He made him a low bow, and asked his blessing. Father Zossima, rising in his chair, blessed him. Dmitri kissed his hand respectfully, and with intense feeling, almost anger, he said: "Be so generous as to forgive me for having kept you waiting so long, but Smerdyakov, the valet sent me by my father, in reply to my inquiries, told me twice over that the appointment was for one. Now I suddenly learn--" "Don't disturb yourself," interposed the elder. "No matter. You are a little late. It's of no consequence...." "I'm extremely obliged to you, and expected no less from your goodness." Saying this, Dmitri bowed once more. Then, turning suddenly towards his father, made him, too, a similarly low and respectful bow. He had evidently considered it beforehand, and made this bow in all seriousness, thinking it his duty to show his respect and good intentions. Although Fyodor Pavlovitch was taken unawares, he was equal to the occasion. In response to Dmitri's bow he jumped up from his chair and made his son a bow as low in return. His face was suddenly solemn and impressive, which gave him a positively malignant look. Dmitri bowed generally to all present, and without a word walked to the window with his long, resolute stride, sat down on the only empty chair, near Father Paissy, and, bending forward, prepared to listen to the conversation he had interrupted. Dmitri's entrance had taken no more than two minutes, and the conversation was resumed. But this time Miuesov thought it unnecessary to reply to Father Paissy's persistent and almost irritable question. "Allow me to withdraw from this discussion," he observed with a certain well-bred nonchalance. "It's a subtle question, too. Here Ivan Fyodorovitch is smiling at us. He must have something interesting to say about that also. Ask him." "Nothing special, except one little remark," Ivan replied at once. "European Liberals in general, and even our liberal dilettanti, often mix up the final results of socialism with those of Christianity. This wild notion is, of course, a characteristic feature. But it's not only Liberals and dilettanti who mix up socialism and Christianity, but, in many cases, it appears, the police--the foreign police, of course--do the same. Your Paris anecdote is rather to the point, Pyotr Alexandrovitch." "I ask your permission to drop this subject altogether," Miuesov repeated. "I will tell you instead, gentlemen, another interesting and rather characteristic anecdote of Ivan Fyodorovitch himself. Only five days ago, in a gathering here, principally of ladies, he solemnly declared in argument that there was nothing in the whole world to make men love their neighbors. That there was no law of nature that man should love mankind, and that, if there had been any love on earth hitherto, it was not owing to a natural law, but simply because men have believed in immortality. Ivan Fyodorovitch added in parenthesis that the whole natural law lies in that faith, and that if you were to destroy in mankind the belief in immortality, not only love but every living force maintaining the life of the world would at once be dried up. Moreover, nothing then would be immoral, everything would be lawful, even cannibalism. That's not all. He ended by asserting that for every individual, like ourselves, who does not believe in God or immortality, the moral law of nature must immediately be changed into the exact contrary of the former religious law, and that egoism, even to crime, must become not only lawful but even recognized as the inevitable, the most rational, even honorable outcome of his position. From this paradox, gentlemen, you can judge of the rest of our eccentric and paradoxical friend Ivan Fyodorovitch's theories." "Excuse me," Dmitri cried suddenly; "if I've heard aright, crime must not only be permitted but even recognized as the inevitable and the most rational outcome of his position for every infidel! Is that so or not?" "Quite so," said Father Paissy. "I'll remember it." Having uttered these words Dmitri ceased speaking as suddenly as he had begun. Every one looked at him with curiosity. "Is that really your conviction as to the consequences of the disappearance of the faith in immortality?" the elder asked Ivan suddenly. "Yes. That was my contention. There is no virtue if there is no immortality." "You are blessed in believing that, or else most unhappy." "Why unhappy?" Ivan asked smiling. "Because, in all probability you don't believe yourself in the immortality of your soul, nor in what you have written yourself in your article on Church jurisdiction." "Perhaps you are right! ... But I wasn't altogether joking," Ivan suddenly and strangely confessed, flushing quickly. "You were not altogether joking. That's true. The question is still fretting your heart, and not answered. But the martyr likes sometimes to divert himself with his despair, as it were driven to it by despair itself. Meanwhile, in your despair, you, too, divert yourself with magazine articles, and discussions in society, though you don't believe your own arguments, and with an aching heart mock at them inwardly.... That question you have not answered, and it is your great grief, for it clamors for an answer." "But can it be answered by me? Answered in the affirmative?" Ivan went on asking strangely, still looking at the elder with the same inexplicable smile. "If it can't be decided in the affirmative, it will never be decided in the negative. You know that that is the peculiarity of your heart, and all its suffering is due to it. But thank the Creator who has given you a lofty heart capable of such suffering; of thinking and seeking higher things, for our dwelling is in the heavens. God grant that your heart will attain the answer on earth, and may God bless your path." The elder raised his hand and would have made the sign of the cross over Ivan from where he stood. But the latter rose from his seat, went up to him, received his blessing, and kissing his hand went back to his place in silence. His face looked firm and earnest. This action and all the preceding conversation, which was so surprising from Ivan, impressed every one by its strangeness and a certain solemnity, so that all were silent for a moment, and there was a look almost of apprehension in Alyosha's face. But Miuesov suddenly shrugged his shoulders. And at the same moment Fyodor Pavlovitch jumped up from his seat. "Most pious and holy elder," he cried, pointing to Ivan, "that is my son, flesh of my flesh, the dearest of my flesh! He is my most dutiful Karl Moor, so to speak, while this son who has just come in, Dmitri, against whom I am seeking justice from you, is the undutiful Franz Moor--they are both out of Schiller's _Robbers_, and so I am the reigning Count von Moor! Judge and save us! We need not only your prayers but your prophecies!" "Speak without buffoonery, and don't begin by insulting the members of your family," answered the elder, in a faint, exhausted voice. He was obviously getting more and more fatigued, and his strength was failing. "An unseemly farce which I foresaw when I came here!" cried Dmitri indignantly. He too leapt up. "Forgive it, reverend Father," he added, addressing the elder. "I am not a cultivated man, and I don't even know how to address you properly, but you have been deceived and you have been too good-natured in letting us meet here. All my father wants is a scandal. Why he wants it only he can tell. He always has some motive. But I believe I know why--" "They all blame me, all of them!" cried Fyodor Pavlovitch in his turn. "Pyotr Alexandrovitch here blames me too. You have been blaming me, Pyotr Alexandrovitch, you have!" he turned suddenly to Miuesov, although the latter was not dreaming of interrupting him. "They all accuse me of having hidden the children's money in my boots, and cheated them, but isn't there a court of law? There they will reckon out for you, Dmitri Fyodorovitch, from your notes, your letters, and your agreements, how much money you had, how much you have spent, and how much you have left. Why does Pyotr Alexandrovitch refuse to pass judgment? Dmitri is not a stranger to him. Because they are all against me, while Dmitri Fyodorovitch is in debt to me, and not a little, but some thousands of which I have documentary proof. The whole town is echoing with his debaucheries. And where he was stationed before, he several times spent a thousand or two for the seduction of some respectable girl; we know all about that, Dmitri Fyodorovitch, in its most secret details. I'll prove it.... Would you believe it, holy Father, he has captivated the heart of the most honorable of young ladies of good family and fortune, daughter of a gallant colonel, formerly his superior officer, who had received many honors and had the Anna Order on his breast. He compromised the girl by his promise of marriage, now she is an orphan and here; she is betrothed to him, yet before her very eyes he is dancing attendance on a certain enchantress. And although this enchantress has lived in, so to speak, civil marriage with a respectable man, yet she is of an independent character, an unapproachable fortress for everybody, just like a legal wife--for she is virtuous, yes, holy Fathers, she is virtuous. Dmitri Fyodorovitch wants to open this fortress with a golden key, and that's why he is insolent to me now, trying to get money from me, though he has wasted thousands on this enchantress already. He's continually borrowing money for the purpose. From whom do you think? Shall I say, Mitya?" "Be silent!" cried Dmitri, "wait till I'm gone. Don't dare in my presence to asperse the good name of an honorable girl! That you should utter a word about her is an outrage, and I won't permit it!" He was breathless. "Mitya! Mitya!" cried Fyodor Pavlovitch hysterically, squeezing out a tear. "And is your father's blessing nothing to you? If I curse you, what then?" "Shameless hypocrite!" exclaimed Dmitri furiously. "He says that to his father! his father! What would he be with others? Gentlemen, only fancy; there's a poor but honorable man living here, burdened with a numerous family, a captain who got into trouble and was discharged from the army, but not publicly, not by court-martial, with no slur on his honor. And three weeks ago, Dmitri seized him by the beard in a tavern, dragged him out into the street and beat him publicly, and all because he is an agent in a little business of mine." "It's all a lie! Outwardly it's the truth, but inwardly a lie!" Dmitri was trembling with rage. "Father, I don't justify my action. Yes, I confess it publicly, I behaved like a brute to that captain, and I regret it now, and I'm disgusted with myself for my brutal rage. But this captain, this agent of yours, went to that lady whom you call an enchantress, and suggested to her from you, that she should take I.O.U.'s of mine which were in your possession, and should sue me for the money so as to get me into prison by means of them, if I persisted in claiming an account from you of my property. Now you reproach me for having a weakness for that lady when you yourself incited her to captivate me! She told me so to my face.... She told me the story and laughed at you.... You wanted to put me in prison because you are jealous of me with her, because you'd begun to force your attentions upon her; and I know all about that, too; she laughed at you for that as well--you hear--she laughed at you as she described it. So here you have this man, this father who reproaches his profligate son! Gentlemen, forgive my anger, but I foresaw that this crafty old man would only bring you together to create a scandal. I had come to forgive him if he held out his hand; to forgive him, and ask forgiveness! But as he has just this minute insulted not only me, but an honorable young lady, for whom I feel such reverence that I dare not take her name in vain, I have made up my mind to show up his game, though he is my father...." He could not go on. His eyes were glittering and he breathed with difficulty. But every one in the cell was stirred. All except Father Zossima got up from their seats uneasily. The monks looked austere but waited for guidance from the elder. He sat still, pale, not from excitement but from the weakness of disease. An imploring smile lighted up his face; from time to time he raised his hand, as though to check the storm, and, of course, a gesture from him would have been enough to end the scene; but he seemed to be waiting for something and watched them intently as though trying to make out something which was not perfectly clear to him. At last Miuesov felt completely humiliated and disgraced. "We are all to blame for this scandalous scene," he said hotly. "But I did not foresee it when I came, though I knew with whom I had to deal. This must be stopped at once! Believe me, your reverence, I had no precise knowledge of the details that have just come to light, I was unwilling to believe them, and I learn for the first time.... A father is jealous of his son's relations with a woman of loose behavior and intrigues with the creature to get his son into prison! This is the company in which I have been forced to be present! I was deceived. I declare to you all that I was as much deceived as any one." "Dmitri Fyodorovitch," yelled Fyodor Pavlovitch suddenly, in an unnatural voice, "if you were not my son I would challenge you this instant to a duel ... with pistols, at three paces ... across a handkerchief," he ended, stamping with both feet. With old liars who have been acting all their lives there are moments when they enter so completely into their part that they tremble or shed tears of emotion in earnest, although at that very moment, or a second later, they are able to whisper to themselves, "You know you are lying, you shameless old sinner! You're acting now, in spite of your 'holy' wrath." Dmitri frowned painfully, and looked with unutterable contempt at his father. "I thought ... I thought," he said, in a soft and, as it were, controlled voice, "that I was coming to my native place with the angel of my heart, my betrothed, to cherish his old age, and I find nothing but a depraved profligate, a despicable clown!" "A duel!" yelled the old wretch again, breathless and spluttering at each syllable. "And you, Pyotr Alexandrovitch Miuesov, let me tell you that there has never been in all your family a loftier, and more honest--you hear--more honest woman than this 'creature,' as you have dared to call her! And you, Dmitri Fyodorovitch, have abandoned your betrothed for that 'creature,' so you must yourself have thought that your betrothed couldn't hold a candle to her. That's the woman called a 'creature'!" "Shameful!" broke from Father Iosif. "Shameful and disgraceful!" Kalganov, flushing crimson, cried in a boyish voice, trembling with emotion. He had been silent till that moment. "Why is such a man alive?" Dmitri, beside himself with rage, growled in a hollow voice, hunching up his shoulders till he looked almost deformed. "Tell me, can he be allowed to go on defiling the earth?" He looked round at every one and pointed at the old man. He spoke evenly and deliberately. "Listen, listen, monks, to the parricide!" cried Fyodor Pavlovitch, rushing up to Father Iosif. "That's the answer to your 'shameful!' What is shameful? That 'creature,' that 'woman of loose behavior' is perhaps holier than you are yourselves, you monks who are seeking salvation! She fell perhaps in her youth, ruined by her environment. But she loved much, and Christ himself forgave the woman 'who loved much.' " "It was not for such love Christ forgave her," broke impatiently from the gentle Father Iosif. "Yes, it was for such, monks, it was! You save your souls here, eating cabbage, and think you are the righteous. You eat a gudgeon a day, and you think you bribe God with gudgeon." "This is unendurable!" was heard on all sides in the cell. But this unseemly scene was cut short in a most unexpected way. Father Zossima rose suddenly from his seat. Almost distracted with anxiety for the elder and every one else, Alyosha succeeded, however, in supporting him by the arm. Father Zossima moved towards Dmitri and reaching him sank on his knees before him. Alyosha thought that he had fallen from weakness, but this was not so. The elder distinctly and deliberately bowed down at Dmitri's feet till his forehead touched the floor. Alyosha was so astounded that he failed to assist him when he got up again. There was a faint smile on his lips. "Good-by! Forgive me, all of you!" he said, bowing on all sides to his guests. Dmitri stood for a few moments in amazement. Bowing down to him--what did it mean? Suddenly he cried aloud, "Oh, God!" hid his face in his hands, and rushed out of the room. All the guests flocked out after him, in their confusion not saying good-by, or bowing to their host. Only the monks went up to him again for a blessing. "What did it mean, falling at his feet like that? Was it symbolic or what?" said Fyodor Pavlovitch, suddenly quieted and trying to reopen conversation without venturing to address anybody in particular. They were all passing out of the precincts of the hermitage at the moment. "I can't answer for a madhouse and for madmen," Miuesov answered at once ill-humoredly, "but I will spare myself your company, Fyodor Pavlovitch, and, trust me, for ever. Where's that monk?" "That monk," that is, the monk who had invited them to dine with the Superior, did not keep them waiting. He met them as soon as they came down the steps from the elder's cell, as though he had been waiting for them all the time. "Reverend Father, kindly do me a favor. Convey my deepest respect to the Father Superior, apologize for me, personally, Miuesov, to his reverence, telling him that I deeply regret that owing to unforeseen circumstances I am unable to have the honor of being present at his table, greatly as I should desire to do so," Miuesov said irritably to the monk. "And that unforeseen circumstance, of course, is myself," Fyodor Pavlovitch cut in immediately. "Do you hear, Father; this gentleman doesn't want to remain in my company or else he'd come at once. And you shall go, Pyotr Alexandrovitch, pray go to the Father Superior and good appetite to you. I will decline, and not you. Home, home, I'll eat at home, I don't feel equal to it here, Pyotr Alexandrovitch, my amiable relative." "I am not your relative and never have been, you contemptible man!" "I said it on purpose to madden you, because you always disclaim the relationship, though you really are a relation in spite of your shuffling. I'll prove it by the church calendar. As for you, Ivan, stay if you like. I'll send the horses for you later. Propriety requires you to go to the Father Superior, Pyotr Alexandrovitch, to apologize for the disturbance we've been making...." "Is it true that you are going home? Aren't you lying?" "Pyotr Alexandrovitch! How could I dare after what's happened! Forgive me, gentlemen, I was carried away! And upset besides! And, indeed, I am ashamed. Gentlemen, one man has the heart of Alexander of Macedon and another the heart of the little dog Fido. Mine is that of the little dog Fido. I am ashamed! After such an escapade how can I go to dinner, to gobble up the monastery's sauces? I am ashamed, I can't. You must excuse me!" "The devil only knows, what if he deceives us?" thought Miuesov, still hesitating, and watching the retreating buffoon with distrustful eyes. The latter turned round, and noticing that Miuesov was watching him, waved him a kiss. "Well, are you coming to the Superior?" Miuesov asked Ivan abruptly. "Why not? I was especially invited yesterday." "Unfortunately I feel myself compelled to go to this confounded dinner," said Miuesov with the same irritability, regardless of the fact that the monk was listening. "We ought, at least, to apologize for the disturbance, and explain that it was not our doing. What do you think?" "Yes, we must explain that it wasn't our doing. Besides, father won't be there," observed Ivan. "Well, I should hope not! Confound this dinner!" They all walked on, however. The monk listened in silence. On the road through the copse he made one observation however--that the Father Superior had been waiting a long time, and that they were more than half an hour late. He received no answer. Miuesov looked with hatred at Ivan. "Here he is, going to the dinner as though nothing had happened," he thought. "A brazen face, and the conscience of a Karamazov!"

Book 2, Chapter 6

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-2-chapter-6

When Dmitri enters, he gives a deep bow to Zosima and receives his blessing. Then he bows deeply to his father, who bows in such a way that even though he looks serious, he still looks like he's mocking Dmitri. Miusov can't let Ivan's argument in the previous chapter go. He tells the group that Ivan had also claimed that man only loves mankind because of a belief in immortality; a love for mankind is not something that comes naturally or is part of human nature. If you're an atheist and don't believe in immortality, then love for mankind is just hypocrisy: you should embrace egotism and do whatever you want. Ivan's point can be summed up in the phrase "everything is permitted." Zosima remarks that these contradictions in Ivan's beliefs only indicate that Ivan is continuing to wrestle with these spiritual issues. He gives Ivan a blessing. This solemn moment is broken up by, you guessed it, Fyodor, who immediately jumps up and accuses Dmitri of trying to bilk him out of his money. He also tells Zosima that Dmitri has been cavorting with another woman even though he's already engaged to the daughter of his former colonel. Dmitri starts yelling back at his father, then the monks start exclaiming at the scandalous behavior of the two. Suddenly Zosima gets up and kneels before Dmitri, bows, and touches the floor with his forehead. He then asks everyone in the cell to forgive him. Overwhelmed, Dmitri rushes out of the room. Miusov attempts to excuse himself, but Fyodor says he's leaving. Miusov decides to stay and heads toward the Father Superior's with Ivan to have dinner.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/03.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Prince/section_3_part_0.txt

The Prince.chapter 3

chapter 3

{"name": "Chapter 3", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-3", "summary": "New monarchies are hard to deal with, even the sort of new ones that are just adding a territory onto an old monarchy. Machiavelli calls these mixed monarchies. What's the problem? The conquered will rebel at the first sign of a better situation, which is good if you want to take over but bad once you've conquered them. As elected officials find out, you can never give people all the things they expected, so they'll hate you for a while. Here's the thing: you need them to not hate you because your army can't control the new land by themselves and need the people on their side. Machiavelli gives the example of when the king of France, Louis XII, tried to take Milan. Everyone thought that Louis was going to be this awesome king, so they helped him kick out their ruler, Duke Ludovico. The thing is, Louis XII was awful, so they ran back to Ludovico. Even though it was easy to take over Milan the first time, after that, the Milanese wised up and it took \"the whole world\" to push their way in the second time . But then Louis was kicked out again. Why did he lose the second time? Let's take a look: If the land you are adding to your kingdom shares the same language as the rest of the kingdom, great. All you have to do is kill the old rulers and you're set. Leave everything else alone. Seriously. It'll all work out. Do that and you're golden. \"But what if my new territory speaks a different language,\" we hear you bloodthirsty princes and princesses asking. That's just a wee bit more difficult. In that case, you should go live there. You wanted a new summer home didn't you? Then, if anyone tries to rebel, you can shut them down personally. Also, then you don't have to trust that officials are taking care of your new pet country instead of stealing all of its riches. Plus, people are more likely to like you if they see you as one of them, and most people would think twice about attacking your new crib. Basically, this is the best way to go. Don't want to move? Then you can make colonies instead. This is great because it doesn't require lots of military and it's super cheap. Just take land from the natives and give it to your colonialists. The only downside is that the people whose land you took will be angry. But that doesn't matter because they are poor and have no land. Win-win. By the way, you should only deal with people in two ways: crush them or pamper them to death. If you are going to hit, you need to hit so hard that they can't stand up again. Are you thinking about armies? Stop it. Armies will cause widespread but uneven damage, leaving more than enough people left who can hit back and are looking for you. Bad idea. Okay, next thing you have to do is become the guardian angel for the weaker nations around your new land. Or at least look like it. What you are really doing is making sure a strong foreign power doesn't swoop in and start cramping your style. People have this silly tendency to ask foreign nations to come in and save them from their horrible rulers. That's how the Roman Empire got so huge--people invited them in. You want to make sure that no foreigners come in and that everyone is on your side. So play nice with the neighbors. Machiavelli has the perfect example: the Romans. They had colonies, they made friends with the neighbors, they made strong neighbors weaker, and they didn't let any stronger people move into the neighborhood. Perfect. They were preparing for trouble that might come in the future, which is the easiest and best way to deal with problems. They didn't try to procrastinate, which only makes things worse. They hit their problems head on. Anyway, back to Louis and Milan. Why was he so terrible again? Oh yeah, he did the opposite of everything he was supposed to do. He didn't play nice with his neighbors and he actually helped two stronger powers move in to the neighborhood. He helped Pope Alexander invade Romagna and basically carried the King of Spain's moving boxes into Naples so they could split the Kingdom and be roomies. Yikes, no wonder he got kicked out. Machiavelli gets that Louis wanted more land, but it's best not to get too greedy. It doesn't make sense to get more land if you can't do it on your own. Help comes with too many strings attached. So in total, Louis was stupid in six ways:He got rid of his weaker buddies. He made the pope stronger.He brought a stronger king into his neighborhood.He didn't live in his new land.He didn't establish colonies. And the worst offense: he took power away from Venice, which allowed another strong state to muscle its way in. He got rid of his weaker buddies. He made the pope stronger. He brought a stronger king into his neighborhood. He didn't live in his new land. He didn't establish colonies. And the worst offense: he took power away from Venice, which allowed another strong state to muscle its way in. According to Machiavelli, it's no surprise that he lost his land. He did everything wrong, after all.", "analysis": ""}

But the difficulties occur in a new principality. And firstly, if it be not entirely new, but is, as it were, a member of a state which, taken collectively, may be called composite, the changes arise chiefly from an inherent difficulty which there is in all new principalities; for men change their rulers willingly, hoping to better themselves, and this hope induces them to take up arms against him who rules: wherein they are deceived, because they afterwards find by experience they have gone from bad to worse. This follows also on another natural and common necessity, which always causes a new prince to burden those who have submitted to him with his soldiery and with infinite other hardships which he must put upon his new acquisition. In this way you have enemies in all those whom you have injured in seizing that principality, and you are not able to keep those friends who put you there because of your not being able to satisfy them in the way they expected, and you cannot take strong measures against them, feeling bound to them. For, although one may be very strong in armed forces, yet in entering a province one has always need of the goodwill of the natives. For these reasons Louis the Twelfth, King of France, quickly occupied Milan, and as quickly lost it; and to turn him out the first time it only needed Lodovico's own forces; because those who had opened the gates to him, finding themselves deceived in their hopes of future benefit, would not endure the ill-treatment of the new prince. It is very true that, after acquiring rebellious provinces a second time, they are not so lightly lost afterwards, because the prince, with little reluctance, takes the opportunity of the rebellion to punish the delinquents, to clear out the suspects, and to strengthen himself in the weakest places. Thus to cause France to lose Milan the first time it was enough for the Duke Lodovico(*) to raise insurrections on the borders; but to cause him to lose it a second time it was necessary to bring the whole world against him, and that his armies should be defeated and driven out of Italy; which followed from the causes above mentioned. (*) Duke Lodovico was Lodovico Moro, a son of Francesco Sforza, who married Beatrice d'Este. He ruled over Milan from 1494 to 1500, and died in 1510. Nevertheless Milan was taken from France both the first and the second time. The general reasons for the first have been discussed; it remains to name those for the second, and to see what resources he had, and what any one in his situation would have had for maintaining himself more securely in his acquisition than did the King of France. Now I say that those dominions which, when acquired, are added to an ancient state by him who acquires them, are either of the same country and language, or they are not. When they are, it is easier to hold them, especially when they have not been accustomed to self-government; and to hold them securely it is enough to have destroyed the family of the prince who was ruling them; because the two peoples, preserving in other things the old conditions, and not being unlike in customs, will live quietly together, as one has seen in Brittany, Burgundy, Gascony, and Normandy, which have been bound to France for so long a time: and, although there may be some difference in language, nevertheless the customs are alike, and the people will easily be able to get on amongst themselves. He who has annexed them, if he wishes to hold them, has only to bear in mind two considerations: the one, that the family of their former lord is extinguished; the other, that neither their laws nor their taxes are altered, so that in a very short time they will become entirely one body with the old principality. But when states are acquired in a country differing in language, customs, or laws, there are difficulties, and good fortune and great energy are needed to hold them, and one of the greatest and most real helps would be that he who has acquired them should go and reside there. This would make his position more secure and durable, as it has made that of the Turk in Greece, who, notwithstanding all the other measures taken by him for holding that state, if he had not settled there, would not have been able to keep it. Because, if one is on the spot, disorders are seen as they spring up, and one can quickly remedy them; but if one is not at hand, they are heard of only when they are great, and then one can no longer remedy them. Besides this, the country is not pillaged by your officials; the subjects are satisfied by prompt recourse to the prince; thus, wishing to be good, they have more cause to love him, and wishing to be otherwise, to fear him. He who would attack that state from the outside must have the utmost caution; as long as the prince resides there it can only be wrested from him with the greatest difficulty. The other and better course is to send colonies to one or two places, which may be as keys to that state, for it is necessary either to do this or else to keep there a great number of cavalry and infantry. A prince does not spend much on colonies, for with little or no expense he can send them out and keep them there, and he offends a minority only of the citizens from whom he takes lands and houses to give them to the new inhabitants; and those whom he offends, remaining poor and scattered, are never able to injure him; whilst the rest being uninjured are easily kept quiet, and at the same time are anxious not to err for fear it should happen to them as it has to those who have been despoiled. In conclusion, I say that these colonies are not costly, they are more faithful, they injure less, and the injured, as has been said, being poor and scattered, cannot hurt. Upon this, one has to remark that men ought either to be well treated or crushed, because they can avenge themselves of lighter injuries, of more serious ones they cannot; therefore the injury that is to be done to a man ought to be of such a kind that one does not stand in fear of revenge. But in maintaining armed men there in place of colonies one spends much more, having to consume on the garrison all the income from the state, so that the acquisition turns into a loss, and many more are exasperated, because the whole state is injured; through the shifting of the garrison up and down all become acquainted with hardship, and all become hostile, and they are enemies who, whilst beaten on their own ground, are yet able to do hurt. For every reason, therefore, such guards are as useless as a colony is useful. Again, the prince who holds a country differing in the above respects ought to make himself the head and defender of his less powerful neighbours, and to weaken the more powerful amongst them, taking care that no foreigner as powerful as himself shall, by any accident, get a footing there; for it will always happen that such a one will be introduced by those who are discontented, either through excess of ambition or through fear, as one has seen already. The Romans were brought into Greece by the Aetolians; and in every other country where they obtained a footing they were brought in by the inhabitants. And the usual course of affairs is that, as soon as a powerful foreigner enters a country, all the subject states are drawn to him, moved by the hatred which they feel against the ruling power. So that in respect to those subject states he has not to take any trouble to gain them over to himself, for the whole of them quickly rally to the state which he has acquired there. He has only to take care that they do not get hold of too much power and too much authority, and then with his own forces, and with their goodwill, he can easily keep down the more powerful of them, so as to remain entirely master in the country. And he who does not properly manage this business will soon lose what he has acquired, and whilst he does hold it he will have endless difficulties and troubles. The Romans, in the countries which they annexed, observed closely these measures; they sent colonies and maintained friendly relations with(*) the minor powers, without increasing their strength; they kept down the greater, and did not allow any strong foreign powers to gain authority. Greece appears to me sufficient for an example. The Achaeans and Aetolians were kept friendly by them, the kingdom of Macedonia was humbled, Antiochus was driven out; yet the merits of the Achaeans and Aetolians never secured for them permission to increase their power, nor did the persuasions of Philip ever induce the Romans to be his friends without first humbling him, nor did the influence of Antiochus make them agree that he should retain any lordship over the country. Because the Romans did in these instances what all prudent princes ought to do, who have to regard not only present troubles, but also future ones, for which they must prepare with every energy, because, when foreseen, it is easy to remedy them; but if you wait until they approach, the medicine is no longer in time because the malady has become incurable; for it happens in this, as the physicians say it happens in hectic fever, that in the beginning of the malady it is easy to cure but difficult to detect, but in the course of time, not having been either detected or treated in the beginning, it becomes easy to detect but difficult to cure. Thus it happens in affairs of state, for when the evils that arise have been foreseen (which it is only given to a wise man to see), they can be quickly redressed, but when, through not having been foreseen, they have been permitted to grow in a way that every one can see them, there is no longer a remedy. Therefore, the Romans, foreseeing troubles, dealt with them at once, and, even to avoid a war, would not let them come to a head, for they knew that war is not to be avoided, but is only to be put off to the advantage of others; moreover they wished to fight with Philip and Antiochus in Greece so as not to have to do it in Italy; they could have avoided both, but this they did not wish; nor did that ever please them which is forever in the mouths of the wise ones of our time:--Let us enjoy the benefits of the time--but rather the benefits of their own valour and prudence, for time drives everything before it, and is able to bring with it good as well as evil, and evil as well as good. (*) See remark in the introduction on the word "intrattenere." But let us turn to France and inquire whether she has done any of the things mentioned. I will speak of Louis(*) (and not of Charles)(+) as the one whose conduct is the better to be observed, he having held possession of Italy for the longest period; and you will see that he has done the opposite to those things which ought to be done to retain a state composed of divers elements. (*) Louis XII, King of France, "The Father of the People," born 1462, died 1515. (+) Charles VIII, King of France, born 1470, died 1498. King Louis was brought into Italy by the ambition of the Venetians, who desired to obtain half the state of Lombardy by his intervention. I will not blame the course taken by the king, because, wishing to get a foothold in Italy, and having no friends there--seeing rather that every door was shut to him owing to the conduct of Charles--he was forced to accept those friendships which he could get, and he would have succeeded very quickly in his design if in other matters he had not made some mistakes. The king, however, having acquired Lombardy, regained at once the authority which Charles had lost: Genoa yielded; the Florentines became his friends; the Marquess of Mantua, the Duke of Ferrara, the Bentivogli, my lady of Forli, the Lords of Faenza, of Pesaro, of Rimini, of Camerino, of Piombino, the Lucchese, the Pisans, the Sienese--everybody made advances to him to become his friend. Then could the Venetians realize the rashness of the course taken by them, which, in order that they might secure two towns in Lombardy, had made the king master of two-thirds of Italy. Let any one now consider with what little difficulty the king could have maintained his position in Italy had he observed the rules above laid down, and kept all his friends secure and protected; for although they were numerous they were both weak and timid, some afraid of the Church, some of the Venetians, and thus they would always have been forced to stand in with him, and by their means he could easily have made himself secure against those who remained powerful. But he was no sooner in Milan than he did the contrary by assisting Pope Alexander to occupy the Romagna. It never occurred to him that by this action he was weakening himself, depriving himself of friends and of those who had thrown themselves into his lap, whilst he aggrandized the Church by adding much temporal power to the spiritual, thus giving it greater authority. And having committed this prime error, he was obliged to follow it up, so much so that, to put an end to the ambition of Alexander, and to prevent his becoming the master of Tuscany, he was himself forced to come into Italy. And as if it were not enough to have aggrandized the Church, and deprived himself of friends, he, wishing to have the kingdom of Naples, divided it with the King of Spain, and where he was the prime arbiter in Italy he takes an associate, so that the ambitious of that country and the malcontents of his own should have somewhere to shelter; and whereas he could have left in the kingdom his own pensioner as king, he drove him out, to put one there who was able to drive him, Louis, out in turn. The wish to acquire is in truth very natural and common, and men always do so when they can, and for this they will be praised not blamed; but when they cannot do so, yet wish to do so by any means, then there is folly and blame. Therefore, if France could have attacked Naples with her own forces she ought to have done so; if she could not, then she ought not to have divided it. And if the partition which she made with the Venetians in Lombardy was justified by the excuse that by it she got a foothold in Italy, this other partition merited blame, for it had not the excuse of that necessity. Therefore Louis made these five errors: he destroyed the minor powers, he increased the strength of one of the greater powers in Italy, he brought in a foreign power, he did not settle in the country, he did not send colonies. Which errors, had he lived, were not enough to injure him had he not made a sixth by taking away their dominions from the Venetians; because, had he not aggrandized the Church, nor brought Spain into Italy, it would have been very reasonable and necessary to humble them; but having first taken these steps, he ought never to have consented to their ruin, for they, being powerful, would always have kept off others from designs on Lombardy, to which the Venetians would never have consented except to become masters themselves there; also because the others would not wish to take Lombardy from France in order to give it to the Venetians, and to run counter to both they would not have had the courage. And if any one should say: "King Louis yielded the Romagna to Alexander and the kingdom to Spain to avoid war," I answer for the reasons given above that a blunder ought never to be perpetrated to avoid war, because it is not to be avoided, but is only deferred to your disadvantage. And if another should allege the pledge which the king had given to the Pope that he would assist him in the enterprise, in exchange for the dissolution of his marriage(*) and for the cap to Rouen,(+) to that I reply what I shall write later on concerning the faith of princes, and how it ought to be kept. (*) Louis XII divorced his wife, Jeanne, daughter of Louis XI, and married in 1499 Anne of Brittany, widow of Charles VIII, in order to retain the Duchy of Brittany for the crown. (+) The Archbishop of Rouen. He was Georges d'Amboise, created a cardinal by Alexander VI. Born 1460, died 1510. Thus King Louis lost Lombardy by not having followed any of the conditions observed by those who have taken possession of countries and wished to retain them. Nor is there any miracle in this, but much that is reasonable and quite natural. And on these matters I spoke at Nantes with Rouen, when Valentino, as Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander, was usually called, occupied the Romagna, and on Cardinal Rouen observing to me that the Italians did not understand war, I replied to him that the French did not understand statecraft, meaning that otherwise they would not have allowed the Church to reach such greatness. And in fact it has been seen that the greatness of the Church and of Spain in Italy has been caused by France, and her ruin may be attributed to them. From this a general rule is drawn which never or rarely fails: that he who is the cause of another becoming powerful is ruined; because that predominancy has been brought about either by astuteness or else by force, and both are distrusted by him who has been raised to power.

Chapter 3

https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-3

New monarchies are hard to deal with, even the sort of new ones that are just adding a territory onto an old monarchy. Machiavelli calls these mixed monarchies. What's the problem? The conquered will rebel at the first sign of a better situation, which is good if you want to take over but bad once you've conquered them. As elected officials find out, you can never give people all the things they expected, so they'll hate you for a while. Here's the thing: you need them to not hate you because your army can't control the new land by themselves and need the people on their side. Machiavelli gives the example of when the king of France, Louis XII, tried to take Milan. Everyone thought that Louis was going to be this awesome king, so they helped him kick out their ruler, Duke Ludovico. The thing is, Louis XII was awful, so they ran back to Ludovico. Even though it was easy to take over Milan the first time, after that, the Milanese wised up and it took "the whole world" to push their way in the second time . But then Louis was kicked out again. Why did he lose the second time? Let's take a look: If the land you are adding to your kingdom shares the same language as the rest of the kingdom, great. All you have to do is kill the old rulers and you're set. Leave everything else alone. Seriously. It'll all work out. Do that and you're golden. "But what if my new territory speaks a different language," we hear you bloodthirsty princes and princesses asking. That's just a wee bit more difficult. In that case, you should go live there. You wanted a new summer home didn't you? Then, if anyone tries to rebel, you can shut them down personally. Also, then you don't have to trust that officials are taking care of your new pet country instead of stealing all of its riches. Plus, people are more likely to like you if they see you as one of them, and most people would think twice about attacking your new crib. Basically, this is the best way to go. Don't want to move? Then you can make colonies instead. This is great because it doesn't require lots of military and it's super cheap. Just take land from the natives and give it to your colonialists. The only downside is that the people whose land you took will be angry. But that doesn't matter because they are poor and have no land. Win-win. By the way, you should only deal with people in two ways: crush them or pamper them to death. If you are going to hit, you need to hit so hard that they can't stand up again. Are you thinking about armies? Stop it. Armies will cause widespread but uneven damage, leaving more than enough people left who can hit back and are looking for you. Bad idea. Okay, next thing you have to do is become the guardian angel for the weaker nations around your new land. Or at least look like it. What you are really doing is making sure a strong foreign power doesn't swoop in and start cramping your style. People have this silly tendency to ask foreign nations to come in and save them from their horrible rulers. That's how the Roman Empire got so huge--people invited them in. You want to make sure that no foreigners come in and that everyone is on your side. So play nice with the neighbors. Machiavelli has the perfect example: the Romans. They had colonies, they made friends with the neighbors, they made strong neighbors weaker, and they didn't let any stronger people move into the neighborhood. Perfect. They were preparing for trouble that might come in the future, which is the easiest and best way to deal with problems. They didn't try to procrastinate, which only makes things worse. They hit their problems head on. Anyway, back to Louis and Milan. Why was he so terrible again? Oh yeah, he did the opposite of everything he was supposed to do. He didn't play nice with his neighbors and he actually helped two stronger powers move in to the neighborhood. He helped Pope Alexander invade Romagna and basically carried the King of Spain's moving boxes into Naples so they could split the Kingdom and be roomies. Yikes, no wonder he got kicked out. Machiavelli gets that Louis wanted more land, but it's best not to get too greedy. It doesn't make sense to get more land if you can't do it on your own. Help comes with too many strings attached. So in total, Louis was stupid in six ways:He got rid of his weaker buddies. He made the pope stronger.He brought a stronger king into his neighborhood.He didn't live in his new land.He didn't establish colonies. And the worst offense: he took power away from Venice, which allowed another strong state to muscle its way in. He got rid of his weaker buddies. He made the pope stronger. He brought a stronger king into his neighborhood. He didn't live in his new land. He didn't establish colonies. And the worst offense: he took power away from Venice, which allowed another strong state to muscle its way in. According to Machiavelli, it's no surprise that he lost his land. He did everything wrong, after all.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/1526-chapters/6.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Twelfth Night, or What You Will/section_5_part_0.txt

Twelfth Night, or What You Will.act 2.scene 1

act 2, scene 1

{"name": "Act 2, Scene 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210415161814/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/twelfth-night/summary/act-2-scene-1", "summary": "On a sea coast Antonio the sea captain asks Sebastian why he's leaving. Antonio also wants to know why he can't go with Sebastian. Sebastian says something like, \"Sorry man. It's not you, it's me. I'm in a really bad mood and I don't want to bum you out, so I think it's best for both of us if we go our separate ways. I would be a total jerk if I explained why I'm acting this way and unloaded all my problems on you - you don't deserve that so...\" Antonio cuts in and begs Sebastian to tell him where and why he's going away. The cryptic Sebastian says that he can't do it, and where he's going isn't important anyway. But, Antonio's such a great guy that he'll reveal his true identity. His name is \"Sebastian,\" not \"Roderigo,\" and he's really sad because he thinks his twin sister is dead. He also says that he would be dead too if Antonio hadn't scooped him up out of the ocean two hours after his ship sank and his sister drowned. Antonio says that's just awful and Sebastian replies that he doesn't want to stress out Antonio with his problems. Antonio begs Sebastian to let him be his servant, but Sebastian brushes him off and tells Antonio to forget he ever existed. Then Antonio says he doesn't want to cry like his mother always does, so he needs to be on his way to Duke Orsino's court.", "analysis": ""}

ACT II. SCENE I. The sea-coast. [Enter ANTONIO and SEBASTIAN.] ANTONIO. Will you stay no longer; nor will you not that I go with you? SEBASTIAN. By your patience, no; my stars shine darkly over me; the malignancy of my fate might, perhaps, distemper yours; therefore I shall crave of you your leave that I may bear my evils alone. It were a bad recompense for your love, to lay any of them on you. ANTONIO. Let me know of you whither you are bound. SEBASTIAN. No, 'sooth, sir; my determinate voyage is mere extravagancy. But I perceive in you so excellent a touch of modesty, that you will not extort from me what I am willing to keep in; therefore it charges me in manners the rather to express myself. You must know of me then, Antonio, my name is Sebastian, which I called Rodorigo; my father was that Sebastian of Messaline whom I know you have heard of: he left behind him myself and a sister, both born in an hour; if the heavens had been pleased, would we had so ended! but you, sir, altered that; for some hours before you took me from the breach of the sea was my sister drowned. ANTONIO. Alas the day! SEBASTIAN. A lady, sir, though it was said she much resembled me, was yet of many accounted beautiful: but though I could not, with such estimable wonder, overfar believe that, yet thus far I will boldly publish her,--she bore mind that envy could not but call fair. She is drowned already, sir, with salt water, though I seem to drown her remembrance again with more. ANTONIO. Pardon me, sir, your bad entertainment. SEBASTIAN. O, good Antonio, forgive me your trouble. ANTONIO. If you will not murder me for my love, let me be your servant. SEBASTIAN. If you will not undo what you have done--that is, kill him whom you have recovered--desire it not. Fare ye well at once; my bosom is full of kindness; and I am yet so near the manners of my mother that, upon the least occasion more, mine eyes will tell tales of me. I am bound to the Count Orsino's court: farewell. [Exit.] ANTONIO. The gentleness of all the gods go with thee! I have many cnemies in Orsino's court, Else would I very shortly see thee there: But come what may, I do adore thee so That danger shall seem sport, and I will go. [Exit.]

Act 2, Scene 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20210415161814/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/twelfth-night/summary/act-2-scene-1

On a sea coast Antonio the sea captain asks Sebastian why he's leaving. Antonio also wants to know why he can't go with Sebastian. Sebastian says something like, "Sorry man. It's not you, it's me. I'm in a really bad mood and I don't want to bum you out, so I think it's best for both of us if we go our separate ways. I would be a total jerk if I explained why I'm acting this way and unloaded all my problems on you - you don't deserve that so..." Antonio cuts in and begs Sebastian to tell him where and why he's going away. The cryptic Sebastian says that he can't do it, and where he's going isn't important anyway. But, Antonio's such a great guy that he'll reveal his true identity. His name is "Sebastian," not "Roderigo," and he's really sad because he thinks his twin sister is dead. He also says that he would be dead too if Antonio hadn't scooped him up out of the ocean two hours after his ship sank and his sister drowned. Antonio says that's just awful and Sebastian replies that he doesn't want to stress out Antonio with his problems. Antonio begs Sebastian to let him be his servant, but Sebastian brushes him off and tells Antonio to forget he ever existed. Then Antonio says he doesn't want to cry like his mother always does, so he needs to be on his way to Duke Orsino's court.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/82.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_14_part_3.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 12.chapter 3

book 12, chapter 3

{"name": "book 12, Chapter 3", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section15/", "summary": "Medical Expertise Three doctors offer contradicting theories about what might have led Dmitri to commit the murder, and about the condition of his mind. One doctor, a German who has lived in the town for many years, tells a story about buying Dmitri a bag of nuts when he was a little boy. Dmitri weeps, evoking a new sympathy in the minds of his listeners", "analysis": ""}

Chapter III. The Medical Experts And A Pound Of Nuts The evidence of the medical experts, too, was of little use to the prisoner. And it appeared later that Fetyukovitch had not reckoned much upon it. The medical line of defense had only been taken up through the insistence of Katerina Ivanovna, who had sent for a celebrated doctor from Moscow on purpose. The case for the defense could, of course, lose nothing by it and might, with luck, gain something from it. There was, however, an element of comedy about it, through the difference of opinion of the doctors. The medical experts were the famous doctor from Moscow, our doctor, Herzenstube, and the young doctor, Varvinsky. The two latter appeared also as witnesses for the prosecution. The first to be called in the capacity of expert was Doctor Herzenstube. He was a gray and bald old man of seventy, of middle height and sturdy build. He was much esteemed and respected by every one in the town. He was a conscientious doctor and an excellent and pious man, a Hernguter or Moravian brother, I am not quite sure which. He had been living amongst us for many years and behaved with wonderful dignity. He was a kind-hearted and humane man. He treated the sick poor and peasants for nothing, visited them in their slums and huts, and left money for medicine, but he was as obstinate as a mule. If once he had taken an idea into his head, there was no shaking it. Almost every one in the town was aware, by the way, that the famous doctor had, within the first two or three days of his presence among us, uttered some extremely offensive allusions to Doctor Herzenstube's qualifications. Though the Moscow doctor asked twenty-five roubles for a visit, several people in the town were glad to take advantage of his arrival, and rushed to consult him regardless of expense. All these had, of course, been previously patients of Doctor Herzenstube, and the celebrated doctor had criticized his treatment with extreme harshness. Finally, he had asked the patients as soon as he saw them, "Well, who has been cramming you with nostrums? Herzenstube? He, he!" Doctor Herzenstube, of course, heard all this, and now all the three doctors made their appearance, one after another, to be examined. Doctor Herzenstube roundly declared that the abnormality of the prisoner's mental faculties was self-evident. Then giving his grounds for this opinion, which I omit here, he added that the abnormality was not only evident in many of the prisoner's actions in the past, but was apparent even now at this very moment. When he was asked to explain how it was apparent now at this moment, the old doctor, with simple-hearted directness, pointed out that the prisoner on entering the court had "an extraordinary air, remarkable in the circumstances"; that he had "marched in like a soldier, looking straight before him, though it would have been more natural for him to look to the left where, among the public, the ladies were sitting, seeing that he was a great admirer of the fair sex and must be thinking much of what the ladies are saying of him now," the old man concluded in his peculiar language. I must add that he spoke Russian readily, but every phrase was formed in German style, which did not, however, trouble him, for it had always been a weakness of his to believe that he spoke Russian perfectly, better indeed than Russians. And he was very fond of using Russian proverbs, always declaring that the Russian proverbs were the best and most expressive sayings in the whole world. I may remark, too, that in conversation, through absent-mindedness he often forgot the most ordinary words, which sometimes went out of his head, though he knew them perfectly. The same thing happened, though, when he spoke German, and at such times he always waved his hand before his face as though trying to catch the lost word, and no one could induce him to go on speaking till he had found the missing word. His remark that the prisoner ought to have looked at the ladies on entering roused a whisper of amusement in the audience. All our ladies were very fond of our old doctor; they knew, too, that having been all his life a bachelor and a religious man of exemplary conduct, he looked upon women as lofty creatures. And so his unexpected observation struck every one as very queer. The Moscow doctor, being questioned in his turn, definitely and emphatically repeated that he considered the prisoner's mental condition abnormal in the highest degree. He talked at length and with erudition of "aberration" and "mania," and argued that, from all the facts collected, the prisoner had undoubtedly been in a condition of aberration for several days before his arrest, and, if the crime had been committed by him, it must, even if he were conscious of it, have been almost involuntary, as he had not the power to control the morbid impulse that possessed him. But apart from temporary aberration, the doctor diagnosed mania, which premised, in his words, to lead to complete insanity in the future. (It must be noted that I report this in my own words, the doctor made use of very learned and professional language.) "All his actions are in contravention of common sense and logic," he continued. "Not to refer to what I have not seen, that is, the crime itself and the whole catastrophe, the day before yesterday, while he was talking to me, he had an unaccountably fixed look in his eye. He laughed unexpectedly when there was nothing to laugh at. He showed continual and inexplicable irritability, using strange words, 'Bernard!' 'Ethics!' and others equally inappropriate." But the doctor detected mania, above all, in the fact that the prisoner could not even speak of the three thousand roubles, of which he considered himself to have been cheated, without extraordinary irritation, though he could speak comparatively lightly of other misfortunes and grievances. According to all accounts, he had even in the past, whenever the subject of the three thousand roubles was touched on, flown into a perfect frenzy, and yet he was reported to be a disinterested and not grasping man. "As to the opinion of my learned colleague," the Moscow doctor added ironically in conclusion, "that the prisoner would, on entering the court, have naturally looked at the ladies and not straight before him, I will only say that, apart from the playfulness of this theory, it is radically unsound. For though I fully agree that the prisoner, on entering the court where his fate will be decided, would not naturally look straight before him in that fixed way, and that that may really be a sign of his abnormal mental condition, at the same time I maintain that he would naturally not look to the left at the ladies, but, on the contrary, to the right to find his legal adviser, on whose help all his hopes rest and on whose defense all his future depends." The doctor expressed his opinion positively and emphatically. But the unexpected pronouncement of Doctor Varvinsky gave the last touch of comedy to the difference of opinion between the experts. In his opinion the prisoner was now, and had been all along, in a perfectly normal condition, and, although he certainly must have been in a nervous and exceedingly excited state before his arrest, this might have been due to several perfectly obvious causes, jealousy, anger, continual drunkenness, and so on. But this nervous condition would not involve the mental aberration of which mention had just been made. As to the question whether the prisoner should have looked to the left or to the right on entering the court, "in his modest opinion," the prisoner would naturally look straight before him on entering the court, as he had in fact done, as that was where the judges, on whom his fate depended, were sitting. So that it was just by looking straight before him that he showed his perfectly normal state of mind at the present. The young doctor concluded his "modest" testimony with some heat. "Bravo, doctor!" cried Mitya, from his seat, "just so!" Mitya, of course, was checked, but the young doctor's opinion had a decisive influence on the judges and on the public, and, as appeared afterwards, every one agreed with him. But Doctor Herzenstube, when called as a witness, was quite unexpectedly of use to Mitya. As an old resident in the town who had known the Karamazov family for years, he furnished some facts of great value for the prosecution, and suddenly, as though recalling something, he added: "But the poor young man might have had a very different life, for he had a good heart both in childhood and after childhood, that I know. But the Russian proverb says, 'If a man has one head, it's good, but if another clever man comes to visit him, it would be better still, for then there will be two heads and not only one.' " "One head is good, but two are better," the prosecutor put in impatiently. He knew the old man's habit of talking slowly and deliberately, regardless of the impression he was making and of the delay he was causing, and highly prizing his flat, dull and always gleefully complacent German wit. The old man was fond of making jokes. "Oh, yes, that's what I say," he went on stubbornly. "One head is good, but two are much better, but he did not meet another head with wits, and his wits went. Where did they go? I've forgotten the word." He went on, passing his hand before his eyes, "Oh, yes, _spazieren_." "Wandering?" "Oh, yes, wandering, that's what I say. Well, his wits went wandering and fell in such a deep hole that he lost himself. And yet he was a grateful and sensitive boy. Oh, I remember him very well, a little chap so high, left neglected by his father in the back yard, when he ran about without boots on his feet, and his little breeches hanging by one button." A note of feeling and tenderness suddenly came into the honest old man's voice. Fetyukovitch positively started, as though scenting something, and caught at it instantly. "Oh, yes, I was a young man then.... I was ... well, I was forty-five then, and had only just come here. And I was so sorry for the boy then; I asked myself why shouldn't I buy him a pound of ... a pound of what? I've forgotten what it's called. A pound of what children are very fond of, what is it, what is it?" The doctor began waving his hands again. "It grows on a tree and is gathered and given to every one...." "Apples?" "Oh, no, no. You have a dozen of apples, not a pound.... No, there are a lot of them, and all little. You put them in the mouth and crack." "Nuts?" "Quite so, nuts, I say so." The doctor repeated in the calmest way as though he had been at no loss for a word. "And I bought him a pound of nuts, for no one had ever bought the boy a pound of nuts before. And I lifted my finger and said to him, 'Boy, _Gott der Vater_.' He laughed and said, '_Gott der Vater_.'... '_Gott der Sohn_.' He laughed again and lisped, '_Gott der Sohn_.' '_Gott der heilige Geist_.' Then he laughed and said as best he could, '_Gott der heilige Geist_.' I went away, and two days after I happened to be passing, and he shouted to me of himself, 'Uncle, _Gott der Vater, Gott der Sohn_,' and he had only forgotten '_Gott der heilige Geist_.' But I reminded him of it and I felt very sorry for him again. But he was taken away, and I did not see him again. Twenty- three years passed. I am sitting one morning in my study, a white-haired old man, when there walks into the room a blooming young man, whom I should never have recognized, but he held up his finger and said, laughing, '_Gott der Vater, Gott der Sohn_, and _Gott der heilige Geist_. I have just arrived and have come to thank you for that pound of nuts, for no one else ever bought me a pound of nuts; you are the only one that ever did.' And then I remembered my happy youth and the poor child in the yard, without boots on his feet, and my heart was touched and I said, 'You are a grateful young man, for you have remembered all your life the pound of nuts I bought you in your childhood.' And I embraced him and blessed him. And I shed tears. He laughed, but he shed tears, too ... for the Russian often laughs when he ought to be weeping. But he did weep; I saw it. And now, alas!..." "And I am weeping now, German, I am weeping now, too, you saintly man," Mitya cried suddenly. In any case the anecdote made a certain favorable impression on the public. But the chief sensation in Mitya's favor was created by the evidence of Katerina Ivanovna, which I will describe directly. Indeed, when the witnesses _a decharge_, that is, called by the defense, began giving evidence, fortune seemed all at once markedly more favorable to Mitya, and what was particularly striking, this was a surprise even to the counsel for the defense. But before Katerina Ivanovna was called, Alyosha was examined, and he recalled a fact which seemed to furnish positive evidence against one important point made by the prosecution.

book 12, Chapter 3

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section15/

Medical Expertise Three doctors offer contradicting theories about what might have led Dmitri to commit the murder, and about the condition of his mind. One doctor, a German who has lived in the town for many years, tells a story about buying Dmitri a bag of nuts when he was a little boy. Dmitri weeps, evoking a new sympathy in the minds of his listeners

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/94.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_93_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.epilogue.chapter 1

epilogue, chapter 1

{"name": "Epilogue, Book 12, Chapter 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/epilogue-book-12-chapter-1", "summary": "But wait, the novel isn't over yet! It's now five days after Dmitri's trial. Alyosha arrives at the home of Katerina Ivanovna, who is caring for Ivan as he recuperates from his illness. Katerina can't help confessing her deepest feelings to Alyosha. She reveals that she and Ivan had argued for three days straight before the trial about Ivan's plans to help his brother to escape. Ivan had left her with an envelope with the escape plans just in case something happened to him. She also talks about her feelings of intense guilt over her vengeful outburst at Dmitri's trial. Alyosha then tells Katerina that he has a special request from Dmitri: he would like to see her before he goes off to serve his sentence in Siberia. Katerina is undecided and Alyosha leaves her.", "analysis": ""}

EPILOGUE Chapter I. Plans For Mitya's Escape Very early, at nine o'clock in the morning, five days after the trial, Alyosha went to Katerina Ivanovna's to talk over a matter of great importance to both of them, and to give her a message. She sat and talked to him in the very room in which she had once received Grushenka. In the next room Ivan Fyodorovitch lay unconscious in a high fever. Katerina Ivanovna had immediately after the scene at the trial ordered the sick and unconscious man to be carried to her house, disregarding the inevitable gossip and general disapproval of the public. One of the two relations who lived with her had departed to Moscow immediately after the scene in court, the other remained. But if both had gone away, Katerina Ivanovna would have adhered to her resolution, and would have gone on nursing the sick man and sitting by him day and night. Varvinsky and Herzenstube were attending him. The famous doctor had gone back to Moscow, refusing to give an opinion as to the probable end of the illness. Though the doctors encouraged Katerina Ivanovna and Alyosha, it was evident that they could not yet give them positive hopes of recovery. Alyosha came to see his sick brother twice a day. But this time he had specially urgent business, and he foresaw how difficult it would be to approach the subject, yet he was in great haste. He had another engagement that could not be put off for that same morning, and there was need of haste. They had been talking for a quarter of an hour. Katerina Ivanovna was pale and terribly fatigued, yet at the same time in a state of hysterical excitement. She had a presentiment of the reason why Alyosha had come to her. "Don't worry about his decision," she said, with confident emphasis to Alyosha. "One way or another he is bound to come to it. He must escape. That unhappy man, that hero of honor and principle--not he, not Dmitri Fyodorovitch, but the man lying the other side of that door, who has sacrificed himself for his brother," Katya added, with flashing eyes--"told me the whole plan of escape long ago. You know he has already entered into negotiations.... I've told you something already.... You see, it will probably come off at the third _etape_ from here, when the party of prisoners is being taken to Siberia. Oh, it's a long way off yet. Ivan Fyodorovitch has already visited the superintendent of the third _etape_. But we don't know yet who will be in charge of the party, and it's impossible to find that out so long beforehand. To-morrow perhaps I will show you in detail the whole plan which Ivan Fyodorovitch left me on the eve of the trial in case of need.... That was when--do you remember?--you found us quarreling. He had just gone down-stairs, but seeing you I made him come back; do you remember? Do you know what we were quarreling about then?" "No, I don't," said Alyosha. "Of course he did not tell you. It was about that plan of escape. He had told me the main idea three days before, and we began quarreling about it at once and quarreled for three days. We quarreled because, when he told me that if Dmitri Fyodorovitch were convicted he would escape abroad with that creature, I felt furious at once--I can't tell you why, I don't know myself why.... Oh, of course, I was furious then about that creature, and that she, too, should go abroad with Dmitri!" Katerina Ivanovna exclaimed suddenly, her lips quivering with anger. "As soon as Ivan Fyodorovitch saw that I was furious about that woman, he instantly imagined I was jealous of Dmitri and that I still loved Dmitri. That is how our first quarrel began. I would not give an explanation, I could not ask forgiveness. I could not bear to think that such a man could suspect me of still loving that ... and when I myself had told him long before that I did not love Dmitri, that I loved no one but him! It was only resentment against that creature that made me angry with him. Three days later, on the evening you came, he brought me a sealed envelope, which I was to open at once, if anything happened to him. Oh, he foresaw his illness! He told me that the envelope contained the details of the escape, and that if he died or was taken dangerously ill, I was to save Mitya alone. Then he left me money, nearly ten thousand--those notes to which the prosecutor referred in his speech, having learnt from some one that he had sent them to be changed. I was tremendously impressed to find that Ivan Fyodorovitch had not given up his idea of saving his brother, and was confiding this plan of escape to me, though he was still jealous of me and still convinced that I loved Mitya. Oh, that was a sacrifice! No, you cannot understand the greatness of such self-sacrifice, Alexey Fyodorovitch. I wanted to fall at his feet in reverence, but I thought at once that he would take it only for my joy at the thought of Mitya's being saved (and he certainly would have imagined that!), and I was so exasperated at the mere possibility of such an unjust thought on his part that I lost my temper again, and instead of kissing his feet, flew into a fury again! Oh, I am unhappy! It's my character, my awful, unhappy character! Oh, you will see, I shall end by driving him, too, to abandon me for another with whom he can get on better, like Dmitri. But ... no, I could not bear it, I should kill myself. And when you came in then, and when I called to you and told him to come back, I was so enraged by the look of contempt and hatred he turned on me that--do you remember?--I cried out to you that it was he, he alone who had persuaded me that his brother Dmitri was a murderer! I said that malicious thing on purpose to wound him again. He had never, never persuaded me that his brother was a murderer. On the contrary, it was I who persuaded him! Oh, my vile temper was the cause of everything! I paved the way to that hideous scene at the trial. He wanted to show me that he was an honorable man, and that, even if I loved his brother, he would not ruin him for revenge or jealousy. So he came to the court ... I am the cause of it all, I alone am to blame!" Katya never had made such confessions to Alyosha before, and he felt that she was now at that stage of unbearable suffering when even the proudest heart painfully crushes its pride and falls vanquished by grief. Oh, Alyosha knew another terrible reason of her present misery, though she had carefully concealed it from him during those days since the trial; but it would have been for some reason too painful to him if she had been brought so low as to speak to him now about that. She was suffering for her "treachery" at the trial, and Alyosha felt that her conscience was impelling her to confess it to him, to him, Alyosha, with tears and cries and hysterical writhings on the floor. But he dreaded that moment and longed to spare her. It made the commission on which he had come even more difficult. He spoke of Mitya again. "It's all right, it's all right, don't be anxious about him!" she began again, sharply and stubbornly. "All that is only momentary, I know him, I know his heart only too well. You may be sure he will consent to escape. It's not as though it would be immediately; he will have time to make up his mind to it. Ivan Fyodorovitch will be well by that time and will manage it all himself, so that I shall have nothing to do with it. Don't be anxious; he will consent to run away. He has agreed already: do you suppose he would give up that creature? And they won't let her go to him, so he is bound to escape. It's you he's most afraid of, he is afraid you won't approve of his escape on moral grounds. But you must generously _allow_ it, if your sanction is so necessary," Katya added viciously. She paused and smiled. "He talks about some hymn," she went on again, "some cross he has to bear, some duty; I remember Ivan Fyodorovitch told me a great deal about it, and if you knew how he talked!" Katya cried suddenly, with feeling she could not repress, "if you knew how he loved that wretched man at the moment he told me, and how he hated him, perhaps, at the same moment. And I heard his story and his tears with sneering disdain. Brute! Yes, I am a brute. I am responsible for his fever. But that man in prison is incapable of suffering," Katya concluded irritably. "Can such a man suffer? Men like him never suffer!" There was a note of hatred and contemptuous repulsion in her words. And yet it was she who had betrayed him. "Perhaps because she feels how she's wronged him she hates him at moments," Alyosha thought to himself. He hoped that it was only "at moments." In Katya's last words he detected a challenging note, but he did not take it up. "I sent for you this morning to make you promise to persuade him yourself. Or do you, too, consider that to escape would be dishonorable, cowardly, or something ... unchristian, perhaps?" Katya added, even more defiantly. "Oh, no. I'll tell him everything," muttered Alyosha. "He asks you to come and see him to-day," he blurted out suddenly, looking her steadily in the face. She started, and drew back a little from him on the sofa. "Me? Can that be?" she faltered, turning pale. "It can and ought to be!" Alyosha began emphatically, growing more animated. "He needs you particularly just now. I would not have opened the subject and worried you, if it were not necessary. He is ill, he is beside himself, he keeps asking for you. It is not to be reconciled with you that he wants you, but only that you would go and show yourself at his door. So much has happened to him since that day. He realizes that he has injured you beyond all reckoning. He does not ask your forgiveness--'It's impossible to forgive me,' he says himself--but only that you would show yourself in his doorway." "It's so sudden...." faltered Katya. "I've had a presentiment all these days that you would come with that message. I knew he would ask me to come. It's impossible!" "Let it be impossible, but do it. Only think, he realizes for the first time how he has wounded you, the first time in his life; he had never grasped it before so fully. He said, 'If she refuses to come I shall be unhappy all my life.' Do you hear? though he is condemned to penal servitude for twenty years, he is still planning to be happy--is not that piteous? Think--you must visit him; though he is ruined, he is innocent," broke like a challenge from Alyosha. "His hands are clean, there is no blood on them! For the sake of his infinite sufferings in the future visit him now. Go, greet him on his way into the darkness--stand at his door, that is all.... You ought to do it, you ought to!" Alyosha concluded, laying immense stress on the word "ought." "I ought to ... but I cannot...." Katya moaned. "He will look at me.... I can't." "Your eyes ought to meet. How will you live all your life, if you don't make up your mind to do it now?" "Better suffer all my life." "You ought to go, you ought to go," Alyosha repeated with merciless emphasis. "But why to-day, why at once?... I can't leave our patient--" "You can for a moment. It will only be a moment. If you don't come, he will be in delirium by to-night. I would not tell you a lie; have pity on him!" "Have pity on _me!_" Katya said, with bitter reproach, and she burst into tears. "Then you will come," said Alyosha firmly, seeing her tears. "I'll go and tell him you will come directly." "No, don't tell him so on any account," cried Katya in alarm. "I will come, but don't tell him beforehand, for perhaps I may go, but not go in.... I don't know yet--" Her voice failed her. She gasped for breath. Alyosha got up to go. "And what if I meet any one?" she said suddenly, in a low voice, turning white again. "That's just why you must go now, to avoid meeting any one. There will be no one there, I can tell you that for certain. We will expect you," he concluded emphatically, and went out of the room.

Epilogue, Book 12, Chapter 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/epilogue-book-12-chapter-1

But wait, the novel isn't over yet! It's now five days after Dmitri's trial. Alyosha arrives at the home of Katerina Ivanovna, who is caring for Ivan as he recuperates from his illness. Katerina can't help confessing her deepest feelings to Alyosha. She reveals that she and Ivan had argued for three days straight before the trial about Ivan's plans to help his brother to escape. Ivan had left her with an envelope with the escape plans just in case something happened to him. She also talks about her feelings of intense guilt over her vengeful outburst at Dmitri's trial. Alyosha then tells Katerina that he has a special request from Dmitri: he would like to see her before he goes off to serve his sentence in Siberia. Katerina is undecided and Alyosha leaves her.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/21.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_2_part_6.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 21

chapter 21

{"name": "Chapter 21", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-3-chapters-16-24", "summary": "There is a great stir in the milk-house just after breakfast, for the churn revolved but butter would not come. Whenever this happens the dairy is paralyzed. Mrs. Crick says that perhaps somebody in the house is in love, for she heard that this will cause it. Dairyman Crick tells a story about how a Jack Dollop impregnated a local girl, whose mother came to the dairy to find him. Jack hid in the churn; the mother learned this and started the churn with him inside until he agreed to marry the girl. The problem with the churn resolves itself, and Tess remains depressed throughout the afternoon. She is wretched at the perception that to her companions the dairyman's story had been a humorous one, for none seemed to see the sorrow of it. One night, Tess's three roommates watch Angel in the garden from their window. The three each are attracted to Angel, but Retty says that none will marry him for he likes Tess Durbeyfield the best. Izz Huett says that Angel will not even marry Tess, for he will be a great landowner and a farmer abroad. Tess overhears this conversation and feels some deal of jealousy. She believes that unequal attachments of rank may lead for marriage, for she wonders what good a lady may be on a farm.", "analysis": "The affection between Angel Clare and Tess Durbeyfield, although not explicitly stated between these two characters is nevertheless obvious to the others at Talbothays dairy, who realize the love that Angel and Tess feel for one another. Mrs. Crick insinuates that a romance in her household is the cause for the stalled butter churn, while Tess's roommates become jealous that she receives the most attention from Angel, whom all of them adore. The jealousy that her roommates feel leads Tess to a realization that she may have a future with Angel Clare, for she believes that he would want to marry a working woman and not a lady of his own social rank; in fact, Tess represents both social spheres, having the family history of a noble lady and the actual history of a working class girl. Despite Tess's relative happiness at Talbothays dairy, Tess cannot fully escape her past history. The humorous anecdote that Dairyman Crick tells about the butter churn reminds Tess of the gravity of her situation; she can find the tragedy in the situation of the girl, while the others focus on the humorous of the mother and Jack Dollop"}

There was a great stir in the milk-house just after breakfast. The churn revolved as usual, but the butter would not come. Whenever this happened the dairy was paralyzed. Squish, squash echoed the milk in the great cylinder, but never arose the sound they waited for. Dairyman Crick and his wife, the milkmaids Tess, Marian, Retty Priddle, Izz Huett, and the married ones from the cottages; also Mr Clare, Jonathan Kail, old Deborah, and the rest, stood gazing hopelessly at the churn; and the boy who kept the horse going outside put on moon-like eyes to show his sense of the situation. Even the melancholy horse himself seemed to look in at the window in inquiring despair at each walk round. "'Tis years since I went to Conjuror Trendle's son in Egdon--years!" said the dairyman bitterly. "And he was nothing to what his father had been. I have said fifty times, if I have said once, that I DON'T believe in en; though 'a do cast folks' waters very true. But I shall have to go to 'n if he's alive. O yes, I shall have to go to 'n, if this sort of thing continnys!" Even Mr Clare began to feel tragical at the dairyman's desperation. "Conjuror Fall, t'other side of Casterbridge, that they used to call 'Wide-O', was a very good man when I was a boy," said Jonathan Kail. "But he's rotten as touchwood by now." "My grandfather used to go to Conjuror Mynterne, out at Owlscombe, and a clever man a' were, so I've heard grandf'er say," continued Mr Crick. "But there's no such genuine folk about nowadays!" Mrs Crick's mind kept nearer to the matter in hand. "Perhaps somebody in the house is in love," she said tentatively. "I've heard tell in my younger days that that will cause it. Why, Crick--that maid we had years ago, do ye mind, and how the butter didn't come then--" "Ah yes, yes!--but that isn't the rights o't. It had nothing to do with the love-making. I can mind all about it--'twas the damage to the churn." He turned to Clare. "Jack Dollop, a 'hore's-bird of a fellow we had here as milker at one time, sir, courted a young woman over at Mellstock, and deceived her as he had deceived many afore. But he had another sort o' woman to reckon wi' this time, and it was not the girl herself. One Holy Thursday of all days in the almanack, we was here as we mid be now, only there was no churning in hand, when we zid the girl's mother coming up to the door, wi' a great brass-mounted umbrella in her hand that would ha' felled an ox, and saying 'Do Jack Dollop work here?--because I want him! I have a big bone to pick with he, I can assure 'n!' And some way behind her mother walked Jack's young woman, crying bitterly into her handkercher. 'O Lard, here's a time!' said Jack, looking out o' winder at 'em. 'She'll murder me! Where shall I get--where shall I--? Don't tell her where I be!' And with that he scrambled into the churn through the trap-door, and shut himself inside, just as the young woman's mother busted into the milk-house. 'The villain--where is he?' says she. 'I'll claw his face for'n, let me only catch him!' Well, she hunted about everywhere, ballyragging Jack by side and by seam, Jack lying a'most stifled inside the churn, and the poor maid--or young woman rather--standing at the door crying her eyes out. I shall never forget it, never! 'Twould have melted a marble stone! But she couldn't find him nowhere at all." The dairyman paused, and one or two words of comment came from the listeners. Dairyman Crick's stories often seemed to be ended when they were not really so, and strangers were betrayed into premature interjections of finality; though old friends knew better. The narrator went on-- "Well, how the old woman should have had the wit to guess it I could never tell, but she found out that he was inside that there churn. Without saying a word she took hold of the winch (it was turned by handpower then), and round she swung him, and Jack began to flop about inside. 'O Lard! stop the churn! let me out!' says he, popping out his head. 'I shall be churned into a pummy!' (He was a cowardly chap in his heart, as such men mostly be). 'Not till ye make amends for ravaging her virgin innocence!' says the old woman. 'Stop the churn you old witch!' screams he. 'You call me old witch, do ye, you deceiver!' says she, 'when ye ought to ha' been calling me mother-law these last five months!' And on went the churn, and Jack's bones rattled round again. Well, none of us ventured to interfere; and at last 'a promised to make it right wi' her. 'Yes--I'll be as good as my word!' he said. And so it ended that day." While the listeners were smiling their comments there was a quick movement behind their backs, and they looked round. Tess, pale-faced, had gone to the door. "How warm 'tis to-day!" she said, almost inaudibly. It was warm, and none of them connected her withdrawal with the reminiscences of the dairyman. He went forward and opened the door for her, saying with tender raillery-- "Why, maidy" (he frequently, with unconscious irony, gave her this pet name), "the prettiest milker I've got in my dairy; you mustn't get so fagged as this at the first breath of summer weather, or we shall be finely put to for want of 'ee by dog-days, shan't we, Mr Clare?" "I was faint--and--I think I am better out o' doors," she said mechanically; and disappeared outside. Fortunately for her the milk in the revolving churn at that moment changed its squashing for a decided flick-flack. "'Tis coming!" cried Mrs Crick, and the attention of all was called off from Tess. That fair sufferer soon recovered herself externally; but she remained much depressed all the afternoon. When the evening milking was done she did not care to be with the rest of them, and went out of doors, wandering along she knew not whither. She was wretched--O so wretched--at the perception that to her companions the dairyman's story had been rather a humorous narration than otherwise; none of them but herself seemed to see the sorrow of it; to a certainty, not one knew how cruelly it touched the tender place in her experience. The evening sun was now ugly to her, like a great inflamed wound in the sky. Only a solitary cracked-voice reed-sparrow greeted her from the bushes by the river, in a sad, machine-made tone, resembling that of a past friend whose friendship she had outworn. In these long June days the milkmaids, and, indeed, most of the household, went to bed at sunset or sooner, the morning work before milking being so early and heavy at a time of full pails. Tess usually accompanied her fellows upstairs. To-night, however, she was the first to go to their common chamber; and she had dozed when the other girls came in. She saw them undressing in the orange light of the vanished sun, which flushed their forms with its colour; she dozed again, but she was reawakened by their voices, and quietly turned her eyes towards them. Neither of her three chamber-companions had got into bed. They were standing in a group, in their nightgowns, barefooted, at the window, the last red rays of the west still warming their faces and necks and the walls around them. All were watching somebody in the garden with deep interest, their three faces close together: a jovial and round one, a pale one with dark hair, and a fair one whose tresses were auburn. "Don't push! You can see as well as I," said Retty, the auburn-haired and youngest girl, without removing her eyes from the window. "'Tis no use for you to be in love with him any more than me, Retty Priddle," said jolly-faced Marian, the eldest, slily. "His thoughts be of other cheeks than thine!" Retty Priddle still looked, and the others looked again. "There he is again!" cried Izz Huett, the pale girl with dark damp hair and keenly cut lips. "You needn't say anything, Izz," answered Retty. "For I zid you kissing his shade." "WHAT did you see her doing?" asked Marian. "Why--he was standing over the whey-tub to let off the whey, and the shade of his face came upon the wall behind, close to Izz, who was standing there filling a vat. She put her mouth against the wall and kissed the shade of his mouth; I zid her, though he didn't." "O Izz Huett!" said Marian. A rosy spot came into the middle of Izz Huett's cheek. "Well, there was no harm in it," she declared, with attempted coolness. "And if I be in love wi'en, so is Retty, too; and so be you, Marian, come to that." Marian's full face could not blush past its chronic pinkness. "I!" she said. "What a tale! Ah, there he is again! Dear eyes--dear face--dear Mr Clare!" "There--you've owned it!" "So have you--so have we all," said Marian, with the dry frankness of complete indifference to opinion. "It is silly to pretend otherwise amongst ourselves, though we need not own it to other folks. I would just marry 'n to-morrow!" "So would I--and more," murmured Izz Huett. "And I too," whispered the more timid Retty. The listener grew warm. "We can't all marry him," said Izz. "We shan't, either of us; which is worse still," said the eldest. "There he is again!" They all three blew him a silent kiss. "Why?" asked Retty quickly. "Because he likes Tess Durbeyfield best," said Marian, lowering her voice. "I have watched him every day, and have found it out." There was a reflective silence. "But she don't care anything for 'n?" at length breathed Retty. "Well--I sometimes think that too." "But how silly all this is!" said Izz Huett impatiently. "Of course he won't marry any one of us, or Tess either--a gentleman's son, who's going to be a great landowner and farmer abroad! More likely to ask us to come wi'en as farm-hands at so much a year!" One sighed, and another sighed, and Marian's plump figure sighed biggest of all. Somebody in bed hard by sighed too. Tears came into the eyes of Retty Priddle, the pretty red-haired youngest--the last bud of the Paridelles, so important in the county annals. They watched silently a little longer, their three faces still close together as before, and the triple hues of their hair mingling. But the unconscious Mr Clare had gone indoors, and they saw him no more; and, the shades beginning to deepen, they crept into their beds. In a few minutes they heard him ascend the ladder to his own room. Marian was soon snoring, but Izz did not drop into forgetfulness for a long time. Retty Priddle cried herself to sleep. The deeper-passioned Tess was very far from sleeping even then. This conversation was another of the bitter pills she had been obliged to swallow that day. Scarce the least feeling of jealousy arose in her breast. For that matter she knew herself to have the preference. Being more finely formed, better educated, and, though the youngest except Retty, more woman than either, she perceived that only the slightest ordinary care was necessary for holding her own in Angel Clare's heart against these her candid friends. But the grave question was, ought she to do this? There was, to be sure, hardly a ghost of a chance for either of them, in a serious sense; but there was, or had been, a chance of one or the other inspiring him with a passing fancy for her, and enjoying the pleasure of his attentions while he stayed here. Such unequal attachments had led to marriage; and she had heard from Mrs Crick that Mr Clare had one day asked, in a laughing way, what would be the use of his marrying a fine lady, and all the while ten thousand acres of Colonial pasture to feed, and cattle to rear, and corn to reap. A farm-woman would be the only sensible kind of wife for him. But whether Mr Clare had spoken seriously or not, why should she, who could never conscientiously allow any man to marry her now, and who had religiously determined that she never would be tempted to do so, draw off Mr Clare's attention from other women, for the brief happiness of sunning herself in his eyes while he remained at Talbothays?

Chapter 21

https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-3-chapters-16-24

There is a great stir in the milk-house just after breakfast, for the churn revolved but butter would not come. Whenever this happens the dairy is paralyzed. Mrs. Crick says that perhaps somebody in the house is in love, for she heard that this will cause it. Dairyman Crick tells a story about how a Jack Dollop impregnated a local girl, whose mother came to the dairy to find him. Jack hid in the churn; the mother learned this and started the churn with him inside until he agreed to marry the girl. The problem with the churn resolves itself, and Tess remains depressed throughout the afternoon. She is wretched at the perception that to her companions the dairyman's story had been a humorous one, for none seemed to see the sorrow of it. One night, Tess's three roommates watch Angel in the garden from their window. The three each are attracted to Angel, but Retty says that none will marry him for he likes Tess Durbeyfield the best. Izz Huett says that Angel will not even marry Tess, for he will be a great landowner and a farmer abroad. Tess overhears this conversation and feels some deal of jealousy. She believes that unequal attachments of rank may lead for marriage, for she wonders what good a lady may be on a farm.

The affection between Angel Clare and Tess Durbeyfield, although not explicitly stated between these two characters is nevertheless obvious to the others at Talbothays dairy, who realize the love that Angel and Tess feel for one another. Mrs. Crick insinuates that a romance in her household is the cause for the stalled butter churn, while Tess's roommates become jealous that she receives the most attention from Angel, whom all of them adore. The jealousy that her roommates feel leads Tess to a realization that she may have a future with Angel Clare, for she believes that he would want to marry a working woman and not a lady of his own social rank; in fact, Tess represents both social spheres, having the family history of a noble lady and the actual history of a working class girl. Despite Tess's relative happiness at Talbothays dairy, Tess cannot fully escape her past history. The humorous anecdote that Dairyman Crick tells about the butter churn reminds Tess of the gravity of her situation; she can find the tragedy in the situation of the girl, while the others focus on the humorous of the mother and Jack Dollop

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/44747-chapters/part_1_chapters_28_to_29.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Red and the Black/section_7_part_0.txt

The Red and the Black.part 1.chapters 28-29

chapters 28-29

{"name": "Chapters 28-29", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201128052739/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/the-red-and-the-black/summary-and-analysis/part-1-chapters-2829", "summary": "One priest, however, befriends Julien: Father Chas-Bernard, master of ceremonies of the cathedral. Julien is selected to aid the latter in an important ceremony in the cathedral in Besancon. There he distinguishes himself for his physical prowess and agility in decorating pillars. Here, Julien is also glimpsed by Mme. de Renal, who promptly faints at the sight of him. He, similarly, is violently moved by this encounter. Pirard sends Julien as his messenger to the bishop with Pirard's letter of resignation. Julien also learns from Pirard that he is being named tutor in the Old and New Testaments, a signal honor proving Pirard's esteem for him. Contrary to Julien's expectations, the other seminarians accept his advancement as evidence of his merit -- that is, they recognize him as one whom they must fear. Stendhal fills in the political intrigue that has prompted Pirard's resignation: Pirard has allied himself with M. de La Mole in a lawsuit the latter has against Frilair, the powerful Jesuit vicar and organizer of the Besancon Congregation. Pirard has accepted the generosity of his friend Mole's influence: responsibility of a very wealthy church in the vicinity of Paris since he knows that Frilair will succeed in divesting him of his position at the seminary. Julien receives an anonymous gift of money from Mole, who has chosen to honor Pirard's prize student, since the rector himself will not accept recompense for his services in Mole's lawsuit. Julien receives a wild boar from Fouque, and this gift further wins the esteem of his fellows since they believe that Julien's parents have sent the boar and, therefore, must be rich. Julien performs brilliantly in his examinations, but he is tricked by Frilair into displaying his knowledge of Latin poets, poets whose works are banned at the seminary. Julien delivers the letter to the bishop and is invited to dinner. In Frilair's presence, he provides a stimulating discussion of the arts for the bishop of Besancon. As a reward, the bishop makes him a gift of the complete works of Tacitus. News of this gift soon circulates in the seminary and adds to the high esteem in which the others now hold Julien.", "analysis": "These chapters narrate Julien's success at the seminary. The beginning of Chapter 28 illustrates Stendhal's improvisational technique. The \"event\" -- the protection offered by Father Chas, thus the beginning of his success -- - needs an introduction to \"precipitate\" it. The method of having the event happen is Julien's question: Surely among all these learned professors, one at least has noticed my willingness and has been taken in by my hypocrisy? Julien has over-evaluated Father Chas, however. Stendhal, it will be remarked, does not state this fact; the reader must draw the conclusion. Julien is so accustomed to hypocrisy and ruse that he sees it where it isn't. He imagines in this simple priest a very shrewd man with some ulterior motives beneath conversation entirely devoted to reveling in the rich furnishings of the cathedral. In reality, Father Chas-Bernard is only what he appears to be. The priest's disinterestedness gives a certain gratuitousness to Julien's success. We learn that Pirard is taking Julien more and more into his confidence from his passing warning to the hero concerning his mission into Besancon to aid in the adornment of the cathedral. This isolated note of confidence is a preparation for Julien's future in Paris. Note again that Julien's physical ascension betokens his aspirations and destiny. He alone is daring enough to risk his neck forty feet off the ground to pose the feathers. The ecstatic reverie that the solemnity of the surroundings inspires in Julien is reminiscent of the scene in Chapter 18 when he watches in ecstasy the ceremony of the ardent chapel. Both scenes betray his highly sensitive, superior nature and contrast his emotional, authentic religious response to the baseness of the Church, no longer a divine instrument but perverted to political ends during the Restoration. The unexpected appearance of Mme. de Renal should not completely surprise us. We know that she has become extremely pious and that, refusing to make Father Maslon her confessor, she frequents the confessional at Besancon. It is also obvious why she comes to Besancon -- her passion for Julien is the only justification for her piety. We will find another important encounter between Julien and Mme. de Renal in a church later in the novel. Her fainting in this scene foreshadows her fate in that later scene, for which Julien will be more directly responsible. The cathedral episode is the first step in Julien's success at the seminary. Julien's mentors are kindred souls: noble, of great principle, who have refused to compromise. The austere Jansenist Pirard, just as Chelan, recognizes Julien's nobility of soul and protects him. The touching \"communion of souls\" that takes place in this scene between Pirard and Julien, two rebels who finally let down their guard and console each other, is reminiscent of Julien's escape sought in high places and solitude in earlier chapters. Note the philosophy of Pirard, similar to Julien's, that has helped to strengthen the latter's character: Pirard has tested Julien by creating insurmountable obstacles in his path. It is Pirard's belief that only the noblest of men could prove themselves by overcoming these obstacles. Pirard tests Julien in this episode just as Stendhal \"tests\" his hero throughout the novel. Julien still interprets incorrectly the attitudes of his fellows. On various occasions during his rapid advancement, he expects hate and receives respect from the seminarians. Stendhal benefits from a certain ambiguity of presentation to maintain the reader's sympathy for Julien. It is uncertain as to how aware of the political maneuvering Julien is; Stendhal chooses not to elaborate this point. It is to be presumed that Julien is as informed as are the others about the rivalry between the Jansenist Pirard and the Jesuit Frilair. The reader is completely informed, however, and our superiority over Julien encourages an indulgent attitude toward his mistakes. The bishop has no future, and his awareness of this accounts in part for his fair treatment of Julien. He is a power, and independent, but his old age relieves him of the need to intrigue. He is another \"father-figure\" for Julien, albeit his role is short-lived. Again, it is by feats of memory, by \"bon mots\" which we do not hear, and by brilliant discussion, likewise unrecorded, that Julien charms the bishop. Note the brief allusion to the \"Red\" in this chapter: Julien is quickly consoled at not being able to enlist as he overhears two old troopers lament the present state of command and the absence of the great Napoleon."}

CHAPTER XXVIII A PROCESSION All hearts were moved. The presence of God seemed to have descended into these narrow Gothic streets that stretched in every direction, and were sanded by the care of the faithful.--_Young_. It was in vain that Julien pretended to be petty and stupid. He could not please; he was too different. Yet all these professors, he said to himself, are very clever people, men in a thousand. Why do they not like my humility? Only one seemed to take advantage of his readiness to believe everything, and apparently to swallow everything. This was the abbe Chas-Bernard, the director of the ceremonies of the cathedral, where, for the last fifteen years, he had been given occasion to hope for a canonry. While waiting, he taught homiletics at the seminary. During the period of Julien's blindness, this class was one of those in which he most frequently came out top. The abbe Chas had used this as an opportunity to manifest some friendship to him, and when the class broke up, he would be glad to take him by the arm for some turns in the garden. "What is he getting at," Julien would say to himself. He noticed with astonishment that, for hours on end, the abbe would talk to him about the ornaments possessed by the cathedral. It had seventeen lace chasubles, besides the mourning vestments. A lot was hoped from the old wife of the judge de Rubempre. This lady, who was ninety years of age, had kept for at least seventy years her wedding dress of superb Lyons material, embroidered with gold. "Imagine, my friend," the abbe Chas would say, stopping abruptly, and staring with amazement, "that this material keeps quite stiff. There is so much gold in it. It is generally thought in Besancon that the will of the judge's wife will result in the cathedral treasure being increased by more than ten chasubles, without counting four or five capes for the great feast. I will go further," said the abbe Chas, lowering his voice, "I have reasons for thinking the judge's wife will leave us her magnificent silver gilt candlesticks, supposed to have been bought in Italy by Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, whose favourite minister was one of the good lady's ancestors." "But what is the fellow getting at with all this old clothes business," thought Julien. "These adroit preliminaries have been going on for centuries, and nothing comes of them. He must be very suspicious of me. He is cleverer than all the others, whose secret aim can be guessed so easily in a fortnight. I understand. He must have been suffering for fifteen years from mortified ambition." Julien was summoned one evening in the middle of the fencing lesson to the abbe Pirard, who said to him. "To-morrow is the feast of Corpus Domini (the Fete Dieu) the abbe Chas-Bernard needs you to help him to decorate the cathedral. Go and obey." The abbe Pirard called him back and added sympathetically. "It depends on you whether you will utilise the occasion to go into the town." "Incedo per ignes," answered Julien. (I have secret enemies). Julien went to the cathedral next morning with downcast eyes. The sight of the streets and the activity which was beginning to prevail in the town did him good. In all quarters they were extending the fronts of the houses for the procession. All the time that he had passed in the seminary seemed to him no more than a moment. His thoughts were of Vergy, and of the pretty Amanda whom he might perhaps meet, for her cafe was not very far off. He saw in the distance the abbe Chas-Bernard on the threshold of his beloved cathedral. He was a big man with a jovial face and a frank air. To-day he looked triumphant. "I was expecting you, my dear son," he cried as soon as he saw Julien in the distance. "Be welcome. This day's duty will be protracted and arduous. Let us fortify ourselves by a first breakfast. We will have the second at ten o'clock during high mass." "I do not wish, sir," said Julien to him gravely, "to be alone for a single instant. Deign to observe," he added, showing him the clock over their heads, "that I have arrived at one minute to five." "So those little rascals at the seminary frightened you. It is very good of you to think of them," said the abbe. "But is the road less beautiful because there are thorns in the hedges which border it. Travellers go on their way, and leave the wicked thorns to wait in vain where they are. And now to work my dear friend, to work." The abbe Chas was right in saying that the task would be arduous. There had been a great funeral ceremony at the cathedral the previous day. They had not been able to make any preparations. They had consequently only one morning for dressing all the Gothic pillars which constitute the three naves with a kind of red damask cloth ascending to a height of thirty feet. The Bishop had fetched by mail four decorators from Paris, but these gentry were not able to do everything, and far from giving any encouragement to the clumsiness of the Besancon colleagues, they made it twice as great by making fun of them. Julien saw that he would have to climb the ladder himself. His agility served him in good stead. He undertook the direction of the decorators from town. The Abbe Chas was delighted as he watched him flit from ladder to ladder. When all the pillars were dressed in damask, five enormous bouquets of feathers had to be placed on the great baldachin above the grand altar. A rich coping of gilded wood was supported by eight big straight columns of Italian marble, but to reach the centre of the baldachin above the tabernacle involved walking over an old wooden cornice which was forty feet high and possibly worm-eaten. The sight of this difficult crossing had extinguished the gaiety of the Parisian decorators, which up till then had been so brilliant. They looked at it from down below, argued a great deal, but did not go up. Julien seized hold of the bouquets of feathers and climbed the ladder at a run. He placed it neatly on the crown-shaped ornament in the centre of the baldachin. When he came down the ladder again, the abbe Chas-Bernard embraced him in his arms. "Optime" exclaimed the good priest, "I will tell this to Monseigneur." Breakfast at ten o'clock was very gay. The abbe Chas had never seen his church look so beautiful. "Dear disciple," he said to Julien. "My mother used to let out chairs in this venerable building, so I have been brought up in this great edifice. The Terror of Robespierre ruined us, but when I was eight years old, that was my age then, I used to serve masses in private houses, so you see I got my meals on mass-days. Nobody could fold a chasuble better than I could, and I never cut the fringes. After the re-establishment of public worship by Napoleon, I had the good fortune to direct everything in this venerable metropolis. Five times a year do my eyes see it adorned with these fine ornaments. But it has never been so resplendent, and the damask breadths have never been so well tied or so close to the pillars as they are to-day." "So he is going to tell me his secret at last," said Julien. "Now he is going to talk about himself. He is expanding." But nothing imprudent was said by the man in spite of his evident exaltation. "All the same he has worked a great deal," said Julien to himself. "He is happy. What a man! What an example for me! He really takes the cake." (This was a vulgar phrase which he had learned from the old surgeon). As the sanctus of high mass sounded, Julien wanted to take a surplice to follow the bishop in the superb procession. "And the thieves, my friend! And the thieves," exclaimed the abbe Chas. "Have you forgotten them? The procession will go out, but we will watch, will you and I. We shall be very lucky if we get off with the loss of a couple of ells of this fine lace which surrounds the base of the pillars. It is a gift of Madame de Rubempre. It comes from her great-grandfather the famous Count. It is made of real gold, my friend," added the abbe in a whisper, and with evident exaltation. "And all genuine. I entrust you with the watching of the north wing. Do not leave it. I will keep the south wing and the great nave for myself. Keep an eye on the confessional. It is there that the women accomplices of the thieves always spy. Look out for the moment when we turn our backs." As he finished speaking, a quarter to twelve struck. Immediately afterwards the sound of the great clock was heard. It rang a full peal. These full solemn sounds affected Julien. His imagination was no longer turned to things earthly. The perfume of the incense and of the rose leaves thrown before the holy sacrament by little children disguised as St. John increased his exaltation. Logically the grave sounds of the bell should only have recalled to Julien's mind the thought of the labour of twenty men paid fifty-four centimes each, and possibly helped by fifteen or twenty faithful souls. Logically, he ought to have thought of the wear and tear of the cords and of the framework and of the danger of the clock itself, which falls down every two centuries, and to have considered the means of diminishing the salary of the bell-ringers, or of paying them by some indulgence or other grace dispensed from the treasures of the Church without diminishing its purse. Julien's soul exalted by these sounds with all their virile fulness, instead of making these wise reflections, wandered in the realm of imagination. He will never turn out a good priest or a good administrator. Souls which get thrilled so easily are at the best only capable of producing an artist. At this moment the presumption of Julien bursts out into full view. Perhaps fifty of his comrades in the seminary made attentive to the realities of life by their own unpopularity and the Jacobinism which they are taught to see hiding behind every hedge, would have had no other thought suggested by the great bell of the cathedral except the wages of the ringers. They would have analysed with the genius of Bareme whether the intensity of the emotion produced among the public was worth the money which was given to the ringers. If Julien had only tried to think of the material interests of the cathedral, his imagination would have transcended its actual object and thought of economizing forty francs on the fabric and have lost the opportunity of avoiding an expense of twenty-five centimes. While the procession slowly traversed Besancon on the finest day imaginable, and stopped at the brilliant altar-stations put up by the authorities, the church remained in profound silence. There prevailed a semi-obscurity, an agreeable freshness. It was still perfumed with the fragrance of flowers and incense. The silence, the deep solitude, the freshness of the long naves sweetened Julien's reverie. He did not fear being troubled by the abbe Chas, who was engaged in another part of the building. His soul had almost abandoned its mortal tenement, which was pacing slowly the north wing which had been trusted to his surveillance. He was all the more tranquil when he had assured himself that there was no one in the confessional except some devout women. His eyes looked in front of him seeing nothing. His reverie was almost broken by the sight of two well-dressed women, one in the Confessional, and the other on a chair quite near her. He looked without seeing, but noticed, however, either by reason of some vague appreciation of his duties or admiration for the aristocratic but simple dress of the ladies, that there was no priest in the Confessional. "It is singular," he thought, "that if these fair ladies are devout, they are not kneeling before some altar, or that if they are in society they have not an advantageous position in the first row of some balcony. How well cut that dress is! How graceful!" He slackened his pace to try and look at them. The lady who was kneeling in the Confessional turned her head a little hearing the noise of Julien's step in this solemn place. Suddenly she gave a loud cry, and felt ill. As the lady collapsed and fell backwards on her knees, her friend who was near her hastened to help her. At the same time Julien saw the shoulders of the lady who was falling backwards. His eyes were struck by a twisted necklace of fine, big pearls, which he knew well. What were his emotions when he recognised the hair of Madame de Renal? It was she! The lady who was trying to prevent her from falling was Madame Derville. Julien was beside himself and hastened to their side. Madame de Renal's fall would perhaps have carried her friend along with her, if Julien had not supported them. He saw the head of Madame de Renal, pale and entirely devoid of consciousness floating on his shoulder. He helped Madame Derville to lean that charming head up against a straw chair. He knelt down. Madame Derville turned round and recognised him. "Away, monsieur, away!" she said to him, in a tone of the most lively anger. "Above all, do not let her see you again. The sight of you would be sure to horrify her. She was so happy before you came. Your conduct is atrocious. Flee! Take yourself off if you have any shame left." These words were spoken with so much authority, and Julien felt so weak, that he did take himself off. "She always hated me," he said to himself, thinking of Madame Derville. At the same moment the nasal chanting of the first priests in the procession which was now coming back resounded in the church. The abbe Chas-Bernard called Julien, who at first did not hear him, several times. He came at last and took his arm behind a pillar where Julien had taken refuge more dead than alive. He wanted to present him to the Bishop. "Are you feeling well, my child?" said the abbe to him, seeing him so pale, and almost incapable of walking. "You have worked too much." The abbe gave him his arm. "Come, sit down behind me here, on the little seat of the dispenser of holy water; I will hide you." They were now beside the main door. "Calm yourself. We have still a good twenty minutes before Monseigneur appears. Try and pull yourself together. I will lift you up when he passes, for in spite of my age, I am strong and vigorous." Julien was trembling so violently when the Bishop passed, that the abbe Chas gave up the idea of presenting him. "Do not take it too much to heart," he said. "I will find another opportunity." The same evening he had six pounds of candles which had been saved, he said, by Julien's carefulness, and by the promptness with which he had extinguished them, carried to the seminary chapel. Nothing could have been nearer the truth. The poor boy was extinguished himself. He had not had a single thought after meeting Madame de Renal. CHAPTER XXIX THE FIRST PROMOTION He knew his age, he knew his department, and he is rich. _The Forerunner_. Julien had not emerged from the deep reverie in which the episode in the cathedral had plunged him, when the severe abbe Pirard summoned him. "M. the abbe Chas-Bernard has just written in your favour. I am on the whole sufficiently satisfied with your conduct. You are extremely imprudent and irresponsible without outward signs of it. However, up to the present, you have proved yourself possessed of a good and even generous heart. Your intellect is superior. Taking it all round, I see in you a spark which one must not neglect. "I am on the point of leaving this house after fifteen years of work. My crime is that I have left the seminarists to their free will, and that I have neither protected nor served that secret society of which you spoke to me at the Confessional. I wish to do something for you before I leave. I would have done so two months earlier, for you deserve it, had it not been for the information laid against you as the result of the finding in your trunk of Amanda Binet's address. I will make you New and Old Testament tutor. Julien was transported with gratitude and evolved the idea of throwing himself on his knees and thanking God. He yielded to a truer impulse, and approaching the abbe Pirard, took his hand and pressed it to his lips. "What is the meaning of this?" exclaimed the director angrily, but Julien's eyes said even more than his act. The abbe Pirard looked at him in astonishment, after the manner of a man who has long lost the habit of encountering refined emotions. The attention deceived the director. His voice altered. "Well yes, my child, I am attached to you. Heaven knows that I have been so in spite of myself. I ought to show neither hate nor love to anyone. I see in you something which offends the vulgar. Jealousy and calumny will pursue you in whatever place Providence may place you. Your comrades will never behold you without hate, and if they pretend to like you, it will only be to betray you with greater certainty. For this there is only one remedy. Seek help only from God, who, to punish you for your presumption, has cursed you with the inevitable hatred of your comrades. Let your conduct be pure. That is the only resource which I can see for you. If you love truth with an irresistible embrace, your enemies will sooner or later be confounded." It had been so long since Julien had heard a friendly voice that he must be forgiven a weakness. He burst out into tears. The abbe Pirard held out his arms to him. This moment was very sweet to both of them. Julien was mad with joy. This promotion was the first which he had obtained. The advantages were immense. To realise them one must have been condemned to pass months on end without an instant's solitude, and in immediate contact with comrades who were at the best importunate, and for the most part insupportable. Their cries alone would have sufficed to disorganise a delicate constitution. The noise and joy of these peasants, well-fed and well-clothed as they were, could only find a vent for itself, or believe in its own completeness when they were shouting with all the strength of their lungs. Now Julien dined alone, or nearly an hour later than the other seminarists. He had a key of the garden and could walk in it when no one else was there. Julien was astonished to perceive that he was now hated less. He, on the contrary, had been expecting that their hate would become twice as intense. That secret desire of his that he should not be spoken to, which had been only too manifest before, and had earned him so many enemies, was no longer looked upon as a sign of ridiculous haughtiness. It became, in the eyes of the coarse beings who surrounded him, a just appreciation of his own dignity. The hatred of him sensibly diminished, above all among the youngest of his comrades, who were now his pupils, and whom he treated with much politeness. Gradually he obtained his own following. It became looked upon as bad form to call him Martin Luther. But what is the good of enumerating his friends and his enemies? The whole business is squalid, and all the more squalid in proportion to the truth of the picture. And yet the clergy supply the only teachers of morals which the people have. What would happen to the people without them? Will the paper ever replace the cure? Since Julien's new dignity, the director of the seminary made a point of never speaking to him without witnesses. These tactics were prudent, both for the master and for the pupil, but above all it was meant for a test. The invariable principle of that severe Jansenist Pirard was this--"if a man has merit in your eyes, put obstacles in the way of all he desires, and of everything which he undertakes. If the merit is real, he will manage to overthrow or get round those obstacles." It was the hunting season. It had occurred to Fouque to send a stag and a boar to the seminary as though they came from Julien's parents. The dead animals were put down on the floor between the kitchen and the refectory. It was there that they were seen by all the seminarists on their way to dinner. They constituted a great attraction for their curiosity. The boar, dead though it was, made the youngest ones feel frightened. They touched its tusks. They talked of nothing else for a whole week. This gift, which raised Julien's family to the level of that class of society which deserves respect, struck a deadly blow at all jealousy. He enjoyed a superiority, consecrated by fortune. Chazel, the most distinguished of the seminarists, made advances to him, and always reproached him for not having previously apprised them of his parents' position and had thus involved them in treating money without sufficient respect. A conscription took place, from which Julien, in his capacity as seminarist, was exempt. This circumstance affected him profoundly. "So there is just passed for ever that moment which, twenty years earlier, would have seen my heroic life begin. He was walking alone in the seminary garden. He heard the masons who were walling up the cloister walls talking between themselves. "Yes, we must go. There's the new conscription. When _the other_ was alive it was good business. A mason could become an officer then, could become a general then. One has seen such things." "You go and see now. It's only the ragamuffins who leave for the army. Any one _who has anything_ stays in the country here." "The man who is born wretched stays wretched, and there you are." "I say, is it true what they say, that the other is dead?" put in the third mason. "Oh well, it's the '_big men_' who say that, you see. The other one made them afraid." "What a difference. How the fortification went ahead in his time. And to think of his being betrayed by his own marshals." This conversation consoled Julien a little. As he went away, he repeated with a sigh: "_Le seul roi dont le peuple a garde la memoire._" The time for the examination arrived. Julien answered brilliantly. He saw that Chazel endeavoured to exhibit all his knowledge. On the first day the examiners, nominated by the famous Grand Vicar de Frilair, were very irritated at always having to put first, or at any rate second, on their list, that Julien Sorel, who had been designated to them as the Benjamin of the Abbe Pirard. There were bets in the seminary that Julien would come out first in the final list of the examination, a privilege which carried with it the honour of dining with my Lord Bishop. But at the end of a sitting, dealing with the fathers of the Church, an adroit examiner, having first interrogated Julien on Saint Jerome and his passion for Cicero, went on to speak about Horace, Virgil and other profane authors. Julien had learnt by heart a great number of passages from these authors without his comrades' knowledge. Swept away by his successes, he forgot the place where he was, and recited in paraphrase with spirit several odes of Horace at the repeated request of the examiner. Having for twenty minutes given him enough rope to hang himself, the examiner changed his expression, and bitterly reproached him for the time he had wasted on these profane studies, and the useless or criminal ideas which he had got into his head. "I am a fool, sir. You are right," said Julien modestly, realising the adroit stratagem of which he was the victim. This examiner's dodge was considered dirty, even at the seminary, but this did not prevent the abbe de Frilair, that adroit individual who had so cleverly organised the machinery of the Besancon congregation, and whose despatches to Paris put fear into the hearts of judges, prefect, and even the generals of the garrison, from placing with his powerful hand the number 198 against Julien's name. He enjoyed subjecting his enemy, Pirard the Jansenist, to this mortification. His chief object for the last ten years had been to deprive him of the headship of the seminary. The abbe, who had himself followed the plan which he had indicated to Julien, was sincere, pious, devoted to his duties and devoid of intrigue, but heaven in its anger had given him that bilious temperament which is by nature so deeply sensitive to insults and to hate. None of the insults which were addressed to him was wasted on his burning soul. He would have handed in his resignation a hundred times over, but he believed that he was useful in the place where Providence had set him. "I prevent the progress of Jesuitism and Idolatry," he said to himself. At the time of the examinations, it was perhaps nearly two months since he had spoken to Julien, and nevertheless, he was ill for eight days when, on receipt of the official letter announcing the result of the competition, he saw the number 198 placed beside the name of that pupil whom he regarded as the glory of his town. This stern character found his only consolation in concentrating all his surveillance on Julien. He was delighted that he discovered in him neither anger, nor vindictiveness, nor discouragement. Julien felt a thrill some months afterwards when he received a letter. It bore the Paris post-mark. Madame de Renal is remembering her promises at last, he thought. A gentleman who signed himself Paul Sorel, and who said that he was his relative, sent him a letter of credit for five hundred francs. The writer went on to add that if Julien went on to study successfully the good Latin authors, a similar sum would be sent to him every year. "It is she. It is her kindness," said Julien to himself, feeling quite overcome. "She wishes to console me. But why not a single word of affection?" He was making a mistake in regard to this letter, for Madame de Renal, under the influence of her friend, Madame Derville, was abandoning herself absolutely to profound remorse. She would often think, in spite of herself, of that singular being, the meeting with whom had revolutionized her life. But she carefully refrained from writing to him. If we were to talk the terminology of the seminary, we would be able to recognise a miracle in the sending of these five hundred francs and to say that heaven was making use of Monsieur de Frilair himself in order to give this gift to Julien. Twelve years previously the abbe de Frilair had arrived in Besancon with an extremely exiguous portmanteau, which, according to the story, contained all his fortune. He was now one of the richest proprietors of the department. In the course of his prosperity, he had bought the one half of an estate, while the other half had been inherited by Monsieur de la Mole. Consequently there was a great lawsuit between these two personages. M. le Marquis de la Mole felt that, in spite of his brilliant life at Paris and the offices which he held at Court, it would be dangerous to fight at Besancon against the Grand Vicar, who was reputed to make and unmake prefects. Instead of soliciting a present of fifty thousand francs which could have been smuggled into the budget under some name or other, and of throwing up this miserable lawsuit with the abbe Frilair over a matter of fifty thousand francs, the marquis lost his temper. He thought he was in the right, absolutely in the right. Moreover, if one is permitted to say so, who is the judge who has not got a son, or at any rate a cousin to push in the world? In order to enlighten the blindest minds the abbe de Frilair took the carriage of my Lord the Bishop eight days after the first decree which he obtained, and went himself to convey the cross of the Legion of Honour to his advocate. M. de la Mole, a little dumbfounded at the demeanour of the other side, and appreciating also that his own advocates were slackening their efforts, asked advice of the abbe Chelan, who put him in communication with M. Pirard. At the period of our story the relations between these two men had lasted for several years. The abbe Pirard imported into this affair his characteristic passion. Being in constant touch with the Marquis's advocates, he studied his case, and finding it just, he became quite openly the solicitor of M. de la Mole against the all-powerful Grand Vicar. The latter felt outraged by such insolence, and on the part of a little Jansenist into the bargain. "See what this Court nobility who pretend to be so powerful really are," would say the abbe de Frilair to his intimates. M. de la Mole has not even sent a miserable cross to his agent at Besancon, and will let him be tamely turned out. None the less, so they write me, this noble peer never lets a week go by without going to show off his blue ribbon in the drawing-room of the Keeper of Seal, whoever it may be. In spite of all the energy of the abbe Pirard, and although M. de la Mole was always on the best of terms with the minister of justice, and above all with his officials, the best that he could achieve after six careful years was not to lose his lawsuit right out. Being as he was in ceaseless correspondence with the abbe Pirard in connection with an affair in which they were both passionately interested, the Marquis came to appreciate the abbe's particular kind of intellect. Little by little, and in spite of the immense distance in their social positions, their correspondence assumed the tone of friendship. The abbe Pirard told the Marquis that they wanted to heap insults upon him till he should be forced to hand in his resignation. In his anger against what, in his opinion, was the infamous stratagem employed against Julien, he narrated his history to the Marquis. Although extremely rich, this great lord was by no means miserly. He had never been able to prevail on the abbe Pirard to accept even the reimbursement of the postal expenses occasioned by the lawsuit. He seized the opportunity of sending five hundred francs to his favourite pupil. M. de la Mole himself took the trouble of writing the covering letter. This gave the abbe food for thought. One day the latter received a little note which requested him to go immediately on an urgent matter to an inn on the outskirts of Besancon. He found there the steward of M. de la Mole. "M. le Marquis has instructed me to bring you his carriage," said the man to him. "He hopes that after you have read this letter you will find it convenient to leave for Paris in four or five days. I will employ the time in the meanwhile in asking you to be good enough to show me the estates of M. le Marquis in the Franche-Comte, so that I can go over them." The letter was short:-- "Rid yourself, my good sir, of all the chicanery of the provinces and come and breathe the peaceful atmosphere of Paris. I send you my carriage which has orders to await your decision for four days. I will await you myself at Paris until Tuesday. You only require to say so, monsieur, to accept in your own name one of the best livings in the environs of Paris. The richest of your future parishioners has never seen you, but is more devoted than you can possibly think: he is the Marquis de la Mole." Without having suspected it, the stern abbe Pirard loved this seminary, peopled as it was by his enemies, but to which for the past fifteen years he had devoted all his thoughts. M. de la Mole's letter had the effect on him of the visit of the surgeon come to perform a difficult but necessary operation. His dismissal was certain. He made an appointment with the steward for three days later. For forty-eight hours he was in a fever of uncertainty. Finally he wrote to the M. de la Mole, and composed for my Lord the Bishop a letter, a masterpiece of ecclesiastical style, although it was a little long; it would have been difficult to have found more unimpeachable phrases, and ones breathing a more sincere respect. And nevertheless, this letter, intended as it was to get M. de Frilair into trouble with his patron, gave utterance to all the serious matters of complaint, and even descended to the little squalid intrigues which, having been endured with resignation for six years, were forcing the abbe Pirard to leave the diocese. They stole his firewood, they poisoned his dog, etc., etc. Having finished this letter he had Julien called. Like all the other seminarists, he was sleeping at eight o'clock in the evening. "You know where the Bishop's Palace is," he said to him in good classical Latin. "Take this letter to my Lord. I will not hide from you that I am sending you into the midst of the wolves. Be all ears and eyes. Let there be no lies in your answers, but realise that the man questioning you will possibly experience a real joy in being able to hurt you. I am very pleased, my child, at being able to give you this experience before I leave you, for I do not hide from you that the letter which you are bearing is my resignation." Julien stood motionless. He loved the abbe Pirard. It was in vain that prudence said to him, "After this honest man's departure the Sacre-Coeur party will disgrace me and perhaps expel me." He could not think of himself. He was embarrassed by a phrase which he was trying to turn in a polite way, but as a matter of fact he found himself without the brains to do so. "Well, my friend, are you not going?" "Is it because they say, monsieur," answered Julian timidly, "that you have put nothing on one side during your long administration. I have six hundred francs." His tears prevented him from continuing. "_That also will be noticed,_" said the ex-director of the seminary coldly. "Go to the Palace. It is getting late." Chance would so have it that on that evening, the abbe de Frilair was on duty in the salon of the Palace. My lord was dining with the prefect, so it was to M. de Frilair himself that Julien, though he did not know it, handed the letter. Julien was astonished to see this abbe boldly open the letter which was addressed to the Bishop. The face of the Grand Vicar soon expressed surprise, tinged with a lively pleasure, and became twice as grave as before. Julien, struck with his good appearance, found time to scrutinise him while he was reading. This face would have possessed more dignity had it not been for the extreme subtlety which appeared in some features, and would have gone to the fact of actually denoting falseness if the possessor of this fine countenance had ceased to school it for a single minute. The very prominent nose formed a perfectly straight line and unfortunately gave to an otherwise distinguished profile, a curious resemblance to the physiognomy of a fox. Otherwise this abbe, who appeared so engrossed with Monsieur Pirard's resignation, was dressed with an elegance which Julien had never seen before in any priest and which pleased him exceedingly. It was only later that Julien knew in what the special talent of the abbe de Frilair really consisted. He knew how to amuse his bishop, an amiable old man made for Paris life, and who looked upon Besancon as exile. This Bishop had very bad sight, and was passionately fond of fish. The abbe de Frilair used to take the bones out of the fish which was served to my Lord. Julien looked silently at the abbe who was rereading the resignation when the door suddenly opened with a noise. A richly dressed lackey passed in rapidly. Julien had only time to turn round towards the door. He perceived a little old man wearing a pectoral cross. He prostrated himself. The Bishop addressed a benevolent smile to him and passed on. The handsome abbe followed him and Julien was left alone in the salon, and was able to admire at his leisure its pious magnificence. The Bishop of Besancon, a man whose spirit had been tried but not broken by the long miseries of the emigration, was more than seventy-five years old and concerned himself infinitely little with what might happen in ten years' time. "Who is that clever-looking seminarist I think I saw as I passed?" said the Bishop. "Oughtn't they to be in bed according to my regulations." "That one is very wide-awake I assure you, my Lord, and he brings great news. It is the resignation of the only Jansenist residing in your diocese, that terrible abbe Pirard realises at last that we mean business." "Well," said the Bishop with a laugh. "I challenge you to replace him with any man of equal worth, and to show you how much I prize that man, I will invite him to dinner for to-morrow." The Grand Vicar tried to slide in a few words concerning the choice of a successor. The prelate, who was little disposed to talk business, said to him. "Before we install the other, let us get to know a little of the circumstances under which the present one is going. Fetch me this seminarist. The truth is in the mouth of children." Julien was summoned. "I shall find myself between two inquisitors," he thought. He had never felt more courageous. At the moment when he entered, two valets, better dressed than M. Valenod himself, were undressing my lord. That prelate thought he ought to question Julien on his studies before questioning him about M. Pirard. He talked a little theology, and was astonished. He soon came to the humanities, to Virgil, to Horace, to Cicero. "It was those names," thought Julien, that earned me my number 198. I have nothing to lose. Let us try and shine. He succeeded. The prelate, who was an excellent humanist himself, was delighted. At the prefect's dinner, a young girl who was justly celebrated, had recited the poem of the Madeleine. He was in the mood to talk literature, and very quickly forgot the abbe Pirard and his affairs to discuss with the seminarist whether Horace was rich or poor. The prelate quoted several odes, but sometimes his memory was sluggish, and then Julien would recite with modesty the whole ode: the fact which struck the bishop was that Julien never deviated from the conversational tone. He spoke his twenty or thirty Latin verses as though he had been speaking of what was taking place in his own seminary. They talked for a long time of Virgil, or Cicero, and the prelate could not help complimenting the young seminarist. "You could not have studied better." "My Lord," said Julien, "your seminary can offer you 197 much less unworthy of your high esteem." "How is that?" said the Prelate astonished by the number. "I can support by official proof just what I have had the honour of saying before my lord. I obtained the number 198 at the seminary's annual examination by giving accurate answers to the very questions which are earning me at the present moment my lord's approbation. "Ah, it is the Benjamin of the abbe Pirard," said the Bishop with a laugh, as he looked at M. de Frilair. "We should have been prepared for this. But it is fair fighting. Did you not have to be woken up, my friend," he said, addressing himself to Julien. "To be sent here?" "Yes, my Lord. I have only been out of the seminary alone once in my life to go and help M. the abbe Chas-Bernard decorate the cathedral on Corpus Christi day. "Optime," said the Bishop. "So, it is you who showed proof of so much courage by placing the bouquets of feathers on the baldachin. They make me shudder. They make me fear that they will cost some man his life. You will go far, my friend, but I do not wish to cut short your brilliant career by making you die of hunger." And by the order of the Bishop, biscuits and wine were brought in, to which Julien did honour, and the abbe de Frilair, who knew that his Bishop liked to see people eat gaily and with a good appetite, even greater honour. The prelate, more and more satisfied with the end of his evening, talked for a moment of ecclesiastical history. He saw that Julien did not understand. The prelate passed on to the moral condition of the Roman Empire under the system of the Emperor Constantine. The end of paganism had been accompanied by that state of anxiety and of doubt which afflicts sad and jaded spirits in the nineteenth century. My Lord noticed Julien's ignorance of almost the very name of Tacitus. To the astonishment of the prelate, Julien answered frankly that that author was not to be found in the seminary library. "I am truly very glad," said the Bishop gaily, "You relieve me of an embarrassment. I have been trying for the last five minutes to find a way of thanking you for the charming evening which you have given me in a way that I could certainly never have expected. I did not anticipate finding a teacher in a pupil in my seminary. Although the gift is not unduly canonical, I want to give you a Tacitus." The prelate had eight volumes in a superior binding fetched for him, and insisted on writing himself on the title page of the first volume a Latin compliment to Julien Sorel. The Bishop plumed himself on his fine Latinity. He finished by saying to him in a serious tone, which completely clashed with the rest of the conversation. "Young man, if you are good, you will have one day the best living in my diocese, and one not a hundred leagues from my episcopal palace, but you must be good." Laden with his volumes, Julien left the palace in a state of great astonishment as midnight was striking. My Lord had not said a word to him about the abbe Pirard. Julien was particularly astonished by the Bishop's extreme politeness. He had had no conception of such an urbanity in form combined with so natural an air of dignity. Julien was especially struck by the contrast on seeing again the gloomy abbe Pirard, who was impatiently awaiting him. "Quid tibi dixerunt (What have they said to you)?" he cried out to him in a loud voice as soon as he saw him in the distance. "Speak French, and repeat my Lord's own words without either adding or subtracting anything," said the ex-Director of the seminary in his harsh tone, and with his particularly inelegant manners, as Julien got slightly confused in translating into Latin the speeches of the Bishop. "What a strange present on the part of the Bishop to a young seminarist," he ventured to say as he turned over the leaves of the superb Tacitus, whose gilt edges seemed to horrify him. Two o'clock was already striking when he allowed his favourite pupil to retire to his room after an extremely detailed account. "Leave me the first volume of your Tacitus," he said to him. "Where is my Lord Bishop's compliment? This Latin line will serve as your lightning-conductor in this house after my departure." Erit tibi, fili mi, successor meus tanquam leo querens quem devoret. (For my successor will be to you, my son, like a ravening lion seeking someone to devour). The following morning Julien noticed a certain strangeness in the manner in which his comrades spoke to him. It only made him more reserved. "This," he thought, "is the result of M. Pirard's resignation. It is known over the whole house, and I pass for his favourite. There ought logically to be an insult in their demeanour." But he could not detect it. On the contrary, there was an absence of hate in the eyes of all those he met along the corridors. "What is the meaning of this? It is doubtless a trap. Let us play a wary game." Finally the little seminarist said to him with a laugh, "Cornelii Taciti opera omnia (complete works of Tacitus)." On hearing these words, they all congratulated Julien enviously, not only on the magnificent present which he had received from my lord, but also on the two hours' conversation with which he had been honoured. They knew even its minutest details. From that moment envy ceased completely. They courted him basely. The abbe Castanede, who had manifested towards him the most extreme insolence the very day before, came and took his arm and invited him to breakfast. By some fatality in Julien's character, while the insolence of these coarse creatures had occasioned him great pain, their baseness afforded him disgust, but no pleasure. Towards mid-day the abbe Pirard took leave of his pupils, but not before addressing to them a severe admonition. "Do you wish for the honours of the world," he said to them. "For all the social advantages, for the pleasure of commanding pleasures, of setting the laws at defiance, and the pleasure of being insolent with impunity to all? Or do you wish for your eternal salvation? The most backward of you have only got to open your eyes to distinguish the true ways." He had scarcely left before the devotees of the _Sacre Coeur de Jesus_ went into the chapel to intone a Te Deum. Nobody in the seminary took the ex-director's admonition seriously. "He shows a great deal of temper because he is losing his job," was what was said in every quarter. Not a single seminarist was simple enough to believe in the voluntary resignation of a position which put him into such close touch with the big contractors. The abbe Pirard went and established himself in the finest inn at Besancon, and making an excuse of business which he had not got, insisted on passing a couple of days there. The Bishop had invited him to dinner, and in order to chaff his Grand Vicar de Frilair, endeavoured to make him shine. They were at dessert when the extraordinary intelligence arrived from Paris that the abbe Pirard had been appointed to the magnificent living of N. ---- four leagues from Paris. The good prelate congratulated him upon it. He saw in the whole affair a piece of good play which put him in a good temper and gave him the highest opinion of the abbe's talents. He gave him a magnificent Latin certificate, and enjoined silence on the abbe de Frilair, who was venturing to remonstrate. The same evening, my Lord conveyed his admiration to the Marquise de Rubempre. This was great news for fine Besancon society. They abandoned themselves to all kinds of conjectures over this extraordinary favour. They already saw the abbe Pirard a Bishop. The more subtle brains thought M. de la Mole was a minister, and indulged on this day in smiles at the imperious airs that M. the abbe de Frilair adopted in society. The following day the abbe Pirard was almost mobbed in the streets, and the tradesmen came to their shop doors when he went to solicit an interview with the judges who had had to try the Marquis's lawsuit. For the first time in his life he was politely received by them. The stern Jansenist, indignant as he was with all that he saw, worked long with the advocates whom he had chosen for the Marquis de la Mole, and left for Paris. He was weak enough to tell two or three college friends who accompanied him to the carriage whose armorial bearings they admired, that after having administered the Seminary for fifteen years he was leaving Besancon with five hundred and twenty francs of savings. His friends kissed him with tears in their eyes, and said to each other, "The good abbe could have spared himself that lie. It is really too ridiculous." The vulgar, blinded as they are by the love of money, were constitutionally incapable of understanding that it was in his own sincerity that the abbe Pirard had found the necessary strength to fight for six years against Marie Alacoque, the _Sacre Coeur de Jesus_, the Jesuits and his Bishop.

Chapters 28-29

https://web.archive.org/web/20201128052739/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/the-red-and-the-black/summary-and-analysis/part-1-chapters-2829

One priest, however, befriends Julien: Father Chas-Bernard, master of ceremonies of the cathedral. Julien is selected to aid the latter in an important ceremony in the cathedral in Besancon. There he distinguishes himself for his physical prowess and agility in decorating pillars. Here, Julien is also glimpsed by Mme. de Renal, who promptly faints at the sight of him. He, similarly, is violently moved by this encounter. Pirard sends Julien as his messenger to the bishop with Pirard's letter of resignation. Julien also learns from Pirard that he is being named tutor in the Old and New Testaments, a signal honor proving Pirard's esteem for him. Contrary to Julien's expectations, the other seminarians accept his advancement as evidence of his merit -- that is, they recognize him as one whom they must fear. Stendhal fills in the political intrigue that has prompted Pirard's resignation: Pirard has allied himself with M. de La Mole in a lawsuit the latter has against Frilair, the powerful Jesuit vicar and organizer of the Besancon Congregation. Pirard has accepted the generosity of his friend Mole's influence: responsibility of a very wealthy church in the vicinity of Paris since he knows that Frilair will succeed in divesting him of his position at the seminary. Julien receives an anonymous gift of money from Mole, who has chosen to honor Pirard's prize student, since the rector himself will not accept recompense for his services in Mole's lawsuit. Julien receives a wild boar from Fouque, and this gift further wins the esteem of his fellows since they believe that Julien's parents have sent the boar and, therefore, must be rich. Julien performs brilliantly in his examinations, but he is tricked by Frilair into displaying his knowledge of Latin poets, poets whose works are banned at the seminary. Julien delivers the letter to the bishop and is invited to dinner. In Frilair's presence, he provides a stimulating discussion of the arts for the bishop of Besancon. As a reward, the bishop makes him a gift of the complete works of Tacitus. News of this gift soon circulates in the seminary and adds to the high esteem in which the others now hold Julien.

These chapters narrate Julien's success at the seminary. The beginning of Chapter 28 illustrates Stendhal's improvisational technique. The "event" -- the protection offered by Father Chas, thus the beginning of his success -- - needs an introduction to "precipitate" it. The method of having the event happen is Julien's question: Surely among all these learned professors, one at least has noticed my willingness and has been taken in by my hypocrisy? Julien has over-evaluated Father Chas, however. Stendhal, it will be remarked, does not state this fact; the reader must draw the conclusion. Julien is so accustomed to hypocrisy and ruse that he sees it where it isn't. He imagines in this simple priest a very shrewd man with some ulterior motives beneath conversation entirely devoted to reveling in the rich furnishings of the cathedral. In reality, Father Chas-Bernard is only what he appears to be. The priest's disinterestedness gives a certain gratuitousness to Julien's success. We learn that Pirard is taking Julien more and more into his confidence from his passing warning to the hero concerning his mission into Besancon to aid in the adornment of the cathedral. This isolated note of confidence is a preparation for Julien's future in Paris. Note again that Julien's physical ascension betokens his aspirations and destiny. He alone is daring enough to risk his neck forty feet off the ground to pose the feathers. The ecstatic reverie that the solemnity of the surroundings inspires in Julien is reminiscent of the scene in Chapter 18 when he watches in ecstasy the ceremony of the ardent chapel. Both scenes betray his highly sensitive, superior nature and contrast his emotional, authentic religious response to the baseness of the Church, no longer a divine instrument but perverted to political ends during the Restoration. The unexpected appearance of Mme. de Renal should not completely surprise us. We know that she has become extremely pious and that, refusing to make Father Maslon her confessor, she frequents the confessional at Besancon. It is also obvious why she comes to Besancon -- her passion for Julien is the only justification for her piety. We will find another important encounter between Julien and Mme. de Renal in a church later in the novel. Her fainting in this scene foreshadows her fate in that later scene, for which Julien will be more directly responsible. The cathedral episode is the first step in Julien's success at the seminary. Julien's mentors are kindred souls: noble, of great principle, who have refused to compromise. The austere Jansenist Pirard, just as Chelan, recognizes Julien's nobility of soul and protects him. The touching "communion of souls" that takes place in this scene between Pirard and Julien, two rebels who finally let down their guard and console each other, is reminiscent of Julien's escape sought in high places and solitude in earlier chapters. Note the philosophy of Pirard, similar to Julien's, that has helped to strengthen the latter's character: Pirard has tested Julien by creating insurmountable obstacles in his path. It is Pirard's belief that only the noblest of men could prove themselves by overcoming these obstacles. Pirard tests Julien in this episode just as Stendhal "tests" his hero throughout the novel. Julien still interprets incorrectly the attitudes of his fellows. On various occasions during his rapid advancement, he expects hate and receives respect from the seminarians. Stendhal benefits from a certain ambiguity of presentation to maintain the reader's sympathy for Julien. It is uncertain as to how aware of the political maneuvering Julien is; Stendhal chooses not to elaborate this point. It is to be presumed that Julien is as informed as are the others about the rivalry between the Jansenist Pirard and the Jesuit Frilair. The reader is completely informed, however, and our superiority over Julien encourages an indulgent attitude toward his mistakes. The bishop has no future, and his awareness of this accounts in part for his fair treatment of Julien. He is a power, and independent, but his old age relieves him of the need to intrigue. He is another "father-figure" for Julien, albeit his role is short-lived. Again, it is by feats of memory, by "bon mots" which we do not hear, and by brilliant discussion, likewise unrecorded, that Julien charms the bishop. Note the brief allusion to the "Red" in this chapter: Julien is quickly consoled at not being able to enlist as he overhears two old troopers lament the present state of command and the absence of the great Napoleon.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/35.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_34_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 35

chapter 35

{"name": "Chapter 35", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility52.asp", "summary": "Elinor has met Mrs. Ferrars and finds nothing to commend her. She is happy that she will no longer have to associate with her. Lucy is impressed by both Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny Dashwood. She is delighted to earn their favor and hopes that she will be accepted as the new daughter of their house. Just as the two girls are exchanging views about Mrs. Ferrars, Edward enters the room. Both Edward and Elinor feel awkward. Lucy does nothing to ease the situation. Elinor plays the part of a good hostess by exchanging polite remarks with him. She also calls Marianne so that she can speak with Edward. Marianne is overly effusive and asks him to spend some more time with them. Edward, however, takes his leave.", "analysis": "Notes Jane Austen creates an uncomfortable situation, in which both Elinor and Lucy are present before the man they love. Edward feels awkward, and Lucy worsens the condition with her silence. It is Elinor who saves the moment through her presence of mind. She welcomes Edward and encourages him to participate in their conversation. She is magnanimous enough to allow Edward to spend a few minutes alone with Lucy. She shows no bitterness towards Edward. Lucy poses a complete contrast to Elinor. She is cold and indifferent to his feelings. She also mocks him. She feels insecure in the presence of Elinor. Instead of taking leave of them, she shamelessly remains on the scene, much to the discomfort of Edward, Elinor and Marianne. It is interesting that with the exception of Edward, all the other people that Lucy likes, Elinor dislikes. Elinor feels disgusted at the snobbish and rude behavior of both Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny Dashwood, while Lucy finds the mother and daughter delightful company. Elinor is relieved to be spared their company in the future, while Lucy looks forward to a life-long relationship with them. CHAPTER 36 Summary Mrs. Jennings decides to spend more time with her daughter, Charlotte, who has had a baby. Elinor and Marianne are thrown in the compadny of Lady Middleton and the Steele sisters as a result of this. One day they receive an invitation to a musical party. At the party Elinor gets acquainted with Robert Ferrars. She identifies him as the same man who had taken a long time to choose a tooth-pick case at Gray's. She thinks he is a foolish, shallow and conceited man. The Steeles are invited to spend a few days with John Dashwood and his wife. The girls are delighted and inform the Dashwood sisters of the invitation. Shortly afterwards, John Dashwood visits his sisters. He talks about the Misses Steele and how impressed Fanny is with them. Notes This chapter also sparkles with Jane Austen's humor. Speaking of Lady Middleton, Austen writes: \"Though nothing could be more polite than Lady Middleton's behavior to Elinor and Marianne, she did not really like them at all. Because they neither flattered herself nor her children, she could not believe them good- natured; and because they were fond of reading, she fancied them satirical: perhaps without exactly knowing what it was to be satirical; but that did not signify. It was censure in common use, and easily given.\" Such passages not only showcase Austen's skill as a satirist, but also delineate the ways in which the heroines stand apart from the other characters. One of the most amusing scenes in the chapter is the one in which Fanny Dashwood convinces her husband that it is pointless to invite his sisters to visit them at their house. The scene resembles an earlier one in which Fanny convinces her husband against providing financial help to his sisters. In each case, Fanny tries to make it seem as though logic and propriety, instead of pettiness and malice, influence her decisions. One more character is introduced in the chapter. He is Robert Ferrars. Unlike his brother, he is shallow and conceited and tries to impress young ladies with his limited knowledge. Elinor patiently listens to his prattle. She \"agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the compliment of rational opposition.\" CHAPTER 37 Summary Mrs. Jennings informs Elinor of Lucy's engagement to Edward. She also recounts how Fanny reacted when she heard this news. Fanny became hysterical and drove the Steeles out of her house. Later, Mrs. Ferrars summoned Edward and asked him to terminate the engagement. However, Edward stood his ground, and the old lady disinherited him. Elinor relates this information to her sister. Marianne is shocked to hear the news. She condemns both Lucy and Edward for their decision. Notes Two humorous characters describe the scene that occurred in Fanny Dashwood's house when the news of Lucy's engagement to Edward was announced. Mrs. Jennings conveys the gossip of the day with exclamations and imaginary conversations. Talking about Fanny's reaction to the news, she remarks, \"She fell into violent hysterics immediately, with such screams as reached your brother's ears, as he was sitting in his own dressing room downstairs. . . So up he flew directly, and a terrible scene took place, for Lucy was come to them by that time, little dreaming what was going on. Poor Soul!. . . for your sister scolded like any fury, and soon drove her into a fainting fit.\" John Dashwood, however, describes the scene through the eyes of a devoted husband and presents his wife as the offended party.\" Poor Fanny! She was in hysterics all yesterday. . . . She has borne it all with the fortitude of an angel.\" He confounds his wife's devilish rage with an angel's strength. Elinor at last reveals Lucy's secret to Marianne. She controls her own emotions and relates the events cautiously, so as not to shock her sister with the news. She discloses the information without damaging Edward's character. She is generous in excusing his juvenile blunder and wishes him well. Marianne admires her sister's will power and tolerance."}

Elinor's curiosity to see Mrs. Ferrars was satisfied.-- She had found in her every thing that could tend to make a farther connection between the families undesirable.-- She had seen enough of her pride, her meanness, and her determined prejudice against herself, to comprehend all the difficulties that must have perplexed the engagement, and retarded the marriage, of Edward and herself, had he been otherwise free;--and she had seen almost enough to be thankful for her OWN sake, that one greater obstacle preserved her from suffering under any other of Mrs. Ferrars's creation, preserved her from all dependence upon her caprice, or any solicitude for her good opinion. Or at least, if she did not bring herself quite to rejoice in Edward's being fettered to Lucy, she determined, that had Lucy been more amiable, she OUGHT to have rejoiced. She wondered that Lucy's spirits could be so very much elevated by the civility of Mrs. Ferrars;--that her interest and her vanity should so very much blind her as to make the attention which seemed only paid her because she was NOT ELINOR, appear a compliment to herself--or to allow her to derive encouragement from a preference only given her, because her real situation was unknown. But that it was so, had not only been declared by Lucy's eyes at the time, but was declared over again the next morning more openly, for at her particular desire, Lady Middleton set her down in Berkeley Street on the chance of seeing Elinor alone, to tell her how happy she was. The chance proved a lucky one, for a message from Mrs. Palmer soon after she arrived, carried Mrs. Jennings away. "My dear friend," cried Lucy, as soon as they were by themselves, "I come to talk to you of my happiness. Could anything be so flattering as Mrs. Ferrars's way of treating me yesterday? So exceeding affable as she was!--You know how I dreaded the thoughts of seeing her;--but the very moment I was introduced, there was such an affability in her behaviour as really should seem to say, she had quite took a fancy to me. Now was not it so?-- You saw it all; and was not you quite struck with it?" "She was certainly very civil to you." "Civil!--Did you see nothing but only civility?-- I saw a vast deal more. Such kindness as fell to the share of nobody but me!--No pride, no hauteur, and your sister just the same--all sweetness and affability!" Elinor wished to talk of something else, but Lucy still pressed her to own that she had reason for her happiness; and Elinor was obliged to go on.-- "Undoubtedly, if they had known your engagement," said she, "nothing could be more flattering than their treatment of you;--but as that was not the case"-- "I guessed you would say so,"--replied Lucy quickly--"but there was no reason in the world why Mrs. Ferrars should seem to like me, if she did not, and her liking me is every thing. You shan't talk me out of my satisfaction. I am sure it will all end well, and there will be no difficulties at all, to what I used to think. Mrs. Ferrars is a charming woman, and so is your sister. They are both delightful women, indeed!--I wonder I should never hear you say how agreeable Mrs. Dashwood was!" To this Elinor had no answer to make, and did not attempt any. "Are you ill, Miss Dashwood?--you seem low--you don't speak;--sure you an't well." "I never was in better health." "I am glad of it with all my heart; but really you did not look it. I should be sorry to have YOU ill; you, that have been the greatest comfort to me in the world!--Heaven knows what I should have done without your friendship."-- Elinor tried to make a civil answer, though doubting her own success. But it seemed to satisfy Lucy, for she directly replied, "Indeed I am perfectly convinced of your regard for me, and next to Edward's love, it is the greatest comfort I have.--Poor Edward!--But now there is one good thing, we shall be able to meet, and meet pretty often, for Lady Middleton's delighted with Mrs. Dashwood, so we shall be a good deal in Harley Street, I dare say, and Edward spends half his time with his sister--besides, Lady Middleton and Mrs. Ferrars will visit now;--and Mrs. Ferrars and your sister were both so good to say more than once, they should always be glad to see me.-- They are such charming women!--I am sure if ever you tell your sister what I think of her, you cannot speak too high." But Elinor would not give her any encouragement to hope that she SHOULD tell her sister. Lucy continued. "I am sure I should have seen it in a moment, if Mrs. Ferrars had took a dislike to me. If she had only made me a formal courtesy, for instance, without saying a word, and never after had took any notice of me, and never looked at me in a pleasant way--you know what I mean--if I had been treated in that forbidding sort of way, I should have gave it all up in despair. I could not have stood it. For where she DOES dislike, I know it is most violent." Elinor was prevented from making any reply to this civil triumph, by the door's being thrown open, the servant's announcing Mr. Ferrars, and Edward's immediately walking in. It was a very awkward moment; and the countenance of each shewed that it was so. They all looked exceedingly foolish; and Edward seemed to have as great an inclination to walk out of the room again, as to advance farther into it. The very circumstance, in its unpleasantest form, which they would each have been most anxious to avoid, had fallen on them.--They were not only all three together, but were together without the relief of any other person. The ladies recovered themselves first. It was not Lucy's business to put herself forward, and the appearance of secrecy must still be kept up. She could therefore only LOOK her tenderness, and after slightly addressing him, said no more. But Elinor had more to do; and so anxious was she, for his sake and her own, to do it well, that she forced herself, after a moment's recollection, to welcome him, with a look and manner that were almost easy, and almost open; and another struggle, another effort still improved them. She would not allow the presence of Lucy, nor the consciousness of some injustice towards herself, to deter her from saying that she was happy to see him, and that she had very much regretted being from home, when he called before in Berkeley Street. She would not be frightened from paying him those attentions which, as a friend and almost a relation, were his due, by the observant eyes of Lucy, though she soon perceived them to be narrowly watching her. Her manners gave some re-assurance to Edward, and he had courage enough to sit down; but his embarrassment still exceeded that of the ladies in a proportion, which the case rendered reasonable, though his sex might make it rare; for his heart had not the indifference of Lucy's, nor could his conscience have quite the ease of Elinor's. Lucy, with a demure and settled air, seemed determined to make no contribution to the comfort of the others, and would not say a word; and almost every thing that WAS said, proceeded from Elinor, who was obliged to volunteer all the information about her mother's health, their coming to town, &c. which Edward ought to have inquired about, but never did. Her exertions did not stop here; for she soon afterwards felt herself so heroically disposed as to determine, under pretence of fetching Marianne, to leave the others by themselves; and she really did it, and THAT in the handsomest manner, for she loitered away several minutes on the landing-place, with the most high-minded fortitude, before she went to her sister. When that was once done, however, it was time for the raptures of Edward to cease; for Marianne's joy hurried her into the drawing-room immediately. Her pleasure in seeing him was like every other of her feelings, strong in itself, and strongly spoken. She met him with a hand that would be taken, and a voice that expressed the affection of a sister. "Dear Edward!" she cried, "this is a moment of great happiness!--This would almost make amends for every thing!" Edward tried to return her kindness as it deserved, but before such witnesses he dared not say half what he really felt. Again they all sat down, and for a moment or two all were silent; while Marianne was looking with the most speaking tenderness, sometimes at Edward and sometimes at Elinor, regretting only that their delight in each other should be checked by Lucy's unwelcome presence. Edward was the first to speak, and it was to notice Marianne's altered looks, and express his fear of her not finding London agree with her. "Oh, don't think of me!" she replied with spirited earnestness, though her eyes were filled with tears as she spoke, "don't think of MY health. Elinor is well, you see. That must be enough for us both." This remark was not calculated to make Edward or Elinor more easy, nor to conciliate the good will of Lucy, who looked up at Marianne with no very benignant expression. "Do you like London?" said Edward, willing to say any thing that might introduce another subject. "Not at all. I expected much pleasure in it, but I have found none. The sight of you, Edward, is the only comfort it has afforded; and thank Heaven! you are what you always were!" She paused--no one spoke. "I think, Elinor," she presently added, "we must employ Edward to take care of us in our return to Barton. In a week or two, I suppose, we shall be going; and, I trust, Edward will not be very unwilling to accept the charge." Poor Edward muttered something, but what it was, nobody knew, not even himself. But Marianne, who saw his agitation, and could easily trace it to whatever cause best pleased herself, was perfectly satisfied, and soon talked of something else. "We spent such a day, Edward, in Harley Street yesterday! So dull, so wretchedly dull!--But I have much to say to you on that head, which cannot be said now." And with this admirable discretion did she defer the assurance of her finding their mutual relatives more disagreeable than ever, and of her being particularly disgusted with his mother, till they were more in private. "But why were you not there, Edward?--Why did you not come?" "I was engaged elsewhere." "Engaged! But what was that, when such friends were to be met?" "Perhaps, Miss Marianne," cried Lucy, eager to take some revenge on her, "you think young men never stand upon engagements, if they have no mind to keep them, little as well as great." Elinor was very angry, but Marianne seemed entirely insensible of the sting; for she calmly replied, "Not so, indeed; for, seriously speaking, I am very sure that conscience only kept Edward from Harley Street. And I really believe he HAS the most delicate conscience in the world; the most scrupulous in performing every engagement, however minute, and however it may make against his interest or pleasure. He is the most fearful of giving pain, of wounding expectation, and the most incapable of being selfish, of any body I ever saw. Edward, it is so, and I will say it. What! are you never to hear yourself praised!--Then you must be no friend of mine; for those who will accept of my love and esteem, must submit to my open commendation." The nature of her commendation, in the present case, however, happened to be particularly ill-suited to the feelings of two thirds of her auditors, and was so very unexhilarating to Edward, that he very soon got up to go away. "Going so soon!" said Marianne; "my dear Edward, this must not be." And drawing him a little aside, she whispered her persuasion that Lucy could not stay much longer. But even this encouragement failed, for he would go; and Lucy, who would have outstaid him, had his visit lasted two hours, soon afterwards went away. "What can bring her here so often?" said Marianne, on her leaving them. "Could not she see that we wanted her gone!--how teazing to Edward!" "Why so?--we were all his friends, and Lucy has been the longest known to him of any. It is but natural that he should like to see her as well as ourselves." Marianne looked at her steadily, and said, "You know, Elinor, that this is a kind of talking which I cannot bear. If you only hope to have your assertion contradicted, as I must suppose to be the case, you ought to recollect that I am the last person in the world to do it. I cannot descend to be tricked out of assurances, that are not really wanted." She then left the room; and Elinor dared not follow her to say more, for bound as she was by her promise of secrecy to Lucy, she could give no information that would convince Marianne; and painful as the consequences of her still continuing in an error might be, she was obliged to submit to it. All that she could hope, was that Edward would not often expose her or himself to the distress of hearing Marianne's mistaken warmth, nor to the repetition of any other part of the pain that had attended their recent meeting--and this she had every reason to expect.

Chapter 35

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility52.asp

Elinor has met Mrs. Ferrars and finds nothing to commend her. She is happy that she will no longer have to associate with her. Lucy is impressed by both Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny Dashwood. She is delighted to earn their favor and hopes that she will be accepted as the new daughter of their house. Just as the two girls are exchanging views about Mrs. Ferrars, Edward enters the room. Both Edward and Elinor feel awkward. Lucy does nothing to ease the situation. Elinor plays the part of a good hostess by exchanging polite remarks with him. She also calls Marianne so that she can speak with Edward. Marianne is overly effusive and asks him to spend some more time with them. Edward, however, takes his leave.

Notes Jane Austen creates an uncomfortable situation, in which both Elinor and Lucy are present before the man they love. Edward feels awkward, and Lucy worsens the condition with her silence. It is Elinor who saves the moment through her presence of mind. She welcomes Edward and encourages him to participate in their conversation. She is magnanimous enough to allow Edward to spend a few minutes alone with Lucy. She shows no bitterness towards Edward. Lucy poses a complete contrast to Elinor. She is cold and indifferent to his feelings. She also mocks him. She feels insecure in the presence of Elinor. Instead of taking leave of them, she shamelessly remains on the scene, much to the discomfort of Edward, Elinor and Marianne. It is interesting that with the exception of Edward, all the other people that Lucy likes, Elinor dislikes. Elinor feels disgusted at the snobbish and rude behavior of both Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny Dashwood, while Lucy finds the mother and daughter delightful company. Elinor is relieved to be spared their company in the future, while Lucy looks forward to a life-long relationship with them. CHAPTER 36 Summary Mrs. Jennings decides to spend more time with her daughter, Charlotte, who has had a baby. Elinor and Marianne are thrown in the compadny of Lady Middleton and the Steele sisters as a result of this. One day they receive an invitation to a musical party. At the party Elinor gets acquainted with Robert Ferrars. She identifies him as the same man who had taken a long time to choose a tooth-pick case at Gray's. She thinks he is a foolish, shallow and conceited man. The Steeles are invited to spend a few days with John Dashwood and his wife. The girls are delighted and inform the Dashwood sisters of the invitation. Shortly afterwards, John Dashwood visits his sisters. He talks about the Misses Steele and how impressed Fanny is with them. Notes This chapter also sparkles with Jane Austen's humor. Speaking of Lady Middleton, Austen writes: "Though nothing could be more polite than Lady Middleton's behavior to Elinor and Marianne, she did not really like them at all. Because they neither flattered herself nor her children, she could not believe them good- natured; and because they were fond of reading, she fancied them satirical: perhaps without exactly knowing what it was to be satirical; but that did not signify. It was censure in common use, and easily given." Such passages not only showcase Austen's skill as a satirist, but also delineate the ways in which the heroines stand apart from the other characters. One of the most amusing scenes in the chapter is the one in which Fanny Dashwood convinces her husband that it is pointless to invite his sisters to visit them at their house. The scene resembles an earlier one in which Fanny convinces her husband against providing financial help to his sisters. In each case, Fanny tries to make it seem as though logic and propriety, instead of pettiness and malice, influence her decisions. One more character is introduced in the chapter. He is Robert Ferrars. Unlike his brother, he is shallow and conceited and tries to impress young ladies with his limited knowledge. Elinor patiently listens to his prattle. She "agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the compliment of rational opposition." CHAPTER 37 Summary Mrs. Jennings informs Elinor of Lucy's engagement to Edward. She also recounts how Fanny reacted when she heard this news. Fanny became hysterical and drove the Steeles out of her house. Later, Mrs. Ferrars summoned Edward and asked him to terminate the engagement. However, Edward stood his ground, and the old lady disinherited him. Elinor relates this information to her sister. Marianne is shocked to hear the news. She condemns both Lucy and Edward for their decision. Notes Two humorous characters describe the scene that occurred in Fanny Dashwood's house when the news of Lucy's engagement to Edward was announced. Mrs. Jennings conveys the gossip of the day with exclamations and imaginary conversations. Talking about Fanny's reaction to the news, she remarks, "She fell into violent hysterics immediately, with such screams as reached your brother's ears, as he was sitting in his own dressing room downstairs. . . So up he flew directly, and a terrible scene took place, for Lucy was come to them by that time, little dreaming what was going on. Poor Soul!. . . for your sister scolded like any fury, and soon drove her into a fainting fit." John Dashwood, however, describes the scene through the eyes of a devoted husband and presents his wife as the offended party." Poor Fanny! She was in hysterics all yesterday. . . . She has borne it all with the fortitude of an angel." He confounds his wife's devilish rage with an angel's strength. Elinor at last reveals Lucy's secret to Marianne. She controls her own emotions and relates the events cautiously, so as not to shock her sister with the news. She discloses the information without damaging Edward's character. She is generous in excusing his juvenile blunder and wishes him well. Marianne admires her sister's will power and tolerance.

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/5658-chapters/chapters_36_to_37.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Lord Jim/section_14_part_0.txt

Lord Jim.chapters 36-37

chapters 36-37

{"name": "Chapters 36-37", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210215030710/https://www.novelguide.com/lord-jim/summaries/chapter36-37", "summary": "Six and Thirty Seven . In Chapter Thirty Six, Marlow tells the readers that he has finished his main narrative with these words and his listeners drifted off and only one of them was to hear 'the last word of the story'. This 'last word' comes to his home two years later in a thick packet; it is addressed to him in Marlow's handwriting. . . This man is described as drawing the heavy curtains and the readers are told his wandering days are over. For him, there are 'no more horizons as boundless as hope'. The sight of the packet brings back sounds and visions and 'the very savour of the past'. . . There are three main enclosures in the packet. There is an explanatory letter from Marlow ; a good many pages pinned together; and a loose sheet of greyish paper. . . Marlow's letter explains how this man is the only one to have shown an interest in Jim after he told him his story. He also says this reader had said that 'giving your life up to them' 'was like selling your soul to a brute'. Marlow also explains that the greyish paper is written by Jim and shows he had made his house into a place of defence . On this piece of paper, Jim has written that 'an awful thing has happened', but gives no further explanation. . . The old letter, which Marlow has forwarded, was found preserved in Jim's writing case and is from his father. It is full of news of people who have never had to grapple with fate as Jim has done. Marlow also says the story of Jim's last events are also included and 'it is romantic beyond the wildest dreams of his boyhood'. We are told that the most astounding part of this adventure is that it is true. Marlow explains that he has written it down as if he were an eyewitness; his information was fragmentary and has had to fit the pieces together. This chapter ends with Marlow saying it is difficult to believe Jim 'will never come' and that he will not hear his voice again. . . Marlow's first-person account begins in Chapter Thirty Seven and says it all begins with a man called Brown and his theft of a Spanish schooner. Much later, Brown tells Marlow about Jim and fills in the gap . Brown refers to Jim as the 'stuck-up beggar' and also reveals 'unsuspected depths of cunning in the wretched Cornelius'. . . The narrative shifts back to eight months before Marlow's encounter with Brown. This is when Marlow visits Stein and is greeted by a man from Patusan. He also sees Tamb' Itam outside Stein's room and Marlow asks if Jim is inside. Tamb' Itam replies, 'no', and repeats 'he would not fight'. Marlow then talks with Stein who tells him Jewel is also at his home. Stein is clearly distressed and says Jim loved her very much. He asks Marlow to talk to her in order to tell her to forgive Jim. . . Jewel tells Marlow that Jim left her and says, 'you always leave us - for your own ends'. She recounts the whole story to Marlow . He says she should have trusted him, but she argues against this and says Jim was 'false'. Marlow asks Stein to explain to her about Jim's past and then leaves. The 'privileged reader' then 'turned to the pages of the story'. .", "analysis": "Six and Thirty Seven . The complexity of the narrative takes a new twist as the 'privileged reader' is given Marlow's account . Throughout Lord Jim, Conrad has favored an elaborate movement in time and perspectives in order to relate the story of Jim. In Chapter Thirty Six, this becomes more complicated still as Marlow becomes distanced from the action and narrative. . . The interested reader receives the packet of letters and this person may also be seen as the readers of the novel in some regards as we have maintained our interest in Jim by continuing to read about him. As with the younger Jim, the readers have been caught up in a tale of romance and adventure and the layers of different narratives trap these readers further."}

With these words Marlow had ended his narrative, and his audience had broken up forthwith, under his abstract, pensive gaze. Men drifted off the verandah in pairs or alone without loss of time, without offering a remark, as if the last image of that incomplete story, its incompleteness itself, and the very tone of the speaker, had made discussion in vain and comment impossible. Each of them seemed to carry away his own impression, to carry it away with him like a secret; but there was only one man of all these listeners who was ever to hear the last word of the story. It came to him at home, more than two years later, and it came contained in a thick packet addressed in Marlow's upright and angular handwriting. The privileged man opened the packet, looked in, then, laying it down, went to the window. His rooms were in the highest flat of a lofty building, and his glance could travel afar beyond the clear panes of glass, as though he were looking out of the lantern of a lighthouse. The slopes of the roofs glistened, the dark broken ridges succeeded each other without end like sombre, uncrested waves, and from the depths of the town under his feet ascended a confused and unceasing mutter. The spires of churches, numerous, scattered haphazard, uprose like beacons on a maze of shoals without a channel; the driving rain mingled with the falling dusk of a winter's evening; and the booming of a big clock on a tower, striking the hour, rolled past in voluminous, austere bursts of sound, with a shrill vibrating cry at the core. He drew the heavy curtains. The light of his shaded reading-lamp slept like a sheltered pool, his footfalls made no sound on the carpet, his wandering days were over. No more horizons as boundless as hope, no more twilights within the forests as solemn as temples, in the hot quest for the Ever-undiscovered Country over the hill, across the stream, beyond the wave. The hour was striking! No more! No more!--but the opened packet under the lamp brought back the sounds, the visions, the very savour of the past--a multitude of fading faces, a tumult of low voices, dying away upon the shores of distant seas under a passionate and unconsoling sunshine. He sighed and sat down to read. At first he saw three distinct enclosures. A good many pages closely blackened and pinned together; a loose square sheet of greyish paper with a few words traced in a handwriting he had never seen before, and an explanatory letter from Marlow. From this last fell another letter, yellowed by time and frayed on the folds. He picked it up and, laying it aside, turned to Marlow's message, ran swiftly over the opening lines, and, checking himself, thereafter read on deliberately, like one approaching with slow feet and alert eyes the glimpse of an undiscovered country. '. . . I don't suppose you've forgotten,' went on the letter. 'You alone have showed an interest in him that survived the telling of his story, though I remember well you would not admit he had mastered his fate. You prophesied for him the disaster of weariness and of disgust with acquired honour, with the self-appointed task, with the love sprung from pity and youth. You had said you knew so well "that kind of thing," its illusory satisfaction, its unavoidable deception. You said also--I call to mind--that "giving your life up to them" (them meaning all of mankind with skins brown, yellow, or black in colour) "was like selling your soul to a brute." You contended that "that kind of thing" was only endurable and enduring when based on a firm conviction in the truth of ideas racially our own, in whose name are established the order, the morality of an ethical progress. "We want its strength at our backs," you had said. "We want a belief in its necessity and its justice, to make a worthy and conscious sacrifice of our lives. Without it the sacrifice is only forgetfulness, the way of offering is no better than the way to perdition." In other words, you maintained that we must fight in the ranks or our lives don't count. Possibly! You ought to know--be it said without malice--you who have rushed into one or two places single-handed and came out cleverly, without singeing your wings. The point, however, is that of all mankind Jim had no dealings but with himself, and the question is whether at the last he had not confessed to a faith mightier than the laws of order and progress. 'I affirm nothing. Perhaps you may pronounce--after you've read. There is much truth--after all--in the common expression "under a cloud." It is impossible to see him clearly--especially as it is through the eyes of others that we take our last look at him. I have no hesitation in imparting to you all I know of the last episode that, as he used to say, had "come to him." One wonders whether this was perhaps that supreme opportunity, that last and satisfying test for which I had always suspected him to be waiting, before he could frame a message to the impeccable world. You remember that when I was leaving him for the last time he had asked whether I would be going home soon, and suddenly cried after me, "Tell them . . ." I had waited--curious I'll own, and hopeful too--only to hear him shout, "No--nothing." That was all then--and there will be nothing more; there will be no message, unless such as each of us can interpret for himself from the language of facts, that are so often more enigmatic than the craftiest arrangement of words. He made, it is true, one more attempt to deliver himself; but that too failed, as you may perceive if you look at the sheet of greyish foolscap enclosed here. He had tried to write; do you notice the commonplace hand? It is headed "The Fort, Patusan." I suppose he had carried out his intention of making out of his house a place of defence. It was an excellent plan: a deep ditch, an earth wall topped by a palisade, and at the angles guns mounted on platforms to sweep each side of the square. Doramin had agreed to furnish him the guns; and so each man of his party would know there was a place of safety, upon which every faithful partisan could rally in case of some sudden danger. All this showed his judicious foresight, his faith in the future. What he called "my own people"--the liberated captives of the Sherif--were to make a distinct quarter of Patusan, with their huts and little plots of ground under the walls of the stronghold. Within he would be an invincible host in himself "The Fort, Patusan." No date, as you observe. What is a number and a name to a day of days? It is also impossible to say whom he had in his mind when he seized the pen: Stein--myself--the world at large--or was this only the aimless startled cry of a solitary man confronted by his fate? "An awful thing has happened," he wrote before he flung the pen down for the first time; look at the ink blot resembling the head of an arrow under these words. After a while he had tried again, scrawling heavily, as if with a hand of lead, another line. "I must now at once . . ." The pen had spluttered, and that time he gave it up. There's nothing more; he had seen a broad gulf that neither eye nor voice could span. I can understand this. He was overwhelmed by the inexplicable; he was overwhelmed by his own personality--the gift of that destiny which he had done his best to master. 'I send you also an old letter--a very old letter. It was found carefully preserved in his writing-case. It is from his father, and by the date you can see he must have received it a few days before he joined the Patna. Thus it must be the last letter he ever had from home. He had treasured it all these years. The good old parson fancied his sailor son. I've looked in at a sentence here and there. There is nothing in it except just affection. He tells his "dear James" that the last long letter from him was very "honest and entertaining." He would not have him "judge men harshly or hastily." There are four pages of it, easy morality and family news. Tom had "taken orders." Carrie's husband had "money losses." The old chap goes on equably trusting Providence and the established order of the universe, but alive to its small dangers and its small mercies. One can almost see him, grey-haired and serene in the inviolable shelter of his book-lined, faded, and comfortable study, where for forty years he had conscientiously gone over and over again the round of his little thoughts about faith and virtue, about the conduct of life and the only proper manner of dying; where he had written so many sermons, where he sits talking to his boy, over there, on the other side of the earth. But what of the distance? Virtue is one all over the world, and there is only one faith, one conceivable conduct of life, one manner of dying. He hopes his "dear James" will never forget that "who once gives way to temptation, in the very instant hazards his total depravity and everlasting ruin. Therefore resolve fixedly never, through any possible motives, to do anything which you believe to be wrong." There is also some news of a favourite dog; and a pony, "which all you boys used to ride," had gone blind from old age and had to be shot. The old chap invokes Heaven's blessing; the mother and all the girls then at home send their love. . . . No, there is nothing much in that yellow frayed letter fluttering out of his cherishing grasp after so many years. It was never answered, but who can say what converse he may have held with all these placid, colourless forms of men and women peopling that quiet corner of the world as free of danger or strife as a tomb, and breathing equably the air of undisturbed rectitude. It seems amazing that he should belong to it, he to whom so many things "had come." Nothing ever came to them; they would never be taken unawares, and never be called upon to grapple with fate. Here they all are, evoked by the mild gossip of the father, all these brothers and sisters, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, gazing with clear unconscious eyes, while I seem to see him, returned at last, no longer a mere white speck at the heart of an immense mystery, but of full stature, standing disregarded amongst their untroubled shapes, with a stern and romantic aspect, but always mute, dark--under a cloud. 'The story of the last events you will find in the few pages enclosed here. You must admit that it is romantic beyond the wildest dreams of his boyhood, and yet there is to my mind a sort of profound and terrifying logic in it, as if it were our imagination alone that could set loose upon us the might of an overwhelming destiny. The imprudence of our thoughts recoils upon our heads; who toys with the sword shall perish by the sword. This astounding adventure, of which the most astounding part is that it is true, comes on as an unavoidable consequence. Something of the sort had to happen. You repeat this to yourself while you marvel that such a thing could happen in the year of grace before last. But it has happened--and there is no disputing its logic. 'I put it down here for you as though I had been an eyewitness. My information was fragmentary, but I've fitted the pieces together, and there is enough of them to make an intelligible picture. I wonder how he would have related it himself. He has confided so much in me that at times it seems as though he must come in presently and tell the story in his own words, in his careless yet feeling voice, with his offhand manner, a little puzzled, a little bothered, a little hurt, but now and then by a word or a phrase giving one of these glimpses of his very own self that were never any good for purposes of orientation. It's difficult to believe he will never come. I shall never hear his voice again, nor shall I see his smooth tan-and-pink face with a white line on the forehead, and the youthful eyes darkened by excitement to a profound, unfathomable blue.' 'It all begins with a remarkable exploit of a man called Brown, who stole with complete success a Spanish schooner out of a small bay near Zamboanga. Till I discovered the fellow my information was incomplete, but most unexpectedly I did come upon him a few hours before he gave up his arrogant ghost. Fortunately he was willing and able to talk between the choking fits of asthma, and his racked body writhed with malicious exultation at the bare thought of Jim. He exulted thus at the idea that he had "paid out the stuck-up beggar after all." He gloated over his action. I had to bear the sunken glare of his fierce crow-footed eyes if I wanted to know; and so I bore it, reflecting how much certain forms of evil are akin to madness, derived from intense egoism, inflamed by resistance, tearing the soul to pieces, and giving factitious vigour to the body. The story also reveals unsuspected depths of cunning in the wretched Cornelius, whose abject and intense hate acts like a subtle inspiration, pointing out an unerring way towards revenge. '"I could see directly I set my eyes on him what sort of a fool he was," gasped the dying Brown. "He a man! Hell! He was a hollow sham. As if he couldn't have said straight out, 'Hands off my plunder!' blast him! That would have been like a man! Rot his superior soul! He had me there--but he hadn't devil enough in him to make an end of me. Not he! A thing like that letting me off as if I wasn't worth a kick! . . ." Brown struggled desperately for breath. . . . "Fraud. . . . Letting me off. . . . And so I did make an end of him after all. . . ." He choked again. . . . "I expect this thing'll kill me, but I shall die easy now. You . . . you here . . . I don't know your name--I would give you a five-pound note if--if I had it--for the news--or my name's not Brown. . . ." He grinned horribly. . . . "Gentleman Brown." 'He said all these things in profound gasps, staring at me with his yellow eyes out of a long, ravaged, brown face; he jerked his left arm; a pepper-and-salt matted beard hung almost into his lap; a dirty ragged blanket covered his legs. I had found him out in Bankok through that busybody Schomberg, the hotel-keeper, who had, confidentially, directed me where to look. It appears that a sort of loafing, fuddled vagabond--a white man living amongst the natives with a Siamese woman--had considered it a great privilege to give a shelter to the last days of the famous Gentleman Brown. While he was talking to me in the wretched hovel, and, as it were, fighting for every minute of his life, the Siamese woman, with big bare legs and a stupid coarse face, sat in a dark corner chewing betel stolidly. Now and then she would get up for the purpose of shooing a chicken away from the door. The whole hut shook when she walked. An ugly yellow child, naked and pot-bellied like a little heathen god, stood at the foot of the couch, finger in mouth, lost in a profound and calm contemplation of the dying man. 'He talked feverishly; but in the middle of a word, perhaps, an invisible hand would take him by the throat, and he would look at me dumbly with an expression of doubt and anguish. He seemed to fear that I would get tired of waiting and go away, leaving him with his tale untold, with his exultation unexpressed. He died during the night, I believe, but by that time I had nothing more to learn. 'So much as to Brown, for the present. 'Eight months before this, coming into Samarang, I went as usual to see Stein. On the garden side of the house a Malay on the verandah greeted me shyly, and I remembered that I had seen him in Patusan, in Jim's house, amongst other Bugis men who used to come in the evening to talk interminably over their war reminiscences and to discuss State affairs. Jim had pointed him out to me once as a respectable petty trader owning a small seagoing native craft, who had showed himself "one of the best at the taking of the stockade." I was not very surprised to see him, since any Patusan trader venturing as far as Samarang would naturally find his way to Stein's house. I returned his greeting and passed on. At the door of Stein's room I came upon another Malay in whom I recognised Tamb' Itam. 'I asked him at once what he was doing there; it occurred to me that Jim might have come on a visit. I own I was pleased and excited at the thought. Tamb' Itam looked as if he did not know what to say. "Is Tuan Jim inside?" I asked impatiently. "No," he mumbled, hanging his head for a moment, and then with sudden earnestness, "He would not fight. He would not fight," he repeated twice. As he seemed unable to say anything else, I pushed him aside and went in. 'Stein, tall and stooping, stood alone in the middle of the room between the rows of butterfly cases. "Ach! is it you, my friend?" he said sadly, peering through his glasses. A drab sack-coat of alpaca hung, unbuttoned, down to his knees. He had a Panama hat on his head, and there were deep furrows on his pale cheeks. "What's the matter now?" I asked nervously. "There's Tamb' Itam there. . . ." "Come and see the girl. Come and see the girl. She is here," he said, with a half-hearted show of activity. I tried to detain him, but with gentle obstinacy he would take no notice of my eager questions. "She is here, she is here," he repeated, in great perturbation. "They came here two days ago. An old man like me, a stranger--sehen Sie--cannot do much. . . . Come this way. . . . Young hearts are unforgiving. . . ." I could see he was in utmost distress. . . . "The strength of life in them, the cruel strength of life. . . ." He mumbled, leading me round the house; I followed him, lost in dismal and angry conjectures. At the door of the drawing-room he barred my way. "He loved her very much," he said interrogatively, and I only nodded, feeling so bitterly disappointed that I would not trust myself to speak. "Very frightful," he murmured. "She can't understand me. I am only a strange old man. Perhaps you . . . she knows you. Talk to her. We can't leave it like this. Tell her to forgive him. It was very frightful." "No doubt," I said, exasperated at being in the dark; "but have you forgiven him?" He looked at me queerly. "You shall hear," he said, and opening the door, absolutely pushed me in. 'You know Stein's big house and the two immense reception-rooms, uninhabited and uninhabitable, clean, full of solitude and of shining things that look as if never beheld by the eye of man? They are cool on the hottest days, and you enter them as you would a scrubbed cave underground. I passed through one, and in the other I saw the girl sitting at the end of a big mahogany table, on which she rested her head, the face hidden in her arms. The waxed floor reflected her dimly as though it had been a sheet of frozen water. The rattan screens were down, and through the strange greenish gloom made by the foliage of the trees outside a strong wind blew in gusts, swaying the long draperies of windows and doorways. Her white figure seemed shaped in snow; the pendent crystals of a great chandelier clicked above her head like glittering icicles. She looked up and watched my approach. I was chilled as if these vast apartments had been the cold abode of despair. 'She recognised me at once, and as soon as I had stopped, looking down at her: "He has left me," she said quietly; "you always leave us--for your own ends." Her face was set. All the heat of life seemed withdrawn within some inaccessible spot in her breast. "It would have been easy to die with him," she went on, and made a slight weary gesture as if giving up the incomprehensible. "He would not! It was like a blindness--and yet it was I who was speaking to him; it was I who stood before his eyes; it was at me that he looked all the time! Ah! you are hard, treacherous, without truth, without compassion. What makes you so wicked? Or is it that you are all mad?" 'I took her hand; it did not respond, and when I dropped it, it hung down to the floor. That indifference, more awful than tears, cries, and reproaches, seemed to defy time and consolation. You felt that nothing you could say would reach the seat of the still and benumbing pain. 'Stein had said, "You shall hear." I did hear. I heard it all, listening with amazement, with awe, to the tones of her inflexible weariness. She could not grasp the real sense of what she was telling me, and her resentment filled me with pity for her--for him too. I stood rooted to the spot after she had finished. Leaning on her arm, she stared with hard eyes, and the wind passed in gusts, the crystals kept on clicking in the greenish gloom. She went on whispering to herself: "And yet he was looking at me! He could see my face, hear my voice, hear my grief! When I used to sit at his feet, with my cheek against his knee and his hand on my head, the curse of cruelty and madness was already within him, waiting for the day. The day came! . . . and before the sun had set he could not see me any more--he was made blind and deaf and without pity, as you all are. He shall have no tears from me. Never, never. Not one tear. I will not! He went away from me as if I had been worse than death. He fled as if driven by some accursed thing he had heard or seen in his sleep. . . ." 'Her steady eyes seemed to strain after the shape of a man torn out of her arms by the strength of a dream. She made no sign to my silent bow. I was glad to escape. 'I saw her once again, the same afternoon. On leaving her I had gone in search of Stein, whom I could not find indoors; and I wandered out, pursued by distressful thoughts, into the gardens, those famous gardens of Stein, in which you can find every plant and tree of tropical lowlands. I followed the course of the canalised stream, and sat for a long time on a shaded bench near the ornamental pond, where some waterfowl with clipped wings were diving and splashing noisily. The branches of casuarina trees behind me swayed lightly, incessantly, reminding me of the soughing of fir trees at home. 'This mournful and restless sound was a fit accompaniment to my meditations. She had said he had been driven away from her by a dream,--and there was no answer one could make her--there seemed to be no forgiveness for such a transgression. And yet is not mankind itself, pushing on its blind way, driven by a dream of its greatness and its power upon the dark paths of excessive cruelty and of excessive devotion? And what is the pursuit of truth, after all? 'When I rose to get back to the house I caught sight of Stein's drab coat through a gap in the foliage, and very soon at a turn of the path I came upon him walking with the girl. Her little hand rested on his forearm, and under the broad, flat rim of his Panama hat he bent over her, grey-haired, paternal, with compassionate and chivalrous deference. I stood aside, but they stopped, facing me. His gaze was bent on the ground at his feet; the girl, erect and slight on his arm, stared sombrely beyond my shoulder with black, clear, motionless eyes. "Schrecklich," he murmured. "Terrible! Terrible! What can one do?" He seemed to be appealing to me, but her youth, the length of the days suspended over her head, appealed to me more; and suddenly, even as I realised that nothing could be said, I found myself pleading his cause for her sake. "You must forgive him," I concluded, and my own voice seemed to me muffled, lost in un irresponsive deaf immensity. "We all want to be forgiven," I added after a while. '"What have I done?" she asked with her lips only. '"You always mistrusted him," I said. '"He was like the others," she pronounced slowly. '"Not like the others," I protested, but she continued evenly, without any feeling-- '"He was false." And suddenly Stein broke in. "No! no! no! My poor child! . . ." He patted her hand lying passively on his sleeve. "No! no! Not false! True! True! True!" He tried to look into her stony face. "You don't understand. Ach! Why you do not understand? . . . Terrible," he said to me. "Some day she _shall_ understand." '"Will you explain?" I asked, looking hard at him. They moved on. 'I watched them. Her gown trailed on the path, her black hair fell loose. She walked upright and light by the side of the tall man, whose long shapeless coat hung in perpendicular folds from the stooping shoulders, whose feet moved slowly. They disappeared beyond that spinney (you may remember) where sixteen different kinds of bamboo grow together, all distinguishable to the learned eye. For my part, I was fascinated by the exquisite grace and beauty of that fluted grove, crowned with pointed leaves and feathery heads, the lightness, the vigour, the charm as distinct as a voice of that unperplexed luxuriating life. I remember staying to look at it for a long time, as one would linger within reach of a consoling whisper. The sky was pearly grey. It was one of those overcast days so rare in the tropics, in which memories crowd upon one, memories of other shores, of other faces. 'I drove back to town the same afternoon, taking with me Tamb' Itam and the other Malay, in whose seagoing craft they had escaped in the bewilderment, fear, and gloom of the disaster. The shock of it seemed to have changed their natures. It had turned her passion into stone, and it made the surly taciturn Tamb' Itam almost loquacious. His surliness, too, was subdued into puzzled humility, as though he had seen the failure of a potent charm in a supreme moment. The Bugis trader, a shy hesitating man, was very clear in the little he had to say. Both were evidently over-awed by a sense of deep inexpressible wonder, by the touch of an inscrutable mystery.' There with Marlow's signature the letter proper ended. The privileged reader screwed up his lamp, and solitary above the billowy roofs of the town, like a lighthouse-keeper above the sea, he turned to the pages of the story.

Chapters 36-37

https://web.archive.org/web/20210215030710/https://www.novelguide.com/lord-jim/summaries/chapter36-37

Six and Thirty Seven . In Chapter Thirty Six, Marlow tells the readers that he has finished his main narrative with these words and his listeners drifted off and only one of them was to hear 'the last word of the story'. This 'last word' comes to his home two years later in a thick packet; it is addressed to him in Marlow's handwriting. . . This man is described as drawing the heavy curtains and the readers are told his wandering days are over. For him, there are 'no more horizons as boundless as hope'. The sight of the packet brings back sounds and visions and 'the very savour of the past'. . . There are three main enclosures in the packet. There is an explanatory letter from Marlow ; a good many pages pinned together; and a loose sheet of greyish paper. . . Marlow's letter explains how this man is the only one to have shown an interest in Jim after he told him his story. He also says this reader had said that 'giving your life up to them' 'was like selling your soul to a brute'. Marlow also explains that the greyish paper is written by Jim and shows he had made his house into a place of defence . On this piece of paper, Jim has written that 'an awful thing has happened', but gives no further explanation. . . The old letter, which Marlow has forwarded, was found preserved in Jim's writing case and is from his father. It is full of news of people who have never had to grapple with fate as Jim has done. Marlow also says the story of Jim's last events are also included and 'it is romantic beyond the wildest dreams of his boyhood'. We are told that the most astounding part of this adventure is that it is true. Marlow explains that he has written it down as if he were an eyewitness; his information was fragmentary and has had to fit the pieces together. This chapter ends with Marlow saying it is difficult to believe Jim 'will never come' and that he will not hear his voice again. . . Marlow's first-person account begins in Chapter Thirty Seven and says it all begins with a man called Brown and his theft of a Spanish schooner. Much later, Brown tells Marlow about Jim and fills in the gap . Brown refers to Jim as the 'stuck-up beggar' and also reveals 'unsuspected depths of cunning in the wretched Cornelius'. . . The narrative shifts back to eight months before Marlow's encounter with Brown. This is when Marlow visits Stein and is greeted by a man from Patusan. He also sees Tamb' Itam outside Stein's room and Marlow asks if Jim is inside. Tamb' Itam replies, 'no', and repeats 'he would not fight'. Marlow then talks with Stein who tells him Jewel is also at his home. Stein is clearly distressed and says Jim loved her very much. He asks Marlow to talk to her in order to tell her to forgive Jim. . . Jewel tells Marlow that Jim left her and says, 'you always leave us - for your own ends'. She recounts the whole story to Marlow . He says she should have trusted him, but she argues against this and says Jim was 'false'. Marlow asks Stein to explain to her about Jim's past and then leaves. The 'privileged reader' then 'turned to the pages of the story'. .

Six and Thirty Seven . The complexity of the narrative takes a new twist as the 'privileged reader' is given Marlow's account . Throughout Lord Jim, Conrad has favored an elaborate movement in time and perspectives in order to relate the story of Jim. In Chapter Thirty Six, this becomes more complicated still as Marlow becomes distanced from the action and narrative. . . The interested reader receives the packet of letters and this person may also be seen as the readers of the novel in some regards as we have maintained our interest in Jim by continuing to read about him. As with the younger Jim, the readers have been caught up in a tale of romance and adventure and the layers of different narratives trap these readers further.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/27.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_11_part_1.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 27

chapter 27

{"name": "CHAPTER 27", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD37.asp", "summary": "Shortly after returning to the dairy farm, Angel tells Tess that he would be delighted to have her as his wife. She confesses that she loves him, but does not accept his proposal. He coaxes her to tell the reason for her denial of him, and she says it is because of her unprivileged background and position. Angel tells Tess he will give her time to think it over. Angel also tells Tess about the Trantridge incident in which a D'Urberville insulted his father. She is quick to realize that the man being discussed is Alec. Tess is once again appalled at the cruelty of her fate.", "analysis": "Notes In this chapter, Angel is pictured as impulsive. Upon returning to Talbothay's, he wastes no time in embracing Tess and asking for her hand in marriage. When she says she loves him but cannot marry him, Angel tries to be patient. He promises to give her time to reconsider his proposal and assures her that she should not be apprehensive about her background or his family. The narration of the Trantridge incident by Angel to Tess is a shocking event for her. She immediately realizes that the young man being discussed is Alec. Tess suddenly feels very vulnerable for the first time since she has been at Talbothay. She worries that her secret may not remain a secret with Alec's involvement with Angel's family. Once again Tess realizes the cruelty of fate"}

An up-hill and down-hill ride of twenty-odd miles through a garish mid-day atmosphere brought him in the afternoon to a detached knoll a mile or two west of Talbothays, whence he again looked into that green trough of sappiness and humidity, the valley of the Var or Froom. Immediately he began to descend from the upland to the fat alluvial soil below, the atmosphere grew heavier; the languid perfume of the summer fruits, the mists, the hay, the flowers, formed therein a vast pool of odour which at this hour seemed to make the animals, the very bees and butterflies drowsy. Clare was now so familiar with the spot that he knew the individual cows by their names when, a long distance off, he saw them dotted about the meads. It was with a sense of luxury that he recognized his power of viewing life here from its inner side, in a way that had been quite foreign to him in his student-days; and, much as he loved his parents, he could not help being aware that to come here, as now, after an experience of home-life, affected him like throwing off splints and bandages; even the one customary curb on the humours of English rural societies being absent in this place, Talbothays having no resident landlord. Not a human being was out of doors at the dairy. The denizens were all enjoying the usual afternoon nap of an hour or so which the exceedingly early hours kept in summer-time rendered a necessity. At the door the wood-hooped pails, sodden and bleached by infinite scrubbings, hung like hats on a stand upon the forked and peeled limb of an oak fixed there for that purpose; all of them ready and dry for the evening milking. Angel entered, and went through the silent passages of the house to the back quarters, where he listened for a moment. Sustained snores came from the cart-house, where some of the men were lying down; the grunt and squeal of sweltering pigs arose from the still further distance. The large-leaved rhubarb and cabbage plants slept too, their broad limp surfaces hanging in the sun like half-closed umbrellas. He unbridled and fed his horse, and as he re-entered the house the clock struck three. Three was the afternoon skimming-hour; and, with the stroke, Clare heard the creaking of the floor-boards above, and then the touch of a descending foot on the stairs. It was Tess's, who in another moment came down before his eyes. She had not heard him enter, and hardly realized his presence there. She was yawning, and he saw the red interior of her mouth as if it had been a snake's. She had stretched one arm so high above her coiled-up cable of hair that he could see its satin delicacy above the sunburn; her face was flushed with sleep, and her eyelids hung heavy over their pupils. The brim-fulness of her nature breathed from her. It was a moment when a woman's soul is more incarnate than at any other time; when the most spiritual beauty bespeaks itself flesh; and sex takes the outside place in the presentation. Then those eyes flashed brightly through their filmy heaviness, before the remainder of her face was well awake. With an oddly compounded look of gladness, shyness, and surprise, she exclaimed--"O Mr Clare! How you frightened me--I--" There had not at first been time for her to think of the changed relations which his declaration had introduced; but the full sense of the matter rose up in her face when she encountered Clare's tender look as he stepped forward to the bottom stair. "Dear, darling Tessy!" he whispered, putting his arm round her, and his face to her flushed cheek. "Don't, for Heaven's sake, Mister me any more. I have hastened back so soon because of you!" Tess's excitable heart beat against his by way of reply; and there they stood upon the red-brick floor of the entry, the sun slanting in by the window upon his back, as he held her tightly to his breast; upon her inclining face, upon the blue veins of her temple, upon her naked arm, and her neck, and into the depths of her hair. Having been lying down in her clothes she was warm as a sunned cat. At first she would not look straight up at him, but her eyes soon lifted, and his plumbed the deepness of the ever-varying pupils, with their radiating fibrils of blue, and black, and gray, and violet, while she regarded him as Eve at her second waking might have regarded Adam. "I've got to go a-skimming," she pleaded, "and I have on'y old Deb to help me to-day. Mrs Crick is gone to market with Mr Crick, and Retty is not well, and the others are gone out somewhere, and won't be home till milking." As they retreated to the milk-house Deborah Fyander appeared on the stairs. "I have come back, Deborah," said Mr Clare, upwards. "So I can help Tess with the skimming; and, as you are very tired, I am sure, you needn't come down till milking-time." Possibly the Talbothays milk was not very thoroughly skimmed that afternoon. Tess was in a dream wherein familiar objects appeared as having light and shade and position, but no particular outline. Every time she held the skimmer under the pump to cool it for the work her hand trembled, the ardour of his affection being so palpable that she seemed to flinch under it like a plant in too burning a sun. Then he pressed her again to his side, and when she had done running her forefinger round the leads to cut off the cream-edge, he cleaned it in nature's way; for the unconstrained manners of Talbothays dairy came convenient now. "I may as well say it now as later, dearest," he resumed gently. "I wish to ask you something of a very practical nature, which I have been thinking of ever since that day last week in the meads. I shall soon want to marry, and, being a farmer, you see I shall require for my wife a woman who knows all about the management of farms. Will you be that woman, Tessy?" He put it that way that she might not think he had yielded to an impulse of which his head would disapprove. She turned quite careworn. She had bowed to the inevitable result of proximity, the necessity of loving him; but she had not calculated upon this sudden corollary, which, indeed, Clare had put before her without quite meaning himself to do it so soon. With pain that was like the bitterness of dissolution she murmured the words of her indispensable and sworn answer as an honourable woman. "O Mr Clare--I cannot be your wife--I cannot be!" The sound of her own decision seemed to break Tess's very heart, and she bowed her face in her grief. "But, Tess!" he said, amazed at her reply, and holding her still more greedily close. "Do you say no? Surely you love me?" "O yes, yes! And I would rather be yours than anybody's in the world," returned the sweet and honest voice of the distressed girl. "But I CANNOT marry you!" "Tess," he said, holding her at arm's length, "you are engaged to marry some one else!" "No, no!" "Then why do you refuse me?" "I don't want to marry! I have not thought of doing it. I cannot! I only want to love you." "But why?" Driven to subterfuge, she stammered-- "Your father is a parson, and your mother wouldn' like you to marry such as me. She will want you to marry a lady." "Nonsense--I have spoken to them both. That was partly why I went home." "I feel I cannot--never, never!" she echoed. "Is it too sudden to be asked thus, my Pretty?" "Yes--I did not expect it." "If you will let it pass, please, Tessy, I will give you time," he said. "It was very abrupt to come home and speak to you all at once. I'll not allude to it again for a while." She again took up the shining skimmer, held it beneath the pump, and began anew. But she could not, as at other times, hit the exact under-surface of the cream with the delicate dexterity required, try as she might; sometimes she was cutting down into the milk, sometimes in the air. She could hardly see, her eyes having filled with two blurring tears drawn forth by a grief which, to this her best friend and dear advocate, she could never explain. "I can't skim--I can't!" she said, turning away from him. Not to agitate and hinder her longer, the considerate Clare began talking in a more general way: You quite misapprehend my parents. They are the most simple-mannered people alive, and quite unambitious. They are two of the few remaining Evangelical school. Tessy, are you an Evangelical?" "I don't know." "You go to church very regularly, and our parson here is not very High, they tell me." Tess's ideas on the views of the parish clergyman, whom she heard every week, seemed to be rather more vague than Clare's, who had never heard him at all. "I wish I could fix my mind on what I hear there more firmly than I do," she remarked as a safe generality. "It is often a great sorrow to me." She spoke so unaffectedly that Angel was sure in his heart that his father could not object to her on religious grounds, even though she did not know whether her principles were High, Low or Broad. He himself knew that, in reality, the confused beliefs which she held, apparently imbibed in childhood, were, if anything, Tractarian as to phraseology, and Pantheistic as to essence. Confused or otherwise, to disturb them was his last desire: Leave thou thy sister, when she prays, Her early Heaven, her happy views; Nor thou with shadow'd hint confuse A life that leads melodious days. He had occasionally thought the counsel less honest than musical; but he gladly conformed to it now. He spoke further of the incidents of his visit, of his father's mode of life, of his zeal for his principles; she grew serener, and the undulations disappeared from her skimming; as she finished one lead after another he followed her, and drew the plugs for letting down the milk. "I fancied you looked a little downcast when you came in," she ventured to observe, anxious to keep away from the subject of herself. "Yes--well, my father had been talking a good deal to me of his troubles and difficulties, and the subject always tends to depress me. He is so zealous that he gets many snubs and buffetings from people of a different way of thinking from himself, and I don't like to hear of such humiliations to a man of his age, the more particularly as I don't think earnestness does any good when carried so far. He has been telling me of a very unpleasant scene in which he took part quite recently. He went as the deputy of some missionary society to preach in the neighbourhood of Trantridge, a place forty miles from here, and made it his business to expostulate with a lax young cynic he met with somewhere about there--son of some landowner up that way--and who has a mother afflicted with blindness. My father addressed himself to the gentleman point-blank, and there was quite a disturbance. It was very foolish of my father, I must say, to intrude his conversation upon a stranger when the probabilities were so obvious that it would be useless. But whatever he thinks to be his duty, that he'll do, in season or out of season; and, of course, he makes many enemies, not only among the absolutely vicious, but among the easy-going, who hate being bothered. He says he glories in what happened, and that good may be done indirectly; but I wish he would not wear himself out now he is getting old, and would leave such pigs to their wallowing." Tess's look had grown hard and worn, and her ripe mouth tragical; but she no longer showed any tremulousness. Clare's revived thoughts of his father prevented his noticing her particularly; and so they went on down the white row of liquid rectangles till they had finished and drained them off, when the other maids returned, and took their pails, and Deb came to scald out the leads for the new milk. As Tess withdrew to go afield to the cows he said to her softly-- "And my question, Tessy?" "O no--no!" replied she with grave hopelessness, as one who had heard anew the turmoil of her own past in the allusion to Alec d'Urberville. "It CAN'T be!" She went out towards the mead, joining the other milkmaids with a bound, as if trying to make the open air drive away her sad constraint. All the girls drew onward to the spot where the cows were grazing in the farther mead, the bevy advancing with the bold grace of wild animals--the reckless, unchastened motion of women accustomed to unlimited space--in which they abandoned themselves to the air as a swimmer to the wave. It seemed natural enough to him now that Tess was again in sight to choose a mate from unconstrained Nature, and not from the abodes of Art.

CHAPTER 27

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD37.asp

Shortly after returning to the dairy farm, Angel tells Tess that he would be delighted to have her as his wife. She confesses that she loves him, but does not accept his proposal. He coaxes her to tell the reason for her denial of him, and she says it is because of her unprivileged background and position. Angel tells Tess he will give her time to think it over. Angel also tells Tess about the Trantridge incident in which a D'Urberville insulted his father. She is quick to realize that the man being discussed is Alec. Tess is once again appalled at the cruelty of her fate.

Notes In this chapter, Angel is pictured as impulsive. Upon returning to Talbothay's, he wastes no time in embracing Tess and asking for her hand in marriage. When she says she loves him but cannot marry him, Angel tries to be patient. He promises to give her time to reconsider his proposal and assures her that she should not be apprehensive about her background or his family. The narration of the Trantridge incident by Angel to Tess is a shocking event for her. She immediately realizes that the young man being discussed is Alec. Tess suddenly feels very vulnerable for the first time since she has been at Talbothay. She worries that her secret may not remain a secret with Alec's involvement with Angel's family. Once again Tess realizes the cruelty of fate

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/1130-chapters/28.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra/section_27_part_0.txt

The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra.act iv.scene iii

act iv, scene iii

{"name": "Act IV, Scene iii", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210116191009/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/antony-cleopatra/summary/act-iv-scene-iii", "summary": "That night, as Antony's soldiers stand watch and chat about the coming battle, strange oboe music begins to play. It seems to come from the air and the earth simultaneously. The men guess it is the sound of Hercules leaving Antony, which is not so good of a sign for the upcoming battle.", "analysis": ""}

SCENE III. Alexandria. Before CLEOPATRA's palace Enter a company of soldiers FIRST SOLDIER. Brother, good night. To-morrow is the day. SECOND SOLDIER. It will determine one way. Fare you well. Heard you of nothing strange about the streets? FIRST SOLDIER. Nothing. What news? SECOND SOLDIER. Belike 'tis but a rumour. Good night to you. FIRST SOLDIER. Well, sir, good night. [They meet other soldiers] SECOND SOLDIER. Soldiers, have careful watch. FIRST SOLDIER. And you. Good night, good night. [The two companies separate and place themselves in every corner of the stage] SECOND SOLDIER. Here we. And if to-morrow Our navy thrive, I have an absolute hope Our landmen will stand up. THIRD SOLDIER. 'Tis a brave army, And full of purpose. [Music of the hautboys is under the stage] SECOND SOLDIER. Peace, what noise? THIRD SOLDIER. List, list! SECOND SOLDIER. Hark! THIRD SOLDIER. Music i' th' air. FOURTH SOLDIER. Under the earth. THIRD SOLDIER. It signs well, does it not? FOURTH SOLDIER. No. THIRD SOLDIER. Peace, I say! What should this mean? SECOND SOLDIER. 'Tis the god Hercules, whom Antony lov'd, Now leaves him. THIRD SOLDIER. Walk; let's see if other watchmen Do hear what we do. SECOND SOLDIER. How now, masters! SOLDIERS. [Speaking together] How now! How now! Do you hear this? FIRST SOLDIER. Ay; is't not strange? THIRD SOLDIER. Do you hear, masters? Do you hear? FIRST SOLDIER. Follow the noise so far as we have quarter; Let's see how it will give off. SOLDIERS. Content. 'Tis strange. Exeunt ACT_4|SC_4

Act IV, Scene iii

https://web.archive.org/web/20210116191009/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/antony-cleopatra/summary/act-iv-scene-iii

That night, as Antony's soldiers stand watch and chat about the coming battle, strange oboe music begins to play. It seems to come from the air and the earth simultaneously. The men guess it is the sound of Hercules leaving Antony, which is not so good of a sign for the upcoming battle.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/11.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_3_part_2.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 11

chapter 11

{"name": "CHAPTER 11", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD20.asp", "summary": "Alec takes advantage of having Tess all alone. Instead of heading straight to Trantridge, he lets his horse wander off the road and into the woods. As they ride, he tells Tess he wants to be her lover; she says that she does not appreciate his advances. As they have talked, Alec has not paid attention and is truly lost. He leaves Tess by the horse to go and search for a way out of the woods. While he is gone, Tess, who has had an exhausting day, falls asleep. When he returns, he looks at the sleeping beauty, and his passion is aroused. He approaches her with lust. She is shocked by his treacherous moves and starts weeping. He plays on her emotions by narrating the good he has done for her family, which always makes Tess feel beholden to him. Alec then seduces Tess, and she is too tired to resist his advances.", "analysis": "Notes Hardy has carefully structured this chapter to show how fate is in control. Tess has agreed to ride with Alec, for she feels she has no other alternative. Her friends are drunk and fighting with her, she is tired and hungry, and she fears walking the next two miles back to Trantridge alone. She has never trusted Alec and often refused his offers of kindness. Once on the horse with him this fateful night, Tess, who is usually observant and cautious, is too exhausted to notice that Alec has allowed the horse to veer off the road and into the woods. Once they are lost in the darkness and forced to dismount, Tess is helpless to fight off Alec's advances. Hardy creates the perfect setting for the seduction. The oldest woods of England stand as mute spectators to the crime. The darkness and the silence shield Alec's sinister desires from the innocent and exhausted Tess. Hardy also creates a perfect contrast between the two characters. Tess's white muslin figure and moonlit face is a total contrast to Alec's darkness. Tess's innocence and naivete is a total contrast to Alec's selfish, evil nature. Tess is at the most vulnerable stage of her life, and unfortunately, as Hardy puts it, her guardian angel is not present to protect her. By the end of the chapter, Tess is a fallen woman, not by her own doing, but at the cruel hands of fate"}

The twain cantered along for some time without speech, Tess as she clung to him still panting in her triumph, yet in other respects dubious. She had perceived that the horse was not the spirited one he sometimes rose, and felt no alarm on that score, though her seat was precarious enough despite her tight hold of him. She begged him to slow the animal to a walk, which Alec accordingly did. "Neatly done, was it not, dear Tess?" he said by and by. "Yes!" said she. "I am sure I ought to be much obliged to you." "And are you?" She did not reply. "Tess, why do you always dislike my kissing you?" "I suppose--because I don't love you." "You are quite sure?" "I am angry with you sometimes!" "Ah, I half feared as much." Nevertheless, Alec did not object to that confession. He knew that anything was better then frigidity. "Why haven't you told me when I have made you angry?" "You know very well why. Because I cannot help myself here." "I haven't offended you often by love-making?" "You have sometimes." "How many times?" "You know as well as I--too many times." "Every time I have tried?" She was silent, and the horse ambled along for a considerable distance, till a faint luminous fog, which had hung in the hollows all the evening, became general and enveloped them. It seemed to hold the moonlight in suspension, rendering it more pervasive than in clear air. Whether on this account, or from absent-mindedness, or from sleepiness, she did not perceive that they had long ago passed the point at which the lane to Trantridge branched from the highway, and that her conductor had not taken the Trantridge track. She was inexpressibly weary. She had risen at five o'clock every morning of that week, had been on foot the whole of each day, and on this evening had in addition walked the three miles to Chaseborough, waited three hours for her neighbours without eating or drinking, her impatience to start them preventing either; she had then walked a mile of the way home, and had undergone the excitement of the quarrel, till, with the slow progress of their steed, it was now nearly one o'clock. Only once, however, was she overcome by actual drowsiness. In that moment of oblivion her head sank gently against him. D'Urberville stopped the horse, withdrew his feet from the stirrups, turned sideways on the saddle, and enclosed her waist with his arm to support her. This immediately put her on the defensive, and with one of those sudden impulses of reprisal to which she was liable she gave him a little push from her. In his ticklish position he nearly lost his balance and only just avoided rolling over into the road, the horse, though a powerful one, being fortunately the quietest he rode. "That is devilish unkind!" he said. "I mean no harm--only to keep you from falling." She pondered suspiciously, till, thinking that this might after all be true, she relented, and said quite humbly, "I beg your pardon, sir." "I won't pardon you unless you show some confidence in me. Good God!" he burst out, "what am I, to be repulsed so by a mere chit like you? For near three mortal months have you trifled with my feelings, eluded me, and snubbed me; and I won't stand it!" "I'll leave you to-morrow, sir." "No, you will not leave me to-morrow! Will you, I ask once more, show your belief in me by letting me clasp you with my arm? Come, between us two and nobody else, now. We know each other well; and you know that I love you, and think you the prettiest girl in the world, which you are. Mayn't I treat you as a lover?" She drew a quick pettish breath of objection, writhing uneasily on her seat, looked far ahead, and murmured, "I don't know--I wish--how can I say yes or no when--" He settled the matter by clasping his arm round her as he desired, and Tess expressed no further negative. Thus they sidled slowly onward till it struck her they had been advancing for an unconscionable time--far longer than was usually occupied by the short journey from Chaseborough, even at this walking pace, and that they were no longer on hard road, but in a mere trackway. "Why, where be we?" she exclaimed. "Passing by a wood." "A wood--what wood? Surely we are quite out of the road?" "A bit of The Chase--the oldest wood in England. It is a lovely night, and why should we not prolong our ride a little?" "How could you be so treacherous!" said Tess, between archness and real dismay, and getting rid of his arm by pulling open his fingers one by one, though at the risk of slipping off herself. "Just when I've been putting such trust in you, and obliging you to please you, because I thought I had wronged you by that push! Please set me down, and let me walk home." "You cannot walk home, darling, even if the air were clear. We are miles away from Trantridge, if I must tell you, and in this growing fog you might wander for hours among these trees." "Never mind that," she coaxed. "Put me down, I beg you. I don't mind where it is; only let me get down, sir, please!" "Very well, then, I will--on one condition. Having brought you here to this out-of-the-way place, I feel myself responsible for your safe-conduct home, whatever you may yourself feel about it. As to your getting to Trantridge without assistance, it is quite impossible; for, to tell the truth, dear, owing to this fog, which so disguises everything, I don't quite know where we are myself. Now, if you will promise to wait beside the horse while I walk through the bushes till I come to some road or house, and ascertain exactly our whereabouts, I'll deposit you here willingly. When I come back I'll give you full directions, and if you insist upon walking you may; or you may ride--at your pleasure." She accepted these terms, and slid off on the near side, though not till he had stolen a cursory kiss. He sprang down on the other side. "I suppose I must hold the horse?" said she. "Oh no; it's not necessary," replied Alec, patting the panting creature. "He's had enough of it for to-night." He turned the horse's head into the bushes, hitched him on to a bough, and made a sort of couch or nest for her in the deep mass of dead leaves. "Now, you sit there," he said. "The leaves have not got damp as yet. Just give an eye to the horse--it will be quite sufficient." He took a few steps away from her, but, returning, said, "By the bye, Tess, your father has a new cob to-day. Somebody gave it to him." "Somebody? You!" D'Urberville nodded. "O how very good of you that is!" she exclaimed, with a painful sense of the awkwardness of having to thank him just then. "And the children have some toys." "I didn't know--you ever sent them anything!" she murmured, much moved. "I almost wish you had not--yes, I almost wish it!" "Why, dear?" "It--hampers me so." "Tessy--don't you love me ever so little now?" "I'm grateful," she reluctantly admitted. "But I fear I do not--" The sudden vision of his passion for herself as a factor in this result so distressed her that, beginning with one slow tear, and then following with another, she wept outright. "Don't cry, dear, dear one! Now sit down here, and wait till I come." She passively sat down amid the leaves he had heaped, and shivered slightly. "Are you cold?" he asked. "Not very--a little." He touched her with his fingers, which sank into her as into down. "You have only that puffy muslin dress on--how's that?" "It's my best summer one. 'Twas very warm when I started, and I didn't know I was going to ride, and that it would be night." "Nights grow chilly in September. Let me see." He pulled off a light overcoat that he had worn, and put it round her tenderly. "That's it--now you'll feel warmer," he continued. "Now, my pretty, rest there; I shall soon be back again." Having buttoned the overcoat round her shoulders he plunged into the webs of vapour which by this time formed veils between the trees. She could hear the rustling of the branches as he ascended the adjoining slope, till his movements were no louder than the hopping of a bird, and finally died away. With the setting of the moon the pale light lessened, and Tess became invisible as she fell into reverie upon the leaves where he had left her. In the meantime Alec d'Urberville had pushed on up the slope to clear his genuine doubt as to the quarter of The Chase they were in. He had, in fact, ridden quite at random for over an hour, taking any turning that came to hand in order to prolong companionship with her, and giving far more attention to Tess's moonlit person than to any wayside object. A little rest for the jaded animal being desirable, he did not hasten his search for landmarks. A clamber over the hill into the adjoining vale brought him to the fence of a highway whose contours he recognized, which settled the question of their whereabouts. D'Urberville thereupon turned back; but by this time the moon had quite gone down, and partly on account of the fog The Chase was wrapped in thick darkness, although morning was not far off. He was obliged to advance with outstretched hands to avoid contact with the boughs, and discovered that to hit the exact spot from which he had started was at first entirely beyond him. Roaming up and down, round and round, he at length heard a slight movement of the horse close at hand; and the sleeve of his overcoat unexpectedly caught his foot. "Tess!" said d'Urberville. There was no answer. The obscurity was now so great that he could see absolutely nothing but a pale nebulousness at his feet, which represented the white muslin figure he had left upon the dead leaves. Everything else was blackness alike. D'Urberville stooped; and heard a gentle regular breathing. He knelt and bent lower, till her breath warmed his face, and in a moment his cheek was in contact with hers. She was sleeping soundly, and upon her eyelashes there lingered tears. Darkness and silence ruled everywhere around. Above them rose the primeval yews and oaks of The Chase, in which there poised gentle roosting birds in their last nap; and about them stole the hopping rabbits and hares. But, might some say, where was Tess's guardian angel? where was the providence of her simple faith? Perhaps, like that other god of whom the ironical Tishbite spoke, he was talking, or he was pursuing, or he was in a journey, or he was sleeping and not to be awaked. Why it was that upon this beautiful feminine tissue, sensitive as gossamer, and practically blank as snow as yet, there should have been traced such a coarse pattern as it was doomed to receive; why so often the coarse appropriates the finer thus, the wrong man the woman, the wrong woman the man, many thousand years of analytical philosophy have failed to explain to our sense of order. One may, indeed, admit the possibility of a retribution lurking in the present catastrophe. Doubtless some of Tess d'Urberville's mailed ancestors rollicking home from a fray had dealt the same measure even more ruthlessly towards peasant girls of their time. But though to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children may be a morality good enough for divinities, it is scorned by average human nature; and it therefore does not mend the matter. As Tess's own people down in those retreats are never tired of saying among each other in their fatalistic way: "It was to be." There lay the pity of it. An immeasurable social chasm was to divide our heroine's personality thereafter from that previous self of hers who stepped from her mother's door to try her fortune at Trantridge poultry-farm. END OF PHASE THE FIRST Phase the Second: Maiden No More

CHAPTER 11

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD20.asp

Alec takes advantage of having Tess all alone. Instead of heading straight to Trantridge, he lets his horse wander off the road and into the woods. As they ride, he tells Tess he wants to be her lover; she says that she does not appreciate his advances. As they have talked, Alec has not paid attention and is truly lost. He leaves Tess by the horse to go and search for a way out of the woods. While he is gone, Tess, who has had an exhausting day, falls asleep. When he returns, he looks at the sleeping beauty, and his passion is aroused. He approaches her with lust. She is shocked by his treacherous moves and starts weeping. He plays on her emotions by narrating the good he has done for her family, which always makes Tess feel beholden to him. Alec then seduces Tess, and she is too tired to resist his advances.

Notes Hardy has carefully structured this chapter to show how fate is in control. Tess has agreed to ride with Alec, for she feels she has no other alternative. Her friends are drunk and fighting with her, she is tired and hungry, and she fears walking the next two miles back to Trantridge alone. She has never trusted Alec and often refused his offers of kindness. Once on the horse with him this fateful night, Tess, who is usually observant and cautious, is too exhausted to notice that Alec has allowed the horse to veer off the road and into the woods. Once they are lost in the darkness and forced to dismount, Tess is helpless to fight off Alec's advances. Hardy creates the perfect setting for the seduction. The oldest woods of England stand as mute spectators to the crime. The darkness and the silence shield Alec's sinister desires from the innocent and exhausted Tess. Hardy also creates a perfect contrast between the two characters. Tess's white muslin figure and moonlit face is a total contrast to Alec's darkness. Tess's innocence and naivete is a total contrast to Alec's selfish, evil nature. Tess is at the most vulnerable stage of her life, and unfortunately, as Hardy puts it, her guardian angel is not present to protect her. By the end of the chapter, Tess is a fallen woman, not by her own doing, but at the cruel hands of fate

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/56.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_55_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 9.chapter 3

book 9, chapter 3

{"name": "Book 9, Chapter 3", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-9-chapter-3", "summary": "So now we're back at the inn, where Dmitri has just been accused of his father's murder. Grushenka has to be pulled away from Dmitri. Dmitri is sat at a table, where Parfenovich and Kirillovich begin his interrogation. A clerk takes notes. Dmitri is relieved to learn that Grigory is OK, and he denies that he murdered Fyodor. The officials remind him that he's been talking about murdering his father for the last month or so; that he's been loudly protesting that his father owes him his inheritance; and that Dmitri regarded the 3,000 roubles Fyodor was saving for Grushenka as his own property. Dmitri concedes all these points, but he still denies murdering his father. His initial joy and relief at discovering that Grigory is still alive gives way to sadness at his father's death. Grushenka bursts in to interrupt the interrogation and she has to be taken to a different floor altogether. Makarovich explains to Dmitri that he calmed Grushenka down and placed her in the care of Maximov and the innkeeper's daughters. Dmitri is grateful.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter III. The Sufferings Of A Soul, The First Ordeal And so Mitya sat looking wildly at the people round him, not understanding what was said to him. Suddenly he got up, flung up his hands, and shouted aloud: "I'm not guilty! I'm not guilty of that blood! I'm not guilty of my father's blood.... I meant to kill him. But I'm not guilty. Not I." But he had hardly said this, before Grushenka rushed from behind the curtain and flung herself at the police captain's feet. "It was my fault! Mine! My wickedness!" she cried, in a heartrending voice, bathed in tears, stretching out her clasped hands towards them. "He did it through me. I tortured him and drove him to it. I tortured that poor old man that's dead, too, in my wickedness, and brought him to this! It's my fault, mine first, mine most, my fault!" "Yes, it's your fault! You're the chief criminal! You fury! You harlot! You're the most to blame!" shouted the police captain, threatening her with his hand. But he was quickly and resolutely suppressed. The prosecutor positively seized hold of him. "This is absolutely irregular, Mihail Makarovitch!" he cried. "You are positively hindering the inquiry.... You're ruining the case...." he almost gasped. "Follow the regular course! Follow the regular course!" cried Nikolay Parfenovitch, fearfully excited too, "otherwise it's absolutely impossible!..." "Judge us together!" Grushenka cried frantically, still kneeling. "Punish us together. I will go with him now, if it's to death!" "Grusha, my life, my blood, my holy one!" Mitya fell on his knees beside her and held her tight in his arms. "Don't believe her," he cried, "she's not guilty of anything, of any blood, of anything!" He remembered afterwards that he was forcibly dragged away from her by several men, and that she was led out, and that when he recovered himself he was sitting at the table. Beside him and behind him stood the men with metal plates. Facing him on the other side of the table sat Nikolay Parfenovitch, the investigating lawyer. He kept persuading him to drink a little water out of a glass that stood on the table. "That will refresh you, that will calm you. Be calm, don't be frightened," he added, extremely politely. Mitya (he remembered it afterwards) became suddenly intensely interested in his big rings, one with an amethyst, and another with a transparent bright yellow stone, of great brilliance. And long afterwards he remembered with wonder how those rings had riveted his attention through all those terrible hours of interrogation, so that he was utterly unable to tear himself away from them and dismiss them, as things that had nothing to do with his position. On Mitya's left side, in the place where Maximov had been sitting at the beginning of the evening, the prosecutor was now seated, and on Mitya's right hand, where Grushenka had been, was a rosy-cheeked young man in a sort of shabby hunting-jacket, with ink and paper before him. This was the secretary of the investigating lawyer, who had brought him with him. The police captain was now standing by the window at the other end of the room, beside Kalganov, who was sitting there. "Drink some water," said the investigating lawyer softly, for the tenth time. "I have drunk it, gentlemen, I have ... but ... come, gentlemen, crush me, punish me, decide my fate!" cried Mitya, staring with terribly fixed wide- open eyes at the investigating lawyer. "So you positively declare that you are not guilty of the death of your father, Fyodor Pavlovitch?" asked the investigating lawyer, softly but insistently. "I am not guilty. I am guilty of the blood of another old man but not of my father's. And I weep for it! I killed, I killed the old man and knocked him down.... But it's hard to have to answer for that murder with another, a terrible murder of which I am not guilty.... It's a terrible accusation, gentlemen, a knock-down blow. But who has killed my father, who has killed him? Who can have killed him if I didn't? It's marvelous, extraordinary, impossible." "Yes, who can have killed him?" the investigating lawyer was beginning, but Ippolit Kirillovitch, the prosecutor, glancing at him, addressed Mitya. "You need not worry yourself about the old servant, Grigory Vassilyevitch. He is alive, he has recovered, and in spite of the terrible blows inflicted, according to his own and your evidence, by you, there seems no doubt that he will live, so the doctor says, at least." "Alive? He's alive?" cried Mitya, flinging up his hands. His face beamed. "Lord, I thank Thee for the miracle Thou has wrought for me, a sinner and evildoer. That's an answer to my prayer. I've been praying all night." And he crossed himself three times. He was almost breathless. "So from this Grigory we have received such important evidence concerning you, that--" The prosecutor would have continued, but Mitya suddenly jumped up from his chair. "One minute, gentlemen, for God's sake, one minute; I will run to her--" "Excuse me, at this moment it's quite impossible," Nikolay Parfenovitch almost shrieked. He, too, leapt to his feet. Mitya was seized by the men with the metal plates, but he sat down of his own accord.... "Gentlemen, what a pity! I wanted to see her for one minute only; I wanted to tell her that it has been washed away, it has gone, that blood that was weighing on my heart all night, and that I am not a murderer now! Gentlemen, she is my betrothed!" he said ecstatically and reverently, looking round at them all. "Oh, thank you, gentlemen! Oh, in one minute you have given me new life, new heart!... That old man used to carry me in his arms, gentlemen. He used to wash me in the tub when I was a baby three years old, abandoned by every one, he was like a father to me!..." "And so you--" the investigating lawyer began. "Allow me, gentlemen, allow me one minute more," interposed Mitya, putting his elbows on the table and covering his face with his hands. "Let me have a moment to think, let me breathe, gentlemen. All this is horribly upsetting, horribly. A man is not a drum, gentlemen!" "Drink a little more water," murmured Nikolay Parfenovitch. Mitya took his hands from his face and laughed. His eyes were confident. He seemed completely transformed in a moment. His whole bearing was changed; he was once more the equal of these men, with all of whom he was acquainted, as though they had all met the day before, when nothing had happened, at some social gathering. We may note in passing that, on his first arrival, Mitya had been made very welcome at the police captain's, but later, during the last month especially, Mitya had hardly called at all, and when the police captain met him, in the street, for instance, Mitya noticed that he frowned and only bowed out of politeness. His acquaintance with the prosecutor was less intimate, though he sometimes paid his wife, a nervous and fanciful lady, visits of politeness, without quite knowing why, and she always received him graciously and had, for some reason, taken an interest in him up to the last. He had not had time to get to know the investigating lawyer, though he had met him and talked to him twice, each time about the fair sex. "You're a most skillful lawyer, I see, Nikolay Parfenovitch," cried Mitya, laughing gayly, "but I can help you now. Oh, gentlemen, I feel like a new man, and don't be offended at my addressing you so simply and directly. I'm rather drunk, too, I'll tell you that frankly. I believe I've had the honor and pleasure of meeting you, Nikolay Parfenovitch, at my kinsman Miuesov's. Gentlemen, gentlemen, I don't pretend to be on equal terms with you. I understand, of course, in what character I am sitting before you. Oh, of course, there's a horrible suspicion ... hanging over me ... if Grigory has given evidence.... A horrible suspicion! It's awful, awful, I understand that! But to business, gentlemen, I am ready, and we will make an end of it in one moment; for, listen, listen, gentlemen! Since I know I'm innocent, we can put an end to it in a minute. Can't we? Can't we?" Mitya spoke much and quickly, nervously and effusively, as though he positively took his listeners to be his best friends. "So, for the present, we will write that you absolutely deny the charge brought against you," said Nikolay Parfenovitch, impressively, and bending down to the secretary he dictated to him in an undertone what to write. "Write it down? You want to write that down? Well, write it; I consent, I give my full consent, gentlemen, only ... do you see?... Stay, stay, write this. Of disorderly conduct I am guilty, of violence on a poor old man I am guilty. And there is something else at the bottom of my heart, of which I am guilty, too--but that you need not write down" (he turned suddenly to the secretary); "that's my personal life, gentlemen, that doesn't concern you, the bottom of my heart, that's to say.... But of the murder of my old father I'm not guilty. That's a wild idea. It's quite a wild idea!... I will prove you that and you'll be convinced directly.... You will laugh, gentlemen. You'll laugh yourselves at your suspicion!..." "Be calm, Dmitri Fyodorovitch," said the investigating lawyer evidently trying to allay Mitya's excitement by his own composure. "Before we go on with our inquiry, I should like, if you will consent to answer, to hear you confirm the statement that you disliked your father, Fyodor Pavlovitch, that you were involved in continual disputes with him. Here at least, a quarter of an hour ago, you exclaimed that you wanted to kill him: 'I didn't kill him,' you said, 'but I wanted to kill him.' " "Did I exclaim that? Ach, that may be so, gentlemen! Yes, unhappily, I did want to kill him ... many times I wanted to ... unhappily, unhappily!" "You wanted to. Would you consent to explain what motives precisely led you to such a sentiment of hatred for your parent?" "What is there to explain, gentlemen?" Mitya shrugged his shoulders sullenly, looking down. "I have never concealed my feelings. All the town knows about it--every one knows in the tavern. Only lately I declared them in Father Zossima's cell.... And the very same day, in the evening I beat my father. I nearly killed him, and I swore I'd come again and kill him, before witnesses.... Oh, a thousand witnesses! I've been shouting it aloud for the last month, any one can tell you that!... The fact stares you in the face, it speaks for itself, it cries aloud, but feelings, gentlemen, feelings are another matter. You see, gentlemen"--Mitya frowned--"it seems to me that about feelings you've no right to question me. I know that you are bound by your office, I quite understand that, but that's my affair, my private, intimate affair, yet ... since I haven't concealed my feelings in the past ... in the tavern, for instance, I've talked to every one, so ... so I won't make a secret of it now. You see, I understand, gentlemen, that there are terrible facts against me in this business. I told every one that I'd kill him, and now, all of a sudden, he's been killed. So it must have been me! Ha ha! I can make allowances for you, gentlemen, I can quite make allowances. I'm struck all of a heap myself, for who can have murdered him, if not I? That's what it comes to, isn't it? If not I, who can it be, who? Gentlemen, I want to know, I insist on knowing!" he exclaimed suddenly. "Where was he murdered? How was he murdered? How, and with what? Tell me," he asked quickly, looking at the two lawyers. "We found him in his study, lying on his back on the floor, with his head battered in," said the prosecutor. "That's horrible!" Mitya shuddered and, putting his elbows on the table, hid his face in his right hand. "We will continue," interposed Nikolay Parfenovitch. "So what was it that impelled you to this sentiment of hatred? You have asserted in public, I believe, that it was based upon jealousy?" "Well, yes, jealousy. And not only jealousy." "Disputes about money?" "Yes, about money, too." "There was a dispute about three thousand roubles, I think, which you claimed as part of your inheritance?" "Three thousand! More, more," cried Mitya hotly; "more than six thousand, more than ten, perhaps. I told every one so, shouted it at them. But I made up my mind to let it go at three thousand. I was desperately in need of that three thousand ... so the bundle of notes for three thousand that I knew he kept under his pillow, ready for Grushenka, I considered as simply stolen from me. Yes, gentlemen, I looked upon it as mine, as my own property...." The prosecutor looked significantly at the investigating lawyer, and had time to wink at him on the sly. "We will return to that subject later," said the lawyer promptly. "You will allow us to note that point and write it down; that you looked upon that money as your own property?" "Write it down, by all means. I know that's another fact that tells against me, but I'm not afraid of facts and I tell them against myself. Do you hear? Do you know, gentlemen, you take me for a different sort of man from what I am," he added, suddenly gloomy and dejected. "You have to deal with a man of honor, a man of the highest honor; above all--don't lose sight of it--a man who's done a lot of nasty things, but has always been, and still is, honorable at bottom, in his inner being. I don't know how to express it. That's just what's made me wretched all my life, that I yearned to be honorable, that I was, so to say, a martyr to a sense of honor, seeking for it with a lantern, with the lantern of Diogenes, and yet all my life I've been doing filthy things like all of us, gentlemen ... that is like me alone. That was a mistake, like me alone, me alone!... Gentlemen, my head aches ..." His brows contracted with pain. "You see, gentlemen, I couldn't bear the look of him, there was something in him ignoble, impudent, trampling on everything sacred, something sneering and irreverent, loathsome, loathsome. But now that he's dead, I feel differently." "How do you mean?" "I don't feel differently, but I wish I hadn't hated him so." "You feel penitent?" "No, not penitent, don't write that. I'm not much good myself, I'm not very beautiful, so I had no right to consider him repulsive. That's what I mean. Write that down, if you like." Saying this Mitya became very mournful. He had grown more and more gloomy as the inquiry continued. At that moment another unexpected scene followed. Though Grushenka had been removed, she had not been taken far away, only into the room next but one from the blue room, in which the examination was proceeding. It was a little room with one window, next beyond the large room in which they had danced and feasted so lavishly. She was sitting there with no one by her but Maximov, who was terribly depressed, terribly scared, and clung to her side, as though for security. At their door stood one of the peasants with a metal plate on his breast. Grushenka was crying, and suddenly her grief was too much for her, she jumped up, flung up her arms and, with a loud wail of sorrow, rushed out of the room to him, to her Mitya, and so unexpectedly that they had not time to stop her. Mitya, hearing her cry, trembled, jumped up, and with a yell rushed impetuously to meet her, not knowing what he was doing. But they were not allowed to come together, though they saw one another. He was seized by the arms. He struggled, and tried to tear himself away. It took three or four men to hold him. She was seized too, and he saw her stretching out her arms to him, crying aloud as they carried her away. When the scene was over, he came to himself again, sitting in the same place as before, opposite the investigating lawyer, and crying out to them: "What do you want with her? Why do you torment her? She's done nothing, nothing!..." The lawyers tried to soothe him. About ten minutes passed like this. At last Mihail Makarovitch, who had been absent, came hurriedly into the room, and said in a loud and excited voice to the prosecutor: "She's been removed, she's downstairs. Will you allow me to say one word to this unhappy man, gentlemen? In your presence, gentlemen, in your presence." "By all means, Mihail Makarovitch," answered the investigating lawyer. "In the present case we have nothing against it." "Listen, Dmitri Fyodorovitch, my dear fellow," began the police captain, and there was a look of warm, almost fatherly, feeling for the luckless prisoner on his excited face. "I took your Agrafena Alexandrovna downstairs myself, and confided her to the care of the landlord's daughters, and that old fellow Maximov is with her all the time. And I soothed her, do you hear? I soothed and calmed her. I impressed on her that you have to clear yourself, so she mustn't hinder you, must not depress you, or you may lose your head and say the wrong thing in your evidence. In fact, I talked to her and she understood. She's a sensible girl, my boy, a good-hearted girl, she would have kissed my old hands, begging help for you. She sent me herself, to tell you not to worry about her. And I must go, my dear fellow, I must go and tell her that you are calm and comforted about her. And so you must be calm, do you understand? I was unfair to her; she is a Christian soul, gentlemen, yes, I tell you, she's a gentle soul, and not to blame for anything. So what am I to tell her, Dmitri Fyodorovitch? Will you sit quiet or not?" The good-natured police captain said a great deal that was irregular, but Grushenka's suffering, a fellow creature's suffering, touched his good- natured heart, and tears stood in his eyes. Mitya jumped up and rushed towards him. "Forgive me, gentlemen, oh, allow me, allow me!" he cried. "You've the heart of an angel, an angel, Mihail Makarovitch, I thank you for her. I will, I will be calm, cheerful, in fact. Tell her, in the kindness of your heart, that I am cheerful, quite cheerful, that I shall be laughing in a minute, knowing that she has a guardian angel like you. I shall have done with all this directly, and as soon as I'm free, I'll be with her, she'll see, let her wait. Gentlemen," he said, turning to the two lawyers, "now I'll open my whole soul to you; I'll pour out everything. We'll finish this off directly, finish it off gayly. We shall laugh at it in the end, shan't we? But, gentlemen, that woman is the queen of my heart. Oh, let me tell you that. That one thing I'll tell you now.... I see I'm with honorable men. She is my light, she is my holy one, and if only you knew! Did you hear her cry, 'I'll go to death with you'? And what have I, a penniless beggar, done for her? Why such love for me? How can a clumsy, ugly brute like me, with my ugly face, deserve such love, that she is ready to go to exile with me? And how she fell down at your feet for my sake, just now!... and yet she's proud and has done nothing! How can I help adoring her, how can I help crying out and rushing to her as I did just now? Gentlemen, forgive me! But now, now I am comforted." And he sank back in his chair and, covering his face with his hands, burst into tears. But they were happy tears. He recovered himself instantly. The old police captain seemed much pleased, and the lawyers also. They felt that the examination was passing into a new phase. When the police captain went out, Mitya was positively gay. "Now, gentlemen, I am at your disposal, entirely at your disposal. And if it were not for all these trivial details, we should understand one another in a minute. I'm at those details again. I'm at your disposal, gentlemen, but I declare that we must have mutual confidence, you in me and I in you, or there'll be no end to it. I speak in your interests. To business, gentlemen, to business, and don't rummage in my soul; don't tease me with trifles, but only ask me about facts and what matters, and I will satisfy you at once. And damn the details!" So spoke Mitya. The interrogation began again.

Book 9, Chapter 3

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-9-chapter-3

So now we're back at the inn, where Dmitri has just been accused of his father's murder. Grushenka has to be pulled away from Dmitri. Dmitri is sat at a table, where Parfenovich and Kirillovich begin his interrogation. A clerk takes notes. Dmitri is relieved to learn that Grigory is OK, and he denies that he murdered Fyodor. The officials remind him that he's been talking about murdering his father for the last month or so; that he's been loudly protesting that his father owes him his inheritance; and that Dmitri regarded the 3,000 roubles Fyodor was saving for Grushenka as his own property. Dmitri concedes all these points, but he still denies murdering his father. His initial joy and relief at discovering that Grigory is still alive gives way to sadness at his father's death. Grushenka bursts in to interrupt the interrogation and she has to be taken to a different floor altogether. Makarovich explains to Dmitri that he calmed Grushenka down and placed her in the care of Maximov and the innkeeper's daughters. Dmitri is grateful.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/107-chapters/24.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Far From the Madding Crowd/section_23_part_0.txt

Far From the Madding Crowd.chapter 24

chapter 24

{"name": "Chapter 24", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219162644/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/far-from-the-madding-crowd/summary/chapter-24", "summary": "Before going to bed, Bathsheba decides to walk around the house and the grounds to make sure everything is as it should be. She walks along a dark path and bumps into a man. She tries to walk away, but something is holding her back. Her dress has gotten caught on the spur of the man's boot. It takes them a moment to get untangled. The man uses her lantern to get them untangled, and then turns it on her face. He tells her that she has a pretty face. Bathsheba accuses him of untangling her skirts in order to keep her next to him for longer, but he denies it. Bathsheba just wants to get away from him. She's blushing from all his compliments and doesn't want to stand so close to a strange man in the middle of the night. She notices that the young man is wearing a soldier's uniform. Bathsheba finally runs home and asks her servant Liddy if she knows of a young soldier staying in the village. Liddy says that it might be a man named Sergeant Troy. Yup, that's the same Sergeant Troy who was supposed to marry Fanny Robin. We have no clue where Fanny is, and the only people in the world who know about her engagement to Troy are Boldwood and Oak. Bathsheba asks Liddy what kind of reputation Troy has, and Liddy answer that he's considered a lady-killer. But she also says that he comes from noble blood. His daddy was an earl. The chapter ends with Bathsheba thinking about Sergeant Troy and how he complimented her on her good looks: something the Boldwood has never done.", "analysis": ""}

THE SAME NIGHT--THE FIR PLANTATION Among the multifarious duties which Bathsheba had voluntarily imposed upon herself by dispensing with the services of a bailiff, was the particular one of looking round the homestead before going to bed, to see that all was right and safe for the night. Gabriel had almost constantly preceded her in this tour every evening, watching her affairs as carefully as any specially appointed officer of surveillance could have done; but this tender devotion was to a great extent unknown to his mistress, and as much as was known was somewhat thanklessly received. Women are never tired of bewailing man's fickleness in love, but they only seem to snub his constancy. As watching is best done invisibly, she usually carried a dark lantern in her hand, and every now and then turned on the light to examine nooks and corners with the coolness of a metropolitan policeman. This coolness may have owed its existence not so much to her fearlessness of expected danger as to her freedom from the suspicion of any; her worst anticipated discovery being that a horse might not be well bedded, the fowls not all in, or a door not closed. This night the buildings were inspected as usual, and she went round to the farm paddock. Here the only sounds disturbing the stillness were steady munchings of many mouths, and stentorian breathings from all but invisible noses, ending in snores and puffs like the blowing of bellows slowly. Then the munching would recommence, when the lively imagination might assist the eye to discern a group of pink-white nostrils, shaped as caverns, and very clammy and humid on their surfaces, not exactly pleasant to the touch until one got used to them; the mouths beneath having a great partiality for closing upon any loose end of Bathsheba's apparel which came within reach of their tongues. Above each of these a still keener vision suggested a brown forehead and two staring though not unfriendly eyes, and above all a pair of whitish crescent-shaped horns like two particularly new moons, an occasional stolid "moo!" proclaiming beyond the shade of a doubt that these phenomena were the features and persons of Daisy, Whitefoot, Bonny-lass, Jolly-O, Spot, Twinkle-eye, etc., etc.--the respectable dairy of Devon cows belonging to Bathsheba aforesaid. Her way back to the house was by a path through a young plantation of tapering firs, which had been planted some years earlier to shelter the premises from the north wind. By reason of the density of the interwoven foliage overhead, it was gloomy there at cloudless noontide, twilight in the evening, dark as midnight at dusk, and black as the ninth plague of Egypt at midnight. To describe the spot is to call it a vast, low, naturally formed hall, the plumy ceiling of which was supported by slender pillars of living wood, the floor being covered with a soft dun carpet of dead spikelets and mildewed cones, with a tuft of grass-blades here and there. This bit of the path was always the crux of the night's ramble, though, before starting, her apprehensions of danger were not vivid enough to lead her to take a companion. Slipping along here covertly as Time, Bathsheba fancied she could hear footsteps entering the track at the opposite end. It was certainly a rustle of footsteps. Her own instantly fell as gently as snowflakes. She reassured herself by a remembrance that the path was public, and that the traveller was probably some villager returning home; regretting, at the same time, that the meeting should be about to occur in the darkest point of her route, even though only just outside her own door. The noise approached, came close, and a figure was apparently on the point of gliding past her when something tugged at her skirt and pinned it forcibly to the ground. The instantaneous check nearly threw Bathsheba off her balance. In recovering she struck against warm clothes and buttons. "A rum start, upon my soul!" said a masculine voice, a foot or so above her head. "Have I hurt you, mate?" "No," said Bathsheba, attempting to shrink away. "We have got hitched together somehow, I think." "Yes." "Are you a woman?" "Yes." "A lady, I should have said." "It doesn't matter." "I am a man." "Oh!" Bathsheba softly tugged again, but to no purpose. "Is that a dark lantern you have? I fancy so," said the man. "Yes." "If you'll allow me I'll open it, and set you free." A hand seized the lantern, the door was opened, the rays burst out from their prison, and Bathsheba beheld her position with astonishment. The man to whom she was hooked was brilliant in brass and scarlet. He was a soldier. His sudden appearance was to darkness what the sound of a trumpet is to silence. Gloom, the _genius loci_ at all times hitherto, was now totally overthrown, less by the lantern-light than by what the lantern lighted. The contrast of this revelation with her anticipations of some sinister figure in sombre garb was so great that it had upon her the effect of a fairy transformation. It was immediately apparent that the military man's spur had become entangled in the gimp which decorated the skirt of her dress. He caught a view of her face. "I'll unfasten you in one moment, miss," he said, with new-born gallantry. "Oh no--I can do it, thank you," she hastily replied, and stooped for the performance. The unfastening was not such a trifling affair. The rowel of the spur had so wound itself among the gimp cords in those few moments, that separation was likely to be a matter of time. He too stooped, and the lantern standing on the ground betwixt them threw the gleam from its open side among the fir-tree needles and the blades of long damp grass with the effect of a large glowworm. It radiated upwards into their faces, and sent over half the plantation gigantic shadows of both man and woman, each dusky shape becoming distorted and mangled upon the tree-trunks till it wasted to nothing. He looked hard into her eyes when she raised them for a moment; Bathsheba looked down again, for his gaze was too strong to be received point-blank with her own. But she had obliquely noticed that he was young and slim, and that he wore three chevrons upon his sleeve. Bathsheba pulled again. "You are a prisoner, miss; it is no use blinking the matter," said the soldier, drily. "I must cut your dress if you are in such a hurry." "Yes--please do!" she exclaimed, helplessly. "It wouldn't be necessary if you could wait a moment," and he unwound a cord from the little wheel. She withdrew her own hand, but, whether by accident or design, he touched it. Bathsheba was vexed; she hardly knew why. His unravelling went on, but it nevertheless seemed coming to no end. She looked at him again. "Thank you for the sight of such a beautiful face!" said the young sergeant, without ceremony. She coloured with embarrassment. "'Twas unwillingly shown," she replied, stiffly, and with as much dignity--which was very little--as she could infuse into a position of captivity. "I like you the better for that incivility, miss," he said. "I should have liked--I wish--you had never shown yourself to me by intruding here!" She pulled again, and the gathers of her dress began to give way like liliputian musketry. "I deserve the chastisement your words give me. But why should such a fair and dutiful girl have such an aversion to her father's sex?" "Go on your way, please." "What, Beauty, and drag you after me? Do but look; I never saw such a tangle!" "Oh, 'tis shameful of you; you have been making it worse on purpose to keep me here--you have!" "Indeed, I don't think so," said the sergeant, with a merry twinkle. "I tell you you have!" she exclaimed, in high temper. "I insist upon undoing it. Now, allow me!" "Certainly, miss; I am not of steel." He added a sigh which had as much archness in it as a sigh could possess without losing its nature altogether. "I am thankful for beauty, even when 'tis thrown to me like a bone to a dog. These moments will be over too soon!" She closed her lips in a determined silence. Bathsheba was revolving in her mind whether by a bold and desperate rush she could free herself at the risk of leaving her skirt bodily behind her. The thought was too dreadful. The dress--which she had put on to appear stately at the supper--was the head and front of her wardrobe; not another in her stock became her so well. What woman in Bathsheba's position, not naturally timid, and within call of her retainers, would have bought escape from a dashing soldier at so dear a price? "All in good time; it will soon be done, I perceive," said her cool friend. "This trifling provokes, and--and--" "Not too cruel!" "--Insults me!" "It is done in order that I may have the pleasure of apologizing to so charming a woman, which I straightway do most humbly, madam," he said, bowing low. Bathsheba really knew not what to say. "I've seen a good many women in my time," continued the young man in a murmur, and more thoughtfully than hitherto, critically regarding her bent head at the same time; "but I've never seen a woman so beautiful as you. Take it or leave it--be offended or like it--I don't care." "Who are you, then, who can so well afford to despise opinion?" "No stranger. Sergeant Troy. I am staying in this place.--There! it is undone at last, you see. Your light fingers were more eager than mine. I wish it had been the knot of knots, which there's no untying!" This was worse and worse. She started up, and so did he. How to decently get away from him--that was her difficulty now. She sidled off inch by inch, the lantern in her hand, till she could see the redness of his coat no longer. "Ah, Beauty; good-bye!" he said. She made no reply, and, reaching a distance of twenty or thirty yards, turned about, and ran indoors. Liddy had just retired to rest. In ascending to her own chamber, Bathsheba opened the girl's door an inch or two, and, panting, said-- "Liddy, is any soldier staying in the village--sergeant somebody-- rather gentlemanly for a sergeant, and good looking--a red coat with blue facings?" "No, miss ... No, I say; but really it might be Sergeant Troy home on furlough, though I have not seen him. He was here once in that way when the regiment was at Casterbridge." "Yes; that's the name. Had he a moustache--no whiskers or beard?" "He had." "What kind of a person is he?" "Oh! miss--I blush to name it--a gay man! But I know him to be very quick and trim, who might have made his thousands, like a squire. Such a clever young dandy as he is! He's a doctor's son by name, which is a great deal; and he's an earl's son by nature!" "Which is a great deal more. Fancy! Is it true?" "Yes. And, he was brought up so well, and sent to Casterbridge Grammar School for years and years. Learnt all languages while he was there; and it was said he got on so far that he could take down Chinese in shorthand; but that I don't answer for, as it was only reported. However, he wasted his gifted lot, and listed a soldier; but even then he rose to be a sergeant without trying at all. Ah! such a blessing it is to be high-born; nobility of blood will shine out even in the ranks and files. And is he really come home, miss?" "I believe so. Good-night, Liddy." After all, how could a cheerful wearer of skirts be permanently offended with the man? There are occasions when girls like Bathsheba will put up with a great deal of unconventional behaviour. When they want to be praised, which is often, when they want to be mastered, which is sometimes; and when they want no nonsense, which is seldom. Just now the first feeling was in the ascendant with Bathsheba, with a dash of the second. Moreover, by chance or by devilry, the ministrant was antecedently made interesting by being a handsome stranger who had evidently seen better days. So she could not clearly decide whether it was her opinion that he had insulted her or not. "Was ever anything so odd!" she at last exclaimed to herself, in her own room. "And was ever anything so meanly done as what I did--to skulk away like that from a man who was only civil and kind!" Clearly she did not think his barefaced praise of her person an insult now. It was a fatal omission of Boldwood's that he had never once told her she was beautiful.

Chapter 24

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219162644/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/far-from-the-madding-crowd/summary/chapter-24

Before going to bed, Bathsheba decides to walk around the house and the grounds to make sure everything is as it should be. She walks along a dark path and bumps into a man. She tries to walk away, but something is holding her back. Her dress has gotten caught on the spur of the man's boot. It takes them a moment to get untangled. The man uses her lantern to get them untangled, and then turns it on her face. He tells her that she has a pretty face. Bathsheba accuses him of untangling her skirts in order to keep her next to him for longer, but he denies it. Bathsheba just wants to get away from him. She's blushing from all his compliments and doesn't want to stand so close to a strange man in the middle of the night. She notices that the young man is wearing a soldier's uniform. Bathsheba finally runs home and asks her servant Liddy if she knows of a young soldier staying in the village. Liddy says that it might be a man named Sergeant Troy. Yup, that's the same Sergeant Troy who was supposed to marry Fanny Robin. We have no clue where Fanny is, and the only people in the world who know about her engagement to Troy are Boldwood and Oak. Bathsheba asks Liddy what kind of reputation Troy has, and Liddy answer that he's considered a lady-killer. But she also says that he comes from noble blood. His daddy was an earl. The chapter ends with Bathsheba thinking about Sergeant Troy and how he complimented her on her good looks: something the Boldwood has never done.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/22.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_21_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 3.chapter 9

book 3, chapter 9

{"name": "Book 3, Chapter 9", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-3-chapter-9", "summary": "Dmitri runs around the room, shouting that he saw Grushenka headed to the house and he knows she's here. Everyone insists that she couldn't possibly have entered the house without their being aware of it. Fyodor accuses Dmitri of stealing the money intended for Grushenka and rushes at him. Dmitri grabs Fyodor by the hair, throws him to the floor, and kicks him. Ivan and Alyosha pull Dmitri away. Finally convinced that Grushenka isn't in the house, Dmitri runs off to look for her. As he leaves, he reminds Alyosha to go see Katerina. The servants help Fyodor to bed and Ivan leaves to get some air in the yard. Alyosha goes to his father, who is still out of it from drink and the beating he got from Dmitri. Fyodor tells Alyosha he can have his mother's icon and return to the monastery. He asks Alyosha to see Grushenka, but then takes back his request. He then asks Alyosha to visit him the next day. On his way out of the house, Alyosha sees Ivan, who says that he'll protect Fyodor from Dmitri.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter IX. The Sensualists Grigory and Smerdyakov ran into the room after Dmitri. They had been struggling with him in the passage, refusing to admit him, acting on instructions given them by Fyodor Pavlovitch some days before. Taking advantage of the fact that Dmitri stopped a moment on entering the room to look about him, Grigory ran round the table, closed the double doors on the opposite side of the room leading to the inner apartments, and stood before the closed doors, stretching wide his arms, prepared to defend the entrance, so to speak, with the last drop of his blood. Seeing this, Dmitri uttered a scream rather than a shout and rushed at Grigory. "Then she's there! She's hidden there! Out of the way, scoundrel!" He tried to pull Grigory away, but the old servant pushed him back. Beside himself with fury, Dmitri struck out, and hit Grigory with all his might. The old man fell like a log, and Dmitri, leaping over him, broke in the door. Smerdyakov remained pale and trembling at the other end of the room, huddling close to Fyodor Pavlovitch. "She's here!" shouted Dmitri. "I saw her turn towards the house just now, but I couldn't catch her. Where is she? Where is she?" That shout, "She's here!" produced an indescribable effect on Fyodor Pavlovitch. All his terror left him. "Hold him! Hold him!" he cried, and dashed after Dmitri. Meanwhile Grigory had got up from the floor, but still seemed stunned. Ivan and Alyosha ran after their father. In the third room something was heard to fall on the floor with a ringing crash: it was a large glass vase--not an expensive one--on a marble pedestal which Dmitri had upset as he ran past it. "At him!" shouted the old man. "Help!" Ivan and Alyosha caught the old man and were forcibly bringing him back. "Why do you run after him? He'll murder you outright," Ivan cried wrathfully at his father. "Ivan! Alyosha! She must be here. Grushenka's here. He said he saw her himself, running." He was choking. He was not expecting Grushenka at the time, and the sudden news that she was here made him beside himself. He was trembling all over. He seemed frantic. "But you've seen for yourself that she hasn't come," cried Ivan. "But she may have come by that other entrance." "You know that entrance is locked, and you have the key." Dmitri suddenly reappeared in the drawing-room. He had, of course, found the other entrance locked, and the key actually was in Fyodor Pavlovitch's pocket. The windows of all the rooms were also closed, so Grushenka could not have come in anywhere nor have run out anywhere. "Hold him!" shrieked Fyodor Pavlovitch, as soon as he saw him again. "He's been stealing money in my bedroom." And tearing himself from Ivan he rushed again at Dmitri. But Dmitri threw up both hands and suddenly clutched the old man by the two tufts of hair that remained on his temples, tugged at them, and flung him with a crash on the floor. He kicked him two or three times with his heel in the face. The old man moaned shrilly. Ivan, though not so strong as Dmitri, threw his arms round him, and with all his might pulled him away. Alyosha helped him with his slender strength, holding Dmitri in front. "Madman! You've killed him!" cried Ivan. "Serve him right!" shouted Dmitri breathlessly. "If I haven't killed him, I'll come again and kill him. You can't protect him!" "Dmitri! Go away at once!" cried Alyosha commandingly. "Alexey! You tell me. It's only you I can believe; was she here just now, or not? I saw her myself creeping this way by the fence from the lane. I shouted, she ran away." "I swear she's not been here, and no one expected her." "But I saw her.... So she must ... I'll find out at once where she is.... Good-by, Alexey! Not a word to AEsop about the money now. But go to Katerina Ivanovna at once and be sure to say, 'He sends his compliments to you!' Compliments, his compliments! Just compliments and farewell! Describe the scene to her." Meanwhile Ivan and Grigory had raised the old man and seated him in an arm-chair. His face was covered with blood, but he was conscious and listened greedily to Dmitri's cries. He was still fancying that Grushenka really was somewhere in the house. Dmitri looked at him with hatred as he went out. "I don't repent shedding your blood!" he cried. "Beware, old man, beware of your dream, for I have my dream, too. I curse you, and disown you altogether." He ran out of the room. "She's here. She must be here. Smerdyakov! Smerdyakov!" the old man wheezed, scarcely audibly, beckoning to him with his finger. "No, she's not here, you old lunatic!" Ivan shouted at him angrily. "Here, he's fainting! Water! A towel! Make haste, Smerdyakov!" Smerdyakov ran for water. At last they got the old man undressed, and put him to bed. They wrapped a wet towel round his head. Exhausted by the brandy, by his violent emotion, and the blows he had received, he shut his eyes and fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow. Ivan and Alyosha went back to the drawing-room. Smerdyakov removed the fragments of the broken vase, while Grigory stood by the table looking gloomily at the floor. "Shouldn't you put a wet bandage on your head and go to bed, too?" Alyosha said to him. "We'll look after him. My brother gave you a terrible blow--on the head." "He's insulted me!" Grigory articulated gloomily and distinctly. "He's 'insulted' his father, not only you," observed Ivan with a forced smile. "I used to wash him in his tub. He's insulted me," repeated Grigory. "Damn it all, if I hadn't pulled him away perhaps he'd have murdered him. It wouldn't take much to do for AEsop, would it?" whispered Ivan to Alyosha. "God forbid!" cried Alyosha. "Why should He forbid?" Ivan went on in the same whisper, with a malignant grimace. "One reptile will devour the other. And serve them both right, too." Alyosha shuddered. "Of course I won't let him be murdered as I didn't just now. Stay here, Alyosha, I'll go for a turn in the yard. My head's begun to ache." Alyosha went to his father's bedroom and sat by his bedside behind the screen for about an hour. The old man suddenly opened his eyes and gazed for a long while at Alyosha, evidently remembering and meditating. All at once his face betrayed extraordinary excitement. "Alyosha," he whispered apprehensively, "where's Ivan?" "In the yard. He's got a headache. He's on the watch." "Give me that looking-glass. It stands over there. Give it me." Alyosha gave him a little round folding looking-glass which stood on the chest of drawers. The old man looked at himself in it; his nose was considerably swollen, and on the left side of his forehead there was a rather large crimson bruise. "What does Ivan say? Alyosha, my dear, my only son, I'm afraid of Ivan. I'm more afraid of Ivan than the other. You're the only one I'm not afraid of...." "Don't be afraid of Ivan either. He is angry, but he'll defend you." "Alyosha, and what of the other? He's run to Grushenka. My angel, tell me the truth, was she here just now or not?" "No one has seen her. It was a mistake. She has not been here." "You know Mitya wants to marry her, to marry her." "She won't marry him." "She won't. She won't. She won't. She won't on any account!" The old man fairly fluttered with joy, as though nothing more comforting could have been said to him. In his delight he seized Alyosha's hand and pressed it warmly to his heart. Tears positively glittered in his eyes. "That image of the Mother of God of which I was telling you just now," he said. "Take it home and keep it for yourself. And I'll let you go back to the monastery.... I was joking this morning, don't be angry with me. My head aches, Alyosha.... Alyosha, comfort my heart. Be an angel and tell me the truth!" "You're still asking whether she has been here or not?" Alyosha said sorrowfully. "No, no, no. I believe you. I'll tell you what it is: you go to Grushenka yourself, or see her somehow; make haste and ask her; see for yourself, which she means to choose, him or me. Eh? What? Can you?" "If I see her I'll ask her," Alyosha muttered, embarrassed. "No, she won't tell you," the old man interrupted, "she's a rogue. She'll begin kissing you and say that it's you she wants. She's a deceitful, shameless hussy. You mustn't go to her, you mustn't!" "No, father, and it wouldn't be suitable, it wouldn't be right at all." "Where was he sending you just now? He shouted 'Go' as he ran away." "To Katerina Ivanovna." "For money? To ask her for money?" "No. Not for money." "He's no money; not a farthing. I'll settle down for the night, and think things over, and you can go. Perhaps you'll meet her.... Only be sure to come to me to-morrow in the morning. Be sure to. I have a word to say to you to-morrow. Will you come?" "Yes." "When you come, pretend you've come of your own accord to ask after me. Don't tell any one I told you to. Don't say a word to Ivan." "Very well." "Good-by, my angel. You stood up for me, just now. I shall never forget it. I've a word to say to you to-morrow--but I must think about it." "And how do you feel now?" "I shall get up to-morrow and go out, perfectly well, perfectly well!" Crossing the yard Alyosha found Ivan sitting on the bench at the gateway. He was sitting writing something in pencil in his note-book. Alyosha told Ivan that their father had waked up, was conscious, and had let him go back to sleep at the monastery. "Alyosha, I should be very glad to meet you to-morrow morning," said Ivan cordially, standing up. His cordiality was a complete surprise to Alyosha. "I shall be at the Hohlakovs' to-morrow," answered Alyosha, "I may be at Katerina Ivanovna's, too, if I don't find her now." "But you're going to her now, anyway? For that 'compliments and farewell,' " said Ivan smiling. Alyosha was disconcerted. "I think I quite understand his exclamations just now, and part of what went before. Dmitri has asked you to go to her and say that he--well, in fact--takes his leave of her?" "Brother, how will all this horror end between father and Dmitri?" exclaimed Alyosha. "One can't tell for certain. Perhaps in nothing: it may all fizzle out. That woman is a beast. In any case we must keep the old man indoors and not let Dmitri in the house." "Brother, let me ask one thing more: has any man a right to look at other men and decide which is worthy to live?" "Why bring in the question of worth? The matter is most often decided in men's hearts on other grounds much more natural. And as for rights--who has not the right to wish?" "Not for another man's death?" "What even if for another man's death? Why lie to oneself since all men live so and perhaps cannot help living so. Are you referring to what I said just now--that one reptile will devour the other? In that case let me ask you, do you think me like Dmitri capable of shedding AEsop's blood, murdering him, eh?" "What are you saying, Ivan? Such an idea never crossed my mind. I don't think Dmitri is capable of it, either." "Thanks, if only for that," smiled Ivan. "Be sure, I should always defend him. But in my wishes I reserve myself full latitude in this case. Good-by till to-morrow. Don't condemn me, and don't look on me as a villain," he added with a smile. They shook hands warmly as they had never done before. Alyosha felt that his brother had taken the first step towards him, and that he had certainly done this with some definite motive.

Book 3, Chapter 9

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-3-chapter-9

Dmitri runs around the room, shouting that he saw Grushenka headed to the house and he knows she's here. Everyone insists that she couldn't possibly have entered the house without their being aware of it. Fyodor accuses Dmitri of stealing the money intended for Grushenka and rushes at him. Dmitri grabs Fyodor by the hair, throws him to the floor, and kicks him. Ivan and Alyosha pull Dmitri away. Finally convinced that Grushenka isn't in the house, Dmitri runs off to look for her. As he leaves, he reminds Alyosha to go see Katerina. The servants help Fyodor to bed and Ivan leaves to get some air in the yard. Alyosha goes to his father, who is still out of it from drink and the beating he got from Dmitri. Fyodor tells Alyosha he can have his mother's icon and return to the monastery. He asks Alyosha to see Grushenka, but then takes back his request. He then asks Alyosha to visit him the next day. On his way out of the house, Alyosha sees Ivan, who says that he'll protect Fyodor from Dmitri.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/01.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Sense and Sensibility/section_0_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 1

chapter 1

{"name": "Chapter 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201101060302/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/s/sense-and-sensibility/summary-and-analysis/chapter-1", "summary": "For many years, Henry Dashwood and his family had lived at Norland Park and cared for its owner, Henry's aged uncle. On the old man's death, Henry inherited the estate. He had always expected that he would be free to leave it, in turn, to be shared among his wife and three daughters. John, his son by a previous marriage, was amply provided for. His mother had left him a large estate, and his wife further increased his wealth with a handsome dowry. However, when the old man's will was read, Henry found to his dismay that he would not be able to dispose of the estate. The uncle had been wooed by John's young son and wished to procure the estate for him by tying it up in favor of \"his son and his son's son.\" This meant that Henry's wife and daughters could inherit only such money as he could save for them, which turned out to be 10,000 pounds. Henry survived his uncle by only one year. When he was dying, he sent for John and begged him, \"with all the strength and urgency which illness could command,\" to look after his stepmother and stepsisters. Moved by this plea, John promised \"to do everything in his power to make them comfortable.\" One thousand pounds for each daughter would be fair, he decided, and would leave them quite comfortable. John was \"rather cold-hearted, and rather selfish.\" He had married young and his wife had great influence over him. She was \"a strong caricature of himself; more narrow-minded and selfish.\" Immediately after Henry's funeral, without notice, Mrs. John Dashwood moved into Norland Park with her small son and her servants. This insensitive behavior was bitterly resented by Mrs. Dashwood, who thought of leaving Norland Park at once. Elinor prudently restrained her. Mrs. Dashwood and her daughters were a devoted family. Elinor, nineteen, was sufficiently mature and well-balanced \"to be the counsellor of her mother,\" a good-hearted woman who tended to be imprudent. Marianne, though clever and sensible, was extreme in her emotions. She was \"generous, amiable, interesting: . . . everything but prudent\" and thus much resembled her mother. Margaret, thirteen, was an immature girl who took after Marianne rather than Elinor. Marianne and her mother \"gave themselves up wholly to their sorrow,\" encouraging each other \"in the violence of their affliction.\" Elinor suffered too, but she managed to \"receive her sister-in-law on her arrival, and treat her with proper attention.\" She prevailed on her mother and Marianne to do likewise.", "analysis": "In this opening chapter, Austen sets the scene with her usual clarity and precision. The reader meets most of the leading characters and is given insight into their personalities and temperaments. It is obvious that this is to be a story of opposing temperaments -- Marianne's excessive \"sensibility\" contrasted to Elinor's calm common sense. The reader is plunged into a world which is socially and linguistically very different from the world of today. Austen is writing a \"comedy of manners,\" or \"domestic comedy.\" As a novelist, she narrows her outlook to the people of her own class -- country gentlemen and their families whose main concern is their social status and the comforts it brings them. Owning property is essential to social status, which explains Henry Dashwood's deep disappointment when he finds that he cannot bequeath Norland Park to his wife and daughters. Also, the meager fortune with which the girls are provided makes their prospects for a good marriage rather dismal."}

The family of Dashwood had long been settled in Sussex. Their estate was large, and their residence was at Norland Park, in the centre of their property, where, for many generations, they had lived in so respectable a manner as to engage the general good opinion of their surrounding acquaintance. The late owner of this estate was a single man, who lived to a very advanced age, and who for many years of his life, had a constant companion and housekeeper in his sister. But her death, which happened ten years before his own, produced a great alteration in his home; for to supply her loss, he invited and received into his house the family of his nephew Mr. Henry Dashwood, the legal inheritor of the Norland estate, and the person to whom he intended to bequeath it. In the society of his nephew and niece, and their children, the old Gentleman's days were comfortably spent. His attachment to them all increased. The constant attention of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood to his wishes, which proceeded not merely from interest, but from goodness of heart, gave him every degree of solid comfort which his age could receive; and the cheerfulness of the children added a relish to his existence. By a former marriage, Mr. Henry Dashwood had one son: by his present lady, three daughters. The son, a steady respectable young man, was amply provided for by the fortune of his mother, which had been large, and half of which devolved on him on his coming of age. By his own marriage, likewise, which happened soon afterwards, he added to his wealth. To him therefore the succession to the Norland estate was not so really important as to his sisters; for their fortune, independent of what might arise to them from their father's inheriting that property, could be but small. Their mother had nothing, and their father only seven thousand pounds in his own disposal; for the remaining moiety of his first wife's fortune was also secured to her child, and he had only a life-interest in it. The old gentleman died: his will was read, and like almost every other will, gave as much disappointment as pleasure. He was neither so unjust, nor so ungrateful, as to leave his estate from his nephew;--but he left it to him on such terms as destroyed half the value of the bequest. Mr. Dashwood had wished for it more for the sake of his wife and daughters than for himself or his son;--but to his son, and his son's son, a child of four years old, it was secured, in such a way, as to leave to himself no power of providing for those who were most dear to him, and who most needed a provision by any charge on the estate, or by any sale of its valuable woods. The whole was tied up for the benefit of this child, who, in occasional visits with his father and mother at Norland, had so far gained on the affections of his uncle, by such attractions as are by no means unusual in children of two or three years old; an imperfect articulation, an earnest desire of having his own way, many cunning tricks, and a great deal of noise, as to outweigh all the value of all the attention which, for years, he had received from his niece and her daughters. He meant not to be unkind, however, and, as a mark of his affection for the three girls, he left them a thousand pounds a-piece. Mr. Dashwood's disappointment was, at first, severe; but his temper was cheerful and sanguine; and he might reasonably hope to live many years, and by living economically, lay by a considerable sum from the produce of an estate already large, and capable of almost immediate improvement. But the fortune, which had been so tardy in coming, was his only one twelvemonth. He survived his uncle no longer; and ten thousand pounds, including the late legacies, was all that remained for his widow and daughters. His son was sent for as soon as his danger was known, and to him Mr. Dashwood recommended, with all the strength and urgency which illness could command, the interest of his mother-in-law and sisters. Mr. John Dashwood had not the strong feelings of the rest of the family; but he was affected by a recommendation of such a nature at such a time, and he promised to do every thing in his power to make them comfortable. His father was rendered easy by such an assurance, and Mr. John Dashwood had then leisure to consider how much there might prudently be in his power to do for them. He was not an ill-disposed young man, unless to be rather cold hearted and rather selfish is to be ill-disposed: but he was, in general, well respected; for he conducted himself with propriety in the discharge of his ordinary duties. Had he married a more amiable woman, he might have been made still more respectable than he was:--he might even have been made amiable himself; for he was very young when he married, and very fond of his wife. But Mrs. John Dashwood was a strong caricature of himself;--more narrow-minded and selfish. When he gave his promise to his father, he meditated within himself to increase the fortunes of his sisters by the present of a thousand pounds a-piece. He then really thought himself equal to it. The prospect of four thousand a-year, in addition to his present income, besides the remaining half of his own mother's fortune, warmed his heart, and made him feel capable of generosity.-- "Yes, he would give them three thousand pounds: it would be liberal and handsome! It would be enough to make them completely easy. Three thousand pounds! he could spare so considerable a sum with little inconvenience."-- He thought of it all day long, and for many days successively, and he did not repent. No sooner was his father's funeral over, than Mrs. John Dashwood, without sending any notice of her intention to her mother-in-law, arrived with her child and their attendants. No one could dispute her right to come; the house was her husband's from the moment of his father's decease; but the indelicacy of her conduct was so much the greater, and to a woman in Mrs. Dashwood's situation, with only common feelings, must have been highly unpleasing;--but in HER mind there was a sense of honor so keen, a generosity so romantic, that any offence of the kind, by whomsoever given or received, was to her a source of immovable disgust. Mrs. John Dashwood had never been a favourite with any of her husband's family; but she had had no opportunity, till the present, of shewing them with how little attention to the comfort of other people she could act when occasion required it. So acutely did Mrs. Dashwood feel this ungracious behaviour, and so earnestly did she despise her daughter-in-law for it, that, on the arrival of the latter, she would have quitted the house for ever, had not the entreaty of her eldest girl induced her first to reflect on the propriety of going, and her own tender love for all her three children determined her afterwards to stay, and for their sakes avoid a breach with their brother. Elinor, this eldest daughter, whose advice was so effectual, possessed a strength of understanding, and coolness of judgment, which qualified her, though only nineteen, to be the counsellor of her mother, and enabled her frequently to counteract, to the advantage of them all, that eagerness of mind in Mrs. Dashwood which must generally have led to imprudence. She had an excellent heart;--her disposition was affectionate, and her feelings were strong; but she knew how to govern them: it was a knowledge which her mother had yet to learn; and which one of her sisters had resolved never to be taught. Marianne's abilities were, in many respects, quite equal to Elinor's. She was sensible and clever; but eager in everything: her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation. She was generous, amiable, interesting: she was everything but prudent. The resemblance between her and her mother was strikingly great. Elinor saw, with concern, the excess of her sister's sensibility; but by Mrs. Dashwood it was valued and cherished. They encouraged each other now in the violence of their affliction. The agony of grief which overpowered them at first, was voluntarily renewed, was sought for, was created again and again. They gave themselves up wholly to their sorrow, seeking increase of wretchedness in every reflection that could afford it, and resolved against ever admitting consolation in future. Elinor, too, was deeply afflicted; but still she could struggle, she could exert herself. She could consult with her brother, could receive her sister-in-law on her arrival, and treat her with proper attention; and could strive to rouse her mother to similar exertion, and encourage her to similar forbearance. Margaret, the other sister, was a good-humored, well-disposed girl; but as she had already imbibed a good deal of Marianne's romance, without having much of her sense, she did not, at thirteen, bid fair to equal her sisters at a more advanced period of life.

Chapter 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20201101060302/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/s/sense-and-sensibility/summary-and-analysis/chapter-1

For many years, Henry Dashwood and his family had lived at Norland Park and cared for its owner, Henry's aged uncle. On the old man's death, Henry inherited the estate. He had always expected that he would be free to leave it, in turn, to be shared among his wife and three daughters. John, his son by a previous marriage, was amply provided for. His mother had left him a large estate, and his wife further increased his wealth with a handsome dowry. However, when the old man's will was read, Henry found to his dismay that he would not be able to dispose of the estate. The uncle had been wooed by John's young son and wished to procure the estate for him by tying it up in favor of "his son and his son's son." This meant that Henry's wife and daughters could inherit only such money as he could save for them, which turned out to be 10,000 pounds. Henry survived his uncle by only one year. When he was dying, he sent for John and begged him, "with all the strength and urgency which illness could command," to look after his stepmother and stepsisters. Moved by this plea, John promised "to do everything in his power to make them comfortable." One thousand pounds for each daughter would be fair, he decided, and would leave them quite comfortable. John was "rather cold-hearted, and rather selfish." He had married young and his wife had great influence over him. She was "a strong caricature of himself; more narrow-minded and selfish." Immediately after Henry's funeral, without notice, Mrs. John Dashwood moved into Norland Park with her small son and her servants. This insensitive behavior was bitterly resented by Mrs. Dashwood, who thought of leaving Norland Park at once. Elinor prudently restrained her. Mrs. Dashwood and her daughters were a devoted family. Elinor, nineteen, was sufficiently mature and well-balanced "to be the counsellor of her mother," a good-hearted woman who tended to be imprudent. Marianne, though clever and sensible, was extreme in her emotions. She was "generous, amiable, interesting: . . . everything but prudent" and thus much resembled her mother. Margaret, thirteen, was an immature girl who took after Marianne rather than Elinor. Marianne and her mother "gave themselves up wholly to their sorrow," encouraging each other "in the violence of their affliction." Elinor suffered too, but she managed to "receive her sister-in-law on her arrival, and treat her with proper attention." She prevailed on her mother and Marianne to do likewise.

In this opening chapter, Austen sets the scene with her usual clarity and precision. The reader meets most of the leading characters and is given insight into their personalities and temperaments. It is obvious that this is to be a story of opposing temperaments -- Marianne's excessive "sensibility" contrasted to Elinor's calm common sense. The reader is plunged into a world which is socially and linguistically very different from the world of today. Austen is writing a "comedy of manners," or "domestic comedy." As a novelist, she narrows her outlook to the people of her own class -- country gentlemen and their families whose main concern is their social status and the comforts it brings them. Owning property is essential to social status, which explains Henry Dashwood's deep disappointment when he finds that he cannot bequeath Norland Park to his wife and daughters. Also, the meager fortune with which the girls are provided makes their prospects for a good marriage rather dismal.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/9.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_8_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 2.chapter 4

book 2, chapter 4

{"name": "Book 2, Chapter 4", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-2-chapter-4", "summary": "In contrast to the women Zosima greeted in the previous chapter, the next visitor is a wealthy landowner. She thanks Zosima for healing her daughter Lise, or rather, for improving Lise's condition - she seems to be partially paralyzed from the waist down. Lise laughs outright at Alyosha, who seems embarrassed by her attention. It turns out the lady landowner and Lise already know Alyosha. Lise has a message for him from Katerina Ivanovna, who wants to talk to Alyosha about Dmitri. The lady landowner voices her concern to Zosima that she feels unable to love mankind. Zosima praises her for feeling troubled and asks her to keep working at it. But the most important piece of advice he gives her is to avoid lying, in particular lying to herself. Lise continues to mock Alyosha, and Zosima asks her why she's giving Alyosha such a hard time. Lise tells Zosima that Alyosha used to visit them often but no longer does. Zosima promises to send Alyosha to visit them.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter IV. A Lady Of Little Faith A visitor looking on the scene of his conversation with the peasants and his blessing them shed silent tears and wiped them away with her handkerchief. She was a sentimental society lady of genuinely good disposition in many respects. When the elder went up to her at last she met him enthusiastically. "Ah, what I have been feeling, looking on at this touching scene!..." She could not go on for emotion. "Oh, I understand the people's love for you. I love the people myself. I want to love them. And who could help loving them, our splendid Russian people, so simple in their greatness!" "How is your daughter's health? You wanted to talk to me again?" "Oh, I have been urgently begging for it, I have prayed for it! I was ready to fall on my knees and kneel for three days at your windows until you let me in. We have come, great healer, to express our ardent gratitude. You have healed my Lise, healed her completely, merely by praying over her last Thursday and laying your hands upon her. We have hastened here to kiss those hands, to pour out our feelings and our homage." "What do you mean by healed? But she is still lying down in her chair." "But her night fevers have entirely ceased ever since Thursday," said the lady with nervous haste. "And that's not all. Her legs are stronger. This morning she got up well; she had slept all night. Look at her rosy cheeks, her bright eyes! She used to be always crying, but now she laughs and is gay and happy. This morning she insisted on my letting her stand up, and she stood up for a whole minute without any support. She wagers that in a fortnight she'll be dancing a quadrille. I've called in Doctor Herzenstube. He shrugged his shoulders and said, 'I am amazed; I can make nothing of it.' And would you have us not come here to disturb you, not fly here to thank you? Lise, thank him--thank him!" Lise's pretty little laughing face became suddenly serious. She rose in her chair as far as she could and, looking at the elder, clasped her hands before him, but could not restrain herself and broke into laughter. "It's at him," she said, pointing to Alyosha, with childish vexation at herself for not being able to repress her mirth. If any one had looked at Alyosha standing a step behind the elder, he would have caught a quick flush crimsoning his cheeks in an instant. His eyes shone and he looked down. "She has a message for you, Alexey Fyodorovitch. How are you?" the mother went on, holding out her exquisitely gloved hand to Alyosha. The elder turned round and all at once looked attentively at Alyosha. The latter went nearer to Lise and, smiling in a strangely awkward way, held out his hand to her too. Lise assumed an important air. "Katerina Ivanovna has sent you this through me." She handed him a little note. "She particularly begs you to go and see her as soon as possible; that you will not fail her, but will be sure to come." "She asks me to go and see her? Me? What for?" Alyosha muttered in great astonishment. His face at once looked anxious. "Oh, it's all to do with Dmitri Fyodorovitch and--what has happened lately," the mother explained hurriedly. "Katerina Ivanovna has made up her mind, but she must see you about it.... Why, of course, I can't say. But she wants to see you at once. And you will go to her, of course. It is a Christian duty." "I have only seen her once," Alyosha protested with the same perplexity. "Oh, she is such a lofty, incomparable creature! If only for her suffering.... Think what she has gone through, what she is enduring now! Think what awaits her! It's all terrible, terrible!" "Very well, I will come," Alyosha decided, after rapidly scanning the brief, enigmatic note, which consisted of an urgent entreaty that he would come, without any sort of explanation. "Oh, how sweet and generous that would be of you!" cried Lise with sudden animation. "I told mamma you'd be sure not to go. I said you were saving your soul. How splendid you are! I've always thought you were splendid. How glad I am to tell you so!" "Lise!" said her mother impressively, though she smiled after she had said it. "You have quite forgotten us, Alexey Fyodorovitch," she said; "you never come to see us. Yet Lise has told me twice that she is never happy except with you." Alyosha raised his downcast eyes and again flushed, and again smiled without knowing why. But the elder was no longer watching him. He had begun talking to a monk who, as mentioned before, had been awaiting his entrance by Lise's chair. He was evidently a monk of the humblest, that is of the peasant, class, of a narrow outlook, but a true believer, and, in his own way, a stubborn one. He announced that he had come from the far north, from Obdorsk, from Saint Sylvester, and was a member of a poor monastery, consisting of only ten monks. The elder gave him his blessing and invited him to come to his cell whenever he liked. "How can you presume to do such deeds?" the monk asked suddenly, pointing solemnly and significantly at Lise. He was referring to her "healing." "It's too early, of course, to speak of that. Relief is not complete cure, and may proceed from different causes. But if there has been any healing, it is by no power but God's will. It's all from God. Visit me, Father," he added to the monk. "It's not often I can see visitors. I am ill, and I know that my days are numbered." "Oh, no, no! God will not take you from us. You will live a long, long time yet," cried the lady. "And in what way are you ill? You look so well, so gay and happy." "I am extraordinarily better to-day. But I know that it's only for a moment. I understand my disease now thoroughly. If I seem so happy to you, you could never say anything that would please me so much. For men are made for happiness, and any one who is completely happy has a right to say to himself, 'I am doing God's will on earth.' All the righteous, all the saints, all the holy martyrs were happy." "Oh, how you speak! What bold and lofty words!" cried the lady. "You seem to pierce with your words. And yet--happiness, happiness--where is it? Who can say of himself that he is happy? Oh, since you have been so good as to let us see you once more to-day, let me tell you what I could not utter last time, what I dared not say, all I am suffering and have been for so long! I am suffering! Forgive me! I am suffering!" And in a rush of fervent feeling she clasped her hands before him. "From what specially?" "I suffer ... from lack of faith." "Lack of faith in God?" "Oh, no, no! I dare not even think of that. But the future life--it is such an enigma! And no one, no one can solve it. Listen! You are a healer, you are deeply versed in the human soul, and of course I dare not expect you to believe me entirely, but I assure you on my word of honor that I am not speaking lightly now. The thought of the life beyond the grave distracts me to anguish, to terror. And I don't know to whom to appeal, and have not dared to all my life. And now I am so bold as to ask you. Oh, God! What will you think of me now?" She clasped her hands. "Don't distress yourself about my opinion of you," said the elder. "I quite believe in the sincerity of your suffering." "Oh, how thankful I am to you! You see, I shut my eyes and ask myself if every one has faith, where did it come from? And then they do say that it all comes from terror at the menacing phenomena of nature, and that none of it's real. And I say to myself, 'What if I've been believing all my life, and when I come to die there's nothing but the burdocks growing on my grave?' as I read in some author. It's awful! How--how can I get back my faith? But I only believed when I was a little child, mechanically, without thinking of anything. How, how is one to prove it? I have come now to lay my soul before you and to ask you about it. If I let this chance slip, no one all my life will answer me. How can I prove it? How can I convince myself? Oh, how unhappy I am! I stand and look about me and see that scarcely any one else cares; no one troubles his head about it, and I'm the only one who can't stand it. It's deadly--deadly!" "No doubt. But there's no proving it, though you can be convinced of it." "How?" "By the experience of active love. Strive to love your neighbor actively and indefatigably. In as far as you advance in love you will grow surer of the reality of God and of the immortality of your soul. If you attain to perfect self-forgetfulness in the love of your neighbor, then you will believe without doubt, and no doubt can possibly enter your soul. This has been tried. This is certain." "In active love? There's another question--and such a question! You see, I so love humanity that--would you believe it?--I often dream of forsaking all that I have, leaving Lise, and becoming a sister of mercy. I close my eyes and think and dream, and at that moment I feel full of strength to overcome all obstacles. No wounds, no festering sores could at that moment frighten me. I would bind them up and wash them with my own hands. I would nurse the afflicted. I would be ready to kiss such wounds." "It is much, and well that your mind is full of such dreams and not others. Sometime, unawares, you may do a good deed in reality." "Yes. But could I endure such a life for long?" the lady went on fervently, almost frantically. "That's the chief question--that's my most agonizing question. I shut my eyes and ask myself, 'Would you persevere long on that path? And if the patient whose wounds you are washing did not meet you with gratitude, but worried you with his whims, without valuing or remarking your charitable services, began abusing you and rudely commanding you, and complaining to the superior authorities of you (which often happens when people are in great suffering)--what then? Would you persevere in your love, or not?' And do you know, I came with horror to the conclusion that, if anything could dissipate my love to humanity, it would be ingratitude. In short, I am a hired servant, I expect my payment at once--that is, praise, and the repayment of love with love. Otherwise I am incapable of loving any one." She was in a very paroxysm of self-castigation, and, concluding, she looked with defiant resolution at the elder. "It's just the same story as a doctor once told me," observed the elder. "He was a man getting on in years, and undoubtedly clever. He spoke as frankly as you, though in jest, in bitter jest. 'I love humanity,' he said, 'but I wonder at myself. The more I love humanity in general, the less I love man in particular. In my dreams,' he said, 'I have often come to making enthusiastic schemes for the service of humanity, and perhaps I might actually have faced crucifixion if it had been suddenly necessary; and yet I am incapable of living in the same room with any one for two days together, as I know by experience. As soon as any one is near me, his personality disturbs my self-complacency and restricts my freedom. In twenty-four hours I begin to hate the best of men: one because he's too long over his dinner; another because he has a cold and keeps on blowing his nose. I become hostile to people the moment they come close to me. But it has always happened that the more I detest men individually the more ardent becomes my love for humanity.' " "But what's to be done? What can one do in such a case? Must one despair?" "No. It is enough that you are distressed at it. Do what you can, and it will be reckoned unto you. Much is done already in you since you can so deeply and sincerely know yourself. If you have been talking to me so sincerely, simply to gain approbation for your frankness, as you did from me just now, then of course you will not attain to anything in the achievement of real love; it will all get no further than dreams, and your whole life will slip away like a phantom. In that case you will naturally cease to think of the future life too, and will of yourself grow calmer after a fashion in the end." "You have crushed me! Only now, as you speak, I understand that I was really only seeking your approbation for my sincerity when I told you I could not endure ingratitude. You have revealed me to myself. You have seen through me and explained me to myself!" "Are you speaking the truth? Well, now, after such a confession, I believe that you are sincere and good at heart. If you do not attain happiness, always remember that you are on the right road, and try not to leave it. Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute. Avoid being scornful, both to others and to yourself. What seems to you bad within you will grow purer from the very fact of your observing it in yourself. Avoid fear, too, though fear is only the consequence of every sort of falsehood. Never be frightened at your own faint-heartedness in attaining love. Don't be frightened overmuch even at your evil actions. I am sorry I can say nothing more consoling to you, for love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared with love in dreams. Love in dreams is greedy for immediate action, rapidly performed and in the sight of all. Men will even give their lives if only the ordeal does not last long but is soon over, with all looking on and applauding as though on the stage. But active love is labor and fortitude, and for some people too, perhaps, a complete science. But I predict that just when you see with horror that in spite of all your efforts you are getting farther from your goal instead of nearer to it--at that very moment I predict that you will reach it and behold clearly the miraculous power of the Lord who has been all the time loving and mysteriously guiding you. Forgive me for not being able to stay longer with you. They are waiting for me. Good-by." The lady was weeping. "Lise, Lise! Bless her--bless her!" she cried, starting up suddenly. "She does not deserve to be loved. I have seen her naughtiness all along," the elder said jestingly. "Why have you been laughing at Alexey?" Lise had in fact been occupied in mocking at him all the time. She had noticed before that Alyosha was shy and tried not to look at her, and she found this extremely amusing. She waited intently to catch his eye. Alyosha, unable to endure her persistent stare, was irresistibly and suddenly drawn to glance at her, and at once she smiled triumphantly in his face. Alyosha was even more disconcerted and vexed. At last he turned away from her altogether and hid behind the elder's back. After a few minutes, drawn by the same irresistible force, he turned again to see whether he was being looked at or not, and found Lise almost hanging out of her chair to peep sideways at him, eagerly waiting for him to look. Catching his eye, she laughed so that the elder could not help saying, "Why do you make fun of him like that, naughty girl?" Lise suddenly and quite unexpectedly blushed. Her eyes flashed and her face became quite serious. She began speaking quickly and nervously in a warm and resentful voice: "Why has he forgotten everything, then? He used to carry me about when I was little. We used to play together. He used to come to teach me to read, do you know. Two years ago, when he went away, he said that he would never forget me, that we were friends for ever, for ever, for ever! And now he's afraid of me all at once. Am I going to eat him? Why doesn't he want to come near me? Why doesn't he talk? Why won't he come and see us? It's not that you won't let him. We know that he goes everywhere. It's not good manners for me to invite him. He ought to have thought of it first, if he hasn't forgotten me. No, now he's saving his soul! Why have you put that long gown on him? If he runs he'll fall." And suddenly she hid her face in her hand and went off into irresistible, prolonged, nervous, inaudible laughter. The elder listened to her with a smile, and blessed her tenderly. As she kissed his hand she suddenly pressed it to her eyes and began crying. "Don't be angry with me. I'm silly and good for nothing ... and perhaps Alyosha's right, quite right, in not wanting to come and see such a ridiculous girl." "I will certainly send him," said the elder.

Book 2, Chapter 4

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-2-chapter-4

In contrast to the women Zosima greeted in the previous chapter, the next visitor is a wealthy landowner. She thanks Zosima for healing her daughter Lise, or rather, for improving Lise's condition - she seems to be partially paralyzed from the waist down. Lise laughs outright at Alyosha, who seems embarrassed by her attention. It turns out the lady landowner and Lise already know Alyosha. Lise has a message for him from Katerina Ivanovna, who wants to talk to Alyosha about Dmitri. The lady landowner voices her concern to Zosima that she feels unable to love mankind. Zosima praises her for feeling troubled and asks her to keep working at it. But the most important piece of advice he gives her is to avoid lying, in particular lying to herself. Lise continues to mock Alyosha, and Zosima asks her why she's giving Alyosha such a hard time. Lise tells Zosima that Alyosha used to visit them often but no longer does. Zosima promises to send Alyosha to visit them.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/07.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Prince/section_7_part_0.txt

The Prince.chapter 7

chapter 7

{"name": "Chapter 7", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-7", "summary": "For those of you who got your nation by sheer luck, or by buying it: we have good news and bad news. The good news is--yay!--you have some territory now. The bad news is, it won't be like that for long. Unless you've been hard at work figuring out how to fight and defend your new land with your very own army, you will probably soon be known as the ex-ruler of your nation. Oops. Enjoy it while you can. Machiavelli gives us examples of men who got their new kingdoms by luck and by sheer abilities. The first is Francesco Sforza, who got Milan through ability and effort and kept it fairly easily. The second is Machiavelli's historical crush, Cesare Borgia, who got his land because his dad tricked people to get it for him. Now, Machiavelli wants us to know that just because Borgia died and lost his land, doesn't mean he wasn't awesome. You see, he did everything right in Machiavelli's eyes. He was just super unlucky. Here's how it went down. Pope Alexander VI, otherwise known as Borgia's dad, got some land called Romagna for his son. Now it was up to Borgia to stand on his own two feet, and he realized that his army and his ally weren't the most loyal ever. This is a problem. Remember what Machiavelli said about using other people's power? Well, Borgia was fed up with it and decided to free himself by getting some new allies. Then he took it up a notch and decided it was time to get rid of anyone else who might challenge him. He invited them to a party and killed them all. So far, so good. Now, remember how were just talking about how sometimes you have to crush your new land in order to rule it? Well, guess who knew that? That's right, Borgia. He put a crazy ruthless guy named Remirro de Orco in charge of Romagna who whipped the area into shape. No one really liked de Orco or Borgia after all this violence, but that would change. Borgia decided that he didn't need such violent methods anymore and established a court of locals to run everything. Oh, and he killed de Orca and displayed his corpse in the town center to show everyone that he was so angry with him for being mean to them. Hmmm. These shenanigans scared the pee out of anyone trying to mess with Borgia and made everyone think that he was a nice guy. We're not sure if there has ever been another case where killing someone and displaying his rotting body has made people like someone. Don't try this on your next date. Things were going okay for Borgia, until he realized that his buddy France was turning on him. He needed some new buddies, and soon--but then his dad died, throwing a wrench in Borgia's plans. But he'd always been a quick thinker. He made a new, four-part plan to deal with whomever the new pope was going to be. Kill more people who didn't like him Make friends with all the nobles of Rome Control the people who were choosing the new pope Get lots and lots of land before the new pope came so he could defend himself When he died, Borgia was pretty close to checking off all of the to-dos on his list. The only thing left was to become master of Tuscany, which would happen as soon as he completed his collection of regions with Pisa. But, well, he never got Pisa. And he was mortally ill. And the new pope? He hated Borgia. So, yeah. Not so great. Despite all this, Machiavelli says that Borgia is the best role model for any new ruler because he did all the things that a ruler should do, like killing all your enemies ruthlessly and appearing to be a nice dude. The only problem was his horrible bad luck. Machiavelli only has this critique of Borgia: he let Julius II become pope. There were tons of other options that would at least have been afraid of Borgia--if not his best bud--but instead, he let the papacy go to a hater. Not a smooth move.", "analysis": ""}

Those who solely by good fortune become princes from being private citizens have little trouble in rising, but much in keeping atop; they have not any difficulties on the way up, because they fly, but they have many when they reach the summit. Such are those to whom some state is given either for money or by the favour of him who bestows it; as happened to many in Greece, in the cities of Ionia and of the Hellespont, where princes were made by Darius, in order that they might hold the cities both for his security and his glory; as also were those emperors who, by the corruption of the soldiers, from being citizens came to empire. Such stand simply elevated upon the goodwill and the fortune of him who has elevated them--two most inconstant and unstable things. Neither have they the knowledge requisite for the position; because, unless they are men of great worth and ability, it is not reasonable to expect that they should know how to command, having always lived in a private condition; besides, they cannot hold it because they have not forces which they can keep friendly and faithful. States that rise unexpectedly, then, like all other things in nature which are born and grow rapidly, cannot leave their foundations and correspondencies(*) fixed in such a way that the first storm will not overthrow them; unless, as is said, those who unexpectedly become princes are men of so much ability that they know they have to be prepared at once to hold that which fortune has thrown into their laps, and that those foundations, which others have laid BEFORE they became princes, they must lay AFTERWARDS. (*) "Le radici e corrispondenze," their roots (i.e. foundations) and correspondencies or relations with other states--a common meaning of "correspondence" and "correspondency" in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Concerning these two methods of rising to be a prince by ability or fortune, I wish to adduce two examples within our own recollection, and these are Francesco Sforza(*) and Cesare Borgia. Francesco, by proper means and with great ability, from being a private person rose to be Duke of Milan, and that which he had acquired with a thousand anxieties he kept with little trouble. On the other hand, Cesare Borgia, called by the people Duke Valentino, acquired his state during the ascendancy of his father, and on its decline he lost it, notwithstanding that he had taken every measure and done all that ought to be done by a wise and able man to fix firmly his roots in the states which the arms and fortunes of others had bestowed on him. (*) Francesco Sforza, born 1401, died 1466. He married Bianca Maria Visconti, a natural daughter of Filippo Visconti, the Duke of Milan, on whose death he procured his own elevation to the duchy. Machiavelli was the accredited agent of the Florentine Republic to Cesare Borgia (1478- 1507) during the transactions which led up to the assassinations of the Orsini and Vitelli at Sinigalia, and along with his letters to his chiefs in Florence he has left an account, written ten years before "The Prince," of the proceedings of the duke in his "Descritione del modo tenuto dal duca Valentino nello ammazzare Vitellozzo Vitelli," etc., a translation of which is appended to the present work. Because, as is stated above, he who has not first laid his foundations may be able with great ability to lay them afterwards, but they will be laid with trouble to the architect and danger to the building. If, therefore, all the steps taken by the duke be considered, it will be seen that he laid solid foundations for his future power, and I do not consider it superfluous to discuss them, because I do not know what better precepts to give a new prince than the example of his actions; and if his dispositions were of no avail, that was not his fault, but the extraordinary and extreme malignity of fortune. Alexander the Sixth, in wishing to aggrandize the duke, his son, had many immediate and prospective difficulties. Firstly, he did not see his way to make him master of any state that was not a state of the Church; and if he was willing to rob the Church he knew that the Duke of Milan and the Venetians would not consent, because Faenza and Rimini were already under the protection of the Venetians. Besides this, he saw the arms of Italy, especially those by which he might have been assisted, in hands that would fear the aggrandizement of the Pope, namely, the Orsini and the Colonnesi and their following. It behoved him, therefore, to upset this state of affairs and embroil the powers, so as to make himself securely master of part of their states. This was easy for him to do, because he found the Venetians, moved by other reasons, inclined to bring back the French into Italy; he would not only not oppose this, but he would render it more easy by dissolving the former marriage of King Louis. Therefore the king came into Italy with the assistance of the Venetians and the consent of Alexander. He was no sooner in Milan than the Pope had soldiers from him for the attempt on the Romagna, which yielded to him on the reputation of the king. The duke, therefore, having acquired the Romagna and beaten the Colonnesi, while wishing to hold that and to advance further, was hindered by two things: the one, his forces did not appear loyal to him, the other, the goodwill of France: that is to say, he feared that the forces of the Orsini, which he was using, would not stand to him, that not only might they hinder him from winning more, but might themselves seize what he had won, and that the king might also do the same. Of the Orsini he had a warning when, after taking Faenza and attacking Bologna, he saw them go very unwillingly to that attack. And as to the king, he learned his mind when he himself, after taking the Duchy of Urbino, attacked Tuscany, and the king made him desist from that undertaking; hence the duke decided to depend no more upon the arms and the luck of others. For the first thing he weakened the Orsini and Colonnesi parties in Rome, by gaining to himself all their adherents who were gentlemen, making them his gentlemen, giving them good pay, and, according to their rank, honouring them with office and command in such a way that in a few months all attachment to the factions was destroyed and turned entirely to the duke. After this he awaited an opportunity to crush the Orsini, having scattered the adherents of the Colonna house. This came to him soon and he used it well; for the Orsini, perceiving at length that the aggrandizement of the duke and the Church was ruin to them, called a meeting of the Magione in Perugia. From this sprung the rebellion at Urbino and the tumults in the Romagna, with endless dangers to the duke, all of which he overcame with the help of the French. Having restored his authority, not to leave it at risk by trusting either to the French or other outside forces, he had recourse to his wiles, and he knew so well how to conceal his mind that, by the mediation of Signor Pagolo--whom the duke did not fail to secure with all kinds of attention, giving him money, apparel, and horses--the Orsini were reconciled, so that their simplicity brought them into his power at Sinigalia.(*) Having exterminated the leaders, and turned their partisans into his friends, the duke laid sufficiently good foundations to his power, having all the Romagna and the Duchy of Urbino; and the people now beginning to appreciate their prosperity, he gained them all over to himself. And as this point is worthy of notice, and to be imitated by others, I am not willing to leave it out. (*) Sinigalia, 31st December 1502. When the duke occupied the Romagna he found it under the rule of weak masters, who rather plundered their subjects than ruled them, and gave them more cause for disunion than for union, so that the country was full of robbery, quarrels, and every kind of violence; and so, wishing to bring back peace and obedience to authority, he considered it necessary to give it a good governor. Thereupon he promoted Messer Ramiro d'Orco,(*) a swift and cruel man, to whom he gave the fullest power. This man in a short time restored peace and unity with the greatest success. Afterwards the duke considered that it was not advisable to confer such excessive authority, for he had no doubt but that he would become odious, so he set up a court of judgment in the country, under a most excellent president, wherein all cities had their advocates. And because he knew that the past severity had caused some hatred against himself, so, to clear himself in the minds of the people, and gain them entirely to himself, he desired to show that, if any cruelty had been practised, it had not originated with him, but in the natural sternness of the minister. Under this pretence he took Ramiro, and one morning caused him to be executed and left on the piazza at Cesena with the block and a bloody knife at his side. The barbarity of this spectacle caused the people to be at once satisfied and dismayed. (*) Ramiro d'Orco. Ramiro de Lorqua. But let us return whence we started. I say that the duke, finding himself now sufficiently powerful and partly secured from immediate dangers by having armed himself in his own way, and having in a great measure crushed those forces in his vicinity that could injure him if he wished to proceed with his conquest, had next to consider France, for he knew that the king, who too late was aware of his mistake, would not support him. And from this time he began to seek new alliances and to temporize with France in the expedition which she was making towards the kingdom of Naples against the Spaniards who were besieging Gaeta. It was his intention to secure himself against them, and this he would have quickly accomplished had Alexander lived. Such was his line of action as to present affairs. But as to the future he had to fear, in the first place, that a new successor to the Church might not be friendly to him and might seek to take from him that which Alexander had given him, so he decided to act in four ways. Firstly, by exterminating the families of those lords whom he had despoiled, so as to take away that pretext from the Pope. Secondly, by winning to himself all the gentlemen of Rome, so as to be able to curb the Pope with their aid, as has been observed. Thirdly, by converting the college more to himself. Fourthly, by acquiring so much power before the Pope should die that he could by his own measures resist the first shock. Of these four things, at the death of Alexander, he had accomplished three. For he had killed as many of the dispossessed lords as he could lay hands on, and few had escaped; he had won over the Roman gentlemen, and he had the most numerous party in the college. And as to any fresh acquisition, he intended to become master of Tuscany, for he already possessed Perugia and Piombino, and Pisa was under his protection. And as he had no longer to study France (for the French were already driven out of the kingdom of Naples by the Spaniards, and in this way both were compelled to buy his goodwill), he pounced down upon Pisa. After this, Lucca and Siena yielded at once, partly through hatred and partly through fear of the Florentines; and the Florentines would have had no remedy had he continued to prosper, as he was prospering the year that Alexander died, for he had acquired so much power and reputation that he would have stood by himself, and no longer have depended on the luck and the forces of others, but solely on his own power and ability. But Alexander died five years after he had first drawn the sword. He left the duke with the state of Romagna alone consolidated, with the rest in the air, between two most powerful hostile armies, and sick unto death. Yet there were in the duke such boldness and ability, and he knew so well how men are to be won or lost, and so firm were the foundations which in so short a time he had laid, that if he had not had those armies on his back, or if he had been in good health, he would have overcome all difficulties. And it is seen that his foundations were good, for the Romagna awaited him for more than a month. In Rome, although but half alive, he remained secure; and whilst the Baglioni, the Vitelli, and the Orsini might come to Rome, they could not effect anything against him. If he could not have made Pope him whom he wished, at least the one whom he did not wish would not have been elected. But if he had been in sound health at the death of Alexander,(*) everything would have been different to him. On the day that Julius the Second(+) was elected, he told me that he had thought of everything that might occur at the death of his father, and had provided a remedy for all, except that he had never anticipated that, when the death did happen, he himself would be on the point to die. (*) Alexander VI died of fever, 18th August 1503. (+) Julius II was Giuliano della Rovere, Cardinal of San Pietro ad Vincula, born 1443, died 1513. When all the actions of the duke are recalled, I do not know how to blame him, but rather it appears to be, as I have said, that I ought to offer him for imitation to all those who, by the fortune or the arms of others, are raised to government. Because he, having a lofty spirit and far-reaching aims, could not have regulated his conduct otherwise, and only the shortness of the life of Alexander and his own sickness frustrated his designs. Therefore, he who considers it necessary to secure himself in his new principality, to win friends, to overcome either by force or fraud, to make himself beloved and feared by the people, to be followed and revered by the soldiers, to exterminate those who have power or reason to hurt him, to change the old order of things for new, to be severe and gracious, magnanimous and liberal, to destroy a disloyal soldiery and to create new, to maintain friendship with kings and princes in such a way that they must help him with zeal and offend with caution, cannot find a more lively example than the actions of this man. Only can he be blamed for the election of Julius the Second, in whom he made a bad choice, because, as is said, not being able to elect a Pope to his own mind, he could have hindered any other from being elected Pope; and he ought never to have consented to the election of any cardinal whom he had injured or who had cause to fear him if they became pontiffs. For men injure either from fear or hatred. Those whom he had injured, amongst others, were San Pietro ad Vincula, Colonna, San Giorgio, and Ascanio.(*) The rest, in becoming Pope, had to fear him, Rouen and the Spaniards excepted; the latter from their relationship and obligations, the former from his influence, the kingdom of France having relations with him. Therefore, above everything, the duke ought to have created a Spaniard Pope, and, failing him, he ought to have consented to Rouen and not San Pietro ad Vincula. He who believes that new benefits will cause great personages to forget old injuries is deceived. Therefore, the duke erred in his choice, and it was the cause of his ultimate ruin. (*) San Giorgio is Raffaello Riario. Ascanio is Ascanio Sforza.

Chapter 7

https://web.archive.org/web/20210420060055/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/prince-machiavelli/summary/chapter-7

For those of you who got your nation by sheer luck, or by buying it: we have good news and bad news. The good news is--yay!--you have some territory now. The bad news is, it won't be like that for long. Unless you've been hard at work figuring out how to fight and defend your new land with your very own army, you will probably soon be known as the ex-ruler of your nation. Oops. Enjoy it while you can. Machiavelli gives us examples of men who got their new kingdoms by luck and by sheer abilities. The first is Francesco Sforza, who got Milan through ability and effort and kept it fairly easily. The second is Machiavelli's historical crush, Cesare Borgia, who got his land because his dad tricked people to get it for him. Now, Machiavelli wants us to know that just because Borgia died and lost his land, doesn't mean he wasn't awesome. You see, he did everything right in Machiavelli's eyes. He was just super unlucky. Here's how it went down. Pope Alexander VI, otherwise known as Borgia's dad, got some land called Romagna for his son. Now it was up to Borgia to stand on his own two feet, and he realized that his army and his ally weren't the most loyal ever. This is a problem. Remember what Machiavelli said about using other people's power? Well, Borgia was fed up with it and decided to free himself by getting some new allies. Then he took it up a notch and decided it was time to get rid of anyone else who might challenge him. He invited them to a party and killed them all. So far, so good. Now, remember how were just talking about how sometimes you have to crush your new land in order to rule it? Well, guess who knew that? That's right, Borgia. He put a crazy ruthless guy named Remirro de Orco in charge of Romagna who whipped the area into shape. No one really liked de Orco or Borgia after all this violence, but that would change. Borgia decided that he didn't need such violent methods anymore and established a court of locals to run everything. Oh, and he killed de Orca and displayed his corpse in the town center to show everyone that he was so angry with him for being mean to them. Hmmm. These shenanigans scared the pee out of anyone trying to mess with Borgia and made everyone think that he was a nice guy. We're not sure if there has ever been another case where killing someone and displaying his rotting body has made people like someone. Don't try this on your next date. Things were going okay for Borgia, until he realized that his buddy France was turning on him. He needed some new buddies, and soon--but then his dad died, throwing a wrench in Borgia's plans. But he'd always been a quick thinker. He made a new, four-part plan to deal with whomever the new pope was going to be. Kill more people who didn't like him Make friends with all the nobles of Rome Control the people who were choosing the new pope Get lots and lots of land before the new pope came so he could defend himself When he died, Borgia was pretty close to checking off all of the to-dos on his list. The only thing left was to become master of Tuscany, which would happen as soon as he completed his collection of regions with Pisa. But, well, he never got Pisa. And he was mortally ill. And the new pope? He hated Borgia. So, yeah. Not so great. Despite all this, Machiavelli says that Borgia is the best role model for any new ruler because he did all the things that a ruler should do, like killing all your enemies ruthlessly and appearing to be a nice dude. The only problem was his horrible bad luck. Machiavelli only has this critique of Borgia: he let Julius II become pope. There were tons of other options that would at least have been afraid of Borgia--if not his best bud--but instead, he let the papacy go to a hater. Not a smooth move.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/53.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_52_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 8.chapter 8

book 8, chapter 8

{"name": "Book 8, Chapter 8", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-8-chapter-8", "summary": "The party begins, with the champagne flowing and scrumptious morsels for everyone. The peasant girls dance and sing, somewhat bawdily. Grushenka watches everything from an armchair, pulling Dmitri over to whisper to him from time to time. Dmitri goes out on the verandah to get some fresh air. He encounters the innkeeper, who seems to be worried about something. Dmitri goes back to the party but Grushenka isn't there. He finds her in another room, weeping in a corner. She declares her love for him, and Dmitri is ecstatic. They return to the party and even get the Poles out of their room to join the fun. The Poles, however, aren't amused by Dmitri. Grushenka is suddenly exhausted, and Dmitri takes her back behind the curtain dividing the room. Drunk, exhausted, and overjoyed, Grushenka and Dmitri dream of their new life together. Their conversation is interrupted, however, by the arrival of the police commissioner, the deputy commissioner, the deputy prosecutor, and the district attorney. The attorney declares that they are arresting Dmitri for the murder of his father. Dmitri is utterly bewildered.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter VIII. Delirium What followed was almost an orgy, a feast to which all were welcome. Grushenka was the first to call for wine. "I want to drink. I want to be quite drunk, as we were before. Do you remember, Mitya, do you remember how we made friends here last time!" Mitya himself was almost delirious, feeling that his happiness was at hand. But Grushenka was continually sending him away from her. "Go and enjoy yourself. Tell them to dance, to make merry, 'let the stove and cottage dance'; as we had it last time," she kept exclaiming. She was tremendously excited. And Mitya hastened to obey her. The chorus were in the next room. The room in which they had been sitting till that moment was too small, and was divided in two by cotton curtains, behind which was a huge bed with a puffy feather mattress and a pyramid of cotton pillows. In the four rooms for visitors there were beds. Grushenka settled herself just at the door. Mitya set an easy chair for her. She had sat in the same place to watch the dancing and singing "the time before," when they had made merry there. All the girls who had come had been there then; the Jewish band with fiddles and zithers had come, too, and at last the long expected cart had arrived with the wines and provisions. Mitya bustled about. All sorts of people began coming into the room to look on, peasants and their women, who had been roused from sleep and attracted by the hopes of another marvelous entertainment such as they had enjoyed a month before. Mitya remembered their faces, greeting and embracing every one he knew. He uncorked bottles and poured out wine for every one who presented himself. Only the girls were very eager for the champagne. The men preferred rum, brandy, and, above all, hot punch. Mitya had chocolate made for all the girls, and ordered that three samovars should be kept boiling all night to provide tea and punch for everyone to help himself. An absurd chaotic confusion followed, but Mitya was in his natural element, and the more foolish it became, the more his spirits rose. If the peasants had asked him for money at that moment, he would have pulled out his notes and given them away right and left. This was probably why the landlord, Trifon Borissovitch, kept hovering about Mitya to protect him. He seemed to have given up all idea of going to bed that night; but he drank little, only one glass of punch, and kept a sharp look-out on Mitya's interests after his own fashion. He intervened in the nick of time, civilly and obsequiously persuading Mitya not to give away "cigars and Rhine wine," and, above all, money to the peasants as he had done before. He was very indignant, too, at the peasant girls drinking liqueur, and eating sweets. "They're a lousy lot, Dmitri Fyodorovitch," he said. "I'd give them a kick, every one of them, and they'd take it as an honor--that's all they're worth!" Mitya remembered Andrey again, and ordered punch to be sent out to him. "I was rude to him just now," he repeated with a sinking, softened voice. Kalganov did not want to drink, and at first did not care for the girls' singing; but after he had drunk a couple of glasses of champagne he became extraordinarily lively, strolling about the room, laughing and praising the music and the songs, admiring every one and everything. Maximov, blissfully drunk, never left his side. Grushenka, too, was beginning to get drunk. Pointing to Kalganov, she said to Mitya: "What a dear, charming boy he is!" And Mitya, delighted, ran to kiss Kalganov and Maximov. Oh, great were his hopes! She had said nothing yet, and seemed, indeed, purposely to refrain from speaking. But she looked at him from time to time with caressing and passionate eyes. At last she suddenly gripped his hand and drew him vigorously to her. She was sitting at the moment in the low chair by the door. "How was it you came just now, eh? Have you walked in!... I was frightened. So you wanted to give me up to him, did you? Did you really want to?" "I didn't want to spoil your happiness!" Mitya faltered blissfully. But she did not need his answer. "Well, go and enjoy yourself ..." she sent him away once more. "Don't cry, I'll call you back again." He would run away, and she listened to the singing and looked at the dancing, though her eyes followed him wherever he went. But in another quarter of an hour she would call him once more and again he would run back to her. "Come, sit beside me, tell me, how did you hear about me, and my coming here yesterday? From whom did you first hear it?" And Mitya began telling her all about it, disconnectedly, incoherently, feverishly. He spoke strangely, often frowning, and stopping abruptly. "What are you frowning at?" she asked. "Nothing.... I left a man ill there. I'd give ten years of my life for him to get well, to know he was all right!" "Well, never mind him, if he's ill. So you meant to shoot yourself to- morrow! What a silly boy! What for? I like such reckless fellows as you," she lisped, with a rather halting tongue. "So you would go any length for me, eh? Did you really mean to shoot yourself to-morrow, you stupid? No, wait a little. To-morrow I may have something to say to you.... I won't say it to-day, but to-morrow. You'd like it to be to-day? No, I don't want to to-day. Come, go along now, go and amuse yourself." Once, however, she called him, as it were, puzzled and uneasy. "Why are you sad? I see you're sad.... Yes, I see it," she added, looking intently into his eyes. "Though you keep kissing the peasants and shouting, I see something. No, be merry. I'm merry; you be merry, too.... I love somebody here. Guess who it is. Ah, look, my boy has fallen asleep, poor dear, he's drunk." She meant Kalganov. He was, in fact, drunk, and had dropped asleep for a moment, sitting on the sofa. But he was not merely drowsy from drink; he felt suddenly dejected, or, as he said, "bored." He was intensely depressed by the girls' songs, which, as the drinking went on, gradually became coarse and more reckless. And the dances were as bad. Two girls dressed up as bears, and a lively girl, called Stepanida, with a stick in her hand, acted the part of keeper, and began to "show them." "Look alive, Marya, or you'll get the stick!" The bears rolled on the ground at last in the most unseemly fashion, amid roars of laughter from the closely-packed crowd of men and women. "Well, let them! Let them!" said Grushenka sententiously, with an ecstatic expression on her face. "When they do get a day to enjoy themselves, why shouldn't folks be happy?" Kalganov looked as though he had been besmirched with dirt. "It's swinish, all this peasant foolery," he murmured, moving away; "it's the game they play when it's light all night in summer." He particularly disliked one "new" song to a jaunty dance-tune. It described how a gentleman came and tried his luck with the girls, to see whether they would love him: The master came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? But the girls could not love the master: He would beat me cruelly And such love won't do for me. Then a gypsy comes along and he, too, tries: The gypsy came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? But they couldn't love the gypsy either: He would be a thief, I fear, And would cause me many a tear. And many more men come to try their luck, among them a soldier: The soldier came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? But the soldier is rejected with contempt, in two indecent lines, sung with absolute frankness and producing a furore in the audience. The song ends with a merchant: The merchant came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? And it appears that he wins their love because: The merchant will make gold for me And his queen I'll gladly be. Kalvanov was positively indignant. "That's just a song of yesterday," he said aloud. "Who writes such things for them? They might just as well have had a railwayman or a Jew come to try his luck with the girls; they'd have carried all before them." And, almost as though it were a personal affront, he declared, on the spot, that he was bored, sat down on the sofa and immediately fell asleep. His pretty little face looked rather pale, as it fell back on the sofa cushion. "Look how pretty he is," said Grushenka, taking Mitya up to him. "I was combing his hair just now; his hair's like flax, and so thick...." And, bending over him tenderly, she kissed his forehead. Kalganov instantly opened his eyes, looked at her, stood up, and with the most anxious air inquired where was Maximov? "So that's who it is you want." Grushenka laughed. "Stay with me a minute. Mitya, run and find his Maximov." Maximov, it appeared, could not tear himself away from the girls, only running away from time to time to pour himself out a glass of liqueur. He had drunk two cups of chocolate. His face was red, and his nose was crimson; his eyes were moist and mawkishly sweet. He ran up and announced that he was going to dance the "sabotiere." "They taught me all those well-bred, aristocratic dances when I was little...." "Go, go with him, Mitya, and I'll watch from here how he dances," said Grushenka. "No, no, I'm coming to look on, too," exclaimed Kalganov, brushing aside in the most naive way Grushenka's offer to sit with him. They all went to look on. Maximov danced his dance. But it roused no great admiration in any one but Mitya. It consisted of nothing but skipping and hopping, kicking up the feet, and at every skip Maximov slapped the upturned sole of his foot. Kalganov did not like it at all, but Mitya kissed the dancer. "Thanks. You're tired perhaps? What are you looking for here? Would you like some sweets? A cigar, perhaps?" "A cigarette." "Don't you want a drink?" "I'll just have a liqueur.... Have you any chocolates?" "Yes, there's a heap of them on the table there. Choose one, my dear soul!" "I like one with vanilla ... for old people. He he!" "No, brother, we've none of that special sort." "I say," the old man bent down to whisper in Mitya's ear. "That girl there, little Marya, he he! How would it be if you were to help me make friends with her?" "So that's what you're after! No, brother, that won't do!" "I'd do no harm to any one," Maximov muttered disconsolately. "Oh, all right, all right. They only come here to dance and sing, you know, brother. But damn it all, wait a bit!... Eat and drink and be merry, meanwhile. Don't you want money?" "Later on, perhaps," smiled Maximov. "All right, all right...." Mitya's head was burning. He went outside to the wooden balcony which ran round the whole building on the inner side, overlooking the courtyard. The fresh air revived him. He stood alone in a dark corner, and suddenly clutched his head in both hands. His scattered thoughts came together; his sensations blended into a whole and threw a sudden light into his mind. A fearful and terrible light! "If I'm to shoot myself, why not now?" passed through his mind. "Why not go for the pistols, bring them here, and here, in this dark dirty corner, make an end?" Almost a minute he stood, undecided. A few hours earlier, when he had been dashing here, he was pursued by disgrace, by the theft he had committed, and that blood, that blood!... But yet it was easier for him then. Then everything was over: he had lost her, given her up. She was gone, for him--oh, then his death sentence had been easier for him; at least it had seemed necessary, inevitable, for what had he to stay on earth for? But now? Was it the same as then? Now one phantom, one terror at least was at an end: that first, rightful lover, that fateful figure had vanished, leaving no trace. The terrible phantom had turned into something so small, so comic; it had been carried into the bedroom and locked in. It would never return. She was ashamed, and from her eyes he could see now whom she loved. Now he had everything to make life happy ... but he could not go on living, he could not; oh, damnation! "O God! restore to life the man I knocked down at the fence! Let this fearful cup pass from me! Lord, thou hast wrought miracles for such sinners as me! But what, what if the old man's alive? Oh, then the shame of the other disgrace I would wipe away. I would restore the stolen money. I'd give it back; I'd get it somehow.... No trace of that shame will remain except in my heart for ever! But no, no; oh, impossible cowardly dreams! Oh, damnation!" Yet there was a ray of light and hope in his darkness. He jumped up and ran back to the room--to her, to her, his queen for ever! Was not one moment of her love worth all the rest of life, even in the agonies of disgrace? This wild question clutched at his heart. "To her, to her alone, to see her, to hear her, to think of nothing, to forget everything, if only for that night, for an hour, for a moment!" Just as he turned from the balcony into the passage, he came upon the landlord, Trifon Borissovitch. He thought he looked gloomy and worried, and fancied he had come to find him. "What is it, Trifon Borissovitch? are you looking for me?" "No, sir." The landlord seemed disconcerted. "Why should I be looking for you? Where have you been?" "Why do you look so glum? You're not angry, are you? Wait a bit, you shall soon get to bed.... What's the time?" "It'll be three o'clock. Past three, it must be." "We'll leave off soon. We'll leave off." "Don't mention it; it doesn't matter. Keep it up as long as you like...." "What's the matter with him?" Mitya wondered for an instant, and he ran back to the room where the girls were dancing. But she was not there. She was not in the blue room either; there was no one but Kalganov asleep on the sofa. Mitya peeped behind the curtain--she was there. She was sitting in the corner, on a trunk. Bent forward, with her head and arms on the bed close by, she was crying bitterly, doing her utmost to stifle her sobs that she might not be heard. Seeing Mitya, she beckoned him to her, and when he ran to her, she grasped his hand tightly. "Mitya, Mitya, I loved him, you know. How I have loved him these five years, all that time! Did I love him or only my own anger? No, him, him! It's a lie that it was my anger I loved and not him. Mitya, I was only seventeen then; he was so kind to me, so merry; he used to sing to me.... Or so it seemed to a silly girl like me.... And now, O Lord, it's not the same man. Even his face is not the same; he's different altogether. I shouldn't have known him. I drove here with Timofey, and all the way I was thinking how I should meet him, what I should say to him, how we should look at one another. My soul was faint, and all of a sudden it was just as though he had emptied a pail of dirty water over me. He talked to me like a schoolmaster, all so grave and learned; he met me so solemnly that I was struck dumb. I couldn't get a word in. At first I thought he was ashamed to talk before his great big Pole. I sat staring at him and wondering why I couldn't say a word to him now. It must have been his wife that ruined him; you know he threw me up to get married. She must have changed him like that. Mitya, how shameful it is! Oh, Mitya, I'm ashamed, I'm ashamed for all my life. Curse it, curse it, curse those five years!" And again she burst into tears, but clung tight to Mitya's hand and did not let it go. "Mitya, darling, stay, don't go away. I want to say one word to you," she whispered, and suddenly raised her face to him. "Listen, tell me who it is I love? I love one man here. Who is that man? That's what you must tell me." A smile lighted up her face that was swollen with weeping, and her eyes shone in the half darkness. "A falcon flew in, and my heart sank. 'Fool! that's the man you love!' That was what my heart whispered to me at once. You came in and all grew bright. What's he afraid of? I wondered. For you were frightened; you couldn't speak. It's not them he's afraid of--could you be frightened of any one? It's me he's afraid of, I thought, only me. So Fenya told you, you little stupid, how I called to Alyosha out of the window that I'd loved Mityenka for one hour, and that I was going now to love ... another. Mitya, Mitya, how could I be such a fool as to think I could love any one after you? Do you forgive me, Mitya? Do you forgive me or not? Do you love me? Do you love me?" She jumped up and held him with both hands on his shoulders. Mitya, dumb with rapture, gazed into her eyes, at her face, at her smile, and suddenly clasped her tightly in his arms and kissed her passionately. "You will forgive me for having tormented you? It was through spite I tormented you all. It was for spite I drove the old man out of his mind.... Do you remember how you drank at my house one day and broke the wine-glass? I remembered that and I broke a glass to-day and drank 'to my vile heart.' Mitya, my falcon, why don't you kiss me? He kissed me once, and now he draws back and looks and listens. Why listen to me? Kiss me, kiss me hard, that's right. If you love, well, then, love! I'll be your slave now, your slave for the rest of my life. It's sweet to be a slave. Kiss me! Beat me, ill-treat me, do what you will with me.... And I do deserve to suffer. Stay, wait, afterwards, I won't have that...." she suddenly thrust him away. "Go along, Mitya, I'll come and have some wine, I want to be drunk, I'm going to get drunk and dance; I must, I must!" She tore herself away from him and disappeared behind the curtain. Mitya followed like a drunken man. "Yes, come what may--whatever may happen now, for one minute I'd give the whole world," he thought. Grushenka did, in fact, toss off a whole glass of champagne at one gulp, and became at once very tipsy. She sat down in the same chair as before, with a blissful smile on her face. Her cheeks were glowing, her lips were burning, her flashing eyes were moist; there was passionate appeal in her eyes. Even Kalganov felt a stir at the heart and went up to her. "Did you feel how I kissed you when you were asleep just now?" she said thickly. "I'm drunk now, that's what it is.... And aren't you drunk? And why isn't Mitya drinking? Why don't you drink, Mitya? I'm drunk, and you don't drink...." "I am drunk! I'm drunk as it is ... drunk with you ... and now I'll be drunk with wine, too." He drank off another glass, and--he thought it strange himself--that glass made him completely drunk. He was suddenly drunk, although till that moment he had been quite sober, he remembered that. From that moment everything whirled about him, as though he were delirious. He walked, laughed, talked to everybody, without knowing what he was doing. Only one persistent burning sensation made itself felt continually, "like a red-hot coal in his heart," he said afterwards. He went up to her, sat beside her, gazed at her, listened to her.... She became very talkative, kept calling every one to her, and beckoned to different girls out of the chorus. When the girl came up, she either kissed her, or made the sign of the cross over her. In another minute she might have cried. She was greatly amused by the "little old man," as she called Maximov. He ran up every minute to kiss her hands, "each little finger," and finally he danced another dance to an old song, which he sang himself. He danced with special vigor to the refrain: The little pig says--umph! umph! umph! The little calf says--moo, moo, moo, The little duck says--quack, quack, quack, The little goose says--ga, ga, ga. The hen goes strutting through the porch; Troo-roo-roo-roo-roo, she'll say, Troo-roo-roo-roo-roo, she'll say! "Give him something, Mitya," said Grushenka. "Give him a present, he's poor, you know. Ah, the poor, the insulted!... Do you know, Mitya, I shall go into a nunnery. No, I really shall one day, Alyosha said something to me to-day that I shall remember all my life.... Yes.... But to-day let us dance. To-morrow to the nunnery, but to-day we'll dance. I want to play to-day, good people, and what of it? God will forgive us. If I were God, I'd forgive every one: 'My dear sinners, from this day forth I forgive you.' I'm going to beg forgiveness: 'Forgive me, good people, a silly wench.' I'm a beast, that's what I am. But I want to pray. I gave a little onion. Wicked as I've been, I want to pray. Mitya, let them dance, don't stop them. Every one in the world is good. Every one--even the worst of them. The world's a nice place. Though we're bad the world's all right. We're good and bad, good and bad.... Come, tell me, I've something to ask you: come here every one, and I'll ask you: Why am I so good? You know I am good. I'm very good.... Come, why am I so good?" So Grushenka babbled on, getting more and more drunk. At last she announced that she was going to dance, too. She got up from her chair, staggering. "Mitya, don't give me any more wine--if I ask you, don't give it to me. Wine doesn't give peace. Everything's going round, the stove, and everything. I want to dance. Let every one see how I dance ... let them see how beautifully I dance...." She really meant it. She pulled a white cambric handkerchief out of her pocket, and took it by one corner in her right hand, to wave it in the dance. Mitya ran to and fro, the girls were quiet, and got ready to break into a dancing song at the first signal. Maximov, hearing that Grushenka wanted to dance, squealed with delight, and ran skipping about in front of her, humming: With legs so slim and sides so trim And its little tail curled tight. But Grushenka waved her handkerchief at him and drove him away. "Sh-h! Mitya, why don't they come? Let every one come ... to look on. Call them in, too, that were locked in.... Why did you lock them in? Tell them I'm going to dance. Let them look on, too...." Mitya walked with a drunken swagger to the locked door, and began knocking to the Poles with his fist. "Hi, you ... Podvysotskys! Come, she's going to dance. She calls you." "_Lajdak!_" one of the Poles shouted in reply. "You're a _lajdak_ yourself! You're a little scoundrel, that's what you are." "Leave off laughing at Poland," said Kalganov sententiously. He too was drunk. "Be quiet, boy! If I call him a scoundrel, it doesn't mean that I called all Poland so. One _lajdak_ doesn't make a Poland. Be quiet, my pretty boy, eat a sweetmeat." "Ach, what fellows! As though they were not men. Why won't they make friends?" said Grushenka, and went forward to dance. The chorus broke into "Ah, my porch, my new porch!" Grushenka flung back her head, half opened her lips, smiled, waved her handkerchief, and suddenly, with a violent lurch, stood still in the middle of the room, looking bewildered. "I'm weak...." she said in an exhausted voice. "Forgive me.... I'm weak, I can't.... I'm sorry." She bowed to the chorus, and then began bowing in all directions. "I'm sorry.... Forgive me...." "The lady's been drinking. The pretty lady has been drinking," voices were heard saying. "The lady's drunk too much," Maximov explained to the girls, giggling. "Mitya, lead me away ... take me," said Grushenka helplessly. Mitya pounced on her, snatched her up in his arms, and carried the precious burden through the curtains. "Well, now I'll go," thought Kalganov, and walking out of the blue room, he closed the two halves of the door after him. But the orgy in the larger room went on and grew louder and louder. Mitya laid Grushenka on the bed and kissed her on the lips. "Don't touch me...." she faltered, in an imploring voice. "Don't touch me, till I'm yours.... I've told you I'm yours, but don't touch me ... spare me.... With them here, with them close, you mustn't. He's here. It's nasty here...." "I'll obey you! I won't think of it ... I worship you!" muttered Mitya. "Yes, it's nasty here, it's abominable." And still holding her in his arms, he sank on his knees by the bedside. "I know, though you're a brute, you're generous," Grushenka articulated with difficulty. "It must be honorable ... it shall be honorable for the future ... and let us be honest, let us be good, not brutes, but good ... take me away, take me far away, do you hear? I don't want it to be here, but far, far away...." "Oh, yes, yes, it must be!" said Mitya, pressing her in his arms. "I'll take you and we'll fly away.... Oh, I'd give my whole life for one year only to know about that blood!" "What blood?" asked Grushenka, bewildered. "Nothing," muttered Mitya, through his teeth. "Grusha, you wanted to be honest, but I'm a thief. But I've stolen money from Katya.... Disgrace, a disgrace!" "From Katya, from that young lady? No, you didn't steal it. Give it her back, take it from me.... Why make a fuss? Now everything of mine is yours. What does money matter? We shall waste it anyway.... Folks like us are bound to waste money. But we'd better go and work the land. I want to dig the earth with my own hands. We must work, do you hear? Alyosha said so. I won't be your mistress, I'll be faithful to you, I'll be your slave, I'll work for you. We'll go to the young lady and bow down to her together, so that she may forgive us, and then we'll go away. And if she won't forgive us, we'll go, anyway. Take her her money and love me.... Don't love her.... Don't love her any more. If you love her, I shall strangle her.... I'll put out both her eyes with a needle...." "I love you. I love only you. I'll love you in Siberia...." "Why Siberia? Never mind, Siberia, if you like. I don't care ... we'll work ... there's snow in Siberia.... I love driving in the snow ... and must have bells.... Do you hear, there's a bell ringing? Where is that bell ringing? There are people coming.... Now it's stopped." She closed her eyes, exhausted, and suddenly fell asleep for an instant. There had certainly been the sound of a bell in the distance, but the ringing had ceased. Mitya let his head sink on her breast. He did not notice that the bell had ceased ringing, nor did he notice that the songs had ceased, and that instead of singing and drunken clamor there was absolute stillness in the house. Grushenka opened her eyes. "What's the matter? Was I asleep? Yes ... a bell ... I've been asleep and dreamt I was driving over the snow with bells, and I dozed. I was with some one I loved, with you. And far, far away. I was holding you and kissing you, nestling close to you. I was cold, and the snow glistened.... You know how the snow glistens at night when the moon shines. It was as though I was not on earth. I woke up, and my dear one is close to me. How sweet that is!..." "Close to you," murmured Mitya, kissing her dress, her bosom, her hands. And suddenly he had a strange fancy: it seemed to him that she was looking straight before her, not at him, not into his face, but over his head, with an intent, almost uncanny fixity. An expression of wonder, almost of alarm, came suddenly into her face. "Mitya, who is that looking at us?" she whispered. Mitya turned, and saw that some one had, in fact, parted the curtains and seemed to be watching them. And not one person alone, it seemed. He jumped up and walked quickly to the intruder. "Here, come to us, come here," said a voice, speaking not loudly, but firmly and peremptorily. Mitya passed to the other side of the curtain and stood stock still. The room was filled with people, but not those who had been there before. An instantaneous shiver ran down his back, and he shuddered. He recognized all those people instantly. That tall, stout old man in the overcoat and forage-cap with a cockade--was the police captain, Mihail Makarovitch. And that "consumptive-looking" trim dandy, "who always has such polished boots"--that was the deputy prosecutor. "He has a chronometer worth four hundred roubles; he showed it to me." And that small young man in spectacles.... Mitya forgot his surname though he knew him, had seen him: he was the "investigating lawyer," from the "school of jurisprudence," who had only lately come to the town. And this man--the inspector of police, Mavriky Mavrikyevitch, a man he knew well. And those fellows with the brass plates on, why are they here? And those other two ... peasants.... And there at the door Kalganov with Trifon Borissovitch.... "Gentlemen! What's this for, gentlemen?" began Mitya, but suddenly, as though beside himself, not knowing what he was doing, he cried aloud, at the top of his voice: "I un--der--stand!" The young man in spectacles moved forward suddenly, and stepping up to Mitya, began with dignity, though hurriedly: "We have to make ... in brief, I beg you to come this way, this way to the sofa.... It is absolutely imperative that you should give an explanation." "The old man!" cried Mitya frantically. "The old man and his blood!... I understand." And he sank, almost fell, on a chair close by, as though he had been mown down by a scythe. "You understand? He understands it! Monster and parricide! Your father's blood cries out against you!" the old captain of police roared suddenly, stepping up to Mitya. He was beside himself, crimson in the face and quivering all over. "This is impossible!" cried the small young man. "Mihail Makarovitch, Mihail Makarovitch, this won't do!... I beg you'll allow me to speak. I should never have expected such behavior from you...." "This is delirium, gentlemen, raving delirium," cried the captain of police; "look at him: drunk, at this time of night, in the company of a disreputable woman, with the blood of his father on his hands.... It's delirium!..." "I beg you most earnestly, dear Mihail Makarovitch, to restrain your feelings," the prosecutor said in a rapid whisper to the old police captain, "or I shall be forced to resort to--" But the little lawyer did not allow him to finish. He turned to Mitya, and delivered himself in a loud, firm, dignified voice: "Ex-Lieutenant Karamazov, it is my duty to inform you that you are charged with the murder of your father, Fyodor Pavlovitch Karamazov, perpetrated this night...." He said something more, and the prosecutor, too, put in something, but though Mitya heard them he did not understand them. He stared at them all with wild eyes.

Book 8, Chapter 8

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-8-chapter-8

The party begins, with the champagne flowing and scrumptious morsels for everyone. The peasant girls dance and sing, somewhat bawdily. Grushenka watches everything from an armchair, pulling Dmitri over to whisper to him from time to time. Dmitri goes out on the verandah to get some fresh air. He encounters the innkeeper, who seems to be worried about something. Dmitri goes back to the party but Grushenka isn't there. He finds her in another room, weeping in a corner. She declares her love for him, and Dmitri is ecstatic. They return to the party and even get the Poles out of their room to join the fun. The Poles, however, aren't amused by Dmitri. Grushenka is suddenly exhausted, and Dmitri takes her back behind the curtain dividing the room. Drunk, exhausted, and overjoyed, Grushenka and Dmitri dream of their new life together. Their conversation is interrupted, however, by the arrival of the police commissioner, the deputy commissioner, the deputy prosecutor, and the district attorney. The attorney declares that they are arresting Dmitri for the murder of his father. Dmitri is utterly bewildered.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/10.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_0_part_10.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 10

chapter 10

{"name": "Chapter 10", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-1-chapters-1-11", "summary": "The village of Trantridge demonstrates a particular levity and its residents tend to drink hard. The chief pleasure of many residents is going to Chaseborough, a decaying market town several miles away. Tess did not join in the weekly pilgrimages, but under pressure from matrons not much older than herself, she finally consents to go. During one trip there, she finds Alec d'Urberville also in town, and he promises to see her again. Tess goes on alone and finds a barn where the residents are dancing. Tess does not abhor dancing, but she did not want to do so, for the movement of the dancers grew more passionate. Tess finds Alec again, but she refuses his offers of assistance home. Tess goes to the other girls, one of whom is Car Darch, nicknamed Queen of Spades, and her sister, Nancy, nicknamed Queen of Diamonds. Car carries a wicker-basket containing her mother's groceries on the top of her head, and a stream of treacle had dripped down below her waist. All of the other girls laugh at Car, including Tess. However, Car notices Tess and confronts her. Car begins to disrobe to fight Tess, but Tess refuses and says that if she knew that Car was of that sort, she would not have consented to come with such a whorage. Car merely insults and continuously berates Tess, making her feel indignant and ashamed. Alec finds Tess once again, and he tells Tess to come with him. As Alec rescues Tess, Car's mother laughs, realizing that Tess has gotten out of the frying pan and into the fire.", "analysis": "The journey to Chaseborough for dancing juxtaposes with the previous chapters by demonstrating that Tess, despite her failure to be accepted as a true d'Urberville, is in some considerable sense still different from the common people with whom she must associate. She is neither the same as the low-class Darch sisters nor the aristocratic d'Urbervilles. Tess at first refuses to go on the weekly pilgrimages for dancing, and even when she consents to go she refuses to dance when it turns more sexual. This returns to the theme of Tess as a sexual innocent; she rejects both the sexuality of Alec d'Urberville and that of the dancers. Throughout this chapter, Hardy places Tess d'Urberville as an outsider among the working class laborers with whom she travels home. Her status is evident even to Car Darch, who immediately notices when Tess laughs and ignores the others. While Tess remains without guile when she is confronted by Car, she nevertheless appears as strikingly out of place among the others. Car provides a stark contrast to Tess: she is a vulgar, brassy woman who is combative and lewd, in comparison to the more demure Tess. If the previous chapters emphasized that Tess is not a member of the upper orders, this chapter disputes the idea that she is one of the lower class. The rescue of Tess by Alec d'Urberville demonstrates the capability for noble behavior that he may demonstrate, yet even in this action there is the great possibility that he may act out of ignoble motives. As Car's mother realizes, Tess is now in greater danger with Alec than she would be around Car. Car's mother thus foreshadows the later tragic events that will come to fruition"}

Every village has its idiosyncrasy, its constitution, often its own code of morality. The levity of some of the younger women in and about Trantridge was marked, and was perhaps symptomatic of the choice spirit who ruled The Slopes in that vicinity. The place had also a more abiding defect; it drank hard. The staple conversation on the farms around was on the uselessness of saving money; and smock-frocked arithmeticians, leaning on their ploughs or hoes, would enter into calculations of great nicety to prove that parish relief was a fuller provision for a man in his old age than any which could result from savings out of their wages during a whole lifetime. The chief pleasure of these philosophers lay in going every Saturday night, when work was done, to Chaseborough, a decayed market-town two or three miles distant; and, returning in the small hours of the next morning, to spend Sunday in sleeping off the dyspeptic effects of the curious compounds sold to them as beer by the monopolizers of the once-independent inns. For a long time Tess did not join in the weekly pilgrimages. But under pressure from matrons not much older than herself--for a field-man's wages being as high at twenty-one as at forty, marriage was early here--Tess at length consented to go. Her first experience of the journey afforded her more enjoyment than she had expected, the hilariousness of the others being quite contagious after her monotonous attention to the poultry-farm all the week. She went again and again. Being graceful and interesting, standing moreover on the momentary threshold of womanhood, her appearance drew down upon her some sly regards from loungers in the streets of Chaseborough; hence, though sometimes her journey to the town was made independently, she always searched for her fellows at nightfall, to have the protection of their companionship homeward. This had gone on for a month or two when there came a Saturday in September, on which a fair and a market coincided; and the pilgrims from Trantridge sought double delights at the inns on that account. Tess's occupations made her late in setting out, so that her comrades reached the town long before her. It was a fine September evening, just before sunset, when yellow lights struggle with blue shades in hairlike lines, and the atmosphere itself forms a prospect without aid from more solid objects, except the innumerable winged insects that dance in it. Through this low-lit mistiness Tess walked leisurely along. She did not discover the coincidence of the market with the fair till she had reached the place, by which time it was close upon dusk. Her limited marketing was soon completed; and then as usual she began to look about for some of the Trantridge cottagers. At first she could not find them, and she was informed that most of them had gone to what they called a private little jig at the house of a hay-trusser and peat-dealer who had transactions with their farm. He lived in an out-of-the-way nook of the townlet, and in trying to find her course thither her eyes fell upon Mr d'Urberville standing at a street corner. "What--my Beauty? You here so late?" he said. She told him that she was simply waiting for company homeward. "I'll see you again," said he over her shoulder as she went on down the back lane. Approaching the hay-trussers, she could hear the fiddled notes of a reel proceeding from some building in the rear; but no sound of dancing was audible--an exceptional state of things for these parts, where as a rule the stamping drowned the music. The front door being open she could see straight through the house into the garden at the back as far as the shades of night would allow; and nobody appearing to her knock, she traversed the dwelling and went up the path to the outhouse whence the sound had attracted her. It was a windowless erection used for storage, and from the open door there floated into the obscurity a mist of yellow radiance, which at first Tess thought to be illuminated smoke. But on drawing nearer she perceived that it was a cloud of dust, lit by candles within the outhouse, whose beams upon the haze carried forward the outline of the doorway into the wide night of the garden. When she came close and looked in she beheld indistinct forms racing up and down to the figure of the dance, the silence of their footfalls arising from their being overshoe in "scroff"--that is to say, the powdery residuum from the storage of peat and other products, the stirring of which by their turbulent feet created the nebulosity that involved the scene. Through this floating, fusty _debris_ of peat and hay, mixed with the perspirations and warmth of the dancers, and forming together a sort of vegeto-human pollen, the muted fiddles feebly pushed their notes, in marked contrast to the spirit with which the measure was trodden out. They coughed as they danced, and laughed as they coughed. Of the rushing couples there could barely be discerned more than the high lights--the indistinctness shaping them to satyrs clasping nymphs--a multiplicity of Pans whirling a multiplicity of Syrinxes; Lotis attempting to elude Priapus, and always failing. At intervals a couple would approach the doorway for air, and the haze no longer veiling their features, the demigods resolved themselves into the homely personalities of her own next-door neighbours. Could Trantridge in two or three short hours have metamorphosed itself thus madly! Some Sileni of the throng sat on benches and hay-trusses by the wall; and one of them recognized her. "The maids don't think it respectable to dance at The Flower-de-Luce," he explained. "They don't like to let everybody see which be their fancy-men. Besides, the house sometimes shuts up just when their jints begin to get greased. So we come here and send out for liquor." "But when be any of you going home?" asked Tess with some anxiety. "Now--a'most directly. This is all but the last jig." She waited. The reel drew to a close, and some of the party were in the mind of starting. But others would not, and another dance was formed. This surely would end it, thought Tess. But it merged in yet another. She became restless and uneasy; yet, having waited so long, it was necessary to wait longer; on account of the fair the roads were dotted with roving characters of possibly ill intent; and, though not fearful of measurable dangers, she feared the unknown. Had she been near Marlott she would have had less dread. "Don't ye be nervous, my dear good soul," expostulated, between his coughs, a young man with a wet face and his straw hat so far back upon his head that the brim encircled it like the nimbus of a saint. "What's yer hurry? To-morrow is Sunday, thank God, and we can sleep it off in church-time. Now, have a turn with me?" She did not abhor dancing, but she was not going to dance here. The movement grew more passionate: the fiddlers behind the luminous pillar of cloud now and then varied the air by playing on the wrong side of the bridge or with the back of the bow. But it did not matter; the panting shapes spun onwards. They did not vary their partners if their inclination were to stick to previous ones. Changing partners simply meant that a satisfactory choice had not as yet been arrived at by one or other of the pair, and by this time every couple had been suitably matched. It was then that the ecstasy and the dream began, in which emotion was the matter of the universe, and matter but an adventitious intrusion likely to hinder you from spinning where you wanted to spin. Suddenly there was a dull thump on the ground: a couple had fallen, and lay in a mixed heap. The next couple, unable to check its progress, came toppling over the obstacle. An inner cloud of dust rose around the prostrate figures amid the general one of the room, in which a twitching entanglement of arms and legs was discernible. "You shall catch it for this, my gentleman, when you get home!" burst in female accents from the human heap--those of the unhappy partner of the man whose clumsiness had caused the mishap; she happened also to be his recently married wife, in which assortment there was nothing unusual at Trantridge as long as any affection remained between wedded couples; and, indeed, it was not uncustomary in their later lives, to avoid making odd lots of the single people between whom there might be a warm understanding. A loud laugh from behind Tess's back, in the shade of the garden, united with the titter within the room. She looked round, and saw the red coal of a cigar: Alec d'Urberville was standing there alone. He beckoned to her, and she reluctantly retreated towards him. "Well, my Beauty, what are you doing here?" She was so tired after her long day and her walk that she confided her trouble to him--that she had been waiting ever since he saw her to have their company home, because the road at night was strange to her. "But it seems they will never leave off, and I really think I will wait no longer." "Certainly do not. I have only a saddle-horse here to-day; but come to The Flower-de-Luce, and I'll hire a trap, and drive you home with me." Tess, though flattered, had never quite got over her original mistrust of him, and, despite their tardiness, she preferred to walk home with the work-folk. So she answered that she was much obliged to him, but would not trouble him. "I have said that I will wait for 'em, and they will expect me to now." "Very well, Miss Independence. Please yourself... Then I shall not hurry... My good Lord, what a kick-up they are having there!" He had not put himself forward into the light, but some of them had perceived him, and his presence led to a slight pause and a consideration of how the time was flying. As soon as he had re-lit a cigar and walked away the Trantridge people began to collect themselves from amid those who had come in from other farms, and prepared to leave in a body. Their bundles and baskets were gathered up, and half an hour later, when the clock-chime sounded a quarter past eleven, they were straggling along the lane which led up the hill towards their homes. It was a three-mile walk, along a dry white road, made whiter to-night by the light of the moon. Tess soon perceived as she walked in the flock, sometimes with this one, sometimes with that, that the fresh night air was producing staggerings and serpentine courses among the men who had partaken too freely; some of the more careless women also were wandering in their gait--to wit, a dark virago, Car Darch, dubbed Queen of Spades, till lately a favourite of d'Urberville's; Nancy, her sister, nicknamed the Queen of Diamonds; and the young married woman who had already tumbled down. Yet however terrestrial and lumpy their appearance just now to the mean unglamoured eye, to themselves the case was different. They followed the road with a sensation that they were soaring along in a supporting medium, possessed of original and profound thoughts, themselves and surrounding nature forming an organism of which all the parts harmoniously and joyously interpenetrated each other. They were as sublime as the moon and stars above them, and the moon and stars were as ardent as they. Tess, however, had undergone such painful experiences of this kind in her father's house that the discovery of their condition spoilt the pleasure she was beginning to feel in the moonlight journey. Yet she stuck to the party, for reasons above given. In the open highway they had progressed in scattered order; but now their route was through a field-gate, and the foremost finding a difficulty in opening it, they closed up together. This leading pedestrian was Car the Queen of Spades, who carried a wicker-basket containing her mother's groceries, her own draperies, and other purchases for the week. The basket being large and heavy, Car had placed it for convenience of porterage on the top of her head, where it rode on in jeopardized balance as she walked with arms akimbo. "Well--whatever is that a-creeping down thy back, Car Darch?" said one of the group suddenly. All looked at Car. Her gown was a light cotton print, and from the back of her head a kind of rope could be seen descending to some distance below her waist, like a Chinaman's queue. "'Tis her hair falling down," said another. No; it was not her hair: it was a black stream of something oozing from her basket, and it glistened like a slimy snake in the cold still rays of the moon. "'Tis treacle," said an observant matron. Treacle it was. Car's poor old grandmother had a weakness for the sweet stuff. Honey she had in plenty out of her own hives, but treacle was what her soul desired, and Car had been about to give her a treat of surprise. Hastily lowering the basket the dark girl found that the vessel containing the syrup had been smashed within. By this time there had arisen a shout of laughter at the extraordinary appearance of Car's back, which irritated the dark queen into getting rid of the disfigurement by the first sudden means available, and independently of the help of the scoffers. She rushed excitedly into the field they were about to cross, and flinging herself flat on her back upon the grass, began to wipe her gown as well as she could by spinning horizontally on the herbage and dragging herself over it upon her elbows. The laughter rang louder; they clung to the gate, to the posts, rested on their staves, in the weakness engendered by their convulsions at the spectacle of Car. Our heroine, who had hitherto held her peace, at this wild moment could not help joining in with the rest. It was a misfortune--in more ways than one. No sooner did the dark queen hear the soberer richer note of Tess among those of the other work-people than a long-smouldering sense of rivalry inflamed her to madness. She sprang to her feet and closely faced the object of her dislike. "How darest th' laugh at me, hussy!" she cried. "I couldn't really help it when t'others did," apologized Tess, still tittering. "Ah, th'st think th' beest everybody, dostn't, because th' beest first favourite with He just now! But stop a bit, my lady, stop a bit! I'm as good as two of such! Look here--here's at 'ee!" To Tess's horror the dark queen began stripping off the bodice of her gown--which for the added reason of its ridiculed condition she was only too glad to be free of--till she had bared her plump neck, shoulders, and arms to the moonshine, under which they looked as luminous and beautiful as some Praxitelean creation, in their possession of the faultless rotundities of a lusty country-girl. She closed her fists and squared up at Tess. "Indeed, then, I shall not fight!" said the latter majestically; "and if I had know you was of that sort, I wouldn't have so let myself down as to come with such a whorage as this is!" The rather too inclusive speech brought down a torrent of vituperation from other quarters upon fair Tess's unlucky head, particularly from the Queen of Diamonds, who having stood in the relations to d'Urberville that Car had also been suspected of, united with the latter against the common enemy. Several other women also chimed in, with an animus which none of them would have been so fatuous as to show but for the rollicking evening they had passed. Thereupon, finding Tess unfairly browbeaten, the husbands and lovers tried to make peace by defending her; but the result of that attempt was directly to increase the war. Tess was indignant and ashamed. She no longer minded the loneliness of the way and the lateness of the hour; her one object was to get away from the whole crew as soon as possible. She knew well enough that the better among them would repent of their passion next day. They were all now inside the field, and she was edging back to rush off alone when a horseman emerged almost silently from the corner of the hedge that screened the road, and Alec d'Urberville looked round upon them. "What the devil is all this row about, work-folk?" he asked. The explanation was not readily forthcoming; and, in truth, he did not require any. Having heard their voices while yet some way off he had ridden creepingly forward, and learnt enough to satisfy himself. Tess was standing apart from the rest, near the gate. He bent over towards her. "Jump up behind me," he whispered, "and we'll get shot of the screaming cats in a jiffy!" She felt almost ready to faint, so vivid was her sense of the crisis. At almost any other moment of her life she would have refused such proffered aid and company, as she had refused them several times before; and now the loneliness would not of itself have forced her to do otherwise. But coming as the invitation did at the particular juncture when fear and indignation at these adversaries could be transformed by a spring of the foot into a triumph over them, she abandoned herself to her impulse, climbed the gate, put her toe upon his instep, and scrambled into the saddle behind him. The pair were speeding away into the distant gray by the time that the contentious revellers became aware of what had happened. The Queen of Spades forgot the stain on her bodice, and stood beside the Queen of Diamonds and the new-married, staggering young woman--all with a gaze of fixity in the direction in which the horse's tramp was diminishing into silence on the road. "What be ye looking at?" asked a man who had not observed the incident. "Ho-ho-ho!" laughed dark Car. "Hee-hee-hee!" laughed the tippling bride, as she steadied herself on the arm of her fond husband. "Heu-heu-heu!" laughed dark Car's mother, stroking her moustache as she explained laconically: "Out of the frying-pan into the fire!" Then these children of the open air, whom even excess of alcohol could scarce injure permanently, betook themselves to the field-path; and as they went there moved onward with them, around the shadow of each one's head, a circle of opalized light, formed by the moon's rays upon the glistening sheet of dew. Each pedestrian could see no halo but his or her own, which never deserted the head-shadow, whatever its vulgar unsteadiness might be; but adhered to it, and persistently beautified it; till the erratic motions seemed an inherent part of the irradiation, and the fumes of their breathing a component of the night's mist; and the spirit of the scene, and of the moonlight, and of Nature, seemed harmoniously to mingle with the spirit of wine.

Chapter 10

https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-1-chapters-1-11

The village of Trantridge demonstrates a particular levity and its residents tend to drink hard. The chief pleasure of many residents is going to Chaseborough, a decaying market town several miles away. Tess did not join in the weekly pilgrimages, but under pressure from matrons not much older than herself, she finally consents to go. During one trip there, she finds Alec d'Urberville also in town, and he promises to see her again. Tess goes on alone and finds a barn where the residents are dancing. Tess does not abhor dancing, but she did not want to do so, for the movement of the dancers grew more passionate. Tess finds Alec again, but she refuses his offers of assistance home. Tess goes to the other girls, one of whom is Car Darch, nicknamed Queen of Spades, and her sister, Nancy, nicknamed Queen of Diamonds. Car carries a wicker-basket containing her mother's groceries on the top of her head, and a stream of treacle had dripped down below her waist. All of the other girls laugh at Car, including Tess. However, Car notices Tess and confronts her. Car begins to disrobe to fight Tess, but Tess refuses and says that if she knew that Car was of that sort, she would not have consented to come with such a whorage. Car merely insults and continuously berates Tess, making her feel indignant and ashamed. Alec finds Tess once again, and he tells Tess to come with him. As Alec rescues Tess, Car's mother laughs, realizing that Tess has gotten out of the frying pan and into the fire.

The journey to Chaseborough for dancing juxtaposes with the previous chapters by demonstrating that Tess, despite her failure to be accepted as a true d'Urberville, is in some considerable sense still different from the common people with whom she must associate. She is neither the same as the low-class Darch sisters nor the aristocratic d'Urbervilles. Tess at first refuses to go on the weekly pilgrimages for dancing, and even when she consents to go she refuses to dance when it turns more sexual. This returns to the theme of Tess as a sexual innocent; she rejects both the sexuality of Alec d'Urberville and that of the dancers. Throughout this chapter, Hardy places Tess d'Urberville as an outsider among the working class laborers with whom she travels home. Her status is evident even to Car Darch, who immediately notices when Tess laughs and ignores the others. While Tess remains without guile when she is confronted by Car, she nevertheless appears as strikingly out of place among the others. Car provides a stark contrast to Tess: she is a vulgar, brassy woman who is combative and lewd, in comparison to the more demure Tess. If the previous chapters emphasized that Tess is not a member of the upper orders, this chapter disputes the idea that she is one of the lower class. The rescue of Tess by Alec d'Urberville demonstrates the capability for noble behavior that he may demonstrate, yet even in this action there is the great possibility that he may act out of ignoble motives. As Car's mother realizes, Tess is now in greater danger with Alec than she would be around Car. Car's mother thus foreshadows the later tragic events that will come to fruition

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/06.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_5_part_0.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapter 6

chapter 6

{"name": "Chapter 6", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210304030722/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/picture-dorian-gray/summary/chapter-6", "summary": "The next night, Henry and Basil get to the restaurant before Dorian, and they take advantage of the opportunity to discuss Dorian's sudden engagement. Basil doesn't approve, but Henry looks at it lightly as a part of his experiment. He hopes that marriage won't ruin Dorian, and that the boy will marry Sibyl, love her madly for a little while, and move on. Dorian shows up in the middle of this heated discussion. He's in a jolly mood, and he recounts the story of his engagement to Sibyl. The night before, Dorian watched Sibyl perform in As You Like It, and was overwhelmed by his adoration for her. Backstage after the show, they kissed and exchanged vows of love. Back to the present--Basil is slowly won over by this story, convinced that Dorian really is in love with the girl. Henry is still incredulous and, as usual, expresses his cynical viewpoint. Dorian laughs Henry off, saying that being with Sibyl undoes everything Henry's done to him--she makes him forget all of Henry's \"poisonous\" theories about life and love. Henry goes off on another of his philosophical binges, this time about goodness, morality, and women. He basically thinks that everyone should just be concerned with themselves and their own pleasures. Basil and Dorian disagree, but Henry persists in putting forth his ideas. Oh yeah, and he also thinks that women are pretty worthless--in his estimation, they're always hanging on to men, preventing them from attaining greatness. Dorian promises that Henry will feel different about all of this once he's seen Sibyl Vane. Henry demurs, admitting that it's possible that he'll be really taken with her. They leave in Henry's carriage, and poor Basil has to follow in a cab. During his solitary ride, Basil is saddened by the feeling that Dorian is lost to him forever--the marriage will drive them apart. However, he reasons, it's better than some things that could have happened to his young friend...", "analysis": ""}

"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry that evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol where dinner had been laid for three. "No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the bowing waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They don't interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of Commons worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little whitewashing." "Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, watching him as he spoke. Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" he cried. "Impossible!" "It is perfectly true." "To whom?" "To some little actress or other." "I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible." "Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear Basil." "Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry." "Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I didn't say he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is a great difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I never was engaged." "But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. It would be absurd for him to marry so much beneath him." "If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is always from the noblest motives." "I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his intellect." "Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she is beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget his appointment." "Are you serious?" "Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should ever be more serious than I am at the present moment." "But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, walking up and down the room and biting his lip. "You can't approve of it, possibly. It is some silly infatuation." "I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes to marry her. Why not? If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the less interesting. You know I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback to marriage is that it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are colourless. They lack individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that marriage makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it many other egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They become more highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should fancy, the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience is of value, and whatever one may say against marriage, it is certainly an experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will make this girl his wife, passionately adore her for six months, and then suddenly become fascinated by some one else. He would be a wonderful study." "You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. If Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be." Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think so well of others is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is sheer terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our neighbour with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to us. We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I have the greatest contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, but there are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. I will certainly encourage them. They have the charm of being fashionable. But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than I can." "My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" said the lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. "I have never been so happy. Of course, it is sudden--all really delightful things are. And yet it seems to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my life." He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked extraordinarily handsome. "I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but I don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. You let Harry know." "And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord Henry, putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. "Come, let us sit down and try what the new _chef_ here is like, and then you will tell us how it all came about." "There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. After I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. Of course, the scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! You should have seen her! When she came on in her boy's clothes, she was perfectly wonderful. She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little green cap with a hawk's feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak lined with dull red. She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She had all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in your studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves round a pale rose. As for her acting--well, you shall see her to-night. She is simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box absolutely enthralled. I forgot that I was in London and in the nineteenth century. I was away with my love in a forest that no man had ever seen. After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke to her. As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes a look that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that moment. It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one perfect point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can't help it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told her own mother. I don't know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley is sure to be furious. I don't care. I shall be of age in less than a year, and then I can do what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven't I, to take my love out of poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare's plays? Lips that Shakespeare taught to speak have whispered their secret in my ear. I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the mouth." "Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly. "Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry. Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; I shall find her in an orchard in Verona." Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. "At what particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it." "My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she said she was not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole world is nothing to me compared with her." "Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, "much more practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to say anything about marriage, and they always remind us." Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. You have annoyed Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon any one. His nature is too fine for that." Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, for the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any question--simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the women who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, of course, in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not modern." Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite incorrigible, Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her would be a beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any one can wish to shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want to place her on a pedestal of gold and to see the world worship the woman who is mine. What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at it for that. Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to take. Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. I become different from what you have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere touch of Sibyl Vane's hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, poisonous, delightful theories." "And those are ...?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. "Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry." "Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," he answered in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature's test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, we are not always happy." "Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward. "Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?" "To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, touching the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. "Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One's own life--that is the important thing. As for the lives of one's neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt one's moral views about them, but they are not one's concern. Besides, individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in accepting the standard of one's age. I consider that for any man of culture to accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest immorality." "But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays a terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter. "Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege of the rich." "One has to pay in other ways but money." "What sort of ways, Basil?" "Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the consciousness of degradation." Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art is charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use them in fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can use in fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever knows what a pleasure is." "I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore some one." "That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, toying with some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us to do something for them." "I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to us," murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They have a right to demand it back." "That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward. "Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry. "This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that women give to men the very gold of their lives." "Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in such very small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always prevent us from carrying them out." "Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much." "You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have some coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and _fine-champagne_, and some cigarettes. No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I can't allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit." "What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from a fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. "Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you have never known." "I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired look in his eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your wonderful girl may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real than life. Let us go. Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, Basil, but there is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow us in a hansom." They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better than many other things that might have happened. After a few minutes, they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, as had been arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little brougham in front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt that Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown years older.

Chapter 6

https://web.archive.org/web/20210304030722/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/picture-dorian-gray/summary/chapter-6

The next night, Henry and Basil get to the restaurant before Dorian, and they take advantage of the opportunity to discuss Dorian's sudden engagement. Basil doesn't approve, but Henry looks at it lightly as a part of his experiment. He hopes that marriage won't ruin Dorian, and that the boy will marry Sibyl, love her madly for a little while, and move on. Dorian shows up in the middle of this heated discussion. He's in a jolly mood, and he recounts the story of his engagement to Sibyl. The night before, Dorian watched Sibyl perform in As You Like It, and was overwhelmed by his adoration for her. Backstage after the show, they kissed and exchanged vows of love. Back to the present--Basil is slowly won over by this story, convinced that Dorian really is in love with the girl. Henry is still incredulous and, as usual, expresses his cynical viewpoint. Dorian laughs Henry off, saying that being with Sibyl undoes everything Henry's done to him--she makes him forget all of Henry's "poisonous" theories about life and love. Henry goes off on another of his philosophical binges, this time about goodness, morality, and women. He basically thinks that everyone should just be concerned with themselves and their own pleasures. Basil and Dorian disagree, but Henry persists in putting forth his ideas. Oh yeah, and he also thinks that women are pretty worthless--in his estimation, they're always hanging on to men, preventing them from attaining greatness. Dorian promises that Henry will feel different about all of this once he's seen Sibyl Vane. Henry demurs, admitting that it's possible that he'll be really taken with her. They leave in Henry's carriage, and poor Basil has to follow in a cab. During his solitary ride, Basil is saddened by the feeling that Dorian is lost to him forever--the marriage will drive them apart. However, he reasons, it's better than some things that could have happened to his young friend...

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/29.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_4_part_5.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapter xxix

chapter xxix

{"name": "Chapter XXIX", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase4-chapter25-34", "summary": "A local farm man named Jack Dollop, the same man who escaped an aspiring mother-in-law by hiding in the dairy's churn, marries a local wealthy widow but finds that her wealth evaporated upon her remarriage. All at Talbothays laugh at this tidbit of gossip and side with the despicable Dollop against the scheming widow. But Tess takes the story to heart and worries more and more about sharing her past with Angel", "analysis": ""}

"Now, who mid ye think I've heard news o' this morning?" said Dairyman Crick, as he sat down to breakfast next day, with a riddling gaze round upon the munching men and maids. "Now, just who mid ye think?" One guessed, and another guessed. Mrs Crick did not guess, because she knew already. "Well," said the dairyman, "'tis that slack-twisted 'hore's-bird of a feller, Jack Dollop. He's lately got married to a widow-woman." "Not Jack Dollop? A villain--to think o' that!" said a milker. The name entered quickly into Tess Durbeyfield's consciousness, for it was the name of the lover who had wronged his sweetheart, and had afterwards been so roughly used by the young woman's mother in the butter-churn. "And had he married the valiant matron's daughter, as he promised?" asked Angel Clare absently, as he turned over the newspaper he was reading at the little table to which he was always banished by Mrs Crick, in her sense of his gentility. "Not he, sir. Never meant to," replied the dairyman. "As I say, 'tis a widow-woman, and she had money, it seems--fifty poun' a year or so; and that was all he was after. They were married in a great hurry; and then she told him that by marrying she had lost her fifty poun' a year. Just fancy the state o' my gentleman's mind at that news! Never such a cat-and-dog life as they've been leading ever since! Serves him well beright. But onluckily the poor woman gets the worst o't." "Well, the silly body should have told en sooner that the ghost of her first man would trouble him," said Mrs Crick. "Ay, ay," responded the dairyman indecisively. "Still, you can see exactly how 'twas. She wanted a home, and didn't like to run the risk of losing him. Don't ye think that was something like it, maidens?" He glanced towards the row of girls. "She ought to ha' told him just before they went to church, when he could hardly have backed out," exclaimed Marian. "Yes, she ought," agreed Izz. "She must have seen what he was after, and should ha' refused him," cried Retty spasmodically. "And what do you say, my dear?" asked the dairyman of Tess. "I think she ought--to have told him the true state of things--or else refused him--I don't know," replied Tess, the bread-and-butter choking her. "Be cust if I'd have done either o't," said Beck Knibbs, a married helper from one of the cottages. "All's fair in love and war. I'd ha' married en just as she did, and if he'd said two words to me about not telling him beforehand anything whatsomdever about my first chap that I hadn't chose to tell, I'd ha' knocked him down wi' the rolling-pin--a scram little feller like he! Any woman could do it." The laughter which followed this sally was supplemented only by a sorry smile, for form's sake, from Tess. What was comedy to them was tragedy to her; and she could hardly bear their mirth. She soon rose from table, and, with an impression that Clare would soon follow her, went along a little wriggling path, now stepping to one side of the irrigating channels, and now to the other, till she stood by the main stream of the Var. Men had been cutting the water-weeds higher up the river, and masses of them were floating past her--moving islands of green crow-foot, whereon she might almost have ridden; long locks of which weed had lodged against the piles driven to keep the cows from crossing. Yes, there was the pain of it. This question of a woman telling her story--the heaviest of crosses to herself--seemed but amusement to others. It was as if people should laugh at martyrdom. "Tessy!" came from behind her, and Clare sprang across the gully, alighting beside her feet. "My wife--soon!" "No, no; I cannot. For your sake, O Mr Clare; for your sake, I say no!" "Tess!" "Still I say no!" she repeated. Not expecting this, he had put his arm lightly round her waist the moment after speaking, beneath her hanging tail of hair. (The younger dairymaids, including Tess, breakfasted with their hair loose on Sunday mornings before building it up extra high for attending church, a style they could not adopt when milking with their heads against the cows.) If she had said "Yes" instead of "No" he would have kissed her; it had evidently been his intention; but her determined negative deterred his scrupulous heart. Their condition of domiciliary comradeship put her, as the woman, to such disadvantage by its enforced intercourse, that he felt it unfair to her to exercise any pressure of blandishment which he might have honestly employed had she been better able to avoid him. He released her momentarily-imprisoned waist, and withheld the kiss. It all turned on that release. What had given her strength to refuse him this time was solely the tale of the widow told by the dairyman; and that would have been overcome in another moment. But Angel said no more; his face was perplexed; he went away. Day after day they met--somewhat less constantly than before; and thus two or three weeks went by. The end of September drew near, and she could see in his eye that he might ask her again. His plan of procedure was different now--as though he had made up his mind that her negatives were, after all, only coyness and youth startled by the novelty of the proposal. The fitful evasiveness of her manner when the subject was under discussion countenanced the idea. So he played a more coaxing game; and while never going beyond words, or attempting the renewal of caresses, he did his utmost orally. In this way Clare persistently wooed her in undertones like that of the purling milk--at the cow's side, at skimmings, at butter-makings, at cheese-makings, among broody poultry, and among farrowing pigs--as no milkmaid was ever wooed before by such a man. Tess knew that she must break down. Neither a religious sense of a certain moral validity in the previous union nor a conscientious wish for candour could hold out against it much longer. She loved him so passionately, and he was so godlike in her eyes; and being, though untrained, instinctively refined, her nature cried for his tutelary guidance. And thus, though Tess kept repeating to herself, "I can never be his wife," the words were vain. A proof of her weakness lay in the very utterance of what calm strength would not have taken the trouble to formulate. Every sound of his voice beginning on the old subject stirred her with a terrifying bliss, and she coveted the recantation she feared. His manner was--what man's is not?--so much that of one who would love and cherish and defend her under any conditions, changes, charges, or revelations, that her gloom lessened as she basked in it. The season meanwhile was drawing onward to the equinox, and though it was still fine, the days were much shorter. The dairy had again worked by morning candlelight for a long time; and a fresh renewal of Clare's pleading occurred one morning between three and four. She had run up in her bedgown to his door to call him as usual; then had gone back to dress and call the others; and in ten minutes was walking to the head of the stairs with the candle in her hand. At the same moment he came down his steps from above in his shirt-sleeves and put his arm across the stairway. "Now, Miss Flirt, before you go down," he said peremptorily. "It is a fortnight since I spoke, and this won't do any longer. You MUST tell me what you mean, or I shall have to leave this house. My door was ajar just now, and I saw you. For your own safety I must go. You don't know. Well? Is it to be yes at last?" "I am only just up, Mr Clare, and it is too early to take me to task!" she pouted. "You need not call me Flirt. 'Tis cruel and untrue. Wait till by and by. Please wait till by and by! I will really think seriously about it between now and then. Let me go downstairs!" She looked a little like what he said she was as, holding the candle sideways, she tried to smile away the seriousness of her words. "Call me Angel, then, and not Mr Clare." "Angel." "Angel dearest--why not?" "'Twould mean that I agree, wouldn't it?" "It would only mean that you love me, even if you cannot marry me; and you were so good as to own that long ago." "Very well, then, 'Angel dearest', if I MUST," she murmured, looking at her candle, a roguish curl coming upon her mouth, notwithstanding her suspense. Clare had resolved never to kiss her until he had obtained her promise; but somehow, as Tess stood there in her prettily tucked-up milking gown, her hair carelessly heaped upon her head till there should be leisure to arrange it when skimming and milking were done, he broke his resolve, and brought his lips to her cheek for one moment. She passed downstairs very quickly, never looking back at him or saying another word. The other maids were already down, and the subject was not pursued. Except Marian, they all looked wistfully and suspiciously at the pair, in the sad yellow rays which the morning candles emitted in contrast with the first cold signals of the dawn without. When skimming was done--which, as the milk diminished with the approach of autumn, was a lessening process day by day--Retty and the rest went out. The lovers followed them. "Our tremulous lives are so different from theirs, are they not?" he musingly observed to her, as he regarded the three figures tripping before him through the frigid pallor of opening day. "Not so very different, I think," she said. "Why do you think that?" "There are very few women's lives that are not--tremulous," Tess replied, pausing over the new word as if it impressed her. "There's more in those three than you think." "What is in them?" "Almost either of 'em," she began, "would make--perhaps would make--a properer wife than I. And perhaps they love you as well as I--almost." "O, Tessy!" There were signs that it was an exquisite relief to her to hear the impatient exclamation, though she had resolved so intrepidly to let generosity make one bid against herself. That was now done, and she had not the power to attempt self-immolation a second time then. They were joined by a milker from one of the cottages, and no more was said on that which concerned them so deeply. But Tess knew that this day would decide it. In the afternoon several of the dairyman's household and assistants went down to the meads as usual, a long way from the dairy, where many of the cows were milked without being driven home. The supply was getting less as the animals advanced in calf, and the supernumerary milkers of the lush green season had been dismissed. The work progressed leisurely. Each pailful was poured into tall cans that stood in a large spring-waggon which had been brought upon the scene; and when they were milked, the cows trailed away. Dairyman Crick, who was there with the rest, his wrapper gleaming miraculously white against a leaden evening sky, suddenly looked at his heavy watch. "Why, 'tis later than I thought," he said. "Begad! We shan't be soon enough with this milk at the station, if we don't mind. There's no time to-day to take it home and mix it with the bulk afore sending off. It must go to station straight from here. Who'll drive it across?" Mr Clare volunteered to do so, though it was none of his business, asking Tess to accompany him. The evening, though sunless, had been warm and muggy for the season, and Tess had come out with her milking-hood only, naked-armed and jacketless; certainly not dressed for a drive. She therefore replied by glancing over her scant habiliments; but Clare gently urged her. She assented by relinquishing her pail and stool to the dairyman to take home, and mounted the spring-waggon beside Clare.

Chapter XXIX

https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase4-chapter25-34

A local farm man named Jack Dollop, the same man who escaped an aspiring mother-in-law by hiding in the dairy's churn, marries a local wealthy widow but finds that her wealth evaporated upon her remarriage. All at Talbothays laugh at this tidbit of gossip and side with the despicable Dollop against the scheming widow. But Tess takes the story to heart and worries more and more about sharing her past with Angel

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/107-chapters/chapters_38_to_45.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Far from the Madding Crowd/section_6_part_0.txt

Far from the Madding Crowd.chapters 38-45

chapters 38-45

{"name": "Chapters 38-45", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210108004047/https://www.gradesaver.com/far-from-the-madding-crowd/study-guide/summary-chapters-38-45", "summary": "In October, Bathsheba and Troy are driving home from town, while Troy discusses the money he has recently lost by betting on horse races. He is unconcerned and thinks it is merely bad luck, but Bathsheba is troubled by how much money her husband is spending wastefully. The couple are approached by a woman who asks them for directions. The woman has a very intense reaction to recognizing Troy and collapses; Troy sends Bathsheba a distance off before helping the woman, giving him an opportunity to speak to her alone. Troy gives Fanny some money, and tells her to continue to town, but meet him on Monday on Casterbridge bridge. When Troy rejoins Bathsheba, he admits that he knows the woman but refuses to give any details or answer any questions. Left alone, Fanny begins her slow and laborious walk towards Casterbridge. She gets more and more weak and exhausted as she walks through the night. Helped by a large dog, she manages to drag herself to a building on the edge of town where she is taken inside. Meanwhile, back at the farmhouse, Troy asks Bathsheba for money. She assumes it is for an upcoming horserace, and complains about his spending, but gives him the money. She then catches sight of a lock of hair in the case of Troy's watch, and asks who it belongs to. Troy explains that it is the hair of a woman he was engaged to before he married Bathsheba. Bathsheba becomes jealous, and the couple have an argument. The next morning, Bathsheba learns that Troy has gone off to Casterbridge. As she walks around the farm, she sees Boldwood and Gabriel conversing, and sends a servant to find out what they talking about. From him, she learns that Fanny has died at the workhouse in town, and that Boldwood is planning to send a wagon to fetch her body. Bathsheba decides that since Fanny was a former employee of the farm, she will send for the body herself. When Bathsheba asks how long Fanny was at the workhouse, the servant explains that Fanny arrived there only on the day she died, having walked there from Melchester where she had been working before. Bathsheba becomes agitated, and asks questions about the route Fanny took, when she walked, and what color her hair was. Before Joseph sets off with the wagon, she questions him as well, trying to find out if anyone knows what Fanny died of. She is able to learn from Liddy that Fanny did indeed have blonde hair. Joseph goes to the workhouse, where the coffin is loaded into the wagon. As he drives home, he becomes depressed and stops at the pub for a drink, where he lingers longer than he intended to. Gabriel runs into him and is angry about this delay, driving the wagon with the corpse the rest of the way home himself. When he arrives at the farmhouse, the parson tells him it is too late and the funeral will have to take place the following day. Although Gabriel is uncomfortable with the idea, Bathsheba instructs that the coffin remain in the farmhouse until the funeral takes place on the subsequent morning. Before he leaves, Gabriel rubs out the words that have been written on the coffin: \"Fanny Robbins and child.\"Later that night, Bathsheba explains that she will sit up and wait for Troy, who still has not returned home. She continues to question Liddy about Fanny's health, unsatisfied with the answers she receives. A short time later, Liddy shares that she has heard a rumor that Fanny gave birth shortly before she died, and that the baby is also in the coffin. After Liddy goes to bed, Bathsheba becomes more and more agitated, wondering about what the truth is. In desperation for someone to help her, Bathsheba goes to Gabriel's cottage where she watches him through the window but finds herself unable to approach him. She returns to her house, and opens the coffin, where she finds Fanny and the corpse of a tiny baby. She realizes that Fanny must have been Troy's lover, and that this is their illegitimate child. While Bathsheba is trying to make sense of her emotions, Troy returns home, comes into the room, and sees what is lying in the coffin. When Troy gently kisses Fanny's corpse, Bathsheba flies into a jealous rage, and the two argue, leading Troy to say that he loves Fanny more than he ever loved Bathsheba and considers Fanny to be is true wife. Bathsheba flees from the house and spends the night wandering outdoors, until Liddy finds her in the early morning. Liddy explains that Troy also left the house early in the morning, and that people will soon be coming to take Fanny's body for the funeral. Bathsheba says she can't return to the house until the corpse has been taken away, so she and Liddy walk around until Fanny's coffin has been removed. Once they return to the house, Bathsheba explains that she is going to move into the attic for the time being, and has Liddy set it up for her. The narrative shifts to describe events from Troy's point of view. On Monday morning, he had gone to keep his meeting with Fanny with as much money as he had been able to put together. When she did not arrive, he got angry and went to spend the day at the horse races, returning late at night to the scene with the coffin. After Bathsheba fled, he waited miserably until it was morning and then hurried to town where he spent the money he had hoped to give to Fanny on a fancy marble tombstone. He set up an elaborate display of flowers and then fell asleep in a corner of the churchyard. When he awakened, there had been heavy rain and the arrangement was ruined. Frustrated, he left the churchyard and left the town a short time later. That same morning, Bathsheba decides to visit the grave since she has learned that Troy was seen leaving town and therefore does not have to worry about meeting him. When she arrives, she finds Gabriel there as well, and observes the marble tombstone, as well as the disarray. Bathsheba and Gabriel work together to tidy up the grave site and leave it in good condition.", "analysis": "Earlier in the novel, Bathsheba illustrated her resistance to the idea of a husband who would try and tell her what to do, or who would annoy her with his presence. Ironically, she is now confronted with the challenges of a husband who neglects her, refuses to play the active role that she needs, and often leaves her abandoned when she most needs his help. The challenges in their relationship are part of why she feels such suspicion when Troy engages in a mysterious conversation with an unknown woman, but Bathsheba also clings vainly to the hope that Troy is actually telling her the truth. Even though she is probably smart enough to know better on some level, Bathsheba is reduced to living in denial and refusing to confront the reality of the kind of man she has married. Fanny's agonizing walk to the village shows Hardy's talent for evoking sympathy for those who suffer, especially through circumstances beyond their control. Not unlike Bathsheba, Fanny has fallen victim to believing Troy and his empty promises but she hardly deserves the wretched poverty, physical pain, and deep fear she is now experiencing. The presence of the dog who finally helps her to endure the last stage of her journey reflects the themes of the natural world that are present throughout the novel. While human beings would be likely to judge Fanny, animals can sense her goodness and innocence because they also embody those qualities. Nonetheless, Fanny's death reveals the harsh reality of what it has meant for her to live in poverty and isolation. Presumably the suffering and ill-health she endured before going in to labor played a significant part in her death and the death of her baby. It is also very possible that dying in the workhouse meant she had limited access to medical care which might have helped her. When news of Fanny's death spreads, Gabriel again shows his instinct to protect Bathsheba. At no other moment in the novel has he lied or tried to conceal anything; in fact, he has been honest in situations where it may not even have served him. Nonetheless, Gabriel shows that he is capable of responding to ethically complex situations, and it seems to him that the greater good is served by Bathsheba remaining ignorant of what actually happened to Fanny. In a moment that echoes Gabriel by chance helping put out the fire, or Bathsheba impulsively opting to send Boldwood the valentine, fate intervenes. The chance event of Joseph being delayed at the pub sets in motion a train of events that means the coffin will stay in Bathsheba's house overnight. Had everything gone according to plan and Fanny been buried that afternoon, her secret would likely have been safe. However, almost as soon as news of Fanny's death reaches her, Bathsheba feels a mixture of sympathy and suspicion. Her suspicions torment her; she does fleetingly consider reaching out to Gabriel. Her attempt to go to his cottage to ask his advice reveals how much trust she places in him, and her awareness that he has her best interests at heart. Nonetheless, the shame that she would have to depend on another man when her own husband might be betraying her is too much for Bathsheba's pride. Left to make the decision alone, she opts to open the coffin and know the truth, only to have her worst fears confirmed. Hardy masterfully captures the complex and shifting emotions of Bathsheba when she realizes the secret Troy has been hiding: rage, betrayal, jealousy, grief, empathy, and shame. Especially when she realizes Troy genuinely cared for Fanny, she feels an almost grotesque need to assert her emotional dominance over him by insisting that he kiss her to balance out the kiss he gave to Fanny. Fixated on his own grief, Troy renounces the emotional and spiritual aspects of his marriage, even though he cannot dispute the legal ones. By telling Bathsheba that he considers Fanny to have been his true wife, he in effect turns Bathsheba into the fallen woman so many others have been afraid she would become. Troy's attempts to embellish Fanny's grave signal his impulsiveness and lack of forethought. He acts based on his emotions, but without planning to think about what will be sustainable. His lack of regard for the weather mirrors his reckless ignorance on the night of the harvest-supper, and leads to destruction again. Troy assumes his own will is the dominant force without acknowledging and respecting how the natural world will always be stronger than human endeavors. His lack of foresight that rainfall would ruin the way he had set up the grave mirrors the way he recklessly created the conditions that led to Fanny's death: he followed his own impulses by engaging in a sexual relationship with her, and did not consider the natural consequences of pregnancy that would follow. What is most telling about the episode is Troy's response when he awakens to find his work ruined: he simply gives up, making no effort to fix it. This is characteristic of his inability to take responsibility for situations he has created, and his unwillingness to work hard. The messy gravesite does however create an opportunity for redemption for Bathsheba. By tenderly fixing up the area, she is able to atone for her ambivalent feelings towards Fanny and experience forgiveness for the innocent woman and child."}

RAIN--ONE SOLITARY MEETS ANOTHER It was now five o'clock, and the dawn was promising to break in hues of drab and ash. The air changed its temperature and stirred itself more vigorously. Cool breezes coursed in transparent eddies round Oak's face. The wind shifted yet a point or two and blew stronger. In ten minutes every wind of heaven seemed to be roaming at large. Some of the thatching on the wheat-stacks was now whirled fantastically aloft, and had to be replaced and weighted with some rails that lay near at hand. This done, Oak slaved away again at the barley. A huge drop of rain smote his face, the wind snarled round every corner, the trees rocked to the bases of their trunks, and the twigs clashed in strife. Driving in spars at any point and on any system, inch by inch he covered more and more safely from ruin this distracting impersonation of seven hundred pounds. The rain came on in earnest, and Oak soon felt the water to be tracking cold and clammy routes down his back. Ultimately he was reduced well-nigh to a homogeneous sop, and the dyes of his clothes trickled down and stood in a pool at the foot of the ladder. The rain stretched obliquely through the dull atmosphere in liquid spines, unbroken in continuity between their beginnings in the clouds and their points in him. Oak suddenly remembered that eight months before this time he had been fighting against fire in the same spot as desperately as he was fighting against water now--and for a futile love of the same woman. As for her--But Oak was generous and true, and dismissed his reflections. It was about seven o'clock in the dark leaden morning when Gabriel came down from the last stack, and thankfully exclaimed, "It is done!" He was drenched, weary, and sad, and yet not so sad as drenched and weary, for he was cheered by a sense of success in a good cause. Faint sounds came from the barn, and he looked that way. Figures stepped singly and in pairs through the doors--all walking awkwardly, and abashed, save the foremost, who wore a red jacket, and advanced with his hands in his pockets, whistling. The others shambled after with a conscience-stricken air: the whole procession was not unlike Flaxman's group of the suitors tottering on towards the infernal regions under the conduct of Mercury. The gnarled shapes passed into the village, Troy, their leader, entering the farmhouse. Not a single one of them had turned his face to the ricks, or apparently bestowed one thought upon their condition. Soon Oak too went homeward, by a different route from theirs. In front of him against the wet glazed surface of the lane he saw a person walking yet more slowly than himself under an umbrella. The man turned and plainly started; he was Boldwood. "How are you this morning, sir?" said Oak. "Yes, it is a wet day.--Oh, I am well, very well, I thank you; quite well." "I am glad to hear it, sir." Boldwood seemed to awake to the present by degrees. "You look tired and ill, Oak," he said then, desultorily regarding his companion. "I am tired. You look strangely altered, sir." "I? Not a bit of it: I am well enough. What put that into your head?" "I thought you didn't look quite so topping as you used to, that was all." "Indeed, then you are mistaken," said Boldwood, shortly. "Nothing hurts me. My constitution is an iron one." "I've been working hard to get our ricks covered, and was barely in time. Never had such a struggle in my life.... Yours of course are safe, sir." "Oh yes," Boldwood added, after an interval of silence: "What did you ask, Oak?" "Your ricks are all covered before this time?" "No." "At any rate, the large ones upon the stone staddles?" "They are not." "Them under the hedge?" "No. I forgot to tell the thatcher to set about it." "Nor the little one by the stile?" "Nor the little one by the stile. I overlooked the ricks this year." "Then not a tenth of your corn will come to measure, sir." "Possibly not." "Overlooked them," repeated Gabriel slowly to himself. It is difficult to describe the intensely dramatic effect that announcement had upon Oak at such a moment. All the night he had been feeling that the neglect he was labouring to repair was abnormal and isolated--the only instance of the kind within the circuit of the county. Yet at this very time, within the same parish, a greater waste had been going on, uncomplained of and disregarded. A few months earlier Boldwood's forgetting his husbandry would have been as preposterous an idea as a sailor forgetting he was in a ship. Oak was just thinking that whatever he himself might have suffered from Bathsheba's marriage, here was a man who had suffered more, when Boldwood spoke in a changed voice--that of one who yearned to make a confidence and relieve his heart by an outpouring. "Oak, you know as well as I that things have gone wrong with me lately. I may as well own it. I was going to get a little settled in life; but in some way my plan has come to nothing." "I thought my mistress would have married you," said Gabriel, not knowing enough of the full depths of Boldwood's love to keep silence on the farmer's account, and determined not to evade discipline by doing so on his own. "However, it is so sometimes, and nothing happens that we expect," he added, with the repose of a man whom misfortune had inured rather than subdued. "I daresay I am a joke about the parish," said Boldwood, as if the subject came irresistibly to his tongue, and with a miserable lightness meant to express his indifference. "Oh no--I don't think that." "--But the real truth of the matter is that there was not, as some fancy, any jilting on--her part. No engagement ever existed between me and Miss Everdene. People say so, but it is untrue: she never promised me!" Boldwood stood still now and turned his wild face to Oak. "Oh, Gabriel," he continued, "I am weak and foolish, and I don't know what, and I can't fend off my miserable grief! ... I had some faint belief in the mercy of God till I lost that woman. Yes, He prepared a gourd to shade me, and like the prophet I thanked Him and was glad. But the next day He prepared a worm to smite the gourd and wither it; and I feel it is better to die than to live!" A silence followed. Boldwood aroused himself from the momentary mood of confidence into which he had drifted, and walked on again, resuming his usual reserve. "No, Gabriel," he resumed, with a carelessness which was like the smile on the countenance of a skull: "it was made more of by other people than ever it was by us. I do feel a little regret occasionally, but no woman ever had power over me for any length of time. Well, good morning; I can trust you not to mention to others what has passed between us two here." COMING HOME--A CRY On the turnpike road, between Casterbridge and Weatherbury, and about three miles from the former place, is Yalbury Hill, one of those steep long ascents which pervade the highways of this undulating part of South Wessex. In returning from market it is usual for the farmers and other gig-gentry to alight at the bottom and walk up. One Saturday evening in the month of October Bathsheba's vehicle was duly creeping up this incline. She was sitting listlessly in the second seat of the gig, whilst walking beside her in a farmer's marketing suit of unusually fashionable cut was an erect, well-made young man. Though on foot, he held the reins and whip, and occasionally aimed light cuts at the horse's ear with the end of the lash, as a recreation. This man was her husband, formerly Sergeant Troy, who, having bought his discharge with Bathsheba's money, was gradually transforming himself into a farmer of a spirited and very modern school. People of unalterable ideas still insisted upon calling him "Sergeant" when they met him, which was in some degree owing to his having still retained the well-shaped moustache of his military days, and the soldierly bearing inseparable from his form and training. "Yes, if it hadn't been for that wretched rain I should have cleared two hundred as easy as looking, my love," he was saying. "Don't you see, it altered all the chances? To speak like a book I once read, wet weather is the narrative, and fine days are the episodes, of our country's history; now, isn't that true?" "But the time of year is come for changeable weather." "Well, yes. The fact is, these autumn races are the ruin of everybody. Never did I see such a day as 'twas! 'Tis a wild open place, just out of Budmouth, and a drab sea rolled in towards us like liquid misery. Wind and rain--good Lord! Dark? Why, 'twas as black as my hat before the last race was run. 'Twas five o'clock, and you couldn't see the horses till they were almost in, leave alone colours. The ground was as heavy as lead, and all judgment from a fellow's experience went for nothing. Horses, riders, people, were all blown about like ships at sea. Three booths were blown over, and the wretched folk inside crawled out upon their hands and knees; and in the next field were as many as a dozen hats at one time. Ay, Pimpernel regularly stuck fast, when about sixty yards off, and when I saw Policy stepping on, it did knock my heart against the lining of my ribs, I assure you, my love!" "And you mean, Frank," said Bathsheba, sadly--her voice was painfully lowered from the fulness and vivacity of the previous summer--"that you have lost more than a hundred pounds in a month by this dreadful horse-racing? O, Frank, it is cruel; it is foolish of you to take away my money so. We shall have to leave the farm; that will be the end of it!" "Humbug about cruel. Now, there 'tis again--turn on the waterworks; that's just like you." "But you'll promise me not to go to Budmouth second meeting, won't you?" she implored. Bathsheba was at the full depth for tears, but she maintained a dry eye. "I don't see why I should; in fact, if it turns out to be a fine day, I was thinking of taking you." "Never, never! I'll go a hundred miles the other way first. I hate the sound of the very word!" "But the question of going to see the race or staying at home has very little to do with the matter. Bets are all booked safely enough before the race begins, you may depend. Whether it is a bad race for me or a good one, will have very little to do with our going there next Monday." "But you don't mean to say that you have risked anything on this one too!" she exclaimed, with an agonized look. "There now, don't you be a little fool. Wait till you are told. Why, Bathsheba, you have lost all the pluck and sauciness you formerly had, and upon my life if I had known what a chicken-hearted creature you were under all your boldness, I'd never have--I know what." A flash of indignation might have been seen in Bathsheba's dark eyes as she looked resolutely ahead after this reply. They moved on without further speech, some early-withered leaves from the trees which hooded the road at this spot occasionally spinning downward across their path to the earth. A woman appeared on the brow of the hill. The ridge was in a cutting, so that she was very near the husband and wife before she became visible. Troy had turned towards the gig to remount, and whilst putting his foot on the step the woman passed behind him. Though the overshadowing trees and the approach of eventide enveloped them in gloom, Bathsheba could see plainly enough to discern the extreme poverty of the woman's garb, and the sadness of her face. "Please, sir, do you know at what time Casterbridge Union-house closes at night?" The woman said these words to Troy over his shoulder. Troy started visibly at the sound of the voice; yet he seemed to recover presence of mind sufficient to prevent himself from giving way to his impulse to suddenly turn and face her. He said, slowly-- "I don't know." The woman, on hearing him speak, quickly looked up, examined the side of his face, and recognized the soldier under the yeoman's garb. Her face was drawn into an expression which had gladness and agony both among its elements. She uttered an hysterical cry, and fell down. "Oh, poor thing!" exclaimed Bathsheba, instantly preparing to alight. "Stay where you are, and attend to the horse!" said Troy, peremptorily throwing her the reins and the whip. "Walk the horse to the top: I'll see to the woman." "But I--" "Do you hear? Clk--Poppet!" The horse, gig, and Bathsheba moved on. "How on earth did you come here? I thought you were miles away, or dead! Why didn't you write to me?" said Troy to the woman, in a strangely gentle, yet hurried voice, as he lifted her up. "I feared to." "Have you any money?" "None." "Good Heaven--I wish I had more to give you! Here's--wretched--the merest trifle. It is every farthing I have left. I have none but what my wife gives me, you know, and I can't ask her now." The woman made no answer. "I have only another moment," continued Troy; "and now listen. Where are you going to-night? Casterbridge Union?" "Yes; I thought to go there." "You shan't go there; yet, wait. Yes, perhaps for to-night; I can do nothing better--worse luck! Sleep there to-night, and stay there to-morrow. Monday is the first free day I have; and on Monday morning, at ten exactly, meet me on Grey's Bridge just out of the town. I'll bring all the money I can muster. You shan't want--I'll see that, Fanny; then I'll get you a lodging somewhere. Good-bye till then. I am a brute--but good-bye!" After advancing the distance which completed the ascent of the hill, Bathsheba turned her head. The woman was upon her feet, and Bathsheba saw her withdrawing from Troy, and going feebly down the hill by the third milestone from Casterbridge. Troy then came on towards his wife, stepped into the gig, took the reins from her hand, and without making any observation whipped the horse into a trot. He was rather agitated. "Do you know who that woman was?" said Bathsheba, looking searchingly into his face. "I do," he said, looking boldly back into hers. "I thought you did," said she, with angry hauteur, and still regarding him. "Who is she?" He suddenly seemed to think that frankness would benefit neither of the women. "Nothing to either of us," he said. "I know her by sight." "What is her name?" "How should I know her name?" "I think you do." "Think if you will, and be--" The sentence was completed by a smart cut of the whip round Poppet's flank, which caused the animal to start forward at a wild pace. No more was said. ON CASTERBRIDGE HIGHWAY For a considerable time the woman walked on. Her steps became feebler, and she strained her eyes to look afar upon the naked road, now indistinct amid the penumbrae of night. At length her onward walk dwindled to the merest totter, and she opened a gate within which was a haystack. Underneath this she sat down and presently slept. When the woman awoke it was to find herself in the depths of a moonless and starless night. A heavy unbroken crust of cloud stretched across the sky, shutting out every speck of heaven; and a distant halo which hung over the town of Casterbridge was visible against the black concave, the luminosity appearing the brighter by its great contrast with the circumscribing darkness. Towards this weak, soft glow the woman turned her eyes. "If I could only get there!" she said. "Meet him the day after to-morrow: God help me! Perhaps I shall be in my grave before then." A manor-house clock from the far depths of shadow struck the hour, one, in a small, attenuated tone. After midnight the voice of a clock seems to lose in breadth as much as in length, and to diminish its sonorousness to a thin falsetto. Afterwards a light--two lights--arose from the remote shade, and grew larger. A carriage rolled along the road, and passed the gate. It probably contained some late diners-out. The beams from one lamp shone for a moment upon the crouching woman, and threw her face into vivid relief. The face was young in the groundwork, old in the finish; the general contours were flexuous and childlike, but the finer lineaments had begun to be sharp and thin. The pedestrian stood up, apparently with revived determination, and looked around. The road appeared to be familiar to her, and she carefully scanned the fence as she slowly walked along. Presently there became visible a dim white shape; it was another milestone. She drew her fingers across its face to feel the marks. "Two more!" she said. She leant against the stone as a means of rest for a short interval, then bestirred herself, and again pursued her way. For a slight distance she bore up bravely, afterwards flagging as before. This was beside a lone copsewood, wherein heaps of white chips strewn upon the leafy ground showed that woodmen had been faggoting and making hurdles during the day. Now there was not a rustle, not a breeze, not the faintest clash of twigs to keep her company. The woman looked over the gate, opened it, and went in. Close to the entrance stood a row of faggots, bound and un-bound, together with stakes of all sizes. For a few seconds the wayfarer stood with that tense stillness which signifies itself to be not the end, but merely the suspension, of a previous motion. Her attitude was that of a person who listens, either to the external world of sound, or to the imagined discourse of thought. A close criticism might have detected signs proving that she was intent on the latter alternative. Moreover, as was shown by what followed, she was oddly exercising the faculty of invention upon the speciality of the clever Jacquet Droz, the designer of automatic substitutes for human limbs. By the aid of the Casterbridge aurora, and by feeling with her hands, the woman selected two sticks from the heaps. These sticks were nearly straight to the height of three or four feet, where each branched into a fork like the letter Y. She sat down, snapped off the small upper twigs, and carried the remainder with her into the road. She placed one of these forks under each arm as a crutch, tested them, timidly threw her whole weight upon them--so little that it was--and swung herself forward. The girl had made for herself a material aid. The crutches answered well. The pat of her feet, and the tap of her sticks upon the highway, were all the sounds that came from the traveller now. She had passed the last milestone by a good long distance, and began to look wistfully towards the bank as if calculating upon another milestone soon. The crutches, though so very useful, had their limits of power. Mechanism only transfers labour, being powerless to supersede it, and the original amount of exertion was not cleared away; it was thrown into the body and arms. She was exhausted, and each swing forward became fainter. At last she swayed sideways, and fell. Here she lay, a shapeless heap, for ten minutes and more. The morning wind began to boom dully over the flats, and to move afresh dead leaves which had lain still since yesterday. The woman desperately turned round upon her knees, and next rose to her feet. Steadying herself by the help of one crutch, she essayed a step, then another, then a third, using the crutches now as walking-sticks only. Thus she progressed till descending Mellstock Hill another milestone appeared, and soon the beginning of an iron-railed fence came into view. She staggered across to the first post, clung to it, and looked around. The Casterbridge lights were now individually visible. It was getting towards morning, and vehicles might be hoped for, if not expected soon. She listened. There was not a sound of life save that acme and sublimation of all dismal sounds, the bark of a fox, its three hollow notes being rendered at intervals of a minute with the precision of a funeral bell. "Less than a mile!" the woman murmured. "No; more," she added, after a pause. "The mile is to the county hall, and my resting-place is on the other side Casterbridge. A little over a mile, and there I am!" After an interval she again spoke. "Five or six steps to a yard--six perhaps. I have to go seventeen hundred yards. A hundred times six, six hundred. Seventeen times that. O pity me, Lord!" Holding to the rails, she advanced, thrusting one hand forward upon the rail, then the other, then leaning over it whilst she dragged her feet on beneath. This woman was not given to soliloquy; but extremity of feeling lessens the individuality of the weak, as it increases that of the strong. She said again in the same tone, "I'll believe that the end lies five posts forward, and no further, and so get strength to pass them." This was a practical application of the principle that a half-feigned and fictitious faith is better than no faith at all. She passed five posts and held on to the fifth. "I'll pass five more by believing my longed-for spot is at the next fifth. I can do it." She passed five more. "It lies only five further." She passed five more. "But it is five further." She passed them. "That stone bridge is the end of my journey," she said, when the bridge over the Froom was in view. She crawled to the bridge. During the effort each breath of the woman went into the air as if never to return again. "Now for the truth of the matter," she said, sitting down. "The truth is, that I have less than half a mile." Self-beguilement with what she had known all the time to be false had given her strength to come over half a mile that she would have been powerless to face in the lump. The artifice showed that the woman, by some mysterious intuition, had grasped the paradoxical truth that blindness may operate more vigorously than prescience, and the short-sighted effect more than the far-seeing; that limitation, and not comprehensiveness, is needed for striking a blow. The half-mile stood now before the sick and weary woman like a stolid Juggernaut. It was an impassive King of her world. The road here ran across Durnover Moor, open to the road on either side. She surveyed the wide space, the lights, herself, sighed, and lay down against a guard-stone of the bridge. Never was ingenuity exercised so sorely as the traveller here exercised hers. Every conceivable aid, method, stratagem, mechanism, by which these last desperate eight hundred yards could be overpassed by a human being unperceived, was revolved in her busy brain, and dismissed as impracticable. She thought of sticks, wheels, crawling--she even thought of rolling. But the exertion demanded by either of these latter two was greater than to walk erect. The faculty of contrivance was worn out. Hopelessness had come at last. "No further!" she whispered, and closed her eyes. From the stripe of shadow on the opposite side of the bridge a portion of shade seemed to detach itself and move into isolation upon the pale white of the road. It glided noiselessly towards the recumbent woman. She became conscious of something touching her hand; it was softness and it was warmth. She opened her eyes, and the substance touched her face. A dog was licking her cheek. He was a huge, heavy, and quiet creature, standing darkly against the low horizon, and at least two feet higher than the present position of her eyes. Whether Newfoundland, mastiff, bloodhound, or what not, it was impossible to say. He seemed to be of too strange and mysterious a nature to belong to any variety among those of popular nomenclature. Being thus assignable to no breed, he was the ideal embodiment of canine greatness--a generalization from what was common to all. Night, in its sad, solemn, and benevolent aspect, apart from its stealthy and cruel side, was personified in this form. Darkness endows the small and ordinary ones among mankind with poetical power, and even the suffering woman threw her idea into figure. In her reclining position she looked up to him just as in earlier times she had, when standing, looked up to a man. The animal, who was as homeless as she, respectfully withdrew a step or two when the woman moved, and, seeing that she did not repulse him, he licked her hand again. A thought moved within her like lightning. "Perhaps I can make use of him--I might do it then!" She pointed in the direction of Casterbridge, and the dog seemed to misunderstand: he trotted on. Then, finding she could not follow, he came back and whined. The ultimate and saddest singularity of woman's effort and invention was reached when, with a quickened breathing, she rose to a stooping posture, and, resting her two little arms upon the shoulders of the dog, leant firmly thereon, and murmured stimulating words. Whilst she sorrowed in her heart she cheered with her voice, and what was stranger than that the strong should need encouragement from the weak was that cheerfulness should be so well stimulated by such utter dejection. Her friend moved forward slowly, and she with small mincing steps moved forward beside him, half her weight being thrown upon the animal. Sometimes she sank as she had sunk from walking erect, from the crutches, from the rails. The dog, who now thoroughly understood her desire and her incapacity, was frantic in his distress on these occasions; he would tug at her dress and run forward. She always called him back, and it was now to be observed that the woman listened for human sounds only to avoid them. It was evident that she had an object in keeping her presence on the road and her forlorn state unknown. Their progress was necessarily very slow. They reached the bottom of the town, and the Casterbridge lamps lay before them like fallen Pleiads as they turned to the left into the dense shade of a deserted avenue of chestnuts, and so skirted the borough. Thus the town was passed, and the goal was reached. On this much-desired spot outside the town rose a picturesque building. Originally it had been a mere case to hold people. The shell had been so thin, so devoid of excrescence, and so closely drawn over the accommodation granted, that the grim character of what was beneath showed through it, as the shape of a body is visible under a winding-sheet. Then Nature, as if offended, lent a hand. Masses of ivy grew up, completely covering the walls, till the place looked like an abbey; and it was discovered that the view from the front, over the Casterbridge chimneys, was one of the most magnificent in the county. A neighbouring earl once said that he would give up a year's rental to have at his own door the view enjoyed by the inmates from theirs--and very probably the inmates would have given up the view for his year's rental. This stone edifice consisted of a central mass and two wings, whereon stood as sentinels a few slim chimneys, now gurgling sorrowfully to the slow wind. In the wall was a gate, and by the gate a bellpull formed of a hanging wire. The woman raised herself as high as possible upon her knees, and could just reach the handle. She moved it and fell forwards in a bowed attitude, her face upon her bosom. It was getting on towards six o'clock, and sounds of movement were to be heard inside the building which was the haven of rest to this wearied soul. A little door by the large one was opened, and a man appeared inside. He discerned the panting heap of clothes, went back for a light, and came again. He entered a second time, and returned with two women. These lifted the prostrate figure and assisted her in through the doorway. The man then closed the door. "How did she get here?" said one of the women. "The Lord knows," said the other. "There is a dog outside," murmured the overcome traveller. "Where is he gone? He helped me." "I stoned him away," said the man. The little procession then moved forward--the man in front bearing the light, the two bony women next, supporting between them the small and supple one. Thus they entered the house and disappeared. SUSPICION--FANNY IS SENT FOR Bathsheba said very little to her husband all that evening of their return from market, and he was not disposed to say much to her. He exhibited the unpleasant combination of a restless condition with a silent tongue. The next day, which was Sunday, passed nearly in the same manner as regarded their taciturnity, Bathsheba going to church both morning and afternoon. This was the day before the Budmouth races. In the evening Troy said, suddenly-- "Bathsheba, could you let me have twenty pounds?" Her countenance instantly sank. "Twenty pounds?" she said. "The fact is, I want it badly." The anxiety upon Troy's face was unusual and very marked. It was a culmination of the mood he had been in all the day. "Ah! for those races to-morrow." Troy for the moment made no reply. Her mistake had its advantages to a man who shrank from having his mind inspected as he did now. "Well, suppose I do want it for races?" he said, at last. "Oh, Frank!" Bathsheba replied, and there was such a volume of entreaty in the words. "Only such a few weeks ago you said that I was far sweeter than all your other pleasures put together, and that you would give them all up for me; and now, won't you give up this one, which is more a worry than a pleasure? Do, Frank. Come, let me fascinate you by all I can do--by pretty words and pretty looks, and everything I can think of--to stay at home. Say yes to your wife--say yes!" The tenderest and softest phases of Bathsheba's nature were prominent now--advanced impulsively for his acceptance, without any of the disguises and defences which the wariness of her character when she was cool too frequently threw over them. Few men could have resisted the arch yet dignified entreaty of the beautiful face, thrown a little back and sideways in the well known attitude that expresses more than the words it accompanies, and which seems to have been designed for these special occasions. Had the woman not been his wife, Troy would have succumbed instantly; as it was, he thought he would not deceive her longer. "The money is not wanted for racing debts at all," he said. "What is it for?" she asked. "You worry me a great deal by these mysterious responsibilities, Frank." Troy hesitated. He did not now love her enough to allow himself to be carried too far by her ways. Yet it was necessary to be civil. "You wrong me by such a suspicious manner," he said. "Such strait-waistcoating as you treat me to is not becoming in you at so early a date." "I think that I have a right to grumble a little if I pay," she said, with features between a smile and a pout. "Exactly; and, the former being done, suppose we proceed to the latter. Bathsheba, fun is all very well, but don't go too far, or you may have cause to regret something." She reddened. "I do that already," she said, quickly. "What do you regret?" "That my romance has come to an end." "All romances end at marriage." "I wish you wouldn't talk like that. You grieve me to my soul by being smart at my expense." "You are dull enough at mine. I believe you hate me." "Not you--only your faults. I do hate them." "'Twould be much more becoming if you set yourself to cure them. Come, let's strike a balance with the twenty pounds, and be friends." She gave a sigh of resignation. "I have about that sum here for household expenses. If you must have it, take it." "Very good. Thank you. I expect I shall have gone away before you are in to breakfast to-morrow." "And must you go? Ah! there was a time, Frank, when it would have taken a good many promises to other people to drag you away from me. You used to call me darling, then. But it doesn't matter to you how my days are passed now." "I must go, in spite of sentiment." Troy, as he spoke, looked at his watch, and, apparently actuated by _non lucendo_ principles, opened the case at the back, revealing, snugly stowed within it, a small coil of hair. Bathsheba's eyes had been accidentally lifted at that moment, and she saw the action and saw the hair. She flushed in pain and surprise, and some words escaped her before she had thought whether or not it was wise to utter them. "A woman's curl of hair!" she said. "Oh, Frank, whose is that?" Troy had instantly closed his watch. He carelessly replied, as one who cloaked some feelings that the sight had stirred. "Why, yours, of course. Whose should it be? I had quite forgotten that I had it." "What a dreadful fib, Frank!" "I tell you I had forgotten it!" he said, loudly. "I don't mean that--it was yellow hair." "Nonsense." "That's insulting me. I know it was yellow. Now whose was it? I want to know." "Very well--I'll tell you, so make no more ado. It is the hair of a young woman I was going to marry before I knew you." "You ought to tell me her name, then." "I cannot do that." "Is she married yet?" "No." "Is she alive?" "Yes." "Is she pretty?" "Yes." "It is wonderful how she can be, poor thing, under such an awful affliction!" "Affliction--what affliction?" he inquired, quickly. "Having hair of that dreadful colour." "Oh--ho--I like that!" said Troy, recovering himself. "Why, her hair has been admired by everybody who has seen her since she has worn it loose, which has not been long. It is beautiful hair. People used to turn their heads to look at it, poor girl!" "Pooh! that's nothing--that's nothing!" she exclaimed, in incipient accents of pique. "If I cared for your love as much as I used to I could say people had turned to look at mine." "Bathsheba, don't be so fitful and jealous. You knew what married life would be like, and shouldn't have entered it if you feared these contingencies." Troy had by this time driven her to bitterness: her heart was big in her throat, and the ducts to her eyes were painfully full. Ashamed as she was to show emotion, at last she burst out:-- "This is all I get for loving you so well! Ah! when I married you your life was dearer to me than my own. I would have died for you--how truly I can say that I would have died for you! And now you sneer at my foolishness in marrying you. O! is it kind to me to throw my mistake in my face? Whatever opinion you may have of my wisdom, you should not tell me of it so mercilessly, now that I am in your power." "I can't help how things fall out," said Troy; "upon my heart, women will be the death of me!" "Well you shouldn't keep people's hair. You'll burn it, won't you, Frank?" Frank went on as if he had not heard her. "There are considerations even before my consideration for you; reparations to be made--ties you know nothing of. If you repent of marrying, so do I." Trembling now, she put her hand upon his arm, saying, in mingled tones of wretchedness and coaxing, "I only repent it if you don't love me better than any woman in the world! I don't otherwise, Frank. You don't repent because you already love somebody better than you love me, do you?" "I don't know. Why do you say that?" "You won't burn that curl. You like the woman who owns that pretty hair--yes; it is pretty--more beautiful than my miserable black mane! Well, it is no use; I can't help being ugly. You must like her best, if you will!" "Until to-day, when I took it from a drawer, I have never looked upon that bit of hair for several months--that I am ready to swear." "But just now you said 'ties'; and then--that woman we met?" "'Twas the meeting with her that reminded me of the hair." "Is it hers, then?" "Yes. There, now that you have wormed it out of me, I hope you are content." "And what are the ties?" "Oh! that meant nothing--a mere jest." "A mere jest!" she said, in mournful astonishment. "Can you jest when I am so wretchedly in earnest? Tell me the truth, Frank. I am not a fool, you know, although I am a woman, and have my woman's moments. Come! treat me fairly," she said, looking honestly and fearlessly into his face. "I don't want much; bare justice--that's all! Ah! once I felt I could be content with nothing less than the highest homage from the husband I should choose. Now, anything short of cruelty will content me. Yes! the independent and spirited Bathsheba is come to this!" "For Heaven's sake don't be so desperate!" Troy said, snappishly, rising as he did so, and leaving the room. Directly he had gone, Bathsheba burst into great sobs--dry-eyed sobs, which cut as they came, without any softening by tears. But she determined to repress all evidences of feeling. She was conquered; but she would never own it as long as she lived. Her pride was indeed brought low by despairing discoveries of her spoliation by marriage with a less pure nature than her own. She chafed to and fro in rebelliousness, like a caged leopard; her whole soul was in arms, and the blood fired her face. Until she had met Troy, Bathsheba had been proud of her position as a woman; it had been a glory to her to know that her lips had been touched by no man's on earth--that her waist had never been encircled by a lover's arm. She hated herself now. In those earlier days she had always nourished a secret contempt for girls who were the slaves of the first good-looking young fellow who should choose to salute them. She had never taken kindly to the idea of marriage in the abstract as did the majority of women she saw about her. In the turmoil of her anxiety for her lover she had agreed to marry him; but the perception that had accompanied her happiest hours on this account was rather that of self-sacrifice than of promotion and honour. Although she scarcely knew the divinity's name, Diana was the goddess whom Bathsheba instinctively adored. That she had never, by look, word, or sign, encouraged a man to approach her--that she had felt herself sufficient to herself, and had in the independence of her girlish heart fancied there was a certain degradation in renouncing the simplicity of a maiden existence to become the humbler half of an indifferent matrimonial whole--were facts now bitterly remembered. Oh, if she had never stooped to folly of this kind, respectable as it was, and could only stand again, as she had stood on the hill at Norcombe, and dare Troy or any other man to pollute a hair of her head by his interference! The next morning she rose earlier than usual, and had the horse saddled for her ride round the farm in the customary way. When she came in at half-past eight--their usual hour for breakfasting--she was informed that her husband had risen, taken his breakfast, and driven off to Casterbridge with the gig and Poppet. After breakfast she was cool and collected--quite herself in fact--and she rambled to the gate, intending to walk to another quarter of the farm, which she still personally superintended as well as her duties in the house would permit, continually, however, finding herself preceded in forethought by Gabriel Oak, for whom she began to entertain the genuine friendship of a sister. Of course, she sometimes thought of him in the light of an old lover, and had momentary imaginings of what life with him as a husband would have been like; also of life with Boldwood under the same conditions. But Bathsheba, though she could feel, was not much given to futile dreaming, and her musings under this head were short and entirely confined to the times when Troy's neglect was more than ordinarily evident. She saw coming up the road a man like Mr. Boldwood. It was Mr. Boldwood. Bathsheba blushed painfully, and watched. The farmer stopped when still a long way off, and held up his hand to Gabriel Oak, who was in a footpath across the field. The two men then approached each other and seemed to engage in earnest conversation. Thus they continued for a long time. Joseph Poorgrass now passed near them, wheeling a barrow of apples up the hill to Bathsheba's residence. Boldwood and Gabriel called to him, spoke to him for a few minutes, and then all three parted, Joseph immediately coming up the hill with his barrow. Bathsheba, who had seen this pantomime with some surprise, experienced great relief when Boldwood turned back again. "Well, what's the message, Joseph?" she said. He set down his barrow, and, putting upon himself the refined aspect that a conversation with a lady required, spoke to Bathsheba over the gate. "You'll never see Fanny Robin no more--use nor principal--ma'am." "Why?" "Because she's dead in the Union." "Fanny dead--never!" "Yes, ma'am." "What did she die from?" "I don't know for certain; but I should be inclined to think it was from general neshness of constitution. She was such a limber maid that 'a could stand no hardship, even when I knowed her, and 'a went like a candle-snoff, so 'tis said. She was took bad in the morning, and, being quite feeble and worn out, she died in the evening. She belongs by law to our parish; and Mr. Boldwood is going to send a waggon at three this afternoon to fetch her home here and bury her." "Indeed I shall not let Mr. Boldwood do any such thing--I shall do it! Fanny was my uncle's servant, and, although I only knew her for a couple of days, she belongs to me. How very, very sad this is!--the idea of Fanny being in a workhouse." Bathsheba had begun to know what suffering was, and she spoke with real feeling.... "Send across to Mr. Boldwood's, and say that Mrs. Troy will take upon herself the duty of fetching an old servant of the family.... We ought not to put her in a waggon; we'll get a hearse." "There will hardly be time, ma'am, will there?" "Perhaps not," she said, musingly. "When did you say we must be at the door--three o'clock?" "Three o'clock this afternoon, ma'am, so to speak it." "Very well--you go with it. A pretty waggon is better than an ugly hearse, after all. Joseph, have the new spring waggon with the blue body and red wheels, and wash it very clean. And, Joseph--" "Yes, ma'am." "Carry with you some evergreens and flowers to put upon her coffin--indeed, gather a great many, and completely bury her in them. Get some boughs of laurustinus, and variegated box, and yew, and boy's-love; ay, and some bunches of chrysanthemum. And let old Pleasant draw her, because she knew him so well." "I will, ma'am. I ought to have said that the Union, in the form of four labouring men, will meet me when I gets to our churchyard gate, and take her and bury her according to the rites of the Board of Guardians, as by law ordained." "Dear me--Casterbridge Union--and is Fanny come to this?" said Bathsheba, musing. "I wish I had known of it sooner. I thought she was far away. How long has she lived there?" "On'y been there a day or two." "Oh!--then she has not been staying there as a regular inmate?" "No. She first went to live in a garrison-town t'other side o' Wessex, and since then she's been picking up a living at seampstering in Melchester for several months, at the house of a very respectable widow-woman who takes in work of that sort. She only got handy the Union-house on Sunday morning 'a b'lieve, and 'tis supposed here and there that she had traipsed every step of the way from Melchester. Why she left her place, I can't say, for I don't know; and as to a lie, why, I wouldn't tell it. That's the short of the story, ma'am." "Ah-h!" No gem ever flashed from a rosy ray to a white one more rapidly than changed the young wife's countenance whilst this word came from her in a long-drawn breath. "Did she walk along our turnpike-road?" she said, in a suddenly restless and eager voice. "I believe she did.... Ma'am, shall I call Liddy? You bain't well, ma'am, surely? You look like a lily--so pale and fainty!" "No; don't call her; it is nothing. When did she pass Weatherbury?" "Last Saturday night." "That will do, Joseph; now you may go." "Certainly, ma'am." "Joseph, come hither a moment. What was the colour of Fanny Robin's hair?" "Really, mistress, now that 'tis put to me so judge-and-jury like, I can't call to mind, if ye'll believe me!" "Never mind; go on and do what I told you. Stop--well no, go on." She turned herself away from him, that he might no longer notice the mood which had set its sign so visibly upon her, and went indoors with a distressing sense of faintness and a beating brow. About an hour after, she heard the noise of the waggon and went out, still with a painful consciousness of her bewildered and troubled look. Joseph, dressed in his best suit of clothes, was putting in the horse to start. The shrubs and flowers were all piled in the waggon, as she had directed; Bathsheba hardly saw them now. "Died of what? did you say, Joseph?" "I don't know, ma'am." "Are you quite sure?" "Yes, ma'am, quite sure." "Sure of what?" "I'm sure that all I know is that she arrived in the morning and died in the evening without further parley. What Oak and Mr. Boldwood told me was only these few words. 'Little Fanny Robin is dead, Joseph,' Gabriel said, looking in my face in his steady old way. I was very sorry, and I said, 'Ah!--and how did she come to die?' 'Well, she's dead in Casterbridge Union,' he said, 'and perhaps 'tisn't much matter about how she came to die. She reached the Union early Sunday morning, and died in the afternoon--that's clear enough.' Then I asked what she'd been doing lately, and Mr. Boldwood turned round to me then, and left off spitting a thistle with the end of his stick. He told me about her having lived by seampstering in Melchester, as I mentioned to you, and that she walked therefrom at the end of last week, passing near here Saturday night in the dusk. They then said I had better just name a hint of her death to you, and away they went. Her death might have been brought on by biding in the night wind, you know, ma'am; for people used to say she'd go off in a decline: she used to cough a good deal in winter time. However, 'tisn't much odds to us about that now, for 'tis all over." "Have you heard a different story at all?" She looked at him so intently that Joseph's eyes quailed. "Not a word, mistress, I assure 'ee!" he said. "Hardly anybody in the parish knows the news yet." "I wonder why Gabriel didn't bring the message to me himself. He mostly makes a point of seeing me upon the most trifling errand." These words were merely murmured, and she was looking upon the ground. "Perhaps he was busy, ma'am," Joseph suggested. "And sometimes he seems to suffer from things upon his mind, connected with the time when he was better off than 'a is now. 'A's rather a curious item, but a very understanding shepherd, and learned in books." "Did anything seem upon his mind whilst he was speaking to you about this?" "I cannot but say that there did, ma'am. He was terrible down, and so was Farmer Boldwood." "Thank you, Joseph. That will do. Go on now, or you'll be late." Bathsheba, still unhappy, went indoors again. In the course of the afternoon she said to Liddy, who had been informed of the occurrence, "What was the colour of poor Fanny Robin's hair? Do you know? I cannot recollect--I only saw her for a day or two." "It was light, ma'am; but she wore it rather short, and packed away under her cap, so that you would hardly notice it. But I have seen her let it down when she was going to bed, and it looked beautiful then. Real golden hair." "Her young man was a soldier, was he not?" "Yes. In the same regiment as Mr. Troy. He says he knew him very well." "What, Mr. Troy says so? How came he to say that?" "One day I just named it to him, and asked him if he knew Fanny's young man. He said, 'Oh yes, he knew the young man as well as he knew himself, and that there wasn't a man in the regiment he liked better.'" "Ah! Said that, did he?" "Yes; and he said there was a strong likeness between himself and the other young man, so that sometimes people mistook them--" "Liddy, for Heaven's sake stop your talking!" said Bathsheba, with the nervous petulance that comes from worrying perceptions. JOSEPH AND HIS BURDEN--BUCK'S HEAD A wall bounded the site of Casterbridge Union-house, except along a portion of the end. Here a high gable stood prominent, and it was covered like the front with a mat of ivy. In this gable was no window, chimney, ornament, or protuberance of any kind. The single feature appertaining to it, beyond the expanse of dark green leaves, was a small door. The situation of the door was peculiar. The sill was three or four feet above the ground, and for a moment one was at a loss for an explanation of this exceptional altitude, till ruts immediately beneath suggested that the door was used solely for the passage of articles and persons to and from the level of a vehicle standing on the outside. Upon the whole, the door seemed to advertise itself as a species of Traitor's Gate translated to another sphere. That entry and exit hereby was only at rare intervals became apparent on noting that tufts of grass were allowed to flourish undisturbed in the chinks of the sill. As the clock over the South-street Alms-house pointed to five minutes to three, a blue spring waggon, picked out with red, and containing boughs and flowers, passed the end of the street, and up towards this side of the building. Whilst the chimes were yet stammering out a shattered form of "Malbrook," Joseph Poorgrass rang the bell, and received directions to back his waggon against the high door under the gable. The door then opened, and a plain elm coffin was slowly thrust forth, and laid by two men in fustian along the middle of the vehicle. One of the men then stepped up beside it, took from his pocket a lump of chalk, and wrote upon the cover the name and a few other words in a large scrawling hand. (We believe that they do these things more tenderly now, and provide a plate.) He covered the whole with a black cloth, threadbare, but decent, the tail-board of the waggon was returned to its place, one of the men handed a certificate of registry to Poorgrass, and both entered the door, closing it behind them. Their connection with her, short as it had been, was over for ever. Joseph then placed the flowers as enjoined, and the evergreens around the flowers, till it was difficult to divine what the waggon contained; he smacked his whip, and the rather pleasing funeral car crept down the hill, and along the road to Weatherbury. The afternoon drew on apace, and, looking to the right towards the sea as he walked beside the horse, Poorgrass saw strange clouds and scrolls of mist rolling over the long ridges which girt the landscape in that quarter. They came in yet greater volumes, and indolently crept across the intervening valleys, and around the withered papery flags of the moor and river brinks. Then their dank spongy forms closed in upon the sky. It was a sudden overgrowth of atmospheric fungi which had their roots in the neighbouring sea, and by the time that horse, man, and corpse entered Yalbury Great Wood, these silent workings of an invisible hand had reached them, and they were completely enveloped, this being the first arrival of the autumn fogs, and the first fog of the series. The air was as an eye suddenly struck blind. The waggon and its load rolled no longer on the horizontal division between clearness and opacity, but were imbedded in an elastic body of a monotonous pallor throughout. There was no perceptible motion in the air, not a visible drop of water fell upon a leaf of the beeches, birches, and firs composing the wood on either side. The trees stood in an attitude of intentness, as if they waited longingly for a wind to come and rock them. A startling quiet overhung all surrounding things--so completely, that the crunching of the waggon-wheels was as a great noise, and small rustles, which had never obtained a hearing except by night, were distinctly individualized. Joseph Poorgrass looked round upon his sad burden as it loomed faintly through the flowering laurustinus, then at the unfathomable gloom amid the high trees on each hand, indistinct, shadowless, and spectre-like in their monochrome of grey. He felt anything but cheerful, and wished he had the company even of a child or dog. Stopping the horse, he listened. Not a footstep or wheel was audible anywhere around, and the dead silence was broken only by a heavy particle falling from a tree through the evergreens and alighting with a smart rap upon the coffin of poor Fanny. The fog had by this time saturated the trees, and this was the first dropping of water from the overbrimming leaves. The hollow echo of its fall reminded the waggoner painfully of the grim Leveller. Then hard by came down another drop, then two or three. Presently there was a continual tapping of these heavy drops upon the dead leaves, the road, and the travellers. The nearer boughs were beaded with the mist to the greyness of aged men, and the rusty-red leaves of the beeches were hung with similar drops, like diamonds on auburn hair. At the roadside hamlet called Roy-Town, just beyond this wood, was the old inn Buck's Head. It was about a mile and a half from Weatherbury, and in the meridian times of stage-coach travelling had been the place where many coaches changed and kept their relays of horses. All the old stabling was now pulled down, and little remained besides the habitable inn itself, which, standing a little way back from the road, signified its existence to people far up and down the highway by a sign hanging from the horizontal bough of an elm on the opposite side of the way. Travellers--for the variety _tourist_ had hardly developed into a distinct species at this date--sometimes said in passing, when they cast their eyes up to the sign-bearing tree, that artists were fond of representing the signboard hanging thus, but that they themselves had never before noticed so perfect an instance in actual working order. It was near this tree that the waggon was standing into which Gabriel Oak crept on his first journey to Weatherbury; but, owing to the darkness, the sign and the inn had been unobserved. The manners of the inn were of the old-established type. Indeed, in the minds of its frequenters they existed as unalterable formulae: _e.g._-- Rap with the bottom of your pint for more liquor. For tobacco, shout. In calling for the girl in waiting, say, "Maid!" Ditto for the landlady, "Old Soul!" etc., etc. It was a relief to Joseph's heart when the friendly signboard came in view, and, stopping his horse immediately beneath it, he proceeded to fulfil an intention made a long time before. His spirits were oozing out of him quite. He turned the horse's head to the green bank, and entered the hostel for a mug of ale. Going down into the kitchen of the inn, the floor of which was a step below the passage, which in its turn was a step below the road outside, what should Joseph see to gladden his eyes but two copper-coloured discs, in the form of the countenances of Mr. Jan Coggan and Mr. Mark Clark. These owners of the two most appreciative throats in the neighbourhood, within the pale of respectability, were now sitting face to face over a three-legged circular table, having an iron rim to keep cups and pots from being accidentally elbowed off; they might have been said to resemble the setting sun and the full moon shining _vis-a-vis_ across the globe. "Why, 'tis neighbour Poorgrass!" said Mark Clark. "I'm sure your face don't praise your mistress's table, Joseph." "I've had a very pale companion for the last four miles," said Joseph, indulging in a shudder toned down by resignation. "And to speak the truth, 'twas beginning to tell upon me. I assure ye, I ha'n't seed the colour of victuals or drink since breakfast time this morning, and that was no more than a dew-bit afield." "Then drink, Joseph, and don't restrain yourself!" said Coggan, handing him a hooped mug three-quarters full. Joseph drank for a moderately long time, then for a longer time, saying, as he lowered the jug, "'Tis pretty drinking--very pretty drinking, and is more than cheerful on my melancholy errand, so to speak it." "True, drink is a pleasant delight," said Jan, as one who repeated a truism so familiar to his brain that he hardly noticed its passage over his tongue; and, lifting the cup, Coggan tilted his head gradually backwards, with closed eyes, that his expectant soul might not be diverted for one instant from its bliss by irrelevant surroundings. "Well, I must be on again," said Poorgrass. "Not but that I should like another nip with ye; but the parish might lose confidence in me if I was seed here." "Where be ye trading o't to to-day, then, Joseph?" "Back to Weatherbury. I've got poor little Fanny Robin in my waggon outside, and I must be at the churchyard gates at a quarter to five with her." "Ay--I've heard of it. And so she's nailed up in parish boards after all, and nobody to pay the bell shilling and the grave half-crown." "The parish pays the grave half-crown, but not the bell shilling, because the bell's a luxery: but 'a can hardly do without the grave, poor body. However, I expect our mistress will pay all." "A pretty maid as ever I see! But what's yer hurry, Joseph? The pore woman's dead, and you can't bring her to life, and you may as well sit down comfortable, and finish another with us." "I don't mind taking just the least thimbleful ye can dream of more with ye, sonnies. But only a few minutes, because 'tis as 'tis." "Of course, you'll have another drop. A man's twice the man afterwards. You feel so warm and glorious, and you whop and slap at your work without any trouble, and everything goes on like sticks a-breaking. Too much liquor is bad, and leads us to that horned man in the smoky house; but after all, many people haven't the gift of enjoying a wet, and since we be highly favoured with a power that way, we should make the most o't." "True," said Mark Clark. "'Tis a talent the Lord has mercifully bestowed upon us, and we ought not to neglect it. But, what with the parsons and clerks and school-people and serious tea-parties, the merry old ways of good life have gone to the dogs--upon my carcase, they have!" "Well, really, I must be onward again now," said Joseph. "Now, now, Joseph; nonsense! The poor woman is dead, isn't she, and what's your hurry?" "Well, I hope Providence won't be in a way with me for my doings," said Joseph, again sitting down. "I've been troubled with weak moments lately, 'tis true. I've been drinky once this month already, and I did not go to church a-Sunday, and I dropped a curse or two yesterday; so I don't want to go too far for my safety. Your next world is your next world, and not to be squandered offhand." "I believe ye to be a chapelmember, Joseph. That I do." "Oh, no, no! I don't go so far as that." "For my part," said Coggan, "I'm staunch Church of England." "Ay, and faith, so be I," said Mark Clark. "I won't say much for myself; I don't wish to," Coggan continued, with that tendency to talk on principles which is characteristic of the barley-corn. "But I've never changed a single doctrine: I've stuck like a plaster to the old faith I was born in. Yes; there's this to be said for the Church, a man can belong to the Church and bide in his cheerful old inn, and never trouble or worry his mind about doctrines at all. But to be a meetinger, you must go to chapel in all winds and weathers, and make yerself as frantic as a skit. Not but that chapel members be clever chaps enough in their way. They can lift up beautiful prayers out of their own heads, all about their families and shipwrecks in the newspaper." "They can--they can," said Mark Clark, with corroborative feeling; "but we Churchmen, you see, must have it all printed aforehand, or, dang it all, we should no more know what to say to a great gaffer like the Lord than babes unborn." "Chapelfolk be more hand-in-glove with them above than we," said Joseph, thoughtfully. "Yes," said Coggan. "We know very well that if anybody do go to heaven, they will. They've worked hard for it, and they deserve to have it, such as 'tis. I bain't such a fool as to pretend that we who stick to the Church have the same chance as they, because we know we have not. But I hate a feller who'll change his old ancient doctrines for the sake of getting to heaven. I'd as soon turn king's-evidence for the few pounds you get. Why, neighbours, when every one of my taties were frosted, our Parson Thirdly were the man who gave me a sack for seed, though he hardly had one for his own use, and no money to buy 'em. If it hadn't been for him, I shouldn't hae had a tatie to put in my garden. D'ye think I'd turn after that? No, I'll stick to my side; and if we be in the wrong, so be it: I'll fall with the fallen!" "Well said--very well said," observed Joseph.--"However, folks, I must be moving now: upon my life I must. Pa'son Thirdly will be waiting at the church gates, and there's the woman a-biding outside in the waggon." "Joseph Poorgrass, don't be so miserable! Pa'son Thirdly won't mind. He's a generous man; he's found me in tracts for years, and I've consumed a good many in the course of a long and shady life; but he's never been the man to cry out at the expense. Sit down." The longer Joseph Poorgrass remained, the less his spirit was troubled by the duties which devolved upon him this afternoon. The minutes glided by uncounted, until the evening shades began perceptibly to deepen, and the eyes of the three were but sparkling points on the surface of darkness. Coggan's repeater struck six from his pocket in the usual still small tones. At that moment hasty steps were heard in the entry, and the door opened to admit the figure of Gabriel Oak, followed by the maid of the inn bearing a candle. He stared sternly at the one lengthy and two round faces of the sitters, which confronted him with the expressions of a fiddle and a couple of warming-pans. Joseph Poorgrass blinked, and shrank several inches into the background. "Upon my soul, I'm ashamed of you; 'tis disgraceful, Joseph, disgraceful!" said Gabriel, indignantly. "Coggan, you call yourself a man, and don't know better than this." Coggan looked up indefinitely at Oak, one or other of his eyes occasionally opening and closing of its own accord, as if it were not a member, but a dozy individual with a distinct personality. "Don't take on so, shepherd!" said Mark Clark, looking reproachfully at the candle, which appeared to possess special features of interest for his eyes. "Nobody can hurt a dead woman," at length said Coggan, with the precision of a machine. "All that could be done for her is done--she's beyond us: and why should a man put himself in a tearing hurry for lifeless clay that can neither feel nor see, and don't know what you do with her at all? If she'd been alive, I would have been the first to help her. If she now wanted victuals and drink, I'd pay for it, money down. But she's dead, and no speed of ours will bring her to life. The woman's past us--time spent upon her is throwed away: why should we hurry to do what's not required? Drink, shepherd, and be friends, for to-morrow we may be like her." "We may," added Mark Clark, emphatically, at once drinking himself, to run no further risk of losing his chance by the event alluded to, Jan meanwhile merging his additional thoughts of to-morrow in a song:-- To-mor-row, to-mor-row! And while peace and plen-ty I find at my board, With a heart free from sick-ness and sor-row, With my friends will I share what to-day may af-ford, And let them spread the ta-ble to-mor-row. To-mor-row', to-mor-- "Do hold thy horning, Jan!" said Oak; and turning upon Poorgrass, "as for you, Joseph, who do your wicked deeds in such confoundedly holy ways, you are as drunk as you can stand." "No, Shepherd Oak, no! Listen to reason, shepherd. All that's the matter with me is the affliction called a multiplying eye, and that's how it is I look double to you--I mean, you look double to me." "A multiplying eye is a very bad thing," said Mark Clark. "It always comes on when I have been in a public-house a little time," said Joseph Poorgrass, meekly. "Yes; I see two of every sort, as if I were some holy man living in the times of King Noah and entering into the ark.... Y-y-y-yes," he added, becoming much affected by the picture of himself as a person thrown away, and shedding tears; "I feel too good for England: I ought to have lived in Genesis by rights, like the other men of sacrifice, and then I shouldn't have b-b-been called a d-d-drunkard in such a way!" "I wish you'd show yourself a man of spirit, and not sit whining there!" "Show myself a man of spirit? ... Ah, well! let me take the name of drunkard humbly--let me be a man of contrite knees--let it be! I know that I always do say 'Please God' afore I do anything, from my getting up to my going down of the same, and I be willing to take as much disgrace as there is in that holy act. Hah, yes! ... But not a man of spirit? Have I ever allowed the toe of pride to be lifted against my hinder parts without groaning manfully that I question the right to do so? I inquire that query boldly?" "We can't say that you have, Hero Poorgrass," admitted Jan. "Never have I allowed such treatment to pass unquestioned! Yet the shepherd says in the face of that rich testimony that I be not a man of spirit! Well, let it pass by, and death is a kind friend!" Gabriel, seeing that neither of the three was in a fit state to take charge of the waggon for the remainder of the journey, made no reply, but, closing the door again upon them, went across to where the vehicle stood, now getting indistinct in the fog and gloom of this mildewy time. He pulled the horse's head from the large patch of turf it had eaten bare, readjusted the boughs over the coffin, and drove along through the unwholesome night. It had gradually become rumoured in the village that the body to be brought and buried that day was all that was left of the unfortunate Fanny Robin who had followed the Eleventh from Casterbridge through Melchester and onwards. But, thanks to Boldwood's reticence and Oak's generosity, the lover she had followed had never been individualized as Troy. Gabriel hoped that the whole truth of the matter might not be published till at any rate the girl had been in her grave for a few days, when the interposing barriers of earth and time, and a sense that the events had been somewhat shut into oblivion, would deaden the sting that revelation and invidious remark would have for Bathsheba just now. By the time that Gabriel reached the old manor-house, her residence, which lay in his way to the church, it was quite dark. A man came from the gate and said through the fog, which hung between them like blown flour-- "Is that Poorgrass with the corpse?" Gabriel recognized the voice as that of the parson. "The corpse is here, sir," said Gabriel. "I have just been to inquire of Mrs. Troy if she could tell me the reason of the delay. I am afraid it is too late now for the funeral to be performed with proper decency. Have you the registrar's certificate?" "No," said Gabriel. "I expect Poorgrass has that; and he's at the Buck's Head. I forgot to ask him for it." "Then that settles the matter. We'll put off the funeral till to-morrow morning. The body may be brought on to the church, or it may be left here at the farm and fetched by the bearers in the morning. They waited more than an hour, and have now gone home." Gabriel had his reasons for thinking the latter a most objectionable plan, notwithstanding that Fanny had been an inmate of the farm-house for several years in the lifetime of Bathsheba's uncle. Visions of several unhappy contingencies which might arise from this delay flitted before him. But his will was not law, and he went indoors to inquire of his mistress what were her wishes on the subject. He found her in an unusual mood: her eyes as she looked up to him were suspicious and perplexed as with some antecedent thought. Troy had not yet returned. At first Bathsheba assented with a mien of indifference to his proposition that they should go on to the church at once with their burden; but immediately afterwards, following Gabriel to the gate, she swerved to the extreme of solicitousness on Fanny's account, and desired that the girl might be brought into the house. Oak argued upon the convenience of leaving her in the waggon, just as she lay now, with her flowers and green leaves about her, merely wheeling the vehicle into the coach-house till the morning, but to no purpose. "It is unkind and unchristian," she said, "to leave the poor thing in a coach-house all night." "Very well, then," said the parson. "And I will arrange that the funeral shall take place early to-morrow. Perhaps Mrs. Troy is right in feeling that we cannot treat a dead fellow-creature too thoughtfully. We must remember that though she may have erred grievously in leaving her home, she is still our sister: and it is to be believed that God's uncovenanted mercies are extended towards her, and that she is a member of the flock of Christ." The parson's words spread into the heavy air with a sad yet unperturbed cadence, and Gabriel shed an honest tear. Bathsheba seemed unmoved. Mr. Thirdly then left them, and Gabriel lighted a lantern. Fetching three other men to assist him, they bore the unconscious truant indoors, placing the coffin on two benches in the middle of a little sitting-room next the hall, as Bathsheba directed. Every one except Gabriel Oak then left the room. He still indecisively lingered beside the body. He was deeply troubled at the wretchedly ironical aspect that circumstances were putting on with regard to Troy's wife, and at his own powerlessness to counteract them. In spite of his careful manoeuvering all this day, the very worst event that could in any way have happened in connection with the burial had happened now. Oak imagined a terrible discovery resulting from this afternoon's work that might cast over Bathsheba's life a shade which the interposition of many lapsing years might but indifferently lighten, and which nothing at all might altogether remove. Suddenly, as in a last attempt to save Bathsheba from, at any rate, immediate anguish, he looked again, as he had looked before, at the chalk writing upon the coffin-lid. The scrawl was this simple one, "FANNY ROBIN AND CHILD." Gabriel took his handkerchief and carefully rubbed out the two latter words, leaving visible the inscription "FANNY ROBIN" only. He then left the room, and went out quietly by the front door. FANNY'S REVENGE "Do you want me any longer ma'am?" inquired Liddy, at a later hour the same evening, standing by the door with a chamber candlestick in her hand and addressing Bathsheba, who sat cheerless and alone in the large parlour beside the first fire of the season. "No more to-night, Liddy." "I'll sit up for master if you like, ma'am. I am not at all afraid of Fanny, if I may sit in my own room and have a candle. She was such a childlike, nesh young thing that her spirit couldn't appear to anybody if it tried, I'm quite sure." "Oh no, no! You go to bed. I'll sit up for him myself till twelve o'clock, and if he has not arrived by that time, I shall give him up and go to bed too." "It is half-past ten now." "Oh! is it?" "Why don't you sit upstairs, ma'am?" "Why don't I?" said Bathsheba, desultorily. "It isn't worth while--there's a fire here, Liddy." She suddenly exclaimed in an impulsive and excited whisper, "Have you heard anything strange said of Fanny?" The words had no sooner escaped her than an expression of unutterable regret crossed her face, and she burst into tears. "No--not a word!" said Liddy, looking at the weeping woman with astonishment. "What is it makes you cry so, ma'am; has anything hurt you?" She came to Bathsheba's side with a face full of sympathy. "No, Liddy--I don't want you any more. I can hardly say why I have taken to crying lately: I never used to cry. Good-night." Liddy then left the parlour and closed the door. Bathsheba was lonely and miserable now; not lonelier actually than she had been before her marriage; but her loneliness then was to that of the present time as the solitude of a mountain is to the solitude of a cave. And within the last day or two had come these disquieting thoughts about her husband's past. Her wayward sentiment that evening concerning Fanny's temporary resting-place had been the result of a strange complication of impulses in Bathsheba's bosom. Perhaps it would be more accurately described as a determined rebellion against her prejudices, a revulsion from a lower instinct of uncharitableness, which would have withheld all sympathy from the dead woman, because in life she had preceded Bathsheba in the attentions of a man whom Bathsheba had by no means ceased from loving, though her love was sick to death just now with the gravity of a further misgiving. In five or ten minutes there was another tap at the door. Liddy reappeared, and coming in a little way stood hesitating, until at length she said, "Maryann has just heard something very strange, but I know it isn't true. And we shall be sure to know the rights of it in a day or two." "What is it?" "Oh, nothing connected with you or us, ma'am. It is about Fanny. That same thing you have heard." "I have heard nothing." "I mean that a wicked story is got to Weatherbury within this last hour--that--" Liddy came close to her mistress and whispered the remainder of the sentence slowly into her ear, inclining her head as she spoke in the direction of the room where Fanny lay. Bathsheba trembled from head to foot. "I don't believe it!" she said, excitedly. "And there's only one name written on the coffin-cover." "Nor I, ma'am. And a good many others don't; for we should surely have been told more about it if it had been true--don't you think so, ma'am?" "We might or we might not." Bathsheba turned and looked into the fire, that Liddy might not see her face. Finding that her mistress was going to say no more, Liddy glided out, closed the door softly, and went to bed. Bathsheba's face, as she continued looking into the fire that evening, might have excited solicitousness on her account even among those who loved her least. The sadness of Fanny Robin's fate did not make Bathsheba's glorious, although she was the Esther to this poor Vashti, and their fates might be supposed to stand in some respects as contrasts to each other. When Liddy came into the room a second time the beautiful eyes which met hers had worn a listless, weary look. When she went out after telling the story they had expressed wretchedness in full activity. Her simple country nature, fed on old-fashioned principles, was troubled by that which would have troubled a woman of the world very little, both Fanny and her child, if she had one, being dead. Bathsheba had grounds for conjecturing a connection between her own history and the dimly suspected tragedy of Fanny's end which Oak and Boldwood never for a moment credited her with possessing. The meeting with the lonely woman on the previous Saturday night had been unwitnessed and unspoken of. Oak may have had the best of intentions in withholding for as many days as possible the details of what had happened to Fanny; but had he known that Bathsheba's perceptions had already been exercised in the matter, he would have done nothing to lengthen the minutes of suspense she was now undergoing, when the certainty which must terminate it would be the worst fact suspected after all. She suddenly felt a longing desire to speak to some one stronger than herself, and so get strength to sustain her surmised position with dignity and her lurking doubts with stoicism. Where could she find such a friend? nowhere in the house. She was by far the coolest of the women under her roof. Patience and suspension of judgement for a few hours were what she wanted to learn, and there was nobody to teach her. Might she but go to Gabriel Oak!--but that could not be. What a way Oak had, she thought, of enduring things. Boldwood, who seemed so much deeper and higher and stronger in feeling than Gabriel, had not yet learnt, any more than she herself, the simple lesson which Oak showed a mastery of by every turn and look he gave--that among the multitude of interests by which he was surrounded, those which affected his personal well-being were not the most absorbing and important in his eyes. Oak meditatively looked upon the horizon of circumstances without any special regard to his own standpoint in the midst. That was how she would wish to be. But then Oak was not racked by incertitude upon the inmost matter of his bosom, as she was at this moment. Oak knew all about Fanny that he wished to know--she felt convinced of that. If she were to go to him now at once and say no more than these few words, "What is the truth of the story?" he would feel bound in honour to tell her. It would be an inexpressible relief. No further speech would need to be uttered. He knew her so well that no eccentricity of behaviour in her would alarm him. She flung a cloak round her, went to the door and opened it. Every blade, every twig was still. The air was yet thick with moisture, though somewhat less dense than during the afternoon, and a steady smack of drops upon the fallen leaves under the boughs was almost musical in its soothing regularity. It seemed better to be out of the house than within it, and Bathsheba closed the door, and walked slowly down the lane till she came opposite to Gabriel's cottage, where he now lived alone, having left Coggan's house through being pinched for room. There was a light in one window only, and that was downstairs. The shutters were not closed, nor was any blind or curtain drawn over the window, neither robbery nor observation being a contingency which could do much injury to the occupant of the domicile. Yes, it was Gabriel himself who was sitting up: he was reading. From her standing-place in the road she could see him plainly, sitting quite still, his light curly head upon his hand, and only occasionally looking up to snuff the candle which stood beside him. At length he looked at the clock, seemed surprised at the lateness of the hour, closed his book, and arose. He was going to bed, she knew, and if she tapped it must be done at once. Alas for her resolve! She felt she could not do it. Not for worlds now could she give a hint about her misery to him, much less ask him plainly for information on the cause of Fanny's death. She must suspect, and guess, and chafe, and bear it all alone. Like a homeless wanderer she lingered by the bank, as if lulled and fascinated by the atmosphere of content which seemed to spread from that little dwelling, and was so sadly lacking in her own. Gabriel appeared in an upper room, placed his light in the window-bench, and then--knelt down to pray. The contrast of the picture with her rebellious and agitated existence at this same time was too much for her to bear to look upon longer. It was not for her to make a truce with trouble by any such means. She must tread her giddy distracting measure to its last note, as she had begun it. With a swollen heart she went again up the lane, and entered her own door. More fevered now by a reaction from the first feelings which Oak's example had raised in her, she paused in the hall, looking at the door of the room wherein Fanny lay. She locked her fingers, threw back her head, and strained her hot hands rigidly across her forehead, saying, with a hysterical sob, "Would to God you would speak and tell me your secret, Fanny! ... Oh, I hope, hope it is not true that there are two of you! ... If I could only look in upon you for one little minute, I should know all!" A few moments passed, and she added, slowly, "AND I WILL." Bathsheba in after times could never gauge the mood which carried her through the actions following this murmured resolution on this memorable evening of her life. She went to the lumber-closet for a screw-driver. At the end of a short though undefined time she found herself in the small room, quivering with emotion, a mist before her eyes, and an excruciating pulsation in her brain, standing beside the uncovered coffin of the girl whose conjectured end had so entirely engrossed her, and saying to herself in a husky voice as she gazed within-- "It was best to know the worst, and I know it now!" She was conscious of having brought about this situation by a series of actions done as by one in an extravagant dream; of following that idea as to method, which had burst upon her in the hall with glaring obviousness, by gliding to the top of the stairs, assuring herself by listening to the heavy breathing of her maids that they were asleep, gliding down again, turning the handle of the door within which the young girl lay, and deliberately setting herself to do what, if she had anticipated any such undertaking at night and alone, would have horrified her, but which, when done, was not so dreadful as was the conclusive proof of her husband's conduct which came with knowing beyond doubt the last chapter of Fanny's story. Bathsheba's head sank upon her bosom, and the breath which had been bated in suspense, curiosity, and interest, was exhaled now in the form of a whispered wail: "Oh-h-h!" she said, and the silent room added length to her moan. Her tears fell fast beside the unconscious pair in the coffin: tears of a complicated origin, of a nature indescribable, almost indefinable except as other than those of simple sorrow. Assuredly their wonted fires must have lived in Fanny's ashes when events were so shaped as to chariot her hither in this natural, unobtrusive, yet effectual manner. The one feat alone--that of dying--by which a mean condition could be resolved into a grand one, Fanny had achieved. And to that had destiny subjoined this reencounter to-night, which had, in Bathsheba's wild imagining, turned her companion's failure to success, her humiliation to triumph, her lucklessness to ascendency; it had thrown over herself a garish light of mockery, and set upon all things about her an ironical smile. Fanny's face was framed in by that yellow hair of hers; and there was no longer much room for doubt as to the origin of the curl owned by Troy. In Bathsheba's heated fancy the innocent white countenance expressed a dim triumphant consciousness of the pain she was retaliating for her pain with all the merciless rigour of the Mosaic law: "Burning for burning; wound for wound: strife for strife." Bathsheba indulged in contemplations of escape from her position by immediate death, which, thought she, though it was an inconvenient and awful way, had limits to its inconvenience and awfulness that could not be overpassed; whilst the shames of life were measureless. Yet even this scheme of extinction by death was but tamely copying her rival's method without the reasons which had glorified it in her rival's case. She glided rapidly up and down the room, as was mostly her habit when excited, her hands hanging clasped in front of her, as she thought and in part expressed in broken words: "O, I hate her, yet I don't mean that I hate her, for it is grievous and wicked; and yet I hate her a little! Yes, my flesh insists upon hating her, whether my spirit is willing or no! ... If she had only lived, I could have been angry and cruel towards her with some justification; but to be vindictive towards a poor dead woman recoils upon myself. O God, have mercy! I am miserable at all this!" Bathsheba became at this moment so terrified at her own state of mind that she looked around for some sort of refuge from herself. The vision of Oak kneeling down that night recurred to her, and with the imitative instinct which animates women she seized upon the idea, resolved to kneel, and, if possible, pray. Gabriel had prayed; so would she. She knelt beside the coffin, covered her face with her hands, and for a time the room was silent as a tomb. Whether from a purely mechanical, or from any other cause, when Bathsheba arose it was with a quieted spirit, and a regret for the antagonistic instincts which had seized upon her just before. In her desire to make atonement she took flowers from a vase by the window, and began laying them around the dead girl's head. Bathsheba knew no other way of showing kindness to persons departed than by giving them flowers. She knew not how long she remained engaged thus. She forgot time, life, where she was, what she was doing. A slamming together of the coach-house doors in the yard brought her to herself again. An instant after, the front door opened and closed, steps crossed the hall, and her husband appeared at the entrance to the room, looking in upon her. He beheld it all by degrees, stared in stupefaction at the scene, as if he thought it an illusion raised by some fiendish incantation. Bathsheba, pallid as a corpse on end, gazed back at him in the same wild way. So little are instinctive guesses the fruit of a legitimate induction that, at this moment, as he stood with the door in his hand, Troy never once thought of Fanny in connection with what he saw. His first confused idea was that somebody in the house had died. "Well--what?" said Troy, blankly. "I must go! I must go!" said Bathsheba, to herself more than to him. She came with a dilated eye towards the door, to push past him. "What's the matter, in God's name? who's dead?" said Troy. "I cannot say; let me go out. I want air!" she continued. "But no; stay, I insist!" He seized her hand, and then volition seemed to leave her, and she went off into a state of passivity. He, still holding her, came up the room, and thus, hand in hand, Troy and Bathsheba approached the coffin's side. The candle was standing on a bureau close by them, and the light slanted down, distinctly enkindling the cold features of both mother and babe. Troy looked in, dropped his wife's hand, knowledge of it all came over him in a lurid sheen, and he stood still. So still he remained that he could be imagined to have left in him no motive power whatever. The clashes of feeling in all directions confounded one another, produced a neutrality, and there was motion in none. "Do you know her?" said Bathsheba, in a small enclosed echo, as from the interior of a cell. "I do," said Troy. "Is it she?" "It is." He had originally stood perfectly erect. And now, in the well-nigh congealed immobility of his frame could be discerned an incipient movement, as in the darkest night may be discerned light after a while. He was gradually sinking forwards. The lines of his features softened, and dismay modulated to illimitable sadness. Bathsheba was regarding him from the other side, still with parted lips and distracted eyes. Capacity for intense feeling is proportionate to the general intensity of the nature, and perhaps in all Fanny's sufferings, much greater relatively to her strength, there never was a time she suffered in an absolute sense what Bathsheba suffered now. What Troy did was to sink upon his knees with an indefinable union of remorse and reverence upon his face, and, bending over Fanny Robin, gently kissed her, as one would kiss an infant asleep to avoid awakening it. At the sight and sound of that, to her, unendurable act, Bathsheba sprang towards him. All the strong feelings which had been scattered over her existence since she knew what feeling was, seemed gathered together into one pulsation now. The revulsion from her indignant mood a little earlier, when she had meditated upon compromised honour, forestalment, eclipse in maternity by another, was violent and entire. All that was forgotten in the simple and still strong attachment of wife to husband. She had sighed for her self-completeness then, and now she cried aloud against the severance of the union she had deplored. She flung her arms round Troy's neck, exclaiming wildly from the deepest deep of her heart-- "Don't--don't kiss them! O, Frank, I can't bear it--I can't! I love you better than she did: kiss me too, Frank--kiss me! YOU WILL, FRANK, KISS ME TOO!" There was something so abnormal and startling in the childlike pain and simplicity of this appeal from a woman of Bathsheba's calibre and independence, that Troy, loosening her tightly clasped arms from his neck, looked at her in bewilderment. It was such an unexpected revelation of all women being alike at heart, even those so different in their accessories as Fanny and this one beside him, that Troy could hardly seem to believe her to be his proud wife Bathsheba. Fanny's own spirit seemed to be animating her frame. But this was the mood of a few instants only. When the momentary surprise had passed, his expression changed to a silencing imperious gaze. "I will not kiss you!" he said pushing her away. Had the wife now but gone no further. Yet, perhaps, under the harrowing circumstances, to speak out was the one wrong act which can be better understood, if not forgiven in her, than the right and politic one, her rival being now but a corpse. All the feeling she had been betrayed into showing she drew back to herself again by a strenuous effort of self-command. "What have you to say as your reason?" she asked, her bitter voice being strangely low--quite that of another woman now. "I have to say that I have been a bad, black-hearted man," he answered. "And that this woman is your victim; and I not less than she." "Ah! don't taunt me, madam. This woman is more to me, dead as she is, than ever you were, or are, or can be. If Satan had not tempted me with that face of yours, and those cursed coquetries, I should have married her. I never had another thought till you came in my way. Would to God that I had; but it is all too late!" He turned to Fanny then. "But never mind, darling," he said; "in the sight of Heaven you are my very, very wife!" At these words there arose from Bathsheba's lips a long, low cry of measureless despair and indignation, such a wail of anguish as had never before been heard within those old-inhabited walls. It was the "Tetelestai" [GREEK word meaning "it is finished"] of her union with Troy. "If she's--that,--what--am I?" she added, as a continuation of the same cry, and sobbing pitifully: and the rarity with her of such abandonment only made the condition more dire. "You are nothing to me--nothing," said Troy, heartlessly. "A ceremony before a priest doesn't make a marriage. I am not morally yours." A vehement impulse to flee from him, to run from this place, hide, and escape his words at any price, not stopping short of death itself, mastered Bathsheba now. She waited not an instant, but turned to the door and ran out. UNDER A TREE--REACTION Bathsheba went along the dark road, neither knowing nor caring about the direction or issue of her flight. The first time that she definitely noticed her position was when she reached a gate leading into a thicket overhung by some large oak and beech trees. On looking into the place, it occurred to her that she had seen it by daylight on some previous occasion, and that what appeared like an impassable thicket was in reality a brake of fern now withering fast. She could think of nothing better to do with her palpitating self than to go in here and hide; and entering, she lighted on a spot sheltered from the damp fog by a reclining trunk, where she sank down upon a tangled couch of fronds and stems. She mechanically pulled some armfuls round her to keep off the breezes, and closed her eyes. Whether she slept or not that night Bathsheba was not clearly aware. But it was with a freshened existence and a cooler brain that, a long time afterwards, she became conscious of some interesting proceedings which were going on in the trees above her head and around. A coarse-throated chatter was the first sound. It was a sparrow just waking. Next: "Chee-weeze-weeze-weeze!" from another retreat. It was a finch. Third: "Tink-tink-tink-tink-a-chink!" from the hedge. It was a robin. "Chuck-chuck-chuck!" overhead. A squirrel. Then, from the road, "With my ra-ta-ta, and my rum-tum-tum!" It was a ploughboy. Presently he came opposite, and she believed from his voice that he was one of the boys on her own farm. He was followed by a shambling tramp of heavy feet, and looking through the ferns Bathsheba could just discern in the wan light of daybreak a team of her own horses. They stopped to drink at a pond on the other side of the way. She watched them flouncing into the pool, drinking, tossing up their heads, drinking again, the water dribbling from their lips in silver threads. There was another flounce, and they came out of the pond, and turned back again towards the farm. She looked further around. Day was just dawning, and beside its cool air and colours her heated actions and resolves of the night stood out in lurid contrast. She perceived that in her lap, and clinging to her hair, were red and yellow leaves which had come down from the tree and settled silently upon her during her partial sleep. Bathsheba shook her dress to get rid of them, when multitudes of the same family lying round about her rose and fluttered away in the breeze thus created, "like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing." There was an opening towards the east, and the glow from the as yet unrisen sun attracted her eyes thither. From her feet, and between the beautiful yellowing ferns with their feathery arms, the ground sloped downwards to a hollow, in which was a species of swamp, dotted with fungi. A morning mist hung over it now--a fulsome yet magnificent silvery veil, full of light from the sun, yet semi-opaque--the hedge behind it being in some measure hidden by its hazy luminousness. Up the sides of this depression grew sheaves of the common rush, and here and there a peculiar species of flag, the blades of which glistened in the emerging sun, like scythes. But the general aspect of the swamp was malignant. From its moist and poisonous coat seemed to be exhaled the essences of evil things in the earth, and in the waters under the earth. The fungi grew in all manner of positions from rotting leaves and tree stumps, some exhibiting to her listless gaze their clammy tops, others their oozing gills. Some were marked with great splotches, red as arterial blood, others were saffron yellow, and others tall and attenuated, with stems like macaroni. Some were leathery and of richest browns. The hollow seemed a nursery of pestilences small and great, in the immediate neighbourhood of comfort and health, and Bathsheba arose with a tremor at the thought of having passed the night on the brink of so dismal a place. There were now other footsteps to be heard along the road. Bathsheba's nerves were still unstrung: she crouched down out of sight again, and the pedestrian came into view. He was a schoolboy, with a bag slung over his shoulder containing his dinner, and a book in his hand. He paused by the gate, and, without looking up, continued murmuring words in tones quite loud enough to reach her ears. "'O Lord, O Lord, O Lord, O Lord, O Lord':--that I know out o' book. 'Give us, give us, give us, give us, give us':--that I know. 'Grace that, grace that, grace that, grace that':--that I know." Other words followed to the same effect. The boy was of the dunce class apparently; the book was a psalter, and this was his way of learning the collect. In the worst attacks of trouble there appears to be always a superficial film of consciousness which is left disengaged and open to the notice of trifles, and Bathsheba was faintly amused at the boy's method, till he too passed on. By this time stupor had given place to anxiety, and anxiety began to make room for hunger and thirst. A form now appeared upon the rise on the other side of the swamp, half-hidden by the mist, and came towards Bathsheba. The woman--for it was a woman--approached with her face askance, as if looking earnestly on all sides of her. When she got a little further round to the left, and drew nearer, Bathsheba could see the newcomer's profile against the sunny sky, and knew the wavy sweep from forehead to chin, with neither angle nor decisive line anywhere about it, to be the familiar contour of Liddy Smallbury. Bathsheba's heart bounded with gratitude in the thought that she was not altogether deserted, and she jumped up. "Oh, Liddy!" she said, or attempted to say; but the words had only been framed by her lips; there came no sound. She had lost her voice by exposure to the clogged atmosphere all these hours of night. "Oh, ma'am! I am so glad I have found you," said the girl, as soon as she saw Bathsheba. "You can't come across," Bathsheba said in a whisper, which she vainly endeavoured to make loud enough to reach Liddy's ears. Liddy, not knowing this, stepped down upon the swamp, saying, as she did so, "It will bear me up, I think." Bathsheba never forgot that transient little picture of Liddy crossing the swamp to her there in the morning light. Iridescent bubbles of dank subterranean breath rose from the sweating sod beside the waiting-maid's feet as she trod, hissing as they burst and expanded away to join the vapoury firmament above. Liddy did not sink, as Bathsheba had anticipated. She landed safely on the other side, and looked up at the beautiful though pale and weary face of her young mistress. "Poor thing!" said Liddy, with tears in her eyes, "Do hearten yourself up a little, ma'am. However did--" "I can't speak above a whisper--my voice is gone for the present," said Bathsheba, hurriedly. "I suppose the damp air from that hollow has taken it away. Liddy, don't question me, mind. Who sent you--anybody?" "Nobody. I thought, when I found you were not at home, that something cruel had happened. I fancy I heard his voice late last night; and so, knowing something was wrong--" "Is he at home?" "No; he left just before I came out." "Is Fanny taken away?" "Not yet. She will soon be--at nine o'clock." "We won't go home at present, then. Suppose we walk about in this wood?" Liddy, without exactly understanding everything, or anything, in this episode, assented, and they walked together further among the trees. "But you had better come in, ma'am, and have something to eat. You will die of a chill!" "I shall not come indoors yet--perhaps never." "Shall I get you something to eat, and something else to put over your head besides that little shawl?" "If you will, Liddy." Liddy vanished, and at the end of twenty minutes returned with a cloak, hat, some slices of bread and butter, a tea-cup, and some hot tea in a little china jug. "Is Fanny gone?" said Bathsheba. "No," said her companion, pouring out the tea. Bathsheba wrapped herself up and ate and drank sparingly. Her voice was then a little clearer, and trifling colour returned to her face. "Now we'll walk about again," she said. They wandered about the wood for nearly two hours, Bathsheba replying in monosyllables to Liddy's prattle, for her mind ran on one subject, and one only. She interrupted with-- "I wonder if Fanny is gone by this time?" "I will go and see." She came back with the information that the men were just taking away the corpse; that Bathsheba had been inquired for; that she had replied to the effect that her mistress was unwell and could not be seen. "Then they think I am in my bedroom?" "Yes." Liddy then ventured to add: "You said when I first found you that you might never go home again--you didn't mean it, ma'am?" "No; I've altered my mind. It is only women with no pride in them who run away from their husbands. There is one position worse than that of being found dead in your husband's house from his ill usage, and that is, to be found alive through having gone away to the house of somebody else. I've thought of it all this morning, and I've chosen my course. A runaway wife is an encumbrance to everybody, a burden to herself and a byword--all of which make up a heap of misery greater than any that comes by staying at home--though this may include the trifling items of insult, beating, and starvation. Liddy, if ever you marry--God forbid that you ever should!--you'll find yourself in a fearful situation; but mind this, don't you flinch. Stand your ground, and be cut to pieces. That's what I'm going to do." "Oh, mistress, don't talk so!" said Liddy, taking her hand; "but I knew you had too much sense to bide away. May I ask what dreadful thing it is that has happened between you and him?" "You may ask; but I may not tell." In about ten minutes they returned to the house by a circuitous route, entering at the rear. Bathsheba glided up the back stairs to a disused attic, and her companion followed. "Liddy," she said, with a lighter heart, for youth and hope had begun to reassert themselves; "you are to be my confidante for the present--somebody must be--and I choose you. Well, I shall take up my abode here for a while. Will you get a fire lighted, put down a piece of carpet, and help me to make the place comfortable. Afterwards, I want you and Maryann to bring up that little stump bedstead in the small room, and the bed belonging to it, and a table, and some other things.... What shall I do to pass the heavy time away?" "Hemming handkerchiefs is a very good thing," said Liddy. "Oh no, no! I hate needlework--I always did." "Knitting?" "And that, too." "You might finish your sampler. Only the carnations and peacocks want filling in; and then it could be framed and glazed, and hung beside your aunt's ma'am." "Samplers are out of date--horribly countrified. No Liddy, I'll read. Bring up some books--not new ones. I haven't heart to read anything new." "Some of your uncle's old ones, ma'am?" "Yes. Some of those we stowed away in boxes." A faint gleam of humour passed over her face as she said: "Bring Beaumont and Fletcher's _Maid's Tragedy_, and the _Mourning Bride_, and--let me see--_Night Thoughts_, and the _Vanity of Human Wishes_." "And that story of the black man, who murdered his wife Desdemona? It is a nice dismal one that would suit you excellent just now." "Now, Liddy, you've been looking into my books without telling me; and I said you were not to! How do you know it would suit me? It wouldn't suit me at all." "But if the others do--" "No, they don't; and I won't read dismal books. Why should I read dismal books, indeed? Bring me _Love in a Village_, and _Maid of the Mill_, and _Doctor Syntax_, and some volumes of the _Spectator-_." All that day Bathsheba and Liddy lived in the attic in a state of barricade; a precaution which proved to be needless as against Troy, for he did not appear in the neighbourhood or trouble them at all. Bathsheba sat at the window till sunset, sometimes attempting to read, at other times watching every movement outside without much purpose, and listening without much interest to every sound. The sun went down almost blood-red that night, and a livid cloud received its rays in the east. Up against this dark background the west front of the church tower--the only part of the edifice visible from the farm-house windows--rose distinct and lustrous, the vane upon the summit bristling with rays. Hereabouts, at six o'clock, the young men of the village gathered, as was their custom, for a game of Prisoners' base. The spot had been consecrated to this ancient diversion from time immemorial, the old stocks conveniently forming a base facing the boundary of the churchyard, in front of which the ground was trodden hard and bare as a pavement by the players. She could see the brown and black heads of the young lads darting about right and left, their white shirt-sleeves gleaming in the sun; whilst occasionally a shout and a peal of hearty laughter varied the stillness of the evening air. They continued playing for a quarter of an hour or so, when the game concluded abruptly, and the players leapt over the wall and vanished round to the other side behind a yew-tree, which was also half behind a beech, now spreading in one mass of golden foliage, on which the branches traced black lines. "Why did the base-players finish their game so suddenly?" Bathsheba inquired, the next time that Liddy entered the room. "I think 'twas because two men came just then from Casterbridge and began putting up a grand carved tombstone," said Liddy. "The lads went to see whose it was." "Do you know?" Bathsheba asked. "I don't," said Liddy. TROY'S ROMANTICISM When Troy's wife had left the house at the previous midnight his first act was to cover the dead from sight. This done he ascended the stairs, and throwing himself down upon the bed dressed as he was, he waited miserably for the morning. Fate had dealt grimly with him through the last four-and-twenty hours. His day had been spent in a way which varied very materially from his intentions regarding it. There is always an inertia to be overcome in striking out a new line of conduct--not more in ourselves, it seems, than in circumscribing events, which appear as if leagued together to allow no novelties in the way of amelioration. Twenty pounds having been secured from Bathsheba, he had managed to add to the sum every farthing he could muster on his own account, which had been seven pounds ten. With this money, twenty-seven pounds ten in all, he had hastily driven from the gate that morning to keep his appointment with Fanny Robin. On reaching Casterbridge he left the horse and trap at an inn, and at five minutes before ten came back to the bridge at the lower end of the town, and sat himself upon the parapet. The clocks struck the hour, and no Fanny appeared. In fact, at that moment she was being robed in her grave-clothes by two attendants at the Union poorhouse--the first and last tiring-women the gentle creature had ever been honoured with. The quarter went, the half hour. A rush of recollection came upon Troy as he waited: this was the second time she had broken a serious engagement with him. In anger he vowed it should be the last, and at eleven o'clock, when he had lingered and watched the stone of the bridge till he knew every lichen upon their face and heard the chink of the ripples underneath till they oppressed him, he jumped from his seat, went to the inn for his gig, and in a bitter mood of indifference concerning the past, and recklessness about the future, drove on to Budmouth races. He reached the race-course at two o'clock, and remained either there or in the town till nine. But Fanny's image, as it had appeared to him in the sombre shadows of that Saturday evening, returned to his mind, backed up by Bathsheba's reproaches. He vowed he would not bet, and he kept his vow, for on leaving the town at nine o'clock in the evening he had diminished his cash only to the extent of a few shillings. He trotted slowly homeward, and it was now that he was struck for the first time with a thought that Fanny had been really prevented by illness from keeping her promise. This time she could have made no mistake. He regretted that he had not remained in Casterbridge and made inquiries. Reaching home he quietly unharnessed the horse and came indoors, as we have seen, to the fearful shock that awaited him. As soon as it grew light enough to distinguish objects, Troy arose from the coverlet of the bed, and in a mood of absolute indifference to Bathsheba's whereabouts, and almost oblivious of her existence, he stalked downstairs and left the house by the back door. His walk was towards the churchyard, entering which he searched around till he found a newly dug unoccupied grave--the grave dug the day before for Fanny. The position of this having been marked, he hastened on to Casterbridge, only pausing and musing for a while at the hill whereon he had last seen Fanny alive. Reaching the town, Troy descended into a side street and entered a pair of gates surmounted by a board bearing the words, "Lester, stone and marble mason." Within were lying about stones of all sizes and designs, inscribed as being sacred to the memory of unnamed persons who had not yet died. Troy was so unlike himself now in look, word, and deed, that the want of likeness was perceptible even to his own consciousness. His method of engaging himself in this business of purchasing a tomb was that of an absolutely unpractised man. He could not bring himself to consider, calculate, or economize. He waywardly wished for something, and he set about obtaining it like a child in a nursery. "I want a good tomb," he said to the man who stood in a little office within the yard. "I want as good a one as you can give me for twenty-seven pounds." It was all the money he possessed. "That sum to include everything?" "Everything. Cutting the name, carriage to Weatherbury, and erection. And I want it now, at once." "We could not get anything special worked this week." "I must have it now." "If you would like one of these in stock it could be got ready immediately." "Very well," said Troy, impatiently. "Let's see what you have." "The best I have in stock is this one," said the stone-cutter, going into a shed. "Here's a marble headstone beautifully crocketed, with medallions beneath of typical subjects; here's the footstone after the same pattern, and here's the coping to enclose the grave. The polishing alone of the set cost me eleven pounds--the slabs are the best of their kind, and I can warrant them to resist rain and frost for a hundred years without flying." "And how much?" "Well, I could add the name, and put it up at Weatherbury for the sum you mention." "Get it done to-day, and I'll pay the money now." The man agreed, and wondered at such a mood in a visitor who wore not a shred of mourning. Troy then wrote the words which were to form the inscription, settled the account and went away. In the afternoon he came back again, and found that the lettering was almost done. He waited in the yard till the tomb was packed, and saw it placed in the cart and starting on its way to Weatherbury, giving directions to the two men who were to accompany it to inquire of the sexton for the grave of the person named in the inscription. It was quite dark when Troy came out of Casterbridge. He carried rather a heavy basket upon his arm, with which he strode moodily along the road, resting occasionally at bridges and gates, whereon he deposited his burden for a time. Midway on his journey he met, returning in the darkness, the men and the waggon which had conveyed the tomb. He merely inquired if the work was done, and, on being assured that it was, passed on again. Troy entered Weatherbury churchyard about ten o'clock and went immediately to the corner where he had marked the vacant grave early in the morning. It was on the obscure side of the tower, screened to a great extent from the view of passers along the road--a spot which until lately had been abandoned to heaps of stones and bushes of alder, but now it was cleared and made orderly for interments, by reason of the rapid filling of the ground elsewhere. Here now stood the tomb as the men had stated, snow-white and shapely in the gloom, consisting of head and foot-stone, and enclosing border of marble-work uniting them. In the midst was mould, suitable for plants. Troy deposited his basket beside the tomb, and vanished for a few minutes. When he returned he carried a spade and a lantern, the light of which he directed for a few moments upon the marble, whilst he read the inscription. He hung his lantern on the lowest bough of the yew-tree, and took from his basket flower-roots of several varieties. There were bundles of snow-drop, hyacinth and crocus bulbs, violets and double daisies, which were to bloom in early spring, and of carnations, pinks, picotees, lilies of the valley, forget-me-not, summer's farewell, meadow-saffron and others, for the later seasons of the year. Troy laid these out upon the grass, and with an impassive face set to work to plant them. The snowdrops were arranged in a line on the outside of the coping, the remainder within the enclosure of the grave. The crocuses and hyacinths were to grow in rows; some of the summer flowers he placed over her head and feet, the lilies and forget-me-nots over her heart. The remainder were dispersed in the spaces between these. Troy, in his prostration at this time, had no perception that in the futility of these romantic doings, dictated by a remorseful reaction from previous indifference, there was any element of absurdity. Deriving his idiosyncrasies from both sides of the Channel, he showed at such junctures as the present the inelasticity of the Englishman, together with that blindness to the line where sentiment verges on mawkishness, characteristic of the French. It was a cloudy, muggy, and very dark night, and the rays from Troy's lantern spread into the two old yews with a strange illuminating power, flickering, as it seemed, up to the black ceiling of cloud above. He felt a large drop of rain upon the back of his hand, and presently one came and entered one of the holes of the lantern, whereupon the candle sputtered and went out. Troy was weary and it being now not far from midnight, and the rain threatening to increase, he resolved to leave the finishing touches of his labour until the day should break. He groped along the wall and over the graves in the dark till he found himself round at the north side. Here he entered the porch, and, reclining upon the bench within, fell asleep.

Chapters 38-45

https://web.archive.org/web/20210108004047/https://www.gradesaver.com/far-from-the-madding-crowd/study-guide/summary-chapters-38-45

In October, Bathsheba and Troy are driving home from town, while Troy discusses the money he has recently lost by betting on horse races. He is unconcerned and thinks it is merely bad luck, but Bathsheba is troubled by how much money her husband is spending wastefully. The couple are approached by a woman who asks them for directions. The woman has a very intense reaction to recognizing Troy and collapses; Troy sends Bathsheba a distance off before helping the woman, giving him an opportunity to speak to her alone. Troy gives Fanny some money, and tells her to continue to town, but meet him on Monday on Casterbridge bridge. When Troy rejoins Bathsheba, he admits that he knows the woman but refuses to give any details or answer any questions. Left alone, Fanny begins her slow and laborious walk towards Casterbridge. She gets more and more weak and exhausted as she walks through the night. Helped by a large dog, she manages to drag herself to a building on the edge of town where she is taken inside. Meanwhile, back at the farmhouse, Troy asks Bathsheba for money. She assumes it is for an upcoming horserace, and complains about his spending, but gives him the money. She then catches sight of a lock of hair in the case of Troy's watch, and asks who it belongs to. Troy explains that it is the hair of a woman he was engaged to before he married Bathsheba. Bathsheba becomes jealous, and the couple have an argument. The next morning, Bathsheba learns that Troy has gone off to Casterbridge. As she walks around the farm, she sees Boldwood and Gabriel conversing, and sends a servant to find out what they talking about. From him, she learns that Fanny has died at the workhouse in town, and that Boldwood is planning to send a wagon to fetch her body. Bathsheba decides that since Fanny was a former employee of the farm, she will send for the body herself. When Bathsheba asks how long Fanny was at the workhouse, the servant explains that Fanny arrived there only on the day she died, having walked there from Melchester where she had been working before. Bathsheba becomes agitated, and asks questions about the route Fanny took, when she walked, and what color her hair was. Before Joseph sets off with the wagon, she questions him as well, trying to find out if anyone knows what Fanny died of. She is able to learn from Liddy that Fanny did indeed have blonde hair. Joseph goes to the workhouse, where the coffin is loaded into the wagon. As he drives home, he becomes depressed and stops at the pub for a drink, where he lingers longer than he intended to. Gabriel runs into him and is angry about this delay, driving the wagon with the corpse the rest of the way home himself. When he arrives at the farmhouse, the parson tells him it is too late and the funeral will have to take place the following day. Although Gabriel is uncomfortable with the idea, Bathsheba instructs that the coffin remain in the farmhouse until the funeral takes place on the subsequent morning. Before he leaves, Gabriel rubs out the words that have been written on the coffin: "Fanny Robbins and child."Later that night, Bathsheba explains that she will sit up and wait for Troy, who still has not returned home. She continues to question Liddy about Fanny's health, unsatisfied with the answers she receives. A short time later, Liddy shares that she has heard a rumor that Fanny gave birth shortly before she died, and that the baby is also in the coffin. After Liddy goes to bed, Bathsheba becomes more and more agitated, wondering about what the truth is. In desperation for someone to help her, Bathsheba goes to Gabriel's cottage where she watches him through the window but finds herself unable to approach him. She returns to her house, and opens the coffin, where she finds Fanny and the corpse of a tiny baby. She realizes that Fanny must have been Troy's lover, and that this is their illegitimate child. While Bathsheba is trying to make sense of her emotions, Troy returns home, comes into the room, and sees what is lying in the coffin. When Troy gently kisses Fanny's corpse, Bathsheba flies into a jealous rage, and the two argue, leading Troy to say that he loves Fanny more than he ever loved Bathsheba and considers Fanny to be is true wife. Bathsheba flees from the house and spends the night wandering outdoors, until Liddy finds her in the early morning. Liddy explains that Troy also left the house early in the morning, and that people will soon be coming to take Fanny's body for the funeral. Bathsheba says she can't return to the house until the corpse has been taken away, so she and Liddy walk around until Fanny's coffin has been removed. Once they return to the house, Bathsheba explains that she is going to move into the attic for the time being, and has Liddy set it up for her. The narrative shifts to describe events from Troy's point of view. On Monday morning, he had gone to keep his meeting with Fanny with as much money as he had been able to put together. When she did not arrive, he got angry and went to spend the day at the horse races, returning late at night to the scene with the coffin. After Bathsheba fled, he waited miserably until it was morning and then hurried to town where he spent the money he had hoped to give to Fanny on a fancy marble tombstone. He set up an elaborate display of flowers and then fell asleep in a corner of the churchyard. When he awakened, there had been heavy rain and the arrangement was ruined. Frustrated, he left the churchyard and left the town a short time later. That same morning, Bathsheba decides to visit the grave since she has learned that Troy was seen leaving town and therefore does not have to worry about meeting him. When she arrives, she finds Gabriel there as well, and observes the marble tombstone, as well as the disarray. Bathsheba and Gabriel work together to tidy up the grave site and leave it in good condition.

Earlier in the novel, Bathsheba illustrated her resistance to the idea of a husband who would try and tell her what to do, or who would annoy her with his presence. Ironically, she is now confronted with the challenges of a husband who neglects her, refuses to play the active role that she needs, and often leaves her abandoned when she most needs his help. The challenges in their relationship are part of why she feels such suspicion when Troy engages in a mysterious conversation with an unknown woman, but Bathsheba also clings vainly to the hope that Troy is actually telling her the truth. Even though she is probably smart enough to know better on some level, Bathsheba is reduced to living in denial and refusing to confront the reality of the kind of man she has married. Fanny's agonizing walk to the village shows Hardy's talent for evoking sympathy for those who suffer, especially through circumstances beyond their control. Not unlike Bathsheba, Fanny has fallen victim to believing Troy and his empty promises but she hardly deserves the wretched poverty, physical pain, and deep fear she is now experiencing. The presence of the dog who finally helps her to endure the last stage of her journey reflects the themes of the natural world that are present throughout the novel. While human beings would be likely to judge Fanny, animals can sense her goodness and innocence because they also embody those qualities. Nonetheless, Fanny's death reveals the harsh reality of what it has meant for her to live in poverty and isolation. Presumably the suffering and ill-health she endured before going in to labor played a significant part in her death and the death of her baby. It is also very possible that dying in the workhouse meant she had limited access to medical care which might have helped her. When news of Fanny's death spreads, Gabriel again shows his instinct to protect Bathsheba. At no other moment in the novel has he lied or tried to conceal anything; in fact, he has been honest in situations where it may not even have served him. Nonetheless, Gabriel shows that he is capable of responding to ethically complex situations, and it seems to him that the greater good is served by Bathsheba remaining ignorant of what actually happened to Fanny. In a moment that echoes Gabriel by chance helping put out the fire, or Bathsheba impulsively opting to send Boldwood the valentine, fate intervenes. The chance event of Joseph being delayed at the pub sets in motion a train of events that means the coffin will stay in Bathsheba's house overnight. Had everything gone according to plan and Fanny been buried that afternoon, her secret would likely have been safe. However, almost as soon as news of Fanny's death reaches her, Bathsheba feels a mixture of sympathy and suspicion. Her suspicions torment her; she does fleetingly consider reaching out to Gabriel. Her attempt to go to his cottage to ask his advice reveals how much trust she places in him, and her awareness that he has her best interests at heart. Nonetheless, the shame that she would have to depend on another man when her own husband might be betraying her is too much for Bathsheba's pride. Left to make the decision alone, she opts to open the coffin and know the truth, only to have her worst fears confirmed. Hardy masterfully captures the complex and shifting emotions of Bathsheba when she realizes the secret Troy has been hiding: rage, betrayal, jealousy, grief, empathy, and shame. Especially when she realizes Troy genuinely cared for Fanny, she feels an almost grotesque need to assert her emotional dominance over him by insisting that he kiss her to balance out the kiss he gave to Fanny. Fixated on his own grief, Troy renounces the emotional and spiritual aspects of his marriage, even though he cannot dispute the legal ones. By telling Bathsheba that he considers Fanny to have been his true wife, he in effect turns Bathsheba into the fallen woman so many others have been afraid she would become. Troy's attempts to embellish Fanny's grave signal his impulsiveness and lack of forethought. He acts based on his emotions, but without planning to think about what will be sustainable. His lack of regard for the weather mirrors his reckless ignorance on the night of the harvest-supper, and leads to destruction again. Troy assumes his own will is the dominant force without acknowledging and respecting how the natural world will always be stronger than human endeavors. His lack of foresight that rainfall would ruin the way he had set up the grave mirrors the way he recklessly created the conditions that led to Fanny's death: he followed his own impulses by engaging in a sexual relationship with her, and did not consider the natural consequences of pregnancy that would follow. What is most telling about the episode is Troy's response when he awakens to find his work ruined: he simply gives up, making no effort to fix it. This is characteristic of his inability to take responsibility for situations he has created, and his unwillingness to work hard. The messy gravesite does however create an opportunity for redemption for Bathsheba. By tenderly fixing up the area, she is able to atone for her ambivalent feelings towards Fanny and experience forgiveness for the innocent woman and child.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/41.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_40_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 41

chapter 41

{"name": "Chapter 41", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility58.asp", "summary": "Edward goes to meet Lucy after thanking Colonel Brandon. Mrs. Jennings is grateful to both Elinor and Brandon for helping Lucy to settle down. Elinor decides to visit her brother before the departure for Cleveland. Since Marianne refuses to accompany her, she goes alone to meet Lady Dashwood and her brother. John Dashwood welcomes her. He shows his surprise at Colonel Brandon's generosity towards Edward. He then informs her of Robert's plans to get married to Miss Morton. When John goes to inform his wife of Elinor's visit, Robert comes to meet her and keeps her company. He is amused at Edward's choosing to become a clergyman and takes pity on him for having to marry Lucy. Shortly afterwards, Fanny Dashwood comes forward to meet Elinor. She talks politely and expresses regret at their departure to Cleveland.", "analysis": "Notes Most of the scenes in which Mrs. Jennings and John Dashwood are present evoke humor. In this chapter John Dashwood amuses the readers through his conversation with Elinor. Obsessed with money and miserly in his attitude, he fails to believe that the Colonel has been so kind as to offer a position at Delaford to Edward. He assumes that the Colonel must have an ulterior motive. He dubs Brandon as unthinking and strange. However, he is happy at the thought that the wealthy Colonel may soon marry Elinor. A hen-pecked and indulgent husband, John Dashwood is afraid to hurt the feelings of his cunning wife. Thus he requests Elinor to refrain from mentioning the Colonel's benevolence to her. He is happy to see his wife talking politely to Elinor and appreciates Fanny's gesture. John Dashwood's views and ideas shock Elinor. Referring to the marriage of Robert Ferrars to Miss Morton, he voices his opinion that Miss Morton should not mind getting married to any one of the brothers as long as he inherits the family property. His line of argument appalls Elinor thoroughly: her brother considers money superior to emotion. CHAPTER 42 Summary In early April the two families from Hanover Square and Berkeley Street set out on their journey to Cleveland. Passing through Somerset, they take three days to reach their destination. The Palmers' house is modern and spacious, and the surrounding flora and fauna enhance its beauty. Marianne is excited at the idea of being able to explore the countryside. However, she is forced to stay indoors due to rain. Mr. Palmer and Colonel Brandon arrive shortly afterwards. Elinor finds both Mr. and Mrs. Palmer charming and friendly hosts. Brandon talks to her about Delaford. He suspects that Marianne has caught a cold, and in fact, she falls ill with the flu a few days later. Notes Marianne and Elinor have different reactions to the departure for Cleveland. Marianne becomes emotional, recollecting the pleasures and pains she has experienced while in London. Elinor is quite content to leave the place, as she is not at all sentimental about it. In fact, she is relieved to be spared the company of Lucy Steele. She also hopes that a change of scene will help Marianne to regain her health. Jane Austen once again highlights Marianne's sensibility in contrast to Elinor's good sense. Mr. Palmer reveals himself to be a gentleman beneath his tough exterior. Elinor is at first apprehensive about living under his roof. However, she finds him refreshingly different at Cleveland. Austen writes, \"She found him, however, perfectly the gentleman in his behaviour to all his visitors, and only occasionally rude to his wife and her mother; she found him very capable of being a pleasant companion.\" Elinor is arguably the mouthpiece of the author, and therefore her renewed assessment of Mr. Palmer is important. John Dashwood is still under the impression that Colonel Brandon is in love with Elinor. Therefore he informs his sister that he will be making a visit to Delaford in the future. Elinor is merely amused at his remark, as she is well aware of the true object of the Colonel's desire: her sister, Marianne. CHAPTER 43 Summary This entire chapter deals with Marianne's illness. Her cold develops into influenza and then into a mysterious illness. The doctor administers medication and predicts her recovery, but Marianne's health turns from bad to worse. Mrs. Palmer, fearing an infection that could be caught by her new-born baby, moves to a friend's house near Bath. Mr. Palmer follows her after a few days. After four days, when Marianne's health shows no improvement, Elinor decides to consult with the Colonel before calling her mother to Cleveland. Colonel Brandon willingly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood from Barton and leaves immediately on this errand. Both Mrs. Jennings and Elinor are anxious after the doctor gives up hope, since the medication fails to cure Marianne. However, after a few more days, Marianne recovers miraculously. As Elinor waits for her mother to arrive, she gets a surprise visitor. It is Willoughby, who makes an appearance at the cottage. Notes Jane Austen throws light on the attitude of the different characters through their distinct reactions to Marianne's illness. When Marianne's condition worsens, Elinor is quite disturbed, but she does not panic. She thinks calmly and arrives at the decision to summon her mother from Barton. The Colonel is concerned about Marianne's health. He sensibly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood and undertakes his mission without delay. Both Elinor and the Colonel use their sense to the best advantage in order to improve the situation. Mrs. Jennings is highly emotional. She thinks of the worst when Marianne's health deteriorates. She feels sorry for the girl, as she is afraid that she may succumb to her illness. However, when Marianne recovers miraculously, she is overjoyed. Mrs. Jennings displays the extremes of emotion. Mr. Palmer conducts himself in a stable manner. When his wife panics about a possible threat to her baby's health, he chides her. As a host, he considers Marianne his responsibility and therefore shows reluctance to leave Cleveland."}

Edward, having carried his thanks to Colonel Brandon, proceeded with his happiness to Lucy; and such was the excess of it by the time he reached Bartlett's Buildings, that she was able to assure Mrs. Jennings, who called on her again the next day with her congratulations, that she had never seen him in such spirits before in her life. Her own happiness, and her own spirits, were at least very certain; and she joined Mrs. Jennings most heartily in her expectation of their being all comfortably together in Delaford Parsonage before Michaelmas. So far was she, at the same time, from any backwardness to give Elinor that credit which Edward WOULD give her, that she spoke of her friendship for them both with the most grateful warmth, was ready to own all their obligation to her, and openly declared that no exertion for their good on Miss Dashwood's part, either present or future, would ever surprise her, for she believed her capable of doing any thing in the world for those she really valued. As for Colonel Brandon, she was not only ready to worship him as a saint, but was moreover truly anxious that he should be treated as one in all worldly concerns; anxious that his tithes should be raised to the utmost; and scarcely resolved to avail herself, at Delaford, as far as she possibly could, of his servants, his carriage, his cows, and his poultry. It was now above a week since John Dashwood had called in Berkeley Street, and as since that time no notice had been taken by them of his wife's indisposition, beyond one verbal enquiry, Elinor began to feel it necessary to pay her a visit.--This was an obligation, however, which not only opposed her own inclination, but which had not the assistance of any encouragement from her companions. Marianne, not contented with absolutely refusing to go herself, was very urgent to prevent her sister's going at all; and Mrs. Jennings, though her carriage was always at Elinor's service, so very much disliked Mrs. John Dashwood, that not even her curiosity to see how she looked after the late discovery, nor her strong desire to affront her by taking Edward's part, could overcome her unwillingness to be in her company again. The consequence was, that Elinor set out by herself to pay a visit, for which no one could really have less inclination, and to run the risk of a tete-a-tete with a woman, whom neither of the others had so much reason to dislike. Mrs. Dashwood was denied; but before the carriage could turn from the house, her husband accidentally came out. He expressed great pleasure in meeting Elinor, told her that he had been just going to call in Berkeley Street, and, assuring her that Fanny would be very glad to see her, invited her to come in. They walked up stairs in to the drawing-room.--Nobody was there. "Fanny is in her own room, I suppose," said he:--"I will go to her presently, for I am sure she will not have the least objection in the world to seeing YOU.-- Very far from it, indeed. NOW especially there cannot be--but however, you and Marianne were always great favourites.--Why would not Marianne come?"-- Elinor made what excuse she could for her. "I am not sorry to see you alone," he replied, "for I have a good deal to say to you. This living of Colonel Brandon's--can it be true?--has he really given it to Edward?--I heard it yesterday by chance, and was coming to you on purpose to enquire farther about it." "It is perfectly true.--Colonel Brandon has given the living of Delaford to Edward." "Really!--Well, this is very astonishing!--no relationship!--no connection between them!--and now that livings fetch such a price!--what was the value of this?" "About two hundred a year." "Very well--and for the next presentation to a living of that value--supposing the late incumbent to have been old and sickly, and likely to vacate it soon--he might have got I dare say--fourteen hundred pounds. And how came he not to have settled that matter before this person's death?--NOW indeed it would be too late to sell it, but a man of Colonel Brandon's sense!--I wonder he should be so improvident in a point of such common, such natural, concern!--Well, I am convinced that there is a vast deal of inconsistency in almost every human character. I suppose, however--on recollection--that the case may probably be THIS. Edward is only to hold the living till the person to whom the Colonel has really sold the presentation, is old enough to take it.--Aye, aye, that is the fact, depend upon it." Elinor contradicted it, however, very positively; and by relating that she had herself been employed in conveying the offer from Colonel Brandon to Edward, and, therefore, must understand the terms on which it was given, obliged him to submit to her authority. "It is truly astonishing!"--he cried, after hearing what she said--"what could be the Colonel's motive?" "A very simple one--to be of use to Mr. Ferrars." "Well, well; whatever Colonel Brandon may be, Edward is a very lucky man.--You will not mention the matter to Fanny, however, for though I have broke it to her, and she bears it vastly well,--she will not like to hear it much talked of." Elinor had some difficulty here to refrain from observing, that she thought Fanny might have borne with composure, an acquisition of wealth to her brother, by which neither she nor her child could be possibly impoverished. "Mrs. Ferrars," added he, lowering his voice to the tone becoming so important a subject, "knows nothing about it at present, and I believe it will be best to keep it entirely concealed from her as long as may be.-- When the marriage takes place, I fear she must hear of it all." "But why should such precaution be used?--Though it is not to be supposed that Mrs. Ferrars can have the smallest satisfaction in knowing that her son has money enough to live upon,--for THAT must be quite out of the question; yet why, upon her late behaviour, is she supposed to feel at all?--She has done with her son, she cast him off for ever, and has made all those over whom she had any influence, cast him off likewise. Surely, after doing so, she cannot be imagined liable to any impression of sorrow or of joy on his account--she cannot be interested in any thing that befalls him.-- She would not be so weak as to throw away the comfort of a child, and yet retain the anxiety of a parent!" "Ah! Elinor," said John, "your reasoning is very good, but it is founded on ignorance of human nature. When Edward's unhappy match takes place, depend upon it his mother will feel as much as if she had never discarded him; and, therefore every circumstance that may accelerate that dreadful event, must be concealed from her as much as possible. Mrs. Ferrars can never forget that Edward is her son." "You surprise me; I should think it must nearly have escaped her memory by THIS time." "You wrong her exceedingly. Mrs. Ferrars is one of the most affectionate mothers in the world." Elinor was silent. "We think NOW,"--said Mr. Dashwood, after a short pause, "of ROBERT'S marrying Miss Morton." Elinor, smiling at the grave and decisive importance of her brother's tone, calmly replied, "The lady, I suppose, has no choice in the affair." "Choice!--how do you mean?" "I only mean that I suppose, from your manner of speaking, it must be the same to Miss Morton whether she marry Edward or Robert." "Certainly, there can be no difference; for Robert will now to all intents and purposes be considered as the eldest son;--and as to any thing else, they are both very agreeable young men: I do not know that one is superior to the other." Elinor said no more, and John was also for a short time silent.--His reflections ended thus. "Of ONE thing, my dear sister," kindly taking her hand, and speaking in an awful whisper,--"I may assure you;--and I WILL do it, because I know it must gratify you. I have good reason to think--indeed I have it from the best authority, or I should not repeat it, for otherwise it would be very wrong to say any thing about it--but I have it from the very best authority--not that I ever precisely heard Mrs. Ferrars say it herself--but her daughter DID, and I have it from her--That in short, whatever objections there might be against a certain--a certain connection--you understand me--it would have been far preferable to her, it would not have given her half the vexation that THIS does. I was exceedingly pleased to hear that Mrs. Ferrars considered it in that light--a very gratifying circumstance you know to us all. 'It would have been beyond comparison,' she said, 'the least evil of the two, and she would be glad to compound NOW for nothing worse.' But however, all that is quite out of the question--not to be thought of or mentioned--as to any attachment you know--it never could be--all that is gone by. But I thought I would just tell you of this, because I knew how much it must please you. Not that you have any reason to regret, my dear Elinor. There is no doubt of your doing exceedingly well--quite as well, or better, perhaps, all things considered. Has Colonel Brandon been with you lately?" Elinor had heard enough, if not to gratify her vanity, and raise her self-importance, to agitate her nerves and fill her mind;--and she was therefore glad to be spared from the necessity of saying much in reply herself, and from the danger of hearing any thing more from her brother, by the entrance of Mr. Robert Ferrars. After a few moments' chat, John Dashwood, recollecting that Fanny was yet uninformed of her sister's being there, quitted the room in quest of her; and Elinor was left to improve her acquaintance with Robert, who, by the gay unconcern, the happy self-complacency of his manner while enjoying so unfair a division of his mother's love and liberality, to the prejudice of his banished brother, earned only by his own dissipated course of life, and that brother's integrity, was confirming her most unfavourable opinion of his head and heart. They had scarcely been two minutes by themselves, before he began to speak of Edward; for he, too, had heard of the living, and was very inquisitive on the subject. Elinor repeated the particulars of it, as she had given them to John; and their effect on Robert, though very different, was not less striking than it had been on HIM. He laughed most immoderately. The idea of Edward's being a clergyman, and living in a small parsonage-house, diverted him beyond measure;--and when to that was added the fanciful imagery of Edward reading prayers in a white surplice, and publishing the banns of marriage between John Smith and Mary Brown, he could conceive nothing more ridiculous. Elinor, while she waited in silence and immovable gravity, the conclusion of such folly, could not restrain her eyes from being fixed on him with a look that spoke all the contempt it excited. It was a look, however, very well bestowed, for it relieved her own feelings, and gave no intelligence to him. He was recalled from wit to wisdom, not by any reproof of hers, but by his own sensibility. "We may treat it as a joke," said he, at last, recovering from the affected laugh which had considerably lengthened out the genuine gaiety of the moment--"but, upon my soul, it is a most serious business. Poor Edward! he is ruined for ever. I am extremely sorry for it--for I know him to be a very good-hearted creature; as well-meaning a fellow perhaps, as any in the world. You must not judge of him, Miss Dashwood, from YOUR slight acquaintance.--Poor Edward!--His manners are certainly not the happiest in nature.--But we are not all born, you know, with the same powers,--the same address.-- Poor fellow!--to see him in a circle of strangers!--to be sure it was pitiable enough!--but upon my soul, I believe he has as good a heart as any in the kingdom; and I declare and protest to you I never was so shocked in my life, as when it all burst forth. I could not believe it.-- My mother was the first person who told me of it; and I, feeling myself called on to act with resolution, immediately said to her, 'My dear madam, I do not know what you may intend to do on the occasion, but as for myself, I must say, that if Edward does marry this young woman, I never will see him again.' That was what I said immediately.-- I was most uncommonly shocked, indeed!--Poor Edward!--he has done for himself completely--shut himself out for ever from all decent society!--but, as I directly said to my mother, I am not in the least surprised at it; from his style of education, it was always to be expected. My poor mother was half frantic." "Have you ever seen the lady?" "Yes; once, while she was staying in this house, I happened to drop in for ten minutes; and I saw quite enough of her. The merest awkward country girl, without style, or elegance, and almost without beauty.-- I remember her perfectly. Just the kind of girl I should suppose likely to captivate poor Edward. I offered immediately, as soon as my mother related the affair to me, to talk to him myself, and dissuade him from the match; but it was too late THEN, I found, to do any thing, for unluckily, I was not in the way at first, and knew nothing of it till after the breach had taken place, when it was not for me, you know, to interfere. But had I been informed of it a few hours earlier--I think it is most probable--that something might have been hit on. I certainly should have represented it to Edward in a very strong light. 'My dear fellow,' I should have said, 'consider what you are doing. You are making a most disgraceful connection, and such a one as your family are unanimous in disapproving.' I cannot help thinking, in short, that means might have been found. But now it is all too late. He must be starved, you know;--that is certain; absolutely starved." He had just settled this point with great composure, when the entrance of Mrs. John Dashwood put an end to the subject. But though SHE never spoke of it out of her own family, Elinor could see its influence on her mind, in the something like confusion of countenance with which she entered, and an attempt at cordiality in her behaviour to herself. She even proceeded so far as to be concerned to find that Elinor and her sister were so soon to leave town, as she had hoped to see more of them;--an exertion in which her husband, who attended her into the room, and hung enamoured over her accents, seemed to distinguish every thing that was most affectionate and graceful.

Chapter 41

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility58.asp

Edward goes to meet Lucy after thanking Colonel Brandon. Mrs. Jennings is grateful to both Elinor and Brandon for helping Lucy to settle down. Elinor decides to visit her brother before the departure for Cleveland. Since Marianne refuses to accompany her, she goes alone to meet Lady Dashwood and her brother. John Dashwood welcomes her. He shows his surprise at Colonel Brandon's generosity towards Edward. He then informs her of Robert's plans to get married to Miss Morton. When John goes to inform his wife of Elinor's visit, Robert comes to meet her and keeps her company. He is amused at Edward's choosing to become a clergyman and takes pity on him for having to marry Lucy. Shortly afterwards, Fanny Dashwood comes forward to meet Elinor. She talks politely and expresses regret at their departure to Cleveland.

Notes Most of the scenes in which Mrs. Jennings and John Dashwood are present evoke humor. In this chapter John Dashwood amuses the readers through his conversation with Elinor. Obsessed with money and miserly in his attitude, he fails to believe that the Colonel has been so kind as to offer a position at Delaford to Edward. He assumes that the Colonel must have an ulterior motive. He dubs Brandon as unthinking and strange. However, he is happy at the thought that the wealthy Colonel may soon marry Elinor. A hen-pecked and indulgent husband, John Dashwood is afraid to hurt the feelings of his cunning wife. Thus he requests Elinor to refrain from mentioning the Colonel's benevolence to her. He is happy to see his wife talking politely to Elinor and appreciates Fanny's gesture. John Dashwood's views and ideas shock Elinor. Referring to the marriage of Robert Ferrars to Miss Morton, he voices his opinion that Miss Morton should not mind getting married to any one of the brothers as long as he inherits the family property. His line of argument appalls Elinor thoroughly: her brother considers money superior to emotion. CHAPTER 42 Summary In early April the two families from Hanover Square and Berkeley Street set out on their journey to Cleveland. Passing through Somerset, they take three days to reach their destination. The Palmers' house is modern and spacious, and the surrounding flora and fauna enhance its beauty. Marianne is excited at the idea of being able to explore the countryside. However, she is forced to stay indoors due to rain. Mr. Palmer and Colonel Brandon arrive shortly afterwards. Elinor finds both Mr. and Mrs. Palmer charming and friendly hosts. Brandon talks to her about Delaford. He suspects that Marianne has caught a cold, and in fact, she falls ill with the flu a few days later. Notes Marianne and Elinor have different reactions to the departure for Cleveland. Marianne becomes emotional, recollecting the pleasures and pains she has experienced while in London. Elinor is quite content to leave the place, as she is not at all sentimental about it. In fact, she is relieved to be spared the company of Lucy Steele. She also hopes that a change of scene will help Marianne to regain her health. Jane Austen once again highlights Marianne's sensibility in contrast to Elinor's good sense. Mr. Palmer reveals himself to be a gentleman beneath his tough exterior. Elinor is at first apprehensive about living under his roof. However, she finds him refreshingly different at Cleveland. Austen writes, "She found him, however, perfectly the gentleman in his behaviour to all his visitors, and only occasionally rude to his wife and her mother; she found him very capable of being a pleasant companion." Elinor is arguably the mouthpiece of the author, and therefore her renewed assessment of Mr. Palmer is important. John Dashwood is still under the impression that Colonel Brandon is in love with Elinor. Therefore he informs his sister that he will be making a visit to Delaford in the future. Elinor is merely amused at his remark, as she is well aware of the true object of the Colonel's desire: her sister, Marianne. CHAPTER 43 Summary This entire chapter deals with Marianne's illness. Her cold develops into influenza and then into a mysterious illness. The doctor administers medication and predicts her recovery, but Marianne's health turns from bad to worse. Mrs. Palmer, fearing an infection that could be caught by her new-born baby, moves to a friend's house near Bath. Mr. Palmer follows her after a few days. After four days, when Marianne's health shows no improvement, Elinor decides to consult with the Colonel before calling her mother to Cleveland. Colonel Brandon willingly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood from Barton and leaves immediately on this errand. Both Mrs. Jennings and Elinor are anxious after the doctor gives up hope, since the medication fails to cure Marianne. However, after a few more days, Marianne recovers miraculously. As Elinor waits for her mother to arrive, she gets a surprise visitor. It is Willoughby, who makes an appearance at the cottage. Notes Jane Austen throws light on the attitude of the different characters through their distinct reactions to Marianne's illness. When Marianne's condition worsens, Elinor is quite disturbed, but she does not panic. She thinks calmly and arrives at the decision to summon her mother from Barton. The Colonel is concerned about Marianne's health. He sensibly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood and undertakes his mission without delay. Both Elinor and the Colonel use their sense to the best advantage in order to improve the situation. Mrs. Jennings is highly emotional. She thinks of the worst when Marianne's health deteriorates. She feels sorry for the girl, as she is afraid that she may succumb to her illness. However, when Marianne recovers miraculously, she is overjoyed. Mrs. Jennings displays the extremes of emotion. Mr. Palmer conducts himself in a stable manner. When his wife panics about a possible threat to her baby's health, he chides her. As a host, he considers Marianne his responsibility and therefore shows reluctance to leave Cleveland.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/chapters_57_to_59.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_14_part_0.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapters 57-59

chapters 57-59

{"name": "Chapters 57-59", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219151046/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary-and-analysis/phase-the-seventh-fulfilment-chapters-5759", "summary": "Angel hears from his parents via telegram that his brother Cuthbert is engaged to Mercy Chant. He leaves his hotel to go to the train station for a return trip home. At the station, Tess finds him and confesses to murdering Alec. Immediately, Angel formulates a plan to walk to the north of England, avoiding the more traveled roads, until they can reach a port city after the events surrounding the murder are forgotten. The two walk for miles, finally happy to be in each other's company. Along the way, they discover a vacant house, with only a caretaker occasionally stopping by. The great house, called Bramshurst Court, is empty of a renter, so the couple takes up residence. They spend five days in the house until the local caretaker sees them sleeping in the large bedrooms. Once discovered, Angel and Tess move directly north until they reach the ancient monoliths of Stonehenge. Tess feels that her freedom is limited and her end is near, so she has Angel promise to marry Liza Lu after her death. Now that it is night and the two are tired, Tess sleeps on one of the \"altars\" of stone. Near daybreak, the two are surrounded by police who take Tess into custody. For her part, Tess is glad that the end has come, and she goes with the police willingly. In the final chapter, Angel and Liza Lu journey together to Wintoncester to see that Tess' sentence, death by hanging, is carried out. They do not actually witness the deed, but know the enterprise is done when a black flag is hoisted over the town's tower. The two then return the way they came, \"As soon as they arose, joined hands again, and went on.\"", "analysis": "Hardy has brought the story full circle. Four years have passed since the day in May, in the beginning of the novel, when Tess and Angel met. At the story's end it is May again. Angel is in the process of leaving Sandbourne when he receives news that his brother, Cuthbert, has become engaged to Mercy Chant. As he is leaving town awaiting the next train, Tess appears with the tale that she had killed Alec. Angel is unsure about her story, but now that she is finally his, he takes no chances of her being discovered. One of their stops takes them to a vacant house, called Bramshurst Court. Their week together is uneventful in that Tess and Angel finally become a married couple. She seems to know that her time with Angel is limited, because she will soon be wanted for Alec's murder; \"My life can only be a question of a few weeks,\" she says. Her last wishes are for Angel to marry her sister, Liza Lu for \"'She had all the best of me without the bad of me.\" In Chapter 59, when Angel and Liza Lu join hands after Tess' execution, we understand that Angel will fulfill this request. The chase from Sandbourne ends at the historic site of Stonehenge, a collection of giant stones arranged in a circular form, dating from 2,800 to 1,500 B.C. The purposes for the monuments were to serve as an astrological calendar and a ceremonial place for religious or tribal worship. Because the original purposes of the ancient monuments have been shrouded in mystery, especially in Hardy's time, experts could only speculate as to the purpose of the megaliths. Tess and Angel stop in Stonehenge after they have traveled a long way and need rest. The stones are still warm from the sun, radiating heat all during the cool night. Tess realizes that her mother's family is from the area, \"One of my mother's people was a shepherd hereabouts, now I think of it. And you used to say at Talbothays that I was a heathen. So now I am at home.\" Angel recognizes that Tess is \"lying on an altar\" -- like a sacrifice to the ancient pagans who used to practice there. In a modern sense, Tess is sacrificed to the laws and morals of the nineteenth century. Hardy ends Tess' tale with the words \"'Justice' was done, and the President of the Immortals, in the Aeschylean phrase, had ended his sport with Tess.\" A bit of background is needed to understand this phrase. First, Aeschylus was an ancient Greek playwright who lived from 525-546 b.c. Aeschylus wrote plays that centered on individual will and the influence of divine power over mortals. In his play called Prometheus Bound, Prometheus is chained to a rock, and an eagle comes to devour his liver every day; each night, Prometheus' liver grows back. Hercules destroys the eagle and sets Prometheus free. Tess is like Prometheus in that she seems to have been a \"toy\" of the gods of morality and religion in Victorian England, and she had to be sacrificed for the good of mankind. All of Tess' life is the result of either an accident, fate, or the intervention of the gods. In fact, some critics feel that the circumstances leading to Tess' tragic life and death are too contrived, are unrealistic, and unbelievable. Whether realistic or not, Fate has intervened in Tess' world and shaped the course of her life. Glossary \"her Antinous . . . \" a favorite of the Roman Emperor Hadrian; like Apollo, the Greek god of sun and of music, Antinous was a figure of male beauty. Atalanta's race Atalanta was a Grecian huntress who refused to marry any suitor who could not outrun her; the penalty for those who lost was death. deprecated expressed disapproval of; depreciated; belittled. antiquity the quality of being ancient or old. \"Temple of the Winds\" also known as the \"tower of the winds,\" a temple in Athens used for telling time. Trilithon a monument consisting of two upright megaliths with a third stone serving as the lintel. taciturnity the condition of being silent or uncommunicative. integument a natural outer covering of the body or of a plant, including skin, shell, hide, husk, or rind. \"Giotto's 'Two Apostles'\" Hardy probably had in mind the fresco in the National Gallery in London that is now attributed to Spinello Aretino . wicket a small door or gate, esp. one set in or near a larger door or gate. Aeschylean phrase \"President of the Immortals\" translates a phrase from Prometheus Bound , by Aeschylus; Hardy finishes the novel by suggesting that the highest power in the universe uses human beings for \"sport.\""}

Meanwhile Angel Clare had walked automatically along the way by which he had come, and, entering his hotel, sat down over the breakfast, staring at nothingness. He went on eating and drinking unconsciously till on a sudden he demanded his bill; having paid which, he took his dressing-bag in his hand, the only luggage he had brought with him, and went out. At the moment of his departure a telegram was handed to him--a few words from his mother, stating that they were glad to know his address, and informing him that his brother Cuthbert had proposed to and been accepted by Mercy Chant. Clare crumpled up the paper and followed the route to the station; reaching it, he found that there would be no train leaving for an hour and more. He sat down to wait, and having waited a quarter of an hour felt that he could wait there no longer. Broken in heart and numbed, he had nothing to hurry for; but he wished to get out of a town which had been the scene of such an experience, and turned to walk to the first station onward, and let the train pick him up there. The highway that he followed was open, and at a little distance dipped into a valley, across which it could be seen running from edge to edge. He had traversed the greater part of this depression, and was climbing the western acclivity when, pausing for breath, he unconsciously looked back. Why he did so he could not say, but something seemed to impel him to the act. The tape-like surface of the road diminished in his rear as far as he could see, and as he gazed a moving spot intruded on the white vacuity of its perspective. It was a human figure running. Clare waited, with a dim sense that somebody was trying to overtake him. The form descending the incline was a woman's, yet so entirely was his mind blinded to the idea of his wife's following him that even when she came nearer he did not recognize her under the totally changed attire in which he now beheld her. It was not till she was quite close that he could believe her to be Tess. "I saw you--turn away from the station--just before I got there--and I have been following you all this way!" She was so pale, so breathless, so quivering in every muscle, that he did not ask her a single question, but seizing her hand, and pulling it within his arm, he led her along. To avoid meeting any possible wayfarers he left the high road and took a footpath under some fir-trees. When they were deep among the moaning boughs he stopped and looked at her inquiringly. "Angel," she said, as if waiting for this, "do you know what I have been running after you for? To tell you that I have killed him!" A pitiful white smile lit her face as she spoke. "What!" said he, thinking from the strangeness of her manner that she was in some delirium. "I have done it--I don't know how," she continued. "Still, I owed it to you, and to myself, Angel. I feared long ago, when I struck him on the mouth with my glove, that I might do it some day for the trap he set for me in my simple youth, and his wrong to you through me. He has come between us and ruined us, and now he can never do it any more. I never loved him at all, Angel, as I loved you. You know it, don't you? You believe it? You didn't come back to me, and I was obliged to go back to him. Why did you go away--why did you--when I loved you so? I can't think why you did it. But I don't blame you; only, Angel, will you forgive me my sin against you, now I have killed him? I thought as I ran along that you would be sure to forgive me now I have done that. It came to me as a shining light that I should get you back that way. I could not bear the loss of you any longer--you don't know how entirely I was unable to bear your not loving me! Say you do now, dear, dear husband; say you do, now I have killed him!" "I do love you, Tess--O, I do--it is all come back!" he said, tightening his arms round her with fervid pressure. "But how do you mean--you have killed him?" "I mean that I have," she murmured in a reverie. "What, bodily? Is he dead?" "Yes. He heard me crying about you, and he bitterly taunted me; and called you by a foul name; and then I did it. My heart could not bear it. He had nagged me about you before. And then I dressed myself and came away to find you." By degrees he was inclined to believe that she had faintly attempted, at least, what she said she had done; and his horror at her impulse was mixed with amazement at the strength of her affection for himself, and at the strangeness of its quality, which had apparently extinguished her moral sense altogether. Unable to realize the gravity of her conduct, she seemed at last content; and he looked at her as she lay upon his shoulder, weeping with happiness, and wondered what obscure strain in the d'Urberville blood had led to this aberration--if it were an aberration. There momentarily flashed through his mind that the family tradition of the coach and murder might have arisen because the d'Urbervilles had been known to do these things. As well as his confused and excited ideas could reason, he supposed that in the moment of mad grief of which she spoke, her mind had lost its balance, and plunged her into this abyss. It was very terrible if true; if a temporary hallucination, sad. But, anyhow, here was this deserted wife of his, this passionately-fond woman, clinging to him without a suspicion that he would be anything to her but a protector. He saw that for him to be otherwise was not, in her mind, within the region of the possible. Tenderness was absolutely dominant in Clare at last. He kissed her endlessly with his white lips, and held her hand, and said-- "I will not desert you! I will protect you by every means in my power, dearest love, whatever you may have done or not have done!" They then walked on under the trees, Tess turning her head every now and then to look at him. Worn and unhandsome as he had become, it was plain that she did not discern the least fault in his appearance. To her he was, as of old, all that was perfection, personally and mentally. He was still her Antinous, her Apollo even; his sickly face was beautiful as the morning to her affectionate regard on this day no less than when she first beheld him; for was it not the face of the one man on earth who had loved her purely, and who had believed in her as pure! With an instinct as to possibilities, he did not now, as he had intended, make for the first station beyond the town, but plunged still farther under the firs, which here abounded for miles. Each clasping the other round the waist they promenaded over the dry bed of fir-needles, thrown into a vague intoxicating atmosphere at the consciousness of being together at last, with no living soul between them; ignoring that there was a corpse. Thus they proceeded for several miles till Tess, arousing herself, looked about her, and said, timidly-- "Are we going anywhere in particular?" "I don't know, dearest. Why?" "I don't know." "Well, we might walk a few miles further, and when it is evening find lodgings somewhere or other--in a lonely cottage, perhaps. Can you walk well, Tessy?" "O yes! I could walk for ever and ever with your arm round me!" Upon the whole it seemed a good thing to do. Thereupon they quickened their pace, avoiding high roads, and following obscure paths tending more or less northward. But there was an unpractical vagueness in their movements throughout the day; neither one of them seemed to consider any question of effectual escape, disguise, or long concealment. Their every idea was temporary and unforefending, like the plans of two children. At mid-day they drew near to a roadside inn, and Tess would have entered it with him to get something to eat, but he persuaded her to remain among the trees and bushes of this half-woodland, half-moorland part of the country till he should come back. Her clothes were of recent fashion; even the ivory-handled parasol that she carried was of a shape unknown in the retired spot to which they had now wandered; and the cut of such articles would have attracted attention in the settle of a tavern. He soon returned, with food enough for half-a-dozen people and two bottles of wine--enough to last them for a day or more, should any emergency arise. They sat down upon some dead boughs and shared their meal. Between one and two o'clock they packed up the remainder and went on again. "I feel strong enough to walk any distance," said she. "I think we may as well steer in a general way towards the interior of the country, where we can hide for a time, and are less likely to be looked for than anywhere near the coast," Clare remarked. "Later on, when they have forgotten us, we can make for some port." She made no reply to this beyond that of grasping him more tightly, and straight inland they went. Though the season was an English May, the weather was serenely bright, and during the afternoon it was quite warm. Through the latter miles of their walk their footpath had taken them into the depths of the New Forest, and towards evening, turning the corner of a lane, they perceived behind a brook and bridge a large board on which was painted in white letters, "This desirable Mansion to be Let Furnished"; particulars following, with directions to apply to some London agents. Passing through the gate they could see the house, an old brick building of regular design and large accommodation. "I know it," said Clare. "It is Bramshurst Court. You can see that it is shut up, and grass is growing on the drive." "Some of the windows are open," said Tess. "Just to air the rooms, I suppose." "All these rooms empty, and we without a roof to our heads!" "You are getting tired, my Tess!" he said. "We'll stop soon." And kissing her sad mouth, he again led her onwards. He was growing weary likewise, for they had wandered a dozen or fifteen miles, and it became necessary to consider what they should do for rest. They looked from afar at isolated cottages and little inns, and were inclined to approach one of the latter, when their hearts failed them, and they sheered off. At length their gait dragged, and they stood still. "Could we sleep under the trees?" she asked. He thought the season insufficiently advanced. "I have been thinking of that empty mansion we passed," he said. "Let us go back towards it again." They retraced their steps, but it was half an hour before they stood without the entrance-gate as earlier. He then requested her to stay where she was, whilst he went to see who was within. She sat down among the bushes within the gate, and Clare crept towards the house. His absence lasted some considerable time, and when he returned Tess was wildly anxious, not for herself, but for him. He had found out from a boy that there was only an old woman in charge as caretaker, and she only came there on fine days, from the hamlet near, to open and shut the windows. She would come to shut them at sunset. "Now, we can get in through one of the lower windows, and rest there," said he. Under his escort she went tardily forward to the main front, whose shuttered windows, like sightless eyeballs, excluded the possibility of watchers. The door was reached a few steps further, and one of the windows beside it was open. Clare clambered in, and pulled Tess in after him. Except the hall, the rooms were all in darkness, and they ascended the staircase. Up here also the shutters were tightly closed, the ventilation being perfunctorily done, for this day at least, by opening the hall-window in front and an upper window behind. Clare unlatched the door of a large chamber, felt his way across it, and parted the shutters to the width of two or three inches. A shaft of dazzling sunlight glanced into the room, revealing heavy, old-fashioned furniture, crimson damask hangings, and an enormous four-post bedstead, along the head of which were carved running figures, apparently Atalanta's race. "Rest at last!" said he, setting down his bag and the parcel of viands. They remained in great quietness till the caretaker should have come to shut the windows: as a precaution, putting themselves in total darkness by barring the shutters as before, lest the woman should open the door of their chamber for any casual reason. Between six and seven o'clock she came, but did not approach the wing they were in. They heard her close the windows, fasten them, lock the door, and go away. Then Clare again stole a chink of light from the window, and they shared another meal, till by-and-by they were enveloped in the shades of night which they had no candle to disperse. The night was strangely solemn and still. In the small hours she whispered to him the whole story of how he had walked in his sleep with her in his arms across the Froom stream, at the imminent risk of both their lives, and laid her down in the stone coffin at the ruined abbey. He had never known of that till now. "Why didn't you tell me next day?" he said. "It might have prevented much misunderstanding and woe." "Don't think of what's past!" said she. "I am not going to think outside of now. Why should we! Who knows what to-morrow has in store?" But it apparently had no sorrow. The morning was wet and foggy, and Clare, rightly informed that the caretaker only opened the windows on fine days, ventured to creep out of their chamber and explore the house, leaving Tess asleep. There was no food on the premises, but there was water, and he took advantage of the fog to emerge from the mansion and fetch tea, bread, and butter from a shop in a little place two miles beyond, as also a small tin kettle and spirit-lamp, that they might get fire without smoke. His re-entry awoke her; and they breakfasted on what he had brought. They were indisposed to stir abroad, and the day passed, and the night following, and the next, and next; till, almost without their being aware, five days had slipped by in absolute seclusion, not a sight or sound of a human being disturbing their peacefulness, such as it was. The changes of the weather were their only events, the birds of the New Forest their only company. By tacit consent they hardly once spoke of any incident of the past subsequent to their wedding-day. The gloomy intervening time seemed to sink into chaos, over which the present and prior times closed as if it never had been. Whenever he suggested that they should leave their shelter, and go forwards towards Southampton or London, she showed a strange unwillingness to move. "Why should we put an end to all that's sweet and lovely!" she deprecated. "What must come will come." And, looking through the shutter-chink: "All is trouble outside there; inside here content." He peeped out also. It was quite true; within was affection, union, error forgiven: outside was the inexorable. "And--and," she said, pressing her cheek against his, "I fear that what you think of me now may not last. I do not wish to outlive your present feeling for me. I would rather not. I would rather be dead and buried when the time comes for you to despise me, so that it may never be known to me that you despised me." "I cannot ever despise you." "I also hope that. But considering what my life has been, I cannot see why any man should, sooner or later, be able to help despising me.... How wickedly mad I was! Yet formerly I never could bear to hurt a fly or a worm, and the sight of a bird in a cage used often to make me cry." They remained yet another day. In the night the dull sky cleared, and the result was that the old caretaker at the cottage awoke early. The brilliant sunrise made her unusually brisk; she decided to open the contiguous mansion immediately, and to air it thoroughly on such a day. Thus it occurred that, having arrived and opened the lower rooms before six o'clock, she ascended to the bedchambers, and was about to turn the handle of the one wherein they lay. At that moment she fancied she could hear the breathing of persons within. Her slippers and her antiquity had rendered her progress a noiseless one so far, and she made for instant retreat; then, deeming that her hearing might have deceived her, she turned anew to the door and softly tried the handle. The lock was out of order, but a piece of furniture had been moved forward on the inside, which prevented her opening the door more than an inch or two. A stream of morning light through the shutter-chink fell upon the faces of the pair, wrapped in profound slumber, Tess's lips being parted like a half-opened flower near his cheek. The caretaker was so struck with their innocent appearance, and with the elegance of Tess's gown hanging across a chair, her silk stockings beside it, the pretty parasol, and the other habits in which she had arrived because she had none else, that her first indignation at the effrontery of tramps and vagabonds gave way to a momentary sentimentality over this genteel elopement, as it seemed. She closed the door, and withdrew as softly as she had come, to go and consult with her neighbours on the odd discovery. Not more than a minute had elapsed after her withdrawal when Tess woke, and then Clare. Both had a sense that something had disturbed them, though they could not say what; and the uneasy feeling which it engendered grew stronger. As soon as he was dressed he narrowly scanned the lawn through the two or three inches of shutter-chink. "I think we will leave at once," said he. "It is a fine day. And I cannot help fancying somebody is about the house. At any rate, the woman will be sure to come to-day." She passively assented, and putting the room in order, they took up the few articles that belonged to them, and departed noiselessly. When they had got into the Forest she turned to take a last look at the house. "Ah, happy house--goodbye!" she said. "My life can only be a question of a few weeks. Why should we not have stayed there?" "Don't say it, Tess! We shall soon get out of this district altogether. We'll continue our course as we've begun it, and keep straight north. Nobody will think of looking for us there. We shall be looked for at the Wessex ports if we are sought at all. When we are in the north we will get to a port and away." Having thus persuaded her, the plan was pursued, and they kept a bee-line northward. Their long repose at the manor-house lent them walking power now; and towards mid-day they found that they were approaching the steepled city of Melchester, which lay directly in their way. He decided to rest her in a clump of trees during the afternoon, and push onward under cover of darkness. At dusk Clare purchased food as usual, and their night march began, the boundary between Upper and Mid-Wessex being crossed about eight o'clock. To walk across country without much regard to roads was not new to Tess, and she showed her old agility in the performance. The intercepting city, ancient Melchester, they were obliged to pass through in order to take advantage of the town bridge for crossing a large river that obstructed them. It was about midnight when they went along the deserted streets, lighted fitfully by the few lamps, keeping off the pavement that it might not echo their footsteps. The graceful pile of cathedral architecture rose dimly on their left hand, but it was lost upon them now. Once out of the town they followed the turnpike-road, which after a few miles plunged across an open plain. Though the sky was dense with cloud, a diffused light from some fragment of a moon had hitherto helped them a little. But the moon had now sunk, the clouds seemed to settle almost on their heads, and the night grew as dark as a cave. However, they found their way along, keeping as much on the turf as possible that their tread might not resound, which it was easy to do, there being no hedge or fence of any kind. All around was open loneliness and black solitude, over which a stiff breeze blew. They had proceeded thus gropingly two or three miles further when on a sudden Clare became conscious of some vast erection close in his front, rising sheer from the grass. They had almost struck themselves against it. "What monstrous place is this?" said Angel. "It hums," said she. "Hearken!" He listened. The wind, playing upon the edifice, produced a booming tune, like the note of some gigantic one-stringed harp. No other sound came from it, and lifting his hand and advancing a step or two, Clare felt the vertical surface of the structure. It seemed to be of solid stone, without joint or moulding. Carrying his fingers onward he found that what he had come in contact with was a colossal rectangular pillar; by stretching out his left hand he could feel a similar one adjoining. At an indefinite height overhead something made the black sky blacker, which had the semblance of a vast architrave uniting the pillars horizontally. They carefully entered beneath and between; the surfaces echoed their soft rustle; but they seemed to be still out of doors. The place was roofless. Tess drew her breath fearfully, and Angel, perplexed, said-- "What can it be?" Feeling sideways they encountered another tower-like pillar, square and uncompromising as the first; beyond it another and another. The place was all doors and pillars, some connected above by continuous architraves. "A very Temple of the Winds," he said. The next pillar was isolated; others composed a trilithon; others were prostrate, their flanks forming a causeway wide enough for a carriage; and it was soon obvious that they made up a forest of monoliths grouped upon the grassy expanse of the plain. The couple advanced further into this pavilion of the night till they stood in its midst. "It is Stonehenge!" said Clare. "The heathen temple, you mean?" "Yes. Older than the centuries; older than the d'Urbervilles! Well, what shall we do, darling? We may find shelter further on." But Tess, really tired by this time, flung herself upon an oblong slab that lay close at hand, and was sheltered from the wind by a pillar. Owing to the action of the sun during the preceding day, the stone was warm and dry, in comforting contrast to the rough and chill grass around, which had damped her skirts and shoes. "I don't want to go any further, Angel," she said, stretching out her hand for his. "Can't we bide here?" "I fear not. This spot is visible for miles by day, although it does not seem so now." "One of my mother's people was a shepherd hereabouts, now I think of it. And you used to say at Talbothays that I was a heathen. So now I am at home." He knelt down beside her outstretched form, and put his lips upon hers. "Sleepy are you, dear? I think you are lying on an altar." "I like very much to be here," she murmured. "It is so solemn and lonely--after my great happiness--with nothing but the sky above my face. It seems as if there were no folk in the world but we two; and I wish there were not--except 'Liza-Lu." Clare though she might as well rest here till it should get a little lighter, and he flung his overcoat upon her, and sat down by her side. "Angel, if anything happens to me, will you watch over 'Liza-Lu for my sake?" she asked, when they had listened a long time to the wind among the pillars. "I will." "She is so good and simple and pure. O, Angel--I wish you would marry her if you lose me, as you will do shortly. O, if you would!" "If I lose you I lose all! And she is my sister-in-law." "That's nothing, dearest. People marry sister-laws continually about Marlott; and 'Liza-Lu is so gentle and sweet, and she is growing so beautiful. O, I could share you with her willingly when we are spirits! If you would train her and teach her, Angel, and bring her up for your own self! ... She had all the best of me without the bad of me; and if she were to become yours it would almost seem as if death had not divided us... Well, I have said it. I won't mention it again." She ceased, and he fell into thought. In the far north-east sky he could see between the pillars a level streak of light. The uniform concavity of black cloud was lifting bodily like the lid of a pot, letting in at the earth's edge the coming day, against which the towering monoliths and trilithons began to be blackly defined. "Did they sacrifice to God here?" asked she. "No," said he. "Who to?" "I believe to the sun. That lofty stone set away by itself is in the direction of the sun, which will presently rise behind it." "This reminds me, dear," she said. "You remember you never would interfere with any belief of mine before we were married? But I knew your mind all the same, and I thought as you thought--not from any reasons of my own, but because you thought so. Tell me now, Angel, do you think we shall meet again after we are dead? I want to know." He kissed her to avoid a reply at such a time. "O, Angel--I fear that means no!" said she, with a suppressed sob. "And I wanted so to see you again--so much, so much! What--not even you and I, Angel, who love each other so well?" Like a greater than himself, to the critical question at the critical time he did not answer; and they were again silent. In a minute or two her breathing became more regular, her clasp of his hand relaxed, and she fell asleep. The band of silver paleness along the east horizon made even the distant parts of the Great Plain appear dark and near; and the whole enormous landscape bore that impress of reserve, taciturnity, and hesitation which is usual just before day. The eastward pillars and their architraves stood up blackly against the light, and the great flame-shaped Sun-stone beyond them; and the Stone of Sacrifice midway. Presently the night wind died out, and the quivering little pools in the cup-like hollows of the stones lay still. At the same time something seemed to move on the verge of the dip eastward--a mere dot. It was the head of a man approaching them from the hollow beyond the Sun-stone. Clare wished they had gone onward, but in the circumstances decided to remain quiet. The figure came straight towards the circle of pillars in which they were. He heard something behind him, the brush of feet. Turning, he saw over the prostrate columns another figure; then before he was aware, another was at hand on the right, under a trilithon, and another on the left. The dawn shone full on the front of the man westward, and Clare could discern from this that he was tall, and walked as if trained. They all closed in with evident purpose. Her story then was true! Springing to his feet, he looked around for a weapon, loose stone, means of escape, anything. By this time the nearest man was upon him. "It is no use, sir," he said. "There are sixteen of us on the Plain, and the whole country is reared." "Let her finish her sleep!" he implored in a whisper of the men as they gathered round. When they saw where she lay, which they had not done till then, they showed no objection, and stood watching her, as still as the pillars around. He went to the stone and bent over her, holding one poor little hand; her breathing now was quick and small, like that of a lesser creature than a woman. All waited in the growing light, their faces and hands as if they were silvered, the remainder of their figures dark, the stones glistening green-gray, the Plain still a mass of shade. Soon the light was strong, and a ray shone upon her unconscious form, peering under her eyelids and waking her. "What is it, Angel?" she said, starting up. "Have they come for me?" "Yes, dearest," he said. "They have come." "It is as it should be," she murmured. "Angel, I am almost glad--yes, glad! This happiness could not have lasted. It was too much. I have had enough; and now I shall not live for you to despise me!" She stood up, shook herself, and went forward, neither of the men having moved. "I am ready," she said quietly. The city of Wintoncester, that fine old city, aforetime capital of Wessex, lay amidst its convex and concave downlands in all the brightness and warmth of a July morning. The gabled brick, tile, and freestone houses had almost dried off for the season their integument of lichen, the streams in the meadows were low, and in the sloping High Street, from the West Gateway to the mediaeval cross, and from the mediaeval cross to the bridge, that leisurely dusting and sweeping was in progress which usually ushers in an old-fashioned market-day. From the western gate aforesaid the highway, as every Wintoncestrian knows, ascends a long and regular incline of the exact length of a measured mile, leaving the houses gradually behind. Up this road from the precincts of the city two persons were walking rapidly, as if unconscious of the trying ascent--unconscious through preoccupation and not through buoyancy. They had emerged upon this road through a narrow, barred wicket in a high wall a little lower down. They seemed anxious to get out of the sight of the houses and of their kind, and this road appeared to offer the quickest means of doing so. Though they were young, they walked with bowed heads, which gait of grief the sun's rays smiled on pitilessly. One of the pair was Angel Clare, the other a tall budding creature--half girl, half woman--a spiritualized image of Tess, slighter than she, but with the same beautiful eyes--Clare's sister-in-law, 'Liza-Lu. Their pale faces seemed to have shrunk to half their natural size. They moved on hand in hand, and never spoke a word, the drooping of their heads being that of Giotto's "Two Apostles". When they had nearly reached the top of the great West Hill the clocks in the town struck eight. Each gave a start at the notes, and, walking onward yet a few steps, they reached the first milestone, standing whitely on the green margin of the grass, and backed by the down, which here was open to the road. They entered upon the turf, and, impelled by a force that seemed to overrule their will, suddenly stood still, turned, and waited in paralyzed suspense beside the stone. The prospect from this summit was almost unlimited. In the valley beneath lay the city they had just left, its more prominent buildings showing as in an isometric drawing--among them the broad cathedral tower, with its Norman windows and immense length of aisle and nave, the spires of St Thomas's, the pinnacled tower of the College, and, more to the right, the tower and gables of the ancient hospice, where to this day the pilgrim may receive his dole of bread and ale. Behind the city swept the rotund upland of St Catherine's Hill; further off, landscape beyond landscape, till the horizon was lost in the radiance of the sun hanging above it. Against these far stretches of country rose, in front of the other city edifices, a large red-brick building, with level gray roofs, and rows of short barred windows bespeaking captivity, the whole contrasting greatly by its formalism with the quaint irregularities of the Gothic erections. It was somewhat disguised from the road in passing it by yews and evergreen oaks, but it was visible enough up here. The wicket from which the pair had lately emerged was in the wall of this structure. From the middle of the building an ugly flat-topped octagonal tower ascended against the east horizon, and viewed from this spot, on its shady side and against the light, it seemed the one blot on the city's beauty. Yet it was with this blot, and not with the beauty, that the two gazers were concerned. Upon the cornice of the tower a tall staff was fixed. Their eyes were riveted on it. A few minutes after the hour had struck something moved slowly up the staff, and extended itself upon the breeze. It was a black flag. "Justice" was done, and the President of the Immortals, in Aeschylean phrase, had ended his sport with Tess. And the d'Urberville knights and dames slept on in their tombs unknowing. The two speechless gazers bent themselves down to the earth, as if in prayer, and remained thus a long time, absolutely motionless: the flag continued to wave silently. As soon as they had strength, they arose, joined hands again, and went on.

Chapters 57-59

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219151046/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary-and-analysis/phase-the-seventh-fulfilment-chapters-5759

Angel hears from his parents via telegram that his brother Cuthbert is engaged to Mercy Chant. He leaves his hotel to go to the train station for a return trip home. At the station, Tess finds him and confesses to murdering Alec. Immediately, Angel formulates a plan to walk to the north of England, avoiding the more traveled roads, until they can reach a port city after the events surrounding the murder are forgotten. The two walk for miles, finally happy to be in each other's company. Along the way, they discover a vacant house, with only a caretaker occasionally stopping by. The great house, called Bramshurst Court, is empty of a renter, so the couple takes up residence. They spend five days in the house until the local caretaker sees them sleeping in the large bedrooms. Once discovered, Angel and Tess move directly north until they reach the ancient monoliths of Stonehenge. Tess feels that her freedom is limited and her end is near, so she has Angel promise to marry Liza Lu after her death. Now that it is night and the two are tired, Tess sleeps on one of the "altars" of stone. Near daybreak, the two are surrounded by police who take Tess into custody. For her part, Tess is glad that the end has come, and she goes with the police willingly. In the final chapter, Angel and Liza Lu journey together to Wintoncester to see that Tess' sentence, death by hanging, is carried out. They do not actually witness the deed, but know the enterprise is done when a black flag is hoisted over the town's tower. The two then return the way they came, "As soon as they arose, joined hands again, and went on."

Hardy has brought the story full circle. Four years have passed since the day in May, in the beginning of the novel, when Tess and Angel met. At the story's end it is May again. Angel is in the process of leaving Sandbourne when he receives news that his brother, Cuthbert, has become engaged to Mercy Chant. As he is leaving town awaiting the next train, Tess appears with the tale that she had killed Alec. Angel is unsure about her story, but now that she is finally his, he takes no chances of her being discovered. One of their stops takes them to a vacant house, called Bramshurst Court. Their week together is uneventful in that Tess and Angel finally become a married couple. She seems to know that her time with Angel is limited, because she will soon be wanted for Alec's murder; "My life can only be a question of a few weeks," she says. Her last wishes are for Angel to marry her sister, Liza Lu for "'She had all the best of me without the bad of me." In Chapter 59, when Angel and Liza Lu join hands after Tess' execution, we understand that Angel will fulfill this request. The chase from Sandbourne ends at the historic site of Stonehenge, a collection of giant stones arranged in a circular form, dating from 2,800 to 1,500 B.C. The purposes for the monuments were to serve as an astrological calendar and a ceremonial place for religious or tribal worship. Because the original purposes of the ancient monuments have been shrouded in mystery, especially in Hardy's time, experts could only speculate as to the purpose of the megaliths. Tess and Angel stop in Stonehenge after they have traveled a long way and need rest. The stones are still warm from the sun, radiating heat all during the cool night. Tess realizes that her mother's family is from the area, "One of my mother's people was a shepherd hereabouts, now I think of it. And you used to say at Talbothays that I was a heathen. So now I am at home." Angel recognizes that Tess is "lying on an altar" -- like a sacrifice to the ancient pagans who used to practice there. In a modern sense, Tess is sacrificed to the laws and morals of the nineteenth century. Hardy ends Tess' tale with the words "'Justice' was done, and the President of the Immortals, in the Aeschylean phrase, had ended his sport with Tess." A bit of background is needed to understand this phrase. First, Aeschylus was an ancient Greek playwright who lived from 525-546 b.c. Aeschylus wrote plays that centered on individual will and the influence of divine power over mortals. In his play called Prometheus Bound, Prometheus is chained to a rock, and an eagle comes to devour his liver every day; each night, Prometheus' liver grows back. Hercules destroys the eagle and sets Prometheus free. Tess is like Prometheus in that she seems to have been a "toy" of the gods of morality and religion in Victorian England, and she had to be sacrificed for the good of mankind. All of Tess' life is the result of either an accident, fate, or the intervention of the gods. In fact, some critics feel that the circumstances leading to Tess' tragic life and death are too contrived, are unrealistic, and unbelievable. Whether realistic or not, Fate has intervened in Tess' world and shaped the course of her life. Glossary "her Antinous . . . " a favorite of the Roman Emperor Hadrian; like Apollo, the Greek god of sun and of music, Antinous was a figure of male beauty. Atalanta's race Atalanta was a Grecian huntress who refused to marry any suitor who could not outrun her; the penalty for those who lost was death. deprecated expressed disapproval of; depreciated; belittled. antiquity the quality of being ancient or old. "Temple of the Winds" also known as the "tower of the winds," a temple in Athens used for telling time. Trilithon a monument consisting of two upright megaliths with a third stone serving as the lintel. taciturnity the condition of being silent or uncommunicative. integument a natural outer covering of the body or of a plant, including skin, shell, hide, husk, or rind. "Giotto's 'Two Apostles'" Hardy probably had in mind the fresco in the National Gallery in London that is now attributed to Spinello Aretino . wicket a small door or gate, esp. one set in or near a larger door or gate. Aeschylean phrase "President of the Immortals" translates a phrase from Prometheus Bound , by Aeschylus; Hardy finishes the novel by suggesting that the highest power in the universe uses human beings for "sport."

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/23042-chapters/6.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Tempest/section_5_part_0.txt

The Tempest.act 3.scene 2

act 3, scene 2

{"name": "Act 3, Scene 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210411014001/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tempest/summary/act-3-scene-2", "summary": "Caliban is with Trinculo and Stefano, and they're all still pretty drunk. Stefano promises that Caliban will be lieutenant on his island, and Caliban promises to lick Stefano's shoe. Fair trade. Trinculo and Caliban get into a little tiff, and Caliban demands that Stefano defend him against Trinculo. Caliban then reminds his two new friends of what he told them earlier: he has been subject to the tyrant sorcerer Prospero, who has wrongfully stolen the island from him. Meanwhile, the invisible Ariel has entered, and whispers things like \"thou liest!\" Seeing no one, Caliban and Stefano think Trinculo is the one whispering, so they beat him up. Caliban instructs Stefano of what must be done to kill Prospero and gain power over the island. Caliban will lead them to Prospero's favorite afternoon nap spot. If they steal his books, Prospero will be powerless, and then they can nail him in the head, or something. Caliban promises that all the pretty linens and things in Prospero's house will belong to them, and, best of all, Stefano can have the beautiful Miranda, who will \"become thy bed, and bring thee forth brave brood\" after they've murdered her father. Not cute. As they get ready to find and murder the magician, Ariel enters playing a tune. Trinculo and Stefano are frightened by the song that comes from nowhere, and ask for forgiveness from Heaven. Caliban reassures them that the island is full of sweet noises, and gives one of the most beautiful speeches in the play, speaking of wonder and dreams. All agree to follow the song, which they hope will lead them to Prospero, so they can do their awful deed.", "analysis": ""}

SCENE II. _Another part of the island._ _Enter CALIBAN, STEPHANO, and TRINCULO._ _Ste._ Tell not me;--when the butt is out, we will drink water; not a drop before: therefore bear up, and board 'em. Servant-monster, drink to me. _Trin._ Servant-monster! the folly of this island! They say there's but five upon this isle: we are three of them; if 5 th' other two be brained like us, the state totters. _Ste._ Drink, servant-monster, when I bid thee: thy eyes are almost set in thy head. _Trin._ Where should they be set else? he were a brave monster indeed, if they were set in his tail. 10 _Ste._ My man-monster hath drowned his tongue in sack: for my part, the sea cannot drown me; I swam, ere I could recover the shore, five-and-thirty leagues off and on. By this light, thou shalt be my lieutenant, monster, or my standard. 15 _Trin._ Your lieutenant, if you list; he's no standard. _Ste._ We'll not run, Monsieur Monster. _Trin._ Nor go neither; but you'll lie, like dogs, and yet say nothing neither. _Ste._ Moon-calf, speak once in thy life, if thou beest a 20 good moon-calf. _Cal._ How does thy honour? Let me lick thy shoe. I'll not serve him, he is not valiant. _Trin._ Thou liest, most ignorant monster: I am in case to justle a constable. Why, thou debauched fish, thou, was 25 there ever man a coward that hath drunk so much sack as I to-day? Wilt thou tell a monstrous lie, being but half a fish and half a monster? _Cal._ Lo, how he mocks me! wilt thou let him, my lord? _Trin._ 'Lord,' quoth he! That a monster should be 30 such a natural! _Cal._ Lo, lo, again! bite him to death, I prithee. _Ste._ Trinculo, keep a good tongue in your head: if you prove a mutineer,--the next tree! The poor monster's my subject, and he shall not suffer indignity. 35 _Cal._ I thank my noble lord. Wilt thou be pleased to hearken once again to the suit I made to thee? _Ste._ Marry, will I: kneel and repeat it; I will stand, and so shall Trinculo. _Enter ARIEL, invisible._ _Cal._ As I told thee before, I am subject to a tyrant, a 40 sorcerer, that by his cunning hath cheated me of the island. _Ari._ Thou liest. _Cal._ Thou liest, thou jesting monkey, thou: I would my valiant master would destroy thee! I do not lie. _Ste._ Trinculo, if you trouble him any more in's tale, by 45 this hand, I will supplant some of your teeth. _Trin._ Why, I said nothing. _Ste._ Mum, then, and no more. Proceed. _Cal._ I say, by sorcery he got this isle; From me he got it. If thy greatness will 50 Revenge it on him,--for I know thou darest, But this thing dare not,-- _Ste._ That's most certain. _Cal._ Thou shalt be lord of it, and I'll serve thee. _Ste._ How now shall this be compassed? Canst thou 55 bring me to the party? _Cal._ Yea, yea, my lord: I'll yield him thee asleep, Where thou mayst knock a nail into his head. _Ari._ Thou liest; thou canst not. _Cal._ What a pied ninny's this! Thou scurvy patch! 60 I do beseech thy Greatness, give him blows, And take his bottle from him: when that's gone, He shall drink nought but brine; for I'll not show him Where the quick freshes are. _Ste._ Trinculo, run into no further danger: interrupt the 65 monster one word further, and, by this hand, I'll turn my mercy out o' doors, and make a stock-fish of thee. _Trin._ Why, what did I? I did nothing. I'll go farther off. _Ste._ Didst thou not say he lied? 70 _Ari._ Thou liest. _Ste._ Do I so? take thou that. [_Beats him._] As you like this, give me the lie another time. _Trin._ I did not give the lie. Out o' your wits, and hearing too? A pox o' your bottle! this can sack and 75 drinking do. A murrain on your monster, and the devil take your fingers! _Cal._ Ha, ha, ha! _Ste._ Now, forward with your tale. --Prithee, stand farther off. 80 _Cal._ Beat him enough: after a little time, I'll beat him too. _Ste._ Stand farther. Come, proceed. _Cal._ Why, as I told thee, 'tis a custom with him I' th' afternoon to sleep: there thou mayst brain him, Having first seized his books; or with a log 85 Batter his skull, or paunch him with a stake, Or cut his wezand with thy knife. Remember First to possess his books; for without them He's but a sot, as I am, nor hath not One spirit to command: they all do hate him 90 As rootedly as I. Burn but his books. He has brave utensils,--for so he calls them,-- Which, when he has a house, he'll deck withal. And that most deeply to consider is The beauty of his daughter; he himself 95 Calls her a nonpareil: I never saw a woman, But only Sycorax my dam and she; But she as far surpasseth Sycorax As great'st does least. _Ste._ Is it so brave a lass? _Cal._ Ay, lord; she will become thy bed, I warrant, 100 And bring thee forth brave brood. _Ste._ Monster, I will kill this man: his daughter and I will be king and queen,--save our Graces!--and Trinculo and thyself shall be viceroys. Dost thou like the plot, Trinculo? 105 _Trin._ Excellent. _Ste._ Give me thy hand: I am sorry I beat thee; but, while thou livest, keep a good tongue in thy head. _Cal._ Within this half hour will he be asleep: Wilt thou destroy him then? _Ste._ Ay, on mine honour. 110 _Ari._ This will I tell my master. _Cal._ Thou makest me merry; I am full of pleasure: Let us be jocund: will you troll the catch You taught me but while-ere? _Ste._ At thy request, monster, I will do reason, any 115 reason. --Come on. Trinculo, let us sing. [_Sings._ Flout 'em and scout 'em, and scout 'em and flout 'em; Thought is free. _Cal._ That's not the tune. [_Ariel plays the tune on a tabor and pipe._ _Ste._ What is this same? 120 _Trin._ This is the tune of our catch, played by the picture of Nobody. _Ste._ If thou beest a man, show thyself in thy likeness: if thou beest a devil, take't as thou list. _Trin._ O, forgive me my sins! 125 _Ste._ He that dies pays all debts: I defy thee. Mercy upon us! _Cal._ Art thou afeard? _Ste._ No, monster, not I. _Cal._ Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises, 130 Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight, and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments Will hum about mine ears; and sometime voices, That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming, 135 The clouds methought would open, and show riches Ready to drop upon me; that, when I waked, I cried to dream again. _Ste._ This will prove a brave kingdom to me, where I shall have my music for nothing. 140 _Cal._ When Prospero is destroyed. _Ste._ That shall be by and by: I remember the story. _Trin._ The sound is going away; let's follow it, and after do our work. _Ste._ Lead, monster; we'll follow. I would I could see 145 this taborer; he lays it on. _Trin._ Wilt come? I'll follow, Stephano. [_Exeunt._ Notes: III, 2. SCENE II. Another...] Theobald. The other... Pope. Enter ...] Enter S. and T. reeling, Caliban following with a bottle. Capell. Enter C. S. and T. with a bottle. Johnson.] 8: _head_] F1. _heart_ F2 F3 F4. 13, 14: _on. By this light, thou_] _on, by this light thou_ Ff. _on, by this light. --Thou_ Capell. 25: _debauched_] _debosh'd_ Ff. 37: _to the suit I made to thee_] _the suit I made thee_ Steevens, who prints all Caliban's speeches as verse. 60: Johnson conjectured that this line was spoken by Stephano. 68: _farther_] F1 _no further_ F2 F3 F4. 72: [Beats him.] Rowe. 84: _there_] _then_ Collier MS. 89: _nor_] _and_ Pope. 93: _deck_] _deck't_ Hanmer. 96: _I never saw a woman_] _I ne'er saw woman_ Pope. 99: _great'st does least_] _greatest does the least_ Rowe. 115, 116:] Printed as verse in Ff. 115: _any_] F1. _and_ F2 F3 F4. 117: _scout 'em, and scout 'em_] Pope. _cout 'em and skowt 'em_ Ff. 125: _sins_] _sin_ F4. 132: _twangling_] _twanging_ Pope. 133: _sometime_] F1. _sometimes_ F2 F3 F4. 137: _that_] om. Pope. 147: Trin. _Will come? I'll follow, Stephano_] Trin. _Wilt come?_ Ste. _I'll follow._ Capell. Ste. _... Wilt come?_ Trin. _I'll follow, Stephano._ Ritson conj.

Act 3, Scene 2

https://web.archive.org/web/20210411014001/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/tempest/summary/act-3-scene-2

Caliban is with Trinculo and Stefano, and they're all still pretty drunk. Stefano promises that Caliban will be lieutenant on his island, and Caliban promises to lick Stefano's shoe. Fair trade. Trinculo and Caliban get into a little tiff, and Caliban demands that Stefano defend him against Trinculo. Caliban then reminds his two new friends of what he told them earlier: he has been subject to the tyrant sorcerer Prospero, who has wrongfully stolen the island from him. Meanwhile, the invisible Ariel has entered, and whispers things like "thou liest!" Seeing no one, Caliban and Stefano think Trinculo is the one whispering, so they beat him up. Caliban instructs Stefano of what must be done to kill Prospero and gain power over the island. Caliban will lead them to Prospero's favorite afternoon nap spot. If they steal his books, Prospero will be powerless, and then they can nail him in the head, or something. Caliban promises that all the pretty linens and things in Prospero's house will belong to them, and, best of all, Stefano can have the beautiful Miranda, who will "become thy bed, and bring thee forth brave brood" after they've murdered her father. Not cute. As they get ready to find and murder the magician, Ariel enters playing a tune. Trinculo and Stefano are frightened by the song that comes from nowhere, and ask for forgiveness from Heaven. Caliban reassures them that the island is full of sweet noises, and gives one of the most beautiful speeches in the play, speaking of wonder and dreams. All agree to follow the song, which they hope will lead them to Prospero, so they can do their awful deed.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/12.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_5_part_2.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapter 12

chapter 12

{"name": "Chapter 12", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210228142327/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/doriangray/section6/", "summary": "On the eve of his thirty-eighth birthday, Dorian runs into Basil on a fog-covered street. He tries to pass him unrecognized, but Basil calls out to him and accompanies him home. Basil mentions that he is about to leave for a six-month stay in Paris but felt it necessary to stop by and warn Dorian that terrible rumors are being spread about his conduct. Basil reminds Dorian that there are no such things as \"secret vices\": sin, he claims, \"writes itself across a man's face. Having said these words, he demands to know why so many of Dorian's friendships have ended disastrously. We learn that one boy committed suicide, and others had their careers or reputations ruined. Basil chastises Dorian for his influence over these unfortunate youths and urges him to use his considerable sway for good rather than evil. He adds that he wonders if he knows Dorian at all and wishes he were able to see the man's soul. Dorian laughs bitterly and says that the artist shall have his wish. He promises to show Basil his soul, which, he notes, most people believe only God can see. Basil decries Dorian's speech as blasphemous, and he begs Dorian to deny the terrible charges that have been made against him. Smiling, Dorian offers to show Basil the diary of his life, which he is certain will answer all of Basil's questions", "analysis": "In the eighteen years that pass over the course of these two chapters, Dorian undergoes a profound psychological and behavioral transformation, though he remains the same physically. Although his behavior is, in part, a function of the Gothic nature of Wilde's tale--his mysterious, potentially dangerous behavior contributes to the novel's darkness--Dorian does not simply devolve into a villain. Though he exhibits inhuman behavior as he carelessly tosses aside his proteges , he never completely sheds his conscience. This divide further manifests itself in that when Dorian looks at the painting of his dissipated self, he \"sometimes loath it and himself,\" while at other times he is overwhelmed by \"that pride of individualism that is half the fascination of sin, and smil with secret pleasure at the misshapen shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been his own.\" This tension points to the conflicted nature of Dorian's character. We might consider Dorian's search for artistic and intellectual enlightenment--much of which is catalogued in Chapter Eleven--an attempt to find refuge from the struggle between mindless egotism and gnawing guilt. Indeed, Dorian lives a life marked by fear and suspicion. He finds it difficult to leave London, giving up the country villa he shares with Lord Henry for fear that someone will stumble upon the dreaded portrait in his absence. One can argue that Dorian turns to the study of perfumes, jewels, musical instruments, and tapestries as a source of comfort. Certainly Dorian's greatest reason for indulging in the studies that Wilde describes at length is his disenchantment with the age in which he lives. Commonly referred to as the fin-de-siecle period, the 1890s in England and Europe were marked by a world-weary sensibility that sought to free humanity from \"the asceticism that deadens the senses.\" In art, this so-called asceticism referred primarily to artistic styles known as naturalism and realism, both of which aimed at reproducing the world as it is and ascribed a moral purpose to art. Dorian, taking the teachings of Lord Henry and the mysterious yellow book as scripture, believes that hedonism is the means by which he will rise above the \"harsh, uncomely puritanism\" of his age. This philosophy counters \"any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice of any mode of passionate experience,\" which echoes the Preface's insistence that artists should not make distinctions between virtue and vice. According to this line of thinking, an experience is valuable in and of itself, regardless of its moral implications. Certainly, as Dorian lives his life under the rubric of aesthetic philosophy, he comes to appreciate the seductive beauty of the darker side of life, feeling \"a curious delight in the thought that Art, like Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous voices.\" A possible seed of Dorian's undoing might be his intellectual development. Dorian is supposedly the personification of a type--a perfect blend of the scholar and the socialite--who lives his life, as Lord Henry dictates, as an individualist. Indeed, we are told that \"no theory of life seemed to him to be of any importance compared with life itself.\" But, paradoxically, even the tenets of Dorian's \"new Hedonism\" prove constricting. It appears that he may have allowed himself to be too strongly influenced by Lord Henry and the yellow book, and that the philosophy of hedonism, meant to spare its followers from the conformities of dulling Victorian morality, may have simply become another, equally limiting doctrine."}

It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth birthday, as he often remembered afterwards. He was walking home about eleven o'clock from Lord Henry's, where he had been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold and foggy. At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, a man passed him in the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of his grey ulster turned up. He had a bag in his hand. Dorian recognized him. It was Basil Hallward. A strange sense of fear, for which he could not account, came over him. He made no sign of recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his own house. But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping on the pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, his hand was on his arm. "Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been waiting for you in your library ever since nine o'clock. Finally I took pity on your tired servant and told him to go to bed, as he let me out. I am off to Paris by the midnight train, and I particularly wanted to see you before I left. I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as you passed me. But I wasn't quite sure. Didn't you recognize me?" "In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognize Grosvenor Square. I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don't feel at all certain about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not seen you for ages. But I suppose you will be back soon?" "No: I am going to be out of England for six months. I intend to take a studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have finished a great picture I have in my head. However, it wasn't about myself I wanted to talk. Here we are at your door. Let me come in for a moment. I have something to say to you." "I shall be charmed. But won't you miss your train?" said Dorian Gray languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his latch-key. The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked at his watch. "I have heaps of time," he answered. "The train doesn't go till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. In fact, I was on my way to the club to look for you, when I met you. You see, I shan't have any delay about luggage, as I have sent on my heavy things. All I have with me is in this bag, and I can easily get to Victoria in twenty minutes." Dorian looked at him and smiled. "What a way for a fashionable painter to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, or the fog will get into the house. And mind you don't talk about anything serious. Nothing is serious nowadays. At least nothing should be." Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the library. There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open hearth. The lamps were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case stood, with some siphons of soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on a little marqueterie table. "You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. He is a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than the Frenchman you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, by the bye?" Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I believe he married Lady Radley's maid, and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. Anglomania is very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly of the French, doesn't it? But--do you know?--he was not at all a bad servant. I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One often imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very devoted to me and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another brandy-and-soda? Or would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take hock-and-seltzer myself. There is sure to be some in the next room." "Thanks, I won't have anything more," said the painter, taking his cap and coat off and throwing them on the bag that he had placed in the corner. "And now, my dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously. Don't frown like that. You make it so much more difficult for me." "What is it all about?" cried Dorian in his petulant way, flinging himself down on the sofa. "I hope it is not about myself. I am tired of myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else." "It is about yourself," answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, "and I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour." Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. "Half an hour!" he murmured. "It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own sake that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that the most dreadful things are being said against you in London." "I don't wish to know anything about them. I love scandals about other people, but scandals about myself don't interest me. They have not got the charm of novelty." "They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested in his good name. You don't want people to talk of you as something vile and degraded. Of course, you have your position, and your wealth, and all that kind of thing. But position and wealth are not everything. Mind you, I don't believe these rumours at all. At least, I can't believe them when I see you. Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the moulding of his hands even. Somebody--I won't mention his name, but you know him--came to me last year to have his portrait done. I had never seen him before, and had never heard anything about him at the time, though I have heard a good deal since. He offered an extravagant price. I refused him. There was something in the shape of his fingers that I hated. I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied about him. His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, bright, innocent face, and your marvellous untroubled youth--I can't believe anything against you. And yet I see you very seldom, and you never come down to the studio now, and when I am away from you, and I hear all these hideous things that people are whispering about you, I don't know what to say. Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of Berwick leaves the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so many gentlemen in London will neither go to your house or invite you to theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. I met him at dinner last week. Your name happened to come up in conversation, in connection with the miniatures you have lent to the exhibition at the Dudley. Staveley curled his lip and said that you might have the most artistic tastes, but that you were a man whom no pure-minded girl should be allowed to know, and whom no chaste woman should sit in the same room with. I reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked him what he meant. He told me. He told me right out before everybody. It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to young men? There was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. You were his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, who had to leave England with a tarnished name. You and he were inseparable. What about Adrian Singleton and his dreadful end? What about Lord Kent's only son and his career? I met his father yesterday in St. James's Street. He seemed broken with shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of Perth? What sort of life has he got now? What gentleman would associate with him?" "Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing," said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt in his voice. "You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. Did I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? If Kent's silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? If Adrian Singleton writes his friend's name across a bill, am I his keeper? I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air their moral prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper about what they call the profligacies of their betters in order to try and pretend that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with the people they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to have distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land of the hypocrite." "Dorian," cried Hallward, "that is not the question. England is bad enough I know, and English society is all wrong. That is the reason why I want you to be fine. You have not been fine. One has a right to judge of a man by the effect he has over his friends. Yours seem to lose all sense of honour, of goodness, of purity. You have filled them with a madness for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. You led them there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you can smile, as you are smiling now. And there is worse behind. I know you and Harry are inseparable. Surely for that reason, if for none other, you should not have made his sister's name a by-word." "Take care, Basil. You go too far." "I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. When you met Lady Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever touched her. Is there a single decent woman in London now who would drive with her in the park? Why, even her children are not allowed to live with her. Then there are other stories--stories that you have been seen creeping at dawn out of dreadful houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest dens in London. Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard them, I laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. What about your country-house and the life that is led there? Dorian, you don't know what is said about you. I won't tell you that I don't want to preach to you. I remember Harry saying once that every man who turned himself into an amateur curate for the moment always began by saying that, and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach to you. I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect you. I want you to have a clean name and a fair record. I want you to get rid of the dreadful people you associate with. Don't shrug your shoulders like that. Don't be so indifferent. You have a wonderful influence. Let it be for good, not for evil. They say that you corrupt every one with whom you become intimate, and that it is quite sufficient for you to enter a house for shame of some kind to follow after. I don't know whether it is so or not. How should I know? But it is said of you. I am told things that it seems impossible to doubt. Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. He showed me a letter that his wife had written to him when she was dying alone in her villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated in the most terrible confession I ever read. I told him that it was absurd--that I knew you thoroughly and that you were incapable of anything of the kind. Know you? I wonder do I know you? Before I could answer that, I should have to see your soul." "To see my soul!" muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa and turning almost white from fear. "Yes," answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his voice, "to see your soul. But only God can do that." A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. "You shall see it yourself, to-night!" he cried, seizing a lamp from the table. "Come: it is your own handiwork. Why shouldn't you look at it? You can tell the world all about it afterwards, if you choose. Nobody would believe you. If they did believe you, they would like me all the better for it. I know the age better than you do, though you will prate about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have chattered enough about corruption. Now you shall look on it face to face." There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. He stamped his foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. He felt a terrible joy at the thought that some one else was to share his secret, and that the man who had painted the portrait that was the origin of all his shame was to be burdened for the rest of his life with the hideous memory of what he had done. "Yes," he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly into his stern eyes, "I shall show you my soul. You shall see the thing that you fancy only God can see." Hallward started back. "This is blasphemy, Dorian!" he cried. "You must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they don't mean anything." "You think so?" He laughed again. "I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your good. You know I have been always a stanch friend to you." "Don't touch me. Finish what you have to say." A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter's face. He paused for a moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. After all, what right had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? If he had done a tithe of what was rumoured about him, how much he must have suffered! Then he straightened himself up, and walked over to the fire-place, and stood there, looking at the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and their throbbing cores of flame. "I am waiting, Basil," said the young man in a hard clear voice. He turned round. "What I have to say is this," he cried. "You must give me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against you. If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to end, I shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can't you see what I am going through? My God! don't tell me that you are bad, and corrupt, and shameful." Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. "Come upstairs, Basil," he said quietly. "I keep a diary of my life from day to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. I shall show it to you if you come with me." "I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed my train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don't ask me to read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question." "That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. You will not have to read long."

Chapter 12

https://web.archive.org/web/20210228142327/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/doriangray/section6/

On the eve of his thirty-eighth birthday, Dorian runs into Basil on a fog-covered street. He tries to pass him unrecognized, but Basil calls out to him and accompanies him home. Basil mentions that he is about to leave for a six-month stay in Paris but felt it necessary to stop by and warn Dorian that terrible rumors are being spread about his conduct. Basil reminds Dorian that there are no such things as "secret vices": sin, he claims, "writes itself across a man's face. Having said these words, he demands to know why so many of Dorian's friendships have ended disastrously. We learn that one boy committed suicide, and others had their careers or reputations ruined. Basil chastises Dorian for his influence over these unfortunate youths and urges him to use his considerable sway for good rather than evil. He adds that he wonders if he knows Dorian at all and wishes he were able to see the man's soul. Dorian laughs bitterly and says that the artist shall have his wish. He promises to show Basil his soul, which, he notes, most people believe only God can see. Basil decries Dorian's speech as blasphemous, and he begs Dorian to deny the terrible charges that have been made against him. Smiling, Dorian offers to show Basil the diary of his life, which he is certain will answer all of Basil's questions

In the eighteen years that pass over the course of these two chapters, Dorian undergoes a profound psychological and behavioral transformation, though he remains the same physically. Although his behavior is, in part, a function of the Gothic nature of Wilde's tale--his mysterious, potentially dangerous behavior contributes to the novel's darkness--Dorian does not simply devolve into a villain. Though he exhibits inhuman behavior as he carelessly tosses aside his proteges , he never completely sheds his conscience. This divide further manifests itself in that when Dorian looks at the painting of his dissipated self, he "sometimes loath it and himself," while at other times he is overwhelmed by "that pride of individualism that is half the fascination of sin, and smil with secret pleasure at the misshapen shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been his own." This tension points to the conflicted nature of Dorian's character. We might consider Dorian's search for artistic and intellectual enlightenment--much of which is catalogued in Chapter Eleven--an attempt to find refuge from the struggle between mindless egotism and gnawing guilt. Indeed, Dorian lives a life marked by fear and suspicion. He finds it difficult to leave London, giving up the country villa he shares with Lord Henry for fear that someone will stumble upon the dreaded portrait in his absence. One can argue that Dorian turns to the study of perfumes, jewels, musical instruments, and tapestries as a source of comfort. Certainly Dorian's greatest reason for indulging in the studies that Wilde describes at length is his disenchantment with the age in which he lives. Commonly referred to as the fin-de-siecle period, the 1890s in England and Europe were marked by a world-weary sensibility that sought to free humanity from "the asceticism that deadens the senses." In art, this so-called asceticism referred primarily to artistic styles known as naturalism and realism, both of which aimed at reproducing the world as it is and ascribed a moral purpose to art. Dorian, taking the teachings of Lord Henry and the mysterious yellow book as scripture, believes that hedonism is the means by which he will rise above the "harsh, uncomely puritanism" of his age. This philosophy counters "any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice of any mode of passionate experience," which echoes the Preface's insistence that artists should not make distinctions between virtue and vice. According to this line of thinking, an experience is valuable in and of itself, regardless of its moral implications. Certainly, as Dorian lives his life under the rubric of aesthetic philosophy, he comes to appreciate the seductive beauty of the darker side of life, feeling "a curious delight in the thought that Art, like Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous voices." A possible seed of Dorian's undoing might be his intellectual development. Dorian is supposedly the personification of a type--a perfect blend of the scholar and the socialite--who lives his life, as Lord Henry dictates, as an individualist. Indeed, we are told that "no theory of life seemed to him to be of any importance compared with life itself." But, paradoxically, even the tenets of Dorian's "new Hedonism" prove constricting. It appears that he may have allowed himself to be too strongly influenced by Lord Henry and the yellow book, and that the philosophy of hedonism, meant to spare its followers from the conformities of dulling Victorian morality, may have simply become another, equally limiting doctrine.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/09.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_4_part_1.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapter 9

chapter 9

{"name": "Chapter 9", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210228142327/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/doriangray/section5/", "summary": "The next day, Basil comes to offer his condolences to Dorian, but Dorian dismisses the memory of Sibyl lightly and easily, remarking, \"What is done is done. What is past is past. Horrified at the change in Dorian, Basil blames Lord Henry for Dorian's heartless attitude. Indeed, in discussing Sibyl's death, Dorian uses many of the same phrases and arguments that Lord Henry favors and evokes a similar air of unaffected composure. He claims that Sibyl's death elevates her \"into the sphere of art. Dorian asks Basil to do a drawing of Sibyl so that he has something by which to remember her. Basil agrees and begs Dorian to return to his studio for a sitting. When Dorian refuses, Basil asks if he is displeased with his portrait, which Basil means to show at an exhibition. When Basil goes to remove the screen with which Dorian has covered the painting, Dorian's composure cracks. Dorian insists that the work never appear in public and pledges never to speak to Basil again should he touch the screen. Remembering Basil's original refusal to show the painting, Dorian asks why he has changed his mind. Basil confesses that he was worried that the painting would reveal his obsession with Dorian. Now, however, Basil believes that the painting, like all art, \"conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him. Basil again asks Dorian to sit for him, and Dorian again refuses. When Basil leaves, Dorian decides to hide his portrait", "analysis": "Sibyl's death compels Dorian to make the conscious decision to embrace Lord Henry's philosophy of selfishness and hedonism wholeheartedly. The contrast between Dorian's and Basil's reactions to Sibyl's death demonstrates the degree to which Lord Henry has changed Dorian. Dorian dismisses the need for grief in words that echo Lord Henry's: Sibyl need not be mourned, he proclaims, for she has \"passed . . . into the sphere of art.\" In other words, Dorian thinks of Sibyl's death as he would the death of a character in a novel or painting, and chooses not to be affected emotionally by her passing. This attitude reveals one way in which the novel blurs the distinction between life and art. Dorian himself passes \"into the sphere of art\" when his portrait reflects the physical manifestations of age and sin. While it is usually paintings that never age and people who do, it is the other way around with Dorian, as he has become more like a work of art than a human. Basil's declaration of his obsession with Dorian is in many ways a defense and justification of homosexual love. In 1895, five years after Dorian Gray was published, Wilde was famously convicted of sodomy for his romantic relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas. Wilde defended homosexual love as an emotion experienced by some of the world's greatest men. He insisted that it had its roots in ancient Greece and was, therefore, fundamental to the development of Western thought and culture. In his trial, when asked to describe the \"love that dare not speak its name,\" Wilde explained it as such a great affection of an elder for a younger man as there was between David and Jonathan, such as Plato made the very basis of his philosophy, and such as you find in the sonnets of Michelangelo and Shakespeare. . . . It is beautiful, it is fine, it is the noblest form of affection. There is nothing unnatural about it. This testimony is strikingly similar to Dorian's reflection upon the kind of affection that Basil shows him: t was really love-- had nothing in it that was not noble and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration of beauty that is born of the senses, and that dies when the senses tire. It was such love as Michael Angelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, and Shakespeare himself. Basil translates these highly emotional and physical feelings into his art; his act of painting is an expression of his love for Dorian. This romantic devotion to Dorian becomes clear when he admits his reason for not wanting to exhibit the painting: he fears that people will see his \"idolatry.\" Dorian reflects, for a moment, that with this love Basil might have saved him from Lord Henry's influence, but he soon resigns himself to living a life dictated by the pursuit of passion. He devours the mysterious \"yellow book\" that Lord Henry gives him, which acts almost as a guide for the journey on which he is to travel. Like the protagonist of that novel, Dorian spirals into a world of self-gratification and exotic sensations. Although Wilde, in letters, identified the novel as imaginary, it is based in part on the nineteenth-century French novel A Rebours , by Joris-Karl Huysmans, in which a decadent and wealthy Frenchman indulges himself in a host of bizarre sensory experiences. The yellow book has profound influence on Dorian; one might argue that it leads to his downfall. This downfall occurs not because the book itself is immoral here is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book\") but because Dorian allows the book to dominate and determine his actions so completely. It becomes, for Dorian, a doctrine as limiting and stultifying as the common Victorian morals from which he seeks escape. After all, Lord Henry is a great fan of the yellow book, but, to his mind, it is no greater or more important than any other work of notable art. He does not let it dominate his life or determine his actions, which, in turn, allows him to retain the respectability that Dorian soon loses."}

As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown into the room. "I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. "I called last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I knew that was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that one tragedy might be followed by another. I think you might have telegraphed for me when you heard of it first. I read of it quite by chance in a late edition of _The Globe_ that I picked up at the club. I came here at once and was miserable at not finding you. I can't tell you how heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl's mother? For a moment I thought of following you there. They gave the address in the paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn't it? But I was afraid of intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! What a state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about it all?" "My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian glass and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. You should have come on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry's sister, for the first time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang divinely. Don't talk about horrid subjects. If one doesn't talk about a thing, it has never happened. It is simply expression, as Harry says, that gives reality to things. I may mention that she was not the woman's only child. There is a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But he is not on the stage. He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell me about yourself and what you are painting." "You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly and with a strained touch of pain in his voice. "You went to the opera while Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You can talk to me of other women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before the girl you loved has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, man, there are horrors in store for that little white body of hers!" "Stop, Basil! I won't hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. "You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is past is past." "You call yesterday the past?" "What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them." "Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. You look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come down to my studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, natural, and affectionate then. You were the most unspoiled creature in the whole world. Now, I don't know what has come over you. You talk as if you had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry's influence. I see that." The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. "I owe a great deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, "more than I owe to you. You only taught me to be vain." "Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day." "I don't know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. "I don't know what you want. What do you want?" "I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint," said the artist sadly. "Basil," said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand on his shoulder, "you have come too late. Yesterday, when I heard that Sibyl Vane had killed herself--" "Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?" cried Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. "My dear Basil! Surely you don't think it was a vulgar accident? Of course she killed herself." The elder man buried his face in his hands. "How fearful," he muttered, and a shudder ran through him. "No," said Dorian Gray, "there is nothing fearful about it. It is one of the great romantic tragedies of the age. As a rule, people who act lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful wives, or something tedious. You know what I mean--middle-class virtue and all that kind of thing. How different Sibyl was! She lived her finest tragedy. She was always a heroine. The last night she played--the night you saw her--she acted badly because she had known the reality of love. When she knew its unreality, she died, as Juliet might have died. She passed again into the sphere of art. There is something of the martyr about her. Her death has all the pathetic uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. But, as I was saying, you must not think I have not suffered. If you had come in yesterday at a particular moment--about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to six--you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, who brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was going through. I suffered immensely. Then it passed away. I cannot repeat an emotion. No one can, except sentimentalists. And you are awfully unjust, Basil. You come down here to console me. That is charming of you. You find me consoled, and you are furious. How like a sympathetic person! You remind me of a story Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who spent twenty years of his life in trying to get some grievance redressed, or some unjust law altered--I forget exactly what it was. Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. He had absolutely nothing to do, almost died of _ennui_, and became a confirmed misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, if you really want to console me, teach me rather to forget what has happened, or to see it from a proper artistic point of view. Was it not Gautier who used to write about _la consolation des arts_? I remember picking up a little vellum-covered book in your studio one day and chancing on that delightful phrase. Well, I am not like that young man you told me of when we were down at Marlow together, the young man who used to say that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of life. I love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. Old brocades, green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, exquisite surroundings, luxury, pomp--there is much to be got from all these. But the artistic temperament that they create, or at any rate reveal, is still more to me. To become the spectator of one's own life, as Harry says, is to escape the suffering of life. I know you are surprised at my talking to you like this. You have not realized how I have developed. I was a schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man now. I have new passions, new thoughts, new ideas. I am different, but you must not like me less. I am changed, but you must always be my friend. Of course, I am very fond of Harry. But I know that you are better than he is. You are not stronger--you are too much afraid of life--but you are better. And how happy we used to be together! Don't leave me, Basil, and don't quarrel with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be said." The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. He could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, his indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. There was so much in him that was good, so much in him that was noble. "Well, Dorian," he said at length, with a sad smile, "I won't speak to you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. I only trust your name won't be mentioned in connection with it. The inquest is to take place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?" Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face at the mention of the word "inquest." There was something so crude and vulgar about everything of the kind. "They don't know my name," he answered. "But surely she did?" "Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to learn who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince Charming. It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, Basil. I should like to have something more of her than the memory of a few kisses and some broken pathetic words." "I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. But you must come and sit to me yourself again. I can't get on without you." "I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!" he exclaimed, starting back. The painter stared at him. "My dear boy, what nonsense!" he cried. "Do you mean to say you don't like what I did of you? Where is it? Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? Let me look at it. It is the best thing I have ever done. Do take the screen away, Dorian. It is simply disgraceful of your servant hiding my work like that. I felt the room looked different as I came in." "My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don't imagine I let him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me sometimes--that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong on the portrait." "Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for it. Let me see it." And Hallward walked towards the corner of the room. A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray's lips, and he rushed between the painter and the screen. "Basil," he said, looking very pale, "you must not look at it. I don't wish you to." "Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn't I look at it?" exclaimed Hallward, laughing. "If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will never speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. I don't offer any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. But, remember, if you touch this screen, everything is over between us." Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in absolute amazement. He had never seen him like this before. The lad was actually pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, and the pupils of his eyes were like disks of blue fire. He was trembling all over. "Dorian!" "Don't speak!" "But what is the matter? Of course I won't look at it if you don't want me to," he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over towards the window. "But, really, it seems rather absurd that I shouldn't see my own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in Paris in the autumn. I shall probably have to give it another coat of varnish before that, so I must see it some day, and why not to-day?" "To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?" exclaimed Dorian Gray, a strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? That was impossible. Something--he did not know what--had to be done at once. "Yes; I don't suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit is going to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition in the Rue de Seze, which will open the first week in October. The portrait will only be away a month. I should think you could easily spare it for that time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. And if you keep it always behind a screen, you can't care much about it." Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible danger. "You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he cried. "Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for being consistent have just as many moods as others have. The only difference is that your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have forgotten that you assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world would induce you to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly the same thing." He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into his eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, half seriously and half in jest, "If you want to have a strange quarter of an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won't exhibit your picture. He told me why he wouldn't, and it was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. "Basil," he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight in the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I shall tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my picture?" The painter shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, you might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I could not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me never to look at your picture again, I am content. I have always you to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done to be hidden from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer to me than any fame or reputation." "No, Basil, you must tell me," insisted Dorian Gray. "I think I have a right to know." His feeling of terror had passed away, and curiosity had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's mystery. "Let us sit down, Dorian," said the painter, looking troubled. "Let us sit down. And just answer me one question. Have you noticed in the picture something curious?--something that probably at first did not strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?" "Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. "I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and power, by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. I worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. I wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with you. When you were away from me, you were still present in my art.... Of course, I never let you know anything about this. It would have been impossible. You would not have understood it. I hardly understood it myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection face to face, and that the world had become wonderful to my eyes--too wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, the peril of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them.... Weeks and weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in you. Then came a new development. I had drawn you as Paris in dainty armour, and as Adonis with huntsman's cloak and polished boar-spear. Crowned with heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on the prow of Adrian's barge, gazing across the green turbid Nile. You had leaned over the still pool of some Greek woodland and seen in the water's silent silver the marvel of your own face. And it had all been what art should be--unconscious, ideal, and remote. One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I determined to paint a wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, not in the costume of dead ages, but in your own dress and in your own time. Whether it was the realism of the method, or the mere wonder of your own personality, thus directly presented to me without mist or veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, every flake and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. I grew afraid that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, that I had told too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. Then it was that I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. You were a little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it meant to me. Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. But I did not mind that. When the picture was finished, and I sat alone with it, I felt that I was right.... Well, after a few days the thing left my studio, and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable fascination of its presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that I had seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely good-looking and that I could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour--that is all. It often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him. And so when I got this offer from Paris, I determined to make your portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. It never occurred to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were right. The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, Dorian, for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are made to be worshipped." Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, and a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. He was safe for the time. Yet he could not help feeling infinite pity for the painter who had just made this strange confession to him, and wondered if he himself would ever be so dominated by the personality of a friend. Lord Henry had the charm of being very dangerous. But that was all. He was too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a strange idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had in store? "It is extraordinary to me, Dorian," said Hallward, "that you should have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?" "I saw something in it," he answered, "something that seemed to me very curious." "Well, you don't mind my looking at the thing now?" Dorian shook his head. "You must not ask me that, Basil. I could not possibly let you stand in front of that picture." "You will some day, surely?" "Never." "Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. You have been the one person in my life who has really influenced my art. Whatever I have done that is good, I owe to you. Ah! you don't know what it cost me to tell you all that I have told you." "My dear Basil," said Dorian, "what have you told me? Simply that you felt that you admired me too much. That is not even a compliment." "It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. Now that I have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one should never put one's worship into words." "It was a very disappointing confession." "Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn't see anything else in the picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?" "No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? But you mustn't talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I are friends, Basil, and we must always remain so." "You have got Harry," said the painter sadly. "Oh, Harry!" cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. "Harry spends his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing what is improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. But still I don't think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. I would sooner go to you, Basil." "You will sit to me again?" "Impossible!" "You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man comes across two ideal things. Few come across one." "I can't explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. I will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant." "Pleasanter for you, I am afraid," murmured Hallward regretfully. "And now good-bye. I am sorry you won't let me look at the picture once again. But that can't be helped. I quite understand what you feel about it." As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! How little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it was that, instead of having been forced to reveal his own secret, he had succeeded, almost by chance, in wresting a secret from his friend! How much that strange confession explained to him! The painter's absurd fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, his extravagant panegyrics, his curious reticences--he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. There seemed to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured by romance. He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away at all costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. It had been mad of him to have allowed the thing to remain, even for an hour, in a room to which any of his friends had access.

Chapter 9

https://web.archive.org/web/20210228142327/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/doriangray/section5/

The next day, Basil comes to offer his condolences to Dorian, but Dorian dismisses the memory of Sibyl lightly and easily, remarking, "What is done is done. What is past is past. Horrified at the change in Dorian, Basil blames Lord Henry for Dorian's heartless attitude. Indeed, in discussing Sibyl's death, Dorian uses many of the same phrases and arguments that Lord Henry favors and evokes a similar air of unaffected composure. He claims that Sibyl's death elevates her "into the sphere of art. Dorian asks Basil to do a drawing of Sibyl so that he has something by which to remember her. Basil agrees and begs Dorian to return to his studio for a sitting. When Dorian refuses, Basil asks if he is displeased with his portrait, which Basil means to show at an exhibition. When Basil goes to remove the screen with which Dorian has covered the painting, Dorian's composure cracks. Dorian insists that the work never appear in public and pledges never to speak to Basil again should he touch the screen. Remembering Basil's original refusal to show the painting, Dorian asks why he has changed his mind. Basil confesses that he was worried that the painting would reveal his obsession with Dorian. Now, however, Basil believes that the painting, like all art, "conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him. Basil again asks Dorian to sit for him, and Dorian again refuses. When Basil leaves, Dorian decides to hide his portrait

Sibyl's death compels Dorian to make the conscious decision to embrace Lord Henry's philosophy of selfishness and hedonism wholeheartedly. The contrast between Dorian's and Basil's reactions to Sibyl's death demonstrates the degree to which Lord Henry has changed Dorian. Dorian dismisses the need for grief in words that echo Lord Henry's: Sibyl need not be mourned, he proclaims, for she has "passed . . . into the sphere of art." In other words, Dorian thinks of Sibyl's death as he would the death of a character in a novel or painting, and chooses not to be affected emotionally by her passing. This attitude reveals one way in which the novel blurs the distinction between life and art. Dorian himself passes "into the sphere of art" when his portrait reflects the physical manifestations of age and sin. While it is usually paintings that never age and people who do, it is the other way around with Dorian, as he has become more like a work of art than a human. Basil's declaration of his obsession with Dorian is in many ways a defense and justification of homosexual love. In 1895, five years after Dorian Gray was published, Wilde was famously convicted of sodomy for his romantic relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas. Wilde defended homosexual love as an emotion experienced by some of the world's greatest men. He insisted that it had its roots in ancient Greece and was, therefore, fundamental to the development of Western thought and culture. In his trial, when asked to describe the "love that dare not speak its name," Wilde explained it as such a great affection of an elder for a younger man as there was between David and Jonathan, such as Plato made the very basis of his philosophy, and such as you find in the sonnets of Michelangelo and Shakespeare. . . . It is beautiful, it is fine, it is the noblest form of affection. There is nothing unnatural about it. This testimony is strikingly similar to Dorian's reflection upon the kind of affection that Basil shows him: t was really love-- had nothing in it that was not noble and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration of beauty that is born of the senses, and that dies when the senses tire. It was such love as Michael Angelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, and Shakespeare himself. Basil translates these highly emotional and physical feelings into his art; his act of painting is an expression of his love for Dorian. This romantic devotion to Dorian becomes clear when he admits his reason for not wanting to exhibit the painting: he fears that people will see his "idolatry." Dorian reflects, for a moment, that with this love Basil might have saved him from Lord Henry's influence, but he soon resigns himself to living a life dictated by the pursuit of passion. He devours the mysterious "yellow book" that Lord Henry gives him, which acts almost as a guide for the journey on which he is to travel. Like the protagonist of that novel, Dorian spirals into a world of self-gratification and exotic sensations. Although Wilde, in letters, identified the novel as imaginary, it is based in part on the nineteenth-century French novel A Rebours , by Joris-Karl Huysmans, in which a decadent and wealthy Frenchman indulges himself in a host of bizarre sensory experiences. The yellow book has profound influence on Dorian; one might argue that it leads to his downfall. This downfall occurs not because the book itself is immoral here is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book") but because Dorian allows the book to dominate and determine his actions so completely. It becomes, for Dorian, a doctrine as limiting and stultifying as the common Victorian morals from which he seeks escape. After all, Lord Henry is a great fan of the yellow book, but, to his mind, it is no greater or more important than any other work of notable art. He does not let it dominate his life or determine his actions, which, in turn, allows him to retain the respectability that Dorian soon loses.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/20.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Prince/section_18_part_0.txt

The Prince.chapter 20

chapter 20

{"name": "Chapter 20", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201108110625/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-prince/summary-and-analysis/chapter-20", "summary": "Princes have tried various tactics to maintain power: disarming their subjects, dividing their subjects into factions, encouraging their enemies, winning over the suspicious, building new fortresses, and tearing down fortresses. New princes must never disarm their subjects, for if a prince arms his people, their arms become his. If a prince disarms them, the people will hate him, and he will be forced to employ mercenaries. Conventional wisdom says that creating factions is a good way to control a state. This may have been true when Italy was more stable, but not in Machiavelli's time. When factious cities are threatened by invaders, they quickly fall. Because rulers become great by overcoming difficulties, some believe that a prince should secretly encourage his enemies, so that when he overcomes them, his reputation will be greater. Some new princes find that those who were at first suspect prove more useful than others in governing the state. They are anxious to prove themselves to the prince. Those who helped the prince gain power may have done so out of dissatisfaction with the prior state, and the new state may also fail to please them. Princes often build fortresses to protect themselves from plotters and sudden attacks. If a prince fears his subjects more than foreign invaders, he should build fortresses. The best fortress, however, is not to be hated by the people.", "analysis": "In this chapter, Machiavelli briefly discusses a number of potential strategies for maintaining power. Predictably, he opposes disarming one's subjects, having already expressed his support for citizen armies over mercenaries or outside troops. Disarming citizens also sends a message that the prince does not trust them, and Machiavelli highly values a good relationship between the prince and his subjects. Like disarming one's subjects, building fortresses within the city also expresses distrust and shows insecurity. No fortress can substitute for the trust and support of the people. Encouraging rival factions to fight in order to keep them occupied also is the mark of a weak and insecure ruler. Machiavelli alludes to the Florentine policy in Pistoia, which he already condemned as cruel in Chapter 17. He blamed factionalism for some of Italy's problems, pointing out that divided cities fall easily when foreign invaders come, because one side or the other sells out to the invaders in hopes of gaining power. Oddly, Machiavelli expresses no opinion about the practice of secretly encouraging one's enemies in order to gain glory by overcoming them later, merely mentioning it without discussing it. Machiavelli devotes the largest portion of this chapter to making the point that those people who are under suspicion turn out to be the most trustworthy servants of the new prince. This should be no surprise, considering that Machiavelli was distrusted by the new Medici leadership, to whom he dedicated The Prince in the hope of regaining his old position as a diplomat. It is easy to imagine Machiavelli speaking about himself when he points out that those who are insecure in their positions work harder and are more motivated to prove themselves to the prince than those whom the prince trusts. He observes that those who were unhappy under the previous regime may be just as likely to become unhappy with the new prince, while those who most love the stability of the state will necessarily prove more loyal. Glossary Guelphs supporters of Papal interests. Their opponents, the Ghibellines, were supporters of the Holy Roman Empire. Pandolfo Petrucci ruler of Siena. It is not clear to what \"suspected men\" Machiavelli is referring. Niccolo Vitelli mercenary leader, father of Paolo and Vitellozo Vitelli. He became leader of Citta de Castello and destroyed several fortresses built there by his opponent, Pope Sixtus IV. Countess of Forli Caterina Sforza Riario . Her husband was Girolamo Riario . Negotiations with Caterina were the subject of Machiavelli's very first diplomatic assignment in July 1499. When her husband was assassinated, she held out against the revolt in one of her fortresses until help arrived from her uncle, Ludovico Sforza of Milan. When Cesare Borgia invaded in late 1499, her subjects welcomed him and again revolted against her, and she was forced to surrender despite the protection of her fortress."}

1. Some princes, so as to hold securely the state, have disarmed their subjects; others have kept their subject towns distracted by factions; others have fostered enmities against themselves; others have laid themselves out to gain over those whom they distrusted in the beginning of their governments; some have built fortresses; some have overthrown and destroyed them. And although one cannot give a final judgment on all of these things unless one possesses the particulars of those states in which a decision has to be made, nevertheless I will speak as comprehensively as the matter of itself will admit. 2. There never was a new prince who has disarmed his subjects; rather when he has found them disarmed he has always armed them, because, by arming them, those arms become yours, those men who were distrusted become faithful, and those who were faithful are kept so, and your subjects become your adherents. And whereas all subjects cannot be armed, yet when those whom you do arm are benefited, the others can be handled more freely, and this difference in their treatment, which they quite understand, makes the former your dependents, and the latter, considering it to be necessary that those who have the most danger and service should have the most reward, excuse you. But when you disarm them, you at once offend them by showing that you distrust them, either for cowardice or for want of loyalty, and either of these opinions breeds hatred against you. And because you cannot remain unarmed, it follows that you turn to mercenaries, which are of the character already shown; even if they should be good they would not be sufficient to defend you against powerful enemies and distrusted subjects. Therefore, as I have said, a new prince in a new principality has always distributed arms. Histories are full of examples. But when a prince acquires a new state, which he adds as a province to his old one, then it is necessary to disarm the men of that state, except those who have been his adherents in acquiring it; and these again, with time and opportunity, should be rendered soft and effeminate; and matters should be managed in such a way that all the armed men in the state shall be your own soldiers who in your old state were living near you. 3. Our forefathers, and those who were reckoned wise, were accustomed to say that it was necessary to hold Pistoia by factions and Pisa by fortresses; and with this idea they fostered quarrels in some of their tributary towns so as to keep possession of them the more easily. This may have been well enough in those times when Italy was in a way balanced, but I do not believe that it can be accepted as a precept for to-day, because I do not believe that factions can ever be of use; rather it is certain that when the enemy comes upon you in divided cities you are quickly lost, because the weakest party will always assist the outside forces and the other will not be able to resist. The Venetians, moved, as I believe, by the above reasons, fostered the Guelph and Ghibelline factions in their tributary cities; and although they never allowed them to come to bloodshed, yet they nursed these disputes amongst them, so that the citizens, distracted by their differences, should not unite against them. Which, as we saw, did not afterwards turn out as expected, because, after the rout at Vaila, one party at once took courage and seized the state. Such methods argue, therefore, weakness in the prince, because these factions will never be permitted in a vigorous principality; such methods for enabling one the more easily to manage subjects are only useful in times of peace, but if war comes this policy proves fallacious. 4. Without doubt princes become great when they overcome the difficulties and obstacles by which they are confronted, and therefore fortune, especially when she desires to make a new prince great, who has a greater necessity to earn renown than an hereditary one, causes enemies to arise and form designs against him, in order that he may have the opportunity of overcoming them, and by them to mount higher, as by a ladder which his enemies have raised. For this reason many consider that a wise prince, when he has the opportunity, ought with craft to foster some animosity against himself, so that, having crushed it, his renown may rise higher. 5. Princes, especially new ones, have found more fidelity and assistance in those men who in the beginning of their rule were distrusted than among those who in the beginning were trusted. Pandolfo Petrucci, Prince of Siena, ruled his state more by those who had been distrusted than by others. But on this question one cannot speak generally, for it varies so much with the individual; I will only say this, that those men who at the commencement of a princedom have been hostile, if they are of a description to need assistance to support themselves, can always be gained over with the greatest ease, and they will be tightly held to serve the prince with fidelity, inasmuch as they know it to be very necessary for them to cancel by deeds the bad impression which he had formed of them; and thus the prince always extracts more profit from them than from those who, serving him in too much security, may neglect his affairs. And since the matter demands it, I must not fail to warn a prince, who by means of secret favours has acquired a new state, that he must well consider the reasons which induced those to favour him who did so; and if it be not a natural affection towards him, but only discontent with their government, then he will only keep them friendly with great trouble and difficulty, for it will be impossible to satisfy them. And weighing well the reasons for this in those examples which can be taken from ancient and modern affairs, we shall find that it is easier for the prince to make friends of those men who were contented under the former government, and are therefore his enemies, than of those who, being discontented with it, were favourable to him and encouraged him to seize it. 6. It has been a custom with princes, in order to hold their states more securely, to build fortresses that may serve as a bridle and bit to those who might design to work against them, and as a place of refuge from a first attack. I praise this system because it has been made use of formerly. Notwithstanding that, Messer Nicolo Vitelli in our times has been seen to demolish two fortresses in Citta di Castello so that he might keep that state; Guido Ubaldo, Duke of Urbino, on returning to his dominion, whence he had been driven by Cesare Borgia, razed to the foundations all the fortresses in that province, and considered that without them it would be more difficult to lose it; the Bentivogli returning to Bologna came to a similar decision. Fortresses, therefore, are useful or not according to circumstances; if they do you good in one way they injure you in another. And this question can be reasoned thus: the prince who has more to fear from the people than from foreigners ought to build fortresses, but he who has more to fear from foreigners than from the people ought to leave them alone. The castle of Milan, built by Francesco Sforza, has made, and will make, more trouble for the house of Sforza than any other disorder in the state. For this reason the best possible fortress is--not to be hated by the people, because, although you may hold the fortresses, yet they will not save you if the people hate you, for there will never be wanting foreigners to assist a people who have taken arms against you. It has not been seen in our times that such fortresses have been of use to any prince, unless to the Countess of Forli,(*) when the Count Girolamo, her consort, was killed; for by that means she was able to withstand the popular attack and wait for assistance from Milan, and thus recover her state; and the posture of affairs was such at that time that the foreigners could not assist the people. But fortresses were of little value to her afterwards when Cesare Borgia attacked her, and when the people, her enemy, were allied with foreigners. Therefore, it would have been safer for her, both then and before, not to have been hated by the people than to have had the fortresses. All these things considered then, I shall praise him who builds fortresses as well as him who does not, and I shall blame whoever, trusting in them, cares little about being hated by the people. (*) Catherine Sforza, a daughter of Galeazzo Sforza and Lucrezia Landriani, born 1463, died 1509. It was to the Countess of Forli that Machiavelli was sent as envoy on 1499. A letter from Fortunati to the countess announces the appointment: "I have been with the signori," wrote Fortunati, "to learn whom they would send and when. They tell me that Nicolo Machiavelli, a learned young Florentine noble, secretary to my Lords of the Ten, is to leave with me at once." Cf. "Catherine Sforza," by Count Pasolini, translated by P. Sylvester, 1898.

Chapter 20

https://web.archive.org/web/20201108110625/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-prince/summary-and-analysis/chapter-20

Princes have tried various tactics to maintain power: disarming their subjects, dividing their subjects into factions, encouraging their enemies, winning over the suspicious, building new fortresses, and tearing down fortresses. New princes must never disarm their subjects, for if a prince arms his people, their arms become his. If a prince disarms them, the people will hate him, and he will be forced to employ mercenaries. Conventional wisdom says that creating factions is a good way to control a state. This may have been true when Italy was more stable, but not in Machiavelli's time. When factious cities are threatened by invaders, they quickly fall. Because rulers become great by overcoming difficulties, some believe that a prince should secretly encourage his enemies, so that when he overcomes them, his reputation will be greater. Some new princes find that those who were at first suspect prove more useful than others in governing the state. They are anxious to prove themselves to the prince. Those who helped the prince gain power may have done so out of dissatisfaction with the prior state, and the new state may also fail to please them. Princes often build fortresses to protect themselves from plotters and sudden attacks. If a prince fears his subjects more than foreign invaders, he should build fortresses. The best fortress, however, is not to be hated by the people.

In this chapter, Machiavelli briefly discusses a number of potential strategies for maintaining power. Predictably, he opposes disarming one's subjects, having already expressed his support for citizen armies over mercenaries or outside troops. Disarming citizens also sends a message that the prince does not trust them, and Machiavelli highly values a good relationship between the prince and his subjects. Like disarming one's subjects, building fortresses within the city also expresses distrust and shows insecurity. No fortress can substitute for the trust and support of the people. Encouraging rival factions to fight in order to keep them occupied also is the mark of a weak and insecure ruler. Machiavelli alludes to the Florentine policy in Pistoia, which he already condemned as cruel in Chapter 17. He blamed factionalism for some of Italy's problems, pointing out that divided cities fall easily when foreign invaders come, because one side or the other sells out to the invaders in hopes of gaining power. Oddly, Machiavelli expresses no opinion about the practice of secretly encouraging one's enemies in order to gain glory by overcoming them later, merely mentioning it without discussing it. Machiavelli devotes the largest portion of this chapter to making the point that those people who are under suspicion turn out to be the most trustworthy servants of the new prince. This should be no surprise, considering that Machiavelli was distrusted by the new Medici leadership, to whom he dedicated The Prince in the hope of regaining his old position as a diplomat. It is easy to imagine Machiavelli speaking about himself when he points out that those who are insecure in their positions work harder and are more motivated to prove themselves to the prince than those whom the prince trusts. He observes that those who were unhappy under the previous regime may be just as likely to become unhappy with the new prince, while those who most love the stability of the state will necessarily prove more loyal. Glossary Guelphs supporters of Papal interests. Their opponents, the Ghibellines, were supporters of the Holy Roman Empire. Pandolfo Petrucci ruler of Siena. It is not clear to what "suspected men" Machiavelli is referring. Niccolo Vitelli mercenary leader, father of Paolo and Vitellozo Vitelli. He became leader of Citta de Castello and destroyed several fortresses built there by his opponent, Pope Sixtus IV. Countess of Forli Caterina Sforza Riario . Her husband was Girolamo Riario . Negotiations with Caterina were the subject of Machiavelli's very first diplomatic assignment in July 1499. When her husband was assassinated, she held out against the revolt in one of her fortresses until help arrived from her uncle, Ludovico Sforza of Milan. When Cesare Borgia invaded in late 1499, her subjects welcomed him and again revolted against her, and she was forced to surrender despite the protection of her fortress.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/book_4.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/The Brothers Karamazov/section_3_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 4.chapter 1-chapter 7

book 4

{"name": "Book 4", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210422052201/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-brothers-karamazov/study-guide/summary-book-4", "summary": "Father Zossima is dying, and his devotees huddle around his bed. He tells them his theory of shared responsibility. A man is not responsible for his sins alone; he bears a portion of the burden for the sins of all other men. Alyosha is very upset at Father Zossima's condition, so he leaves. He knows that everyone expects a miracle when Zossima dies. Many think that Father Zossima is almost saint-like--except a few detractors such as Father Ferapont. Ferapont hates all the other elders, Father Zossima most of all. He advocates severe asceticism. He believes that the devil is at work in all things. Father Zossima asks to see Alyosha in his cell. He tells Alyosha that the boy's place is not in the monastery but alongside his brothers and father. They need his help more than the monastery does. When he goes back to town, Alyosha finds his father sitting by himself. Fyodor says he wants to live much longer. He says he needs money to make women sleep with him in his old age--thus he needs to be frugal in order to continue his lifestyle of debauchery. He vows that he will be a hedonist until he dies. Alyosha leaves and sees some schoolboys throwing rocks at a delicate nine-year-old boy, who throws rocks back and then runs away. Alyosha runs after the boy, fascinated about what would make a nine-year-old so angry. He finds the young boy, but the youngster will not answer Alyosha's questions. He eventually picks up a rock and hits Alyosha with it, bites his hand, and then runs away, leaving Alyosha confused. Alyosha goes to visit Katerina again, but he is surprised to find Ivan upstairs with her. He asks Madame Hohlakov for something for his bitten hand, and Lise comes to talk to him. She wants her letter back, telling him she wrote it as a prank. Alyosha says he does not have the letter, so he cannot give it back. Then he talks to Ivan and Katerina. Katerina tells Alyosha she will never leave Dmitri even if he wants Grushenka or marries her. She does not mind if her love goes unrequited, even though she understands the craziness of such a gesture. Alyosha cannot take this anymore, and he tells her that they clearly love each other and should follow their hearts, not their intellectualizations. Ivan says he loves Katerina but that she and Dmitri are more complementary. He is unhappy about this fact, but he is resigned to the fact that he will not be with the woman he loves. Ivan declares that he is leaving for Moscow, and he says his farewell. Katerina tells Alyosha about a certain Captain Snegiryov whom Dmitri has beaten. She feels very bad about this and takes pity on the man. She tells Alyosha that she wants to help him in some way and that she has two hundred rubles that she would like to give him as a token of her sympathy. She asks Alyosha to deliver this money to the man, and he accepts. Alyosha continues to be a messenger for others, proving his willingness to help, but acting without his own volition. He goes to visit the man, troubled about what has happened to him during the day. Captain Snegiryov lives in an old, dilapidated house with his wife and two daughters--one of whom is handicapped--and his son. His son Ilusha is the boy who bit Alyosha's hand. Ilusha immediately assumes that Alyosha is there to bemoan his injured hand. Alyosha suddenly realizes that this boy felt such rage against him because he is Dmitri's brother. Captain Snegiryov goes outside with Alyosha and tells him that Dmitri traumatized his poor son by beating him badly. He makes clear that his family is excessively poor, and Alyosha becomes very excited that he can help. He tells Captain Snegiryov that he came to give him money. The captain is overjoyed at first, telling Alyosha all the ways he can help his family with the money. But he changes his mind and suddenly throws the money on the ground, explaining that he cannot dishonor himself by accepting money from the brother of a man who has humiliated him; this would destroy his son. Alyosha takes the money and goes back to Katerina.", "analysis": "Alyosha encounters the two strongest father figures in his life at the beginning of this book. They both talk of old age, of dying, and of what Alyosha should do with himself. Father Zossima wants Alyosha to be with his family to help them through a difficult time, and Fyodor also wants Alyosha to leave the monastery and stay with him. This may be the only area where the two men agree. Father Zossima knows he does not have long to live, and, according to rumors and hypotheses of men like Rakitin, Fyodor is about to be murdered. The men have a parallel relationship regarding Alyosha, though they are quite different. Whereas Father Zossima is most concerned about his disciples and Alyosha as he nears his death, Fyodor talks mostly about himself. Zossima wants to make sure he has spread the word about living with love and understanding to as many people as he can before he passes; Fyodor is only concerned with sleeping with as many wenches as possible. Alyosha does not try to change Fyodor; he simply listens to him. Alyosha is passive in the way he tries to help everyone around him. He does not change anyone's behavior. Instead, he does their bidding, usually giving others messages for them, and he listens. He is loving and understanding, but he does not change the course of what they are doing. Just as he wants to be by Father Zossima's side as he lays dying, Alyosha is there for his brothers and father, talking with them and aiding them when they need assistance. Alyosha provides comfort and support without actively protecting those around him. While this is a service that is much needed, it may not prove to be enough to keep his family from disasters ahead. Alyosha encounters a boy, the first character who is of an even younger generation than the Karamazov brothers. The emphasis has been on the relationship between the older generation and the younger one, but this boy adds another generation to the mix. The boy has a strong sense of the connectedness of families. He feels responsible for his father's honor, and he believes that any relative of someone who has wronged someone should be treated with as much disdain as the person who has committed the offense. His father also makes a great financial sacrifice by not taking Katerina's money to gain his son's respect. This family sees little generational divide; the Snegiryovs see a family as one unit, and all its members are inextricable from each other. Alyosha treats Ilusha with interest and care, but the boy clearly does not appreciate the attention. Alyosha reaches out to him, and he does not try to punish the boy's violence; instead, he tries to understand his motives and feelings. Father Zossima tried to pass along salutary teachings to Alyosha, and now Alyosha is passing along those teachings to others, at least by example. Katerina is proving to be a very active character who tries to make things right. After her father's death, she made sure to find Dmitri and repay him for his loan. She also repaid him for his kindness by offering herself to him. She felt as if Captain Snegiryov had been wronged, and her instinct was to compensate him in some way. She actively tries to see justice done. She is also very kind. Earlier in the novel, it seemed as if she might try to gain a sort of karma by her actions. Even though she knew Dmitri was in love with another woman and had disgraced her, she vowed to stay by his side. This seemed less of an expression of her love for him and more of a gesture showing her fidelity and steadfastness. She seems to relish the obvious disparity between her actions and Dmitri's. The worse he is, the better she seems to be. Katerina's motivations continue to be mysterious. She may long for humiliation, or she wants to prove to the world that she is upstanding and honorable--or perhaps she simply is very loving. She trusts Alyosha very much, and she entreats him to help her often. Alyosha believes that she has good intentions, so he is very willing to help her. Captain Snegiryov is a living reminder of the damage that can be done from living a reckless, profligate life. Dmitri not only hurts his conscience if he sins; he hurts those around him. He also reminds the reader what abject poverty existed in Russia in the 19th century. The fact that 200 rubles is a large sum to him puts the 3,000 rubles Dmitri spent with Grushenka into new perspective. Dmitri is obsessed with money, and not having his 3,000-ruble inheritance drives him to rage and violence. Dmitri acts as though this money is essential to his life, but he is far from the poverty in which the captain and his family live. The quarrel over Dmitri's inheritance now seems like a battle characterized by greed and privilege. They are concerned with impressing women, and 3,000 rubles is an amount that will allow them to continue their courting. To a family like the Snegiryovs, however, 3,000 rubles would provide a great deal of food and medicine. They could repair their pathetic house and alleviate their misery. Captain Snegiryov refuses the money that could help his family because honor and dignity mean more to him than his or his family's material situation. These circumstances show that money remains of great importance in this novel."}

PART II Book IV. Lacerations Chapter I. Father Ferapont Alyosha was roused early, before daybreak. Father Zossima woke up feeling very weak, though he wanted to get out of bed and sit up in a chair. His mind was quite clear; his face looked very tired, yet bright and almost joyful. It wore an expression of gayety, kindness and cordiality. "Maybe I shall not live through the coming day," he said to Alyosha. Then he desired to confess and take the sacrament at once. He always confessed to Father Paissy. After taking the communion, the service of extreme unction followed. The monks assembled and the cell was gradually filled up by the inmates of the hermitage. Meantime it was daylight. People began coming from the monastery. After the service was over the elder desired to kiss and take leave of every one. As the cell was so small the earlier visitors withdrew to make room for others. Alyosha stood beside the elder, who was seated again in his arm-chair. He talked as much as he could. Though his voice was weak, it was fairly steady. "I've been teaching you so many years, and therefore I've been talking aloud so many years, that I've got into the habit of talking, and so much so that it's almost more difficult for me to hold my tongue than to talk, even now, in spite of my weakness, dear Fathers and brothers," he jested, looking with emotion at the group round him. Alyosha remembered afterwards something of what he said to them. But though he spoke out distinctly and his voice was fairly steady, his speech was somewhat disconnected. He spoke of many things, he seemed anxious before the moment of death to say everything he had not said in his life, and not simply for the sake of instructing them, but as though thirsting to share with all men and all creation his joy and ecstasy, and once more in his life to open his whole heart. "Love one another, Fathers," said Father Zossima, as far as Alyosha could remember afterwards. "Love God's people. Because we have come here and shut ourselves within these walls, we are no holier than those that are outside, but on the contrary, from the very fact of coming here, each of us has confessed to himself that he is worse than others, than all men on earth.... And the longer the monk lives in his seclusion, the more keenly he must recognize that. Else he would have had no reason to come here. When he realizes that he is not only worse than others, but that he is responsible to all men for all and everything, for all human sins, national and individual, only then the aim of our seclusion is attained. For know, dear ones, that every one of us is undoubtedly responsible for all men and everything on earth, not merely through the general sinfulness of creation, but each one personally for all mankind and every individual man. This knowledge is the crown of life for the monk and for every man. For monks are not a special sort of men, but only what all men ought to be. Only through that knowledge, our heart grows soft with infinite, universal, inexhaustible love. Then every one of you will have the power to win over the whole world by love and to wash away the sins of the world with your tears.... Each of you keep watch over your heart and confess your sins to yourself unceasingly. Be not afraid of your sins, even when perceiving them, if only there be penitence, but make no conditions with God. Again I say, Be not proud. Be proud neither to the little nor to the great. Hate not those who reject you, who insult you, who abuse and slander you. Hate not the atheists, the teachers of evil, the materialists--and I mean not only the good ones--for there are many good ones among them, especially in our day--hate not even the wicked ones. Remember them in your prayers thus: Save, O Lord, all those who have none to pray for them, save too all those who will not pray. And add: it is not in pride that I make this prayer, O Lord, for I am lower than all men.... Love God's people, let not strangers draw away the flock, for if you slumber in your slothfulness and disdainful pride, or worse still, in covetousness, they will come from all sides and draw away your flock. Expound the Gospel to the people unceasingly ... be not extortionate.... Do not love gold and silver, do not hoard them.... Have faith. Cling to the banner and raise it on high." But the elder spoke more disconnectedly than Alyosha reported his words afterwards. Sometimes he broke off altogether, as though to take breath, and recover his strength, but he was in a sort of ecstasy. They heard him with emotion, though many wondered at his words and found them obscure.... Afterwards all remembered those words. When Alyosha happened for a moment to leave the cell, he was struck by the general excitement and suspense in the monks who were crowding about it. This anticipation showed itself in some by anxiety, in others by devout solemnity. All were expecting that some marvel would happen immediately after the elder's death. Their suspense was, from one point of view, almost frivolous, but even the most austere of the monks were affected by it. Father Paissy's face looked the gravest of all. Alyosha was mysteriously summoned by a monk to see Rakitin, who had arrived from town with a singular letter for him from Madame Hohlakov. In it she informed Alyosha of a strange and very opportune incident. It appeared that among the women who had come on the previous day to receive Father Zossima's blessing, there had been an old woman from the town, a sergeant's widow, called Prohorovna. She had inquired whether she might pray for the rest of the soul of her son, Vassenka, who had gone to Irkutsk, and had sent her no news for over a year. To which Father Zossima had answered sternly, forbidding her to do so, and saying that to pray for the living as though they were dead was a kind of sorcery. He afterwards forgave her on account of her ignorance, and added, "as though reading the book of the future" (this was Madame Hohlakov's expression), words of comfort: "that her son Vassya was certainly alive and he would either come himself very shortly or send a letter, and that she was to go home and expect him." And "Would you believe it?" exclaimed Madame Hohlakov enthusiastically, "the prophecy has been fulfilled literally indeed, and more than that." Scarcely had the old woman reached home when they gave her a letter from Siberia which had been awaiting her. But that was not all; in the letter written on the road from Ekaterinenburg, Vassya informed his mother that he was returning to Russia with an official, and that three weeks after her receiving the letter he hoped "to embrace his mother." Madame Hohlakov warmly entreated Alyosha to report this new "miracle of prediction" to the Superior and all the brotherhood. "All, all, ought to know of it!" she concluded. The letter had been written in haste, the excitement of the writer was apparent in every line of it. But Alyosha had no need to tell the monks, for all knew of it already. Rakitin had commissioned the monk who brought his message "to inform most respectfully his reverence Father Paissy, that he, Rakitin, has a matter to speak of with him, of such gravity that he dare not defer it for a moment, and humbly begs forgiveness for his presumption." As the monk had given the message to Father Paissy before that to Alyosha, the latter found after reading the letter, there was nothing left for him to do but to hand it to Father Paissy in confirmation of the story. And even that austere and cautious man, though he frowned as he read the news of the "miracle," could not completely restrain some inner emotion. His eyes gleamed, and a grave and solemn smile came into his lips. "We shall see greater things!" broke from him. "We shall see greater things, greater things yet!" the monks around repeated. But Father Paissy, frowning again, begged all of them, at least for a time, not to speak of the matter "till it be more fully confirmed, seeing there is so much credulity among those of this world, and indeed this might well have chanced naturally," he added, prudently, as it were to satisfy his conscience, though scarcely believing his own disavowal, a fact his listeners very clearly perceived. Within the hour the "miracle" was of course known to the whole monastery, and many visitors who had come for the mass. No one seemed more impressed by it than the monk who had come the day before from St. Sylvester, from the little monastery of Obdorsk in the far North. It was he who had been standing near Madame Hohlakov the previous day and had asked Father Zossima earnestly, referring to the "healing" of the lady's daughter, "How can you presume to do such things?" He was now somewhat puzzled and did not know whom to believe. The evening before he had visited Father Ferapont in his cell apart, behind the apiary, and had been greatly impressed and overawed by the visit. This Father Ferapont was that aged monk so devout in fasting and observing silence who has been mentioned already, as antagonistic to Father Zossima and the whole institution of "elders," which he regarded as a pernicious and frivolous innovation. He was a very formidable opponent, although from his practice of silence he scarcely spoke a word to any one. What made him formidable was that a number of monks fully shared his feeling, and many of the visitors looked upon him as a great saint and ascetic, although they had no doubt that he was crazy. But it was just his craziness attracted them. Father Ferapont never went to see the elder. Though he lived in the hermitage they did not worry him to keep its regulations, and this too because he behaved as though he were crazy. He was seventy-five or more, and he lived in a corner beyond the apiary in an old decaying wooden cell which had been built long ago for another great ascetic, Father Iona, who had lived to be a hundred and five, and of whose saintly doings many curious stories were still extant in the monastery and the neighborhood. Father Ferapont had succeeded in getting himself installed in this same solitary cell seven years previously. It was simply a peasant's hut, though it looked like a chapel, for it contained an extraordinary number of ikons with lamps perpetually burning before them--which men brought to the monastery as offerings to God. Father Ferapont had been appointed to look after them and keep the lamps burning. It was said (and indeed it was true) that he ate only two pounds of bread in three days. The beekeeper, who lived close by the apiary, used to bring him the bread every three days, and even to this man who waited upon him, Father Ferapont rarely uttered a word. The four pounds of bread, together with the sacrament bread, regularly sent him on Sundays after the late mass by the Father Superior, made up his weekly rations. The water in his jug was changed every day. He rarely appeared at mass. Visitors who came to do him homage saw him sometimes kneeling all day long at prayer without looking round. If he addressed them, he was brief, abrupt, strange, and almost always rude. On very rare occasions, however, he would talk to visitors, but for the most part he would utter some one strange saying which was a complete riddle, and no entreaties would induce him to pronounce a word in explanation. He was not a priest, but a simple monk. There was a strange belief, chiefly however among the most ignorant, that Father Ferapont had communication with heavenly spirits and would only converse with them, and so was silent with men. The monk from Obdorsk, having been directed to the apiary by the beekeeper, who was also a very silent and surly monk, went to the corner where Father Ferapont's cell stood. "Maybe he will speak as you are a stranger and maybe you'll get nothing out of him," the beekeeper had warned him. The monk, as he related afterwards, approached in the utmost apprehension. It was rather late in the evening. Father Ferapont was sitting at the door of his cell on a low bench. A huge old elm was lightly rustling overhead. There was an evening freshness in the air. The monk from Obdorsk bowed down before the saint and asked his blessing. "Do you want me to bow down to you, monk?" said Father Ferapont. "Get up!" The monk got up. "Blessing, be blessed! Sit beside me. Where have you come from?" What most struck the poor monk was the fact that in spite of his strict fasting and great age, Father Ferapont still looked a vigorous old man. He was tall, held himself erect, and had a thin, but fresh and healthy face. There was no doubt he still had considerable strength. He was of athletic build. In spite of his great age he was not even quite gray, and still had very thick hair and a full beard, both of which had once been black. His eyes were gray, large and luminous, but strikingly prominent. He spoke with a broad accent. He was dressed in a peasant's long reddish coat of coarse convict cloth (as it used to be called) and had a stout rope round his waist. His throat and chest were bare. Beneath his coat, his shirt of the coarsest linen showed almost black with dirt, not having been changed for months. They said that he wore irons weighing thirty pounds under his coat. His stockingless feet were thrust in old slippers almost dropping to pieces. "From the little Obdorsk monastery, from St. Sylvester," the monk answered humbly, whilst his keen and inquisitive, but rather frightened little eyes kept watch on the hermit. "I have been at your Sylvester's. I used to stay there. Is Sylvester well?" The monk hesitated. "You are a senseless lot! How do you keep the fasts?" "Our dietary is according to the ancient conventual rules. During Lent there are no meals provided for Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. For Tuesday and Thursday we have white bread, stewed fruit with honey, wild berries, or salt cabbage and wholemeal stirabout. On Saturday white cabbage soup, noodles with peas, kasha, all with hemp oil. On weekdays we have dried fish and kasha with the cabbage soup. From Monday till Saturday evening, six whole days in Holy Week, nothing is cooked, and we have only bread and water, and that sparingly; if possible not taking food every day, just the same as is ordered for first week in Lent. On Good Friday nothing is eaten. In the same way on the Saturday we have to fast till three o'clock, and then take a little bread and water and drink a single cup of wine. On Holy Thursday we drink wine and have something cooked without oil or not cooked at all, inasmuch as the Laodicean council lays down for Holy Thursday: 'It is unseemly by remitting the fast on the Holy Thursday to dishonor the whole of Lent!' This is how we keep the fast. But what is that compared with you, holy Father," added the monk, growing more confident, "for all the year round, even at Easter, you take nothing but bread and water, and what we should eat in two days lasts you full seven. It's truly marvelous--your great abstinence." "And mushrooms?" asked Father Ferapont, suddenly. "Mushrooms?" repeated the surprised monk. "Yes. I can give up their bread, not needing it at all, and go away into the forest and live there on the mushrooms or the berries, but they can't give up their bread here, wherefore they are in bondage to the devil. Nowadays the unclean deny that there is need of such fasting. Haughty and unclean is their judgment." "Och, true," sighed the monk. "And have you seen devils among them?" asked Ferapont. "Among them? Among whom?" asked the monk, timidly. "I went to the Father Superior on Trinity Sunday last year, I haven't been since. I saw a devil sitting on one man's chest hiding under his cassock, only his horns poked out; another had one peeping out of his pocket with such sharp eyes, he was afraid of me; another settled in the unclean belly of one, another was hanging round a man's neck, and so he was carrying him about without seeing him." "You--can see spirits?" the monk inquired. "I tell you I can see, I can see through them. When I was coming out from the Superior's I saw one hiding from me behind the door, and a big one, a yard and a half or more high, with a thick long gray tail, and the tip of his tail was in the crack of the door and I was quick and slammed the door, pinching his tail in it. He squealed and began to struggle, and I made the sign of the cross over him three times. And he died on the spot like a crushed spider. He must have rotted there in the corner and be stinking, but they don't see, they don't smell it. It's a year since I have been there. I reveal it to you, as you are a stranger." "Your words are terrible! But, holy and blessed Father," said the monk, growing bolder and bolder, "is it true, as they noise abroad even to distant lands about you, that you are in continual communication with the Holy Ghost?" "He does fly down at times." "How does he fly down? In what form?" "As a bird." "The Holy Ghost in the form of a dove?" "There's the Holy Ghost and there's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit can appear as other birds--sometimes as a swallow, sometimes a goldfinch and sometimes as a blue-tit." "How do you know him from an ordinary tit?" "He speaks." "How does he speak, in what language?" "Human language." "And what does he tell you?" "Why, to-day he told me that a fool would visit me and would ask me unseemly questions. You want to know too much, monk." "Terrible are your words, most holy and blessed Father," the monk shook his head. But there was a doubtful look in his frightened little eyes. "Do you see this tree?" asked Father Ferapont, after a pause. "I do, blessed Father." "You think it's an elm, but for me it has another shape." "What sort of shape?" inquired the monk, after a pause of vain expectation. "It happens at night. You see those two branches? In the night it is Christ holding out His arms to me and seeking me with those arms, I see it clearly and tremble. It's terrible, terrible!" "What is there terrible if it's Christ Himself?" "Why, He'll snatch me up and carry me away." "Alive?" "In the spirit and glory of Elijah, haven't you heard? He will take me in His arms and bear me away." Though the monk returned to the cell he was sharing with one of the brothers, in considerable perplexity of mind, he still cherished at heart a greater reverence for Father Ferapont than for Father Zossima. He was strongly in favor of fasting, and it was not strange that one who kept so rigid a fast as Father Ferapont should "see marvels." His words seemed certainly queer, but God only could tell what was hidden in those words, and were not worse words and acts commonly seen in those who have sacrificed their intellects for the glory of God? The pinching of the devil's tail he was ready and eager to believe, and not only in the figurative sense. Besides he had, before visiting the monastery, a strong prejudice against the institution of "elders," which he only knew of by hearsay and believed to be a pernicious innovation. Before he had been long at the monastery, he had detected the secret murmurings of some shallow brothers who disliked the institution. He was, besides, a meddlesome, inquisitive man, who poked his nose into everything. This was why the news of the fresh "miracle" performed by Father Zossima reduced him to extreme perplexity. Alyosha remembered afterwards how their inquisitive guest from Obdorsk had been continually flitting to and fro from one group to another, listening and asking questions among the monks that were crowding within and without the elder's cell. But he did not pay much attention to him at the time, and only recollected it afterwards. He had no thought to spare for it indeed, for when Father Zossima, feeling tired again, had gone back to bed, he thought of Alyosha as he was closing his eyes, and sent for him. Alyosha ran at once. There was no one else in the cell but Father Paissy, Father Iosif, and the novice Porfiry. The elder, opening his weary eyes and looking intently at Alyosha, asked him suddenly: "Are your people expecting you, my son?" Alyosha hesitated. "Haven't they need of you? Didn't you promise some one yesterday to see them to-day?" "I did promise--to my father--my brothers--others too." "You see, you must go. Don't grieve. Be sure I shall not die without your being by to hear my last word. To you I will say that word, my son, it will be my last gift to you. To you, dear son, because you love me. But now go to keep your promise." Alyosha immediately obeyed, though it was hard to go. But the promise that he should hear his last word on earth, that it should be the last gift to him, Alyosha, sent a thrill of rapture through his soul. He made haste that he might finish what he had to do in the town and return quickly. Father Paissy, too, uttered some words of exhortation which moved and surprised him greatly. He spoke as they left the cell together. "Remember, young man, unceasingly," Father Paissy began, without preface, "that the science of this world, which has become a great power, has, especially in the last century, analyzed everything divine handed down to us in the holy books. After this cruel analysis the learned of this world have nothing left of all that was sacred of old. But they have only analyzed the parts and overlooked the whole, and indeed their blindness is marvelous. Yet the whole still stands steadfast before their eyes, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Has it not lasted nineteen centuries, is it not still a living, a moving power in the individual soul and in the masses of people? It is still as strong and living even in the souls of atheists, who have destroyed everything! For even those who have renounced Christianity and attack it, in their inmost being still follow the Christian ideal, for hitherto neither their subtlety nor the ardor of their hearts has been able to create a higher ideal of man and of virtue than the ideal given by Christ of old. When it has been attempted, the result has been only grotesque. Remember this especially, young man, since you are being sent into the world by your departing elder. Maybe, remembering this great day, you will not forget my words, uttered from the heart for your guidance, seeing you are young, and the temptations of the world are great and beyond your strength to endure. Well, now go, my orphan." With these words Father Paissy blessed him. As Alyosha left the monastery and thought them over, he suddenly realized that he had met a new and unexpected friend, a warmly loving teacher, in this austere monk who had hitherto treated him sternly. It was as though Father Zossima had bequeathed him to him at his death, and "perhaps that's just what had passed between them," Alyosha thought suddenly. The philosophic reflections he had just heard so unexpectedly testified to the warmth of Father Paissy's heart. He was in haste to arm the boy's mind for conflict with temptation and to guard the young soul left in his charge with the strongest defense he could imagine. Chapter II. At His Father's First of all, Alyosha went to his father. On the way he remembered that his father had insisted the day before that he should come without his brother Ivan seeing him. "Why so?" Alyosha wondered suddenly. "Even if my father has something to say to me alone, why should I go in unseen? Most likely in his excitement yesterday he meant to say something different," he decided. Yet he was very glad when Marfa Ignatyevna, who opened the garden gate to him (Grigory, it appeared, was ill in bed in the lodge), told him in answer to his question that Ivan Fyodorovitch had gone out two hours ago. "And my father?" "He is up, taking his coffee," Marfa answered somewhat dryly. Alyosha went in. The old man was sitting alone at the table wearing slippers and a little old overcoat. He was amusing himself by looking through some accounts, rather inattentively however. He was quite alone in the house, for Smerdyakov too had gone out marketing. Though he had got up early and was trying to put a bold face on it, he looked tired and weak. His forehead, upon which huge purple bruises had come out during the night, was bandaged with a red handkerchief; his nose too had swollen terribly in the night, and some smaller bruises covered it in patches, giving his whole face a peculiarly spiteful and irritable look. The old man was aware of this, and turned a hostile glance on Alyosha as he came in. "The coffee is cold," he cried harshly; "I won't offer you any. I've ordered nothing but a Lenten fish soup to-day, and I don't invite any one to share it. Why have you come?" "To find out how you are," said Alyosha. "Yes. Besides, I told you to come yesterday. It's all of no consequence. You need not have troubled. But I knew you'd come poking in directly." He said this with almost hostile feeling. At the same time he got up and looked anxiously in the looking-glass (perhaps for the fortieth time that morning) at his nose. He began, too, binding his red handkerchief more becomingly on his forehead. "Red's better. It's just like the hospital in a white one," he observed sententiously. "Well, how are things over there? How is your elder?" "He is very bad; he may die to-day," answered Alyosha. But his father had not listened, and had forgotten his own question at once. "Ivan's gone out," he said suddenly. "He is doing his utmost to carry off Mitya's betrothed. That's what he is staying here for," he added maliciously, and, twisting his mouth, looked at Alyosha. "Surely he did not tell you so?" asked Alyosha. "Yes, he did, long ago. Would you believe it, he told me three weeks ago? You don't suppose he too came to murder me, do you? He must have had some object in coming." "What do you mean? Why do you say such things?" said Alyosha, troubled. "He doesn't ask for money, it's true, but yet he won't get a farthing from me. I intend living as long as possible, you may as well know, my dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, and so I need every farthing, and the longer I live, the more I shall need it," he continued, pacing from one corner of the room to the other, keeping his hands in the pockets of his loose greasy overcoat made of yellow cotton material. "I can still pass for a man at five and fifty, but I want to pass for one for another twenty years. As I get older, you know, I shan't be a pretty object. The wenches won't come to me of their own accord, so I shall want my money. So I am saving up more and more, simply for myself, my dear son Alexey Fyodorovitch. You may as well know. For I mean to go on in my sins to the end, let me tell you. For sin is sweet; all abuse it, but all men live in it, only others do it on the sly, and I openly. And so all the other sinners fall upon me for being so simple. And your paradise, Alexey Fyodorovitch, is not to my taste, let me tell you that; and it's not the proper place for a gentleman, your paradise, even if it exists. I believe that I fall asleep and don't wake up again, and that's all. You can pray for my soul if you like. And if you don't want to, don't, damn you! That's my philosophy. Ivan talked well here yesterday, though we were all drunk. Ivan is a conceited coxcomb, but he has no particular learning ... nor education either. He sits silent and smiles at one without speaking--that's what pulls him through." Alyosha listened to him in silence. "Why won't he talk to me? If he does speak, he gives himself airs. Your Ivan is a scoundrel! And I'll marry Grushenka in a minute if I want to. For if you've money, Alexey Fyodorovitch, you have only to want a thing and you can have it. That's what Ivan is afraid of, he is on the watch to prevent me getting married and that's why he is egging on Mitya to marry Grushenka himself. He hopes to keep me from Grushenka by that (as though I should leave him my money if I don't marry her!). Besides if Mitya marries Grushenka, Ivan will carry off his rich betrothed, that's what he's reckoning on! He is a scoundrel, your Ivan!" "How cross you are! It's because of yesterday; you had better lie down," said Alyosha. "There! you say that," the old man observed suddenly, as though it had struck him for the first time, "and I am not angry with you. But if Ivan said it, I should be angry with him. It is only with you I have good moments, else you know I am an ill-natured man." "You are not ill-natured, but distorted," said Alyosha with a smile. "Listen. I meant this morning to get that ruffian Mitya locked up and I don't know now what I shall decide about it. Of course in these fashionable days fathers and mothers are looked upon as a prejudice, but even now the law does not allow you to drag your old father about by the hair, to kick him in the face in his own house, and brag of murdering him outright--all in the presence of witnesses. If I liked, I could crush him and could have him locked up at once for what he did yesterday." "Then you don't mean to take proceedings?" "Ivan has dissuaded me. I shouldn't care about Ivan, but there's another thing." And bending down to Alyosha, he went on in a confidential half-whisper. "If I send the ruffian to prison, she'll hear of it and run to see him at once. But if she hears that he has beaten me, a weak old man, within an inch of my life, she may give him up and come to me.... For that's her way, everything by contraries. I know her through and through! Won't you have a drop of brandy? Take some cold coffee and I'll pour a quarter of a glass of brandy into it, it's delicious, my boy." "No, thank you. I'll take that roll with me if I may," said Alyosha, and taking a halfpenny French roll he put it in the pocket of his cassock. "And you'd better not have brandy, either," he suggested apprehensively, looking into the old man's face. "You are quite right, it irritates my nerves instead of soothing them. Only one little glass. I'll get it out of the cupboard." He unlocked the cupboard, poured out a glass, drank it, then locked the cupboard and put the key back in his pocket. "That's enough. One glass won't kill me." "You see you are in a better humor now," said Alyosha, smiling. "Um! I love you even without the brandy, but with scoundrels I am a scoundrel. Ivan is not going to Tchermashnya--why is that? He wants to spy how much I give Grushenka if she comes. They are all scoundrels! But I don't recognize Ivan, I don't know him at all. Where does he come from? He is not one of us in soul. As though I'd leave him anything! I shan't leave a will at all, you may as well know. And I'll crush Mitya like a beetle. I squash black-beetles at night with my slipper; they squelch when you tread on them. And your Mitya will squelch too. _Your_ Mitya, for you love him. Yes, you love him and I am not afraid of your loving him. But if Ivan loved him I should be afraid for myself at his loving him. But Ivan loves nobody. Ivan is not one of us. People like Ivan are not our sort, my boy. They are like a cloud of dust. When the wind blows, the dust will be gone.... I had a silly idea in my head when I told you to come to-day; I wanted to find out from you about Mitya. If I were to hand him over a thousand or maybe two now, would the beggarly wretch agree to take himself off altogether for five years or, better still, thirty-five, and without Grushenka, and give her up once for all, eh?" "I--I'll ask him," muttered Alyosha. "If you would give him three thousand, perhaps he--" "That's nonsense! You needn't ask him now, no need! I've changed my mind. It was a nonsensical idea of mine. I won't give him anything, not a penny, I want my money myself," cried the old man, waving his hand. "I'll crush him like a beetle without it. Don't say anything to him or else he will begin hoping. There's nothing for you to do here, you needn't stay. Is that betrothed of his, Katerina Ivanovna, whom he has kept so carefully hidden from me all this time, going to marry him or not? You went to see her yesterday, I believe?" "Nothing will induce her to abandon him." "There you see how dearly these fine young ladies love a rake and a scoundrel. They are poor creatures I tell you, those pale young ladies, very different from--Ah, if I had his youth and the looks I had then (for I was better-looking than he at eight and twenty) I'd have been a conquering hero just as he is. He is a low cad! But he shan't have Grushenka, anyway, he shan't! I'll crush him!" His anger had returned with the last words. "You can go. There's nothing for you to do here to-day," he snapped harshly. Alyosha went up to say good-by to him, and kissed him on the shoulder. "What's that for?" The old man was a little surprised. "We shall see each other again, or do you think we shan't?" "Not at all, I didn't mean anything." "Nor did I, I did not mean anything," said the old man, looking at him. "Listen, listen," he shouted after him, "make haste and come again and I'll have a fish soup for you, a fine one, not like to-day. Be sure to come! Come to-morrow, do you hear, to-morrow!" And as soon as Alyosha had gone out of the door, he went to the cupboard again and poured out another half-glass. "I won't have more!" he muttered, clearing his throat, and again he locked the cupboard and put the key in his pocket. Then he went into his bedroom, lay down on the bed, exhausted, and in one minute he was asleep. Chapter III. A Meeting With The Schoolboys "Thank goodness he did not ask me about Grushenka," thought Alyosha, as he left his father's house and turned towards Madame Hohlakov's, "or I might have to tell him of my meeting with Grushenka yesterday." Alyosha felt painfully that since yesterday both combatants had renewed their energies, and that their hearts had grown hard again. "Father is spiteful and angry, he's made some plan and will stick to it. And what of Dmitri? He too will be harder than yesterday, he too must be spiteful and angry, and he too, no doubt, has made some plan. Oh, I must succeed in finding him to-day, whatever happens." But Alyosha had not long to meditate. An incident occurred on the road, which, though apparently of little consequence, made a great impression on him. Just after he had crossed the square and turned the corner coming out into Mihailovsky Street, which is divided by a small ditch from the High Street (our whole town is intersected by ditches), he saw a group of schoolboys between the ages of nine and twelve, at the bridge. They were going home from school, some with their bags on their shoulders, others with leather satchels slung across them, some in short jackets, others in little overcoats. Some even had those high boots with creases round the ankles, such as little boys spoilt by rich fathers love to wear. The whole group was talking eagerly about something, apparently holding a council. Alyosha had never from his Moscow days been able to pass children without taking notice of them, and although he was particularly fond of children of three or thereabout, he liked schoolboys of ten and eleven too. And so, anxious as he was to-day, he wanted at once to turn aside to talk to them. He looked into their excited rosy faces, and noticed at once that all the boys had stones in their hands. Behind the ditch some thirty paces away, there was another schoolboy standing by a fence. He too had a satchel at his side. He was about ten years old, pale, delicate-looking and with sparkling black eyes. He kept an attentive and anxious watch on the other six, obviously his schoolfellows with whom he had just come out of school, but with whom he had evidently had a feud. Alyosha went up and, addressing a fair, curly-headed, rosy boy in a black jacket, observed: "When I used to wear a satchel like yours, I always used to carry it on my left side, so as to have my right hand free, but you've got yours on your right side. So it will be awkward for you to get at it." Alyosha had no art or premeditation in beginning with this practical remark. But it is the only way for a grown-up person to get at once into confidential relations with a child, or still more with a group of children. One must begin in a serious, businesslike way so as to be on a perfectly equal footing. Alyosha understood it by instinct. "But he is left-handed," another, a fine healthy-looking boy of eleven, answered promptly. All the others stared at Alyosha. "He even throws stones with his left hand," observed a third. At that instant a stone flew into the group, but only just grazed the left-handed boy, though it was well and vigorously thrown by the boy standing the other side of the ditch. "Give it him, hit him back, Smurov," they all shouted. But Smurov, the left-handed boy, needed no telling, and at once revenged himself; he threw a stone, but it missed the boy and hit the ground. The boy the other side of the ditch, the pocket of whose coat was visibly bulging with stones, flung another stone at the group; this time it flew straight at Alyosha and hit him painfully on the shoulder. "He aimed it at you, he meant it for you. You are Karamazov, Karamazov!" the boys shouted, laughing. "Come, all throw at him at once!" and six stones flew at the boy. One struck the boy on the head and he fell down, but at once leapt up and began ferociously returning their fire. Both sides threw stones incessantly. Many of the group had their pockets full too. "What are you about! Aren't you ashamed? Six against one! Why, you'll kill him," cried Alyosha. He ran forward and met the flying stones to screen the solitary boy. Three or four ceased throwing for a minute. "He began first!" cried a boy in a red shirt in an angry childish voice. "He is a beast, he stabbed Krassotkin in class the other day with a penknife. It bled. Krassotkin wouldn't tell tales, but he must be thrashed." "But what for? I suppose you tease him." "There, he sent a stone in your back again, he knows you," cried the children. "It's you he is throwing at now, not us. Come, all of you, at him again, don't miss, Smurov!" and again a fire of stones, and a very vicious one, began. The boy the other side of the ditch was hit in the chest; he screamed, began to cry and ran away uphill towards Mihailovsky Street. They all shouted: "Aha, he is funking, he is running away. Wisp of tow!" "You don't know what a beast he is, Karamazov, killing is too good for him," said the boy in the jacket, with flashing eyes. He seemed to be the eldest. "What's wrong with him?" asked Alyosha, "is he a tell-tale or what?" The boys looked at one another as though derisively. "Are you going that way, to Mihailovsky?" the same boy went on. "Catch him up.... You see he's stopped again, he is waiting and looking at you." "He is looking at you," the other boys chimed in. "You ask him, does he like a disheveled wisp of tow. Do you hear, ask him that!" There was a general burst of laughter. Alyosha looked at them, and they at him. "Don't go near him, he'll hurt you," cried Smurov in a warning voice. "I shan't ask him about the wisp of tow, for I expect you tease him with that question somehow. But I'll find out from him why you hate him so." "Find out then, find out," cried the boys, laughing. Alyosha crossed the bridge and walked uphill by the fence, straight towards the boy. "You'd better look out," the boys called after him; "he won't be afraid of you. He will stab you in a minute, on the sly, as he did Krassotkin." The boy waited for him without budging. Coming up to him, Alyosha saw facing him a child of about nine years old. He was an undersized weakly boy with a thin pale face, with large dark eyes that gazed at him vindictively. He was dressed in a rather shabby old overcoat, which he had monstrously outgrown. His bare arms stuck out beyond his sleeves. There was a large patch on the right knee of his trousers, and in his right boot just at the toe there was a big hole in the leather, carefully blackened with ink. Both the pockets of his great-coat were weighed down with stones. Alyosha stopped two steps in front of him, looking inquiringly at him. The boy, seeing at once from Alyosha's eyes that he wouldn't beat him, became less defiant, and addressed him first. "I am alone, and there are six of them. I'll beat them all, alone!" he said suddenly, with flashing eyes. "I think one of the stones must have hurt you badly," observed Alyosha. "But I hit Smurov on the head!" cried the boy. "They told me that you know me, and that you threw a stone at me on purpose," said Alyosha. The boy looked darkly at him. "I don't know you. Do you know me?" Alyosha continued. "Let me alone!" the boy cried irritably; but he did not move, as though he were expecting something, and again there was a vindictive light in his eyes. "Very well, I am going," said Alyosha; "only I don't know you and I don't tease you. They told me how they tease you, but I don't want to tease you. Good-by!" "Monk in silk trousers!" cried the boy, following Alyosha with the same vindictive and defiant expression, and he threw himself into an attitude of defense, feeling sure that now Alyosha would fall upon him; but Alyosha turned, looked at him, and walked away. He had not gone three steps before the biggest stone the boy had in his pocket hit him a painful blow in the back. "So you'll hit a man from behind! They tell the truth, then, when they say that you attack on the sly," said Alyosha, turning round again. This time the boy threw a stone savagely right into Alyosha's face; but Alyosha just had time to guard himself, and the stone struck him on the elbow. "Aren't you ashamed? What have I done to you?" he cried. The boy waited in silent defiance, certain that now Alyosha would attack him. Seeing that even now he would not, his rage was like a little wild beast's; he flew at Alyosha himself, and before Alyosha had time to move, the spiteful child had seized his left hand with both of his and bit his middle finger. He fixed his teeth in it and it was ten seconds before he let go. Alyosha cried out with pain and pulled his finger away with all his might. The child let go at last and retreated to his former distance. Alyosha's finger had been badly bitten to the bone, close to the nail; it began to bleed. Alyosha took out his handkerchief and bound it tightly round his injured hand. He was a full minute bandaging it. The boy stood waiting all the time. At last Alyosha raised his gentle eyes and looked at him. "Very well," he said, "you see how badly you've bitten me. That's enough, isn't it? Now tell me, what have I done to you?" The boy stared in amazement. "Though I don't know you and it's the first time I've seen you," Alyosha went on with the same serenity, "yet I must have done something to you--you wouldn't have hurt me like this for nothing. So what have I done? How have I wronged you, tell me?" Instead of answering, the boy broke into a loud tearful wail and ran away. Alyosha walked slowly after him towards Mihailovsky Street, and for a long time he saw the child running in the distance as fast as ever, not turning his head, and no doubt still keeping up his tearful wail. He made up his mind to find him out as soon as he had time, and to solve this mystery. Just now he had not the time. Chapter IV. At The Hohlakovs' Alyosha soon reached Madame Hohlakov's house, a handsome stone house of two stories, one of the finest in our town. Though Madame Hohlakov spent most of her time in another province where she had an estate, or in Moscow, where she had a house of her own, yet she had a house in our town too, inherited from her forefathers. The estate in our district was the largest of her three estates, yet she had been very little in our province before this time. She ran out to Alyosha in the hall. "Did you get my letter about the new miracle?" She spoke rapidly and nervously. "Yes." "Did you show it to every one? He restored the son to his mother!" "He is dying to-day," said Alyosha. "I have heard, I know, oh, how I long to talk to you, to you or some one, about all this. No, to you, to you! And how sorry I am I can't see him! The whole town is in excitement, they are all suspense. But now--do you know Katerina Ivanovna is here now?" "Ah, that's lucky," cried Alyosha. "Then I shall see her here. She told me yesterday to be sure to come and see her to-day." "I know, I know all. I've heard exactly what happened yesterday--and the atrocious behavior of that--creature. _C'est tragique_, and if I'd been in her place I don't know what I should have done. And your brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch, what do you think of him?--my goodness! Alexey Fyodorovitch, I am forgetting, only fancy; your brother is in there with her, not that dreadful brother who was so shocking yesterday, but the other, Ivan Fyodorovitch, he is sitting with her talking; they are having a serious conversation. If you could only imagine what's passing between them now--it's awful, I tell you it's lacerating, it's like some incredible tale of horror. They are ruining their lives for no reason any one can see. They both recognize it and revel in it. I've been watching for you! I've been thirsting for you! It's too much for me, that's the worst of it. I'll tell you all about it presently, but now I must speak of something else, the most important thing--I had quite forgotten what's most important. Tell me, why has Lise been in hysterics? As soon as she heard you were here, she began to be hysterical!" "_Maman_, it's you who are hysterical now, not I," Lise's voice caroled through a tiny crack of the door at the side. Her voice sounded as though she wanted to laugh, but was doing her utmost to control it. Alyosha at once noticed the crack, and no doubt Lise was peeping through it, but that he could not see. "And no wonder, Lise, no wonder ... your caprices will make me hysterical too. But she is so ill, Alexey Fyodorovitch, she has been so ill all night, feverish and moaning! I could hardly wait for the morning and for Herzenstube to come. He says that he can make nothing of it, that we must wait. Herzenstube always comes and says that he can make nothing of it. As soon as you approached the house, she screamed, fell into hysterics, and insisted on being wheeled back into this room here." "Mamma, I didn't know he had come. It wasn't on his account I wanted to be wheeled into this room." "That's not true, Lise, Yulia ran to tell you that Alexey Fyodorovitch was coming. She was on the look-out for you." "My darling mamma, it's not at all clever of you. But if you want to make up for it and say something very clever, dear mamma, you'd better tell our honored visitor, Alexey Fyodorovitch, that he has shown his want of wit by venturing to us after what happened yesterday and although every one is laughing at him." "Lise, you go too far. I declare I shall have to be severe. Who laughs at him? I am so glad he has come, I need him, I can't do without him. Oh, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I am exceedingly unhappy!" "But what's the matter with you, mamma, darling?" "Ah, your caprices, Lise, your fidgetiness, your illness, that awful night of fever, that awful everlasting Herzenstube, everlasting, everlasting, that's the worst of it! Everything, in fact, everything.... Even that miracle, too! Oh, how it has upset me, how it has shattered me, that miracle, dear Alexey Fyodorovitch! And that tragedy in the drawing-room, it's more than I can bear, I warn you. I can't bear it. A comedy, perhaps, not a tragedy. Tell me, will Father Zossima live till to-morrow, will he? Oh, my God! What is happening to me? Every minute I close my eyes and see that it's all nonsense, all nonsense." "I should be very grateful," Alyosha interrupted suddenly, "if you could give me a clean rag to bind up my finger with. I have hurt it, and it's very painful." Alyosha unbound his bitten finger. The handkerchief was soaked with blood. Madame Hohlakov screamed and shut her eyes. "Good heavens, what a wound, how awful!" But as soon as Lise saw Alyosha's finger through the crack, she flung the door wide open. "Come, come here," she cried, imperiously. "No nonsense now! Good heavens, why did you stand there saying nothing about it all this time? He might have bled to death, mamma! How did you do it? Water, water! You must wash it first of all, simply hold it in cold water to stop the pain, and keep it there, keep it there.... Make haste, mamma, some water in a slop-basin. But do make haste," she finished nervously. She was quite frightened at the sight of Alyosha's wound. "Shouldn't we send for Herzenstube?" cried Madame Hohlakov. "Mamma, you'll be the death of me. Your Herzenstube will come and say that he can make nothing of it! Water, water! Mamma, for goodness' sake go yourself and hurry Yulia, she is such a slowcoach and never can come quickly! Make haste, mamma, or I shall die." "Why, it's nothing much," cried Alyosha, frightened at this alarm. Yulia ran in with water and Alyosha put his finger in it. "Some lint, mamma, for mercy's sake, bring some lint and that muddy caustic lotion for wounds, what's it called? We've got some. You know where the bottle is, mamma; it's in your bedroom in the right-hand cupboard, there's a big bottle of it there with the lint." "I'll bring everything in a minute, Lise, only don't scream and don't fuss. You see how bravely Alexey Fyodorovitch bears it. Where did you get such a dreadful wound, Alexey Fyodorovitch?" Madame Hohlakov hastened away. This was all Lise was waiting for. "First of all, answer the question, where did you get hurt like this?" she asked Alyosha, quickly. "And then I'll talk to you about something quite different. Well?" Instinctively feeling that the time of her mother's absence was precious for her, Alyosha hastened to tell her of his enigmatic meeting with the schoolboys in the fewest words possible. Lise clasped her hands at his story. "How can you, and in that dress too, associate with schoolboys?" she cried angrily, as though she had a right to control him. "You are nothing but a boy yourself if you can do that, a perfect boy! But you must find out for me about that horrid boy and tell me all about it, for there's some mystery in it. Now for the second thing, but first a question: does the pain prevent you talking about utterly unimportant things, but talking sensibly?" "Of course not, and I don't feel much pain now." "That's because your finger is in the water. It must be changed directly, for it will get warm in a minute. Yulia, bring some ice from the cellar and another basin of water. Now she is gone, I can speak; will you give me the letter I sent you yesterday, dear Alexey Fyodorovitch--be quick, for mamma will be back in a minute and I don't want--" "I haven't got the letter." "That's not true, you have. I knew you would say that. You've got it in that pocket. I've been regretting that joke all night. Give me back the letter at once, give it me." "I've left it at home." "But you can't consider me as a child, a little girl, after that silly joke! I beg your pardon for that silliness, but you must bring me the letter, if you really haven't got it--bring it to-day, you must, you must." "To-day I can't possibly, for I am going back to the monastery and I shan't come and see you for the next two days--three or four perhaps--for Father Zossima--" "Four days, what nonsense! Listen. Did you laugh at me very much?" "I didn't laugh at all." "Why not?" "Because I believed all you said." "You are insulting me!" "Not at all. As soon as I read it, I thought that all that would come to pass, for as soon as Father Zossima dies, I am to leave the monastery. Then I shall go back and finish my studies, and when you reach the legal age we will be married. I shall love you. Though I haven't had time to think about it, I believe I couldn't find a better wife than you, and Father Zossima tells me I must marry." "But I am a cripple, wheeled about in a chair," laughed Lise, flushing crimson. "I'll wheel you about myself, but I'm sure you'll get well by then." "But you are mad," said Lise, nervously, "to make all this nonsense out of a joke! Here's mamma, very _a propos_, perhaps. Mamma, how slow you always are, how can you be so long! And here's Yulia with the ice!" "Oh, Lise, don't scream, above all things don't scream. That scream drives me ... How can I help it when you put the lint in another place? I've been hunting and hunting--I do believe you did it on purpose." "But I couldn't tell that he would come with a bad finger, or else perhaps I might have done it on purpose. My darling mamma, you begin to say really witty things." "Never mind my being witty, but I must say you show nice feeling for Alexey Fyodorovitch's sufferings! Oh, my dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, what's killing me is no one thing in particular, not Herzenstube, but everything together, that's what is too much for me." "That's enough, mamma, enough about Herzenstube," Lise laughed gayly. "Make haste with the lint and the lotion, mamma. That's simply Goulard's water, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I remember the name now, but it's a splendid lotion. Would you believe it, mamma, on the way here he had a fight with the boys in the street, and it was a boy bit his finger, isn't he a child, a child himself? Is he fit to be married after that? For only fancy, he wants to be married, mamma. Just think of him married, wouldn't it be funny, wouldn't it be awful?" And Lise kept laughing her thin hysterical giggle, looking slyly at Alyosha. "But why married, Lise? What makes you talk of such a thing? It's quite out of place--and perhaps the boy was rabid." "Why, mamma! As though there were rabid boys!" "Why not, Lise, as though I had said something stupid! Your boy might have been bitten by a mad dog and he would become mad and bite any one near him. How well she has bandaged it, Alexey Fyodorovitch! I couldn't have done it. Do you still feel the pain?" "It's nothing much now." "You don't feel afraid of water?" asked Lise. "Come, that's enough, Lise, perhaps I really was rather too quick talking of the boy being rabid, and you pounced upon it at once Katerina Ivanovna has only just heard that you are here, Alexey Fyodorovitch, she simply rushed at me, she's dying to see you, dying!" "Ach, mamma, go to them yourself. He can't go just now, he is in too much pain." "Not at all, I can go quite well," said Alyosha. "What! You are going away? Is that what you say?" "Well, when I've seen them, I'll come back here and we can talk as much as you like. But I should like to see Katerina Ivanovna at once, for I am very anxious to be back at the monastery as soon as I can." "Mamma, take him away quickly. Alexey Fyodorovitch, don't trouble to come and see me afterwards, but go straight back to your monastery and a good riddance. I want to sleep, I didn't sleep all night." "Ah, Lise, you are only making fun, but how I wish you would sleep!" cried Madame Hohlakov. "I don't know what I've done.... I'll stay another three minutes, five if you like," muttered Alyosha. "Even five! Do take him away quickly, mamma, he is a monster." "Lise, you are crazy. Let us go, Alexey Fyodorovitch, she is too capricious to-day. I am afraid to cross her. Oh, the trouble one has with nervous girls! Perhaps she really will be able to sleep after seeing you. How quickly you have made her sleepy, and how fortunate it is!" "Ah, mamma, how sweetly you talk! I must kiss you for it, mamma." "And I kiss you too, Lise. Listen, Alexey Fyodorovitch," Madame Hohlakov began mysteriously and importantly, speaking in a rapid whisper. "I don't want to suggest anything, I don't want to lift the veil, you will see for yourself what's going on. It's appalling. It's the most fantastic farce. She loves your brother, Ivan, and she is doing her utmost to persuade herself she loves your brother, Dmitri. It's appalling! I'll go in with you, and if they don't turn me out, I'll stay to the end." Chapter V. A Laceration In The Drawing-Room But in the drawing-room the conversation was already over. Katerina Ivanovna was greatly excited, though she looked resolute. At the moment Alyosha and Madame Hohlakov entered, Ivan Fyodorovitch stood up to take leave. His face was rather pale, and Alyosha looked at him anxiously. For this moment was to solve a doubt, a harassing enigma which had for some time haunted Alyosha. During the preceding month it had been several times suggested to him that his brother Ivan was in love with Katerina Ivanovna, and, what was more, that he meant "to carry her off" from Dmitri. Until quite lately the idea seemed to Alyosha monstrous, though it worried him extremely. He loved both his brothers, and dreaded such rivalry between them. Meantime, Dmitri had said outright on the previous day that he was glad that Ivan was his rival, and that it was a great assistance to him, Dmitri. In what way did it assist him? To marry Grushenka? But that Alyosha considered the worst thing possible. Besides all this, Alyosha had till the evening before implicitly believed that Katerina Ivanovna had a steadfast and passionate love for Dmitri; but he had only believed it till the evening before. He had fancied, too, that she was incapable of loving a man like Ivan, and that she did love Dmitri, and loved him just as he was, in spite of all the strangeness of such a passion. But during yesterday's scene with Grushenka another idea had struck him. The word "lacerating," which Madame Hohlakov had just uttered, almost made him start, because half waking up towards daybreak that night he had cried out "Laceration, laceration," probably applying it to his dream. He had been dreaming all night of the previous day's scene at Katerina Ivanovna's. Now Alyosha was impressed by Madame Hohlakov's blunt and persistent assertion that Katerina Ivanovna was in love with Ivan, and only deceived herself through some sort of pose, from "self-laceration," and tortured herself by her pretended love for Dmitri from some fancied duty of gratitude. "Yes," he thought, "perhaps the whole truth lies in those words." But in that case what was Ivan's position? Alyosha felt instinctively that a character like Katerina Ivanovna's must dominate, and she could only dominate some one like Dmitri, and never a man like Ivan. For Dmitri might at last submit to her domination "to his own happiness" (which was what Alyosha would have desired), but Ivan--no, Ivan could not submit to her, and such submission would not give him happiness. Alyosha could not help believing that of Ivan. And now all these doubts and reflections flitted through his mind as he entered the drawing-room. Another idea, too, forced itself upon him: "What if she loved neither of them--neither Ivan nor Dmitri?" It must be noted that Alyosha felt as it were ashamed of his own thoughts and blamed himself when they kept recurring to him during the last month. "What do I know about love and women and how can I decide such questions?" he thought reproachfully, after such doubts and surmises. And yet it was impossible not to think about it. He felt instinctively that this rivalry was of immense importance in his brothers' lives and that a great deal depended upon it. "One reptile will devour the other," Ivan had pronounced the day before, speaking in anger of his father and Dmitri. So Ivan looked upon Dmitri as a reptile, and perhaps had long done so. Was it perhaps since he had known Katerina Ivanovna? That phrase had, of course, escaped Ivan unawares yesterday, but that only made it more important. If he felt like that, what chance was there of peace? Were there not, on the contrary, new grounds for hatred and hostility in their family? And with which of them was Alyosha to sympathize? And what was he to wish for each of them? He loved them both, but what could he desire for each in the midst of these conflicting interests? He might go quite astray in this maze, and Alyosha's heart could not endure uncertainty, because his love was always of an active character. He was incapable of passive love. If he loved any one, he set to work at once to help him. And to do so he must know what he was aiming at; he must know for certain what was best for each, and having ascertained this it was natural for him to help them both. But instead of a definite aim, he found nothing but uncertainty and perplexity on all sides. "It was lacerating," as was said just now. But what could he understand even in this "laceration"? He did not understand the first word in this perplexing maze. Seeing Alyosha, Katerina Ivanovna said quickly and joyfully to Ivan, who had already got up to go, "A minute! Stay another minute! I want to hear the opinion of this person here whom I trust absolutely. Don't go away," she added, addressing Madame Hohlakov. She made Alyosha sit down beside her, and Madame Hohlakov sat opposite, by Ivan. "You are all my friends here, all I have in the world, my dear friends," she began warmly, in a voice which quivered with genuine tears of suffering, and Alyosha's heart warmed to her at once. "You, Alexey Fyodorovitch, were witness yesterday of that abominable scene, and saw what I did. You did not see it, Ivan Fyodorovitch, he did. What he thought of me yesterday I don't know. I only know one thing, that if it were repeated to-day, this minute, I should express the same feelings again as yesterday--the same feelings, the same words, the same actions. You remember my actions, Alexey Fyodorovitch; you checked me in one of them" ... (as she said that, she flushed and her eyes shone). "I must tell you that I can't get over it. Listen, Alexey Fyodorovitch. I don't even know whether I still love _him_. I feel _pity_ for him, and that is a poor sign of love. If I loved him, if I still loved him, perhaps I shouldn't be sorry for him now, but should hate him." Her voice quivered, and tears glittered on her eyelashes. Alyosha shuddered inwardly. "That girl is truthful and sincere," he thought, "and she does not love Dmitri any more." "That's true, that's true," cried Madame Hohlakov. "Wait, dear. I haven't told you the chief, the final decision I came to during the night. I feel that perhaps my decision is a terrible one--for me, but I foresee that nothing will induce me to change it--nothing. It will be so all my life. My dear, kind, ever-faithful and generous adviser, the one friend I have in the world, Ivan Fyodorovitch, with his deep insight into the heart, approves and commends my decision. He knows it." "Yes, I approve of it," Ivan assented, in a subdued but firm voice. "But I should like Alyosha, too (Ah! Alexey Fyodorovitch, forgive my calling you simply Alyosha), I should like Alexey Fyodorovitch, too, to tell me before my two friends whether I am right. I feel instinctively that you, Alyosha, my dear brother (for you are a dear brother to me)," she said again ecstatically, taking his cold hand in her hot one, "I foresee that your decision, your approval, will bring me peace, in spite of all my sufferings, for, after your words, I shall be calm and submit--I feel that." "I don't know what you are asking me," said Alyosha, flushing. "I only know that I love you and at this moment wish for your happiness more than my own!... But I know nothing about such affairs," something impelled him to add hurriedly. "In such affairs, Alexey Fyodorovitch, in such affairs, the chief thing is honor and duty and something higher--I don't know what--but higher perhaps even than duty. I am conscious of this irresistible feeling in my heart, and it compels me irresistibly. But it may all be put in two words. I've already decided, even if he marries that--creature," she began solemnly, "whom I never, never can forgive, _even then I will not abandon him_. Henceforward I will never, never abandon him!" she cried, breaking into a sort of pale, hysterical ecstasy. "Not that I would run after him continually, get in his way and worry him. Oh, no! I will go away to another town--where you like--but I will watch over him all my life--I will watch over him all my life unceasingly. When he becomes unhappy with that woman, and that is bound to happen quite soon, let him come to me and he will find a friend, a sister.... Only a sister, of course, and so for ever; but he will learn at least that that sister is really his sister, who loves him and has sacrificed all her life to him. I will gain my point. I will insist on his knowing me and confiding entirely in me, without reserve," she cried, in a sort of frenzy. "I will be a god to whom he can pray--and that, at least, he owes me for his treachery and for what I suffered yesterday through him. And let him see that all my life I will be true to him and the promise I gave him, in spite of his being untrue and betraying me. I will--I will become nothing but a means for his happiness, or--how shall I say?--an instrument, a machine for his happiness, and that for my whole life, my whole life, and that he may see that all his life! That's my decision. Ivan Fyodorovitch fully approves me." She was breathless. She had perhaps intended to express her idea with more dignity, art and naturalness, but her speech was too hurried and crude. It was full of youthful impulsiveness, it betrayed that she was still smarting from yesterday's insult, and that her pride craved satisfaction. She felt this herself. Her face suddenly darkened, an unpleasant look came into her eyes. Alyosha at once saw it and felt a pang of sympathy. His brother Ivan made it worse by adding: "I've only expressed my own view," he said. "From any one else, this would have been affected and overstrained, but from you--no. Any other woman would have been wrong, but you are right. I don't know how to explain it, but I see that you are absolutely genuine and, therefore, you are right." "But that's only for the moment. And what does this moment stand for? Nothing but yesterday's insult." Madame Hohlakov obviously had not intended to interfere, but she could not refrain from this very just comment. "Quite so, quite so," cried Ivan, with peculiar eagerness, obviously annoyed at being interrupted, "in any one else this moment would be only due to yesterday's impression and would be only a moment. But with Katerina Ivanovna's character, that moment will last all her life. What for any one else would be only a promise is for her an everlasting burdensome, grim perhaps, but unflagging duty. And she will be sustained by the feeling of this duty being fulfilled. Your life, Katerina Ivanovna, will henceforth be spent in painful brooding over your own feelings, your own heroism, and your own suffering; but in the end that suffering will be softened and will pass into sweet contemplation of the fulfillment of a bold and proud design. Yes, proud it certainly is, and desperate in any case, but a triumph for you. And the consciousness of it will at last be a source of complete satisfaction and will make you resigned to everything else." This was unmistakably said with some malice and obviously with intention; even perhaps with no desire to conceal that he spoke ironically and with intention. "Oh, dear, how mistaken it all is!" Madame Hohlakov cried again. "Alexey Fyodorovitch, you speak. I want dreadfully to know what you will say!" cried Katerina Ivanovna, and burst into tears. Alyosha got up from the sofa. "It's nothing, nothing!" she went on through her tears. "I'm upset, I didn't sleep last night. But by the side of two such friends as you and your brother I still feel strong--for I know--you two will never desert me." "Unluckily I am obliged to return to Moscow--perhaps to-morrow--and to leave you for a long time--And, unluckily, it's unavoidable," Ivan said suddenly. "To-morrow--to Moscow!" her face was suddenly contorted; "but--but, dear me, how fortunate!" she cried in a voice suddenly changed. In one instant there was no trace left of her tears. She underwent an instantaneous transformation, which amazed Alyosha. Instead of a poor, insulted girl, weeping in a sort of "laceration," he saw a woman completely self- possessed and even exceedingly pleased, as though something agreeable had just happened. "Oh, not fortunate that I am losing you, of course not," she corrected herself suddenly, with a charming society smile. "Such a friend as you are could not suppose that. I am only too unhappy at losing you." She rushed impulsively at Ivan, and seizing both his hands, pressed them warmly. "But what is fortunate is that you will be able in Moscow to see auntie and Agafya and to tell them all the horror of my present position. You can speak with complete openness to Agafya, but spare dear auntie. You will know how to do that. You can't think how wretched I was yesterday and this morning, wondering how I could write them that dreadful letter--for one can never tell such things in a letter.... Now it will be easy for me to write, for you will see them and explain everything. Oh, how glad I am! But I am only glad of that, believe me. Of course, no one can take your place.... I will run at once to write the letter," she finished suddenly, and took a step as though to go out of the room. "And what about Alyosha and his opinion, which you were so desperately anxious to hear?" cried Madame Hohlakov. There was a sarcastic, angry note in her voice. "I had not forgotten that," cried Katerina Ivanovna, coming to a sudden standstill, "and why are you so antagonistic at such a moment?" she added, with warm and bitter reproachfulness. "What I said, I repeat. I must have his opinion. More than that, I must have his decision! As he says, so it shall be. You see how anxious I am for your words, Alexey Fyodorovitch.... But what's the matter?" "I couldn't have believed it. I can't understand it!" Alyosha cried suddenly in distress. "What? What?" "He is going to Moscow, and you cry out that you are glad. You said that on purpose! And you begin explaining that you are not glad of that but sorry to be--losing a friend. But that was acting, too--you were playing a part--as in a theater!" "In a theater? What? What do you mean?" exclaimed Katerina Ivanovna, profoundly astonished, flushing crimson, and frowning. "Though you assure him you are sorry to lose a friend in him, you persist in telling him to his face that it's fortunate he is going," said Alyosha breathlessly. He was standing at the table and did not sit down. "What are you talking about? I don't understand." "I don't understand myself.... I seemed to see in a flash ... I know I am not saying it properly, but I'll say it all the same," Alyosha went on in the same shaking and broken voice. "What I see is that perhaps you don't love Dmitri at all ... and never have, from the beginning.... And Dmitri, too, has never loved you ... and only esteems you.... I really don't know how I dare to say all this, but somebody must tell the truth ... for nobody here will tell the truth." "What truth?" cried Katerina Ivanovna, and there was an hysterical ring in her voice. "I'll tell you," Alyosha went on with desperate haste, as though he were jumping from the top of a house. "Call Dmitri; I will fetch him--and let him come here and take your hand and take Ivan's and join your hands. For you're torturing Ivan, simply because you love him--and torturing him, because you love Dmitri through 'self-laceration'--with an unreal love--because you've persuaded yourself." Alyosha broke off and was silent. "You ... you ... you are a little religious idiot--that's what you are!" Katerina Ivanovna snapped. Her face was white and her lips were moving with anger. Ivan suddenly laughed and got up. His hat was in his hand. "You are mistaken, my good Alyosha," he said, with an expression Alyosha had never seen in his face before--an expression of youthful sincerity and strong, irresistibly frank feeling. "Katerina Ivanovna has never cared for me! She has known all the time that I cared for her--though I never said a word of my love to her--she knew, but she didn't care for me. I have never been her friend either, not for one moment; she is too proud to need my friendship. She kept me at her side as a means of revenge. She revenged with me and on me all the insults which she has been continually receiving from Dmitri ever since their first meeting. For even that first meeting has rankled in her heart as an insult--that's what her heart is like! She has talked to me of nothing but her love for him. I am going now; but, believe me, Katerina Ivanovna, you really love him. And the more he insults you, the more you love him--that's your 'laceration.' You love him just as he is; you love him for insulting you. If he reformed, you'd give him up at once and cease to love him. But you need him so as to contemplate continually your heroic fidelity and to reproach him for infidelity. And it all comes from your pride. Oh, there's a great deal of humiliation and self-abasement about it, but it all comes from pride.... I am too young and I've loved you too much. I know that I ought not to say this, that it would be more dignified on my part simply to leave you, and it would be less offensive for you. But I am going far away, and shall never come back.... It is for ever. I don't want to sit beside a 'laceration.'... But I don't know how to speak now. I've said everything.... Good-by, Katerina Ivanovna; you can't be angry with me, for I am a hundred times more severely punished than you, if only by the fact that I shall never see you again. Good-by! I don't want your hand. You have tortured me too deliberately for me to be able to forgive you at this moment. I shall forgive you later, but now I don't want your hand. 'Den Dank, Dame, begehr ich nicht,' " he added, with a forced smile, showing, however, that he could read Schiller, and read him till he knew him by heart--which Alyosha would never have believed. He went out of the room without saying good-by even to his hostess, Madame Hohlakov. Alyosha clasped his hands. "Ivan!" he cried desperately after him. "Come back, Ivan! No, nothing will induce him to come back now!" he cried again, regretfully realizing it; "but it's my fault, my fault. I began it! Ivan spoke angrily, wrongly. Unjustly and angrily. He must come back here, come back," Alyosha kept exclaiming frantically. Katerina Ivanovna went suddenly into the next room. "You have done no harm. You behaved beautifully, like an angel," Madame Hohlakov whispered rapidly and ecstatically to Alyosha. "I will do my utmost to prevent Ivan Fyodorovitch from going." Her face beamed with delight, to the great distress of Alyosha, but Katerina Ivanovna suddenly returned. She had two hundred-rouble notes in her hand. "I have a great favor to ask of you, Alexey Fyodorovitch," she began, addressing Alyosha with an apparently calm and even voice, as though nothing had happened. "A week--yes, I think it was a week ago--Dmitri Fyodorovitch was guilty of a hasty and unjust action--a very ugly action. There is a low tavern here, and in it he met that discharged officer, that captain, whom your father used to employ in some business. Dmitri Fyodorovitch somehow lost his temper with this captain, seized him by the beard and dragged him out into the street and for some distance along it, in that insulting fashion. And I am told that his son, a boy, quite a child, who is at the school here, saw it and ran beside them crying and begging for his father, appealing to every one to defend him, while every one laughed. You must forgive me, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I cannot think without indignation of that disgraceful action of _his_ ... one of those actions of which only Dmitri Fyodorovitch would be capable in his anger ... and in his passions! I can't describe it even.... I can't find my words. I've made inquiries about his victim, and find he is quite a poor man. His name is Snegiryov. He did something wrong in the army and was discharged. I can't tell you what. And now he has sunk into terrible destitution, with his family--an unhappy family of sick children, and, I believe, an insane wife. He has been living here a long time; he used to work as a copying clerk, but now he is getting nothing. I thought if you ... that is I thought ... I don't know. I am so confused. You see, I wanted to ask you, my dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, to go to him, to find some excuse to go to them--I mean to that captain--oh, goodness, how badly I explain it!--and delicately, carefully, as only you know how to" (Alyosha blushed), "manage to give him this assistance, these two hundred roubles. He will be sure to take it.... I mean, persuade him to take it.... Or, rather, what do I mean? You see it's not by way of compensation to prevent him from taking proceedings (for I believe he meant to), but simply a token of sympathy, of a desire to assist him from me, Dmitri Fyodorovitch's betrothed, not from himself.... But you know.... I would go myself, but you'll know how to do it ever so much better. He lives in Lake Street, in the house of a woman called Kalmikov.... For God's sake, Alexey Fyodorovitch, do it for me, and now ... now I am rather ... tired. Good- by!" She turned and disappeared behind the portiere so quickly that Alyosha had not time to utter a word, though he wanted to speak. He longed to beg her pardon, to blame himself, to say something, for his heart was full and he could not bear to go out of the room without it. But Madame Hohlakov took him by the hand and drew him along with her. In the hall she stopped him again as before. "She is proud, she is struggling with herself; but kind, charming, generous," she exclaimed, in a half-whisper. "Oh, how I love her, especially sometimes, and how glad I am again of everything! Dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, you didn't know, but I must tell you, that we all, all--both her aunts, I and all of us, Lise, even--have been hoping and praying for nothing for the last month but that she may give up your favorite Dmitri, who takes no notice of her and does not care for her, and may marry Ivan Fyodorovitch--such an excellent and cultivated young man, who loves her more than anything in the world. We are in a regular plot to bring it about, and I am even staying on here perhaps on that account." "But she has been crying--she has been wounded again," cried Alyosha. "Never trust a woman's tears, Alexey Fyodorovitch. I am never for the women in such cases. I am always on the side of the men." "Mamma, you are spoiling him," Lise's little voice cried from behind the door. "No, it was all my fault. I am horribly to blame," Alyosha repeated unconsoled, hiding his face in his hands in an agony of remorse for his indiscretion. "Quite the contrary; you behaved like an angel, like an angel. I am ready to say so a thousand times over." "Mamma, how has he behaved like an angel?" Lise's voice was heard again. "I somehow fancied all at once," Alyosha went on as though he had not heard Lise, "that she loved Ivan, and so I said that stupid thing.... What will happen now?" "To whom, to whom?" cried Lise. "Mamma, you really want to be the death of me. I ask you and you don't answer." At the moment the maid ran in. "Katerina Ivanovna is ill.... She is crying, struggling ... hysterics." "What is the matter?" cried Lise, in a tone of real anxiety. "Mamma, I shall be having hysterics, and not she!" "Lise, for mercy's sake, don't scream, don't persecute me. At your age one can't know everything that grown-up people know. I'll come and tell you everything you ought to know. Oh, mercy on us! I am coming, I am coming.... Hysterics is a good sign, Alexey Fyodorovitch; it's an excellent thing that she is hysterical. That's just as it ought to be. In such cases I am always against the woman, against all these feminine tears and hysterics. Run and say, Yulia, that I'll fly to her. As for Ivan Fyodorovitch's going away like that, it's her own fault. But he won't go away. Lise, for mercy's sake, don't scream! Oh, yes; you are not screaming. It's I am screaming. Forgive your mamma; but I am delighted, delighted, delighted! Did you notice, Alexey Fyodorovitch, how young, how young Ivan Fyodorovitch was just now when he went out, when he said all that and went out? I thought he was so learned, such a _savant_, and all of a sudden he behaved so warmly, openly, and youthfully, with such youthful inexperience, and it was all so fine, like you.... And the way he repeated that German verse, it was just like you! But I must fly, I must fly! Alexey Fyodorovitch, make haste to carry out her commission, and then make haste back. Lise, do you want anything now? For mercy's sake, don't keep Alexey Fyodorovitch a minute. He will come back to you at once." Madame Hohlakov at last ran off. Before leaving, Alyosha would have opened the door to see Lise. "On no account," cried Lise. "On no account now. Speak through the door. How have you come to be an angel? That's the only thing I want to know." "For an awful piece of stupidity, Lise! Good-by!" "Don't dare to go away like that!" Lise was beginning. "Lise, I have a real sorrow! I'll be back directly, but I have a great, great sorrow!" And he ran out of the room. Chapter VI. A Laceration In The Cottage He certainly was really grieved in a way he had seldom been before. He had rushed in like a fool, and meddled in what? In a love-affair. "But what do I know about it? What can I tell about such things?" he repeated to himself for the hundredth time, flushing crimson. "Oh, being ashamed would be nothing; shame is only the punishment I deserve. The trouble is I shall certainly have caused more unhappiness.... And Father Zossima sent me to reconcile and bring them together. Is this the way to bring them together?" Then he suddenly remembered how he had tried to join their hands, and he felt fearfully ashamed again. "Though I acted quite sincerely, I must be more sensible in the future," he concluded suddenly, and did not even smile at his conclusion. Katerina Ivanovna's commission took him to Lake Street, and his brother Dmitri lived close by, in a turning out of Lake Street. Alyosha decided to go to him in any case before going to the captain, though he had a presentiment that he would not find his brother. He suspected that he would intentionally keep out of his way now, but he must find him anyhow. Time was passing: the thought of his dying elder had not left Alyosha for one minute from the time he set off from the monastery. There was one point which interested him particularly about Katerina Ivanovna's commission; when she had mentioned the captain's son, the little schoolboy who had run beside his father crying, the idea had at once struck Alyosha that this must be the schoolboy who had bitten his finger when he, Alyosha, asked him what he had done to hurt him. Now Alyosha felt practically certain of this, though he could not have said why. Thinking of another subject was a relief, and he resolved to think no more about the "mischief" he had done, and not to torture himself with remorse, but to do what he had to do, let come what would. At that thought he was completely comforted. Turning to the street where Dmitri lodged, he felt hungry, and taking out of his pocket the roll he had brought from his father's, he ate it. It made him feel stronger. Dmitri was not at home. The people of the house, an old cabinet-maker, his son, and his old wife, looked with positive suspicion at Alyosha. "He hasn't slept here for the last three nights. Maybe he has gone away," the old man said in answer to Alyosha's persistent inquiries. Alyosha saw that he was answering in accordance with instructions. When he asked whether he were not at Grushenka's or in hiding at Foma's (Alyosha spoke so freely on purpose), all three looked at him in alarm. "They are fond of him, they are doing their best for him," thought Alyosha. "That's good." At last he found the house in Lake Street. It was a decrepit little house, sunk on one side, with three windows looking into the street, and with a muddy yard, in the middle of which stood a solitary cow. He crossed the yard and found the door opening into the passage. On the left of the passage lived the old woman of the house with her old daughter. Both seemed to be deaf. In answer to his repeated inquiry for the captain, one of them at last understood that he was asking for their lodgers, and pointed to a door across the passage. The captain's lodging turned out to be a simple cottage room. Alyosha had his hand on the iron latch to open the door, when he was struck by the strange hush within. Yet he knew from Katerina Ivanovna's words that the man had a family. "Either they are all asleep or perhaps they have heard me coming and are waiting for me to open the door. I'd better knock first," and he knocked. An answer came, but not at once, after an interval of perhaps ten seconds. "Who's there?" shouted some one in a loud and very angry voice. Then Alyosha opened the door and crossed the threshold. He found himself in a regular peasant's room. Though it was large, it was cumbered up with domestic belongings of all sorts, and there were several people in it. On the left was a large Russian stove. From the stove to the window on the left was a string running across the room, and on it there were rags hanging. There was a bedstead against the wall on each side, right and left, covered with knitted quilts. On the one on the left was a pyramid of four print-covered pillows, each smaller than the one beneath. On the other there was only one very small pillow. The opposite corner was screened off by a curtain or a sheet hung on a string. Behind this curtain could be seen a bed made up on a bench and a chair. The rough square table of plain wood had been moved into the middle window. The three windows, which consisted each of four tiny greenish mildewy panes, gave little light, and were close shut, so that the room was not very light and rather stuffy. On the table was a frying-pan with the remains of some fried eggs, a half-eaten piece of bread, and a small bottle with a few drops of vodka. A woman of genteel appearance, wearing a cotton gown, was sitting on a chair by the bed on the left. Her face was thin and yellow, and her sunken cheeks betrayed at the first glance that she was ill. But what struck Alyosha most was the expression in the poor woman's eyes--a look of surprised inquiry and yet of haughty pride. And while he was talking to her husband, her big brown eyes moved from one speaker to the other with the same haughty and questioning expression. Beside her at the window stood a young girl, rather plain, with scanty reddish hair, poorly but very neatly dressed. She looked disdainfully at Alyosha as he came in. Beside the other bed was sitting another female figure. She was a very sad sight, a young girl of about twenty, but hunchback and crippled "with withered legs," as Alyosha was told afterwards. Her crutches stood in the corner close by. The strikingly beautiful and gentle eyes of this poor girl looked with mild serenity at Alyosha. A man of forty-five was sitting at the table, finishing the fried eggs. He was spare, small and weakly built. He had reddish hair and a scanty light-colored beard, very much like a wisp of tow (this comparison and the phrase "a wisp of tow" flashed at once into Alyosha's mind for some reason, he remembered it afterwards). It was obviously this gentleman who had shouted to him, as there was no other man in the room. But when Alyosha went in, he leapt up from the bench on which he was sitting, and, hastily wiping his mouth with a ragged napkin, darted up to Alyosha. "It's a monk come to beg for the monastery. A nice place to come to!" the girl standing in the left corner said aloud. The man spun round instantly towards her and answered her in an excited and breaking voice: "No, Varvara, you are wrong. Allow me to ask," he turned again to Alyosha, "what has brought you to--our retreat?" Alyosha looked attentively at him. It was the first time he had seen him. There was something angular, flurried and irritable about him. Though he had obviously just been drinking, he was not drunk. There was extraordinary impudence in his expression, and yet, strange to say, at the same time there was fear. He looked like a man who had long been kept in subjection and had submitted to it, and now had suddenly turned and was trying to assert himself. Or, better still, like a man who wants dreadfully to hit you but is horribly afraid you will hit him. In his words and in the intonation of his shrill voice there was a sort of crazy humor, at times spiteful and at times cringing, and continually shifting from one tone to another. The question about "our retreat" he had asked as it were quivering all over, rolling his eyes, and skipping up so close to Alyosha that he instinctively drew back a step. He was dressed in a very shabby dark cotton coat, patched and spotted. He wore checked trousers of an extremely light color, long out of fashion, and of very thin material. They were so crumpled and so short that he looked as though he had grown out of them like a boy. "I am Alexey Karamazov," Alyosha began in reply. "I quite understand that, sir," the gentleman snapped out at once to assure him that he knew who he was already. "I am Captain Snegiryov, sir, but I am still desirous to know precisely what has led you--" "Oh, I've come for nothing special. I wanted to have a word with you--if only you allow me." "In that case, here is a chair, sir; kindly be seated. That's what they used to say in the old comedies, 'kindly be seated,' " and with a rapid gesture he seized an empty chair (it was a rough wooden chair, not upholstered) and set it for him almost in the middle of the room; then, taking another similar chair for himself, he sat down facing Alyosha, so close to him that their knees almost touched. "Nikolay Ilyitch Snegiryov, sir, formerly a captain in the Russian infantry, put to shame for his vices, but still a captain. Though I might not be one now for the way I talk; for the last half of my life I've learnt to say 'sir.' It's a word you use when you've come down in the world." "That's very true," smiled Alyosha. "But is it used involuntarily or on purpose?" "As God's above, it's involuntary, and I usen't to use it! I didn't use the word 'sir' all my life, but as soon as I sank into low water I began to say 'sir.' It's the work of a higher power. I see you are interested in contemporary questions, but how can I have excited your curiosity, living as I do in surroundings impossible for the exercise of hospitality?" "I've come--about that business." "About what business?" the captain interrupted impatiently. "About your meeting with my brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch," Alyosha blurted out awkwardly. "What meeting, sir? You don't mean that meeting? About my 'wisp of tow,' then?" He moved closer so that his knees positively knocked against Alyosha. His lips were strangely compressed like a thread. "What wisp of tow?" muttered Alyosha. "He is come to complain of me, father!" cried a voice familiar to Alyosha--the voice of the schoolboy--from behind the curtain. "I bit his finger just now." The curtain was pulled, and Alyosha saw his assailant lying on a little bed made up on the bench and the chair in the corner under the ikons. The boy lay covered by his coat and an old wadded quilt. He was evidently unwell, and, judging by his glittering eyes, he was in a fever. He looked at Alyosha without fear, as though he felt he was at home and could not be touched. "What! Did he bite your finger?" The captain jumped up from his chair. "Was it your finger he bit?" "Yes. He was throwing stones with other schoolboys. There were six of them against him alone. I went up to him, and he threw a stone at me and then another at my head. I asked him what I had done to him. And then he rushed at me and bit my finger badly, I don't know why." "I'll thrash him, sir, at once--this minute!" The captain jumped up from his seat. "But I am not complaining at all, I am simply telling you ... I don't want him to be thrashed. Besides, he seems to be ill." "And do you suppose I'd thrash him? That I'd take my Ilusha and thrash him before you for your satisfaction? Would you like it done at once, sir?" said the captain, suddenly turning to Alyosha, as though he were going to attack him. "I am sorry about your finger, sir; but instead of thrashing Ilusha, would you like me to chop off my four fingers with this knife here before your eyes to satisfy your just wrath? I should think four fingers would be enough to satisfy your thirst for vengeance. You won't ask for the fifth one too?" He stopped short with a catch in his throat. Every feature in his face was twitching and working; he looked extremely defiant. He was in a sort of frenzy. "I think I understand it all now," said Alyosha gently and sorrowfully, still keeping his seat. "So your boy is a good boy, he loves his father, and he attacked me as the brother of your assailant.... Now I understand it," he repeated thoughtfully. "But my brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch regrets his action, I know that, and if only it is possible for him to come to you, or better still, to meet you in that same place, he will ask your forgiveness before every one--if you wish it." "After pulling out my beard, you mean, he will ask my forgiveness? And he thinks that will be a satisfactory finish, doesn't he?" "Oh, no! On the contrary, he will do anything you like and in any way you like." "So if I were to ask his highness to go down on his knees before me in that very tavern--'The Metropolis' it's called--or in the market-place, he would do it?" "Yes, he would even go down on his knees." "You've pierced me to the heart, sir. Touched me to tears and pierced me to the heart! I am only too sensible of your brother's generosity. Allow me to introduce my family, my two daughters and my son--my litter. If I die, who will care for them, and while I live who but they will care for a wretch like me? That's a great thing the Lord has ordained for every man of my sort, sir. For there must be some one able to love even a man like me." "Ah, that's perfectly true!" exclaimed Alyosha. "Oh, do leave off playing the fool! Some idiot comes in, and you put us to shame!" cried the girl by the window, suddenly turning to her father with a disdainful and contemptuous air. "Wait a little, Varvara!" cried her father, speaking peremptorily but looking at her quite approvingly. "That's her character," he said, addressing Alyosha again. "And in all nature there was naught That could find favor in his eyes-- or rather in the feminine: that could find favor in her eyes. But now let me present you to my wife, Arina Petrovna. She is crippled, she is forty- three; she can move, but very little. She is of humble origin. Arina Petrovna, compose your countenance. This is Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov. Get up, Alexey Fyodorovitch." He took him by the hand and with unexpected force pulled him up. "You must stand up to be introduced to a lady. It's not the Karamazov, mamma, who ... h'm ... etcetera, but his brother, radiant with modest virtues. Come, Arina Petrovna, come, mamma, first your hand to be kissed." And he kissed his wife's hand respectfully and even tenderly. The girl at the window turned her back indignantly on the scene; an expression of extraordinary cordiality came over the haughtily inquiring face of the woman. "Good morning! Sit down, Mr. Tchernomazov," she said. "Karamazov, mamma, Karamazov. We are of humble origin," he whispered again. "Well, Karamazov, or whatever it is, but I always think of Tchernomazov.... Sit down. Why has he pulled you up? He calls me crippled, but I am not, only my legs are swollen like barrels, and I am shriveled up myself. Once I used to be so fat, but now it's as though I had swallowed a needle." "We are of humble origin," the captain muttered again. "Oh, father, father!" the hunchback girl, who had till then been silent on her chair, said suddenly, and she hid her eyes in her handkerchief. "Buffoon!" blurted out the girl at the window. "Have you heard our news?" said the mother, pointing at her daughters. "It's like clouds coming over; the clouds pass and we have music again. When we were with the army, we used to have many such guests. I don't mean to make any comparisons; every one to their taste. The deacon's wife used to come then and say, 'Alexandr Alexandrovitch is a man of the noblest heart, but Nastasya Petrovna,' she would say, 'is of the brood of hell.' 'Well,' I said, 'that's a matter of taste; but you are a little spitfire.' 'And you want keeping in your place,' says she. 'You black sword,' said I, 'who asked you to teach me?' 'But my breath,' says she, 'is clean, and yours is unclean.' 'You ask all the officers whether my breath is unclean.' And ever since then I had it in my mind. Not long ago I was sitting here as I am now, when I saw that very general come in who came here for Easter, and I asked him: 'Your Excellency,' said I, 'can a lady's breath be unpleasant?' 'Yes,' he answered; 'you ought to open a window- pane or open the door, for the air is not fresh here.' And they all go on like that! And what is my breath to them? The dead smell worse still! 'I won't spoil the air,' said I, 'I'll order some slippers and go away.' My darlings, don't blame your own mother! Nikolay Ilyitch, how is it I can't please you? There's only Ilusha who comes home from school and loves me. Yesterday he brought me an apple. Forgive your own mother--forgive a poor lonely creature! Why has my breath become unpleasant to you?" And the poor mad woman broke into sobs, and tears streamed down her cheeks. The captain rushed up to her. "Mamma, mamma, my dear, give over! You are not lonely. Every one loves you, every one adores you." He began kissing both her hands again and tenderly stroking her face; taking the dinner-napkin, he began wiping away her tears. Alyosha fancied that he too had tears in his eyes. "There, you see, you hear?" he turned with a sort of fury to Alyosha, pointing to the poor imbecile. "I see and hear," muttered Alyosha. "Father, father, how can you--with him! Let him alone!" cried the boy, sitting up in his bed and gazing at his father with glowing eyes. "Do give over fooling, showing off your silly antics which never lead to anything!" shouted Varvara, stamping her foot with passion. "Your anger is quite just this time, Varvara, and I'll make haste to satisfy you. Come, put on your cap, Alexey Fyodorovitch, and I'll put on mine. We will go out. I have a word to say to you in earnest, but not within these walls. This girl sitting here is my daughter Nina; I forgot to introduce her to you. She is a heavenly angel incarnate ... who has flown down to us mortals,... if you can understand." "There he is shaking all over, as though he is in convulsions!" Varvara went on indignantly. "And she there stamping her foot at me and calling me a fool just now, she is a heavenly angel incarnate too, and she has good reason to call me so. Come along, Alexey Fyodorovitch, we must make an end." And, snatching Alyosha's hand, he drew him out of the room into the street. Chapter VII. And In The Open Air "The air is fresh, but in my apartment it is not so in any sense of the word. Let us walk slowly, sir. I should be glad of your kind interest." "I too have something important to say to you," observed Alyosha, "only I don't know how to begin." "To be sure you must have business with me. You would never have looked in upon me without some object. Unless you come simply to complain of the boy, and that's hardly likely. And, by the way, about the boy: I could not explain to you in there, but here I will describe that scene to you. My tow was thicker a week ago--I mean my beard. That's the nickname they give to my beard, the schoolboys most of all. Well, your brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch was pulling me by my beard, I'd done nothing, he was in a towering rage and happened to come upon me. He dragged me out of the tavern into the market-place; at that moment the boys were coming out of school, and with them Ilusha. As soon as he saw me in such a state he rushed up to me. 'Father,' he cried, 'father!' He caught hold of me, hugged me, tried to pull me away, crying to my assailant, 'Let go, let go, it's my father, forgive him!'--yes, he actually cried 'forgive him.' He clutched at that hand, that very hand, in his little hands and kissed it.... I remember his little face at that moment, I haven't forgotten it and I never shall!" "I swear," cried Alyosha, "that my brother will express his most deep and sincere regret, even if he has to go down on his knees in that same market-place.... I'll make him or he is no brother of mine!" "Aha, then it's only a suggestion! And it does not come from him but simply from the generosity of your own warm heart. You should have said so. No, in that case allow me to tell you of your brother's highly chivalrous soldierly generosity, for he did give expression to it at the time. He left off dragging me by my beard and released me: 'You are an officer,' he said, 'and I am an officer, if you can find a decent man to be your second send me your challenge. I will give satisfaction, though you are a scoundrel.' That's what he said. A chivalrous spirit indeed! I retired with Ilusha, and that scene is a family record imprinted for ever on Ilusha's soul. No, it's not for us to claim the privileges of noblemen. Judge for yourself. You've just been in our mansion, what did you see there? Three ladies, one a cripple and weak-minded, another a cripple and hunchback and the third not crippled but far too clever. She is a student, dying to get back to Petersburg, to work for the emancipation of the Russian woman on the banks of the Neva. I won't speak of Ilusha, he is only nine. I am alone in the world, and if I die, what will become of all of them? I simply ask you that. And if I challenge him and he kills me on the spot, what then? What will become of them? And worse still, if he doesn't kill me but only cripples me: I couldn't work, but I should still be a mouth to feed. Who would feed it and who would feed them all? Must I take Ilusha from school and send him to beg in the streets? That's what it means for me to challenge him to a duel. It's silly talk and nothing else." "He will beg your forgiveness, he will bow down at your feet in the middle of the market-place," cried Alyosha again, with glowing eyes. "I did think of prosecuting him," the captain went on, "but look in our code, could I get much compensation for a personal injury? And then Agrafena Alexandrovna(3) sent for me and shouted at me: 'Don't dare to dream of it! If you proceed against him, I'll publish it to all the world that he beat you for your dishonesty, and then you will be prosecuted.' I call God to witness whose was the dishonesty and by whose commands I acted, wasn't it by her own and Fyodor Pavlovitch's? 'And what's more,' she went on, 'I'll dismiss you for good and you'll never earn another penny from me. I'll speak to my merchant too' (that's what she calls her old man) 'and he will dismiss you!' And if he dismisses me, what can I earn then from any one? Those two are all I have to look to, for your Fyodor Pavlovitch has not only given over employing me, for another reason, but he means to make use of papers I've signed to go to law against me. And so I kept quiet, and you have seen our retreat. But now let me ask you: did Ilusha hurt your finger much? I didn't like to go into it in our mansion before him." "Yes, very much, and he was in a great fury. He was avenging you on me as a Karamazov, I see that now. But if only you had seen how he was throwing stones at his school-fellows! It's very dangerous. They might kill him. They are children and stupid. A stone may be thrown and break somebody's head." "That's just what has happened. He has been bruised by a stone to-day. Not on the head but on the chest, just above the heart. He came home crying and groaning and now he is ill." "And you know he attacks them first. He is bitter against them on your account. They say he stabbed a boy called Krassotkin with a pen-knife not long ago." "I've heard about that too, it's dangerous. Krassotkin is an official here, we may hear more about it." "I would advise you," Alyosha went on warmly, "not to send him to school at all for a time till he is calmer ... and his anger is passed." "Anger!" the captain repeated, "that's just what it is. He is a little creature, but it's a mighty anger. You don't know all, sir. Let me tell you more. Since that incident all the boys have been teasing him about the 'wisp of tow.' Schoolboys are a merciless race, individually they are angels, but together, especially in schools, they are often merciless. Their teasing has stirred up a gallant spirit in Ilusha. An ordinary boy, a weak son, would have submitted, have felt ashamed of his father, sir, but he stood up for his father against them all. For his father and for truth and justice. For what he suffered when he kissed your brother's hand and cried to him 'Forgive father, forgive him,'--that only God knows--and I, his father. For our children--not your children, but ours--the children of the poor gentlemen looked down upon by every one--know what justice means, sir, even at nine years old. How should the rich know? They don't explore such depths once in their lives. But at that moment in the square when he kissed his hand, at that moment my Ilusha had grasped all that justice means. That truth entered into him and crushed him for ever, sir," the captain said hotly again with a sort of frenzy, and he struck his right fist against his left palm as though he wanted to show how "the truth" crushed Ilusha. "That very day, sir, he fell ill with fever and was delirious all night. All that day he hardly said a word to me, but I noticed he kept watching me from the corner, though he turned to the window and pretended to be learning his lessons. But I could see his mind was not on his lessons. Next day I got drunk to forget my troubles, sinful man as I am, and I don't remember much. Mamma began crying, too--I am very fond of mamma--well, I spent my last penny drowning my troubles. Don't despise me for that, sir, in Russia men who drink are the best. The best men amongst us are the greatest drunkards. I lay down and I don't remember about Ilusha, though all that day the boys had been jeering at him at school. 'Wisp of tow,' they shouted, 'your father was pulled out of the tavern by his wisp of tow, you ran by and begged forgiveness.' " "On the third day when he came back from school, I saw he looked pale and wretched. 'What is it?' I asked. He wouldn't answer. Well, there's no talking in our mansion without mamma and the girls taking part in it. What's more, the girls had heard about it the very first day. Varvara had begun snarling. 'You fools and buffoons, can you ever do anything rational?' 'Quite so,' I said, 'can we ever do anything rational?' For the time I turned it off like that. So in the evening I took the boy out for a walk, for you must know we go for a walk every evening, always the same way, along which we are going now--from our gate to that great stone which lies alone in the road under the hurdle, which marks the beginning of the town pasture. A beautiful and lonely spot, sir. Ilusha and I walked along hand in hand as usual. He has a little hand, his fingers are thin and cold--he suffers with his chest, you know. 'Father,' said he, 'father!' 'Well?' said I. I saw his eyes flashing. 'Father, how he treated you then!' 'It can't be helped, Ilusha,' I said. 'Don't forgive him, father, don't forgive him! At school they say that he has paid you ten roubles for it.' 'No, Ilusha,' said I, 'I would not take money from him for anything.' Then he began trembling all over, took my hand in both his and kissed it again. 'Father,' he said, 'father, challenge him to a duel, at school they say you are a coward and won't challenge him, and that you'll accept ten roubles from him.' 'I can't challenge him to a duel, Ilusha,' I answered. And I told briefly what I've just told you. He listened. 'Father,' he said, 'anyway don't forgive it. When I grow up I'll call him out myself and kill him.' His eyes shone and glowed. And of course I am his father, and I had to put in a word: 'It's a sin to kill,' I said, 'even in a duel.' 'Father,' he said, 'when I grow up, I'll knock him down, knock the sword out of his hand, I'll fall on him, wave my sword over him and say: "I could kill you, but I forgive you, so there!" ' You see what the workings of his little mind have been during these two days; he must have been planning that vengeance all day, and raving about it at night. "But he began to come home from school badly beaten, I found out about it the day before yesterday, and you are right, I won't send him to that school any more. I heard that he was standing up against all the class alone and defying them all, that his heart was full of resentment, of bitterness--I was alarmed about him. We went for another walk. 'Father,' he asked, 'are the rich people stronger than any one else on earth?' 'Yes, Ilusha,' I said, 'there are no people on earth stronger than the rich.' 'Father,' he said, 'I will get rich, I will become an officer and conquer everybody. The Tsar will reward me, I will come back here and then no one will dare--' Then he was silent and his lips still kept trembling. 'Father,' he said, 'what a horrid town this is.' 'Yes, Ilusha,' I said, 'it isn't a very nice town.' 'Father, let us move into another town, a nice one,' he said, 'where people don't know about us.' 'We will move, we will, Ilusha,' said I, 'only I must save up for it.' I was glad to be able to turn his mind from painful thoughts, and we began to dream of how we would move to another town, how we would buy a horse and cart. 'We will put mamma and your sisters inside, we will cover them up and we'll walk, you shall have a lift now and then, and I'll walk beside, for we must take care of our horse, we can't all ride. That's how we'll go.' He was enchanted at that, most of all at the thought of having a horse and driving him. For of course a Russian boy is born among horses. We chattered a long while. Thank God, I thought, I have diverted his mind and comforted him. "That was the day before yesterday, in the evening, but last night everything was changed. He had gone to school in the morning, he came back depressed, terribly depressed. In the evening I took him by the hand and we went for a walk; he would not talk. There was a wind blowing and no sun, and a feeling of autumn; twilight was coming on. We walked along, both of us depressed. 'Well, my boy,' said I, 'how about our setting off on our travels?' I thought I might bring him back to our talk of the day before. He didn't answer, but I felt his fingers trembling in my hand. Ah, I thought, it's a bad job; there's something fresh. We had reached the stone where we are now. I sat down on the stone. And in the air there were lots of kites flapping and whirling. There were as many as thirty in sight. Of course, it's just the season for the kites. 'Look, Ilusha,' said I, 'it's time we got out our last year's kite again. I'll mend it, where have you put it away?' My boy made no answer. He looked away and turned sideways to me. And then a gust of wind blew up the sand. He suddenly fell on me, threw both his little arms round my neck and held me tight. You know, when children are silent and proud, and try to keep back their tears when they are in great trouble and suddenly break down, their tears fall in streams. With those warm streams of tears, he suddenly wetted my face. He sobbed and shook as though he were in convulsions, and squeezed up against me as I sat on the stone. 'Father,' he kept crying, 'dear father, how he insulted you!' And I sobbed too. We sat shaking in each other's arms. 'Ilusha,' I said to him, 'Ilusha darling.' No one saw us then. God alone saw us, I hope He will record it to my credit. You must thank your brother, Alexey Fyodorovitch. No, sir, I won't thrash my boy for your satisfaction." He had gone back to his original tone of resentful buffoonery. Alyosha felt though that he trusted him, and that if there had been some one else in his, Alyosha's place, the man would not have spoken so openly and would not have told what he had just told. This encouraged Alyosha, whose heart was trembling on the verge of tears. "Ah, how I would like to make friends with your boy!" he cried. "If you could arrange it--" "Certainly, sir," muttered the captain. "But now listen to something quite different!" Alyosha went on. "I have a message for you. That same brother of mine, Dmitri, has insulted his betrothed, too, a noble-hearted girl of whom you have probably heard. I have a right to tell you of her wrong; I ought to do so, in fact, for hearing of the insult done to you and learning all about your unfortunate position, she commissioned me at once--just now--to bring you this help from her--but only from her alone, not from Dmitri, who has abandoned her. Nor from me, his brother, nor from any one else, but from her, only from her! She entreats you to accept her help.... You have both been insulted by the same man. She thought of you only when she had just received a similar insult from him--similar in its cruelty, I mean. She comes like a sister to help a brother in misfortune.... She told me to persuade you to take these two hundred roubles from her, as from a sister, knowing that you are in such need. No one will know of it, it can give rise to no unjust slander. There are the two hundred roubles, and I swear you must take them unless--unless all men are to be enemies on earth! But there are brothers even on earth.... You have a generous heart ... you must see that, you must," and Alyosha held out two new rainbow-colored hundred-rouble notes. They were both standing at the time by the great stone close to the fence, and there was no one near. The notes seemed to produce a tremendous impression on the captain. He started, but at first only from astonishment. Such an outcome of their conversation was the last thing he expected. Nothing could have been farther from his dreams than help from any one--and such a sum! He took the notes, and for a minute he was almost unable to answer, quite a new expression came into his face. "That for me? So much money--two hundred roubles! Good heavens! Why, I haven't seen so much money for the last four years! Mercy on us! And she says she is a sister.... And is that the truth?" "I swear that all I told you is the truth," cried Alyosha. The captain flushed red. "Listen, my dear, listen. If I take it, I shan't be behaving like a scoundrel? In your eyes, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I shan't be a scoundrel? No, Alexey Fyodorovitch, listen, listen," he hurried, touching Alyosha with both his hands. "You are persuading me to take it, saying that it's a sister sends it, but inwardly, in your heart won't you feel contempt for me if I take it, eh?" "No, no, on my salvation I swear I shan't! And no one will ever know but me--I, you and she, and one other lady, her great friend." "Never mind the lady! Listen, Alexey Fyodorovitch, at a moment like this you must listen, for you can't understand what these two hundred roubles mean to me now." The poor fellow went on rising gradually into a sort of incoherent, almost wild enthusiasm. He was thrown off his balance and talked extremely fast, as though afraid he would not be allowed to say all he had to say. "Besides its being honestly acquired from a 'sister,' so highly respected and revered, do you know that now I can look after mamma and Nina, my hunchback angel daughter? Doctor Herzenstube came to me in the kindness of his heart and was examining them both for a whole hour. 'I can make nothing of it,' said he, but he prescribed a mineral water which is kept at a chemist's here. He said it would be sure to do her good, and he ordered baths, too, with some medicine in them. The mineral water costs thirty copecks, and she'd need to drink forty bottles perhaps; so I took the prescription and laid it on the shelf under the ikons, and there it lies. And he ordered hot baths for Nina with something dissolved in them, morning and evening. But how can we carry out such a cure in our mansion, without servants, without help, without a bath, and without water? Nina is rheumatic all over, I don't think I told you that. All her right side aches at night, she is in agony, and, would you believe it, the angel bears it without groaning for fear of waking us. We eat what we can get, and she'll only take the leavings, what you'd scarcely give to a dog. 'I am not worth it, I am taking it from you, I am a burden on you,' that's what her angel eyes try to express. We wait on her, but she doesn't like it. 'I am a useless cripple, no good to any one.' As though she were not worth it, when she is the saving of all of us with her angelic sweetness. Without her, without her gentle word it would be hell among us! She softens even Varvara. And don't judge Varvara harshly either, she is an angel too, she, too, has suffered wrong. She came to us for the summer, and she brought sixteen roubles she had earned by lessons and saved up, to go back with to Petersburg in September, that is now. But we took her money and lived on it, so now she has nothing to go back with. Though indeed she couldn't go back, for she has to work for us like a slave. She is like an overdriven horse with all of us on her back. She waits on us all, mends and washes, sweeps the floor, puts mamma to bed. And mamma is capricious and tearful and insane! And now I can get a servant with this money, you understand, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I can get medicines for the dear creatures, I can send my student to Petersburg, I can buy beef, I can feed them properly. Good Lord, but it's a dream!" Alyosha was delighted that he had brought him such happiness and that the poor fellow had consented to be made happy. "Stay, Alexey Fyodorovitch, stay," the captain began to talk with frenzied rapidity, carried away by a new day-dream. "Do you know that Ilusha and I will perhaps really carry out our dream. We will buy a horse and cart, a black horse, he insists on its being black, and we will set off as we pretended the other day. I have an old friend, a lawyer in K. province, and I heard through a trustworthy man that if I were to go he'd give me a place as clerk in his office, so, who knows, maybe he would. So I'd just put mamma and Nina in the cart, and Ilusha could drive, and I'd walk, I'd walk.... Why, if I only succeed in getting one debt paid that's owing me, I should have perhaps enough for that too!" "There would be enough!" cried Alyosha. "Katerina Ivanovna will send you as much more as you need, and you know, I have money too, take what you want, as you would from a brother, from a friend, you can give it back later.... (You'll get rich, you'll get rich!) And you know you couldn't have a better idea than to move to another province! It would be the saving of you, especially of your boy--and you ought to go quickly, before the winter, before the cold. You must write to us when you are there, and we will always be brothers.... No, it's not a dream!" Alyosha could have hugged him, he was so pleased. But glancing at him he stopped short. The man was standing with his neck outstretched and his lips protruding, with a pale and frenzied face. His lips were moving as though trying to articulate something; no sound came, but still his lips moved. It was uncanny. "What is it?" asked Alyosha, startled. "Alexey Fyodorovitch ... I ... you," muttered the captain, faltering, looking at him with a strange, wild, fixed stare, and an air of desperate resolution. At the same time there was a sort of grin on his lips. "I ... you, sir ... wouldn't you like me to show you a little trick I know?" he murmured, suddenly, in a firm rapid whisper, his voice no longer faltering. "What trick?" "A pretty trick," whispered the captain. His mouth was twisted on the left side, his left eye was screwed up. He still stared at Alyosha. "What is the matter? What trick?" Alyosha cried, now thoroughly alarmed. "Why, look," squealed the captain suddenly, and showing him the two notes which he had been holding by one corner between his thumb and forefinger during the conversation, he crumpled them up savagely and squeezed them tight in his right hand. "Do you see, do you see?" he shrieked, pale and infuriated. And suddenly flinging up his hand, he threw the crumpled notes on the sand. "Do you see?" he shrieked again, pointing to them. "Look there!" And with wild fury he began trampling them under his heel, gasping and exclaiming as he did so: "So much for your money! So much for your money! So much for your money! So much for your money!" Suddenly he darted back and drew himself up before Alyosha, and his whole figure expressed unutterable pride. "Tell those who sent you that the wisp of tow does not sell his honor," he cried, raising his arm in the air. Then he turned quickly and began to run; but he had not run five steps before he turned completely round and kissed his hand to Alyosha. He ran another five paces and then turned round for the last time. This time his face was not contorted with laughter, but quivering all over with tears. In a tearful, faltering, sobbing voice he cried: "What should I say to my boy if I took money from you for our shame?" And then he ran on without turning. Alyosha looked after him, inexpressibly grieved. Oh, he saw that till the very last moment the man had not known he would crumple up and fling away the notes. He did not turn back. Alyosha knew he would not. He would not follow him and call him back, he knew why. When he was out of sight, Alyosha picked up the two notes. They were very much crushed and crumpled, and had been pressed into the sand, but were uninjured and even rustled like new ones when Alyosha unfolded them and smoothed them out. After smoothing them out, he folded them up, put them in his pocket and went to Katerina Ivanovna to report on the success of her commission.

Book 4

https://web.archive.org/web/20210422052201/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-brothers-karamazov/study-guide/summary-book-4

Father Zossima is dying, and his devotees huddle around his bed. He tells them his theory of shared responsibility. A man is not responsible for his sins alone; he bears a portion of the burden for the sins of all other men. Alyosha is very upset at Father Zossima's condition, so he leaves. He knows that everyone expects a miracle when Zossima dies. Many think that Father Zossima is almost saint-like--except a few detractors such as Father Ferapont. Ferapont hates all the other elders, Father Zossima most of all. He advocates severe asceticism. He believes that the devil is at work in all things. Father Zossima asks to see Alyosha in his cell. He tells Alyosha that the boy's place is not in the monastery but alongside his brothers and father. They need his help more than the monastery does. When he goes back to town, Alyosha finds his father sitting by himself. Fyodor says he wants to live much longer. He says he needs money to make women sleep with him in his old age--thus he needs to be frugal in order to continue his lifestyle of debauchery. He vows that he will be a hedonist until he dies. Alyosha leaves and sees some schoolboys throwing rocks at a delicate nine-year-old boy, who throws rocks back and then runs away. Alyosha runs after the boy, fascinated about what would make a nine-year-old so angry. He finds the young boy, but the youngster will not answer Alyosha's questions. He eventually picks up a rock and hits Alyosha with it, bites his hand, and then runs away, leaving Alyosha confused. Alyosha goes to visit Katerina again, but he is surprised to find Ivan upstairs with her. He asks Madame Hohlakov for something for his bitten hand, and Lise comes to talk to him. She wants her letter back, telling him she wrote it as a prank. Alyosha says he does not have the letter, so he cannot give it back. Then he talks to Ivan and Katerina. Katerina tells Alyosha she will never leave Dmitri even if he wants Grushenka or marries her. She does not mind if her love goes unrequited, even though she understands the craziness of such a gesture. Alyosha cannot take this anymore, and he tells her that they clearly love each other and should follow their hearts, not their intellectualizations. Ivan says he loves Katerina but that she and Dmitri are more complementary. He is unhappy about this fact, but he is resigned to the fact that he will not be with the woman he loves. Ivan declares that he is leaving for Moscow, and he says his farewell. Katerina tells Alyosha about a certain Captain Snegiryov whom Dmitri has beaten. She feels very bad about this and takes pity on the man. She tells Alyosha that she wants to help him in some way and that she has two hundred rubles that she would like to give him as a token of her sympathy. She asks Alyosha to deliver this money to the man, and he accepts. Alyosha continues to be a messenger for others, proving his willingness to help, but acting without his own volition. He goes to visit the man, troubled about what has happened to him during the day. Captain Snegiryov lives in an old, dilapidated house with his wife and two daughters--one of whom is handicapped--and his son. His son Ilusha is the boy who bit Alyosha's hand. Ilusha immediately assumes that Alyosha is there to bemoan his injured hand. Alyosha suddenly realizes that this boy felt such rage against him because he is Dmitri's brother. Captain Snegiryov goes outside with Alyosha and tells him that Dmitri traumatized his poor son by beating him badly. He makes clear that his family is excessively poor, and Alyosha becomes very excited that he can help. He tells Captain Snegiryov that he came to give him money. The captain is overjoyed at first, telling Alyosha all the ways he can help his family with the money. But he changes his mind and suddenly throws the money on the ground, explaining that he cannot dishonor himself by accepting money from the brother of a man who has humiliated him; this would destroy his son. Alyosha takes the money and goes back to Katerina.

Alyosha encounters the two strongest father figures in his life at the beginning of this book. They both talk of old age, of dying, and of what Alyosha should do with himself. Father Zossima wants Alyosha to be with his family to help them through a difficult time, and Fyodor also wants Alyosha to leave the monastery and stay with him. This may be the only area where the two men agree. Father Zossima knows he does not have long to live, and, according to rumors and hypotheses of men like Rakitin, Fyodor is about to be murdered. The men have a parallel relationship regarding Alyosha, though they are quite different. Whereas Father Zossima is most concerned about his disciples and Alyosha as he nears his death, Fyodor talks mostly about himself. Zossima wants to make sure he has spread the word about living with love and understanding to as many people as he can before he passes; Fyodor is only concerned with sleeping with as many wenches as possible. Alyosha does not try to change Fyodor; he simply listens to him. Alyosha is passive in the way he tries to help everyone around him. He does not change anyone's behavior. Instead, he does their bidding, usually giving others messages for them, and he listens. He is loving and understanding, but he does not change the course of what they are doing. Just as he wants to be by Father Zossima's side as he lays dying, Alyosha is there for his brothers and father, talking with them and aiding them when they need assistance. Alyosha provides comfort and support without actively protecting those around him. While this is a service that is much needed, it may not prove to be enough to keep his family from disasters ahead. Alyosha encounters a boy, the first character who is of an even younger generation than the Karamazov brothers. The emphasis has been on the relationship between the older generation and the younger one, but this boy adds another generation to the mix. The boy has a strong sense of the connectedness of families. He feels responsible for his father's honor, and he believes that any relative of someone who has wronged someone should be treated with as much disdain as the person who has committed the offense. His father also makes a great financial sacrifice by not taking Katerina's money to gain his son's respect. This family sees little generational divide; the Snegiryovs see a family as one unit, and all its members are inextricable from each other. Alyosha treats Ilusha with interest and care, but the boy clearly does not appreciate the attention. Alyosha reaches out to him, and he does not try to punish the boy's violence; instead, he tries to understand his motives and feelings. Father Zossima tried to pass along salutary teachings to Alyosha, and now Alyosha is passing along those teachings to others, at least by example. Katerina is proving to be a very active character who tries to make things right. After her father's death, she made sure to find Dmitri and repay him for his loan. She also repaid him for his kindness by offering herself to him. She felt as if Captain Snegiryov had been wronged, and her instinct was to compensate him in some way. She actively tries to see justice done. She is also very kind. Earlier in the novel, it seemed as if she might try to gain a sort of karma by her actions. Even though she knew Dmitri was in love with another woman and had disgraced her, she vowed to stay by his side. This seemed less of an expression of her love for him and more of a gesture showing her fidelity and steadfastness. She seems to relish the obvious disparity between her actions and Dmitri's. The worse he is, the better she seems to be. Katerina's motivations continue to be mysterious. She may long for humiliation, or she wants to prove to the world that she is upstanding and honorable--or perhaps she simply is very loving. She trusts Alyosha very much, and she entreats him to help her often. Alyosha believes that she has good intentions, so he is very willing to help her. Captain Snegiryov is a living reminder of the damage that can be done from living a reckless, profligate life. Dmitri not only hurts his conscience if he sins; he hurts those around him. He also reminds the reader what abject poverty existed in Russia in the 19th century. The fact that 200 rubles is a large sum to him puts the 3,000 rubles Dmitri spent with Grushenka into new perspective. Dmitri is obsessed with money, and not having his 3,000-ruble inheritance drives him to rage and violence. Dmitri acts as though this money is essential to his life, but he is far from the poverty in which the captain and his family live. The quarrel over Dmitri's inheritance now seems like a battle characterized by greed and privilege. They are concerned with impressing women, and 3,000 rubles is an amount that will allow them to continue their courting. To a family like the Snegiryovs, however, 3,000 rubles would provide a great deal of food and medicine. They could repair their pathetic house and alleviate their misery. Captain Snegiryov refuses the money that could help his family because honor and dignity mean more to him than his or his family's material situation. These circumstances show that money remains of great importance in this novel.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/67.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_12_part_5.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 10.chapter 5

book 10, chapter 5

{"name": "book 10, Chapter 5", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section13/", "summary": "At Ilyusha's Bedside Alyosha and Kolya go inside, where Kolya impresses Ilyusha's mother by bowing to her. The pale and bedridden Ilyusha is thrilled to see Kolya, but all the boys around the bed are disappointed that he was unable to bring Zuchka. Kolya mocks Ilyusha about Zuchka, asking how any dog could possibly have survived eating a pin for an appetizer. Then, he calls for Perezvon, and when Perezvon runs into the room, Ilyusha cries out that it is Zuchka. Kolya did find Zuchka, and then gave the dog a different name so that no one would spoil his surprise for Ilyusha. Katerina, still guilty over Dmitri's beating of Ilyusha's father, has summoned a doctor from Moscow to look after the boy, and when he arrives, Ilyusha's guests are forced to leave", "analysis": ""}

Chapter V. By Ilusha's Bedside The room inhabited by the family of the retired captain Snegiryov is already familiar to the reader. It was close and crowded at that moment with a number of visitors. Several boys were sitting with Ilusha, and though all of them, like Smurov, were prepared to deny that it was Alyosha who had brought them and reconciled them with Ilusha, it was really the fact. All the art he had used had been to take them, one by one, to Ilusha, without "sheepish sentimentality," appearing to do so casually and without design. It was a great consolation to Ilusha in his suffering. He was greatly touched by seeing the almost tender affection and sympathy shown him by these boys, who had been his enemies. Krassotkin was the only one missing and his absence was a heavy load on Ilusha's heart. Perhaps the bitterest of all his bitter memories was his stabbing Krassotkin, who had been his one friend and protector. Clever little Smurov, who was the first to make it up with Ilusha, thought it was so. But when Smurov hinted to Krassotkin that Alyosha wanted to come and see him about something, the latter cut him short, bidding Smurov tell "Karamazov" at once that he knew best what to do, that he wanted no one's advice, and that, if he went to see Ilusha, he would choose his own time for he had "his own reasons." That was a fortnight before this Sunday. That was why Alyosha had not been to see him, as he had meant to. But though he waited, he sent Smurov to him twice again. Both times Krassotkin met him with a curt, impatient refusal, sending Alyosha a message not to bother him any more, that if he came himself, he, Krassotkin, would not go to Ilusha at all. Up to the very last day, Smurov did not know that Kolya meant to go to Ilusha that morning, and only the evening before, as he parted from Smurov, Kolya abruptly told him to wait at home for him next morning, for he would go with him to the Snegiryovs', but warned him on no account to say he was coming, as he wanted to drop in casually. Smurov obeyed. Smurov's fancy that Kolya would bring back the lost dog was based on the words Kolya had dropped that "they must be asses not to find the dog, if it was alive." When Smurov, waiting for an opportunity, timidly hinted at his guess about the dog, Krassotkin flew into a violent rage. "I'm not such an ass as to go hunting about the town for other people's dogs when I've got a dog of my own! And how can you imagine a dog could be alive after swallowing a pin? Sheepish sentimentality, that's what it is!" For the last fortnight Ilusha had not left his little bed under the ikons in the corner. He had not been to school since the day he met Alyosha and bit his finger. He was taken ill the same day, though for a month afterwards he was sometimes able to get up and walk about the room and passage. But latterly he had become so weak that he could not move without help from his father. His father was terribly concerned about him. He even gave up drinking and was almost crazy with terror that his boy would die. And often, especially after leading him round the room on his arm and putting him back to bed, he would run to a dark corner in the passage and, leaning his head against the wall, he would break into paroxysms of violent weeping, stifling his sobs that they might not be heard by Ilusha. Returning to the room, he would usually begin doing something to amuse and comfort his precious boy; he would tell him stories, funny anecdotes, or would mimic comic people he had happened to meet, even imitate the howls and cries of animals. But Ilusha could not bear to see his father fooling and playing the buffoon. Though the boy tried not to show how he disliked it, he saw with an aching heart that his father was an object of contempt, and he was continually haunted by the memory of the "wisp of tow" and that "terrible day." Nina, Ilusha's gentle, crippled sister, did not like her father's buffoonery either (Varvara had been gone for some time past to Petersburg to study at the university). But the half-imbecile mother was greatly diverted and laughed heartily when her husband began capering about or performing something. It was the only way she could be amused; all the rest of the time she was grumbling and complaining that now every one had forgotten her, that no one treated her with respect, that she was slighted, and so on. But during the last few days she had completely changed. She began looking constantly at Ilusha's bed in the corner and seemed lost in thought. She was more silent, quieter, and, if she cried, she cried quietly so as not to be heard. The captain noticed the change in her with mournful perplexity. The boys' visits at first only angered her, but later on their merry shouts and stories began to divert her, and at last she liked them so much that, if the boys had given up coming, she would have felt dreary without them. When the children told some story or played a game, she laughed and clapped her hands. She called some of them to her and kissed them. She was particularly fond of Smurov. As for the captain, the presence in his room of the children, who came to cheer up Ilusha, filled his heart from the first with ecstatic joy. He even hoped that Ilusha would now get over his depression, and that that would hasten his recovery. In spite of his alarm about Ilusha, he had not, till lately, felt one minute's doubt of his boy's ultimate recovery. He met his little visitors with homage, waited upon them hand and foot; he was ready to be their horse and even began letting them ride on his back, but Ilusha did not like the game and it was given up. He began buying little things for them, gingerbread and nuts, gave them tea and cut them sandwiches. It must be noted that all this time he had plenty of money. He had taken the two hundred roubles from Katerina Ivanovna just as Alyosha had predicted he would. And afterwards Katerina Ivanovna, learning more about their circumstances and Ilusha's illness, visited them herself, made the acquaintance of the family, and succeeded in fascinating the half- imbecile mother. Since then she had been lavish in helping them, and the captain, terror-stricken at the thought that his boy might be dying, forgot his pride and humbly accepted her assistance. All this time Doctor Herzenstube, who was called in by Katerina Ivanovna, came punctually every other day, but little was gained by his visits and he dosed the invalid mercilessly. But on that Sunday morning a new doctor was expected, who had come from Moscow, where he had a great reputation. Katerina Ivanovna had sent for him from Moscow at great expense, not expressly for Ilusha, but for another object of which more will be said in its place hereafter. But, as he had come, she had asked him to see Ilusha as well, and the captain had been told to expect him. He hadn't the slightest idea that Kolya Krassotkin was coming, though he had long wished for a visit from the boy for whom Ilusha was fretting. At the moment when Krassotkin opened the door and came into the room, the captain and all the boys were round Ilusha's bed, looking at a tiny mastiff pup, which had only been born the day before, though the captain had bespoken it a week ago to comfort and amuse Ilusha, who was still fretting over the lost and probably dead Zhutchka. Ilusha, who had heard three days before that he was to be presented with a puppy, not an ordinary puppy, but a pedigree mastiff (a very important point, of course), tried from delicacy of feeling to pretend that he was pleased. But his father and the boys could not help seeing that the puppy only served to recall to his little heart the thought of the unhappy dog he had killed. The puppy lay beside him feebly moving and he, smiling sadly, stroked it with his thin, pale, wasted hand. Clearly he liked the puppy, but ... it wasn't Zhutchka; if he could have had Zhutchka and the puppy, too, then he would have been completely happy. "Krassotkin!" cried one of the boys suddenly. He was the first to see him come in. Krassotkin's entrance made a general sensation; the boys moved away and stood on each side of the bed, so that he could get a full view of Ilusha. The captain ran eagerly to meet Kolya. "Please come in ... you are welcome!" he said hurriedly. "Ilusha, Mr. Krassotkin has come to see you!" But Krassotkin, shaking hands with him hurriedly, instantly showed his complete knowledge of the manners of good society. He turned first to the captain's wife sitting in her arm-chair, who was very ill-humored at the moment, and was grumbling that the boys stood between her and Ilusha's bed and did not let her see the new puppy. With the greatest courtesy he made her a bow, scraping his foot, and turning to Nina, he made her, as the only other lady present, a similar bow. This polite behavior made an extremely favorable impression on the deranged lady. "There, you can see at once he is a young man that has been well brought up," she commented aloud, throwing up her hands; "but as for our other visitors they come in one on the top of another." "How do you mean, mamma, one on the top of another, how is that?" muttered the captain affectionately, though a little anxious on her account. "That's how they ride in. They get on each other's shoulders in the passage and prance in like that on a respectable family. Strange sort of visitors!" "But who's come in like that, mamma?" "Why, that boy came in riding on that one's back and this one on that one's." Kolya was already by Ilusha's bedside. The sick boy turned visibly paler. He raised himself in the bed and looked intently at Kolya. Kolya had not seen his little friend for two months, and he was overwhelmed at the sight of him. He had never imagined that he would see such a wasted, yellow face, such enormous, feverishly glowing eyes and such thin little hands. He saw, with grieved surprise, Ilusha's rapid, hard breathing and dry lips. He stepped close to him, held out his hand, and almost overwhelmed, he said: "Well, old man ... how are you?" But his voice failed him, he couldn't achieve an appearance of ease; his face suddenly twitched and the corners of his mouth quivered. Ilusha smiled a pitiful little smile, still unable to utter a word. Something moved Kolya to raise his hand and pass it over Ilusha's hair. "Never mind!" he murmured softly to him to cheer him up, or perhaps not knowing why he said it. For a minute they were silent again. "Hallo, so you've got a new puppy?" Kolya said suddenly, in a most callous voice. "Ye--es," answered Ilusha in a long whisper, gasping for breath. "A black nose, that means he'll be fierce, a good house-dog," Kolya observed gravely and stolidly, as if the only thing he cared about was the puppy and its black nose. But in reality he still had to do his utmost to control his feelings not to burst out crying like a child, and do what he would he could not control it. "When it grows up, you'll have to keep it on the chain, I'm sure." "He'll be a huge dog!" cried one of the boys. "Of course he will," "a mastiff," "large," "like this," "as big as a calf," shouted several voices. "As big as a calf, as a real calf," chimed in the captain. "I got one like that on purpose, one of the fiercest breed, and his parents are huge and very fierce, they stand as high as this from the floor.... Sit down here, on Ilusha's bed, or here on the bench. You are welcome, we've been hoping to see you a long time.... You were so kind as to come with Alexey Fyodorovitch?" Krassotkin sat on the edge of the bed, at Ilusha's feet. Though he had perhaps prepared a free-and-easy opening for the conversation on his way, now he completely lost the thread of it. "No ... I came with Perezvon. I've got a dog now, called Perezvon. A Slavonic name. He's out there ... if I whistle, he'll run in. I've brought a dog, too," he said, addressing Ilusha all at once. "Do you remember Zhutchka, old man?" he suddenly fired the question at him. Ilusha's little face quivered. He looked with an agonized expression at Kolya. Alyosha, standing at the door, frowned and signed to Kolya not to speak of Zhutchka, but he did not or would not notice. "Where ... is Zhutchka?" Ilusha asked in a broken voice. "Oh, well, my boy, your Zhutchka's lost and done for!" Ilusha did not speak, but he fixed an intent gaze once more on Kolya. Alyosha, catching Kolya's eye, signed to him vigorously again, but he turned away his eyes pretending not to have noticed. "It must have run away and died somewhere. It must have died after a meal like that," Kolya pronounced pitilessly, though he seemed a little breathless. "But I've got a dog, Perezvon ... A Slavonic name.... I've brought him to show you." "I don't want him!" said Ilusha suddenly. "No, no, you really must see him ... it will amuse you. I brought him on purpose.... He's the same sort of shaggy dog.... You allow me to call in my dog, madam?" He suddenly addressed Madame Snegiryov, with inexplicable excitement in his manner. "I don't want him, I don't want him!" cried Ilusha, with a mournful break in his voice. There was a reproachful light in his eyes. "You'd better," the captain started up from the chest by the wall on which he had just sat down, "you'd better ... another time," he muttered, but Kolya could not be restrained. He hurriedly shouted to Smurov, "Open the door," and as soon as it was open, he blew his whistle. Perezvon dashed headlong into the room. "Jump, Perezvon, beg! Beg!" shouted Kolya, jumping up, and the dog stood erect on its hind-legs by Ilusha's bedside. What followed was a surprise to every one: Ilusha started, lurched violently forward, bent over Perezvon and gazed at him, faint with suspense. "It's ... Zhutchka!" he cried suddenly, in a voice breaking with joy and suffering. "And who did you think it was?" Krassotkin shouted with all his might, in a ringing, happy voice, and bending down he seized the dog and lifted him up to Ilusha. "Look, old man, you see, blind of one eye and the left ear is torn, just the marks you described to me. It was by that I found him. I found him directly. He did not belong to any one!" he explained, turning quickly to the captain, to his wife, to Alyosha and then again to Ilusha. "He used to live in the Fedotovs' back-yard. Though he made his home there, they did not feed him. He was a stray dog that had run away from the village ... I found him.... You see, old man, he couldn't have swallowed what you gave him. If he had, he must have died, he must have! So he must have spat it out, since he is alive. You did not see him do it. But the pin pricked his tongue, that is why he squealed. He ran away squealing and you thought he'd swallowed it. He might well squeal, because the skin of dogs' mouths is so tender ... tenderer than in men, much tenderer!" Kolya cried impetuously, his face glowing and radiant with delight. Ilusha could not speak. White as a sheet, he gazed open-mouthed at Kolya, with his great eyes almost starting out of his head. And if Krassotkin, who had no suspicion of it, had known what a disastrous and fatal effect such a moment might have on the sick child's health, nothing would have induced him to play such a trick on him. But Alyosha was perhaps the only person in the room who realized it. As for the captain he behaved like a small child. "Zhutchka! It's Zhutchka!" he cried in a blissful voice, "Ilusha, this is Zhutchka, your Zhutchka! Mamma, this is Zhutchka!" He was almost weeping. "And I never guessed!" cried Smurov regretfully. "Bravo, Krassotkin! I said he'd find the dog and here he's found him." "Here he's found him!" another boy repeated gleefully. "Krassotkin's a brick!" cried a third voice. "He's a brick, he's a brick!" cried the other boys, and they began clapping. "Wait, wait," Krassotkin did his utmost to shout above them all. "I'll tell you how it happened, that's the whole point. I found him, I took him home and hid him at once. I kept him locked up at home and did not show him to any one till to-day. Only Smurov has known for the last fortnight, but I assured him this dog was called Perezvon and he did not guess. And meanwhile I taught the dog all sorts of tricks. You should only see all the things he can do! I trained him so as to bring you a well-trained dog, in good condition, old man, so as to be able to say to you, 'See, old man, what a fine dog your Zhutchka is now!' Haven't you a bit of meat? He'll show you a trick that will make you die with laughing. A piece of meat, haven't you got any?" The captain ran across the passage to the landlady, where their cooking was done. Not to lose precious time, Kolya, in desperate haste, shouted to Perezvon, "Dead!" And the dog immediately turned round and lay on his back with its four paws in the air. The boys laughed. Ilusha looked on with the same suffering smile, but the person most delighted with the dog's performance was "mamma." She laughed at the dog and began snapping her fingers and calling it, "Perezvon, Perezvon!" "Nothing will make him get up, nothing!" Kolya cried triumphantly, proud of his success. "He won't move for all the shouting in the world, but if I call to him, he'll jump up in a minute. Ici, Perezvon!" The dog leapt up and bounded about, whining with delight. The captain ran back with a piece of cooked beef. "Is it hot?" Kolya inquired hurriedly, with a business-like air, taking the meat. "Dogs don't like hot things. No, it's all right. Look, everybody, look, Ilusha, look, old man; why aren't you looking? He does not look at him, now I've brought him." The new trick consisted in making the dog stand motionless with his nose out and putting a tempting morsel of meat just on his nose. The luckless dog had to stand without moving, with the meat on his nose, as long as his master chose to keep him, without a movement, perhaps for half an hour. But he kept Perezvon only for a brief moment. "Paid for!" cried Kolya, and the meat passed in a flash from the dog's nose to his mouth. The audience, of course, expressed enthusiasm and surprise. "Can you really have put off coming all this time simply to train the dog?" exclaimed Alyosha, with an involuntary note of reproach in his voice. "Simply for that!" answered Kolya, with perfect simplicity. "I wanted to show him in all his glory." "Perezvon! Perezvon," called Ilusha suddenly, snapping his thin fingers and beckoning to the dog. "What is it? Let him jump up on the bed! _Ici_, Perezvon!" Kolya slapped the bed and Perezvon darted up by Ilusha. The boy threw both arms round his head and Perezvon instantly licked his cheek. Ilusha crept close to him, stretched himself out in bed and hid his face in the dog's shaggy coat. "Dear, dear!" kept exclaiming the captain. Kolya sat down again on the edge of the bed. "Ilusha, I can show you another trick. I've brought you a little cannon. You remember, I told you about it before and you said how much you'd like to see it. Well, here, I've brought it to you." And Kolya hurriedly pulled out of his satchel the little bronze cannon. He hurried, because he was happy himself. Another time he would have waited till the sensation made by Perezvon had passed off, now he hurried on regardless of all consideration. "You are all happy now," he felt, "so here's something to make you happier!" He was perfectly enchanted himself. "I've been coveting this thing for a long while; it's for you, old man, it's for you. It belonged to Morozov, it was no use to him, he had it from his brother. I swopped a book from father's book-case for it, _A Kinsman of Mahomet or Salutary Folly_, a scandalous book published in Moscow a hundred years ago, before they had any censorship. And Morozov has a taste for such things. He was grateful to me, too...." Kolya held the cannon in his hand so that all could see and admire it. Ilusha raised himself, and, with his right arm still round the dog, he gazed enchanted at the toy. The sensation was even greater when Kolya announced that he had gunpowder too, and that it could be fired off at once "if it won't alarm the ladies." "Mamma" immediately asked to look at the toy closer and her request was granted. She was much pleased with the little bronze cannon on wheels and began rolling it to and fro on her lap. She readily gave permission for the cannon to be fired, without any idea of what she had been asked. Kolya showed the powder and the shot. The captain, as a military man, undertook to load it, putting in a minute quantity of powder. He asked that the shot might be put off till another time. The cannon was put on the floor, aiming towards an empty part of the room, three grains of powder were thrust into the touch-hole and a match was put to it. A magnificent explosion followed. Mamma was startled, but at once laughed with delight. The boys gazed in speechless triumph. But the captain, looking at Ilusha, was more enchanted than any of them. Kolya picked up the cannon and immediately presented it to Ilusha, together with the powder and the shot. "I got it for you, for you! I've been keeping it for you a long time," he repeated once more in his delight. "Oh, give it to me! No, give me the cannon!" mamma began begging like a little child. Her face showed a piteous fear that she would not get it. Kolya was disconcerted. The captain fidgeted uneasily. "Mamma, mamma," he ran to her, "the cannon's yours, of course, but let Ilusha have it, because it's a present to him, but it's just as good as yours. Ilusha will always let you play with it; it shall belong to both of you, both of you." "No, I don't want it to belong to both of us, I want it to be mine altogether, not Ilusha's," persisted mamma, on the point of tears. "Take it, mother, here, keep it!" Ilusha cried. "Krassotkin, may I give it to my mother?" he turned to Krassotkin with an imploring face, as though he were afraid he might be offended at his giving his present to some one else. "Of course you may," Krassotkin assented heartily, and, taking the cannon from Ilusha, he handed it himself to mamma with a polite bow. She was so touched that she cried. "Ilusha, darling, he's the one who loves his mamma!" she said tenderly, and at once began wheeling the cannon to and fro on her lap again. "Mamma, let me kiss your hand." The captain darted up to her at once and did so. "And I never saw such a charming fellow as this nice boy," said the grateful lady, pointing to Krassotkin. "And I'll bring you as much powder as you like, Ilusha. We make the powder ourselves now. Borovikov found out how it's made--twenty-four parts of saltpeter, ten of sulphur and six of birchwood charcoal. It's all pounded together, mixed into a paste with water and rubbed through a tammy sieve--that's how it's done." "Smurov told me about your powder, only father says it's not real gunpowder," responded Ilusha. "Not real?" Kolya flushed. "It burns. I don't know, of course." "No, I didn't mean that," put in the captain with a guilty face. "I only said that real powder is not made like that, but that's nothing, it can be made so." "I don't know, you know best. We lighted some in a pomatum pot, it burned splendidly, it all burnt away leaving only a tiny ash. But that was only the paste, and if you rub it through ... but of course you know best, I don't know.... And Bulkin's father thrashed him on account of our powder, did you hear?" he turned to Ilusha. "Yes," answered Ilusha. He listened to Kolya with immense interest and enjoyment. "We had prepared a whole bottle of it and he used to keep it under his bed. His father saw it. He said it might explode, and thrashed him on the spot. He was going to make a complaint against me to the masters. He is not allowed to go about with me now, no one is allowed to go about with me now. Smurov is not allowed to either, I've got a bad name with every one. They say I'm a 'desperate character,' " Kolya smiled scornfully. "It all began from what happened on the railway." "Ah, we've heard of that exploit of yours, too," cried the captain. "How could you lie still on the line? Is it possible you weren't the least afraid, lying there under the train? Weren't you frightened?" The captain was abject in his flattery of Kolya. "N--not particularly," answered Kolya carelessly. "What's blasted my reputation more than anything here was that cursed goose," he said, turning again to Ilusha. But though he assumed an unconcerned air as he talked, he still could not control himself and was continually missing the note he tried to keep up. "Ah! I heard about the goose!" Ilusha laughed, beaming all over. "They told me, but I didn't understand. Did they really take you to the court?" "The most stupid, trivial affair, they made a mountain of a molehill as they always do," Kolya began carelessly. "I was walking through the market-place here one day, just when they'd driven in the geese. I stopped and looked at them. All at once a fellow, who is an errand-boy at Plotnikov's now, looked at me and said, 'What are you looking at the geese for?' I looked at him; he was a stupid, moon-faced fellow of twenty. I am always on the side of the peasantry, you know. I like talking to the peasants.... We've dropped behind the peasants--that's an axiom. I believe you are laughing, Karamazov?" "No, Heaven forbid, I am listening," said Alyosha with a most good-natured air, and the sensitive Kolya was immediately reassured. "My theory, Karamazov, is clear and simple," he hurried on again, looking pleased. "I believe in the people and am always glad to give them their due, but I am not for spoiling them, that is a _sine qua non_ ... But I was telling you about the goose. So I turned to the fool and answered, 'I am wondering what the goose thinks about.' He looked at me quite stupidly, 'And what does the goose think about?' he asked. 'Do you see that cart full of oats?' I said. 'The oats are dropping out of the sack, and the goose has put its neck right under the wheel to gobble them up--do you see?' 'I see that quite well,' he said. 'Well,' said I, 'if that cart were to move on a little, would it break the goose's neck or not?' 'It'd be sure to break it,' and he grinned all over his face, highly delighted. 'Come on, then,' said I, 'let's try.' 'Let's,' he said. And it did not take us long to arrange: he stood at the bridle without being noticed, and I stood on one side to direct the goose. And the owner wasn't looking, he was talking to some one, so I had nothing to do, the goose thrust its head in after the oats of itself, under the cart, just under the wheel. I winked at the lad, he tugged at the bridle, and crack. The goose's neck was broken in half. And, as luck would have it, all the peasants saw us at that moment and they kicked up a shindy at once. 'You did that on purpose!' 'No, not on purpose.' 'Yes, you did, on purpose!' Well, they shouted, 'Take him to the justice of the peace!' They took me, too. 'You were there, too,' they said, 'you helped, you're known all over the market!' And, for some reason, I really am known all over the market," Kolya added conceitedly. "We all went off to the justice's, they brought the goose, too. The fellow was crying in a great funk, simply blubbering like a woman. And the farmer kept shouting that you could kill any number of geese like that. Well, of course, there were witnesses. The justice of the peace settled it in a minute, that the farmer was to be paid a rouble for the goose, and the fellow to have the goose. And he was warned not to play such pranks again. And the fellow kept blubbering like a woman. 'It wasn't me,' he said, 'it was he egged me on,' and he pointed to me. I answered with the utmost composure that I hadn't egged him on, that I simply stated the general proposition, had spoken hypothetically. The justice of the peace smiled and was vexed with himself at once for having smiled. 'I'll complain to your masters of you, so that for the future you mayn't waste your time on such general propositions, instead of sitting at your books and learning your lessons.' He didn't complain to the masters, that was a joke, but the matter was noised abroad and came to the ears of the masters. Their ears are long, you know! The classical master, Kolbasnikov, was particularly shocked about it, but Dardanelov got me off again. But Kolbasnikov is savage with every one now like a green ass. Did you know, Ilusha, he is just married, got a dowry of a thousand roubles, and his bride's a regular fright of the first rank and the last degree. The third-class fellows wrote an epigram on it: Astounding news has reached the class, Kolbasnikov has been an ass. And so on, awfully funny, I'll bring it to you later on. I say nothing against Dardanelov, he is a learned man, there's no doubt about it. I respect men like that and it's not because he stood up for me." "But you took him down about the founders of Troy!" Smurov put in suddenly, unmistakably proud of Krassotkin at such a moment. He was particularly pleased with the story of the goose. "Did you really take him down?" the captain inquired, in a flattering way. "On the question who founded Troy? We heard of it, Ilusha told me about it at the time." "He knows everything, father, he knows more than any of us!" put in Ilusha; "he only pretends to be like that, but really he is top in every subject...." Ilusha looked at Kolya with infinite happiness. "Oh, that's all nonsense about Troy, a trivial matter. I consider this an unimportant question," said Kolya with haughty humility. He had by now completely recovered his dignity, though he was still a little uneasy. He felt that he was greatly excited and that he had talked about the goose, for instance, with too little reserve, while Alyosha had looked serious and had not said a word all the time. And the vain boy began by degrees to have a rankling fear that Alyosha was silent because he despised him, and thought he was showing off before him. If he dared to think anything like that Kolya would-- "I regard the question as quite a trivial one," he rapped out again, proudly. "And I know who founded Troy," a boy, who had not spoken before, said suddenly, to the surprise of every one. He was silent and seemed to be shy. He was a pretty boy of about eleven, called Kartashov. He was sitting near the door. Kolya looked at him with dignified amazement. The fact was that the identity of the founders of Troy had become a secret for the whole school, a secret which could only be discovered by reading Smaragdov, and no one had Smaragdov but Kolya. One day, when Kolya's back was turned, Kartashov hastily opened Smaragdov, which lay among Kolya's books, and immediately lighted on the passage relating to the foundation of Troy. This was a good time ago, but he felt uneasy and could not bring himself to announce publicly that he too knew who had founded Troy, afraid of what might happen and of Krassotkin's somehow putting him to shame over it. But now he couldn't resist saying it. For weeks he had been longing to. "Well, who did found it?" asked Kolya, turning to him with haughty superciliousness. He saw from his face that he really did know and at once made up his mind how to take it. There was, so to speak, a discordant note in the general harmony. "Troy was founded by Teucer, Dardanus, Ilius and Tros," the boy rapped out at once, and in the same instant he blushed, blushed so, that it was painful to look at him. But the boys stared at him, stared at him for a whole minute, and then all the staring eyes turned at once and were fastened upon Kolya, who was still scanning the audacious boy with disdainful composure. "In what sense did they found it?" he deigned to comment at last. "And what is meant by founding a city or a state? What do they do? Did they go and each lay a brick, do you suppose?" There was laughter. The offending boy turned from pink to crimson. He was silent and on the point of tears. Kolya held him so for a minute. "Before you talk of a historical event like the foundation of a nationality, you must first understand what you mean by it," he admonished him in stern, incisive tones. "But I attach no consequence to these old wives' tales and I don't think much of universal history in general," he added carelessly, addressing the company generally. "Universal history?" the captain inquired, looking almost scared. "Yes, universal history! It's the study of the successive follies of mankind and nothing more. The only subjects I respect are mathematics and natural science," said Kolya. He was showing off and he stole a glance at Alyosha; his was the only opinion he was afraid of there. But Alyosha was still silent and still serious as before. If Alyosha had said a word it would have stopped him, but Alyosha was silent and "it might be the silence of contempt," and that finally irritated Kolya. "The classical languages, too ... they are simply madness, nothing more. You seem to disagree with me again, Karamazov?" "I don't agree," said Alyosha, with a faint smile. "The study of the classics, if you ask my opinion, is simply a police measure, that's simply why it has been introduced into our schools." By degrees Kolya began to get breathless again. "Latin and Greek were introduced because they are a bore and because they stupefy the intellect. It was dull before, so what could they do to make things duller? It was senseless enough before, so what could they do to make it more senseless? So they thought of Greek and Latin. That's my opinion, I hope I shall never change it," Kolya finished abruptly. His cheeks were flushed. "That's true," assented Smurov suddenly, in a ringing tone of conviction. He had listened attentively. "And yet he is first in Latin himself," cried one of the group of boys suddenly. "Yes, father, he says that and yet he is first in Latin," echoed Ilusha. "What of it?" Kolya thought fit to defend himself, though the praise was very sweet to him. "I am fagging away at Latin because I have to, because I promised my mother to pass my examination, and I think that whatever you do, it's worth doing it well. But in my soul I have a profound contempt for the classics and all that fraud.... You don't agree, Karamazov?" "Why 'fraud'?" Alyosha smiled again. "Well, all the classical authors have been translated into all languages, so it was not for the sake of studying the classics they introduced Latin, but solely as a police measure, to stupefy the intelligence. So what can one call it but a fraud?" "Why, who taught you all this?" cried Alyosha, surprised at last. "In the first place I am capable of thinking for myself without being taught. Besides, what I said just now about the classics being translated our teacher Kolbasnikov has said to the whole of the third class." "The doctor has come!" cried Nina, who had been silent till then. A carriage belonging to Madame Hohlakov drove up to the gate. The captain, who had been expecting the doctor all the morning, rushed headlong out to meet him. "Mamma" pulled herself together and assumed a dignified air. Alyosha went up to Ilusha and began setting his pillows straight. Nina, from her invalid chair, anxiously watched him putting the bed tidy. The boys hurriedly took leave. Some of them promised to come again in the evening. Kolya called Perezvon and the dog jumped off the bed. "I won't go away, I won't go away," Kolya said hastily to Ilusha. "I'll wait in the passage and come back when the doctor's gone, I'll come back with Perezvon." But by now the doctor had entered, an important-looking person with long, dark whiskers and a shiny, shaven chin, wearing a bearskin coat. As he crossed the threshold he stopped, taken aback; he probably fancied he had come to the wrong place. "How is this? Where am I?" he muttered, not removing his coat nor his peaked sealskin cap. The crowd, the poverty of the room, the washing hanging on a line in the corner, puzzled him. The captain, bent double, was bowing low before him. "It's here, sir, here, sir," he muttered cringingly; "it's here, you've come right, you were coming to us..." "Sne-gi-ryov?" the doctor said loudly and pompously. "Mr. Snegiryov--is that you?" "That's me, sir!" "Ah!" The doctor looked round the room with a squeamish air once more and threw off his coat, displaying to all eyes the grand decoration at his neck. The captain caught the fur coat in the air, and the doctor took off his cap. "Where is the patient?" he asked emphatically.

book 10, Chapter 5

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section13/

At Ilyusha's Bedside Alyosha and Kolya go inside, where Kolya impresses Ilyusha's mother by bowing to her. The pale and bedridden Ilyusha is thrilled to see Kolya, but all the boys around the bed are disappointed that he was unable to bring Zuchka. Kolya mocks Ilyusha about Zuchka, asking how any dog could possibly have survived eating a pin for an appetizer. Then, he calls for Perezvon, and when Perezvon runs into the room, Ilyusha cries out that it is Zuchka. Kolya did find Zuchka, and then gave the dog a different name so that no one would spoil his surprise for Ilyusha. Katerina, still guilty over Dmitri's beating of Ilyusha's father, has summoned a doctor from Moscow to look after the boy, and when he arrives, Ilyusha's guests are forced to leave

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/44747-chapters/54.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Red and the Black/section_53_part_0.txt

The Red and the Black.part 2.chapter 24

part 2, chapter 24

{"name": "Part 2, Chapter 24", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20200920104425/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/red-and-the-black/summary/part-2-chapter-24", "summary": "While waiting to reconnoiter with the duke, Julien just hangs out and feels bad about his life. He knows he'll never be respected by the de La Mole family and never loved by Mathide. He feels like he's gotten nowhere in his life, despite how others might see it. While riding his horse one day, he runs into Prince Korasoff, his old buddy from his trip to England. He quickly realizes that if he acted more like Korasoff, Mathilde wouldn't have dumped him. Korasoff acts like he's totally better than everyone around him, and this is what Mathilde is looking for. Korasoff gives Julien tips to help him win back Mathilde. His main advice is for Julien to start paying a lot of attention to some other woman and to always do it in front of Mathilde. This will make her jealous. To make things easier, Korasoff gives Julien a stack of love letters for him to copy out and give to this new woman one by one. Korasoff promises that they'll win the woman's heart, making the defeat all the more bitter for Mathilde. Julien leaves to meet the duke again, feeling confident that he can follow Korasoff's instructions.", "analysis": ""}

CHAPTER LIV STRASBOURG Fascination! Love gives thee all his love, energy and all his power of suffering unhappiness. It is only his enchanting pleasures, his sweet delights, which are outside thy sphere. When I saw her sleep I was made to say "With all her angelic beauty and her sweet weaknesses she is absolutely mine! There she is, quite in my power, such as Heaven made her in its pity in order to ravish a man's heart."--_Ode of Schiller_. Julien was compelled to spend eight days in Strasbourg and tried to distract himself by thoughts of military glory and patriotic devotion. Was he in love then? he could not tell, he only felt in his tortured soul that Mathilde was the absolute mistress both of his happiness and of his imagination. He needed all the energy of his character to keep himself from sinking into despair. It was out of his power to think of anything unconnected with mademoiselle de la Mole. His ambition and his simple personal successes had formerly distracted him from the sentiments which madame de Renal had inspired. Mathilde was all-absorbing; she loomed large over his whole future. Julien saw failure in every phase of that future. This same individual whom we remember to have been so presumptuous and haughty at Verrieres, had fallen into an excess of grotesque modesty. Three days ago he would only have been too pleased to have killed the abbe Castanede, and now, at Strasbourg, if a child had picked a quarrel with him he would have thought the child was in the right. In thinking again about the adversaries and enemies whom he had met in his life he always thought that he, Julien, had been in the wrong. The fact was that the same powerful imagination which had formerly been continuously employed in painting a successful future in the most brilliant colours had now been transformed into his implacable enemy. The absolute solicitude of a traveller's life increased the ascendancy of this sinister imagination. What a boon a friend would have been! But Julien said to himself, "Is there a single heart which beats with affection for me? And even if I did have a friend, would not honour enjoin me to eternal silence?" He was riding gloomily in the outskirts of Kehl; it is a market town on the banks of the Rhine and immortalised by Desaix and Gouvion Saint-Cyr. A German peasant showed him the little brooks, roads and islands of the Rhine, which have acquired a name through the courage of these great generals. Julien was guiding his horse with his left hand, while he held unfolded in his right the superb map which adorns the _Memoirs of the Marshal Saint Cyr_. A merry exclamation made him lift his head. It was the Prince Korasoff, that London friend of his, who had initiated him some months before into the elementary rules of high fatuity. Faithful to his great art, Korasoff, who had just arrived at Strasbourg, had been one hour in Kehl and had never read a single line in his whole life about the siege of 1796, began to explain it all to Julien. The German peasant looked at him in astonishment; for he knew enough French to appreciate the enormous blunders which the prince was making. Julien was a thousand leagues away from the peasant's thoughts. He was looking in astonishment at the handsome young man and admiring his grace in sitting a horse. "What a lucky temperament," he said to himself, "and how his trousers suit him and how elegantly his hair is cut! Alas, if I had been like him, it might have been that she would not have come to dislike me after loving me for three days." When the prince had finished his siege of Kehl, he said to Julien, "You look like a Trappist, you are carrying to excess that principle of gravity which I enjoined upon you in London. A melancholy manner cannot be good form. What is wanted is an air of boredom. If you are melancholy, it is because you lack something, because you have failed in something." "That means showing one's own inferiority; if, on the other hand you are bored, it is only what has made an unsuccessful attempt to please you, which is inferior. So realise, my dear friend, the enormity of your mistake." Julien tossed a crown to the gaping peasant who was listening to them. "Good," said the prince, "that shows grace and a noble disdain, very good!" And he put his horse to the gallop. Full of a stupid admiration, Julien followed him. "Ah! if I have been like that, she would not have preferred Croisenois to me!" The more his reason was offended by the grotesque affectations of the prince the more he despised himself for not having them. It was impossible for self-disgust to be carried further. The prince still finding him distinctly melancholy, said to him as they re-entered Strasbourg, "Come, my dear fellow, have you lost all your money, or perhaps you are in love with some little actress. "The Russians copy French manners, but always at an interval of fifty years. They have now reached the age of Louis XV." These jests about love brought the tears to Julien's eyes. "Why should I not consult this charming man," he suddenly said to himself. "Well, yes, my dear friend," he said to the prince, "you see in me a man who is very much in love and jilted into the bargain. A charming woman who lives in a neighbouring town has left me stranded here after three passionate days, and the change kills me." Using fictitious names, he described to the prince Mathilde's conduct and character. "You need not finish," said Korasoff. "In order to give you confidence in your doctor, I will finish the story you have confided to me. This young woman's husband enjoys an enormous income, or even more probably, she belongs herself to the high nobility of the district. She must be proud about something." Julien nodded his head, he had no longer the courage to speak. "Very good," said the prince, "here are three fairly bitter pills that you will take without delay. "1. See madame ----. What is her name, any way?" "Madame de Dubois." "What a name!" said the prince bursting into laughter. "But forgive me, you find it sublime. Your tactics must be to see Madame de Dubois every day; above all do not appear to be cold and piqued. Remember the great principle of your century: be the opposite of what is expected. Be exactly as you were the week before you were honoured by her favours." "Ah! I was calm enough then," exclaimed Julien in despair, "I thought I was taking pity on her...." "The moth is burning itself at the candle," continued the prince using a metaphor as old as the world. "1. You will see her every day. "2. You will pay court to a woman in her own set, but without manifesting a passion, do you understand? I do not disguise from you that your role is difficult; you are playing a part, and if she realises you are playing it you are lost." "She has so much intelligence and I have so little, I shall be lost," said Julien sadly. "No, you are only more in love than I thought. Madame de Dubois is preoccupied with herself as are all women who have been favoured by heaven either with too much pedigree or too much money. She contemplates herself instead of contemplating you, consequently she does not know you. During the two or three fits of love into which she managed to work herself for your especial benefit, she saw in you the hero of her dreams, and not the man you really are. "But, deuce take it, this is elementary, my dear Sorel, are you an absolute novice? "Oddslife! Let us go into this shop. Look at that charming black cravat, one would say it was made by John Anderson of Burlington Street. Be kind enough to take it and throw far away that awful black cord which you are wearing round your neck." "And now," continued the prince as they came out of the shop of the first hosier of Strasbourg, "what is the society in which madame de Dubois lives? Great God, what a name, don't be angry, my dear Sorel, I can't help it.... Now, whom are you going to pay court to?" "To an absolute prude, the daughter of an immensely rich stocking-merchant. She has the finest eyes in the world and they please me infinitely; she doubtless holds the highest place in the society of the district, but in the midst of all her greatness she blushes and becomes positively confused if anyone starts talking about trade or shops. And, unfortunately, her father was one of the best known merchants in Strasbourg." "So," said the prince with a laugh, "you are sure that when one talks about trade your fair lady thinks about herself and not about you. This silly weakness is divine and extremely useful, it will prevent you from yielding to a single moment's folly when near her sparkling eyes. Success is assured." Julien was thinking of madame the marechale de Fervaques who often came to the Hotel de la Mole. She was a beautiful foreigner who had married the marechal a year before his death. The one object of her whole life seemed to be to make people forget that she was the daughter of a manufacturer. In order to cut some figure in Paris she had placed herself at the head of the party of piety. Julien sincerely admired the prince; what would he not have given to have possessed his affectations! The conversation between the two friends was interminable. Korasoff was delighted: No Frenchman had ever listened to him for so long. "So I have succeeded at last," said the prince to himself complacently, "in getting a proper hearing and that too through giving lessons to my master." "So we are quite agreed," he repeated to Julien for the tenth time. "When you talk to the young beauty, I mean the daughter of the Strasbourg stocking merchant in the presence of madame de Dubois, not a trace of passion. But on the other hand be ardently passionate when you write. Reading a well-written love-letter is a prude's supremest pleasure. It is a moment of relaxation. She leaves off posing and dares to listen to her own heart; consequently two letters a day." "Never, never," said Julien despondently, "I would rather be ground in a mortar than make up three phrases. I am a corpse, my dear fellow, hope nothing from me. Let me die by the road side." "And who is talking about making up phrases? I have got six volumes of copied-out love-letters in my bag. I have letters to suit every variation of feminine character, including the most highly virtuous. Did not Kalisky pay court at Richmond-on-the-Thames at three leagues from London, you know, to the prettiest Quakeress in the whole of England?" Julien was less unhappy when he left his friend at two o'clock in the morning. The prince summoned a copyist on the following day, and two days afterwards Julien was the possessor of fifty-three carefully numbered love-letters intended for the most sublime and the most melancholy virtue. "The reason why there is not fifty-four," said the prince "is because Kalisky allowed himself to be dismissed. But what does it matter to you, if you are badly treated by the stocking-merchant's daughter since you only wish to produce an impression upon madame de Dubois' heart." They went out riding every day, the prince was mad on Julien. Not knowing how else to manifest his sudden friendship, he finished up by offering him the hand of one of his cousins, a rich Moscow heiress; "and once married," he added, "my influence and that cross of yours will get you made a Colonel within two years." "But that cross was not given me by Napoleon, far from it." "What does it matter?" said the prince, "didn't he invent it. It is still the first in Europe by a long way." Julien was on the point of accepting; but his duty called him back to the great personage. When he left Korasoff he promised to write. He received the answer to the secret note which he had brought, and posted towards Paris; but he had scarcely been alone for two successive days before leaving France, and Mathilde seemed a worse punishment than death. "I will not marry the millions Korasoff offers me," he said to himself, "and I will follow his advice. "After all the art of seduction is his speciality. He has thought about nothing else except that alone for more than fifteen years, for he is now thirty. "One can't say that he lacks intelligence; he is subtle and cunning; enthusiasm and poetry are impossible in such a character. He is an attorney: an additional reason for his not making a mistake. "I must do it, I will pay court to madame de Fervaques. "It is very likely she will bore me a little, but I will look at her beautiful eyes which are so like those other eyes which have loved me more than anyone in the world. "She is a foreigner; she is a new character to observe. "I feel mad, and as though I were going to the devil. I must follow the advice of a friend and not trust myself."

Part 2, Chapter 24

https://web.archive.org/web/20200920104425/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/red-and-the-black/summary/part-2-chapter-24

While waiting to reconnoiter with the duke, Julien just hangs out and feels bad about his life. He knows he'll never be respected by the de La Mole family and never loved by Mathide. He feels like he's gotten nowhere in his life, despite how others might see it. While riding his horse one day, he runs into Prince Korasoff, his old buddy from his trip to England. He quickly realizes that if he acted more like Korasoff, Mathilde wouldn't have dumped him. Korasoff acts like he's totally better than everyone around him, and this is what Mathilde is looking for. Korasoff gives Julien tips to help him win back Mathilde. His main advice is for Julien to start paying a lot of attention to some other woman and to always do it in front of Mathilde. This will make her jealous. To make things easier, Korasoff gives Julien a stack of love letters for him to copy out and give to this new woman one by one. Korasoff promises that they'll win the woman's heart, making the defeat all the more bitter for Mathilde. Julien leaves to meet the duke again, feeling confident that he can follow Korasoff's instructions.

shmoop

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The Brothers Karamazov.book 5.chapter 5

book 5, chapter 5

{"name": "Book 5, Chapter 5", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-5-chapter-5", "summary": "Before Ivan dives into his poem, he gives Alyosha a little lecture on literary history. Ivan explains that in the 16th century - which is when the actions of his poem take place - poems and plays were written about holy figures - the Virgin Mary, Christ, angels, even god - coming down to earth and conversing with ordinary people. Ivan's own poem is set in 16th century Seville , at the height of the Spanish Inquisition. It's the day after a particularly bloody massacre where hundreds of heretics were burned at the stake. Christ decides to appear, but instead of making a grand entrance, he comes quietly and inconspicuously. He doesn't say anything, but he quietly performs miracles - raising a child from the dead, healing the blind - which pretty much gives him away. As Christ goes around wowing everyone with his miracles, the Grand Inquisitor, the guy in charge of all the heretic-burning, appears. He demands that Christ be arrested by the guard, and everyone is so frightened by him that they readily comply. Later that night, the Grand Inquisitor visits Christ in prison. He recognizes his prisoner as Christ, but, paradoxically for a self-described Catholic, refuses to listen to anything He has to say. At this point, Alyosha is extremely puzzled. Alyosha wonders whether the whole poem is supposed to be some kind of joke. Ivan says it's not, and continues on. The Grand Inquisitor, according to Ivan, berates Christ for rejecting Satan's three temptations back in the day when Christ was wandering the wilderness. Those three temptations, for those of you fuzzy on the New Testament, were: 1) offer everybody bread and they will follow you; 2) jump off a cliff to prove that you're the Son of God, and people will believe you; and 3) set yourself up as the ruler of the entire earth and use your power to compel people to obey you. According to Ivan's Grand Inquisitor, Christ rejected all of these temptations because he wanted man to freely follow him . But the Grand Inquisitor claims Christ got it all wrong, because man does not want to be free. Or rather, only a chosen few can endure the terrible gift of freedom; the majority prefer to be led around, told what to do, and essentially be treated like children. Some even choose to accept the gift of freedom, but because they are not strong or clever enough to know what to do with it, they end up setting up reason and science as gods instead. Here the Grand Inquisitor lets Christ in on his secret: he is on Satan's side. Out of his concern for mankind, he has deprived them of their freedom by accepting Satan's temptations, the temptations of miracle, mystery, and authority that Christ had rejected in the wilderness. But just because the Grand Inquisitor has all the power doesn't mean he's a happy man. He views his power as a horrible burden, which he has to endure because he happens to be one of the chosen few who accept the terrible gift of freedom. He has to lie to the majority in order to deprive them of their horrifying freedom, and this lie, this sin, makes him suffer. Alyosha finds Ivan's poem absurd, although he has trouble spelling out his objections coherently. He asks Ivan how the poem ends, and Ivan imagines that at the end of the scene, Christ gets up and kisses the Grand Inquisitor on his wrinkly old lips. The Grand Inquisitor then frees Christ and tells him never to return again. Alyosha doesn't understand how Ivan could possibly live with such a dismal view of the world. Ivan says he'll rely on the good old \"Karamazov baseness.\" Ivan then reproaches Alyosha for judging him so severely, and Alyosha bends over and kisses his brother. Ivan is immensely pleased by this gesture and takes his leave of Alyosha. Alyosha notices that Ivan is walking with a slight sway and that his right shoulder is lower than his left. He then rushes back to Zosima, who is still on his deathbed. Much later, Alyosha will wonder how he forgot about his brother Dmitri so quickly.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter V. The Grand Inquisitor "Even this must have a preface--that is, a literary preface," laughed Ivan, "and I am a poor hand at making one. You see, my action takes place in the sixteenth century, and at that time, as you probably learnt at school, it was customary in poetry to bring down heavenly powers on earth. Not to speak of Dante, in France, clerks, as well as the monks in the monasteries, used to give regular performances in which the Madonna, the saints, the angels, Christ, and God himself were brought on the stage. In those days it was done in all simplicity. In Victor Hugo's _Notre Dame de Paris_ an edifying and gratuitous spectacle was provided for the people in the Hotel de Ville of Paris in the reign of Louis XI. in honor of the birth of the dauphin. It was called _Le bon jugement de la tres sainte et gracieuse Vierge Marie_, and she appears herself on the stage and pronounces her _bon jugement_. Similar plays, chiefly from the Old Testament, were occasionally performed in Moscow too, up to the times of Peter the Great. But besides plays there were all sorts of legends and ballads scattered about the world, in which the saints and angels and all the powers of Heaven took part when required. In our monasteries the monks busied themselves in translating, copying, and even composing such poems--and even under the Tatars. There is, for instance, one such poem (of course, from the Greek), _The Wanderings of Our Lady through Hell_, with descriptions as bold as Dante's. Our Lady visits hell, and the Archangel Michael leads her through the torments. She sees the sinners and their punishment. There she sees among others one noteworthy set of sinners in a burning lake; some of them sink to the bottom of the lake so that they can't swim out, and 'these God forgets'--an expression of extraordinary depth and force. And so Our Lady, shocked and weeping, falls before the throne of God and begs for mercy for all in hell--for all she has seen there, indiscriminately. Her conversation with God is immensely interesting. She beseeches Him, she will not desist, and when God points to the hands and feet of her Son, nailed to the Cross, and asks, 'How can I forgive His tormentors?' she bids all the saints, all the martyrs, all the angels and archangels to fall down with her and pray for mercy on all without distinction. It ends by her winning from God a respite of suffering every year from Good Friday till Trinity Day, and the sinners at once raise a cry of thankfulness from hell, chanting, 'Thou art just, O Lord, in this judgment.' Well, my poem would have been of that kind if it had appeared at that time. He comes on the scene in my poem, but He says nothing, only appears and passes on. Fifteen centuries have passed since He promised to come in His glory, fifteen centuries since His prophet wrote, 'Behold, I come quickly'; 'Of that day and that hour knoweth no man, neither the Son, but the Father,' as He Himself predicted on earth. But humanity awaits him with the same faith and with the same love. Oh, with greater faith, for it is fifteen centuries since man has ceased to see signs from heaven. No signs from heaven come to-day To add to what the heart doth say. There was nothing left but faith in what the heart doth say. It is true there were many miracles in those days. There were saints who performed miraculous cures; some holy people, according to their biographies, were visited by the Queen of Heaven herself. But the devil did not slumber, and doubts were already arising among men of the truth of these miracles. And just then there appeared in the north of Germany a terrible new heresy. "A huge star like to a torch" (that is, to a church) "fell on the sources of the waters and they became bitter." These heretics began blasphemously denying miracles. But those who remained faithful were all the more ardent in their faith. The tears of humanity rose up to Him as before, awaited His coming, loved Him, hoped for Him, yearned to suffer and die for Him as before. And so many ages mankind had prayed with faith and fervor, "O Lord our God, hasten Thy coming," so many ages called upon Him, that in His infinite mercy He deigned to come down to His servants. Before that day He had come down, He had visited some holy men, martyrs and hermits, as is written in their lives. Among us, Tyutchev, with absolute faith in the truth of his words, bore witness that Bearing the Cross, in slavish dress, Weary and worn, the Heavenly King Our mother, Russia, came to bless, And through our land went wandering. And that certainly was so, I assure you. "And behold, He deigned to appear for a moment to the people, to the tortured, suffering people, sunk in iniquity, but loving Him like children. My story is laid in Spain, in Seville, in the most terrible time of the Inquisition, when fires were lighted every day to the glory of God, and 'in the splendid _auto da fe_ the wicked heretics were burnt.' Oh, of course, this was not the coming in which He will appear according to His promise at the end of time in all His heavenly glory, and which will be sudden 'as lightning flashing from east to west.' No, He visited His children only for a moment, and there where the flames were crackling round the heretics. In His infinite mercy He came once more among men in that human shape in which He walked among men for three years fifteen centuries ago. He came down to the 'hot pavements' of the southern town in which on the day before almost a hundred heretics had, _ad majorem gloriam Dei_, been burnt by the cardinal, the Grand Inquisitor, in a magnificent _auto da fe_, in the presence of the king, the court, the knights, the cardinals, the most charming ladies of the court, and the whole population of Seville. "He came softly, unobserved, and yet, strange to say, every one recognized Him. That might be one of the best passages in the poem. I mean, why they recognized Him. The people are irresistibly drawn to Him, they surround Him, they flock about Him, follow Him. He moves silently in their midst with a gentle smile of infinite compassion. The sun of love burns in His heart, light and power shine from His eyes, and their radiance, shed on the people, stirs their hearts with responsive love. He holds out His hands to them, blesses them, and a healing virtue comes from contact with Him, even with His garments. An old man in the crowd, blind from childhood, cries out, 'O Lord, heal me and I shall see Thee!' and, as it were, scales fall from his eyes and the blind man sees Him. The crowd weeps and kisses the earth under His feet. Children throw flowers before Him, sing, and cry hosannah. 'It is He--it is He!' all repeat. 'It must be He, it can be no one but Him!' He stops at the steps of the Seville cathedral at the moment when the weeping mourners are bringing in a little open white coffin. In it lies a child of seven, the only daughter of a prominent citizen. The dead child lies hidden in flowers. 'He will raise your child,' the crowd shouts to the weeping mother. The priest, coming to meet the coffin, looks perplexed, and frowns, but the mother of the dead child throws herself at His feet with a wail. 'If it is Thou, raise my child!' she cries, holding out her hands to Him. The procession halts, the coffin is laid on the steps at His feet. He looks with compassion, and His lips once more softly pronounce, 'Maiden, arise!' and the maiden arises. The little girl sits up in the coffin and looks round, smiling with wide- open wondering eyes, holding a bunch of white roses they had put in her hand. "There are cries, sobs, confusion among the people, and at that moment the cardinal himself, the Grand Inquisitor, passes by the cathedral. He is an old man, almost ninety, tall and erect, with a withered face and sunken eyes, in which there is still a gleam of light. He is not dressed in his gorgeous cardinal's robes, as he was the day before, when he was burning the enemies of the Roman Church--at this moment he is wearing his coarse, old, monk's cassock. At a distance behind him come his gloomy assistants and slaves and the 'holy guard.' He stops at the sight of the crowd and watches it from a distance. He sees everything; he sees them set the coffin down at His feet, sees the child rise up, and his face darkens. He knits his thick gray brows and his eyes gleam with a sinister fire. He holds out his finger and bids the guards take Him. And such is his power, so completely are the people cowed into submission and trembling obedience to him, that the crowd immediately makes way for the guards, and in the midst of deathlike silence they lay hands on Him and lead Him away. The crowd instantly bows down to the earth, like one man, before the old Inquisitor. He blesses the people in silence and passes on. The guards lead their prisoner to the close, gloomy vaulted prison in the ancient palace of the Holy Inquisition and shut Him in it. The day passes and is followed by the dark, burning, 'breathless' night of Seville. The air is 'fragrant with laurel and lemon.' In the pitch darkness the iron door of the prison is suddenly opened and the Grand Inquisitor himself comes in with a light in his hand. He is alone; the door is closed at once behind him. He stands in the doorway and for a minute or two gazes into His face. At last he goes up slowly, sets the light on the table and speaks. " 'Is it Thou? Thou?' but receiving no answer, he adds at once, 'Don't answer, be silent. What canst Thou say, indeed? I know too well what Thou wouldst say. And Thou hast no right to add anything to what Thou hadst said of old. Why, then, art Thou come to hinder us? For Thou hast come to hinder us, and Thou knowest that. But dost Thou know what will be to- morrow? I know not who Thou art and care not to know whether it is Thou or only a semblance of Him, but to-morrow I shall condemn Thee and burn Thee at the stake as the worst of heretics. And the very people who have to-day kissed Thy feet, to-morrow at the faintest sign from me will rush to heap up the embers of Thy fire. Knowest Thou that? Yes, maybe Thou knowest it,' he added with thoughtful penetration, never for a moment taking his eyes off the Prisoner." "I don't quite understand, Ivan. What does it mean?" Alyosha, who had been listening in silence, said with a smile. "Is it simply a wild fantasy, or a mistake on the part of the old man--some impossible _quiproquo_?" "Take it as the last," said Ivan, laughing, "if you are so corrupted by modern realism and can't stand anything fantastic. If you like it to be a case of mistaken identity, let it be so. It is true," he went on, laughing, "the old man was ninety, and he might well be crazy over his set idea. He might have been struck by the appearance of the Prisoner. It might, in fact, be simply his ravings, the delusion of an old man of ninety, over-excited by the _auto da fe_ of a hundred heretics the day before. But does it matter to us after all whether it was a mistake of identity or a wild fantasy? All that matters is that the old man should speak out, should speak openly of what he has thought in silence for ninety years." "And the Prisoner too is silent? Does He look at him and not say a word?" "That's inevitable in any case," Ivan laughed again. "The old man has told Him He hasn't the right to add anything to what He has said of old. One may say it is the most fundamental feature of Roman Catholicism, in my opinion at least. 'All has been given by Thee to the Pope,' they say, 'and all, therefore, is still in the Pope's hands, and there is no need for Thee to come now at all. Thou must not meddle for the time, at least.' That's how they speak and write too--the Jesuits, at any rate. I have read it myself in the works of their theologians. 'Hast Thou the right to reveal to us one of the mysteries of that world from which Thou hast come?' my old man asks Him, and answers the question for Him. 'No, Thou hast not; that Thou mayest not add to what has been said of old, and mayest not take from men the freedom which Thou didst exalt when Thou wast on earth. Whatsoever Thou revealest anew will encroach on men's freedom of faith; for it will be manifest as a miracle, and the freedom of their faith was dearer to Thee than anything in those days fifteen hundred years ago. Didst Thou not often say then, "I will make you free"? But now Thou hast seen these "free" men,' the old man adds suddenly, with a pensive smile. 'Yes, we've paid dearly for it,' he goes on, looking sternly at Him, 'but at last we have completed that work in Thy name. For fifteen centuries we have been wrestling with Thy freedom, but now it is ended and over for good. Dost Thou not believe that it's over for good? Thou lookest meekly at me and deignest not even to be wroth with me. But let me tell Thee that now, to-day, people are more persuaded than ever that they have perfect freedom, yet they have brought their freedom to us and laid it humbly at our feet. But that has been our doing. Was this what Thou didst? Was this Thy freedom?' " "I don't understand again," Alyosha broke in. "Is he ironical, is he jesting?" "Not a bit of it! He claims it as a merit for himself and his Church that at last they have vanquished freedom and have done so to make men happy. 'For now' (he is speaking of the Inquisition, of course) 'for the first time it has become possible to think of the happiness of men. Man was created a rebel; and how can rebels be happy? Thou wast warned,' he says to Him. 'Thou hast had no lack of admonitions and warnings, but Thou didst not listen to those warnings; Thou didst reject the only way by which men might be made happy. But, fortunately, departing Thou didst hand on the work to us. Thou hast promised, Thou hast established by Thy word, Thou hast given to us the right to bind and to unbind, and now, of course, Thou canst not think of taking it away. Why, then, hast Thou come to hinder us?' " "And what's the meaning of 'no lack of admonitions and warnings'?" asked Alyosha. "Why, that's the chief part of what the old man must say. " 'The wise and dread spirit, the spirit of self-destruction and non- existence,' the old man goes on, 'the great spirit talked with Thee in the wilderness, and we are told in the books that he "tempted" Thee. Is that so? And could anything truer be said than what he revealed to Thee in three questions and what Thou didst reject, and what in the books is called "the temptation"? And yet if there has ever been on earth a real stupendous miracle, it took place on that day, on the day of the three temptations. The statement of those three questions was itself the miracle. If it were possible to imagine simply for the sake of argument that those three questions of the dread spirit had perished utterly from the books, and that we had to restore them and to invent them anew, and to do so had gathered together all the wise men of the earth--rulers, chief priests, learned men, philosophers, poets--and had set them the task to invent three questions, such as would not only fit the occasion, but express in three words, three human phrases, the whole future history of the world and of humanity--dost Thou believe that all the wisdom of the earth united could have invented anything in depth and force equal to the three questions which were actually put to Thee then by the wise and mighty spirit in the wilderness? From those questions alone, from the miracle of their statement, we can see that we have here to do not with the fleeting human intelligence, but with the absolute and eternal. For in those three questions the whole subsequent history of mankind is, as it were, brought together into one whole, and foretold, and in them are united all the unsolved historical contradictions of human nature. At the time it could not be so clear, since the future was unknown; but now that fifteen hundred years have passed, we see that everything in those three questions was so justly divined and foretold, and has been so truly fulfilled, that nothing can be added to them or taken from them. " 'Judge Thyself who was right--Thou or he who questioned Thee then? Remember the first question; its meaning, in other words, was this: "Thou wouldst go into the world, and art going with empty hands, with some promise of freedom which men in their simplicity and their natural unruliness cannot even understand, which they fear and dread--for nothing has ever been more insupportable for a man and a human society than freedom. But seest Thou these stones in this parched and barren wilderness? Turn them into bread, and mankind will run after Thee like a flock of sheep, grateful and obedient, though for ever trembling, lest Thou withdraw Thy hand and deny them Thy bread." But Thou wouldst not deprive man of freedom and didst reject the offer, thinking, what is that freedom worth, if obedience is bought with bread? Thou didst reply that man lives not by bread alone. But dost Thou know that for the sake of that earthly bread the spirit of the earth will rise up against Thee and will strive with Thee and overcome Thee, and all will follow him, crying, "Who can compare with this beast? He has given us fire from heaven!" Dost Thou know that the ages will pass, and humanity will proclaim by the lips of their sages that there is no crime, and therefore no sin; there is only hunger? "Feed men, and then ask of them virtue!" that's what they'll write on the banner, which they will raise against Thee, and with which they will destroy Thy temple. Where Thy temple stood will rise a new building; the terrible tower of Babel will be built again, and though, like the one of old, it will not be finished, yet Thou mightest have prevented that new tower and have cut short the sufferings of men for a thousand years; for they will come back to us after a thousand years of agony with their tower. They will seek us again, hidden underground in the catacombs, for we shall be again persecuted and tortured. They will find us and cry to us, "Feed us, for those who have promised us fire from heaven haven't given it!" And then we shall finish building their tower, for he finishes the building who feeds them. And we alone shall feed them in Thy name, declaring falsely that it is in Thy name. Oh, never, never can they feed themselves without us! No science will give them bread so long as they remain free. In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet, and say to us, "Make us your slaves, but feed us." They will understand themselves, at last, that freedom and bread enough for all are inconceivable together, for never, never will they be able to share between them! They will be convinced, too, that they can never be free, for they are weak, vicious, worthless and rebellious. Thou didst promise them the bread of Heaven, but, I repeat again, can it compare with earthly bread in the eyes of the weak, ever sinful and ignoble race of man? And if for the sake of the bread of Heaven thousands shall follow Thee, what is to become of the millions and tens of thousands of millions of creatures who will not have the strength to forego the earthly bread for the sake of the heavenly? Or dost Thou care only for the tens of thousands of the great and strong, while the millions, numerous as the sands of the sea, who are weak but love Thee, must exist only for the sake of the great and strong? No, we care for the weak too. They are sinful and rebellious, but in the end they too will become obedient. They will marvel at us and look on us as gods, because we are ready to endure the freedom which they have found so dreadful and to rule over them--so awful it will seem to them to be free. But we shall tell them that we are Thy servants and rule them in Thy name. We shall deceive them again, for we will not let Thee come to us again. That deception will be our suffering, for we shall be forced to lie. " 'This is the significance of the first question in the wilderness, and this is what Thou hast rejected for the sake of that freedom which Thou hast exalted above everything. Yet in this question lies hid the great secret of this world. Choosing "bread," Thou wouldst have satisfied the universal and everlasting craving of humanity--to find some one to worship. So long as man remains free he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find some one to worship. But man seeks to worship what is established beyond dispute, so that all men would agree at once to worship it. For these pitiful creatures are concerned not only to find what one or the other can worship, but to find something that all would believe in and worship; what is essential is that all may be _together_ in it. This craving for _community_ of worship is the chief misery of every man individually and of all humanity from the beginning of time. For the sake of common worship they've slain each other with the sword. They have set up gods and challenged one another, "Put away your gods and come and worship ours, or we will kill you and your gods!" And so it will be to the end of the world, even when gods disappear from the earth; they will fall down before idols just the same. Thou didst know, Thou couldst not but have known, this fundamental secret of human nature, but Thou didst reject the one infallible banner which was offered Thee to make all men bow down to Thee alone--the banner of earthly bread; and Thou hast rejected it for the sake of freedom and the bread of Heaven. Behold what Thou didst further. And all again in the name of freedom! I tell Thee that man is tormented by no greater anxiety than to find some one quickly to whom he can hand over that gift of freedom with which the ill-fated creature is born. But only one who can appease their conscience can take over their freedom. In bread there was offered Thee an invincible banner; give bread, and man will worship thee, for nothing is more certain than bread. But if some one else gains possession of his conscience--oh! then he will cast away Thy bread and follow after him who has ensnared his conscience. In that Thou wast right. For the secret of man's being is not only to live but to have something to live for. Without a stable conception of the object of life, man would not consent to go on living, and would rather destroy himself than remain on earth, though he had bread in abundance. That is true. But what happened? Instead of taking men's freedom from them, Thou didst make it greater than ever! Didst Thou forget that man prefers peace, and even death, to freedom of choice in the knowledge of good and evil? Nothing is more seductive for man than his freedom of conscience, but nothing is a greater cause of suffering. And behold, instead of giving a firm foundation for setting the conscience of man at rest for ever, Thou didst choose all that is exceptional, vague and enigmatic; Thou didst choose what was utterly beyond the strength of men, acting as though Thou didst not love them at all--Thou who didst come to give Thy life for them! Instead of taking possession of men's freedom, Thou didst increase it, and burdened the spiritual kingdom of mankind with its sufferings for ever. Thou didst desire man's free love, that he should follow Thee freely, enticed and taken captive by Thee. In place of the rigid ancient law, man must hereafter with free heart decide for himself what is good and what is evil, having only Thy image before him as his guide. But didst Thou not know that he would at last reject even Thy image and Thy truth, if he is weighed down with the fearful burden of free choice? They will cry aloud at last that the truth is not in Thee, for they could not have been left in greater confusion and suffering than Thou hast caused, laying upon them so many cares and unanswerable problems. " 'So that, in truth, Thou didst Thyself lay the foundation for the destruction of Thy kingdom, and no one is more to blame for it. Yet what was offered Thee? There are three powers, three powers alone, able to conquer and to hold captive for ever the conscience of these impotent rebels for their happiness--those forces are miracle, mystery and authority. Thou hast rejected all three and hast set the example for doing so. When the wise and dread spirit set Thee on the pinnacle of the temple and said to Thee, "If Thou wouldst know whether Thou art the Son of God then cast Thyself down, for it is written: the angels shall hold him up lest he fall and bruise himself, and Thou shalt know then whether Thou art the Son of God and shalt prove then how great is Thy faith in Thy Father." But Thou didst refuse and wouldst not cast Thyself down. Oh, of course, Thou didst proudly and well, like God; but the weak, unruly race of men, are they gods? Oh, Thou didst know then that in taking one step, in making one movement to cast Thyself down, Thou wouldst be tempting God and have lost all Thy faith in Him, and wouldst have been dashed to pieces against that earth which Thou didst come to save. And the wise spirit that tempted Thee would have rejoiced. But I ask again, are there many like Thee? And couldst Thou believe for one moment that men, too, could face such a temptation? Is the nature of men such, that they can reject miracle, and at the great moments of their life, the moments of their deepest, most agonizing spiritual difficulties, cling only to the free verdict of the heart? Oh, Thou didst know that Thy deed would be recorded in books, would be handed down to remote times and the utmost ends of the earth, and Thou didst hope that man, following Thee, would cling to God and not ask for a miracle. But Thou didst not know that when man rejects miracle he rejects God too; for man seeks not so much God as the miraculous. And as man cannot bear to be without the miraculous, he will create new miracles of his own for himself, and will worship deeds of sorcery and witchcraft, though he might be a hundred times over a rebel, heretic and infidel. Thou didst not come down from the Cross when they shouted to Thee, mocking and reviling Thee, "Come down from the cross and we will believe that Thou art He." Thou didst not come down, for again Thou wouldst not enslave man by a miracle, and didst crave faith given freely, not based on miracle. Thou didst crave for free love and not the base raptures of the slave before the might that has overawed him for ever. But Thou didst think too highly of men therein, for they are slaves, of course, though rebellious by nature. Look round and judge; fifteen centuries have passed, look upon them. Whom hast Thou raised up to Thyself? I swear, man is weaker and baser by nature than Thou hast believed him! Can he, can he do what Thou didst? By showing him so much respect, Thou didst, as it were, cease to feel for him, for Thou didst ask far too much from him--Thou who hast loved him more than Thyself! Respecting him less, Thou wouldst have asked less of him. That would have been more like love, for his burden would have been lighter. He is weak and vile. What though he is everywhere now rebelling against our power, and proud of his rebellion? It is the pride of a child and a schoolboy. They are little children rioting and barring out the teacher at school. But their childish delight will end; it will cost them dear. They will cast down temples and drench the earth with blood. But they will see at last, the foolish children, that, though they are rebels, they are impotent rebels, unable to keep up their own rebellion. Bathed in their foolish tears, they will recognize at last that He who created them rebels must have meant to mock at them. They will say this in despair, and their utterance will be a blasphemy which will make them more unhappy still, for man's nature cannot bear blasphemy, and in the end always avenges it on itself. And so unrest, confusion and unhappiness--that is the present lot of man after Thou didst bear so much for their freedom! The great prophet tells in vision and in image, that he saw all those who took part in the first resurrection and that there were of each tribe twelve thousand. But if there were so many of them, they must have been not men but gods. They had borne Thy cross, they had endured scores of years in the barren, hungry wilderness, living upon locusts and roots--and Thou mayest indeed point with pride at those children of freedom, of free love, of free and splendid sacrifice for Thy name. But remember that they were only some thousands; and what of the rest? And how are the other weak ones to blame, because they could not endure what the strong have endured? How is the weak soul to blame that it is unable to receive such terrible gifts? Canst Thou have simply come to the elect and for the elect? But if so, it is a mystery and we cannot understand it. And if it is a mystery, we too have a right to preach a mystery, and to teach them that it's not the free judgment of their hearts, not love that matters, but a mystery which they must follow blindly, even against their conscience. So we have done. We have corrected Thy work and have founded it upon _miracle_, _mystery_ and _authority_. And men rejoiced that they were again led like sheep, and that the terrible gift that had brought them such suffering was, at last, lifted from their hearts. Were we right teaching them this? Speak! Did we not love mankind, so meekly acknowledging their feebleness, lovingly lightening their burden, and permitting their weak nature even sin with our sanction? Why hast Thou come now to hinder us? And why dost Thou look silently and searchingly at me with Thy mild eyes? Be angry. I don't want Thy love, for I love Thee not. And what use is it for me to hide anything from Thee? Don't I know to Whom I am speaking? All that I can say is known to Thee already. And is it for me to conceal from Thee our mystery? Perhaps it is Thy will to hear it from my lips. Listen, then. We are not working with Thee, but with _him_--that is our mystery. It's long--eight centuries--since we have been on _his_ side and not on Thine. Just eight centuries ago, we took from him what Thou didst reject with scorn, that last gift he offered Thee, showing Thee all the kingdoms of the earth. We took from him Rome and the sword of Caesar, and proclaimed ourselves sole rulers of the earth, though hitherto we have not been able to complete our work. But whose fault is that? Oh, the work is only beginning, but it has begun. It has long to await completion and the earth has yet much to suffer, but we shall triumph and shall be Caesars, and then we shall plan the universal happiness of man. But Thou mightest have taken even then the sword of Caesar. Why didst Thou reject that last gift? Hadst Thou accepted that last counsel of the mighty spirit, Thou wouldst have accomplished all that man seeks on earth--that is, some one to worship, some one to keep his conscience, and some means of uniting all in one unanimous and harmonious ant-heap, for the craving for universal unity is the third and last anguish of men. Mankind as a whole has always striven to organize a universal state. There have been many great nations with great histories, but the more highly they were developed the more unhappy they were, for they felt more acutely than other people the craving for world-wide union. The great conquerors, Timours and Ghenghis-Khans, whirled like hurricanes over the face of the earth striving to subdue its people, and they too were but the unconscious expression of the same craving for universal unity. Hadst Thou taken the world and Caesar's purple, Thou wouldst have founded the universal state and have given universal peace. For who can rule men if not he who holds their conscience and their bread in his hands? We have taken the sword of Caesar, and in taking it, of course, have rejected Thee and followed _him_. Oh, ages are yet to come of the confusion of free thought, of their science and cannibalism. For having begun to build their tower of Babel without us, they will end, of course, with cannibalism. But then the beast will crawl to us and lick our feet and spatter them with tears of blood. And we shall sit upon the beast and raise the cup, and on it will be written, "Mystery." But then, and only then, the reign of peace and happiness will come for men. Thou art proud of Thine elect, but Thou hast only the elect, while we give rest to all. And besides, how many of those elect, those mighty ones who could become elect, have grown weary waiting for Thee, and have transferred and will transfer the powers of their spirit and the warmth of their heart to the other camp, and end by raising their _free_ banner against Thee. Thou didst Thyself lift up that banner. But with us all will be happy and will no more rebel nor destroy one another as under Thy freedom. Oh, we shall persuade them that they will only become free when they renounce their freedom to us and submit to us. And shall we be right or shall we be lying? They will be convinced that we are right, for they will remember the horrors of slavery and confusion to which Thy freedom brought them. Freedom, free thought and science, will lead them into such straits and will bring them face to face with such marvels and insoluble mysteries, that some of them, the fierce and rebellious, will destroy themselves, others, rebellious but weak, will destroy one another, while the rest, weak and unhappy, will crawl fawning to our feet and whine to us: "Yes, you were right, you alone possess His mystery, and we come back to you, save us from ourselves!" " 'Receiving bread from us, they will see clearly that we take the bread made by their hands from them, to give it to them, without any miracle. They will see that we do not change the stones to bread, but in truth they will be more thankful for taking it from our hands than for the bread itself! For they will remember only too well that in old days, without our help, even the bread they made turned to stones in their hands, while since they have come back to us, the very stones have turned to bread in their hands. Too, too well will they know the value of complete submission! And until men know that, they will be unhappy. Who is most to blame for their not knowing it?--speak! Who scattered the flock and sent it astray on unknown paths? But the flock will come together again and will submit once more, and then it will be once for all. Then we shall give them the quiet humble happiness of weak creatures such as they are by nature. Oh, we shall persuade them at last not to be proud, for Thou didst lift them up and thereby taught them to be proud. We shall show them that they are weak, that they are only pitiful children, but that childlike happiness is the sweetest of all. They will become timid and will look to us and huddle close to us in fear, as chicks to the hen. They will marvel at us and will be awe-stricken before us, and will be proud at our being so powerful and clever, that we have been able to subdue such a turbulent flock of thousands of millions. They will tremble impotently before our wrath, their minds will grow fearful, they will be quick to shed tears like women and children, but they will be just as ready at a sign from us to pass to laughter and rejoicing, to happy mirth and childish song. Yes, we shall set them to work, but in their leisure hours we shall make their life like a child's game, with children's songs and innocent dance. Oh, we shall allow them even sin, they are weak and helpless, and they will love us like children because we allow them to sin. We shall tell them that every sin will be expiated, if it is done with our permission, that we allow them to sin because we love them, and the punishment for these sins we take upon ourselves. And we shall take it upon ourselves, and they will adore us as their saviors who have taken on themselves their sins before God. And they will have no secrets from us. We shall allow or forbid them to live with their wives and mistresses, to have or not to have children--according to whether they have been obedient or disobedient--and they will submit to us gladly and cheerfully. The most painful secrets of their conscience, all, all they will bring to us, and we shall have an answer for all. And they will be glad to believe our answer, for it will save them from the great anxiety and terrible agony they endure at present in making a free decision for themselves. And all will be happy, all the millions of creatures except the hundred thousand who rule over them. For only we, we who guard the mystery, shall be unhappy. There will be thousands of millions of happy babes, and a hundred thousand sufferers who have taken upon themselves the curse of the knowledge of good and evil. Peacefully they will die, peacefully they will expire in Thy name, and beyond the grave they will find nothing but death. But we shall keep the secret, and for their happiness we shall allure them with the reward of heaven and eternity. Though if there were anything in the other world, it certainly would not be for such as they. It is prophesied that Thou wilt come again in victory, Thou wilt come with Thy chosen, the proud and strong, but we will say that they have only saved themselves, but we have saved all. We are told that the harlot who sits upon the beast, and holds in her hands the _mystery_, shall be put to shame, that the weak will rise up again, and will rend her royal purple and will strip naked her loathsome body. But then I will stand up and point out to Thee the thousand millions of happy children who have known no sin. And we who have taken their sins upon us for their happiness will stand up before Thee and say: "Judge us if Thou canst and darest." Know that I fear Thee not. Know that I too have been in the wilderness, I too have lived on roots and locusts, I too prized the freedom with which Thou hast blessed men, and I too was striving to stand among Thy elect, among the strong and powerful, thirsting "to make up the number." But I awakened and would not serve madness. I turned back and joined the ranks of those _who have corrected Thy work_. I left the proud and went back to the humble, for the happiness of the humble. What I say to Thee will come to pass, and our dominion will be built up. I repeat, to-morrow Thou shalt see that obedient flock who at a sign from me will hasten to heap up the hot cinders about the pile on which I shall burn Thee for coming to hinder us. For if any one has ever deserved our fires, it is Thou. To-morrow I shall burn Thee. _Dixi._' " Ivan stopped. He was carried away as he talked, and spoke with excitement; when he had finished, he suddenly smiled. Alyosha had listened in silence; towards the end he was greatly moved and seemed several times on the point of interrupting, but restrained himself. Now his words came with a rush. "But ... that's absurd!" he cried, flushing. "Your poem is in praise of Jesus, not in blame of Him--as you meant it to be. And who will believe you about freedom? Is that the way to understand it? That's not the idea of it in the Orthodox Church.... That's Rome, and not even the whole of Rome, it's false--those are the worst of the Catholics, the Inquisitors, the Jesuits!... And there could not be such a fantastic creature as your Inquisitor. What are these sins of mankind they take on themselves? Who are these keepers of the mystery who have taken some curse upon themselves for the happiness of mankind? When have they been seen? We know the Jesuits, they are spoken ill of, but surely they are not what you describe? They are not that at all, not at all.... They are simply the Romish army for the earthly sovereignty of the world in the future, with the Pontiff of Rome for Emperor ... that's their ideal, but there's no sort of mystery or lofty melancholy about it.... It's simple lust of power, of filthy earthly gain, of domination--something like a universal serfdom with them as masters--that's all they stand for. They don't even believe in God perhaps. Your suffering Inquisitor is a mere fantasy." "Stay, stay," laughed Ivan, "how hot you are! A fantasy you say, let it be so! Of course it's a fantasy. But allow me to say: do you really think that the Roman Catholic movement of the last centuries is actually nothing but the lust of power, of filthy earthly gain? Is that Father Paissy's teaching?" "No, no, on the contrary, Father Paissy did once say something rather the same as you ... but of course it's not the same, not a bit the same," Alyosha hastily corrected himself. "A precious admission, in spite of your 'not a bit the same.' I ask you why your Jesuits and Inquisitors have united simply for vile material gain? Why can there not be among them one martyr oppressed by great sorrow and loving humanity? You see, only suppose that there was one such man among all those who desire nothing but filthy material gain--if there's only one like my old Inquisitor, who had himself eaten roots in the desert and made frenzied efforts to subdue his flesh to make himself free and perfect. But yet all his life he loved humanity, and suddenly his eyes were opened, and he saw that it is no great moral blessedness to attain perfection and freedom, if at the same time one gains the conviction that millions of God's creatures have been created as a mockery, that they will never be capable of using their freedom, that these poor rebels can never turn into giants to complete the tower, that it was not for such geese that the great idealist dreamt his dream of harmony. Seeing all that he turned back and joined--the clever people. Surely that could have happened?" "Joined whom, what clever people?" cried Alyosha, completely carried away. "They have no such great cleverness and no mysteries and secrets.... Perhaps nothing but Atheism, that's all their secret. Your Inquisitor does not believe in God, that's his secret!" "What if it is so! At last you have guessed it. It's perfectly true, it's true that that's the whole secret, but isn't that suffering, at least for a man like that, who has wasted his whole life in the desert and yet could not shake off his incurable love of humanity? In his old age he reached the clear conviction that nothing but the advice of the great dread spirit could build up any tolerable sort of life for the feeble, unruly, 'incomplete, empirical creatures created in jest.' And so, convinced of this, he sees that he must follow the counsel of the wise spirit, the dread spirit of death and destruction, and therefore accept lying and deception, and lead men consciously to death and destruction, and yet deceive them all the way so that they may not notice where they are being led, that the poor blind creatures may at least on the way think themselves happy. And note, the deception is in the name of Him in Whose ideal the old man had so fervently believed all his life long. Is not that tragic? And if only one such stood at the head of the whole army 'filled with the lust of power only for the sake of filthy gain'--would not one such be enough to make a tragedy? More than that, one such standing at the head is enough to create the actual leading idea of the Roman Church with all its armies and Jesuits, its highest idea. I tell you frankly that I firmly believe that there has always been such a man among those who stood at the head of the movement. Who knows, there may have been some such even among the Roman Popes. Who knows, perhaps the spirit of that accursed old man who loves mankind so obstinately in his own way, is to be found even now in a whole multitude of such old men, existing not by chance but by agreement, as a secret league formed long ago for the guarding of the mystery, to guard it from the weak and the unhappy, so as to make them happy. No doubt it is so, and so it must be indeed. I fancy that even among the Masons there's something of the same mystery at the bottom, and that that's why the Catholics so detest the Masons as their rivals breaking up the unity of the idea, while it is so essential that there should be one flock and one shepherd.... But from the way I defend my idea I might be an author impatient of your criticism. Enough of it." "You are perhaps a Mason yourself!" broke suddenly from Alyosha. "You don't believe in God," he added, speaking this time very sorrowfully. He fancied besides that his brother was looking at him ironically. "How does your poem end?" he asked, suddenly looking down. "Or was it the end?" "I meant to end it like this. When the Inquisitor ceased speaking he waited some time for his Prisoner to answer him. His silence weighed down upon him. He saw that the Prisoner had listened intently all the time, looking gently in his face and evidently not wishing to reply. The old man longed for Him to say something, however bitter and terrible. But He suddenly approached the old man in silence and softly kissed him on his bloodless aged lips. That was all His answer. The old man shuddered. His lips moved. He went to the door, opened it, and said to Him: 'Go, and come no more ... come not at all, never, never!' And he let Him out into the dark alleys of the town. The Prisoner went away." "And the old man?" "The kiss glows in his heart, but the old man adheres to his idea." "And you with him, you too?" cried Alyosha, mournfully. Ivan laughed. "Why, it's all nonsense, Alyosha. It's only a senseless poem of a senseless student, who could never write two lines of verse. Why do you take it so seriously? Surely you don't suppose I am going straight off to the Jesuits, to join the men who are correcting His work? Good Lord, it's no business of mine. I told you, all I want is to live on to thirty, and then ... dash the cup to the ground!" "But the little sticky leaves, and the precious tombs, and the blue sky, and the woman you love! How will you live, how will you love them?" Alyosha cried sorrowfully. "With such a hell in your heart and your head, how can you? No, that's just what you are going away for, to join them ... if not, you will kill yourself, you can't endure it!" "There is a strength to endure everything," Ivan said with a cold smile. "What strength?" "The strength of the Karamazovs--the strength of the Karamazov baseness." "To sink into debauchery, to stifle your soul with corruption, yes?" "Possibly even that ... only perhaps till I am thirty I shall escape it, and then--" "How will you escape it? By what will you escape it? That's impossible with your ideas." "In the Karamazov way, again." " 'Everything is lawful,' you mean? Everything is lawful, is that it?" Ivan scowled, and all at once turned strangely pale. "Ah, you've caught up yesterday's phrase, which so offended Miuesov--and which Dmitri pounced upon so naively, and paraphrased!" he smiled queerly. "Yes, if you like, 'everything is lawful' since the word has been said. I won't deny it. And Mitya's version isn't bad." Alyosha looked at him in silence. "I thought that going away from here I have you at least," Ivan said suddenly, with unexpected feeling; "but now I see that there is no place for me even in your heart, my dear hermit. The formula, 'all is lawful,' I won't renounce--will you renounce me for that, yes?" Alyosha got up, went to him and softly kissed him on the lips. "That's plagiarism," cried Ivan, highly delighted. "You stole that from my poem. Thank you though. Get up, Alyosha, it's time we were going, both of us." They went out, but stopped when they reached the entrance of the restaurant. "Listen, Alyosha," Ivan began in a resolute voice, "if I am really able to care for the sticky little leaves I shall only love them, remembering you. It's enough for me that you are somewhere here, and I shan't lose my desire for life yet. Is that enough for you? Take it as a declaration of love if you like. And now you go to the right and I to the left. And it's enough, do you hear, enough. I mean even if I don't go away to-morrow (I think I certainly shall go) and we meet again, don't say a word more on these subjects. I beg that particularly. And about Dmitri too, I ask you specially, never speak to me again," he added, with sudden irritation; "it's all exhausted, it has all been said over and over again, hasn't it? And I'll make you one promise in return for it. When at thirty, I want to 'dash the cup to the ground,' wherever I may be I'll come to have one more talk with you, even though it were from America, you may be sure of that. I'll come on purpose. It will be very interesting to have a look at you, to see what you'll be by that time. It's rather a solemn promise, you see. And we really may be parting for seven years or ten. Come, go now to your Pater Seraphicus, he is dying. If he dies without you, you will be angry with me for having kept you. Good-by, kiss me once more; that's right, now go." Ivan turned suddenly and went his way without looking back. It was just as Dmitri had left Alyosha the day before, though the parting had been very different. The strange resemblance flashed like an arrow through Alyosha's mind in the distress and dejection of that moment. He waited a little, looking after his brother. He suddenly noticed that Ivan swayed as he walked and that his right shoulder looked lower than his left. He had never noticed it before. But all at once he turned too, and almost ran to the monastery. It was nearly dark, and he felt almost frightened; something new was growing up in him for which he could not account. The wind had risen again as on the previous evening, and the ancient pines murmured gloomily about him when he entered the hermitage copse. He almost ran. "Pater Seraphicus--he got that name from somewhere--where from?" Alyosha wondered. "Ivan, poor Ivan, and when shall I see you again?... Here is the hermitage. Yes, yes, that he is, Pater Seraphicus, he will save me--from him and for ever!" Several times afterwards he wondered how he could on leaving Ivan so completely forget his brother Dmitri, though he had that morning, only a few hours before, so firmly resolved to find him and not to give up doing so, even should he be unable to return to the monastery that night.

Book 5, Chapter 5

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Before Ivan dives into his poem, he gives Alyosha a little lecture on literary history. Ivan explains that in the 16th century - which is when the actions of his poem take place - poems and plays were written about holy figures - the Virgin Mary, Christ, angels, even god - coming down to earth and conversing with ordinary people. Ivan's own poem is set in 16th century Seville , at the height of the Spanish Inquisition. It's the day after a particularly bloody massacre where hundreds of heretics were burned at the stake. Christ decides to appear, but instead of making a grand entrance, he comes quietly and inconspicuously. He doesn't say anything, but he quietly performs miracles - raising a child from the dead, healing the blind - which pretty much gives him away. As Christ goes around wowing everyone with his miracles, the Grand Inquisitor, the guy in charge of all the heretic-burning, appears. He demands that Christ be arrested by the guard, and everyone is so frightened by him that they readily comply. Later that night, the Grand Inquisitor visits Christ in prison. He recognizes his prisoner as Christ, but, paradoxically for a self-described Catholic, refuses to listen to anything He has to say. At this point, Alyosha is extremely puzzled. Alyosha wonders whether the whole poem is supposed to be some kind of joke. Ivan says it's not, and continues on. The Grand Inquisitor, according to Ivan, berates Christ for rejecting Satan's three temptations back in the day when Christ was wandering the wilderness. Those three temptations, for those of you fuzzy on the New Testament, were: 1) offer everybody bread and they will follow you; 2) jump off a cliff to prove that you're the Son of God, and people will believe you; and 3) set yourself up as the ruler of the entire earth and use your power to compel people to obey you. According to Ivan's Grand Inquisitor, Christ rejected all of these temptations because he wanted man to freely follow him . But the Grand Inquisitor claims Christ got it all wrong, because man does not want to be free. Or rather, only a chosen few can endure the terrible gift of freedom; the majority prefer to be led around, told what to do, and essentially be treated like children. Some even choose to accept the gift of freedom, but because they are not strong or clever enough to know what to do with it, they end up setting up reason and science as gods instead. Here the Grand Inquisitor lets Christ in on his secret: he is on Satan's side. Out of his concern for mankind, he has deprived them of their freedom by accepting Satan's temptations, the temptations of miracle, mystery, and authority that Christ had rejected in the wilderness. But just because the Grand Inquisitor has all the power doesn't mean he's a happy man. He views his power as a horrible burden, which he has to endure because he happens to be one of the chosen few who accept the terrible gift of freedom. He has to lie to the majority in order to deprive them of their horrifying freedom, and this lie, this sin, makes him suffer. Alyosha finds Ivan's poem absurd, although he has trouble spelling out his objections coherently. He asks Ivan how the poem ends, and Ivan imagines that at the end of the scene, Christ gets up and kisses the Grand Inquisitor on his wrinkly old lips. The Grand Inquisitor then frees Christ and tells him never to return again. Alyosha doesn't understand how Ivan could possibly live with such a dismal view of the world. Ivan says he'll rely on the good old "Karamazov baseness." Ivan then reproaches Alyosha for judging him so severely, and Alyosha bends over and kisses his brother. Ivan is immensely pleased by this gesture and takes his leave of Alyosha. Alyosha notices that Ivan is walking with a slight sway and that his right shoulder is lower than his left. He then rushes back to Zosima, who is still on his deathbed. Much later, Alyosha will wonder how he forgot about his brother Dmitri so quickly.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/18.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_17_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 3.chapter 5

book 3, chapter 5

{"name": "Book 3, Chapter 5", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-3-chapter-5", "summary": "Dmitri continues to tell Alyosha about his history with Katerina. After he loans her the money, the family's honor is saved. Then the colonel dies of an illness and Katerina and her sister leave for Moscow. A wealthy aunt takes Katerina under her wing. Katerina is able to repay the money to Dmitri and also, in a letter, offers herself in marriage to him. Dmitri sends a letter back, then sends a letter explaining the situation to Ivan. Ivan is living in Moscow at the time, and Dmitri tells him to go see Katerina. There, Dmitri suspects, Ivan fell in love with Katerina. Later Dmitri finally arrives in Moscow, where his engagement with Katerina is celebrated. Although Katerina had made him promise to reform, Dmitri is quickly seduced back to his old ways by Grushenka, a foxy babe in their hometown. Grushenka also has her claws in their father, Fyodor. Dmitri confesses that the worst of it is that Katerina had entrusted him with 3,000 roubles to send to her sister in Moscow. But instead of sending the money, Dmitri had spent it all partying with Grushenka. Dmitri's only hope, as he tells Alyosha, is to repay Katerina so that he's not the absolute lowest scum of the earth. Since he has no money of his own, he asks for Alyosha's help in getting the money and in breaking off his engagement with Katerina. But Alyosha's just a poor monk. Where is he supposed to get the money, you ask? From the very same father, Fyodor, who's also in love with Grushenka. Smerdyakov has told Dmitri that Fyodor, in an attempt to win over Grushenka, has promised her 3,000 roubles. All she has to do is sneak into his room with a secret knock that only Smerdyakov and Fyodor know. But now Dmitri knows about their little scheme because Smerdyakov has spilled the beans. This is why Dmitri has been hiding in their neighbor's garden guzzling cognac. He's waiting for Grushenka, to prevent her tryst with his father. On top of all that, Dmitri wants Alyosha to convince their father to give Alyosha the money intended for Grushenka, money Alyosha can then give to Dmitri to give back to Katerina. Complicated much?", "analysis": ""}

Chapter V. The Confession Of A Passionate Heart--"Heels Up" "Now," said Alyosha, "I understand the first half." "You understand the first half. That half is a drama, and it was played out there. The second half is a tragedy, and it is being acted here." "And I understand nothing of that second half so far," said Alyosha. "And I? Do you suppose I understand it?" "Stop, Dmitri. There's one important question. Tell me, you were betrothed, you are betrothed still?" "We weren't betrothed at once, not for three months after that adventure. The next day I told myself that the incident was closed, concluded, that there would be no sequel. It seemed to me caddish to make her an offer. On her side she gave no sign of life for the six weeks that she remained in the town; except, indeed, for one action. The day after her visit the maid-servant slipped round with an envelope addressed to me. I tore it open: it contained the change out of the banknote. Only four thousand five hundred roubles was needed, but there was a discount of about two hundred on changing it. She only sent me about two hundred and sixty. I don't remember exactly, but not a note, not a word of explanation. I searched the packet for a pencil mark--n-nothing! Well, I spent the rest of the money on such an orgy that the new major was obliged to reprimand me. "Well, the lieutenant-colonel produced the battalion money, to the astonishment of every one, for nobody believed that he had the money untouched. He'd no sooner paid it than he fell ill, took to his bed, and, three weeks later, softening of the brain set in, and he died five days afterwards. He was buried with military honors, for he had not had time to receive his discharge. Ten days after his funeral, Katerina Ivanovna, with her aunt and sister, went to Moscow. And, behold, on the very day they went away (I hadn't seen them, didn't see them off or take leave) I received a tiny note, a sheet of thin blue paper, and on it only one line in pencil: 'I will write to you. Wait. K.' And that was all. "I'll explain the rest now, in two words. In Moscow their fortunes changed with the swiftness of lightning and the unexpectedness of an Arabian fairy-tale. That general's widow, their nearest relation, suddenly lost the two nieces who were her heiresses and next-of-kin--both died in the same week of small-pox. The old lady, prostrated with grief, welcomed Katya as a daughter, as her one hope, clutched at her, altered her will in Katya's favor. But that concerned the future. Meanwhile she gave her, for present use, eighty thousand roubles, as a marriage portion, to do what she liked with. She was an hysterical woman. I saw something of her in Moscow, later. "Well, suddenly I received by post four thousand five hundred roubles. I was speechless with surprise, as you may suppose. Three days later came the promised letter. I have it with me now. You must read it. She offers to be my wife, offers herself to me. 'I love you madly,' she says, 'even if you don't love me, never mind. Be my husband. Don't be afraid. I won't hamper you in any way. I will be your chattel. I will be the carpet under your feet. I want to love you for ever. I want to save you from yourself.' Alyosha, I am not worthy to repeat those lines in my vulgar words and in my vulgar tone, my everlastingly vulgar tone, that I can never cure myself of. That letter stabs me even now. Do you think I don't mind--that I don't mind still? I wrote her an answer at once, as it was impossible for me to go to Moscow. I wrote to her with tears. One thing I shall be ashamed of for ever. I referred to her being rich and having a dowry while I was only a stuck-up beggar! I mentioned money! I ought to have borne it in silence, but it slipped from my pen. Then I wrote at once to Ivan, and told him all I could about it in a letter of six pages, and sent him to her. Why do you look like that? Why are you staring at me? Yes, Ivan fell in love with her; he's in love with her still. I know that. I did a stupid thing, in the world's opinion; but perhaps that one stupid thing may be the saving of us all now. Oo! Don't you see what a lot she thinks of Ivan, how she respects him? When she compares us, do you suppose she can love a man like me, especially after all that has happened here?" "But I am convinced that she does love a man like you, and not a man like him." "She loves her own _virtue_, not me." The words broke involuntarily, and almost malignantly, from Dmitri. He laughed, but a minute later his eyes gleamed, he flushed crimson and struck the table violently with his fist. "I swear, Alyosha," he cried, with intense and genuine anger at himself; "you may not believe me, but as God is holy, and as Christ is God, I swear that though I smiled at her lofty sentiments just now, I know that I am a million times baser in soul than she, and that these lofty sentiments of hers are as sincere as a heavenly angel's. That's the tragedy of it--that I know that for certain. What if any one does show off a bit? Don't I do it myself? And yet I'm sincere, I'm sincere. As for Ivan, I can understand how he must be cursing nature now--with his intellect, too! To see the preference given--to whom, to what? To a monster who, though he is betrothed and all eyes are fixed on him, can't restrain his debaucheries--and before the very eyes of his betrothed! And a man like me is preferred, while he is rejected. And why? Because a girl wants to sacrifice her life and destiny out of gratitude. It's ridiculous! I've never said a word of this to Ivan, and Ivan of course has never dropped a hint of the sort to me. But destiny will be accomplished, and the best man will hold his ground while the undeserving one will vanish into his back- alley for ever--his filthy back-alley, his beloved back-alley, where he is at home and where he will sink in filth and stench at his own free will and with enjoyment. I've been talking foolishly. I've no words left. I use them at random, but it will be as I have said. I shall drown in the back- alley, and she will marry Ivan." "Stop, Dmitri," Alyosha interrupted again with great anxiety. "There's one thing you haven't made clear yet: you are still betrothed all the same, aren't you? How can you break off the engagement if she, your betrothed, doesn't want to?" "Yes, formally and solemnly betrothed. It was all done on my arrival in Moscow, with great ceremony, with ikons, all in fine style. The general's wife blessed us, and--would you believe it?--congratulated Katya. 'You've made a good choice,' she said, 'I see right through him.' And--would you believe it?--she didn't like Ivan, and hardly greeted him. I had a lot of talk with Katya in Moscow. I told her about myself--sincerely, honorably. She listened to everything. There was sweet confusion, There were tender words. Though there were proud words, too. She wrung out of me a mighty promise to reform. I gave my promise, and here--" "What?" "Why, I called to you and brought you out here to-day, this very day--remember it--to send you--this very day again--to Katerina Ivanovna, and--" "What?" "To tell her that I shall never come to see her again. Say, 'He sends you his compliments.' " "But is that possible?" "That's just the reason I'm sending you, in my place, because it's impossible. And, how could I tell her myself?" "And where are you going?" "To the back-alley." "To Grushenka, then!" Alyosha exclaimed mournfully, clasping his hands. "Can Rakitin really have told the truth? I thought that you had just visited her, and that was all." "Can a betrothed man pay such visits? Is such a thing possible and with such a betrothed, and before the eyes of all the world? Confound it, I have some honor! As soon as I began visiting Grushenka, I ceased to be betrothed, and to be an honest man. I understand that. Why do you look at me? You see, I went in the first place to beat her. I had heard, and I know for a fact now, that that captain, father's agent, had given Grushenka an I.O.U. of mine for her to sue me for payment, so as to put an end to me. They wanted to scare me. I went to beat her. I had had a glimpse of her before. She doesn't strike one at first sight. I knew about her old merchant, who's lying ill now, paralyzed; but he's leaving her a decent little sum. I knew, too, that she was fond of money, that she hoarded it, and lent it at a wicked rate of interest, that she's a merciless cheat and swindler. I went to beat her, and I stayed. The storm broke--it struck me down like the plague. I'm plague-stricken still, and I know that everything is over, that there will never be anything more for me. The cycle of the ages is accomplished. That's my position. And though I'm a beggar, as fate would have it, I had three thousand just then in my pocket. I drove with Grushenka to Mokroe, a place twenty-five versts from here. I got gypsies there and champagne and made all the peasants there drunk on it, and all the women and girls. I sent the thousands flying. In three days' time I was stripped bare, but a hero. Do you suppose the hero had gained his end? Not a sign of it from her. I tell you that rogue, Grushenka, has a supple curve all over her body. You can see it in her little foot, even in her little toe. I saw it, and kissed it, but that was all, I swear! 'I'll marry you if you like,' she said, 'you're a beggar, you know. Say that you won't beat me, and will let me do anything I choose, and perhaps I will marry you.' She laughed, and she's laughing still!" Dmitri leapt up with a sort of fury. He seemed all at once as though he were drunk. His eyes became suddenly bloodshot. "And do you really mean to marry her?" "At once, if she will. And if she won't, I shall stay all the same. I'll be the porter at her gate. Alyosha!" he cried. He stopped short before him, and taking him by the shoulders began shaking him violently. "Do you know, you innocent boy, that this is all delirium, senseless delirium, for there's a tragedy here. Let me tell you, Alexey, that I may be a low man, with low and degraded passions, but a thief and a pickpocket Dmitri Karamazov never can be. Well, then; let me tell you that I am a thief and a pickpocket. That very morning, just before I went to beat Grushenka, Katerina Ivanovna sent for me, and in strict secrecy (why I don't know, I suppose she had some reason) asked me to go to the chief town of the province and to post three thousand roubles to Agafya Ivanovna in Moscow, so that nothing should be known of it in the town here. So I had that three thousand roubles in my pocket when I went to see Grushenka, and it was that money we spent at Mokroe. Afterwards I pretended I had been to the town, but did not show her the post office receipt. I said I had sent the money and would bring the receipt, and so far I haven't brought it. I've forgotten it. Now what do you think you're going to her to-day to say? 'He sends his compliments,' and she'll ask you, 'What about the money?' You might still have said to her, 'He's a degraded sensualist, and a low creature, with uncontrolled passions. He didn't send your money then, but wasted it, because, like a low brute, he couldn't control himself.' But still you might have added, 'He isn't a thief though. Here is your three thousand; he sends it back. Send it yourself to Agafya Ivanovna. But he told me to say "he sends his compliments." ' But, as it is, she will ask, 'But where is the money?' " "Mitya, you are unhappy, yes! But not as unhappy as you think. Don't worry yourself to death with despair." "What, do you suppose I'd shoot myself because I can't get three thousand to pay back? That's just it. I shan't shoot myself. I haven't the strength now. Afterwards, perhaps. But now I'm going to Grushenka. I don't care what happens." "And what then?" "I'll be her husband if she deigns to have me, and when lovers come, I'll go into the next room. I'll clean her friends' goloshes, blow up their samovar, run their errands." "Katerina Ivanovna will understand it all," Alyosha said solemnly. "She'll understand how great this trouble is and will forgive. She has a lofty mind, and no one could be more unhappy than you. She'll see that for herself." "She won't forgive everything," said Dmitri, with a grin. "There's something in it, brother, that no woman could forgive. Do you know what would be the best thing to do?" "What?" "Pay back the three thousand." "Where can we get it from? I say, I have two thousand. Ivan will give you another thousand--that makes three. Take it and pay it back." "And when would you get it, your three thousand? You're not of age, besides, and you must--you absolutely must--take my farewell to her to-day, with the money or without it, for I can't drag on any longer, things have come to such a pass. To-morrow is too late. I shall send you to father." "To father?" "Yes, to father first. Ask him for three thousand." "But, Mitya, he won't give it." "As though he would! I know he won't. Do you know the meaning of despair, Alexey?" "Yes." "Listen. Legally he owes me nothing. I've had it all from him, I know that. But morally he owes me something, doesn't he? You know he started with twenty-eight thousand of my mother's money and made a hundred thousand with it. Let him give me back only three out of the twenty-eight thousand, and he'll draw my soul out of hell, and it will atone for many of his sins. For that three thousand--I give you my solemn word--I'll make an end of everything, and he shall hear nothing more of me. For the last time I give him the chance to be a father. Tell him God Himself sends him this chance." "Mitya, he won't give it for anything." "I know he won't. I know it perfectly well. Now, especially. That's not all. I know something more. Now, only a few days ago, perhaps only yesterday he found out for the first time _in earnest_ (underline _in earnest_) that Grushenka is really perhaps not joking, and really means to marry me. He knows her nature; he knows the cat. And do you suppose he's going to give me money to help to bring that about when he's crazy about her himself? And that's not all, either. I can tell you more than that. I know that for the last five days he has had three thousand drawn out of the bank, changed into notes of a hundred roubles, packed into a large envelope, sealed with five seals, and tied across with red tape. You see how well I know all about it! On the envelope is written: 'To my angel, Grushenka, when she will come to me.' He scrawled it himself in silence and in secret, and no one knows that the money's there except the valet, Smerdyakov, whom he trusts like himself. So now he has been expecting Grushenka for the last three or four days; he hopes she'll come for the money. He has sent her word of it, and she has sent him word that perhaps she'll come. And if she does go to the old man, can I marry her after that? You understand now why I'm here in secret and what I'm on the watch for." "For her?" "Yes, for her. Foma has a room in the house of these sluts here. Foma comes from our parts; he was a soldier in our regiment. He does jobs for them. He's watchman at night and goes grouse-shooting in the day-time; and that's how he lives. I've established myself in his room. Neither he nor the women of the house know the secret--that is, that I am on the watch here." "No one but Smerdyakov knows, then?" "No one else. He will let me know if she goes to the old man." "It was he told you about the money, then?" "Yes. It's a dead secret. Even Ivan doesn't know about the money, or anything. The old man is sending Ivan to Tchermashnya on a two or three days' journey. A purchaser has turned up for the copse: he'll give eight thousand for the timber. So the old man keeps asking Ivan to help him by going to arrange it. It will take him two or three days. That's what the old man wants, so that Grushenka can come while he's away." "Then he's expecting Grushenka to-day?" "No, she won't come to-day; there are signs. She's certain not to come," cried Mitya suddenly. "Smerdyakov thinks so, too. Father's drinking now. He's sitting at table with Ivan. Go to him, Alyosha, and ask for the three thousand." "Mitya, dear, what's the matter with you?" cried Alyosha, jumping up from his place, and looking keenly at his brother's frenzied face. For one moment the thought struck him that Dmitri was mad. "What is it? I'm not insane," said Dmitri, looking intently and earnestly at him. "No fear. I am sending you to father, and I know what I'm saying. I believe in miracles." "In miracles?" "In a miracle of Divine Providence. God knows my heart. He sees my despair. He sees the whole picture. Surely He won't let something awful happen. Alyosha, I believe in miracles. Go!" "I am going. Tell me, will you wait for me here?" "Yes. I know it will take some time. You can't go at him point blank. He's drunk now. I'll wait three hours--four, five, six, seven. Only remember you must go to Katerina Ivanovna to-day, if it has to be at midnight, _with the money or without the money_, and say, 'He sends his compliments to you.' I want you to say that verse to her: 'He sends his compliments to you.' " "Mitya! And what if Grushenka comes to-day--if not to-day, to-morrow, or the next day?" "Grushenka? I shall see her. I shall rush out and prevent it." "And if--" "If there's an if, it will be murder. I couldn't endure it." "Who will be murdered?" "The old man. I shan't kill her." "Brother, what are you saying?" "Oh, I don't know.... I don't know. Perhaps I shan't kill, and perhaps I shall. I'm afraid that he will suddenly become so loathsome to me with his face at that moment. I hate his ugly throat, his nose, his eyes, his shameless snigger. I feel a physical repulsion. That's what I'm afraid of. That's what may be too much for me." "I'll go, Mitya. I believe that God will order things for the best, that nothing awful may happen." "And I will sit and wait for the miracle. And if it doesn't come to pass--" Alyosha went thoughtfully towards his father's house.

Book 3, Chapter 5

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-3-chapter-5

Dmitri continues to tell Alyosha about his history with Katerina. After he loans her the money, the family's honor is saved. Then the colonel dies of an illness and Katerina and her sister leave for Moscow. A wealthy aunt takes Katerina under her wing. Katerina is able to repay the money to Dmitri and also, in a letter, offers herself in marriage to him. Dmitri sends a letter back, then sends a letter explaining the situation to Ivan. Ivan is living in Moscow at the time, and Dmitri tells him to go see Katerina. There, Dmitri suspects, Ivan fell in love with Katerina. Later Dmitri finally arrives in Moscow, where his engagement with Katerina is celebrated. Although Katerina had made him promise to reform, Dmitri is quickly seduced back to his old ways by Grushenka, a foxy babe in their hometown. Grushenka also has her claws in their father, Fyodor. Dmitri confesses that the worst of it is that Katerina had entrusted him with 3,000 roubles to send to her sister in Moscow. But instead of sending the money, Dmitri had spent it all partying with Grushenka. Dmitri's only hope, as he tells Alyosha, is to repay Katerina so that he's not the absolute lowest scum of the earth. Since he has no money of his own, he asks for Alyosha's help in getting the money and in breaking off his engagement with Katerina. But Alyosha's just a poor monk. Where is he supposed to get the money, you ask? From the very same father, Fyodor, who's also in love with Grushenka. Smerdyakov has told Dmitri that Fyodor, in an attempt to win over Grushenka, has promised her 3,000 roubles. All she has to do is sneak into his room with a secret knock that only Smerdyakov and Fyodor know. But now Dmitri knows about their little scheme because Smerdyakov has spilled the beans. This is why Dmitri has been hiding in their neighbor's garden guzzling cognac. He's waiting for Grushenka, to prevent her tryst with his father. On top of all that, Dmitri wants Alyosha to convince their father to give Alyosha the money intended for Grushenka, money Alyosha can then give to Dmitri to give back to Katerina. Complicated much?

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/40.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The Brothers Karamazov/section_39_part_0.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 6.chapter 2

book 6, chapter 2

{"name": "Book 6, Chapter 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-6-chapter-2", "summary": "Zosima begins by telling everyone about his older brother, Markel, who died from consumption when he was only 17. All through his life, Markel had rebelled against any religious teaching. But at the age of 17, during Holy Week, his consumption took a turn for the worse, and the doctor said he had a very short time left to live. Suddenly Markel underwent some kind of religious conversion. Zosima recalls his brother's joyful expression as he celebrated God's glory and exhorted everyone around him to welcome paradise on earth. His brother passed away a few weeks after Easter. Zosima then recalls the first time he felt God's word in his soul. When he was 8 years old, he heard the story of Job in church, and he felt overwhelmed with awe and astonishment. He tells his fellow monks that all they have to do to touch the souls of their flock is to share the moving stories of Scripture. As an example, he relates the story of a young man he encountered in his early days as a monk. The young man wonders whether even animals \"have Christ.\" Zosima tells the young man a story about how a saint once convinced a bear not to attack him by handing it a piece of bread. The young man is moved by the story. Flash forward to an older Zosima, who's now a hip cadet officer partying in St. Petersburg. He falls in love with a girl who's smart and hot, but then he gets called away for a couple months on a military mission. When he gets back, the girl is married. Hurt and angry, Zosima deliberately insults the girl's husband during a conversation about an important event. This insult leads to a duel. The evening before the duel, Zosima is in a foul mood. He takes it out on his servant Afanasy by slapping him so hard that he bleeds. The next morning, though, Zosima's mood is radically different. He's filled with a deep self-consciousness that there is something utterly shameful within him. He realizes that he treated Afanasy with inhuman cruelty. He realizes that Afanasy is a man created in God's image like himself, just like the guy he's going to duel. In fact, everyone is made in God's image. Filled with this enlightenment, Zosima rides off to the duel with his second , a fellow military officer. Zosima and the girl's husband take twelve paces apart from each other, and the girl's husband takes the first shot. Instead of shooting back, Zosima throws away his weapon and apologizes. Everyone's in dismay. Zosima explains that if he hadn't let the girl's husband take a shot at him, everyone would have thought he was apologizing because he was a coward. No one knows what to do with that, but they all acknowledge that he's done something \"original.\" Back at his regiment, the officers debate whether Zosima ought to resign, but Zosima interrupts them to announce that he's resigning and joining a monastery. When news of his actions spreads through the town, Zosima is greeted with laughter, but not with malice, as everyone seems to accept him with love. At a social gathering, the girl he was in love with embraces him with gratitude, as does her husband and everyone else. Just then, Zosima notices an elderly man approaching him. This elderly man, an important and wealthy official well respected in the town, had never spoken to Zosima before. But after the dueling incident, the elderly man begins to visit him regularly in his rooms, where they have long philosophical discussions. Zosima is impressed with his visitor's wisdom, and much of what he says echoes Zosima's later, more mature philosophy, including the idea that paradise is possible on earth if universal brotherhood can be achieved . Eventually Zosima's visitor confesses that he killed someone. Fourteen years ago he was in love with a widow who had already promised herself to an officer. Although the officer was away on a military campaign, the widow expected him to return to her soon. Furious, the visitor snuck in at night and stabbed her to death. He then stole a few items to make it look as if a servant had robbed and murdered her. The visitor's plan succeeded. A disgruntled servant was blamed for the deed and - conveniently, before the visitor could feel guilty about letting someone else take the fall for his crime - the servant died a couple weeks later of some illness. As the years went by, the visitor was tormented by guilt. He fell in love again, married a young woman, and had three children, but he couldn't bear to embrace them because of his guilt. Zosima advises the visitor to confess his deeds, but the visitor continues to waffle for a couple of weeks. The visitor leaves late one night, then suddenly returns. They sit together, and the visitor mysteriously tells Zosima to remember that he had returned that night. The next day, the visitor confesses everything. Nobody really believes him, even though he kept some souvenirs from the widow he murdered, and many think he's crazy. As if on cue, the visitor falls seriously ill. On his deathbed, he confesses to Zosima that he had returned that night to kill Zosima for fear that Zosima would tell everyone about his terrible secret. The town blames Zosima for the visitor's mad confession and subsequent decline. When the visitor dies a couple of weeks later, Zosima leaves town and joins a monastery. It's only at the end of this section that we finally learn the name of the visitor, Mikhail.", "analysis": ""}

Chapter II. The Duel _(c) Recollections of Father Zossima's Youth before he became a Monk. The Duel_ I spent a long time, almost eight years, in the military cadet school at Petersburg, and in the novelty of my surroundings there, many of my childish impressions grew dimmer, though I forgot nothing. I picked up so many new habits and opinions that I was transformed into a cruel, absurd, almost savage creature. A surface polish of courtesy and society manners I did acquire together with the French language. But we all, myself included, looked upon the soldiers in our service as cattle. I was perhaps worse than the rest in that respect, for I was so much more impressionable than my companions. By the time we left the school as officers, we were ready to lay down our lives for the honor of the regiment, but no one of us had any knowledge of the real meaning of honor, and if any one had known it, he would have been the first to ridicule it. Drunkenness, debauchery and devilry were what we almost prided ourselves on. I don't say that we were bad by nature, all these young men were good fellows, but they behaved badly, and I worst of all. What made it worse for me was that I had come into my own money, and so I flung myself into a life of pleasure, and plunged headlong into all the recklessness of youth. I was fond of reading, yet strange to say, the Bible was the one book I never opened at that time, though I always carried it about with me, and I was never separated from it; in very truth I was keeping that book "for the day and the hour, for the month and the year," though I knew it not. After four years of this life, I chanced to be in the town of K. where our regiment was stationed at the time. We found the people of the town hospitable, rich and fond of entertainments. I met with a cordial reception everywhere, as I was of a lively temperament and was known to be well off, which always goes a long way in the world. And then a circumstance happened which was the beginning of it all. I formed an attachment to a beautiful and intelligent young girl of noble and lofty character, the daughter of people much respected. They were well-to-do people of influence and position. They always gave me a cordial and friendly reception. I fancied that the young lady looked on me with favor and my heart was aflame at such an idea. Later on I saw and fully realized that I perhaps was not so passionately in love with her at all, but only recognized the elevation of her mind and character, which I could not indeed have helped doing. I was prevented, however, from making her an offer at the time by my selfishness, I was loath to part with the allurements of my free and licentious bachelor life in the heyday of my youth, and with my pockets full of money. I did drop some hint as to my feelings however, though I put off taking any decisive step for a time. Then, all of a sudden, we were ordered off for two months to another district. On my return two months later, I found the young lady already married to a rich neighboring landowner, a very amiable man, still young though older than I was, connected with the best Petersburg society, which I was not, and of excellent education, which I also was not. I was so overwhelmed at this unexpected circumstance that my mind was positively clouded. The worst of it all was that, as I learned then, the young landowner had been a long while betrothed to her, and I had met him indeed many times in her house, but blinded by my conceit I had noticed nothing. And this particularly mortified me; almost everybody had known all about it, while I knew nothing. I was filled with sudden irrepressible fury. With flushed face I began recalling how often I had been on the point of declaring my love to her, and as she had not attempted to stop me or to warn me, she must, I concluded, have been laughing at me all the time. Later on, of course, I reflected and remembered that she had been very far from laughing at me; on the contrary, she used to turn off any love-making on my part with a jest and begin talking of other subjects; but at that moment I was incapable of reflecting and was all eagerness for revenge. I am surprised to remember that my wrath and revengeful feelings were extremely repugnant to my own nature, for being of an easy temper, I found it difficult to be angry with any one for long, and so I had to work myself up artificially and became at last revolting and absurd. I waited for an opportunity and succeeded in insulting my "rival" in the presence of a large company. I insulted him on a perfectly extraneous pretext, jeering at his opinion upon an important public event--it was in the year 1826(5)--and my jeer was, so people said, clever and effective. Then I forced him to ask for an explanation, and behaved so rudely that he accepted my challenge in spite of the vast inequality between us, as I was younger, a person of no consequence, and of inferior rank. I learned afterwards for a fact that it was from a jealous feeling on his side also that my challenge was accepted; he had been rather jealous of me on his wife's account before their marriage; he fancied now that if he submitted to be insulted by me and refused to accept my challenge, and if she heard of it, she might begin to despise him and waver in her love for him. I soon found a second in a comrade, an ensign of our regiment. In those days though duels were severely punished, yet dueling was a kind of fashion among the officers--so strong and deeply rooted will a brutal prejudice sometimes be. It was the end of June, and our meeting was to take place at seven o'clock the next day on the outskirts of the town--and then something happened that in very truth was the turning-point of my life. In the evening, returning home in a savage and brutal humor, I flew into a rage with my orderly Afanasy, and gave him two blows in the face with all my might, so that it was covered with blood. He had not long been in my service and I had struck him before, but never with such ferocious cruelty. And, believe me, though it's forty years ago, I recall it now with shame and pain. I went to bed and slept for about three hours; when I waked up the day was breaking. I got up--I did not want to sleep any more--I went to the window--opened it, it looked out upon the garden; I saw the sun rising; it was warm and beautiful, the birds were singing. "What's the meaning of it?" I thought. "I feel in my heart as it were something vile and shameful. Is it because I am going to shed blood? No," I thought, "I feel it's not that. Can it be that I am afraid of death, afraid of being killed? No, that's not it, that's not it at all."... And all at once I knew what it was: it was because I had beaten Afanasy the evening before! It all rose before my mind, it all was as it were repeated over again; he stood before me and I was beating him straight on the face and he was holding his arms stiffly down, his head erect, his eyes fixed upon me as though on parade. He staggered at every blow and did not even dare to raise his hands to protect himself. That is what a man has been brought to, and that was a man beating a fellow creature! What a crime! It was as though a sharp dagger had pierced me right through. I stood as if I were struck dumb, while the sun was shining, the leaves were rejoicing and the birds were trilling the praise of God.... I hid my face in my hands, fell on my bed and broke into a storm of tears. And then I remembered my brother Markel and what he said on his death-bed to his servants: "My dear ones, why do you wait on me, why do you love me, am I worth your waiting on me?" "Yes, am I worth it?" flashed through my mind. "After all what am I worth, that another man, a fellow creature, made in the likeness and image of God, should serve me?" For the first time in my life this question forced itself upon me. He had said, "Mother, my little heart, in truth we are each responsible to all for all, it's only that men don't know this. If they knew it, the world would be a paradise at once." "God, can that too be false?" I thought as I wept. "In truth, perhaps, I am more than all others responsible for all, a greater sinner than all men in the world." And all at once the whole truth in its full light appeared to me; what was I going to do? I was going to kill a good, clever, noble man, who had done me no wrong, and by depriving his wife of happiness for the rest of her life, I should be torturing and killing her too. I lay thus in my bed with my face in the pillow, heedless how the time was passing. Suddenly my second, the ensign, came in with the pistols to fetch me. "Ah," said he, "it's a good thing you are up already, it's time we were off, come along!" I did not know what to do and hurried to and fro undecided; we went out to the carriage, however. "Wait here a minute," I said to him. "I'll be back directly, I have forgotten my purse." And I ran back alone, to Afanasy's little room. "Afanasy," I said, "I gave you two blows on the face yesterday, forgive me," I said. He started as though he were frightened, and looked at me; and I saw that it was not enough, and on the spot, in my full officer's uniform, I dropped at his feet and bowed my head to the ground. "Forgive me," I said. Then he was completely aghast. "Your honor ... sir, what are you doing? Am I worth it?" And he burst out crying as I had done before, hid this face in his hands, turned to the window and shook all over with his sobs. I flew out to my comrade and jumped into the carriage. "Ready," I cried. "Have you ever seen a conqueror?" I asked him. "Here is one before you." I was in ecstasy, laughing and talking all the way, I don't remember what about. He looked at me. "Well, brother, you are a plucky fellow, you'll keep up the honor of the uniform, I can see." So we reached the place and found them there, waiting us. We were placed twelve paces apart; he had the first shot. I stood gayly, looking him full in the face; I did not twitch an eyelash, I looked lovingly at him, for I knew what I would do. His shot just grazed my cheek and ear. "Thank God," I cried, "no man has been killed," and I seized my pistol, turned back and flung it far away into the wood. "That's the place for you," I cried. I turned to my adversary. "Forgive me, young fool that I am, sir," I said, "for my unprovoked insult to you and for forcing you to fire at me. I am ten times worse than you and more, maybe. Tell that to the person whom you hold dearest in the world." I had no sooner said this than they all three shouted at me. "Upon my word," cried my adversary, annoyed, "if you did not want to fight, why did not you let me alone?" "Yesterday I was a fool, to-day I know better," I answered him gayly. "As to yesterday, I believe you, but as for to-day, it is difficult to agree with your opinion," said he. "Bravo," I cried, clapping my hands. "I agree with you there too. I have deserved it!" "Will you shoot, sir, or not?" "No, I won't," I said; "if you like, fire at me again, but it would be better for you not to fire." The seconds, especially mine, were shouting too: "Can you disgrace the regiment like this, facing your antagonist and begging his forgiveness! If I'd only known this!" I stood facing them all, not laughing now. "Gentlemen," I said, "is it really so wonderful in these days to find a man who can repent of his stupidity and publicly confess his wrongdoing?" "But not in a duel," cried my second again. "That's what's so strange," I said. "For I ought to have owned my fault as soon as I got here, before he had fired a shot, before leading him into a great and deadly sin; but we have made our life so grotesque, that to act in that way would have been almost impossible, for only after I have faced his shot at the distance of twelve paces could my words have any significance for him, and if I had spoken before, he would have said, 'He is a coward, the sight of the pistols has frightened him, no use to listen to him.' Gentlemen," I cried suddenly, speaking straight from my heart, "look around you at the gifts of God, the clear sky, the pure air, the tender grass, the birds; nature is beautiful and sinless, and we, only we, are sinful and foolish, and we don't understand that life is heaven, for we have only to understand that and it will at once be fulfilled in all its beauty, we shall embrace each other and weep." I would have said more but I could not; my voice broke with the sweetness and youthful gladness of it, and there was such bliss in my heart as I had never known before in my life. "All this as rational and edifying," said my antagonist, "and in any case you are an original person." "You may laugh," I said to him, laughing too, "but afterwards you will approve of me." "Oh, I am ready to approve of you now," said he; "will you shake hands? for I believe you are genuinely sincere." "No," I said, "not now, later on when I have grown worthier and deserve your esteem, then shake hands and you will do well." We went home, my second upbraiding me all the way, while I kissed him. All my comrades heard of the affair at once and gathered together to pass judgment on me the same day. "He has disgraced the uniform," they said; "let him resign his commission." Some stood up for me: "He faced the shot," they said. "Yes, but he was afraid of his other shot and begged for forgiveness." "If he had been afraid of being shot, he would have shot his own pistol first before asking forgiveness, while he flung it loaded into the forest. No, there's something else in this, something original." I enjoyed listening and looking at them. "My dear friends and comrades," said I, "don't worry about my resigning my commission, for I have done so already. I have sent in my papers this morning and as soon as I get my discharge I shall go into a monastery--it's with that object I am leaving the regiment." When I had said this every one of them burst out laughing. "You should have told us of that first, that explains everything, we can't judge a monk." They laughed and could not stop themselves, and not scornfully, but kindly and merrily. They all felt friendly to me at once, even those who had been sternest in their censure, and all the following month, before my discharge came, they could not make enough of me. "Ah, you monk," they would say. And every one said something kind to me, they began trying to dissuade me, even to pity me: "What are you doing to yourself?" "No," they would say, "he is a brave fellow, he faced fire and could have fired his own pistol too, but he had a dream the night before that he should become a monk, that's why he did it." It was the same thing with the society of the town. Till then I had been kindly received, but had not been the object of special attention, and now all came to know me at once and invited me; they laughed at me, but they loved me. I may mention that although everybody talked openly of our duel, the authorities took no notice of it, because my antagonist was a near relation of our general, and as there had been no bloodshed and no serious consequences, and as I resigned my commission, they took it as a joke. And I began then to speak aloud and fearlessly, regardless of their laughter, for it was always kindly and not spiteful laughter. These conversations mostly took place in the evenings, in the company of ladies; women particularly liked listening to me then and they made the men listen. "But how can I possibly be responsible for all?" every one would laugh in my face. "Can I, for instance, be responsible for you?" "You may well not know it," I would answer, "since the whole world has long been going on a different line, since we consider the veriest lies as truth and demand the same lies from others. Here I have for once in my life acted sincerely and, well, you all look upon me as a madman. Though you are friendly to me, yet, you see, you all laugh at me." "But how can we help being friendly to you?" said my hostess, laughing. The room was full of people. All of a sudden the young lady rose, on whose account the duel had been fought and whom only lately I had intended to be my future wife. I had not noticed her coming into the room. She got up, came to me and held out her hand. "Let me tell you," she said, "that I am the first not to laugh at you, but on the contrary I thank you with tears and express my respect for you for your action then." Her husband, too, came up and then they all approached me and almost kissed me. My heart was filled with joy, but my attention was especially caught by a middle-aged man who came up to me with the others. I knew him by name already, but had never made his acquaintance nor exchanged a word with him till that evening. _(d) The Mysterious Visitor_ He had long been an official in the town; he was in a prominent position, respected by all, rich and had a reputation for benevolence. He subscribed considerable sums to the almshouse and the orphan asylum; he was very charitable, too, in secret, a fact which only became known after his death. He was a man of about fifty, almost stern in appearance and not much given to conversation. He had been married about ten years and his wife, who was still young, had borne him three children. Well, I was sitting alone in my room the following evening, when my door suddenly opened and this gentleman walked in. I must mention, by the way, that I was no longer living in my former quarters. As soon as I resigned my commission, I took rooms with an old lady, the widow of a government clerk. My landlady's servant waited upon me, for I had moved into her rooms simply because on my return from the duel I had sent Afanasy back to the regiment, as I felt ashamed to look him in the face after my last interview with him. So prone is the man of the world to be ashamed of any righteous action. "I have," said my visitor, "with great interest listened to you speaking in different houses the last few days and I wanted at last to make your personal acquaintance, so as to talk to you more intimately. Can you, dear sir, grant me this favor?" "I can, with the greatest pleasure, and I shall look upon it as an honor." I said this, though I felt almost dismayed, so greatly was I impressed from the first moment by the appearance of this man. For though other people had listened to me with interest and attention, no one had come to me before with such a serious, stern and concentrated expression. And now he had come to see me in my own rooms. He sat down. "You are, I see, a man of great strength of character," he said; "as you have dared to serve the truth, even when by doing so you risked incurring the contempt of all." "Your praise is, perhaps, excessive," I replied. "No, it's not excessive," he answered; "believe me, such a course of action is far more difficult than you think. It is that which has impressed me, and it is only on that account that I have come to you," he continued. "Tell me, please, that is if you are not annoyed by my perhaps unseemly curiosity, what were your exact sensations, if you can recall them, at the moment when you made up your mind to ask forgiveness at the duel. Do not think my question frivolous; on the contrary, I have in asking the question a secret motive of my own, which I will perhaps explain to you later on, if it is God's will that we should become more intimately acquainted." All the while he was speaking, I was looking at him straight into the face and I felt all at once a complete trust in him and great curiosity on my side also, for I felt that there was some strange secret in his soul. "You ask what were my exact sensations at the moment when I asked my opponent's forgiveness," I answered; "but I had better tell you from the beginning what I have not yet told any one else." And I described all that had passed between Afanasy and me, and how I had bowed down to the ground at his feet. "From that you can see for yourself," I concluded, "that at the time of the duel it was easier for me, for I had made a beginning already at home, and when once I had started on that road, to go farther along it was far from being difficult, but became a source of joy and happiness." I liked the way he looked at me as he listened. "All that," he said, "is exceedingly interesting. I will come to see you again and again." And from that time forth he came to see me nearly every evening. And we should have become greater friends, if only he had ever talked of himself. But about himself he scarcely ever said a word, yet continually asked me about myself. In spite of that I became very fond of him and spoke with perfect frankness to him about all my feelings; "for," thought I, "what need have I to know his secrets, since I can see without that that he is a good man? Moreover, though he is such a serious man and my senior, he comes to see a youngster like me and treats me as his equal." And I learned a great deal that was profitable from him, for he was a man of lofty mind. "That life is heaven," he said to me suddenly, "that I have long been thinking about"; and all at once he added, "I think of nothing else indeed." He looked at me and smiled. "I am more convinced of it than you are, I will tell you later why." I listened to him and thought that he evidently wanted to tell me something. "Heaven," he went on, "lies hidden within all of us--here it lies hidden in me now, and if I will it, it will be revealed to me to-morrow and for all time." I looked at him; he was speaking with great emotion and gazing mysteriously at me, as if he were questioning me. "And that we are all responsible to all for all, apart from our own sins, you were quite right in thinking that, and it is wonderful how you could comprehend it in all its significance at once. And in very truth, so soon as men understand that, the Kingdom of Heaven will be for them not a dream, but a living reality." "And when," I cried out to him bitterly, "when will that come to pass? and will it ever come to pass? Is not it simply a dream of ours?" "What then, you don't believe it," he said. "You preach it and don't believe it yourself. Believe me, this dream, as you call it, will come to pass without doubt; it will come, but not now, for every process has its law. It's a spiritual, psychological process. To transform the world, to recreate it afresh, men must turn into another path psychologically. Until you have become really, in actual fact, a brother to every one, brotherhood will not come to pass. No sort of scientific teaching, no kind of common interest, will ever teach men to share property and privileges with equal consideration for all. Every one will think his share too small and they will be always envying, complaining and attacking one another. You ask when it will come to pass; it will come to pass, but first we have to go through the period of isolation." "What do you mean by isolation?" I asked him. "Why, the isolation that prevails everywhere, above all in our age--it has not fully developed, it has not reached its limit yet. For every one strives to keep his individuality as apart as possible, wishes to secure the greatest possible fullness of life for himself; but meantime all his efforts result not in attaining fullness of life but self-destruction, for instead of self-realization he ends by arriving at complete solitude. All mankind in our age have split up into units, they all keep apart, each in his own groove; each one holds aloof, hides himself and hides what he has, from the rest, and he ends by being repelled by others and repelling them. He heaps up riches by himself and thinks, 'How strong I am now and how secure,' and in his madness he does not understand that the more he heaps up, the more he sinks into self-destructive impotence. For he is accustomed to rely upon himself alone and to cut himself off from the whole; he has trained himself not to believe in the help of others, in men and in humanity, and only trembles for fear he should lose his money and the privileges that he has won for himself. Everywhere in these days men have, in their mockery, ceased to understand that the true security is to be found in social solidarity rather than in isolated individual effort. But this terrible individualism must inevitably have an end, and all will suddenly understand how unnaturally they are separated from one another. It will be the spirit of the time, and people will marvel that they have sat so long in darkness without seeing the light. And then the sign of the Son of Man will be seen in the heavens.... But, until then, we must keep the banner flying. Sometimes even if he has to do it alone, and his conduct seems to be crazy, a man must set an example, and so draw men's souls out of their solitude, and spur them to some act of brotherly love, that the great idea may not die." Our evenings, one after another, were spent in such stirring and fervent talk. I gave up society and visited my neighbors much less frequently. Besides, my vogue was somewhat over. I say this, not as blame, for they still loved me and treated me good-humoredly, but there's no denying that fashion is a great power in society. I began to regard my mysterious visitor with admiration, for besides enjoying his intelligence, I began to perceive that he was brooding over some plan in his heart, and was preparing himself perhaps for a great deed. Perhaps he liked my not showing curiosity about his secret, not seeking to discover it by direct question nor by insinuation. But I noticed at last, that he seemed to show signs of wanting to tell me something. This had become quite evident, indeed, about a month after he first began to visit me. "Do you know," he said to me once, "that people are very inquisitive about us in the town and wonder why I come to see you so often. But let them wonder, for _soon all will be explained_." Sometimes an extraordinary agitation would come over him, and almost always on such occasions he would get up and go away. Sometimes he would fix a long piercing look upon me, and I thought, "He will say something directly now." But he would suddenly begin talking of something ordinary and familiar. He often complained of headache too. One day, quite unexpectedly indeed, after he had been talking with great fervor a long time, I saw him suddenly turn pale, and his face worked convulsively, while he stared persistently at me. "What's the matter?" I said; "do you feel ill?"--he had just been complaining of headache. "I ... do you know ... I murdered some one." He said this and smiled with a face as white as chalk. "Why is it he is smiling?" The thought flashed through my mind before I realized anything else. I too turned pale. "What are you saying?" I cried. "You see," he said, with a pale smile, "how much it has cost me to say the first word. Now I have said it, I feel I've taken the first step and shall go on." For a long while I could not believe him, and I did not believe him at that time, but only after he had been to see me three days running and told me all about it. I thought he was mad, but ended by being convinced, to my great grief and amazement. His crime was a great and terrible one. Fourteen years before, he had murdered the widow of a landowner, a wealthy and handsome young woman who had a house in our town. He fell passionately in love with her, declared his feeling and tried to persuade her to marry him. But she had already given her heart to another man, an officer of noble birth and high rank in the service, who was at that time away at the front, though she was expecting him soon to return. She refused his offer and begged him not to come and see her. After he had ceased to visit her, he took advantage of his knowledge of the house to enter at night through the garden by the roof, at great risk of discovery. But, as often happens, a crime committed with extraordinary audacity is more successful than others. Entering the garret through the skylight, he went down the ladder, knowing that the door at the bottom of it was sometimes, through the negligence of the servants, left unlocked. He hoped to find it so, and so it was. He made his way in the dark to her bedroom, where a light was burning. As though on purpose, both her maids had gone off to a birthday-party in the same street, without asking leave. The other servants slept in the servants' quarters or in the kitchen on the ground-floor. His passion flamed up at the sight of her asleep, and then vindictive, jealous anger took possession of his heart, and like a drunken man, beside himself, he thrust a knife into her heart, so that she did not even cry out. Then with devilish and criminal cunning he contrived that suspicion should fall on the servants. He was so base as to take her purse, to open her chest with keys from under her pillow, and to take some things from it, doing it all as it might have been done by an ignorant servant, leaving valuable papers and taking only money. He took some of the larger gold things, but left smaller articles that were ten times as valuable. He took with him, too, some things for himself as remembrances, but of that later. Having done this awful deed, he returned by the way he had come. Neither the next day, when the alarm was raised, nor at any time after in his life, did any one dream of suspecting that he was the criminal. No one indeed knew of his love for her, for he was always reserved and silent and had no friend to whom he would have opened his heart. He was looked upon simply as an acquaintance, and not a very intimate one, of the murdered woman, as for the previous fortnight he had not even visited her. A serf of hers called Pyotr was at once suspected, and every circumstance confirmed the suspicion. The man knew--indeed his mistress did not conceal the fact--that having to send one of her serfs as a recruit she had decided to send him, as he had no relations and his conduct was unsatisfactory. People had heard him angrily threatening to murder her when he was drunk in a tavern. Two days before her death, he had run away, staying no one knew where in the town. The day after the murder, he was found on the road leading out of the town, dead drunk, with a knife in his pocket, and his right hand happened to be stained with blood. He declared that his nose had been bleeding, but no one believed him. The maids confessed that they had gone to a party and that the street-door had been left open till they returned. And a number of similar details came to light, throwing suspicion on the innocent servant. They arrested him, and he was tried for the murder; but a week after the arrest, the prisoner fell sick of a fever and died unconscious in the hospital. There the matter ended and the judges and the authorities and every one in the town remained convinced that the crime had been committed by no one but the servant who had died in the hospital. And after that the punishment began. My mysterious visitor, now my friend, told me that at first he was not in the least troubled by pangs of conscience. He was miserable a long time, but not for that reason; only from regret that he had killed the woman he loved, that she was no more, that in killing her he had killed his love, while the fire of passion was still in his veins. But of the innocent blood he had shed, of the murder of a fellow creature, he scarcely thought. The thought that his victim might have become the wife of another man was insupportable to him, and so, for a long time, he was convinced in his conscience that he could not have acted otherwise. At first he was worried at the arrest of the servant, but his illness and death soon set his mind at rest, for the man's death was apparently (so he reflected at the time) not owing to his arrest or his fright, but a chill he had taken on the day he ran away, when he had lain all night dead drunk on the damp ground. The theft of the money and other things troubled him little, for he argued that the theft had not been committed for gain but to avert suspicion. The sum stolen was small, and he shortly afterwards subscribed the whole of it, and much more, towards the funds for maintaining an almshouse in the town. He did this on purpose to set his conscience at rest about the theft, and it's a remarkable fact that for a long time he really was at peace--he told me this himself. He entered then upon a career of great activity in the service, volunteered for a difficult and laborious duty, which occupied him two years, and being a man of strong will almost forgot the past. Whenever he recalled it, he tried not to think of it at all. He became active in philanthropy too, founded and helped to maintain many institutions in the town, did a good deal in the two capitals, and in both Moscow and Petersburg was elected a member of philanthropic societies. At last, however, he began brooding over the past, and the strain of it was too much for him. Then he was attracted by a fine and intelligent girl and soon after married her, hoping that marriage would dispel his lonely depression, and that by entering on a new life and scrupulously doing his duty to his wife and children, he would escape from old memories altogether. But the very opposite of what he expected happened. He began, even in the first month of his marriage, to be continually fretted by the thought, "My wife loves me--but what if she knew?" When she first told him that she would soon bear him a child, he was troubled. "I am giving life, but I have taken life." Children came. "How dare I love them, teach and educate them, how can I talk to them of virtue? I have shed blood." They were splendid children, he longed to caress them; "and I can't look at their innocent candid faces, I am unworthy." At last he began to be bitterly and ominously haunted by the blood of his murdered victim, by the young life he had destroyed, by the blood that cried out for vengeance. He had begun to have awful dreams. But, being a man of fortitude, he bore his suffering a long time, thinking: "I shall expiate everything by this secret agony." But that hope, too, was vain; the longer it went on, the more intense was his suffering. He was respected in society for his active benevolence, though every one was overawed by his stern and gloomy character. But the more he was respected, the more intolerable it was for him. He confessed to me that he had thoughts of killing himself. But he began to be haunted by another idea--an idea which he had at first regarded as impossible and unthinkable, though at last it got such a hold on his heart that he could not shake it off. He dreamed of rising up, going out and confessing in the face of all men that he had committed murder. For three years this dream had pursued him, haunting him in different forms. At last he believed with his whole heart that if he confessed his crime, he would heal his soul and would be at peace for ever. But this belief filled his heart with terror, for how could he carry it out? And then came what happened at my duel. "Looking at you, I have made up my mind." I looked at him. "Is it possible," I cried, clasping my hands, "that such a trivial incident could give rise to such a resolution in you?" "My resolution has been growing for the last three years," he answered, "and your story only gave the last touch to it. Looking at you, I reproached myself and envied you." He said this to me almost sullenly. "But you won't be believed," I observed; "it's fourteen years ago." "I have proofs, great proofs. I shall show them." Then I cried and kissed him. "Tell me one thing, one thing," he said (as though it all depended upon me), "my wife, my children! My wife may die of grief, and though my children won't lose their rank and property, they'll be a convict's children and for ever! And what a memory, what a memory of me I shall leave in their hearts!" I said nothing. "And to part from them, to leave them for ever? It's for ever, you know, for ever!" I sat still and repeated a silent prayer. I got up at last, I felt afraid. "Well?" He looked at me. "Go!" said I, "confess. Everything passes, only the truth remains. Your children will understand, when they grow up, the nobility of your resolution." He left me that time as though he had made up his mind. Yet for more than a fortnight afterwards, he came to me every evening, still preparing himself, still unable to bring himself to the point. He made my heart ache. One day he would come determined and say fervently: "I know it will be heaven for me, heaven, the moment I confess. Fourteen years I've been in hell. I want to suffer. I will take my punishment and begin to live. You can pass through the world doing wrong, but there's no turning back. Now I dare not love my neighbor nor even my own children. Good God, my children will understand, perhaps, what my punishment has cost me and will not condemn me! God is not in strength but in truth." "All will understand your sacrifice," I said to him, "if not at once, they will understand later; for you have served truth, the higher truth, not of the earth." And he would go away seeming comforted, but next day he would come again, bitter, pale, sarcastic. "Every time I come to you, you look at me so inquisitively as though to say, 'He has still not confessed!' Wait a bit, don't despise me too much. It's not such an easy thing to do, as you would think. Perhaps I shall not do it at all. You won't go and inform against me then, will you?" And far from looking at him with indiscreet curiosity, I was afraid to look at him at all. I was quite ill from anxiety, and my heart was full of tears. I could not sleep at night. "I have just come from my wife," he went on. "Do you understand what the word 'wife' means? When I went out, the children called to me, 'Good-by, father, make haste back to read _The Children's Magazine_ with us.' No, you don't understand that! No one is wise from another man's woe." His eyes were glittering, his lips were twitching. Suddenly he struck the table with his fist so that everything on it danced--it was the first time he had done such a thing, he was such a mild man. "But need I?" he exclaimed, "must I? No one has been condemned, no one has been sent to Siberia in my place, the man died of fever. And I've been punished by my sufferings for the blood I shed. And I shan't be believed, they won't believe my proofs. Need I confess, need I? I am ready to go on suffering all my life for the blood I have shed, if only my wife and children may be spared. Will it be just to ruin them with me? Aren't we making a mistake? What is right in this case? And will people recognize it, will they appreciate it, will they respect it?" "Good Lord!" I thought to myself, "he is thinking of other people's respect at such a moment!" And I felt so sorry for him then, that I believe I would have shared his fate if it could have comforted him. I saw he was beside himself. I was aghast, realizing with my heart as well as my mind what such a resolution meant. "Decide my fate!" he exclaimed again. "Go and confess," I whispered to him. My voice failed me, but I whispered it firmly. I took up the New Testament from the table, the Russian translation, and showed him the Gospel of St. John, chapter xii. verse 24: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." I had just been reading that verse when he came in. He read it. "That's true," he said, but he smiled bitterly. "It's terrible the things you find in those books," he said, after a pause. "It's easy enough to thrust them upon one. And who wrote them? Can they have been written by men?" "The Holy Spirit wrote them," said I. "It's easy for you to prate," he smiled again, this time almost with hatred. I took the book again, opened it in another place and showed him the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter x. verse 31. He read: "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God." He read it and simply flung down the book. He was trembling all over. "An awful text," he said. "There's no denying you've picked out fitting ones." He rose from the chair. "Well!" he said, "good-by, perhaps I shan't come again ... we shall meet in heaven. So I have been for fourteen years 'in the hands of the living God,' that's how one must think of those fourteen years. To-morrow I will beseech those hands to let me go." I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him, but I did not dare--his face was contorted and somber. He went away. "Good God," I thought, "what has he gone to face!" I fell on my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift defender and helper. I was half an hour praying in tears, and it was late, about midnight. Suddenly I saw the door open and he came in again. I was surprised. "Where have you been?" I asked him. "I think," he said, "I've forgotten something ... my handkerchief, I think.... Well, even if I've not forgotten anything, let me stay a little." He sat down. I stood over him. "You sit down, too," said he. I sat down. We sat still for two minutes; he looked intently at me and suddenly smiled--I remembered that--then he got up, embraced me warmly and kissed me. "Remember," he said, "how I came to you a second time. Do you hear, remember it!" And he went out. "To-morrow," I thought. And so it was. I did not know that evening that the next day was his birthday. I had not been out for the last few days, so I had no chance of hearing it from any one. On that day he always had a great gathering, every one in the town went to it. It was the same this time. After dinner he walked into the middle of the room, with a paper in his hand--a formal declaration to the chief of his department who was present. This declaration he read aloud to the whole assembly. It contained a full account of the crime, in every detail. "I cut myself off from men as a monster. God has visited me," he said in conclusion. "I want to suffer for my sin!" Then he brought out and laid on the table all the things he had been keeping for fourteen years, that he thought would prove his crime, the jewels belonging to the murdered woman which he had stolen to divert suspicion, a cross and a locket taken from her neck with a portrait of her betrothed in the locket, her notebook and two letters; one from her betrothed, telling her that he would soon be with her, and her unfinished answer left on the table to be sent off next day. He carried off these two letters--what for? Why had he kept them for fourteen years afterwards instead of destroying them as evidence against him? And this is what happened: every one was amazed and horrified, every one refused to believe it and thought that he was deranged, though all listened with intense curiosity. A few days later it was fully decided and agreed in every house that the unhappy man was mad. The legal authorities could not refuse to take the case up, but they too dropped it. Though the trinkets and letters made them ponder, they decided that even if they did turn out to be authentic, no charge could be based on those alone. Besides, she might have given him those things as a friend, or asked him to take care of them for her. I heard afterwards, however, that the genuineness of the things was proved by the friends and relations of the murdered woman, and that there was no doubt about them. Yet nothing was destined to come of it, after all. Five days later, all had heard that he was ill and that his life was in danger. The nature of his illness I can't explain, they said it was an affection of the heart. But it became known that the doctors had been induced by his wife to investigate his mental condition also, and had come to the conclusion that it was a case of insanity. I betrayed nothing, though people ran to question me. But when I wanted to visit him, I was for a long while forbidden to do so, above all by his wife. "It's you who have caused his illness," she said to me; "he was always gloomy, but for the last year people noticed that he was peculiarly excited and did strange things, and now you have been the ruin of him. Your preaching has brought him to this; for the last month he was always with you." Indeed, not only his wife but the whole town were down upon me and blamed me. "It's all your doing," they said. I was silent and indeed rejoiced at heart, for I saw plainly God's mercy to the man who had turned against himself and punished himself. I could not believe in his insanity. They let me see him at last, he insisted upon saying good-by to me. I went in to him and saw at once, that not only his days, but his hours were numbered. He was weak, yellow, his hands trembled, he gasped for breath, but his face was full of tender and happy feeling. "It is done!" he said. "I've long been yearning to see you, why didn't you come?" I did not tell him that they would not let me see him. "God has had pity on me and is calling me to Himself. I know I am dying, but I feel joy and peace for the first time after so many years. There was heaven in my heart from the moment I had done what I had to do. Now I dare to love my children and to kiss them. Neither my wife nor the judges, nor any one has believed it. My children will never believe it either. I see in that God's mercy to them. I shall die, and my name will be without a stain for them. And now I feel God near, my heart rejoices as in Heaven ... I have done my duty." He could not speak, he gasped for breath, he pressed my hand warmly, looking fervently at me. We did not talk for long, his wife kept peeping in at us. But he had time to whisper to me: "Do you remember how I came back to you that second time, at midnight? I told you to remember it. You know what I came back for? I came to kill you!" I started. "I went out from you then into the darkness, I wandered about the streets, struggling with myself. And suddenly I hated you so that I could hardly bear it. Now, I thought, he is all that binds me, and he is my judge. I can't refuse to face my punishment to-morrow, for he knows all. It was not that I was afraid you would betray me (I never even thought of that), but I thought, 'How can I look him in the face if I don't confess?' And if you had been at the other end of the earth, but alive, it would have been all the same, the thought was unendurable that you were alive knowing everything and condemning me. I hated you as though you were the cause, as though you were to blame for everything. I came back to you then, remembering that you had a dagger lying on your table. I sat down and asked you to sit down, and for a whole minute I pondered. If I had killed you, I should have been ruined by that murder even if I had not confessed the other. But I didn't think about that at all, and I didn't want to think of it at that moment. I only hated you and longed to revenge myself on you for everything. The Lord vanquished the devil in my heart. But let me tell you, you were never nearer death." A week later he died. The whole town followed him to the grave. The chief priest made a speech full of feeling. All lamented the terrible illness that had cut short his days. But all the town was up in arms against me after the funeral, and people even refused to see me. Some, at first a few and afterwards more, began indeed to believe in the truth of his story, and they visited me and questioned me with great interest and eagerness, for man loves to see the downfall and disgrace of the righteous. But I held my tongue, and very shortly after, I left the town, and five months later by God's grace I entered upon the safe and blessed path, praising the unseen finger which had guided me so clearly to it. But I remember in my prayer to this day, the servant of God, Mihail, who suffered so greatly.

Book 6, Chapter 2

https://web.archive.org/web/20201023112808/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/brothers-karamazov/summary/book-6-chapter-2

Zosima begins by telling everyone about his older brother, Markel, who died from consumption when he was only 17. All through his life, Markel had rebelled against any religious teaching. But at the age of 17, during Holy Week, his consumption took a turn for the worse, and the doctor said he had a very short time left to live. Suddenly Markel underwent some kind of religious conversion. Zosima recalls his brother's joyful expression as he celebrated God's glory and exhorted everyone around him to welcome paradise on earth. His brother passed away a few weeks after Easter. Zosima then recalls the first time he felt God's word in his soul. When he was 8 years old, he heard the story of Job in church, and he felt overwhelmed with awe and astonishment. He tells his fellow monks that all they have to do to touch the souls of their flock is to share the moving stories of Scripture. As an example, he relates the story of a young man he encountered in his early days as a monk. The young man wonders whether even animals "have Christ." Zosima tells the young man a story about how a saint once convinced a bear not to attack him by handing it a piece of bread. The young man is moved by the story. Flash forward to an older Zosima, who's now a hip cadet officer partying in St. Petersburg. He falls in love with a girl who's smart and hot, but then he gets called away for a couple months on a military mission. When he gets back, the girl is married. Hurt and angry, Zosima deliberately insults the girl's husband during a conversation about an important event. This insult leads to a duel. The evening before the duel, Zosima is in a foul mood. He takes it out on his servant Afanasy by slapping him so hard that he bleeds. The next morning, though, Zosima's mood is radically different. He's filled with a deep self-consciousness that there is something utterly shameful within him. He realizes that he treated Afanasy with inhuman cruelty. He realizes that Afanasy is a man created in God's image like himself, just like the guy he's going to duel. In fact, everyone is made in God's image. Filled with this enlightenment, Zosima rides off to the duel with his second , a fellow military officer. Zosima and the girl's husband take twelve paces apart from each other, and the girl's husband takes the first shot. Instead of shooting back, Zosima throws away his weapon and apologizes. Everyone's in dismay. Zosima explains that if he hadn't let the girl's husband take a shot at him, everyone would have thought he was apologizing because he was a coward. No one knows what to do with that, but they all acknowledge that he's done something "original." Back at his regiment, the officers debate whether Zosima ought to resign, but Zosima interrupts them to announce that he's resigning and joining a monastery. When news of his actions spreads through the town, Zosima is greeted with laughter, but not with malice, as everyone seems to accept him with love. At a social gathering, the girl he was in love with embraces him with gratitude, as does her husband and everyone else. Just then, Zosima notices an elderly man approaching him. This elderly man, an important and wealthy official well respected in the town, had never spoken to Zosima before. But after the dueling incident, the elderly man begins to visit him regularly in his rooms, where they have long philosophical discussions. Zosima is impressed with his visitor's wisdom, and much of what he says echoes Zosima's later, more mature philosophy, including the idea that paradise is possible on earth if universal brotherhood can be achieved . Eventually Zosima's visitor confesses that he killed someone. Fourteen years ago he was in love with a widow who had already promised herself to an officer. Although the officer was away on a military campaign, the widow expected him to return to her soon. Furious, the visitor snuck in at night and stabbed her to death. He then stole a few items to make it look as if a servant had robbed and murdered her. The visitor's plan succeeded. A disgruntled servant was blamed for the deed and - conveniently, before the visitor could feel guilty about letting someone else take the fall for his crime - the servant died a couple weeks later of some illness. As the years went by, the visitor was tormented by guilt. He fell in love again, married a young woman, and had three children, but he couldn't bear to embrace them because of his guilt. Zosima advises the visitor to confess his deeds, but the visitor continues to waffle for a couple of weeks. The visitor leaves late one night, then suddenly returns. They sit together, and the visitor mysteriously tells Zosima to remember that he had returned that night. The next day, the visitor confesses everything. Nobody really believes him, even though he kept some souvenirs from the widow he murdered, and many think he's crazy. As if on cue, the visitor falls seriously ill. On his deathbed, he confesses to Zosima that he had returned that night to kill Zosima for fear that Zosima would tell everyone about his terrible secret. The town blames Zosima for the visitor's mad confession and subsequent decline. When the visitor dies a couple of weeks later, Zosima leaves town and joins a monastery. It's only at the end of this section that we finally learn the name of the visitor, Mikhail.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/29.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Sense and Sensibility/section_2_part_9.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 29

chapter 29

{"name": "Chapter 29", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210419170735/https://www.gradesaver.com/sense-and-sensibility/study-guide/summary-chapters-21-30", "summary": "Marianne gets up at dawn to write a letter to Willoughby; one comes in reply, in which Willoughby denies having loved Marianne, and says he hopes he didn't lead her to that conclusion. The letter is an insult to Marianne, and she is deeply grieved at being dumped so coldly; Marianne feels weak and ill, but Elinor feels only anger at the cruel way in which her sister has been discarded. Marianne then reveals that she and Willoughby were never engaged; the text of Marianne's letters to Willoughby is revealed, as Elinor examines them to see if Marianne has been indiscreet. Marianne indeed was too open with Willoughby, as is in her nature; she tells Elinor that she wants to go home immediately, though Elinor knows they must stay out of obligation to Mrs. Jennings.", "analysis": "The letter hearkens to the theme of appearance vs. reality; for although Willoughby appeared in every way to be kind and honorable, this letter confirms that he is cold, inconstant, and cruel, traits which were hardly apparent while he was with Marianne. Willoughby's tone and diction in the letter are also completely unlike any he has shown before; his language is detached and unyielding, whereas before all his communications with Marianne had been very affectionate and warm in their address. It is uncharacteristic of Marianne to note, when she is most upset, that she is concerned about her unhappiness affecting Elinor; this is Marianne's first step toward becoming more sensitive about other people's needs, although she unfortunately relapses into a selfish focus on her own miseries. The contrast in tone and speech of the two girls shows that there is still great difference between them; Marianne speaks haltingly and passionately, in outbursts, and Elinor speaks carefully, her statements complete and considered"}

Before the house-maid had lit their fire the next day, or the sun gained any power over a cold, gloomy morning in January, Marianne, only half dressed, was kneeling against one of the window-seats for the sake of all the little light she could command from it, and writing as fast as a continual flow of tears would permit her. In this situation, Elinor, roused from sleep by her agitation and sobs, first perceived her; and after observing her for a few moments with silent anxiety, said, in a tone of the most considerate gentleness, "Marianne, may I ask-?" "No, Elinor," she replied, "ask nothing; you will soon know all." The sort of desperate calmness with which this was said, lasted no longer than while she spoke, and was immediately followed by a return of the same excessive affliction. It was some minutes before she could go on with her letter, and the frequent bursts of grief which still obliged her, at intervals, to withhold her pen, were proofs enough of her feeling how more than probable it was that she was writing for the last time to Willoughby. Elinor paid her every quiet and unobtrusive attention in her power; and she would have tried to sooth and tranquilize her still more, had not Marianne entreated her, with all the eagerness of the most nervous irritability, not to speak to her for the world. In such circumstances, it was better for both that they should not be long together; and the restless state of Marianne's mind not only prevented her from remaining in the room a moment after she was dressed, but requiring at once solitude and continual change of place, made her wander about the house till breakfast time, avoiding the sight of every body. At breakfast she neither ate, nor attempted to eat any thing; and Elinor's attention was then all employed, not in urging her, not in pitying her, nor in appearing to regard her, but in endeavouring to engage Mrs. Jennings's notice entirely to herself. As this was a favourite meal with Mrs. Jennings, it lasted a considerable time, and they were just setting themselves, after it, round the common working table, when a letter was delivered to Marianne, which she eagerly caught from the servant, and, turning of a death-like paleness, instantly ran out of the room. Elinor, who saw as plainly by this, as if she had seen the direction, that it must come from Willoughby, felt immediately such a sickness at heart as made her hardly able to hold up her head, and sat in such a general tremour as made her fear it impossible to escape Mrs. Jennings's notice. That good lady, however, saw only that Marianne had received a letter from Willoughby, which appeared to her a very good joke, and which she treated accordingly, by hoping, with a laugh, that she would find it to her liking. Of Elinor's distress, she was too busily employed in measuring lengths of worsted for her rug, to see any thing at all; and calmly continuing her talk, as soon as Marianne disappeared, she said, "Upon my word, I never saw a young woman so desperately in love in my life! MY girls were nothing to her, and yet they used to be foolish enough; but as for Miss Marianne, she is quite an altered creature. I hope, from the bottom of my heart, he won't keep her waiting much longer, for it is quite grievous to see her look so ill and forlorn. Pray, when are they to be married?" Elinor, though never less disposed to speak than at that moment, obliged herself to answer such an attack as this, and, therefore, trying to smile, replied, "And have you really, Ma'am, talked yourself into a persuasion of my sister's being engaged to Mr. Willoughby? I thought it had been only a joke, but so serious a question seems to imply more; and I must beg, therefore, that you will not deceive yourself any longer. I do assure you that nothing would surprise me more than to hear of their being going to be married." "For shame, for shame, Miss Dashwood! how can you talk so? Don't we all know that it must be a match, that they were over head and ears in love with each other from the first moment they met? Did not I see them together in Devonshire every day, and all day long; and did not I know that your sister came to town with me on purpose to buy wedding clothes? Come, come, this won't do. Because you are so sly about it yourself, you think nobody else has any senses; but it is no such thing, I can tell you, for it has been known all over town this ever so long. I tell every body of it and so does Charlotte." "Indeed, Ma'am," said Elinor, very seriously, "you are mistaken. Indeed, you are doing a very unkind thing in spreading the report, and you will find that you have though you will not believe me now." Mrs. Jennings laughed again, but Elinor had not spirits to say more, and eager at all events to know what Willoughby had written, hurried away to their room, where, on opening the door, she saw Marianne stretched on the bed, almost choked by grief, one letter in her hand, and two or three others laying by her. Elinor drew near, but without saying a word; and seating herself on the bed, took her hand, kissed her affectionately several times, and then gave way to a burst of tears, which at first was scarcely less violent than Marianne's. The latter, though unable to speak, seemed to feel all the tenderness of this behaviour, and after some time thus spent in joint affliction, she put all the letters into Elinor's hands; and then covering her face with her handkerchief, almost screamed with agony. Elinor, who knew that such grief, shocking as it was to witness it, must have its course, watched by her till this excess of suffering had somewhat spent itself, and then turning eagerly to Willoughby's letter, read as follows: "Bond Street, January. "MY DEAR MADAM, "I have just had the honour of receiving your letter, for which I beg to return my sincere acknowledgments. I am much concerned to find there was anything in my behaviour last night that did not meet your approbation; and though I am quite at a loss to discover in what point I could be so unfortunate as to offend you, I entreat your forgiveness of what I can assure you to have been perfectly unintentional. I shall never reflect on my former acquaintance with your family in Devonshire without the most grateful pleasure, and flatter myself it will not be broken by any mistake or misapprehension of my actions. My esteem for your whole family is very sincere; but if I have been so unfortunate as to give rise to a belief of more than I felt, or meant to express, I shall reproach myself for not having been more guarded in my professions of that esteem. That I should ever have meant more you will allow to be impossible, when you understand that my affections have been long engaged elsewhere, and it will not be many weeks, I believe, before this engagement is fulfilled. It is with great regret that I obey your commands in returning the letters with which I have been honoured from you, and the lock of hair, which you so obligingly bestowed on me. "I am, dear Madam, "Your most obedient "humble servant, "JOHN WILLOUGHBY." With what indignation such a letter as this must be read by Miss Dashwood, may be imagined. Though aware, before she began it, that it must bring a confession of his inconstancy, and confirm their separation for ever, she was not aware that such language could be suffered to announce it; nor could she have supposed Willoughby capable of departing so far from the appearance of every honourable and delicate feeling--so far from the common decorum of a gentleman, as to send a letter so impudently cruel: a letter which, instead of bringing with his desire of a release any professions of regret, acknowledged no breach of faith, denied all peculiar affection whatever--a letter of which every line was an insult, and which proclaimed its writer to be deep in hardened villainy. She paused over it for some time with indignant astonishment; then read it again and again; but every perusal only served to increase her abhorrence of the man, and so bitter were her feelings against him, that she dared not trust herself to speak, lest she might wound Marianne still deeper by treating their disengagement, not as a loss to her of any possible good but as an escape from the worst and most irremediable of all evils, a connection, for life, with an unprincipled man, as a deliverance the most real, a blessing the most important. In her earnest meditations on the contents of the letter, on the depravity of that mind which could dictate it, and probably, on the very different mind of a very different person, who had no other connection whatever with the affair than what her heart gave him with every thing that passed, Elinor forgot the immediate distress of her sister, forgot that she had three letters on her lap yet unread, and so entirely forgot how long she had been in the room, that when on hearing a carriage drive up to the door, she went to the window to see who could be coming so unreasonably early, she was all astonishment to perceive Mrs. Jennings's chariot, which she knew had not been ordered till one. Determined not to quit Marianne, though hopeless of contributing, at present, to her ease, she hurried away to excuse herself from attending Mrs. Jennings, on account of her sister being indisposed. Mrs. Jennings, with a thoroughly good-humoured concern for its cause, admitted the excuse most readily, and Elinor, after seeing her safe off, returned to Marianne, whom she found attempting to rise from the bed, and whom she reached just in time to prevent her from falling on the floor, faint and giddy from a long want of proper rest and food; for it was many days since she had any appetite, and many nights since she had really slept; and now, when her mind was no longer supported by the fever of suspense, the consequence of all this was felt in an aching head, a weakened stomach, and a general nervous faintness. A glass of wine, which Elinor procured for her directly, made her more comfortable, and she was at last able to express some sense of her kindness, by saying, "Poor Elinor! how unhappy I make you!" "I only wish," replied her sister, "there were any thing I COULD do, which might be of comfort to you." This, as every thing else would have been, was too much for Marianne, who could only exclaim, in the anguish of her heart, "Oh! Elinor, I am miserable, indeed," before her voice was entirely lost in sobs. Elinor could no longer witness this torrent of unresisted grief in silence. "Exert yourself, dear Marianne," she cried, "if you would not kill yourself and all who love you. Think of your mother; think of her misery while YOU suffer: for her sake you must exert yourself." "I cannot, I cannot," cried Marianne; "leave me, leave me, if I distress you; leave me, hate me, forget me! but do not torture me so. Oh! how easy for those, who have no sorrow of their own to talk of exertion! Happy, happy Elinor, YOU cannot have an idea of what I suffer." "Do you call ME happy, Marianne? Ah! if you knew!--And can you believe me to be so, while I see you so wretched!" "Forgive me, forgive me," throwing her arms round her sister's neck; "I know you feel for me; I know what a heart you have; but yet you are--you must be happy; Edward loves you--what, oh what, can do away such happiness as that?" "Many, many circumstances," said Elinor, solemnly. "No, no, no," cried Marianne wildly, "he loves you, and only you. You CAN have no grief." "I can have no pleasure while I see you in this state." "And you will never see me otherwise. Mine is a misery which nothing can do away." "You must not talk so, Marianne. Have you no comforts? no friends? Is your loss such as leaves no opening for consolation? Much as you suffer now, think of what you would have suffered if the discovery of his character had been delayed to a later period--if your engagement had been carried on for months and months, as it might have been, before he chose to put an end to it. Every additional day of unhappy confidence, on your side, would have made the blow more dreadful." "Engagement!" cried Marianne, "there has been no engagement." "No engagement!" "No, he is not so unworthy as you believe him. He has broken no faith with me." "But he told you that he loved you." "Yes--no--never absolutely. It was every day implied, but never professedly declared. Sometimes I thought it had been--but it never was." "Yet you wrote to him?"-- "Yes--could that be wrong after all that had passed?-- But I cannot talk." Elinor said no more, and turning again to the three letters which now raised a much stronger curiosity than before, directly ran over the contents of all. The first, which was what her sister had sent him on their arrival in town, was to this effect. Berkeley Street, January. "How surprised you will be, Willoughby, on receiving this; and I think you will feel something more than surprise, when you know that I am in town. An opportunity of coming hither, though with Mrs. Jennings, was a temptation we could not resist. I wish you may receive this in time to come here to-night, but I will not depend on it. At any rate I shall expect you to-morrow. For the present, adieu. "M.D." Her second note, which had been written on the morning after the dance at the Middletons', was in these words:-- "I cannot express my disappointment in having missed you the day before yesterday, nor my astonishment at not having received any answer to a note which I sent you above a week ago. I have been expecting to hear from you, and still more to see you, every hour of the day. Pray call again as soon as possible, and explain the reason of my having expected this in vain. You had better come earlier another time, because we are generally out by one. We were last night at Lady Middleton's, where there was a dance. I have been told that you were asked to be of the party. But could it be so? You must be very much altered indeed since we parted, if that could be the case, and you not there. But I will not suppose this possible, and I hope very soon to receive your personal assurance of its being otherwise. "M.D." The contents of her last note to him were these:-- "What am I to imagine, Willoughby, by your behaviour last night? Again I demand an explanation of it. I was prepared to meet you with the pleasure which our separation naturally produced, with the familiarity which our intimacy at Barton appeared to me to justify. I was repulsed indeed! I have passed a wretched night in endeavouring to excuse a conduct which can scarcely be called less than insulting; but though I have not yet been able to form any reasonable apology for your behaviour, I am perfectly ready to hear your justification of it. You have perhaps been misinformed, or purposely deceived, in something concerning me, which may have lowered me in your opinion. Tell me what it is, explain the grounds on which you acted, and I shall be satisfied, in being able to satisfy you. It would grieve me indeed to be obliged to think ill of you; but if I am to do it, if I am to learn that you are not what we have hitherto believed you, that your regard for us all was insincere, that your behaviour to me was intended only to deceive, let it be told as soon as possible. My feelings are at present in a state of dreadful indecision; I wish to acquit you, but certainty on either side will be ease to what I now suffer. If your sentiments are no longer what they were, you will return my notes, and the lock of my hair which is in your possession. "M.D." That such letters, so full of affection and confidence, could have been so answered, Elinor, for Willoughby's sake, would have been unwilling to believe. But her condemnation of him did not blind her to the impropriety of their having been written at all; and she was silently grieving over the imprudence which had hazarded such unsolicited proofs of tenderness, not warranted by anything preceding, and most severely condemned by the event, when Marianne, perceiving that she had finished the letters, observed to her that they contained nothing but what any one would have written in the same situation. "I felt myself," she added, "to be as solemnly engaged to him, as if the strictest legal covenant had bound us to each other." "I can believe it," said Elinor; "but unfortunately he did not feel the same." "He DID feel the same, Elinor--for weeks and weeks he felt it. I know he did. Whatever may have changed him now, (and nothing but the blackest art employed against me can have done it), I was once as dear to him as my own soul could wish. This lock of hair, which now he can so readily give up, was begged of me with the most earnest supplication. Had you seen his look, his manner, had you heard his voice at that moment! Have you forgot the last evening of our being together at Barton? The morning that we parted too! When he told me that it might be many weeks before we met again--his distress--can I ever forget his distress?" For a moment or two she could say no more; but when this emotion had passed away, she added, in a firmer tone, "Elinor, I have been cruelly used; but not by Willoughby." "Dearest Marianne, who but himself? By whom can he have been instigated?" "By all the world, rather than by his own heart. I could rather believe every creature of my acquaintance leagued together to ruin me in his opinion, than believe his nature capable of such cruelty. This woman of whom he writes--whoever she be--or any one, in short, but your own dear self, mama, and Edward, may have been so barbarous to bely me. Beyond you three, is there a creature in the world whom I would not rather suspect of evil than Willoughby, whose heart I know so well?" Elinor would not contend, and only replied, "Whoever may have been so detestably your enemy, let them be cheated of their malignant triumph, my dear sister, by seeing how nobly the consciousness of your own innocence and good intentions supports your spirits. It is a reasonable and laudable pride which resists such malevolence." "No, no," cried Marianne, "misery such as mine has no pride. I care not who knows that I am wretched. The triumph of seeing me so may be open to all the world. Elinor, Elinor, they who suffer little may be proud and independent as they like--may resist insult, or return mortification--but I cannot. I must feel--I must be wretched--and they are welcome to enjoy the consciousness of it that can." "But for my mother's sake and mine--" "I would do more than for my own. But to appear happy when I am so miserable--Oh! who can require it?" Again they were both silent. Elinor was employed in walking thoughtfully from the fire to the window, from the window to the fire, without knowing that she received warmth from one, or discerning objects through the other; and Marianne, seated at the foot of the bed, with her head leaning against one of its posts, again took up Willoughby's letter, and, after shuddering over every sentence, exclaimed-- "It is too much! Oh, Willoughby, Willoughby, could this be yours! Cruel, cruel--nothing can acquit you. Elinor, nothing can. Whatever he might have heard against me--ought he not to have suspended his belief? ought he not to have told me of it, to have given me the power of clearing myself? 'The lock of hair, (repeating it from the letter,) which you so obligingly bestowed on me'--That is unpardonable. Willoughby, where was your heart when you wrote those words? Oh, barbarously insolent!--Elinor, can he be justified?" "No, Marianne, in no possible way." "And yet this woman--who knows what her art may have been?--how long it may have been premeditated, and how deeply contrived by her!--Who is she?--Who can she be?--Whom did I ever hear him talk of as young and attractive among his female acquaintance?--Oh! no one, no one--he talked to me only of myself." Another pause ensued; Marianne was greatly agitated, and it ended thus. "Elinor, I must go home. I must go and comfort mama. Can not we be gone to-morrow?" "To-morrow, Marianne!" "Yes, why should I stay here? I came only for Willoughby's sake--and now who cares for me? Who regards me?" "It would be impossible to go to-morrow. We owe Mrs. Jennings much more than civility; and civility of the commonest kind must prevent such a hasty removal as that." "Well then, another day or two, perhaps; but I cannot stay here long, I cannot stay to endure the questions and remarks of all these people. The Middletons and Palmers--how am I to bear their pity? The pity of such a woman as Lady Middleton! Oh, what would HE say to that!" Elinor advised her to lie down again, and for a moment she did so; but no attitude could give her ease; and in restless pain of mind and body she moved from one posture to another, till growing more and more hysterical, her sister could with difficulty keep her on the bed at all, and for some time was fearful of being constrained to call for assistance. Some lavender drops, however, which she was at length persuaded to take, were of use; and from that time till Mrs. Jennings returned, she continued on the bed quiet and motionless.

Chapter 29

https://web.archive.org/web/20210419170735/https://www.gradesaver.com/sense-and-sensibility/study-guide/summary-chapters-21-30

Marianne gets up at dawn to write a letter to Willoughby; one comes in reply, in which Willoughby denies having loved Marianne, and says he hopes he didn't lead her to that conclusion. The letter is an insult to Marianne, and she is deeply grieved at being dumped so coldly; Marianne feels weak and ill, but Elinor feels only anger at the cruel way in which her sister has been discarded. Marianne then reveals that she and Willoughby were never engaged; the text of Marianne's letters to Willoughby is revealed, as Elinor examines them to see if Marianne has been indiscreet. Marianne indeed was too open with Willoughby, as is in her nature; she tells Elinor that she wants to go home immediately, though Elinor knows they must stay out of obligation to Mrs. Jennings.

The letter hearkens to the theme of appearance vs. reality; for although Willoughby appeared in every way to be kind and honorable, this letter confirms that he is cold, inconstant, and cruel, traits which were hardly apparent while he was with Marianne. Willoughby's tone and diction in the letter are also completely unlike any he has shown before; his language is detached and unyielding, whereas before all his communications with Marianne had been very affectionate and warm in their address. It is uncharacteristic of Marianne to note, when she is most upset, that she is concerned about her unhappiness affecting Elinor; this is Marianne's first step toward becoming more sensitive about other people's needs, although she unfortunately relapses into a selfish focus on her own miseries. The contrast in tone and speech of the two girls shows that there is still great difference between them; Marianne speaks haltingly and passionately, in outbursts, and Elinor speaks carefully, her statements complete and considered

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/04.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_4_part_0.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapter 4

chapter 4

{"name": "Chapter 4", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219150422/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-picture-of-dorian-gray/summary-and-analysis/chapter-4", "summary": "A month later, Dorian waits for Lord Henry in Henry's library at Mayfair. He is sulking and annoyed until someone at the door interrupts his mood. It is not Lord Henry, but his wife. Lady Henry is familiar with Dorian, having seen Lord Henry's photographs of the young man and having noticed Dorian with Lord Henry recently at the opera. In her brief appearance, Lady Henry seems as witty as her husband and equally indifferent toward convention. Lord Henry enters, complaining about the hours he has spent trying to bargain for a piece of elegant fabric: \"Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing.\" After Lady Henry leaves, he comments lightly on the disappointments of marriage, and Dorian volunteers that he doubts that he will ever marry because he is too much in love with an actress named Sibyl Vane. He recounts his discovery of Sibyl in \"an absurd little theatre\" in the East End of London. He had gone out one evening to seek adventure, recalling Lord Henry's advice that the search for beauty was \"the real secret of life.\" In front of a theatre was a \"hideous Jew,\" named Mr. Isaacs. Dorian was so amused with the man that he paid an entire guinea for a private theatre box. The play was Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. When Juliet, played by Sibyl Vane, walked onto the stage, her voice and performance were as magnificent as her appearance, and Dorian was immediately smitten. After that first night, he returned to the theatre every evening to see Sibyl Vane excel in various leading roles. Lord Henry offers a few skeptical remarks about Dorian's dramatic description of his newfound love, but he does not oppose his young friend's choice to love the actress. Dorian is concerned that Lord Henry will assume that all actresses are \"horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces.\" In one of his better comebacks, Lord Henry quietly advises, \"Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces.\" The love-struck Dorian tells of meeting Sibyl Vane, who immediately dubbed him \"Prince Charming.\" He laments that the actress is bound to work for Mr. Isaacs, vowing to liberate her and present her properly at a more reputable West End theatre. As Dorian describes Sibyl and his love for her, Dorian admits that he is entranced partly because Sibyl Vane is an actress and, thus, a different woman every night. He confesses his love for Sibyl, calling her a \"genius,\" and in the next breath states that he doesn't really care who she is or where she came from. From his own description, Dorian's \"love\" for Sibyl has more to do with the affectations of her profession than with her as a person. Lord Henry remains detached about Dorian's romance. However, he does agree to meet Dorian and Basil for dinner and to see Sibyl Vane in a play the next evening. Dorian leaves for the theatre, and Lord Henry muses on the situation. He feels \"not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy\" that Sibyl may intervene in their growing friendship; rather, these new developments make his protege \"a more interesting study.\" Eventually, his valet interrupts this reverie, and Lord Henry dresses to go out for dinner. When he returns home after midnight, he finds a telegram on the hall table. It is from Dorian: He is engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane.", "analysis": "Of primary interest in this chapter is the development of Dorian's character. Throughout the first three chapters, Lord Henry was the center of attention; Dorian was little more than a pretty face who envied his own portrait and was devoted to his mentor. In Chapter 4, however, Dorian begins to take over the novel. He comes into his own as a character, beginning to drive the plot of the story by acting independently of Lord Henry. His pronouncements, however, echo Lord Henry's, an indication that he is still very much under Lord Henry's influence. At least twice, the reader hears that an adage spoken by the protege -- Dorian -- was originally spoken by the mentor -- Lord Henry. However, Dorian's relationship with Sibyl Vane, superficial and immature as it may be, illustrates a burgeoning independence. It will soon lead to crisis and force more changes on the title character. Dorian has not just fallen in love with an actress; he has fallen in love with her performances. He does not know the girl at all; yet, by the end of the chapter, they are engaged to be married. His ambition is not to build a relationship but to develop a star. If Dorian has learned nothing else from Lord Henry, he has learned the joy of manipulation. He wants to become Sibyl Vane's agent, not her husband. That Dorian's first love is so flawed with selfishness and manipulation is a bright indicator of the emerging dark side of his nature. As for Lord Henry, he may not be jealous of Dorian's love interest, but he is somewhat skeptical. He feels that Dorian is \"premature,\" noting early on that an actress is a \"rather commonplace debut\" for a young man entering the world of romance, but he quickly drops that approach when he sees how intensely in love Dorian is. Lord Henry is wise enough to avoid confrontation. However, he must be stunned by the telegram announcing the engagement. A modern audience might find one disturbing factor in the chapter. Mr. Isaacs, who runs the theatre and holds Sibyl Vane under contract, is described in such flagrantly racist terms that the reader cannot ignore them. Someone might argue, in Wilde's defense, that he describes one specific Jew, not necessarily a stereotype. A better defense is that Dorian is speaking, not Wilde, and the crude, racist observations may be early indications of Dorian's character. Certainly, the young man can be superficial. It may be unfair to conclude that the narrator's views are Wilde's views. However, either way, anti-Semitism was thriving in nineteenth-century England as well as in much of the rest of Europe, as witnessed in Charles Dickens' portrayal of Fagin in Oliver Twist or in the real-life Dreyfus affair in France. Glossary Louis Quatorze Louis XIV , King of France , known as \"the Sun King.\" The novel's reference is to a style of furniture. Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner , German poet and composer, known for his stirring, nationalistic music. brocade a heavy fabric interwoven with a raised design. frangipanni a tropical American shrub with fragrant flowers; perfume from or resembling the flowers. debut French, meaning \"beginning\" or \"coming out.\" abstruse difficult to understand; obscure. rouge French, meaning \"red,\" \"lipstick,\" or \"rouge\"; artificial blush for facial cheeks. espirit French, \"spirit\" or \"wit\"; usually spelled \"esprit.\" Piccadilly a thoroughfare in London running from the Haymarket to Hyde Park Corner. myriad a large, indefinite number. les grandperes ont toujours tort French, meaning \"Grandfathers are always wrong.\" hautboy an oboe. Juliet the leading female role in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Rosalind a leading role in William Shakespeare's As You Like It. munificent very generous. greenroom a waiting room or lounge in a theatre, used by performers when off-stage. Lady Capulet the mother of Juliet in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Giordano Bruno Italian philosopher. staccato here, rapid, short, crisp words. efficacy ability to produce a specific effect."}

One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry's house in Mayfair. It was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars and parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a summer day in London. Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. So the lad was looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers he turned over the pages of an elaborately illustrated edition of Manon Lescaut that he had found in one of the book-cases. The formal monotonous ticking of the Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. Once or twice he thought of going away. At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. "How late you are, Harry!" he murmured. "I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray," answered a shrill voice. He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. "I beg your pardon. I thought--" "You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. You must let me introduce myself. I know you quite well by your photographs. I think my husband has got seventeen of them." "Not seventeen, Lady Henry?" "Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other night at the opera." She laughed nervously as she spoke, and watched him with her vague forget-me-not eyes. She was a curious woman, whose dresses always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest. She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion was never returned, she had kept all her illusions. She tried to look picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. Her name was Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going to church. "That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?" "Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner's music better than anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don't you think so, Mr. Gray?" The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife. Dorian smiled and shook his head: "I am afraid I don't think so, Lady Henry. I never talk during music--at least, during good music. If one hears bad music, it is one's duty to drown it in conversation." "Ah! that is one of Harry's views, isn't it, Mr. Gray? I always hear Harry's views from his friends. It is the only way I get to know of them. But you must not think I don't like good music. I adore it, but I am afraid of it. It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped pianists--two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don't know what it is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. They all are, ain't they? Even those that are born in England become foreigners after a time, don't they? It is so clever of them, and such a compliment to art. Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn't it? You have never been to any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. I can't afford orchids, but I spare no expense in foreigners. They make one's rooms look so picturesque. But here is Harry! Harry, I came in to look for you, to ask you something--I forget what it was--and I found Mr. Gray here. We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We have quite the same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad I've seen him." "I am charmed, my love, quite charmed," said Lord Henry, elevating his dark, crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused smile. "So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of old brocade in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing." "I am afraid I must be going," exclaimed Lady Henry, breaking an awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. "I have promised to drive with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Good-bye, Harry. You are dining out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I shall see you at Lady Thornbury's." "I dare say, my dear," said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind her as, looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the rain, she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of frangipanni. Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the sofa. "Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian," he said after a few puffs. "Why, Harry?" "Because they are so sentimental." "But I like sentimental people." "Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, because they are curious: both are disappointed." "I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do everything that you say." "Who are you in love with?" asked Lord Henry after a pause. "With an actress," said Dorian Gray, blushing. Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "That is a rather commonplace _debut_." "You would not say so if you saw her, Harry." "Who is she?" "Her name is Sibyl Vane." "Never heard of her." "No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius." "My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of mind over morals." "Harry, how can you?" "My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, so I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. I find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, the plain and the coloured. The plain women are very useful. If you want to gain a reputation for respectability, you have merely to take them down to supper. The other women are very charming. They commit one mistake, however. They paint in order to try and look young. Our grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. _Rouge_ and _esprit_ used to go together. That is all over now. As long as a woman can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five women in London worth talking to, and two of these can't be admitted into decent society. However, tell me about your genius. How long have you known her?" "Ah! Harry, your views terrify me." "Never mind that. How long have you known her?" "About three weeks." "And where did you come across her?" "I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn't be unsympathetic about it. After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. You filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. For days after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. As I lounged in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used to look at every one who passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, what sort of lives they led. Some of them fascinated me. Others filled me with terror. There was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a passion for sensations.... Well, one evening about seven o'clock, I determined to go out in search of some adventure. I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, with its myriads of people, its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, as you once phrased it, must have something in store for me. I fancied a thousand things. The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful evening when we first dined together, about the search for beauty being the real secret of life. I don't know what I expected, but I went out and wandered eastward, soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. A hideous Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld in my life, was standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. He had greasy ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre of a soiled shirt. 'Have a box, my Lord?' he said, when he saw me, and he took off his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. There was something about him, Harry, that amused me. He was such a monster. You will laugh at me, I know, but I really went in and paid a whole guinea for the stage-box. To the present day I can't make out why I did so; and yet if I hadn't--my dear Harry, if I hadn't--I should have missed the greatest romance of my life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of you!" "I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the first romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will always be in love with love. A _grande passion_ is the privilege of people who have nothing to do. That is the one use of the idle classes of a country. Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store for you. This is merely the beginning." "Do you think my nature so shallow?" cried Dorian Gray angrily. "No; I think your nature so deep." "How do you mean?" "My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life of the intellect--simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! I must analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up. But I don't want to interrupt you. Go on with your story." "Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, with a vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. I looked out from behind the curtain and surveyed the house. It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and cornucopias, like a third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were fairly full, but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and there was hardly a person in what I suppose they called the dress-circle. Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there was a terrible consumption of nuts going on." "It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama." "Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder what on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. What do you think the play was, Harry?" "I should think 'The Idiot Boy', or 'Dumb but Innocent'. Our fathers used to like that sort of piece, I believe. The longer I live, Dorian, the more keenly I feel that whatever was good enough for our fathers is not good enough for us. In art, as in politics, _les grandperes ont toujours tort_." "This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I must admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare done in such a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in a sort of way. At any rate, I determined to wait for the first act. There was a dreadful orchestra, presided over by a young Hebrew who sat at a cracked piano, that nearly drove me away, but at last the drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was a stout elderly gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and a figure like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most friendly terms with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the scenery, and that looked as if it had come out of a country-booth. But Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly seventeen years of age, with a little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with plaited coils of dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips that were like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, Harry, I could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came across me. And her voice--I never heard such a voice. It was very low at first, with deep mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one's ear. Then it became a little louder, and sounded like a flute or a distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. There were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. You know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of Sibyl Vane are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear them, and each of them says something different. I don't know which to follow. Why should I not love her? Harry, I do love her. She is everything to me in life. Night after night I go to see her play. One evening she is Rosalind, and the next evening she is Imogen. I have seen her die in the gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from her lover's lips. I have watched her wandering through the forest of Arden, disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. She has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, and given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. She has been innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have crushed her reedlike throat. I have seen her in every age and in every costume. Ordinary women never appeal to one's imagination. They are limited to their century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped smile and their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious. But an actress! How different an actress is! Harry! why didn't you tell me that the only thing worth loving is an actress?" "Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian." "Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces." "Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary charm in them, sometimes," said Lord Henry. "I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane." "You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life you will tell me everything you do." "Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would come and confess it to you. You would understand me." "People like you--the wilful sunbeams of life--don't commit crimes, Dorian. But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And now tell me--reach me the matches, like a good boy--thanks--what are your actual relations with Sibyl Vane?" Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. "Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!" "It is only the sacred things that are worth touching, Dorian," said Lord Henry, with a strange touch of pathos in his voice. "But why should you be annoyed? I suppose she will belong to you some day. When one is in love, one always begins by deceiving one's self, and one always ends by deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance. You know her, at any rate, I suppose?" "Of course I know her. On the first night I was at the theatre, the horrid old Jew came round to the box after the performance was over and offered to take me behind the scenes and introduce me to her. I was furious with him, and told him that Juliet had been dead for hundreds of years and that her body was lying in a marble tomb in Verona. I think, from his blank look of amazement, that he was under the impression that I had taken too much champagne, or something." "I am not surprised." "Then he asked me if I wrote for any of the newspapers. I told him I never even read them. He seemed terribly disappointed at that, and confided to me that all the dramatic critics were in a conspiracy against him, and that they were every one of them to be bought." "I should not wonder if he was quite right there. But, on the other hand, judging from their appearance, most of them cannot be at all expensive." "Well, he seemed to think they were beyond his means," laughed Dorian. "By this time, however, the lights were being put out in the theatre, and I had to go. He wanted me to try some cigars that he strongly recommended. I declined. The next night, of course, I arrived at the place again. When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that I was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, though he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. He told me once, with an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies were entirely due to 'The Bard,' as he insisted on calling him. He seemed to think it a distinction." "It was a distinction, my dear Dorian--a great distinction. Most people become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose of life. To have ruined one's self over poetry is an honour. But when did you first speak to Miss Sibyl Vane?" "The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. I could not help going round. I had thrown her some flowers, and she had looked at me--at least I fancied that she had. The old Jew was persistent. He seemed determined to take me behind, so I consented. It was curious my not wanting to know her, wasn't it?" "No; I don't think so." "My dear Harry, why?" "I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl." "Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a child about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I told her what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite unconscious of her power. I think we were both rather nervous. The old Jew stood grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, making elaborate speeches about us both, while we stood looking at each other like children. He would insist on calling me 'My Lord,' so I had to assure Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. She said quite simply to me, 'You look more like a prince. I must call you Prince Charming.'" "Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments." "You don't understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, a faded tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen better days." "I know that look. It depresses me," murmured Lord Henry, examining his rings. "The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest me." "You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean about other people's tragedies." "Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me where she came from? From her little head to her little feet, she is absolutely and entirely divine. Every night of my life I go to see her act, and every night she is more marvellous." "That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. I thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; but it is not quite what I expected." "My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, and I have been to the opera with you several times," said Dorian, opening his blue eyes in wonder. "You always come dreadfully late." "Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play," he cried, "even if it is only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, I am filled with awe." "You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?" He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, "and to-morrow night she will be Juliet." "When is she Sibyl Vane?" "Never." "I congratulate you." "How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in one. She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. My God, Harry, how I worship her!" He was walking up and down the room as he spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was terribly excited. Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward's studio! His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of scarlet flame. Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and desire had come to meet it on the way. "And what do you propose to do?" said Lord Henry at last. "I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. I have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew's hands. She is bound to him for three years--at least for two years and eight months--from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of course. When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and bring her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has made me." "That would be impossible, my dear boy." "Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, in her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me that it is personalities, not principles, that move the age." "Well, what night shall we go?" "Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays Juliet to-morrow." "All right. The Bristol at eight o'clock; and I will get Basil." "Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there before the curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, where she meets Romeo." "Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or reading an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before seven. Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to him?" "Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. It is rather horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in the most wonderful frame, specially designed by himself, and, though I am a little jealous of the picture for being a whole month younger than I am, I must admit that I delight in it. Perhaps you had better write to him. I don't want to see him alone. He says things that annoy me. He gives me good advice." Lord Henry smiled. "People are very fond of giving away what they need most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity." "Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered that." "Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him into his work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for life but his prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. The only artists I have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize." "I wonder is that really so, Harry?" said Dorian Gray, putting some perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, gold-topped bottle that stood on the table. "It must be, if you say it. And now I am off. Imogen is waiting for me. Don't forget about to-morrow. Good-bye." As he left the room, Lord Henry's heavy eyelids drooped, and he began to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much as Dorian Gray, and yet the lad's mad adoration of some one else caused him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. He was pleased by it. It made him a more interesting study. He had been always enthralled by the methods of natural science, but the ordinary subject-matter of that science had seemed to him trivial and of no import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, as he had ended by vivisecting others. Human life--that appeared to him the one thing worth investigating. Compared to it there was nothing else of any value. It was true that as one watched life in its curious crucible of pain and pleasure, one could not wear over one's face a mask of glass, nor keep the sulphurous fumes from troubling the brain and making the imagination turbid with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There were poisons so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken of them. There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through them if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great reward one received! How wonderful the whole world became to one! To note the curious hard logic of passion, and the emotional coloured life of the intellect--to observe where they met, and where they separated, at what point they were in unison, and at what point they were at discord--there was a delight in that! What matter what the cost was? One could never pay too high a price for any sensation. He was conscious--and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into his brown agate eyes--that it was through certain words of his, musical words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray's soul had turned to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. To a large extent the lad was his own creation. He had made him premature. That was something. Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex personality took the place and assumed the office of art, was indeed, in its way, a real work of art, life having its elaborate masterpieces, just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting. Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it was yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, but he was becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. With his beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to wonder at. It was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. He was like one of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, whose joys seem to be remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one's sense of beauty, and whose wounds are like red roses. Soul and body, body and soul--how mysterious they were! There was animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could say where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? How shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! And yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various schools! Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the body really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of spirit from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter was a mystery also. He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute a science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. As it was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many times, and with joy. It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only method by which one could arrive at any scientific analysis of the passions; and certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made to his hand, and seemed to promise rich and fruitful results. His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane was a psychological phenomenon of no small interest. There was no doubt that curiosity had much to do with it, curiosity and the desire for new experiences, yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex passion. What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote from sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. It was the passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most strongly over us. Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we were conscious. It often happened that when we thought we were experimenting on others we were really experimenting on ourselves. While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the door, and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for dinner. He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had smitten into scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. The panes glowed like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a faded rose. He thought of his friend's young fiery-coloured life and wondered how it was all going to end. When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o'clock, he saw a telegram lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian Gray. It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane.

Chapter 4

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219150422/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-picture-of-dorian-gray/summary-and-analysis/chapter-4

A month later, Dorian waits for Lord Henry in Henry's library at Mayfair. He is sulking and annoyed until someone at the door interrupts his mood. It is not Lord Henry, but his wife. Lady Henry is familiar with Dorian, having seen Lord Henry's photographs of the young man and having noticed Dorian with Lord Henry recently at the opera. In her brief appearance, Lady Henry seems as witty as her husband and equally indifferent toward convention. Lord Henry enters, complaining about the hours he has spent trying to bargain for a piece of elegant fabric: "Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing." After Lady Henry leaves, he comments lightly on the disappointments of marriage, and Dorian volunteers that he doubts that he will ever marry because he is too much in love with an actress named Sibyl Vane. He recounts his discovery of Sibyl in "an absurd little theatre" in the East End of London. He had gone out one evening to seek adventure, recalling Lord Henry's advice that the search for beauty was "the real secret of life." In front of a theatre was a "hideous Jew," named Mr. Isaacs. Dorian was so amused with the man that he paid an entire guinea for a private theatre box. The play was Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. When Juliet, played by Sibyl Vane, walked onto the stage, her voice and performance were as magnificent as her appearance, and Dorian was immediately smitten. After that first night, he returned to the theatre every evening to see Sibyl Vane excel in various leading roles. Lord Henry offers a few skeptical remarks about Dorian's dramatic description of his newfound love, but he does not oppose his young friend's choice to love the actress. Dorian is concerned that Lord Henry will assume that all actresses are "horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces." In one of his better comebacks, Lord Henry quietly advises, "Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces." The love-struck Dorian tells of meeting Sibyl Vane, who immediately dubbed him "Prince Charming." He laments that the actress is bound to work for Mr. Isaacs, vowing to liberate her and present her properly at a more reputable West End theatre. As Dorian describes Sibyl and his love for her, Dorian admits that he is entranced partly because Sibyl Vane is an actress and, thus, a different woman every night. He confesses his love for Sibyl, calling her a "genius," and in the next breath states that he doesn't really care who she is or where she came from. From his own description, Dorian's "love" for Sibyl has more to do with the affectations of her profession than with her as a person. Lord Henry remains detached about Dorian's romance. However, he does agree to meet Dorian and Basil for dinner and to see Sibyl Vane in a play the next evening. Dorian leaves for the theatre, and Lord Henry muses on the situation. He feels "not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy" that Sibyl may intervene in their growing friendship; rather, these new developments make his protege "a more interesting study." Eventually, his valet interrupts this reverie, and Lord Henry dresses to go out for dinner. When he returns home after midnight, he finds a telegram on the hall table. It is from Dorian: He is engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane.

Of primary interest in this chapter is the development of Dorian's character. Throughout the first three chapters, Lord Henry was the center of attention; Dorian was little more than a pretty face who envied his own portrait and was devoted to his mentor. In Chapter 4, however, Dorian begins to take over the novel. He comes into his own as a character, beginning to drive the plot of the story by acting independently of Lord Henry. His pronouncements, however, echo Lord Henry's, an indication that he is still very much under Lord Henry's influence. At least twice, the reader hears that an adage spoken by the protege -- Dorian -- was originally spoken by the mentor -- Lord Henry. However, Dorian's relationship with Sibyl Vane, superficial and immature as it may be, illustrates a burgeoning independence. It will soon lead to crisis and force more changes on the title character. Dorian has not just fallen in love with an actress; he has fallen in love with her performances. He does not know the girl at all; yet, by the end of the chapter, they are engaged to be married. His ambition is not to build a relationship but to develop a star. If Dorian has learned nothing else from Lord Henry, he has learned the joy of manipulation. He wants to become Sibyl Vane's agent, not her husband. That Dorian's first love is so flawed with selfishness and manipulation is a bright indicator of the emerging dark side of his nature. As for Lord Henry, he may not be jealous of Dorian's love interest, but he is somewhat skeptical. He feels that Dorian is "premature," noting early on that an actress is a "rather commonplace debut" for a young man entering the world of romance, but he quickly drops that approach when he sees how intensely in love Dorian is. Lord Henry is wise enough to avoid confrontation. However, he must be stunned by the telegram announcing the engagement. A modern audience might find one disturbing factor in the chapter. Mr. Isaacs, who runs the theatre and holds Sibyl Vane under contract, is described in such flagrantly racist terms that the reader cannot ignore them. Someone might argue, in Wilde's defense, that he describes one specific Jew, not necessarily a stereotype. A better defense is that Dorian is speaking, not Wilde, and the crude, racist observations may be early indications of Dorian's character. Certainly, the young man can be superficial. It may be unfair to conclude that the narrator's views are Wilde's views. However, either way, anti-Semitism was thriving in nineteenth-century England as well as in much of the rest of Europe, as witnessed in Charles Dickens' portrayal of Fagin in Oliver Twist or in the real-life Dreyfus affair in France. Glossary Louis Quatorze Louis XIV , King of France , known as "the Sun King." The novel's reference is to a style of furniture. Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner , German poet and composer, known for his stirring, nationalistic music. brocade a heavy fabric interwoven with a raised design. frangipanni a tropical American shrub with fragrant flowers; perfume from or resembling the flowers. debut French, meaning "beginning" or "coming out." abstruse difficult to understand; obscure. rouge French, meaning "red," "lipstick," or "rouge"; artificial blush for facial cheeks. espirit French, "spirit" or "wit"; usually spelled "esprit." Piccadilly a thoroughfare in London running from the Haymarket to Hyde Park Corner. myriad a large, indefinite number. les grandperes ont toujours tort French, meaning "Grandfathers are always wrong." hautboy an oboe. Juliet the leading female role in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Rosalind a leading role in William Shakespeare's As You Like It. munificent very generous. greenroom a waiting room or lounge in a theatre, used by performers when off-stage. Lady Capulet the mother of Juliet in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Giordano Bruno Italian philosopher. staccato here, rapid, short, crisp words. efficacy ability to produce a specific effect.

cliffnotes

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Lord Jim.chapters 42-43

chapters 42-43

{"name": "Chapters 42-43", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219145744/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/l/lord-jim/summary-and-analysis/chapters-4243", "summary": "Brown didn't know precisely what he had come upon in the jungle. But he sensed, intuitively, that Jim was a man with a guilty conscience and was, therefore, pitifully vulnerable. Brown, of course, never expected to confront this sort of man, He supposed that he would have to battle Jim physically for control of Patusan. Of course, he did not tell Jim this. He simply fed Jim's weakness by continuing to speak of their \"common blood,\" the bond between both their minds and their hearts. And at last, Lord Jim walked away, promising Brown either \"a clear road or a clear fight.\" Cornelius was furious. Why didn't Brown kill Jim? Brown answered that he could \"do better than that.\" Jim returned and tried to convince Doramin and the other Bugis to allow Brown and his men to return downriver. Doramin was against the idea. Jim then suggested that they call Dain Waris back and allow him to massacre Brown and his men; Jim said that he himself could not do so. Jim then promised to answer with his life if any harm came to any of the Bugis if they agreed to let Brown and his men leave Patusan. Doramin still did not respond, and Jim told him to call in Dain Waris, for \"in this business, I shall not lead.\" He had to live according to his own code. Tamb' Itam, Jim's bodyguard, was thunderstruck when he learned of Jim's decision. Jim, in turn, elaborated on his decision: he wanted Brown and his men to be allowed to leave, he said, because that was \"best in my knowledge,\" and his knowledge, he said, had \"never deceived you .\" At last, most of the men said that they would comply, because, above all, they believed and trusted in the wisdom of Tuan Jim. Jim realized the immensity of his responsibility. He told Jewel that he was \"responsible for every life in the land.\" Accordingly, Jim wanted no misunderstanding to occur, so he spent the night patrolling the streets. Then he put his own men in Rajah Allang's stockade, which commanded the mouth of the creek. There, Jim intended to remain until Brown and his party passed downriver. Next, he sent Tamb' Itam, downstream to warn Dain Waris that Brown and his men would be passing, and they were to be allowed to proceed without incident. Tamb' Itam asked for some sort of token so that Dain Waris would know that it was Jim himself who had issued this unusual order. Jim gave his bodyguard the silver ring that Stein gave to him long ago. Jim then sent Cornelius to Brown, telling Brown to use the full tide in the morning, but to be very careful not to provoke the armed men who would be alongside the river. Cornelius also added that one of the men would be Dain Waris, who had initially pursued Brown upriver. Cornelius then told Brown that he knew another way out of Patusan. Brown was interested; he agreed to take this new, secret route, especially if it would, as Cornelius promised, route him behind Dain Waris. Then, if \"something happened,\" the people would cease to believe blindly in Lord Jim. \"Then,\" says Brown, \"where will he be?\"", "analysis": "In Chapter 42, once Brown has discovered Jim's weak spot, he continues to emphasize to Jim that there is a common bond between them -- that they both share some kind of common guilt. As noted above, Brown is similar to Iago -- that is, while being the incarnation of pure evil, he is nevertheless very astute in psyching out his opponent. Brown, Conrad tells us, \"had a satanic gift of finding out the best and the weakest spot in his victims,\" and it did not take him long to discover Jim's weak spot. In fact, Conrad virtually uses Jim's earlier words when Brown asks Jim if Jim \"didn't understand that when it came to saving one's life in the dark, one didn't care who else went three, thirty, three hundred people,\" and upon asking this question to Jim, Brown brags that he was delighted: \"I made him wince.\" Of course, Brown's question uses virtually the same words that Jim used earlier to Marlow when he was trying to explain the confusion aboard the Patna and the fact that any man in an emergency would reach out to save his own life. Thus, we see that Lord Jim's deep compassion, combined with his lingering guilt over the Patna affair, causes him to totally misjudge Brown. Jim's guilt is still so great that he eventually yields to Brown's refusal to surrender his arms, thus leaving Brown and his men with sufficient means to accomplish the forthcoming ambush. Having now been exposed to Brown's total devotion to evil, we are in a position to know that Jim was wrong in his decision to release Brown, and thus we can once again see how Jim's judgment has been affected by his guilt long before we know of the impending catastrophe. For example, Jim's defense of his decision to free Brown and his men -- \"they were erring men whom suffering had made blind to right and wrong\" -- could so easily apply to Jim himself, for Jim also feels that as he himself once needed a chance to redeem himself, so these cutthroats might also need a similar chance for redemption. Therefore, Jim pledges his life if any of the men should come to any harm -- a pledge that later Jewel and Tamb' Itam cannot see any reason to honor. In Chapter 43, Stein, upon hearing of Jim's releasing Brown, once again calls Jim a \"romantic! romantic!\" and in this instance, Stein means that the true romantic is forever looking for the innate goodness of man. Jim's altruistic belief in man's innate nobility causes him to be blind to Brown's evilness and thus allows Brown to wreak vengeance upon Patusan."}

'I don't think he could do more than perhaps look upon that straight path. He seemed to have been puzzled by what he saw, for he interrupted himself in his narrative more than once to exclaim, "He nearly slipped from me there. I could not make him out. Who was he?" And after glaring at me wildly he would go on, jubilating and sneering. To me the conversation of these two across the creek appears now as the deadliest kind of duel on which Fate looked on with her cold-eyed knowledge of the end. No, he didn't turn Jim's soul inside out, but I am much mistaken if the spirit so utterly out of his reach had not been made to taste to the full the bitterness of that contest. These were the emissaries with whom the world he had renounced was pursuing him in his retreat--white men from "out there" where he did not think himself good enough to live. This was all that came to him--a menace, a shock, a danger to his work. I suppose it is this sad, half-resentful, half-resigned feeling, piercing through the few words Jim said now and then, that puzzled Brown so much in the reading of his character. Some great men owe most of their greatness to the ability of detecting in those they destine for their tools the exact quality of strength that matters for their work; and Brown, as though he had been really great, had a satanic gift of finding out the best and the weakest spot in his victims. He admitted to me that Jim wasn't of the sort that can be got over by truckling, and accordingly he took care to show himself as a man confronting without dismay ill-luck, censure, and disaster. The smuggling of a few guns was no great crime, he pointed out. As to coming to Patusan, who had the right to say he hadn't come to beg? The infernal people here let loose at him from both banks without staying to ask questions. He made the point brazenly, for, in truth, Dain Waris's energetic action had prevented the greatest calamities; because Brown told me distinctly that, perceiving the size of the place, he had resolved instantly in his mind that as soon as he had gained a footing he would set fire right and left, and begin by shooting down everything living in sight, in order to cow and terrify the population. The disproportion of forces was so great that this was the only way giving him the slightest chance of attaining his ends--he argued in a fit of coughing. But he didn't tell Jim this. As to the hardships and starvation they had gone through, these had been very real; it was enough to look at his band. He made, at the sound of a shrill whistle, all his men appear standing in a row on the logs in full view, so that Jim could see them. For the killing of the man, it had been done--well, it had--but was not this war, bloody war--in a corner? and the fellow had been killed cleanly, shot through the chest, not like that poor devil of his lying now in the creek. They had to listen to him dying for six hours, with his entrails torn with slugs. At any rate this was a life for a life. . . . And all this was said with the weariness, with the recklessness of a man spurred on and on by ill-luck till he cares not where he runs. When he asked Jim, with a sort of brusque despairing frankness, whether he himself--straight now--didn't understand that when "it came to saving one's life in the dark, one didn't care who else went--three, thirty, three hundred people"--it was as if a demon had been whispering advice in his ear. "I made him wince," boasted Brown to me. "He very soon left off coming the righteous over me. He just stood there with nothing to say, and looking as black as thunder--not at me--on the ground." He asked Jim whether he had nothing fishy in his life to remember that he was so damnedly hard upon a man trying to get out of a deadly hole by the first means that came to hand--and so on, and so on. And there ran through the rough talk a vein of subtle reference to their common blood, an assumption of common experience; a sickening suggestion of common guilt, of secret knowledge that was like a bond of their minds and of their hearts. 'At last Brown threw himself down full length and watched Jim out of the corners of his eyes. Jim on his side of the creek stood thinking and switching his leg. The houses in view were silent, as if a pestilence had swept them clean of every breath of life; but many invisible eyes were turned, from within, upon the two men with the creek between them, a stranded white boat, and the body of the third man half sunk in the mud. On the river canoes were moving again, for Patusan was recovering its belief in the stability of earthly institutions since the return of the white lord. The right bank, the platforms of the houses, the rafts moored along the shores, even the roofs of bathing-huts, were covered with people that, far away out of earshot and almost out of sight, were straining their eyes towards the knoll beyond the Rajah's stockade. Within the wide irregular ring of forests, broken in two places by the sheen of the river, there was a silence. "Will you promise to leave the coast?" Jim asked. Brown lifted and let fall his hand, giving everything up as it were--accepting the inevitable. "And surrender your arms?" Jim went on. Brown sat up and glared across. "Surrender our arms! Not till you come to take them out of our stiff hands. You think I am gone crazy with funk? Oh no! That and the rags I stand in is all I have got in the world, besides a few more breechloaders on board; and I expect to sell the lot in Madagascar, if I ever get so far--begging my way from ship to ship." 'Jim said nothing to this. At last, throwing away the switch he held in his hand, he said, as if speaking to himself, "I don't know whether I have the power." . . . "You don't know! And you wanted me just now to give up my arms! That's good, too," cried Brown; "Suppose they say one thing to you, and do the other thing to me." He calmed down markedly. "I dare say you have the power, or what's the meaning of all this talk?" he continued. "What did you come down here for? To pass the time of day?" '"Very well," said Jim, lifting his head suddenly after a long silence. "You shall have a clear road or else a clear fight." He turned on his heel and walked away. 'Brown got up at once, but he did not go up the hill till he had seen Jim disappear between the first houses. He never set his eyes on him again. On his way back he met Cornelius slouching down with his head between his shoulders. He stopped before Brown. "Why didn't you kill him?" he demanded in a sour, discontented voice. "Because I could do better than that," Brown said with an amused smile. "Never! never!" protested Cornelius with energy. "Couldn't. I have lived here for many years." Brown looked up at him curiously. There were many sides to the life of that place in arms against him; things he would never find out. Cornelius slunk past dejectedly in the direction of the river. He was now leaving his new friends; he accepted the disappointing course of events with a sulky obstinacy which seemed to draw more together his little yellow old face; and as he went down he glanced askant here and there, never giving up his fixed idea. 'Henceforth events move fast without a check, flowing from the very hearts of men like a stream from a dark source, and we see Jim amongst them, mostly through Tamb' Itam's eyes. The girl's eyes had watched him too, but her life is too much entwined with his: there is her passion, her wonder, her anger, and, above all, her fear and her unforgiving love. Of the faithful servant, uncomprehending as the rest of them, it is the fidelity alone that comes into play; a fidelity and a belief in his lord so strong that even amazement is subdued to a sort of saddened acceptance of a mysterious failure. He has eyes only for one figure, and through all the mazes of bewilderment he preserves his air of guardianship, of obedience, of care. 'His master came back from his talk with the white men, walking slowly towards the stockade in the street. Everybody was rejoiced to see him return, for while he was away every man had been afraid not only of him being killed, but also of what would come after. Jim went into one of the houses, where old Doramin had retired, and remained alone for a long time with the head of the Bugis settlers. No doubt he discussed the course to follow with him then, but no man was present at the conversation. Only Tamb' Itam, keeping as close to the door as he could, heard his master say, "Yes. I shall let all the people know that such is my wish; but I spoke to you, O Doramin, before all the others, and alone; for you know my heart as well as I know yours and its greatest desire. And you know well also that I have no thought but for the people's good." Then his master, lifting the sheeting in the doorway, went out, and he, Tamb' Itam, had a glimpse of old Doramin within, sitting in the chair with his hands on his knees, and looking between his feet. Afterwards he followed his master to the fort, where all the principal Bugis and Patusan inhabitants had been summoned for a talk. Tamb' Itam himself hoped there would be some fighting. "What was it but the taking of another hill?" he exclaimed regretfully. However, in the town many hoped that the rapacious strangers would be induced, by the sight of so many brave men making ready to fight, to go away. It would be a good thing if they went away. Since Jim's arrival had been made known before daylight by the gun fired from the fort and the beating of the big drum there, the fear that had hung over Patusan had broken and subsided like a wave on a rock, leaving the seething foam of excitement, curiosity, and endless speculation. Half of the population had been ousted out of their homes for purposes of defence, and were living in the street on the left side of the river, crowding round the fort, and in momentary expectation of seeing their abandoned dwellings on the threatened bank burst into flames. The general anxiety was to see the matter settled quickly. Food, through Jewel's care, had been served out to the refugees. Nobody knew what their white man would do. Some remarked that it was worse than in Sherif Ali's war. Then many people did not care; now everybody had something to lose. The movements of canoes passing to and fro between the two parts of the town were watched with interest. A couple of Bugis war-boats lay anchored in the middle of the stream to protect the river, and a thread of smoke stood at the bow of each; the men in them were cooking their midday rice when Jim, after his interviews with Brown and Doramin, crossed the river and entered by the water-gate of his fort. The people inside crowded round him, so that he could hardly make his way to the house. They had not seen him before, because on his arrival during the night he had only exchanged a few words with the girl, who had come down to the landing-stage for the purpose, and had then gone on at once to join the chiefs and the fighting men on the other bank. People shouted greetings after him. One old woman raised a laugh by pushing her way to the front madly and enjoining him in a scolding voice to see to it that her two sons, who were with Doramin, did not come to harm at the hands of the robbers. Several of the bystanders tried to pull her away, but she struggled and cried, "Let me go. What is this, O Muslims? This laughter is unseemly. Are they not cruel, bloodthirsty robbers bent on killing?" "Let her be," said Jim, and as a silence fell suddenly, he said slowly, "Everybody shall be safe." He entered the house before the great sigh, and the loud murmurs of satisfaction, had died out. 'There's no doubt his mind was made up that Brown should have his way clear back to the sea. His fate, revolted, was forcing his hand. He had for the first time to affirm his will in the face of outspoken opposition. "There was much talk, and at first my master was silent," Tamb' Itam said. "Darkness came, and then I lit the candles on the long table. The chiefs sat on each side, and the lady remained by my master's right hand." 'When he began to speak, the unaccustomed difficulty seemed only to fix his resolve more immovably. The white men were now waiting for his answer on the hill. Their chief had spoken to him in the language of his own people, making clear many things difficult to explain in any other speech. They were erring men whom suffering had made blind to right and wrong. It is true that lives had been lost already, but why lose more? He declared to his hearers, the assembled heads of the people, that their welfare was his welfare, their losses his losses, their mourning his mourning. He looked round at the grave listening faces and told them to remember that they had fought and worked side by side. They knew his courage . . . Here a murmur interrupted him . . . And that he had never deceived them. For many years they had dwelt together. He loved the land and the people living in it with a very great love. He was ready to answer with his life for any harm that should come to them if the white men with beards were allowed to retire. They were evil-doers, but their destiny had been evil, too. Had he ever advised them ill? Had his words ever brought suffering to the people? he asked. He believed that it would be best to let these whites and their followers go with their lives. It would be a small gift. "I whom you have tried and found always true ask you to let them go." He turned to Doramin. The old nakhoda made no movement. "Then," said Jim, "call in Dain Waris, your son, my friend, for in this business I shall not lead."' 'Tamb' Itam behind his chair was thunderstruck. The declaration produced an immense sensation. "Let them go because this is best in my knowledge which has never deceived you," Jim insisted. There was a silence. In the darkness of the courtyard could be heard the subdued whispering, shuffling noise of many people. Doramin raised his heavy head and said that there was no more reading of hearts than touching the sky with the hand, but--he consented. The others gave their opinion in turn. "It is best," "Let them go," and so on. But most of them simply said that they "believed Tuan Jim." 'In this simple form of assent to his will lies the whole gist of the situation; their creed, his truth; and the testimony to that faithfulness which made him in his own eyes the equal of the impeccable men who never fall out of the ranks. Stein's words, "Romantic!--Romantic!" seem to ring over those distances that will never give him up now to a world indifferent to his failings and his virtues, and to that ardent and clinging affection that refuses him the dole of tears in the bewilderment of a great grief and of eternal separation. From the moment the sheer truthfulness of his last three years of life carries the day against the ignorance, the fear, and the anger of men, he appears no longer to me as I saw him last--a white speck catching all the dim light left upon a sombre coast and the darkened sea--but greater and more pitiful in the loneliness of his soul, that remains even for her who loved him best a cruel and insoluble mystery. 'It is evident that he did not mistrust Brown; there was no reason to doubt the story, whose truth seemed warranted by the rough frankness, by a sort of virile sincerity in accepting the morality and the consequences of his acts. But Jim did not know the almost inconceivable egotism of the man which made him, when resisted and foiled in his will, mad with the indignant and revengeful rage of a thwarted autocrat. But if Jim did not mistrust Brown, he was evidently anxious that some misunderstanding should not occur, ending perhaps in collision and bloodshed. It was for this reason that directly the Malay chiefs had gone he asked Jewel to get him something to eat, as he was going out of the fort to take command in the town. On her remonstrating against this on the score of his fatigue, he said that something might happen for which he would never forgive himself. "I am responsible for every life in the land," he said. He was moody at first; she served him with her own hands, taking the plates and dishes (of the dinner-service presented him by Stein) from Tamb' Itam. He brightened up after a while; told her she would be again in command of the fort for another night. "There's no sleep for us, old girl," he said, "while our people are in danger." Later on he said jokingly that she was the best man of them all. "If you and Dain Waris had done what you wanted, not one of these poor devils would be alive to-day." "Are they very bad?" she asked, leaning over his chair. "Men act badly sometimes without being much worse than others," he said after some hesitation. 'Tamb' Itam followed his master to the landing-stage outside the fort. The night was clear but without a moon, and the middle of the river was dark, while the water under each bank reflected the light of many fires "as on a night of Ramadan," Tamb' Itam said. War-boats drifted silently in the dark lane or, anchored, floated motionless with a loud ripple. That night there was much paddling in a canoe and walking at his master's heels for Tamb' Itam: up and down the street they tramped, where the fires were burning, inland on the outskirts of the town where small parties of men kept guard in the fields. Tuan Jim gave his orders and was obeyed. Last of all they went to the Rajah's stockade, which a detachment of Jim's people manned on that night. The old Rajah had fled early in the morning with most of his women to a small house he had near a jungle village on a tributary stream. Kassim, left behind, had attended the council with his air of diligent activity to explain away the diplomacy of the day before. He was considerably cold-shouldered, but managed to preserve his smiling, quiet alertness, and professed himself highly delighted when Jim told him sternly that he proposed to occupy the stockade on that night with his own men. After the council broke up he was heard outside accosting this and that deputing chief, and speaking in a loud, gratified tone of the Rajah's property being protected in the Rajah's absence. 'About ten or so Jim's men marched in. The stockade commanded the mouth of the creek, and Jim meant to remain there till Brown had passed below. A small fire was lit on the flat, grassy point outside the wall of stakes, and Tamb' Itam placed a little folding-stool for his master. Jim told him to try and sleep. Tamb' Itam got a mat and lay down a little way off; but he could not sleep, though he knew he had to go on an important journey before the night was out. His master walked to and fro before the fire with bowed head and with his hands behind his back. His face was sad. Whenever his master approached him Tamb' Itam pretended to sleep, not wishing his master to know he had been watched. At last his master stood still, looking down on him as he lay, and said softly, "It is time." 'Tamb' Itam arose directly and made his preparations. His mission was to go down the river, preceding Brown's boat by an hour or more, to tell Dain Waris finally and formally that the whites were to be allowed to pass out unmolested. Jim would not trust anybody else with that service. Before starting, Tamb' Itam, more as a matter of form (since his position about Jim made him perfectly known), asked for a token. "Because, Tuan," he said, "the message is important, and these are thy very words I carry." His master first put his hand into one pocket, then into another, and finally took off his forefinger Stein's silver ring, which he habitually wore, and gave it to Tamb' Itam. When Tamb' Itam left on his mission, Brown's camp on the knoll was dark but for a single small glow shining through the branches of one of the trees the white men had cut down. 'Early in the evening Brown had received from Jim a folded piece of paper on which was written, "You get the clear road. Start as soon as your boat floats on the morning tide. Let your men be careful. The bushes on both sides of the creek and the stockade at the mouth are full of well-armed men. You would have no chance, but I don't believe you want bloodshed." Brown read it, tore the paper into small pieces, and, turning to Cornelius, who had brought it, said jeeringly, "Good-bye, my excellent friend." Cornelius had been in the fort, and had been sneaking around Jim's house during the afternoon. Jim chose him to carry the note because he could speak English, was known to Brown, and was not likely to be shot by some nervous mistake of one of the men as a Malay, approaching in the dusk, perhaps might have been. 'Cornelius didn't go away after delivering the paper. Brown was sitting up over a tiny fire; all the others were lying down. "I could tell you something you would like to know," Cornelius mumbled crossly. Brown paid no attention. "You did not kill him," went on the other, "and what do you get for it? You might have had money from the Rajah, besides the loot of all the Bugis houses, and now you get nothing." "You had better clear out from here," growled Brown, without even looking at him. But Cornelius let himself drop by his side and began to whisper very fast, touching his elbow from time to time. What he had to say made Brown sit up at first, with a curse. He had simply informed him of Dain Waris's armed party down the river. At first Brown saw himself completely sold and betrayed, but a moment's reflection convinced him that there could be no treachery intended. He said nothing, and after a while Cornelius remarked, in a tone of complete indifference, that there was another way out of the river which he knew very well. "A good thing to know, too," said Brown, pricking up his ears; and Cornelius began to talk of what went on in town and repeated all that had been said in council, gossiping in an even undertone at Brown's ear as you talk amongst sleeping men you do not wish to wake. "He thinks he has made me harmless, does he?" mumbled Brown very low. . . . "Yes. He is a fool. A little child. He came here and robbed me," droned on Cornelius, "and he made all the people believe him. But if something happened that they did not believe him any more, where would he be? And the Bugis Dain who is waiting for you down the river there, captain, is the very man who chased you up here when you first came." Brown observed nonchalantly that it would be just as well to avoid him, and with the same detached, musing air Cornelius declared himself acquainted with a backwater broad enough to take Brown's boat past Waris's camp. "You will have to be quiet," he said as an afterthought, "for in one place we pass close behind his camp. Very close. They are camped ashore with their boats hauled up." "Oh, we know how to be as quiet as mice; never fear," said Brown. Cornelius stipulated that in case he were to pilot Brown out, his canoe should be towed. "I'll have to get back quick," he explained. 'It was two hours before the dawn when word was passed to the stockade from outlying watchers that the white robbers were coming down to their boat. In a very short time every armed man from one end of Patusan to the other was on the alert, yet the banks of the river remained so silent that but for the fires burning with sudden blurred flares the town might have been asleep as if in peace-time. A heavy mist lay very low on the water, making a sort of illusive grey light that showed nothing. When Brown's long-boat glided out of the creek into the river, Jim was standing on the low point of land before the Rajah's stockade--on the very spot where for the first time he put his foot on Patusan shore. A shadow loomed up, moving in the greyness, solitary, very bulky, and yet constantly eluding the eye. A murmur of low talking came out of it. Brown at the tiller heard Jim speak calmly: "A clear road. You had better trust to the current while the fog lasts; but this will lift presently." "Yes, presently we shall see clear," replied Brown. 'The thirty or forty men standing with muskets at ready outside the stockade held their breath. The Bugis owner of the prau, whom I saw on Stein's verandah, and who was amongst them, told me that the boat, shaving the low point close, seemed for a moment to grow big and hang over it like a mountain. "If you think it worth your while to wait a day outside," called out Jim, "I'll try to send you down something--a bullock, some yams--what I can." The shadow went on moving. "Yes. Do," said a voice, blank and muffled out of the fog. Not one of the many attentive listeners understood what the words meant; and then Brown and his men in their boat floated away, fading spectrally without the slightest sound. 'Thus Brown, invisible in the mist, goes out of Patusan elbow to elbow with Cornelius in the stern-sheets of the long-boat. "Perhaps you shall get a small bullock," said Cornelius. "Oh yes. Bullock. Yam. You'll get it if he said so. He always speaks the truth. He stole everything I had. I suppose you like a small bullock better than the loot of many houses." "I would advise you to hold your tongue, or somebody here may fling you overboard into this damned fog," said Brown. The boat seemed to be standing still; nothing could be seen, not even the river alongside, only the water-dust flew and trickled, condensed, down their beards and faces. It was weird, Brown told me. Every individual man of them felt as though he were adrift alone in a boat, haunted by an almost imperceptible suspicion of sighing, muttering ghosts. "Throw me out, would you? But I would know where I was," mumbled Cornelius surlily. "I've lived many years here." "Not long enough to see through a fog like this," Brown said, lolling back with his arm swinging to and fro on the useless tiller. "Yes. Long enough for that," snarled Cornelius. "That's very useful," commented Brown. "Am I to believe you could find that backway you spoke of blindfold, like this?" Cornelius grunted. "Are you too tired to row?" he asked after a silence. "No, by God!" shouted Brown suddenly. "Out with your oars there." There was a great knocking in the fog, which after a while settled into a regular grind of invisible sweeps against invisible thole-pins. Otherwise nothing was changed, and but for the slight splash of a dipped blade it was like rowing a balloon car in a cloud, said Brown. Thereafter Cornelius did not open his lips except to ask querulously for somebody to bale out his canoe, which was towing behind the long-boat. Gradually the fog whitened and became luminous ahead. To the left Brown saw a darkness as though he had been looking at the back of the departing night. All at once a big bough covered with leaves appeared above his head, and ends of twigs, dripping and still, curved slenderly close alongside. Cornelius, without a word, took the tiller from his hand.'

Chapters 42-43

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Brown didn't know precisely what he had come upon in the jungle. But he sensed, intuitively, that Jim was a man with a guilty conscience and was, therefore, pitifully vulnerable. Brown, of course, never expected to confront this sort of man, He supposed that he would have to battle Jim physically for control of Patusan. Of course, he did not tell Jim this. He simply fed Jim's weakness by continuing to speak of their "common blood," the bond between both their minds and their hearts. And at last, Lord Jim walked away, promising Brown either "a clear road or a clear fight." Cornelius was furious. Why didn't Brown kill Jim? Brown answered that he could "do better than that." Jim returned and tried to convince Doramin and the other Bugis to allow Brown and his men to return downriver. Doramin was against the idea. Jim then suggested that they call Dain Waris back and allow him to massacre Brown and his men; Jim said that he himself could not do so. Jim then promised to answer with his life if any harm came to any of the Bugis if they agreed to let Brown and his men leave Patusan. Doramin still did not respond, and Jim told him to call in Dain Waris, for "in this business, I shall not lead." He had to live according to his own code. Tamb' Itam, Jim's bodyguard, was thunderstruck when he learned of Jim's decision. Jim, in turn, elaborated on his decision: he wanted Brown and his men to be allowed to leave, he said, because that was "best in my knowledge," and his knowledge, he said, had "never deceived you ." At last, most of the men said that they would comply, because, above all, they believed and trusted in the wisdom of Tuan Jim. Jim realized the immensity of his responsibility. He told Jewel that he was "responsible for every life in the land." Accordingly, Jim wanted no misunderstanding to occur, so he spent the night patrolling the streets. Then he put his own men in Rajah Allang's stockade, which commanded the mouth of the creek. There, Jim intended to remain until Brown and his party passed downriver. Next, he sent Tamb' Itam, downstream to warn Dain Waris that Brown and his men would be passing, and they were to be allowed to proceed without incident. Tamb' Itam asked for some sort of token so that Dain Waris would know that it was Jim himself who had issued this unusual order. Jim gave his bodyguard the silver ring that Stein gave to him long ago. Jim then sent Cornelius to Brown, telling Brown to use the full tide in the morning, but to be very careful not to provoke the armed men who would be alongside the river. Cornelius also added that one of the men would be Dain Waris, who had initially pursued Brown upriver. Cornelius then told Brown that he knew another way out of Patusan. Brown was interested; he agreed to take this new, secret route, especially if it would, as Cornelius promised, route him behind Dain Waris. Then, if "something happened," the people would cease to believe blindly in Lord Jim. "Then," says Brown, "where will he be?"

In Chapter 42, once Brown has discovered Jim's weak spot, he continues to emphasize to Jim that there is a common bond between them -- that they both share some kind of common guilt. As noted above, Brown is similar to Iago -- that is, while being the incarnation of pure evil, he is nevertheless very astute in psyching out his opponent. Brown, Conrad tells us, "had a satanic gift of finding out the best and the weakest spot in his victims," and it did not take him long to discover Jim's weak spot. In fact, Conrad virtually uses Jim's earlier words when Brown asks Jim if Jim "didn't understand that when it came to saving one's life in the dark, one didn't care who else went three, thirty, three hundred people," and upon asking this question to Jim, Brown brags that he was delighted: "I made him wince." Of course, Brown's question uses virtually the same words that Jim used earlier to Marlow when he was trying to explain the confusion aboard the Patna and the fact that any man in an emergency would reach out to save his own life. Thus, we see that Lord Jim's deep compassion, combined with his lingering guilt over the Patna affair, causes him to totally misjudge Brown. Jim's guilt is still so great that he eventually yields to Brown's refusal to surrender his arms, thus leaving Brown and his men with sufficient means to accomplish the forthcoming ambush. Having now been exposed to Brown's total devotion to evil, we are in a position to know that Jim was wrong in his decision to release Brown, and thus we can once again see how Jim's judgment has been affected by his guilt long before we know of the impending catastrophe. For example, Jim's defense of his decision to free Brown and his men -- "they were erring men whom suffering had made blind to right and wrong" -- could so easily apply to Jim himself, for Jim also feels that as he himself once needed a chance to redeem himself, so these cutthroats might also need a similar chance for redemption. Therefore, Jim pledges his life if any of the men should come to any harm -- a pledge that later Jewel and Tamb' Itam cannot see any reason to honor. In Chapter 43, Stein, upon hearing of Jim's releasing Brown, once again calls Jim a "romantic! romantic!" and in this instance, Stein means that the true romantic is forever looking for the innate goodness of man. Jim's altruistic belief in man's innate nobility causes him to be blind to Brown's evilness and thus allows Brown to wreak vengeance upon Patusan.

gradesaver

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Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 50

chapter 50

{"name": "Chapter 50", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-6-chapters-45-52", "summary": "Tess returns home to find a neighbor who has been caring for Joan Durbeyfield. John tells Tess that he is thinking of asking local antiquarians to subscribe to a fund to maintain him as a part of local history. He says that such societies keep local bones, and living remains should be far more interesting. Alec finds Tess in Marlott. He asks Tess if her engagement at Flintcomb-Ash has ended, and mocks the idea that she might join her husband. Tess replies that she has no husband. Alec tells her that he has sent her something that should have arrived at her house, and insists that he will help her in spite of herself. When Tess returns home, she finds that her father has died.", "analysis": "The death of John Durbeyfield is an ironic reversal of fortune for the Durbeyfield family, for it is Joan, who makes a sudden recovery, whose health seemed most in danger. This plot point is particularly ironic when considered in reference to his final conversation with his daughter in which he notes that local antiquarians support old bones of d'Urbervilles, and might do so for living descendants from that family. Durbeyfield therefore holds his final hopes on his worth as a d'Urberville. Although he notes the discrepancy between antiquarians supporting artifacts but not living remains, he does not find the irony in this predicament; instead, he holds to the same system of values that prizes the antique and the established over the modern. It is John Durbeyfield's reliance on his history as a d'Urberville that proves his most significant flaw, one with tragic consequences for his family. Alec's attempts to help Tess appear more sinister in this chapter, for Alec uses them more explicitly as a means for domination. Alec approaches his efforts to aid Tess as if his kindness must be inflicted upon her; he essentially states that he will help her whether she likes her or not. This once again reinforces that, even when Alec appears ready to aid Tess, he in fact proves dangerous to her, a fact that Tess rightfully realizes"}

She plunged into the chilly equinoctial darkness as the clock struck ten, for her fifteen miles' walk under the steely stars. In lonely districts night is a protection rather than a danger to a noiseless pedestrian, and knowing this, Tess pursued the nearest course along by-lanes that she would almost have feared in the day-time; but marauders were wanting now, and spectral fears were driven out of her mind by thoughts of her mother. Thus she proceeded mile after mile, ascending and descending till she came to Bulbarrow, and about midnight looked from that height into the abyss of chaotic shade which was all that revealed itself of the vale on whose further side she was born. Having already traversed about five miles on the upland, she had now some ten or eleven in the lowland before her journey would be finished. The winding road downwards became just visible to her under the wan starlight as she followed it, and soon she paced a soil so contrasting with that above it that the difference was perceptible to the tread and to the smell. It was the heavy clay land of Blackmoor Vale, and a part of the Vale to which turnpike-roads had never penetrated. Superstitions linger longest on these heavy soils. Having once been forest, at this shadowy time it seemed to assert something of its old character, the far and the near being blended, and every tree and tall hedge making the most of its presence. The harts that had been hunted here, the witches that had been pricked and ducked, the green-spangled fairies that "whickered" at you as you passed;--the place teemed with beliefs in them still, and they formed an impish multitude now. At Nuttlebury she passed the village inn, whose sign creaked in response to the greeting of her footsteps, which not a human soul heard but herself. Under the thatched roofs her mind's eye beheld relaxed tendons and flaccid muscles, spread out in the darkness beneath coverlets made of little purple patchwork squares, and undergoing a bracing process at the hands of sleep for renewed labour on the morrow, as soon as a hint of pink nebulosity appeared on Hambledon Hill. At three she turned the last corner of the maze of lanes she had threaded, and entered Marlott, passing the field in which as a club-girl she had first seen Angel Clare, when he had not danced with her; the sense of disappointment remained with her yet. In the direction of her mother's house she saw a light. It came from the bedroom window, and a branch waved in front of it and made it wink at her. As soon as she could discern the outline of the house--newly thatched with her money--it had all its old effect upon Tess's imagination. Part of her body and life it ever seemed to be; the slope of its dormers, the finish of its gables, the broken courses of brick which topped the chimney, all had something in common with her personal character. A stupefaction had come into these features, to her regard; it meant the illness of her mother. She opened the door so softly as to disturb nobody; the lower room was vacant, but the neighbour who was sitting up with her mother came to the top of the stairs, and whispered that Mrs Durbeyfield was no better, though she was sleeping just then. Tess prepared herself a breakfast, and then took her place as nurse in her mother's chamber. In the morning, when she contemplated the children, they had all a curiously elongated look; although she had been away little more than a year, their growth was astounding; and the necessity of applying herself heart and soul to their needs took her out of her own cares. Her father's ill-health was the same indefinite kind, and he sat in his chair as usual. But the day after her arrival he was unusually bright. He had a rational scheme for living, and Tess asked him what it was. "I'm thinking of sending round to all the old antiqueerians in this part of England," he said, "asking them to subscribe to a fund to maintain me. I'm sure they'd see it as a romantical, artistical, and proper thing to do. They spend lots o' money in keeping up old ruins, and finding the bones o' things, and such like; and living remains must be more interesting to 'em still, if they only knowed of me. Would that somebody would go round and tell 'em what there is living among 'em, and they thinking nothing of him! If Pa'son Tringham, who discovered me, had lived, he'd ha' done it, I'm sure." Tess postponed her arguments on this high project till she had grappled with pressing matters in hand, which seemed little improved by her remittances. When indoor necessities had been eased, she turned her attention to external things. It was now the season for planting and sowing; many gardens and allotments of the villagers had already received their spring tillage; but the garden and the allotment of the Durbeyfields were behindhand. She found, to her dismay, that this was owing to their having eaten all the seed potatoes,--that last lapse of the improvident. At the earliest moment she obtained what others she could procure, and in a few days her father was well enough to see to the garden, under Tess's persuasive efforts: while she herself undertook the allotment-plot which they rented in a field a couple of hundred yards out of the village. She liked doing it after the confinement of the sick chamber, where she was not now required by reason of her mother's improvement. Violent motion relieved thought. The plot of ground was in a high, dry, open enclosure, where there were forty or fifty such pieces, and where labour was at its briskest when the hired labour of the day had ended. Digging began usually at six o'clock and extended indefinitely into the dusk or moonlight. Just now heaps of dead weeds and refuse were burning on many of the plots, the dry weather favouring their combustion. One fine day Tess and 'Liza-Lu worked on here with their neighbours till the last rays of the sun smote flat upon the white pegs that divided the plots. As soon as twilight succeeded to sunset the flare of the couch-grass and cabbage-stalk fires began to light up the allotments fitfully, their outlines appearing and disappearing under the dense smoke as wafted by the wind. When a fire glowed, banks of smoke, blown level along the ground, would themselves become illuminated to an opaque lustre, screening the workpeople from one another; and the meaning of the "pillar of a cloud", which was a wall by day and a light by night, could be understood. As evening thickened, some of the gardening men and women gave over for the night, but the greater number remained to get their planting done, Tess being among them, though she sent her sister home. It was on one of the couch-burning plots that she laboured with her fork, its four shining prongs resounding against the stones and dry clods in little clicks. Sometimes she was completely involved in the smoke of her fire; then it would leave her figure free, irradiated by the brassy glare from the heap. She was oddly dressed to-night, and presented a somewhat staring aspect, her attire being a gown bleached by many washings, with a short black jacket over it, the effect of the whole being that of a wedding and funeral guest in one. The women further back wore white aprons, which, with their pale faces, were all that could be seen of them in the gloom, except when at moments they caught a flash from the flames. Westward, the wiry boughs of the bare thorn hedge which formed the boundary of the field rose against the pale opalescence of the lower sky. Above, Jupiter hung like a full-blown jonquil, so bright as almost to throw a shade. A few small nondescript stars were appearing elsewhere. In the distance a dog barked, and wheels occasionally rattled along the dry road. Still the prongs continued to click assiduously, for it was not late; and though the air was fresh and keen there was a whisper of spring in it that cheered the workers on. Something in the place, the hours, the crackling fires, the fantastic mysteries of light and shade, made others as well as Tess enjoy being there. Nightfall, which in the frost of winter comes as a fiend and in the warmth of summer as a lover, came as a tranquillizer on this March day. Nobody looked at his or her companions. The eyes of all were on the soil as its turned surface was revealed by the fires. Hence as Tess stirred the clods and sang her foolish little songs with scarce now a hope that Clare would ever hear them, she did not for a long time notice the person who worked nearest to her--a man in a long smockfrock who, she found, was forking the same plot as herself, and whom she supposed her father had sent there to advance the work. She became more conscious of him when the direction of his digging brought him closer. Sometimes the smoke divided them; then it swerved, and the two were visible to each other but divided from all the rest. Tess did not speak to her fellow-worker, nor did he speak to her. Nor did she think of him further than to recollect that he had not been there when it was broad daylight, and that she did not know him as any one of the Marlott labourers, which was no wonder, her absences having been so long and frequent of late years. By-and-by he dug so close to her that the fire-beams were reflected as distinctly from the steel prongs of his fork as from her own. On going up to the fire to throw a pitch of dead weeds upon it, she found that he did the same on the other side. The fire flared up, and she beheld the face of d'Urberville. The unexpectedness of his presence, the grotesqueness of his appearance in a gathered smockfrock, such as was now worn only by the most old-fashioned of the labourers, had a ghastly comicality that chilled her as to its bearing. D'Urberville emitted a low, long laugh. "If I were inclined to joke, I should say, How much this seems like Paradise!" he remarked whimsically, looking at her with an inclined head. "What do you say?" she weakly asked. "A jester might say this is just like Paradise. You are Eve, and I am the old Other One come to tempt you in the disguise of an inferior animal. I used to be quite up in that scene of Milton's when I was theological. Some of it goes-- "'Empress, the way is ready, and not long, Beyond a row of myrtles... ... If thou accept My conduct, I can bring thee thither soon.' 'Lead then,' said Eve. "And so on. My dear Tess, I am only putting this to you as a thing that you might have supposed or said quite untruly, because you think so badly of me." "I never said you were Satan, or thought it. I don't think of you in that way at all. My thoughts of you are quite cold, except when you affront me. What, did you come digging here entirely because of me?" "Entirely. To see you; nothing more. The smockfrock, which I saw hanging for sale as I came along, was an afterthought, that I mightn't be noticed. I come to protest against your working like this." "But I like doing it--it is for my father." "Your engagement at the other place is ended?" "Yes." "Where are you going to next? To join your dear husband?" She could not bear the humiliating reminder. "O--I don't know!" she said bitterly. "I have no husband!" "It is quite true--in the sense you mean. But you have a friend, and I have determined that you shall be comfortable in spite of yourself. When you get down to your house you will see what I have sent there for you." "O, Alec, I wish you wouldn't give me anything at all! I cannot take it from you! I don't like--it is not right!" "It IS right!" he cried lightly. "I am not going to see a woman whom I feel so tenderly for as I do for you in trouble without trying to help her." "But I am very well off! I am only in trouble about--about--not about living at all!" She turned, and desperately resumed her digging, tears dripping upon the fork-handle and upon the clods. "About the children--your brothers and sisters," he resumed. "I've been thinking of them." Tess's heart quivered--he was touching her in a weak place. He had divined her chief anxiety. Since returning home her soul had gone out to those children with an affection that was passionate. "If your mother does not recover, somebody ought to do something for them; since your father will not be able to do much, I suppose?" "He can with my assistance. He must!" "And with mine." "No, sir!" "How damned foolish this is!" burst out d'Urberville. "Why, he thinks we are the same family; and will be quite satisfied!" "He don't. I've undeceived him." "The more fool you!" D'Urberville in anger retreated from her to the hedge, where he pulled off the long smockfrock which had disguised him; and rolling it up and pushing it into the couch-fire, went away. Tess could not get on with her digging after this; she felt restless; she wondered if he had gone back to her father's house; and taking the fork in her hand proceeded homewards. Some twenty yards from the house she was met by one of her sisters. "O, Tessy--what do you think! 'Liza-Lu is a-crying, and there's a lot of folk in the house, and mother is a good deal better, but they think father is dead!" The child realized the grandeur of the news; but not as yet its sadness, and stood looking at Tess with round-eyed importance till, beholding the effect produced upon her, she said-- "What, Tess, shan't we talk to father never no more?" "But father was only a little bit ill!" exclaimed Tess distractedly. 'Liza-Lu came up. "He dropped down just now, and the doctor who was there for mother said there was no chance for him, because his heart was growed in." Yes; the Durbeyfield couple had changed places; the dying one was out of danger, and the indisposed one was dead. The news meant even more than it sounded. Her father's life had a value apart from his personal achievements, or perhaps it would not have had much. It was the last of the three lives for whose duration the house and premises were held under a lease; and it had long been coveted by the tenant-farmer for his regular labourers, who were stinted in cottage accommodation. Moreover, "liviers" were disapproved of in villages almost as much as little freeholders, because of their independence of manner, and when a lease determined it was never renewed. Thus the Durbeyfields, once d'Urbervilles, saw descending upon them the destiny which, no doubt, when they were among the Olympians of the county, they had caused to descend many a time, and severely enough, upon the heads of such landless ones as they themselves were now. So do flux and reflux--the rhythm of change--alternate and persist in everything under the sky.

Chapter 50

https://web.archive.org/web/20210410060617/https://www.gradesaver.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/study-guide/summary-phase-6-chapters-45-52

Tess returns home to find a neighbor who has been caring for Joan Durbeyfield. John tells Tess that he is thinking of asking local antiquarians to subscribe to a fund to maintain him as a part of local history. He says that such societies keep local bones, and living remains should be far more interesting. Alec finds Tess in Marlott. He asks Tess if her engagement at Flintcomb-Ash has ended, and mocks the idea that she might join her husband. Tess replies that she has no husband. Alec tells her that he has sent her something that should have arrived at her house, and insists that he will help her in spite of herself. When Tess returns home, she finds that her father has died.

The death of John Durbeyfield is an ironic reversal of fortune for the Durbeyfield family, for it is Joan, who makes a sudden recovery, whose health seemed most in danger. This plot point is particularly ironic when considered in reference to his final conversation with his daughter in which he notes that local antiquarians support old bones of d'Urbervilles, and might do so for living descendants from that family. Durbeyfield therefore holds his final hopes on his worth as a d'Urberville. Although he notes the discrepancy between antiquarians supporting artifacts but not living remains, he does not find the irony in this predicament; instead, he holds to the same system of values that prizes the antique and the established over the modern. It is John Durbeyfield's reliance on his history as a d'Urberville that proves his most significant flaw, one with tragic consequences for his family. Alec's attempts to help Tess appear more sinister in this chapter, for Alec uses them more explicitly as a means for domination. Alec approaches his efforts to aid Tess as if his kindness must be inflicted upon her; he essentially states that he will help her whether she likes her or not. This once again reinforces that, even when Alec appears ready to aid Tess, he in fact proves dangerous to her, a fact that Tess rightfully realizes

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/12915-chapters/act_3.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/The White Devil/section_2_part_0.txt

The White Devil.act 3.scene 1-scene 3

act 3

{"name": "Act 3", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180409073731/http://www.gradesaver.com/the-white-devil/study-guide/summary-act-3", "summary": "Act 3 opens in Rome, as Francisco and Monticelso prepare Vittoria's trial for the murder of Camillo. As their Chancellor and Register physically set the stage for the trial, Francisco and Monticelso discuss how they will blacken Vittoria's name, despite their lack of concrete evidence. The four men soon leave, and Flamineo, Marcello, and a Lawyer enter. The lawyer chides the two brothers, explaining that Vittoria will be easily convicted if any evidence exists showing she has even kissed Brachiano. Flamineo jokes with the lawyer, twisting his words around to make sexual innuendos in order to prevent suspicion of his own guilt in the matter. Marcello, however, is in a miserable mood, and chastises his brother for helping Brachiano and Vittoria enact their illicit schemes. Flamineo counters that his goal was always to better his and Vittoria's fortunes. He criticizes Marcello for serving Francisco for very little money, but Marcello interrupts and insults him. At that moment, several foreign ambassadors, who are to judge the trial, walk across the stage. The Savoy Ambassador enters first, followed by the French Ambassador. The Lawyer and Flamineo mockingly discuss the French Ambassador's talent for tilting, which is also a pun for sexual intercourse, and Flamineo further describes him as impotent. The England and Spanish Ambassadors arrive last, and Flamineo insults them to himself. Everyone exits. Scene 2 Scene 2 presents Vittoria's arraignment. It begins as Francisco, Monticelso, the Ambassadors, Brachiano, Vittoria, Zanche, Flamineo, Marcello, the Lawyer, and a guard file in. Monticelso explains to Brachiano that there is no chair for him, so Brachiano lays a rich gown underneath himself as a place to rest. Monticelso then calls Vittoria and Zanche to the stand, and the lawyer enters a plea against them in Latin. Vittoria asks for the lawyer to speak in his \"usual tongue\" so that the spectators can understand. She believes that Latin will cloud the trial and judgment. Francisco grants the request, so the lawyer, searching for large, Latin-esque words, delivers a flowery, nonsensical rant against Vittoria. Vittoria protests, and Francisco dismisses the lawyer. Monticelso now takes control of the prosecution, accusing Vittoria of being a whore. When Vittoria asks him to elucidate his meaning, he compares whores alternately to poisoned perfumes, Russian winters, high taxes, and counterfeit money. When Vittoria denies the charge, the ambassadors discuss the case, concluding that she has lived \"ill,\" but that Monticelso is also \"too bitter\" to be trusted as impartial. Together, Francisco and Monticelso present the case claiming that Vittoria killed Camillo. In her defense, Vittoria kneels before the ambassadors and begs forgiveness for her strong, masculine assertions and personality. The ambassadors are impressed by her bravery, and Vittoria triumphantly tells Monticelso that the insults he used towards her are easily leveled back at him. To further implicate Vittoria, Monticelso asks her who was in her home the night her husband was murdered. Brachiano stands up and admits to being there, but claims that he was trying to help Camillo settle his debt to Monticelso. When Monticelso accuses Brachiano of indulging his lust, Brachiano insults Monticelso and leaves the courtroom, leaving his rich coat behind. Francisco asserts that the prosecution lacks sufficient evidence to convict Vittoria, and moreover believes her soul is not \"black\" enough to commit such a deed. In answer, Monticelso produces a letter from Brachiano to Vittoria, which entreats her to join him at a summer-house. Vittoria reminds him that they have only his invitation and not her \"frosty\" response to it, and so the letter proves only his lust, and not her sin. Vittoria claims she has only committed petty sins, and that Monticelso is accusing her unsympathetically and unfairly. Monticelso next reveals that Brachiano gave Vittoria money, which she claims was meant to pay her husband's debt. She insists Monticelso cannot fairly act as both prosecutor and impartial judge, and appeals to both the ambassadors and the audience for judgment instead. Monticelso then tells the story of Camillo's marriage to Vittoria, claiming Camillo received no money from her dowry, and that she had always acted like a whore. Monticelso prepares to pass judgment. He first tells Flamineo and Marcello that they must stay nearby even though he does not yet have evidence with which to charge them of a crime. He then sentences Vittoria to a \"house of convertites,\" a home for penitent prostitutes. Vittoria screams for vengeance and insists Monticelso has raped Justice as she is led away. Brachiano enters, dazed and upset. He says a few mysterious and mournful words to Francisco before leaving again. Aside, Flamineo congratulates Brachiano on his performance, and resolves to also act like he is mad with grief other Vittoria's punishment so that nobody will think him guilty of anything. He exits, and Lodovico and Giovanni enter together. Dressed in black, Giovanni reveals to his uncle that Isabella is dead. The ambassadors leave the stage at Monticelso's request, and Giovanni mourns his mother's death, asking Francisco what happens to the dead. Deeply upset, Francisco sends Giovanni and Lodovico away so that he may mourn Isabella's death privately. Scene 3 Flamineo enters, acting distracted and insane as planned in the previous scene. When Marcello and Lodovico follow him, Flamineo gripes about his misfortune, listing all the situations he'd prefer to serving Brachiano. The Savoy Ambassador enters and tries to console Flamineo, but he rebuffs the condolences. The French Ambassador then enters and argues that the proof of guilt was clear, but Flamineo accuses Monticelso of being corrupt and using bribes. The English Ambassador enters and Flamineo continues cursing at Monticelso. All three ambassadors leave, and Flamineo subtly insults Marcello, partly by referencing Cain's murder of Abel. Flamineo then leaves the stage. Aside, Lodovico comments on Flamineo's scandalous words, and resolves to learn more of the man. Flamineo re-enters, wondering how and why Lodovico is back, since he is still officially banished. The two men exchange subtle insults. Gasparo and Antonelli enter, laughing. Flamineo refers sarcastically to the \"grieving\" couple, while he and Lodovico exchange a few more insults and then make a pact to stop arguing. Antonelli tells Lodovico that the Pope, on his deathbed, has signed Lodovico's pardon. Rejoicing in his good fortune, Lodovico breaks with Flamineo and calls Vittoria a whore. Flamineo strikes Lodovico, and Marcello drags him away. Lodovico is upset to have been hit by Flamineo, whom he considers a low-class pimp. Nonetheless, he resolves to forget the insult and get drunk instead.", "analysis": "Act 3 is the center of the narrative action. Most of the act, which is divided into smaller scenes mostly for convenience and could be performed as a continuous scene, is concerned with Vittoria's trial. This central event allows Webster to explore and express most of his play's major themes in an explicit fashion, and it also showcases how deeply Webster's pessimism runs. A woman's lack of agency is quite clear in the trial, both through the story and through the theatricality. One interesting aspect is how the trial deepens Vittoria's character, and explores her as more than just a lover or sensual figure. She demonstrates intelligence and power by commanding that her lawyer not speak in Latin. She wants the trial to be clear for everyone, and although she knows Latin , she fears the esoteric language will alienate those to whom she might appeal for justice. Unfortunately, though her clever use of power does get the Lawyer eliminated, Cardinal Monticelsco quickly seizes what power she has. One other way that the trial explores a woman's position is through an interesting theatrical device. In describing the stage, Webster writes that Isabella is amongst those watching, even though she died in the previous act. While this could be simply a slip-up, it is also possible that Isabella and Zanche were meant to be played by the same actress. This casting would connect the two women in the audience's minds, and thereby connect Isabella and Vittoria. Although they are often presented as polar opposites, one being a whore and the other a martyr, it is also possible to argue that their similarities as women are more significant those those differences. Each woman has a complex mix of vice and virtue within her, and both women are ultimately victims of male desires and social forces. The most overpowering impression left by the trial is the intense misogyny that is personified through Monticelso. Though he admits that he has no concrete proof, he energetically seeks conviction solely on arguments that attack her character, focusing on her misuse of female sexuality. Vittoria has many logical arguments - she says one cannot blame a river for a man's suicide, for instance - but as she notes, a woman can only find revenge through words whereas men can exploit fears of cuckoldry or contempt for overly-sexualized women as tools. When she apologizes to the judges for having appeared too masculine, it is a last ditch effort to acknowledge why she is being persecuted and then hopefully help them transcend their prejudices. And of course, the trial reveals a blatant misuse of power. Monticelso's conflict of interest as both prosecutor and judge underscores how corrupt the system is, and how difficult it is to rise above it. Monticelso and other \"great men\" like him guard the gate to freedom and social betterment, preventing not just a woman like Vittoria, but also a poor man like Flamineo, from achieving what they desire. Monticelso's pretension to an unbiased opinion is most dangerous of all, since it guards him from legitimately reforming. As a result, the system itself is somewhat to blame for inspiring cruelty and crime in the likes of Flamineo, who merely take what path is available to achieve what they feel capable of. And yet, the most pessimistic irony of all is that for all this misuse and perversion of power, Vittoria is arguably guilty of having facilitated the crime, as the audience knows from earlier. Further, she did so through a clever ruse that stroked Brachiano's ego, through the very type of intrigue that frightens men like Monticelso. At the end of Act 3, another parallel occurs in the meeting of Lodovico and Flamineo. Both men could be considered the base villains of the play - they are the primary murderers, they both toe the line between knave and gentility, and they both unhappily work for \"great men.\" Their meeting provides the audience with cue to follow their story, to see how their paths deviate. Finally, Webster uses an interesting device when Lodovico notes that \"Fortune's wheel\" has spun in his favor. This allusion to Fortune's wheel evokes a torture wheel which, to men of their position, also applies. Misfortune can be tantamount to torture, and Lodovico may, by the end of the play, undergo actual torture for his part in the murders."}

ACT III SCENE I Enter Francisco de Medicis, and Monticelso, their Chancellor and Register Fran. You have dealt discreetly, to obtain the presence Of all the great lieger ambassadors To hear Vittoria's trial. Mont. 'Twas not ill; For, sir, you know we have naught but circumstances To charge her with, about her husband's death: Their approbation, therefore, to the proofs Of her black lust shall make her infamous To all our neighbouring kingdoms. I wonder If Brachiano will be here? Fran. Oh, fie! 'Twere impudence too palpable. [Exeunt. Enter Flamineo and Marcello guarded, and a Lawyer Lawyer. What, are you in by the week? So--I will try now whether they wit be close prisoner--methinks none should sit upon thy sister, but old whore-masters---- Flam. Or cuckolds; for your cuckold is your most terrible tickler of lechery. Whore-masters would serve; for none are judges at tilting, but those that have been old tilters. Lawyer. My lord duke and she have been very private. Flam. You are a dull ass; 'tis threatened they have been very public. Lawyer. If it can be proved they have but kissed one another---- Flam. What then? Lawyer. My lord cardinal will ferret them. Flam. A cardinal, I hope, will not catch conies. Lawyer. For to sow kisses (mark what I say), to sow kisses is to reap lechery; and, I am sure, a woman that will endure kissing is half won. Flam. True, her upper part, by that rule; if you will win her neither part too, you know what follows. Lawyer. Hark! the ambassadors are 'lighted---- Flam. I do put on this feigned garb of mirth, To gull suspicion. Marc. Oh, my unfortunate sister! I would my dagger-point had cleft her heart When she first saw Brachiano: you, 'tis said, Were made his engine, and his stalking horse, To undo my sister. Flam. I am a kind of path To her and mine own preferment. Marc. Your ruin. Flam. Hum! thou art a soldier, Followest the great duke, feed'st his victories, As witches do their serviceable spirits, Even with thy prodigal blood: what hast got? But, like the wealth of captains, a poor handful, Which in thy palm thou bear'st, as men hold water; Seeking to grip it fast, the frail reward Steals through thy fingers. Marc. Sir! Flam. Thou hast scarce maintenance To keep thee in fresh chamois. Marc. Brother! Flam. Hear me: And thus, when we have even pour'd ourselves Into great fights, for their ambition, Or idle spleen, how shall we find reward? But as we seldom find the mistletoe, Sacred to physic, or the builder oak, Without a mandrake by it; so in our quest of gain, Alas, the poorest of their forc'd dislikes At a limb proffers, but at heart it strikes! This is lamented doctrine. Marc. Come, come. Flam. When age shall turn thee White as a blooming hawthorn---- Marc. I 'll interrupt you: For love of virtue bear an honest heart, And stride o'er every politic respect, Which, where they most advance, they most infect. Were I your father, as I am your brother, I should not be ambitious to leave you A better patrimony. Flam. I 'll think on 't. [Enter Savoy Ambassador. The lord ambassadors. [Here there is a passage of the Lieger Ambassadors over the stage severally. Enter French Ambassador Lawyer. Oh, my sprightly Frenchman! Do you know him? he 's an admirable tilter. Flam. I saw him at last tilting: he showed like a pewter candlestick fashioned like a man in armour, holding a tilting staff in his hand, little bigger than a candle of twelve i' th' pound. Lawyer. Oh, but he's an excellent horseman! Flam. A lame one in his lofty tricks; he sleeps a-horseback, like a poulterer. Enter English and Spanish Lawyer. Lo you, my Spaniard! Flam. He carried his face in 's ruff, as I have seen a serving-man carry glasses in a cypress hatband, monstrous steady, for fear of breaking; he looks like the claw of a blackbird, first salted, and then broiled in a candle. [Exeunt. SCENE II The Arraignment of Vittoria Enter Francisco, Monticelso, the six Lieger Ambassadors, Brachiano, Vittoria, Zanche, Flamineo, Marcello, Lawyer, and a Guard. Mont. Forbear, my lord, here is no place assign'd you. This business, by his Holiness, is left To our examination. Brach. May it thrive with you. [Lays a rich gown under him. Fran. A chair there for his Lordship. Brach. Forbear your kindness: an unbidden guest Should travel as Dutch women go to church, Bear their stools with them. Mont. At your pleasure, sir. Stand to the table, gentlewoman. Now, signior, Fall to your plea. Lawyer. Domine judex, converte oculos in hanc pestem, mulierum corruptissiman. Vit. What 's he? Fran. A lawyer that pleads against you. Vit. Pray, my lord, let him speak his usual tongue, I 'll make no answer else. Fran. Why, you understand Latin. Vit. I do, sir, but amongst this auditory Which come to hear my cause, the half or more May be ignorant in 't. Mont. Go on, sir. Vit. By your favour, I will not have my accusation clouded In a strange tongue: all this assembly Shall hear what you can charge me with. Fran. Signior, You need not stand on 't much; pray, change your language. Mont. Oh, for God's sake--Gentlewoman, your credit Shall be more famous by it. Lawyer. Well then, have at you. Vit. I am at the mark, sir; I 'll give aim to you, And tell you how near you shoot. Lawyer. Most literated judges, please your lordships So to connive your judgments to the view Of this debauch'd and diversivolent woman; Who such a black concatenation Of mischief hath effected, that to extirp The memory of 't, must be the consummation Of her, and her projections---- Vit. What 's all this? Lawyer. Hold your peace! Exorbitant sins must have exulceration. Vit. Surely, my lords, this lawyer here hath swallow'd Some 'pothecaries' bills, or proclamations; And now the hard and undigestible words Come up, like stones we use give hawks for physic. Why, this is Welsh to Latin. Lawyer. My lords, the woman Knows not her tropes, nor figures, nor is perfect In the academic derivation Of grammatical elocution. Fran. Sir, your pains Shall be well spar'd, and your deep eloquence Be worthily applauded amongst thouse Which understand you. Lawyer. My good lord. Fran. Sir, Put up your papers in your fustian bag-- [Francisco speaks this as in scorn. Cry mercy, sir, 'tis buckram and accept My notion of your learn'd verbosity. Lawyer. I most graduatically thank your lordship: I shall have use for them elsewhere. Mont. I shall be plainer with you, and paint out Your follies in more natural red and white Than that upon your cheek. Vit. Oh, you mistake! You raise a blood as noble in this cheek As ever was your mother's. Mont. I must spare you, till proof cry whore to that. Observe this creature here, my honour'd lords, A woman of must prodigious spirit, In her effected. Vit. My honourable lord, It doth not suit a reverend cardinal To play the lawyer thus. Mont. Oh, your trade instructs your language! You see, my lords, what goodly fruit she seems; Yet like those apples travellers report To grow where Sodom and Gomorrah stood, I will but touch her, and you straight shall see She 'll fall to soot and ashes. Vit. Your envenom'd 'pothecary should do 't. Mont. I am resolv'd, Were there a second paradise to lose, This devil would betray it. Vit. O poor Charity! Thou art seldom found in scarlet. Mont. Who knows not how, when several night by night Her gates were chok'd with coaches, and her rooms Outbrav'd the stars with several kind of lights; When she did counterfeit a prince's court In music, banquets, and most riotous surfeits; This whore forsooth was holy. Vit. Ha! whore! what 's that? Mont. Shall I expound whore to you? sure I shall; I 'll give their perfect character. They are first, Sweetmeats which rot the eater; in man's nostrils Poison'd perfumes. They are cozening alchemy; Shipwrecks in calmest weather. What are whores! Cold Russian winters, that appear so barren, As if that nature had forgot the spring. They are the true material fire of hell: Worse than those tributes i' th' Low Countries paid, Exactions upon meat, drink, garments, sleep, Ay, even on man's perdition, his sin. They are those brittle evidences of law, Which forfeit all a wretched man's estate For leaving out one syllable. What are whores! They are those flattering bells have all one tune, At weddings, and at funerals. Your rich whores Are only treasures by extortion fill'd, And emptied by curs'd riot. They are worse, Worse than dead bodies which are begg'd at gallows, And wrought upon by surgeons, to teach man Wherein he is imperfect. What's a whore! She 's like the guilty counterfeited coin, Which, whosoe'er first stamps it, brings in trouble All that receive it. Vit. This character 'scapes me. Mont. You, gentlewoman! Take from all beasts and from all minerals Their deadly poison---- Vit. Well, what then? Mont. I 'll tell thee; I 'll find in thee a 'pothecary's shop, To sample them all. Fr. Ambass. She hath liv'd ill. Eng. Ambass. True, but the cardinal 's too bitter. Mont. You know what whore is. Next the devil adultery, Enters the devil murder. Fran. Your unhappy husband Is dead. Vit. Oh, he 's a happy husband! Now he owes nature nothing. Fran. And by a vaulting engine. Mont. An active plot; he jump'd into his grave. Fran. What a prodigy was 't, That from some two yards' height, a slender man Should break his neck! Mont. I' th' rushes! Fran. And what's more, Upon the instant lose all use of speech, All vital motion, like a man had lain Wound up three days. Now mark each circumstance. Mont. And look upon this creature was his wife! She comes not like a widow; she comes arm'd With scorn and impudence: is this a mourning-habit? Vit. Had I foreknown his death, as you suggest, I would have bespoke my mourning. Mont. Oh, you are cunning! Vit. You shame your wit and judgment, To call it so. What! is my just defence By him that is my judge call'd impudence? Let me appeal then from this Christian court, To the uncivil Tartar. Mont. See, my lords, She scandals our proceedings. Vit. Humbly thus, Thus low to the most worthy and respected Lieger ambassadors, my modesty And womanhood I tender; but withal, So entangled in a curs'd accusation, That my defence, of force, like Perseus, Must personate masculine virtue. To the point. Find me but guilty, sever head from body, We 'll part good friends: I scorn to hold my life At yours, or any man's entreaty, sir. Eng. Ambass. She hath a brave spirit. Mont. Well, well, such counterfeit jewels Make true ones oft suspected. Vit. You are deceiv'd: For know, that all your strict-combined heads, Which strike against this mine of diamonds, Shall prove but glassen hammers: they shall break. These are but feigned shadows of my evils. Terrify babes, my lord, with painted devils, I am past such needless palsy. For your names Of 'whore' and 'murderess', they proceed from you, As if a man should spit against the wind, The filth returns in 's face. Mont. Pray you, mistress, satisfy me one question: Who lodg'd beneath your roof that fatal night Your husband broke his neck? Brach. That question Enforceth me break silence: I was there. Mont. Your business? Brach. Why, I came to comfort he, And take some course for settling her estate, Because I heard her husband was in debt To you, my lord. Mont. He was. Brach. And 'twas strangely fear'd, That you would cozen her. Mont. Who made you overseer? Brach. Why, my charity, my charity, which should flow From every generous and noble spirit, To orphans and to widows. Mont. Your lust! Brach. Cowardly dogs bark loudest: sirrah priest, I 'll talk with you hereafter. Do you hear? The sword you frame of such an excellent temper, I 'll sheath in your own bowels. There are a number of thy coat resemble Your common post-boys. Mont. Ha! Brach. Your mercenary post-boys; Your letters carry truth, but 'tis your guise To fill your mouths with gross and impudent lies. Servant. My lord, your gown. Brach. Thou liest, 'twas my stool: Bestow 't upon thy master, that will challenge The rest o' th' household-stuff; for Brachiano Was ne'er so beggarly to take a stool Out of another's lodging: let him make Vallance for his bed on 't, or a demy foot-cloth For his most reverend moil. Monticelso, Nemo me impune lacessit. [Exit. Mont. Your champion's gone. Vit. The wolf may prey the better. Fran. My lord, there 's great suspicion of the murder, But no sound proof who did it. For my part, I do not think she hath a soul so black To act a deed so bloody; if she have, As in cold countries husbandmen plant vines, And with warm blood manure them; even so One summer she will bear unsavoury fruit, And ere next spring wither both branch and root. The act of blood let pass; only descend To matters of incontinence. Vit. I discern poison Under your gilded pills. Mont. Now the duke's gone, I will produce a letter Wherein 'twas plotted, he and you should meet At an apothecary's summer-house, Down by the River Tiber,--view 't, my lords, Where after wanton bathing and the heat Of a lascivious banquet--I pray read it, I shame to speak the rest. Vit. Grant I was tempted; Temptation to lust proves not the act: Casta est quam nemo rogavit. You read his hot love to me, but you want My frosty answer. Mont. Frost i' th' dog-days! strange! Vit. Condemn you me for that the duke did love me? So may you blame some fair and crystal river, For that some melancholic distracted man Hath drown'd himself in 't. Mont. Truly drown'd, indeed. Vit. Sum up my faults, I pray, and you shall find, That beauty and gay clothes, a merry heart, And a good stomach to feast, are all, All the poor crimes that you can charge me with. In faith, my lord, you might go pistol flies, The sport would be more noble. Mont. Very good. Vit. But take your course: it seems you 've beggar'd me first, And now would fain undo me. I have houses, Jewels, and a poor remnant of crusadoes; Would those would make you charitable! Mont. If the devil Did ever take good shape, behold his picture. Vit. You have one virtue left, You will not flatter me. Fran. Who brought this letter? Vit. I am not compell'd to tell you. Mont. My lord duke sent to you a thousand ducats The twelfth of August. Vit. 'Twas to keep your cousin From prison; I paid use for 't. Mont. I rather think, 'Twas interest for his lust. Vit. Who says so but yourself? If you be my accuser, Pray cease to be my judge: come from the bench; Give in your evidence 'gainst me, and let these Be moderators. My lord cardinal, Were your intelligencing ears as loving As to my thoughts, had you an honest tongue, I would not care though you proclaim'd them all. Mont. Go to, go to. After your goodly and vainglorious banquet, I 'll give you a choke-pear. Vit. O' your own grafting? Mont. You were born in Venice, honourably descended From the Vittelli: 'twas my cousin's fate, Ill may I name the hour, to marry you; He bought you of your father. Vit. Ha! Mont. He spent there in six months Twelve thousand ducats, and (to my acquaintance) Receiv'd in dowry with you not one Julio: 'Twas a hard pennyworth, the ware being so light. I yet but draw the curtain; now to your picture: You came from thence a most notorious strumpet, And so you have continued. Vit. My lord! Mont. Nay, hear me, You shall have time to prate. My Lord Brachiano-- Alas! I make but repetition Of what is ordinary and Rialto talk, And ballated, and would be play'd a' th' stage, But that vice many times finds such loud friends, That preachers are charm'd silent. You, gentlemen, Flamineo and Marcello, The Court hath nothing now to charge you with, Only you must remain upon your sureties For your appearance. Fran. I stand for Marcello. Flam. And my lord duke for me. Mont. For you, Vittoria, your public fault, Join'd to th' condition of the present time, Takes from you all the fruits of noble pity, Such a corrupted trial have you made Both of your life and beauty, and been styl'd No less an ominous fate than blazing stars To princes. Hear your sentence: you are confin'd Unto a house of convertites, and your bawd---- Flam. [Aside.] Who, I? Mont. The Moor. Flam. [Aside.] Oh, I am a sound man again. Vit. A house of convertites! what 's that? Mont. A house of penitent whores. Vit. Do the noblemen in Rome Erect it for their wives, that I am sent To lodge there? Fran. You must have patience. Vit. I must first have vengeance! I fain would know if you have your salvation By patent, that you proceed thus. Mont. Away with her, Take her hence. Vit. A rape! a rape! Mont. How? Vit. Yes, you have ravish'd justice; Forc'd her to do your pleasure. Mont. Fie, she 's mad---- Vit. Die with those pills in your most cursed maw, Should bring you health! or while you sit o' th' bench, Let your own spittle choke you! Mont. She 's turned fury. Vit. That the last day of judgment may so find you, And leave you the same devil you were before! Instruct me, some good horse-leech, to speak treason; For since you cannot take my life for deeds, Take it for words. O woman's poor revenge, Which dwells but in the tongue! I will not weep; No, I do scorn to call up one poor tear To fawn on your injustice: bear me hence Unto this house of--what's your mitigating title? Mont. Of convertites. Vit. It shall not be a house of convertites; My mind shall make it honester to me Than the Pope's palace, and more peaceable Than thy soul, though thou art a cardinal. Know this, and let it somewhat raise your spite, Through darkness diamonds spread their richest light. [Exit. Enter Brachiano Brach. Now you and I are friends, sir, we'll shake hands In a friend's grave together; a fit place, Being th' emblem of soft peace, t' atone our hatred. Fran. Sir, what 's the matter? Brach. I will not chase more blood from that lov'd cheek; You have lost too much already; fare you well. [Exit. Fran. How strange these words sound! what 's the interpretation? Flam. [Aside.] Good; this is a preface to the discovery of the duchess' death: he carries it well. Because now I cannot counterfeit a whining passion for the death of my lady, I will feign a mad humour for the disgrace of my sister; and that will keep off idle questions. Treason's tongue hath a villainous palsy in 't; I will talk to any man, hear no man, and for a time appear a politic madman. Enter Giovanni, and Count Lodovico Fran. How now, my noble cousin? what, in black! Giov. Yes, uncle, I was taught to imitate you In virtue, and you must imitate me In colours of your garments. My sweet mother Is---- Fran. How? where? Giov. Is there; no, yonder: indeed, sir, I 'll not tell you, For I shall make you weep. Fran. Is dead? Giov. Do not blame me now, I did not tell you so. Lodo. She 's dead, my lord. Fran. Dead! Mont. Bless'd lady, thou art now above thy woes! Will 't please your lordships to withdraw a little? Giov. What do the dead do, uncle? do they eat, Hear music, go a-hunting, and be merry, As we that live? Fran. No, coz; they sleep. Giov. Lord, Lord, that I were dead! I have not slept these six nights. When do they wake? Fran. When God shall please. Giov. Good God, let her sleep ever! For I have known her wake an hundred nights, When all the pillow where she laid her head Was brine-wet with her tears. I am to complain to you, sir; I 'll tell you how they have us'd her now she 's dead: They wrapp'd her in a cruel fold of lead, And would not let me kiss her. Fran. Thou didst love her? Giov. I have often heard her say she gave me suck, And it should seem by that she dearly lov'd me, Since princes seldom do it. Fran. Oh, all of my poor sister that remains! Take him away for God's sake! [Exit Giovanni. Mont. How now, my lord? Fran. Believe me, I am nothing but her grave; And I shall keep her blessed memory Longer than thousand epitaphs. SCENE III Enter Flamineo as distracted, Marcello, and Lodovico Flam. We endure the strokes like anvils or hard steel, Till pain itself make us no pain to feel. Who shall do me right now? is this the end of service? I'd rather go weed garlic; travel through France, and be mine own ostler; wear sheep-skin linings, or shoes that stink of blacking; be entered into the list of the forty thousand pedlars in Poland. [Enter Savoy Ambassador.] Would I had rotted in some surgeon's house at Venice, built upon the pox as well as one pines, ere I had served Brachiano! Savoy Ambass. You must have comfort. Flam. Your comfortable words are like honey: they relish well in your mouth that 's whole, but in mine that 's wounded, they go down as if the sting of the bee were in them. Oh, they have wrought their purpose cunningly, as if they would not seem to do it of malice! In this a politician imitates the devil, as the devil imitates a canon; wheresoever he comes to do mischief, he comes with his backside towards you. Enter French Ambassador Fr. Ambass. The proofs are evident. Flam. Proof! 'twas corruption. O gold, what a god art thou! and O man, what a devil art thou to be tempted by that cursed mineral! Your diversivolent lawyer, mark him! knaves turn informers, as maggots turn to flies, you may catch gudgeons with either. A cardinal! I would he would hear me: there 's nothing so holy but money will corrupt and putrity it, like victual under the line. [Enter English Ambassador.] You are happy in England, my lord; here they sell justice with those weights they press men to death with. O horrible salary! Eng. Ambass. Fie, fie, Flamineo. Flam. Bells ne'er ring well, till they are at their full pitch; and I hope yon cardinal shall never have the grace to pray well, till he come to the scaffold. If they were racked now to know the confederacy: but your noblemen are privileged from the rack; and well may, for a little thing would pull some of them a-pieces afore they came to their arraignment. Religion, oh, how it is commeddled with policy! The first blood shed in the world happened about religion. Would I were a Jew! Marc. Oh, there are too many! Flam. You are deceived; there are not Jews enough, priests enough, nor gentlemen enough. Marc. How? Flam. I 'll prove it; for if there were Jews enough, so many Christians would not turn usurers; if priests enough, one should not have six benefices; and if gentlemen enough, so many early mushrooms, whose best growth sprang from a live by begging: be thou one of them practise the art of Wolner in England, to swallow all 's given thee: and yet let one purgation make thee as hungry again as fellows that work in a saw-pit. I 'll go hear the screech-owl. [Exit. Lodo. This was Brachiano's pander; and 'tis strange That in such open, and apparent guilt Of his adulterous sister, he dare utter So scandalous a passion. I must wind him. Re-enter Flamineo. Flam. How dares this banish'd count return to Rome, His pardon not yet purchas'd! I have heard The deceased duchess gave him pension, And that he came along from Padua I' th' train of the young prince. There 's somewhat in 't: Physicians, that cure poisons, still do work With counter-poisons. Marc. Mark this strange encounter. Flam. The god of melancholy turn thy gall to poison, And let the stigmatic wrinkles in thy face, Like to the boisterous waves in a rough tide, One still overtake another. Lodo. I do thank thee, And I do wish ingeniously for thy sake, The dog-days all year long. Flam. How croaks the raven? Is our good duchess dead? Lodo. Dead. Flam. O fate! Misfortune comes like the coroner's business Huddle upon huddle. Lodo. Shalt thou and I join housekeeping? Flam. Yes, content: Let 's be unsociably sociable. Lodo. Sit some three days together, and discourse? Flam. Only with making faces; Lie in our clothes. Lodo. With faggots for our pillows. Flam. And be lousy. Lodo. In taffeta linings, that 's genteel melancholy; Sleep all day. Flam. Yes; and, like your melancholic hare, Feed after midnight. [Enter Antonelli and Gasparo. We are observed: see how yon couple grieve. Lodo. What a strange creature is a laughing fool! As if man were created to no use But only to show his teeth. Flam. I 'll tell thee what, It would do well instead of looking-glasses, To set one's face each morning by a saucer Of a witch's congeal'd blood. Lodo. Precious rogue! We'll never part. Flam. Never, till the beggary of courtiers, The discontent of churchmen, want of soldiers, And all the creatures that hang manacled, Worse than strappadoed, on the lowest felly Of fortune's wheel, be taught, in our two lives, To scorn that world which life of means deprives. Ant. My lord, I bring good news. The Pope, on 's death bed, At th' earnest suit of the great Duke of Florence, Hath sign'd your pardon, and restor'd unto you---- Lodo. I thank you for your news. Look up again, Flamineo, see my pardon. Flam. Why do you laugh? There was no such condition in our covenant. Lodo. Why? Flam. You shall not seem a happier man than I: You know our vow, sir; if you will be merry, Do it i' th' like posture, as if some great man Sat while his enemy were executed: Though it be very lechery unto thee, Do 't with a crabbed politician's face. Lodo. Your sister is a damnable whore. Flam. Ha! Lodo. Look you, I spake that laughing. Flam. Dost ever think to speak again? Lodo. Do you hear? Wilt sell me forty ounces of her blood To water a mandrake? Flam. Poor lord, you did vow To live a lousy creature. Lodo. Yes. Flam. Like one That had for ever forfeited the daylight, By being in debt. Lodo. Ha, ha! Flam. I do not greatly wonder you do break, Your lordship learn'd 't long since. But I 'll tell you. Lodo. What? Flam. And 't shall stick by you. Lodo. I long for it. Flam. This laughter scurvily becomes your face: If you will not be melancholy, be angry. [Strikes him. See, now I laugh too. Marc. You are to blame: I 'll force you hence. Lodo. Unhand me. [Exeunt Marcello and Flamineo. That e'er I should be forc'd to right myself, Upon a pander! Ant. My lord. Lodo. H' had been as good met with his fist a thunderbolt. Gas. How this shows! Lodo. Ud's death! how did my sword miss him? These rogues that are most weary of their lives Still 'scape the greatest dangers. A pox upon him; all his reputation, Nay, all the goodness of his family, Is not worth half this earthquake: I learn'd it of no fencer to shake thus: Come, I 'll forget him, and go drink some wine. [Exeunt.

Act 3

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Act 3 opens in Rome, as Francisco and Monticelso prepare Vittoria's trial for the murder of Camillo. As their Chancellor and Register physically set the stage for the trial, Francisco and Monticelso discuss how they will blacken Vittoria's name, despite their lack of concrete evidence. The four men soon leave, and Flamineo, Marcello, and a Lawyer enter. The lawyer chides the two brothers, explaining that Vittoria will be easily convicted if any evidence exists showing she has even kissed Brachiano. Flamineo jokes with the lawyer, twisting his words around to make sexual innuendos in order to prevent suspicion of his own guilt in the matter. Marcello, however, is in a miserable mood, and chastises his brother for helping Brachiano and Vittoria enact their illicit schemes. Flamineo counters that his goal was always to better his and Vittoria's fortunes. He criticizes Marcello for serving Francisco for very little money, but Marcello interrupts and insults him. At that moment, several foreign ambassadors, who are to judge the trial, walk across the stage. The Savoy Ambassador enters first, followed by the French Ambassador. The Lawyer and Flamineo mockingly discuss the French Ambassador's talent for tilting, which is also a pun for sexual intercourse, and Flamineo further describes him as impotent. The England and Spanish Ambassadors arrive last, and Flamineo insults them to himself. Everyone exits. Scene 2 Scene 2 presents Vittoria's arraignment. It begins as Francisco, Monticelso, the Ambassadors, Brachiano, Vittoria, Zanche, Flamineo, Marcello, the Lawyer, and a guard file in. Monticelso explains to Brachiano that there is no chair for him, so Brachiano lays a rich gown underneath himself as a place to rest. Monticelso then calls Vittoria and Zanche to the stand, and the lawyer enters a plea against them in Latin. Vittoria asks for the lawyer to speak in his "usual tongue" so that the spectators can understand. She believes that Latin will cloud the trial and judgment. Francisco grants the request, so the lawyer, searching for large, Latin-esque words, delivers a flowery, nonsensical rant against Vittoria. Vittoria protests, and Francisco dismisses the lawyer. Monticelso now takes control of the prosecution, accusing Vittoria of being a whore. When Vittoria asks him to elucidate his meaning, he compares whores alternately to poisoned perfumes, Russian winters, high taxes, and counterfeit money. When Vittoria denies the charge, the ambassadors discuss the case, concluding that she has lived "ill," but that Monticelso is also "too bitter" to be trusted as impartial. Together, Francisco and Monticelso present the case claiming that Vittoria killed Camillo. In her defense, Vittoria kneels before the ambassadors and begs forgiveness for her strong, masculine assertions and personality. The ambassadors are impressed by her bravery, and Vittoria triumphantly tells Monticelso that the insults he used towards her are easily leveled back at him. To further implicate Vittoria, Monticelso asks her who was in her home the night her husband was murdered. Brachiano stands up and admits to being there, but claims that he was trying to help Camillo settle his debt to Monticelso. When Monticelso accuses Brachiano of indulging his lust, Brachiano insults Monticelso and leaves the courtroom, leaving his rich coat behind. Francisco asserts that the prosecution lacks sufficient evidence to convict Vittoria, and moreover believes her soul is not "black" enough to commit such a deed. In answer, Monticelso produces a letter from Brachiano to Vittoria, which entreats her to join him at a summer-house. Vittoria reminds him that they have only his invitation and not her "frosty" response to it, and so the letter proves only his lust, and not her sin. Vittoria claims she has only committed petty sins, and that Monticelso is accusing her unsympathetically and unfairly. Monticelso next reveals that Brachiano gave Vittoria money, which she claims was meant to pay her husband's debt. She insists Monticelso cannot fairly act as both prosecutor and impartial judge, and appeals to both the ambassadors and the audience for judgment instead. Monticelso then tells the story of Camillo's marriage to Vittoria, claiming Camillo received no money from her dowry, and that she had always acted like a whore. Monticelso prepares to pass judgment. He first tells Flamineo and Marcello that they must stay nearby even though he does not yet have evidence with which to charge them of a crime. He then sentences Vittoria to a "house of convertites," a home for penitent prostitutes. Vittoria screams for vengeance and insists Monticelso has raped Justice as she is led away. Brachiano enters, dazed and upset. He says a few mysterious and mournful words to Francisco before leaving again. Aside, Flamineo congratulates Brachiano on his performance, and resolves to also act like he is mad with grief other Vittoria's punishment so that nobody will think him guilty of anything. He exits, and Lodovico and Giovanni enter together. Dressed in black, Giovanni reveals to his uncle that Isabella is dead. The ambassadors leave the stage at Monticelso's request, and Giovanni mourns his mother's death, asking Francisco what happens to the dead. Deeply upset, Francisco sends Giovanni and Lodovico away so that he may mourn Isabella's death privately. Scene 3 Flamineo enters, acting distracted and insane as planned in the previous scene. When Marcello and Lodovico follow him, Flamineo gripes about his misfortune, listing all the situations he'd prefer to serving Brachiano. The Savoy Ambassador enters and tries to console Flamineo, but he rebuffs the condolences. The French Ambassador then enters and argues that the proof of guilt was clear, but Flamineo accuses Monticelso of being corrupt and using bribes. The English Ambassador enters and Flamineo continues cursing at Monticelso. All three ambassadors leave, and Flamineo subtly insults Marcello, partly by referencing Cain's murder of Abel. Flamineo then leaves the stage. Aside, Lodovico comments on Flamineo's scandalous words, and resolves to learn more of the man. Flamineo re-enters, wondering how and why Lodovico is back, since he is still officially banished. The two men exchange subtle insults. Gasparo and Antonelli enter, laughing. Flamineo refers sarcastically to the "grieving" couple, while he and Lodovico exchange a few more insults and then make a pact to stop arguing. Antonelli tells Lodovico that the Pope, on his deathbed, has signed Lodovico's pardon. Rejoicing in his good fortune, Lodovico breaks with Flamineo and calls Vittoria a whore. Flamineo strikes Lodovico, and Marcello drags him away. Lodovico is upset to have been hit by Flamineo, whom he considers a low-class pimp. Nonetheless, he resolves to forget the insult and get drunk instead.

Act 3 is the center of the narrative action. Most of the act, which is divided into smaller scenes mostly for convenience and could be performed as a continuous scene, is concerned with Vittoria's trial. This central event allows Webster to explore and express most of his play's major themes in an explicit fashion, and it also showcases how deeply Webster's pessimism runs. A woman's lack of agency is quite clear in the trial, both through the story and through the theatricality. One interesting aspect is how the trial deepens Vittoria's character, and explores her as more than just a lover or sensual figure. She demonstrates intelligence and power by commanding that her lawyer not speak in Latin. She wants the trial to be clear for everyone, and although she knows Latin , she fears the esoteric language will alienate those to whom she might appeal for justice. Unfortunately, though her clever use of power does get the Lawyer eliminated, Cardinal Monticelsco quickly seizes what power she has. One other way that the trial explores a woman's position is through an interesting theatrical device. In describing the stage, Webster writes that Isabella is amongst those watching, even though she died in the previous act. While this could be simply a slip-up, it is also possible that Isabella and Zanche were meant to be played by the same actress. This casting would connect the two women in the audience's minds, and thereby connect Isabella and Vittoria. Although they are often presented as polar opposites, one being a whore and the other a martyr, it is also possible to argue that their similarities as women are more significant those those differences. Each woman has a complex mix of vice and virtue within her, and both women are ultimately victims of male desires and social forces. The most overpowering impression left by the trial is the intense misogyny that is personified through Monticelso. Though he admits that he has no concrete proof, he energetically seeks conviction solely on arguments that attack her character, focusing on her misuse of female sexuality. Vittoria has many logical arguments - she says one cannot blame a river for a man's suicide, for instance - but as she notes, a woman can only find revenge through words whereas men can exploit fears of cuckoldry or contempt for overly-sexualized women as tools. When she apologizes to the judges for having appeared too masculine, it is a last ditch effort to acknowledge why she is being persecuted and then hopefully help them transcend their prejudices. And of course, the trial reveals a blatant misuse of power. Monticelso's conflict of interest as both prosecutor and judge underscores how corrupt the system is, and how difficult it is to rise above it. Monticelso and other "great men" like him guard the gate to freedom and social betterment, preventing not just a woman like Vittoria, but also a poor man like Flamineo, from achieving what they desire. Monticelso's pretension to an unbiased opinion is most dangerous of all, since it guards him from legitimately reforming. As a result, the system itself is somewhat to blame for inspiring cruelty and crime in the likes of Flamineo, who merely take what path is available to achieve what they feel capable of. And yet, the most pessimistic irony of all is that for all this misuse and perversion of power, Vittoria is arguably guilty of having facilitated the crime, as the audience knows from earlier. Further, she did so through a clever ruse that stroked Brachiano's ego, through the very type of intrigue that frightens men like Monticelso. At the end of Act 3, another parallel occurs in the meeting of Lodovico and Flamineo. Both men could be considered the base villains of the play - they are the primary murderers, they both toe the line between knave and gentility, and they both unhappily work for "great men." Their meeting provides the audience with cue to follow their story, to see how their paths deviate. Finally, Webster uses an interesting device when Lodovico notes that "Fortune's wheel" has spun in his favor. This allusion to Fortune's wheel evokes a torture wheel which, to men of their position, also applies. Misfortune can be tantamount to torture, and Lodovico may, by the end of the play, undergo actual torture for his part in the murders.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/53.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_10_part_8.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 8.chapter 8

book 8, chapter 8

{"name": "book 8, Chapter 8", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section11/", "summary": "Delirium As Grushenka watches her Polish lover cheat at the games, and listens to the coarse and degrading things that he says, she realizes she does not love him. Instead, she loves Dmitri. When the officer insults her, Dmitri attacks him and locks him in another room. Dmitri and Grushenka begin to plan their future together. Through his joy at winning Grushenka, Dmitri is troubled by the thought of the wound he dealt Grigory and the fortune he owes Katerina. Just then, a group of officers bursts into the room. They seize Dmitri and place him under arrest. Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov has been murdered, and Dmitri is the prime suspect.", "analysis": "Book VIII: Mitya, Chapters 1-8 Dostoevsky uses a variety of literary techniques to suggest that Dmitri is responsible for his father's murder. Before Dmitri appears with a large amount of money, the narrator continually makes statements implying that Dmitri will steal Fyodor Pavlovich's 3,000 rubles: \"Only three or four hours before a certain incident, of which I will speak below, Mitya did not have a kopeck, and pawned his dearest possession for ten roubles, whereas three hours later he suddenly had thousands in his hands. but I anticipate. Dmitri's inner monologue is similarly misleading, as when Dmitri thinks about going to Madame Khokhlakov's and realizes \"fully and now with mathematical clarity that this was his last hope, that if this should fall through, there was nothing left in the world but 'to kill and rob someone for the three thousand, and that's all. Dostoevsky also uses a technique called ellipsis, skipping over a moment of action in order to play on our expectations: he implies Dmitri's guilt by leaving out the crucial stretch of action in Chapter 5, in between Dmitri's discovery of Grushenka's whereabouts and his arrival at Perkhotin's office. This strategy leads us to suspect that Dmitri has killed his father in that time. Finally, the events we do see suggest Dmitri's guilt. Dmitri is desperate, impassioned, and antagonistic toward Grigory. The combination of these factors makes Dmitri seem eminently capable of committing murder. The narrative throughout this book lays the groundwork for a surprise plot twist: the revelation in Book XI that Smerdyakov, and not Dmitri, is the murderer. Dostoevsky goes to such lengths to imply that an innocent man is guilty of such a crime for several reasons. First, making Dmitri guilty and then innocent in our mind is a way of enacting the spiritual rebirth that Dmitri experiences after his arrest. Second, making us learn that our judgment about Dmitri is wrong is a way of emphasizing Zosima's advice never to judge anyone because all people are responsible for one another's sins. Third, making Dmitri appear guilty is a way of emphasizing the extraordinary scope of his passion. Dmitri may not have committed murder, but he is clearly capable of such a crime, and possesses a tormented and sinful soul. The redemption of such a passionate person is all the more dramatic. Fourth, making Dmitri appear guilty is a way of making us feel the way most of the other characters do when they learn about the arrest. The whole town believes him to be guilty. Making Dmitri appear guilty is also a way for Dostoevsky to put human nature itself on trial. Throughout the novel we have seen various conceptions of human nature, ranging from Alyosha's faith that people are essentially good, like Zosima, to Ivan's belief that people are essentially bad, like Fyodor Pavlovich. But Dmitri combines the qualities of Fyodor Pavlovich and Zosima: he is a lustful and sinful man who nevertheless powerfully loves God. He commits bad deeds and longs to redeem them. He believes that he is bound for hell but pledges to love God even from the depths of hell. After spending a large amount of his fiancee's money on a lavish vacation with another woman, he is now greedily desperate for even more money, but only so that he can salvage his honor with Katerina, and thus make up for his sin. By putting Dmitri on trial through circumstantial evidence, Dostoevsky essentially poses the question of whether Dmitri's sinfulness or his goodness is the more fundamental aspect of his nature. This query in turn should make us question which of the two aspects is more fundamentally a characteristic of humanity. Dostoevsky wants us to consider whether humanity, burdened as it is with free will, is capable of overcoming its sinful nature and choosing to live within its good nature. When Dmitri is proved to be innocent shortly after he undergoes his powerful spiritual conversion, the question is answered in favor of human goodness--though not without a thorough understanding of the reality of evil in human life. Although a great deal of the novel's thematic development relies on the events in these chapters, the chapters are so devoted to narrative action that there is comparatively little thematic development within Book VIII itself. Apart from the insight it offers into Dmitri's tormented inner conflict, the most interesting psychological aspect of this section is its look at Grushenka's growth since her encounter with Alyosha. Before, Grushenka is too proud and suspicious to acknowledge her love for Dmitri, but through Alyosha she discovers real goodness. As a result, she is at last capable of admitting to herself that the Polish officer is just a vulgar man who betrayed her in her youth, and that Dmitri is the man she really loves. Alyosha does not appear at all in the action of this book, but his presence is strongly felt in Grushenka's positive acquiescence to her love for Dmitri--a lovely moment of goodness that is interrupted sharply by evil, with the arrival of the police and the announcement of the murder of Fyodor Pavlovich"}

Chapter VIII. Delirium What followed was almost an orgy, a feast to which all were welcome. Grushenka was the first to call for wine. "I want to drink. I want to be quite drunk, as we were before. Do you remember, Mitya, do you remember how we made friends here last time!" Mitya himself was almost delirious, feeling that his happiness was at hand. But Grushenka was continually sending him away from her. "Go and enjoy yourself. Tell them to dance, to make merry, 'let the stove and cottage dance'; as we had it last time," she kept exclaiming. She was tremendously excited. And Mitya hastened to obey her. The chorus were in the next room. The room in which they had been sitting till that moment was too small, and was divided in two by cotton curtains, behind which was a huge bed with a puffy feather mattress and a pyramid of cotton pillows. In the four rooms for visitors there were beds. Grushenka settled herself just at the door. Mitya set an easy chair for her. She had sat in the same place to watch the dancing and singing "the time before," when they had made merry there. All the girls who had come had been there then; the Jewish band with fiddles and zithers had come, too, and at last the long expected cart had arrived with the wines and provisions. Mitya bustled about. All sorts of people began coming into the room to look on, peasants and their women, who had been roused from sleep and attracted by the hopes of another marvelous entertainment such as they had enjoyed a month before. Mitya remembered their faces, greeting and embracing every one he knew. He uncorked bottles and poured out wine for every one who presented himself. Only the girls were very eager for the champagne. The men preferred rum, brandy, and, above all, hot punch. Mitya had chocolate made for all the girls, and ordered that three samovars should be kept boiling all night to provide tea and punch for everyone to help himself. An absurd chaotic confusion followed, but Mitya was in his natural element, and the more foolish it became, the more his spirits rose. If the peasants had asked him for money at that moment, he would have pulled out his notes and given them away right and left. This was probably why the landlord, Trifon Borissovitch, kept hovering about Mitya to protect him. He seemed to have given up all idea of going to bed that night; but he drank little, only one glass of punch, and kept a sharp look-out on Mitya's interests after his own fashion. He intervened in the nick of time, civilly and obsequiously persuading Mitya not to give away "cigars and Rhine wine," and, above all, money to the peasants as he had done before. He was very indignant, too, at the peasant girls drinking liqueur, and eating sweets. "They're a lousy lot, Dmitri Fyodorovitch," he said. "I'd give them a kick, every one of them, and they'd take it as an honor--that's all they're worth!" Mitya remembered Andrey again, and ordered punch to be sent out to him. "I was rude to him just now," he repeated with a sinking, softened voice. Kalganov did not want to drink, and at first did not care for the girls' singing; but after he had drunk a couple of glasses of champagne he became extraordinarily lively, strolling about the room, laughing and praising the music and the songs, admiring every one and everything. Maximov, blissfully drunk, never left his side. Grushenka, too, was beginning to get drunk. Pointing to Kalganov, she said to Mitya: "What a dear, charming boy he is!" And Mitya, delighted, ran to kiss Kalganov and Maximov. Oh, great were his hopes! She had said nothing yet, and seemed, indeed, purposely to refrain from speaking. But she looked at him from time to time with caressing and passionate eyes. At last she suddenly gripped his hand and drew him vigorously to her. She was sitting at the moment in the low chair by the door. "How was it you came just now, eh? Have you walked in!... I was frightened. So you wanted to give me up to him, did you? Did you really want to?" "I didn't want to spoil your happiness!" Mitya faltered blissfully. But she did not need his answer. "Well, go and enjoy yourself ..." she sent him away once more. "Don't cry, I'll call you back again." He would run away, and she listened to the singing and looked at the dancing, though her eyes followed him wherever he went. But in another quarter of an hour she would call him once more and again he would run back to her. "Come, sit beside me, tell me, how did you hear about me, and my coming here yesterday? From whom did you first hear it?" And Mitya began telling her all about it, disconnectedly, incoherently, feverishly. He spoke strangely, often frowning, and stopping abruptly. "What are you frowning at?" she asked. "Nothing.... I left a man ill there. I'd give ten years of my life for him to get well, to know he was all right!" "Well, never mind him, if he's ill. So you meant to shoot yourself to- morrow! What a silly boy! What for? I like such reckless fellows as you," she lisped, with a rather halting tongue. "So you would go any length for me, eh? Did you really mean to shoot yourself to-morrow, you stupid? No, wait a little. To-morrow I may have something to say to you.... I won't say it to-day, but to-morrow. You'd like it to be to-day? No, I don't want to to-day. Come, go along now, go and amuse yourself." Once, however, she called him, as it were, puzzled and uneasy. "Why are you sad? I see you're sad.... Yes, I see it," she added, looking intently into his eyes. "Though you keep kissing the peasants and shouting, I see something. No, be merry. I'm merry; you be merry, too.... I love somebody here. Guess who it is. Ah, look, my boy has fallen asleep, poor dear, he's drunk." She meant Kalganov. He was, in fact, drunk, and had dropped asleep for a moment, sitting on the sofa. But he was not merely drowsy from drink; he felt suddenly dejected, or, as he said, "bored." He was intensely depressed by the girls' songs, which, as the drinking went on, gradually became coarse and more reckless. And the dances were as bad. Two girls dressed up as bears, and a lively girl, called Stepanida, with a stick in her hand, acted the part of keeper, and began to "show them." "Look alive, Marya, or you'll get the stick!" The bears rolled on the ground at last in the most unseemly fashion, amid roars of laughter from the closely-packed crowd of men and women. "Well, let them! Let them!" said Grushenka sententiously, with an ecstatic expression on her face. "When they do get a day to enjoy themselves, why shouldn't folks be happy?" Kalganov looked as though he had been besmirched with dirt. "It's swinish, all this peasant foolery," he murmured, moving away; "it's the game they play when it's light all night in summer." He particularly disliked one "new" song to a jaunty dance-tune. It described how a gentleman came and tried his luck with the girls, to see whether they would love him: The master came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? But the girls could not love the master: He would beat me cruelly And such love won't do for me. Then a gypsy comes along and he, too, tries: The gypsy came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? But they couldn't love the gypsy either: He would be a thief, I fear, And would cause me many a tear. And many more men come to try their luck, among them a soldier: The soldier came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? But the soldier is rejected with contempt, in two indecent lines, sung with absolute frankness and producing a furore in the audience. The song ends with a merchant: The merchant came to try the girls: Would they love him, would they not? And it appears that he wins their love because: The merchant will make gold for me And his queen I'll gladly be. Kalvanov was positively indignant. "That's just a song of yesterday," he said aloud. "Who writes such things for them? They might just as well have had a railwayman or a Jew come to try his luck with the girls; they'd have carried all before them." And, almost as though it were a personal affront, he declared, on the spot, that he was bored, sat down on the sofa and immediately fell asleep. His pretty little face looked rather pale, as it fell back on the sofa cushion. "Look how pretty he is," said Grushenka, taking Mitya up to him. "I was combing his hair just now; his hair's like flax, and so thick...." And, bending over him tenderly, she kissed his forehead. Kalganov instantly opened his eyes, looked at her, stood up, and with the most anxious air inquired where was Maximov? "So that's who it is you want." Grushenka laughed. "Stay with me a minute. Mitya, run and find his Maximov." Maximov, it appeared, could not tear himself away from the girls, only running away from time to time to pour himself out a glass of liqueur. He had drunk two cups of chocolate. His face was red, and his nose was crimson; his eyes were moist and mawkishly sweet. He ran up and announced that he was going to dance the "sabotiere." "They taught me all those well-bred, aristocratic dances when I was little...." "Go, go with him, Mitya, and I'll watch from here how he dances," said Grushenka. "No, no, I'm coming to look on, too," exclaimed Kalganov, brushing aside in the most naive way Grushenka's offer to sit with him. They all went to look on. Maximov danced his dance. But it roused no great admiration in any one but Mitya. It consisted of nothing but skipping and hopping, kicking up the feet, and at every skip Maximov slapped the upturned sole of his foot. Kalganov did not like it at all, but Mitya kissed the dancer. "Thanks. You're tired perhaps? What are you looking for here? Would you like some sweets? A cigar, perhaps?" "A cigarette." "Don't you want a drink?" "I'll just have a liqueur.... Have you any chocolates?" "Yes, there's a heap of them on the table there. Choose one, my dear soul!" "I like one with vanilla ... for old people. He he!" "No, brother, we've none of that special sort." "I say," the old man bent down to whisper in Mitya's ear. "That girl there, little Marya, he he! How would it be if you were to help me make friends with her?" "So that's what you're after! No, brother, that won't do!" "I'd do no harm to any one," Maximov muttered disconsolately. "Oh, all right, all right. They only come here to dance and sing, you know, brother. But damn it all, wait a bit!... Eat and drink and be merry, meanwhile. Don't you want money?" "Later on, perhaps," smiled Maximov. "All right, all right...." Mitya's head was burning. He went outside to the wooden balcony which ran round the whole building on the inner side, overlooking the courtyard. The fresh air revived him. He stood alone in a dark corner, and suddenly clutched his head in both hands. His scattered thoughts came together; his sensations blended into a whole and threw a sudden light into his mind. A fearful and terrible light! "If I'm to shoot myself, why not now?" passed through his mind. "Why not go for the pistols, bring them here, and here, in this dark dirty corner, make an end?" Almost a minute he stood, undecided. A few hours earlier, when he had been dashing here, he was pursued by disgrace, by the theft he had committed, and that blood, that blood!... But yet it was easier for him then. Then everything was over: he had lost her, given her up. She was gone, for him--oh, then his death sentence had been easier for him; at least it had seemed necessary, inevitable, for what had he to stay on earth for? But now? Was it the same as then? Now one phantom, one terror at least was at an end: that first, rightful lover, that fateful figure had vanished, leaving no trace. The terrible phantom had turned into something so small, so comic; it had been carried into the bedroom and locked in. It would never return. She was ashamed, and from her eyes he could see now whom she loved. Now he had everything to make life happy ... but he could not go on living, he could not; oh, damnation! "O God! restore to life the man I knocked down at the fence! Let this fearful cup pass from me! Lord, thou hast wrought miracles for such sinners as me! But what, what if the old man's alive? Oh, then the shame of the other disgrace I would wipe away. I would restore the stolen money. I'd give it back; I'd get it somehow.... No trace of that shame will remain except in my heart for ever! But no, no; oh, impossible cowardly dreams! Oh, damnation!" Yet there was a ray of light and hope in his darkness. He jumped up and ran back to the room--to her, to her, his queen for ever! Was not one moment of her love worth all the rest of life, even in the agonies of disgrace? This wild question clutched at his heart. "To her, to her alone, to see her, to hear her, to think of nothing, to forget everything, if only for that night, for an hour, for a moment!" Just as he turned from the balcony into the passage, he came upon the landlord, Trifon Borissovitch. He thought he looked gloomy and worried, and fancied he had come to find him. "What is it, Trifon Borissovitch? are you looking for me?" "No, sir." The landlord seemed disconcerted. "Why should I be looking for you? Where have you been?" "Why do you look so glum? You're not angry, are you? Wait a bit, you shall soon get to bed.... What's the time?" "It'll be three o'clock. Past three, it must be." "We'll leave off soon. We'll leave off." "Don't mention it; it doesn't matter. Keep it up as long as you like...." "What's the matter with him?" Mitya wondered for an instant, and he ran back to the room where the girls were dancing. But she was not there. She was not in the blue room either; there was no one but Kalganov asleep on the sofa. Mitya peeped behind the curtain--she was there. She was sitting in the corner, on a trunk. Bent forward, with her head and arms on the bed close by, she was crying bitterly, doing her utmost to stifle her sobs that she might not be heard. Seeing Mitya, she beckoned him to her, and when he ran to her, she grasped his hand tightly. "Mitya, Mitya, I loved him, you know. How I have loved him these five years, all that time! Did I love him or only my own anger? No, him, him! It's a lie that it was my anger I loved and not him. Mitya, I was only seventeen then; he was so kind to me, so merry; he used to sing to me.... Or so it seemed to a silly girl like me.... And now, O Lord, it's not the same man. Even his face is not the same; he's different altogether. I shouldn't have known him. I drove here with Timofey, and all the way I was thinking how I should meet him, what I should say to him, how we should look at one another. My soul was faint, and all of a sudden it was just as though he had emptied a pail of dirty water over me. He talked to me like a schoolmaster, all so grave and learned; he met me so solemnly that I was struck dumb. I couldn't get a word in. At first I thought he was ashamed to talk before his great big Pole. I sat staring at him and wondering why I couldn't say a word to him now. It must have been his wife that ruined him; you know he threw me up to get married. She must have changed him like that. Mitya, how shameful it is! Oh, Mitya, I'm ashamed, I'm ashamed for all my life. Curse it, curse it, curse those five years!" And again she burst into tears, but clung tight to Mitya's hand and did not let it go. "Mitya, darling, stay, don't go away. I want to say one word to you," she whispered, and suddenly raised her face to him. "Listen, tell me who it is I love? I love one man here. Who is that man? That's what you must tell me." A smile lighted up her face that was swollen with weeping, and her eyes shone in the half darkness. "A falcon flew in, and my heart sank. 'Fool! that's the man you love!' That was what my heart whispered to me at once. You came in and all grew bright. What's he afraid of? I wondered. For you were frightened; you couldn't speak. It's not them he's afraid of--could you be frightened of any one? It's me he's afraid of, I thought, only me. So Fenya told you, you little stupid, how I called to Alyosha out of the window that I'd loved Mityenka for one hour, and that I was going now to love ... another. Mitya, Mitya, how could I be such a fool as to think I could love any one after you? Do you forgive me, Mitya? Do you forgive me or not? Do you love me? Do you love me?" She jumped up and held him with both hands on his shoulders. Mitya, dumb with rapture, gazed into her eyes, at her face, at her smile, and suddenly clasped her tightly in his arms and kissed her passionately. "You will forgive me for having tormented you? It was through spite I tormented you all. It was for spite I drove the old man out of his mind.... Do you remember how you drank at my house one day and broke the wine-glass? I remembered that and I broke a glass to-day and drank 'to my vile heart.' Mitya, my falcon, why don't you kiss me? He kissed me once, and now he draws back and looks and listens. Why listen to me? Kiss me, kiss me hard, that's right. If you love, well, then, love! I'll be your slave now, your slave for the rest of my life. It's sweet to be a slave. Kiss me! Beat me, ill-treat me, do what you will with me.... And I do deserve to suffer. Stay, wait, afterwards, I won't have that...." she suddenly thrust him away. "Go along, Mitya, I'll come and have some wine, I want to be drunk, I'm going to get drunk and dance; I must, I must!" She tore herself away from him and disappeared behind the curtain. Mitya followed like a drunken man. "Yes, come what may--whatever may happen now, for one minute I'd give the whole world," he thought. Grushenka did, in fact, toss off a whole glass of champagne at one gulp, and became at once very tipsy. She sat down in the same chair as before, with a blissful smile on her face. Her cheeks were glowing, her lips were burning, her flashing eyes were moist; there was passionate appeal in her eyes. Even Kalganov felt a stir at the heart and went up to her. "Did you feel how I kissed you when you were asleep just now?" she said thickly. "I'm drunk now, that's what it is.... And aren't you drunk? And why isn't Mitya drinking? Why don't you drink, Mitya? I'm drunk, and you don't drink...." "I am drunk! I'm drunk as it is ... drunk with you ... and now I'll be drunk with wine, too." He drank off another glass, and--he thought it strange himself--that glass made him completely drunk. He was suddenly drunk, although till that moment he had been quite sober, he remembered that. From that moment everything whirled about him, as though he were delirious. He walked, laughed, talked to everybody, without knowing what he was doing. Only one persistent burning sensation made itself felt continually, "like a red-hot coal in his heart," he said afterwards. He went up to her, sat beside her, gazed at her, listened to her.... She became very talkative, kept calling every one to her, and beckoned to different girls out of the chorus. When the girl came up, she either kissed her, or made the sign of the cross over her. In another minute she might have cried. She was greatly amused by the "little old man," as she called Maximov. He ran up every minute to kiss her hands, "each little finger," and finally he danced another dance to an old song, which he sang himself. He danced with special vigor to the refrain: The little pig says--umph! umph! umph! The little calf says--moo, moo, moo, The little duck says--quack, quack, quack, The little goose says--ga, ga, ga. The hen goes strutting through the porch; Troo-roo-roo-roo-roo, she'll say, Troo-roo-roo-roo-roo, she'll say! "Give him something, Mitya," said Grushenka. "Give him a present, he's poor, you know. Ah, the poor, the insulted!... Do you know, Mitya, I shall go into a nunnery. No, I really shall one day, Alyosha said something to me to-day that I shall remember all my life.... Yes.... But to-day let us dance. To-morrow to the nunnery, but to-day we'll dance. I want to play to-day, good people, and what of it? God will forgive us. If I were God, I'd forgive every one: 'My dear sinners, from this day forth I forgive you.' I'm going to beg forgiveness: 'Forgive me, good people, a silly wench.' I'm a beast, that's what I am. But I want to pray. I gave a little onion. Wicked as I've been, I want to pray. Mitya, let them dance, don't stop them. Every one in the world is good. Every one--even the worst of them. The world's a nice place. Though we're bad the world's all right. We're good and bad, good and bad.... Come, tell me, I've something to ask you: come here every one, and I'll ask you: Why am I so good? You know I am good. I'm very good.... Come, why am I so good?" So Grushenka babbled on, getting more and more drunk. At last she announced that she was going to dance, too. She got up from her chair, staggering. "Mitya, don't give me any more wine--if I ask you, don't give it to me. Wine doesn't give peace. Everything's going round, the stove, and everything. I want to dance. Let every one see how I dance ... let them see how beautifully I dance...." She really meant it. She pulled a white cambric handkerchief out of her pocket, and took it by one corner in her right hand, to wave it in the dance. Mitya ran to and fro, the girls were quiet, and got ready to break into a dancing song at the first signal. Maximov, hearing that Grushenka wanted to dance, squealed with delight, and ran skipping about in front of her, humming: With legs so slim and sides so trim And its little tail curled tight. But Grushenka waved her handkerchief at him and drove him away. "Sh-h! Mitya, why don't they come? Let every one come ... to look on. Call them in, too, that were locked in.... Why did you lock them in? Tell them I'm going to dance. Let them look on, too...." Mitya walked with a drunken swagger to the locked door, and began knocking to the Poles with his fist. "Hi, you ... Podvysotskys! Come, she's going to dance. She calls you." "_Lajdak!_" one of the Poles shouted in reply. "You're a _lajdak_ yourself! You're a little scoundrel, that's what you are." "Leave off laughing at Poland," said Kalganov sententiously. He too was drunk. "Be quiet, boy! If I call him a scoundrel, it doesn't mean that I called all Poland so. One _lajdak_ doesn't make a Poland. Be quiet, my pretty boy, eat a sweetmeat." "Ach, what fellows! As though they were not men. Why won't they make friends?" said Grushenka, and went forward to dance. The chorus broke into "Ah, my porch, my new porch!" Grushenka flung back her head, half opened her lips, smiled, waved her handkerchief, and suddenly, with a violent lurch, stood still in the middle of the room, looking bewildered. "I'm weak...." she said in an exhausted voice. "Forgive me.... I'm weak, I can't.... I'm sorry." She bowed to the chorus, and then began bowing in all directions. "I'm sorry.... Forgive me...." "The lady's been drinking. The pretty lady has been drinking," voices were heard saying. "The lady's drunk too much," Maximov explained to the girls, giggling. "Mitya, lead me away ... take me," said Grushenka helplessly. Mitya pounced on her, snatched her up in his arms, and carried the precious burden through the curtains. "Well, now I'll go," thought Kalganov, and walking out of the blue room, he closed the two halves of the door after him. But the orgy in the larger room went on and grew louder and louder. Mitya laid Grushenka on the bed and kissed her on the lips. "Don't touch me...." she faltered, in an imploring voice. "Don't touch me, till I'm yours.... I've told you I'm yours, but don't touch me ... spare me.... With them here, with them close, you mustn't. He's here. It's nasty here...." "I'll obey you! I won't think of it ... I worship you!" muttered Mitya. "Yes, it's nasty here, it's abominable." And still holding her in his arms, he sank on his knees by the bedside. "I know, though you're a brute, you're generous," Grushenka articulated with difficulty. "It must be honorable ... it shall be honorable for the future ... and let us be honest, let us be good, not brutes, but good ... take me away, take me far away, do you hear? I don't want it to be here, but far, far away...." "Oh, yes, yes, it must be!" said Mitya, pressing her in his arms. "I'll take you and we'll fly away.... Oh, I'd give my whole life for one year only to know about that blood!" "What blood?" asked Grushenka, bewildered. "Nothing," muttered Mitya, through his teeth. "Grusha, you wanted to be honest, but I'm a thief. But I've stolen money from Katya.... Disgrace, a disgrace!" "From Katya, from that young lady? No, you didn't steal it. Give it her back, take it from me.... Why make a fuss? Now everything of mine is yours. What does money matter? We shall waste it anyway.... Folks like us are bound to waste money. But we'd better go and work the land. I want to dig the earth with my own hands. We must work, do you hear? Alyosha said so. I won't be your mistress, I'll be faithful to you, I'll be your slave, I'll work for you. We'll go to the young lady and bow down to her together, so that she may forgive us, and then we'll go away. And if she won't forgive us, we'll go, anyway. Take her her money and love me.... Don't love her.... Don't love her any more. If you love her, I shall strangle her.... I'll put out both her eyes with a needle...." "I love you. I love only you. I'll love you in Siberia...." "Why Siberia? Never mind, Siberia, if you like. I don't care ... we'll work ... there's snow in Siberia.... I love driving in the snow ... and must have bells.... Do you hear, there's a bell ringing? Where is that bell ringing? There are people coming.... Now it's stopped." She closed her eyes, exhausted, and suddenly fell asleep for an instant. There had certainly been the sound of a bell in the distance, but the ringing had ceased. Mitya let his head sink on her breast. He did not notice that the bell had ceased ringing, nor did he notice that the songs had ceased, and that instead of singing and drunken clamor there was absolute stillness in the house. Grushenka opened her eyes. "What's the matter? Was I asleep? Yes ... a bell ... I've been asleep and dreamt I was driving over the snow with bells, and I dozed. I was with some one I loved, with you. And far, far away. I was holding you and kissing you, nestling close to you. I was cold, and the snow glistened.... You know how the snow glistens at night when the moon shines. It was as though I was not on earth. I woke up, and my dear one is close to me. How sweet that is!..." "Close to you," murmured Mitya, kissing her dress, her bosom, her hands. And suddenly he had a strange fancy: it seemed to him that she was looking straight before her, not at him, not into his face, but over his head, with an intent, almost uncanny fixity. An expression of wonder, almost of alarm, came suddenly into her face. "Mitya, who is that looking at us?" she whispered. Mitya turned, and saw that some one had, in fact, parted the curtains and seemed to be watching them. And not one person alone, it seemed. He jumped up and walked quickly to the intruder. "Here, come to us, come here," said a voice, speaking not loudly, but firmly and peremptorily. Mitya passed to the other side of the curtain and stood stock still. The room was filled with people, but not those who had been there before. An instantaneous shiver ran down his back, and he shuddered. He recognized all those people instantly. That tall, stout old man in the overcoat and forage-cap with a cockade--was the police captain, Mihail Makarovitch. And that "consumptive-looking" trim dandy, "who always has such polished boots"--that was the deputy prosecutor. "He has a chronometer worth four hundred roubles; he showed it to me." And that small young man in spectacles.... Mitya forgot his surname though he knew him, had seen him: he was the "investigating lawyer," from the "school of jurisprudence," who had only lately come to the town. And this man--the inspector of police, Mavriky Mavrikyevitch, a man he knew well. And those fellows with the brass plates on, why are they here? And those other two ... peasants.... And there at the door Kalganov with Trifon Borissovitch.... "Gentlemen! What's this for, gentlemen?" began Mitya, but suddenly, as though beside himself, not knowing what he was doing, he cried aloud, at the top of his voice: "I un--der--stand!" The young man in spectacles moved forward suddenly, and stepping up to Mitya, began with dignity, though hurriedly: "We have to make ... in brief, I beg you to come this way, this way to the sofa.... It is absolutely imperative that you should give an explanation." "The old man!" cried Mitya frantically. "The old man and his blood!... I understand." And he sank, almost fell, on a chair close by, as though he had been mown down by a scythe. "You understand? He understands it! Monster and parricide! Your father's blood cries out against you!" the old captain of police roared suddenly, stepping up to Mitya. He was beside himself, crimson in the face and quivering all over. "This is impossible!" cried the small young man. "Mihail Makarovitch, Mihail Makarovitch, this won't do!... I beg you'll allow me to speak. I should never have expected such behavior from you...." "This is delirium, gentlemen, raving delirium," cried the captain of police; "look at him: drunk, at this time of night, in the company of a disreputable woman, with the blood of his father on his hands.... It's delirium!..." "I beg you most earnestly, dear Mihail Makarovitch, to restrain your feelings," the prosecutor said in a rapid whisper to the old police captain, "or I shall be forced to resort to--" But the little lawyer did not allow him to finish. He turned to Mitya, and delivered himself in a loud, firm, dignified voice: "Ex-Lieutenant Karamazov, it is my duty to inform you that you are charged with the murder of your father, Fyodor Pavlovitch Karamazov, perpetrated this night...." He said something more, and the prosecutor, too, put in something, but though Mitya heard them he did not understand them. He stared at them all with wild eyes.

book 8, Chapter 8

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section11/

Delirium As Grushenka watches her Polish lover cheat at the games, and listens to the coarse and degrading things that he says, she realizes she does not love him. Instead, she loves Dmitri. When the officer insults her, Dmitri attacks him and locks him in another room. Dmitri and Grushenka begin to plan their future together. Through his joy at winning Grushenka, Dmitri is troubled by the thought of the wound he dealt Grigory and the fortune he owes Katerina. Just then, a group of officers bursts into the room. They seize Dmitri and place him under arrest. Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov has been murdered, and Dmitri is the prime suspect.

Book VIII: Mitya, Chapters 1-8 Dostoevsky uses a variety of literary techniques to suggest that Dmitri is responsible for his father's murder. Before Dmitri appears with a large amount of money, the narrator continually makes statements implying that Dmitri will steal Fyodor Pavlovich's 3,000 rubles: "Only three or four hours before a certain incident, of which I will speak below, Mitya did not have a kopeck, and pawned his dearest possession for ten roubles, whereas three hours later he suddenly had thousands in his hands. but I anticipate. Dmitri's inner monologue is similarly misleading, as when Dmitri thinks about going to Madame Khokhlakov's and realizes "fully and now with mathematical clarity that this was his last hope, that if this should fall through, there was nothing left in the world but 'to kill and rob someone for the three thousand, and that's all. Dostoevsky also uses a technique called ellipsis, skipping over a moment of action in order to play on our expectations: he implies Dmitri's guilt by leaving out the crucial stretch of action in Chapter 5, in between Dmitri's discovery of Grushenka's whereabouts and his arrival at Perkhotin's office. This strategy leads us to suspect that Dmitri has killed his father in that time. Finally, the events we do see suggest Dmitri's guilt. Dmitri is desperate, impassioned, and antagonistic toward Grigory. The combination of these factors makes Dmitri seem eminently capable of committing murder. The narrative throughout this book lays the groundwork for a surprise plot twist: the revelation in Book XI that Smerdyakov, and not Dmitri, is the murderer. Dostoevsky goes to such lengths to imply that an innocent man is guilty of such a crime for several reasons. First, making Dmitri guilty and then innocent in our mind is a way of enacting the spiritual rebirth that Dmitri experiences after his arrest. Second, making us learn that our judgment about Dmitri is wrong is a way of emphasizing Zosima's advice never to judge anyone because all people are responsible for one another's sins. Third, making Dmitri appear guilty is a way of emphasizing the extraordinary scope of his passion. Dmitri may not have committed murder, but he is clearly capable of such a crime, and possesses a tormented and sinful soul. The redemption of such a passionate person is all the more dramatic. Fourth, making Dmitri appear guilty is a way of making us feel the way most of the other characters do when they learn about the arrest. The whole town believes him to be guilty. Making Dmitri appear guilty is also a way for Dostoevsky to put human nature itself on trial. Throughout the novel we have seen various conceptions of human nature, ranging from Alyosha's faith that people are essentially good, like Zosima, to Ivan's belief that people are essentially bad, like Fyodor Pavlovich. But Dmitri combines the qualities of Fyodor Pavlovich and Zosima: he is a lustful and sinful man who nevertheless powerfully loves God. He commits bad deeds and longs to redeem them. He believes that he is bound for hell but pledges to love God even from the depths of hell. After spending a large amount of his fiancee's money on a lavish vacation with another woman, he is now greedily desperate for even more money, but only so that he can salvage his honor with Katerina, and thus make up for his sin. By putting Dmitri on trial through circumstantial evidence, Dostoevsky essentially poses the question of whether Dmitri's sinfulness or his goodness is the more fundamental aspect of his nature. This query in turn should make us question which of the two aspects is more fundamentally a characteristic of humanity. Dostoevsky wants us to consider whether humanity, burdened as it is with free will, is capable of overcoming its sinful nature and choosing to live within its good nature. When Dmitri is proved to be innocent shortly after he undergoes his powerful spiritual conversion, the question is answered in favor of human goodness--though not without a thorough understanding of the reality of evil in human life. Although a great deal of the novel's thematic development relies on the events in these chapters, the chapters are so devoted to narrative action that there is comparatively little thematic development within Book VIII itself. Apart from the insight it offers into Dmitri's tormented inner conflict, the most interesting psychological aspect of this section is its look at Grushenka's growth since her encounter with Alyosha. Before, Grushenka is too proud and suspicious to acknowledge her love for Dmitri, but through Alyosha she discovers real goodness. As a result, she is at last capable of admitting to herself that the Polish officer is just a vulgar man who betrayed her in her youth, and that Dmitri is the man she really loves. Alyosha does not appear at all in the action of this book, but his presence is strongly felt in Grushenka's positive acquiescence to her love for Dmitri--a lovely moment of goodness that is interrupted sharply by evil, with the arrival of the police and the announcement of the murder of Fyodor Pavlovich

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/1756-chapters/act_iii.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/Uncle Vanya/section_4_part_0.txt

Uncle Vanya.act iii

act iii

{"name": "Act III - Part One", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210227035013/https://www.sparknotes.com/drama/unclevanya/section5/", "summary": "Set in the daytime, Act III opens in the drawing room with Voynitsky and Sonya seated as Yelena paces in thought. The professor has called a meeting at one o'clock. After grumbling about Serebryakov, Voynitsky attacks Yelena, describing her as ready to \"drop from sheer laziness\". Yelena replies that she is dying of boredom and is without an idea of what to do. Sonya produces a number of possibilities: help with the estate, teaching, nursing, and so on. Yelena cannot imagine being interested; only people in ideological novels undertake such work. For Sonya, Yelena's idleness is \"infectious\"--her effect on Vanya, herself, and the doctor, all of whom having deserted their work to follow her, make this clear. Yelena is certainly a witch. Voynitsky adds that she must have the blood of a mermaid and should flee the estate by diving into a whirlpool with some water sprite. Yelena is enraged: Voynitsky offers to pick her a bouquet of roses in apology and exits. Sadly Sonya then puts her head on Yelena's breast and once again begins pining for the doctor. Having loved him for six years, she has lost all pride and confessed her love to everyone except Astrov. Remarking that he is a strange person, Yelena resolves to find out what he thinks of Sonya, using his cartograms as a pretext. Sonya pauses for a moment, wondering if uncertainty is better and exits to fetch him. Yelena then delivers a soliloquy, ruminating on how Sonya cannot help falling for such a \"fascinating\" man amidst such boredom and admits her own fascination for the doctor. Recalling Vanya's quip about the mermaid, she wonders if she should flee with him--her conscience, however, prevents it. Indeed, she already feels guilty, ready to prostrate herself before Sonya and weep. Astrov then enters with a cartogram and proceeds to explain the progressive degeneration of the region. Forests, settlements, and wildlife have disappeared in the \"downhill struggle for existence\"; instead of progress, the same swamps, diseases, and disasters remain. It is clear to Astrov that Yelena is uninterested. He breaks off, and she cross-examines him with regards to Sonya. Astrov does not love her. He is, however, convinced that the subtext of Yelena's cross-examination is her own desire and that she is finally responding to his longtime advances. Much to Yelena's dismay, he embraces her passionately and insists upon arranging a rendezvous. Yelena resists, and suddenly Voynitsky enters unseen. For a moment, Yelena will then relent, laying her head on Astrov's chest. Just as the doctor proposes a rendezvous, however, she sees Voynitsky and disengages herself from his arms. Astrov chats about the weather, noting that the days are getting shorter, and he exits. Nervously, Yelena insists that Voynitsky prevail upon her husband for an immediate departure from the estate; a shaken Voynitsky replies that he has seen everything.", "analysis": "As noted earlier, among all the erotic criss-crossings in the play, Astrov and Yelena's intrigue structurally resembles an affair from conventional melodrama, in which the impassioned lover comes to rescue the beautiful heroine from her unhappy marriage. Indeed, in The Wood Demon,Uncle Vanya's precursor, their intrigue takes on this form. Certainly here we have elements that might suggest that Yelena's escape from Serebryakov and something like a \"happy ending\" could be imminent. Notably, the prospect of this escape is cast in \"fairy tale\" terms: like a mermaid, Yelena may disappear into a whirlpool with her water sprite. Moreover, Yelena's soliloquy reveals the extent of her fascination with the doctor. In musing over Astrov, she already feels guilty, finding herself ready to implore Sonya for forgiveness. One wonders then if at some level she has already accepted the doctor as a paramour. At the same time, Astrov's seduction is strangely \"off\"--awkward, bungled, and more farcical than romantic. One cannot but laugh, for example, at such pet names as \"dear bird of prey\" and \"beautiful, fluffy weasel\". Astrov's boorishness aside, we will also examine the strangeness of this seduction by looking at two of Chekhov's primary dramaturgical devices: indirect action and subtext. Allowing an indefinite period of time to pass between Acts II and III , Chekhov opens a gap between what happened since we left off and what transpires at the moment on stage. Thus one experiences an almost ridiculous abruptness in Astrov's attempt. This is even more the case as Astrov seems to take great interpretative liberties in identifying Yelena's desire as the subtext of their conversation: his accusation that she wants him seems wishful at best. At the same time, his proposition is not quite absurd. Framed in realist fashion, the events here would seem to take what was admitted in the act previous to its logical conclusion--namely, the fascination Yelena and Astrov share for each other that should culminate in an erotic encounter. Moreover, we are told that the doctor has been visiting the estate daily for some time now. Indirect action and Astrov's unconvincing sense of subtext make this encounter jarring even as it is entirely reasonable in the narrative. Thus Chekhov undermines the seduction one might find in conventional melodrama. No dashing doctor rescues a beautiful wife from her decrepit husband here. The seduction will end quite anti-climatically, the lovers never getting to a first rendezvous. Indeed, the theme of the \"might-have-been\" prevails: Yelena refuses the doctor once caught, this break prefiguring their almost elegiac farewell in Act IV. As Astrov tells Yelena in the last scene: \"It is strange somehow, we never got to know each other, and all at once for some reason--we shall never meet again. So it is with everything in the world.\" Theirs will be a \"love\" at last sight, never realized and nostalgically rooted in what might have been. These scenes are also notable in defining Yelena's character. First, they reveal her in all her idleness: she cannot even begin to be interested in the tasks Sonya offers her, tasks that might rescue her from her boredom. Nor can she feign interest in Astrov's cartogram. As Sonya notes, this idleness is \"infectious,\" bewitching, inspiring the household's general malaise. Once again, as indicated throughout the play, Yelena's arrival, along with that of her husband, has thrown the life of the estate out of joint, plunging it into indolence. One might speculate then on how her wasted life perhaps reminds those around her of their own situations, making work impossible. Recall that in Act I, for example, when Voynitsky declares that before Yelena he cannot bear the thought of another wasting her life on the estate as he has."}

ACT III The drawing-room of SEREBRAKOFF'S house. There are three doors: one to the right, one to the left, and one in the centre of the room. VOITSKI and SONIA are sitting down. HELENA is walking up and down, absorbed in thought. VOITSKI. We were asked by the professor to be here at one o'clock. [Looks at his watch] It is now a quarter to one. It seems he has some communication to make to the world. HELENA. Probably a matter of business. VOITSKI. He never had any business. He writes twaddle, grumbles, and eats his heart out with jealousy; that's all he does. SONIA. [Reproachfully] Uncle! VOITSKI. All right. I beg your pardon. [He points to HELENA] Look at her. Wandering up and down from sheer idleness. A sweet picture, really. HELENA. I wonder you are not bored, droning on in the same key from morning till night. [Despairingly] I am dying of this tedium. What shall I do? SONIA. [Shrugging her shoulders] There is plenty to do if you would. HELENA. For instance? SONIA. You could help run this place, teach the children, care for the sick--isn't that enough? Before you and papa came, Uncle Vanya and I used to go to market ourselves to deal in flour. HELENA. I don't know anything about such things, and besides, they don't interest me. It is only in novels that women go out and teach and heal the peasants; how can I suddenly begin to do it? SONIA. How can you live here and not do it? Wait awhile, you will get used to it all. [Embraces her] Don't be sad, dearest. [Laughing] You feel miserable and restless, and can't seem to fit into this life, and your restlessness is catching. Look at Uncle Vanya, he does nothing now but haunt you like a shadow, and I have left my work to-day to come here and talk with you. I am getting lazy, and don't want to go on with it. Dr. Astroff hardly ever used to come here; it was all we could do to persuade him to visit us once a month, and now he has abandoned his forestry and his practice, and comes every day. You must be a witch. VOITSKI. Why should you languish here? Come, my dearest, my beauty, be sensible! The blood of a Nixey runs in your veins. Oh, won't you let yourself be one? Give your nature the reins for once in your life; fall head over ears in love with some other water sprite and plunge down head first into a deep pool, so that the Herr Professor and all of us may have our hands free again. HELENA. [Angrily] Leave me alone! How cruel you are! [She tries to go out.] VOITSKI. [Preventing her] There, there, my beauty, I apologise. [He kisses her hand] Forgive me. HELENA. Confess that you would try the patience of an angel. VOITSKI. As a peace offering I am going to fetch some flowers which I picked for you this morning: some autumn roses, beautiful, sorrowful roses. [He goes out.] SONIA. Autumn roses, beautiful, sorrowful roses! [She and HELENA stand looking out of the window.] HELENA. September already! How shall we live through the long winter here? [A pause] Where is the doctor? SONIA. He is writing in Uncle Vanya's room. I am glad Uncle Vanya has gone out, I want to talk to you about something. HELENA. About what? SONIA. About what? [She lays her head on HELENA'S breast.] HELENA. [Stroking her hair] There, there, that will do. Don't, Sonia. SONIA. I am ugly! HELENA. You have lovely hair. SONIA. Don't say that! [She turns to look at herself in the glass] No, when a woman is ugly they always say she has beautiful hair or eyes. I have loved him now for six years, I have loved him more than one loves one's mother. I seem to hear him beside me every moment of the day. I feel the pressure of his hand on mine. If I look up, I seem to see him coming, and as you see, I run to you to talk of him. He is here every day now, but he never looks at me, he does not notice my presence. It is agony. I have absolutely no hope, no, no hope. Oh, my God! Give me strength to endure. I prayed all last night. I often go up to him and speak to him and look into his eyes. My pride is gone. I am not mistress of myself. Yesterday I told Uncle Vanya I couldn't control myself, and all the servants know it. Every one knows that I love him. HELENA. Does he? SONIA. No, he never notices me. HELENA. [Thoughtfully] He is a strange man. Listen, Sonia, will you allow me to speak to him? I shall be careful, only hint. [A pause] Really, to be in uncertainty all these years! Let me do it! SONIA nods an affirmative. HELENA. Splendid! It will be easy to find out whether he loves you or not. Don't be ashamed, sweetheart, don't worry. I shall be careful; he will not notice a thing. We only want to find out whether it is yes or no, don't we? [A pause] And if it is no, then he must keep away from here, is that so? SONIA nods. HELENA. It will be easier not to see him any more. We won't put off the examination an instant. He said he had a sketch to show me. Go and tell him at once that I want to see him. SONIA. [In great excitement] Will you tell me the whole truth? HELENA. Of course I will. I am sure that no matter what it is, it will be easier for you to bear than this uncertainty. Trust to me, dearest. SONIA. Yes, yes. I shall say that you want to see his sketch. [She starts out, but stops near the door and looks back] No, it is better not to know--and yet--there may be hope. HELENA. What do you say? SONIA. Nothing. [She goes out.] HELENA. [Alone] There is no greater sorrow than to know another's secret when you cannot help them. [In deep thought] He is obviously not in love with her, but why shouldn't he marry her? She is not pretty, but she is so clever and pure and good, she would make a splendid wife for a country doctor of his years. [A pause] I can understand how the poor child feels. She lives here in this desperate loneliness with no one around her except these colourless shadows that go mooning about talking nonsense and knowing nothing except that they eat, drink, and sleep. Among them appears from time to time this Dr. Astroff, so different, so handsome, so interesting, so charming. It is like seeing the moon rise on a dark night. Oh, to surrender oneself to his embrace! To lose oneself in his arms! I am a little in love with him myself! Yes, I am lonely without him, and when I think of him I smile. That Uncle Vanya says I have the blood of a Nixey in my veins: "Give rein to your nature for once in your life!" Perhaps it is right that I should. Oh, to be free as a bird, to fly away from all your sleepy faces and your talk and forget that you have existed at all! But I am a coward, I am afraid; my conscience torments me. He comes here every day now. I can guess why, and feel guilty already; I should like to fall on my knees at Sonia's feet and beg her forgiveness, and weep. ASTROFF comes in carrying a portfolio. ASTROFF. How do you do? [Shakes hands with her] Do you want to see my sketch? HELENA. Yes, you promised to show me what you had been doing. Have you time now? ASTROFF. Of course I have! He lays the portfolio on the table, takes out the sketch and fastens it to the table with thumb-tacks. ASTROFF. Where were you born? HELENA. [Helping him] In St. Petersburg. ASTROFF. And educated? HELENA. At the Conservatory there. ASTROFF. You don't find this life very interesting, I dare say? HELENA. Oh, why not? It is true I don't know the country very well, but I have read a great deal about it. ASTROFF. I have my own desk there in Ivan's room. When I am absolutely too exhausted to go on I drop everything and rush over here to forget myself in this work for an hour or two. Ivan and Miss Sonia sit rattling at their counting-boards, the cricket chirps, and I sit beside them and paint, feeling warm and peaceful. But I don't permit myself this luxury very often, only once a month. [Pointing to the picture] Look there! That is a map of our country as it was fifty years ago. The green tints, both dark and light, represent forests. Half the map, as you see, is covered with it. Where the green is striped with red the forests were inhabited by elk and wild goats. Here on this lake, lived great flocks of swans and geese and ducks; as the old men say, there was a power of birds of every kind. Now they have vanished like a cloud. Beside the hamlets and villages, you see, I have dotted down here and there the various settlements, farms, hermit's caves, and water-mills. This country carried a great many cattle and horses, as you can see by the quantity of blue paint. For instance, see how thickly it lies in this part; there were great herds of them here, an average of three horses to every house. [A pause] Now, look lower down. This is the country as it was twenty-five years ago. Only a third of the map is green now with forests. There are no goats left and no elk. The blue paint is lighter, and so on, and so on. Now we come to the third part; our country as it appears to-day. We still see spots of green, but not much. The elk, the swans, the black-cock have disappeared. It is, on the whole, the picture of a regular and slow decline which it will evidently only take about ten or fifteen more years to complete. You may perhaps object that it is the march of progress, that the old order must give place to the new, and you might be right if roads had been run through these ruined woods, or if factories and schools had taken their place. The people then would have become better educated and healthier and richer, but as it is, we have nothing of the sort. We have the same swamps and mosquitoes; the same disease and want; the typhoid, the diphtheria, the burning villages. We are confronted by the degradation of our country, brought on by the fierce struggle for existence of the human race. It is the consequence of the ignorance and unconsciousness of starving, shivering, sick humanity that, to save its children, instinctively snatches at everything that can warm it and still its hunger. So it destroys everything it can lay its hands on, without a thought for the morrow. And almost everything has gone, and nothing has been created to take its place. [Coldly] But I see by your face that I am not interesting you. HELENA. I know so little about such things! ASTROFF. There is nothing to know. It simply isn't interesting, that's all. HELENA. Frankly, my thoughts were elsewhere. Forgive me! I want to submit you to a little examination, but I am embarrassed and don't know how to begin. ASTROFF. An examination? HELENA. Yes, but quite an innocent one. Sit down. [They sit down] It is about a certain young girl I know. Let us discuss it like honest people, like friends, and then forget what has passed between us, shall we? ASTROFF. Very well. HELENA. It is about my step-daughter, Sonia. Do you like her? ASTROFF. Yes, I respect her. HELENA. Do you like her--as a woman? ASTROFF. [Slowly] No. HELENA. One more word, and that will be the last. You have not noticed anything? ASTROFF. No, nothing. HELENA. [Taking his hand] You do not love her. I see that in your eyes. She is suffering. You must realise that, and not come here any more. ASTROFF. My sun has set, yes, and then I haven't the time. [Shrugging his shoulders] Where shall I find time for such things? [He is embarrassed.] HELENA. Bah! What an unpleasant conversation! I am as out of breath as if I had been running three miles uphill. Thank heaven, that is over! Now let us forget everything as if nothing had been said. You are sensible. You understand. [A pause] I am actually blushing. ASTROFF. If you had spoken a month ago I might perhaps have considered it, but now--[He shrugs his shoulders] Of course, if she is suffering--but I cannot understand why you had to put me through this examination. [He searches her face with his eyes, and shakes his finger at her] Oho, you are wily! HELENA. What does this mean? ASTROFF. [Laughing] You are a wily one! I admit that Sonia is suffering, but what does this examination of yours mean? [He prevents her from retorting, and goes on quickly] Please don't put on such a look of surprise; you know perfectly well why I come here every day. Yes, you know perfectly why and for whose sake I come! Oh, my sweet tigress! don't look at me in that way; I am an old bird! HELENA. [Perplexed] A tigress? I don't understand you. ASTROFF. Beautiful, sleek tigress, you must have your victims! For a whole month I have done nothing but seek you eagerly. I have thrown over everything for you, and you love to see it. Now then, I am sure you knew all this without putting me through your examination. [Crossing his arms and bowing his head] I surrender. Here you have me--now, eat me. HELENA. You have gone mad! ASTROFF. You are afraid! HELENA. I am a better and stronger woman than you think me. Good-bye. [She tries to leave the room.] ASTROFF. Why good-bye? Don't say good-bye, don't waste words. Oh, how lovely you are--what hands! [He kisses her hands.] HELENA. Enough of this! [She frees her hands] Leave the room! You have forgotten yourself. ASTROFF. Tell me, tell me, where can we meet to-morrow? [He puts his arm around her] Don't you see that we must meet, that it is inevitable? He kisses her. VOITSKI comes in carrying a bunch of roses, and stops in the doorway. HELENA. [Without seeing VOITSKI] Have pity! Leave me, [lays her head on ASTROFF'S shoulder] Don't! [She tries to break away from him.] ASTROFF. [Holding her by the waist] Be in the forest tomorrow at two o'clock. Will you? Will you? HELENA. [Sees VOITSKI] Let me go! [Goes to the window deeply embarrassed] This is appalling! VOITSKI. [Throws the flowers on a chair, and speaks in great excitement, wiping his face with his handkerchief] Nothing--yes, yes, nothing. ASTROFF. The weather is fine to-day, my dear Ivan; the morning was overcast and looked like rain, but now the sun is shining again. Honestly, we have had a very fine autumn, and the wheat is looking fairly well. [Puts his map back into the portfolio] But the days are growing short. HELENA. [Goes quickly up to VOITSKI] You must do your best; you must use all your power to get my husband and myself away from here to-day! Do you hear? I say, this very day! VOITSKI. [Wiping his face] Oh! Ah! Oh! All right! I--Helena, I saw everything! HELENA. [In great agitation] Do you hear me? I must leave here this very day! SEREBRAKOFF, SONIA, MARINA, and TELEGIN come in. TELEGIN. I am not very well myself, your Excellency. I have been limping for two days, and my head-- SEREBRAKOFF. Where are the others? I hate this house. It is a regular labyrinth. Every one is always scattered through the twenty-six enormous rooms; one never can find a soul. [Rings] Ask my wife and Madame Voitskaya to come here! HELENA. I am here already. SEREBRAKOFF. Please, all of you, sit down. SONIA. [Goes up to HELENA and asks anxiously] What did he say? HELENA. I'll tell you later. SONIA. You are moved. [looking quickly and inquiringly into her face] I understand; he said he would not come here any more. [A pause] Tell me, did he? HELENA nods. SEREBRAKOFF. [To TELEGIN] One can, after all, become reconciled to being an invalid, but not to this country life. The ways of it stick in my throat and I feel exactly as if I had been whirled off the earth and landed on a strange planet. Please be seated, ladies and gentlemen. Sonia! [SONIA does not hear. She is standing with her head bowed sadly forward on her breast] Sonia! [A pause] She does not hear me. [To MARINA] Sit down too, nurse. [MARINA sits down and begins to knit her stocking] I crave your indulgence, ladies and gentlemen; hang your ears, if I may say so, on the peg of attention. [He laughs.] VOITSKI. [Agitated] Perhaps you do not need me--may I be excused? SEREBRAKOFF. No, you are needed now more than any one. VOITSKI. What is it you want of me? SEREBRAKOFF. You--but what are you angry about? If it is anything I have done, I ask you to forgive me. VOITSKI. Oh, drop that and come to business; what do you want? MME. VOITSKAYA comes in. SEREBRAKOFF. Here is mother. Ladies and gentlemen, I shall begin. I have asked you to assemble here, my friends, in order to discuss a very important matter. I want to ask you for your assistance and advice, and knowing your unfailing amiability I think I can count on both. I am a book-worm and a scholar, and am unfamiliar with practical affairs. I cannot, I find, dispense with the help of well-informed people such as you, Ivan, and you, Telegin, and you, mother. The truth is, _manet omnes una nox,_ that is to say, our lives are in the hands of God, and as I am old and ill, I realise that the time has come for me to dispose of my property in regard to the interests of my family. My life is nearly over, and I am not thinking of myself, but I have a young wife and daughter. [A pause] I cannot continue to live in the country; we were not made for country life, and yet we cannot afford to live in town on the income derived from this estate. We might sell the woods, but that would be an expedient we could not resort to every year. We must find some means of guaranteeing to ourselves a certain more or less fixed yearly income. With this object in view, a plan has occurred to me which I now have the honour of presenting to you for your consideration. I shall only give you a rough outline, avoiding all details. Our estate does not pay on an average more than two per cent on the money invested in it. I propose to sell it. If we then invest our capital in bonds, it will earn us four to five per cent, and we should probably have a surplus over of several thousand roubles, with which we could buy a summer cottage in Finland-- VOITSKI. Hold on! Repeat what you just said; I don't think I heard you quite right. SEREBRAKOFF. I said we would invest the money in bonds and buy a cottage in Finland with the surplus. VOITSKI. No, not Finland--you said something else. SEREBRAKOFF. I propose to sell this place. VOITSKI. Aha! That was it! So you are going to sell the place? Splendid. The idea is a rich one. And what do you propose to do with my old mother and me and with Sonia here? SEREBRAKOFF. That will be decided in due time. We can't do everything at once. VOITSKI. Wait! It is clear that until this moment I have never had a grain of sense in my head. I have always been stupid enough to think that the estate belonged to Sonia. My father bought it as a wedding present for my sister, and I foolishly imagined that as our laws were made for Russians and not Turks, my sister's estate would come down to her child. SEREBRAKOFF. Of course it is Sonia's. Has any one denied it? I don't want to sell it without Sonia's consent; on the contrary, what I am doing is for Sonia's good. VOITSKI. This is absolutely incomprehensible. Either I have gone mad or--or-- MME. VOITSKAYA. Jean, don't contradict Alexander. Trust to him; he knows better than we do what is right and what is wrong. VOITSKI. I shan't. Give me some water. [He drinks] Go ahead! Say anything you please--anything! SEREBRAKOFF. I can't imagine why you are so upset. I don't pretend that my scheme is an ideal one, and if you all object to it I shall not insist. [A pause.] TELEGIN. [With embarrassment] I not only nourish feelings of respect toward learning, your Excellency, but I am also drawn to it by family ties. My brother Gregory's wife's brother, whom you may know; his name is Constantine Lakedemonoff, and he used to be a magistrate-- VOITSKI. Stop, Waffles. This is business; wait a bit, we will talk of that later. [To SEREBRAKOFF] There now, ask him what he thinks; this estate was bought from his uncle. SEREBRAKOFF. Ah! Why should I ask questions? What good would it do? VOITSKI. The price was ninety-five thousand roubles. My father paid seventy and left a debt of twenty-five. Now listen! This place could never have been bought had I not renounced my inheritance in favour of my sister, whom I deeply loved--and what is more, I worked for ten years like an ox, and paid off the debt. SEREBRAKOFF. I regret ever having started this conversation. VOITSKI. Thanks entirely to my own personal efforts, the place is entirely clear of debts, and now, when I have grown old, you want to throw me out, neck and crop! SEREBRAKOFF. I can't imagine what you are driving at. VOITSKI. For twenty-five years I have managed this place, and have sent you the returns from it like the most honest of servants, and you have never given me one single word of thanks for my work, not one--neither in my youth nor now. You allowed me a meagre salary of five hundred roubles a year, a beggar's pittance, and have never even thought of adding a rouble to it. SEREBRAKOFF. What did I know about such things, Ivan? I am not a practical man and don't understand them. You might have helped yourself to all you wanted. VOITSKI. Yes, why did I not steal? Don't you all despise me for not stealing, when it would have been only justice? And I should not now have been a beggar! MME. VOITSKAYA. [Sternly] Jean! TELEGIN. [Agitated] Vanya, old man, don't talk in that way. Why spoil such pleasant relations? [He embraces him] Do stop! VOITSKI. For twenty-five years I have been sitting here with my mother like a mole in a burrow. Our every thought and hope was yours and yours only. By day we talked with pride of you and your work, and spoke your name with veneration; our nights we wasted reading the books and papers which my soul now loathes. TELEGIN. Don't, Vanya, don't. I can't stand it. SEREBRAKOFF. [Wrathfully] What under heaven do you want, anyway? VOITSKI. We used to think of you as almost superhuman, but now the scales have fallen from my eyes and I see you as you are! You write on art without knowing anything about it. Those books of yours which I used to admire are not worth one copper kopeck. You are a hoax! SEREBRAKOFF. Can't any one make him stop? I am going! HELENA. Ivan, I command you to stop this instant! Do you hear me? VOITSKI. I refuse! [SEREBRAKOFF tries to get out of the room, but VOITSKI bars the door] Wait! I have not done yet! You have wrecked my life. I have never lived. My best years have gone for nothing, have been ruined, thanks to you. You are my most bitter enemy! TELEGIN. I can't stand it; I can't stand it. I am going. [He goes out in great excitement.] SEREBRAKOFF. But what do you want? What earthly right have you to use such language to me? Ruination! If this estate is yours, then take it, and let me be ruined! HELENA. I am going away out of this hell this minute. [Shrieks] This is too much! VOITSKI. My life has been a failure. I am clever and brave and strong. If I had lived a normal life I might have become another Schopenhauer or Dostoieffski. I am losing my head! I am going crazy! Mother, I am in despair! Oh, mother! MME. VOITSKAYA. [Sternly] Listen, Alexander! SONIA falls on her knees beside the nurse and nestles against her. SONIA. Oh, nurse, nurse! VOITSKI. Mother! What shall I do? But no, don't speak! I know what to do. [To SEREBRAKOFF] And you will understand me! He goes out through the door in the centre of the room and MME. VOITSKAYA follows him. SEREBRAKOFF. Tell me, what on earth is the matter? Take this lunatic out of my sight! I cannot possibly live under the same roof with him. His room [He points to the centre door] is almost next door to mine. Let him take himself off into the village or into the wing of the house, or I shall leave here at once. I cannot stay in the same house with him. HELENA. [To her husband] We are leaving to-day; we must get ready at once for our departure. SEREBRAKOFF. What a perfectly dreadful man! SONIA. [On her knees beside the nurse and turning to her father. She speaks with emotion] You must be kind to us, papa. Uncle Vanya and I are so unhappy! [Controlling her despair] Have pity on us. Remember how Uncle Vanya and Granny used to copy and translate your books for you every night--every, every night. Uncle Vanya has toiled without rest; he would never spend a penny on us, we sent it all to you. We have not eaten the bread of idleness. I am not saying this as I should like to, but you must understand us, papa, you must be merciful to us. HELENA. [Very excited, to her husband] For heaven's sake, Alexander, go and have a talk with him--explain! SEREBRAKOFF. Very well, I shall have a talk with him, but I won't apologise for a thing. I am not angry with him, but you must confess that his behaviour has been strange, to say the least. Excuse me, I shall go to him. [He goes out through the centre door.] HELENA. Be gentle with him; try to quiet him. [She follows him out.] SONIA. [Nestling nearer to MARINA] Nurse, oh, nurse! MARINA. It's all right, my baby. When the geese have cackled they will be still again. First they cackle and then they stop. SONIA. Nurse! MARINA. You are trembling all over, as if you were freezing. There, there, little orphan baby, God is merciful. A little linden-tea, and it will all pass away. Don't cry, my sweetest. [Looking angrily at the door in the centre of the room] See, the geese have all gone now. The devil take them! A shot is heard. HELENA screams behind the scenes. SONIA shudders. MARINA. Bang! What's that? SEREBRAKOFF. [Comes in reeling with terror] Hold him! hold him! He has gone mad! HELENA and VOITSKI are seen struggling in the doorway. HELENA. [Trying to wrest the revolver from him] Give it to me; give it to me, I tell you! VOITSKI. Let me go, Helena, let me go! [He frees himself and rushes in, looking everywhere for SEREBRAKOFF] Where is he? Ah, there he is! [He shoots at him. A pause] I didn't get him? I missed again? [Furiously] Damnation! Damnation! To hell with him! He flings the revolver on the floor, and drops helpless into a chair. SEREBRAKOFF stands as if stupefied. HELENA leans against the wall, almost fainting. HELENA. Take me away! Take me away! I can't stay here--I can't! VOITSKI. [In despair] Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do? SONIA. [Softly] Oh, nurse, nurse! The curtain falls.

Act III - Part One

https://web.archive.org/web/20210227035013/https://www.sparknotes.com/drama/unclevanya/section5/

Set in the daytime, Act III opens in the drawing room with Voynitsky and Sonya seated as Yelena paces in thought. The professor has called a meeting at one o'clock. After grumbling about Serebryakov, Voynitsky attacks Yelena, describing her as ready to "drop from sheer laziness". Yelena replies that she is dying of boredom and is without an idea of what to do. Sonya produces a number of possibilities: help with the estate, teaching, nursing, and so on. Yelena cannot imagine being interested; only people in ideological novels undertake such work. For Sonya, Yelena's idleness is "infectious"--her effect on Vanya, herself, and the doctor, all of whom having deserted their work to follow her, make this clear. Yelena is certainly a witch. Voynitsky adds that she must have the blood of a mermaid and should flee the estate by diving into a whirlpool with some water sprite. Yelena is enraged: Voynitsky offers to pick her a bouquet of roses in apology and exits. Sadly Sonya then puts her head on Yelena's breast and once again begins pining for the doctor. Having loved him for six years, she has lost all pride and confessed her love to everyone except Astrov. Remarking that he is a strange person, Yelena resolves to find out what he thinks of Sonya, using his cartograms as a pretext. Sonya pauses for a moment, wondering if uncertainty is better and exits to fetch him. Yelena then delivers a soliloquy, ruminating on how Sonya cannot help falling for such a "fascinating" man amidst such boredom and admits her own fascination for the doctor. Recalling Vanya's quip about the mermaid, she wonders if she should flee with him--her conscience, however, prevents it. Indeed, she already feels guilty, ready to prostrate herself before Sonya and weep. Astrov then enters with a cartogram and proceeds to explain the progressive degeneration of the region. Forests, settlements, and wildlife have disappeared in the "downhill struggle for existence"; instead of progress, the same swamps, diseases, and disasters remain. It is clear to Astrov that Yelena is uninterested. He breaks off, and she cross-examines him with regards to Sonya. Astrov does not love her. He is, however, convinced that the subtext of Yelena's cross-examination is her own desire and that she is finally responding to his longtime advances. Much to Yelena's dismay, he embraces her passionately and insists upon arranging a rendezvous. Yelena resists, and suddenly Voynitsky enters unseen. For a moment, Yelena will then relent, laying her head on Astrov's chest. Just as the doctor proposes a rendezvous, however, she sees Voynitsky and disengages herself from his arms. Astrov chats about the weather, noting that the days are getting shorter, and he exits. Nervously, Yelena insists that Voynitsky prevail upon her husband for an immediate departure from the estate; a shaken Voynitsky replies that he has seen everything.

As noted earlier, among all the erotic criss-crossings in the play, Astrov and Yelena's intrigue structurally resembles an affair from conventional melodrama, in which the impassioned lover comes to rescue the beautiful heroine from her unhappy marriage. Indeed, in The Wood Demon,Uncle Vanya's precursor, their intrigue takes on this form. Certainly here we have elements that might suggest that Yelena's escape from Serebryakov and something like a "happy ending" could be imminent. Notably, the prospect of this escape is cast in "fairy tale" terms: like a mermaid, Yelena may disappear into a whirlpool with her water sprite. Moreover, Yelena's soliloquy reveals the extent of her fascination with the doctor. In musing over Astrov, she already feels guilty, finding herself ready to implore Sonya for forgiveness. One wonders then if at some level she has already accepted the doctor as a paramour. At the same time, Astrov's seduction is strangely "off"--awkward, bungled, and more farcical than romantic. One cannot but laugh, for example, at such pet names as "dear bird of prey" and "beautiful, fluffy weasel". Astrov's boorishness aside, we will also examine the strangeness of this seduction by looking at two of Chekhov's primary dramaturgical devices: indirect action and subtext. Allowing an indefinite period of time to pass between Acts II and III , Chekhov opens a gap between what happened since we left off and what transpires at the moment on stage. Thus one experiences an almost ridiculous abruptness in Astrov's attempt. This is even more the case as Astrov seems to take great interpretative liberties in identifying Yelena's desire as the subtext of their conversation: his accusation that she wants him seems wishful at best. At the same time, his proposition is not quite absurd. Framed in realist fashion, the events here would seem to take what was admitted in the act previous to its logical conclusion--namely, the fascination Yelena and Astrov share for each other that should culminate in an erotic encounter. Moreover, we are told that the doctor has been visiting the estate daily for some time now. Indirect action and Astrov's unconvincing sense of subtext make this encounter jarring even as it is entirely reasonable in the narrative. Thus Chekhov undermines the seduction one might find in conventional melodrama. No dashing doctor rescues a beautiful wife from her decrepit husband here. The seduction will end quite anti-climatically, the lovers never getting to a first rendezvous. Indeed, the theme of the "might-have-been" prevails: Yelena refuses the doctor once caught, this break prefiguring their almost elegiac farewell in Act IV. As Astrov tells Yelena in the last scene: "It is strange somehow, we never got to know each other, and all at once for some reason--we shall never meet again. So it is with everything in the world." Theirs will be a "love" at last sight, never realized and nostalgically rooted in what might have been. These scenes are also notable in defining Yelena's character. First, they reveal her in all her idleness: she cannot even begin to be interested in the tasks Sonya offers her, tasks that might rescue her from her boredom. Nor can she feign interest in Astrov's cartogram. As Sonya notes, this idleness is "infectious," bewitching, inspiring the household's general malaise. Once again, as indicated throughout the play, Yelena's arrival, along with that of her husband, has thrown the life of the estate out of joint, plunging it into indolence. One might speculate then on how her wasted life perhaps reminds those around her of their own situations, making work impossible. Recall that in Act I, for example, when Voynitsky declares that before Yelena he cannot bear the thought of another wasting her life on the estate as he has.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/51.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_18_part_3.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 50

chapter 50

{"name": "CHAPTER 50", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD58.asp", "summary": "In Marlott, Tess resumes her difficult work in the potato fields and takes care of her ailing parents. Once while working in the fields, she is astonished to find that Alec is working with her. He again begs Tess to let him help she and her family, a request that she resolutely refuses. Alec expresses his anger and leaves. While she is returning home, one of her sisters brings her the news of her father's death. This is a serious blow to her, especially since the family will not be able to remain in their house after his death. Another tenant farmer has the legal right to it now.", "analysis": "Notes To help pass the time in Marlott, Tess thinks about her past. She is again nostalgic about the May-Day dance episode, when she first spied the handsome Angel. It always pricks her heart to think that if she had been Angel's partner at that dance, life would perhaps have been totally different. Fate, however, did not allow that to happen. Now, there are only memories and drudgery. In tempting Tess to let him help her, Alec refers to the temptation of Eve in the Garden of Eden; he reminds her that Satan was successful in his temptation. Like Satan, Alec believes that he will also achieve his desire, if the temptations continue. With John's death, the family is left homeless, and Tess's plight is worse than ever. Fate is wearing her down and preparing her to accept temptation,"}

She plunged into the chilly equinoctial darkness as the clock struck ten, for her fifteen miles' walk under the steely stars. In lonely districts night is a protection rather than a danger to a noiseless pedestrian, and knowing this, Tess pursued the nearest course along by-lanes that she would almost have feared in the day-time; but marauders were wanting now, and spectral fears were driven out of her mind by thoughts of her mother. Thus she proceeded mile after mile, ascending and descending till she came to Bulbarrow, and about midnight looked from that height into the abyss of chaotic shade which was all that revealed itself of the vale on whose further side she was born. Having already traversed about five miles on the upland, she had now some ten or eleven in the lowland before her journey would be finished. The winding road downwards became just visible to her under the wan starlight as she followed it, and soon she paced a soil so contrasting with that above it that the difference was perceptible to the tread and to the smell. It was the heavy clay land of Blackmoor Vale, and a part of the Vale to which turnpike-roads had never penetrated. Superstitions linger longest on these heavy soils. Having once been forest, at this shadowy time it seemed to assert something of its old character, the far and the near being blended, and every tree and tall hedge making the most of its presence. The harts that had been hunted here, the witches that had been pricked and ducked, the green-spangled fairies that "whickered" at you as you passed;--the place teemed with beliefs in them still, and they formed an impish multitude now. At Nuttlebury she passed the village inn, whose sign creaked in response to the greeting of her footsteps, which not a human soul heard but herself. Under the thatched roofs her mind's eye beheld relaxed tendons and flaccid muscles, spread out in the darkness beneath coverlets made of little purple patchwork squares, and undergoing a bracing process at the hands of sleep for renewed labour on the morrow, as soon as a hint of pink nebulosity appeared on Hambledon Hill. At three she turned the last corner of the maze of lanes she had threaded, and entered Marlott, passing the field in which as a club-girl she had first seen Angel Clare, when he had not danced with her; the sense of disappointment remained with her yet. In the direction of her mother's house she saw a light. It came from the bedroom window, and a branch waved in front of it and made it wink at her. As soon as she could discern the outline of the house--newly thatched with her money--it had all its old effect upon Tess's imagination. Part of her body and life it ever seemed to be; the slope of its dormers, the finish of its gables, the broken courses of brick which topped the chimney, all had something in common with her personal character. A stupefaction had come into these features, to her regard; it meant the illness of her mother. She opened the door so softly as to disturb nobody; the lower room was vacant, but the neighbour who was sitting up with her mother came to the top of the stairs, and whispered that Mrs Durbeyfield was no better, though she was sleeping just then. Tess prepared herself a breakfast, and then took her place as nurse in her mother's chamber. In the morning, when she contemplated the children, they had all a curiously elongated look; although she had been away little more than a year, their growth was astounding; and the necessity of applying herself heart and soul to their needs took her out of her own cares. Her father's ill-health was the same indefinite kind, and he sat in his chair as usual. But the day after her arrival he was unusually bright. He had a rational scheme for living, and Tess asked him what it was. "I'm thinking of sending round to all the old antiqueerians in this part of England," he said, "asking them to subscribe to a fund to maintain me. I'm sure they'd see it as a romantical, artistical, and proper thing to do. They spend lots o' money in keeping up old ruins, and finding the bones o' things, and such like; and living remains must be more interesting to 'em still, if they only knowed of me. Would that somebody would go round and tell 'em what there is living among 'em, and they thinking nothing of him! If Pa'son Tringham, who discovered me, had lived, he'd ha' done it, I'm sure." Tess postponed her arguments on this high project till she had grappled with pressing matters in hand, which seemed little improved by her remittances. When indoor necessities had been eased, she turned her attention to external things. It was now the season for planting and sowing; many gardens and allotments of the villagers had already received their spring tillage; but the garden and the allotment of the Durbeyfields were behindhand. She found, to her dismay, that this was owing to their having eaten all the seed potatoes,--that last lapse of the improvident. At the earliest moment she obtained what others she could procure, and in a few days her father was well enough to see to the garden, under Tess's persuasive efforts: while she herself undertook the allotment-plot which they rented in a field a couple of hundred yards out of the village. She liked doing it after the confinement of the sick chamber, where she was not now required by reason of her mother's improvement. Violent motion relieved thought. The plot of ground was in a high, dry, open enclosure, where there were forty or fifty such pieces, and where labour was at its briskest when the hired labour of the day had ended. Digging began usually at six o'clock and extended indefinitely into the dusk or moonlight. Just now heaps of dead weeds and refuse were burning on many of the plots, the dry weather favouring their combustion. One fine day Tess and 'Liza-Lu worked on here with their neighbours till the last rays of the sun smote flat upon the white pegs that divided the plots. As soon as twilight succeeded to sunset the flare of the couch-grass and cabbage-stalk fires began to light up the allotments fitfully, their outlines appearing and disappearing under the dense smoke as wafted by the wind. When a fire glowed, banks of smoke, blown level along the ground, would themselves become illuminated to an opaque lustre, screening the workpeople from one another; and the meaning of the "pillar of a cloud", which was a wall by day and a light by night, could be understood. As evening thickened, some of the gardening men and women gave over for the night, but the greater number remained to get their planting done, Tess being among them, though she sent her sister home. It was on one of the couch-burning plots that she laboured with her fork, its four shining prongs resounding against the stones and dry clods in little clicks. Sometimes she was completely involved in the smoke of her fire; then it would leave her figure free, irradiated by the brassy glare from the heap. She was oddly dressed to-night, and presented a somewhat staring aspect, her attire being a gown bleached by many washings, with a short black jacket over it, the effect of the whole being that of a wedding and funeral guest in one. The women further back wore white aprons, which, with their pale faces, were all that could be seen of them in the gloom, except when at moments they caught a flash from the flames. Westward, the wiry boughs of the bare thorn hedge which formed the boundary of the field rose against the pale opalescence of the lower sky. Above, Jupiter hung like a full-blown jonquil, so bright as almost to throw a shade. A few small nondescript stars were appearing elsewhere. In the distance a dog barked, and wheels occasionally rattled along the dry road. Still the prongs continued to click assiduously, for it was not late; and though the air was fresh and keen there was a whisper of spring in it that cheered the workers on. Something in the place, the hours, the crackling fires, the fantastic mysteries of light and shade, made others as well as Tess enjoy being there. Nightfall, which in the frost of winter comes as a fiend and in the warmth of summer as a lover, came as a tranquillizer on this March day. Nobody looked at his or her companions. The eyes of all were on the soil as its turned surface was revealed by the fires. Hence as Tess stirred the clods and sang her foolish little songs with scarce now a hope that Clare would ever hear them, she did not for a long time notice the person who worked nearest to her--a man in a long smockfrock who, she found, was forking the same plot as herself, and whom she supposed her father had sent there to advance the work. She became more conscious of him when the direction of his digging brought him closer. Sometimes the smoke divided them; then it swerved, and the two were visible to each other but divided from all the rest. Tess did not speak to her fellow-worker, nor did he speak to her. Nor did she think of him further than to recollect that he had not been there when it was broad daylight, and that she did not know him as any one of the Marlott labourers, which was no wonder, her absences having been so long and frequent of late years. By-and-by he dug so close to her that the fire-beams were reflected as distinctly from the steel prongs of his fork as from her own. On going up to the fire to throw a pitch of dead weeds upon it, she found that he did the same on the other side. The fire flared up, and she beheld the face of d'Urberville. The unexpectedness of his presence, the grotesqueness of his appearance in a gathered smockfrock, such as was now worn only by the most old-fashioned of the labourers, had a ghastly comicality that chilled her as to its bearing. D'Urberville emitted a low, long laugh. "If I were inclined to joke, I should say, How much this seems like Paradise!" he remarked whimsically, looking at her with an inclined head. "What do you say?" she weakly asked. "A jester might say this is just like Paradise. You are Eve, and I am the old Other One come to tempt you in the disguise of an inferior animal. I used to be quite up in that scene of Milton's when I was theological. Some of it goes-- "'Empress, the way is ready, and not long, Beyond a row of myrtles... ... If thou accept My conduct, I can bring thee thither soon.' 'Lead then,' said Eve. "And so on. My dear Tess, I am only putting this to you as a thing that you might have supposed or said quite untruly, because you think so badly of me." "I never said you were Satan, or thought it. I don't think of you in that way at all. My thoughts of you are quite cold, except when you affront me. What, did you come digging here entirely because of me?" "Entirely. To see you; nothing more. The smockfrock, which I saw hanging for sale as I came along, was an afterthought, that I mightn't be noticed. I come to protest against your working like this." "But I like doing it--it is for my father." "Your engagement at the other place is ended?" "Yes." "Where are you going to next? To join your dear husband?" She could not bear the humiliating reminder. "O--I don't know!" she said bitterly. "I have no husband!" "It is quite true--in the sense you mean. But you have a friend, and I have determined that you shall be comfortable in spite of yourself. When you get down to your house you will see what I have sent there for you." "O, Alec, I wish you wouldn't give me anything at all! I cannot take it from you! I don't like--it is not right!" "It IS right!" he cried lightly. "I am not going to see a woman whom I feel so tenderly for as I do for you in trouble without trying to help her." "But I am very well off! I am only in trouble about--about--not about living at all!" She turned, and desperately resumed her digging, tears dripping upon the fork-handle and upon the clods. "About the children--your brothers and sisters," he resumed. "I've been thinking of them." Tess's heart quivered--he was touching her in a weak place. He had divined her chief anxiety. Since returning home her soul had gone out to those children with an affection that was passionate. "If your mother does not recover, somebody ought to do something for them; since your father will not be able to do much, I suppose?" "He can with my assistance. He must!" "And with mine." "No, sir!" "How damned foolish this is!" burst out d'Urberville. "Why, he thinks we are the same family; and will be quite satisfied!" "He don't. I've undeceived him." "The more fool you!" D'Urberville in anger retreated from her to the hedge, where he pulled off the long smockfrock which had disguised him; and rolling it up and pushing it into the couch-fire, went away. Tess could not get on with her digging after this; she felt restless; she wondered if he had gone back to her father's house; and taking the fork in her hand proceeded homewards. Some twenty yards from the house she was met by one of her sisters. "O, Tessy--what do you think! 'Liza-Lu is a-crying, and there's a lot of folk in the house, and mother is a good deal better, but they think father is dead!" The child realized the grandeur of the news; but not as yet its sadness, and stood looking at Tess with round-eyed importance till, beholding the effect produced upon her, she said-- "What, Tess, shan't we talk to father never no more?" "But father was only a little bit ill!" exclaimed Tess distractedly. 'Liza-Lu came up. "He dropped down just now, and the doctor who was there for mother said there was no chance for him, because his heart was growed in." Yes; the Durbeyfield couple had changed places; the dying one was out of danger, and the indisposed one was dead. The news meant even more than it sounded. Her father's life had a value apart from his personal achievements, or perhaps it would not have had much. It was the last of the three lives for whose duration the house and premises were held under a lease; and it had long been coveted by the tenant-farmer for his regular labourers, who were stinted in cottage accommodation. Moreover, "liviers" were disapproved of in villages almost as much as little freeholders, because of their independence of manner, and when a lease determined it was never renewed. Thus the Durbeyfields, once d'Urbervilles, saw descending upon them the destiny which, no doubt, when they were among the Olympians of the county, they had caused to descend many a time, and severely enough, upon the heads of such landless ones as they themselves were now. So do flux and reflux--the rhythm of change--alternate and persist in everything under the sky.

CHAPTER 50

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD58.asp

In Marlott, Tess resumes her difficult work in the potato fields and takes care of her ailing parents. Once while working in the fields, she is astonished to find that Alec is working with her. He again begs Tess to let him help she and her family, a request that she resolutely refuses. Alec expresses his anger and leaves. While she is returning home, one of her sisters brings her the news of her father's death. This is a serious blow to her, especially since the family will not be able to remain in their house after his death. Another tenant farmer has the legal right to it now.

Notes To help pass the time in Marlott, Tess thinks about her past. She is again nostalgic about the May-Day dance episode, when she first spied the handsome Angel. It always pricks her heart to think that if she had been Angel's partner at that dance, life would perhaps have been totally different. Fate, however, did not allow that to happen. Now, there are only memories and drudgery. In tempting Tess to let him help her, Alec refers to the temptation of Eve in the Garden of Eden; he reminds her that Satan was successful in his temptation. Like Satan, Alec believes that he will also achieve his desire, if the temptations continue. With John's death, the family is left homeless, and Tess's plight is worse than ever. Fate is wearing her down and preparing her to accept temptation,

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/39.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Sense and Sensibility/section_27_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 39

chapter 39

{"name": "Chapter 39", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201101060302/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/s/sense-and-sensibility/summary-and-analysis/chapter-39", "summary": "When Mrs. Jennings planned to go to Cleveland, home of the Palmers, she invited Elinor and Marianne to go with her. Marianne at first declined violently since the house was in Somersetshire where the Willoughbys lived. But when Elinor wisely pointed out that they could get home more quickly by that route and more quickly see their dear mother, she agreed. Before they left, Colonel Brandon informed Elinor that the living at Delaford, near his estate, was vacant, and that Edward might have it. He did not think, however, that it could \"do . . . more than make Mr. Ferrars comfortable as a bachelor.\" Mrs. Jennings, who overheard part of the conversation, misunderstood what the colonel was saying and believed that he was proposing to Elinor.", "analysis": "Most of the journeys in Sense and Sensibility take place in winter and are tedious and uncomfortable. Wealthy people like Mrs. Jennings usually traveled in their own carriages and took the journey in easy stages. From London to Somerset was a two-day journey. From Cleveland, which was a few miles from Bristol, it took a day to get to Barton. Propriety demanded that young ladies should be accompanied; thus Elinor points out that \"their mother's servant might easily come there to attend them down.\" Austen uses \"low comedy\" in this chapter to gently burlesque the warm, yet loquacious, Mrs. Jennings. The woman hears only a few lines of what the couple is saying but interprets them to fit what she wishes it to be -- a proposal of marriage."}

The Miss Dashwoods had now been rather more than two months in town, and Marianne's impatience to be gone increased every day. She sighed for the air, the liberty, the quiet of the country; and fancied that if any place could give her ease, Barton must do it. Elinor was hardly less anxious than herself for their removal, and only so much less bent on its being effected immediately, as that she was conscious of the difficulties of so long a journey, which Marianne could not be brought to acknowledge. She began, however, seriously to turn her thoughts towards its accomplishment, and had already mentioned their wishes to their kind hostess, who resisted them with all the eloquence of her good-will, when a plan was suggested, which, though detaining them from home yet a few weeks longer, appeared to Elinor altogether much more eligible than any other. The Palmers were to remove to Cleveland about the end of March, for the Easter holidays; and Mrs. Jennings, with both her friends, received a very warm invitation from Charlotte to go with them. This would not, in itself, have been sufficient for the delicacy of Miss Dashwood;--but it was inforced with so much real politeness by Mr. Palmer himself, as, joined to the very great amendment of his manners towards them since her sister had been known to be unhappy, induced her to accept it with pleasure. When she told Marianne what she had done, however, her first reply was not very auspicious. "Cleveland!"--she cried, with great agitation. "No, I cannot go to Cleveland."-- "You forget," said Elinor gently, "that its situation is not...that it is not in the neighbourhood of..." "But it is in Somersetshire.--I cannot go into Somersetshire.--There, where I looked forward to going...No, Elinor, you cannot expect me to go there." Elinor would not argue upon the propriety of overcoming such feelings;--she only endeavoured to counteract them by working on others;--represented it, therefore, as a measure which would fix the time of her returning to that dear mother, whom she so much wished to see, in a more eligible, more comfortable manner, than any other plan could do, and perhaps without any greater delay. From Cleveland, which was within a few miles of Bristol, the distance to Barton was not beyond one day, though a long day's journey; and their mother's servant might easily come there to attend them down; and as there could be no occasion of their staying above a week at Cleveland, they might now be at home in little more than three weeks' time. As Marianne's affection for her mother was sincere, it must triumph with little difficulty, over the imaginary evils she had started. Mrs. Jennings was so far from being weary of her guests, that she pressed them very earnestly to return with her again from Cleveland. Elinor was grateful for the attention, but it could not alter her design; and their mother's concurrence being readily gained, every thing relative to their return was arranged as far as it could be;--and Marianne found some relief in drawing up a statement of the hours that were yet to divide her from Barton. "Ah! Colonel, I do not know what you and I shall do without the Miss Dashwoods;"--was Mrs. Jennings's address to him when he first called on her, after their leaving her was settled--"for they are quite resolved upon going home from the Palmers;--and how forlorn we shall be, when I come back!--Lord! we shall sit and gape at one another as dull as two cats." Perhaps Mrs. Jennings was in hopes, by this vigorous sketch of their future ennui, to provoke him to make that offer, which might give himself an escape from it;--and if so, she had soon afterwards good reason to think her object gained; for, on Elinor's moving to the window to take more expeditiously the dimensions of a print, which she was going to copy for her friend, he followed her to it with a look of particular meaning, and conversed with her there for several minutes. The effect of his discourse on the lady too, could not escape her observation, for though she was too honorable to listen, and had even changed her seat, on purpose that she might NOT hear, to one close by the piano forte on which Marianne was playing, she could not keep herself from seeing that Elinor changed colour, attended with agitation, and was too intent on what he said to pursue her employment.-- Still farther in confirmation of her hopes, in the interval of Marianne's turning from one lesson to another, some words of the Colonel's inevitably reached her ear, in which he seemed to be apologising for the badness of his house. This set the matter beyond a doubt. She wondered, indeed, at his thinking it necessary to do so; but supposed it to be the proper etiquette. What Elinor said in reply she could not distinguish, but judged from the motion of her lips, that she did not think THAT any material objection;--and Mrs. Jennings commended her in her heart for being so honest. They then talked on for a few minutes longer without her catching a syllable, when another lucky stop in Marianne's performance brought her these words in the Colonel's calm voice,-- "I am afraid it cannot take place very soon." Astonished and shocked at so unlover-like a speech, she was almost ready to cry out, "Lord! what should hinder it?"--but checking her desire, confined herself to this silent ejaculation. "This is very strange!--sure he need not wait to be older." This delay on the Colonel's side, however, did not seem to offend or mortify his fair companion in the least, for on their breaking up the conference soon afterwards, and moving different ways, Mrs. Jennings very plainly heard Elinor say, and with a voice which shewed her to feel what she said, "I shall always think myself very much obliged to you." Mrs. Jennings was delighted with her gratitude, and only wondered that after hearing such a sentence, the Colonel should be able to take leave of them, as he immediately did, with the utmost sang-froid, and go away without making her any reply!--She had not thought her old friend could have made so indifferent a suitor. What had really passed between them was to this effect. "I have heard," said he, with great compassion, "of the injustice your friend Mr. Ferrars has suffered from his family; for if I understand the matter right, he has been entirely cast off by them for persevering in his engagement with a very deserving young woman.-- Have I been rightly informed?--Is it so?--" Elinor told him that it was. "The cruelty, the impolitic cruelty,"--he replied, with great feeling,--"of dividing, or attempting to divide, two young people long attached to each other, is terrible.-- Mrs. Ferrars does not know what she may be doing--what she may drive her son to. I have seen Mr. Ferrars two or three times in Harley Street, and am much pleased with him. He is not a young man with whom one can be intimately acquainted in a short time, but I have seen enough of him to wish him well for his own sake, and as a friend of yours, I wish it still more. I understand that he intends to take orders. Will you be so good as to tell him that the living of Delaford, now just vacant, as I am informed by this day's post, is his, if he think it worth his acceptance--but THAT, perhaps, so unfortunately circumstanced as he is now, it may be nonsense to appear to doubt; I only wish it were more valuable.-- It is a rectory, but a small one; the late incumbent, I believe, did not make more than 200 L per annum, and though it is certainly capable of improvement, I fear, not to such an amount as to afford him a very comfortable income. Such as it is, however, my pleasure in presenting it to him, will be very great. Pray assure him of it." Elinor's astonishment at this commission could hardly have been greater, had the Colonel been really making her an offer of his hand. The preferment, which only two days before she had considered as hopeless for Edward, was already provided to enable him to marry;--and SHE, of all people in the world, was fixed on to bestow it!--Her emotion was such as Mrs. Jennings had attributed to a very different cause;--but whatever minor feelings less pure, less pleasing, might have a share in that emotion, her esteem for the general benevolence, and her gratitude for the particular friendship, which together prompted Colonel Brandon to this act, were strongly felt, and warmly expressed. She thanked him for it with all her heart, spoke of Edward's principles and disposition with that praise which she knew them to deserve; and promised to undertake the commission with pleasure, if it were really his wish to put off so agreeable an office to another. But at the same time, she could not help thinking that no one could so well perform it as himself. It was an office in short, from which, unwilling to give Edward the pain of receiving an obligation from HER, she would have been very glad to be spared herself;-- but Colonel Brandon, on motives of equal delicacy, declining it likewise, still seemed so desirous of its being given through her means, that she would not on any account make farther opposition. Edward, she believed, was still in town, and fortunately she had heard his address from Miss Steele. She could undertake therefore to inform him of it, in the course of the day. After this had been settled, Colonel Brandon began to talk of his own advantage in securing so respectable and agreeable a neighbour, and THEN it was that he mentioned with regret, that the house was small and indifferent;--an evil which Elinor, as Mrs. Jennings had supposed her to do, made very light of, at least as far as regarded its size. "The smallness of the house," said she, "I cannot imagine any inconvenience to them, for it will be in proportion to their family and income." By which the Colonel was surprised to find that SHE was considering Mr. Ferrars's marriage as the certain consequence of the presentation; for he did not suppose it possible that Delaford living could supply such an income, as anybody in his style of life would venture to settle on--and he said so. "This little rectory CAN do no more than make Mr. Ferrars comfortable as a bachelor; it cannot enable him to marry. I am sorry to say that my patronage ends with this; and my interest is hardly more extensive. If, however, by an unforeseen chance it should be in my power to serve him farther, I must think very differently of him from what I now do, if I am not as ready to be useful to him then as I sincerely wish I could be at present. What I am now doing indeed, seems nothing at all, since it can advance him so little towards what must be his principal, his only object of happiness. His marriage must still be a distant good;--at least, I am afraid it cannot take place very soon.--" Such was the sentence which, when misunderstood, so justly offended the delicate feelings of Mrs. Jennings; but after this narration of what really passed between Colonel Brandon and Elinor, while they stood at the window, the gratitude expressed by the latter on their parting, may perhaps appear in general, not less reasonably excited, nor less properly worded than if it had arisen from an offer of marriage.

Chapter 39

https://web.archive.org/web/20201101060302/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/s/sense-and-sensibility/summary-and-analysis/chapter-39

When Mrs. Jennings planned to go to Cleveland, home of the Palmers, she invited Elinor and Marianne to go with her. Marianne at first declined violently since the house was in Somersetshire where the Willoughbys lived. But when Elinor wisely pointed out that they could get home more quickly by that route and more quickly see their dear mother, she agreed. Before they left, Colonel Brandon informed Elinor that the living at Delaford, near his estate, was vacant, and that Edward might have it. He did not think, however, that it could "do . . . more than make Mr. Ferrars comfortable as a bachelor." Mrs. Jennings, who overheard part of the conversation, misunderstood what the colonel was saying and believed that he was proposing to Elinor.

Most of the journeys in Sense and Sensibility take place in winter and are tedious and uncomfortable. Wealthy people like Mrs. Jennings usually traveled in their own carriages and took the journey in easy stages. From London to Somerset was a two-day journey. From Cleveland, which was a few miles from Bristol, it took a day to get to Barton. Propriety demanded that young ladies should be accompanied; thus Elinor points out that "their mother's servant might easily come there to attend them down." Austen uses "low comedy" in this chapter to gently burlesque the warm, yet loquacious, Mrs. Jennings. The woman hears only a few lines of what the couple is saying but interprets them to fit what she wishes it to be -- a proposal of marriage.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/77.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_13_part_9.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 11.chapter 8

book 11, chapter 8

{"name": "book 11, Chapter 8", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section14/", "summary": "The Third and Last Meeting with Smerdyakov On Ivan's third visit to Smerdyakov, Smerdyakov openly confesses that he murdered Fyodor Pavlovich. But he says that he could not have done so had his philosophical discussions with Ivan not given him a new understanding of morality that made it possible for him to kill. For this reason, he says, Ivan is as much to blame for the murder as Smerdyakov is", "analysis": ""}

Chapter VIII. The Third And Last Interview With Smerdyakov When he was half-way there, the keen dry wind that had been blowing early that morning rose again, and a fine dry snow began falling thickly. It did not lie on the ground, but was whirled about by the wind, and soon there was a regular snowstorm. There were scarcely any lamp-posts in the part of the town where Smerdyakov lived. Ivan strode alone in the darkness, unconscious of the storm, instinctively picking out his way. His head ached and there was a painful throbbing in his temples. He felt that his hands were twitching convulsively. Not far from Marya Kondratyevna's cottage, Ivan suddenly came upon a solitary drunken little peasant. He was wearing a coarse and patched coat, and was walking in zigzags, grumbling and swearing to himself. Then suddenly he would begin singing in a husky drunken voice: "Ach, Vanka's gone to Petersburg; I won't wait till he comes back." But he broke off every time at the second line and began swearing again; then he would begin the same song again. Ivan felt an intense hatred for him before he had thought about him at all. Suddenly he realized his presence and felt an irresistible impulse to knock him down. At that moment they met, and the peasant with a violent lurch fell full tilt against Ivan, who pushed him back furiously. The peasant went flying backwards and fell like a log on the frozen ground. He uttered one plaintive "O--oh!" and then was silent. Ivan stepped up to him. He was lying on his back, without movement or consciousness. "He will be frozen," thought Ivan, and he went on his way to Smerdyakov's. In the passage, Marya Kondratyevna, who ran out to open the door with a candle in her hand, whispered that Smerdyakov was very ill, "It's not that he's laid up, but he seems not himself, and he even told us to take the tea away; he wouldn't have any." "Why, does he make a row?" asked Ivan coarsely. "Oh, dear, no, quite the contrary, he's very quiet. Only please don't talk to him too long," Marya Kondratyevna begged him. Ivan opened the door and stepped into the room. It was over-heated as before, but there were changes in the room. One of the benches at the side had been removed, and in its place had been put a large old mahogany leather sofa, on which a bed had been made up, with fairly clean white pillows. Smerdyakov was sitting on the sofa, wearing the same dressing-gown. The table had been brought out in front of the sofa, so that there was hardly room to move. On the table lay a thick book in yellow cover, but Smerdyakov was not reading it. He seemed to be sitting doing nothing. He met Ivan with a slow silent gaze, and was apparently not at all surprised at his coming. There was a great change in his face; he was much thinner and sallower. His eyes were sunken and there were blue marks under them. "Why, you really are ill?" Ivan stopped short. "I won't keep you long, I won't even take off my coat. Where can one sit down?" He went to the other end of the table, moved up a chair and sat down on it. "Why do you look at me without speaking? I've only come with one question, and I swear I won't go without an answer. Has the young lady, Katerina Ivanovna, been with you?" Smerdyakov still remained silent, looking quietly at Ivan as before. Suddenly, with a motion of his hand, he turned his face away. "What's the matter with you?" cried Ivan. "Nothing." "What do you mean by 'nothing'?" "Yes, she has. It's no matter to you. Let me alone." "No, I won't let you alone. Tell me, when was she here?" "Why, I'd quite forgotten about her," said Smerdyakov, with a scornful smile, and turning his face to Ivan again, he stared at him with a look of frenzied hatred, the same look that he had fixed on him at their last interview, a month before. "You seem very ill yourself, your face is sunken; you don't look like yourself," he said to Ivan. "Never mind my health, tell me what I ask you." "But why are your eyes so yellow? The whites are quite yellow. Are you so worried?" He smiled contemptuously and suddenly laughed outright. "Listen; I've told you I won't go away without an answer!" Ivan cried, intensely irritated. "Why do you keep pestering me? Why do you torment me?" said Smerdyakov, with a look of suffering. "Damn it! I've nothing to do with you. Just answer my question and I'll go away." "I've no answer to give you," said Smerdyakov, looking down again. "You may be sure I'll make you answer!" "Why are you so uneasy?" Smerdyakov stared at him, not simply with contempt, but almost with repulsion. "Is this because the trial begins to- morrow? Nothing will happen to you; can't you believe that at last? Go home, go to bed and sleep in peace, don't be afraid of anything." "I don't understand you.... What have I to be afraid of to-morrow?" Ivan articulated in astonishment, and suddenly a chill breath of fear did in fact pass over his soul. Smerdyakov measured him with his eyes. "You don't understand?" he drawled reproachfully. "It's a strange thing a sensible man should care to play such a farce!" Ivan looked at him speechless. The startling, incredibly supercilious tone of this man who had once been his valet, was extraordinary in itself. He had not taken such a tone even at their last interview. "I tell you, you've nothing to be afraid of. I won't say anything about you; there's no proof against you. I say, how your hands are trembling! Why are your fingers moving like that? Go home, _you_ did not murder him." Ivan started. He remembered Alyosha. "I know it was not I," he faltered. "Do you?" Smerdyakov caught him up again. Ivan jumped up and seized him by the shoulder. "Tell me everything, you viper! Tell me everything!" Smerdyakov was not in the least scared. He only riveted his eyes on Ivan with insane hatred. "Well, it was you who murdered him, if that's it," he whispered furiously. Ivan sank back on his chair, as though pondering something. He laughed malignantly. "You mean my going away. What you talked about last time?" "You stood before me last time and understood it all, and you understand it now." "All I understand is that you are mad." "Aren't you tired of it? Here we are face to face; what's the use of going on keeping up a farce to each other? Are you still trying to throw it all on me, to my face? _You_ murdered him; you are the real murderer, I was only your instrument, your faithful servant, and it was following your words I did it." "_Did_ it? Why, did you murder him?" Ivan turned cold. Something seemed to give way in his brain, and he shuddered all over with a cold shiver. Then Smerdyakov himself looked at him wonderingly; probably the genuineness of Ivan's horror struck him. "You don't mean to say you really did not know?" he faltered mistrustfully, looking with a forced smile into his eyes. Ivan still gazed at him, and seemed unable to speak. Ach, Vanka's gone to Petersburg; I won't wait till he comes back, suddenly echoed in his head. "Do you know, I am afraid that you are a dream, a phantom sitting before me," he muttered. "There's no phantom here, but only us two and one other. No doubt he is here, that third, between us." "Who is he? Who is here? What third person?" Ivan cried in alarm, looking about him, his eyes hastily searching in every corner. "That third is God Himself--Providence. He is the third beside us now. Only don't look for Him, you won't find Him." "It's a lie that you killed him!" Ivan cried madly. "You are mad, or teasing me again!" Smerdyakov, as before, watched him curiously, with no sign of fear. He could still scarcely get over his incredulity; he still fancied that Ivan knew everything and was trying to "throw it all on him to his face." "Wait a minute," he said at last in a weak voice, and suddenly bringing up his left leg from under the table, he began turning up his trouser leg. He was wearing long white stockings and slippers. Slowly he took off his garter and fumbled to the bottom of his stocking. Ivan gazed at him, and suddenly shuddered in a paroxysm of terror. "He's mad!" he cried, and rapidly jumping up, he drew back, so that he knocked his back against the wall and stood up against it, stiff and straight. He looked with insane terror at Smerdyakov, who, entirely unaffected by his terror, continued fumbling in his stocking, as though he were making an effort to get hold of something with his fingers and pull it out. At last he got hold of it and began pulling it out. Ivan saw that it was a piece of paper, or perhaps a roll of papers. Smerdyakov pulled it out and laid it on the table. "Here," he said quietly. "What is it?" asked Ivan, trembling. "Kindly look at it," Smerdyakov answered, still in the same low tone. Ivan stepped up to the table, took up the roll of paper and began unfolding it, but suddenly he drew back his fingers, as though from contact with a loathsome reptile. "Your hands keep twitching," observed Smerdyakov, and he deliberately unfolded the bundle himself. Under the wrapper were three packets of hundred-rouble notes. "They are all here, all the three thousand roubles; you need not count them. Take them," Smerdyakov suggested to Ivan, nodding at the notes. Ivan sank back in his chair. He was as white as a handkerchief. "You frightened me ... with your stocking," he said, with a strange grin. "Can you really not have known till now?" Smerdyakov asked once more. "No, I did not know. I kept thinking of Dmitri. Brother, brother! Ach!" He suddenly clutched his head in both hands. "Listen. Did you kill him alone? With my brother's help or without?" "It was only with you, with your help, I killed him, and Dmitri Fyodorovitch is quite innocent." "All right, all right. Talk about me later. Why do I keep on trembling? I can't speak properly." "You were bold enough then. You said 'everything was lawful,' and how frightened you are now," Smerdyakov muttered in surprise. "Won't you have some lemonade? I'll ask for some at once. It's very refreshing. Only I must hide this first." And again he motioned at the notes. He was just going to get up and call at the door to Marya Kondratyevna to make some lemonade and bring it them, but, looking for something to cover up the notes that she might not see them, he first took out his handkerchief, and as it turned out to be very dirty, took up the big yellow book that Ivan had noticed at first lying on the table, and put it over the notes. The book was _The Sayings of the Holy Father Isaac the Syrian_. Ivan read it mechanically. "I won't have any lemonade," he said. "Talk of me later. Sit down and tell me how you did it. Tell me all about it." "You'd better take off your greatcoat, or you'll be too hot." Ivan, as though he'd only just thought of it, took off his coat, and, without getting up from his chair, threw it on the bench. "Speak, please, speak." He seemed calmer. He waited, feeling sure that Smerdyakov would tell him _all_ about it. "How it was done?" sighed Smerdyakov. "It was done in a most natural way, following your very words." "Of my words later," Ivan broke in again, apparently with complete self- possession, firmly uttering his words, and not shouting as before. "Only tell me in detail how you did it. Everything, as it happened. Don't forget anything. The details, above everything, the details, I beg you." "You'd gone away, then I fell into the cellar." "In a fit or in a sham one?" "A sham one, naturally. I shammed it all. I went quietly down the steps to the very bottom and lay down quietly, and as I lay down I gave a scream, and struggled, till they carried me out." "Stay! And were you shamming all along, afterwards, and in the hospital?" "No, not at all. Next day, in the morning, before they took me to the hospital, I had a real attack and a more violent one than I've had for years. For two days I was quite unconscious." "All right, all right. Go on." "They laid me on the bed. I knew I'd be the other side of the partition, for whenever I was ill, Marfa Ignatyevna used to put me there, near them. She's always been very kind to me, from my birth up. At night I moaned, but quietly. I kept expecting Dmitri Fyodorovitch to come." "Expecting him? To come to you?" "Not to me. I expected him to come into the house, for I'd no doubt that he'd come that night, for being without me and getting no news, he'd be sure to come and climb over the fence, as he used to, and do something." "And if he hadn't come?" "Then nothing would have happened. I should never have brought myself to it without him." "All right, all right ... speak more intelligibly, don't hurry; above all, don't leave anything out!" "I expected him to kill Fyodor Pavlovitch. I thought that was certain, for I had prepared him for it ... during the last few days.... He knew about the knocks, that was the chief thing. With his suspiciousness and the fury which had been growing in him all those days, he was bound to get into the house by means of those taps. That was inevitable, so I was expecting him." "Stay," Ivan interrupted; "if he had killed him, he would have taken the money and carried it away; you must have considered that. What would you have got by it afterwards? I don't see." "But he would never have found the money. That was only what I told him, that the money was under the mattress. But that wasn't true. It had been lying in a box. And afterwards I suggested to Fyodor Pavlovitch, as I was the only person he trusted, to hide the envelope with the notes in the corner behind the ikons, for no one would have guessed that place, especially if they came in a hurry. So that's where the envelope lay, in the corner behind the ikons. It would have been absurd to keep it under the mattress; the box, anyway, could be locked. But all believe it was under the mattress. A stupid thing to believe. So if Dmitri Fyodorovitch had committed the murder, finding nothing, he would either have run away in a hurry, afraid of every sound, as always happens with murderers, or he would have been arrested. So I could always have clambered up to the ikons and have taken away the money next morning or even that night, and it would have all been put down to Dmitri Fyodorovitch. I could reckon upon that." "But what if he did not kill him, but only knocked him down?" "If he did not kill him, of course, I would not have ventured to take the money, and nothing would have happened. But I calculated that he would beat him senseless, and I should have time to take it then, and then I'd make out to Fyodor Pavlovitch that it was no one but Dmitri Fyodorovitch who had taken the money after beating him." "Stop ... I am getting mixed. Then it was Dmitri after all who killed him; you only took the money?" "No, he didn't kill him. Well, I might as well have told you now that he was the murderer.... But I don't want to lie to you now, because ... because if you really haven't understood till now, as I see for myself, and are not pretending, so as to throw your guilt on me to my very face, you are still responsible for it all, since you knew of the murder and charged me to do it, and went away knowing all about it. And so I want to prove to your face this evening that you are the only real murderer in the whole affair, and I am not the real murderer, though I did kill him. You are the rightful murderer." "Why, why, am I a murderer? Oh, God!" Ivan cried, unable to restrain himself at last, and forgetting that he had put off discussing himself till the end of the conversation. "You still mean that Tchermashnya? Stay, tell me, why did you want my consent, if you really took Tchermashnya for consent? How will you explain that now?" "Assured of your consent, I should have known that you wouldn't have made an outcry over those three thousand being lost, even if I'd been suspected, instead of Dmitri Fyodorovitch, or as his accomplice; on the contrary, you would have protected me from others.... And when you got your inheritance you would have rewarded me when you were able, all the rest of your life. For you'd have received your inheritance through me, seeing that if he had married Agrafena Alexandrovna, you wouldn't have had a farthing." "Ah! Then you intended to worry me all my life afterwards," snarled Ivan. "And what if I hadn't gone away then, but had informed against you?" "What could you have informed? That I persuaded you to go to Tchermashnya? That's all nonsense. Besides, after our conversation you would either have gone away or have stayed. If you had stayed, nothing would have happened. I should have known that you didn't want it done, and should have attempted nothing. As you went away, it meant you assured me that you wouldn't dare to inform against me at the trial, and that you'd overlook my having the three thousand. And, indeed, you couldn't have prosecuted me afterwards, because then I should have told it all in the court; that is, not that I had stolen the money or killed him--I shouldn't have said that--but that you'd put me up to the theft and the murder, though I didn't consent to it. That's why I needed your consent, so that you couldn't have cornered me afterwards, for what proof could you have had? I could always have cornered you, revealing your eagerness for your father's death, and I tell you the public would have believed it all, and you would have been ashamed for the rest of your life." "Was I then so eager, was I?" Ivan snarled again. "To be sure you were, and by your consent you silently sanctioned my doing it." Smerdyakov looked resolutely at Ivan. He was very weak and spoke slowly and wearily, but some hidden inner force urged him on. He evidently had some design. Ivan felt that. "Go on," he said. "Tell me what happened that night." "What more is there to tell! I lay there and I thought I heard the master shout. And before that Grigory Vassilyevitch had suddenly got up and came out, and he suddenly gave a scream, and then all was silence and darkness. I lay there waiting, my heart beating; I couldn't bear it. I got up at last, went out. I saw the window open on the left into the garden, and I stepped to the left to listen whether he was sitting there alive, and I heard the master moving about, sighing, so I knew he was alive. 'Ech!' I thought. I went to the window and shouted to the master, 'It's I.' And he shouted to me, 'He's been, he's been; he's run away.' He meant Dmitri Fyodorovitch had been. 'He's killed Grigory!' 'Where?' I whispered. 'There, in the corner,' he pointed. He was whispering, too. 'Wait a bit,' I said. I went to the corner of the garden to look, and there I came upon Grigory Vassilyevitch lying by the wall, covered with blood, senseless. So it's true that Dmitri Fyodorovitch has been here, was the thought that came into my head, and I determined on the spot to make an end of it, as Grigory Vassilyevitch, even if he were alive, would see nothing of it, as he lay there senseless. The only risk was that Marfa Ignatyevna might wake up. I felt that at the moment, but the longing to get it done came over me, till I could scarcely breathe. I went back to the window to the master and said, 'She's here, she's come; Agrafena Alexandrovna has come, wants to be let in.' And he started like a baby. 'Where is she?' he fairly gasped, but couldn't believe it. 'She's standing there,' said I. 'Open.' He looked out of the window at me, half believing and half distrustful, but afraid to open. 'Why, he is afraid of me now,' I thought. And it was funny. I bethought me to knock on the window-frame those taps we'd agreed upon as a signal that Grushenka had come, in his presence, before his eyes. He didn't seem to believe my word, but as soon as he heard the taps, he ran at once to open the door. He opened it. I would have gone in, but he stood in the way to prevent me passing. 'Where is she? Where is she?' He looked at me, all of a tremble. 'Well,' thought I, 'if he's so frightened of me as all that, it's a bad look out!' And my legs went weak with fright that he wouldn't let me in or would call out, or Marfa Ignatyevna would run up, or something else might happen. I don't remember now, but I must have stood pale, facing him. I whispered to him, 'Why, she's there, there, under the window; how is it you don't see her?' I said. 'Bring her then, bring her.' 'She's afraid,' said I; 'she was frightened at the noise, she's hidden in the bushes; go and call to her yourself from the study.' He ran to the window, put the candle in the window. 'Grushenka,' he cried, 'Grushenka, are you here?' Though he cried that, he didn't want to lean out of the window, he didn't want to move away from me, for he was panic-stricken; he was so frightened he didn't dare to turn his back on me. 'Why, here she is,' said I. I went up to the window and leaned right out of it. 'Here she is; she's in the bush, laughing at you, don't you see her?' He suddenly believed it; he was all of a shake--he was awfully crazy about her--and he leaned right out of the window. I snatched up that iron paper-weight from his table; do you remember, weighing about three pounds? I swung it and hit him on the top of the skull with the corner of it. He didn't even cry out. He only sank down suddenly, and I hit him again and a third time. And the third time I knew I'd broken his skull. He suddenly rolled on his back, face upwards, covered with blood. I looked round. There was no blood on me, not a spot. I wiped the paper-weight, put it back, went up to the ikons, took the money out of the envelope, and flung the envelope on the floor and the pink ribbon beside it. I went out into the garden all of a tremble, straight to the apple-tree with a hollow in it--you know that hollow. I'd marked it long before and put a rag and a piece of paper ready in it. I wrapped all the notes in the rag and stuffed it deep down in the hole. And there it stayed for over a fortnight. I took it out later, when I came out of the hospital. I went back to my bed, lay down and thought, 'If Grigory Vassilyevitch has been killed outright it may be a bad job for me, but if he is not killed and recovers, it will be first-rate, for then he'll bear witness that Dmitri Fyodorovitch has been here, and so he must have killed him and taken the money.' Then I began groaning with suspense and impatience, so as to wake Marfa Ignatyevna as soon as possible. At last she got up and she rushed to me, but when she saw Grigory Vassilyevitch was not there, she ran out, and I heard her scream in the garden. And that set it all going and set my mind at rest." He stopped. Ivan had listened all the time in dead silence without stirring or taking his eyes off him. As he told his story Smerdyakov glanced at him from time to time, but for the most part kept his eyes averted. When he had finished he was evidently agitated and was breathing hard. The perspiration stood out on his face. But it was impossible to tell whether it was remorse he was feeling, or what. "Stay," cried Ivan, pondering. "What about the door? If he only opened the door to you, how could Grigory have seen it open before? For Grigory saw it before you went." It was remarkable that Ivan spoke quite amicably, in a different tone, not angry as before, so if any one had opened the door at that moment and peeped in at them, he would certainly have concluded that they were talking peaceably about some ordinary, though interesting, subject. "As for that door and Grigory Vassilyevitch's having seen it open, that's only his fancy," said Smerdyakov, with a wry smile. "He is not a man, I assure you, but an obstinate mule. He didn't see it, but fancied he had seen it, and there's no shaking him. It's just our luck he took that notion into his head, for they can't fail to convict Dmitri Fyodorovitch after that." "Listen ..." said Ivan, beginning to seem bewildered again and making an effort to grasp something. "Listen. There are a lot of questions I want to ask you, but I forget them ... I keep forgetting and getting mixed up. Yes. Tell me this at least, why did you open the envelope and leave it there on the floor? Why didn't you simply carry off the envelope?... When you were telling me, I thought you spoke about it as though it were the right thing to do ... but why, I can't understand...." "I did that for a good reason. For if a man had known all about it, as I did for instance, if he'd seen those notes before, and perhaps had put them in that envelope himself, and had seen the envelope sealed up and addressed, with his own eyes, if such a man had done the murder, what should have made him tear open the envelope afterwards, especially in such desperate haste, since he'd know for certain the notes must be in the envelope? No, if the robber had been some one like me, he'd simply have put the envelope straight in his pocket and got away with it as fast as he could. But it'd be quite different with Dmitri Fyodorovitch. He only knew about the envelope by hearsay; he had never seen it, and if he'd found it, for instance, under the mattress, he'd have torn it open as quickly as possible to make sure the notes were in it. And he'd have thrown the envelope down, without having time to think that it would be evidence against him. Because he was not an habitual thief and had never directly stolen anything before, for he is a gentleman born, and if he did bring himself to steal, it would not be regular stealing, but simply taking what was his own, for he'd told the whole town he meant to before, and had even bragged aloud before every one that he'd go and take his property from Fyodor Pavlovitch. I didn't say that openly to the prosecutor when I was being examined, but quite the contrary, I brought him to it by a hint, as though I didn't see it myself, and as though he'd thought of it himself and I hadn't prompted him; so that Mr. Prosecutor's mouth positively watered at my suggestion." "But can you possibly have thought of all that on the spot?" cried Ivan, overcome with astonishment. He looked at Smerdyakov again with alarm. "Mercy on us! Could any one think of it all in such a desperate hurry? It was all thought out beforehand." "Well ... well, it was the devil helped you!" Ivan cried again. "No, you are not a fool, you are far cleverer than I thought...." He got up, obviously intending to walk across the room. He was in terrible distress. But as the table blocked his way, and there was hardly room to pass between the table and the wall, he only turned round where he stood and sat down again. Perhaps the impossibility of moving irritated him, as he suddenly cried out almost as furiously as before. "Listen, you miserable, contemptible creature! Don't you understand that if I haven't killed you, it's simply because I am keeping you to answer to-morrow at the trial. God sees," Ivan raised his hand, "perhaps I, too, was guilty; perhaps I really had a secret desire for my father's ... death, but I swear I was not as guilty as you think, and perhaps I didn't urge you on at all. No, no, I didn't urge you on! But no matter, I will give evidence against myself to-morrow at the trial. I'm determined to! I shall tell everything, everything. But we'll make our appearance together. And whatever you may say against me at the trial, whatever evidence you give, I'll face it; I am not afraid of you. I'll confirm it all myself! But you must confess, too! You must, you must; we'll go together. That's how it shall be!" Ivan said this solemnly and resolutely and from his flashing eyes alone it could be seen that it would be so. "You are ill, I see; you are quite ill. Your eyes are yellow," Smerdyakov commented, without the least irony, with apparent sympathy in fact. "We'll go together," Ivan repeated. "And if you won't go, no matter, I'll go alone." Smerdyakov paused as though pondering. "There'll be nothing of the sort, and you won't go," he concluded at last positively. "You don't understand me," Ivan exclaimed reproachfully. "You'll be too much ashamed, if you confess it all. And, what's more, it will be no use at all, for I shall say straight out that I never said anything of the sort to you, and that you are either ill (and it looks like it, too), or that you're so sorry for your brother that you are sacrificing yourself to save him and have invented it all against me, for you've always thought no more of me than if I'd been a fly. And who will believe you, and what single proof have you got?" "Listen, you showed me those notes just now to convince me." Smerdyakov lifted the book off the notes and laid it on one side. "Take that money away with you," Smerdyakov sighed. "Of course, I shall take it. But why do you give it to me, if you committed the murder for the sake of it?" Ivan looked at him with great surprise. "I don't want it," Smerdyakov articulated in a shaking voice, with a gesture of refusal. "I did have an idea of beginning a new life with that money in Moscow or, better still, abroad. I did dream of it, chiefly because 'all things are lawful.' That was quite right what you taught me, for you talked a lot to me about that. For if there's no everlasting God, there's no such thing as virtue, and there's no need of it. You were right there. So that's how I looked at it." "Did you come to that of yourself?" asked Ivan, with a wry smile. "With your guidance." "And now, I suppose, you believe in God, since you are giving back the money?" "No, I don't believe," whispered Smerdyakov. "Then why are you giving it back?" "Leave off ... that's enough!" Smerdyakov waved his hand again. "You used to say yourself that everything was lawful, so now why are you so upset, too? You even want to go and give evidence against yourself.... Only there'll be nothing of the sort! You won't go to give evidence," Smerdyakov decided with conviction. "You'll see," said Ivan. "It isn't possible. You are very clever. You are fond of money, I know that. You like to be respected, too, for you're very proud; you are far too fond of female charms, too, and you mind most of all about living in undisturbed comfort, without having to depend on any one--that's what you care most about. You won't want to spoil your life for ever by taking such a disgrace on yourself. You are like Fyodor Pavlovitch, you are more like him than any of his children; you've the same soul as he had." "You are not a fool," said Ivan, seeming struck. The blood rushed to his face. "You are serious now!" he observed, looking suddenly at Smerdyakov with a different expression. "It was your pride made you think I was a fool. Take the money." Ivan took the three rolls of notes and put them in his pocket without wrapping them in anything. "I shall show them at the court to-morrow," he said. "Nobody will believe you, as you've plenty of money of your own; you may simply have taken it out of your cash-box and brought it to the court." Ivan rose from his seat. "I repeat," he said, "the only reason I haven't killed you is that I need you for to-morrow, remember that, don't forget it!" "Well, kill me. Kill me now," Smerdyakov said, all at once looking strangely at Ivan. "You won't dare do that even!" he added, with a bitter smile. "You won't dare to do anything, you, who used to be so bold!" "Till to-morrow," cried Ivan, and moved to go out. "Stay a moment.... Show me those notes again." Ivan took out the notes and showed them to him. Smerdyakov looked at them for ten seconds. "Well, you can go," he said, with a wave of his hand. "Ivan Fyodorovitch!" he called after him again. "What do you want?" Ivan turned without stopping. "Good-by!" "Till to-morrow!" Ivan cried again, and he walked out of the cottage. The snowstorm was still raging. He walked the first few steps boldly, but suddenly began staggering. "It's something physical," he thought with a grin. Something like joy was springing up in his heart. He was conscious of unbounded resolution; he would make an end of the wavering that had so tortured him of late. His determination was taken, "and now it will not be changed," he thought with relief. At that moment he stumbled against something and almost fell down. Stopping short, he made out at his feet the peasant he had knocked down, still lying senseless and motionless. The snow had almost covered his face. Ivan seized him and lifted him in his arms. Seeing a light in the little house to the right he went up, knocked at the shutters, and asked the man to whom the house belonged to help him carry the peasant to the police-station, promising him three roubles. The man got ready and came out. I won't describe in detail how Ivan succeeded in his object, bringing the peasant to the police-station and arranging for a doctor to see him at once, providing with a liberal hand for the expenses. I will only say that this business took a whole hour, but Ivan was well content with it. His mind wandered and worked incessantly. "If I had not taken my decision so firmly for to-morrow," he reflected with satisfaction, "I should not have stayed a whole hour to look after the peasant, but should have passed by, without caring about his being frozen. I am quite capable of watching myself, by the way," he thought at the same instant, with still greater satisfaction, "although they have decided that I am going out of my mind!" Just as he reached his own house he stopped short, asking himself suddenly hadn't he better go at once to the prosecutor and tell him everything. He decided the question by turning back to the house. "Everything together to-morrow!" he whispered to himself, and, strange to say, almost all his gladness and self-satisfaction passed in one instant. As he entered his own room he felt something like a touch of ice on his heart, like a recollection or, more exactly, a reminder, of something agonizing and revolting that was in that room now, at that moment, and had been there before. He sank wearily on his sofa. The old woman brought him a samovar; he made tea, but did not touch it. He sat on the sofa and felt giddy. He felt that he was ill and helpless. He was beginning to drop asleep, but got up uneasily and walked across the room to shake off his drowsiness. At moments he fancied he was delirious, but it was not illness that he thought of most. Sitting down again, he began looking round, as though searching for something. This happened several times. At last his eyes were fastened intently on one point. Ivan smiled, but an angry flush suffused his face. He sat a long time in his place, his head propped on both arms, though he looked sideways at the same point, at the sofa that stood against the opposite wall. There was evidently something, some object, that irritated him there, worried him and tormented him.

book 11, Chapter 8

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section14/

The Third and Last Meeting with Smerdyakov On Ivan's third visit to Smerdyakov, Smerdyakov openly confesses that he murdered Fyodor Pavlovich. But he says that he could not have done so had his philosophical discussions with Ivan not given him a new understanding of morality that made it possible for him to kill. For this reason, he says, Ivan is as much to blame for the murder as Smerdyakov is

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/1232-chapters/09.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/The Prince/section_7_part_0.txt

The Prince.chapter 9

chapter 9

{"name": "Chapter 9", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201108110625/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-prince/summary-and-analysis/chapter-9", "summary": "When private citizens become rulers through the favor of their fellow citizens, these may be called civil principalities. One can reach this position through the favor of either the common citizens or the nobles, because the two classes are found in every city. The nobles want only to oppress the people, and the people want only to avoid oppression. From these opposing impulses can come three results: a principality, a republic, or anarchy. When the nobles feel pressure from the people, they try to make one of their own the prince in order to protect their privileges. When the people feel they cannot resist the nobles, they try to make a fellow citizen prince in order to protect their rights. You can never satisfy the nobles by acting honorably, but you can satisfy the people. Regardless of how a prince comes to power, he should make every effort to win the good will of the people, or in times of trouble, he will have no hope. A prince must not delude himself about the reliability of the people, but nonetheless, a prince who makes good preparations and knows how to command will never be betrayed by them. A wise ruler will contrive to keep all his citizens dependent on him and on the state, and then he will be able to trust them.", "analysis": "Machiavelli's theme in this chapter is the relationship between the people and their opposites, the nobles . Machiavelli portrays these two groups as constantly at odds, but his sympathy is clearly with the people, who only want to live free under the rule of their own laws. Machiavelli himself belonged firmly in this group, having been prevented from holding high office because he was not an aristocrat, and having served his entire career in Florence's civil government. The Medici, to whom he was writing, were members of the nobility, and this makes his advice somewhat more daring than it may sound at first. As in Chapter 5, Machiavelli can be seen reminding the Medici how much free states like Florence value their freedom and how justified they are in doing so. Machiavelli emphasizes how necessary it is for a prince to win over the people, because they are many, while the nobles are few, and a prince can never live safely without being able to trust the people. On this subject, Machiavelli was going against prevailing opinion, which he acknowledges by quoting the proverb \"He who builds on the people builds on mud.\" In fact, he is able to find only one example to support his argument , but two that disprove it . Machiavelli had many opportunities to observe the fickleness of the Florentine people, as they had alternately supported the Medici, Savonarola, the Republic, and then the Medici again. In another pessimistic observation about human nature, Machiavelli says that everyone is ready to die for you when the prospect of death is far off. The key, he maintains, is for the prince to keep his subjects dependent on him for all their benefits, because dependency is the only way to ensure loyalty. Characteristically, Machiavelli advocates a particular behavior not for its moral qualities, but because it accomplishes a specific goal for the prince: A prince should treat his subjects well and do all he can to benefit them, not necessarily because it is right to do so, but because it ultimately consolidates the prince's power. Machiavelli also insists on the importance of self-interest as a motivator throughout the chapter: He notes that all parties, whether princes, nobles, or common people, come into conflict or make alliances primarily to protect their own rights and privileges. Throughout the book, self-interest and a concern for one's own comfort level can be seen as the driving force in human behavior. Glossary Nabis ruler of Sparta . Machiavelli is probably exaggerating Nabis' success, but Nabis did introduce many social reforms. Gracchi brothers Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus . Roman officials who instituted many social reforms and were killed by aristocratic opponents. Giorgio Scali a leader of the Ciompi revolt in Florence in 1378. The wool workers' guild briefly held some political power, but its leaders, including Scali, were quickly overthrown and later executed."}

But coming to the other point--where a leading citizen becomes the prince of his country, not by wickedness or any intolerable violence, but by the favour of his fellow citizens--this may be called a civil principality: nor is genius or fortune altogether necessary to attain to it, but rather a happy shrewdness. I say then that such a principality is obtained either by the favour of the people or by the favour of the nobles. Because in all cities these two distinct parties are found, and from this it arises that the people do not wish to be ruled nor oppressed by the nobles, and the nobles wish to rule and oppress the people; and from these two opposite desires there arises in cities one of three results, either a principality, self-government, or anarchy. A principality is created either by the people or by the nobles, accordingly as one or other of them has the opportunity; for the nobles, seeing they cannot withstand the people, begin to cry up the reputation of one of themselves, and they make him a prince, so that under his shadow they can give vent to their ambitions. The people, finding they cannot resist the nobles, also cry up the reputation of one of themselves, and make him a prince so as to be defended by his authority. He who obtains sovereignty by the assistance of the nobles maintains himself with more difficulty than he who comes to it by the aid of the people, because the former finds himself with many around him who consider themselves his equals, and because of this he can neither rule nor manage them to his liking. But he who reaches sovereignty by popular favour finds himself alone, and has none around him, or few, who are not prepared to obey him. Besides this, one cannot by fair dealing, and without injury to others, satisfy the nobles, but you can satisfy the people, for their object is more righteous than that of the nobles, the latter wishing to oppress, while the former only desire not to be oppressed. It is to be added also that a prince can never secure himself against a hostile people, because of there being too many, whilst from the nobles he can secure himself, as they are few in number. The worst that a prince may expect from a hostile people is to be abandoned by them; but from hostile nobles he has not only to fear abandonment, but also that they will rise against him; for they, being in these affairs more far-seeing and astute, always come forward in time to save themselves, and to obtain favours from him whom they expect to prevail. Further, the prince is compelled to live always with the same people, but he can do well without the same nobles, being able to make and unmake them daily, and to give or take away authority when it pleases him. Therefore, to make this point clearer, I say that the nobles ought to be looked at mainly in two ways: that is to say, they either shape their course in such a way as binds them entirely to your fortune, or they do not. Those who so bind themselves, and are not rapacious, ought to be honoured and loved; those who do not bind themselves may be dealt with in two ways; they may fail to do this through pusillanimity and a natural want of courage, in which case you ought to make use of them, especially of those who are of good counsel; and thus, whilst in prosperity you honour them, in adversity you do not have to fear them. But when for their own ambitious ends they shun binding themselves, it is a token that they are giving more thought to themselves than to you, and a prince ought to guard against such, and to fear them as if they were open enemies, because in adversity they always help to ruin him. Therefore, one who becomes a prince through the favour of the people ought to keep them friendly, and this he can easily do seeing they only ask not to be oppressed by him. But one who, in opposition to the people, becomes a prince by the favour of the nobles, ought, above everything, to seek to win the people over to himself, and this he may easily do if he takes them under his protection. Because men, when they receive good from him of whom they were expecting evil, are bound more closely to their benefactor; thus the people quickly become more devoted to him than if he had been raised to the principality by their favours; and the prince can win their affections in many ways, but as these vary according to the circumstances one cannot give fixed rules, so I omit them; but, I repeat, it is necessary for a prince to have the people friendly, otherwise he has no security in adversity. Nabis,(*) Prince of the Spartans, sustained the attack of all Greece, and of a victorious Roman army, and against them he defended his country and his government; and for the overcoming of this peril it was only necessary for him to make himself secure against a few, but this would not have been sufficient had the people been hostile. And do not let any one impugn this statement with the trite proverb that "He who builds on the people, builds on the mud," for this is true when a private citizen makes a foundation there, and persuades himself that the people will free him when he is oppressed by his enemies or by the magistrates; wherein he would find himself very often deceived, as happened to the Gracchi in Rome and to Messer Giorgio Scali(+) in Florence. But granted a prince who has established himself as above, who can command, and is a man of courage, undismayed in adversity, who does not fail in other qualifications, and who, by his resolution and energy, keeps the whole people encouraged--such a one will never find himself deceived in them, and it will be shown that he has laid his foundations well. (*) Nabis, tyrant of Sparta, conquered by the Romans under Flamininus in 195 B.C.; killed 192 B.C. (+) Messer Giorgio Scali. This event is to be found in Machiavelli's "Florentine History," Book III. These principalities are liable to danger when they are passing from the civil to the absolute order of government, for such princes either rule personally or through magistrates. In the latter case their government is weaker and more insecure, because it rests entirely on the goodwill of those citizens who are raised to the magistracy, and who, especially in troubled times, can destroy the government with great ease, either by intrigue or open defiance; and the prince has not the chance amid tumults to exercise absolute authority, because the citizens and subjects, accustomed to receive orders from magistrates, are not of a mind to obey him amid these confusions, and there will always be in doubtful times a scarcity of men whom he can trust. For such a prince cannot rely upon what he observes in quiet times, when citizens have need of the state, because then every one agrees with him; they all promise, and when death is far distant they all wish to die for him; but in troubled times, when the state has need of its citizens, then he finds but few. And so much the more is this experiment dangerous, inasmuch as it can only be tried once. Therefore a wise prince ought to adopt such a course that his citizens will always in every sort and kind of circumstance have need of the state and of him, and then he will always find them faithful.

Chapter 9

https://web.archive.org/web/20201108110625/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/p/the-prince/summary-and-analysis/chapter-9

When private citizens become rulers through the favor of their fellow citizens, these may be called civil principalities. One can reach this position through the favor of either the common citizens or the nobles, because the two classes are found in every city. The nobles want only to oppress the people, and the people want only to avoid oppression. From these opposing impulses can come three results: a principality, a republic, or anarchy. When the nobles feel pressure from the people, they try to make one of their own the prince in order to protect their privileges. When the people feel they cannot resist the nobles, they try to make a fellow citizen prince in order to protect their rights. You can never satisfy the nobles by acting honorably, but you can satisfy the people. Regardless of how a prince comes to power, he should make every effort to win the good will of the people, or in times of trouble, he will have no hope. A prince must not delude himself about the reliability of the people, but nonetheless, a prince who makes good preparations and knows how to command will never be betrayed by them. A wise ruler will contrive to keep all his citizens dependent on him and on the state, and then he will be able to trust them.

Machiavelli's theme in this chapter is the relationship between the people and their opposites, the nobles . Machiavelli portrays these two groups as constantly at odds, but his sympathy is clearly with the people, who only want to live free under the rule of their own laws. Machiavelli himself belonged firmly in this group, having been prevented from holding high office because he was not an aristocrat, and having served his entire career in Florence's civil government. The Medici, to whom he was writing, were members of the nobility, and this makes his advice somewhat more daring than it may sound at first. As in Chapter 5, Machiavelli can be seen reminding the Medici how much free states like Florence value their freedom and how justified they are in doing so. Machiavelli emphasizes how necessary it is for a prince to win over the people, because they are many, while the nobles are few, and a prince can never live safely without being able to trust the people. On this subject, Machiavelli was going against prevailing opinion, which he acknowledges by quoting the proverb "He who builds on the people builds on mud." In fact, he is able to find only one example to support his argument , but two that disprove it . Machiavelli had many opportunities to observe the fickleness of the Florentine people, as they had alternately supported the Medici, Savonarola, the Republic, and then the Medici again. In another pessimistic observation about human nature, Machiavelli says that everyone is ready to die for you when the prospect of death is far off. The key, he maintains, is for the prince to keep his subjects dependent on him for all their benefits, because dependency is the only way to ensure loyalty. Characteristically, Machiavelli advocates a particular behavior not for its moral qualities, but because it accomplishes a specific goal for the prince: A prince should treat his subjects well and do all he can to benefit them, not necessarily because it is right to do so, but because it ultimately consolidates the prince's power. Machiavelli also insists on the importance of self-interest as a motivator throughout the chapter: He notes that all parties, whether princes, nobles, or common people, come into conflict or make alliances primarily to protect their own rights and privileges. Throughout the book, self-interest and a concern for one's own comfort level can be seen as the driving force in human behavior. Glossary Nabis ruler of Sparta . Machiavelli is probably exaggerating Nabis' success, but Nabis did introduce many social reforms. Gracchi brothers Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus . Roman officials who instituted many social reforms and were killed by aristocratic opponents. Giorgio Scali a leader of the Ciompi revolt in Florence in 1378. The wool workers' guild briefly held some political power, but its leaders, including Scali, were quickly overthrown and later executed.

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/5658-chapters/chapters_31_to_33.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Lord Jim/section_19_part_0.txt

Lord Jim.chapters 31-33

chapters 31-33

{"name": "Chapters 31-33", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219145744/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/l/lord-jim/summary-and-analysis/chapters-3133", "summary": "The next day, Jim spent a long time with Doramin, the old nakhoda, trying to impress on him and the principal men of the Bugis community the absolute necessity for immediate and vigorous action in order to counter Sherif Ali. Meanwhile, Sherif Ali's men strutted about, \"haughtily in white cloaks,\" spreading the rumor that Rajah Allang intended to join them in raiding and defeating the Bugis once and for all. The attack seemed imminent, and terror among the natives was intense and widespread. Jim returned home at sunset, pleased at having convinced Doramin of his plan to rout Sherif Ali. Now he had \"irretrievably committed\" the Bugis to action. Now, also, Jim had committed himself; in fact, all of the responsibility for success was \"on his own head.\" And yet he was elated and lighthearted with the fantastic possibility of his vision. In the middle of a deep sleep that night, Jim was awakened by Jewel. She put his revolver into his hand and insisted that he get up. Four men, she said, were waiting to kill him. Then she took him to one of the storehouses. Jim sighed. He was tired of these alarms, and he was angry with Jewel for her increasing anxiety. But he pushed open the door of the dungeon-like ruin of a storehouse anyway. At first, he saw nothing -- an empty wooden crate, and a litter of rags and straw. For days, he had been living with a heavy weight on his soul; if only there had been something here -- a trace or a sign of someone. But there was nothing. Suddenly, Jewel shouted at Jim to defend himself, and in the pale light, he saw the gleam of a pair of eyes within a heap of mats. Jim yelled for the man to come out, and a half-naked, glistening native pounced toward Jim, the blade of his knife above his head. Jim felt utter relief. He let the man come toward him until he could see his dilated nostrils and his wide eyes. Then he fired, his bullet exploding inside the man's mouth and disappearing through the back of his head. Afterward, Jim was strangely calm. He felt \"appeased, without rancour, without uneasiness.\" He stepped over the body and routed out three other naked figures, crawling forward from under the mats and holding out their empty hands. Jim led the prisoners out into the night, and Jewel followed, her white nightgown trailing and her black hair falling to her waist. At the edge of the river bank, Jim stopped. He told the men to take his greetings to Sherif Ali, and then he ordered them all to \"Jump!\" Afterward, when he and Jewel were alone on the river bank, Jim told Marlow that never before had he realized how dearly he loved Jewel. \"More than I can tell,\" Jim said; to him, his love for Jewel was \"idyllic, a little solemn, and also true.\" In addition, Jim expressed his almost disbelief in the natives' complete trust of him. He knew that he was equated with what was \"true\" and \"brave\" and \"just,\" and yet he knew his own secret nature -- that is, he knew how utterly he had failed, once. Later, after sundown, Marlow was stopped by Jewel. She wanted assurance\" from Marlow, \"a statement, a promise, an explanation.\" Her life had been a puzzle and a living hell -- until Jim's appearance. Now she had fallen in love with him -- a white man -- exactly what her mother warned her against. What would keep Jim from leaving her and Patusan one day? The world \"out there\" had always been one vast Unknown to her, and then Jim came to her from that vast Unknown, as did Marlow now. Marlow sensed that she felt that he could -- and would -- \"with a word whisk Jim away -- out of her arms.\" He was overwhelmed by her breathless urgency to keep Jim. Marlow was touched by Jewel's innocence and her youth, as well as by her \"wild flower\" beauty and by her tremulous fears. To her, Marlow clearly stood for the frightening void of the Unknown. If he had not come for Jim, Jewel asked, why had he come? Marlow tried to explain that he had come because of friendship and because of business. But the girl was firmly convinced that he had come for Jim. Marlow said that she must trust Jim: he would never leave her. Marlow also told her that she was the only one in Patusan who doubted Jim's word. Jewel said that Jim swore never to leave her, but she could not believe him. His promise was not enough. And yet she feared for his life if he stayed. She had even begged him to go. But after Jim killed a man and sent three others back to Sherif Ali, he and Jewel fell in love \"under the shadow of a life's disaster.\" Jewel said that she feared dying like her mother -- that is, dying of sorrow because of a man. And even if Jim did swear never to leave her, what made his vow any more honorable than any other white man's vow? Was Jim, she asked Marlow, any different from other men? Marlow answered Jewel. He said that yes, Jim was different. Was Jim, Jewel asked, more brave? More true? Marlow tried to discover what Jim had told the girl about his past, but he could not. Seemingly, Jim had told her only that once, long ago, he was \"afraid.\" Jewel beseeched Marlow to tell her what it was that Jim was afraid of. How could she battle this ghost in Jim's past? Jim had told her that \"the world out there\" did not want him; was it true, she asked. Marlow answered that yes, it was true. Jewel continued to ask questions about Jim until Marlow exasperatedly shouted that Jim was \"not good enough\" for the world. Jewel was stunned. Those were the same words that Jim had uttered when he had told her why he had to stay on at Patusan. \"You lie!\" she cried out to Marlow. Hearing footsteps, Marlow slipped away.", "analysis": "These chapters are essentially devoted to the love that developed between Jim and Jewel, and the difficulties that Jewel encountered when she tried to believe Jim and trust him -- in spite of the fact that everyone else in the village trusted him completely. In Chapter 31, we go back in narrative time to a point before Jim blew up Sherif Ali's fortress; we return to a night when four of Sherif Ali's men attempted to kill Jim. It was the first night that Jim discovered that the girl, Jewel, had constantly kept a vigil over him while he was sleeping, thus indicating to him her deep concern for him. At first, when Jewel came to him, Jim thought that she was in trouble; then he was annoyed when she told him that his life was in danger. He had heard this fear expressed so many times from so many people that the threat had become boring. This time, however, Jewel was correct, and we see Jim confronting the charging killer and capturing the three men in hiding. The entire purpose of this scene is to illustrate both to the reader and to Jewel the nature of Jim's courage. Here, in the face of almost certain death, Jim did not \"jump.\" He held his ground until the last possible moment, and then he fired at the charging killer. By standing his ground, Jim displayed considerable courage; in one sense, he has begun to redeem himself from his jump from the Patna. Furthermore, Jim grew in stature in Jewel's eyes. In Chapter 32, Jim expressed some of the paradoxes of his love for Jewel. First of all, he couldn't leave her because he had become convinced that his very existence was essential for her own continued existence. He was obligated to her. He was, however, troubled that he could never be completely honest with her, partly because she would never believe him if he were to tell her the true reason for his being in Patusan. That is, Jewel has seen Lord Jim perform outstanding acts of bravery, courage, and defiance; thus, she would never believe him if he were to tell her the true state of affairs. But the colossal irony is that if Jim were to tell Jewel or anyone else about his past, they not only wouldn't care, but they would agree that Jim had done the right thing in saving his own life. This view is what will make it so impossible for Jewel and Tamb' Itam to accept Jim's decision, at the end of the novel, not to \"run for his life.\" Chapters 32 and 33 present a fuller view of Jewel. When she is alone with Marlow, she questions him about Jim because she can't understand Jim. We see her as an acute, sharp, intelligent woman, but one who is still naive and innocent. She also has deep fears of Marlow's \"hold\" over Jim, and as Marlow says: I belonged to the Unknown that might claim Jim for its own at any moment.\" Jewel greatly fears this great Unknown. Jewel knows that other white men have come, and they have always left after awhile: \"They always leave us.\" Sometimes she thinks that Jim \"in his sleep when he cannot see me then arise and go\" because even though \"other men had sworn the same,\" yet they all have left. The irony of these fears is that, in the ultimate analysis, Jewel is right. In deciding not to flee and in his decision to face death rather than live with her, Jim will be \"deserting\" Jewel."}

'You may imagine with what interest I listened. All these details were perceived to have some significance twenty-four hours later. In the morning Cornelius made no allusion to the events of the night. "I suppose you will come back to my poor house," he muttered, surlily, slinking up just as Jim was entering the canoe to go over to Doramin's campong. Jim only nodded, without looking at him. "You find it good fun, no doubt," muttered the other in a sour tone. Jim spent the day with the old nakhoda, preaching the necessity of vigorous action to the principal men of the Bugis community, who had been summoned for a big talk. He remembered with pleasure how very eloquent and persuasive he had been. "I managed to put some backbone into them that time, and no mistake," he said. Sherif Ali's last raid had swept the outskirts of the settlement, and some women belonging to the town had been carried off to the stockade. Sherif Ali's emissaries had been seen in the market-place the day before, strutting about haughtily in white cloaks, and boasting of the Rajah's friendship for their master. One of them stood forward in the shade of a tree, and, leaning on the long barrel of a rifle, exhorted the people to prayer and repentance, advising them to kill all the strangers in their midst, some of whom, he said, were infidels and others even worse--children of Satan in the guise of Moslems. It was reported that several of the Rajah's people amongst the listeners had loudly expressed their approbation. The terror amongst the common people was intense. Jim, immensely pleased with his day's work, crossed the river again before sunset. 'As he had got the Bugis irretrievably committed to action and had made himself responsible for success on his own head, he was so elated that in the lightness of his heart he absolutely tried to be civil with Cornelius. But Cornelius became wildly jovial in response, and it was almost more than he could stand, he says, to hear his little squeaks of false laughter, to see him wriggle and blink, and suddenly catch hold of his chin and crouch low over the table with a distracted stare. The girl did not show herself, and Jim retired early. When he rose to say good-night, Cornelius jumped up, knocking his chair over, and ducked out of sight as if to pick up something he had dropped. His good-night came huskily from under the table. Jim was amazed to see him emerge with a dropping jaw, and staring, stupidly frightened eyes. He clutched the edge of the table. "What's the matter? Are you unwell?" asked Jim. "Yes, yes, yes. A great colic in my stomach," says the other; and it is Jim's opinion that it was perfectly true. If so, it was, in view of his contemplated action, an abject sign of a still imperfect callousness for which he must be given all due credit. 'Be it as it may, Jim's slumbers were disturbed by a dream of heavens like brass resounding with a great voice, which called upon him to Awake! Awake! so loud that, notwithstanding his desperate determination to sleep on, he did wake up in reality. The glare of a red spluttering conflagration going on in mid-air fell on his eyes. Coils of black thick smoke curved round the head of some apparition, some unearthly being, all in white, with a severe, drawn, anxious face. After a second or so he recognised the girl. She was holding a dammar torch at arm's-length aloft, and in a persistent, urgent monotone she was repeating, "Get up! Get up! Get up!" 'Suddenly he leaped to his feet; at once she put into his hand a revolver, his own revolver, which had been hanging on a nail, but loaded this time. He gripped it in silence, bewildered, blinking in the light. He wondered what he could do for her. 'She asked rapidly and very low, "Can you face four men with this?" He laughed while narrating this part at the recollection of his polite alacrity. It seems he made a great display of it. "Certainly--of course--certainly--command me." He was not properly awake, and had a notion of being very civil in these extraordinary circumstances, of showing his unquestioning, devoted readiness. She left the room, and he followed her; in the passage they disturbed an old hag who did the casual cooking of the household, though she was so decrepit as to be hardly able to understand human speech. She got up and hobbled behind them, mumbling toothlessly. On the verandah a hammock of sail-cloth, belonging to Cornelius, swayed lightly to the touch of Jim's elbow. It was empty. 'The Patusan establishment, like all the posts of Stein's Trading Company, had originally consisted of four buildings. Two of them were represented by two heaps of sticks, broken bamboos, rotten thatch, over which the four corner-posts of hardwood leaned sadly at different angles: the principal storeroom, however, stood yet, facing the agent's house. It was an oblong hut, built of mud and clay; it had at one end a wide door of stout planking, which so far had not come off the hinges, and in one of the side walls there was a square aperture, a sort of window, with three wooden bars. Before descending the few steps the girl turned her face over her shoulder and said quickly, "You were to be set upon while you slept." Jim tells me he experienced a sense of deception. It was the old story. He was weary of these attempts upon his life. He had had his fill of these alarms. He was sick of them. He assured me he was angry with the girl for deceiving him. He had followed her under the impression that it was she who wanted his help, and now he had half a mind to turn on his heel and go back in disgust. "Do you know," he commented profoundly, "I rather think I was not quite myself for whole weeks on end about that time." "Oh yes. You were though," I couldn't help contradicting. 'But she moved on swiftly, and he followed her into the courtyard. All its fences had fallen in a long time ago; the neighbours' buffaloes would pace in the morning across the open space, snorting profoundly, without haste; the very jungle was invading it already. Jim and the girl stopped in the rank grass. The light in which they stood made a dense blackness all round, and only above their heads there was an opulent glitter of stars. He told me it was a beautiful night--quite cool, with a little stir of breeze from the river. It seems he noticed its friendly beauty. Remember this is a love story I am telling you now. A lovely night seemed to breathe on them a soft caress. The flame of the torch streamed now and then with a fluttering noise like a flag, and for a time this was the only sound. "They are in the storeroom waiting," whispered the girl; "they are waiting for the signal." "Who's to give it?" he asked. She shook the torch, which blazed up after a shower of sparks. "Only you have been sleeping so restlessly," she continued in a murmur; "I watched your sleep, too." "You!" he exclaimed, craning his neck to look about him. "You think I watched on this night only!" she said, with a sort of despairing indignation. 'He says it was as if he had received a blow on the chest. He gasped. He thought he had been an awful brute somehow, and he felt remorseful, touched, happy, elated. This, let me remind you again, is a love story; you can see it by the imbecility, not a repulsive imbecility, the exalted imbecility of these proceedings, this station in torchlight, as if they had come there on purpose to have it out for the edification of concealed murderers. If Sherif Ali's emissaries had been possessed--as Jim remarked--of a pennyworth of spunk, this was the time to make a rush. His heart was thumping--not with fear--but he seemed to hear the grass rustle, and he stepped smartly out of the light. Something dark, imperfectly seen, flitted rapidly out of sight. He called out in a strong voice, "Cornelius! O Cornelius!" A profound silence succeeded: his voice did not seem to have carried twenty feet. Again the girl was by his side. "Fly!" she said. The old woman was coming up; her broken figure hovered in crippled little jumps on the edge of the light; they heard her mumbling, and a light, moaning sigh. "Fly!" repeated the girl excitedly. "They are frightened now--this light--the voices. They know you are awake now--they know you are big, strong, fearless . . ." "If I am all that," he began; but she interrupted him: "Yes--to-night! But what of to-morrow night? Of the next night? Of the night after--of all the many, many nights? Can I be always watching?" A sobbing catch of her breath affected him beyond the power of words. 'He told me that he had never felt so small, so powerless--and as to courage, what was the good of it? he thought. He was so helpless that even flight seemed of no use; and though she kept on whispering, "Go to Doramin, go to Doramin," with feverish insistence, he realised that for him there was no refuge from that loneliness which centupled all his dangers except--in her. "I thought," he said to me, "that if I went away from her it would be the end of everything somehow." Only as they couldn't stop there for ever in the middle of that courtyard, he made up his mind to go and look into the storehouse. He let her follow him without thinking of any protest, as if they had been indissolubly united. "I am fearless--am I?" he muttered through his teeth. She restrained his arm. "Wait till you hear my voice," she said, and, torch in hand, ran lightly round the corner. He remained alone in the darkness, his face to the door: not a sound, not a breath came from the other side. The old hag let out a dreary groan somewhere behind his back. He heard a high-pitched almost screaming call from the girl. "Now! Push!" He pushed violently; the door swung with a creak and a clatter, disclosing to his intense astonishment the low dungeon-like interior illuminated by a lurid, wavering glare. A turmoil of smoke eddied down upon an empty wooden crate in the middle of the floor, a litter of rags and straw tried to soar, but only stirred feebly in the draught. She had thrust the light through the bars of the window. He saw her bare round arm extended and rigid, holding up the torch with the steadiness of an iron bracket. A conical ragged heap of old mats cumbered a distant corner almost to the ceiling, and that was all. 'He explained to me that he was bitterly disappointed at this. His fortitude had been tried by so many warnings, he had been for weeks surrounded by so many hints of danger, that he wanted the relief of some reality, of something tangible that he could meet. "It would have cleared the air for a couple of hours at least, if you know what I mean," he said to me. "Jove! I had been living for days with a stone on my chest." Now at last he had thought he would get hold of something, and--nothing! Not a trace, not a sign of anybody. He had raised his weapon as the door flew open, but now his arm fell. "Fire! Defend yourself," the girl outside cried in an agonising voice. She, being in the dark and with her arm thrust in to the shoulder through the small hole, couldn't see what was going on, and she dared not withdraw the torch now to run round. "There's nobody here!" yelled Jim contemptuously, but his impulse to burst into a resentful exasperated laugh died without a sound: he had perceived in the very act of turning away that he was exchanging glances with a pair of eyes in the heap of mats. He saw a shifting gleam of whites. "Come out!" he cried in a fury, a little doubtful, and a dark-faced head, a head without a body, shaped itself in the rubbish, a strangely detached head, that looked at him with a steady scowl. Next moment the whole mound stirred, and with a low grunt a man emerged swiftly, and bounded towards Jim. Behind him the mats as it were jumped and flew, his right arm was raised with a crooked elbow, and the dull blade of a kriss protruded from his fist held off, a little above his head. A cloth wound tight round his loins seemed dazzlingly white on his bronze skin; his naked body glistened as if wet. 'Jim noted all this. He told me he was experiencing a feeling of unutterable relief, of vengeful elation. He held his shot, he says, deliberately. He held it for the tenth part of a second, for three strides of the man--an unconscionable time. He held it for the pleasure of saying to himself, That's a dead man! He was absolutely positive and certain. He let him come on because it did not matter. A dead man, anyhow. He noticed the dilated nostrils, the wide eyes, the intent, eager stillness of the face, and then he fired. 'The explosion in that confined space was stunning. He stepped back a pace. He saw the man jerk his head up, fling his arms forward, and drop the kriss. He ascertained afterwards that he had shot him through the mouth, a little upwards, the bullet coming out high at the back of the skull. With the impetus of his rush the man drove straight on, his face suddenly gaping disfigured, with his hands open before him gropingly, as though blinded, and landed with terrific violence on his forehead, just short of Jim's bare toes. Jim says he didn't lose the smallest detail of all this. He found himself calm, appeased, without rancour, without uneasiness, as if the death of that man had atoned for everything. The place was getting very full of sooty smoke from the torch, in which the unswaying flame burned blood-red without a flicker. He walked in resolutely, striding over the dead body, and covered with his revolver another naked figure outlined vaguely at the other end. As he was about to pull the trigger, the man threw away with force a short heavy spear, and squatted submissively on his hams, his back to the wall and his clasped hands between his legs. "You want your life?" Jim said. The other made no sound. "How many more of you?" asked Jim again. "Two more, Tuan," said the man very softly, looking with big fascinated eyes into the muzzle of the revolver. Accordingly two more crawled from under the mats, holding out ostentatiously their empty hands.''Jim took up an advantageous position and shepherded them out in a bunch through the doorway: all that time the torch had remained vertical in the grip of a little hand, without so much as a tremble. The three men obeyed him, perfectly mute, moving automatically. He ranged them in a row. "Link arms!" he ordered. They did so. "The first who withdraws his arm or turns his head is a dead man," he said. "March!" They stepped out together, rigidly; he followed, and at the side the girl, in a trailing white gown, her black hair falling as low as her waist, bore the light. Erect and swaying, she seemed to glide without touching the earth; the only sound was the silky swish and rustle of the long grass. "Stop!" cried Jim. 'The river-bank was steep; a great freshness ascended, the light fell on the edge of smooth dark water frothing without a ripple; right and left the shapes of the houses ran together below the sharp outlines of the roofs. "Take my greetings to Sherif Ali--till I come myself," said Jim. Not one head of the three budged. "Jump!" he thundered. The three splashes made one splash, a shower flew up, black heads bobbed convulsively, and disappeared; but a great blowing and spluttering went on, growing faint, for they were diving industriously in great fear of a parting shot. Jim turned to the girl, who had been a silent and attentive observer. His heart seemed suddenly to grow too big for his breast and choke him in the hollow of his throat. This probably made him speechless for so long, and after returning his gaze she flung the burning torch with a wide sweep of the arm into the river. The ruddy fiery glare, taking a long flight through the night, sank with a vicious hiss, and the calm soft starlight descended upon them, unchecked. 'He did not tell me what it was he said when at last he recovered his voice. I don't suppose he could be very eloquent. The world was still, the night breathed on them, one of those nights that seem created for the sheltering of tenderness, and there are moments when our souls, as if freed from their dark envelope, glow with an exquisite sensibility that makes certain silences more lucid than speeches. As to the girl, he told me, "She broke down a bit. Excitement--don't you know. Reaction. Deucedly tired she must have been--and all that kind of thing. And--and--hang it all--she was fond of me, don't you see. . . . I too . . . didn't know, of course . . . never entered my head . . ." 'Then he got up and began to walk about in some agitation. "I--I love her dearly. More than I can tell. Of course one cannot tell. You take a different view of your actions when you come to understand, when you are _made_ to understand every day that your existence is necessary--you see, absolutely necessary--to another person. I am made to feel that. Wonderful! But only try to think what her life has been. It is too extravagantly awful! Isn't it? And me finding her here like this--as you may go out for a stroll and come suddenly upon somebody drowning in a lonely dark place. Jove! No time to lose. Well, it is a trust too . . . I believe I am equal to it . . ." 'I must tell you the girl had left us to ourselves some time before. He slapped his chest. "Yes! I feel that, but I believe I am equal to all my luck!" He had the gift of finding a special meaning in everything that happened to him. This was the view he took of his love affair; it was idyllic, a little solemn, and also true, since his belief had all the unshakable seriousness of youth. Some time after, on another occasion, he said to me, "I've been only two years here, and now, upon my word, I can't conceive being able to live anywhere else. The very thought of the world outside is enough to give me a fright; because, don't you see," he continued, with downcast eyes watching the action of his boot busied in squashing thoroughly a tiny bit of dried mud (we were strolling on the river-bank)--"because I have not forgotten why I came here. Not yet!" 'I refrained from looking at him, but I think I heard a short sigh; we took a turn or two in silence. "Upon my soul and conscience," he began again, "if such a thing can be forgotten, then I think I have a right to dismiss it from my mind. Ask any man here" . . . his voice changed. "Is it not strange," he went on in a gentle, almost yearning tone, "that all these people, all these people who would do anything for me, can never be made to understand? Never! If you disbelieved me I could not call them up. It seems hard, somehow. I am stupid, am I not? What more can I want? If you ask them who is brave--who is true--who is just--who is it they would trust with their lives?--they would say, Tuan Jim. And yet they can never know the real, real truth . . ." 'That's what he said to me on my last day with him. I did not let a murmur escape me: I felt he was going to say more, and come no nearer to the root of the matter. The sun, whose concentrated glare dwarfs the earth into a restless mote of dust, had sunk behind the forest, and the diffused light from an opal sky seemed to cast upon a world without shadows and without brilliance the illusion of a calm and pensive greatness. I don't know why, listening to him, I should have noted so distinctly the gradual darkening of the river, of the air; the irresistible slow work of the night settling silently on all the visible forms, effacing the outlines, burying the shapes deeper and deeper, like a steady fall of impalpable black dust. '"Jove!" he began abruptly, "there are days when a fellow is too absurd for anything; only I know I can tell you what I like. I talk about being done with it--with the bally thing at the back of my head . . . Forgetting . . . Hang me if I know! I can think of it quietly. After all, what has it proved? Nothing. I suppose you don't think so . . ." 'I made a protesting murmur. '"No matter," he said. "I am satisfied . . . nearly. I've got to look only at the face of the first man that comes along, to regain my confidence. They can't be made to understand what is going on in me. What of that? Come! I haven't done so badly." '"Not so badly," I said. '"But all the same, you wouldn't like to have me aboard your own ship hey?" '"Confound you!" I cried. "Stop this." '"Aha! You see," he said, crowing, as it were, over me placidly. "Only," he went on, "you just try to tell this to any of them here. They would think you a fool, a liar, or worse. And so I can stand it. I've done a thing or two for them, but this is what they have done for me." '"My dear chap," I cried, "you shall always remain for them an insoluble mystery." Thereupon we were silent. '"Mystery," he repeated, before looking up. "Well, then let me always remain here." 'After the sun had set, the darkness seemed to drive upon us, borne in every faint puff of the breeze. In the middle of a hedged path I saw the arrested, gaunt, watchful, and apparently one-legged silhouette of Tamb' Itam; and across the dusky space my eye detected something white moving to and fro behind the supports of the roof. As soon as Jim, with Tamb' Itam at his heels, had started upon his evening rounds, I went up to the house alone, and, unexpectedly, found myself waylaid by the girl, who had been clearly waiting for this opportunity. 'It is hard to tell you what it was precisely she wanted to wrest from me. Obviously it would be something very simple--the simplest impossibility in the world; as, for instance, the exact description of the form of a cloud. She wanted an assurance, a statement, a promise, an explanation--I don't know how to call it: the thing has no name. It was dark under the projecting roof, and all I could see were the flowing lines of her gown, the pale small oval of her face, with the white flash of her teeth, and, turned towards me, the big sombre orbits of her eyes, where there seemed to be a faint stir, such as you may fancy you can detect when you plunge your gaze to the bottom of an immensely deep well. What is it that moves there? you ask yourself. Is it a blind monster or only a lost gleam from the universe? It occurred to me--don't laugh--that all things being dissimilar, she was more inscrutable in her childish ignorance than the Sphinx propounding childish riddles to wayfarers. She had been carried off to Patusan before her eyes were open. She had grown up there; she had seen nothing, she had known nothing, she had no conception of anything. I ask myself whether she were sure that anything else existed. What notions she may have formed of the outside world is to me inconceivable: all that she knew of its inhabitants were a betrayed woman and a sinister pantaloon. Her lover also came to her from there, gifted with irresistible seductions; but what would become of her if he should return to these inconceivable regions that seemed always to claim back their own? Her mother had warned her of this with tears, before she died . . . 'She had caught hold of my arm firmly, and as soon as I had stopped she had withdrawn her hand in haste. She was audacious and shrinking. She feared nothing, but she was checked by the profound incertitude and the extreme strangeness--a brave person groping in the dark. I belonged to this Unknown that might claim Jim for its own at any moment. I was, as it were, in the secret of its nature and of its intentions--the confidant of a threatening mystery--armed with its power perhaps! I believe she supposed I could with a word whisk Jim away out of her very arms; it is my sober conviction she went through agonies of apprehension during my long talks with Jim; through a real and intolerable anguish that might have conceivably driven her into plotting my murder, had the fierceness of her soul been equal to the tremendous situation it had created. This is my impression, and it is all I can give you: the whole thing dawned gradually upon me, and as it got clearer and clearer I was overwhelmed by a slow incredulous amazement. She made me believe her, but there is no word that on my lips could render the effect of the headlong and vehement whisper, of the soft, passionate tones, of the sudden breathless pause and the appealing movement of the white arms extended swiftly. They fell; the ghostly figure swayed like a slender tree in the wind, the pale oval of the face drooped; it was impossible to distinguish her features, the darkness of the eyes was unfathomable; two wide sleeves uprose in the dark like unfolding wings, and she stood silent, holding her head in her hands.' 'I was immensely touched: her youth, her ignorance, her pretty beauty, which had the simple charm and the delicate vigour of a wild-flower, her pathetic pleading, her helplessness, appealed to me with almost the strength of her own unreasonable and natural fear. She feared the unknown as we all do, and her ignorance made the unknown infinitely vast. I stood for it, for myself, for you fellows, for all the world that neither cared for Jim nor needed him in the least. I would have been ready enough to answer for the indifference of the teeming earth but for the reflection that he too belonged to this mysterious unknown of her fears, and that, however much I stood for, I did not stand for him. This made me hesitate. A murmur of hopeless pain unsealed my lips. I began by protesting that I at least had come with no intention to take Jim away. 'Why did I come, then? After a slight movement she was as still as a marble statue in the night. I tried to explain briefly: friendship, business; if I had any wish in the matter it was rather to see him stay. . . . "They always leave us," she murmured. The breath of sad wisdom from the grave which her piety wreathed with flowers seemed to pass in a faint sigh. . . . Nothing, I said, could separate Jim from her. 'It is my firm conviction now; it was my conviction at the time; it was the only possible conclusion from the facts of the case. It was not made more certain by her whispering in a tone in which one speaks to oneself, "He swore this to me." "Did you ask him?" I said. 'She made a step nearer. "No. Never!" She had asked him only to go away. It was that night on the river-bank, after he had killed the man--after she had flung the torch in the water because he was looking at her so. There was too much light, and the danger was over then--for a little time--for a little time. He said then he would not abandon her to Cornelius. She had insisted. She wanted him to leave her. He said that he could not--that it was impossible. He trembled while he said this. She had felt him tremble. . . . One does not require much imagination to see the scene, almost to hear their whispers. She was afraid for him too. I believe that then she saw in him only a predestined victim of dangers which she understood better than himself. Though by nothing but his mere presence he had mastered her heart, had filled all her thoughts, and had possessed himself of all her affections, she underestimated his chances of success. It is obvious that at about that time everybody was inclined to underestimate his chances. Strictly speaking he didn't seem to have any. I know this was Cornelius's view. He confessed that much to me in extenuation of the shady part he had played in Sherif Ali's plot to do away with the infidel. Even Sherif Ali himself, as it seems certain now, had nothing but contempt for the white man. Jim was to be murdered mainly on religious grounds, I believe. A simple act of piety (and so far infinitely meritorious), but otherwise without much importance. In the last part of this opinion Cornelius concurred. "Honourable sir," he argued abjectly on the only occasion he managed to have me to himself--"honourable sir, how was I to know? Who was he? What could he do to make people believe him? What did Mr. Stein mean sending a boy like that to talk big to an old servant? I was ready to save him for eighty dollars. Only eighty dollars. Why didn't the fool go? Was I to get stabbed myself for the sake of a stranger?" He grovelled in spirit before me, with his body doubled up insinuatingly and his hands hovering about my knees, as though he were ready to embrace my legs. "What's eighty dollars? An insignificant sum to give to a defenceless old man ruined for life by a deceased she-devil." Here he wept. But I anticipate. I didn't that night chance upon Cornelius till I had had it out with the girl. 'She was unselfish when she urged Jim to leave her, and even to leave the country. It was his danger that was foremost in her thoughts--even if she wanted to save herself too--perhaps unconsciously: but then look at the warning she had, look at the lesson that could be drawn from every moment of the recently ended life in which all her memories were centred. She fell at his feet--she told me so--there by the river, in the discreet light of stars which showed nothing except great masses of silent shadows, indefinite open spaces, and trembling faintly upon the broad stream made it appear as wide as the sea. He had lifted her up. He lifted her up, and then she would struggle no more. Of course not. Strong arms, a tender voice, a stalwart shoulder to rest her poor lonely little head upon. The need--the infinite need--of all this for the aching heart, for the bewildered mind;--the promptings of youth--the necessity of the moment. What would you have? One understands--unless one is incapable of understanding anything under the sun. And so she was content to be lifted up--and held. "You know--Jove! this is serious--no nonsense in it!" as Jim had whispered hurriedly with a troubled concerned face on the threshold of his house. I don't know so much about nonsense, but there was nothing light-hearted in their romance: they came together under the shadow of a life's disaster, like knight and maiden meeting to exchange vows amongst haunted ruins. The starlight was good enough for that story, a light so faint and remote that it cannot resolve shadows into shapes, and show the other shore of a stream. I did look upon the stream that night and from the very place; it rolled silent and as black as Styx: the next day I went away, but I am not likely to forget what it was she wanted to be saved from when she entreated him to leave her while there was time. She told me what it was, calmed--she was now too passionately interested for mere excitement--in a voice as quiet in the obscurity as her white half-lost figure. She told me, "I didn't want to die weeping." I thought I had not heard aright. '"You did not want to die weeping?" I repeated after her. "Like my mother," she added readily. The outlines of her white shape did not stir in the least. "My mother had wept bitterly before she died," she explained. An inconceivable calmness seemed to have risen from the ground around us, imperceptibly, like the still rise of a flood in the night, obliterating the familiar landmarks of emotions. There came upon me, as though I had felt myself losing my footing in the midst of waters, a sudden dread, the dread of the unknown depths. She went on explaining that, during the last moments, being alone with her mother, she had to leave the side of the couch to go and set her back against the door, in order to keep Cornelius out. He desired to get in, and kept on drumming with both fists, only desisting now and again to shout huskily, "Let me in! Let me in! Let me in!" In a far corner upon a few mats the moribund woman, already speechless and unable to lift her arm, rolled her head over, and with a feeble movement of her hand seemed to command--"No! No!" and the obedient daughter, setting her shoulders with all her strength against the door, was looking on. "The tears fell from her eyes--and then she died," concluded the girl in an imperturbable monotone, which more than anything else, more than the white statuesque immobility of her person, more than mere words could do, troubled my mind profoundly with the passive, irremediable horror of the scene. It had the power to drive me out of my conception of existence, out of that shelter each of us makes for himself to creep under in moments of danger, as a tortoise withdraws within its shell. For a moment I had a view of a world that seemed to wear a vast and dismal aspect of disorder, while, in truth, thanks to our unwearied efforts, it is as sunny an arrangement of small conveniences as the mind of man can conceive. But still--it was only a moment: I went back into my shell directly. One _must_--don't you know?--though I seemed to have lost all my words in the chaos of dark thoughts I had contemplated for a second or two beyond the pale. These came back, too, very soon, for words also belong to the sheltering conception of light and order which is our refuge. I had them ready at my disposal before she whispered softly, "He swore he would never leave me, when we stood there alone! He swore to me!". . . "And it is possible that you--you! do not believe him?" I asked, sincerely reproachful, genuinely shocked. Why couldn't she believe? Wherefore this craving for incertitude, this clinging to fear, as if incertitude and fear had been the safeguards of her love. It was monstrous. She should have made for herself a shelter of inexpugnable peace out of that honest affection. She had not the knowledge--not the skill perhaps. The night had come on apace; it had grown pitch-dark where we were, so that without stirring she had faded like the intangible form of a wistful and perverse spirit. And suddenly I heard her quiet whisper again, "Other men had sworn the same thing." It was like a meditative comment on some thoughts full of sadness, of awe. And she added, still lower if possible, "My father did." She paused the time to draw an inaudible breath. "Her father too." . . . These were the things she knew! At once I said, "Ah! but he is not like that." This, it seemed, she did not intend to dispute; but after a time the strange still whisper wandering dreamily in the air stole into my ears. "Why is he different? Is he better? Is he . . ." "Upon my word of honour," I broke in, "I believe he is." We subdued our tones to a mysterious pitch. Amongst the huts of Jim's workmen (they were mostly liberated slaves from the Sherif's stockade) somebody started a shrill, drawling song. Across the river a big fire (at Doramin's, I think) made a glowing ball, completely isolated in the night. "Is he more true?" she murmured. "Yes," I said. "More true than any other man," she repeated in lingering accents. "Nobody here," I said, "would dream of doubting his word--nobody would dare--except you." 'I think she made a movement at this. "More brave," she went on in a changed tone. "Fear will never drive him away from you," I said a little nervously. The song stopped short on a shrill note, and was succeeded by several voices talking in the distance. Jim's voice too. I was struck by her silence. "What has he been telling you? He has been telling you something?" I asked. There was no answer. "What is it he told you?" I insisted. '"Do you think I can tell you? How am I to know? How am I to understand?" she cried at last. There was a stir. I believe she was wringing her hands. "There is something he can never forget." '"So much the better for you," I said gloomily. '"What is it? What is it?" She put an extraordinary force of appeal into her supplicating tone. "He says he had been afraid. How can I believe this? Am I a mad woman to believe this? You all remember something! You all go back to it. What is it? You tell me! What is this thing? Is it alive?--is it dead? I hate it. It is cruel. Has it got a face and a voice--this calamity? Will he see it--will he hear it? In his sleep perhaps when he cannot see me--and then arise and go. Ah! I shall never forgive him. My mother had forgiven--but I, never! Will it be a sign--a call?" 'It was a wonderful experience. She mistrusted his very slumbers--and she seemed to think I could tell her why! Thus a poor mortal seduced by the charm of an apparition might have tried to wring from another ghost the tremendous secret of the claim the other world holds over a disembodied soul astray amongst the passions of this earth. The very ground on which I stood seemed to melt under my feet. And it was so simple too; but if the spirits evoked by our fears and our unrest have ever to vouch for each other's constancy before the forlorn magicians that we are, then I--I alone of us dwellers in the flesh--have shuddered in the hopeless chill of such a task. A sign, a call! How telling in its expression was her ignorance. A few words! How she came to know them, how she came to pronounce them, I can't imagine. Women find their inspiration in the stress of moments that for us are merely awful, absurd, or futile. To discover that she had a voice at all was enough to strike awe into the heart. Had a spurned stone cried out in pain it could not have appeared a greater and more pitiful miracle. These few sounds wandering in the dark had made their two benighted lives tragic to my mind. It was impossible to make her understand. I chafed silently at my impotence. And Jim, too--poor devil! Who would need him? Who would remember him? He had what he wanted. His very existence probably had been forgotten by this time. They had mastered their fates. They were tragic. 'Her immobility before me was clearly expectant, and my part was to speak for my brother from the realm of forgetful shade. I was deeply moved at my responsibility and at her distress. I would have given anything for the power to soothe her frail soul, tormenting itself in its invincible ignorance like a small bird beating about the cruel wires of a cage. Nothing easier than to say, Have no fear! Nothing more difficult. How does one kill fear, I wonder? How do you shoot a spectre through the heart, slash off its spectral head, take it by its spectral throat? It is an enterprise you rush into while you dream, and are glad to make your escape with wet hair and every limb shaking. The bullet is not run, the blade not forged, the man not born; even the winged words of truth drop at your feet like lumps of lead. You require for such a desperate encounter an enchanted and poisoned shaft dipped in a lie too subtle to be found on earth. An enterprise for a dream, my masters! 'I began my exorcism with a heavy heart, with a sort of sullen anger in it too. Jim's voice, suddenly raised with a stern intonation, carried across the courtyard, reproving the carelessness of some dumb sinner by the river-side. Nothing--I said, speaking in a distinct murmur--there could be nothing, in that unknown world she fancied so eager to rob her of her happiness, there was nothing, neither living nor dead, there was no face, no voice, no power, that could tear Jim from her side. I drew breath and she whispered softly, "He told me so." "He told you the truth," I said. "Nothing," she sighed out, and abruptly turned upon me with a barely audible intensity of tone: "Why did you come to us from out there? He speaks of you too often. You make me afraid. Do you--do you want him?" A sort of stealthy fierceness had crept into our hurried mutters. "I shall never come again," I said bitterly. "And I don't want him. No one wants him." "No one," she repeated in a tone of doubt. "No one," I affirmed, feeling myself swayed by some strange excitement. "You think him strong, wise, courageous, great--why not believe him to be true too? I shall go to-morrow--and that is the end. You shall never be troubled by a voice from there again. This world you don't know is too big to miss him. You understand? Too big. You've got his heart in your hand. You must feel that. You must know that." "Yes, I know that," she breathed out, hard and still, as a statue might whisper. 'I felt I had done nothing. And what is it that I had wished to do? I am not sure now. At the time I was animated by an inexplicable ardour, as if before some great and necessary task--the influence of the moment upon my mental and emotional state. There are in all our lives such moments, such influences, coming from the outside, as it were, irresistible, incomprehensible--as if brought about by the mysterious conjunctions of the planets. She owned, as I had put it to her, his heart. She had that and everything else--if she could only believe it. What I had to tell her was that in the whole world there was no one who ever would need his heart, his mind, his hand. It was a common fate, and yet it seemed an awful thing to say of any man. She listened without a word, and her stillness now was like the protest of an invincible unbelief. What need she care for the world beyond the forests? I asked. From all the multitudes that peopled the vastness of that unknown there would come, I assured her, as long as he lived, neither a call nor a sign for him. Never. I was carried away. Never! Never! I remember with wonder the sort of dogged fierceness I displayed. I had the illusion of having got the spectre by the throat at last. Indeed the whole real thing has left behind the detailed and amazing impression of a dream. Why should she fear? She knew him to be strong, true, wise, brave. He was all that. Certainly. He was more. He was great--invincible--and the world did not want him, it had forgotten him, it would not even know him. 'I stopped; the silence over Patusan was profound, and the feeble dry sound of a paddle striking the side of a canoe somewhere in the middle of the river seemed to make it infinite. "Why?" she murmured. I felt that sort of rage one feels during a hard tussle. The spectre was trying to slip out of my grasp. "Why?" she repeated louder; "tell me!" And as I remained confounded, she stamped with her foot like a spoilt child. "Why? Speak." "You want to know?" I asked in a fury. "Yes!" she cried. "Because he is not good enough," I said brutally. During the moment's pause I noticed the fire on the other shore blaze up, dilating the circle of its glow like an amazed stare, and contract suddenly to a red pin-point. I only knew how close to me she had been when I felt the clutch of her fingers on my forearm. Without raising her voice, she threw into it an infinity of scathing contempt, bitterness, and despair. '"This is the very thing he said. . . . You lie!" 'The last two words she cried at me in the native dialect. "Hear me out!" I entreated; she caught her breath tremulously, flung my arm away. "Nobody, nobody is good enough," I began with the greatest earnestness. I could hear the sobbing labour of her breath frightfully quickened. I hung my head. What was the use? Footsteps were approaching; I slipped away without another word. . . .'

Chapters 31-33

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219145744/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/l/lord-jim/summary-and-analysis/chapters-3133

The next day, Jim spent a long time with Doramin, the old nakhoda, trying to impress on him and the principal men of the Bugis community the absolute necessity for immediate and vigorous action in order to counter Sherif Ali. Meanwhile, Sherif Ali's men strutted about, "haughtily in white cloaks," spreading the rumor that Rajah Allang intended to join them in raiding and defeating the Bugis once and for all. The attack seemed imminent, and terror among the natives was intense and widespread. Jim returned home at sunset, pleased at having convinced Doramin of his plan to rout Sherif Ali. Now he had "irretrievably committed" the Bugis to action. Now, also, Jim had committed himself; in fact, all of the responsibility for success was "on his own head." And yet he was elated and lighthearted with the fantastic possibility of his vision. In the middle of a deep sleep that night, Jim was awakened by Jewel. She put his revolver into his hand and insisted that he get up. Four men, she said, were waiting to kill him. Then she took him to one of the storehouses. Jim sighed. He was tired of these alarms, and he was angry with Jewel for her increasing anxiety. But he pushed open the door of the dungeon-like ruin of a storehouse anyway. At first, he saw nothing -- an empty wooden crate, and a litter of rags and straw. For days, he had been living with a heavy weight on his soul; if only there had been something here -- a trace or a sign of someone. But there was nothing. Suddenly, Jewel shouted at Jim to defend himself, and in the pale light, he saw the gleam of a pair of eyes within a heap of mats. Jim yelled for the man to come out, and a half-naked, glistening native pounced toward Jim, the blade of his knife above his head. Jim felt utter relief. He let the man come toward him until he could see his dilated nostrils and his wide eyes. Then he fired, his bullet exploding inside the man's mouth and disappearing through the back of his head. Afterward, Jim was strangely calm. He felt "appeased, without rancour, without uneasiness." He stepped over the body and routed out three other naked figures, crawling forward from under the mats and holding out their empty hands. Jim led the prisoners out into the night, and Jewel followed, her white nightgown trailing and her black hair falling to her waist. At the edge of the river bank, Jim stopped. He told the men to take his greetings to Sherif Ali, and then he ordered them all to "Jump!" Afterward, when he and Jewel were alone on the river bank, Jim told Marlow that never before had he realized how dearly he loved Jewel. "More than I can tell," Jim said; to him, his love for Jewel was "idyllic, a little solemn, and also true." In addition, Jim expressed his almost disbelief in the natives' complete trust of him. He knew that he was equated with what was "true" and "brave" and "just," and yet he knew his own secret nature -- that is, he knew how utterly he had failed, once. Later, after sundown, Marlow was stopped by Jewel. She wanted assurance" from Marlow, "a statement, a promise, an explanation." Her life had been a puzzle and a living hell -- until Jim's appearance. Now she had fallen in love with him -- a white man -- exactly what her mother warned her against. What would keep Jim from leaving her and Patusan one day? The world "out there" had always been one vast Unknown to her, and then Jim came to her from that vast Unknown, as did Marlow now. Marlow sensed that she felt that he could -- and would -- "with a word whisk Jim away -- out of her arms." He was overwhelmed by her breathless urgency to keep Jim. Marlow was touched by Jewel's innocence and her youth, as well as by her "wild flower" beauty and by her tremulous fears. To her, Marlow clearly stood for the frightening void of the Unknown. If he had not come for Jim, Jewel asked, why had he come? Marlow tried to explain that he had come because of friendship and because of business. But the girl was firmly convinced that he had come for Jim. Marlow said that she must trust Jim: he would never leave her. Marlow also told her that she was the only one in Patusan who doubted Jim's word. Jewel said that Jim swore never to leave her, but she could not believe him. His promise was not enough. And yet she feared for his life if he stayed. She had even begged him to go. But after Jim killed a man and sent three others back to Sherif Ali, he and Jewel fell in love "under the shadow of a life's disaster." Jewel said that she feared dying like her mother -- that is, dying of sorrow because of a man. And even if Jim did swear never to leave her, what made his vow any more honorable than any other white man's vow? Was Jim, she asked Marlow, any different from other men? Marlow answered Jewel. He said that yes, Jim was different. Was Jim, Jewel asked, more brave? More true? Marlow tried to discover what Jim had told the girl about his past, but he could not. Seemingly, Jim had told her only that once, long ago, he was "afraid." Jewel beseeched Marlow to tell her what it was that Jim was afraid of. How could she battle this ghost in Jim's past? Jim had told her that "the world out there" did not want him; was it true, she asked. Marlow answered that yes, it was true. Jewel continued to ask questions about Jim until Marlow exasperatedly shouted that Jim was "not good enough" for the world. Jewel was stunned. Those were the same words that Jim had uttered when he had told her why he had to stay on at Patusan. "You lie!" she cried out to Marlow. Hearing footsteps, Marlow slipped away.

These chapters are essentially devoted to the love that developed between Jim and Jewel, and the difficulties that Jewel encountered when she tried to believe Jim and trust him -- in spite of the fact that everyone else in the village trusted him completely. In Chapter 31, we go back in narrative time to a point before Jim blew up Sherif Ali's fortress; we return to a night when four of Sherif Ali's men attempted to kill Jim. It was the first night that Jim discovered that the girl, Jewel, had constantly kept a vigil over him while he was sleeping, thus indicating to him her deep concern for him. At first, when Jewel came to him, Jim thought that she was in trouble; then he was annoyed when she told him that his life was in danger. He had heard this fear expressed so many times from so many people that the threat had become boring. This time, however, Jewel was correct, and we see Jim confronting the charging killer and capturing the three men in hiding. The entire purpose of this scene is to illustrate both to the reader and to Jewel the nature of Jim's courage. Here, in the face of almost certain death, Jim did not "jump." He held his ground until the last possible moment, and then he fired at the charging killer. By standing his ground, Jim displayed considerable courage; in one sense, he has begun to redeem himself from his jump from the Patna. Furthermore, Jim grew in stature in Jewel's eyes. In Chapter 32, Jim expressed some of the paradoxes of his love for Jewel. First of all, he couldn't leave her because he had become convinced that his very existence was essential for her own continued existence. He was obligated to her. He was, however, troubled that he could never be completely honest with her, partly because she would never believe him if he were to tell her the true reason for his being in Patusan. That is, Jewel has seen Lord Jim perform outstanding acts of bravery, courage, and defiance; thus, she would never believe him if he were to tell her the true state of affairs. But the colossal irony is that if Jim were to tell Jewel or anyone else about his past, they not only wouldn't care, but they would agree that Jim had done the right thing in saving his own life. This view is what will make it so impossible for Jewel and Tamb' Itam to accept Jim's decision, at the end of the novel, not to "run for his life." Chapters 32 and 33 present a fuller view of Jewel. When she is alone with Marlow, she questions him about Jim because she can't understand Jim. We see her as an acute, sharp, intelligent woman, but one who is still naive and innocent. She also has deep fears of Marlow's "hold" over Jim, and as Marlow says: I belonged to the Unknown that might claim Jim for its own at any moment." Jewel greatly fears this great Unknown. Jewel knows that other white men have come, and they have always left after awhile: "They always leave us." Sometimes she thinks that Jim "in his sleep when he cannot see me then arise and go" because even though "other men had sworn the same," yet they all have left. The irony of these fears is that, in the ultimate analysis, Jewel is right. In deciding not to flee and in his decision to face death rather than live with her, Jim will be "deserting" Jewel.

novelguide

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/56.txt

finished_summaries/novelguide/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_7_part_3.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapter lv

chapter lv

{"name": "Chapter LV", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase7-chapter53-59", "summary": "Angel's search finally leads him to an expensive lodging house called The Herons, where he finds Tess expensively dressed and in the company of Alec d'Urberville. He begs her to forgive him but she explains that it is too late: \"he has won me back to him\". She believed that Angel would never return and so left with d'Urberville for the sake of her homeless family. Devastated, Angel leaves", "analysis": ""}

At eleven o'clock that night, having secured a bed at one of the hotels and telegraphed his address to his father immediately on his arrival, he walked out into the streets of Sandbourne. It was too late to call on or inquire for any one, and he reluctantly postponed his purpose till the morning. But he could not retire to rest just yet. This fashionable watering-place, with its eastern and its western stations, its piers, its groves of pines, its promenades, and its covered gardens, was, to Angel Clare, like a fairy place suddenly created by the stroke of a wand, and allowed to get a little dusty. An outlying eastern tract of the enormous Egdon Waste was close at hand, yet on the very verge of that tawny piece of antiquity such a glittering novelty as this pleasure city had chosen to spring up. Within the space of a mile from its outskirts every irregularity of the soil was prehistoric, every channel an undisturbed British trackway; not a sod having been turned there since the days of the Caesars. Yet the exotic had grown here, suddenly as the prophet's gourd; and had drawn hither Tess. By the midnight lamps he went up and down the winding way of this new world in an old one, and could discern between the trees and against the stars the lofty roofs, chimneys, gazebos, and towers of the numerous fanciful residences of which the place was composed. It was a city of detached mansions; a Mediterranean lounging-place on the English Channel; and as seen now by night it seemed even more imposing than it was. The sea was near at hand, but not intrusive; it murmured, and he thought it was the pines; the pines murmured in precisely the same tones, and he thought they were the sea. Where could Tess possibly be, a cottage-girl, his young wife, amidst all this wealth and fashion? The more he pondered, the more was he puzzled. Were there any cows to milk here? There certainly were no fields to till. She was most probably engaged to do something in one of these large houses; and he sauntered along, looking at the chamber-windows and their lights going out one by one, and wondered which of them might be hers. Conjecture was useless, and just after twelve o'clock he entered and went to bed. Before putting out his light he re-read Tess's impassioned letter. Sleep, however, he could not--so near her, yet so far from her--and he continually lifted the window-blind and regarded the backs of the opposite houses, and wondered behind which of the sashes she reposed at that moment. He might almost as well have sat up all night. In the morning he arose at seven, and shortly after went out, taking the direction of the chief post-office. At the door he met an intelligent postman coming out with letters for the morning delivery. "Do you know the address of a Mrs Clare?" asked Angel. The postman shook his head. Then, remembering that she would have been likely to continue the use of her maiden name, Clare said-- "Of a Miss Durbeyfield?" "Durbeyfield?" This also was strange to the postman addressed. "There's visitors coming and going every day, as you know, sir," he said; "and without the name of the house 'tis impossible to find 'em." One of his comrades hastening out at that moment, the name was repeated to him. "I know no name of Durbeyfield; but there is the name of d'Urberville at The Herons," said the second. "That's it!" cried Clare, pleased to think that she had reverted to the real pronunciation. "What place is The Herons?" "A stylish lodging-house. 'Tis all lodging-houses here, bless 'ee." Clare received directions how to find the house, and hastened thither, arriving with the milkman. The Herons, though an ordinary villa, stood in its own grounds, and was certainly the last place in which one would have expected to find lodgings, so private was its appearance. If poor Tess was a servant here, as he feared, she would go to the back-door to that milkman, and he was inclined to go thither also. However, in his doubts he turned to the front, and rang. The hour being early, the landlady herself opened the door. Clare inquired for Teresa d'Urberville or Durbeyfield. "Mrs d'Urberville?" "Yes." Tess, then, passed as a married woman, and he felt glad, even though she had not adopted his name. "Will you kindly tell her that a relative is anxious to see her?" "It is rather early. What name shall I give, sir?" "Angel." "Mr Angel?" "No; Angel. It is my Christian name. She'll understand." "I'll see if she is awake." He was shown into the front room--the dining-room--and looked out through the spring curtains at the little lawn, and the rhododendrons and other shrubs upon it. Obviously her position was by no means so bad as he had feared, and it crossed his mind that she must somehow have claimed and sold the jewels to attain it. He did not blame her for one moment. Soon his sharpened ear detected footsteps upon the stairs, at which his heart thumped so painfully that he could hardly stand firm. "Dear me! what will she think of me, so altered as I am!" he said to himself; and the door opened. Tess appeared on the threshold--not at all as he had expected to see her--bewilderingly otherwise, indeed. Her great natural beauty was, if not heightened, rendered more obvious by her attire. She was loosely wrapped in a cashmere dressing-gown of gray-white, embroidered in half-mourning tints, and she wore slippers of the same hue. Her neck rose out of a frill of down, and her well-remembered cable of dark-brown hair was partially coiled up in a mass at the back of her head and partly hanging on her shoulder--the evident result of haste. He had held out his arms, but they had fallen again to his side; for she had not come forward, remaining still in the opening of the doorway. Mere yellow skeleton that he was now, he felt the contrast between them, and thought his appearance distasteful to her. "Tess!" he said huskily, "can you forgive me for going away? Can't you--come to me? How do you get to be--like this?" "It is too late," said she, her voice sounding hard through the room, her eyes shining unnaturally. "I did not think rightly of you--I did not see you as you were!" he continued to plead. "I have learnt to since, dearest Tessy mine!" "Too late, too late!" she said, waving her hand in the impatience of a person whose tortures cause every instant to seem an hour. "Don't come close to me, Angel! No--you must not. Keep away." "But don't you love me, my dear wife, because I have been so pulled down by illness? You are not so fickle--I am come on purpose for you--my mother and father will welcome you now!" "Yes--O, yes, yes! But I say, I say it is too late." She seemed to feel like a fugitive in a dream, who tries to move away, but cannot. "Don't you know all--don't you know it? Yet how do you come here if you do not know?" "I inquired here and there, and I found the way." "I waited and waited for you," she went on, her tones suddenly resuming their old fluty pathos. "But you did not come! And I wrote to you, and you did not come! He kept on saying you would never come any more, and that I was a foolish woman. He was very kind to me, and to mother, and to all of us after father's death. He--" "I don't understand." "He has won me back to him." Clare looked at her keenly, then, gathering her meaning, flagged like one plague-stricken, and his glance sank; it fell on her hands, which, once rosy, were now white and more delicate. She continued-- "He is upstairs. I hate him now, because he told me a lie--that you would not come again; and you HAVE come! These clothes are what he's put upon me: I didn't care what he did wi' me! But--will you go away, Angel, please, and never come any more?" They stood fixed, their baffled hearts looking out of their eyes with a joylessness pitiful to see. Both seemed to implore something to shelter them from reality. "Ah--it is my fault!" said Clare. But he could not get on. Speech was as inexpressive as silence. But he had a vague consciousness of one thing, though it was not clear to him till later; that his original Tess had spiritually ceased to recognize the body before him as hers--allowing it to drift, like a corpse upon the current, in a direction dissociated from its living will. A few instants passed, and he found that Tess was gone. His face grew colder and more shrunken as he stood concentrated on the moment, and a minute or two after, he found himself in the street, walking along he did not know whither.

Chapter LV

https://web.archive.org/web/20210213065711/https://www.novelguide.com/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summaries/phase7-chapter53-59

Angel's search finally leads him to an expensive lodging house called The Herons, where he finds Tess expensively dressed and in the company of Alec d'Urberville. He begs her to forgive him but she explains that it is too late: "he has won me back to him". She believed that Angel would never return and so left with d'Urberville for the sake of her homeless family. Devastated, Angel leaves

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/chapters_6_to_7.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_4_part_0.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapters 6-7

chapters 6-7

{"name": "Chapters 6 & 7", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210421171214/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-picture-of-dorian-gray/study-guide/summary-chapters-6-and-7", "summary": "Lord Henry and Basil Hallward discuss Dorian's engagement at the painter's house. They are planning to dine with Dorian before going to see Sibyl's performance that night. Basil can't believe that Dorian is really engaged, saying that Dorian \"is far too sensible\" to make such a rash decision. To this, Henry replies that \"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then.\" Basil is taken aback by Henry's detached, artistic fascination with Dorian's life. The artist disapproves of Dorian's actions, and is worried about the boy's emotional health; Henry, however, is delighted, knowing that whatever the outcome is, it will be greatly entertaining. Dorian arrives, insisting that he be congratulated. Basil says that was hurt to hear about the engagement from Henry, and not from Dorian himself. Henry quickly changes the subject. Dorian wants Basil to approve of his actions, saying \"I have been right, Basil, haven't I, to take my love out of poetry, and to find my wife in Shakespeare's plays?\" Basil reluctantly agrees with Dorian. When Henry cynically remarks about the business-like nature of marriage, Basil objects, saying that Dorian \"is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon anyone. His nature is too fine for that.\" Henry continues to philosophize about the nature of women and how they act when in love. To him, \"Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. They worship us and are always bothering us to do something for them.\" Dorian is sure that Sibyl's acting will put an end to Henry's cynicism and reconcile all disagreements between the three men. When they see her perform, they will be too overwhelmed by her beauty to consider anything else. The three men leave to see the play, Romeo and Juliet. The theater is surprisingly crowded that night. Once seated in their box, Lord Henry observes the obnoxious, unrefined behavior of the lower-class theatergoers. Basil comforts Dorian against Henry's cynicism. The play begins, and they all note that the orchestra is terrible. Finally, Sibyl appears on stage. She looks beautiful, but acts terribly. Her voice is exquisite, but \"from the point of view of tone\" is \"absolutely false.\" Dorian is horrified and confused. The other two men are disappointed, but are too polite to make any remarks. Her performance, usually the one saving grace in the theater's otherwise dreadful productions, only gets worse as the play progresses. After the second act, the audience hisses, and Dorian's guests stand to leave. Basil tries to comfort the boy, saying that Sibyl must be ill, and that he shouldn't be upset, since \"Love is a more wonderful thing than art\" anyway, to which Henry replies that \"They are both simply forms of imitation\". Dorian is inconsolable. Henry tells him to cheer up, since \"the secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is unbecoming.\" The two men leave, and Dorian forces himself to suffer through the rest of the performance. Afterwards, he rushes backstage to confront Sibyl. She is delighted to see him and surprised at his anger, since she had assumed that he would know the reason for her terrible performance. When he demands to be told why she performed badly, she tells him that having met him, she can no longer believe in the theater. Before Dorian, she says, \"acting was the one reality of my life,\" and now he has \"freed my soul from prison\" and \"taught me what reality really is.\" Having experienced true love, she says, \"it would be profanation for me to play at being in love.\" Dorian is horrified, disgusted, and completely unable to love her anymore. She can't believe it, and when he pulls away from her touch, she falls to the floor, groveling at his feet. Dorian feels repulsion rather than empathy, and leaves her sobbing on the floor. Strangely numb and unable to come to terms with Sibyl's lost talent or his unexpected callousness towards her, Dorian aimlessly wanders the city until dawn. He returns home, where he happens to glance at Basil's portrait, and is puzzled to find that the facial expression is slightly different: there seems to be \"a touch of cruelty in the mouth.\" He rubs his eyes and changes the lighting, but is certain that the picture has changed. The cruelty in the expression reminds him of his cruelty to Sibyl, but he feels wronged for the misery that she has caused him with her bad acting, and consoles himself by thinking that \"women were better suited to bear sorrow than men...When they took lovers, it was merely to have someone with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry told him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were.\" Unable to make any sense of the picture's transformation, he realizes, after much pondering, that \"It held the secret of his life, and told his story...changed or unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience.\" Exhausted, he covers the portrait with a screen, and goes to sleep.", "analysis": "Dorian's relationship with Sibyl is the first major casualty of the devotion to sensual pleasure inspired by Lord Henry. Valuing artistic beauty above all else allows Dorian to confuse his love for Sibyl's acting with a love for Sibyl herself. She seems to be the perfect wife, because Dorian believes that she can offer him all of Shakespeare's heroines in a single body. Indeed, Dorian remarks to Basil that he has \"had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the mouth.\" Dorian's love is a means of escaping reality; therefore, Sibyl's awareness of \"what reality really is\" is unacceptable. His resulting cruelty towards her is the first undeniable mark of the corruption of Dorian's character, and therefore causes the first visible change in his portrait. He considers the aesthetic pain caused by her poor acting to be on par with Sibyl's emotional devastation at his rejection. This belief is rooted in the sentiment expressed by Lord Henry before the trio leaves for the play, when he says \"I love acting. It is so much more real than life.\" This statement is a clear indication of Henry's continuing influence on Dorian. We are also reminded of the statement in the preface that \"Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.\" Dorian is not prepared to see the person beneath the surface of Sibyl's acting. The preface also states that \"It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.\" Dorian saw himself reflected in Sibyl's acting, because it was artful, but once her acting is revealed as artless, he can no longer see himself in it, and his feelings for her disappear. What he thought was love for Sibyl is really a form of vanity; the pain of enduring her poor performance is actually the pain of not seeing his own reflection. In Chapter 7, Dorian undergoes several dramatic changes of character: he transforms from a devoted lover, to a bitter art critic, to a cruel betrayer, and seemingly back to a devoted lover. This final change is, however, superficial. He decides to do the honorable thing and marry Sibyl, but only when faced with the possibility of watching the beautiful image in the portrait succumb to degradation. The corruption of Dorian's soul has begun in earnest, as reflected by the first visible change in the portrait. Interestingly, this chapter marks a turning point in the narrative: the focus switches from Lord Henry to Dorian. Now that Henry's influence has begun to show its effects, the narrative no longer appears as concerned with Lord Henry himself. At this point, the story begins to focus solely on Dorian as a corrupt figure. At the end of the chapter, as Dorian feebly resolves to spend less time with Lord Henry and to marry Sibyl, he is acting more out of vanity than out of love or a true sense of morality; a fact that will be revealed when the portrait fails to change for the better. This is not the last time Dorian will fail to recognize the vanity that lies behind his decisions."}

"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry that evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol where dinner had been laid for three. "No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the bowing waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They don't interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of Commons worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little whitewashing." "Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, watching him as he spoke. Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" he cried. "Impossible!" "It is perfectly true." "To whom?" "To some little actress or other." "I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible." "Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear Basil." "Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry." "Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I didn't say he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is a great difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I never was engaged." "But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. It would be absurd for him to marry so much beneath him." "If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is always from the noblest motives." "I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his intellect." "Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she is beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget his appointment." "Are you serious?" "Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should ever be more serious than I am at the present moment." "But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, walking up and down the room and biting his lip. "You can't approve of it, possibly. It is some silly infatuation." "I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes to marry her. Why not? If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the less interesting. You know I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback to marriage is that it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are colourless. They lack individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that marriage makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it many other egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They become more highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should fancy, the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience is of value, and whatever one may say against marriage, it is certainly an experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will make this girl his wife, passionately adore her for six months, and then suddenly become fascinated by some one else. He would be a wonderful study." "You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. If Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be." Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think so well of others is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is sheer terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our neighbour with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to us. We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I have the greatest contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, but there are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. I will certainly encourage them. They have the charm of being fashionable. But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than I can." "My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" said the lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. "I have never been so happy. Of course, it is sudden--all really delightful things are. And yet it seems to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my life." He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked extraordinarily handsome. "I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but I don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. You let Harry know." "And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord Henry, putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. "Come, let us sit down and try what the new _chef_ here is like, and then you will tell us how it all came about." "There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. After I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. Of course, the scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! You should have seen her! When she came on in her boy's clothes, she was perfectly wonderful. She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little green cap with a hawk's feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak lined with dull red. She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She had all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in your studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves round a pale rose. As for her acting--well, you shall see her to-night. She is simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box absolutely enthralled. I forgot that I was in London and in the nineteenth century. I was away with my love in a forest that no man had ever seen. After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke to her. As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes a look that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that moment. It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one perfect point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can't help it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told her own mother. I don't know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley is sure to be furious. I don't care. I shall be of age in less than a year, and then I can do what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven't I, to take my love out of poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare's plays? Lips that Shakespeare taught to speak have whispered their secret in my ear. I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the mouth." "Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly. "Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry. Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; I shall find her in an orchard in Verona." Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. "At what particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it." "My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she said she was not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole world is nothing to me compared with her." "Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, "much more practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to say anything about marriage, and they always remind us." Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. You have annoyed Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon any one. His nature is too fine for that." Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, for the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any question--simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the women who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, of course, in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not modern." Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite incorrigible, Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her would be a beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any one can wish to shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want to place her on a pedestal of gold and to see the world worship the woman who is mine. What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at it for that. Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to take. Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. I become different from what you have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere touch of Sibyl Vane's hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, poisonous, delightful theories." "And those are ...?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. "Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry." "Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," he answered in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature's test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, we are not always happy." "Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward. "Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?" "To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, touching the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. "Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One's own life--that is the important thing. As for the lives of one's neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt one's moral views about them, but they are not one's concern. Besides, individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in accepting the standard of one's age. I consider that for any man of culture to accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest immorality." "But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays a terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter. "Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege of the rich." "One has to pay in other ways but money." "What sort of ways, Basil?" "Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the consciousness of degradation." Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art is charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use them in fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can use in fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever knows what a pleasure is." "I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore some one." "That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, toying with some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us to do something for them." "I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to us," murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They have a right to demand it back." "That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward. "Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry. "This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that women give to men the very gold of their lives." "Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in such very small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always prevent us from carrying them out." "Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much." "You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have some coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and _fine-champagne_, and some cigarettes. No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I can't allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit." "What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from a fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. "Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you have never known." "I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired look in his eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your wonderful girl may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real than life. Let us go. Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, Basil, but there is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow us in a hansom." They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better than many other things that might have happened. After a few minutes, they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, as had been arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little brougham in front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt that Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown years older. For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat Jew manager who met them at the door was beaming from ear to ear with an oily tremulous smile. He escorted them to their box with a sort of pompous humility, waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top of his voice. Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if he had come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. Lord Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. At least he declared he did, and insisted on shaking him by the hand and assuring him that he was proud to meet a man who had discovered a real genius and gone bankrupt over a poet. Hallward amused himself with watching the faces in the pit. The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight flamed like a monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. The youths in the gallery had taken off their coats and waistcoats and hung them over the side. They talked to each other across the theatre and shared their oranges with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women were laughing in the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill and discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from the bar. "What a place to find one's divinity in!" said Lord Henry. "Yes!" answered Dorian Gray. "It was here I found her, and she is divine beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget everything. These common rough people, with their coarse faces and brutal gestures, become quite different when she is on the stage. They sit silently and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to do. She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one's self." "The same flesh and blood as one's self! Oh, I hope not!" exclaimed Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery through his opera-glass. "Don't pay any attention to him, Dorian," said the painter. "I understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. Any one you love must be marvellous, and any girl who has the effect you describe must be fine and noble. To spiritualize one's age--that is something worth doing. If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without one, if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives have been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their selfishness and lend them tears for sorrows that are not their own, she is worthy of all your adoration, worthy of the adoration of the world. This marriage is quite right. I did not think so at first, but I admit it now. The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have been incomplete." "Thanks, Basil," answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. "I knew that you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, he terrifies me. But here is the orchestra. It is quite dreadful, but it only lasts for about five minutes. Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl to whom I am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything that is good in me." A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of applause, Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly lovely to look at--one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, that he had ever seen. There was something of the fawn in her shy grace and startled eyes. A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a mirror of silver, came to her cheeks as she glanced at the crowded enthusiastic house. She stepped back a few paces and her lips seemed to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet and began to applaud. Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, gazing at her. Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, "Charming! charming!" The scene was the hall of Capulet's house, and Romeo in his pilgrim's dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, such as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, while she danced, as a plant sways in the water. The curves of her throat were the curves of a white lily. Her hands seemed to be made of cool ivory. Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her eyes rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak-- Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, Which mannerly devotion shows in this; For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss-- with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly artificial manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view of tone it was absolutely false. It was wrong in colour. It took away all the life from the verse. It made the passion unreal. Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to them to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene of the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, there was nothing in her. She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not be denied. But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew worse as she went on. Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She overemphasized everything that she had to say. The beautiful passage-- Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face, Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night-- was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been taught to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she leaned over the balcony and came to those wonderful lines-- Although I joy in thee, I have no joy of this contract to-night: It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night! This bud of love by summer's ripening breath May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet-- she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and to whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was the girl herself. When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, and Lord Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. "She is quite beautiful, Dorian," he said, "but she can't act. Let us go." "I am going to see the play through," answered the lad, in a hard bitter voice. "I am awfully sorry that I have made you waste an evening, Harry. I apologize to you both." "My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill," interrupted Hallward. "We will come some other night." "I wish she were ill," he rejoined. "But she seems to me to be simply callous and cold. She has entirely altered. Last night she was a great artist. This evening she is merely a commonplace mediocre actress." "Don't talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more wonderful thing than art." "They are both simply forms of imitation," remarked Lord Henry. "But do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. It is not good for one's morals to see bad acting. Besides, I don't suppose you will want your wife to act, so what does it matter if she plays Juliet like a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little about life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful experience. There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating--people who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, don't look so tragic! The secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. We will smoke cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. She is beautiful. What more can you want?" "Go away, Harry," cried the lad. "I want to be alone. Basil, you must go. Ah! can't you see that my heart is breaking?" The hot tears came to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, he leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. "Let us go, Basil," said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in his voice, and the two young men passed out together. A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed interminable. Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots and laughing. The whole thing was a _fiasco_. The last act was played to almost empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some groans. As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was a radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of their own. When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy came over her. "How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!" she cried. "Horribly!" he answered, gazing at her in amazement. "Horribly! It was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. You have no idea what I suffered." The girl smiled. "Dorian," she answered, lingering over his name with long-drawn music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to the red petals of her mouth. "Dorian, you should have understood. But you understand now, don't you?" "Understand what?" he asked, angrily. "Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall never act well again." He shrugged his shoulders. "You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill you shouldn't act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were bored. I was bored." She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. An ecstasy of happiness dominated her. "Dorian, Dorian," she cried, "before I knew you, acting was the one reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I thought that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the other. The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia were mine also. I believed in everything. The common people who acted with me seemed to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them real. You came--oh, my beautiful love!--and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what reality really is. To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in which I had always played. To-night, for the first time, I became conscious that the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the moonlight in the orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and that the words I had to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not what I wanted to say. You had brought me something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection. You had made me understand what love really is. My love! My love! Prince Charming! Prince of life! I have grown sick of shadows. You are more to me than all art can ever be. What have I to do with the puppets of a play? When I came on to-night, I could not understand how it was that everything had gone from me. I thought that I was going to be wonderful. I found that I could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned on my soul what it all meant. The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. What could they know of love such as ours? Take me away, Dorian--take me away with you, where we can be quite alone. I hate the stage. I might mimic a passion that I do not feel, but I cannot mimic one that burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, you understand now what it signifies? Even if I could do it, it would be profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me see that." He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. "You have killed my love," he muttered. She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. She came across to him, and with her little fingers stroked his hair. She knelt down and pressed his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a shudder ran through him. Then he leaped up and went to the door. "Yes," he cried, "you have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don't even stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because you were marvellous, because you had genius and intellect, because you realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid. My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. I will never think of you. I will never mention your name. You don't know what you were to me, once. Why, once ... Oh, I can't bear to think of it! I wish I had never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of my life. How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made you famous, splendid, magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you would have borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with a pretty face." The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. "You are not serious, Dorian?" she murmured. "You are acting." "Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well," he answered bitterly. She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain in her face, came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm and looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. "Don't touch me!" he cried. A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet and lay there like a trampled flower. "Dorian, Dorian, don't leave me!" she whispered. "I am so sorry I didn't act well. I was thinking of you all the time. But I will try--indeed, I will try. It came so suddenly across me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if you had not kissed me--if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, my love. Don't go away from me. I couldn't bear it. Oh! don't go away from me. My brother ... No; never mind. He didn't mean it. He was in jest.... But you, oh! can't you forgive me for to-night? I will work so hard and try to improve. Don't be cruel to me, because I love you better than anything in the world. After all, it is only once that I have not pleased you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should have shown myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I couldn't help it. Oh, don't leave me, don't leave me." A fit of passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on the floor like a wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his beautiful eyes, looked down at her, and his chiselled lips curled in exquisite disdain. There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love. Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. Her tears and sobs annoyed him. "I am going," he said at last in his calm clear voice. "I don't wish to be unkind, but I can't see you again. You have disappointed me." She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He turned on his heel and left the room. In a few moments he was out of the theatre. Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking houses. Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after him. Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves like monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon door-steps, and heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts. As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed itself into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies rumbled slowly down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an anodyne for his pain. He followed into the market and watched the men unloading their waggons. A white-smocked carter offered him some cherries. He thanked him, wondered why he refused to accept any money for them, and began to eat them listlessly. They had been plucked at midnight, and the coldness of the moon had entered into them. A long line of boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red roses, defiled in front of him, threading their way through the huge, jade-green piles of vegetables. Under the portico, with its grey, sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop of draggled bareheaded girls, waiting for the auction to be over. Others crowded round the swinging doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. The heavy cart-horses slipped and stamped upon the rough stones, shaking their bells and trappings. Some of the drivers were lying asleep on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about picking up seeds. After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. For a few moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round at the silent square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows and its staring blinds. The sky was pure opal now, and the roofs of the houses glistened like silver against it. From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke was rising. It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air. In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, that hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall of entrance, lights were still burning from three flickering jets: thin blue petals of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. He turned them out and, having thrown his hat and cape on the table, passed through the library towards the door of his bedroom, a large octagonal chamber on the ground floor that, in his new-born feeling for luxury, he had just had decorated for himself and hung with some curious Renaissance tapestries that had been discovered stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait Basil Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. After he had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed to hesitate. Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, and examined it. In the dim arrested light that struggled through the cream-coloured silk blinds, the face appeared to him to be a little changed. The expression looked different. One would have said that there was a touch of cruelty in the mouth. It was certainly strange. He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. The bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic shadows into dusky corners, where they lay shuddering. But the strange expression that he had noticed in the face of the portrait seemed to linger there, to be more intensified even. The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the lines of cruelty round the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking into a mirror after he had done some dreadful thing. He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed in ivory Cupids, one of Lord Henry's many presents to him, glanced hurriedly into its polished depths. No line like that warped his red lips. What did it mean? He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it again. There were no signs of any change when he looked into the actual painting, and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression had altered. It was not a mere fancy of his own. The thing was horribly apparent. He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there flashed across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward's studio the day the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. He had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, and the portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, and the face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; that the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering and thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been fulfilled? Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to think of them. And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the touch of cruelty in the mouth. Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl's fault, not his. He had dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her because he had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. She had been shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling of infinite regret came over him, as he thought of her lying at his feet sobbing like a little child. He remembered with what callousness he had watched her. Why had he been made like that? Why had such a soul been given to him? But he had suffered also. During the three terrible hours that the play had lasted, he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of torture. His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a moment, if he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better suited to bear sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. They only thought of their emotions. When they took lovers, it was merely to have some one with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry had told him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. Why should he trouble about Sibyl Vane? She was nothing to him now. But the picture? What was he to say of that? It held the secret of his life, and told his story. It had taught him to love his own beauty. Would it teach him to loathe his own soul? Would he ever look at it again? No; it was merely an illusion wrought on the troubled senses. The horrible night that he had passed had left phantoms behind it. Suddenly there had fallen upon his brain that tiny scarlet speck that makes men mad. The picture had not changed. It was folly to think so. Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel smile. Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes met his own. A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the painted image of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and would alter more. Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white roses would die. For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck and wreck its fairness. But he would not sin. The picture, changed or unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would resist temptation. He would not see Lord Henry any more--would not, at any rate, listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil Hallward's garden had first stirred within him the passion for impossible things. He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, marry her, try to love her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She must have suffered more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish and cruel to her. The fascination that she had exercised over him would return. They would be happy together. His life with her would be beautiful and pure. He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front of the portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. "How horrible!" he murmured to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. When he stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. The fresh morning air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. He thought only of Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. He repeated her name over and over again. The birds that were singing in the dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the flowers about her.

Chapters 6 & 7

https://web.archive.org/web/20210421171214/https://www.gradesaver.com/the-picture-of-dorian-gray/study-guide/summary-chapters-6-and-7

Lord Henry and Basil Hallward discuss Dorian's engagement at the painter's house. They are planning to dine with Dorian before going to see Sibyl's performance that night. Basil can't believe that Dorian is really engaged, saying that Dorian "is far too sensible" to make such a rash decision. To this, Henry replies that "Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then." Basil is taken aback by Henry's detached, artistic fascination with Dorian's life. The artist disapproves of Dorian's actions, and is worried about the boy's emotional health; Henry, however, is delighted, knowing that whatever the outcome is, it will be greatly entertaining. Dorian arrives, insisting that he be congratulated. Basil says that was hurt to hear about the engagement from Henry, and not from Dorian himself. Henry quickly changes the subject. Dorian wants Basil to approve of his actions, saying "I have been right, Basil, haven't I, to take my love out of poetry, and to find my wife in Shakespeare's plays?" Basil reluctantly agrees with Dorian. When Henry cynically remarks about the business-like nature of marriage, Basil objects, saying that Dorian "is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon anyone. His nature is too fine for that." Henry continues to philosophize about the nature of women and how they act when in love. To him, "Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. They worship us and are always bothering us to do something for them." Dorian is sure that Sibyl's acting will put an end to Henry's cynicism and reconcile all disagreements between the three men. When they see her perform, they will be too overwhelmed by her beauty to consider anything else. The three men leave to see the play, Romeo and Juliet. The theater is surprisingly crowded that night. Once seated in their box, Lord Henry observes the obnoxious, unrefined behavior of the lower-class theatergoers. Basil comforts Dorian against Henry's cynicism. The play begins, and they all note that the orchestra is terrible. Finally, Sibyl appears on stage. She looks beautiful, but acts terribly. Her voice is exquisite, but "from the point of view of tone" is "absolutely false." Dorian is horrified and confused. The other two men are disappointed, but are too polite to make any remarks. Her performance, usually the one saving grace in the theater's otherwise dreadful productions, only gets worse as the play progresses. After the second act, the audience hisses, and Dorian's guests stand to leave. Basil tries to comfort the boy, saying that Sibyl must be ill, and that he shouldn't be upset, since "Love is a more wonderful thing than art" anyway, to which Henry replies that "They are both simply forms of imitation". Dorian is inconsolable. Henry tells him to cheer up, since "the secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is unbecoming." The two men leave, and Dorian forces himself to suffer through the rest of the performance. Afterwards, he rushes backstage to confront Sibyl. She is delighted to see him and surprised at his anger, since she had assumed that he would know the reason for her terrible performance. When he demands to be told why she performed badly, she tells him that having met him, she can no longer believe in the theater. Before Dorian, she says, "acting was the one reality of my life," and now he has "freed my soul from prison" and "taught me what reality really is." Having experienced true love, she says, "it would be profanation for me to play at being in love." Dorian is horrified, disgusted, and completely unable to love her anymore. She can't believe it, and when he pulls away from her touch, she falls to the floor, groveling at his feet. Dorian feels repulsion rather than empathy, and leaves her sobbing on the floor. Strangely numb and unable to come to terms with Sibyl's lost talent or his unexpected callousness towards her, Dorian aimlessly wanders the city until dawn. He returns home, where he happens to glance at Basil's portrait, and is puzzled to find that the facial expression is slightly different: there seems to be "a touch of cruelty in the mouth." He rubs his eyes and changes the lighting, but is certain that the picture has changed. The cruelty in the expression reminds him of his cruelty to Sibyl, but he feels wronged for the misery that she has caused him with her bad acting, and consoles himself by thinking that "women were better suited to bear sorrow than men...When they took lovers, it was merely to have someone with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry told him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were." Unable to make any sense of the picture's transformation, he realizes, after much pondering, that "It held the secret of his life, and told his story...changed or unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience." Exhausted, he covers the portrait with a screen, and goes to sleep.

Dorian's relationship with Sibyl is the first major casualty of the devotion to sensual pleasure inspired by Lord Henry. Valuing artistic beauty above all else allows Dorian to confuse his love for Sibyl's acting with a love for Sibyl herself. She seems to be the perfect wife, because Dorian believes that she can offer him all of Shakespeare's heroines in a single body. Indeed, Dorian remarks to Basil that he has "had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the mouth." Dorian's love is a means of escaping reality; therefore, Sibyl's awareness of "what reality really is" is unacceptable. His resulting cruelty towards her is the first undeniable mark of the corruption of Dorian's character, and therefore causes the first visible change in his portrait. He considers the aesthetic pain caused by her poor acting to be on par with Sibyl's emotional devastation at his rejection. This belief is rooted in the sentiment expressed by Lord Henry before the trio leaves for the play, when he says "I love acting. It is so much more real than life." This statement is a clear indication of Henry's continuing influence on Dorian. We are also reminded of the statement in the preface that "Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril." Dorian is not prepared to see the person beneath the surface of Sibyl's acting. The preface also states that "It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors." Dorian saw himself reflected in Sibyl's acting, because it was artful, but once her acting is revealed as artless, he can no longer see himself in it, and his feelings for her disappear. What he thought was love for Sibyl is really a form of vanity; the pain of enduring her poor performance is actually the pain of not seeing his own reflection. In Chapter 7, Dorian undergoes several dramatic changes of character: he transforms from a devoted lover, to a bitter art critic, to a cruel betrayer, and seemingly back to a devoted lover. This final change is, however, superficial. He decides to do the honorable thing and marry Sibyl, but only when faced with the possibility of watching the beautiful image in the portrait succumb to degradation. The corruption of Dorian's soul has begun in earnest, as reflected by the first visible change in the portrait. Interestingly, this chapter marks a turning point in the narrative: the focus switches from Lord Henry to Dorian. Now that Henry's influence has begun to show its effects, the narrative no longer appears as concerned with Lord Henry himself. At this point, the story begins to focus solely on Dorian as a corrupt figure. At the end of the chapter, as Dorian feebly resolves to spend less time with Lord Henry and to marry Sibyl, he is acting more out of vanity than out of love or a true sense of morality; a fact that will be revealed when the portrait fails to change for the better. This is not the last time Dorian will fail to recognize the vanity that lies behind his decisions.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/34.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_33_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 34

chapter 34

{"name": "Chapter 34", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility48.asp", "summary": "Elinor tells the Colonel's story to Marianne, who believes it, but feels miserable on hearing this information. Her attitude towards Colonel Brandon improves. A letter arrives from Mrs. Dashwood, expressing concern for Marianne. She advises them to prolong their stay in London. The Middletons and the Palmers sympathize with Marianne and curse Willoughby for his deceit. Mrs. Palmer informs Elinor of Willoughby's wedding. Elinor conveys the news to her sister a few days later. Marianne breaks down after this. At about this time, the Steeles pay them a visit. They indulge in frivolous talk and insist on meeting Marianne.", "analysis": "Notes Marianne gradually comes to terms with her situation. First she hears about Willoughby's deceptive nature and his shameless behavior towards Miss Williams, followed by the news of his wedding. Her hopes are dashed and she is miserable. Everyone shows concern for Marianne, but their words of consolation only hurt the sensitive girl. In such circumstances, Lady Middleton's indifference proves to be a blessing in disguise. Her non-committal attitude neither hurts nor soothes Marianne's feelings. Mrs. Jennings is busy matchmaking, even during an unhappy period, such as the present one. When she observes Colonel Brandon talking to Elinor, she presumes that they are in love. Matchmaking is her favorite pursuit. The Steele sisters arrive and irritate Elinor with their frivolous behavior. Miss Steele talks coquettishly about Dr. Davies, while Lucy makes a show of her affection for Elinor. They feign concern for Marianne and insist on meeting with her. They are downright indiscreet in their behavior; the Steele sisters offer a complete contrast to the heroines of the novel. CHAPTER 33 Summary One day while they are out shopping, Elinor and Marianne have a chance encounter with their brother. He is apologetic for not having contacted them earlier but promises to pay them a visit the next day. True to his word, he keeps his appointment. He is introduced to Mrs. Jennings and Colonel Brandon, both of whom he treats respectfully. He considers Colonel Brandon an eligible match for Elinor and astonishes his sister with his congratulations on her impending marriage. He also meets the Middletons and is impressed by their wealth and status. Notes Jane Austen here portrays John Dashwood as a hen-pecked husband who is governed by nothing but money. He is impressed by Mrs. Jennings because she lives in elegance. He wants Elinor to marry Colonel Brandon because he possesses considerable property in Dorsetshire. He commends the abilities of Mrs. Ferrars in finding a good match for Edward in Miss Morton, who is to inherit thirty thousand pounds. Finally, he is impressed by the Middletons because \"they are people of large fortune.\" John Dashwood approves of just about anyone who is wealthy. John Dashwood is a humorous character, who never fails to amuse the readers through his talk and behavior. His conversation with Elinor is comical. He presumes that Colonel Brandon is in love with Elinor, and so he congratulates her on her good fortune in getting married to a man of status. In order to cover up his guilt for not helping his sisters financially, he paints a sorry picture of himself and exaggerates his own financial obligations. He then expresses the hope that Mrs. Jennings will bestow her wealth on Elinor and Marianne. He meets the Middletons and is impressed by their style of living, and he decides to introduce his wife to them because she would surely approve of such people. Elinor is embarrassed by his outlook and attitude. He is obsessed with money and entirely governed by his wife. CHAPTER 34 Summary Fanny Dashwood makes the acquaintance of Lady Middleton and is impressed by her. She also meets the Steele sisters and takes a liking to them. She thus invites all of them, including the Dashwood sisters, to a party at her house. Lucy Steele is eager to attend the party, as it will give her an opportunity to meet with Edward and Mrs. Ferrars. Elinor is apprehensive about the visit. At the party they meet Mrs. Ferrars, who is cold and snobbish. She looks down on Elinor, and in order to slight her, pays attention to Lucy. John Dashwood tries to impress Colonel Brandon by boasting about Elinor's talent. Marianne feels offended when Mrs. Ferrars tries to insult Elinor and answers her back, much to Fanny's dismay. To rectify the situation, John informs the Colonel of Marianne's delicate health and her loss of beauty, which he says is the cause of her anxiety. Notes This chapter focuses on Fanny and John Dashwood and Mrs. Ferrars. Both Mrs. Ferrars and her daughter, Fanny Dashwood, are molded in a similar fashion. They are haughty, snobbish and cold. They are obsessed with money and fascinated by the wealthy. Fanny Dashwood is in awe of Lady Middleton because she resembles herself in her tastes, temperament and status. \"There was a kind of cold-hearted selfishness on both sides, which mutually attracted them; and they sympathised with each other in an insipid propriety of demeanour, and a general want of understanding.\" Jane Austen is rather sarcastic about the relationship between the two snobbish ladies. Austen continues the same tone of harsh critique while describing Mrs. Ferrars: \"Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright, even to formality, in her figure, and serious, even to sourness, in her aspect. Her complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression: but a lucky contraction of the brow had rescued her countenance from the disgrace of insipidity, by giving it the strong characters of pride and ill-nature.\" But Austen chooses only such characters as Lady Middleton, Fanny Dashwood and Mrs. Ferrars to present as caricatures. Lucy and Elinor, who are both in love with Edward, get the opportunity to meet Mrs. Ferrars, and each responds differently to the situation. Lucy is excited about meeting her and tries her best to impress her, while Elinor is merely curious about Mrs. Ferrars. She acts normally and presents her true self before the old lady. Elinor is always composed and handles even an unfavorable situation to the best of her ability. Marianne, on the other hand, is easily excited by criticism or unjust remarks. When Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny Dashwood try to hurt Elinor by praising the talent of Miss Morton, Marianne rebukes them. She then becomes emotional and bursts into tears, thereby embarrassing the guests. The chapter also presents humorous situations. Marianne's defending her sister and offending Mrs. Ferrars, creates a furor at the party. When she finally breaks down after consoling her sister, her distress affects all the other characters. Jane Austen describes the scene thus: \"She could say no more; her spirits were quite overcome, and hiding her face on Elinor's shoulder, she burst into tears. Everybody's attention was called, and almost everybody was concerned. Colonel Brandon rose up and went to them without knowing what he did. Mrs. Jennings, with a very intelligent, 'Ah! poor dear,' immediately gave her salts; and Sir John felt so desperately enraged against the author of this nervous distress, that he instantly changed his seat to one close by Lucy Steele, and gave her, in a whisper, a brief account of the whole shocking affair.\" No one but Jane Austen could describe the confusion so effectively and amusingly."}

Mrs. John Dashwood had so much confidence in her husband's judgment, that she waited the very next day both on Mrs. Jennings and her daughter; and her confidence was rewarded by finding even the former, even the woman with whom her sisters were staying, by no means unworthy her notice; and as for Lady Middleton, she found her one of the most charming women in the world! Lady Middleton was equally pleased with Mrs. Dashwood. There was a kind of cold hearted selfishness on both sides, which mutually attracted them; and they sympathised with each other in an insipid propriety of demeanor, and a general want of understanding. The same manners, however, which recommended Mrs. John Dashwood to the good opinion of Lady Middleton did not suit the fancy of Mrs. Jennings, and to HER she appeared nothing more than a little proud-looking woman of uncordial address, who met her husband's sisters without any affection, and almost without having anything to say to them; for of the quarter of an hour bestowed on Berkeley Street, she sat at least seven minutes and a half in silence. Elinor wanted very much to know, though she did not chuse to ask, whether Edward was then in town; but nothing would have induced Fanny voluntarily to mention his name before her, till able to tell her that his marriage with Miss Morton was resolved on, or till her husband's expectations on Colonel Brandon were answered; because she believed them still so very much attached to each other, that they could not be too sedulously divided in word and deed on every occasion. The intelligence however, which SHE would not give, soon flowed from another quarter. Lucy came very shortly to claim Elinor's compassion on being unable to see Edward, though he had arrived in town with Mr. and Mrs. Dashwood. He dared not come to Bartlett's Buildings for fear of detection, and though their mutual impatience to meet, was not to be told, they could do nothing at present but write. Edward assured them himself of his being in town, within a very short time, by twice calling in Berkeley Street. Twice was his card found on the table, when they returned from their morning's engagements. Elinor was pleased that he had called; and still more pleased that she had missed him. The Dashwoods were so prodigiously delighted with the Middletons, that, though not much in the habit of giving anything, they determined to give them--a dinner; and soon after their acquaintance began, invited them to dine in Harley Street, where they had taken a very good house for three months. Their sisters and Mrs. Jennings were invited likewise, and John Dashwood was careful to secure Colonel Brandon, who, always glad to be where the Miss Dashwoods were, received his eager civilities with some surprise, but much more pleasure. They were to meet Mrs. Ferrars; but Elinor could not learn whether her sons were to be of the party. The expectation of seeing HER, however, was enough to make her interested in the engagement; for though she could now meet Edward's mother without that strong anxiety which had once promised to attend such an introduction, though she could now see her with perfect indifference as to her opinion of herself, her desire of being in company with Mrs. Ferrars, her curiosity to know what she was like, was as lively as ever. The interest with which she thus anticipated the party, was soon afterwards increased, more powerfully than pleasantly, by her hearing that the Miss Steeles were also to be at it. So well had they recommended themselves to Lady Middleton, so agreeable had their assiduities made them to her, that though Lucy was certainly not so elegant, and her sister not even genteel, she was as ready as Sir John to ask them to spend a week or two in Conduit Street; and it happened to be particularly convenient to the Miss Steeles, as soon as the Dashwoods' invitation was known, that their visit should begin a few days before the party took place. Their claims to the notice of Mrs. John Dashwood, as the nieces of the gentleman who for many years had had the care of her brother, might not have done much, however, towards procuring them seats at her table; but as Lady Middleton's guests they must be welcome; and Lucy, who had long wanted to be personally known to the family, to have a nearer view of their characters and her own difficulties, and to have an opportunity of endeavouring to please them, had seldom been happier in her life, than she was on receiving Mrs. John Dashwood's card. On Elinor its effect was very different. She began immediately to determine, that Edward who lived with his mother, must be asked as his mother was, to a party given by his sister; and to see him for the first time, after all that passed, in the company of Lucy!--she hardly knew how she could bear it! These apprehensions, perhaps, were not founded entirely on reason, and certainly not at all on truth. They were relieved however, not by her own recollection, but by the good will of Lucy, who believed herself to be inflicting a severe disappointment when she told her that Edward certainly would not be in Harley Street on Tuesday, and even hoped to be carrying the pain still farther by persuading her that he was kept away by the extreme affection for herself, which he could not conceal when they were together. The important Tuesday came that was to introduce the two young ladies to this formidable mother-in-law. "Pity me, dear Miss Dashwood!" said Lucy, as they walked up the stairs together--for the Middletons arrived so directly after Mrs. Jennings, that they all followed the servant at the same time--"There is nobody here but you, that can feel for me.--I declare I can hardly stand. Good gracious!--In a moment I shall see the person that all my happiness depends on--that is to be my mother!"-- Elinor could have given her immediate relief by suggesting the possibility of its being Miss Morton's mother, rather than her own, whom they were about to behold; but instead of doing that, she assured her, and with great sincerity, that she did pity her--to the utter amazement of Lucy, who, though really uncomfortable herself, hoped at least to be an object of irrepressible envy to Elinor. Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright, even to formality, in her figure, and serious, even to sourness, in her aspect. Her complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression; but a lucky contraction of the brow had rescued her countenance from the disgrace of insipidity, by giving it the strong characters of pride and ill nature. She was not a woman of many words; for, unlike people in general, she proportioned them to the number of her ideas; and of the few syllables that did escape her, not one fell to the share of Miss Dashwood, whom she eyed with the spirited determination of disliking her at all events. Elinor could not NOW be made unhappy by this behaviour.-- A few months ago it would have hurt her exceedingly; but it was not in Mrs. Ferrars' power to distress her by it now;--and the difference of her manners to the Miss Steeles, a difference which seemed purposely made to humble her more, only amused her. She could not but smile to see the graciousness of both mother and daughter towards the very person-- for Lucy was particularly distinguished--whom of all others, had they known as much as she did, they would have been most anxious to mortify; while she herself, who had comparatively no power to wound them, sat pointedly slighted by both. But while she smiled at a graciousness so misapplied, she could not reflect on the mean-spirited folly from which it sprung, nor observe the studied attentions with which the Miss Steeles courted its continuance, without thoroughly despising them all four. Lucy was all exultation on being so honorably distinguished; and Miss Steele wanted only to be teazed about Dr. Davies to be perfectly happy. The dinner was a grand one, the servants were numerous, and every thing bespoke the Mistress's inclination for show, and the Master's ability to support it. In spite of the improvements and additions which were making to the Norland estate, and in spite of its owner having once been within some thousand pounds of being obliged to sell out at a loss, nothing gave any symptom of that indigence which he had tried to infer from it;--no poverty of any kind, except of conversation, appeared--but there, the deficiency was considerable. John Dashwood had not much to say for himself that was worth hearing, and his wife had still less. But there was no peculiar disgrace in this; for it was very much the case with the chief of their visitors, who almost all laboured under one or other of these disqualifications for being agreeable--Want of sense, either natural or improved--want of elegance--want of spirits--or want of temper. When the ladies withdrew to the drawing-room after dinner, this poverty was particularly evident, for the gentlemen HAD supplied the discourse with some variety--the variety of politics, inclosing land, and breaking horses--but then it was all over; and one subject only engaged the ladies till coffee came in, which was the comparative heights of Harry Dashwood, and Lady Middleton's second son William, who were nearly of the same age. Had both the children been there, the affair might have been determined too easily by measuring them at once; but as Harry only was present, it was all conjectural assertion on both sides; and every body had a right to be equally positive in their opinion, and to repeat it over and over again as often as they liked. The parties stood thus: The two mothers, though each really convinced that her own son was the tallest, politely decided in favour of the other. The two grandmothers, with not less partiality, but more sincerity, were equally earnest in support of their own descendant. Lucy, who was hardly less anxious to please one parent than the other, thought the boys were both remarkably tall for their age, and could not conceive that there could be the smallest difference in the world between them; and Miss Steele, with yet greater address gave it, as fast as she could, in favour of each. Elinor, having once delivered her opinion on William's side, by which she offended Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny still more, did not see the necessity of enforcing it by any farther assertion; and Marianne, when called on for hers, offended them all, by declaring that she had no opinion to give, as she had never thought about it. Before her removing from Norland, Elinor had painted a very pretty pair of screens for her sister-in-law, which being now just mounted and brought home, ornamented her present drawing room; and these screens, catching the eye of John Dashwood on his following the other gentlemen into the room, were officiously handed by him to Colonel Brandon for his admiration. "These are done by my eldest sister," said he; "and you, as a man of taste, will, I dare say, be pleased with them. I do not know whether you have ever happened to see any of her performances before, but she is in general reckoned to draw extremely well." The Colonel, though disclaiming all pretensions to connoisseurship, warmly admired the screens, as he would have done any thing painted by Miss Dashwood; and on the curiosity of the others being of course excited, they were handed round for general inspection. Mrs. Ferrars, not aware of their being Elinor's work, particularly requested to look at them; and after they had received gratifying testimony of Lady Middletons's approbation, Fanny presented them to her mother, considerately informing her, at the same time, that they were done by Miss Dashwood. "Hum"--said Mrs. Ferrars--"very pretty,"--and without regarding them at all, returned them to her daughter. Perhaps Fanny thought for a moment that her mother had been quite rude enough,--for, colouring a little, she immediately said, "They are very pretty, ma'am--an't they?" But then again, the dread of having been too civil, too encouraging herself, probably came over her, for she presently added, "Do you not think they are something in Miss Morton's style of painting, Ma'am?--She DOES paint most delightfully!--How beautifully her last landscape is done!" "Beautifully indeed! But SHE does every thing well." Marianne could not bear this.--She was already greatly displeased with Mrs. Ferrars; and such ill-timed praise of another, at Elinor's expense, though she had not any notion of what was principally meant by it, provoked her immediately to say with warmth, "This is admiration of a very particular kind!--what is Miss Morton to us?--who knows, or who cares, for her?--it is Elinor of whom WE think and speak." And so saying, she took the screens out of her sister-in-law's hands, to admire them herself as they ought to be admired. Mrs. Ferrars looked exceedingly angry, and drawing herself up more stiffly than ever, pronounced in retort this bitter philippic, "Miss Morton is Lord Morton's daughter." Fanny looked very angry too, and her husband was all in a fright at his sister's audacity. Elinor was much more hurt by Marianne's warmth than she had been by what produced it; but Colonel Brandon's eyes, as they were fixed on Marianne, declared that he noticed only what was amiable in it, the affectionate heart which could not bear to see a sister slighted in the smallest point. Marianne's feelings did not stop here. The cold insolence of Mrs. Ferrars's general behaviour to her sister, seemed, to her, to foretell such difficulties and distresses to Elinor, as her own wounded heart taught her to think of with horror; and urged by a strong impulse of affectionate sensibility, she moved after a moment, to her sister's chair, and putting one arm round her neck, and one cheek close to hers, said in a low, but eager, voice, "Dear, dear Elinor, don't mind them. Don't let them make YOU unhappy." She could say no more; her spirits were quite overcome, and hiding her face on Elinor's shoulder, she burst into tears. Every body's attention was called, and almost every body was concerned.--Colonel Brandon rose up and went to them without knowing what he did.--Mrs. Jennings, with a very intelligent "Ah! poor dear," immediately gave her her salts; and Sir John felt so desperately enraged against the author of this nervous distress, that he instantly changed his seat to one close by Lucy Steele, and gave her, in a whisper, a brief account of the whole shocking affair. In a few minutes, however, Marianne was recovered enough to put an end to the bustle, and sit down among the rest; though her spirits retained the impression of what had passed, the whole evening. "Poor Marianne!" said her brother to Colonel Brandon, in a low voice, as soon as he could secure his attention,-- "She has not such good health as her sister,--she is very nervous,--she has not Elinor's constitution;--and one must allow that there is something very trying to a young woman who HAS BEEN a beauty in the loss of her personal attractions. You would not think it perhaps, but Marianne WAS remarkably handsome a few months ago; quite as handsome as Elinor.-- Now you see it is all gone."

Chapter 34

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility48.asp

Elinor tells the Colonel's story to Marianne, who believes it, but feels miserable on hearing this information. Her attitude towards Colonel Brandon improves. A letter arrives from Mrs. Dashwood, expressing concern for Marianne. She advises them to prolong their stay in London. The Middletons and the Palmers sympathize with Marianne and curse Willoughby for his deceit. Mrs. Palmer informs Elinor of Willoughby's wedding. Elinor conveys the news to her sister a few days later. Marianne breaks down after this. At about this time, the Steeles pay them a visit. They indulge in frivolous talk and insist on meeting Marianne.

Notes Marianne gradually comes to terms with her situation. First she hears about Willoughby's deceptive nature and his shameless behavior towards Miss Williams, followed by the news of his wedding. Her hopes are dashed and she is miserable. Everyone shows concern for Marianne, but their words of consolation only hurt the sensitive girl. In such circumstances, Lady Middleton's indifference proves to be a blessing in disguise. Her non-committal attitude neither hurts nor soothes Marianne's feelings. Mrs. Jennings is busy matchmaking, even during an unhappy period, such as the present one. When she observes Colonel Brandon talking to Elinor, she presumes that they are in love. Matchmaking is her favorite pursuit. The Steele sisters arrive and irritate Elinor with their frivolous behavior. Miss Steele talks coquettishly about Dr. Davies, while Lucy makes a show of her affection for Elinor. They feign concern for Marianne and insist on meeting with her. They are downright indiscreet in their behavior; the Steele sisters offer a complete contrast to the heroines of the novel. CHAPTER 33 Summary One day while they are out shopping, Elinor and Marianne have a chance encounter with their brother. He is apologetic for not having contacted them earlier but promises to pay them a visit the next day. True to his word, he keeps his appointment. He is introduced to Mrs. Jennings and Colonel Brandon, both of whom he treats respectfully. He considers Colonel Brandon an eligible match for Elinor and astonishes his sister with his congratulations on her impending marriage. He also meets the Middletons and is impressed by their wealth and status. Notes Jane Austen here portrays John Dashwood as a hen-pecked husband who is governed by nothing but money. He is impressed by Mrs. Jennings because she lives in elegance. He wants Elinor to marry Colonel Brandon because he possesses considerable property in Dorsetshire. He commends the abilities of Mrs. Ferrars in finding a good match for Edward in Miss Morton, who is to inherit thirty thousand pounds. Finally, he is impressed by the Middletons because "they are people of large fortune." John Dashwood approves of just about anyone who is wealthy. John Dashwood is a humorous character, who never fails to amuse the readers through his talk and behavior. His conversation with Elinor is comical. He presumes that Colonel Brandon is in love with Elinor, and so he congratulates her on her good fortune in getting married to a man of status. In order to cover up his guilt for not helping his sisters financially, he paints a sorry picture of himself and exaggerates his own financial obligations. He then expresses the hope that Mrs. Jennings will bestow her wealth on Elinor and Marianne. He meets the Middletons and is impressed by their style of living, and he decides to introduce his wife to them because she would surely approve of such people. Elinor is embarrassed by his outlook and attitude. He is obsessed with money and entirely governed by his wife. CHAPTER 34 Summary Fanny Dashwood makes the acquaintance of Lady Middleton and is impressed by her. She also meets the Steele sisters and takes a liking to them. She thus invites all of them, including the Dashwood sisters, to a party at her house. Lucy Steele is eager to attend the party, as it will give her an opportunity to meet with Edward and Mrs. Ferrars. Elinor is apprehensive about the visit. At the party they meet Mrs. Ferrars, who is cold and snobbish. She looks down on Elinor, and in order to slight her, pays attention to Lucy. John Dashwood tries to impress Colonel Brandon by boasting about Elinor's talent. Marianne feels offended when Mrs. Ferrars tries to insult Elinor and answers her back, much to Fanny's dismay. To rectify the situation, John informs the Colonel of Marianne's delicate health and her loss of beauty, which he says is the cause of her anxiety. Notes This chapter focuses on Fanny and John Dashwood and Mrs. Ferrars. Both Mrs. Ferrars and her daughter, Fanny Dashwood, are molded in a similar fashion. They are haughty, snobbish and cold. They are obsessed with money and fascinated by the wealthy. Fanny Dashwood is in awe of Lady Middleton because she resembles herself in her tastes, temperament and status. "There was a kind of cold-hearted selfishness on both sides, which mutually attracted them; and they sympathised with each other in an insipid propriety of demeanour, and a general want of understanding." Jane Austen is rather sarcastic about the relationship between the two snobbish ladies. Austen continues the same tone of harsh critique while describing Mrs. Ferrars: "Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright, even to formality, in her figure, and serious, even to sourness, in her aspect. Her complexion was sallow; and her features small, without beauty, and naturally without expression: but a lucky contraction of the brow had rescued her countenance from the disgrace of insipidity, by giving it the strong characters of pride and ill-nature." But Austen chooses only such characters as Lady Middleton, Fanny Dashwood and Mrs. Ferrars to present as caricatures. Lucy and Elinor, who are both in love with Edward, get the opportunity to meet Mrs. Ferrars, and each responds differently to the situation. Lucy is excited about meeting her and tries her best to impress her, while Elinor is merely curious about Mrs. Ferrars. She acts normally and presents her true self before the old lady. Elinor is always composed and handles even an unfavorable situation to the best of her ability. Marianne, on the other hand, is easily excited by criticism or unjust remarks. When Mrs. Ferrars and Fanny Dashwood try to hurt Elinor by praising the talent of Miss Morton, Marianne rebukes them. She then becomes emotional and bursts into tears, thereby embarrassing the guests. The chapter also presents humorous situations. Marianne's defending her sister and offending Mrs. Ferrars, creates a furor at the party. When she finally breaks down after consoling her sister, her distress affects all the other characters. Jane Austen describes the scene thus: "She could say no more; her spirits were quite overcome, and hiding her face on Elinor's shoulder, she burst into tears. Everybody's attention was called, and almost everybody was concerned. Colonel Brandon rose up and went to them without knowing what he did. Mrs. Jennings, with a very intelligent, 'Ah! poor dear,' immediately gave her salts; and Sir John felt so desperately enraged against the author of this nervous distress, that he instantly changed his seat to one close by Lucy Steele, and gave her, in a whisper, a brief account of the whole shocking affair." No one but Jane Austen could describe the confusion so effectively and amusingly.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/23042-chapters/7.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Tempest/section_7_part_0.txt

The Tempest.act iii.scene iii

act iii, scene iii

{"name": "Act III, scene iii", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210131162607/https://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/tempest/section8/", "summary": "Alonso, Sebastian, Antonio, Gonzalo, and their companion lords become exhausted, and Alonso gives up all hope of finding his son. Antonio, still hoping to kill Alonso, whispers to Sebastian that Alonso's exhaustion and desperation will provide them with the perfect opportunity to kill the king later that evening. At this point \"solemn and strange music\" fills the stage , and a procession of spirits in \"several strange shapes\" enters, bringing a banquet of food . The spirits dance about the table, invite the king and his party to eat, and then dance away. Prospero enters at this time as well, having rendered himself magically invisible to everyone but the audience. The men disagree at first about whether to eat, but Gonzalo persuades them it will be all right, noting that travelers are returning every day with stories of unbelievable but true events. This, he says, might be just such an event. Just as the men are about to eat, however, a noise of thunder erupts, and Ariel enters in the shape of a harpy. He claps his wings upon the table and the banquet vanishes. Ariel mocks the men for attempting to draw their swords, which magically have been made to feel heavy. Calling himself an instrument of Fate and Destiny, he goes on to accuse Alonso, Sebastian, and Antonio of driving Prospero from Milan and leaving him and his child at the mercy of the sea. For this sin, he tells them, the powers of nature and the sea have exacted revenge on Alonso by taking Ferdinand. He vanishes, and the procession of spirits enters again and removes the banquet table. Prospero, still invisible, applauds the work of his spirit and announces with satisfaction that his enemies are now in his control. He leaves them in their distracted state and goes to visit with Ferdinand and his daughter. Alonso, meanwhile, is quite desperate. He has heard the name of Prospero once more, and it has signaled the death of his own son. He runs to drown himself. Sebastian and Antonio, meanwhile, decide to pursue and fight with the spirits. Gonzalo, ever the voice of reason, tells the other, younger lords to run after Antonio, Sebastian, and Alonso and to make sure that none of the three does anything rash.", "analysis": "Analysis Ariel's appearance as an avenging harpy represents the climax of Prospero's revenge, as Antonio, Alonso, and the other lords are confronted with their crimes and threatened with punishment. From Prospero's perspective, the disguised Ariel represents justice and the powers of nature. He has arrived to right the wrongs that have been done to Prospero, and to punish the wicked for their sins. However, the audience knows that Ariel is not an angel or representative of a higher moral power, but merely mouths the script that Prospero has taught him. Ariel's only true concern, of course, is to win his freedom from Prospero. Thus, the vision of justice presented in this scene is artificial and staged. Ariel's display has less to do with fate or justice than with Prospero's ability to manipulate the thoughts and feelings of others. Just as his frequent recitations of history to Ariel, Miranda, and Caliban are designed to govern their thinking by imposing his own rhetoric upon it, Prospero's decision to use Ariel as an illusory instrument of \"fate\" is designed to govern the thinking of the nobles at the table by imposing his own ideas of justice and right action upon their minds. Whether or not Prospero's case is really just--as it may well be--his use of Ariel in this scene is done purely to further his persuasion and control. He knows that a supernatural creature claiming to represent nature will make a greater impression in advancing his argument than he himself could hope to. If Prospero simply appeared before the table and stated his case, it would seem tainted with selfish desire. However, for Ariel to present Prospero's case in this fashion makes it seem like the inevitable natural order of the universe--even though Prospero himself is behind everything Ariel says. This state of affairs gets at the heart of the central problem of reading The Tempest. The play seems to present Prospero's notion of justice as the only viable one, but it simultaneously undercuts Prospero's notion of justice by presenting the artificiality of his method of obtaining justice. We are left to wonder if justice really exists when it appears that only a sorcerer can bring about justice. Alternatively, Prospero's manipulations may put us in mind of what playwrights do when they arrange events into meaningful patterns, rewarding the good and punishing the bad."}

SCENE III. _Another part of the island._ _Enter ALONSO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, GONZALO, ADRIAN, FRANCISCO, and others._ _Gon._ By'r lakin, I can go no further, sir; My old bones ache: here's a maze trod, indeed, Through forth-rights and meanders! By your patience, I needs must rest me. _Alon._ Old lord, I cannot blame thee, Who am myself attach'd with weariness, 5 To the dulling of my spirits: sit down, and rest. Even here I will put off my hope, and keep it No longer for my flatterer: he is drown'd Whom thus we stray to find; and the sea mocks Our frustrate search on land. Well, let him go. 10 _Ant._ [_Aside to Seb._] I am right glad that he's so out of hope. Do not, for one repulse, forego the purpose That you resolved to effect. _Seb._ [_Aside to Ant._] The next advantage Will we take throughly. _Ant._ [_Aside to Seb._] Let it be to-night; For, now they are oppress'd with travel, they 15 Will not, nor cannot, use such vigilance As when they are fresh. _Seb._ [_Aside to Ant._] I say, to-night: no more. [_Solemn and strange music._ _Alon._ What harmony is this?--My good friends, hark! _Gon._ Marvellous sweet music! _Enter PROSPERO above, invisible. Enter several strange Shapes, bringing in a banquet: they dance about it with gentle actions of salutation; and, inviting the King, &c. to eat, they depart._ _Alon._ Give us kind keepers, heavens!--What were these? 20 _Seb._ A living drollery. Now I will believe That there are unicorns; that in Arabia There is one tree, the phoenix' throne; one phoenix At this hour reigning there. _Ant._ I'll believe both; And what does else want credit, come to me, 25 And I'll be sworn 'tis true: travellers ne'er did lie, Though fools at home condemn 'em. _Gon._ If in Naples I should report this now, would they believe me? If I should say, I saw such islanders,-- For, certes, these are people of the island,-- 30 Who, though they are of monstrous shape, yet, note, Their manners are more gentle-kind than of Our human generation you shall find Many, nay, almost any. _Pros._ [_Aside_] Honest lord, Thou hast said well; for some of you there present 35 Are worse than devils. _Alon._ I cannot too much muse Such shapes, such gesture, and such sound, expressing-- Although they want the use of tongue--a kind Of excellent dumb discourse. _Pros._ [_Aside_] Praise in departing. _Fran._ They vanish'd strangely. _Seb._ No matter, since 40 They have left their viands behind; for we have stomachs.-- Will't please you taste of what is here? _Alon._ Not I. _Gon._ Faith, sir, you need not fear. When we were boys, Who would believe that there were mountaineers Dew-lapp'd like bulls, whose throats had hanging at 'em 45 Wallets of flesh? or that there were such men Whose heads stood in their breasts? which now we find Each putter-out of five for one will bring us Good warrant of. _Alon._ I will stand to, and feed, Although my last: no matter, since I feel 50 The best is past. Brother, my lord the duke, Stand to, and do as we. _Thunder and lightning. Enter ARIEL, like a harpy; claps his wings upon the table; and, with a quaint device, the banquet vanishes._ _Ari._ You are three men of sin, whom Destiny,-- That hath to instrument this lower world And what is in't,--the never-surfeited sea 55 Hath caused to belch up you; and on this island, Where man doth not inhabit,--you 'mongst men Being most unfit to live. I have made you mad; And even with such-like valour men hang and drown Their proper selves. [_Alon., Seb. &c. draw their swords._ You fools! I and my fellows 60 Are ministers of Fate: the elements, Of whom your swords are temper'd, may as well Wound the loud winds, or with bemock'd-at stabs Kill the still-closing waters, as diminish One dowle that's in my plume: my fellow-ministers 65 Are like invulnerable. If you could hurt, Your swords are now too massy for your strengths, And will not be uplifted. But remember,-- For that's my business to you,--that you three From Milan did supplant good Prospero; 70 Exposed unto the sea, which hath requit it, Him and his innocent child: for which foul deed The powers, delaying, not forgetting, have Incensed the seas and shores, yea, all the creatures, Against your peace. Thee of thy son, Alonso, 75 They have bereft; and do pronounce by me: Lingering perdition--worse than any death Can be at once--shall step by step attend You and your ways; whose wraths to guard you from,-- Which here, in this most desolate isle, else falls 80 Upon your heads,--is nothing but heart-sorrow And a clear life ensuing. _He vanishes in thunder; then, to soft music, enter the Shapes again, and dance, with mocks and mows, and carrying out the table._ _Pros._ Bravely the figure of this harpy hast thou Perform'd, my Ariel; a grace it had, devouring: Of my instruction hast thou nothing bated 85 In what thou hadst to say: so, with good life And observation strange, my meaner ministers Their several kinds have done. My high charms work, And these mine enemies are all knit up In their distractions: they now are in my power; 90 And in these fits I leave them, while I visit Young Ferdinand,--whom they suppose is drown'd,-- And his and mine loved darling. [_Exit above._ _Gon._ I' the name of something holy, sir, why stand you In this strange stare? _Alon._ O, it is monstrous, monstrous! 95 Methought the billows spoke, and told me of it; The winds did sing it to me; and the thunder, That deep and dreadful organ-pipe, pronounced The name of Prosper: it did bass my trespass. Therefore my son i' th' ooze is bedded; and 100 I'll seek him deeper than e'er plummet sounded, And with him there lie mudded. [_Exit._ _Seb._ But one fiend at a time, I'll fight their legions o'er. _Ant._ I'll be thy second. [_Exeunt Seb. and Ant._ _Gon._ All three of them are desperate: their great guilt, Like poison given to work a great time after, 105 Now 'gins to bite the spirits. I do beseech you, That are of suppler joints, follow them swiftly, And hinder them from what this ecstasy May now provoke them to. _Adr._ Follow, I pray you. [_Exeunt._ Notes: III, 3. 2: _ache_] _ake_ F2 F3 F4. _akes_ F1. 3: _forth-rights_] F2 F3 F4. _fourth rights_ F1. 8: _flatterer_] F1. _flatterers_ F2 F3 F4. 17: Prospero above] Malone. Prosper on the top Ff. See note (XIV). 20: _were_] F1 F2 F3. _are_ F4. 26: _'tis true_] _to 't_ Steevens conj. _did lie_] _lied_ Hanmer. 29: _islanders_] F2 F3 F4. _islands_ F1. 32: _gentle-kind_] Theobald. _gentle, kind_ Ff. _gentle kind_ Rowe. 36: _muse_] F1 F2 F3. _muse_, F4. _muse_; Capell. 48: _of five for one_] Ff. _on five for one_ Theobald. _of one for five_ Malone, (Thirlby conj.) See note (XV). 49-51: _I will ... past_] Mason conjectured that these lines formed a rhyming couplet. 53: SCENE IV. Pope. 54: _instrument_] _instruments_ F4. 56: _belch up you_] F1 F2 F3. _belch you up_ F4. _belch up_ Theobald. 60: [... draw their swords] Hanmer. 65: _dowle_] _down_ Pope.] _plume_] Rowe. _plumbe_ F1 F2 F3. _plumb_ F4. 67: _strengths_] _strength_ F4. 79: _wraths_] _wrath_ Theobald. 81: _heart-sorrow_] Edd. _hearts-sorrow_ Ff. _heart's-sorrow_ Rowe. _heart's sorrow_ Pope. 82: mocks] mopps Theobald. 86: _life_] _list_ Johnson conj. 90: _now_] om. Pope. 92: _whom_] _who_ Hanmer. 93: _mine_] _my_ Rowe. [Exit above] Theobald.] 94: _something holy, sir_,] _something, holy Sir_, F4. 99: _bass_] Johnson. _base_ Ff. 106: _do_] om. Pope.

Act III, scene iii

https://web.archive.org/web/20210131162607/https://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/tempest/section8/

Alonso, Sebastian, Antonio, Gonzalo, and their companion lords become exhausted, and Alonso gives up all hope of finding his son. Antonio, still hoping to kill Alonso, whispers to Sebastian that Alonso's exhaustion and desperation will provide them with the perfect opportunity to kill the king later that evening. At this point "solemn and strange music" fills the stage , and a procession of spirits in "several strange shapes" enters, bringing a banquet of food . The spirits dance about the table, invite the king and his party to eat, and then dance away. Prospero enters at this time as well, having rendered himself magically invisible to everyone but the audience. The men disagree at first about whether to eat, but Gonzalo persuades them it will be all right, noting that travelers are returning every day with stories of unbelievable but true events. This, he says, might be just such an event. Just as the men are about to eat, however, a noise of thunder erupts, and Ariel enters in the shape of a harpy. He claps his wings upon the table and the banquet vanishes. Ariel mocks the men for attempting to draw their swords, which magically have been made to feel heavy. Calling himself an instrument of Fate and Destiny, he goes on to accuse Alonso, Sebastian, and Antonio of driving Prospero from Milan and leaving him and his child at the mercy of the sea. For this sin, he tells them, the powers of nature and the sea have exacted revenge on Alonso by taking Ferdinand. He vanishes, and the procession of spirits enters again and removes the banquet table. Prospero, still invisible, applauds the work of his spirit and announces with satisfaction that his enemies are now in his control. He leaves them in their distracted state and goes to visit with Ferdinand and his daughter. Alonso, meanwhile, is quite desperate. He has heard the name of Prospero once more, and it has signaled the death of his own son. He runs to drown himself. Sebastian and Antonio, meanwhile, decide to pursue and fight with the spirits. Gonzalo, ever the voice of reason, tells the other, younger lords to run after Antonio, Sebastian, and Alonso and to make sure that none of the three does anything rash.

Analysis Ariel's appearance as an avenging harpy represents the climax of Prospero's revenge, as Antonio, Alonso, and the other lords are confronted with their crimes and threatened with punishment. From Prospero's perspective, the disguised Ariel represents justice and the powers of nature. He has arrived to right the wrongs that have been done to Prospero, and to punish the wicked for their sins. However, the audience knows that Ariel is not an angel or representative of a higher moral power, but merely mouths the script that Prospero has taught him. Ariel's only true concern, of course, is to win his freedom from Prospero. Thus, the vision of justice presented in this scene is artificial and staged. Ariel's display has less to do with fate or justice than with Prospero's ability to manipulate the thoughts and feelings of others. Just as his frequent recitations of history to Ariel, Miranda, and Caliban are designed to govern their thinking by imposing his own rhetoric upon it, Prospero's decision to use Ariel as an illusory instrument of "fate" is designed to govern the thinking of the nobles at the table by imposing his own ideas of justice and right action upon their minds. Whether or not Prospero's case is really just--as it may well be--his use of Ariel in this scene is done purely to further his persuasion and control. He knows that a supernatural creature claiming to represent nature will make a greater impression in advancing his argument than he himself could hope to. If Prospero simply appeared before the table and stated his case, it would seem tainted with selfish desire. However, for Ariel to present Prospero's case in this fashion makes it seem like the inevitable natural order of the universe--even though Prospero himself is behind everything Ariel says. This state of affairs gets at the heart of the central problem of reading The Tempest. The play seems to present Prospero's notion of justice as the only viable one, but it simultaneously undercuts Prospero's notion of justice by presenting the artificiality of his method of obtaining justice. We are left to wonder if justice really exists when it appears that only a sorcerer can bring about justice. Alternatively, Prospero's manipulations may put us in mind of what playwrights do when they arrange events into meaningful patterns, rewarding the good and punishing the bad.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/47.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_10_part_2.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 8.chapter 2

book 8, chapter 2

{"name": "book 8, Chapter 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section11/", "summary": "Lyagavy Dmitri travels to the merchant's town, pawning his watch to pay for the transportation, but finds the man drunk. When the man has not sobered up the next day, Dmitri returns to town, desperate and uncertain of how to proceed", "analysis": ""}

Chapter II. Lyagavy So he must drive at full speed, and he had not the money for horses. He had forty kopecks, and that was all, all that was left after so many years of prosperity! But he had at home an old silver watch which had long ceased to go. He snatched it up and carried it to a Jewish watchmaker who had a shop in the market-place. The Jew gave him six roubles for it. "And I didn't expect that," cried Mitya, ecstatically. (He was still in a state of ecstasy.) He seized his six roubles and ran home. At home he borrowed three roubles from the people of the house, who loved him so much that they were pleased to give it him, though it was all they had. Mitya in his excitement told them on the spot that his fate would be decided that day, and he described, in desperate haste, the whole scheme he had put before Samsonov, the latter's decision, his own hopes for the future, and so on. These people had been told many of their lodger's secrets before, and so looked upon him as a gentleman who was not at all proud, and almost one of themselves. Having thus collected nine roubles Mitya sent for posting-horses to take him to the Volovya station. This was how the fact came to be remembered and established that "at midday, on the day before the event, Mitya had not a farthing, and that he had sold his watch to get money and had borrowed three roubles from his landlord, all in the presence of witnesses." I note this fact, later on it will be apparent why I do so. Though he was radiant with the joyful anticipation that he would at last solve all his difficulties, yet, as he drew near Volovya station, he trembled at the thought of what Grushenka might be doing in his absence. What if she made up her mind to-day to go to Fyodor Pavlovitch? This was why he had gone off without telling her and why he left orders with his landlady not to let out where he had gone, if any one came to inquire for him. "I must, I must get back to-night," he repeated, as he was jolted along in the cart, "and I dare say I shall have to bring this Lyagavy back here ... to draw up the deed." So mused Mitya, with a throbbing heart, but alas! his dreams were not fated to be carried out. To begin with, he was late, taking a short cut from Volovya station which turned out to be eighteen versts instead of twelve. Secondly, he did not find the priest at home at Ilyinskoe; he had gone off to a neighboring village. While Mitya, setting off there with the same exhausted horses, was looking for him, it was almost dark. The priest, a shy and amiable looking little man, informed him at once that though Lyagavy had been staying with him at first, he was now at Suhoy Possyolok, that he was staying the night in the forester's cottage, as he was buying timber there too. At Mitya's urgent request that he would take him to Lyagavy at once, and by so doing "save him, so to speak," the priest agreed, after some demur, to conduct him to Suhoy Possyolok; his curiosity was obviously aroused. But, unluckily, he advised their going on foot, as it would not be "much over" a verst. Mitya, of course, agreed, and marched off with his yard-long strides, so that the poor priest almost ran after him. He was a very cautious man, though not old. Mitya at once began talking to him, too, of his plans, nervously and excitedly asking advice in regard to Lyagavy, and talking all the way. The priest listened attentively, but gave little advice. He turned off Mitya's questions with: "I don't know. Ah, I can't say. How can I tell?" and so on. When Mitya began to speak of his quarrel with his father over his inheritance, the priest was positively alarmed, as he was in some way dependent on Fyodor Pavlovitch. He inquired, however, with surprise, why he called the peasant-trader Gorstkin, Lyagavy, and obligingly explained to Mitya that, though the man's name really was Lyagavy, he was never called so, as he would be grievously offended at the name, and that he must be sure to call him Gorstkin, "or you'll do nothing with him; he won't even listen to you," said the priest in conclusion. Mitya was somewhat surprised for a moment, and explained that that was what Samsonov had called him. On hearing this fact, the priest dropped the subject, though he would have done well to put into words his doubt whether, if Samsonov had sent him to that peasant, calling him Lyagavy, there was not something wrong about it and he was turning him into ridicule. But Mitya had no time to pause over such trifles. He hurried, striding along, and only when he reached Suhoy Possyolok did he realize that they had come not one verst, nor one and a half, but at least three. This annoyed him, but he controlled himself. They went into the hut. The forester lived in one half of the hut, and Gorstkin was lodging in the other, the better room the other side of the passage. They went into that room and lighted a tallow candle. The hut was extremely overheated. On the table there was a samovar that had gone out, a tray with cups, an empty rum bottle, a bottle of vodka partly full, and some half-eaten crusts of wheaten bread. The visitor himself lay stretched at full length on the bench, with his coat crushed up under his head for a pillow, snoring heavily. Mitya stood in perplexity. "Of course I must wake him. My business is too important. I've come in such haste. I'm in a hurry to get back to-day," he said in great agitation. But the priest and the forester stood in silence, not giving their opinion. Mitya went up and began trying to wake him himself; he tried vigorously, but the sleeper did not wake. "He's drunk," Mitya decided. "Good Lord! What am I to do? What am I to do?" And, terribly impatient, he began pulling him by the arms, by the legs, shaking his head, lifting him up and making him sit on the bench. Yet, after prolonged exertions, he could only succeed in getting the drunken man to utter absurd grunts, and violent, but inarticulate oaths. "No, you'd better wait a little," the priest pronounced at last, "for he's obviously not in a fit state." "He's been drinking the whole day," the forester chimed in. "Good heavens!" cried Mitya. "If only you knew how important it is to me and how desperate I am!" "No, you'd better wait till morning," the priest repeated. "Till morning? Mercy! that's impossible!" And in his despair he was on the point of attacking the sleeping man again, but stopped short at once, realizing the uselessness of his efforts. The priest said nothing, the sleepy forester looked gloomy. "What terrible tragedies real life contrives for people," said Mitya, in complete despair. The perspiration was streaming down his face. The priest seized the moment to put before him, very reasonably, that, even if he succeeded in wakening the man, he would still be drunk and incapable of conversation. "And your business is important," he said, "so you'd certainly better put it off till morning." With a gesture of despair Mitya agreed. "Father, I will stay here with a light, and seize the favorable moment. As soon as he wakes I'll begin. I'll pay you for the light," he said to the forester, "for the night's lodging, too; you'll remember Dmitri Karamazov. Only, Father, I don't know what we're to do with you. Where will you sleep?" "No, I'm going home. I'll take his horse and get home," he said, indicating the forester. "And now I'll say good-by. I wish you all success." So it was settled. The priest rode off on the forester's horse, delighted to escape, though he shook his head uneasily, wondering whether he ought not next day to inform his benefactor Fyodor Pavlovitch of this curious incident, "or he may in an unlucky hour hear of it, be angry, and withdraw his favor." The forester, scratching himself, went back to his room without a word, and Mitya sat on the bench to "catch the favorable moment," as he expressed it. Profound dejection clung about his soul like a heavy mist. A profound, intense dejection! He sat thinking, but could reach no conclusion. The candle burnt dimly, a cricket chirped; it became insufferably close in the overheated room. He suddenly pictured the garden, the path behind the garden, the door of his father's house mysteriously opening and Grushenka running in. He leapt up from the bench. "It's a tragedy!" he said, grinding his teeth. Mechanically he went up to the sleeping man and looked in his face. He was a lean, middle-aged peasant, with a very long face, flaxen curls, and a long, thin, reddish beard, wearing a blue cotton shirt and a black waistcoat, from the pocket of which peeped the chain of a silver watch. Mitya looked at his face with intense hatred, and for some unknown reason his curly hair particularly irritated him. What was insufferably humiliating was, that after leaving things of such importance and making such sacrifices, he, Mitya, utterly worn out, should with business of such urgency be standing over this dolt on whom his whole fate depended, while he snored as though there were nothing the matter, as though he'd dropped from another planet. "Oh, the irony of fate!" cried Mitya, and, quite losing his head, he fell again to rousing the tipsy peasant. He roused him with a sort of ferocity, pulled at him, pushed him, even beat him; but after five minutes of vain exertions, he returned to his bench in helpless despair, and sat down. "Stupid! Stupid!" cried Mitya. "And how dishonorable it all is!" something made him add. His head began to ache horribly. "Should he fling it up and go away altogether?" he wondered. "No, wait till to-morrow now. I'll stay on purpose. What else did I come for? Besides, I've no means of going. How am I to get away from here now? Oh, the idiocy of it!" But his head ached more and more. He sat without moving, and unconsciously dozed off and fell asleep as he sat. He seemed to have slept for two hours or more. He was waked up by his head aching so unbearably that he could have screamed. There was a hammering in his temples, and the top of his head ached. It was a long time before he could wake up fully and understand what had happened to him. At last he realized that the room was full of charcoal fumes from the stove, and that he might die of suffocation. And the drunken peasant still lay snoring. The candle guttered and was about to go out. Mitya cried out, and ran staggering across the passage into the forester's room. The forester waked up at once, but hearing that the other room was full of fumes, to Mitya's surprise and annoyance, accepted the fact with strange unconcern, though he did go to see to it. "But he's dead, he's dead! and ... what am I to do then?" cried Mitya frantically. They threw open the doors, opened a window and the chimney. Mitya brought a pail of water from the passage. First he wetted his own head, then, finding a rag of some sort, dipped it into the water, and put it on Lyagavy's head. The forester still treated the matter contemptuously, and when he opened the window said grumpily: "It'll be all right, now." He went back to sleep, leaving Mitya a lighted lantern. Mitya fussed about the drunken peasant for half an hour, wetting his head, and gravely resolved not to sleep all night. But he was so worn out that when he sat down for a moment to take breath, he closed his eyes, unconsciously stretched himself full length on the bench and slept like the dead. It was dreadfully late when he waked. It was somewhere about nine o'clock. The sun was shining brightly in the two little windows of the hut. The curly-headed peasant was sitting on the bench and had his coat on. He had another samovar and another bottle in front of him. Yesterday's bottle had already been finished, and the new one was more than half empty. Mitya jumped up and saw at once that the cursed peasant was drunk again, hopelessly and incurably. He stared at him for a moment with wide opened eyes. The peasant was silently and slyly watching him, with insulting composure, and even a sort of contemptuous condescension, so Mitya fancied. He rushed up to him. "Excuse me, you see ... I ... you've most likely heard from the forester here in the hut. I'm Lieutenant Dmitri Karamazov, the son of the old Karamazov whose copse you are buying." "That's a lie!" said the peasant, calmly and confidently. "A lie? You know Fyodor Pavlovitch?" "I don't know any of your Fyodor Pavlovitches," said the peasant, speaking thickly. "You're bargaining with him for the copse, for the copse. Do wake up, and collect yourself. Father Pavel of Ilyinskoe brought me here. You wrote to Samsonov, and he has sent me to you," Mitya gasped breathlessly. "You're l-lying!" Lyagavy blurted out again. Mitya's legs went cold. "For mercy's sake! It isn't a joke! You're drunk, perhaps. Yet you can speak and understand ... or else ... I understand nothing!" "You're a painter!" "For mercy's sake! I'm Karamazov, Dmitri Karamazov. I have an offer to make you, an advantageous offer ... very advantageous offer, concerning the copse!" The peasant stroked his beard importantly. "No, you've contracted for the job and turned out a scamp. You're a scoundrel!" "I assure you you're mistaken," cried Mitya, wringing his hands in despair. The peasant still stroked his beard, and suddenly screwed up his eyes cunningly. "No, you show me this: you tell me the law that allows roguery. D'you hear? You're a scoundrel! Do you understand that?" Mitya stepped back gloomily, and suddenly "something seemed to hit him on the head," as he said afterwards. In an instant a light seemed to dawn in his mind, "a light was kindled and I grasped it all." He stood, stupefied, wondering how he, after all a man of intelligence, could have yielded to such folly, have been led into such an adventure, and have kept it up for almost twenty-four hours, fussing round this Lyagavy, wetting his head. "Why, the man's drunk, dead drunk, and he'll go on drinking now for a week; what's the use of waiting here? And what if Samsonov sent me here on purpose? What if she--? Oh, God, what have I done?" The peasant sat watching him and grinning. Another time Mitya might have killed the fool in a fury, but now he felt as weak as a child. He went quietly to the bench, took up his overcoat, put it on without a word, and went out of the hut. He did not find the forester in the next room; there was no one there. He took fifty kopecks in small change out of his pocket and put them on the table for his night's lodging, the candle, and the trouble he had given. Coming out of the hut he saw nothing but forest all round. He walked at hazard, not knowing which way to turn out of the hut, to the right or to the left. Hurrying there the evening before with the priest, he had not noticed the road. He had no revengeful feeling for anybody, even for Samsonov, in his heart. He strode along a narrow forest path, aimless, dazed, without heeding where he was going. A child could have knocked him down, so weak was he in body and soul. He got out of the forest somehow, however, and a vista of fields, bare after the harvest, stretched as far as the eye could see. "What despair! What death all round!" he repeated, striding on and on. He was saved by meeting an old merchant who was being driven across country in a hired trap. When he overtook him, Mitya asked the way, and it turned out that the old merchant, too, was going to Volovya. After some discussion Mitya got into the trap. Three hours later they arrived. At Volovya, Mitya at once ordered posting-horses to drive to the town, and suddenly realized that he was appallingly hungry. While the horses were being harnessed, an omelette was prepared for him. He ate it all in an instant, ate a huge hunk of bread, ate a sausage, and swallowed three glasses of vodka. After eating, his spirits and his heart grew lighter. He flew towards the town, urged on the driver, and suddenly made a new and "unalterable" plan to procure that "accursed money" before evening. "And to think, only to think that a man's life should be ruined for the sake of that paltry three thousand!" he cried, contemptuously. "I'll settle it to- day." And if it had not been for the thought of Grushenka and of what might have happened to her, which never left him, he would perhaps have become quite cheerful again.... But the thought of her was stabbing him to the heart every moment, like a sharp knife. At last they arrived, and Mitya at once ran to Grushenka.

book 8, Chapter 2

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section11/

Lyagavy Dmitri travels to the merchant's town, pawning his watch to pay for the transportation, but finds the man drunk. When the man has not sobered up the next day, Dmitri returns to town, desperate and uncertain of how to proceed

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/28054-chapters/25.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_4_part_1.txt

The Brothers Karamazov.book 4.chapter 1

book 4, chapter 1

{"name": "book 4, Chapter 1", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section5/", "summary": "Father Ferapont Zosima, realizing that he will soon die, summons a group of students and friends to his side to have one last conversation about faith, love, and goodness. As he speaks, he emphasizes the importance of actively loving mankind, and of carrying universal love into all dealings with other people. He also discourages his listeners from being judgmental, saying that every person on Earth shares the blame for the sins of every other person. As Alyosha leaves Zosima's bedside, he reflects on his elder's impending death, and thinks that surely God would not let such a wise man die without marking his death with a spectacular miracle of some sort. Alyosha is certain that everyone in the monastery feels the same way, with the possible exception of the dour Father Ferapont, Zosima's enemy and an advocate of a harsh and ascetic form of piety that bears little resemblance to Zosima's warmhearted doctrine of love and forgiveness. Zosima calls Alyosha back to his cell. He asks him again to leave the monastery in order to help his family and to do good in the town. This time, Alyosha agrees to do so", "analysis": ""}

PART II Book IV. Lacerations Chapter I. Father Ferapont Alyosha was roused early, before daybreak. Father Zossima woke up feeling very weak, though he wanted to get out of bed and sit up in a chair. His mind was quite clear; his face looked very tired, yet bright and almost joyful. It wore an expression of gayety, kindness and cordiality. "Maybe I shall not live through the coming day," he said to Alyosha. Then he desired to confess and take the sacrament at once. He always confessed to Father Paissy. After taking the communion, the service of extreme unction followed. The monks assembled and the cell was gradually filled up by the inmates of the hermitage. Meantime it was daylight. People began coming from the monastery. After the service was over the elder desired to kiss and take leave of every one. As the cell was so small the earlier visitors withdrew to make room for others. Alyosha stood beside the elder, who was seated again in his arm-chair. He talked as much as he could. Though his voice was weak, it was fairly steady. "I've been teaching you so many years, and therefore I've been talking aloud so many years, that I've got into the habit of talking, and so much so that it's almost more difficult for me to hold my tongue than to talk, even now, in spite of my weakness, dear Fathers and brothers," he jested, looking with emotion at the group round him. Alyosha remembered afterwards something of what he said to them. But though he spoke out distinctly and his voice was fairly steady, his speech was somewhat disconnected. He spoke of many things, he seemed anxious before the moment of death to say everything he had not said in his life, and not simply for the sake of instructing them, but as though thirsting to share with all men and all creation his joy and ecstasy, and once more in his life to open his whole heart. "Love one another, Fathers," said Father Zossima, as far as Alyosha could remember afterwards. "Love God's people. Because we have come here and shut ourselves within these walls, we are no holier than those that are outside, but on the contrary, from the very fact of coming here, each of us has confessed to himself that he is worse than others, than all men on earth.... And the longer the monk lives in his seclusion, the more keenly he must recognize that. Else he would have had no reason to come here. When he realizes that he is not only worse than others, but that he is responsible to all men for all and everything, for all human sins, national and individual, only then the aim of our seclusion is attained. For know, dear ones, that every one of us is undoubtedly responsible for all men and everything on earth, not merely through the general sinfulness of creation, but each one personally for all mankind and every individual man. This knowledge is the crown of life for the monk and for every man. For monks are not a special sort of men, but only what all men ought to be. Only through that knowledge, our heart grows soft with infinite, universal, inexhaustible love. Then every one of you will have the power to win over the whole world by love and to wash away the sins of the world with your tears.... Each of you keep watch over your heart and confess your sins to yourself unceasingly. Be not afraid of your sins, even when perceiving them, if only there be penitence, but make no conditions with God. Again I say, Be not proud. Be proud neither to the little nor to the great. Hate not those who reject you, who insult you, who abuse and slander you. Hate not the atheists, the teachers of evil, the materialists--and I mean not only the good ones--for there are many good ones among them, especially in our day--hate not even the wicked ones. Remember them in your prayers thus: Save, O Lord, all those who have none to pray for them, save too all those who will not pray. And add: it is not in pride that I make this prayer, O Lord, for I am lower than all men.... Love God's people, let not strangers draw away the flock, for if you slumber in your slothfulness and disdainful pride, or worse still, in covetousness, they will come from all sides and draw away your flock. Expound the Gospel to the people unceasingly ... be not extortionate.... Do not love gold and silver, do not hoard them.... Have faith. Cling to the banner and raise it on high." But the elder spoke more disconnectedly than Alyosha reported his words afterwards. Sometimes he broke off altogether, as though to take breath, and recover his strength, but he was in a sort of ecstasy. They heard him with emotion, though many wondered at his words and found them obscure.... Afterwards all remembered those words. When Alyosha happened for a moment to leave the cell, he was struck by the general excitement and suspense in the monks who were crowding about it. This anticipation showed itself in some by anxiety, in others by devout solemnity. All were expecting that some marvel would happen immediately after the elder's death. Their suspense was, from one point of view, almost frivolous, but even the most austere of the monks were affected by it. Father Paissy's face looked the gravest of all. Alyosha was mysteriously summoned by a monk to see Rakitin, who had arrived from town with a singular letter for him from Madame Hohlakov. In it she informed Alyosha of a strange and very opportune incident. It appeared that among the women who had come on the previous day to receive Father Zossima's blessing, there had been an old woman from the town, a sergeant's widow, called Prohorovna. She had inquired whether she might pray for the rest of the soul of her son, Vassenka, who had gone to Irkutsk, and had sent her no news for over a year. To which Father Zossima had answered sternly, forbidding her to do so, and saying that to pray for the living as though they were dead was a kind of sorcery. He afterwards forgave her on account of her ignorance, and added, "as though reading the book of the future" (this was Madame Hohlakov's expression), words of comfort: "that her son Vassya was certainly alive and he would either come himself very shortly or send a letter, and that she was to go home and expect him." And "Would you believe it?" exclaimed Madame Hohlakov enthusiastically, "the prophecy has been fulfilled literally indeed, and more than that." Scarcely had the old woman reached home when they gave her a letter from Siberia which had been awaiting her. But that was not all; in the letter written on the road from Ekaterinenburg, Vassya informed his mother that he was returning to Russia with an official, and that three weeks after her receiving the letter he hoped "to embrace his mother." Madame Hohlakov warmly entreated Alyosha to report this new "miracle of prediction" to the Superior and all the brotherhood. "All, all, ought to know of it!" she concluded. The letter had been written in haste, the excitement of the writer was apparent in every line of it. But Alyosha had no need to tell the monks, for all knew of it already. Rakitin had commissioned the monk who brought his message "to inform most respectfully his reverence Father Paissy, that he, Rakitin, has a matter to speak of with him, of such gravity that he dare not defer it for a moment, and humbly begs forgiveness for his presumption." As the monk had given the message to Father Paissy before that to Alyosha, the latter found after reading the letter, there was nothing left for him to do but to hand it to Father Paissy in confirmation of the story. And even that austere and cautious man, though he frowned as he read the news of the "miracle," could not completely restrain some inner emotion. His eyes gleamed, and a grave and solemn smile came into his lips. "We shall see greater things!" broke from him. "We shall see greater things, greater things yet!" the monks around repeated. But Father Paissy, frowning again, begged all of them, at least for a time, not to speak of the matter "till it be more fully confirmed, seeing there is so much credulity among those of this world, and indeed this might well have chanced naturally," he added, prudently, as it were to satisfy his conscience, though scarcely believing his own disavowal, a fact his listeners very clearly perceived. Within the hour the "miracle" was of course known to the whole monastery, and many visitors who had come for the mass. No one seemed more impressed by it than the monk who had come the day before from St. Sylvester, from the little monastery of Obdorsk in the far North. It was he who had been standing near Madame Hohlakov the previous day and had asked Father Zossima earnestly, referring to the "healing" of the lady's daughter, "How can you presume to do such things?" He was now somewhat puzzled and did not know whom to believe. The evening before he had visited Father Ferapont in his cell apart, behind the apiary, and had been greatly impressed and overawed by the visit. This Father Ferapont was that aged monk so devout in fasting and observing silence who has been mentioned already, as antagonistic to Father Zossima and the whole institution of "elders," which he regarded as a pernicious and frivolous innovation. He was a very formidable opponent, although from his practice of silence he scarcely spoke a word to any one. What made him formidable was that a number of monks fully shared his feeling, and many of the visitors looked upon him as a great saint and ascetic, although they had no doubt that he was crazy. But it was just his craziness attracted them. Father Ferapont never went to see the elder. Though he lived in the hermitage they did not worry him to keep its regulations, and this too because he behaved as though he were crazy. He was seventy-five or more, and he lived in a corner beyond the apiary in an old decaying wooden cell which had been built long ago for another great ascetic, Father Iona, who had lived to be a hundred and five, and of whose saintly doings many curious stories were still extant in the monastery and the neighborhood. Father Ferapont had succeeded in getting himself installed in this same solitary cell seven years previously. It was simply a peasant's hut, though it looked like a chapel, for it contained an extraordinary number of ikons with lamps perpetually burning before them--which men brought to the monastery as offerings to God. Father Ferapont had been appointed to look after them and keep the lamps burning. It was said (and indeed it was true) that he ate only two pounds of bread in three days. The beekeeper, who lived close by the apiary, used to bring him the bread every three days, and even to this man who waited upon him, Father Ferapont rarely uttered a word. The four pounds of bread, together with the sacrament bread, regularly sent him on Sundays after the late mass by the Father Superior, made up his weekly rations. The water in his jug was changed every day. He rarely appeared at mass. Visitors who came to do him homage saw him sometimes kneeling all day long at prayer without looking round. If he addressed them, he was brief, abrupt, strange, and almost always rude. On very rare occasions, however, he would talk to visitors, but for the most part he would utter some one strange saying which was a complete riddle, and no entreaties would induce him to pronounce a word in explanation. He was not a priest, but a simple monk. There was a strange belief, chiefly however among the most ignorant, that Father Ferapont had communication with heavenly spirits and would only converse with them, and so was silent with men. The monk from Obdorsk, having been directed to the apiary by the beekeeper, who was also a very silent and surly monk, went to the corner where Father Ferapont's cell stood. "Maybe he will speak as you are a stranger and maybe you'll get nothing out of him," the beekeeper had warned him. The monk, as he related afterwards, approached in the utmost apprehension. It was rather late in the evening. Father Ferapont was sitting at the door of his cell on a low bench. A huge old elm was lightly rustling overhead. There was an evening freshness in the air. The monk from Obdorsk bowed down before the saint and asked his blessing. "Do you want me to bow down to you, monk?" said Father Ferapont. "Get up!" The monk got up. "Blessing, be blessed! Sit beside me. Where have you come from?" What most struck the poor monk was the fact that in spite of his strict fasting and great age, Father Ferapont still looked a vigorous old man. He was tall, held himself erect, and had a thin, but fresh and healthy face. There was no doubt he still had considerable strength. He was of athletic build. In spite of his great age he was not even quite gray, and still had very thick hair and a full beard, both of which had once been black. His eyes were gray, large and luminous, but strikingly prominent. He spoke with a broad accent. He was dressed in a peasant's long reddish coat of coarse convict cloth (as it used to be called) and had a stout rope round his waist. His throat and chest were bare. Beneath his coat, his shirt of the coarsest linen showed almost black with dirt, not having been changed for months. They said that he wore irons weighing thirty pounds under his coat. His stockingless feet were thrust in old slippers almost dropping to pieces. "From the little Obdorsk monastery, from St. Sylvester," the monk answered humbly, whilst his keen and inquisitive, but rather frightened little eyes kept watch on the hermit. "I have been at your Sylvester's. I used to stay there. Is Sylvester well?" The monk hesitated. "You are a senseless lot! How do you keep the fasts?" "Our dietary is according to the ancient conventual rules. During Lent there are no meals provided for Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. For Tuesday and Thursday we have white bread, stewed fruit with honey, wild berries, or salt cabbage and wholemeal stirabout. On Saturday white cabbage soup, noodles with peas, kasha, all with hemp oil. On weekdays we have dried fish and kasha with the cabbage soup. From Monday till Saturday evening, six whole days in Holy Week, nothing is cooked, and we have only bread and water, and that sparingly; if possible not taking food every day, just the same as is ordered for first week in Lent. On Good Friday nothing is eaten. In the same way on the Saturday we have to fast till three o'clock, and then take a little bread and water and drink a single cup of wine. On Holy Thursday we drink wine and have something cooked without oil or not cooked at all, inasmuch as the Laodicean council lays down for Holy Thursday: 'It is unseemly by remitting the fast on the Holy Thursday to dishonor the whole of Lent!' This is how we keep the fast. But what is that compared with you, holy Father," added the monk, growing more confident, "for all the year round, even at Easter, you take nothing but bread and water, and what we should eat in two days lasts you full seven. It's truly marvelous--your great abstinence." "And mushrooms?" asked Father Ferapont, suddenly. "Mushrooms?" repeated the surprised monk. "Yes. I can give up their bread, not needing it at all, and go away into the forest and live there on the mushrooms or the berries, but they can't give up their bread here, wherefore they are in bondage to the devil. Nowadays the unclean deny that there is need of such fasting. Haughty and unclean is their judgment." "Och, true," sighed the monk. "And have you seen devils among them?" asked Ferapont. "Among them? Among whom?" asked the monk, timidly. "I went to the Father Superior on Trinity Sunday last year, I haven't been since. I saw a devil sitting on one man's chest hiding under his cassock, only his horns poked out; another had one peeping out of his pocket with such sharp eyes, he was afraid of me; another settled in the unclean belly of one, another was hanging round a man's neck, and so he was carrying him about without seeing him." "You--can see spirits?" the monk inquired. "I tell you I can see, I can see through them. When I was coming out from the Superior's I saw one hiding from me behind the door, and a big one, a yard and a half or more high, with a thick long gray tail, and the tip of his tail was in the crack of the door and I was quick and slammed the door, pinching his tail in it. He squealed and began to struggle, and I made the sign of the cross over him three times. And he died on the spot like a crushed spider. He must have rotted there in the corner and be stinking, but they don't see, they don't smell it. It's a year since I have been there. I reveal it to you, as you are a stranger." "Your words are terrible! But, holy and blessed Father," said the monk, growing bolder and bolder, "is it true, as they noise abroad even to distant lands about you, that you are in continual communication with the Holy Ghost?" "He does fly down at times." "How does he fly down? In what form?" "As a bird." "The Holy Ghost in the form of a dove?" "There's the Holy Ghost and there's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit can appear as other birds--sometimes as a swallow, sometimes a goldfinch and sometimes as a blue-tit." "How do you know him from an ordinary tit?" "He speaks." "How does he speak, in what language?" "Human language." "And what does he tell you?" "Why, to-day he told me that a fool would visit me and would ask me unseemly questions. You want to know too much, monk." "Terrible are your words, most holy and blessed Father," the monk shook his head. But there was a doubtful look in his frightened little eyes. "Do you see this tree?" asked Father Ferapont, after a pause. "I do, blessed Father." "You think it's an elm, but for me it has another shape." "What sort of shape?" inquired the monk, after a pause of vain expectation. "It happens at night. You see those two branches? In the night it is Christ holding out His arms to me and seeking me with those arms, I see it clearly and tremble. It's terrible, terrible!" "What is there terrible if it's Christ Himself?" "Why, He'll snatch me up and carry me away." "Alive?" "In the spirit and glory of Elijah, haven't you heard? He will take me in His arms and bear me away." Though the monk returned to the cell he was sharing with one of the brothers, in considerable perplexity of mind, he still cherished at heart a greater reverence for Father Ferapont than for Father Zossima. He was strongly in favor of fasting, and it was not strange that one who kept so rigid a fast as Father Ferapont should "see marvels." His words seemed certainly queer, but God only could tell what was hidden in those words, and were not worse words and acts commonly seen in those who have sacrificed their intellects for the glory of God? The pinching of the devil's tail he was ready and eager to believe, and not only in the figurative sense. Besides he had, before visiting the monastery, a strong prejudice against the institution of "elders," which he only knew of by hearsay and believed to be a pernicious innovation. Before he had been long at the monastery, he had detected the secret murmurings of some shallow brothers who disliked the institution. He was, besides, a meddlesome, inquisitive man, who poked his nose into everything. This was why the news of the fresh "miracle" performed by Father Zossima reduced him to extreme perplexity. Alyosha remembered afterwards how their inquisitive guest from Obdorsk had been continually flitting to and fro from one group to another, listening and asking questions among the monks that were crowding within and without the elder's cell. But he did not pay much attention to him at the time, and only recollected it afterwards. He had no thought to spare for it indeed, for when Father Zossima, feeling tired again, had gone back to bed, he thought of Alyosha as he was closing his eyes, and sent for him. Alyosha ran at once. There was no one else in the cell but Father Paissy, Father Iosif, and the novice Porfiry. The elder, opening his weary eyes and looking intently at Alyosha, asked him suddenly: "Are your people expecting you, my son?" Alyosha hesitated. "Haven't they need of you? Didn't you promise some one yesterday to see them to-day?" "I did promise--to my father--my brothers--others too." "You see, you must go. Don't grieve. Be sure I shall not die without your being by to hear my last word. To you I will say that word, my son, it will be my last gift to you. To you, dear son, because you love me. But now go to keep your promise." Alyosha immediately obeyed, though it was hard to go. But the promise that he should hear his last word on earth, that it should be the last gift to him, Alyosha, sent a thrill of rapture through his soul. He made haste that he might finish what he had to do in the town and return quickly. Father Paissy, too, uttered some words of exhortation which moved and surprised him greatly. He spoke as they left the cell together. "Remember, young man, unceasingly," Father Paissy began, without preface, "that the science of this world, which has become a great power, has, especially in the last century, analyzed everything divine handed down to us in the holy books. After this cruel analysis the learned of this world have nothing left of all that was sacred of old. But they have only analyzed the parts and overlooked the whole, and indeed their blindness is marvelous. Yet the whole still stands steadfast before their eyes, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Has it not lasted nineteen centuries, is it not still a living, a moving power in the individual soul and in the masses of people? It is still as strong and living even in the souls of atheists, who have destroyed everything! For even those who have renounced Christianity and attack it, in their inmost being still follow the Christian ideal, for hitherto neither their subtlety nor the ardor of their hearts has been able to create a higher ideal of man and of virtue than the ideal given by Christ of old. When it has been attempted, the result has been only grotesque. Remember this especially, young man, since you are being sent into the world by your departing elder. Maybe, remembering this great day, you will not forget my words, uttered from the heart for your guidance, seeing you are young, and the temptations of the world are great and beyond your strength to endure. Well, now go, my orphan." With these words Father Paissy blessed him. As Alyosha left the monastery and thought them over, he suddenly realized that he had met a new and unexpected friend, a warmly loving teacher, in this austere monk who had hitherto treated him sternly. It was as though Father Zossima had bequeathed him to him at his death, and "perhaps that's just what had passed between them," Alyosha thought suddenly. The philosophic reflections he had just heard so unexpectedly testified to the warmth of Father Paissy's heart. He was in haste to arm the boy's mind for conflict with temptation and to guard the young soul left in his charge with the strongest defense he could imagine.

book 4, Chapter 1

https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section5/

Father Ferapont Zosima, realizing that he will soon die, summons a group of students and friends to his side to have one last conversation about faith, love, and goodness. As he speaks, he emphasizes the importance of actively loving mankind, and of carrying universal love into all dealings with other people. He also discourages his listeners from being judgmental, saying that every person on Earth shares the blame for the sins of every other person. As Alyosha leaves Zosima's bedside, he reflects on his elder's impending death, and thinks that surely God would not let such a wise man die without marking his death with a spectacular miracle of some sort. Alyosha is certain that everyone in the monastery feels the same way, with the possible exception of the dour Father Ferapont, Zosima's enemy and an advocate of a harsh and ascetic form of piety that bears little resemblance to Zosima's warmhearted doctrine of love and forgiveness. Zosima calls Alyosha back to his cell. He asks him again to leave the monastery in order to help his family and to do good in the town. This time, Alyosha agrees to do so

cliffnotes

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/chapters_21_to_24.txt

finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Tess of the d'Urbervilles/section_5_part_0.txt

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.chapters 21-24

chapters 21-24

{"name": "Chapters 21-24", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219151046/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary-and-analysis/phase-the-third-the-rally-chapters-2124", "summary": "The entire dairy is paralyzed when the milk does not begin to turn to butter. It is suggested that the butter won't come because \"Perhaps somebody in the house is in love.\" Mr. Crick doesn't believe the superstition but instead tells a rather raucous story about a man who had gotten a young girl pregnant. Tess hears the tale, and while others laugh at the story, she rushes outside because the story of Jack Dollop is too real for her. Eventually, the butter begins to form in the churn, and all settles down at the farm. The resident milkmaids, Retty Priddle, Izz Huett, and Marian, take turns gawking at Angel by peeking at him from their room as he moves through the farmyard. Tess does not engage in the girls' sport, and Marian suggests that Angel is in love with Tess, that \"he likes Tess Durbeyfield best.\" All the maids are in love with Angel, but even they seem to sense that Tess and Angel are beginning to show signs of love for each other. It is mid-July, and the weather has turned quite warm, both morning and night, in the Blackmoor Valley. One Sunday, the four maids ready themselves for church. On their way, as a heavy summer downpour had flooded the rivers and creeks, an overflowing creek stops them. Coming from the direction opposite the church is Angel. He volunteers to carry each girl across the swollen current so that their Sunday frocks are not ruined. All of them, including Tess, are shocked and delighted that Angel would spontaneously extend an opportunity for each of them to be held so close to their \"ideal man.\" As Angel crosses the creek with Tess, he hints at his feelings for her, telling her that \"he has undergone three-quarters of the labour entirely for the sake of the fourth-quarter\" and that he \"did not expect such an event today.\" When Tess replies that she also had not anticipated the heavy rains and swollen creek, Angel realizes that Tess does not realize his meaning. Feeling that he is taking unfair advantage of an accidental situation, Angel carries her the rest of the way across and deposits her with her friends. When Angel again leaves, Tess' companions tell her that, although Angel likes her best, he is meant to marry another woman, chosen by his family. During the hot summer at Talbothays, the relationship between Tess and Angel grows as Hardy notes \"It was impossible that the most fanciful love should not grow passionate. The ready bosoms existing there were impregnated by their surroundings.\" Angel secretly watches Tess as she works and musters the courage to tell her of his love for her.", "analysis": "In Crick's telling the story of Jack Dollop, Hardy shows us the dark, real side of humor whereupon many jokes are based. The butt of the joke is usually some person or profession that we might see as humorous. But Tess has lived the tale of Jack Dollop, and she cannot bear being \"ridiculed\" even though no one at Talbothays knows her story. When Angel carries Tess across the swollen creek and his preference for her becomes obvious to her companions, the other young ladies are not hurtful or vindictive, as the women at The Slopes were when they realized Alec's preference for Tess. Of the girls at Talbothays, Hardy says \"The differences which distinguished them as individuals were abstracted by passion, and each was but portion of one organism called sex. There was so much frankness and so little jealousy because there was no hope.\" In fact, they later tell Tess of the woman Angel's family has selected for him to marry and do so without spite or resentfulness. Instead, they \"talked, and ached, and wept till sleep charmed their sorrow away.\" Hardy presents Angel's character more fully in this chapter. Angel is a man very much intellectually challenged by his world, a man who studies its contradictions and who uses a most subtle approach when he makes his overtures to Tess. Angel, although he is the son of a minister, has difficulty with the religion, the church, and church doctrine. He is a naturalist who seeks his answers in the world that he can relate to, \"preferr sermons in stones to sermons in churches and chapels on fine summer days.\" Yet his actions to aid the young ladies when crossing the flooded creek and his remarks alluding to the Jacob/Leah/Rachel story from Genesis, suggest a more complex character steeped in Christian teachings, but who questions some of the practices of the institution itself. Angel is an intellectual free thinker who approaches his environment with thoughtful deliberation and careful consideration. His approach to other people is not as aloof as we may be inclined to believe; he prefers not to abuse his position or stand with others. This can be clearly seen at the creek, \"It reminded Angel that he was somewhat unfairly taking advantage of an accidental position, and he went no further with it.\" It is also, as mentioned earlier, a way in which Angel's behavior directly contrasts with Alec d'Urberville's behavior. Glossary Touchwood dried, decayed wood or dried fungus used as tinder. almanack almanac. handkercher handkerchief. Ballyragging bullying, intimidating, or browbeating. pummy ground apples used in making cider. fagged to have worked hard and become very tired; to have served as a servant. Thermidorean weather here, warm summer months; Thermidor is a reference to the month from July 19 to August 17 in the French calendar, instituted in 1793 after the Revolution. enervating depriving of strength, force, vigor, etc.; weakening physically, mentally, or morally. Ethiopic hot, African-like scorching of the farmland and pasture."}

There was a great stir in the milk-house just after breakfast. The churn revolved as usual, but the butter would not come. Whenever this happened the dairy was paralyzed. Squish, squash echoed the milk in the great cylinder, but never arose the sound they waited for. Dairyman Crick and his wife, the milkmaids Tess, Marian, Retty Priddle, Izz Huett, and the married ones from the cottages; also Mr Clare, Jonathan Kail, old Deborah, and the rest, stood gazing hopelessly at the churn; and the boy who kept the horse going outside put on moon-like eyes to show his sense of the situation. Even the melancholy horse himself seemed to look in at the window in inquiring despair at each walk round. "'Tis years since I went to Conjuror Trendle's son in Egdon--years!" said the dairyman bitterly. "And he was nothing to what his father had been. I have said fifty times, if I have said once, that I DON'T believe in en; though 'a do cast folks' waters very true. But I shall have to go to 'n if he's alive. O yes, I shall have to go to 'n, if this sort of thing continnys!" Even Mr Clare began to feel tragical at the dairyman's desperation. "Conjuror Fall, t'other side of Casterbridge, that they used to call 'Wide-O', was a very good man when I was a boy," said Jonathan Kail. "But he's rotten as touchwood by now." "My grandfather used to go to Conjuror Mynterne, out at Owlscombe, and a clever man a' were, so I've heard grandf'er say," continued Mr Crick. "But there's no such genuine folk about nowadays!" Mrs Crick's mind kept nearer to the matter in hand. "Perhaps somebody in the house is in love," she said tentatively. "I've heard tell in my younger days that that will cause it. Why, Crick--that maid we had years ago, do ye mind, and how the butter didn't come then--" "Ah yes, yes!--but that isn't the rights o't. It had nothing to do with the love-making. I can mind all about it--'twas the damage to the churn." He turned to Clare. "Jack Dollop, a 'hore's-bird of a fellow we had here as milker at one time, sir, courted a young woman over at Mellstock, and deceived her as he had deceived many afore. But he had another sort o' woman to reckon wi' this time, and it was not the girl herself. One Holy Thursday of all days in the almanack, we was here as we mid be now, only there was no churning in hand, when we zid the girl's mother coming up to the door, wi' a great brass-mounted umbrella in her hand that would ha' felled an ox, and saying 'Do Jack Dollop work here?--because I want him! I have a big bone to pick with he, I can assure 'n!' And some way behind her mother walked Jack's young woman, crying bitterly into her handkercher. 'O Lard, here's a time!' said Jack, looking out o' winder at 'em. 'She'll murder me! Where shall I get--where shall I--? Don't tell her where I be!' And with that he scrambled into the churn through the trap-door, and shut himself inside, just as the young woman's mother busted into the milk-house. 'The villain--where is he?' says she. 'I'll claw his face for'n, let me only catch him!' Well, she hunted about everywhere, ballyragging Jack by side and by seam, Jack lying a'most stifled inside the churn, and the poor maid--or young woman rather--standing at the door crying her eyes out. I shall never forget it, never! 'Twould have melted a marble stone! But she couldn't find him nowhere at all." The dairyman paused, and one or two words of comment came from the listeners. Dairyman Crick's stories often seemed to be ended when they were not really so, and strangers were betrayed into premature interjections of finality; though old friends knew better. The narrator went on-- "Well, how the old woman should have had the wit to guess it I could never tell, but she found out that he was inside that there churn. Without saying a word she took hold of the winch (it was turned by handpower then), and round she swung him, and Jack began to flop about inside. 'O Lard! stop the churn! let me out!' says he, popping out his head. 'I shall be churned into a pummy!' (He was a cowardly chap in his heart, as such men mostly be). 'Not till ye make amends for ravaging her virgin innocence!' says the old woman. 'Stop the churn you old witch!' screams he. 'You call me old witch, do ye, you deceiver!' says she, 'when ye ought to ha' been calling me mother-law these last five months!' And on went the churn, and Jack's bones rattled round again. Well, none of us ventured to interfere; and at last 'a promised to make it right wi' her. 'Yes--I'll be as good as my word!' he said. And so it ended that day." While the listeners were smiling their comments there was a quick movement behind their backs, and they looked round. Tess, pale-faced, had gone to the door. "How warm 'tis to-day!" she said, almost inaudibly. It was warm, and none of them connected her withdrawal with the reminiscences of the dairyman. He went forward and opened the door for her, saying with tender raillery-- "Why, maidy" (he frequently, with unconscious irony, gave her this pet name), "the prettiest milker I've got in my dairy; you mustn't get so fagged as this at the first breath of summer weather, or we shall be finely put to for want of 'ee by dog-days, shan't we, Mr Clare?" "I was faint--and--I think I am better out o' doors," she said mechanically; and disappeared outside. Fortunately for her the milk in the revolving churn at that moment changed its squashing for a decided flick-flack. "'Tis coming!" cried Mrs Crick, and the attention of all was called off from Tess. That fair sufferer soon recovered herself externally; but she remained much depressed all the afternoon. When the evening milking was done she did not care to be with the rest of them, and went out of doors, wandering along she knew not whither. She was wretched--O so wretched--at the perception that to her companions the dairyman's story had been rather a humorous narration than otherwise; none of them but herself seemed to see the sorrow of it; to a certainty, not one knew how cruelly it touched the tender place in her experience. The evening sun was now ugly to her, like a great inflamed wound in the sky. Only a solitary cracked-voice reed-sparrow greeted her from the bushes by the river, in a sad, machine-made tone, resembling that of a past friend whose friendship she had outworn. In these long June days the milkmaids, and, indeed, most of the household, went to bed at sunset or sooner, the morning work before milking being so early and heavy at a time of full pails. Tess usually accompanied her fellows upstairs. To-night, however, she was the first to go to their common chamber; and she had dozed when the other girls came in. She saw them undressing in the orange light of the vanished sun, which flushed their forms with its colour; she dozed again, but she was reawakened by their voices, and quietly turned her eyes towards them. Neither of her three chamber-companions had got into bed. They were standing in a group, in their nightgowns, barefooted, at the window, the last red rays of the west still warming their faces and necks and the walls around them. All were watching somebody in the garden with deep interest, their three faces close together: a jovial and round one, a pale one with dark hair, and a fair one whose tresses were auburn. "Don't push! You can see as well as I," said Retty, the auburn-haired and youngest girl, without removing her eyes from the window. "'Tis no use for you to be in love with him any more than me, Retty Priddle," said jolly-faced Marian, the eldest, slily. "His thoughts be of other cheeks than thine!" Retty Priddle still looked, and the others looked again. "There he is again!" cried Izz Huett, the pale girl with dark damp hair and keenly cut lips. "You needn't say anything, Izz," answered Retty. "For I zid you kissing his shade." "WHAT did you see her doing?" asked Marian. "Why--he was standing over the whey-tub to let off the whey, and the shade of his face came upon the wall behind, close to Izz, who was standing there filling a vat. She put her mouth against the wall and kissed the shade of his mouth; I zid her, though he didn't." "O Izz Huett!" said Marian. A rosy spot came into the middle of Izz Huett's cheek. "Well, there was no harm in it," she declared, with attempted coolness. "And if I be in love wi'en, so is Retty, too; and so be you, Marian, come to that." Marian's full face could not blush past its chronic pinkness. "I!" she said. "What a tale! Ah, there he is again! Dear eyes--dear face--dear Mr Clare!" "There--you've owned it!" "So have you--so have we all," said Marian, with the dry frankness of complete indifference to opinion. "It is silly to pretend otherwise amongst ourselves, though we need not own it to other folks. I would just marry 'n to-morrow!" "So would I--and more," murmured Izz Huett. "And I too," whispered the more timid Retty. The listener grew warm. "We can't all marry him," said Izz. "We shan't, either of us; which is worse still," said the eldest. "There he is again!" They all three blew him a silent kiss. "Why?" asked Retty quickly. "Because he likes Tess Durbeyfield best," said Marian, lowering her voice. "I have watched him every day, and have found it out." There was a reflective silence. "But she don't care anything for 'n?" at length breathed Retty. "Well--I sometimes think that too." "But how silly all this is!" said Izz Huett impatiently. "Of course he won't marry any one of us, or Tess either--a gentleman's son, who's going to be a great landowner and farmer abroad! More likely to ask us to come wi'en as farm-hands at so much a year!" One sighed, and another sighed, and Marian's plump figure sighed biggest of all. Somebody in bed hard by sighed too. Tears came into the eyes of Retty Priddle, the pretty red-haired youngest--the last bud of the Paridelles, so important in the county annals. They watched silently a little longer, their three faces still close together as before, and the triple hues of their hair mingling. But the unconscious Mr Clare had gone indoors, and they saw him no more; and, the shades beginning to deepen, they crept into their beds. In a few minutes they heard him ascend the ladder to his own room. Marian was soon snoring, but Izz did not drop into forgetfulness for a long time. Retty Priddle cried herself to sleep. The deeper-passioned Tess was very far from sleeping even then. This conversation was another of the bitter pills she had been obliged to swallow that day. Scarce the least feeling of jealousy arose in her breast. For that matter she knew herself to have the preference. Being more finely formed, better educated, and, though the youngest except Retty, more woman than either, she perceived that only the slightest ordinary care was necessary for holding her own in Angel Clare's heart against these her candid friends. But the grave question was, ought she to do this? There was, to be sure, hardly a ghost of a chance for either of them, in a serious sense; but there was, or had been, a chance of one or the other inspiring him with a passing fancy for her, and enjoying the pleasure of his attentions while he stayed here. Such unequal attachments had led to marriage; and she had heard from Mrs Crick that Mr Clare had one day asked, in a laughing way, what would be the use of his marrying a fine lady, and all the while ten thousand acres of Colonial pasture to feed, and cattle to rear, and corn to reap. A farm-woman would be the only sensible kind of wife for him. But whether Mr Clare had spoken seriously or not, why should she, who could never conscientiously allow any man to marry her now, and who had religiously determined that she never would be tempted to do so, draw off Mr Clare's attention from other women, for the brief happiness of sunning herself in his eyes while he remained at Talbothays? They came downstairs yawning next morning; but skimming and milking were proceeded with as usual, and they went indoors to breakfast. Dairyman Crick was discovered stamping about the house. He had received a letter, in which a customer had complained that the butter had a twang. "And begad, so 't have!" said the dairyman, who held in his left hand a wooden slice on which a lump of butter was stuck. "Yes--taste for yourself!" Several of them gathered round him; and Mr Clare tasted, Tess tasted, also the other indoor milkmaids, one or two of the milking-men, and last of all Mrs Crick, who came out from the waiting breakfast-table. There certainly was a twang. The dairyman, who had thrown himself into abstraction to better realize the taste, and so divine the particular species of noxious weed to which it appertained, suddenly exclaimed-- "'Tis garlic! and I thought there wasn't a blade left in that mead!" Then all the old hands remembered that a certain dry mead, into which a few of the cows had been admitted of late, had, in years gone by, spoilt the butter in the same way. The dairyman had not recognized the taste at that time, and thought the butter bewitched. "We must overhaul that mead," he resumed; "this mustn't continny!" All having armed themselves with old pointed knives, they went out together. As the inimical plant could only be present in very microscopic dimensions to have escaped ordinary observation, to find it seemed rather a hopeless attempt in the stretch of rich grass before them. However, they formed themselves into line, all assisting, owing to the importance of the search; the dairyman at the upper end with Mr Clare, who had volunteered to help; then Tess, Marian, Izz Huett, and Retty; then Bill Lewell, Jonathan, and the married dairywomen--Beck Knibbs, with her wooly black hair and rolling eyes; and flaxen Frances, consumptive from the winter damps of the water-meads--who lived in their respective cottages. With eyes fixed upon the ground they crept slowly across a strip of the field, returning a little further down in such a manner that, when they should have finished, not a single inch of the pasture but would have fallen under the eye of some one of them. It was a most tedious business, not more than half a dozen shoots of garlic being discoverable in the whole field; yet such was the herb's pungency that probably one bite of it by one cow had been sufficient to season the whole dairy's produce for the day. Differing one from another in natures and moods so greatly as they did, they yet formed, bending, a curiously uniform row--automatic, noiseless; and an alien observer passing down the neighbouring lane might well have been excused for massing them as "Hodge". As they crept along, stooping low to discern the plant, a soft yellow gleam was reflected from the buttercups into their shaded faces, giving them an elfish, moonlit aspect, though the sun was pouring upon their backs in all the strength of noon. Angel Clare, who communistically stuck to his rule of taking part with the rest in everything, glanced up now and then. It was not, of course, by accident that he walked next to Tess. "Well, how are you?" he murmured. "Very well, thank you, sir," she replied demurely. As they had been discussing a score of personal matters only half-an-hour before, the introductory style seemed a little superfluous. But they got no further in speech just then. They crept and crept, the hem of her petticoat just touching his gaiter, and his elbow sometimes brushing hers. At last the dairyman, who came next, could stand it no longer. "Upon my soul and body, this here stooping do fairly make my back open and shut!" he exclaimed, straightening himself slowly with an excruciated look till quite upright. "And you, maidy Tess, you wasn't well a day or two ago--this will make your head ache finely! Don't do any more, if you feel fainty; leave the rest to finish it." Dairyman Crick withdrew, and Tess dropped behind. Mr Clare also stepped out of line, and began privateering about for the weed. When she found him near her, her very tension at what she had heard the night before made her the first to speak. "Don't they look pretty?" she said. "Who?" "Izzy Huett and Retty." Tess had moodily decided that either of these maidens would make a good farmer's wife, and that she ought to recommend them, and obscure her own wretched charms. "Pretty? Well, yes--they are pretty girls--fresh looking. I have often thought so." "Though, poor dears, prettiness won't last long!" "O no, unfortunately." "They are excellent dairywomen." "Yes: though not better than you." "They skim better than I." "Do they?" Clare remained observing them--not without their observing him. "She is colouring up," continued Tess heroically. "Who?" "Retty Priddle." "Oh! Why it that?" "Because you are looking at her." Self-sacrificing as her mood might be, Tess could not well go further and cry, "Marry one of them, if you really do want a dairywoman and not a lady; and don't think of marrying me!" She followed Dairyman Crick, and had the mournful satisfaction of seeing that Clare remained behind. From this day she forced herself to take pains to avoid him--never allowing herself, as formerly, to remain long in his company, even if their juxtaposition were purely accidental. She gave the other three every chance. Tess was woman enough to realize from their avowals to herself that Angel Clare had the honour of all the dairymaids in his keeping, and her perception of his care to avoid compromising the happiness of either in the least degree bred a tender respect in Tess for what she deemed, rightly or wrongly, the self-controlling sense of duty shown by him, a quality which she had never expected to find in one of the opposite sex, and in the absence of which more than one of the simple hearts who were his house-mates might have gone weeping on her pilgrimage. The hot weather of July had crept upon them unawares, and the atmosphere of the flat vale hung heavy as an opiate over the dairy-folk, the cows, and the trees. Hot steaming rains fell frequently, making the grass where the cows fed yet more rank, and hindering the late hay-making in the other meads. It was Sunday morning; the milking was done; the outdoor milkers had gone home. Tess and the other three were dressing themselves rapidly, the whole bevy having agreed to go together to Mellstock Church, which lay some three or four miles distant from the dairy-house. She had now been two months at Talbothays, and this was her first excursion. All the preceding afternoon and night heavy thunderstorms had hissed down upon the meads, and washed some of the hay into the river; but this morning the sun shone out all the more brilliantly for the deluge, and the air was balmy and clear. The crooked lane leading from their own parish to Mellstock ran along the lowest levels in a portion of its length, and when the girls reached the most depressed spot they found that the result of the rain had been to flood the lane over-shoe to a distance of some fifty yards. This would have been no serious hindrance on a week-day; they would have clicked through it in their high pattens and boots quite unconcerned; but on this day of vanity, this Sun's-day, when flesh went forth to coquet with flesh while hypocritically affecting business with spiritual things; on this occasion for wearing their white stockings and thin shoes, and their pink, white, and lilac gowns, on which every mud spot would be visible, the pool was an awkward impediment. They could hear the church-bell calling--as yet nearly a mile off. "Who would have expected such a rise in the river in summer-time!" said Marian, from the top of the roadside bank on which they had climbed, and were maintaining a precarious footing in the hope of creeping along its slope till they were past the pool. "We can't get there anyhow, without walking right through it, or else going round the Turnpike way; and that would make us so very late!" said Retty, pausing hopelessly. "And I do colour up so hot, walking into church late, and all the people staring round," said Marian, "that I hardly cool down again till we get into the That-it-may-please-Thees." While they stood clinging to the bank they heard a splashing round the bend of the road, and presently appeared Angel Clare, advancing along the lane towards them through the water. Four hearts gave a big throb simultaneously. His aspect was probably as un-Sabbatarian a one as a dogmatic parson's son often presented; his attire being his dairy clothes, long wading boots, a cabbage-leaf inside his hat to keep his head cool, with a thistle-spud to finish him off. "He's not going to church," said Marian. "No--I wish he was!" murmured Tess. Angel, in fact, rightly or wrongly (to adopt the safe phrase of evasive controversialists), preferred sermons in stones to sermons in churches and chapels on fine summer days. This morning, moreover, he had gone out to see if the damage to the hay by the flood was considerable or not. On his walk he observed the girls from a long distance, though they had been so occupied with their difficulties of passage as not to notice him. He knew that the water had risen at that spot, and that it would quite check their progress. So he had hastened on, with a dim idea of how he could help them--one of them in particular. The rosy-cheeked, bright-eyed quartet looked so charming in their light summer attire, clinging to the roadside bank like pigeons on a roof-slope, that he stopped a moment to regard them before coming close. Their gauzy skirts had brushed up from the grass innumerable flies and butterflies which, unable to escape, remained caged in the transparent tissue as in an aviary. Angel's eye at last fell upon Tess, the hindmost of the four; she, being full of suppressed laughter at their dilemma, could not help meeting his glance radiantly. He came beneath them in the water, which did not rise over his long boots; and stood looking at the entrapped flies and butterflies. "Are you trying to get to church?" he said to Marian, who was in front, including the next two in his remark, but avoiding Tess. "Yes, sir; and 'tis getting late; and my colour do come up so--" "I'll carry you through the pool--every Jill of you." The whole four flushed as if one heart beat through them. "I think you can't, sir," said Marian. "It is the only way for you to get past. Stand still. Nonsense--you are not too heavy! I'd carry you all four together. Now, Marian, attend," he continued, "and put your arms round my shoulders, so. Now! Hold on. That's well done." Marian had lowered herself upon his arm and shoulder as directed, and Angel strode off with her, his slim figure, as viewed from behind, looking like the mere stem to the great nosegay suggested by hers. They disappeared round the curve of the road, and only his sousing footsteps and the top ribbon of Marian's bonnet told where they were. In a few minutes he reappeared. Izz Huett was the next in order upon the bank. "Here he comes," she murmured, and they could hear that her lips were dry with emotion. "And I have to put my arms round his neck and look into his face as Marian did." "There's nothing in that," said Tess quickly. "There's a time for everything," continued Izz, unheeding. "A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; the first is now going to be mine." "Fie--it is Scripture, Izz!" "Yes," said Izz, "I've always a' ear at church for pretty verses." Angel Clare, to whom three-quarters of this performance was a commonplace act of kindness, now approached Izz. She quietly and dreamily lowered herself into his arms, and Angel methodically marched off with her. When he was heard returning for the third time Retty's throbbing heart could be almost seen to shake her. He went up to the red-haired girl, and while he was seizing her he glanced at Tess. His lips could not have pronounced more plainly, "It will soon be you and I." Her comprehension appeared in her face; she could not help it. There was an understanding between them. Poor little Retty, though by far the lightest weight, was the most troublesome of Clare's burdens. Marian had been like a sack of meal, a dead weight of plumpness under which he has literally staggered. Izz had ridden sensibly and calmly. Retty was a bunch of hysterics. However, he got through with the disquieted creature, deposited her, and returned. Tess could see over the hedge the distant three in a group, standing as he had placed them on the next rising ground. It was now her turn. She was embarrassed to discover that excitement at the proximity of Mr Clare's breath and eyes, which she had contemned in her companions, was intensified in herself; and as if fearful of betraying her secret, she paltered with him at the last moment. "I may be able to clim' along the bank perhaps--I can clim' better than they. You must be so tired, Mr Clare!" "No, no, Tess," said he quickly. And almost before she was aware, she was seated in his arms and resting against his shoulder. "Three Leahs to get one Rachel," he whispered. "They are better women than I," she replied, magnanimously sticking to her resolve. "Not to me," said Angel. He saw her grow warm at this; and they went some steps in silence. "I hope I am not too heavy?" she said timidly. "O no. You should lift Marian! Such a lump. You are like an undulating billow warmed by the sun. And all this fluff of muslin about you is the froth." "It is very pretty--if I seem like that to you." "Do you know that I have undergone three-quarters of this labour entirely for the sake of the fourth quarter?" "No." "I did not expect such an event to-day." "Nor I... The water came up so sudden." That the rise in the water was what she understood him to refer to, the state of breathing belied. Clare stood still and inclinced his face towards hers. "O Tessy!" he exclaimed. The girl's cheeks burned to the breeze, and she could not look into his eyes for her emotion. It reminded Angel that he was somewhat unfairly taking advantage of an accidental position; and he went no further with it. No definite words of love had crossed their lips as yet, and suspension at this point was desirable now. However, he walked slowly, to make the remainder of the distance as long as possible; but at last they came to the bend, and the rest of their progress was in full view of the other three. The dry land was reached, and he set her down. Her friends were looking with round thoughtful eyes at her and him, and she could see that they had been talking of her. He hastily bade them farewell, and splashed back along the stretch of submerged road. The four moved on together as before, till Marian broke the silence by saying-- "No--in all truth; we have no chance against her!" She looked joylessly at Tess. "What do you mean?" asked the latter. "He likes 'ee best--the very best! We could see it as he brought 'ee. He would have kissed 'ee, if you had encouraged him to do it, ever so little." "No, no," said she. The gaiety with which they had set out had somehow vanished; and yet there was no enmity or malice between them. They were generous young souls; they had been reared in the lonely country nooks where fatalism is a strong sentiment, and they did not blame her. Such supplanting was to be. Tess's heart ached. There was no concealing from herself the fact that she loved Angel Clare, perhaps all the more passionately from knowing that the others had also lost their hearts to him. There is contagion in this sentiment, especially among women. And yet that same hungry nature had fought against this, but too feebly, and the natural result had followed. "I will never stand in your way, nor in the way of either of you!" she declared to Retty that night in the bedroom (her tears running down). "I can't help this, my dear! I don't think marrying is in his mind at all; but if he were ever to ask me I should refuse him, as I should refuse any man." "Oh! would you? Why?" said wondering Retty. "It cannot be! But I will be plain. Putting myself quite on one side, I don't think he will choose either of you." "I have never expected it--thought of it!" moaned Retty. "But O! I wish I was dead!" The poor child, torn by a feeling which she hardly understood, turned to the other two girls who came upstairs just then. "We be friends with her again," she said to them. "She thinks no more of his choosing her than we do." So the reserve went off, and they were confiding and warm. "I don't seem to care what I do now," said Marian, whose mood was turned to its lowest bass. "I was going to marry a dairyman at Stickleford, who's asked me twice; but--my soul--I would put an end to myself rather'n be his wife now! Why don't ye speak, Izz?" "To confess, then," murmured Izz, "I made sure to-day that he was going to kiss me as he held me; and I lay still against his breast, hoping and hoping, and never moved at all. But he did not. I don't like biding here at Talbothays any longer! I shall go hwome." The air of the sleeping-chamber seemed to palpitate with the hopeless passion of the girls. They writhed feverishly under the oppressiveness of an emotion thrust on them by cruel Nature's law--an emotion which they had neither expected nor desired. The incident of the day had fanned the flame that was burning the inside of their hearts out, and the torture was almost more than they could endure. The differences which distinguished them as individuals were abstracted by this passion, and each was but portion of one organism called sex. There was so much frankness and so little jealousy because there was no hope. Each one was a girl of fair common sense, and she did not delude herself with any vain conceits, or deny her love, or give herself airs, in the idea of outshining the others. The full recognition of the futility of their infatuation, from a social point of view; its purposeless beginning; its self-bounded outlook; its lack of everything to justify its existence in the eye of civilization (while lacking nothing in the eye of Nature); the one fact that it did exist, ecstasizing them to a killing joy--all this imparted to them a resignation, a dignity, which a practical and sordid expectation of winning him as a husband would have destroyed. They tossed and turned on their little beds, and the cheese-wring dripped monotonously downstairs. "B' you awake, Tess?" whispered one, half-an-hour later. It was Izz Huett's voice. Tess replied in the affirmative, whereupon also Retty and Marian suddenly flung the bedclothes off them, and sighed-- "So be we!" "I wonder what she is like--the lady they say his family have looked out for him!" "I wonder," said Izz. "Some lady looked out for him?" gasped Tess, starting. "I have never heard o' that!" "O yes--'tis whispered; a young lady of his own rank, chosen by his family; a Doctor of Divinity's daughter near his father's parish of Emminster; he don't much care for her, they say. But he is sure to marry her." They had heard so very little of this; yet it was enough to build up wretched dolorous dreams upon, there in the shade of the night. They pictured all the details of his being won round to consent, of the wedding preparations, of the bride's happiness, of her dress and veil, of her blissful home with him, when oblivion would have fallen upon themselves as far as he and their love were concerned. Thus they talked, and ached, and wept till sleep charmed their sorrow away. After this disclosure Tess nourished no further foolish thought that there lurked any grave and deliberate import in Clare's attentions to her. It was a passing summer love of her face, for love's own temporary sake--nothing more. And the thorny crown of this sad conception was that she whom he really did prefer in a cursory way to the rest, she who knew herself to be more impassioned in nature, cleverer, more beautiful than they, was in the eyes of propriety far less worthy of him than the homelier ones whom he ignored. Amid the oozing fatness and warm ferments of the Froom Vale, at a season when the rush of juices could almost be heard below the hiss of fertilization, it was impossible that the most fanciful love should not grow passionate. The ready bosoms existing there were impregnated by their surroundings. July passed over their heads, and the Thermidorean weather which came in its wake seemed an effort on the part of Nature to match the state of hearts at Talbothays Dairy. The air of the place, so fresh in the spring and early summer, was stagnant and enervating now. Its heavy scents weighed upon them, and at mid-day the landscape seemed lying in a swoon. Ethiopic scorchings browned the upper slopes of the pastures, but there was still bright green herbage here where the watercourses purled. And as Clare was oppressed by the outward heats, so was he burdened inwardly by waxing fervour of passion for the soft and silent Tess. The rains having passed, the uplands were dry. The wheels of the dairyman's spring-cart, as he sped home from market, licked up the pulverized surface of the highway, and were followed by white ribands of dust, as if they had set a thin powder-train on fire. The cows jumped wildly over the five-barred barton-gate, maddened by the gad-fly; Dairyman Crick kept his shirt-sleeves permanently rolled up from Monday to Saturday; open windows had no effect in ventilation without open doors, and in the dairy-garden the blackbirds and thrushes crept about under the currant-bushes, rather in the manner of quadrupeds than of winged creatures. The flies in the kitchen were lazy, teasing, and familiar, crawling about in the unwonted places, on the floors, into drawers, and over the backs of the milkmaids' hands. Conversations were concerning sunstroke; while butter-making, and still more butter-keeping, was a despair. They milked entirely in the meads for coolness and convenience, without driving in the cows. During the day the animals obsequiously followed the shadow of the smallest tree as it moved round the stem with the diurnal roll; and when the milkers came they could hardly stand still for the flies. On one of these afternoons four or five unmilked cows chanced to stand apart from the general herd, behind the corner of a hedge, among them being Dumpling and Old Pretty, who loved Tess's hands above those of any other maid. When she rose from her stool under a finished cow, Angel Clare, who had been observing her for some time, asked her if she would take the aforesaid creatures next. She silently assented, and with her stool at arm's length, and the pail against her knee, went round to where they stood. Soon the sound of Old Pretty's milk fizzing into the pail came through the hedge, and then Angel felt inclined to go round the corner also, to finish off a hard-yielding milcher who had strayed there, he being now as capable of this as the dairyman himself. All the men, and some of the women, when milking, dug their foreheads into the cows and gazed into the pail. But a few--mainly the younger ones--rested their heads sideways. This was Tess Durbeyfield's habit, her temple pressing the milcher's flank, her eyes fixed on the far end of the meadow with the quiet of one lost in meditation. She was milking Old Pretty thus, and the sun chancing to be on the milking-side, it shone flat upon her pink-gowned form and her white curtain-bonnet, and upon her profile, rendering it keen as a cameo cut from the dun background of the cow. She did not know that Clare had followed her round, and that he sat under his cow watching her. The stillness of her head and features was remarkable: she might have been in a trance, her eyes open, yet unseeing. Nothing in the picture moved but Old Pretty's tail and Tess's pink hands, the latter so gently as to be a rhythmic pulsation only, as if they were obeying a reflex stimulus, like a beating heart. How very lovable her face was to him. Yet there was nothing ethereal about it; all was real vitality, real warmth, real incarnation. And it was in her mouth that this culminated. Eyes almost as deep and speaking he had seen before, and cheeks perhaps as fair; brows as arched, a chin and throat almost as shapely; her mouth he had seen nothing to equal on the face of the earth. To a young man with the least fire in him that little upward lift in the middle of her red top lip was distracting, infatuating, maddening. He had never before seen a woman's lips and teeth which forced upon his mind with such persistent iteration the old Elizabethan simile of roses filled with snow. Perfect, he, as a lover, might have called them off-hand. But no--they were not perfect. And it was the touch of the imperfect upon the would-be perfect that gave the sweetness, because it was that which gave the humanity. Clare had studied the curves of those lips so many times that he could reproduce them mentally with ease: and now, as they again confronted him, clothed with colour and life, they sent an _aura_ over his flesh, a breeze through his nerves, which well nigh produced a qualm; and actually produced, by some mysterious physiological process, a prosaic sneeze. She then became conscious that he was observing her; but she would not show it by any change of position, though the curious dream-like fixity disappeared, and a close eye might easily have discerned that the rosiness of her face deepened, and then faded till only a tinge of it was left. The influence that had passed into Clare like an excitation from the sky did not die down. Resolutions, reticences, prudences, fears, fell back like a defeated battalion. He jumped up from his seat, and, leaving his pail to be kicked over if the milcher had such a mind, went quickly towards the desire of his eyes, and, kneeling down beside her, clasped her in his arms. Tess was taken completely by surprise, and she yielded to his embrace with unreflecting inevitableness. Having seen that it was really her lover who had advanced, and no one else, her lips parted, and she sank upon him in her momentary joy, with something very like an ecstatic cry. He had been on the point of kissing that too tempting mouth, but he checked himself, for tender conscience' sake. "Forgive me, Tess dear!" he whispered. "I ought to have asked. I--did not know what I was doing. I do not mean it as a liberty. I am devoted to you, Tessy, dearest, in all sincerity!" Old Pretty by this time had looked round, puzzled; and seeing two people crouching under her where, by immemorial custom, there should have been only one, lifted her hind leg crossly. "She is angry--she doesn't know what we mean--she'll kick over the milk!" exclaimed Tess, gently striving to free herself, her eyes concerned with the quadruped's actions, her heart more deeply concerned with herself and Clare. She slipped up from her seat, and they stood together, his arm still encircling her. Tess's eyes, fixed on distance, began to fill. "Why do you cry, my darling?" he said. "O--I don't know!" she murmured. As she saw and felt more clearly the position she was in she became agitated and tried to withdraw. "Well, I have betrayed my feeling, Tess, at last," said he, with a curious sigh of desperation, signifying unconsciously that his heart had outrun his judgement. "That I--love you dearly and truly I need not say. But I--it shall go no further now--it distresses you--I am as surprised as you are. You will not think I have presumed upon your defencelessness--been too quick and unreflecting, will you?" "N'--I can't tell." He had allowed her to free herself; and in a minute or two the milking of each was resumed. Nobody had beheld the gravitation of the two into one; and when the dairyman came round by that screened nook a few minutes later, there was not a sign to reveal that the markedly sundered pair were more to each other than mere acquaintance. Yet in the interval since Crick's last view of them something had occurred which changed the pivot of the universe for their two natures; something which, had he known its quality, the dairyman would have despised, as a practical man; yet which was based upon a more stubborn and resistless tendency than a whole heap of so-called practicalities. A veil had been whisked aside; the tract of each one's outlook was to have a new horizon thenceforward--for a short time or for a long. END OF PHASE THE THIRD Phase the Fourth: The Consequence

Chapters 21-24

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219151046/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/t/tess-of-the-durbervilles/summary-and-analysis/phase-the-third-the-rally-chapters-2124

The entire dairy is paralyzed when the milk does not begin to turn to butter. It is suggested that the butter won't come because "Perhaps somebody in the house is in love." Mr. Crick doesn't believe the superstition but instead tells a rather raucous story about a man who had gotten a young girl pregnant. Tess hears the tale, and while others laugh at the story, she rushes outside because the story of Jack Dollop is too real for her. Eventually, the butter begins to form in the churn, and all settles down at the farm. The resident milkmaids, Retty Priddle, Izz Huett, and Marian, take turns gawking at Angel by peeking at him from their room as he moves through the farmyard. Tess does not engage in the girls' sport, and Marian suggests that Angel is in love with Tess, that "he likes Tess Durbeyfield best." All the maids are in love with Angel, but even they seem to sense that Tess and Angel are beginning to show signs of love for each other. It is mid-July, and the weather has turned quite warm, both morning and night, in the Blackmoor Valley. One Sunday, the four maids ready themselves for church. On their way, as a heavy summer downpour had flooded the rivers and creeks, an overflowing creek stops them. Coming from the direction opposite the church is Angel. He volunteers to carry each girl across the swollen current so that their Sunday frocks are not ruined. All of them, including Tess, are shocked and delighted that Angel would spontaneously extend an opportunity for each of them to be held so close to their "ideal man." As Angel crosses the creek with Tess, he hints at his feelings for her, telling her that "he has undergone three-quarters of the labour entirely for the sake of the fourth-quarter" and that he "did not expect such an event today." When Tess replies that she also had not anticipated the heavy rains and swollen creek, Angel realizes that Tess does not realize his meaning. Feeling that he is taking unfair advantage of an accidental situation, Angel carries her the rest of the way across and deposits her with her friends. When Angel again leaves, Tess' companions tell her that, although Angel likes her best, he is meant to marry another woman, chosen by his family. During the hot summer at Talbothays, the relationship between Tess and Angel grows as Hardy notes "It was impossible that the most fanciful love should not grow passionate. The ready bosoms existing there were impregnated by their surroundings." Angel secretly watches Tess as she works and musters the courage to tell her of his love for her.

In Crick's telling the story of Jack Dollop, Hardy shows us the dark, real side of humor whereupon many jokes are based. The butt of the joke is usually some person or profession that we might see as humorous. But Tess has lived the tale of Jack Dollop, and she cannot bear being "ridiculed" even though no one at Talbothays knows her story. When Angel carries Tess across the swollen creek and his preference for her becomes obvious to her companions, the other young ladies are not hurtful or vindictive, as the women at The Slopes were when they realized Alec's preference for Tess. Of the girls at Talbothays, Hardy says "The differences which distinguished them as individuals were abstracted by passion, and each was but portion of one organism called sex. There was so much frankness and so little jealousy because there was no hope." In fact, they later tell Tess of the woman Angel's family has selected for him to marry and do so without spite or resentfulness. Instead, they "talked, and ached, and wept till sleep charmed their sorrow away." Hardy presents Angel's character more fully in this chapter. Angel is a man very much intellectually challenged by his world, a man who studies its contradictions and who uses a most subtle approach when he makes his overtures to Tess. Angel, although he is the son of a minister, has difficulty with the religion, the church, and church doctrine. He is a naturalist who seeks his answers in the world that he can relate to, "preferr sermons in stones to sermons in churches and chapels on fine summer days." Yet his actions to aid the young ladies when crossing the flooded creek and his remarks alluding to the Jacob/Leah/Rachel story from Genesis, suggest a more complex character steeped in Christian teachings, but who questions some of the practices of the institution itself. Angel is an intellectual free thinker who approaches his environment with thoughtful deliberation and careful consideration. His approach to other people is not as aloof as we may be inclined to believe; he prefers not to abuse his position or stand with others. This can be clearly seen at the creek, "It reminded Angel that he was somewhat unfairly taking advantage of an accidental position, and he went no further with it." It is also, as mentioned earlier, a way in which Angel's behavior directly contrasts with Alec d'Urberville's behavior. Glossary Touchwood dried, decayed wood or dried fungus used as tinder. almanack almanac. handkercher handkerchief. Ballyragging bullying, intimidating, or browbeating. pummy ground apples used in making cider. fagged to have worked hard and become very tired; to have served as a servant. Thermidorean weather here, warm summer months; Thermidor is a reference to the month from July 19 to August 17 in the French calendar, instituted in 1793 after the Revolution. enervating depriving of strength, force, vigor, etc.; weakening physically, mentally, or morally. Ethiopic hot, African-like scorching of the farmland and pasture.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/107-chapters/06.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Far From the Madding Crowd/section_5_part_0.txt

Far From the Madding Crowd.chapter 6

chapter 6

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THE FAIR--THE JOURNEY--THE FIRE Two months passed away. We are brought on to a day in February, on which was held the yearly statute or hiring fair in the county-town of Casterbridge. At one end of the street stood from two to three hundred blithe and hearty labourers waiting upon Chance--all men of the stamp to whom labour suggests nothing worse than a wrestle with gravitation, and pleasure nothing better than a renunciation of the same. Among these, carters and waggoners were distinguished by having a piece of whip-cord twisted round their hats; thatchers wore a fragment of woven straw; shepherds held their sheep-crooks in their hands; and thus the situation required was known to the hirers at a glance. In the crowd was an athletic young fellow of somewhat superior appearance to the rest--in fact, his superiority was marked enough to lead several ruddy peasants standing by to speak to him inquiringly, as to a farmer, and to use "Sir" as a finishing word. His answer always was,-- "I am looking for a place myself--a bailiff's. Do ye know of anybody who wants one?" Gabriel was paler now. His eyes were more meditative, and his expression was more sad. He had passed through an ordeal of wretchedness which had given him more than it had taken away. He had sunk from his modest elevation as pastoral king into the very slime-pits of Siddim; but there was left to him a dignified calm he had never before known, and that indifference to fate which, though it often makes a villain of a man, is the basis of his sublimity when it does not. And thus the abasement had been exaltation, and the loss gain. In the morning a regiment of cavalry had left the town, and a sergeant and his party had been beating up for recruits through the four streets. As the end of the day drew on, and he found himself not hired, Gabriel almost wished that he had joined them, and gone off to serve his country. Weary of standing in the market-place, and not much minding the kind of work he turned his hand to, he decided to offer himself in some other capacity than that of bailiff. All the farmers seemed to be wanting shepherds. Sheep-tending was Gabriel's speciality. Turning down an obscure street and entering an obscurer lane, he went up to a smith's shop. "How long would it take you to make a shepherd's crook?" "Twenty minutes." "How much?" "Two shillings." He sat on a bench and the crook was made, a stem being given him into the bargain. He then went to a ready-made clothes' shop, the owner of which had a large rural connection. As the crook had absorbed most of Gabriel's money, he attempted, and carried out, an exchange of his overcoat for a shepherd's regulation smock-frock. This transaction having been completed, he again hurried off to the centre of the town, and stood on the kerb of the pavement, as a shepherd, crook in hand. Now that Oak had turned himself into a shepherd, it seemed that bailiffs were most in demand. However, two or three farmers noticed him and drew near. Dialogues followed, more or less in the subjoined form:-- "Where do you come from?" "Norcombe." "That's a long way. "Fifteen miles." "Who's farm were you upon last?" "My own." This reply invariably operated like a rumour of cholera. The inquiring farmer would edge away and shake his head dubiously. Gabriel, like his dog, was too good to be trustworthy, and he never made advance beyond this point. It is safer to accept any chance that offers itself, and extemporize a procedure to fit it, than to get a good plan matured, and wait for a chance of using it. Gabriel wished he had not nailed up his colours as a shepherd, but had laid himself out for anything in the whole cycle of labour that was required in the fair. It grew dusk. Some merry men were whistling and singing by the corn-exchange. Gabriel's hand, which had lain for some time idle in his smock-frock pocket, touched his flute which he carried there. Here was an opportunity for putting his dearly bought wisdom into practice. He drew out his flute and began to play "Jockey to the Fair" in the style of a man who had never known moment's sorrow. Oak could pipe with Arcadian sweetness, and the sound of the well-known notes cheered his own heart as well as those of the loungers. He played on with spirit, and in half an hour had earned in pence what was a small fortune to a destitute man. By making inquiries he learnt that there was another fair at Shottsford the next day. "How far is Shottsford?" "Ten miles t'other side of Weatherbury." Weatherbury! It was where Bathsheba had gone two months before. This information was like coming from night into noon. "How far is it to Weatherbury?" "Five or six miles." Bathsheba had probably left Weatherbury long before this time, but the place had enough interest attaching to it to lead Oak to choose Shottsford fair as his next field of inquiry, because it lay in the Weatherbury quarter. Moreover, the Weatherbury folk were by no means uninteresting intrinsically. If report spoke truly they were as hardy, merry, thriving, wicked a set as any in the whole county. Oak resolved to sleep at Weatherbury that night on his way to Shottsford, and struck out at once into the high road which had been recommended as the direct route to the village in question. The road stretched through water-meadows traversed by little brooks, whose quivering surfaces were braided along their centres, and folded into creases at the sides; or, where the flow was more rapid, the stream was pied with spots of white froth, which rode on in undisturbed serenity. On the higher levels the dead and dry carcasses of leaves tapped the ground as they bowled along helter-skelter upon the shoulders of the wind, and little birds in the hedges were rustling their feathers and tucking themselves in comfortably for the night, retaining their places if Oak kept moving, but flying away if he stopped to look at them. He passed by Yalbury Wood where the game-birds were rising to their roosts, and heard the crack-voiced cock-pheasants "cu-uck, cuck," and the wheezy whistle of the hens. By the time he had walked three or four miles every shape in the landscape had assumed a uniform hue of blackness. He descended Yalbury Hill and could just discern ahead of him a waggon, drawn up under a great over-hanging tree by the roadside. On coming close, he found there were no horses attached to it, the spot being apparently quite deserted. The waggon, from its position, seemed to have been left there for the night, for beyond about half a truss of hay which was heaped in the bottom, it was quite empty. Gabriel sat down on the shafts of the vehicle and considered his position. He calculated that he had walked a very fair proportion of the journey; and having been on foot since daybreak, he felt tempted to lie down upon the hay in the waggon instead of pushing on to the village of Weatherbury, and having to pay for a lodging. Eating his last slices of bread and ham, and drinking from the bottle of cider he had taken the precaution to bring with him, he got into the lonely waggon. Here he spread half of the hay as a bed, and, as well as he could in the darkness, pulled the other half over him by way of bed-clothes, covering himself entirely, and feeling, physically, as comfortable as ever he had been in his life. Inward melancholy it was impossible for a man like Oak, introspective far beyond his neighbours, to banish quite, whilst conning the present untoward page of his history. So, thinking of his misfortunes, amorous and pastoral, he fell asleep, shepherds enjoying, in common with sailors, the privilege of being able to summon the god instead of having to wait for him. On somewhat suddenly awaking, after a sleep of whose length he had no idea, Oak found that the waggon was in motion. He was being carried along the road at a rate rather considerable for a vehicle without springs, and under circumstances of physical uneasiness, his head being dandled up and down on the bed of the waggon like a kettledrum-stick. He then distinguished voices in conversation, coming from the forpart of the waggon. His concern at this dilemma (which would have been alarm, had he been a thriving man; but misfortune is a fine opiate to personal terror) led him to peer cautiously from the hay, and the first sight he beheld was the stars above him. Charles's Wain was getting towards a right angle with the Pole star, and Gabriel concluded that it must be about nine o'clock--in other words, that he had slept two hours. This small astronomical calculation was made without any positive effort, and whilst he was stealthily turning to discover, if possible, into whose hands he had fallen. Two figures were dimly visible in front, sitting with their legs outside the waggon, one of whom was driving. Gabriel soon found that this was the waggoner, and it appeared they had come from Casterbridge fair, like himself. A conversation was in progress, which continued thus:-- "Be as 'twill, she's a fine handsome body as far's looks be concerned. But that's only the skin of the woman, and these dandy cattle be as proud as a lucifer in their insides." "Ay--so 'a do seem, Billy Smallbury--so 'a do seem." This utterance was very shaky by nature, and more so by circumstance, the jolting of the waggon not being without its effect upon the speaker's larynx. It came from the man who held the reins. "She's a very vain feymell--so 'tis said here and there." "Ah, now. If so be 'tis like that, I can't look her in the face. Lord, no: not I--heh-heh-heh! Such a shy man as I be!" "Yes--she's very vain. 'Tis said that every night at going to bed she looks in the glass to put on her night-cap properly." "And not a married woman. Oh, the world!" "And 'a can play the peanner, so 'tis said. Can play so clever that 'a can make a psalm tune sound as well as the merriest loose song a man can wish for." "D'ye tell o't! A happy time for us, and I feel quite a new man! And how do she pay?" "That I don't know, Master Poorgrass." On hearing these and other similar remarks, a wild thought flashed into Gabriel's mind that they might be speaking of Bathsheba. There were, however, no grounds for retaining such a supposition, for the waggon, though going in the direction of Weatherbury, might be going beyond it, and the woman alluded to seemed to be the mistress of some estate. They were now apparently close upon Weatherbury and not to alarm the speakers unnecessarily, Gabriel slipped out of the waggon unseen. He turned to an opening in the hedge, which he found to be a gate, and mounting thereon, he sat meditating whether to seek a cheap lodging in the village, or to ensure a cheaper one by lying under some hay or corn-stack. The crunching jangle of the waggon died upon his ear. He was about to walk on, when he noticed on his left hand an unusual light--appearing about half a mile distant. Oak watched it, and the glow increased. Something was on fire. Gabriel again mounted the gate, and, leaping down on the other side upon what he found to be ploughed soil, made across the field in the exact direction of the fire. The blaze, enlarging in a double ratio by his approach and its own increase, showed him as he drew nearer the outlines of ricks beside it, lighted up to great distinctness. A rick-yard was the source of the fire. His weary face now began to be painted over with a rich orange glow, and the whole front of his smock-frock and gaiters was covered with a dancing shadow pattern of thorn-twigs--the light reaching him through a leafless intervening hedge--and the metallic curve of his sheep-crook shone silver-bright in the same abounding rays. He came up to the boundary fence, and stood to regain breath. It seemed as if the spot was unoccupied by a living soul. The fire was issuing from a long straw-stack, which was so far gone as to preclude a possibility of saving it. A rick burns differently from a house. As the wind blows the fire inwards, the portion in flames completely disappears like melting sugar, and the outline is lost to the eye. However, a hay or a wheat-rick, well put together, will resist combustion for a length of time, if it begins on the outside. This before Gabriel's eyes was a rick of straw, loosely put together, and the flames darted into it with lightning swiftness. It glowed on the windward side, rising and falling in intensity, like the coal of a cigar. Then a superincumbent bundle rolled down, with a whisking noise; flames elongated, and bent themselves about with a quiet roar, but no crackle. Banks of smoke went off horizontally at the back like passing clouds, and behind these burned hidden pyres, illuminating the semi-transparent sheet of smoke to a lustrous yellow uniformity. Individual straws in the foreground were consumed in a creeping movement of ruddy heat, as if they were knots of red worms, and above shone imaginary fiery faces, tongues hanging from lips, glaring eyes, and other impish forms, from which at intervals sparks flew in clusters like birds from a nest. Oak suddenly ceased from being a mere spectator by discovering the case to be more serious than he had at first imagined. A scroll of smoke blew aside and revealed to him a wheat-rick in startling juxtaposition with the decaying one, and behind this a series of others, composing the main corn produce of the farm; so that instead of the straw-stack standing, as he had imagined comparatively isolated, there was a regular connection between it and the remaining stacks of the group. Gabriel leapt over the hedge, and saw that he was not alone. The first man he came to was running about in a great hurry, as if his thoughts were several yards in advance of his body, which they could never drag on fast enough. "O, man--fire, fire! A good master and a bad servant is fire, fire!--I mane a bad servant and a good master. Oh, Mark Clark--come! And you, Billy Smallbury--and you, Maryann Money--and you, Jan Coggan, and Matthew there!" Other figures now appeared behind this shouting man and among the smoke, and Gabriel found that, far from being alone he was in a great company--whose shadows danced merrily up and down, timed by the jigging of the flames, and not at all by their owners' movements. The assemblage--belonging to that class of society which casts its thoughts into the form of feeling, and its feelings into the form of commotion--set to work with a remarkable confusion of purpose. "Stop the draught under the wheat-rick!" cried Gabriel to those nearest to him. The corn stood on stone staddles, and between these, tongues of yellow hue from the burning straw licked and darted playfully. If the fire once got UNDER this stack, all would be lost. "Get a tarpaulin--quick!" said Gabriel. A rick-cloth was brought, and they hung it like a curtain across the channel. The flames immediately ceased to go under the bottom of the corn-stack, and stood up vertical. "Stand here with a bucket of water and keep the cloth wet." said Gabriel again. The flames, now driven upwards, began to attack the angles of the huge roof covering the wheat-stack. "A ladder," cried Gabriel. "The ladder was against the straw-rick and is burnt to a cinder," said a spectre-like form in the smoke. Oak seized the cut ends of the sheaves, as if he were going to engage in the operation of "reed-drawing," and digging in his feet, and occasionally sticking in the stem of his sheep-crook, he clambered up the beetling face. He at once sat astride the very apex, and began with his crook to beat off the fiery fragments which had lodged thereon, shouting to the others to get him a bough and a ladder, and some water. Billy Smallbury--one of the men who had been on the waggon--by this time had found a ladder, which Mark Clark ascended, holding on beside Oak upon the thatch. The smoke at this corner was stifling, and Clark, a nimble fellow, having been handed a bucket of water, bathed Oak's face and sprinkled him generally, whilst Gabriel, now with a long beech-bough in one hand, in addition to his crook in the other, kept sweeping the stack and dislodging all fiery particles. On the ground the groups of villagers were still occupied in doing all they could to keep down the conflagration, which was not much. They were all tinged orange, and backed up by shadows of varying pattern. Round the corner of the largest stack, out of the direct rays of the fire, stood a pony, bearing a young woman on its back. By her side was another woman, on foot. These two seemed to keep at a distance from the fire, that the horse might not become restive. "He's a shepherd," said the woman on foot. "Yes--he is. See how his crook shines as he beats the rick with it. And his smock-frock is burnt in two holes, I declare! A fine young shepherd he is too, ma'am." "Whose shepherd is he?" said the equestrian in a clear voice. "Don't know, ma'am." "Don't any of the others know?" "Nobody at all--I've asked 'em. Quite a stranger, they say." The young woman on the pony rode out from the shade and looked anxiously around. "Do you think the barn is safe?" she said. "D'ye think the barn is safe, Jan Coggan?" said the second woman, passing on the question to the nearest man in that direction. "Safe-now--leastwise I think so. If this rick had gone the barn would have followed. 'Tis that bold shepherd up there that have done the most good--he sitting on the top o' rick, whizzing his great long-arms about like a windmill." "He does work hard," said the young woman on horseback, looking up at Gabriel through her thick woollen veil. "I wish he was shepherd here. Don't any of you know his name." "Never heard the man's name in my life, or seed his form afore." The fire began to get worsted, and Gabriel's elevated position being no longer required of him, he made as if to descend. "Maryann," said the girl on horseback, "go to him as he comes down, and say that the farmer wishes to thank him for the great service he has done." Maryann stalked off towards the rick and met Oak at the foot of the ladder. She delivered her message. "Where is your master the farmer?" asked Gabriel, kindling with the idea of getting employment that seemed to strike him now. "'Tisn't a master; 'tis a mistress, shepherd." "A woman farmer?" "Ay, 'a b'lieve, and a rich one too!" said a bystander. "Lately 'a came here from a distance. Took on her uncle's farm, who died suddenly. Used to measure his money in half-pint cups. They say now that she've business in every bank in Casterbridge, and thinks no more of playing pitch-and-toss sovereign than you and I, do pitch-halfpenny--not a bit in the world, shepherd." "That's she, back there upon the pony," said Maryann; "wi' her face a-covered up in that black cloth with holes in it." Oak, his features smudged, grimy, and undiscoverable from the smoke and heat, his smock-frock burnt into holes and dripping with water, the ash stem of his sheep-crook charred six inches shorter, advanced with the humility stern adversity had thrust upon him up to the slight female form in the saddle. He lifted his hat with respect, and not without gallantry: stepping close to her hanging feet he said in a hesitating voice,-- "Do you happen to want a shepherd, ma'am?" She lifted the wool veil tied round her face, and looked all astonishment. Gabriel and his cold-hearted darling, Bathsheba Everdene, were face to face. Bathsheba did not speak, and he mechanically repeated in an abashed and sad voice,-- "Do you want a shepherd, ma'am?"

Chapter 6

https://web.archive.org/web/20201219162644/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/far-from-the-madding-crowd/summary/chapter-6

Now that he's poor, Gabriel Oak needs to walk to the nearby town of Casterbridge to attend a job fair. Yup, they had things like that back around 1874. And Oak is looking for any work he can get his hands on. He's been hardened by misfortune and doesn't think that he's too good for anything. Things don't go that well, though. After an unsuccessful morning, Oak wishes he'd gone away with some army recruits who were around a few hours earlier. No one wants to hire him to do farmwork because he's been financially ruined. He wears the scarlet "u" for "unemployable." When the day is over, Oak is still unemployed. He hears that there'll be another fair in the nearby town of Weatherbury the next day, and he heads for that town on foot. Oh, and Oak knows that Weatherbury is the place that Bathsheba moved to. Bonus. He takes a nap in a hay wagon and later wakes up to find the wagon moving. He's been asleep for two hours and has no clue how far he's travelled. He can hear two men in the front of the wagon talking rudely about a pretty young lady who lives in their town. Oak wonders for a moment if the lady might be Bathsheba. When he finally hops off the wagon, he sees a chaotic scene on a nearby farm. There's a huge fire burning up the crops and threatening to torch the buildings, too. He jumps into action and succeeds in leading the townspeople's attempts to put the fire out. Oak: 1. Fire: 0. Everyone is impressed with his heroism. Oak wants to ride the wave of this sudden celebrity by asking the farmer owner if there's a need for a shepherd with mad shepherding skills. When the owner rides up, he sees that it's none other than Bathsheba. Seeing him makes her go temporarily mute with surprise. So Oak takes advantage of this by asking whether she needs a shepherd.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/44.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_43_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 44

chapter 44

{"name": "Chapter 44", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility61.asp", "summary": "Willoughby pours out his heart to Elinor. He had heard about Marianne's illness and thus decided to undertake a journey to Cleveland. He insists on talking extensively to Elinor. He tells her about his genuine affection for Marianne. In the beginning he had the intention of only flirting with her, since he had wanted to marry a wealthy girl. His dalliance with Marianne had to be cut short because of Mrs. Smith. The old lady had insisted that Willoughby marry Miss Williams, and when he had refused to obey her order, she had disowned him. Hence, Willoughby had to leave for London. In the city he had met Miss Grey, who is wealthy, and had become engaged to her. Marianne's letter had reached the hand of his fiancee, who had made him write the offensive letter to Marianne, whose heart was broken. Willoughby concludes his tale with regret at marrying the wealthy but cold Miss Grey.", "analysis": "Notes Willoughby arrives at Cleveland in order to clear his conscience because he has feared that Marianne might die from this strange illness. He portrays himself as a pitiable creature, dominated by a rich but cruel wife. He tries to justify his actions with Miss Williams and professes love for Marianne. At the end of his emotional tale, he still appears as a heartless man who has deceived two innocent girls. Even Elinor, who possesses a generous heart, fails to excuse him for his wrongs. She also condemns his criticism of his wife. She considers his behavior unpardonable and allows him to relate his tale only out of a sense of courtesy. CHAPTER 45 Summary After Willoughby leaves, Elinor continues to think about what he has told her. Elinor's generous heart sympathizes with Willoughby's plight, even though she considers him selfish in the ultimate analysis. She is one of the few characters prepared to listen to Willoughby after all that he has done. Mrs. Dashwood arrives in great agony. Elinor relieves her of her anxiety by informing her immediately about Marianne's recovery. Nevertheless, Mrs. Dashwood rushes in to meet her sick daughter. Marianne is delighted to see her mother. After their reunion, Mrs. Dashwood reveals to Elinor that Colonel Brandon has confessed his love for Marianne and his desire to marry her. She thinks highly of Brandon and is glad about the prospect of her daughter becoming his wife. Notes Elinor, aware of her mother's anxiety, informs her immediately about Marianne's recovery, thus sparing the elderly lady from further agony. She also offers solace to her mother. Mrs. Dashwood is like Marianne in her temperament. She is sensitive, emotional and judgmental. She criticizes Willoughby and praises Brandon because the Colonel has professed his love for Marianne. She attributes exaggerated defects and merits to Willoughby and Brandon respectively, according to the changed circumstances. Mrs. Dashwood even finds fault with Willoughby's appearance and manners because he has rejected her daughter. CHAPTER 46 Summary Marianne recovers steadily. She is grateful to the Colonel for taking the trouble of bringing her mother to Cleveland, and at such short notice. Brandon is overwhelmed by the attention she gives him. He arranges a special carriage to take the family to Barton and prepares to leave for Delaford. Marianne bears the journey well and becomes emotional upon reaching Barton. At home, she devises a program to keep herself occupied. Elinor is relieved to see her sister's renewed zest for life. One day, as they go out for a walk, Marianne takes Elinor to the spot where she fell and where Willoughby rescued her. Elinor informs Marianne of Willoughby's visit to Cleveland and relates his tale of confession. Marianne is moved to tears and asks Elinor to share the facts with her mother as well. Notes The chapter presents a mature Marianne. She appears confident and cheerful. She withstands the pressures of the journey with a smile. She is thankful to those who have helped her to recover. She is courteous enough to express her gratitude to the Colonel. She also shows a desire to make the best of her life. At Barton, she resolves to utilize her time by reading, practicing music and appreciating the beauty of nature through walks. She wants to forget the past and start life anew. Her sincere desire is to divert her mind from thoughts of Willoughby \"by religion, by reason, by constant employment.\" Marianne regrets her past behavior with friends and acquaintances. Her days of sickness have made her contemplative: she emerges from the illness a different person. She resolves to understand and appreciate the views of the people around her. Elinor, who had been burdened with Willoughby's story, finally gets the opportunity to reveal it to Marianne: when Marianne asks Elinor to gauge the true feelings of Willoughby for her, Elinor relates Willoughby's confession to her. Marianne is moved to tears after hearing the story, but at the same time, she is relieved to hear the facts."}

Elinor, starting back with a look of horror at the sight of him, obeyed the first impulse of her heart in turning instantly to quit the room, and her hand was already on the lock, when its action was suspended by his hastily advancing, and saying, in a voice rather of command than supplication, "Miss Dashwood, for half an hour--for ten minutes--I entreat you to stay." "No, sir," she replied with firmness, "I shall NOT stay. Your business cannot be with ME. The servants, I suppose, forgot to tell you that Mr. Palmer was not in the house." "Had they told me," he cried with vehemence, "that Mr. Palmer and all his relations were at the devil, it would not have turned me from the door. My business is with you, and only you." "With me!"--in the utmost amazement--"well, sir,--be quick--and if you can--less violent." "Sit down, and I will be both." She hesitated; she knew not what to do. The possibility of Colonel Brandon's arriving and finding her there, came across her. But she had promised to hear him, and her curiosity no less than her honor was engaged. After a moment's recollection, therefore, concluding that prudence required dispatch, and that her acquiescence would best promote it, she walked silently towards the table, and sat down. He took the opposite chair, and for half a minute not a word was said by either. "Pray be quick, sir,"--said Elinor, impatiently;--"I have no time to spare." He was sitting in an attitude of deep meditation, and seemed not to hear her. "Your sister," said he, with abruptness, a moment afterwards--"is out of danger. I heard it from the servant. God be praised!--But is it true? is it really true?" Elinor would not speak. He repeated the inquiry with yet greater eagerness. "For God's sake tell me, is she out of danger, or is she not?" "We hope she is." He rose up, and walked across the room. "Had I known as much half an hour ago--But since I AM here,"--speaking with a forced vivacity as he returned to his seat--"what does it signify?--For once, Miss Dashwood--it will be the last time, perhaps--let us be cheerful together.--I am in a fine mood for gaiety.-- Tell me honestly"--a deeper glow overspreading his cheeks--"do you think me most a knave or a fool?" Elinor looked at him with greater astonishment than ever. She began to think that he must be in liquor;--the strangeness of such a visit, and of such manners, seemed no otherwise intelligible; and with this impression she immediately rose, saying, "Mr. Willoughby, I advise you at present to return to Combe--I am not at leisure to remain with you longer.-- Whatever your business may be with me, it will be better recollected and explained to-morrow." "I understand you," he replied, with an expressive smile, and a voice perfectly calm; "yes, I am very drunk.-- A pint of porter with my cold beef at Marlborough was enough to over-set me." "At Marlborough!"--cried Elinor, more and more at a loss to understand what he would be at. "Yes,--I left London this morning at eight o'clock, and the only ten minutes I have spent out of my chaise since that time procured me a nuncheon at Marlborough." The steadiness of his manner, and the intelligence of his eye as he spoke, convincing Elinor, that whatever other unpardonable folly might bring him to Cleveland, he was not brought there by intoxication, she said, after a moment's recollection, "Mr. Willoughby, you OUGHT to feel, and I certainly DO--that after what has passed--your coming here in this manner, and forcing yourself upon my notice, requires a very particular excuse.--What is it, that you mean by it?"-- "I mean,"--said he, with serious energy--"if I can, to make you hate me one degree less than you do NOW. I mean to offer some kind of explanation, some kind of apology, for the past; to open my whole heart to you, and by convincing you, that though I have been always a blockhead, I have not been always a rascal, to obtain something like forgiveness from Ma--from your sister." "Is this the real reason of your coming?" "Upon my soul it is,"--was his answer, with a warmth which brought all the former Willoughby to her remembrance, and in spite of herself made her think him sincere. "If that is all, you may be satisfied already,--for Marianne DOES--she has LONG forgiven you." "Has she?"--he cried, in the same eager tone.-- "Then she has forgiven me before she ought to have done it. But she shall forgive me again, and on more reasonable grounds.--NOW will you listen to me?" Elinor bowed her assent. "I do not know," said he, after a pause of expectation on her side, and thoughtfulness on his own,--"how YOU may have accounted for my behaviour to your sister, or what diabolical motive you may have imputed to me.-- Perhaps you will hardly think the better of me,--it is worth the trial however, and you shall hear every thing. When I first became intimate in your family, I had no other intention, no other view in the acquaintance than to pass my time pleasantly while I was obliged to remain in Devonshire, more pleasantly than I had ever done before. Your sister's lovely person and interesting manners could not but please me; and her behaviour to me almost from the first, was of a kind--It is astonishing, when I reflect on what it was, and what SHE was, that my heart should have been so insensible! But at first I must confess, my vanity only was elevated by it. Careless of her happiness, thinking only of my own amusement, giving way to feelings which I had always been too much in the habit of indulging, I endeavoured, by every means in my power, to make myself pleasing to her, without any design of returning her affection." Miss Dashwood, at this point, turning her eyes on him with the most angry contempt, stopped him, by saying, "It is hardly worth while, Mr. Willoughby, for you to relate, or for me to listen any longer. Such a beginning as this cannot be followed by any thing.-- Do not let me be pained by hearing any thing more on the subject." "I insist on you hearing the whole of it," he replied, "My fortune was never large, and I had always been expensive, always in the habit of associating with people of better income than myself. Every year since my coming of age, or even before, I believe, had added to my debts; and though the death of my old cousin, Mrs. Smith, was to set me free; yet that event being uncertain, and possibly far distant, it had been for some time my intention to re-establish my circumstances by marrying a woman of fortune. To attach myself to your sister, therefore, was not a thing to be thought of;--and with a meanness, selfishness, cruelty--which no indignant, no contemptuous look, even of yours, Miss Dashwood, can ever reprobate too much--I was acting in this manner, trying to engage her regard, without a thought of returning it.--But one thing may be said for me: even in that horrid state of selfish vanity, I did not know the extent of the injury I meditated, because I did not THEN know what it was to love. But have I ever known it?--Well may it be doubted; for, had I really loved, could I have sacrificed my feelings to vanity, to avarice?--or, what is more, could I have sacrificed hers?-- But I have done it. To avoid a comparative poverty, which her affection and her society would have deprived of all its horrors, I have, by raising myself to affluence, lost every thing that could make it a blessing." "You did then," said Elinor, a little softened, "believe yourself at one time attached to her?" "To have resisted such attractions, to have withstood such tenderness!--Is there a man on earth who could have done it?--Yes, I found myself, by insensible degrees, sincerely fond of her; and the happiest hours of my life were what I spent with her when I felt my intentions were strictly honourable, and my feelings blameless. Even THEN, however, when fully determined on paying my addresses to her, I allowed myself most improperly to put off, from day to day, the moment of doing it, from an unwillingness to enter into an engagement while my circumstances were so greatly embarrassed. I will not reason here--nor will I stop for YOU to expatiate on the absurdity, and the worse than absurdity, of scrupling to engage my faith where my honour was already bound. The event has proved, that I was a cunning fool, providing with great circumspection for a possible opportunity of making myself contemptible and wretched for ever. At last, however, my resolution was taken, and I had determined, as soon as I could engage her alone, to justify the attentions I had so invariably paid her, and openly assure her of an affection which I had already taken such pains to display. But in the interim--in the interim of the very few hours that were to pass, before I could have an opportunity of speaking with her in private--a circumstance occurred--an unlucky circumstance, to ruin all my resolution, and with it all my comfort. A discovery took place,"--here he hesitated and looked down.--"Mrs. Smith had somehow or other been informed, I imagine by some distant relation, whose interest it was to deprive me of her favour, of an affair, a connection--but I need not explain myself farther," he added, looking at her with an heightened colour and an enquiring eye--"your particular intimacy--you have probably heard the whole story long ago." "I have," returned Elinor, colouring likewise, and hardening her heart anew against any compassion for him, "I have heard it all. And how you will explain away any part of your guilt in that dreadful business, I confess is beyond my comprehension." "Remember," cried Willoughby, "from whom you received the account. Could it be an impartial one? I acknowledge that her situation and her character ought to have been respected by me. I do not mean to justify myself, but at the same time cannot leave you to suppose that I have nothing to urge--that because she was injured she was irreproachable, and because I was a libertine, SHE must be a saint. If the violence of her passions, the weakness of her understanding--I do not mean, however, to defend myself. Her affection for me deserved better treatment, and I often, with great self-reproach, recall the tenderness which, for a very short time, had the power of creating any return. I wish--I heartily wish it had never been. But I have injured more than herself; and I have injured one, whose affection for me--(may I say it?) was scarcely less warm than hers; and whose mind--Oh! how infinitely superior!"-- "Your indifference, however, towards that unfortunate girl--I must say it, unpleasant to me as the discussion of such a subject may well be--your indifference is no apology for your cruel neglect of her. Do not think yourself excused by any weakness, any natural defect of understanding on her side, in the wanton cruelty so evident on yours. You must have known, that while you were enjoying yourself in Devonshire pursuing fresh schemes, always gay, always happy, she was reduced to the extremest indigence." "But, upon my soul, I did NOT know it," he warmly replied; "I did not recollect that I had omitted to give her my direction; and common sense might have told her how to find it out." "Well, sir, and what said Mrs. Smith?" "She taxed me with the offence at once, and my confusion may be guessed. The purity of her life, the formality of her notions, her ignorance of the world--every thing was against me. The matter itself I could not deny, and vain was every endeavour to soften it. She was previously disposed, I believe, to doubt the morality of my conduct in general, and was moreover discontented with the very little attention, the very little portion of my time that I had bestowed on her, in my present visit. In short, it ended in a total breach. By one measure I might have saved myself. In the height of her morality, good woman! she offered to forgive the past, if I would marry Eliza. That could not be--and I was formally dismissed from her favour and her house. The night following this affair--I was to go the next morning--was spent by me in deliberating on what my future conduct should be. The struggle was great--but it ended too soon. My affection for Marianne, my thorough conviction of her attachment to me--it was all insufficient to outweigh that dread of poverty, or get the better of those false ideas of the necessity of riches, which I was naturally inclined to feel, and expensive society had increased. I had reason to believe myself secure of my present wife, if I chose to address her, and I persuaded myself to think that nothing else in common prudence remained for me to do. A heavy scene however awaited me, before I could leave Devonshire;--I was engaged to dine with you on that very day; some apology was therefore necessary for my breaking this engagement. But whether I should write this apology, or deliver it in person, was a point of long debate. To see Marianne, I felt, would be dreadful, and I even doubted whether I could see her again, and keep to my resolution. In that point, however, I undervalued my own magnanimity, as the event declared; for I went, I saw her, and saw her miserable, and left her miserable--and left her hoping never to see her again." "Why did you call, Mr. Willoughby?" said Elinor, reproachfully; "a note would have answered every purpose.-- Why was it necessary to call?" "It was necessary to my own pride. I could not bear to leave the country in a manner that might lead you, or the rest of the neighbourhood, to suspect any part of what had really passed between Mrs. Smith and myself--and I resolved therefore on calling at the cottage, in my way to Honiton. The sight of your dear sister, however, was really dreadful; and, to heighten the matter, I found her alone. You were all gone I do not know where. I had left her only the evening before, so fully, so firmly resolved within my self on doing right! A few hours were to have engaged her to me for ever; and I remember how happy, how gay were my spirits, as I walked from the cottage to Allenham, satisfied with myself, delighted with every body! But in this, our last interview of friendship, I approached her with a sense of guilt that almost took from me the power of dissembling. Her sorrow, her disappointment, her deep regret, when I told her that I was obliged to leave Devonshire so immediately--I never shall forget it--united too with such reliance, such confidence in me!--Oh, God!--what a hard-hearted rascal I was!" They were both silent for a few moments. Elinor first spoke. "Did you tell her that you should soon return?" "I do not know what I told her," he replied, impatiently; "less than was due to the past, beyond a doubt, and in all likelihood much more than was justified by the future. I cannot think of it.--It won't do.--Then came your dear mother to torture me farther, with all her kindness and confidence. Thank Heaven! it DID torture me. I was miserable. Miss Dashwood, you cannot have an idea of the comfort it gives me to look back on my own misery. I owe such a grudge to myself for the stupid, rascally folly of my own heart, that all my past sufferings under it are only triumph and exultation to me now. Well, I went, left all that I loved, and went to those to whom, at best, I was only indifferent. My journey to town--travelling with my own horses, and therefore so tediously--no creature to speak to--my own reflections so cheerful--when I looked forward every thing so inviting!--when I looked back at Barton, the picture so soothing!--oh, it was a blessed journey!" He stopped. "Well, sir," said Elinor, who, though pitying him, grew impatient for his departure, "and this is all?" "Ah!--no,--have you forgot what passed in town?-- That infamous letter--Did she shew it you?" "Yes, I saw every note that passed." "When the first of hers reached me (as it immediately did, for I was in town the whole time,) what I felt is--in the common phrase, not to be expressed; in a more simple one--perhaps too simple to raise any emotion--my feelings were very, very painful.--Every line, every word was--in the hackneyed metaphor which their dear writer, were she here, would forbid--a dagger to my heart. To know that Marianne was in town was--in the same language--a thunderbolt.--Thunderbolts and daggers!--what a reproof would she have given me!--her taste, her opinions--I believe they are better known to me than my own,--and I am sure they are dearer." Elinor's heart, which had undergone many changes in the course of this extraordinary conversation, was now softened again;--yet she felt it her duty to check such ideas in her companion as the last. "This is not right, Mr. Willoughby.--Remember that you are married. Relate only what in your conscience you think necessary for me to hear." "Marianne's note, by assuring me that I was still as dear to her as in former days, that in spite of the many, many weeks we had been separated, she was as constant in her own feelings, and as full of faith in the constancy of mine as ever, awakened all my remorse. I say awakened, because time and London, business and dissipation, had in some measure quieted it, and I had been growing a fine hardened villain, fancying myself indifferent to her, and chusing to fancy that she too must have become indifferent to me; talking to myself of our past attachment as a mere idle, trifling business, shrugging up my shoulders in proof of its being so, and silencing every reproach, overcoming every scruple, by secretly saying now and then, 'I shall be heartily glad to hear she is well married.'-- But this note made me know myself better. I felt that she was infinitely dearer to me than any other woman in the world, and that I was using her infamously. But every thing was then just settled between Miss Grey and me. To retreat was impossible. All that I had to do, was to avoid you both. I sent no answer to Marianne, intending by that to preserve myself from her farther notice; and for some time I was even determined not to call in Berkeley Street;--but at last, judging it wiser to affect the air of a cool, common acquaintance than anything else, I watched you all safely out of the house one morning, and left my name." "Watched us out of the house!" "Even so. You would be surprised to hear how often I watched you, how often I was on the point of falling in with you. I have entered many a shop to avoid your sight, as the carriage drove by. Lodging as I did in Bond Street, there was hardly a day in which I did not catch a glimpse of one or other of you; and nothing but the most constant watchfulness on my side, a most invariably prevailing desire to keep out of your sight, could have separated us so long. I avoided the Middletons as much as possible, as well as everybody else who was likely to prove an acquaintance in common. Not aware of their being in town, however, I blundered on Sir John, I believe, the first day of his coming, and the day after I had called at Mrs. Jennings's. He asked me to a party, a dance at his house in the evening.--Had he NOT told me as an inducement that you and your sister were to be there, I should have felt it too certain a thing, to trust myself near him. The next morning brought another short note from Marianne--still affectionate, open, artless, confiding--everything that could make MY conduct most hateful. I could not answer it. I tried--but could not frame a sentence. But I thought of her, I believe, every moment of the day. If you CAN pity me, Miss Dashwood, pity my situation as it was THEN. With my head and heart full of your sister, I was forced to play the happy lover to another woman!--Those three or four weeks were worse than all. Well, at last, as I need not tell you, you were forced on me; and what a sweet figure I cut!--what an evening of agony it was!-- Marianne, beautiful as an angel on one side, calling me Willoughby in such a tone!--Oh, God!--holding out her hand to me, asking me for an explanation, with those bewitching eyes fixed in such speaking solicitude on my face!--and Sophia, jealous as the devil on the other hand, looking all that was--Well, it does not signify; it is over now.-- Such an evening!--I ran away from you all as soon as I could; but not before I had seen Marianne's sweet face as white as death.--THAT was the last, last look I ever had of her;--the last manner in which she appeared to me. It was a horrid sight!--yet when I thought of her to-day as really dying, it was a kind of comfort to me to imagine that I knew exactly how she would appear to those, who saw her last in this world. She was before me, constantly before me, as I travelled, in the same look and hue." A short pause of mutual thoughtfulness succeeded. Willoughby first rousing himself, broke it thus: "Well, let me make haste and be gone. Your sister is certainly better, certainly out of danger?" "We are assured of it." "Your poor mother, too!--doting on Marianne." "But the letter, Mr. Willoughby, your own letter; have you any thing to say about that?" "Yes, yes, THAT in particular. Your sister wrote to me again, you know, the very next morning. You saw what she said. I was breakfasting at the Ellisons,--and her letter, with some others, was brought to me there from my lodgings. It happened to catch Sophia's eye before it caught mine--and its size, the elegance of the paper, the hand-writing altogether, immediately gave her a suspicion. Some vague report had reached her before of my attachment to some young lady in Devonshire, and what had passed within her observation the preceding evening had marked who the young lady was, and made her more jealous than ever. Affecting that air of playfulness, therefore, which is delightful in a woman one loves, she opened the letter directly, and read its contents. She was well paid for her impudence. She read what made her wretched. Her wretchedness I could have borne, but her passion--her malice--At all events it must be appeased. And, in short--what do you think of my wife's style of letter-writing?--delicate--tender--truly feminine--was it not?" "Your wife!--The letter was in your own hand-writing." "Yes, but I had only the credit of servilely copying such sentences as I was ashamed to put my name to. The original was all her own--her own happy thoughts and gentle diction. But what could I do!--we were engaged, every thing in preparation, the day almost fixed--But I am talking like a fool. Preparation!--day!--In honest words, her money was necessary to me, and in a situation like mine, any thing was to be done to prevent a rupture. And after all, what did it signify to my character in the opinion of Marianne and her friends, in what language my answer was couched?--It must have been only to one end. My business was to declare myself a scoundrel, and whether I did it with a bow or a bluster was of little importance.-- 'I am ruined for ever in their opinion--' said I to myself--'I am shut out for ever from their society, they already think me an unprincipled fellow, this letter will only make them think me a blackguard one.' Such were my reasonings, as, in a sort of desperate carelessness, I copied my wife's words, and parted with the last relics of Marianne. Her three notes--unluckily they were all in my pocketbook, or I should have denied their existence, and hoarded them for ever--I was forced to put them up, and could not even kiss them. And the lock of hair--that too I had always carried about me in the same pocket-book, which was now searched by Madam with the most ingratiating virulence,--the dear lock--all, every memento was torn from me." "You are very wrong, Mr. Willoughby, very blamable," said Elinor, while her voice, in spite of herself, betrayed her compassionate emotion; "you ought not to speak in this way, either of Mrs. Willoughby or my sister. You had made your own choice. It was not forced on you. Your wife has a claim to your politeness, to your respect, at least. She must be attached to you, or she would not have married you. To treat her with unkindness, to speak of her slightingly is no atonement to Marianne--nor can I suppose it a relief to your own conscience." "Do not talk to me of my wife," said he with a heavy sigh.-- "She does not deserve your compassion.--She knew I had no regard for her when we married.--Well, married we were, and came down to Combe Magna to be happy, and afterwards returned to town to be gay.--And now do you pity me, Miss Dashwood?--or have I said all this to no purpose?-- Am I--be it only one degree--am I less guilty in your opinion than I was before?--My intentions were not always wrong. Have I explained away any part of my guilt?" "Yes, you have certainly removed something--a little.-- You have proved yourself, on the whole, less faulty than I had believed you. You have proved your heart less wicked, much less wicked. But I hardly know--the misery that you have inflicted--I hardly know what could have made it worse." "Will you repeat to your sister when she is recovered, what I have been telling you?--Let me be a little lightened too in her opinion as well as in yours. You tell me that she has forgiven me already. Let me be able to fancy that a better knowledge of my heart, and of my present feelings, will draw from her a more spontaneous, more natural, more gentle, less dignified, forgiveness. Tell her of my misery and my penitence--tell her that my heart was never inconstant to her, and if you will, that at this moment she is dearer to me than ever." "I will tell her all that is necessary to what may comparatively be called, your justification. But you have not explained to me the particular reason of your coming now, nor how you heard of her illness." "Last night, in Drury Lane lobby, I ran against Sir John Middleton, and when he saw who I was--for the first time these two months--he spoke to me.--That he had cut me ever since my marriage, I had seen without surprise or resentment. Now, however, his good-natured, honest, stupid soul, full of indignation against me, and concern for your sister, could not resist the temptation of telling me what he knew ought to--though probably he did not think it WOULD--vex me horridly. As bluntly as he could speak it, therefore, he told me that Marianne Dashwood was dying of a putrid fever at Cleveland--a letter that morning received from Mrs. Jennings declared her danger most imminent--the Palmers are all gone off in a fright, &c.--I was too much shocked to be able to pass myself off as insensible even to the undiscerning Sir John. His heart was softened in seeing mine suffer; and so much of his ill-will was done away, that when we parted, he almost shook me by the hand while he reminded me of an old promise about a pointer puppy. What I felt on hearing that your sister was dying--and dying too, believing me the greatest villain upon earth, scorning, hating me in her latest moments--for how could I tell what horrid projects might not have been imputed? ONE person I was sure would represent me as capable of any thing-- What I felt was dreadful!--My resolution was soon made, and at eight o'clock this morning I was in my carriage. Now you know all." Elinor made no answer. Her thoughts were silently fixed on the irreparable injury which too early an independence and its consequent habits of idleness, dissipation, and luxury, had made in the mind, the character, the happiness, of a man who, to every advantage of person and talents, united a disposition naturally open and honest, and a feeling, affectionate temper. The world had made him extravagant and vain--Extravagance and vanity had made him cold-hearted and selfish. Vanity, while seeking its own guilty triumph at the expense of another, had involved him in a real attachment, which extravagance, or at least its offspring, necessity, had required to be sacrificed. Each faulty propensity in leading him to evil, had led him likewise to punishment. The attachment, from which against honour, against feeling, against every better interest he had outwardly torn himself, now, when no longer allowable, governed every thought; and the connection, for the sake of which he had, with little scruple, left her sister to misery, was likely to prove a source of unhappiness to himself of a far more incurable nature. From a reverie of this kind she was recalled at the end of some minutes by Willoughby, who, rousing himself from a reverie at least equally painful, started up in preparation for going, and said-- "There is no use in staying here; I must be off." "Are you going back to town?" "No--to Combe Magna. I have business there; from thence to town in a day or two. Good bye." He held out his hand. She could not refuse to give him hers;--he pressed it with affection. "And you DO think something better of me than you did?"--said he, letting it fall, and leaning against the mantel-piece as if forgetting he was to go. Elinor assured him that she did;--that she forgave, pitied, wished him well--was even interested in his happiness--and added some gentle counsel as to the behaviour most likely to promote it. His answer was not very encouraging. "As to that," said he, "I must rub through the world as well as I can. Domestic happiness is out of the question. If, however, I am allowed to think that you and yours feel an interest in my fate and actions, it may be the means--it may put me on my guard--at least, it may be something to live for. Marianne to be sure is lost to me for ever. Were I even by any blessed chance at liberty again--" Elinor stopped him with a reproof. "Well,"--he replied--"once more good bye. I shall now go away and live in dread of one event." "What do you mean?" "Your sister's marriage." "You are very wrong. She can never be more lost to you than she is now." "But she will be gained by some one else. And if that some one should be the very he whom, of all others, I could least bear--but I will not stay to rob myself of all your compassionate goodwill, by shewing that where I have most injured I can least forgive. Good bye,--God bless you!" And with these words, he almost ran out of the room.

Chapter 44

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility61.asp

Willoughby pours out his heart to Elinor. He had heard about Marianne's illness and thus decided to undertake a journey to Cleveland. He insists on talking extensively to Elinor. He tells her about his genuine affection for Marianne. In the beginning he had the intention of only flirting with her, since he had wanted to marry a wealthy girl. His dalliance with Marianne had to be cut short because of Mrs. Smith. The old lady had insisted that Willoughby marry Miss Williams, and when he had refused to obey her order, she had disowned him. Hence, Willoughby had to leave for London. In the city he had met Miss Grey, who is wealthy, and had become engaged to her. Marianne's letter had reached the hand of his fiancee, who had made him write the offensive letter to Marianne, whose heart was broken. Willoughby concludes his tale with regret at marrying the wealthy but cold Miss Grey.

Notes Willoughby arrives at Cleveland in order to clear his conscience because he has feared that Marianne might die from this strange illness. He portrays himself as a pitiable creature, dominated by a rich but cruel wife. He tries to justify his actions with Miss Williams and professes love for Marianne. At the end of his emotional tale, he still appears as a heartless man who has deceived two innocent girls. Even Elinor, who possesses a generous heart, fails to excuse him for his wrongs. She also condemns his criticism of his wife. She considers his behavior unpardonable and allows him to relate his tale only out of a sense of courtesy. CHAPTER 45 Summary After Willoughby leaves, Elinor continues to think about what he has told her. Elinor's generous heart sympathizes with Willoughby's plight, even though she considers him selfish in the ultimate analysis. She is one of the few characters prepared to listen to Willoughby after all that he has done. Mrs. Dashwood arrives in great agony. Elinor relieves her of her anxiety by informing her immediately about Marianne's recovery. Nevertheless, Mrs. Dashwood rushes in to meet her sick daughter. Marianne is delighted to see her mother. After their reunion, Mrs. Dashwood reveals to Elinor that Colonel Brandon has confessed his love for Marianne and his desire to marry her. She thinks highly of Brandon and is glad about the prospect of her daughter becoming his wife. Notes Elinor, aware of her mother's anxiety, informs her immediately about Marianne's recovery, thus sparing the elderly lady from further agony. She also offers solace to her mother. Mrs. Dashwood is like Marianne in her temperament. She is sensitive, emotional and judgmental. She criticizes Willoughby and praises Brandon because the Colonel has professed his love for Marianne. She attributes exaggerated defects and merits to Willoughby and Brandon respectively, according to the changed circumstances. Mrs. Dashwood even finds fault with Willoughby's appearance and manners because he has rejected her daughter. CHAPTER 46 Summary Marianne recovers steadily. She is grateful to the Colonel for taking the trouble of bringing her mother to Cleveland, and at such short notice. Brandon is overwhelmed by the attention she gives him. He arranges a special carriage to take the family to Barton and prepares to leave for Delaford. Marianne bears the journey well and becomes emotional upon reaching Barton. At home, she devises a program to keep herself occupied. Elinor is relieved to see her sister's renewed zest for life. One day, as they go out for a walk, Marianne takes Elinor to the spot where she fell and where Willoughby rescued her. Elinor informs Marianne of Willoughby's visit to Cleveland and relates his tale of confession. Marianne is moved to tears and asks Elinor to share the facts with her mother as well. Notes The chapter presents a mature Marianne. She appears confident and cheerful. She withstands the pressures of the journey with a smile. She is thankful to those who have helped her to recover. She is courteous enough to express her gratitude to the Colonel. She also shows a desire to make the best of her life. At Barton, she resolves to utilize her time by reading, practicing music and appreciating the beauty of nature through walks. She wants to forget the past and start life anew. Her sincere desire is to divert her mind from thoughts of Willoughby "by religion, by reason, by constant employment." Marianne regrets her past behavior with friends and acquaintances. Her days of sickness have made her contemplative: she emerges from the illness a different person. She resolves to understand and appreciate the views of the people around her. Elinor, who had been burdened with Willoughby's story, finally gets the opportunity to reveal it to Marianne: when Marianne asks Elinor to gauge the true feelings of Willoughby for her, Elinor relates Willoughby's confession to her. Marianne is moved to tears after hearing the story, but at the same time, she is relieved to hear the facts.

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all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/28.txt

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Sense and Sensibility.chapter 28

chapter 28

{"name": "Chapter 28", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility42.asp", "summary": "It takes three days for the ladies to complete their journey. The house at Portman Square is cozy and comfortable. Elinor and Marianne are given separate quarters. After settling in, Elinor sits down to write a letter to her mother. Marianne, too, writes a letter, but it is addressed to Willoughby. In the following days she waits eagerly for his visit and his letter. However, she is in for much disappointment. Colonel Brandon visits them the next day. Marianne avoids him, while Elinor engages him in a conversation. In the evening Mrs. Palmer pays them a visit. She is in high spirits and expresses pleasure at meeting the girls. Other guests of Mrs. Jennings also arrive, and they are entertained with a game of whist. Elinor is concerned over her sister's behavior. Marianne neither participates in any activity nor shows enthusiasm in entertaining the guests. Elinor decides to write to her mother regarding her sister.", "analysis": "Notes It is the time for waiting and visiting. Marianne's impatience is revealed when she writes a letter to Willoughby immediately after arriving in London. She cannot think of anyone but him. Her restlessness only increases with time. Thus, when Colonel Brandon pays them a visit, she is disappointed and even disgusted. She also shows no desire to talk to Mrs. Palmer or the other guests of Mrs. Jennings. Through her behavior, she hurts the feelings of people like Colonel Brandon. Elinor observes her sister and is naturally concerned. Marianne's callous attitude towards others disturbs her. When Marianne avoids Colonel Brandon, Mrs. Palmer and the others, Elinor tries to make up for her sister's neglect by engaging them in conversation. She plays the part of a responsible hostess by helping Mrs. Jennings to entertain her guests. Her sensitivity to others is well brought out in this episode. CHAPTER 27 Summary Mrs. Jennings waits for the arrival of the Middletons, while Marianne waits for Willoughby's visit. Colonel Brandon visits them everyday. Elinor keeps him company. One day, after returning from a drive, Marianne finds Willoughby's card on the table. She is excited and waits for his visit. In the meantime Mrs. Jennings receives a letter from Lady Middleton informing her about their visit to the city. The Middletons arrive and host a party. All their friends make an appearance except for Willoughby, who was invited but failed to keep his appointment. Marianne is distressed. She writes another letter to Willoughby. Colonel Brandon visits them again and expresses a desire to speak to Elinor. He questions Elinor about Marianne's engagement in order to ascertain whether he stands any chance of winning her favor. Elinor indicates little hope. Brandon takes his leave after wishing Marianne happiness. Notes Marianne displays her feelings for Willoughby openly. When Mrs. Jennings mentions John Middleton's reluctance to leave the countryside when the weather is so good, Marianne responds excitedly, thinking of her lover and his passion for sports. When she finds Willoughby's card on the table, her hopes soar, and she is excited. However, when she is informed at the Middletons' party that Willoughby will not be in attendance, she feels depressed and reveals her displeasure. Elinor feels helpless in offering any advice to her sister. Instead, she decides to write to her mother about this matter. Whenever Marianne is indiscreet, Elinor tries to compensate for her sister. She feels sorry for Colonel Brandon but thinks it reasonable to lay bare the truth about Marianne's feelings for Willoughby. Elinor is honest but discreet and prudent. CHAPTER 28 Summary Willoughby neither visits nor writes Marianne. One evening, both the girls accompany Mrs. Jennings to a party, where they ultimately meet Willoughby. Elinor notices him talking to a fashionable lady. Marianne is agitated after catching a glimpse of him. A short while afterward, Willoughby comes forward to meet them. He is formal in his manners and fails to reciprocate Marianne's passionate entreaties. When he takes leave of them abruptly, Marianne is shocked and feels faint. Elinor seeks the help of Lady Middleton and takes her home. Notes Marianne gets a shattering blow after meeting Willoughby at the party. All along she had been looking forward to meeting him and when she does, she expects him to apologize for his neglect and express his love for her. Instead, he behaves like a stranger and gives her the cold shoulder. He is formal in his manners and curt in his behavior towards the sisters. His callous attitude breaks Marianne's heart. What Elinor had feared all along comes true. Elinor had never been sure of Willoughby's intentions towards Marianne and had expressed her doubts to her mother. She had been worried when Willoughby failed to respond to Marianne's letters. She had felt disturbed by his negligent attitude. When she meets him and receives a cold response from him, she is disgusted. The scene at the party finally severs the relationship between Marianne and Willoughby. Elinor rightly believes that he had treated her sister in a shameful manner and that he deserves nothing but contempt. Jane Austen has constructed an emotional situation in which to present the confrontation between Marianne and Willoughby. The scene is charged with expectation. Marianne is enraptured to meet Willoughby and openly displays her affection for him, but Willoughby acts reserved and shows restraint in his behavior towards her. He appears indifferent to her feelings. His curt reply to her passionate questions is cruel and shattering."}

Nothing occurred during the next three or four days, to make Elinor regret what she had done, in applying to her mother; for Willoughby neither came nor wrote. They were engaged about the end of that time to attend Lady Middleton to a party, from which Mrs. Jennings was kept away by the indisposition of her youngest daughter; and for this party, Marianne, wholly dispirited, careless of her appearance, and seeming equally indifferent whether she went or staid, prepared, without one look of hope or one expression of pleasure. She sat by the drawing-room fire after tea, till the moment of Lady Middleton's arrival, without once stirring from her seat, or altering her attitude, lost in her own thoughts, and insensible of her sister's presence; and when at last they were told that Lady Middleton waited for them at the door, she started as if she had forgotten that any one was expected. They arrived in due time at the place of destination, and as soon as the string of carriages before them would allow, alighted, ascended the stairs, heard their names announced from one landing-place to another in an audible voice, and entered a room splendidly lit up, quite full of company, and insufferably hot. When they had paid their tribute of politeness by curtsying to the lady of the house, they were permitted to mingle in the crowd, and take their share of the heat and inconvenience, to which their arrival must necessarily add. After some time spent in saying little or doing less, Lady Middleton sat down to Cassino, and as Marianne was not in spirits for moving about, she and Elinor luckily succeeding to chairs, placed themselves at no great distance from the table. They had not remained in this manner long, before Elinor perceived Willoughby, standing within a few yards of them, in earnest conversation with a very fashionable looking young woman. She soon caught his eye, and he immediately bowed, but without attempting to speak to her, or to approach Marianne, though he could not but see her; and then continued his discourse with the same lady. Elinor turned involuntarily to Marianne, to see whether it could be unobserved by her. At that moment she first perceived him, and her whole countenance glowing with sudden delight, she would have moved towards him instantly, had not her sister caught hold of her. "Good heavens!" she exclaimed, "he is there--he is there--Oh! why does he not look at me? why cannot I speak to him?" "Pray, pray be composed," cried Elinor, "and do not betray what you feel to every body present. Perhaps he has not observed you yet." This however was more than she could believe herself; and to be composed at such a moment was not only beyond the reach of Marianne, it was beyond her wish. She sat in an agony of impatience which affected every feature. At last he turned round again, and regarded them both; she started up, and pronouncing his name in a tone of affection, held out her hand to him. He approached, and addressing himself rather to Elinor than Marianne, as if wishing to avoid her eye, and determined not to observe her attitude, inquired in a hurried manner after Mrs. Dashwood, and asked how long they had been in town. Elinor was robbed of all presence of mind by such an address, and was unable to say a word. But the feelings of her sister were instantly expressed. Her face was crimsoned over, and she exclaimed, in a voice of the greatest emotion, "Good God! Willoughby, what is the meaning of this? Have you not received my letters? Will you not shake hands with me?" He could not then avoid it, but her touch seemed painful to him, and he held her hand only for a moment. During all this time he was evidently struggling for composure. Elinor watched his countenance and saw its expression becoming more tranquil. After a moment's pause, he spoke with calmness. "I did myself the honour of calling in Berkeley Street last Tuesday, and very much regretted that I was not fortunate enough to find yourselves and Mrs. Jennings at home. My card was not lost, I hope." "But have you not received my notes?" cried Marianne in the wildest anxiety. "Here is some mistake I am sure--some dreadful mistake. What can be the meaning of it? Tell me, Willoughby; for heaven's sake tell me, what is the matter?" He made no reply; his complexion changed and all his embarrassment returned; but as if, on catching the eye of the young lady with whom he had been previously talking, he felt the necessity of instant exertion, he recovered himself again, and after saying, "Yes, I had the pleasure of receiving the information of your arrival in town, which you were so good as to send me," turned hastily away with a slight bow and joined his friend. Marianne, now looking dreadfully white, and unable to stand, sunk into her chair, and Elinor, expecting every moment to see her faint, tried to screen her from the observation of others, while reviving her with lavender water. "Go to him, Elinor," she cried, as soon as she could speak, "and force him to come to me. Tell him I must see him again--must speak to him instantly.-- I cannot rest--I shall not have a moment's peace till this is explained--some dreadful misapprehension or other.-- Oh go to him this moment." "How can that be done? No, my dearest Marianne, you must wait. This is not the place for explanations. Wait only till tomorrow." With difficulty however could she prevent her from following him herself; and to persuade her to check her agitation, to wait, at least, with the appearance of composure, till she might speak to him with more privacy and more effect, was impossible; for Marianne continued incessantly to give way in a low voice to the misery of her feelings, by exclamations of wretchedness. In a short time Elinor saw Willoughby quit the room by the door towards the staircase, and telling Marianne that he was gone, urged the impossibility of speaking to him again that evening, as a fresh argument for her to be calm. She instantly begged her sister would entreat Lady Middleton to take them home, as she was too miserable to stay a minute longer. Lady Middleton, though in the middle of a rubber, on being informed that Marianne was unwell, was too polite to object for a moment to her wish of going away, and making over her cards to a friend, they departed as soon the carriage could be found. Scarcely a word was spoken during their return to Berkeley Street. Marianne was in a silent agony, too much oppressed even for tears; but as Mrs. Jennings was luckily not come home, they could go directly to their own room, where hartshorn restored her a little to herself. She was soon undressed and in bed, and as she seemed desirous of being alone, her sister then left her, and while she waited the return of Mrs. Jennings, had leisure enough for thinking over the past. That some kind of engagement had subsisted between Willoughby and Marianne she could not doubt, and that Willoughby was weary of it, seemed equally clear; for however Marianne might still feed her own wishes, SHE could not attribute such behaviour to mistake or misapprehension of any kind. Nothing but a thorough change of sentiment could account for it. Her indignation would have been still stronger than it was, had she not witnessed that embarrassment which seemed to speak a consciousness of his own misconduct, and prevented her from believing him so unprincipled as to have been sporting with the affections of her sister from the first, without any design that would bear investigation. Absence might have weakened his regard, and convenience might have determined him to overcome it, but that such a regard had formerly existed she could not bring herself to doubt. As for Marianne, on the pangs which so unhappy a meeting must already have given her, and on those still more severe which might await her in its probable consequence, she could not reflect without the deepest concern. Her own situation gained in the comparison; for while she could ESTEEM Edward as much as ever, however they might be divided in future, her mind might be always supported. But every circumstance that could embitter such an evil seemed uniting to heighten the misery of Marianne in a final separation from Willoughby--in an immediate and irreconcilable rupture with him.

Chapter 28

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility42.asp

It takes three days for the ladies to complete their journey. The house at Portman Square is cozy and comfortable. Elinor and Marianne are given separate quarters. After settling in, Elinor sits down to write a letter to her mother. Marianne, too, writes a letter, but it is addressed to Willoughby. In the following days she waits eagerly for his visit and his letter. However, she is in for much disappointment. Colonel Brandon visits them the next day. Marianne avoids him, while Elinor engages him in a conversation. In the evening Mrs. Palmer pays them a visit. She is in high spirits and expresses pleasure at meeting the girls. Other guests of Mrs. Jennings also arrive, and they are entertained with a game of whist. Elinor is concerned over her sister's behavior. Marianne neither participates in any activity nor shows enthusiasm in entertaining the guests. Elinor decides to write to her mother regarding her sister.

Notes It is the time for waiting and visiting. Marianne's impatience is revealed when she writes a letter to Willoughby immediately after arriving in London. She cannot think of anyone but him. Her restlessness only increases with time. Thus, when Colonel Brandon pays them a visit, she is disappointed and even disgusted. She also shows no desire to talk to Mrs. Palmer or the other guests of Mrs. Jennings. Through her behavior, she hurts the feelings of people like Colonel Brandon. Elinor observes her sister and is naturally concerned. Marianne's callous attitude towards others disturbs her. When Marianne avoids Colonel Brandon, Mrs. Palmer and the others, Elinor tries to make up for her sister's neglect by engaging them in conversation. She plays the part of a responsible hostess by helping Mrs. Jennings to entertain her guests. Her sensitivity to others is well brought out in this episode. CHAPTER 27 Summary Mrs. Jennings waits for the arrival of the Middletons, while Marianne waits for Willoughby's visit. Colonel Brandon visits them everyday. Elinor keeps him company. One day, after returning from a drive, Marianne finds Willoughby's card on the table. She is excited and waits for his visit. In the meantime Mrs. Jennings receives a letter from Lady Middleton informing her about their visit to the city. The Middletons arrive and host a party. All their friends make an appearance except for Willoughby, who was invited but failed to keep his appointment. Marianne is distressed. She writes another letter to Willoughby. Colonel Brandon visits them again and expresses a desire to speak to Elinor. He questions Elinor about Marianne's engagement in order to ascertain whether he stands any chance of winning her favor. Elinor indicates little hope. Brandon takes his leave after wishing Marianne happiness. Notes Marianne displays her feelings for Willoughby openly. When Mrs. Jennings mentions John Middleton's reluctance to leave the countryside when the weather is so good, Marianne responds excitedly, thinking of her lover and his passion for sports. When she finds Willoughby's card on the table, her hopes soar, and she is excited. However, when she is informed at the Middletons' party that Willoughby will not be in attendance, she feels depressed and reveals her displeasure. Elinor feels helpless in offering any advice to her sister. Instead, she decides to write to her mother about this matter. Whenever Marianne is indiscreet, Elinor tries to compensate for her sister. She feels sorry for Colonel Brandon but thinks it reasonable to lay bare the truth about Marianne's feelings for Willoughby. Elinor is honest but discreet and prudent. CHAPTER 28 Summary Willoughby neither visits nor writes Marianne. One evening, both the girls accompany Mrs. Jennings to a party, where they ultimately meet Willoughby. Elinor notices him talking to a fashionable lady. Marianne is agitated after catching a glimpse of him. A short while afterward, Willoughby comes forward to meet them. He is formal in his manners and fails to reciprocate Marianne's passionate entreaties. When he takes leave of them abruptly, Marianne is shocked and feels faint. Elinor seeks the help of Lady Middleton and takes her home. Notes Marianne gets a shattering blow after meeting Willoughby at the party. All along she had been looking forward to meeting him and when she does, she expects him to apologize for his neglect and express his love for her. Instead, he behaves like a stranger and gives her the cold shoulder. He is formal in his manners and curt in his behavior towards the sisters. His callous attitude breaks Marianne's heart. What Elinor had feared all along comes true. Elinor had never been sure of Willoughby's intentions towards Marianne and had expressed her doubts to her mother. She had been worried when Willoughby failed to respond to Marianne's letters. She had felt disturbed by his negligent attitude. When she meets him and receives a cold response from him, she is disgusted. The scene at the party finally severs the relationship between Marianne and Willoughby. Elinor rightly believes that he had treated her sister in a shameful manner and that he deserves nothing but contempt. Jane Austen has constructed an emotional situation in which to present the confrontation between Marianne and Willoughby. The scene is charged with expectation. Marianne is enraptured to meet Willoughby and openly displays her affection for him, but Willoughby acts reserved and shows restraint in his behavior towards her. He appears indifferent to her feelings. His curt reply to her passionate questions is cruel and shattering.

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/07.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/Sense and Sensibility/section_0_part_7.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 7

chapter 7

{"name": "Chapter 7", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210419170735/https://www.gradesaver.com/sense-and-sensibility/study-guide/summary-chapters-1-10", "summary": "Barton Park is a very open and elegant home, and Sir John and his wife are never without a good many guests. Sir John's sole occupation is hunting, and his wife's is raising their children; they have guests and travel to otherwise entertain themselves. Sir John is genuinely fond of the Dashwood girls, since they are pretty and \"unaffected,\" as he calls them; he is kind to them out of the goodness of his heart, and enjoys their company. When the Dashwoods arrive, they meet two people at Barton, which is much fewer than Sir John would liked to have had; one is Mrs. Jennings, Sir John's mother-in-law, who is a merry, somewhat vulgar older woman, who delights in jokes and general merriment. They also meet Colonel Brandon, one of Sir John's old friends; he is a gentleman and a bachelor, and although rather silent and serious, is not unpleasing to them. Marianne plays for the party after dinner, and is pleased at Colonel Brandon's silent attention, compared to the blabbering of Sir John and his mother-in-law, and the pretenses of Lady Middleton.", "analysis": "Sir John Middleton seems to symbolize the best of upper class society, while his wife represents the usual rich person. While Sir John is genuinely kind and enjoys having guests and socializing, his wife is more preoccupied with elegance, planning suitably impressive gatherings, and being generally polite company. Lady Middleton is dull and plain, like many of the upper class; she may be polite, elegant, and refined, but as Austen observes, she also seems to have had the life polished out of her. Sir John, while more of an anomaly, manages to combine the riches and pursuits of the upper class with real friendliness and personality; he might represent what this class of people could be, if not preoccupied with vanity and appearances to an overwhelming extent. It seems very strange that Marianne and Elinor regard the 35-year-old Colonel Brandon as being an old bachelor; but, it is easy to forget that they are 17 and 19 respectively, and that life expectancy was shorter back then. Marriages were usually made at a younger age as well, at least for women. But, Marianne regards Colonel Brandon's age with such exaggeration that it makes Marianne look quite silly and naive. She comments to herself on Colonel Brandon's \"advanced state of life\" as if he were a man of sixty or seventy, and Austen's wry tone in communicating this thought makes Marianne's misjudgment quite humorous"}

Barton Park was about half a mile from the cottage. The ladies had passed near it in their way along the valley, but it was screened from their view at home by the projection of a hill. The house was large and handsome; and the Middletons lived in a style of equal hospitality and elegance. The former was for Sir John's gratification, the latter for that of his lady. They were scarcely ever without some friends staying with them in the house, and they kept more company of every kind than any other family in the neighbourhood. It was necessary to the happiness of both; for however dissimilar in temper and outward behaviour, they strongly resembled each other in that total want of talent and taste which confined their employments, unconnected with such as society produced, within a very narrow compass. Sir John was a sportsman, Lady Middleton a mother. He hunted and shot, and she humoured her children; and these were their only resources. Lady Middleton had the advantage of being able to spoil her children all the year round, while Sir John's independent employments were in existence only half the time. Continual engagements at home and abroad, however, supplied all the deficiencies of nature and education; supported the good spirits of Sir John, and gave exercise to the good breeding of his wife. Lady Middleton piqued herself upon the elegance of her table, and of all her domestic arrangements; and from this kind of vanity was her greatest enjoyment in any of their parties. But Sir John's satisfaction in society was much more real; he delighted in collecting about him more young people than his house would hold, and the noisier they were the better was he pleased. He was a blessing to all the juvenile part of the neighbourhood, for in summer he was for ever forming parties to eat cold ham and chicken out of doors, and in winter his private balls were numerous enough for any young lady who was not suffering under the unsatiable appetite of fifteen. The arrival of a new family in the country was always a matter of joy to him, and in every point of view he was charmed with the inhabitants he had now procured for his cottage at Barton. The Miss Dashwoods were young, pretty, and unaffected. It was enough to secure his good opinion; for to be unaffected was all that a pretty girl could want to make her mind as captivating as her person. The friendliness of his disposition made him happy in accommodating those, whose situation might be considered, in comparison with the past, as unfortunate. In showing kindness to his cousins therefore he had the real satisfaction of a good heart; and in settling a family of females only in his cottage, he had all the satisfaction of a sportsman; for a sportsman, though he esteems only those of his sex who are sportsmen likewise, is not often desirous of encouraging their taste by admitting them to a residence within his own manor. Mrs. Dashwood and her daughters were met at the door of the house by Sir John, who welcomed them to Barton Park with unaffected sincerity; and as he attended them to the drawing room repeated to the young ladies the concern which the same subject had drawn from him the day before, at being unable to get any smart young men to meet them. They would see, he said, only one gentleman there besides himself; a particular friend who was staying at the park, but who was neither very young nor very gay. He hoped they would all excuse the smallness of the party, and could assure them it should never happen so again. He had been to several families that morning in hopes of procuring some addition to their number, but it was moonlight and every body was full of engagements. Luckily Lady Middleton's mother had arrived at Barton within the last hour, and as she was a very cheerful agreeable woman, he hoped the young ladies would not find it so very dull as they might imagine. The young ladies, as well as their mother, were perfectly satisfied with having two entire strangers of the party, and wished for no more. Mrs. Jennings, Lady Middleton's mother, was a good-humoured, merry, fat, elderly woman, who talked a great deal, seemed very happy, and rather vulgar. She was full of jokes and laughter, and before dinner was over had said many witty things on the subject of lovers and husbands; hoped they had not left their hearts behind them in Sussex, and pretended to see them blush whether they did or not. Marianne was vexed at it for her sister's sake, and turned her eyes towards Elinor to see how she bore these attacks, with an earnestness which gave Elinor far more pain than could arise from such common-place raillery as Mrs. Jennings's. Colonel Brandon, the friend of Sir John, seemed no more adapted by resemblance of manner to be his friend, than Lady Middleton was to be his wife, or Mrs. Jennings to be Lady Middleton's mother. He was silent and grave. His appearance however was not unpleasing, in spite of his being in the opinion of Marianne and Margaret an absolute old bachelor, for he was on the wrong side of five and thirty; but though his face was not handsome, his countenance was sensible, and his address was particularly gentlemanlike. There was nothing in any of the party which could recommend them as companions to the Dashwoods; but the cold insipidity of Lady Middleton was so particularly repulsive, that in comparison of it the gravity of Colonel Brandon, and even the boisterous mirth of Sir John and his mother-in-law was interesting. Lady Middleton seemed to be roused to enjoyment only by the entrance of her four noisy children after dinner, who pulled her about, tore her clothes, and put an end to every kind of discourse except what related to themselves. In the evening, as Marianne was discovered to be musical, she was invited to play. The instrument was unlocked, every body prepared to be charmed, and Marianne, who sang very well, at their request went through the chief of the songs which Lady Middleton had brought into the family on her marriage, and which perhaps had lain ever since in the same position on the pianoforte, for her ladyship had celebrated that event by giving up music, although by her mother's account, she had played extremely well, and by her own was very fond of it. Marianne's performance was highly applauded. Sir John was loud in his admiration at the end of every song, and as loud in his conversation with the others while every song lasted. Lady Middleton frequently called him to order, wondered how any one's attention could be diverted from music for a moment, and asked Marianne to sing a particular song which Marianne had just finished. Colonel Brandon alone, of all the party, heard her without being in raptures. He paid her only the compliment of attention; and she felt a respect for him on the occasion, which the others had reasonably forfeited by their shameless want of taste. His pleasure in music, though it amounted not to that ecstatic delight which alone could sympathize with her own, was estimable when contrasted against the horrible insensibility of the others; and she was reasonable enough to allow that a man of five and thirty might well have outlived all acuteness of feeling and every exquisite power of enjoyment. She was perfectly disposed to make every allowance for the colonel's advanced state of life which humanity required.

Chapter 7

https://web.archive.org/web/20210419170735/https://www.gradesaver.com/sense-and-sensibility/study-guide/summary-chapters-1-10

Barton Park is a very open and elegant home, and Sir John and his wife are never without a good many guests. Sir John's sole occupation is hunting, and his wife's is raising their children; they have guests and travel to otherwise entertain themselves. Sir John is genuinely fond of the Dashwood girls, since they are pretty and "unaffected," as he calls them; he is kind to them out of the goodness of his heart, and enjoys their company. When the Dashwoods arrive, they meet two people at Barton, which is much fewer than Sir John would liked to have had; one is Mrs. Jennings, Sir John's mother-in-law, who is a merry, somewhat vulgar older woman, who delights in jokes and general merriment. They also meet Colonel Brandon, one of Sir John's old friends; he is a gentleman and a bachelor, and although rather silent and serious, is not unpleasing to them. Marianne plays for the party after dinner, and is pleased at Colonel Brandon's silent attention, compared to the blabbering of Sir John and his mother-in-law, and the pretenses of Lady Middleton.

Sir John Middleton seems to symbolize the best of upper class society, while his wife represents the usual rich person. While Sir John is genuinely kind and enjoys having guests and socializing, his wife is more preoccupied with elegance, planning suitably impressive gatherings, and being generally polite company. Lady Middleton is dull and plain, like many of the upper class; she may be polite, elegant, and refined, but as Austen observes, she also seems to have had the life polished out of her. Sir John, while more of an anomaly, manages to combine the riches and pursuits of the upper class with real friendliness and personality; he might represent what this class of people could be, if not preoccupied with vanity and appearances to an overwhelming extent. It seems very strange that Marianne and Elinor regard the 35-year-old Colonel Brandon as being an old bachelor; but, it is easy to forget that they are 17 and 19 respectively, and that life expectancy was shorter back then. Marriages were usually made at a younger age as well, at least for women. But, Marianne regards Colonel Brandon's age with such exaggeration that it makes Marianne look quite silly and naive. She comments to herself on Colonel Brandon's "advanced state of life" as if he were a man of sixty or seventy, and Austen's wry tone in communicating this thought makes Marianne's misjudgment quite humorous

gradesaver

all_chapterized_books/11012-chapters/chapters_7_to_9.txt

finished_summaries/gradesaver/The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man/section_3_part_0.txt

The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man.chapters 7-9

chapters 7-9

{"name": "Chapters VII-IX", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180424054150/http://www.gradesaver.com/the-autobiography-of-an-excolored-man/study-guide/summary-chapters-vii-ix", "summary": "The narrator pauses his story to describe the Club in more detail since he spends so much time there. In the basement is a Chinese restaurant, and many Club patrons have discovered that Chop Suey is good for soaking up alcohol. On the main floor are a parlor which opens into a back room, which is covered from ceiling to floor with pictures of notable African Americans. There is also a private room for parties and an open space for performers. The narrator describes the performance spaces as \"a center of colored Bohemians and sports\". Many notable personalities wander through its rooms. Admirers of both races visit frequently. Meanwhile, the wealthier Club patrons think nothing of buying champagne for everyone in the room. The narrator describes the few white patrons who come to the Club. Some stay a few minutes, others remain the whole night. Some actors come to see how \"colored\" people act so they can work on perfecting their own \"darky characters\" . There are also a few women who appear to be white who come to the Club with dark-skinned companions. One of them in particular catches the narrator's eye. He nicknames her \"the widow\", because rumor has it that she inherited a large sum from a late husband. She is cultured and well-traveled, and pays for her young African American companion to wear fine suits and travel in taxicabs. The morning after the narrator's first eye-opening night in New York City, he and his friends put off finding jobs and instead return to the gambling house to get into good spirits. The narrator loses fifty dollars but is optimistic that he will regain his luck next time. At the Club, the narrator tries to play ragtime like the resident pianist, but finds the task more difficult than he had expected. Eventually, the narrator takes a job rolling cigars to make money during the day and gambling it away at night. He falls into a routine going to the craps table and afterwards, whether he wins or loses, he spends time at the Club. Soon, he decides to gamble full-time and gives up his steady cigar-rolling work. For the next year, which the narrator describes as a \"dark period\", he many other bright ambitious types become obsessed with the world of gambling and glittering nightlife. Sometimes he has money, sometimes he does not. However, during this year he does manage to master ragtime and becomes a popular entertainer at The Club. He soon earns the nickname \"the professor\" and starts making a living playing the piano, which weans him off his gambling habit. It is through his talent for ragtime that the narrator will have the opportunity to explore the world. One night, a young white man , impeccably dressed and very cultured in appearance, comes into the club and, week after week, gives the narrator five dollars after each of his performances. He mysteriously asks the narrator to fill an engagement for him, giving him no other information than a visiting card. On the night of the \"engagement\", the narrator arrives at the millionaire's house to furnish musical entertainment for a dinner party. The lavishly furnished house is comfortable but elegant, and the guests cultured and vibrant. While the narrator plays classical music, a background score, he observes the guests around him, noting the lovely women as well as the millionaire, whose reserve grows in proportion to the guests' gregariousness. The narrator soon learns that this is simply the way the millionaire always behaves at social events. When it is time for dinner, the millionaire encourages the narrator decides to switch to ragtime music. His performance delights the guests and they flock around the piano, nearly forgetting about their food. The millionaire compliments the narrator when the guests leave and tells him that he will give him lots of work as long as he does not perform for any other private employers. The narrator readily consents. The narrator begins playing regularly for the millionaire. What is striking, the narrator observes, is that the millionaire's love for music is all-consuming and his \"powers of endurance in listening often exceeded in performing\". The narrator's arms often grow sore and his mind fatigued, playing for hours while the millionaire listens quietly with his own eyes barely open. Over time, their relationship grows warm and familiar. The narrator still headquarters at the club, playing for fun. He attracts the attention of many women, including the widow. He is warned that her younger African American companion is violent and hot-headed, evidenced by the lovers' frequent quarrels. However, the widow is so beautiful that the narrator cannot help but be charmed by her. One night, she asks him to have a drink with her and he agrees. Mid-conversation, the narrator becomes aware that her companion has arrived. The widow's companion approaches their table and just when the narrator thinks he is going to strike her, the widow's companion pulls out a revolver and shoots her in the throat. The narrator leaps up and runs frantically into the city streets, frightened and paranoid, until the millionaire drives by and finds him. The narrator tells him what has happened and the millionaire replies, \"'I decided last night that I'd go to Europe tomorrow. I think I'll take you along instead of Walter'\" . The narrator agrees to this and sits back in the car; he comments, \"the jet of blood pulsing from had placed an indelible red stain on my memory\". The journey to Europe is difficult for the narrator at first; he is seasick and afraid that he will somehow be tied to the murder. He eventually feels better and by the time they arrive in Paris, he is excited for his next adventure. He writes that \"there was awakened in my heart a love for France\". He details his sightseeing and his love of Parisian culture. The millionaire never treats him as a subordinate, but as an equal. During the days when the millionaire is occupied, the narrator wanders around Paris and begins learning French. He devotes himself to refreshing his Spanish and learning German as well. He spends many evenings at the Opera, and one night, he notices a striking young girl in the audience. She is with her parents, and when the narrator looks a bit more closely, he notices that man is his own father, meaning that the girl is his sister. He leaves the building, feeling suffocated and miserable. He cannot decide whether he wants to weep or curse. The millionaire decides he is tired of Paris, and the narrator is saddened to have to leave. They move on to London, which the narrator finds distasteful at first. He soon grows to love it, though, for different reasons than he loved Paris. They make a stop in Amsterdam and then move on to Germany. In Berlin, the narrator meets some of the millionaire's friends who are also musicians. One night, when the millionaire is entertaining these men, he asks the narrator to play ragtime. The narrator complies, and before he can be commended, a large German man takes over the piano to play many variations on the the ragtime tune, in several different musical genres. The narrator is astonished, for \"this man has taken ragtime and made it classic\". The narrator then loses interest in his travels. He wants to move back to the South, live among African Americans and feel the inspiration firsthand, but he is nervous to leave the millionaire. They are friends and the narrator knows how much music means to the millionaire. When the millionaire announces his plans to go to Egypt and Japan, the narrator finally reveals his plans to return to the USA and pursue a career in music. The millionaire wonders why he would want throw his life away with the poor and ignorant \"colored\" people in America when he can pass for white. They have a deep discussion about race, leading the narrator to conclude that the millionaire does not feel prejudice but is aware that prejudice exists. The millionaire's perspective is this: \"I can imagine no more dissatisfied human being than an educated, cultured, and refined colored man in the United States\". He believes that life should be enjoyed that it is a waste of time attempt to ease the world's suffering. The narrator admits that the millionaire's ideas are compelling and wonders if his motivation is to help his own people or to find success for himself. He concludes that there is some selfishness in his ambitions, as he will be more remarkable as a \"colored composer\" than as a white one, but that he also feels \"stirred by an unselfish desire to voice all the joys and sorrows, the hopes and ambitions, of the American Negro, in classic musical form\". The millionaire accepts the narrator's decision and gives him a large sum of money, with a promise of more should he need it. The narrator does not know if the coldness of their parting is because the millionaire feels that the narrator is making mistake or because he is trying to cover up his own emotions. The narrator soon boards a ship to Boston, and journeys back to his home country.", "analysis": "In these chapters, the narrator establishes himself in New York and unearths new facets of his personality, first as a gambler and then as a the millionaire's personal musician. Although he gets off to a shaky start with ragtime, he soon becomes the best ragtime player in the city, noting that ragtime opens doors for him that his study of Chopin and Mendelssohn never could. His time in New York ends abruptly, though, when has a run-in with the widow's kept man and witnesses her violent death at her companion's hands. However, after his jaunt in Europe, it is music that compels him to come back to the states, just as it catalyzed his departure. As the narrator travels from place to place in the United States, his story reveals that the physical and psychological barriers between the races are invisible and complex. Critic Kathleen Pfeiffer writes, \"the Ex-Colored Man's embodiment of physical whiteness and legal blackness literalizes the instability of these ideological frontiers, and demonstrates that their barriers are increasingly permeable.\" The narrator never ascribes to fixed boundaries, even as a child. He resists music lessons that curtail his creativity and is unimpressed by great books, including the Bible. He evinces frustration that these books present history in a fragmented, impersonal way. His journey of discovery, as described in the novel, is a layered narrative that reveals the history of racial identity in America with all its inexplicable contradictions. However, as Pfeiffer points out, the narrator still has an overwhelming impulse to order and categorize. He lists the content of each of his childhood rooms, compares and contrasts European people, and develops categories of \"colored people\" in the South, Club patrons, and gamblers. Despite this, Johnson denies his reader the same ability to find order in his narrative, as he liberally jumps back-and-forth chronologically, defies literary conventions, and mixes genres. It is difficult to read Autobiography through any single lens or categorize it neatly. Just as the narrator vacillates between \"passing\" as white or embracing his blackness, his internal loyalties fluctuate as well. This could be a symptom of his racial self-hatred, or indicative of a unique form of self-determination; Pfeiffer writes, \"neither wholly black nor wholly white, the Ex-Colored Man believes himself to be free from the politics which race loyalty demands.\" The narrator is extremely adaptable in all of his jobs and locales, and \"his only constant, essential characteristic is that he possesses no constant, essential characteristic.\" Johnson even avoids giving the narrator and most of the other characters real names, identifying them by their physical characteristics or jobs. Traditionally, white masters had the authority to name their slaves, but after emancipation, African Americans reclaimed autonomy by un-naming or re-naming themselves. The narrator avoids being controlled by either tradition and creates a system of identification based neither on the slaveowners' tradition or by rebelling against it. The narrator's ability to straddle racial categories is evident in the novel's treatment of music. The narrator describes his individualism as a musician, eschewing formal lessons and abhorring the role of an accompanist. He distinguishes himself a classical musician, then, in New York, starts employing ragtime techniques to come up with new variations on classical music, and finally, during his stint in Europe, he is inspired by a German musician's classical interpretation of ragtime. Some critics excoriate the narrator for taking an African American form and turning it into something half-white, and then for venturing to exploit music in the South simply because he sees it that route as the most promising. He cannot accept ragtime music for what it is and instead follows the German musician's lead by adulterating it with classical European music. However, it can also be said that the narrator does not accept classical music for what it is either. This blurring of musical boundaries was a reality of the ragtime phenomenon, with both white and black artists borrowing from each other and achieving success. Also, most of the narrator's most important moments take place at a piano, which seems to challenge the idea that the narrator's white identity equals a loss of musical inspiration."}

I shall take advantage of this pause in my narrative to describe more closely the "Club" spoken of in the latter part of the preceding chapter--to describe it as I afterwards came to know it, as an habitue. I shall do this not only because of the direct influence it had on my life, but also because it was at that time the most famous place of its kind in New York, and was well known to both white and colored people of certain classes. I have already stated that in the basement of the house there was a Chinese restaurant. The Chinaman who kept it did an exceptionally good business; for chop-suey was a favorite dish among the frequenters of the place. It is a food that, somehow, has the power of absorbing alcoholic liquors that have been taken into the stomach. I have heard men claim that they could sober up on chop-suey. Perhaps that accounted, in some degree, for its popularity. On the main floor there were two large rooms: a parlor about thirty feet in length, and a large, square back room into which the parlor opened. The floor of the parlor was carpeted; small tables and chairs were arranged about the room; the windows were draped with lace curtains, and the walls were literally covered with photographs or lithographs of every colored man in America who had ever "done anything." There were pictures of Frederick Douglass and of Peter Jackson, of all the lesser lights of the prize-fighting ring, of all the famous jockeys and the stage celebrities, down to the newest song and dance team. The most of these photographs were autographed and, in a sense, made a really valuable collection. In the back room there was a piano, and tables were placed around the wall. The floor was bare and the center was left vacant for singers, dancers, and others who entertained the patrons. In a closet in this room which jutted out into the hall the proprietor kept his buffet. There was no open bar, because the place had no liquor license. In this back room the tables were sometimes pushed aside, and the floor given over to general dancing. The front room on the next floor was a sort of private party room; a back room on the same floor contained no furniture and was devoted to the use of new and ambitious performers. In this room song and dance teams practiced their steps, acrobatic teams practiced their tumbles, and many other kinds of "acts" rehearsed their "turns." The other rooms of the house were used as sleeping-apartments. No gambling was allowed, and the conduct of the place was surprisingly orderly. It was, in short, a center of colored Bohemians and sports. Here the great prize fighters were wont to come, the famous jockeys, the noted minstrels, whose names and faces were familiar on every bill-board in the country; and these drew a multitude of those who love to dwell in the shadow of greatness. There were then no organizations giving performances of such order as are now given by several colored companies; that was because no manager could imagine that audiences would pay to see Negro performers in any other role than that of Mississippi River roustabouts; but there was lots of talent and ambition. I often heard the younger and brighter men discussing the time when they would compel the public to recognize that they could do something more than grin and cut pigeon-wings. Sometimes one or two of the visiting stage professionals, after being sufficiently urged, would go into the back room and take the places of the regular amateur entertainers, but they were very sparing with these favors, and the patrons regarded them as special treats. There was one man, a minstrel, who, whenever he responded to a request to "do something," never essayed anything below a reading from Shakespeare. How well he read I do not know, but he greatly impressed me; and I can say that at least he had a voice which strangely stirred those who heard it. Here was a man who made people laugh at the size of his mouth, while he carried in his heart a burning ambition to be a tragedian; and so after all he did play a part in a tragedy. These notables of the ring, the turf, and the stage, drew to the place crowds of admirers, both white and colored. Whenever one of them came in, there were awe-inspired whispers from those who knew him by sight, in which they enlightened those around them as to his identity, and hinted darkly at their great intimacy with the noted one. Those who were on terms of approach immediately showed their privilege over others less fortunate by gathering around their divinity. I was, at first, among those who dwelt in darkness. Most of these celebrities I had never heard of. This made me an object of pity among many of my new associates. I soon learned, however, to fake a knowledge for the benefit of those who were greener than I; and, finally, I became personally acquainted with the majority of the famous personages who came to the "Club." A great deal of money was spent here, so many of the patrons were men who earned large sums. I remember one night a dapper little brown-skin fellow was pointed out to me and I was told that he was the most popular jockey of the day, and that he earned $12,000 a year. This latter statement I couldn't doubt, for with my own eyes I saw him spending at about thirty times that rate. For his friends and those who were introduced to him he bought nothing but wine--in sporting circles, "wine" means champagne--and paid for it at five dollars a quart. He sent a quart to every table in the place with his compliments; and on the table at which he and his party were seated there were more than a dozen bottles. It was the custom at the "Club" for the waiter not to remove the bottles when champagne was being drunk until the party had finished. There were reasons for this; it advertised the brand of wine, it advertised that the party was drinking wine, and advertised how much they had bought. This jockey had won a great race that day, and he was rewarding his admirers for the homage they paid him, all of which he accepted with a fine air of condescension. Besides the people I have just been describing, there was at the place almost every night one or two parties of white people, men and women, who were out sight-seeing, or slumming. They generally came in cabs; some of them would stay only for a few minutes, while others sometimes stayed until morning. There was also another set of white people who came frequently; it was made up of variety performers and others who delineated "darky characters"; they came to get their imitations first hand from the Negro entertainers they saw there. There was still another set of white patrons, composed of women; these were not occasional visitors, but five or six of them were regular habituees. When I first saw them, I was not sure that they were white. In the first place, among the many colored women who came to the "Club" there were several just as fair; and, secondly, I always saw these women in company with colored men. They were all good-looking and well-dressed, and seemed to be women of some education. One of these in particular attracted my attention; she was an exceedingly beautiful woman of perhaps thirty-five; she had glistening copper-colored hair, very white skin, and eyes very much like Du Maurier's conception of Trilby's "twin gray stars." When I came to know her, I found that she was a woman of considerable culture; she had traveled in Europe, spoke French, and played the piano well. She was always dressed elegantly, but in absolute good taste. She always came to the "Club" in a cab, and was soon joined by a well-set-up, very black young fellow. He was always faultlessly dressed; one of the most exclusive tailors in New York made his clothes, and he wore a number of diamonds in about as good taste as they could be worn in by a man. I learned that she paid for his clothes and his diamonds. I learned, too, that he was not the only one of his kind. More that I learned would be better suited to a book on social phenomena than to a narrative of my life. This woman was known at the "Club" as the rich widow. She went by a very aristocratic-sounding name, which corresponded to her appearance. I shall never forget how hard it was for me to get over my feelings of surprise, perhaps more than surprise, at seeing her with her black companion; somehow I never exactly enjoyed the sight. I have devoted so much time to this pair, the "widow" and her companion, because it was through them that another decided turn was brought about in my life. On the day following our night at the "Club" we slept until late in the afternoon; so late that beginning search for work was entirely out of the question. This did not cause me much worry, for I had more than three hundred dollars, and New York had impressed me as a place where there was lots of money and not much difficulty in getting it. It is needless to inform my readers that I did not long hold this opinion. We got out of the house about dark, went to a restaurant on Sixth Avenue and ate something, then walked around for a couple of hours. I finally suggested that we visit the same places we had been in the night before. Following my suggestion, we started first to the gambling house. The man on the door let us in without any question; I accredited this to my success of the night before. We went straight to the "crap" room, and I at once made my way to a table, where I was rather flattered by the murmur of recognition which went around. I played in up and down luck for three or four hours; then, worn with nervous excitement, quit, having lost about fifty dollars. But I was so strongly possessed with the thought that I would make up my losses the next time I played that I left the place with a light heart. When we got into the street our party was divided against itself; two were for going home at once and getting to bed. They gave as a reason that we were to get up early and look for jobs. I think the real reason was that they had each lost several dollars in the game. I lived to learn that in the world of sport all men win alike, but lose differently; and so gamblers are rated, not by the way in which they win, but by the way in which they lose. Some men lose with a careless smile, recognizing that losing is a part of the game; others curse their luck and rail at fortune; and others, still, lose sadly; after each such experience they are swept by a wave of reform; they resolve to stop gambling and be good. When in this frame of mind it would take very little persuasion to lead them into a prayer-meeting. Those in the first class are looked upon with admiration; those in the second class are merely commonplace; while those in the third are regarded with contempt. I believe these distinctions hold good in all the ventures of life. After some minutes one of my friends and I succeeded in convincing the other two that a while at the "Club" would put us all in better spirits; and they consented to go, on our promise not to stay longer than an hour. We found the place crowded, and the same sort of thing going on which we had seen the night before. I took a seat at once by the side of the piano player, and was soon lost to everything except the novel charm of the music. I watched the performer with the idea of catching the trick, and during one of his intermissions I took his place at the piano and made an attempt to imitate him, but even my quick ear and ready fingers were unequal to the task on first trial. We did not stay at the "Club" very long, but went home to bed in order to be up early the next day. We had no difficulty in finding work, and my third morning in New York found me at a table rolling cigars. I worked steadily for some weeks, at the same time spending my earnings between the "crap" game and the "Club." Making cigars became more and more irksome to me; perhaps my more congenial work as a "reader" had unfitted me for work at the table. And, too, the late hours I was keeping made such a sedentary occupation almost beyond the powers of will and endurance. I often found it hard to keep my eyes open and sometimes had to get up and move around to keep from falling asleep. I began to miss whole days from the factory, days on which I was compelled to stay at home and sleep. My luck at the gambling table was varied; sometimes I was fifty to a hundred dollars ahead, and at other times I had to borrow money from my fellow workmen to settle my room rent and pay for my meals. Each night after leaving the dice game I went to the "Club" to hear the music and watch the gaiety. If I had won, this was in accord with my mood; if I had lost, it made me forget. I at last realized that making cigars for a living and gambling for a living could not both be carried on at the same time, and I resolved to give up the cigar making. This resolution led me into a life which held me bound more than a year. During that period my regular time for going to bed was somewhere between four and six o'clock in the mornings. I got up late in the afternoons, walked about a little, then went to the gambling house or the "Club." My New York was limited to ten blocks; the boundaries were Sixth Avenue from Twenty-third to Thirty-third Streets, with the cross streets one block to the west. Central Park was a distant forest, and the lower part of the city a foreign land. I look back upon the life I then led with a shudder when I think what would have been had I not escaped it. But had I not escaped it, I should have been no more unfortunate than are many young colored men who come to New York. During that dark period I became acquainted with a score of bright, intelligent young fellows who had come up to the great city with high hopes and ambitions and who had fallen under the spell of this under life, a spell they could not throw off. There was one popularly known as "the doctor"; he had had two years in the Harvard Medical School, but here he was, living this gas-light life, his will and moral sense so enervated and deadened that it was impossible for him to break away. I do not doubt that the same thing is going on now, but I have sympathy rather than censure for these victims, for I know how easy it is to slip into a slough from which it takes a herculean effort to leap. I regret that I cannot contrast my views of life among colored people of New York; but the truth is, during my entire stay in this city I did not become acquainted with a single respectable family. I knew that there were several colored men worth a hundred or so thousand dollars each, and some families who proudly dated their free ancestry back a half-dozen generations. I also learned that in Brooklyn there lived quite a large colony in comfortable homes which they owned; but at no point did my life come in contact with theirs. In my gambling experiences I passed through all the states and conditions that a gambler is heir to. Some days found me able to peel ten and twenty-dollar bills from a roll, and others found me clad in a linen duster and carpet slippers. I finally caught up another method of earning money, and so did not have to depend entirely upon the caprices of fortune at the gaming table. Through continually listening to the music at the "Club," and through my own previous training, my natural talent and perseverance, I developed into a remarkable player of ragtime; indeed, I had the name at that time of being the best ragtime-player in New York. I brought all my knowledge of classic music to bear and, in so doing, achieved some novelties which pleased and even astonished my listeners. It was I who first made ragtime transcriptions of familiar classic selections. I used to play Mendelssohn's "Wedding March" in a manner that never failed to arouse enthusiasm among the patrons of the "Club." Very few nights passed during which I was not asked to play it. It was no secret that the great increase in slumming visitors was due to my playing. By mastering ragtime I gained several things: first of all, I gained the title of professor. I was known as "the professor" as long as I remained in that world. Then, too, I gained the means of earning a rather fair livelihood. This work took up much of my time and kept me almost entirely away from the gambling table. Through it I also gained a friend who was the means by which I escaped from this lower world. And, finally, I secured a wedge which has opened to me more doors and made me a welcome guest than my playing of Beethoven and Chopin could ever have done. The greater part of the money I now began to earn came through the friend to whom I alluded in the foregoing paragraph. Among the other white "slummers" there came into the "Club" one night a clean-cut, slender, but athletic-looking man, who would have been taken for a youth had it not been for the tinge of gray about his temples. He was clean-shaven and had regular features, and all of his movements bore the indefinable but unmistakable stamp of culture. He spoke to no one, but sat languidly puffing cigarettes and sipping a glass of beer. He was the center of a great deal of attention; all of the old-timers were wondering who he was. When I had finished playing, he called a waiter and by him sent me a five-dollar bill. For about a month after that he was at the "Club" one or two nights each week, and each time after I had played, he gave me five dollars. One night he sent for me to come to his table; he asked me several questions about myself; then told me that he had an engagement which he wanted me to fill. He gave me a card containing his address and asked me to be there on a certain night. I was on hand promptly and found that he was giving a dinner in his own apartments to a party of ladies and gentlemen and that I was expected to furnish the musical entertainment. When the grave, dignified man at the door let me in, the place struck me as being almost dark, my eyes had been so accustomed to the garish light of the "Club." He took my coat and hat, bade me take a seat, and went to tell his master that I had come. When my eyes were adjusted to the soft light, I saw that I was in the midst of elegance and luxury in a degree such as I had never seen; but not the elegance which makes one ill at ease. As I sank into a great chair, the subdued tone, the delicately sensuous harmony of my surroundings, drew from me a deep sigh of relief and comfort. How long the man was gone I do not know, but I was startled by a voice saying: "Come this way, if you please, sir," and I saw him standing by my chair. I had been asleep; and I awoke very much confused and a little ashamed, because I did not know how many times he may have called me. I followed him through into the dining-room, where the butler was putting the finishing touches to a table which already looked like a big jewel. The doorman turned me over to the butler, and I passed with the butler on back to where several waiters were busy polishing and assorting table utensils. Without being asked whether I was hungry or not, I was placed at a table and given something to eat. Before I had finished eating, I heard the laughter and talk of the guests who were arriving. Soon afterwards I was called in to begin my work. I passed in to where the company was gathered and went directly to the piano. According to a suggestion from the host, I began with classic music. During the first number there was absolute quiet and appreciative attention, and when I had finished, I was given a round of generous applause. After that the talk and the laughter began to grow until the music was only an accompaniment to the chatter. This, however, did not disconcert me as it once would have done, for I had become accustomed to playing in the midst of uproarious noise. As the guests began to pay less attention to me, I was enabled to pay more to them. There were about a dozen of them. The men ranged in appearance from a girlish-looking youth to a big grizzled man whom everybody addressed as "Judge." None of the women appeared to be under thirty, but each of them struck me as being handsome. I was not long in finding out that they were all decidedly blase. Several of the women smoked cigarettes, and with a careless grace which showed they were used to the habit. Occasionally a "Damn it!" escaped from the lips of some one of them, but in such a charming way as to rob it of all vulgarity. The most notable thing which I observed was that the reserve of the host increased in direct proportion with the hilarity of his guests. I thought that there was something going wrong which displeased him. I afterwards learned that it was his habitual manner on such occasions. He seemed to take cynical delight in watching and studying others indulging in excess. His guests were evidently accustomed to his rather non-participating attitude, for it did not seem in any degree to dampen their spirits. When dinner was served, the piano was moved and the door left open, so that the company might hear the music while eating. At a word from the host I struck up one of my liveliest ragtime pieces. The effect was surprising, perhaps even to the host; the ragtime music came very near spoiling the party so far as eating the dinner was concerned. As soon as I began, the conversation suddenly stopped. It was a pleasure to me to watch the expression of astonishment and delight that grew on the faces of everybody. These were people--and they represented a large class--who were ever expecting to find happiness in novelty, each day restlessly exploring and exhausting every resource of this great city that might possibly furnish a new sensation or awaken a fresh emotion, and who were always grateful to anyone who aided them in their quest. Several of the women left the table and gathered about the piano. They watched my fingers and asked what kind of music it was that I was playing, where I had learned it, and a host of other questions. It was only by being repeatedly called back to the table that they were induced to finish their dinner. When the guests arose, I struck up my ragtime transcription of Mendelssohn's "Wedding March," playing it with terrific chromatic octave runs in the bass. This raised everybody's spirits to the highest point of gaiety, and the whole company involuntarily and unconsciously did an impromptu cake-walk. From that time on until the time of leaving they kept me so busy that my arms ached. I obtained a little respite when the girlish-looking youth and one or two of the ladies sang several songs, but after each of these it was "back to ragtime." In leaving, the guests were enthusiastic in telling the host that he had furnished them the most unusual entertainment they had ever enjoyed. When they had gone, my millionaire friend--for he was reported to be a millionaire--said to me with a smile: "Well, I have given them something they've never had before." After I had put on my coat and was ready to leave, he made me take a glass of wine; he then gave me a cigar and twenty dollars in bills. He told me that he would give me lots of work, his only stipulation being that I should not play any engagements such as I had just filled for him, except by his instructions. I readily accepted the proposition, for I was sure that I could not be the loser by such a contract. I afterwards played for him at many dinners and parties of one kind or another. Occasionally he "loaned" me to some of his friends. And, too, I often played for him alone at his apartments. At such times he was quite a puzzle to me until I became accustomed to his manners. He would sometimes sit for three or four hours hearing me play, his eyes almost closed, making scarcely a motion except to light a fresh cigarette, and never commenting one way or another on the music. At first I sometimes thought he had fallen asleep and would pause in playing. The stopping of the music always aroused him enough to tell me to play this or that; and I soon learned that my task was not to be considered finished until he got up from his chair and said: "That will do." The man's powers of endurance in listening often exceeded mine in performing--yet I am not sure that he was always listening. At times I became so oppressed with fatigue and sleepiness that it took almost superhuman effort to keep my fingers going; in fact, I believe I sometimes did so while dozing. During such moments this man sitting there so mysteriously silent, almost hid in a cloud of heavy-scented smoke, filled me with a sort of unearthly terror. He seemed to be some grim, mute, but relentless tyrant, possessing over me a supernatural power which he used to drive me on mercilessly to exhaustion. But these feelings came very rarely; besides, he paid me so liberally I could forget much. There at length grew between us a familiar and warm relationship, and I am sure he had a decided personal liking for me. On my part, I looked upon him at that time as about all a man could wish to be. The "Club" still remained my headquarters, and when I was not playing for my good patron, I was generally to be found there. However, I no longer depended on playing at the "Club" to earn my living; I rather took rank with the visiting celebrities and, occasionally, after being sufficiently urged, would favor my old and new admirers with a number or two. I say, without any egotistic pride, that among my admirers were several of the best-looking women who frequented the place, and who made no secret of the fact that they admired me as much as they did my playing. Among these was the "widow"; indeed, her attentions became so marked that one of my friends warned me to beware of her black companion, who was generally known as a "bad man." He said there was much more reason to be careful because the pair had lately quarreled and had not been together at the "Club" for some nights. This warning greatly impressed me and I resolved to stop the affair before it should go any further; but the woman was so beautiful that my native gallantry and delicacy would not allow me to repulse her; my finer feelings entirely overcame my judgment. The warning also opened my eyes sufficiently to see that though my artistic temperament and skill made me interesting and attractive to the woman, she was, after all, using me only to excite the jealousy of her companion and revenge herself upon him. It was this surly, black despot who held sway over her deepest emotions. One night, shortly afterwards, I went into the "Club" and saw the "widow" sitting at a table in company with another woman. She at once beckoned for me to come to her. I went, knowing that I was committing worse than folly. She ordered a quart of champagne and insisted that I sit down and drink with her. I took a chair on the opposite side of the table and began to sip a glass of the wine. Suddenly I noticed by an expression on the "widow's" face that something had occurred. I instinctively glanced around and saw that her companion had just entered. His ugly look completely frightened me. My back was turned to him, but by watching the "widow's" eyes I judged that he was pacing back and forth across the room. My feelings were far from being comfortable; I expected every moment to feel a blow on my head. She, too, was very nervous; she was trying hard to appear unconcerned, but could not succeed in hiding her real feelings. I decided that it was best to get out of such a predicament even at the expense of appearing cowardly, and I made a motion to rise. Just as I partly turned in my chair, I saw the black fellow approaching; he walked directly to our table and leaned over. The "widow" evidently feared he was going to strike her, and she threw back her head. Instead of striking her he whipped out a revolver and fired; the first shot went straight into her throat. There were other shots fired, but how many I do not know; for the first knowledge I had of my surroundings and actions was that I was rushing through the chop-suey restaurant into the street. Just which streets I followed when I got outside I do not know, but I think I must have gone towards Eighth Avenue, then down towards Twenty-third Street and across towards Fifth Avenue. I traveled, not by sight, but instinctively. I felt like one fleeing in a horrible nightmare. How long and far I walked I cannot tell; but on Fifth Avenue, under a light, I passed a cab containing a solitary occupant, who called to me, and I recognized the voice and face of my millionaire friend. He stopped the cab and asked: "What on earth are you doing strolling in this part of the town?" For answer I got into the cab and related to him all that had happened. He reassured me by saying that no charge of any kind could be brought against me; then added: "But of course you don't want to be mixed up in such an affair." He directed the driver to turn around and go into the park, and then went on to say: "I decided last night that I'd go to Europe tomorrow. I think I'll take you along instead of Walter." Walter was his valet. It was settled that I should go to his apartments for the rest of the night and sail with him in the morning. We drove around through the park, exchanging only an occasional word. The cool air somewhat calmed my nerves and I lay back and closed my eyes; but still I could see that beautiful white throat with the ugly wound. The jet of blood pulsing from it had placed an indelible red stain on my memory. I did not feel at ease until the ship was well out of New York harbor; and, notwithstanding the repeated reassurances of my millionaire friend and my own knowledge of the facts in the case, I somehow could not rid myself of the sentiment that I was, in a great degree, responsible for the "widow's" tragic end. We had brought most of the morning papers aboard with us, but my great fear of seeing my name in connection with the killing would not permit me to read the accounts, although, in one of the papers, I did look at the picture of the victim, which did not in the least resemble her. This morbid state of mind, together with sea-sickness, kept me miserable for three or four days. At the end of that time my spirits began to revive, and I took an interest in the ship, my fellow passengers, and the voyage in general. On the second or third day out we passed several spouting whales, but I could not arouse myself to make the effort to go to the other side of the ship to see them. A little later we ran in close proximity to a large iceberg. I was curious enough to get up and look at it, and I was fully repaid for my pains. The sun was shining full upon it, and it glistened like a mammoth diamond, cut with a million facets. As we passed, it constantly changed its shape; at each different angle of vision it assumed new and astonishing forms of beauty. I watched it through a pair of glasses, seeking to verify my early conception of an iceberg--in the geographies of my grammar school days the pictures of icebergs always included a stranded polar bear, standing desolately upon one of the snowy crags. I looked for the bear, but if he was there, he refused to put himself on exhibition. It was not, however, until the morning that we entered the harbor of Havre that I was able to shake off my gloom. Then the strange sights, the chatter in an unfamiliar tongue, and the excitement of landing and passing the customs officials caused me to forget completely the events of a few days before. Indeed, I grew so lighthearted that when I caught my first sight of the train which was to take us to Paris, I enjoyed a hearty laugh. The toy-looking engine, the stuffy little compartment cars, with tiny, old-fashioned wheels, struck me as being extremely funny. But before we reached Paris my respect for our train rose considerably. I found that the "tiny" engine made remarkably fast time, and that the old-fashioned wheels ran very smoothly. I even began to appreciate the "stuffy" cars for their privacy. As I watched the passing scenery from the car window, it seemed too beautiful to be real. The bright-colored houses against the green background impressed me as the work of some idealistic painter. Before we arrived in Paris, there was awakened in my heart a love for France which continued to grow stronger, a love which to-day makes that country for me the one above all others to be desired. We rolled into the station Saint Lazare about four o'clock in the afternoon and drove immediately to the Hotel Continental. My benefactor, humoring my curiosity and enthusiasm, which seemed to please him very much, suggested that we take a short walk before dinner. We stepped out of the hotel and turned to the right into the rue de Rivoli. When the vista of the Place de la Concorde and the Champs Elysees suddenly burst on me, I could hardly credit my own eyes. I shall attempt no such supererogatory task as a description of Paris. I wish only to give briefly the impressions which that wonderful city made upon me. It impressed me as the perfect and perfectly beautiful city; and even after I had been there for some time, and seen not only its avenues and palaces, but its most squalid alleys and hovels, this impression was not weakened. Paris became for me a charmed spot, and whenever I have returned there, I have fallen under the spell, a spell which compels admiration for all of its manners and customs and justification of even its follies and sins. We walked a short distance up the Champs Elysees and sat for a while in chairs along the sidewalk, watching the passing crowds on foot and in carriages. It was with reluctance that I went back to the hotel for dinner. After dinner we went to one of the summer theatres, and after the performance my friend took me to a large cafe on one of the Grands Boulevards. Here it was that I had my first glimpse of the French life of popular literature, so different from real French life. There were several hundred people, men and women, in the place drinking, smoking, talking, and listening to the music. My millionaire friend and I took seats at a table, where we sat smoking and watching the crowd. It was not long before we were joined by two or three good-looking, well-dressed young women. My friend talked to them in French and bought drinks for the whole party. I tried to recall my high-school French, but the effort availed me little. I could stammer out a few phrases, but, very naturally, could not understand a word that was said to me. We stayed at the cafe a couple of hours, then went back to the hotel. The next day we spent several hours in the shops and at the tailor's. I had no clothes except what I had been able to gather together at my benefactor's apartments the night before we sailed. He bought me the same kind of clothes which he himself wore, and that was the best; and he treated me in every way as he dressed me, as an equal, not as a servant. In fact, I don't think anyone could have guessed that such a relation existed. My duties were light and few, and he was a man full of life and vigor, who rather enjoyed doing things for himself. He kept me supplied with money far beyond what ordinary wages would have amounted to. For the first two weeks we were together almost constantly, seeing the sights, sights old to him, but from which he seemed to get new pleasure in showing them to me. During the day we took in the places of interest, and at night the theatres and cafes. This sort of life appealed to me as ideal, and I asked him one day how long he intended to stay in Paris. He answered: "Oh, until I get tired of it." I could not understand how that could ever happen. As it was, including several short trips to the Mediterranean, to Spain, to Brussels, and to Ostend, we did remain there fourteen or fifteen months. We stayed at the Hotel Continental about two months of this time. Then my millionaire took apartments, hired a piano, and lived almost the same life he lived in New York. He entertained a great deal, some of the parties being a good deal more blase than the New York ones. I played for the guests at all of them with an effect which to relate would be but a tiresome repetition to the reader. I played not only for the guests, but continued, as I used to do in New York, to play often for the host when he was alone. This man of the world, who grew weary of everything and was always searching for something new, appeared never to grow tired of my music; he seemed to take it as a drug. He fell into a habit which caused me no little annoyance; sometimes he would come in during the early hours of the morning and, finding me in bed asleep, would wake me up and ask me to play something. This, so far as I can remember, was my only hardship during my whole stay with him in Europe. After the first few weeks spent in sight-seeing I had a great deal of time left to myself; my friend was often I did not know where. When not with him, I spent the day nosing about all the curious nooks and corners of Paris; of this I never grew tired. At night I usually went to some theatre, but always ended up at the big cafe on the Grands Boulevards. I wish the reader to know that it was not alone the gaiety which drew me there; aside from that I had a laudable purpose. I had purchased an English-French conversational dictionary, and I went there every night to take a language lesson. I used to get three or four of the young women who frequented the place at a table and buy beer and cigarettes for them. In return I received my lesson. I got more than my money's worth, for they actually compelled me to speak the language. This, together with reading the papers every day, enabled me within a few months to express myself fairly well, and, before I left Paris, to have more than an ordinary command of French. Of course, every person who goes to Paris could not dare to learn French in this manner, but I can think of no easier or quicker way of doing it. The acquiring of another foreign language awoke me to the fact that with a little effort I could secure an added accomplishment as fine and as valuable as music; so I determined to make myself as much of a linguist as possible. I bought a Spanish newspaper every day in order to freshen my memory of that language, and, for French, devised what was, so far as I knew, an original system of study. I compiled a list which I termed "Three hundred necessary words." These I thoroughly committed to memory, also the conjugation of the verbs which were included in the list. I studied these words over and over, much as children of a couple of generations ago studied the alphabet. I also practiced a set of phrases like the following: "How?" "What did you say?" "What does the word ---- mean?" "I understand all you say except ----." "Please repeat." "What do you call ----?" "How do you say ----?" These I called my working sentences. In an astonishingly short time I reached the point where the language taught itself--where I learned to speak merely by speaking. This point is the place which students taught foreign languages in our schools and colleges find great difficulty in reaching. I think the main trouble is that they learn too much of a language at a time. A French child with a vocabulary of two hundred words can express more spoken ideas than a student of French can with a knowledge of two thousand. A small vocabulary, the smaller the better, which embraces the common, everyday-used ideas, thoroughly mastered, is the key to a language. When that much is acquired the vocabulary can be increased simply by talking. And it is easy. Who cannot commit three hundred words to memory? Later I tried my method, if I may so term it, with German, and found that it worked in the same way. I spent a good many evenings at the Opera. The music there made me strangely reminiscent of my life in Connecticut; it was an atmosphere in which I caught a fresh breath of my boyhood days and early youth. Generally, in the morning after I had attended a performance, I would sit at the piano and for a couple of hours play the music which I used to play in my mother's little parlor. One night I went to hear _Faust_. I got into my seat just as the lights went down for the first act. At the end of the act I noticed that my neighbor on the left was a young girl. I cannot describe her either as to feature, or color of her hair, or of her eyes; she was so young, so fair, so ethereal, that I felt to stare at her would be a violation; yet I was distinctly conscious of her beauty. During the intermission she spoke English in a low voice to a gentleman and a lady who sat in the seats to her left, addressing them as father and mother. I held my program as though studying it, but listened to catch every sound of her voice. Her observations on the performance and the audience were so fresh and naive as to be almost amusing. I gathered that she was just out of school, and that this was her first trip to Paris. I occasionally stole a glance at her, and each time I did so my heart leaped into my throat. Once I glanced beyond to the gentleman who sat next to her. My glance immediately turned into a stare. Yes, there he was, unmistakably, my father! looking hardly a day older than when I had seen him some ten years before. What a strange coincidence! What should I say to him? What would he say to me? Before I had recovered from my first surprise, there came another shock in the realization that the beautiful, tender girl at my side was my sister. Then all the springs of affection in my heart, stopped since my mother's death, burst out in fresh and terrible torrents, and I could have fallen at her feet and worshiped her. They were singing the second act, but I did not hear the music. Slowly the desolate loneliness of my position became clear to me. I knew that I could not speak, but I would have given a part of my life to touch her hand with mine and call her "sister." I sat through the opera until I could stand it no longer. I felt that I was suffocating. Valentine's love seemed like mockery, and I felt an almost uncontrollable impulse to rise up and scream to the audience: "Here, here in your very midst, is a tragedy, a real tragedy!" This impulse grew so strong that I became afraid of myself, and in the darkness of one of the scenes I stumbled out of the theatre. I walked aimlessly about for an hour or so, my feelings divided between a desire to weep and a desire to curse. I finally took a cab and went from cafe to cafe, and for one of the very few times in my life drank myself into a stupor. It was unwelcome news for me when my benefactor--I could not think of him as employer--informed me that he was at last tired of Paris. This news gave me, I think, a passing doubt as to his sanity. I had enjoyed life in Paris, and, taking all things into consideration, enjoyed it wholesomely. One thing which greatly contributed to my enjoyment was the fact that I was an American. Americans are immensely popular in Paris; and this is not due solely to the fact that they spend lots of money there, for they spend just as much or more in London, and in the latter city they are merely tolerated because they do spend. The Londoner seems to think that Americans are people whose only claim to be classed as civilized is that they have money, and the regrettable thing about that is that the money is not English. But the French are more logical and freer from prejudices than the British; so the difference of attitude is easily explained. Only once in Paris did I have cause to blush for my American citizenship. I had become quite friendly with a young man from Luxemburg whom I had met at the big cafe. He was a stolid, slow-witted fellow, but, as we say, with a heart of gold. He and I grew attached to each other and were together frequently. He was a great admirer of the United States and never grew tired of talking to me about the country and asking for information. It was his intention to try his fortune there some day. One night he asked me in a tone of voice which indicated that he expected an authoritative denial of an ugly rumor: "Did they really burn a man alive in the United States?" I never knew what I stammered out to him as an answer. I should have felt relieved if I could even have said to him: "Well, only one." When we arrived in London, my sadness at leaving Paris was turned into despair. After my long stay in the French capital, huge, ponderous, massive London seemed to me as ugly a thing as man could contrive to make. I thought of Paris as a beauty spot on the face of the earth, and of London as a big freckle. But soon London's massiveness, I might say its very ugliness, began to impress me. I began to experience that sense of grandeur which one feels when he looks at a great mountain or a mighty river. Beside London Paris becomes a toy, a pretty plaything. And I must own that before I left the world's metropolis I discovered much there that was beautiful. The beauty in and about London is entirely different from that in and about Paris; and I could not but admit that the beauty of the French city seemed hand-made, artificial, as though set up for the photographer's camera, everything nicely adjusted so as not to spoil the picture; while that of the English city was rugged, natural, and fresh. How these two cities typify the two peoples who built them! Even the sound of their names expresses a certain racial difference. Paris is the concrete expression of the gaiety, regard for symmetry, love of art, and, I might well add, of the morality of the French people. London stands for the conservatism, the solidarity, the utilitarianism, and, I might well add, the hypocrisy of the Anglo-Saxon. It may sound odd to speak of the morality of the French, if not of the hypocrisy of the English; but this seeming paradox impresses me as a deep truth. I saw many things in Paris which were immoral according to English standards, but the absence of hypocrisy, the absence of the spirit to do the thing if it might only be done in secret, robbed these very immoralities of the damning influence of the same evils in London. I have walked along the terrace cafes of Paris and seen hundreds of men and women sipping their wine and beer, without observing a sign of drunkenness. As they drank, they chatted and laughed and watched the passing crowds; the drinking seemed to be a secondary thing. This I have witnessed, not only in the cafes along the Grands Boulevards, but in the out-of-the-way places patronized by the working classes. In London I have seen in the "pubs" men and women crowded in stuffy little compartments, drinking seemingly only for the pleasure of swallowing as much as they could hold. I have seen there women from eighteen to eighty, some in tatters, and some clutching babes in their arms, drinking the heavy English ales and whiskies served to them by women. In the whole scene, not one ray of brightness, not one flash of gaiety, only maudlin joviality or grim despair. And I have thought, if some men and women will drink--and it is certain that some will--is it not better that they do so under the open sky, in the fresh air, than huddled together in some close, smoky room? There is a sort of frankness about the evils of Paris which robs them of much of the seductiveness of things forbidden, and with that frankness goes a certain cleanliness of thought belonging to things not hidden. London will do whatever Paris does, provided exterior morals are not shocked. As a result, Paris has the appearance only of being the more immoral city. The difference may be summed up in this: Paris practices its sins as lightly as it does its religion, while London practices both very seriously. I should not neglect to mention what impressed me most forcibly during my stay in London. It was not St. Paul's nor the British Museum nor Westminster Abbey. It was nothing more or less than the simple phrase "Thank you," or sometimes more elaborated, "Thank you very kindly, sir." I was continually surprised by the varied uses to which it was put; and, strange to say, its use as an expression of politeness seemed more limited than any other. One night I was in a cheap music hall and accidentally bumped into a waiter who was carrying a tray-load of beer, almost bringing him to several shillings' worth of grief. To my amazement he righted himself and said: "Thank ye, sir," and left me wondering whether he meant that he thanked me for not completely spilling his beer, or that he would thank me for keeping out of his way. I also found cause to wonder upon what ground the English accuse Americans of corrupting the language by introducing slang words. I think I heard more and more different kinds of slang during my few weeks' stay in London than in my whole "tenderloin" life in New York. But I suppose the English feel that the language is theirs, and that they may do with it as they please without at the same time allowing that privilege to others. My millionaire was not so long in growing tired of London as of Paris. After a stay of six or eight weeks we went across into Holland. Amsterdam was a great surprise to me. I had always thought of Venice as the city of canals; it had never entered my mind that I should find similar conditions in a Dutch town. I don't suppose the comparison goes far beyond the fact that there are canals in both cities--I have never seen Venice--but Amsterdam struck me as being extremely picturesque. From Holland we went to Germany, where we spent five or six months, most of the time in Berlin. I found Berlin more to my taste than London, and occasionally I had to admit that in some things it was superior to Paris. In Berlin I especially enjoyed the orchestral concerts, and I attended a large number of them. I formed the acquaintance of a good many musicians, several of whom spoke of my playing in high terms. It was in Berlin that my inspiration was renewed. One night my millionaire entertained a party of men composed of artists, musicians, writers, and, for aught I know, a count or two. They drank and smoked a great deal, talked art and music, and discussed, it seemed to me, everything that ever entered man's mind. I could only follow the general drift of what they were saying. When they discussed music, it was more interesting to me; for then some fellow would run excitedly to the piano and give a demonstration of his opinions, and another would follow quickly, doing the same. In this way, I learned that, regardless of what his specialty might be, every man in the party was a musician. I was at the same time impressed with the falsity of the general idea that Frenchmen are excitable and emotional, and that Germans are calm and phlegmatic. Frenchmen are merely gay and never overwhelmed by their emotions. When they talk loud and fast, it is merely talk, while Germans get worked up and red in the face when sustaining an opinion, and in heated discussions are likely to allow their emotions to sweep them off their feet. My millionaire planned, in the midst of the discussion on music, to have me play the "new American music" and astonish everybody present. The result was that I was more astonished than anyone else. I went to the piano and played the most intricate ragtime piece I knew. Before there was time for anybody to express an opinion on what I had done, a big bespectacled, bushy-headed man rushed over, and, shoving me out of the chair, exclaimed: "Get up! Get up!" He seated himself at the piano, and, taking the theme of my ragtime, played it through first in straight chords; then varied and developed it through every known musical form. I sat amazed. I had been turning classic music into ragtime, a comparatively easy task; and this man had taken ragtime and made it classic. The thought came across me like a flash--It can be done, why can't I do it? From that moment my mind was made up. I clearly saw the way of carrying out the ambition I had formed when a boy. I now lost interest in our trip. I thought: "Here I am a man, no longer a boy, and what am I doing but wasting my time and abusing my talent? What use am I making of my gifts? What future have I before me following my present course?" These thoughts made me feel remorseful and put me in a fever to get to work, to begin to do something. Of course I know now that I was not wasting time; that there was nothing I could have done at that age which would have benefited me more than going to Europe as I did. The desire to begin work grew stronger each day. I could think of nothing else. I made up my mind to go back into the very heart of the South, to live among the people, and drink in my inspiration firsthand. I gloated over the immense amount of material I had to work with, not only modern ragtime, but also the old slave songs--material which no one had yet touched. The more decided and anxious I became to return to the United States, the more I dreaded the ordeal of breaking with my millionaire. Between this peculiar man and me there had grown a very strong bond of affection, backed up by a debt which each owed to the other. He had taken me from a terrible life in New York and, by giving me the opportunity of traveling and of coming in contact with the people with whom he associated, had made me a polished man of the world. On the other hand, I was his chief means of disposing of the thing which seemed to sum up all in life that he dreaded--time. As I remember him now, I can see that time was what he was always endeavoring to escape, to bridge over, to blot out; and it is not strange that some years later he did escape it forever, by leaping into eternity. For some weeks I waited for just the right moment in which to tell my patron of my decision. Those weeks were a trying time to me. I felt that I was playing the part of a traitor to my best friend. At length, one day he said to me: "Well, get ready for a long trip; we are going to Egypt, and then to Japan." The temptation was for an instant almost overwhelming, but I summoned determination enough to say: "I don't think I want to go." "What!" he exclaimed, "you want to go back to your dear Paris? You still think that the only spot on earth? Wait until you see Cairo and Tokyo, you may change your mind." "No," I stammered, "it is not because I want to go back to Paris. I want to go back to the United States." He wished to know my reason, and I told him, as best I could, my dreams, my ambition, and my decision. While I was talking, he watched me with a curious, almost cynical, smile growing on his lips. When I had finished he put his hand on my shoulder--this was the first physical expression of tender regard he had ever shown me--and looking at me in a big-brotherly way, said: "My boy, you are by blood, by appearance, by education, and by tastes a white man. Now, why do you want to throw your life away amidst the poverty and ignorance, in the hopeless struggle, of the black people of the United States? Then look at the terrible handicap you are placing on yourself by going home and working as a Negro composer; you can never be able to get the hearing for your work which it might deserve. I doubt that even a white musician of recognized ability could succeed there by working on the theory that American music should be based on Negro themes. Music is a universal art; anybody's music belongs to everybody; you can't limit it to race or country. Now, if you want to become a composer, why not stay right here in Europe? I will put you under the best teachers on the Continent. Then if you want to write music on Negro themes, why, go ahead and do it." We talked for some time on music and the race question. On the latter subject I had never before heard him express any opinion. Between him and me no suggestion of racial differences had ever come up. I found that he was a man entirely free from prejudice, but he recognized that prejudice was a big stubborn entity which had to be taken into account. He went on to say: "This idea you have of making a Negro out of yourself is nothing more than a sentiment; and you do not realize the fearful import of what you intend to do. What kind of a Negro would you make now, especially in the South? If you had remained there, or perhaps even in your club in New York, you might have succeeded very well; but now you would be miserable. I can imagine no more dissatisfied human being than an educated, cultured, and refined colored man in the United States. I have given more study to the race question in the United States than you may suppose, and I sympathize with the Negroes there; but what's the use? I can't right their wrongs, and neither can you; they must do that themselves. They are unfortunate in having wrongs to right, and you would be foolish to take their wrongs unnecessarily on your shoulders. Perhaps some day, through study and observation, you will come to see that evil is a force, and, like the physical and chemical forces, we cannot annihilate it; we may only change its form. We light upon one evil and hit it with all the might of our civilization, but only succeed in scattering it into a dozen other forms. We hit slavery through a great civil war. Did we destroy it? No, we only changed it into hatred between sections of the country: in the South, into political corruption and chicanery, the degradation of the blacks through peonage, unjust laws, unfair and cruel treatment; and the degradation of the whites by their resorting to these practices, the paralyzation of the public conscience, and the ever over-hanging dread of what the future may bring. Modern civilization hit ignorance of the masses through the means of popular education. What has it done but turn ignorance into anarchy, socialism, strikes, hatred between poor and rich, and universal discontent? In like manner, modern philanthropy hit at suffering and disease through asylums and hospitals; it prolongs the sufferers' lives, it is true, but is, at the same time, sending down strains of insanity and weakness into future generations. My philosophy of life is this: make yourself as happy as possible, and try to make those happy whose lives come in touch with yours; but to attempt to right the wrongs and ease the sufferings of the world in general is a waste of effort. You had just as well try to bail the Atlantic by pouring the water into the Pacific." This tremendous flow of serious talk from a man I was accustomed to see either gay or taciturn so surprised and overwhelmed me that I could not frame a reply. He left me thinking over what he had said. Whatever was the soundness of his logic or the moral tone of his philosophy, his argument greatly impressed me. I could see, in spite of the absolute selfishness upon which it was based, that there was reason and common sense in it. I began to analyze my own motives, and found that they, too, were very largely mixed with selfishness. Was it more a desire to help those I considered my people, or more a desire to distinguish myself, which was leading me back to the United States? That is a question I have never definitely answered. For several weeks longer I was in a troubled state of mind. Added to the fact that I was loath to leave my good friend was the weight of the question he had aroused in my mind, whether I was not making a fatal mistake. I suffered more than one sleepless night during that time. Finally, I settled the question on purely selfish grounds, in accordance with my millionaire's philosophy. I argued that music offered me a better future than anything else I had any knowledge of, and, in opposition to my friend's opinion, that I should have greater chances of attracting attention as a colored composer than as a white one. But I must own that I also felt stirred by an unselfish desire to voice all the joys and sorrows, the hopes and ambitions, of the American Negro, in classic musical form. When my mind was fully made up, I told my friend. He asked me when I intended to start. I replied that I would do so at once. He then asked me how much money I had. I told him that I had saved several hundred dollars out of sums he had given me. He gave me a check for five hundred dollars, told me to write to him in care of his Paris bankers if I ever needed his help, wished me good luck, and bade me good-by. All this he did almost coldly; and I often wondered whether he was in a hurry to get rid of what he considered a fool, or whether he was striving to hide deeper feelings. And so I separated from the man who was, all in all, the best friend I ever had, except my mother, the man who exerted the greatest influence ever brought into my life, except that exerted by my mother. My affection for him was so strong, my recollections of him are so distinct, he was such a peculiar and striking character, that I could easily fill several chapters with reminiscences of him; but for fear of tiring the reader I shall go on with my narration. I decided to go to Liverpool and take ship for Boston. I still had an uneasy feeling about returning to New York; and in a few days I found myself aboard ship headed for home.

Chapters VII-IX

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The narrator pauses his story to describe the Club in more detail since he spends so much time there. In the basement is a Chinese restaurant, and many Club patrons have discovered that Chop Suey is good for soaking up alcohol. On the main floor are a parlor which opens into a back room, which is covered from ceiling to floor with pictures of notable African Americans. There is also a private room for parties and an open space for performers. The narrator describes the performance spaces as "a center of colored Bohemians and sports". Many notable personalities wander through its rooms. Admirers of both races visit frequently. Meanwhile, the wealthier Club patrons think nothing of buying champagne for everyone in the room. The narrator describes the few white patrons who come to the Club. Some stay a few minutes, others remain the whole night. Some actors come to see how "colored" people act so they can work on perfecting their own "darky characters" . There are also a few women who appear to be white who come to the Club with dark-skinned companions. One of them in particular catches the narrator's eye. He nicknames her "the widow", because rumor has it that she inherited a large sum from a late husband. She is cultured and well-traveled, and pays for her young African American companion to wear fine suits and travel in taxicabs. The morning after the narrator's first eye-opening night in New York City, he and his friends put off finding jobs and instead return to the gambling house to get into good spirits. The narrator loses fifty dollars but is optimistic that he will regain his luck next time. At the Club, the narrator tries to play ragtime like the resident pianist, but finds the task more difficult than he had expected. Eventually, the narrator takes a job rolling cigars to make money during the day and gambling it away at night. He falls into a routine going to the craps table and afterwards, whether he wins or loses, he spends time at the Club. Soon, he decides to gamble full-time and gives up his steady cigar-rolling work. For the next year, which the narrator describes as a "dark period", he many other bright ambitious types become obsessed with the world of gambling and glittering nightlife. Sometimes he has money, sometimes he does not. However, during this year he does manage to master ragtime and becomes a popular entertainer at The Club. He soon earns the nickname "the professor" and starts making a living playing the piano, which weans him off his gambling habit. It is through his talent for ragtime that the narrator will have the opportunity to explore the world. One night, a young white man , impeccably dressed and very cultured in appearance, comes into the club and, week after week, gives the narrator five dollars after each of his performances. He mysteriously asks the narrator to fill an engagement for him, giving him no other information than a visiting card. On the night of the "engagement", the narrator arrives at the millionaire's house to furnish musical entertainment for a dinner party. The lavishly furnished house is comfortable but elegant, and the guests cultured and vibrant. While the narrator plays classical music, a background score, he observes the guests around him, noting the lovely women as well as the millionaire, whose reserve grows in proportion to the guests' gregariousness. The narrator soon learns that this is simply the way the millionaire always behaves at social events. When it is time for dinner, the millionaire encourages the narrator decides to switch to ragtime music. His performance delights the guests and they flock around the piano, nearly forgetting about their food. The millionaire compliments the narrator when the guests leave and tells him that he will give him lots of work as long as he does not perform for any other private employers. The narrator readily consents. The narrator begins playing regularly for the millionaire. What is striking, the narrator observes, is that the millionaire's love for music is all-consuming and his "powers of endurance in listening often exceeded in performing". The narrator's arms often grow sore and his mind fatigued, playing for hours while the millionaire listens quietly with his own eyes barely open. Over time, their relationship grows warm and familiar. The narrator still headquarters at the club, playing for fun. He attracts the attention of many women, including the widow. He is warned that her younger African American companion is violent and hot-headed, evidenced by the lovers' frequent quarrels. However, the widow is so beautiful that the narrator cannot help but be charmed by her. One night, she asks him to have a drink with her and he agrees. Mid-conversation, the narrator becomes aware that her companion has arrived. The widow's companion approaches their table and just when the narrator thinks he is going to strike her, the widow's companion pulls out a revolver and shoots her in the throat. The narrator leaps up and runs frantically into the city streets, frightened and paranoid, until the millionaire drives by and finds him. The narrator tells him what has happened and the millionaire replies, "'I decided last night that I'd go to Europe tomorrow. I think I'll take you along instead of Walter'" . The narrator agrees to this and sits back in the car; he comments, "the jet of blood pulsing from had placed an indelible red stain on my memory". The journey to Europe is difficult for the narrator at first; he is seasick and afraid that he will somehow be tied to the murder. He eventually feels better and by the time they arrive in Paris, he is excited for his next adventure. He writes that "there was awakened in my heart a love for France". He details his sightseeing and his love of Parisian culture. The millionaire never treats him as a subordinate, but as an equal. During the days when the millionaire is occupied, the narrator wanders around Paris and begins learning French. He devotes himself to refreshing his Spanish and learning German as well. He spends many evenings at the Opera, and one night, he notices a striking young girl in the audience. She is with her parents, and when the narrator looks a bit more closely, he notices that man is his own father, meaning that the girl is his sister. He leaves the building, feeling suffocated and miserable. He cannot decide whether he wants to weep or curse. The millionaire decides he is tired of Paris, and the narrator is saddened to have to leave. They move on to London, which the narrator finds distasteful at first. He soon grows to love it, though, for different reasons than he loved Paris. They make a stop in Amsterdam and then move on to Germany. In Berlin, the narrator meets some of the millionaire's friends who are also musicians. One night, when the millionaire is entertaining these men, he asks the narrator to play ragtime. The narrator complies, and before he can be commended, a large German man takes over the piano to play many variations on the the ragtime tune, in several different musical genres. The narrator is astonished, for "this man has taken ragtime and made it classic". The narrator then loses interest in his travels. He wants to move back to the South, live among African Americans and feel the inspiration firsthand, but he is nervous to leave the millionaire. They are friends and the narrator knows how much music means to the millionaire. When the millionaire announces his plans to go to Egypt and Japan, the narrator finally reveals his plans to return to the USA and pursue a career in music. The millionaire wonders why he would want throw his life away with the poor and ignorant "colored" people in America when he can pass for white. They have a deep discussion about race, leading the narrator to conclude that the millionaire does not feel prejudice but is aware that prejudice exists. The millionaire's perspective is this: "I can imagine no more dissatisfied human being than an educated, cultured, and refined colored man in the United States". He believes that life should be enjoyed that it is a waste of time attempt to ease the world's suffering. The narrator admits that the millionaire's ideas are compelling and wonders if his motivation is to help his own people or to find success for himself. He concludes that there is some selfishness in his ambitions, as he will be more remarkable as a "colored composer" than as a white one, but that he also feels "stirred by an unselfish desire to voice all the joys and sorrows, the hopes and ambitions, of the American Negro, in classic musical form". The millionaire accepts the narrator's decision and gives him a large sum of money, with a promise of more should he need it. The narrator does not know if the coldness of their parting is because the millionaire feels that the narrator is making mistake or because he is trying to cover up his own emotions. The narrator soon boards a ship to Boston, and journeys back to his home country.

In these chapters, the narrator establishes himself in New York and unearths new facets of his personality, first as a gambler and then as a the millionaire's personal musician. Although he gets off to a shaky start with ragtime, he soon becomes the best ragtime player in the city, noting that ragtime opens doors for him that his study of Chopin and Mendelssohn never could. His time in New York ends abruptly, though, when has a run-in with the widow's kept man and witnesses her violent death at her companion's hands. However, after his jaunt in Europe, it is music that compels him to come back to the states, just as it catalyzed his departure. As the narrator travels from place to place in the United States, his story reveals that the physical and psychological barriers between the races are invisible and complex. Critic Kathleen Pfeiffer writes, "the Ex-Colored Man's embodiment of physical whiteness and legal blackness literalizes the instability of these ideological frontiers, and demonstrates that their barriers are increasingly permeable." The narrator never ascribes to fixed boundaries, even as a child. He resists music lessons that curtail his creativity and is unimpressed by great books, including the Bible. He evinces frustration that these books present history in a fragmented, impersonal way. His journey of discovery, as described in the novel, is a layered narrative that reveals the history of racial identity in America with all its inexplicable contradictions. However, as Pfeiffer points out, the narrator still has an overwhelming impulse to order and categorize. He lists the content of each of his childhood rooms, compares and contrasts European people, and develops categories of "colored people" in the South, Club patrons, and gamblers. Despite this, Johnson denies his reader the same ability to find order in his narrative, as he liberally jumps back-and-forth chronologically, defies literary conventions, and mixes genres. It is difficult to read Autobiography through any single lens or categorize it neatly. Just as the narrator vacillates between "passing" as white or embracing his blackness, his internal loyalties fluctuate as well. This could be a symptom of his racial self-hatred, or indicative of a unique form of self-determination; Pfeiffer writes, "neither wholly black nor wholly white, the Ex-Colored Man believes himself to be free from the politics which race loyalty demands." The narrator is extremely adaptable in all of his jobs and locales, and "his only constant, essential characteristic is that he possesses no constant, essential characteristic." Johnson even avoids giving the narrator and most of the other characters real names, identifying them by their physical characteristics or jobs. Traditionally, white masters had the authority to name their slaves, but after emancipation, African Americans reclaimed autonomy by un-naming or re-naming themselves. The narrator avoids being controlled by either tradition and creates a system of identification based neither on the slaveowners' tradition or by rebelling against it. The narrator's ability to straddle racial categories is evident in the novel's treatment of music. The narrator describes his individualism as a musician, eschewing formal lessons and abhorring the role of an accompanist. He distinguishes himself a classical musician, then, in New York, starts employing ragtime techniques to come up with new variations on classical music, and finally, during his stint in Europe, he is inspired by a German musician's classical interpretation of ragtime. Some critics excoriate the narrator for taking an African American form and turning it into something half-white, and then for venturing to exploit music in the South simply because he sees it that route as the most promising. He cannot accept ragtime music for what it is and instead follows the German musician's lead by adulterating it with classical European music. However, it can also be said that the narrator does not accept classical music for what it is either. This blurring of musical boundaries was a reality of the ragtime phenomenon, with both white and black artists borrowing from each other and achieving success. Also, most of the narrator's most important moments take place at a piano, which seems to challenge the idea that the narrator's white identity equals a loss of musical inspiration.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/43.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_42_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 43

chapter 43

{"name": "Chapter 43", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility58.asp", "summary": "Edward goes to meet Lucy after thanking Colonel Brandon. Mrs. Jennings is grateful to both Elinor and Brandon for helping Lucy to settle down. Elinor decides to visit her brother before the departure for Cleveland. Since Marianne refuses to accompany her, she goes alone to meet Lady Dashwood and her brother. John Dashwood welcomes her. He shows his surprise at Colonel Brandon's generosity towards Edward. He then informs her of Robert's plans to get married to Miss Morton. When John goes to inform his wife of Elinor's visit, Robert comes to meet her and keeps her company. He is amused at Edward's choosing to become a clergyman and takes pity on him for having to marry Lucy. Shortly afterwards, Fanny Dashwood comes forward to meet Elinor. She talks politely and expresses regret at their departure to Cleveland.", "analysis": "Notes Most of the scenes in which Mrs. Jennings and John Dashwood are present evoke humor. In this chapter John Dashwood amuses the readers through his conversation with Elinor. Obsessed with money and miserly in his attitude, he fails to believe that the Colonel has been so kind as to offer a position at Delaford to Edward. He assumes that the Colonel must have an ulterior motive. He dubs Brandon as unthinking and strange. However, he is happy at the thought that the wealthy Colonel may soon marry Elinor. A hen-pecked and indulgent husband, John Dashwood is afraid to hurt the feelings of his cunning wife. Thus he requests Elinor to refrain from mentioning the Colonel's benevolence to her. He is happy to see his wife talking politely to Elinor and appreciates Fanny's gesture. John Dashwood's views and ideas shock Elinor. Referring to the marriage of Robert Ferrars to Miss Morton, he voices his opinion that Miss Morton should not mind getting married to any one of the brothers as long as he inherits the family property. His line of argument appalls Elinor thoroughly: her brother considers money superior to emotion. CHAPTER 42 Summary In early April the two families from Hanover Square and Berkeley Street set out on their journey to Cleveland. Passing through Somerset, they take three days to reach their destination. The Palmers' house is modern and spacious, and the surrounding flora and fauna enhance its beauty. Marianne is excited at the idea of being able to explore the countryside. However, she is forced to stay indoors due to rain. Mr. Palmer and Colonel Brandon arrive shortly afterwards. Elinor finds both Mr. and Mrs. Palmer charming and friendly hosts. Brandon talks to her about Delaford. He suspects that Marianne has caught a cold, and in fact, she falls ill with the flu a few days later. Notes Marianne and Elinor have different reactions to the departure for Cleveland. Marianne becomes emotional, recollecting the pleasures and pains she has experienced while in London. Elinor is quite content to leave the place, as she is not at all sentimental about it. In fact, she is relieved to be spared the company of Lucy Steele. She also hopes that a change of scene will help Marianne to regain her health. Jane Austen once again highlights Marianne's sensibility in contrast to Elinor's good sense. Mr. Palmer reveals himself to be a gentleman beneath his tough exterior. Elinor is at first apprehensive about living under his roof. However, she finds him refreshingly different at Cleveland. Austen writes, \"She found him, however, perfectly the gentleman in his behaviour to all his visitors, and only occasionally rude to his wife and her mother; she found him very capable of being a pleasant companion.\" Elinor is arguably the mouthpiece of the author, and therefore her renewed assessment of Mr. Palmer is important. John Dashwood is still under the impression that Colonel Brandon is in love with Elinor. Therefore he informs his sister that he will be making a visit to Delaford in the future. Elinor is merely amused at his remark, as she is well aware of the true object of the Colonel's desire: her sister, Marianne. CHAPTER 43 Summary This entire chapter deals with Marianne's illness. Her cold develops into influenza and then into a mysterious illness. The doctor administers medication and predicts her recovery, but Marianne's health turns from bad to worse. Mrs. Palmer, fearing an infection that could be caught by her new-born baby, moves to a friend's house near Bath. Mr. Palmer follows her after a few days. After four days, when Marianne's health shows no improvement, Elinor decides to consult with the Colonel before calling her mother to Cleveland. Colonel Brandon willingly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood from Barton and leaves immediately on this errand. Both Mrs. Jennings and Elinor are anxious after the doctor gives up hope, since the medication fails to cure Marianne. However, after a few more days, Marianne recovers miraculously. As Elinor waits for her mother to arrive, she gets a surprise visitor. It is Willoughby, who makes an appearance at the cottage. Notes Jane Austen throws light on the attitude of the different characters through their distinct reactions to Marianne's illness. When Marianne's condition worsens, Elinor is quite disturbed, but she does not panic. She thinks calmly and arrives at the decision to summon her mother from Barton. The Colonel is concerned about Marianne's health. He sensibly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood and undertakes his mission without delay. Both Elinor and the Colonel use their sense to the best advantage in order to improve the situation. Mrs. Jennings is highly emotional. She thinks of the worst when Marianne's health deteriorates. She feels sorry for the girl, as she is afraid that she may succumb to her illness. However, when Marianne recovers miraculously, she is overjoyed. Mrs. Jennings displays the extremes of emotion. Mr. Palmer conducts himself in a stable manner. When his wife panics about a possible threat to her baby's health, he chides her. As a host, he considers Marianne his responsibility and therefore shows reluctance to leave Cleveland."}

Marianne got up the next morning at her usual time; to every inquiry replied that she was better, and tried to prove herself so, by engaging in her accustomary employments. But a day spent in sitting shivering over the fire with a book in her hand, which she was unable to read, or in lying, weary and languid, on a sofa, did not speak much in favour of her amendment; and when, at last, she went early to bed, more and more indisposed, Colonel Brandon was only astonished at her sister's composure, who, though attending and nursing her the whole day, against Marianne's inclination, and forcing proper medicines on her at night, trusted, like Marianne, to the certainty and efficacy of sleep, and felt no real alarm. A very restless and feverish night, however, disappointed the expectation of both; and when Marianne, after persisting in rising, confessed herself unable to sit up, and returned voluntarily to her bed, Elinor was very ready to adopt Mrs. Jennings's advice, of sending for the Palmers' apothecary. He came, examined his patient, and though encouraging Miss Dashwood to expect that a very few days would restore her sister to health, yet, by pronouncing her disorder to have a putrid tendency, and allowing the word "infection" to pass his lips, gave instant alarm to Mrs. Palmer, on her baby's account. Mrs. Jennings, who had been inclined from the first to think Marianne's complaint more serious than Elinor, now looked very grave on Mr. Harris's report, and confirming Charlotte's fears and caution, urged the necessity of her immediate removal with her infant; and Mr. Palmer, though treating their apprehensions as idle, found the anxiety and importunity of his wife too great to be withstood. Her departure, therefore, was fixed on; and within an hour after Mr. Harris's arrival, she set off, with her little boy and his nurse, for the house of a near relation of Mr. Palmer's, who lived a few miles on the other side of Bath; whither her husband promised, at her earnest entreaty, to join her in a day or two; and whither she was almost equally urgent with her mother to accompany her. Mrs. Jennings, however, with a kindness of heart which made Elinor really love her, declared her resolution of not stirring from Cleveland as long as Marianne remained ill, and of endeavouring, by her own attentive care, to supply to her the place of the mother she had taken her from; and Elinor found her on every occasion a most willing and active helpmate, desirous to share in all her fatigues, and often by her better experience in nursing, of material use. Poor Marianne, languid and low from the nature of her malady, and feeling herself universally ill, could no longer hope that tomorrow would find her recovered; and the idea of what tomorrow would have produced, but for this unlucky illness, made every ailment severe; for on that day they were to have begun their journey home; and, attended the whole way by a servant of Mrs. Jennings, were to have taken their mother by surprise on the following forenoon. The little she said was all in lamentation of this inevitable delay; though Elinor tried to raise her spirits, and make her believe, as she THEN really believed herself, that it would be a very short one. The next day produced little or no alteration in the state of the patient; she certainly was not better, and, except that there was no amendment, did not appear worse. Their party was now farther reduced; for Mr. Palmer, though very unwilling to go as well from real humanity and good-nature, as from a dislike of appearing to be frightened away by his wife, was persuaded at last by Colonel Brandon to perform his promise of following her; and while he was preparing to go, Colonel Brandon himself, with a much greater exertion, began to talk of going likewise.--Here, however, the kindness of Mrs. Jennings interposed most acceptably; for to send the Colonel away while his love was in so much uneasiness on her sister's account, would be to deprive them both, she thought, of every comfort; and therefore telling him at once that his stay at Cleveland was necessary to herself, that she should want him to play at piquet of an evening, while Miss Dashwood was above with her sister, &c. she urged him so strongly to remain, that he, who was gratifying the first wish of his own heart by a compliance, could not long even affect to demur; especially as Mrs. Jennings's entreaty was warmly seconded by Mr. Palmer, who seemed to feel a relief to himself, in leaving behind him a person so well able to assist or advise Miss Dashwood in any emergence. Marianne was, of course, kept in ignorance of all these arrangements. She knew not that she had been the means of sending the owners of Cleveland away, in about seven days from the time of their arrival. It gave her no surprise that she saw nothing of Mrs. Palmer; and as it gave her likewise no concern, she never mentioned her name. Two days passed away from the time of Mr. Palmer's departure, and her situation continued, with little variation, the same. Mr. Harris, who attended her every day, still talked boldly of a speedy recovery, and Miss Dashwood was equally sanguine; but the expectation of the others was by no means so cheerful. Mrs. Jennings had determined very early in the seizure that Marianne would never get over it, and Colonel Brandon, who was chiefly of use in listening to Mrs. Jennings's forebodings, was not in a state of mind to resist their influence. He tried to reason himself out of fears, which the different judgment of the apothecary seemed to render absurd; but the many hours of each day in which he was left entirely alone, were but too favourable for the admission of every melancholy idea, and he could not expel from his mind the persuasion that he should see Marianne no more. On the morning of the third day however, the gloomy anticipations of both were almost done away; for when Mr. Harris arrived, he declared his patient materially better. Her pulse was much stronger, and every symptom more favourable than on the preceding visit. Elinor, confirmed in every pleasant hope, was all cheerfulness; rejoicing that in her letters to her mother, she had pursued her own judgment rather than her friend's, in making very light of the indisposition which delayed them at Cleveland; and almost fixing on the time when Marianne would be able to travel. But the day did not close so auspiciously as it began.-- Towards the evening Marianne became ill again, growing more heavy, restless, and uncomfortable than before. Her sister, however, still sanguine, was willing to attribute the change to nothing more than the fatigue of having sat up to have her bed made; and carefully administering the cordials prescribed, saw her, with satisfaction, sink at last into a slumber, from which she expected the most beneficial effects. Her sleep, though not so quiet as Elinor wished to see it, lasted a considerable time; and anxious to observe the result of it herself, she resolved to sit with her during the whole of it. Mrs. Jennings, knowing nothing of any change in the patient, went unusually early to bed; her maid, who was one of the principal nurses, was recreating herself in the housekeeper's room, and Elinor remained alone with Marianne. The repose of the latter became more and more disturbed; and her sister, who watched, with unremitting attention her continual change of posture, and heard the frequent but inarticulate sounds of complaint which passed her lips, was almost wishing to rouse her from so painful a slumber, when Marianne, suddenly awakened by some accidental noise in the house, started hastily up, and, with feverish wildness, cried out,-- "Is mama coming?--" "Not yet," cried the other, concealing her terror, and assisting Marianne to lie down again, "but she will be here, I hope, before it is long. It is a great way, you know, from hence to Barton." "But she must not go round by London," cried Marianne, in the same hurried manner. "I shall never see her, if she goes by London." Elinor perceived with alarm that she was not quite herself, and, while attempting to soothe her, eagerly felt her pulse. It was lower and quicker than ever! and Marianne, still talking wildly of mama, her alarm increased so rapidly, as to determine her on sending instantly for Mr. Harris, and despatching a messenger to Barton for her mother. To consult with Colonel Brandon on the best means of effecting the latter, was a thought which immediately followed the resolution of its performance; and as soon she had rung up the maid to take her place by her sister, she hastened down to the drawing-room, where she knew he was generally to be found at a much later hour than the present. It was no time for hesitation. Her fears and her difficulties were immediately before him. Her fears, he had no courage, no confidence to attempt the removal of:--he listened to them in silent despondence;--but her difficulties were instantly obviated, for with a readiness that seemed to speak the occasion, and the service pre-arranged in his mind, he offered himself as the messenger who should fetch Mrs. Dashwood. Elinor made no resistance that was not easily overcome. She thanked him with brief, though fervent gratitude, and while he went to hurry off his servant with a message to Mr. Harris, and an order for post-horses directly, she wrote a few lines to her mother. The comfort of such a friend at that moment as Colonel Brandon--or such a companion for her mother,--how gratefully was it felt!--a companion whose judgment would guide, whose attendance must relieve, and whose friendship might soothe her!--as far as the shock of such a summons COULD be lessened to her, his presence, his manners, his assistance, would lessen it. HE, meanwhile, whatever he might feel, acted with all the firmness of a collected mind, made every necessary arrangement with the utmost despatch, and calculated with exactness the time in which she might look for his return. Not a moment was lost in delay of any kind. The horses arrived, even before they were expected, and Colonel Brandon only pressing her hand with a look of solemnity, and a few words spoken too low to reach her ear, hurried into the carriage. It was then about twelve o'clock, and she returned to her sister's apartment to wait for the arrival of the apothecary, and to watch by her the rest of the night. It was a night of almost equal suffering to both. Hour after hour passed away in sleepless pain and delirium on Marianne's side, and in the most cruel anxiety on Elinor's, before Mr. Harris appeared. Her apprehensions once raised, paid by their excess for all her former security; and the servant who sat up with her, for she would not allow Mrs. Jennings to be called, only tortured her more, by hints of what her mistress had always thought. Marianne's ideas were still, at intervals, fixed incoherently on her mother, and whenever she mentioned her name, it gave a pang to the heart of poor Elinor, who, reproaching herself for having trifled with so many days of illness, and wretched for some immediate relief, fancied that all relief might soon be in vain, that every thing had been delayed too long, and pictured to herself her suffering mother arriving too late to see this darling child, or to see her rational. She was on the point of sending again for Mr. Harris, or if HE could not come, for some other advice, when the former--but not till after five o'clock--arrived. His opinion, however, made some little amends for his delay, for though acknowledging a very unexpected and unpleasant alteration in his patient, he would not allow the danger to be material, and talked of the relief which a fresh mode of treatment must procure, with a confidence which, in a lesser degree, was communicated to Elinor. He promised to call again in the course of three or four hours, and left both the patient and her anxious attendant more composed than he had found them. With strong concern, and with many reproaches for not being called to their aid, did Mrs. Jennings hear in the morning of what had passed. Her former apprehensions, now with greater reason restored, left her no doubt of the event; and though trying to speak comfort to Elinor, her conviction of her sister's danger would not allow her to offer the comfort of hope. Her heart was really grieved. The rapid decay, the early death of a girl so young, so lovely as Marianne, must have struck a less interested person with concern. On Mrs. Jennings's compassion she had other claims. She had been for three months her companion, was still under her care, and she was known to have been greatly injured, and long unhappy. The distress of her sister too, particularly a favourite, was before her;--and as for their mother, when Mrs. Jennings considered that Marianne might probably be to HER what Charlotte was to herself, her sympathy in HER sufferings was very sincere. Mr. Harris was punctual in his second visit;--but he came to be disappointed in his hopes of what the last would produce. His medicines had failed;--the fever was unabated; and Marianne only more quiet--not more herself--remained in a heavy stupor. Elinor, catching all, and more than all, his fears in a moment, proposed to call in further advice. But he judged it unnecessary: he had still something more to try, some more fresh application, of whose success he was as confident as the last, and his visit concluded with encouraging assurances which reached the ear, but could not enter the heart of Miss Dashwood. She was calm, except when she thought of her mother; but she was almost hopeless; and in this state she continued till noon, scarcely stirring from her sister's bed, her thoughts wandering from one image of grief, one suffering friend to another, and her spirits oppressed to the utmost by the conversation of Mrs. Jennings, who scrupled not to attribute the severity and danger of this attack to the many weeks of previous indisposition which Marianne's disappointment had brought on. Elinor felt all the reasonableness of the idea, and it gave fresh misery to her reflections. About noon, however, she began--but with a caution--a dread of disappointment which for some time kept her silent, even to her friend--to fancy, to hope she could perceive a slight amendment in her sister's pulse;--she waited, watched, and examined it again and again;--and at last, with an agitation more difficult to bury under exterior calmness, than all her foregoing distress, ventured to communicate her hopes. Mrs. Jennings, though forced, on examination, to acknowledge a temporary revival, tried to keep her young friend from indulging a thought of its continuance;--and Elinor, conning over every injunction of distrust, told herself likewise not to hope. But it was too late. Hope had already entered; and feeling all its anxious flutter, she bent over her sister to watch--she hardly knew for what. Half an hour passed away, and the favourable symptom yet blessed her. Others even arose to confirm it. Her breath, her skin, her lips, all flattered Elinor with signs of amendment; and Marianne fixed her eyes on her with a rational, though languid, gaze. Anxiety and hope now oppressed her in equal degrees, and left her no moment of tranquillity till the arrival of Mr. Harris at four o'clock;--when his assurances, his felicitations on a recovery in her sister even surpassing his expectation, gave her confidence, comfort, and tears of joy. Marianne was in every respect materially better, and he declared her entirely out of danger. Mrs. Jennings, perhaps satisfied with the partial justification of her forebodings which had been found in their late alarm, allowed herself to trust in his judgment, and admitted, with unfeigned joy, and soon with unequivocal cheerfulness, the probability of an entire recovery. Elinor could not be cheerful. Her joy was of a different kind, and led to any thing rather than to gaiety. Marianne restored to life, health, friends, and to her doting mother, was an idea to fill her heart with sensations of exquisite comfort, and expand it in fervent gratitude;--but it led to no outward demonstrations of joy, no words, no smiles. All within Elinor's breast was satisfaction, silent and strong. She continued by the side of her sister, with little intermission the whole afternoon, calming every fear, satisfying every inquiry of her enfeebled spirits, supplying every succour, and watching almost every look and every breath. The possibility of a relapse would of course, in some moments, occur to remind her of what anxiety was--but when she saw, on her frequent and minute examination, that every symptom of recovery continued, and saw Marianne at six o'clock sink into a quiet, steady, and to all appearance comfortable, sleep, she silenced every doubt. The time was now drawing on, when Colonel Brandon might be expected back. At ten o'clock, she trusted, or at least not much later her mother would be relieved from the dreadful suspense in which she must now be travelling towards them. The Colonel, too!--perhaps scarcely less an object of pity!--Oh!--how slow was the progress of time which yet kept them in ignorance! At seven o'clock, leaving Marianne still sweetly asleep, she joined Mrs. Jennings in the drawing-room to tea. Of breakfast she had been kept by her fears, and of dinner by their sudden reverse, from eating much;--and the present refreshment, therefore, with such feelings of content as she brought to it, was particularly welcome. Mrs. Jennings would have persuaded her, at its conclusion, to take some rest before her mother's arrival, and allow HER to take her place by Marianne; but Elinor had no sense of fatigue, no capability of sleep at that moment about her, and she was not to be kept away from her sister an unnecessary instant. Mrs. Jennings therefore attending her up stairs into the sick chamber, to satisfy herself that all continued right, left her there again to her charge and her thoughts, and retired to her own room to write letters and sleep. The night was cold and stormy. The wind roared round the house, and the rain beat against the windows; but Elinor, all happiness within, regarded it not. Marianne slept through every blast; and the travellers--they had a rich reward in store, for every present inconvenience. The clock struck eight. Had it been ten, Elinor would have been convinced that at that moment she heard a carriage driving up to the house; and so strong was the persuasion that she DID, in spite of the ALMOST impossibility of their being already come, that she moved into the adjoining dressing-closet and opened a window shutter, to be satisfied of the truth. She instantly saw that her ears had not deceived her. The flaring lamps of a carriage were immediately in view. By their uncertain light she thought she could discern it to be drawn by four horses; and this, while it told the excess of her poor mother's alarm, gave some explanation to such unexpected rapidity. Never in her life had Elinor found it so difficult to be calm, as at that moment. The knowledge of what her mother must be feeling as the carriage stopt at the door--of her doubt--her dread--perhaps her despair!--and of what SHE had to tell!--with such knowledge it was impossible to be calm. All that remained to be done was to be speedy; and, therefore staying only till she could leave Mrs. Jennings's maid with her sister, she hurried down stairs. The bustle in the vestibule, as she passed along an inner lobby, assured her that they were already in the house. She rushed to the drawing-room,--she entered it,--and saw only Willoughby.

Chapter 43

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility58.asp

Edward goes to meet Lucy after thanking Colonel Brandon. Mrs. Jennings is grateful to both Elinor and Brandon for helping Lucy to settle down. Elinor decides to visit her brother before the departure for Cleveland. Since Marianne refuses to accompany her, she goes alone to meet Lady Dashwood and her brother. John Dashwood welcomes her. He shows his surprise at Colonel Brandon's generosity towards Edward. He then informs her of Robert's plans to get married to Miss Morton. When John goes to inform his wife of Elinor's visit, Robert comes to meet her and keeps her company. He is amused at Edward's choosing to become a clergyman and takes pity on him for having to marry Lucy. Shortly afterwards, Fanny Dashwood comes forward to meet Elinor. She talks politely and expresses regret at their departure to Cleveland.

Notes Most of the scenes in which Mrs. Jennings and John Dashwood are present evoke humor. In this chapter John Dashwood amuses the readers through his conversation with Elinor. Obsessed with money and miserly in his attitude, he fails to believe that the Colonel has been so kind as to offer a position at Delaford to Edward. He assumes that the Colonel must have an ulterior motive. He dubs Brandon as unthinking and strange. However, he is happy at the thought that the wealthy Colonel may soon marry Elinor. A hen-pecked and indulgent husband, John Dashwood is afraid to hurt the feelings of his cunning wife. Thus he requests Elinor to refrain from mentioning the Colonel's benevolence to her. He is happy to see his wife talking politely to Elinor and appreciates Fanny's gesture. John Dashwood's views and ideas shock Elinor. Referring to the marriage of Robert Ferrars to Miss Morton, he voices his opinion that Miss Morton should not mind getting married to any one of the brothers as long as he inherits the family property. His line of argument appalls Elinor thoroughly: her brother considers money superior to emotion. CHAPTER 42 Summary In early April the two families from Hanover Square and Berkeley Street set out on their journey to Cleveland. Passing through Somerset, they take three days to reach their destination. The Palmers' house is modern and spacious, and the surrounding flora and fauna enhance its beauty. Marianne is excited at the idea of being able to explore the countryside. However, she is forced to stay indoors due to rain. Mr. Palmer and Colonel Brandon arrive shortly afterwards. Elinor finds both Mr. and Mrs. Palmer charming and friendly hosts. Brandon talks to her about Delaford. He suspects that Marianne has caught a cold, and in fact, she falls ill with the flu a few days later. Notes Marianne and Elinor have different reactions to the departure for Cleveland. Marianne becomes emotional, recollecting the pleasures and pains she has experienced while in London. Elinor is quite content to leave the place, as she is not at all sentimental about it. In fact, she is relieved to be spared the company of Lucy Steele. She also hopes that a change of scene will help Marianne to regain her health. Jane Austen once again highlights Marianne's sensibility in contrast to Elinor's good sense. Mr. Palmer reveals himself to be a gentleman beneath his tough exterior. Elinor is at first apprehensive about living under his roof. However, she finds him refreshingly different at Cleveland. Austen writes, "She found him, however, perfectly the gentleman in his behaviour to all his visitors, and only occasionally rude to his wife and her mother; she found him very capable of being a pleasant companion." Elinor is arguably the mouthpiece of the author, and therefore her renewed assessment of Mr. Palmer is important. John Dashwood is still under the impression that Colonel Brandon is in love with Elinor. Therefore he informs his sister that he will be making a visit to Delaford in the future. Elinor is merely amused at his remark, as she is well aware of the true object of the Colonel's desire: her sister, Marianne. CHAPTER 43 Summary This entire chapter deals with Marianne's illness. Her cold develops into influenza and then into a mysterious illness. The doctor administers medication and predicts her recovery, but Marianne's health turns from bad to worse. Mrs. Palmer, fearing an infection that could be caught by her new-born baby, moves to a friend's house near Bath. Mr. Palmer follows her after a few days. After four days, when Marianne's health shows no improvement, Elinor decides to consult with the Colonel before calling her mother to Cleveland. Colonel Brandon willingly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood from Barton and leaves immediately on this errand. Both Mrs. Jennings and Elinor are anxious after the doctor gives up hope, since the medication fails to cure Marianne. However, after a few more days, Marianne recovers miraculously. As Elinor waits for her mother to arrive, she gets a surprise visitor. It is Willoughby, who makes an appearance at the cottage. Notes Jane Austen throws light on the attitude of the different characters through their distinct reactions to Marianne's illness. When Marianne's condition worsens, Elinor is quite disturbed, but she does not panic. She thinks calmly and arrives at the decision to summon her mother from Barton. The Colonel is concerned about Marianne's health. He sensibly offers to fetch Mrs. Dashwood and undertakes his mission without delay. Both Elinor and the Colonel use their sense to the best advantage in order to improve the situation. Mrs. Jennings is highly emotional. She thinks of the worst when Marianne's health deteriorates. She feels sorry for the girl, as she is afraid that she may succumb to her illness. However, when Marianne recovers miraculously, she is overjoyed. Mrs. Jennings displays the extremes of emotion. Mr. Palmer conducts himself in a stable manner. When his wife panics about a possible threat to her baby's health, he chides her. As a host, he considers Marianne his responsibility and therefore shows reluctance to leave Cleveland.

sparknotes

all_chapterized_books/174-chapters/chapters_19_to_20.txt

finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Picture of Dorian Gray/section_9_part_0.txt

The Picture of Dorian Gray.chapters 19-20

chapters 19-20

{"name": "Chapters Nineteen-Twenty", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210228142327/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/doriangray/section10/", "summary": "Art has no influence upon action. . . . The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. Chapter Nineteen Several weeks have passed, it seems, and Dorian visits Lord Henry. Dorian claims that he wants to reform himself and be virtuous. As evidence of his newfound resolve, Dorian describes a recent trip to the country during which he passed up an opportunity to seduce and defile an innkeeper's innocent daughter. Lord Henry dismisses Dorian's intentions to reform, and he turns the conversation to other subjects--Alan Campbell's recent suicide and the continued mystery of Basil Hallward's disappearance. Dorian asks if Lord Henry has ever considered that Basil might have been murdered. Lord Henry dismisses the idea, noting that Basil lacked enemies. Dorian then asks: \"What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?\" Lord Henry laughs and responds that murder is too vulgar for a man like Dorian. The conversation drifts away from Basil. Lord Henry then asks Dorian, \"'hat does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose'--how does the quotation run?--'his own soul'?\" Dorian starts nervously; Lord Henry explains that he heard a street preacher posing this question to a crowd. He mocks the man in his typical fashion, but Dorian cuts him short, insisting that the soul is very real. Lord Henry laughs at the suggestion, wondering aloud how Dorian has managed to remain so young after all these years. He wishes he knew Dorian's secret and praises Dorian's life as being \"exquisite.\" He commends Dorian's mode of living and begs him not to spoil it by trying to be virtuous. Dorian somberly asks his friend not to loan anyone else the \"yellow book,\" which has had such a corrupting effect upon his own character, but Lord Henry discounts his \"moraliz\" and remarks that \"rt has no influence upon action. . . . The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.\" Before leaving, Lord Henry invites Dorian to visit him the next day. Chapter Twenty That night, Dorian goes to the locked room to look at his portrait. He hopes his decision to amend his life will have changed the painting, and he considers that perhaps his decision not to ruin the innkeeper's daughter's reputation will be reflected in the painted face. But when Dorian looks at his portrait, he sees there is no change--except that \"in the eyes there was a look of cunning, and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite.\" He realizes his pitiful attempt to be good was no more than hypocrisy, an attempt to minimize the seriousness of his crimes that falls far short of atonement. Furious, he seizes a knife--the same weapon with which he killed Basil--and drives it into the portrait in an attempt to destroy it. From below, Dorian's servants hear a cry and a clatter. Breaking into the room, they see the portrait, unharmed, showing Dorian Gray as a beautiful young man. On the floor is the body of an old man, horribly wrinkled and disfigured, with a knife plunged into his heart. It is not until the servants examine the rings on the old man's hands that they identify him as Dorian Gray.", "analysis": "The contrast between Lord Henry and Dorian in Chapter Nineteen is instructive. When the novel begins, Lord Henry appears as a figure of worldly wisdom who seduces the naive Dorian with fawning compliments and a celebration of selfishness and hedonism. Now that Dorian has actually lived the philosophy that Lord Henry so eloquently champions, however, he stands as proof of the limitations--indeed, even the misguided notions--of that philosophy. In the novel's final pages, Dorian is world-weary and borne down by the weight of his sins, while Lord Henry seems almost childishly naive as he repeats his long-held but poorly informed beliefs. When Dorian all but confesses to Basil's murder, Lord Henry flippantly dismisses him, since his worldview holds that \"rime belongs exclusively to the lower orders.\" Only Lord Henry, who has never actually done any of the things he has inspired Dorian to do, could have the luxury of this thought. By keeping himself free from sin, even as he argues the virtues of sinning, Lord Henry lacks the terrible awareness of guilt and its debilitating effects. While the street preacher's rhetorical question about earthly gain at the cost of spiritual loss haunts Dorian, it holds no real meaning for Lord Henry. At this stage, however, not even truthful self-awareness is enough to save Dorian. In his final moments, he attempts to repent the murder of Basil, the suicides of Sibyl Vane and Alan Campbell, and his countless other sins by refraining from seducing and ruining a naive village girl. The discrepancy between the enormity of his crimes and this minor act of contrition is too great. Furthermore, he realizes that he does not want to confess his sins but rather have them simply go away. The portrait reflects this hypocrisy and drives him to his final, desperate act. He decides it is better to destroy the last evidence of his sin--the painting of his soul--than face up to his own depravity. The depravity he seeks to destroy is, in essence, himself; therefore, by killing it, he kills himself. The end of the novel suggests a number of possible interpretations of Dorian's death. It may be his punishment for living the life of a hedonist, and for prizing beauty too highly, in which case the novel would be a criticism of the philosophy of aestheticism. But it is just as possible that Dorian is suffering for having violated the creeds of aestheticism. In other words, one can argue that Dorian's belief that his portrait reflects the state of his soul violates the principles of aestheticism, since, within that philosophy, art has no moral component. This reading is more in keeping with Wilde's personal philosophies and with the events of his life. In fact, elements of The Picture of Dorian Gray have an almost prophetic ring to them. Like Basil Hallward, Wilde would meet a tragic end brought about by his unrestrained worship of a beautiful young man. Additionally, like Alan Campbell, whom Dorian blackmails with vague threats of exposed secrets, Wilde would be punished for sexual indiscretions. Given the public nature of Wilde's trial and entire life--he was, in many ways, the first celebrity personality--it is impossible to ignore these parallels while reading The Picture of Dorian Gray. In De Profundis, Wilde's long letter to his lover, written from prison, he admits the limitations of the modes of thought and living that structured his life: I let myself be lured into long spells of senseless and sensual ease. I amused myself with being a flaneur, a dandy; a man of fashion. . . . Tired of being on the heights, I deliberately went to the depths in the search for new sensation. What the paradox was to me in the sphere of thought, perversity became to me in the sphere of passion. Desire, at the end, was malady, or a madness, or both. I grew careless of the lives of others, I took pleasure where it pleased me, and passed on. I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has someday to cry aloud on the house-tops. I ceased to be lord over myself. I was no longer the captain of my soul, and did not know it. I allowed pleasure to dominate me. I ended in horrible disgrace. The philosophy that The Picture of Dorian Gray proposes can be extremely seductive and liberating. But Wilde's words here reveal that society, conscience, or more likely both together ultimately make living that philosophy extremely difficult and even painful."}

"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," cried Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change." Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good actions yesterday." "Where were you yesterday?" "In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself." "My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good in the country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the other by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being either, so they stagnate." "Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something of both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I think I have altered." "You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say you had done more than one?" asked his companion as he spilled into his plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a perforated, shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them. "I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one else. I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I mean. She was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I think it was that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, don't you? How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our own class, of course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I really loved her. I am quite sure that I loved her. All during this wonderful May that we have been having, I used to run down and see her two or three times a week. Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. The apple-blossoms kept tumbling down on her hair, and she was laughing. We were to have gone away together this morning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to leave her as flowerlike as I had found her." "I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. "But I can finish your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. That was the beginning of your reformation." "Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her garden of mint and marigold." "And weep over a faithless Florizel," said Lord Henry, laughing, as he leaned back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really content now with any one of her own rank? I suppose she will be married some day to a rough carter or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having met you, and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, and she will be wretched. From a moral point of view, I cannot say that I think much of your great renunciation. Even as a beginning, it is poor. Besides, how do you know that Hetty isn't floating at the present moment in some starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies round her, like Ophelia?" "I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggest the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don't care what you say to me. I know I was right in acting as I did. Poor Hetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, I saw her white face at the window, like a spray of jasmine. Don't let us talk about it any more, and don't try to persuade me that the first good action I have done for years, the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever known, is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. I am going to be better. Tell me something about yourself. What is going on in town? I have not been to the club for days." "The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance." "I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time," said Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. "My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, and the British public are really not equal to the mental strain of having more than one topic every three months. They have been very fortunate lately, however. They have had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell's suicide. Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster who left for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November was poor Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never arrived in Paris at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall be told that he has been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, but every one who disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a delightful city, and possess all the attractions of the next world." "What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, holding up his Burgundy against the light and wondering how it was that he could discuss the matter so calmly. "I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, it is no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think about him. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it." "Why?" said the younger man wearily. "Because," said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt trellis of an open vinaigrette box, "one can survive everything nowadays except that. Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away. Let us have our coffee in the music-room, Dorian. You must play Chopin to me. The man with whom my wife ran away played Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! I was very fond of her. The house is rather lonely without her. Of course, married life is merely a habit, a bad habit. But then one regrets the loss even of one's worst habits. Perhaps one regrets them the most. They are such an essential part of one's personality." Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next room, sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white and black ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he stopped, and looking over at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever occur to you that Basil was murdered?" Lord Henry yawned. "Basil was very popular, and always wore a Waterbury watch. Why should he have been murdered? He was not clever enough to have enemies. Of course, he had a wonderful genius for painting. But a man can paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as possible. Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once, and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wild adoration for you and that you were the dominant motive of his art." "I was very fond of Basil," said Dorian with a note of sadness in his voice. "But don't people say that he was murdered?" "Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all probable. I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not the sort of man to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his chief defect." "What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken. "I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character that doesn't suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime. It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. I am sorry if I hurt your vanity by saying so, but I assure you it is true. Crime belongs exclusively to the lower orders. I don't blame them in the smallest degree. I should fancy that crime was to them what art is to us, simply a method of procuring extraordinary sensations." "A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man who has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? Don't tell me that." "Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often," cried Lord Henry, laughing. "That is one of the most important secrets of life. I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. But let us pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had come to such a really romantic end as you suggest, but I can't. I dare say he fell into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor hushed up the scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. I see him lying now on his back under those dull-green waters, with the heavy barges floating over him and long weeds catching in his hair. Do you know, I don't think he would have done much more good work. During the last ten years his painting had gone off very much." Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room and began to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, grey-plumaged bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing itself upon a bamboo perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, it dropped the white scurf of crinkled lids over black, glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards and forwards. "Yes," he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out of his pocket; "his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be great friends, he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated you? I suppose he bored you. If so, he never forgave you. It's a habit bores have. By the way, what has become of that wonderful portrait he did of you? I don't think I have ever seen it since he finished it. Oh! I remember your telling me years ago that you had sent it down to Selby, and that it had got mislaid or stolen on the way. You never got it back? What a pity! it was really a masterpiece. I remember I wanted to buy it. I wish I had now. It belonged to Basil's best period. Since then, his work was that curious mixture of bad painting and good intentions that always entitles a man to be called a representative British artist. Did you advertise for it? You should." "I forget," said Dorian. "I suppose I did. But I never really liked it. I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to me. Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious lines in some play--Hamlet, I think--how do they run?-- "Like the painting of a sorrow, A face without a heart." Yes: that is what it was like." Lord Henry laughed. "If a man treats life artistically, his brain is his heart," he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. "'Like the painting of a sorrow,'" he repeated, "'a face without a heart.'" The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. "By the way, Dorian," he said after a pause, "'what does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose--how does the quotation run?--his own soul'?" The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. "Why do you ask me that, Harry?" "My dear fellow," said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, "I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by the Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people listening to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the man yelling out that question to his audience. It struck me as being rather dramatic. London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. A wet Sunday, an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly white faces under a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful phrase flung into the air by shrill hysterical lips--it was really very good in its way, quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet that art had a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he would not have understood me." "Don't, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There is a soul in each one of us. I know it." "Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?" "Quite sure." "Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the lesson of romance. How grave you are! Don't be so serious. What have you or I to do with the superstitions of our age? No: we have given up our belief in the soul. Play me something. Play me a nocturne, Dorian, and, as you play, tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept your youth. You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are really wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming than you do to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. You were rather cheeky, very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. You have changed, of course, but not in appearance. I wish you would tell me your secret. To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing like it. It's absurd to talk of the ignorance of youth. The only people to whose opinions I listen now with any respect are people much younger than myself. They seem in front of me. Life has revealed to them her latest wonder. As for the aged, I always contradict the aged. I do it on principle. If you ask them their opinion on something that happened yesterday, they solemnly give you the opinions current in 1820, when people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing you are playing is! I wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, with the sea weeping round the villa and the salt spray dashing against the panes? It is marvellously romantic. What a blessing it is that there is one art left to us that is not imitative! Don't stop. I want music to-night. It seems to me that you are the young Apollo and that I am Marsyas listening to you. I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know nothing of. The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young. I am amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the same." "I am not the same, Harry." "Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. Don't spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. Don't make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don't deceive yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a question of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up cells in which thought hides itself and passion has its dreams. You may fancy yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance tone of colour in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume that you had once loved and that brings subtle memories with it, a line from a forgotten poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music that you had ceased to play--I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things like these that our lives depend. Browning writes about that somewhere; but our own senses will imagine them for us. There are moments when the odour of _lilas blanc_ passes suddenly across me, and I have to live the strangest month of my life over again. I wish I could change places with you, Dorian. The world has cried out against us both, but it has always worshipped you. It always will worship you. You are the type of what the age is searching for, and what it is afraid it has found. I am so glad that you have never done anything, never carved a statue, or painted a picture, or produced anything outside of yourself! Life has been your art. You have set yourself to music. Your days are your sonnets." Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. "Yes, life has been exquisite," he murmured, "but I am not going to have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagant things to me. You don't know everything about me. I think that if you did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. Don't laugh." "Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me the nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon that hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't? Let us go to the club, then. It has been a charming evening, and we must end it charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants immensely to know you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son. He has already copied your neckties, and has begged me to introduce him to you. He is quite delightful and rather reminds me of you." "I hope not," said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. "But I am tired to-night, Harry. I shan't go to the club. It is nearly eleven, and I want to go to bed early." "Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was something in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression than I had ever heard from it before." "It is because I am going to be good," he answered, smiling. "I am a little changed already." "You cannot change to me, Dorian," said Lord Henry. "You and I will always be friends." "Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. It does harm." "My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon be going about like the converted, and the revivalist, warning people against all the sins of which you have grown tired. You are much too delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. You and I are what we are, and will be what we will be. As for being poisoned by a book, there is no such thing as that. Art has no influence upon action. It annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. That is all. But we won't discuss literature. Come round to-morrow. I am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, and I will take you to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. She is a charming woman, and wants to consult you about some tapestries she is thinking of buying. Mind you come. Or shall we lunch with our little duchess? She says she never sees you now. Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought you would be. Her clever tongue gets on one's nerves. Well, in any case, be here at eleven." "Must I really come, Harry?" "Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don't think there have been such lilacs since the year I met you." "Very well. I shall be here at eleven," said Dorian. "Good night, Harry." As he reached the door, he hesitated for a moment, as if he had something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and did not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. He heard one of them whisper to the other, "That is Dorian Gray." He remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, or stared at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. Half the charm of the little village where he had been so often lately was that no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom he had lured to love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. He had told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him and answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. What a laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had been in her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but she had everything that he had lost. When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. He sent him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, and began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said to him. Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wild longing for the unstained purity of his boyhood--his rose-white boyhood, as Lord Henry had once called it. He knew that he had tarnished himself, filled his mind with corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he had been an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible joy in being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, it had been the fairest and the most full of promise that he had brought to shame. But was it all irretrievable? Was there no hope for him? Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had prayed that the portrait should bear the burden of his days, and he keep the unsullied splendour of eternal youth! All his failure had been due to that. Better for him that each sin of his life had brought its sure swift penalty along with it. There was purification in punishment. Not "Forgive us our sins" but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be the prayer of man to a most just God. The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so many years ago now, was standing on the table, and the white-limbed Cupids laughed round it as of old. He took it up, as he had done on that night of horror when he had first noted the change in the fatal picture, and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished shield. Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written to him a mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: "The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history." The phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated them over and over to himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the mirror on the floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his heel. It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty and the youth that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his life might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him but a mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? A green, an unripe time, a time of shallow moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he worn its livery? Youth had spoiled him. It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. It was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. James Vane was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. Alan Campbell had shot himself one night in his laboratory, but had not revealed the secret that he had been forced to know. The excitement, such as it was, over Basil Hallward's disappearance would soon pass away. It was already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. It was the living death of his own soul that troubled him. Basil had painted the portrait that had marred his life. He could not forgive him that. It was the portrait that had done everything. Basil had said things to him that were unbearable, and that he had yet borne with patience. The murder had been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. It was nothing to him. A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting for. Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent thing, at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be good. As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in the locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel every sign of evil passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil had already gone away. He would go and look. He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the door, a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face and lingered for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and the hideous thing that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror to him. He felt as if the load had been lifted from him already. He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and indignation broke from him. He could see no change, save that in the eyes there was a look of cunning and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome--more loathsome, if possible, than before--and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand seemed brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. Then he trembled. Had it been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Or the desire for a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do things finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the red stain larger than it had been? It seemed to have crept like a horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There was blood on the painted feet, as though the thing had dripped--blood even on the hand that had not held the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to confess? To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. He felt that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, who would believe him? There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. Everything belonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned what had been below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. They would shut him up if he persisted in his story.... Yet it was his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to make public atonement. There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to earth as well as to heaven. Nothing that he could do would cleanse him till he had told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. He was thinking of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul that he was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there been nothing more in his renunciation than that? There had been something more. At least he thought so. But who could tell? ... No. There had been nothing more. Through vanity he had spared her. In hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For curiosity's sake he had tried the denial of self. He recognized that now. But this murder--was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was only one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself--that was evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? Once it had given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. Of late he had felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. When he had been away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been like conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would destroy it. He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. He had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. It was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, so it would kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. It would kill the past, and when that was dead, he would be free. It would kill this monstrous soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, he would be at peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture with it. There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its agony that the frightened servants woke and crept out of their rooms. Two gentlemen, who were passing in the square below, stopped and looked up at the great house. They walked on till they met a policeman and brought him back. The man rang the bell several times, but there was no answer. Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was all dark. After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico and watched. "Whose house is that, Constable?" asked the elder of the two gentlemen. "Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir," answered the policeman. They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One of them was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle. Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad domestics were talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying and wringing her hands. Francis was as pale as death. After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the footmen and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. They called out. Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying to force the door, they got on the roof and dropped down on to the balcony. The windows yielded easily--their bolts were old. When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid portrait of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in evening dress, with a knife in his heart. He was withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examined the rings that they recognized who it was.

Chapters Nineteen-Twenty

https://web.archive.org/web/20210228142327/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/doriangray/section10/

Art has no influence upon action. . . . The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. Chapter Nineteen Several weeks have passed, it seems, and Dorian visits Lord Henry. Dorian claims that he wants to reform himself and be virtuous. As evidence of his newfound resolve, Dorian describes a recent trip to the country during which he passed up an opportunity to seduce and defile an innkeeper's innocent daughter. Lord Henry dismisses Dorian's intentions to reform, and he turns the conversation to other subjects--Alan Campbell's recent suicide and the continued mystery of Basil Hallward's disappearance. Dorian asks if Lord Henry has ever considered that Basil might have been murdered. Lord Henry dismisses the idea, noting that Basil lacked enemies. Dorian then asks: "What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" Lord Henry laughs and responds that murder is too vulgar for a man like Dorian. The conversation drifts away from Basil. Lord Henry then asks Dorian, "'hat does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose'--how does the quotation run?--'his own soul'?" Dorian starts nervously; Lord Henry explains that he heard a street preacher posing this question to a crowd. He mocks the man in his typical fashion, but Dorian cuts him short, insisting that the soul is very real. Lord Henry laughs at the suggestion, wondering aloud how Dorian has managed to remain so young after all these years. He wishes he knew Dorian's secret and praises Dorian's life as being "exquisite." He commends Dorian's mode of living and begs him not to spoil it by trying to be virtuous. Dorian somberly asks his friend not to loan anyone else the "yellow book," which has had such a corrupting effect upon his own character, but Lord Henry discounts his "moraliz" and remarks that "rt has no influence upon action. . . . The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame." Before leaving, Lord Henry invites Dorian to visit him the next day. Chapter Twenty That night, Dorian goes to the locked room to look at his portrait. He hopes his decision to amend his life will have changed the painting, and he considers that perhaps his decision not to ruin the innkeeper's daughter's reputation will be reflected in the painted face. But when Dorian looks at his portrait, he sees there is no change--except that "in the eyes there was a look of cunning, and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite." He realizes his pitiful attempt to be good was no more than hypocrisy, an attempt to minimize the seriousness of his crimes that falls far short of atonement. Furious, he seizes a knife--the same weapon with which he killed Basil--and drives it into the portrait in an attempt to destroy it. From below, Dorian's servants hear a cry and a clatter. Breaking into the room, they see the portrait, unharmed, showing Dorian Gray as a beautiful young man. On the floor is the body of an old man, horribly wrinkled and disfigured, with a knife plunged into his heart. It is not until the servants examine the rings on the old man's hands that they identify him as Dorian Gray.

The contrast between Lord Henry and Dorian in Chapter Nineteen is instructive. When the novel begins, Lord Henry appears as a figure of worldly wisdom who seduces the naive Dorian with fawning compliments and a celebration of selfishness and hedonism. Now that Dorian has actually lived the philosophy that Lord Henry so eloquently champions, however, he stands as proof of the limitations--indeed, even the misguided notions--of that philosophy. In the novel's final pages, Dorian is world-weary and borne down by the weight of his sins, while Lord Henry seems almost childishly naive as he repeats his long-held but poorly informed beliefs. When Dorian all but confesses to Basil's murder, Lord Henry flippantly dismisses him, since his worldview holds that "rime belongs exclusively to the lower orders." Only Lord Henry, who has never actually done any of the things he has inspired Dorian to do, could have the luxury of this thought. By keeping himself free from sin, even as he argues the virtues of sinning, Lord Henry lacks the terrible awareness of guilt and its debilitating effects. While the street preacher's rhetorical question about earthly gain at the cost of spiritual loss haunts Dorian, it holds no real meaning for Lord Henry. At this stage, however, not even truthful self-awareness is enough to save Dorian. In his final moments, he attempts to repent the murder of Basil, the suicides of Sibyl Vane and Alan Campbell, and his countless other sins by refraining from seducing and ruining a naive village girl. The discrepancy between the enormity of his crimes and this minor act of contrition is too great. Furthermore, he realizes that he does not want to confess his sins but rather have them simply go away. The portrait reflects this hypocrisy and drives him to his final, desperate act. He decides it is better to destroy the last evidence of his sin--the painting of his soul--than face up to his own depravity. The depravity he seeks to destroy is, in essence, himself; therefore, by killing it, he kills himself. The end of the novel suggests a number of possible interpretations of Dorian's death. It may be his punishment for living the life of a hedonist, and for prizing beauty too highly, in which case the novel would be a criticism of the philosophy of aestheticism. But it is just as possible that Dorian is suffering for having violated the creeds of aestheticism. In other words, one can argue that Dorian's belief that his portrait reflects the state of his soul violates the principles of aestheticism, since, within that philosophy, art has no moral component. This reading is more in keeping with Wilde's personal philosophies and with the events of his life. In fact, elements of The Picture of Dorian Gray have an almost prophetic ring to them. Like Basil Hallward, Wilde would meet a tragic end brought about by his unrestrained worship of a beautiful young man. Additionally, like Alan Campbell, whom Dorian blackmails with vague threats of exposed secrets, Wilde would be punished for sexual indiscretions. Given the public nature of Wilde's trial and entire life--he was, in many ways, the first celebrity personality--it is impossible to ignore these parallels while reading The Picture of Dorian Gray. In De Profundis, Wilde's long letter to his lover, written from prison, he admits the limitations of the modes of thought and living that structured his life: I let myself be lured into long spells of senseless and sensual ease. I amused myself with being a flaneur, a dandy; a man of fashion. . . . Tired of being on the heights, I deliberately went to the depths in the search for new sensation. What the paradox was to me in the sphere of thought, perversity became to me in the sphere of passion. Desire, at the end, was malady, or a madness, or both. I grew careless of the lives of others, I took pleasure where it pleased me, and passed on. I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has someday to cry aloud on the house-tops. I ceased to be lord over myself. I was no longer the captain of my soul, and did not know it. I allowed pleasure to dominate me. I ended in horrible disgrace. The philosophy that The Picture of Dorian Gray proposes can be extremely seductive and liberating. But Wilde's words here reveal that society, conscience, or more likely both together ultimately make living that philosophy extremely difficult and even painful.

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/20.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Sense and Sensibility/section_19_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 20

chapter 20

{"name": "Chapter 20", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility36.asp", "summary": "The Dashwood girls visit the Middletons at the Park. Mrs. Palmer comes forward to welcome them and regretfully informs them about their early departure. She invites Elinor and Marianne to Cleveland. She dominates the conversation by imparting information about Willoughby and Colonel Brandon. She also talks about her husband and his profession.", "analysis": "Notes The chapter is devoted to the Palmers. Mrs. and Mr. Palmer make interesting cases for a character study. Mrs. Palmer enjoys indulging in gossip and gives exaggerated accounts about people. She tries her best to please her friends. Mr. Palmer is frank, factual and down-to-earth. He often cautions his wife when she makes inconsiderate remarks or rash statements. Mrs. Palmer is frivolous and lacks insight. Since her husband is intelligent and shrewd, he is intolerant of her views. Mr. Palmer appears rude, but Elinor considers him rather agreeable. CHAPTER 21 Summary One more pair of guests arrives after the departure of the Palmers. On their trip to Exeter, John Middleton and Mrs. Jennings meet the Steele sisters and invite them to Barton Park. The Misses Steele eventually arrive at the Park. Sir John invites the Dashwoods to the Park to get acquainted with the Steele sisters. The Misses Dashwood meet the Steele sisters and are unimpressed. The girls are pleasant looking and smart, but they lack refinement. However, they please Lady Middleton because they pay attention to her children. During the course of their conversation with the Dashwoods, the Steele sisters mention their acquaintance with Edward Ferrars. This piece of information stirs Elinor's curiosity. Notes This chapter illustrates Jane Austen's subtle use of satire. Sir John Middleton is an amusing character, as shown by his talk and behavior. As soon as he meets the Steele sisters at Exeter, he invites them to Barton Park to spend a few days. However, Lady Middleton shows apprehension at having the Steele girls as their guests. But she is unable to stop the girls from coming to Barton, as they have already accepted the invitation of Sir John. Hence she contents herself \"with merely giving her husband a gentle reprimand on the subject five or six times everyday.\" This sentence illustrates Austen's ability to use understatement to her advantage. Another humorous instance occurs when John Middleton persuades the Dashwood sisters to accompany him to the Park in order to meet the Steeles. It is reported in this manner: \"Sir John wanted the whole family to walk to the Park directly and look at the guests. Benevolent, philanthropic man! It was painful to him even to keep a third cousin to himself. \" The passage adequately demonstrates Austen's ironic humor. The manner in which Sir John persuades the Dashwood sisters to come to the Park is hilarious. His logic is amusing, \"'Do come, now,' said he--'pray come--you must come--I declare you shall come.--You can't think how you will like them. Lucy is monstrous pretty, and so good-humored and agreeable!---They have brought the whole coach full of playthings for the children. How can you be so cross as not to come! Why, they are your cousins, you know, after a fashion. You are my cousins, and they are my wife's, so you must be related.\" Through repetition and exaggerated remarks, he finally persuades the sisters to visit the Park to meet his guests. The Steele sisters are a perfect foil to Elinor and Marianne. They are crude, vulgar and frivolous. Elinor and Marianne find it tedious to converse with them. They have no wish to renew their acquaintance with them. CHAPTER 22 Summary One day while walking from the Park to the cottage, Lucy confides in Elinor about her secret engagement with Edward Ferrars. Edward had stayed with her uncle four years ago, and it was at that time that the two had become intimate. To prove her point, Lucy displays Edward's picture in her locket and a letter he wrote to her. She also informs Elinor that Edward had spent some time with them before proceeding to Barton. Lucy's revelations naturally come as an absolute shock to Elinor. Notes Chapter 22 reveals something important about Edward Ferrars' past. Before Edward had met Elinor, he had been friendly with Lucy Steele and had become engaged to her. It is Lucy's hair that he wears in his ring. Elinor is distressed on hearing Lucy's secret. She is fond of Edward and had believed that he returned her affection. However, she did see a look of concern in his eyes during his recent trip to Barton. At that time he was moody and out of spirits. Lucy's revelation reveals the cause behind Edward's melancholy. It is ironic that Lucy should choose to tell her secret to Elinor, the girl who loves Edward. It makes the reader wonder if Lucy has knowledge of Edward's affection for Elinor. Lucy not only reveals her relationship with Edward to her confidante, but she also asks her for her advice to tackle this precarious situation. Elinor is stunned to hear the news. She fails to comprehend how Edward could have loved a girl who is so lacking in taste and refinement."}

As the Miss Dashwoods entered the drawing-room of the park the next day, at one door, Mrs. Palmer came running in at the other, looking as good humoured and merry as before. She took them all most affectionately by the hand, and expressed great delight in seeing them again. "I am so glad to see you!" said she, seating herself between Elinor and Marianne, "for it is so bad a day I was afraid you might not come, which would be a shocking thing, as we go away again tomorrow. We must go, for the Westons come to us next week you know. It was quite a sudden thing our coming at all, and I knew nothing of it till the carriage was coming to the door, and then Mr. Palmer asked me if I would go with him to Barton. He is so droll! He never tells me any thing! I am so sorry we cannot stay longer; however we shall meet again in town very soon, I hope." They were obliged to put an end to such an expectation. "Not go to town!" cried Mrs. Palmer, with a laugh, "I shall be quite disappointed if you do not. I could get the nicest house in the world for you, next door to ours, in Hanover-square. You must come, indeed. I am sure I shall be very happy to chaperon you at any time till I am confined, if Mrs. Dashwood should not like to go into public." They thanked her; but were obliged to resist all her entreaties. "Oh, my love," cried Mrs. Palmer to her husband, who just then entered the room--"you must help me to persuade the Miss Dashwoods to go to town this winter." Her love made no answer; and after slightly bowing to the ladies, began complaining of the weather. "How horrid all this is!" said he. "Such weather makes every thing and every body disgusting. Dullness is as much produced within doors as without, by rain. It makes one detest all one's acquaintance. What the devil does Sir John mean by not having a billiard room in his house? How few people know what comfort is! Sir John is as stupid as the weather." The rest of the company soon dropt in. "I am afraid, Miss Marianne," said Sir John, "you have not been able to take your usual walk to Allenham today." Marianne looked very grave and said nothing. "Oh, don't be so sly before us," said Mrs. Palmer; "for we know all about it, I assure you; and I admire your taste very much, for I think he is extremely handsome. We do not live a great way from him in the country, you know. Not above ten miles, I dare say." "Much nearer thirty," said her husband. "Ah, well! there is not much difference. I never was at his house; but they say it is a sweet pretty place." "As vile a spot as I ever saw in my life," said Mr. Palmer. Marianne remained perfectly silent, though her countenance betrayed her interest in what was said. "Is it very ugly?" continued Mrs. Palmer--"then it must be some other place that is so pretty I suppose." When they were seated in the dining room, Sir John observed with regret that they were only eight all together. "My dear," said he to his lady, "it is very provoking that we should be so few. Why did not you ask the Gilberts to come to us today?" "Did not I tell you, Sir John, when you spoke to me about it before, that it could not be done? They dined with us last." "You and I, Sir John," said Mrs. Jennings, "should not stand upon such ceremony." "Then you would be very ill-bred," cried Mr. Palmer. "My love you contradict every body," said his wife with her usual laugh. "Do you know that you are quite rude?" "I did not know I contradicted any body in calling your mother ill-bred." "Ay, you may abuse me as you please," said the good-natured old lady, "you have taken Charlotte off my hands, and cannot give her back again. So there I have the whip hand of you." Charlotte laughed heartily to think that her husband could not get rid of her; and exultingly said, she did not care how cross he was to her, as they must live together. It was impossible for any one to be more thoroughly good-natured, or more determined to be happy than Mrs. Palmer. The studied indifference, insolence, and discontent of her husband gave her no pain; and when he scolded or abused her, she was highly diverted. "Mr. Palmer is so droll!" said she, in a whisper, to Elinor. "He is always out of humour." Elinor was not inclined, after a little observation, to give him credit for being so genuinely and unaffectedly ill-natured or ill-bred as he wished to appear. His temper might perhaps be a little soured by finding, like many others of his sex, that through some unaccountable bias in favour of beauty, he was the husband of a very silly woman,--but she knew that this kind of blunder was too common for any sensible man to be lastingly hurt by it.-- It was rather a wish of distinction, she believed, which produced his contemptuous treatment of every body, and his general abuse of every thing before him. It was the desire of appearing superior to other people. The motive was too common to be wondered at; but the means, however they might succeed by establishing his superiority in ill-breeding, were not likely to attach any one to him except his wife. "Oh, my dear Miss Dashwood," said Mrs. Palmer soon afterwards, "I have got such a favour to ask of you and your sister. Will you come and spend some time at Cleveland this Christmas? Now, pray do,--and come while the Westons are with us. You cannot think how happy I shall be! It will be quite delightful!--My love," applying to her husband, "don't you long to have the Miss Dashwoods come to Cleveland?" "Certainly," he replied, with a sneer--"I came into Devonshire with no other view." "There now,"--said his lady, "you see Mr. Palmer expects you; so you cannot refuse to come." They both eagerly and resolutely declined her invitation. "But indeed you must and shall come. I am sure you will like it of all things. The Westons will be with us, and it will be quite delightful. You cannot think what a sweet place Cleveland is; and we are so gay now, for Mr. Palmer is always going about the country canvassing against the election; and so many people came to dine with us that I never saw before, it is quite charming! But, poor fellow! it is very fatiguing to him! for he is forced to make every body like him." Elinor could hardly keep her countenance as she assented to the hardship of such an obligation. "How charming it will be," said Charlotte, "when he is in Parliament!--won't it? How I shall laugh! It will be so ridiculous to see all his letters directed to him with an M.P.--But do you know, he says, he will never frank for me? He declares he won't. Don't you, Mr. Palmer?" Mr. Palmer took no notice of her. "He cannot bear writing, you know," she continued--"he says it is quite shocking." "No," said he, "I never said any thing so irrational. Don't palm all your abuses of languages upon me." "There now; you see how droll he is. This is always the way with him! Sometimes he won't speak to me for half a day together, and then he comes out with something so droll--all about any thing in the world." She surprised Elinor very much as they returned into the drawing-room, by asking her whether she did not like Mr. Palmer excessively. "Certainly," said Elinor; "he seems very agreeable." "Well--I am so glad you do. I thought you would, he is so pleasant; and Mr. Palmer is excessively pleased with you and your sisters I can tell you, and you can't think how disappointed he will be if you don't come to Cleveland.--I can't imagine why you should object to it." Elinor was again obliged to decline her invitation; and by changing the subject, put a stop to her entreaties. She thought it probable that as they lived in the same county, Mrs. Palmer might be able to give some more particular account of Willoughby's general character, than could be gathered from the Middletons' partial acquaintance with him; and she was eager to gain from any one, such a confirmation of his merits as might remove the possibility of fear from Marianne. She began by inquiring if they saw much of Mr. Willoughby at Cleveland, and whether they were intimately acquainted with him. "Oh dear, yes; I know him extremely well," replied Mrs. Palmer;--"Not that I ever spoke to him, indeed; but I have seen him for ever in town. Somehow or other I never happened to be staying at Barton while he was at Allenham. Mama saw him here once before;--but I was with my uncle at Weymouth. However, I dare say we should have seen a great deal of him in Somersetshire, if it had not happened very unluckily that we should never have been in the country together. He is very little at Combe, I believe; but if he were ever so much there, I do not think Mr. Palmer would visit him, for he is in the opposition, you know, and besides it is such a way off. I know why you inquire about him, very well; your sister is to marry him. I am monstrous glad of it, for then I shall have her for a neighbour you know." "Upon my word," replied Elinor, "you know much more of the matter than I do, if you have any reason to expect such a match." "Don't pretend to deny it, because you know it is what every body talks of. I assure you I heard of it in my way through town." "My dear Mrs. Palmer!" "Upon my honour I did.--I met Colonel Brandon Monday morning in Bond-street, just before we left town, and he told me of it directly." "You surprise me very much. Colonel Brandon tell you of it! Surely you must be mistaken. To give such intelligence to a person who could not be interested in it, even if it were true, is not what I should expect Colonel Brandon to do." "But I do assure you it was so, for all that, and I will tell you how it happened. When we met him, he turned back and walked with us; and so we began talking of my brother and sister, and one thing and another, and I said to him, 'So, Colonel, there is a new family come to Barton cottage, I hear, and mama sends me word they are very pretty, and that one of them is going to be married to Mr. Willoughby of Combe Magna. Is it true, pray? for of course you must know, as you have been in Devonshire so lately.'" "And what did the Colonel say?" "Oh--he did not say much; but he looked as if he knew it to be true, so from that moment I set it down as certain. It will be quite delightful, I declare! When is it to take place?" "Mr. Brandon was very well I hope?" "Oh! yes, quite well; and so full of your praises, he did nothing but say fine things of you." "I am flattered by his commendation. He seems an excellent man; and I think him uncommonly pleasing." "So do I.--He is such a charming man, that it is quite a pity he should be so grave and so dull. Mama says HE was in love with your sister too.-- I assure you it was a great compliment if he was, for he hardly ever falls in love with any body." "Is Mr. Willoughby much known in your part of Somersetshire?" said Elinor. "Oh! yes, extremely well; that is, I do not believe many people are acquainted with him, because Combe Magna is so far off; but they all think him extremely agreeable I assure you. Nobody is more liked than Mr. Willoughby wherever he goes, and so you may tell your sister. She is a monstrous lucky girl to get him, upon my honour; not but that he is much more lucky in getting her, because she is so very handsome and agreeable, that nothing can be good enough for her. However, I don't think her hardly at all handsomer than you, I assure you; for I think you both excessively pretty, and so does Mr. Palmer too I am sure, though we could not get him to own it last night." Mrs. Palmer's information respecting Willoughby was not very material; but any testimony in his favour, however small, was pleasing to her. "I am so glad we are got acquainted at last," continued Charlotte.--"And now I hope we shall always be great friends. You can't think how much I longed to see you! It is so delightful that you should live at the cottage! Nothing can be like it, to be sure! And I am so glad your sister is going to be well married! I hope you will be a great deal at Combe Magna. It is a sweet place, by all accounts." "You have been long acquainted with Colonel Brandon, have not you?" "Yes, a great while; ever since my sister married.-- He was a particular friend of Sir John's. I believe," she added in a low voice, "he would have been very glad to have had me, if he could. Sir John and Lady Middleton wished it very much. But mama did not think the match good enough for me, otherwise Sir John would have mentioned it to the Colonel, and we should have been married immediately." "Did not Colonel Brandon know of Sir John's proposal to your mother before it was made? Had he never owned his affection to yourself?" "Oh, no; but if mama had not objected to it, I dare say he would have liked it of all things. He had not seen me then above twice, for it was before I left school. However, I am much happier as I am. Mr. Palmer is the kind of man I like."

Chapter 20

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820034609/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmSenseSensibility36.asp

The Dashwood girls visit the Middletons at the Park. Mrs. Palmer comes forward to welcome them and regretfully informs them about their early departure. She invites Elinor and Marianne to Cleveland. She dominates the conversation by imparting information about Willoughby and Colonel Brandon. She also talks about her husband and his profession.

Notes The chapter is devoted to the Palmers. Mrs. and Mr. Palmer make interesting cases for a character study. Mrs. Palmer enjoys indulging in gossip and gives exaggerated accounts about people. She tries her best to please her friends. Mr. Palmer is frank, factual and down-to-earth. He often cautions his wife when she makes inconsiderate remarks or rash statements. Mrs. Palmer is frivolous and lacks insight. Since her husband is intelligent and shrewd, he is intolerant of her views. Mr. Palmer appears rude, but Elinor considers him rather agreeable. CHAPTER 21 Summary One more pair of guests arrives after the departure of the Palmers. On their trip to Exeter, John Middleton and Mrs. Jennings meet the Steele sisters and invite them to Barton Park. The Misses Steele eventually arrive at the Park. Sir John invites the Dashwoods to the Park to get acquainted with the Steele sisters. The Misses Dashwood meet the Steele sisters and are unimpressed. The girls are pleasant looking and smart, but they lack refinement. However, they please Lady Middleton because they pay attention to her children. During the course of their conversation with the Dashwoods, the Steele sisters mention their acquaintance with Edward Ferrars. This piece of information stirs Elinor's curiosity. Notes This chapter illustrates Jane Austen's subtle use of satire. Sir John Middleton is an amusing character, as shown by his talk and behavior. As soon as he meets the Steele sisters at Exeter, he invites them to Barton Park to spend a few days. However, Lady Middleton shows apprehension at having the Steele girls as their guests. But she is unable to stop the girls from coming to Barton, as they have already accepted the invitation of Sir John. Hence she contents herself "with merely giving her husband a gentle reprimand on the subject five or six times everyday." This sentence illustrates Austen's ability to use understatement to her advantage. Another humorous instance occurs when John Middleton persuades the Dashwood sisters to accompany him to the Park in order to meet the Steeles. It is reported in this manner: "Sir John wanted the whole family to walk to the Park directly and look at the guests. Benevolent, philanthropic man! It was painful to him even to keep a third cousin to himself. " The passage adequately demonstrates Austen's ironic humor. The manner in which Sir John persuades the Dashwood sisters to come to the Park is hilarious. His logic is amusing, "'Do come, now,' said he--'pray come--you must come--I declare you shall come.--You can't think how you will like them. Lucy is monstrous pretty, and so good-humored and agreeable!---They have brought the whole coach full of playthings for the children. How can you be so cross as not to come! Why, they are your cousins, you know, after a fashion. You are my cousins, and they are my wife's, so you must be related." Through repetition and exaggerated remarks, he finally persuades the sisters to visit the Park to meet his guests. The Steele sisters are a perfect foil to Elinor and Marianne. They are crude, vulgar and frivolous. Elinor and Marianne find it tedious to converse with them. They have no wish to renew their acquaintance with them. CHAPTER 22 Summary One day while walking from the Park to the cottage, Lucy confides in Elinor about her secret engagement with Edward Ferrars. Edward had stayed with her uncle four years ago, and it was at that time that the two had become intimate. To prove her point, Lucy displays Edward's picture in her locket and a letter he wrote to her. She also informs Elinor that Edward had spent some time with them before proceeding to Barton. Lucy's revelations naturally come as an absolute shock to Elinor. Notes Chapter 22 reveals something important about Edward Ferrars' past. Before Edward had met Elinor, he had been friendly with Lucy Steele and had become engaged to her. It is Lucy's hair that he wears in his ring. Elinor is distressed on hearing Lucy's secret. She is fond of Edward and had believed that he returned her affection. However, she did see a look of concern in his eyes during his recent trip to Barton. At that time he was moody and out of spirits. Lucy's revelation reveals the cause behind Edward's melancholy. It is ironic that Lucy should choose to tell her secret to Elinor, the girl who loves Edward. It makes the reader wonder if Lucy has knowledge of Edward's affection for Elinor. Lucy not only reveals her relationship with Edward to her confidante, but she also asks her for her advice to tackle this precarious situation. Elinor is stunned to hear the news. She fails to comprehend how Edward could have loved a girl who is so lacking in taste and refinement.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/161-chapters/17.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/Sense and Sensibility/section_16_part_0.txt

Sense and Sensibility.chapter 17

chapter 17

{"name": "Chapter 17", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210421140324/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/sense-and-sensibility/summary/chapter-17", "summary": "Mrs. Dashwood is pleasantly surprised by Edward's appearance - but not too surprised, since she takes it for granted that he's in love with Elinor. Under her affectionate gaze, he can't help but become more like his previous self, and Elinor is relieved that he's back to normal. Mrs. Dashwood asks a rather sensitive question - what are Mrs. Ferrars's plans for her eldest son? Are her expectations still too high? Edward tells them that he still doesn't have any ambition, except to live moderately and happily. Elinor and Marianne have another spat, this time about how much money one requires to live well - Elinor's estimated sum is about half of what her sister requires. Marianne describes her reasons for needing two thousand pounds a year, including horses for hunting - and they match up exactly with what she and Willoughby would require at his home, Combe Magna. Margaret comes up with a great solution - someone should come along and give them all a huge fortune each. Margaret and Mrs. Dashwood wonder what they would spend all the money on. Marianne looks as though she already knows. Edward guesses that Elinor would spend all of hers on fine art, and Marianne would buy tons of music and books. He teases the sisters easily, and Marianne seems to cheer up a bit. Elinor and Edward affectionately analyze Marianne's character . Marianne steps in to criticize how much stock Elinor puts in other people's opinions. Edward admits that he himself is perhaps a little too shy - Marianne comes out and says that he's too reserved. He's thrown off and is embarrassed by this claim.", "analysis": ""}

Mrs. Dashwood was surprised only for a moment at seeing him; for his coming to Barton was, in her opinion, of all things the most natural. Her joy and expression of regard long outlived her wonder. He received the kindest welcome from her; and shyness, coldness, reserve could not stand against such a reception. They had begun to fail him before he entered the house, and they were quite overcome by the captivating manners of Mrs. Dashwood. Indeed a man could not very well be in love with either of her daughters, without extending the passion to her; and Elinor had the satisfaction of seeing him soon become more like himself. His affections seemed to reanimate towards them all, and his interest in their welfare again became perceptible. He was not in spirits, however; he praised their house, admired its prospect, was attentive, and kind; but still he was not in spirits. The whole family perceived it, and Mrs. Dashwood, attributing it to some want of liberality in his mother, sat down to table indignant against all selfish parents. "What are Mrs. Ferrars's views for you at present, Edward?" said she, when dinner was over and they had drawn round the fire; "are you still to be a great orator in spite of yourself?" "No. I hope my mother is now convinced that I have no more talents than inclination for a public life!" "But how is your fame to be established? for famous you must be to satisfy all your family; and with no inclination for expense, no affection for strangers, no profession, and no assurance, you may find it a difficult matter." "I shall not attempt it. I have no wish to be distinguished; and have every reason to hope I never shall. Thank Heaven! I cannot be forced into genius and eloquence." "You have no ambition, I well know. Your wishes are all moderate." "As moderate as those of the rest of the world, I believe. I wish as well as every body else to be perfectly happy; but, like every body else it must be in my own way. Greatness will not make me so." "Strange that it would!" cried Marianne. "What have wealth or grandeur to do with happiness?" "Grandeur has but little," said Elinor, "but wealth has much to do with it." "Elinor, for shame!" said Marianne, "money can only give happiness where there is nothing else to give it. Beyond a competence, it can afford no real satisfaction, as far as mere self is concerned." "Perhaps," said Elinor, smiling, "we may come to the same point. YOUR competence and MY wealth are very much alike, I dare say; and without them, as the world goes now, we shall both agree that every kind of external comfort must be wanting. Your ideas are only more noble than mine. Come, what is your competence?" "About eighteen hundred or two thousand a year; not more than THAT." Elinor laughed. "TWO thousand a year! ONE is my wealth! I guessed how it would end." "And yet two thousand a-year is a very moderate income," said Marianne. "A family cannot well be maintained on a smaller. I am sure I am not extravagant in my demands. A proper establishment of servants, a carriage, perhaps two, and hunters, cannot be supported on less." Elinor smiled again, to hear her sister describing so accurately their future expenses at Combe Magna. "Hunters!" repeated Edward--"but why must you have hunters? Every body does not hunt." Marianne coloured as she replied, "But most people do." "I wish," said Margaret, striking out a novel thought, "that somebody would give us all a large fortune apiece!" "Oh that they would!" cried Marianne, her eyes sparkling with animation, and her cheeks glowing with the delight of such imaginary happiness. "We are all unanimous in that wish, I suppose," said Elinor, "in spite of the insufficiency of wealth." "Oh dear!" cried Margaret, "how happy I should be! I wonder what I should do with it!" Marianne looked as if she had no doubt on that point. "I should be puzzled to spend so large a fortune myself," said Mrs. Dashwood, "if my children were all to be rich without my help." "You must begin your improvements on this house," observed Elinor, "and your difficulties will soon vanish." "What magnificent orders would travel from this family to London," said Edward, "in such an event! What a happy day for booksellers, music-sellers, and print-shops! You, Miss Dashwood, would give a general commission for every new print of merit to be sent you--and as for Marianne, I know her greatness of soul, there would not be music enough in London to content her. And books!--Thomson, Cowper, Scott--she would buy them all over and over again: she would buy up every copy, I believe, to prevent their falling into unworthy hands; and she would have every book that tells her how to admire an old twisted tree. Should not you, Marianne? Forgive me, if I am very saucy. But I was willing to shew you that I had not forgot our old disputes." "I love to be reminded of the past, Edward--whether it be melancholy or gay, I love to recall it--and you will never offend me by talking of former times. You are very right in supposing how my money would be spent--some of it, at least--my loose cash would certainly be employed in improving my collection of music and books." "And the bulk of your fortune would be laid out in annuities on the authors or their heirs." "No, Edward, I should have something else to do with it." "Perhaps, then, you would bestow it as a reward on that person who wrote the ablest defence of your favourite maxim, that no one can ever be in love more than once in their life--your opinion on that point is unchanged, I presume?" "Undoubtedly. At my time of life opinions are tolerably fixed. It is not likely that I should now see or hear any thing to change them." "Marianne is as steadfast as ever, you see," said Elinor, "she is not at all altered." "She is only grown a little more grave than she was." "Nay, Edward," said Marianne, "you need not reproach me. You are not very gay yourself." "Why should you think so!" replied he, with a sigh. "But gaiety never was a part of MY character." "Nor do I think it a part of Marianne's," said Elinor; "I should hardly call her a lively girl--she is very earnest, very eager in all she does--sometimes talks a great deal and always with animation--but she is not often really merry." "I believe you are right," he replied, "and yet I have always set her down as a lively girl." "I have frequently detected myself in such kind of mistakes," said Elinor, "in a total misapprehension of character in some point or other: fancying people so much more gay or grave, or ingenious or stupid than they really are, and I can hardly tell why or in what the deception originated. Sometimes one is guided by what they say of themselves, and very frequently by what other people say of them, without giving oneself time to deliberate and judge." "But I thought it was right, Elinor," said Marianne, "to be guided wholly by the opinion of other people. I thought our judgments were given us merely to be subservient to those of neighbours. This has always been your doctrine, I am sure." "No, Marianne, never. My doctrine has never aimed at the subjection of the understanding. All I have ever attempted to influence has been the behaviour. You must not confound my meaning. I am guilty, I confess, of having often wished you to treat our acquaintance in general with greater attention; but when have I advised you to adopt their sentiments or to conform to their judgment in serious matters?" "You have not been able to bring your sister over to your plan of general civility," said Edward to Elinor. "Do you gain no ground?" "Quite the contrary," replied Elinor, looking expressively at Marianne. "My judgment," he returned, "is all on your side of the question; but I am afraid my practice is much more on your sister's. I never wish to offend, but I am so foolishly shy, that I often seem negligent, when I am only kept back by my natural awkwardness. I have frequently thought that I must have been intended by nature to be fond of low company, I am so little at my ease among strangers of gentility!" "Marianne has not shyness to excuse any inattention of hers," said Elinor. "She knows her own worth too well for false shame," replied Edward. "Shyness is only the effect of a sense of inferiority in some way or other. If I could persuade myself that my manners were perfectly easy and graceful, I should not be shy." "But you would still be reserved," said Marianne, "and that is worse." Edward started--"Reserved! Am I reserved, Marianne?" "Yes, very." "I do not understand you," replied he, colouring. "Reserved!--how, in what manner? What am I to tell you? What can you suppose?" Elinor looked surprised at his emotion; but trying to laugh off the subject, she said to him, "Do not you know my sister well enough to understand what she means? Do not you know she calls every one reserved who does not talk as fast, and admire what she admires as rapturously as herself?" Edward made no answer. His gravity and thoughtfulness returned on him in their fullest extent--and he sat for some time silent and dull.

Chapter 17

https://web.archive.org/web/20210421140324/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/sense-and-sensibility/summary/chapter-17

Mrs. Dashwood is pleasantly surprised by Edward's appearance - but not too surprised, since she takes it for granted that he's in love with Elinor. Under her affectionate gaze, he can't help but become more like his previous self, and Elinor is relieved that he's back to normal. Mrs. Dashwood asks a rather sensitive question - what are Mrs. Ferrars's plans for her eldest son? Are her expectations still too high? Edward tells them that he still doesn't have any ambition, except to live moderately and happily. Elinor and Marianne have another spat, this time about how much money one requires to live well - Elinor's estimated sum is about half of what her sister requires. Marianne describes her reasons for needing two thousand pounds a year, including horses for hunting - and they match up exactly with what she and Willoughby would require at his home, Combe Magna. Margaret comes up with a great solution - someone should come along and give them all a huge fortune each. Margaret and Mrs. Dashwood wonder what they would spend all the money on. Marianne looks as though she already knows. Edward guesses that Elinor would spend all of hers on fine art, and Marianne would buy tons of music and books. He teases the sisters easily, and Marianne seems to cheer up a bit. Elinor and Edward affectionately analyze Marianne's character . Marianne steps in to criticize how much stock Elinor puts in other people's opinions. Edward admits that he himself is perhaps a little too shy - Marianne comes out and says that he's too reserved. He's thrown off and is embarrassed by this claim.

shmoop

all_chapterized_books/12915-chapters/4.txt

finished_summaries/shmoop/The White Devil/section_3_part_0.txt

The White Devil.act 2.scene 2

act 2, scene 2

{"name": "Act 2, Scene 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210510044810/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/the-white-devil/summary/act-2-scene-2", "summary": "Brachiano enters with a Conjurer--the guy who's going to use magic to let him see how his wife and Vittoria's husband are murdered. The conjurer gives a little speech about how a lot of people are practicing fake magic, but he's the real deal. Thanks to genuine magic, the Duke is able to see his wife's murder. She enters her chamber with Giovanni, Lodovico , and other attendants. She kisses the Duke's picture as she does every night--only, this time, Doctor Julio and Christophero have smeared poison on the lips. She dies. Brachiano is delighted. Next--in a different vision--they see Flamineo, Marcello, Camillo, and four captains enter. They drink and dance. Marcello leaves the room, and they get ready to jump over a vaulting horse. But Flamineo breaks Camillo's neck, and makes sure he's dead with the help of the other four . They place the body to make it look like a gymnastics accident. Marcello enters and sends for the cardinal and the Duke--they apprehend Flamineo and the others with an armed guard, and go to find Vittoria. The Duke says he needs to leave, since he doesn't want to get caught . He exits. The conjurer exits after saying that great men do either \"great good\" or \"great harm.\"", "analysis": ""}

SCENE II Enter Brachiano, with one in the habit of a conjurer Brach. Now, sir, I claim your promise: 'tis dead midnight, The time prefix'd to show me by your art, How the intended murder of Camillo, And our loath'd duchess, grow to action. Conj. You have won me by your bounty to a deed I do not often practise. Some there are, Which by sophistic tricks, aspire that name Which I would gladly lose, of necromancer; As some that use to juggle upon cards, Seeming to conjure, when indeed they cheat; Others that raise up their confederate spirits 'Bout windmills, and endanger their own necks For making of a squib; and some there are Will keep a curtal to show juggling tricks, And give out 'tis a spirit; besides these, Such a whole ream of almanac-makers, figure-flingers, Fellows, indeed that only live by stealth, Since they do merely lie about stol'n goods, They 'd make men think the devil were fast and loose, With speaking fustian Latin. Pray, sit down; Put on this nightcap, sir, 'tis charmed; and now I 'll show you, by my strong commanding art, The circumstance that breaks your duchess' heart. A Dumb Show Enter suspiciously Julio and Christophero: they draw a curtain where Brachiano's picture is; they put on spectacles of glass, which cover their eyes and noses, and then burn perfumes before the picture, and wash the lips of the picture; that done, quenching the fire, and putting off their spectacles, they depart laughing. Enter Isabella in her night-gown, as to bedward, with lights, after her, Count Lodovico, Giovanni, Guidantonio, and others waiting on her: she kneels down as to prayers, then draws the curtain of the picture, does three reverences to it, and kisses it thrice; she faints, and will not suffer them to come near it; dies; sorrow expressed in Giovanni, and in Count Lodovico. She is conveyed out solemnly. Brach. Excellent! then she 's dead. Conj. She 's poisoned By the fumed picture. 'Twas her custom nightly, Before she went to bed, to go and visit Your picture, and to feed her eyes and lips On the dead shadow: Doctor Julio, Observing this, infects it with an oil, And other poison'd stuff, which presently Did suffocate her spirits. Brach. Methought I saw Count Lodowick there. Conj. He was; and by my art I find he did most passionately dote Upon your duchess. Now turn another way, And view Camillo's far more politic fate. Strike louder, music, from this charmed ground, To yield, as fits the act, a tragic sound! The Second Dumb Show Enter Flamineo, Marcello, Camillo, with four more as captains: they drink healths, and dance; a vaulting horse is brought into the room; Marcello and two more whispered out of the room, while Flamineo and Camillo strip themselves into their shirts, as to vault; compliment who shall begin; as Camillo is about to vault, Flamineo pitcheth him upon his neck, and, with the help of the rest, writhes his neck about; seems to see if it be broke, and lays him folded double, as 'twere under the horse; makes show to call for help; Marcello comes in, laments; sends for the cardinal and duke, who comes forth with armed men; wonders at the act; commands the body to be carried home; apprehends Flamineo, Marcello, and the rest, and go, as 'twere, to apprehend Vittoria. Brach. 'Twas quaintly done; but yet each circumstance I taste not fully. Conj. Oh, 'twas most apparent! You saw them enter, charg'd with their deep healths To their boon voyage; and, to second that, Flamineo calls to have a vaulting horse Maintain their sport; the virtuous Marcello Is innocently plotted forth the room; Whilst your eye saw the rest, and can inform you The engine of all. Brach. It seems Marcello and Flamineo Are both committed. Conj. Yes, you saw them guarded; And now they are come with purpose to apprehend Your mistress, fair Vittoria. We are now Beneath her roof: 'twere fit we instantly Make out by some back postern. Brach. Noble friend, You bind me ever to you: this shall stand As the firm seal annexed to my hand; It shall enforce a payment. [Exit Brachiano. Conj. Sir, I thank you. Both flowers and weeds spring, when the sun is warm, And great men do great good, or else great harm. [Exit.

Act 2, Scene 2

https://web.archive.org/web/20210510044810/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/the-white-devil/summary/act-2-scene-2

Brachiano enters with a Conjurer--the guy who's going to use magic to let him see how his wife and Vittoria's husband are murdered. The conjurer gives a little speech about how a lot of people are practicing fake magic, but he's the real deal. Thanks to genuine magic, the Duke is able to see his wife's murder. She enters her chamber with Giovanni, Lodovico , and other attendants. She kisses the Duke's picture as she does every night--only, this time, Doctor Julio and Christophero have smeared poison on the lips. She dies. Brachiano is delighted. Next--in a different vision--they see Flamineo, Marcello, Camillo, and four captains enter. They drink and dance. Marcello leaves the room, and they get ready to jump over a vaulting horse. But Flamineo breaks Camillo's neck, and makes sure he's dead with the help of the other four . They place the body to make it look like a gymnastics accident. Marcello enters and sends for the cardinal and the Duke--they apprehend Flamineo and the others with an armed guard, and go to find Vittoria. The Duke says he needs to leave, since he doesn't want to get caught . He exits. The conjurer exits after saying that great men do either "great good" or "great harm."

pinkmonkey

all_chapterized_books/110-chapters/30.txt

finished_summaries/pinkmonkey/Tess of the D'Urbervilles/section_12_part_1.txt

Tess of the D'Urbervilles.chapter 30

chapter 30

{"name": "CHAPTER 30", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD40.asp", "summary": "One evening as Tess and Angel transport the milk, Angel points out an old mansion that used to belong to the D'Urberville family. Tess takes it as a sign that it is time to tell Angel about her past. When he begs her again to marry him, she says that she needs to tell him some things about herself. She discloses that her ancestors are D'Urbervilles; she assumes Angel will be upset, for she knows his dislike towards old families and the D'Urbervilles in particular. Angel dismisses her apprehension and proclaims that her background will not affect their love. He also believes that such a relationship will impress his mother and further Tess's cause with her. Tess's strong desire to reveal the rest of her story without prevarication weakens. She tells Angel she will marry him and then begins to cry. Angel kisses his fiancee passionately and then recalls that he has seen her before at the dance in Marlott.", "analysis": "Notes In this chapter, a panicked Tess tries to disclose all of her past misadventure to Angel, but her courage fails her. Instead, she only manages to tell him that she is from the D'Urberville family, a fact that she thinks may discourage Angel's love. Quite the opposite happens; Angel realizes that this association will make Tess more welcomed as his wife by his mother and society. Undone by this reaction on Angel's part, Tess looses all resolve to stay single. She tells Angel she will marry him. Angel rejoices at her acceptance. Tess, however, sobs over breaking her vow of remaining single and failing to reveal her past. Angel is perplexed by her tears but is delighted in her passionate kiss. It begins to rain on the engaged couple. They are quickly drenched, but proclaim that their love will be able to face all the odds. The reader is not so certain"}

In the diminishing daylight they went along the level roadway through the meads, which stretched away into gray miles, and were backed in the extreme edge of distance by the swarthy and abrupt slopes of Egdon Heath. On its summit stood clumps and stretches of fir-trees, whose notched tips appeared like battlemented towers crowning black-fronted castles of enchantment. They were so absorbed in the sense of being close to each other that they did not begin talking for a long while, the silence being broken only by the clucking of the milk in the tall cans behind them. The lane they followed was so solitary that the hazel nuts had remained on the boughs till they slipped from their shells, and the blackberries hung in heavy clusters. Every now and then Angel would fling the lash of his whip round one of these, pluck it off, and give it to his companion. The dull sky soon began to tell its meaning by sending down herald-drops of rain, and the stagnant air of the day changed into a fitful breeze which played about their faces. The quick-silvery glaze on the rivers and pools vanished; from broad mirrors of light they changed to lustreless sheets of lead, with a surface like a rasp. But that spectacle did not affect her preoccupation. Her countenance, a natural carnation slightly embrowned by the season, had deepened its tinge with the beating of the rain-drops; and her hair, which the pressure of the cows' flanks had, as usual, caused to tumble down from its fastenings and stray beyond the curtain of her calico bonnet, was made clammy by the moisture, till it hardly was better than seaweed. "I ought not to have come, I suppose," she murmured, looking at the sky. "I am sorry for the rain," said he. "But how glad I am to have you here!" Remote Egdon disappeared by degree behind the liquid gauze. The evening grew darker, and the roads being crossed by gates, it was not safe to drive faster than at a walking pace. The air was rather chill. "I am so afraid you will get cold, with nothing upon your arms and shoulders," he said. "Creep close to me, and perhaps the drizzle won't hurt you much. I should be sorrier still if I did not think that the rain might be helping me." She imperceptibly crept closer, and he wrapped round them both a large piece of sail-cloth, which was sometimes used to keep the sun off the milk-cans. Tess held it from slipping off him as well as herself, Clare's hands being occupied. "Now we are all right again. Ah--no we are not! It runs down into my neck a little, and it must still more into yours. That's better. Your arms are like wet marble, Tess. Wipe them in the cloth. Now, if you stay quiet, you will not get another drop. Well, dear--about that question of mine--that long-standing question?" The only reply that he could hear for a little while was the smack of the horse's hoofs on the moistening road, and the cluck of the milk in the cans behind them. "Do you remember what you said?" "I do," she replied. "Before we get home, mind." "I'll try." He said no more then. As they drove on, the fragment of an old manor house of Caroline date rose against the sky, and was in due course passed and left behind. "That," he observed, to entertain her, "is an interesting old place--one of the several seats which belonged to an ancient Norman family formerly of great influence in this county, the d'Urbervilles. I never pass one of their residences without thinking of them. There is something very sad in the extinction of a family of renown, even if it was fierce, domineering, feudal renown." "Yes," said Tess. They crept along towards a point in the expanse of shade just at hand at which a feeble light was beginning to assert its presence, a spot where, by day, a fitful white streak of steam at intervals upon the dark green background denoted intermittent moments of contact between their secluded world and modern life. Modern life stretched out its steam feeler to this point three or four times a day, touched the native existences, and quickly withdrew its feeler again, as if what it touched had been uncongenial. They reached the feeble light, which came from the smoky lamp of a little railway station; a poor enough terrestrial star, yet in one sense of more importance to Talbothays Dairy and mankind than the celestial ones to which it stood in such humiliating contrast. The cans of new milk were unladen in the rain, Tess getting a little shelter from a neighbouring holly tree. Then there was the hissing of a train, which drew up almost silently upon the wet rails, and the milk was rapidly swung can by can into the truck. The light of the engine flashed for a second upon Tess Durbeyfield's figure, motionless under the great holly tree. No object could have looked more foreign to the gleaming cranks and wheels than this unsophisticated girl, with the round bare arms, the rainy face and hair, the suspended attitude of a friendly leopard at pause, the print gown of no date or fashion, and the cotton bonnet drooping on her brow. She mounted again beside her lover, with a mute obedience characteristic of impassioned natures at times, and when they had wrapped themselves up over head and ears in the sailcloth again, they plunged back into the now thick night. Tess was so receptive that the few minutes of contact with the whirl of material progress lingered in her thought. "Londoners will drink it at their breakfasts to-morrow, won't they?" she asked. "Strange people that we have never seen." "Yes--I suppose they will. Though not as we send it. When its strength has been lowered, so that it may not get up into their heads." "Noble men and noble women, ambassadors and centurions, ladies and tradeswomen, and babies who have never seen a cow." "Well, yes; perhaps; particularly centurions." "Who don't know anything of us, and where it comes from; or think how we two drove miles across the moor to-night in the rain that it might reach 'em in time?" "We did not drive entirely on account of these precious Londoners; we drove a little on our own--on account of that anxious matter which you will, I am sure, set at rest, dear Tess. Now, permit me to put it in this way. You belong to me already, you know; your heart, I mean. Does it not?" "You know as well as I. O yes--yes!" "Then, if your heart does, why not your hand?" "My only reason was on account of you--on account of a question. I have something to tell you--" "But suppose it to be entirely for my happiness, and my worldly convenience also?" "O yes; if it is for your happiness and worldly convenience. But my life before I came here--I want--" "Well, it is for my convenience as well as my happiness. If I have a very large farm, either English or colonial, you will be invaluable as a wife to me; better than a woman out of the largest mansion in the country. So please--please, dear Tessy, disabuse your mind of the feeling that you will stand in my way." "But my history. I want you to know it--you must let me tell you--you will not like me so well!" "Tell it if you wish to, dearest. This precious history then. Yes, I was born at so and so, Anno Domini--" "I was born at Marlott," she said, catching at his words as a help, lightly as they were spoken. "And I grew up there. And I was in the Sixth Standard when I left school, and they said I had great aptness, and should make a good teacher, so it was settled that I should be one. But there was trouble in my family; father was not very industrious, and he drank a little." "Yes, yes. Poor child! Nothing new." He pressed her more closely to his side. "And then--there is something very unusual about it--about me. I--I was--" Tess's breath quickened. "Yes, dearest. Never mind." "I--I--am not a Durbeyfield, but a d'Urberville--a descendant of the same family as those that owned the old house we passed. And--we are all gone to nothing!" "A d'Urberville!--Indeed! And is that all the trouble, dear Tess?" "Yes," she answered faintly. "Well--why should I love you less after knowing this?" "I was told by the dairyman that you hated old families." He laughed. "Well, it is true, in one sense. I do hate the aristocratic principle of blood before everything, and do think that as reasoners the only pedigrees we ought to respect are those spiritual ones of the wise and virtuous, without regard to corporal paternity. But I am extremely interested in this news--you can have no idea how interested I am! Are you not interested yourself in being one of that well-known line?" "No. I have thought it sad--especially since coming here, and knowing that many of the hills and fields I see once belonged to my father's people. But other hills and field belonged to Retty's people, and perhaps others to Marian's, so that I don't value it particularly." "Yes--it is surprising how many of the present tillers of the soil were once owners of it, and I sometimes wonder that a certain school of politicians don't make capital of the circumstance; but they don't seem to know it... I wonder that I did not see the resemblance of your name to d'Urberville, and trace the manifest corruption. And this was the carking secret!" She had not told. At the last moment her courage had failed her; she feared his blame for not telling him sooner; and her instinct of self-preservation was stronger than her candour. "Of course," continued the unwitting Clare, "I should have been glad to know you to be descended exclusively from the long-suffering, dumb, unrecorded rank and file of the English nation, and not from the self-seeking few who made themselves powerful at the expense of the rest. But I am corrupted away from that by my affection for you, Tess (he laughed as he spoke), and made selfish likewise. For your own sake I rejoice in your descent. Society is hopelessly snobbish, and this fact of your extraction may make an appreciable difference to its acceptance of you as my wife, after I have made you the well-read woman that I mean to make you. My mother too, poor soul, will think so much better of you on account of it. Tess, you must spell your name correctly--d'Urberville--from this very day." "I like the other way rather best." "But you MUST, dearest! Good heavens, why dozens of mushroom millionaires would jump at such a possession! By the bye, there's one of that kidney who has taken the name--where have I heard of him?--Up in the neighbourhood of The Chase, I think. Why, he is the very man who had that rumpus with my father I told you of. What an odd coincidence!" "Angel, I think I would rather not take the name! It is unlucky, perhaps!" She was agitated. "Now then, Mistress Teresa d'Urberville, I have you. Take my name, and so you will escape yours! The secret is out, so why should you any longer refuse me?" "If it is SURE to make you happy to have me as your wife, and you feel that you do wish to marry me, VERY, VERY much--" "I do, dearest, of course!" "I mean, that it is only your wanting me very much, and being hardly able to keep alive without me, whatever my offences, that would make me feel I ought to say I will." "You will--you do say it, I know! You will be mine for ever and ever." He clasped her close and kissed her. "Yes!" She had no sooner said it than she burst into a dry hard sobbing, so violent that it seemed to rend her. Tess was not a hysterical girl by any means, and he was surprised. "Why do you cry, dearest?" "I can't tell--quite!--I am so glad to think--of being yours, and making you happy!" "But this does not seem very much like gladness, my Tessy!" "I mean--I cry because I have broken down in my vow! I said I would die unmarried!" "But, if you love me you would like me to be your husband?" "Yes, yes, yes! But O, I sometimes wish I had never been born!" "Now, my dear Tess, if I did not know that you are very much excited, and very inexperienced, I should say that remark was not very complimentary. How came you to wish that if you care for me? Do you care for me? I wish you would prove it in some way." "How can I prove it more than I have done?" she cried, in a distraction of tenderness. "Will this prove it more?" She clasped his neck, and for the first time Clare learnt what an impassioned woman's kisses were like upon the lips of one whom she loved with all her heart and soul, as Tess loved him. "There--now do you believe?" she asked, flushed, and wiping her eyes. "Yes. I never really doubted--never, never!" So they drove on through the gloom, forming one bundle inside the sail-cloth, the horse going as he would, and the rain driving against them. She had consented. She might as well have agreed at first. The "appetite for joy" which pervades all creation, that tremendous force which sways humanity to its purpose, as the tide sways the helpless weed, was not to be controlled by vague lucubrations over the social rubric. "I must write to my mother," she said. "You don't mind my doing that?" "Of course not, dear child. You are a child to me, Tess, not to know how very proper it is to write to your mother at such a time, and how wrong it would be in me to object. Where does she live?" "At the same place--Marlott. On the further side of Blackmoor Vale." "Ah, then I HAVE seen you before this summer--" "Yes; at that dance on the green; but you would not dance with me. O, I hope that is of no ill-omen for us now!"

CHAPTER 30

https://web.archive.org/web/20180820050202/http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmTessD40.asp

One evening as Tess and Angel transport the milk, Angel points out an old mansion that used to belong to the D'Urberville family. Tess takes it as a sign that it is time to tell Angel about her past. When he begs her again to marry him, she says that she needs to tell him some things about herself. She discloses that her ancestors are D'Urbervilles; she assumes Angel will be upset, for she knows his dislike towards old families and the D'Urbervilles in particular. Angel dismisses her apprehension and proclaims that her background will not affect their love. He also believes that such a relationship will impress his mother and further Tess's cause with her. Tess's strong desire to reveal the rest of her story without prevarication weakens. She tells Angel she will marry him and then begins to cry. Angel kisses his fiancee passionately and then recalls that he has seen her before at the dance in Marlott.

Notes In this chapter, a panicked Tess tries to disclose all of her past misadventure to Angel, but her courage fails her. Instead, she only manages to tell him that she is from the D'Urberville family, a fact that she thinks may discourage Angel's love. Quite the opposite happens; Angel realizes that this association will make Tess more welcomed as his wife by his mother and society. Undone by this reaction on Angel's part, Tess looses all resolve to stay single. She tells Angel she will marry him. Angel rejoices at her acceptance. Tess, however, sobs over breaking her vow of remaining single and failing to reveal her past. Angel is perplexed by her tears but is delighted in her passionate kiss. It begins to rain on the engaged couple. They are quickly drenched, but proclaim that their love will be able to face all the odds. The reader is not so certain