Geoffrey Hamstead Part 16

Mrs. Dusenall piped all hands for divine service. They came out of the ark two by two and filed up the streets in that order until the church was reached. The boys came out in "heavy marching order"--Sunday coats, and all that sort of thing--which made a vast change from the picturesque and rather buccaneer-like appearance they presented on the yacht.

If a traveling circus had proceeded up the center aisle of the attractively decorated edifice, no greater curiosity could have been exhibited among the worshipers. Mrs. Dusenall had some of the imposing mien of a drum-major as she led her gallant band to seats at the head of the church, and Charley was justly proud of the fine appearance they made. He had surveyed them all with pleasure while on the sidewalk outside, and had paid the usher half a dollar to lead them all together to front seats. Walk as lightly as they could, it was impossible in the stillness of the church to prevent their entrance from sounding like that of soldiery, and once the eyes of the worshipers rested on the n.o.ble troop they became fixed there for some time. There was a ruddy, bronzed look about the yachting men's faces which, innocent of limestone dust tended to deny the almost aggressive respectability which good tailoring and cruelty collars attempted to claim for them. In the hearts of the fair Kingstonians who glanced toward them there arose visions of lawn-tennis, boating, and buccaneer costumes suggested by that remarkably able-bodied and healthy appearance which a fashionable walk, bank trousers, and a gauzy umbrella may do much to modify but can not obliterate. As for the male devotees, it was touching to mark their interest in Margaret as she went up the aisle keeping step with the shortened pace of the long-limbed Geoffrey. The clergyman was just saying that the scriptures moved them in sundry places when all at once he became a mere cipher to them. After their first thrill at the beauty of her face, their eyes followed Margaret and that wonderful movement of hers that made her, as with a well-ordered regiment, almost as dangerous in the retreat as in the advance. But Nina came along close behind her, and those who, though disabled, survived the first volley were slaughtered to a man when the rich charms of her appearance won her a triumph all her own. Jack, walking by her side, full of gravity but happy, took in the situation with pride at her silent success. Then all the others followed, and when they were installed in a body in the three front pews, and after they had all bowed their heads and the gentlemen had carefully perused the legend printed in their hats--"Lincoln Bennett & Coy, Sackville Street, Piccadilly, London. Manufactured expressly for Jas. H. Rogers, Toronto and Winnipeg"--they got their books open and admitted that they had done things they ought not to have done and that there was no health in them.

The interior of the church was a luxury to the eye in its mellow coloring from stained-gla.s.s windows and carefully-arranged lights, and in its banners, altar-cloths, embroidery, and church millinery generally, it left little to be desired. The clergyman was a young unmarried offspring of a high-church college who, with a lofty disregard for general knowledge, had acquired a great deal of theology. He it was who arranged that dim religious light about the altar and walled up a neighboring window so that the burning of candles seemed to become necessary. Never having been out of America, it was difficult to imagine where he acquired the ultra-English p.r.o.nunciation that had all those flowing "ah" sounds which after a while make all words so pleasantly alike in the high-pitched reading of prayers when, it may be inferred, that word-meanings are perhaps of minor import. It seemed that he alone was, from the holiness of his office, qualified to enter that mysterious place at the head of the chancel where, with his back to the congregation, at stated times he went through certain genuflexions and other movements in which the general public did not partic.i.p.ate further than to admire the splendor of his back. The effect of the many mysteries on some of the Kingston men was to keep them away from the church. A few fathers of families and others came to please wives, sweethearts, or clients, and in the cool, agreeable edifice enjoyed some respectable slumber or watched the proceedings with mild curiosity or had their ears filled either with good music or the agreeable sound of the intoning.

The effect of the little mysteries on the well-to-do women of the church (for it was no place for a poor man's family) was varied. On the large-eyed, nervous, impressionable, and imaginative virgins--those who could always be found ready in the days of human sacrifices--the clergyman's mysteries and the exercise of the power of the Church, as exhibited in the continual working of his strong will upon them, had of course the usual results in enfeebling their judgment and in rendering them very subservient. In the case of some unimaginative matrons and more level-headed girls these attractions did not unfit them for every-day life more than continual theatre-going, and they took a pride in and enjoyed a sense of quasi-ownership in the man whom it tickled their fancy to clothe in gorgeous raiment. To these solid, pleasure-loving, good-natured women, whose religion was inextricably mixed up with romance, the mysteries, sideshows, and formalities of their splendid _protege_ brought satisfaction; and in their social gatherings they discussed the doings of their favorite much as a syndicate of owners might, in the pride of ownership, discuss their horse. It may be pleasing to be identified with the supernatural, but one's self-respect must need all such compensations to allow one to become a peg for admiring women to hang their embroidery on--to be largely dependent upon their gratuities, subject to some of their control, to put in, say, two fair days' work in seven, and spend the rest in fiddle-faddle.

"There is but one G.o.d. What directly concerns you, my friends, is that Mohammed _is his Prophet_--to interpret the supernatural for you." It would be interesting to find out if there ever existed a religion, savage or civilized, whose public proclamation did not contain a qualifying clause to retain the power in the priests.

The sermon on this occasion was on the observance of the Sabbath. It contained much church law and theology, and in quotations from different saints who had lived at various periods during the dark ages, and whose sayings did not seem to be chosen so much on account of their force as for the weight given by the names of the saints themselves, which were delivered _ore rotundo_. But it is doubtful whether the most erudite quotation from obscure mediaeval saints is capable of carrying much conviction to the hearts of a Canadian audience, and Jack and Charley had to be kicked into consciousness from an uneasy slumber.

From the saints the priest descended to Chicago, a transition which awoke several. And he sought to ill.u.s.trate the depravity of that city by commenting upon the large facilities there provided for Sabbath-breaking. He spoke of the street-cars he had seen there running on that day, and of the suburban trains that carried thousands of working-women and girls out of the city. He did not say that the cars were chiefly drawn by steam-power, nor that these poor, jaded, hollow-eyed girls worked harder in one day than he did in three weeks; nor did he speak of the weak women's hard struggle for existence in the life-consuming factories; nor of the freshness of the lake breezes in the spots where the trains dropped thousands of their overworked pa.s.sengers.

Margaret Mackintosh had seen these dragged, dust-choked, narrow-chested, smoke-dried girls, with all the bloom of youth gone from them, trying to make their drawn faces smile as they go off together in their clean, Sunday print dresses, too jaded for anything save rest and fresh air.

She knew that any man not devoid of the true essence of Christ might almost weep in the fullness of his sympathy with them. But the young priest convicted them of sacrilege, and did not say he was thankful for being privileged to witness such a sight, or that Chicago existed to shame the more priest-ridden cities of Canada.

When this story was concluded, Mrs. Dusenall, and many of her kind; and the unimpressionable girls looked acquiescence, because the words were backed by the Church, but their hearts went out to the poor sinners in Chicago. Only with those who took their mental bias from the priest did his words find solid resting-place. Geoffrey sat with an inmovable face, impossible to read. His subsequent remark to Margaret, when she had delivered her opinions about the matter, was, however, characteristic.

He said simply, as if deprecating her vehemence:

"The man must live, you know, and how is he to live if people go out of town on Sunday." To Geoffrey a short time was sufficient to satisfy him that the preacher ought to have lived in the days when mankind were saturated with belief in miracle and looked for explanation of events by miracle without dreaming of other explanation.

During the next five minutes the sermon rather wandered from the subject, but fastened upon it again in an anecdote of an occurrence said to have taken place at an American seaport town, during the preacher's visit there.

Several young mechanics, instead of going to church one Sunday morning, had engaged a yawl, and also the fishermen who owned it, to take them to a village on the coast and back again. It appeared from the account that for a day and a night the yawl had been blown away from the coast, and then that the wind had changed, so as to drive it back again; and the story of the voyage naturally found attentive listeners among our yachting friends.

"All through that first terrible day, and all through the long, black night they were tossed about among the giant billows of a most tempestuous ocean. And what, dear friends, must have been the agony and remorse of those misguided young men when they thus realized the results of their deliberate breaking of the holy day. As they clung to the frail vessel, which reeled to and fro beneath them like a drunken man, and which now alone remained to possibly save them from a watery grave--as they perceived the billows breaking in upon that devoted ship, insomuch that it was covered with waves, what must have been their sensations?

And when the wind suddenly changed its direction and blew them with terrible force back again toward the rocky coast, we can imagine how earnestly they made their resolutions never again to transgress in this way. Once more, after a while, they saw the land again, and as they came closer they could discern the spires of those holy edifices which they had abandoned for the sake of forbidden pleasures and in which they were doomed never to hear the teachings of the Church again. There lay the harbor before them, as if in mockery of all their attempts to reach it; and while raised on high in the air, on the summit of some white, mountainous billow, they could obtain a Pisgah-like view of those homes they were destined never again to enter."

Jack was broad awake now and wondering why, with the wind dead after them, the fishermen in charge of the boat could not make the harbor.

"Suddenly there came a great noise, which no doubt sounded like a death knell in the hearts of the terrified and exhausted young men. It was soon discovered that the mainsail of the ship had been blown away by the fury of the tempest."

"Now what was their unhappy condition? How could they any longer strive to reach the longed-for haven when the mainsail of the yawl was blown away?"

Jack shifted in his seat uncomfortably at this point. He was saying to himself: "Why not sneak in under a jib? Or even under bare poles? Or, if the harbor was intricate, why not heave to under the mizzen and signal for a tug?" Half a score of possibilities followed each other through his brain, which in sailing matters worked quickly. He always inclined from his early training to accept without question all that issued from the pulpit; but this story bothered him. The instructor went on:

"Clearly there was now no hope for the devoted vessel. Even the anchor was gone; the anchor of Hope, dear friends, was gone. The strong trustworthy anchor (in which mariners place so great confidence that it has become the type or symbol of Hope) was gone--washed overboard by the temptuous waves."

Charley here received a kick under the seat from Jack whose face was now filled with a blank incredulity, which showed that the influence of his early training had departed from him.

In one way or another, the preacher succeeded in irritating some of the Ideal's crew. He went on to say that the yawl was dashed to pieces on the rocks, and that only one man--a fisherman--survived; from which he drew the usual moral.

With three or four exceptions, our friends went out of church not as good-humored as when they came in. Geoffrey alone seemed to have enjoyed himself. His heart-felt cynicism pulled him through. He said aloud to Mrs. Dusenall, when they were all together again, that he thought the preacher's description of the perils of the deep was very beautiful.

(Dead silence from Jack and Charley). Mrs. Dusenall concurred with him, and said it was wonderful how clergymen acquired so much general knowledge.

Presently Charley, thoughtfully: "Say, Jack, what was the matter with that boat, any way?"

"Blessed if I could find out," said Jack.

"Why! did you not hear? Her mainsail was gone," said Geoffrey gravely, to draw Jack out.

"Well, who the deuce cares for a mains'l?" answered Jack, rising testily to the bait. "The man does not know what he is--well, of course, he is a clergyman, but then, you know--my stars! not make a port in broad daylight with the wind dead aft! Perfectly impossible to miss it! And, then the anchor--a fisherman's anchor!--washed overboard!"

Geoffrey persisted, more gravely, in a reproachful tone; "You don't mean to say, Jack, that you doubt that what a clergyman says is true?"

The Misses Dusenall also looked at him very seriously.

Jack was a candid young man, and had his religious views fixed, as it were, hereditarily. He looked at his boots, as if he would like to evade the question; but, seeing no escape, he came out with his answer like parting with his teeth.

"When the parson," he said with stolid determination, "goes in for mediaeval saints, I don't interfere. He can forge ahead and I won't try to split his wind. But when he talks sailing he must talk sense. No, sir! I do _not_ believe that story--and no Angel Gabriel would make me."

There was a force behind his tones of conviction which amused some of his hearers.

"Jack Cresswell! You surprise me," said Geoffrey loftily.

After lunch the ladies went up into the city to visit some friends, and the men were lying about under the awning, chatting, smoking, and sipping claret.

"Well, there was one thing about that boat that caused the entire disturbance," said Charley, sagaciously. "I've thought the whole thing out; and I put down the trouble to the usual cause--and that is--whisky.

When the fishermen found there was liquor on board they 'steered for the open sea,' and when they were all stark, staring, blind drunk they went ash.o.r.e."

"I fancy you have solved the difficulty," said Mr. Lemons. "The preacher did not, somehow, seem to get hold of me. My notion is that he should come down to your level and help you up--like those Arab chaps that lug and b.u.t.t you up the Pyramids--not stand at the top and order you to climb."

"Just so," said Geoffrey. "A speaker must in some way make his listeners feel at home with him, just as a novel, to sell well, must contain some one touch of nature that makes the whole world kin. The sympathies must be excited. In books accepted by gentle folk the "one touch" of attractive and primitive nature is refined, and in this shape it is called poetry--in this shape it creates vague and pleasant wonderings, especially in the minds of those whose fancies are capable of no higher intellectual flight. When we see that people so universally seek productions in which nature is only more or less disguised, we seem to understand man better."

"What are you trying to get at now?" asked Jack, with a smiling show of impatience.

"Why," said Hampstead, "take the work of the sprightliest modern novel writers--say, for instance, Besant and Rice. Deduct the fun from their books and the shadowy plot, and what remains? A girl--a fresh, young, innocent girl--who, with her beautiful face and figure, charms the heart. She does not do much, and (with William Black) she says even less; but the people in the book are all in love with her, and the reader becomes, in a second-hand and imaginative way, in love with her also. She is quiet, lady-like, and delicious; her surroundings a.s.sist in creating an interest in her; but in the dawn and development of love within her lies the chief interest of most readers. The mind concentrates itself without effort when lured by any of our earlier instincts. What we want is a definition as to what degree of careful mental exertion is worthy of being dignified by the name of "thought,"

as distinguished from that sequence of ideas, without exertion, which is sufficient in all animals for daily routine and the carrying out of instinct."

"There are some of your ideas, Hampstead, which do not seem to promise improvement to anybody," said Jack.

"And, for you, the worst thing about them is that they have a semblance of truth," replied Hampstead.

"Sometimes--yes," admitted Jack. "But I would not excuse you because they happened to be true. The only way I excuse you is because, after your scientific mud-groveling, you sometimes point higher than others.

Are we to understand, then, that you object to novel reading on moral grounds?"

"Don't be absurd. A novel may be all that it should be. I am stating what I take to be facts, and I think it interesting to consider why we enjoy what ladies call 'a good love-story.' You will notice that people who adopt an over-ascetic and unnatural life and do not seek nature, give up reading 'good love-stories.' Perhaps they vaguely realize that the difference in the interest created by Black's insipid Yolande and Byron's Don Juan is merely one of degree."

"Now, will you be so good as to say candidly what gain you or any one else ever received from thinking in such channels as these?" inquired Jack, with impatience.

"Certainly. It keeps me from transcendentalism--from being led off into vanity--thoughts about my immortality--"

"Surely," interrupted Jack, "the aspirations of one's soul are sufficient to convince us that we will live again."

"Jack, a man's soul is simply his power of imagining and desiring what he hasn't got. Once a day, more or less, his soul imagines immortality.

The rest of the time it imagines his sweetheart. If a poet, his soul combines the two. Or else it is the mighty dollar, or hunting, or something else. Shall all his aspirations toward nature go for nothing?

His soul will conjure up his sweetheart nine thousand times for one thought of his future state. Because he has acquired neither. If he had acquired either, he would soon be quite as certain that there was something still better in store for him. With our minds as active and refined as they are, it would be quite impossible for men to do otherwise than have their imaginings about souls and immortality. These make no proof; the savage has none of them; and if they were proof, whither do man's aspirations chiefly point? To earth or to heaven?"