ill-tempered people and their friends—narrow escapes—the hatchet-quarrel.

i do not wish for a moment to defend ill-temper, but i do think that people who suffer from ill-tempered people often talk as if they were the only ones who do suffer in the matter; and as if the ill-tempered people themselves quite enjoyed being in a rage.

and yet how much misery is endured by those who have never got the victory over their own ill-temper! to feel wretched and exasperated by little annoyances which good-humoured people get over with a shrug or a smile; to have things rankle in my mind like a splinter in the flesh, which glide lightly off yours, and leave no mark; to be unable to bear a joke, knowing that one is doubly laughed at because one can't; to have this deadly sore at heart—"i cannot forgive; i cannot forget," there is no pleasure in these things. the tears of sorrow are not more bitter than the tears of anger, of hurt pride or thwarted [154]will. as to the fit of passion in which one is giddy, blind, and deaf, if there is a relief to the overcharged mind in saying the sharpest things and hitting the heaviest blows one can at the moment, the pleasantness is less than momentary, for almost as we strike we foresee the pains of regret and of humbling ourselves to beg pardon which must ensue. our friends do not always pity as well as blame us, though they are sorry for those who were possessed by devils long ago.

good-tempered people, too, who i fancy would find it quite easy not to be provoking, and to be a little patient and forbearing, really seem sometimes to irritate hot-tempered ones on purpose, as if they thought it was good for them to get used to it.

i do not mean that i think ill-tempered people should be constantly yielded to, as nurse says mrs. rampant and the servants have given way to mr. rampant till he has got to be quite as unreasonable and nearly as dangerous as most maniacs, and his friends never cross him, for the same reason that they would not stir up a mad bull.

perhaps i do not quite know how i would have our friends treat us who are cursed with bad tempers. i think to avoid unnecessary provocation, and to be patient with us in the height of our passion, is wise as well as kind. but no principle should be conceded [155]to us, and rights that we have unjustly attacked should be faithfully defended when we are calm enough to listen. i fancy that where gentle mrs. rampant is wrong is that she allows mr. rampant to think that what really are concessions to his weakness are concessions to his wisdom. and what is not founded on truth cannot do lasting good. and if, years ago, before he became a sort of gunpowder cask at large, he had been asked if he wished mrs. rampant to persuade herself, and mrs. rampant, the little rampants, and the servants to combine to persuade him, that he was right when he was wrong, and wise when he was foolish, and reasonable when he was unjust, i think he would have said no. i do not believe one could deliberately desire to be befooled by one's family for all the best years of one's life. and yet how many people are!

i do not think i am ever likely to be so loved and feared by those i live with as to have my ill-humours made into laws. i hope not. but i am sometimes thankful, on the other hand, that god is more forbearing with us than we commonly are with each other, and does not lead us into temptation when we are at our worst and weakest.

any one who has a bad temper must sometimes look back at the years before he learned self-control, and feel thankful that he is not a murderer, or bur[156]dened for life by the weight on his conscience of some calamity of which he was the cause. if the knife which furious fred threw at his sister before he was out of petticoats had hit the child's eye instead of her forehead, could he ever have looked into the blinded face without a pang? if the blow with which impatient annie flattered herself she was correcting her younger brother had thrown the naughty little lad out of the boat instead of into the sailor's arms, and he had been drowned—at ten years old a murderess, how could she endure for life the weight of her unavailing remorse?

i very nearly killed philip once. it makes me shudder to think of it, and i often wonder i ever could lose my temper again.

we were eight years old, and out in the garden together. we had settled to build a moss-house for my dolls, and had borrowed the hatchet out of the wood-house, without leave, to chop the stakes with. it was entirely my idea, and i had collected all the moss and most of the sticks. it was i, too, who had taken the hatchet. philip had been very tiresome about not helping me in the hard part; but when i had driven in the sticks by leaning on them with all my weight, and had put in bits of brushwood where the moss fell out and philip laughed at me, and, in short, when the moss-house was beginning to look [157]quite real, philip was very anxious to work at it, and wanted the hatchet.

"you wouldn't help me over the hard work," said i, "so i shan't give it you now; i'll make my moss-house myself."

"no, you won't," said philip.

"yes, i shall," said i.

"no, you won't," he reiterated; "for i shall pull it down as fast as you build it."

"you'd better not," i threatened.

just then we were called in to dinner. i hid the hatchet, and philip said no more; but he got out before me, and when i returned to work i found that the moss-house walls, which had cost me so much labour, were pulled to pieces and scattered about the shrubbery. philip was not to be seen.

my heart had been so set upon my project that at first i could only feel the overwhelming disappointment. i was not a child who often cried, but i burst into tears.

i was sobbing my hardest when philip sprang upon me in triumph, and laughing at my distress.

"i kept my promise," said he, tossing his head, "and i'll go on doing it."

i am sure those shocks of fury which seize one like a fit must be a devil possessing one. in an instant my eyes were as dry as the desert in a hot wind, and [158]my head reeling with passion. i ran to the hatchet, and came back brandishing it.

"if you touch one stake or bit of moss of mine again," said i, "i'll throw my hatchet at your head. i can keep promises too."

my intention was only to frighten him. i relied on his not daring to brave such a threat; unhappily he relied on my not daring to carry it out. he took up some of my moss and threw it at me by way of reply.

i flung the hatchet!—

my aunt isobel has a splendid figure, with such grace and power as one might expect from her strong health and ready mind. i had not seen her at the moment, for i was blind with passion, nor had philip, for his back was turned towards her. i did not see distinctly how she watched, as one watches for a ball, and caught the hatchet within a yard of philip's head.

my aunt isobel has a temper much like the temper of the rest of the family. when she had caught it in her left hand she turned round and boxed my ears with her right hand till i could see less than ever. (i believe she suffered for that outburst for months afterwards. she was afraid she had damaged my hearing, as that sense is too often damaged or destroyed by the blows of ill-tempered parents, teachers, and [159]nurses.)

then she turned back and shook philip as vigorously as she had boxed me. "i saw you, you spiteful, malicious boy!" said my aunt isobel.

all the time she was shaking him, philip was looking at her feet. something that he saw absorbed his attention so fully that he forgot to cry.

"you're bleeding, aunt isobel," said he, when she gave him breath enough to speak.

the truth was this: the nervous force which aunt isobel had summoned up to catch the hatchet seemed to cease when it was caught; her arm fell powerless, and the hatchet cut her ankle. that left arm was useless for many months afterwards, to my abiding reproach.

philip was not hurt, but he might have been killed. everybody told me so often that it was a warning to me to correct my terrible temper, that i might have revolted against the reiteration if the facts had been less grave. but i never can feel lightly about that hatchet-quarrel. it opened a gulf of possible wickedness and life-long misery, over the brink of which my temper would have dragged me, but for aunt isobel's strong arm and keen eye, and over which it might succeed in dragging me any day, unless i could cure myself of my besetting sin.

i never denied it. it was a warning.