Collected Works (Vol. II)

INTRODUCTION BY THE EDITOR 59 able interruption as Mr. Shandy,! and from behind the hideous yellow partition came sounds as of the constant babbling of a human voice. Repeated glances in this direction drew from my entertainer the in- formation that it was ‘‘only her husband,”’ indicating the yellow-haired girl with the stem of her short clay pipe. She added that he was dying. Curiosity, Compassion’s Siamese prompted a desire to see the sufferer. The old lady rose, not without difficulty, lifted the curtain, and let it fall behind me as I entered the gloom which lay beyond. On a bed, in that half-fathomed twilight, big with the scent of joss-sticks smouldering in a saucer before a little bronze Buddha- rupa,” lay a man, still young, the traces of rare beauty in his face, though worn with suffering and horrid with a week’s growth of beard. He was, murmuring over to himself some words which I could not catch, but my entrance, though he did not notice me, seemed to rouse him a little. I distinctly heard— twin, ‘« These are the spells by which to re-assume An empire o’er the disentangled doom.” He paused, sighing, then continued— ‘* To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite; To forgive wrongs darker than death or night ; To defy power which seems omnipotent ; To love, and bear ; to hope till hope creates From its own wreck the thing it contem- plates ; Neither to change, nor falter, nor repent : This, like thy glory, Titan, is to be Good, great, and joyous, beautiful, and free: This is alone Life, Joy, Empire, and Vic- tory,” 3 The last phrase pealed trumpet-wise: he sank back into thought. ‘‘ Yes,” he said slowly, ‘‘ neither to change, nor falter, nor repent.” I moved forward, and he saw me. ‘Who are you?” he asked. . ‘‘T am travelling in the East,” I said. ‘‘T love Man also; I have come to see you. Who are you?” 1 See “Tristam Shandy,” by Laurence Sterne, Chap. I. 2 Image of Buddha. 3 Shelley, ‘‘ Prometheus Unbound,” iv. He laughed pleasantly. ‘‘I am the child of many prayers.”’ There was a pause. I stood still, thinking. Here was surely the very strangest outcast of Society. What uncouth bypaths of human experience, across what mapless tracks be- yond the social pale, must have led hither— hither to death in this Anglo-Saxon-blasted corner of Japan, here, at the very outpost of the East. He spoke my thought. ‘Here I lie,” he said, ‘‘ east of all things. All my life I have been travelling eastward, and now there is now no further east to go.” ‘‘ There is America,” I said. I had to say something. ‘Where the disappearance of man has followed that of manners: the exit of God has not wished to lag behind that of grammar. I have no use for American men, and only one use for American women.” ‘“*Of a truth,” I said, ‘‘the continent is accursed—a very limbo.” ‘‘Tt is the counterfoil of evolution,” said the man wearily. There was silence. ‘* What can I do for you?” I asked. “* Are you indeed ill?” ‘* Four days more,” he answered, thrilling with excitement, ‘‘and all my dreams will come true—until I wake. But you can serve me, if indeed— Did you hear me spouting poetry ?” I nodded, and lit my pipe. He watched me narrowly while the match illuminated my face. ‘‘ What poetry ?”’ I told him Shelley. ‘*Do you read Ibsen?” he queried, keen- ing visibly. After a moment’s pause: ‘‘ He is the Sophocles of manners,” I said, re- warded royally for months of weary waiting. My strange companion sat up transfigured. ‘¢ The Hour,” he murmured, ‘‘and the Man ! . . . What of Tennyson?” ‘* Which Tennyson ?”’ I asked. The answer seemed to please him. ‘In Memoriam ?” he replied. ‘‘ He is a neurasthenic counter-jumper.” ‘And of the Idylls?” - . ‘‘Sir Thomas! did no wrong; can im- potence excuse his posthumous emascula- tion ?” 2 1 Sir T. Malory: author of the true ‘‘ Morte d’ Arthur.”’ 2 See A. C. Swinburne, ‘‘ Under the Micro- scope.”