The Last Man
having exchanged our temperate climate for the intolerable heats of a
summer in Egypt or Persia. We were therefore obliged to modify our
plan, as the season continued to be inclement; and it was determined
that we should await the arrival of spring in our present abode, and so
order our future movements as to pass the hot months in the icy vallies
of Switzerland, deferring our southern progress until the ensuing
autumn, if such a season was ever again to be beheld by us.
The castle and town of Versailles afforded our numbers ample
accommodation, and foraging parties took it by turns to supply our
wants. There was a strange and appalling motley in the situation of
these the last of the race. At first I likened it to a colony, which
borne over the far seas, struck root for the first time in a new
country. But where was the bustle and industry characteristic of such
an assemblage; the rudely constructed dwelling, which was to suffice
till a more commodious mansion could be built; the marking out of
fields; the attempt at cultivation; the eager curiosity to discover
unknown animals and herbs; the excursions for the sake of exploring the
country? Our habitations were palaces—our food was ready stored in
granaries—there was no need of labour, no inquisitiveness, no restless
desire to get on. If we had been assured that we should secure the
lives of our present numbers, there would have been more vivacity and
hope in our councils. We should have discussed as to the period when
the existing produce for man’s sustenance would no longer suffice for
us, and what mode of life we should then adopt. We should have
considered more carefully our future plans, and debated concerning the
spot where we should in future dwell. But summer and the plague were
near, and we dared not look forward. Every heart sickened at the
thought of amusement; if the younger part of our community were ever
impelled, by youthful and untamed hilarity, to enter on any dance or
song, to cheer the melancholy time, they would suddenly break off,
checked by a mournful look or agonizing sigh from any one among them,
who was prevented by sorrows and losses from mingling in the festivity.
If laughter echoed under our roof, yet the heart was vacant of joy;
and, when ever it chanced that I witnessed such attempts at pastime,
they encreased instead of diminishing my sense of woe. In the midst of
the pleasure-hunting throng, I would close my eyes, and see before me
the obscure cavern, where was garnered the mortality of Idris, and the
dead lay around, mouldering in hushed repose. When I again became aware
of the present hour, softest melody of Lydian flute, or harmonious maze
of graceful dance, was but as the demoniac chorus in the Wolf’s Glen,
and the caperings of the reptiles that surrounded the magic circle.
My dearest interval of peace occurred, when, released from the
obligation of associating with the crowd, I could repose in the dear
home where my children lived. Children I say, for the tenderest
emotions of paternity bound me to Clara. She was now fourteen; sorrow,
and deep insight into the scenes around her, calmed the restless spirit
of girlhood; while the remembrance of her father whom she idolized, and
respect for me and Adrian, implanted an high sense of duty in her young
heart. Though serious she was not sad; the eager desire that makes us
all, when young, plume our wings, and stretch our necks, that we may
more swiftly alight tiptoe on the height of maturity, was subdued in
her by early experience. All that she could spare of overflowing love
from her parents’ memory, and attention to her living relatives, was
spent upon religion. This was the hidden law of her heart, which she
concealed with childish reserve, and cherished the more because it was
secret. What faith so entire, what charity so pure, what hope so
fervent, as that of early youth? and she, all love, all tenderness and
trust, who from infancy had been tossed on the wide sea of passion and
misfortune, saw the finger of apparent divinity in all, and her best
hope was to make herself acceptable to the power she worshipped. Evelyn
was only five years old; his joyous heart was incapable of sorrow, and
he enlivened our house with the innocent mirth incident to his years.
The aged Countess of Windsor had fallen from her dream of power, rank
and grandeur; she had been suddenly seized with the conviction, that
love was the only good of life, virtue the only ennobling distinction
and enriching wealth. Such a lesson had been taught her by the dead
lips of her neglected daughter; and she devoted herself, with all the
fiery violence of her character, to the obtaining the affection of the
remnants of her family. In early years the heart of Adrian had been
chilled towards her; and, though he observed a due respect, her
coldness, mixed with the recollection of disappointment and madness,
caused him to feel even pain in her society. She saw this, and yet
determined to win his love; the obstacle served the rather to excite
her ambition. As Henry, Emperor of Germany, lay in the snow before Pope
Leo’s gate for three winter days and nights, so did she in humility
wait before the icy barriers of his closed heart, till he, the servant
of love, and prince of tender courtesy, opened it wide for her
admittance, bestowing, with fervency and gratitude, the tribute of
filial affection she merited. Her understanding, courage, and presence
of mind, became powerful auxiliaries to him in the difficult task of
ruling the tumultuous crowd, which were subjected to his control, in
truth by a single hair.
The principal circumstances that disturbed our tranquillity during this
interval, originated in the vicinity of the impostor-prophet and his
followers. They continued to reside at Paris; but missionaries from
among them often visited Versailles—and such was the power of
assertions, however false, yet vehemently iterated, over the ready
credulity of the ignorant and fearful, that they seldom failed in
drawing over to their party some from among our numbers. An instance of
this nature coming immediately under our notice, we were led to
consider the miserable state in which we should leave our countrymen,
when we should, at the approach of summer, move on towards Switzerland,
and leave a deluded crew behind us in the hands of their miscreant
leader. The sense of the smallness of our numbers, and expectation of
decrease, pressed upon us; and, while it would be a subject of
congratulation to ourselves to add one to our party, it would be doubly
gratifying to rescue from the pernicious influence of superstition and
unrelenting tyranny, the victims that now, though voluntarily
enchained, groaned beneath it. If we had considered the preacher as
sincere in a belief of his own denunciations, or only moderately
actuated by kind feeling in the exercise of his assumed powers, we
should have immediately addressed ourselves to him, and endeavoured
with our best arguments to soften and humanize his views. But he was
instigated by ambition, he desired to rule over these last stragglers
from the fold of death; his projects went so far, as to cause him to
calculate that, if, from these crushed remains, a few survived, so that
a new race should spring up, he, by holding tight the reins of belief,
might be remembered by the post-pestilential race as a patriarch, a
prophet, nay a deity; such as of old among the post-diluvians were
Jupiter the conqueror, Serapis the lawgiver, and Vishnou the preserver.
These ideas made him inflexible in his rule, and violent in his hate of
any who presumed to share with him his usurped empire.
It is a strange fact, but incontestible, that the philanthropist, who
ardent in his desire to do good, who patient, reasonable and gentle,
yet disdains to use other argument than truth, has less influence over
men’s minds, than he who, grasping and selfish, refuses not to adopt
any means, nor awaken any passion, nor diffuse any falsehood, for the
advancement of his cause. If this from time immemorial has been the
case, the contrast was infinitely greater, now that the one could bring
harrowing fears and transcendent hopes into play; while the other had
few hopes to hold forth, nor could influence the imagination to
diminish the fears which he himself was the first to entertain. The
preacher had persuaded his followers, that their escape from the
plague, the salvation of their children, and the rise of a new race of
men from their seed, depended on their faith in, and their submission
to him. They greedily imbibed this belief; and their over-weening
credulity even rendered them eager to make converts to the same faith.
How to seduce any individuals from such an alliance of fraud, was a
frequent subject of Adrian’s meditations and discourse. He formed many
plans for the purpose; but his own troop kept him in full occupation to
ensure their fidelity and safety; beside which the preacher was as
cautious and prudent, as he was cruel. His victims lived under the
strictest rules and laws, which either entirely imprisoned them within
the Tuileries, or let them out in such numbers, and under such leaders,
as precluded the possibility of controversy. There was one among them
however whom I resolved to save; she had been known to us in happier
days; Idris had loved her; and her excellent nature made it peculiarly
lamentable that she should be sacrificed by this merciless cannibal of
souls.
This man had between two and three hundred persons enlisted under his
banners. More than half of them were women; there were about fifty
children of all ages; and not more than eighty men. They were mostly
drawn from that which, when such distinctions existed, was denominated
the lower rank of society. The exceptions consisted of a few high-born
females, who, panic-struck, and tamed by sorrow, had joined him. Among
these was one, young, lovely, and enthusiastic, whose very goodness
made her a more easy victim. I have mentioned her before: Juliet, the
youngest daughter, and now sole relic of the ducal house of L—-. There
are some beings, whom fate seems to select on whom to pour, in
unmeasured portion, the vials of her wrath, and whom she bathes even to
the lips in misery. Such a one was the ill-starred Juliet. She had lost
her indulgent parents, her brothers and sisters, companions of her
youth; in one fell swoop they had been carried off from her. Yet she
had again dared to call herself happy; united to her admirer, to him
who possessed and filled her whole heart, she yielded to the lethean
powers of love, and knew and felt only his life and presence. At the
very time when with keen delight she welcomed the tokens of maternity,
this sole prop of her life failed, her husband died of the plague. For
a time she had been lulled in insanity; the birth of her child restored
her to the cruel reality of things, but gave her at the same time an
object for whom to preserve at once life and reason. Every friend and
relative had died off, and she was reduced to solitude and penury; deep
melancholy and angry impatience distorted her judgment, so that she
could not persuade herself to disclose her distress to us. When she
heard of the plan of universal emigration, she resolved to remain
behind with her child, and alone in wide England to live or die, as
fate might decree, beside the grave of her beloved. She had hidden
herself in one of the many empty habitations of London; it was she who
rescued my Idris on the fatal twentieth of November, though my
immediate danger, and the subsequent illness of Idris, caused us to
forget our hapless friend. This circumstance had however brought her
again in contact with her fellow-creatures; a slight illness of her
infant, proved to her that she was still bound to humanity by an