The Last Man
from this dread enemy. She told me that she was sure she should
recover. That she had a presentiment, that the tide of calamity which
deluged our unhappy race had now turned. That the remnant would be
preserved, and among them the dear objects of her tender affection; and
that in some selected spot we should wear out our lives together in
pleasant society. “Do not let my state of feebleness deceive you,” she
said; “I feel that I am better; there is a quick life within me, and a
spirit of anticipation that assures me, that I shall continue long to
make a part of this world. I shall throw off this degrading weakness of
body, which infects even my mind with debility, and I shall enter again
on the performance of my duties. I was sorry to leave Windsor: but now
I am weaned from this local attachment; I am content to remove to a
mild climate, which will complete my recovery. Trust me, dearest, I
shall neither leave you, nor my brother, nor these dear children; my
firm determination to remain with you to the last, and to continue to
contribute to your happiness and welfare, would keep me alive, even if
grim death were nearer at hand than he really is.”
I was only half re-assured by these expressions; I could not believe
that the over-quick flow of her blood was a sign of health, or that her
burning cheeks denoted convalescence. But I had no fears of an
immediate catastrophe; nay, I persuaded myself that she would
ultimately recover. And thus cheerfulness reigned in our little
society. Idris conversed with animation on a thousand topics. Her chief
desire was to lead our thoughts from melancholy reflections; so she
drew charming pictures of a tranquil solitude, of a beauteous retreat,
of the simple manners of our little tribe, and of the patriarchal
brotherhood of love, which would survive the ruins of the populous
nations which had lately existed. We shut out from our thoughts the
present, and withdrew our eyes from the dreary landscape we traversed.
Winter reigned in all its gloom. The leafless trees lay without motion
against the dun sky; the forms of frost, mimicking the foliage of
summer, strewed the ground; the paths were overgrown; the unploughed
cornfields were patched with grass and weeds; the sheep congregated at
the threshold of the cottage, the horned ox thrust his head from the
window. The wind was bleak, and frequent sleet or snow-storms, added to
the melancholy appearance wintry nature assumed.
We arrived at Rochester, and an accident caused us to be detained there
a day. During that time, a circumstance occurred that changed our
plans, and which, alas! in its result changed the eternal course of
events, turning me from the pleasant new sprung hope I enjoyed, to an
obscure and gloomy desert. But I must give some little explanation
before I proceed with the final cause of our temporary alteration of
plan, and refer again to those times when man walked the earth
fearless, before Plague had become Queen of the World.
There resided a family in the neighbourhood of Windsor, of very humble
pretensions, but which had been an object of interest to us on account
of one of the persons of whom it was composed. The family of the
Claytons had known better days; but, after a series of reverses, the
father died a bankrupt, and the mother heartbroken, and a confirmed
invalid, retired with her five children to a little cottage between
Eton and Salt Hill. The eldest of these children, who was thirteen
years old, seemed at once from the influence of adversity, to acquire
the sagacity and principle belonging to a more mature age. Her mother
grew worse and worse in health, but Lucy attended on her, and was as a
tender parent to her younger brothers and sisters, and in the meantime
shewed herself so good-humoured, social, and benevolent, that she was
beloved as well as honoured, in her little neighbourhood.
Lucy was besides extremely pretty; so when she grew to be sixteen, it
was to be supposed, notwithstanding her poverty, that she should have
admirers. One of these was the son of a country-curate; he was a
generous, frank-hearted youth, with an ardent love of knowledge, and no
mean acquirements. Though Lucy was untaught, her mother’s conversation
and manners gave her a taste for refinements superior to her present
situation. She loved the youth even without knowing it, except that in
any difficulty she naturally turned to him for aid, and awoke with a
lighter heart every Sunday, because she knew that she would be met and
accompanied by him in her evening walk with her sisters. She had
another admirer, one of the head-waiters at the inn at Salt Hill. He
also was not without pretensions to urbane superiority, such as he
learnt from gentlemen’s servants and waiting-maids, who initiating him
in all the slang of high life below stairs, rendered his arrogant
temper ten times more intrusive. Lucy did not disclaim him—she was
incapable of that feeling; but she was sorry when she saw him approach,
and quietly resisted all his endeavours to establish an intimacy. The
fellow soon discovered that his rival was preferred to him; and this
changed what was at first a chance admiration into a passion, whose
main springs were envy, and a base desire to deprive his competitor of
the advantage he enjoyed over himself.
Poor Lucy’s sad story was but a common one. Her lover’s father died;
and he was left destitute. He accepted the offer of a gentleman to go
to India with him, feeling secure that he should soon acquire an
independence, and return to claim the hand of his beloved. He became
involved in the war carried on there, was taken prisoner, and years
elapsed before tidings of his existence were received in his native
land. In the meantime disastrous poverty came on Lucy. Her little
cottage, which stood looking from its trellice, covered with woodbine
and jessamine, was burnt down; and the whole of their little property
was included in the destruction. Whither betake them? By what exertion
of industry could Lucy procure them another abode? Her mother nearly
bed-rid, could not survive any extreme of famine-struck poverty. At
this time her other admirer stept forward, and renewed his offer of
marriage. He had saved money, and was going to set up a little inn at
Datchet. There was nothing alluring to Lucy in this offer, except the
home it secured to her mother; and she felt more sure of this, since
she was struck by the apparent generosity which occasioned the present
offer. She accepted it; thus sacrificing herself for the comfort and
welfare of her parent.
It was some years after her marriage that we became acquainted with
her. The accident of a storm caused us to take refuge in the inn, where
we witnessed the brutal and quarrelsome behaviour of her husband, and
her patient endurance. Her lot was not a fortunate one. Her first lover
had returned with the hope of making her his own, and met her by
accident, for the first time, as the mistress of his country inn, and
the wife of another. He withdrew despairingly to foreign parts; nothing
went well with him; at last he enlisted, and came back again wounded
and sick, and yet Lucy was debarred from nursing him. Her husband’s
brutal disposition was aggravated by his yielding to the many
temptations held out by his situation, and the consequent
disarrangement of his affairs. Fortunately she had no children; but her
heart was bound up in her brothers and sisters, and these his avarice
and ill temper soon drove from the house; they were dispersed about the
country, earning their livelihood with toil and care. He even shewed an
inclination to get rid of her mother—but Lucy was firm here—she had
sacrificed herself for her; she lived for her —she would not part with
her—if the mother went, she would also go beg bread for her, die with
her, but never desert her. The presence of Lucy was too necessary in
keeping up the order of the house, and in preventing the whole
establishment from going to wreck, for him to permit her to leave him.
He yielded the point; but in all accesses of anger, or in his drunken
fits, he recurred to the old topic, and stung poor Lucy’s heart by
opprobrious epithets bestowed on her parent.
A passion however, if it be wholly pure, entire, and reciprocal, brings
with it its own solace. Lucy was truly, and from the depth of heart,
devoted to her mother; the sole end she proposed to herself in life,
was the comfort and preservation of this parent. Though she grieved for
the result, yet she did not repent of her marriage, even when her lover
returned to bestow competence on her. Three years had intervened, and
how, in their pennyless state, could her mother have existed during
this time? This excellent woman was worthy of her child’s devotion. A
perfect confidence and friendship existed between them; besides, she
was by no means illiterate; and Lucy, whose mind had been in some
degree cultivated by her former lover, now found in her the only person
who could understand and appreciate her. Thus, though suffering, she
was by no means desolate, and when, during fine summer days, she led
her mother into the flowery and shady lanes near their abode, a gleam
of unmixed joy enlightened her countenance; she saw that her parent was
happy, and she knew that this happiness was of her sole creating.
Meanwhile her husband’s affairs grew more and more involved; ruin was
near at hand, and she was about to lose the fruit of all her labours,
when pestilence came to change the aspect of the world. Her husband
reaped benefit from the universal misery; but, as the disaster
encreased, the spirit of lawlessness seized him; he deserted his home
to revel in the luxuries promised him in London, and found there a
grave. Her former lover had been one of the first victims of the
disease. But Lucy continued to live for and in her mother. Her courage
only failed when she dreaded peril for her parent, or feared that death
might prevent her from performing those duties to which she was
unalterably devoted.
When we had quitted Windsor for London, as the previous step to our
final emigration, we visited Lucy, and arranged with her the plan of
her own and her mother’s removal. Lucy was sorry at the necessity which
forced her to quit her native lanes and village, and to drag an infirm
parent from her comforts at home, to the homeless waste of depopulate
earth; but she was too well disciplined by adversity, and of too sweet
a temper, to indulge in repinings at what was inevitable.
Subsequent circumstances, my illness and that of Idris, drove her from
our remembrance; and we called her to mind at last, only to conclude
that she made one of the few who came from Windsor to join the
emigrants, and that she was already in Paris. When we arrived at
Rochester therefore, we were surprised to receive, by a man just come
from Slough, a letter from this exemplary sufferer. His account was,
that, journeying from his home, and passing through Datchet, he was
surprised to see smoke issue from the chimney of the inn, and supposing
that he should find comrades for his journey assembled there, he
knocked and was admitted. There was no one in the house but Lucy, and
her mother; the latter had been deprived of the use of her limbs by an
attack of rheumatism, and so, one by one, all the remaining inhabitants
of the country set forward, leaving them alone. Lucy intreated the man
to stay with her; in a week or two her mother would be better, and they
would then set out; but they must perish, if they were left thus
helpless and forlorn. The man said, that his wife and children were
already among the emigrants, and it was therefore, according to his
notion, impossible for him to remain. Lucy, as a last resource, gave
him a letter for Idris, to be delivered to her wherever he should meet