CHAPTER XXI.
That evening Rufinus was sitting in the garden with his wife anddaughter and their friend Philippus. Paula, too, was there, and fromtime to time she stroked Pulcheria's silky golden hair, for the girl hadseated herself at her feet, leaning her head against Paula's knee.
The moon was full, and it was so light out of doors that they could seeeach other plainly, so Rufinus' proposition that they should remain towatch an eclipse which was to take place an hour before midnight foundall the more ready acceptance because the air was pleasant. The menhad been discussing the expected phenomenon, lamenting that the Churchshould still lend itself to the superstitions of the populace byregarding it as of evil omen, and organizing a penitential processionfor the occasion to implore God to avert all ill. Rufinus declared thatit was blasphemy against the Almighty to interpret events happening inthe course of eternal law and calculable beforehand, as a threateningsign from Him; as though man's deserts had any connection with thecourses of the sun and moon. The Bishop and all the priests of theprovince were to head the procession, and thus a simple naturalphenomenon was forced in the minds of the people into a significance itdid not possess.
"And if the little comet which my old foster father discovered last weekcontinues to increase," added the physician, "so that its tail spreadsover a portion of the sky, the panic will reach its highest pitch; I cansee already that they will behave like mad creatures."
"But a comet really does portend war, drought, plague, and famine," saidPulcheria, with full conviction; and Paula added:
"So I have always believed."
"But very wrongly," replied the leech. "There are a thousand reasonsto the contrary; and it is a crime to confirm the mob in such asuperstition. It fills them with grief and alarms; and, would youbelieve it--such anguish of mind, especially when the Nile is so lowand there is more sickness than usual, gives rise to numberless forms ofdisease? We shall have our hands full, Rufinus."
"I am yours to command," replied the old man. "But at the same time,if the tailed wanderer must do some mischief, I would rather it shouldbreak folks' arms and legs than turn their brains."
"What a wish!" exclaimed Paula. "But you often say things--and I seethings about you too--which seem to me extraordinary. Yesterday youpromised...."
"To explain to you why I gather about me so many of God's creatures whohave to struggle under the burden of life as cripples, or with injuredlimbs."
"Just so," replied Paula. "Nothing can be more truly merciful than torender life bearable to such hapless beings...."
"But still, you think," interrupted the eager old man, "that this noblemotive alone would hardly account for the old oddity's riding his hobbyso hard.--Well, you are right. From my earliest youth the structure ofthe bones in man and beast has captivated me exceedingly; and just ascollectors of horns, when once they have a complete series of everyvariety of stag, roe, and gazelle, set to work with fresh zeal to finddeformed or monstrous growths, so I have found pleasure in studyingevery kind of malformation and injury in the bones of men and beasts."
"And to remedy them," added Philippus. "It has been his passion fromchildhood.
"And the passion has grown upon me since I broke my own hip boneand know what it means," the old man went on. "With the help of myfellow-student there, from a mere dilettante I became a practisedsurgeon; and, what is more, I am one of those who serve Esculapius atmy own expense. However, there are accessory reasons for which I havechosen such strange companions: deformed slaves are cheap and besidesthat, certain investigations afford me inestimable and peculiarsatisfaction. But this cannot interest a young girl."
"Indeed it does!" cried Paula. "So far as I have understood Philippuswhen he explains some details of natural history...."
"Stay," laughed Rufinus, "our friend will take good care not to explainthis. He regards it as folly, and all he will admit is that no surgeonor student could wish for better, more willing, or more amusinghouse-mates than my cripples."
"They are grateful to you," cried Paula.
"Grateful?" asked the old man. "That is true sometimes, no doubt; still,gratitude is a tribute on which no wise man ever reckons. Now I havetold you enough; for the sake of Philippus we will let the rest pass."
"No, no," said Paula putting up entreating hands, and Rufinus answeredgaily:
"Who can refuse you anything? I will cut it short, but you must pay goodheed.--Well then Man is the standard of all things. Do you understandthat?"
"Yes, I often hear you say so. Things you mean are only what they seemto us."
"To us, you say, because we--you and I and the rest of us here--aresound in body and mind. And we must regard all things--being God'shandiwork--as by nature sound and normal. Thus we are justified inrequiring that man, who gives the standard for them shall, first andforemost, himself be sound and normal. Can a carpenter measure straightplanks properly with a crooked or sloping rod?"
"Certainly not."
"Then you will understand how I came to ask myself: 'Do sickly,crippled, and deformed men measure things by a different standard tothat of sound men? And might it not be a useful task to investigate howtheir estimates differ from ours?'"
"And have your researches among your cripples led to any results?"
"To many important ones," the old man declared; but Philippusinterrupted him with a loud: "Oho!" adding that his friend was intoo great a hurry to deduce laws from individual cases. Many of hisobservations were, no doubt, of considerable interest.... Here Rufinusbroke in with some vehemence, and the discussion would have become adispute if Paula had not intervened by requesting her zealous host togive her the results, at any rate, of his studies.
"I find," said Rufinus very confidently, as he stroked down his longbeard, "that they are not merely shrewd because their faculties areearly sharpened to make up by mental qualifications for what they lackin physical advantages; they are also witty, like AEesop the fabulistand Besa the Egyptian god, who, as I have been told by our old friendHorus, from whom we derive all our Egyptian lore, presided among thoseheathen over festivity, jesting, and wit, and also over the toiletof women. This shows the subtle observation of the ancients; for thehunchback whose body is bent, applies a crooked standard to thingsin general. His keen insight often enables him to measure life asthe majority of men do, that is by a straight rule; but in some happymoments when he yields to natural impulse he makes the straight crookedand the crooked straight; and this gives rise to wit, which onlyconsists in looking at things obliquely and--setting them askew as itwere. You have only to talk to my hump-backed gardener Gibbus, or listento what he says. When he is sitting with the rest of our people in anevening, they all laugh as soon as he opens his mouth.--And why? Becausehis conformation makes him utter nothing but paradoxes.--You know whatthey are?"
"Certainly."
"And you, Pul?"
"No, Father."
"You are too straight-nay, and so is your simple soul, to know what thething is! Well, listen then: It would be a paradox, for instance, ifI were to say to the Bishop as he marches past in procession: 'You aregodless out of sheer piety;' or if I were to say to Paula, by way ofexcuse for all the flattery which I and your mother offered her justnow: 'Our incense was nauseous for very sweetness.'--These paradoxes,when examined, are truths in a crooked form, and so they best suit thedeformed. Do you understand?"
"Certainly," said Paula.
"And you, Pul?"
"I am not quite sure. I should be better pleased to be simply told: 'Weought not to have made such flattering speeches; they may vex a younggirl.'"
"Very good, my straightforward child," laughed her father. "But look,there is the man! Here, good Gibbus--come here!--Now, just consider:supposing you had flattered some one so grossly that you had offendedhim instead of pleasing him: How would you explain the state of affairsin telling me of it?"
The gardener, a short, square man, with a huge hump but a clever faceand good features, reflected a minute and then replied: "I wa
nted tomake an ass smell at some roses and I put thistles under his nose."
"Capital!" cried Paula; and as Gibbus turned away, laughing to himself,the physician said:
"One might almost envy the man his hump. But yet, fair Paula, I thinkwe have some straight-limbed folks who can make use of such crookedphrases, too, when occasion serves."
But Rufinus spoke before Paula could reply, referring her to his Essayon the deformed in soul and body; and then he went on vehemently:
"I call you all to witness, does not Baste, the lame woman, restrict herviews to the lower aspect of things, to the surface of the earth indeed?She has one leg much shorter than the other, and it is only with muchpains that we have contrived that it should carry her. To limp alongat all she is forced always to look down at the ground, and what is theconsequence? She can never tell you what is hanging to a tree, andabout three weeks since I asked her under a clear sky and a waning moonwhether the moon had been shining the evening before and she could nottell me, though she had been sitting out of doors with the otherstill quite late, evening after evening. I have noticed, too, that shescarcely recognizes men who are rather tall, though she may have seenthem three or four times. Her standard has fallen short-like her leg.Now, am I right or wrong?"
"In this instance you are right," replied Philippus, "still, I know somelame people..."
And again words ran high between the friends; Pulcheria, however, put anend to the discussion this time, by exclaiming enthusiastically:
"Baste is the best and most good-natured soul in the whole house!"
"Because she looks into her own heart," replied Rufinus. "She knowsherself; and, because she knows how painful pain is, she treats otherstenderly. Do you remember, Philippus, how we disputed after thatanatomical lecture we heard together at Caesarea?"
"Perfectly well," said the leech, "and later life has but confirmed theopinion I then held. There is no less true or less just saying than theLatin motto: 'Mens sana in corpore sano,' as it is generally interpretedto mean that a healthy soul is only to be found in a healthy body. Asthe expression of a wish it may pass, but I have often felt inclined todoubt even that. It has been my lot to meet with a strength of mind,a hopefulness, and a thankfulness for the smallest mercies in thesickliest bodies, and at the same time a delicacy of feeling, a wisereserve, and an undeviating devotion to lofty things such as I havenever seen in a healthy frame. The body is but the tenement of the soul,and just as we find righteous men and sinners, wise men and fools, alikein the palace and the hovel--nay, and often see truer worth in a cottagethan in the splendid mansions of the great--so we may discover noblesouls both in the ugly and the fair, in the healthy and the infirm, andmost frequently, perhaps, in the least vigorous. We should be carefulhow we go about repeating such false axioms, for they can only do harmto those who have a heavy burthen to bear through life as it is. In myopinion a hunchback's thoughts are as straightforward as an athlete's;or do you imagine that if a mother were to place her new-born childrenin a spiral chamber and let them grow up in it, they could not tendupwards as all men do by nature?"
"Your comparison limps," cried Rufinus, "and needs setting to rights. Ifwe are not to find ourselves in open antagonism...."
"You must keep the peace," Joanna put in addressing her husband; andbefore Rufinus could retort, Paula had asked him with frank simplicity:
"How old are you, my worthy host?"
"Your arrival at my house blessed the second day of my seventieth year,"replied Rufinus with a courteous bow. His wife shook her finger at him,exclaiming:
"I wonder whether you have not a secret hump? Such fine phrases..."
"He is catching the style from his cripples," said Paula laughing athim. "But now it is your turn, friend Philippus. Your exposition wasworthy of an antique sage, and it struck me--for the sake of Rufinushere I will not say convinced me. I respect you--and yet I should liketo know how old...."
"I shall soon be thirty-one," said Philippus, anticipating her question.
"That is an honest answer," observed Dame Joanna. "At your age many aman clings to his twenties."
"Why?" asked Pulcheria.
"Well," said her mother, "only because there are some girls who think aman of thirty too old to be attractive."
"Stupid creatures," answered Pulcheria. "Let them find me a youngman who is more lovable than my father; and if Philippus--yes you,Philippus--were ten or twenty years over nine and twenty, would thatmake you less clever or kind?"
"Not less ugly, at any rate," said the physician. Pulcheria laughed, butwith some annoyance, as though she had herself been the object of theremark. "You are not a bit ugly!" she exclaimed. "Any one who says sohas no eyes. And you will hear nothing said of you but that you are atall, fine man!"
As the warm-hearted girl thus spoke, defending her friend againsthimself, Paula stroked her golden hair and added to the physician:
"Pulcheria's father is so far right that she, at any rate, measures menby a true and straight standard. Note that, Philippus!--But do not takemy questioning ill.--I cannot help wondering how a man of one and thirtyand one of seventy should have been studying in the high schools at thesame time? The moon will not be eclipsed for a long time yet--how brightand clear it is!--So you, Rufinus, who have wandered so far through thewide world, if you would do me a great pleasure, will tell us somethingof your past life and how you came to settle in Memphis."
"His history?" cried Joanna. "If he were to tell it, in all its detailsfrom beginning to end, the night would wane and breakfast would getcold. He has had as many adventures as travelled Odysseus. But tell ussomething husband; you know there is nothing we should like better."
"I must be off to my duties," said the leech, and when he had takena friendly leave of the others and bidden farewell to Paula with lesseffusiveness than of late, Rufinus began his story.
"I was born in Alexandria, where, at that time, commerce and industrystill flourished. My father was an armorer; above two hundred slaves andfree laborers were employed in his work-shops. He required the finestmetal, and commonly procured it by way of Massilia from Britain. On oneoccasion he himself went to that remote island in a friend's ship, andhe there met my mother. Her ruddy gold hair, which Pul has inherited,seems to have bewitched him and, as the handsome foreigner pleased herwell--for men like my father are hard to match nowadays--she turnedChristian for his sake and came home with him. They neither of them everregretted it; for though she was a quiet woman, and to her dying dayspoke Greek like a foreigner, the old man often said she was his bestcounsellor. At the same time she was so soft-hearted, that she couldnot bear that any living creature should suffer, and though she lookedkeenly after everything at the hearth and loom, she could never seea fowl, a goose, or a pig slaughtered. And I have inherited herweakness--shall I say 'alas!' or 'thank God?'
"I had two elder brothers who both had to help my father, and whowere to carry on the business. When I was ten years old my calling wasdecided on. My mother would have liked to make a priest of me and atthat time I should have consented joyfully; but my father would notagree, and as we had an uncle who was making a great deal of money asa Rhetor, my father accepted a proposal from him that I should devotemyself to that career. So I went from one teacher to another and madegood progress in the schools.
"Till my twentieth year I continued to live with my parents, and duringmy many hours of leisure I was free to do or leave undone whatever I hada fancy for; and this was always something medical, if that is not toobig a word. I was but a lad of twelve when this fancy first took me, andthat through pure accident. Of course I was fond of wandering about theworkshops, and there they kept a magpie, a quaint little bird, which mymother had fed out of compassion. It could say 'Blockhead,' and callmy name and a few other words, and it seemed to like the noise, for italways would fly off to where the smiths were hammering and filing theirloudest, and whenever it perched close to one of the anvils there weresure to be mirthful faces over the shaping and scraping and polis
hing.For many years its sociable ways made it a favorite; but one day it gotcaught in a vice and its left leg was broken. Poor little creature!"
The old man stooped to wipe his eyes unseen, but he went on withoutpausing:
"It fell on its back and looked at me so pathetically that I snatchedthe tongs out of the bellows-man's hand--for he was going to put an endto its sufferings in all kindness--and, picking it up gently, I made upmy mind I would cure it. Then I carried the bird into my own room, andto keep it quiet that it might not hurt itself, I tied it down to aframe that I contrived, straightened its little leg, warmed the injuredbone by sucking it, and strapped it to little wooden splints. And beholdit really set: the bird got quite well and fluttered about the workshopsagain as sound as before, and whenever it saw me it would perch upon myshoulder and peck very gently at my hair with its sharp beak.
"From that moment I could have found it in me to break the legs of everyhen in the yard, that I might set them again; but I thought of somethingbetter. I went to the barbers and told them that if any one had a bird,a dog, or a cat, with a broken limb, he might bring it to me, and thatI was prepared to cure all these injuries gratis; they might tell alltheir customers. The very next day I had a patient brought me: a blackhound, with tan spots over his eyes, whose leg had been smashed by abadly-aimed spear: I can see him now! Others followed; feathered orfour-footed sufferers; and this was the beginning of my surgical career.The invalid birds on the trees I still owe to my old allies the barbers.I only occasionally take beasts in hand. The lame children, whom yousaw in the garden, come to me from poor parents who cannot afford asurgeon's aid. The merry, curly-headed boy who brought you a rose justnow is to go home again in a few days.--But to return to the story of myyouth.
"The more serious events which gave my life this particular biasoccurred in my twentieth year, when I had already left even the highschool behind me; nor was I fully carried away by their influence tillafter my uncle had procured me several opportunities of proving myproficiency in my calling. I may say without vanity that my speeches wonapproval; but I was revolted by the pompous, flowery bombast, withoutwhich I should have been hissed down, and though my parents rejoicedwhen I went home from Niku, Arsmoe, or some other little provincialtown, with laurel-wreaths and gold pieces, to myself I always seemedan impostor. Still, for my father's sake, I dared not give up myprofession, although I hated more and more the task of praising peopleto the skies whom I neither loved nor respected, and of shedding tearsof pathos while all the time I was minded to laugh.
"I had plenty of time to myself, and as I did not lack courage and heldstoutly to our Greek confession, I was always to be found where therewas any stir or contention between the various sects. They generallypassed off with nothing worse than bruises and scratches, but now andthen swords were drawn. On one occasion thousands came forth to meetthousands, and the Prefect called out the troops--all Greeks--to restoreorder by force. A massacre ensued in which thousands were killed. Icould not describe it! Such scenes were not rare, and the fury and greedof the mob were often directed against the Jews by the machinations ofthe creatures of the archbishop and the government. The things I sawthere were so horrible, so shocking, that the tongue refuses to tellthem; but one poor Jewess, whose husband the wretches--our fellowChristians--killed, and then pillaged the house, I have never forgotten!A soldier dragged her down by her hair, while a ruffian snatched thechild from her breast and, holding it by its feet, dashed its skullagainst the wall before her eyes--as you might slash a wet cloth againsta pillar to dry it--I shall never forget that handsome young mother andher child; they come before me in my dreams at night even now.
"All these things I saw; and I shuddered to behold God's creatures,beings endowed with reason, persecuting their fellows, plunging theminto misery, tearing them limb from limb--and why? Merciful Saviour,why? For sheer hatred--as sure as man is the standard for allthings--merely carried away by a hideous impulse to spite their neighborfor not thinking as they do--nay, simply for not being themselves--tohurt him, insult him, work him woe. And these fanatics, these armieswho raised the standard of ruthlessness, of extermination, ofbloodthirstiness, were Christians, were baptized in the name of Him whobids us forgive our enemies, who enlarged the borders of love from thehome and the city and the state to include all mankind; who raised theadulteress from the dust, who took children into his arms, and wouldhave more joy over a sinner who repents than over ninety and nine justpersons!--Blood, blood, was what they craved; and did not the doctrineof Him whose followers they boastfully called themselves grow out of theblood of Him who shed it for all men alike,--just as that lotos flowergrows out of the clear water in the marble tank? And it was the highestguardians and keepers of this teaching of mercy, who goaded on thefury of the mob: Patriarchs, bishops, priests and deacons--instead ofpointing to the picture of the Shepherd who tenderly carries the lostsheep and brings it home to the fold.
"My own times seemed to me the worst that had ever been; aye, and--assurely as man is the standard of all things--so they are! for love isturned to hatred, mercy to implacable hardheartedness. The thrones notonly of the temporal but of the spiritual rulers, are dripping withthe blood of their fellow-men. Emperors and bishops set the example;subjects and churchmen follow it. The great, the leading men of thestruggle are copied by the small, by the peaceful candidates forspiritual benefices. All that I saw as a man, in the open streets, I hadalready seen as a boy both in the low and high schools. Every doctrinehas its adherents; the man who casts in his lot with Cneius is hated byCaius, who forthwith speaks and writes to no other end than to vex andput down Cneius, and give him pain. Each for his part strives hisutmost to find out faults in his neighbor and to put him in the pillory,particularly if his antagonist is held the greater man, or is likelyto overtop him. Listen to the girls at the well, to the women at thespindle; no one is sure of applause who cannot tell some evil of theother men or women. Who cares to listen to his neighbor's praises? Theman who hears that his brother is happy at once envies him! Hatred,hatred everywhere! Everywhere the will, the desire, the passion forbringing grief and ruin on others rather than to help them, raise themand heal them!
"That is the spirit of my time; and everything within me revoltedagainst it with sacred wrath. I vowed in my heart that I would live andact differently; that my sole aim should be to succor the unfortunate,to help the wretched, to open my arms to those who had fallen intounmerited contumely, to set the crooked straight for my neighbor, tomend what was broken, to pour in balm, to heal and to save!
"And, thank God! it has been vouchsafed to me in some degree to keepthis vow; and though, later, some whims and a passionate curiosity gotmixed up with my zeal, still, never have I lost sight of the great taskof which I have spoken, since my father's death and since my uncle alsoleft me his large fortune. Then I had done with the Rhetor's art, andtravelled east and west to seek the land where love unites men's heartsand where hatred is only a disease; but as sure as man is the standardof all things, to this day all my endeavors to find it have been invain. Meanwhile I have kept my own house on such a footing that it hasbecome a stronghold of love; in its atmosphere hatred cannot grow, butis nipped in the germ.
"In spite of this I am no saint. I have committed many a folly, many aninjustice; and much of my goods and gold, which I should perhaps havedone better to save for my family, has slipped through my fingers,though in the execution, no doubt, of what I deemed the highest duties.Would you believe it, Paula?--Forgive an old man for such fatherlyfamiliarity with the daughter of Thomas;--hardly five years after mymarriage with this good wife, not long after we had lost our only son, Ileft her and our little daughter, Pul there, for more than two years, tofollow the Emperor Heraclius of my own free will to the war against thePersians who had done me no harm--not, indeed, as a soldier, but as asurgeon eager for experience. To confess the truth I was quite as eagerto see and treat fractures and wounds and injuries in great numbers,as I was to exercise benevolence. I came home wit
h a broken hip-bone,tolerably patched up, and again, a few years later, I could not keepstill in one place. The bird of passage must need drag wife and childfrom the peace of hearth and homestead, and take them to where he couldgo to the high school. A husband, a father, and already grey-headed,I was a singular exception among the youths who sat listening to thelectures and explanations of their teachers; but as sure as man is thestandard of all things, they none of them outdid me in diligence andzeal, though many a one was greatly my superior in gifts and intellect,and among them the foremost was our friend Philippus. Thus it cameabout, noble Paula, that the old man and the youth in his prime werefellow-students; but to this day the senior gladly bows down to hisyoung brother in learning and feeling. To straighten, to comfort, andto heal: this is the aim of his life too. And even I, an old man, whostarted long before Philippus on the same career, often long to callmyself his disciple."
Here Rufinus paused and rose; Paula, too, got up, grasped his handwarmly, and said:
"If I were a man, I would join you! But Philippus has told me that evena woman may be allowed to work with the same purpose.--And now let mebeg of you never to call me anything but Paula--you will not refuse methis favor. I never thought I could be so happy again as I am with you;here my heart is free and whole. Dame Joanna, do you be my mother! Ihave lost the best of fathers, and till I find him again, you, Rufinus,must fill his place!"
"Gladly, gladly!" cried the old man; he clasped both her hands and wenton vivaciously: "And in return I ask you to be an elder sister to Pul.Make that timid little thing such a maiden as you are yourself.--Butlook, children, look up quickly; it is beginning!--Typhon, in the formof a boar, is swallowing the eye of Horns: so the heathen of old in thiscountry used to believe when the moon suffered an eclipse. See how theshadow is covering the bright disk. When the ancients saw this happeningthey used to make a noise, shaking the sistrum with its metal rings,drumming and trumpeting, shouting and yelling, to scare off the evil oneand drive him away. It may be about four hundred years since that lasttook place, but to this day--draw your kerchiefs more closely roundyour heads and come with me to the river--to this day Christians degradethemselves by similar rites. Wherever I have been in Christian lands, Ihave always witnessed the same scenes: our holy faith has, to be sure,demolished the religions of the heathen; but their superstitions havesurvived, and have forced their way through rifts and chinks into ourceremonial. They are marching round now, with the bishop at their head,and you can hear the loud wailing of the women, and the cries ofthe men, drowning the chant of the priests. Only listen! They are aspassionate and agonized in their entreaty as though old Typhon were evennow about to swallow the moon, and the greatest catastrophe was hangingover the world. Aye, as surely as man is the standard of all things,those terrified beings are diseased in mind; and how are we to forgivethose who dare to scare Christians; yes, Christian souls, with thetraditions of heathen folly, and to blind their inward vision?"