Mosses from an old manse
another. Pandora’s box, without the lid, stood next, containing nothing
but the girdle of Venus, which had been carelessly flung into it. A
bundle of birch-rods which had been used by Shenstone’s schoolmistress
were tied up with the Countess of Salisbury’s garter. I know not which
to value most, a roc’s egg as big as an ordinary hogshead, or the shell
of the egg which Columbus set upon its end. Perhaps the most delicate
article in the whole museum was Queen Mab’s chariot, which, to guard it
from the touch of meddlesome fingers, was placed under a glass tumbler.
Several of the shelves were occupied by specimens of entomology.
Feeling but little interest in the science, I noticed only Anacreon’s
grasshopper, and a bumblebee which had been presented to the virtuoso
by Ralph Waldo Emerson.
In the part of the hall which we had now reached I observed a curtain,
that descended from the ceiling to the floor in voluminous folds, of a
depth, richness, and magnificence which I had never seen equalled. It
was not to be doubted that this splendid though dark and solemn veil
concealed a portion of the museum even richer in wonders than that
through which I had already passed; but, on my attempting to grasp the
edge of the curtain and draw it aside, it proved to be an illusive
picture.
“You need not blush,” remarked the virtuoso; “for that same curtain
deceived Zeuxis. It is the celebrated painting of Parrhasius.”
In a range with the curtain there were a number of other choice
pictures by artists of ancient days. Here was the famous cluster of
grapes by Zeuxis, so admirably depicted that it seemed as if the ripe
juice were bursting forth. As to the picture of the old woman by the
same illustrious painter, and which was so ludicrous that he himself
died with laughing at it, I cannot say that it particularly moved my
risibility. Ancient humor seems to have little power over modern
muscles. Here, also, was the horse painted by Apelles which living
horses neighed at; his first portrait of Alexander the Great, and his
last unfinished picture of Venus asleep. Each of these works of art,
together with others by Parrhasius, Timanthes, Polygnotus, Apollodorus,
Pausias, and Pamplulus, required more time and study than I could
bestow for the adequate perception of their merits. I shall therefore
leave them undescribed and uncriticised, nor attempt to settle the
question of superiority between ancient and modern art.
For the same reason I shall pass lightly over the specimens of antique
sculpture which this indefatigable and fortunate virtuoso had dug out
of the dust of fallen empires. Here was AEtion’s cedar statue of
AEsculapius, much decayed, and Alcon’s iron statue of Hercules,
lamentably rusted. Here was the statue of Victory, six feet high, which
the Jupiter Olympus of Phidias had held in his hand. Here was a
forefinger of the Colossus of Rhodes, seven feet in length. Here was
the Venus Urania of Phidias, and other images of male and female beauty
or grandeur, wrought by sculptors who appeared never to have debased
their souls by the sight of any meaner forms than those of gods or
godlike mortals. But the deep simplicity of these great works was not
to be comprehended by a mind excited and disturbed, as mine was, by the
various objects that had recently been presented to it. I therefore
turned away with merely a passing glance, resolving on some future
occasion to brood over each individual statue and picture until my
inmost spirit should feel their excellence. In this department, again,
I noticed the tendency to whimsical combinations and ludicrous
analogies which seemed to influence many of the arrangements of the
museum. The wooden statue so well known as the Palladium of Troy was
placed in close apposition with the wooden head of General Jackson,
which was stolen a few years since from the bows of the frigate
Constitution.
We had now completed the circuit of the spacious hall, and found
ourselves again near the door. Feeling somewhat wearied with the survey
of so many novelties and antiquities, I sat down upon Cowper’s sofa,
while the virtuoso threw himself carelessly into Rabelais’s easychair.
Casting my eyes upon the opposite wall, I was surprised to perceive the
shadow of a man flickering unsteadily across the wainscot, and looking
as if it were stirred by some breath of air that found its way through
the door or windows. No substantial figure was visible from which this
shadow might be thrown; nor, had there been such, was there any
sunshine that would have caused it to darken upon the wall.
“It is Peter Schlemihl’s shadow,” observed the virtuoso, “and one of
the most valuable articles in my collection.”
“Methinks a shadow would have made a fitting doorkeeper to such a
museum,” said I; “although, indeed, yonder figure has something strange
and fantastic about him, which suits well enough with many of the
impressions which I have received here. Pray, who is he?”
While speaking, I gazed more scrutinizingly than before at the
antiquated presence of the person who had admitted me, and who still
sat on his bench with the same restless aspect, and dim, confused,
questioning anxiety that I had noticed on my first entrance. At this
moment he looked eagerly towards us, and, half starting from his seat,
addressed me.
“I beseech you, kind sir,” said he, in a cracked, melancholy tone,
“have pity on the most unfortunate man in the world. For Heaven’s sake,
answer me a single question! Is this the town of Boston?”
“You have recognized him now,” said the virtuoso. “It is Peter Rugg,
the missing man. I chanced to meet him the other day still in search of
Boston, and conducted him hither; and, as he could not succeed in
finding his friends, I have taken him into my service as doorkeeper. He
is somewhat too apt to ramble, but otherwise a man of trust and
integrity.”
“And might I venture to ask,” continued I, “to whom am I indebted for
this afternoon’s gratification?”
The virtuoso, before replying, laid his hand upon an antique dart, or
javelin, the rusty steel head of winch seemed to have been blunted, as
if it had encountered the resistance of a tempered shield, or
breastplate.
“My name has not been without its distinction in the world for a longer
period than that of any other man alive,” answered he. “Yet many doubt
of my existence; perhaps you will do so to-morrow. This dart which I
hold in my hand was once grim Death’s own weapon. It served him well
for the space of four thousand years; but it fell blunted, as you see,
when he directed it against my breast.”
These words were spoken with the calm and cold courtesy of manner that
had characterized this singular personage throughout our interview. I
fancied, it is true, that there was a bitterness indefinably mingled
with his tone, as of one cut off from natural sympathies and blasted
with a doom that had been inflicted on no other human being, and by the
results of which he had ceased to be human. Yet, withal, it seemed one
of the most terrible consequences of that doom that the victim no
longer regarded it as a calamity, but had finally accepted it as the
greatest good that could have befallen him.
“You are the Wandering Jew!” exclaimed I.
The virtuoso bowed without emotion of any kind; for, by centuries of
custom, he had almost lost the sense of strangeness in his fate, and
was but imperfectly conscious of the astonishment and awe with which it
affected such as are capable of death.
“Your doom is indeed a fearful one!” said I, with irrepressible feeling
and a frankness that afterwards startled me; “yet perhaps the ethereal
spirit is not entirely extinct under all this corrupted or frozen mass
of earthly life. Perhaps the immortal spark may yet be rekindled by a
breath of heaven. Perhaps you may yet be permitted to die before it is
too late to live eternally. You have my prayers for such a
consummation. Farewell.”
“Your prayers will be in vain,” replied he, with a smile of cold
triumph. “My destiny is linked with the realities of earth. You are
welcome to your visions and shadows of a future state; but give me what
I can see, and touch, and understand, and I ask no more.”
“It is indeed too late,” thought I. “The soul is dead within him.”
Struggling between pity and horror, I extended my hand, to which the
virtuoso gave his own, still with the habitual courtesy of a man of the
world, but without a single heart-throb of human brotherhood. The touch
seemed like ice, yet I know not whether morally or physically. As I
departed, he bade me observe that the inner door of the hall was
constructed with the ivory leaves of the gateway through which Aeneas
and the Sibyl had been dismissed from Hades.