The Last Man
full of strange horror and gloomy misery, that I dare not pause too
long in the narration. If I were to dissect each incident, every small
fragment of a second would contain an harrowing tale, whose minutest
word would curdle the blood in thy young veins. It is right that I
should erect for thy instruction this monument of the foregone race;
but not that I should drag thee through the wards of an hospital, nor
the secret chambers of the charnel-house. This tale, therefore, shall
be rapidly unfolded. Images of destruction, pictures of despair, the
procession of the last triumph of death, shall be drawn before thee,
swift as the rack driven by the north wind along the blotted splendour
of the sky.
Weed-grown fields, desolate towns, the wild approach of riderless
horses had now become habitual to my eyes; nay, sights far worse, of
the unburied dead, and human forms which were strewed on the road side,
and on the steps of once frequented habitations, where,
Through the flesh that wastes away
Beneath the parching sun, the whitening bones
Start forth, and moulder in the sable dust.[23]
Sights like these had become—ah, woe the while! so familiar, that we
had ceased to shudder, or spur our stung horses to sudden speed, as we
passed them. France in its best days, at least that part of France
through which we travelled, had been a cultivated desert, and the
absence of enclosures, of cottages, and even of peasantry, was
saddening to a traveller from sunny Italy, or busy England. Yet the
towns were frequent and lively, and the cordial politeness and ready
smile of the wooden-shoed peasant restored good humour to the
splenetic. Now, the old woman sat no more at the door with her
distaff—the lank beggar no longer asked charity in courtier-like
phrase; nor on holidays did the peasantry thread with slow grace the
mazes of the dance. Silence, melancholy bride of death, went in
procession with him from town to town through the spacious region.
We arrived at Fontainebleau, and speedily prepared for the reception of
our friends. On mustering our numbers for the night, three were found
missing. When I enquired for them, the man to whom I spoke, uttered the
word “plague,” and fell at my feet in convulsions; he also was
infected. There were hard faces around me; for among my troop were
sailors who had crossed the line times unnumbered, soldiers who, in
Russia and far America, had suffered famine, cold and danger, and men
still sterner-featured, once nightly depredators in our over-grown
metropolis; men bred from their cradle to see the whole machine of
society at work for their destruction. I looked round, and saw upon the
faces of all horror and despair written in glaring characters.
We passed four days at Fontainebleau. Several sickened and died, and in
the mean time neither Adrian nor any of our friends appeared. My own
troop was in commotion; to reach Switzerland, to plunge into rivers of
snow, and to dwell in caves of ice, became the mad desire of all. Yet
we had promised to wait for the Earl; and he came not. My people
demanded to be led forward— rebellion, if so we might call what was the
mere casting away of straw-formed shackles, appeared manifestly among
them. They would away on the word without a leader. The only chance of
safety, the only hope of preservation from every form of indescribable
suffering, was our keeping together. I told them this; while the most
determined among them answered with sullenness, that they could take
care of themselves, and replied to my entreaties with scoffs and
menaces.
At length, on the fifth day, a messenger arrived from Adrian, bearing
letters, which directed us to proceed to Auxerre, and there await his
arrival, which would only be deferred for a few days. Such was the
tenor of his public letters. Those privately delivered to me, detailed
at length the difficulties of his situation, and left the arrangement
of my future plans to my own discretion. His account of the state of
affairs at Versailles was brief, but the oral communications of his
messenger filled up his omissions, and shewed me that perils of the
most frightful nature were gathering around him. At first the
re-awakening of the plague had been concealed; but the number of deaths
encreasing, the secret was divulged, and the destruction already
achieved, was exaggerated by the fears of the survivors. Some
emissaries of the enemy of mankind, the accursed Impostors, were among
them instilling their doctrine that safety and life could only be
ensured by submission to their chief; and they succeeded so well, that
soon, instead of desiring to proceed to Switzerland, the major part of
the multitude, weak-minded women, and dastardly men, desired to return
to Paris, and, by ranging themselves under the banners of the so called
prophet, and by a cowardly worship of the principle of evil, to
purchase respite, as they hoped, from impending death. The discord and
tumult induced by these conflicting fears and passions, detained
Adrian. It required all his ardour in pursuit of an object, and his
patience under difficulties, to calm and animate such a number of his
followers, as might counterbalance the panic of the rest, and lead them
back to the means from which alone safety could be derived. He had
hoped immediately to follow me; but, being defeated in this intention,
he sent his messenger urging me to secure my own troop at such a
distance from Versailles, as to prevent the contagion of rebellion from
reaching them; promising, at the same time, to join me the moment a
favourable occasion should occur, by means of which he could withdraw
the main body of the emigrants from the evil influence at present
exercised over them.
I was thrown into a most painful state of uncertainty by these
communications. My first impulse was that we should all return to
Versailles, there to assist in extricating our chief from his perils. I
accordingly assembled my troop, and proposed to them this retrograde
movement, instead of the continuation of our journey to Auxerre. With
one voice they refused to comply. The notion circulated among them was,
that the ravages of the plague alone detained the Protector; they
opposed his order to my request; they came to a resolve to proceed
without me, should I refuse to accompany them. Argument and adjuration
were lost on these dastards. The continual diminution of their own
numbers, effected by pestilence, added a sting to their dislike of
delay; and my opposition only served to bring their resolution to a
crisis. That same evening they departed towards Auxerre. Oaths, as from
soldiers to their general, had been taken by them: these they broke. I
also had engaged myself not to desert them; it appeared to me inhuman
to ground any infraction of my word on theirs. The same spirit that
caused them to rebel against me, would impel them to desert each other;
and the most dreadful sufferings would be the consequence of their
journey in their present unordered and chiefless array. These feelings
for a time were paramount; and, in obedience to them, I accompanied the
rest towards Auxerre. We arrived the same night at
Villeneuve-la-Guiard, a town at the distance of four posts from
Fontainebleau. When my companions had retired to rest, and I was left
alone to revolve and ruminate upon the intelligence I received of
Adrian’s situation, another view of the subject presented itself to me.
What was I doing, and what was the object of my present movements?
Apparently I was to lead this troop of selfish and lawless men towards
Switzerland, leaving behind my family and my selected friend, which,
subject as they were hourly to the death that threatened to all, I
might never see again. Was it not my first duty to assist the
Protector, setting an example of attachment and duty? At a crisis, such
as the one I had reached, it is very difficult to balance nicely
opposing interests, and that towards which our inclinations lead us,
obstinately assumes the appearance of selfishness, even when we
meditate a sacrifice. We are easily led at such times to make a
compromise of the question; and this was my present resource. I
resolved that very night to ride to Versailles; if I found affairs less
desperate than I now deemed them, I would return without delay to my
troop; I had a vague idea that my arrival at that town, would occasion
some sensation more or less strong, of which we might profit, for the
purpose of leading forward the vacillating multitude—at least no time
was to be lost—I visited the stables, I saddled my favourite horse, and
vaulting on his back, without giving myself time for further reflection
or hesitation, quitted Villeneuve-la-Guiard on my return to Versailles.
I was glad to escape from my rebellious troop, and to lose sight for a
time, of the strife of evil with good, where the former for ever
remained triumphant. I was stung almost to madness by my uncertainty
concerning the fate of Adrian, and grew reckless of any event, except
what might lose or preserve my unequalled friend. With an heavy heart,
that sought relief in the rapidity of my course, I rode through the
night to Versailles. I spurred my horse, who addressed his free limbs
to speed, and tossed his gallant head in pride. The constellations
reeled swiftly by, swiftly each tree and stone and landmark fled past
my onward career. I bared my head to the rushing wind, which bathed my
brow in delightful coolness. As I lost sight of Villeneuve-la-Guiard, I
forgot the sad drama of human misery; methought it was happiness enough
to live, sensitive the while of the beauty of the verdure-clad earth,
the star-bespangled sky, and the tameless wind that lent animation to
the whole. My horse grew tired—and I, forgetful of his fatigue, still
as he lagged, cheered him with my voice, and urged him with the spur.
He was a gallant animal, and I did not wish to exchange him for any
chance beast I might light on, leaving him never to be refound. All
night we went forward; in the morning he became sensible that we
approached Versailles, to reach which as his home, he mustered his
flagging strength. The distance we had come was not less than fifty
miles, yet he shot down the long Boulevards swift as an arrow; poor
fellow, as I dismounted at the gate of the castle, he sunk on his
knees, his eyes were covered with a film, he fell on his side, a few
gasps inflated his noble chest, and he died. I saw him expire with an
anguish, unaccountable even to myself, the spasm was as the wrenching
of some limb in agonizing torture, but it was brief as it was
intolerable. I forgot him, as I swiftly darted through the open portal,
and up the majestic stairs of this castle of victories—heard Adrian’s
voice—O fool! O woman nurtured, effeminate and contemptible being—I
heard his voice, and answered it with convulsive shrieks; I rushed into
the Hall of Hercules, where he stood surrounded by a crowd, whose eyes,
turned in wonder on me, reminded me that on the stage of the world, a
man must repress such girlish extacies. I would have given worlds to
have embraced him; I dared not—Half in exhaustion, half voluntarily, I
threw myself at my length on the ground— dare I disclose the truth to
the gentle offspring of solitude? I did so, that I might kiss the dear
and sacred earth he trod.
I found everything in a state of tumult. An emissary of the leader of
the elect, had been so worked up by his chief, and by his own fanatical
creed, as to make an attempt on the life of the Protector and preserver
of lost mankind. His hand was arrested while in the act of poignarding
the Earl; this circumstance had caused the clamour I heard on my
arrival at the castle, and the confused assembly of persons that I
found assembled in the Salle d’Hercule. Although superstition and