the death of rubens—polly's news—last times

when one has reached a certain age time seems to go very fast. then, also, one begins to understand the meaning of such terms as "the uncertainty of life," "changes," "loss of friends," "partings," "old times," etc., which ring sadly in the ears of grown-up folk.

after my first half at eton, this universal experience became mine. there was never a holiday time that i did not find some change; and, too often, a loss to meet my return.

one of the first and bitterest was the death of rubens.

i had been most anxious to get home, and yet somehow, in less high spirits than usual, which made it feel not unnatural that my father's face should be so unusually grave when he came to meet me.

"i have some very bad news for you, my dear boy," he said. "i fear, regie, that poor rubens is dying."

"he've been a-dying all day, sir," said the groom, when we stood at last by rubens' side. "but he seems as if he couldn't go peaceable till you was come."

he seemed to be gone. the beautiful curls were limp and tangled. he lay on his side with his[186] legs stretched out; his eyes were closed. but when i stooped over him and cried "ruby!" his flabby ears pricked, and he began to struggle.

"it's a fit," said the groom.

but it was nothing of the kind. rubens knew what he was about, and at last actually got on to his feet, when, after swaying feebly about for a moment, he staggered in my direction (he could not see) and literally fell into my arms, with one last wag of his dear tail.

"they say care killed the cat," said mrs. bundle, when i went up to the nursery, "but if it could cure a dog, my deary, your dog would have been alive now. i never see the squire so put about since you had the fever. he was up at five o'clock this very morning, the groom says, putting stuff into the corners of its mouth with a silver teaspoon, and he've had all the cow doctors about to see him, and dr. gilpin himself he've been every day, and mr. andrewes the same. and i'd like to know, my deary, what more could be done for a sick christian than the doctor and parson with him daily till he dies?"

"a christian would be buried in the churchyard," said i; "and i wish poor dear rubens could."

but as he couldn't, i made his grave where the churchyard wall skirted the grounds of the hall. "perhaps, some day, the churchyard will have to be enlarged," i explained to the rector, who was puzzled by my choice of a burying-place, "and then rubens will get taken in."

my father was most anxious to get me another pet. i might have had a dog of any kind. dogs of priceless breeds, dogs for sporting, for ratting, and for petting; dogs for use or for ornament.[187] from a bloodhound and mastiff almost large enough for me to ride, to a toy poodle that would go into my pocket—i might have chosen a worthy successor to rubens, but i could not.

"i shall never care for any other dog," i was rash enough to declare. but my resolve melted away one day at the sight of a soft, black ball, like a lump of soot, which arrived in a game-bag, and proved to be a retriever pup. he grew into a charming dog, of much wisdom and amiability. i called him sweep.

thus half by half, holidays by holidays, changes, ceaseless changes went on. births, deaths, and marriages furnished my father with "news" for his letters when i was away, and nurse bundle and me with gossip when i came back.

i heard also at intervals from polly. uncle ascott's wealth increased yearly. the girls grew up. helen "was becoming tractarian and peculiar," which annoyed aunt maria exceedingly. mr. clerke had got a curacy in london, and preached very earnest sermons, which aunt maria hoped would do helen good. mr. clerke worked very hard, and seemed to like it; but he said that his happiest days were dacrefield days. "i quite agree with him," polly added. then came a letter:—"oh, my dear regie, fancy! miss blomfield is married. and to whom, do you think? do you remember the old gentleman who sent us the cinder-parcel? well, it's to him; and he is really a very jolly old man; and thinks there is no one in the world like miss blomfield. he told her he had been carefully observing her conduct in the affairs of daily life for eight years. my dear regie, fancy waiting eight years for one's next door neighbour, when one was quite old to[188] begin with! you have no idea how much younger and better she looks in a home of her own, and a handsome silk dress. can you fancy her always apologising for being so happy? she thinks she has too much happiness, and is idle, and who knows what. it makes me feel quite ill, regie, for if she is idle, and has too much happiness, what am i, and what have i had? do you remember the days when you proposed that we should be very religious? i am sure it's the only way to be very happy: i mean happy always, and underneath. leo says the great mistake is being too religious, and that people ought to keep out of extremes, and not make themselves ridiculous. but i think he's wrong. for it seems just to be all the heap of people who are only a little religious who never get any good out of it. it isn't enough to make them happy whatever happens, and it's just enough to make them uncomfortable if they play cards on a sunday. i know i wish i were really good, like miss blomfield, and mr. clerke, and helen. * * *"

it was the year of miss blomfield's marriage that ragged robin's wife died. we had all quite looked forward to the peace she would enjoy when she was a widow, for it was known that delirium tremens was surely shortening her husband's life. but she died before him. her children were wonderfully provided for. they were girls, and we had them all at the hall by turns in some sort of sub-kitchenmaid capacity, from which they progressed to higher offices, and all became first-class servants, and "did well."

"my dear," said nurse bundle, "there ain't no difficulty in finding homes for gals that have been brought up to clean, and to do as they're bid.[189] it's folk as can't do a thing if you set it 'em, nor take care of a thing if you gives it 'em, as there's no providing for."

i almost shrink from recording the hardest, bitterest loss that those changeful years of my school-life brought me—the death of mr. andrewes. it was during my holidays, and yet i was not with him when he died.

i do not think i had noticed anything unusual about him beforehand. he had not been very well for some months, but we thought little of it, and he never dwelt upon it himself. i was in the fifth form at the time, and almost grown up. sweep was a middle-aged dog, the wisest and handsomest of his race. the rector always dined with us on sunday, but one evening he excused himself, saying he felt too unwell to come out, and would prefer to stay quietly at home, especially as he had a journey before him; for he was going the next day to visit his brother in yorkshire for a change. but he asked if my father would spare me to come down and spend the evening with him instead. i rightly considered sweep as included in the invitation, and we went together.

as we went up the drive (so familiar to me and poor little rubens!) i thought i had never seen the rector's garden in richer beauty, or heard such a chorus from the birds he loved and protected. indeed the border plants were luxuriant almost to disorder. it struck me that mr. andrewes had not been gardening for some time. perhaps this idea led me to notice how ill he looked when i went indoors. but dinner seemed to revive him, and then in the warm summer sunset we strolled outside again. the rector leant heavily on my arm. he made some joke about my height,[190] i remember. (i was proud of having grown so tall, and secretly thought well of my general appearance in the tail-coat of "fifth form.") with one arm i supported mr. andrewes, the other hung at my side, into the hand of which sweep ever and anon thrust his nose caressingly.

"how well the garden looks!" i said. "and your birds are giving you a farewell concert."

"ah! you think so too?" said the rector, quickly.

i was puzzled. "you are going to-morrow, are you not?" i said.

"yes, of course. i see," said the rector laughing. "i was thinking of a longer journey. how superstitions do cling to north-countrymen! we've a terrible lot of paganism in us yet, for all the christians that we are!"

"what was your superstition just now?" said i.

"oh, just part of a belief in the occult sympathy of the animal world with humanity, which, indeed, i am by no means prepared to give up."

"i should think not!" said i.

"though doubtless the idea that they feel and presage impending death to man must be counted a fable."

"awful rot!" was my comment. "i say, sir, i'm sure you're not well, to get such stuff into your head."

"it's just that," said the rector. "when i was a boy, i was far from strong, and being rather bookish, i was constantly overworking my head. what weird fancies and fads i had then, to be sure! i was haunted by a lot of nervous plagues which it's best not to explain to people who have never been tormented with them. one of the least annoying was a sensation which now and then[191] took possession of me that everything i saw, heard, or did, was 'for the last time.' i've often run back down a lane to get another glimpse of home, and done over again something i had just finished—to break the charm! the old childish folly has been plaguing me the last few days. it is strong on me to-night."

"then we'll talk of something else," said i.

eventually our conversation became a religious one. it was like the old days before i went to school. we had not had much religious talk of late years. to say the truth, since i became an eton man the religious fervour of my childhood had died out. a strong belief in the practical power of prayer (especially "when everything else failed") was almost all that remained of that resolution to which polly had alluded in her letter. in discussions with her, i took leo's view of the subject. i warned her in a common-sense way against being "religious overmuch" (not that i had any definite religious measure in my mind); i laughed at helen; i indulged a little cheap wit, and made polly furious, by smart sneers about women and parsons. i puzzled her with scraps of old philosophy, and theological difficulties of venerable standing, and was as proud to discomfit her faith as if my own soul had no stake in the matter. i fairly drove her to tears about the origin of evil. sometimes i would have "sunday talks" with her in a different spirit, but even then she said i "did her no good," for i would not believe that she could "have anything to repent of."

i fancy mr. andrewes had asked me to come to him that evening greatly for the purpose of having a "sunday talk." my father had wished me to be confirmed at home rather than at school,[192] and as bishops did not hold confirmations at such short intervals then as they do now, an opportunity had only just occurred. mr. andrewes was preparing me, and it was a great annoyance to him that his ill-health obliged him to go away in the middle of his instructions. i think he was feverish that night. every now and then he spoke so rapidly that i could hardly follow him. then there were pauses in which he seemed lost, and abrupt changes of subject, as if he could hardly control the order of his thoughts. and in all the evident strain and anxiety to say everything that he wished to say to me appeared that morbid fancy of its being "the last time."

after we had talked for some time he said, "life goes wonderfully fast, regie, though you may not think so just now. i do so well remember being a child myself. i was eight years old, i think, when i prayed for money enough to buy a fuchsia coccinea (they had not been in england more than ten or twelve years then). my brother gave me half-a-crown, and i got one. it seems as if that one yonder must be it. i began a model of my father's house in card-board one winter, too. then i got bronchitis, and did not finish it. i have been intending to finish it ever since, but it lies uncompleted in a box upstairs. so we purpose and neglect, till death comes like a nurse to take us to bed, and finds our tasks unfinished, and takes away our toys!"

presently he went on: "our mechanical arbitrary division of time is indeed a very false one. see how one day drags along, and how quickly another passes. the true measure of time is that which makes each man's life a day, his day. the real night is that in which no man can work.[193] indeed, nothing can be more true and natural than those eastern expressions. i remember things that happened in my childhood as one remembers what one did this morning. what a lot of things i meant to do to-day! and one runs out into the garden instead of setting to work, and it is noon before one knows where he is, and other people take up one's time, and the afternoon slips away, and a man's day had need be fifty times its length for him to do all he means and ought to do, and to run after all the distractions the devil sends him as well. so comes old age, the evening when one is tired, and it's hard to make any fresh start; and then we're pretty near the end, at 'the last feather of the shuttle,' as we say in yorkshire. i often think that the pitiful shortness of this life, compared with a man's hopes and plans, is almost proof enough of itself that there must be another, better fitted to his aims and capacities. and then—measure the folly of not securing that! and talking of proofs, regie, and whilst i'm taking the privilege of this season of your confirmation to proffer a little advice, above all things make up your mind as to what you believe, and on what grounds you believe it. ask yourself, my boy, if you believe the articles of the apostles' creed to be real positive truths. do you think there is evidence for the facts, as matters of history? are you ever likely to have the time or the talent to test this for yourself? and, if not, do you consider the authority of those who have done so, and staked everything upon their truth, as sufficient? will you receive it as the creed of your church? make up your mind, my boy, above all things make up your mind! have some convictions, some real opinions, some worthy hopes; and be loyal to, and[194] in earnest about, whatever you do pin your faith to, i assure you that vagueness of faith affects people's every-day conduct more than they think. the sort of belief which takes a man to church on sunday who would be ashamed to look as if he were really praying, or confessing real sins when he gets there, is small help to him when the will balances between right and wrong. it is truly, as a matter of mere common sense, a poor bargain, a wretched speculation, to be half religious; to get a few checks and scruples out of it, and no real strength and peace; and, it may be, to lose a man's soul, and not even gain the world. for who dare promise himself that christ our judge, who spent a self-denying human youth as our example, and so loved us as to die for us, will accept a youth of indifference, and a dissatisfied death-bed on our part? and if it be all true, and if gratitude and common sense, and self-preservation, and the example and advice of great men, demand that we shall serve god with all our powers, don't you think the devil must, so to speak, laugh in his sleeve to see us really conceited of being too large-minded to attend too closely, or to begin to attend too early, to our own best interests?"

"ah!" he added after a while, "my dear boy—dearer to me than you can tell—the truth is, i covet for you the unutterable blessing of a youth given to god. what that is, some know, and many a man converted late in life has imagined with heart-wrung envy: an augustine, already numbered with the saints, a prodigal robed and decked with more than pardon, haunted yet by dark shadows of the past, the husks and the swine. my boy, with an unstained youth yet before you to mould as you will, get to yourself the elder son's portion—'thou[195] art ever with me, and all that i have is thine.' and what god has for those who abide with him, even here, who can describe? it's worth trying for, lad; it would be worth trying for, on the chance of god fulfilling his promises, if his word were an open question. how well worth any effort, any struggle, you'll know when you stand where i stand to-night."

we had reached the front steps of the house as he said this. the last few sentences had been spoken in jerks, and he seemed alarmingly feeble. i shrank from understanding what he meant by his last words, though i knew he did not refer to the actual spot on which we stood. the garden was black now in the gloaming. the reflection from the yellow light left by the sunset in the west gave an unearthly brightness to his face, and i fancied something more than common in the voice with which he quoted:

"jesu, spes poenitentibus,

quam pius es petentibus!

quam bonus te quaerentibus!

sed quid invenientibus!"

but i was fanciful that sunday, or his nervous "fads" were infectious ones; for on me also the superstition was strong to-night that it was "the last time."