Gryll Grange Part 7

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ A good idea. That may be something to his mind.

_Miss Gryll._ Talking of comedy, doctor, what has become of Lord Curryfin, and his lecture on fish.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ Why, Lord Michin Malicho,{1} Lord Facing-both-ways, and two or three other arch-quacks, have taken to merry-andrewising in a new arena, which they call the Science of Pantopragmatics, and they have bitten Lord Curryfin into tumbling with them; but the mania will subside when the weather grows cool; and no doubt we shall still have him at Thornback Bay, teaching the fishermen how to know a herring from a halibut.

1 'Marry, this is _miching mallecho_: it means mischief.'

--Hamlet.

_Miss Gryll._ But pray, doctor, what is this new science?

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ Why that, Miss Gryll, I cannot well make out.

I have asked several professors of the science, and have got nothing in return but some fine varieties of rigmarole, of which I can make neither head nor tail. It seems to be a real art of talking about an imaginary art of teaching every man his own business. Nothing practical comes of it, and, indeed, so much the better. It will be at least harmless, as long as it is like Hamlet's reading, 'words., words, words.' Like most other science, it resolves itself into lecturing, lecturing, lecturing, about all sorts of matters, relevant and irrelevant: one enormous bore prating about jurisprudence, another about statistics, another about education, and so forth; the _crambe repet.i.ta_ of the same rubbish, which has already been served up 'twies hot and twies cold,'{1} at as many other a.s.sociations nicknamed scientific.

_Miss Gryll._ Then, doctor, I should think Lord Curryfin's lecture would be a great relief to the unfortunate audience.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ No doubt more amusing and equally profitable.

Not a fish more would be caught for it, and this will typify the result of all such scientific talk. I had rather hear a practical cook lecture on bubble and squeak: no bad emblem of the whole affair.

_Mr. Gryll._ It has been said a man of genius can discourse on anything.

Bubble and squeak seems a limited subject; but in the days of the French Revolution there was an amusing poem with that t.i.tle;{2} and there might be an amusing lecture; especially if it were like the poem, discursive and emblematical. But men so dismally far gone in the affectation of earnestness would scarcely relish it.

1 And many a Jacke of Dover hast thou sold, That hath been twies hot and twies cold.

Chaucer: The c.o.ke's Prologue.

2 'Babble and Squeak: a Gallimaufry of British Beef with the Chopped Cabbage of Gallic Philosophy.' By Huddesford.

CHAPTER IX

SAINT CATHARINE

... gli occhi su levai, E vidi lei che si facea corona, Riflettendo da se gli eterni ral Dante: Paradiso, x.x.xi. 70-72.

I lifted up my gaze, And looked on her who made herself a crown, Reflecting from herself the eternal rays.

It was not long before the doctor again walked over to the Tower, to propose to his young friend to co-operate in the Aristophanic comedy.

He found him well disposed to do so, and they pa.s.sed a portion of the afternoon in arranging their programme.

They dined, and pa.s.sed the evening much as before. The next morning, as they were ascending to the library to resume their pleasant labour, the doctor said to himself, 'I have pa.s.sed along galleries wherein were many chambers, and the doors in the day were more commonly open than shut, yet this chamber door of my young friend is always shut. There must be a mystery in it.' And the doctor, not generally given to morbid curiosity, found himself very curious about this very simple matter.

At last he mustered up courage to say, 'I have seen your library, dining-room, and drawing-room; but you have so much taste in internal arrangements, I should like to see the rest of the house.'

_Mr. Falconer._ There is not much more to see. You have occupied one of the best bedrooms. The rest do not materially differ.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ To say the truth, I should like to see your own.

_Mr. Falconer._ I am quite willing. But I have thought, perhaps erroneously, it is decorated in a manner you might not altogether approve.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ Nothing indecorous, I hope.

_Mr. Falconer._ Quite the contrary. You may, perhaps, think it too much devoted to my peculiar views of the purity of ideal beauty, as developed in Saint Catharine.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ You have not much to apprehend on that score.

_Mr. Falconer._ You see, there is an altar, with an image of Saint Catharine, and the panels of the room are painted with subjects from her life, mostly copied from Italian masters. The pictures of St. Catharine and her legend very early impressed her on my mind as the type of ideal beauty--of all that can charm, irradiate, refine, exalt, in the best of the better s.e.x.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ You are enthusiastic; but indeed, though she is retained as a saint in the Reformed Church, I am not very familiar with her history. And to me some of these pictures require explanation.

_Mr. Falconer._ I will tell you her legend as briefly as I may. And we will pa.s.s from picture to picture as the subjects arise.

THE LEGEND OF SAINT CATHARINE

Catharine was a Princess of Alexandria in the third century. She embraced the Christian religion by divine inspiration. She was pre-eminent in beauty, learning, and discourse. She converted her father and mother, and all with whom she came into communication. The Emperor Maxentius brought together the fifty wisest men of the empire to convert her from the error of her way, and she converted them all to the new faith. Maxentius burned her proselytes, and threatened her with a similar death. She remained firm. He had her publicly scourged, and cast her into prison to perish by famine. Going on an expedition, he left the execution of his orders to the empress and his chief general, Porphyrius. Angels healed her wounds and supplied her with food; and in a beatific vision the Saviour of the world placed a ring on her finger, and called her His bride.{1} The presence of the ring showed to her the truth of the visitation. The empress and Porphyrius visited the prison, and she converted them also. The emperor, returning, put the empress and Porphyrius to death; and after many ineffectual expostulations with Catharine, determined on putting her to death by the wheel which bears her name.

1 Maria, Vergine delle Vergini, e Misericordia delle Misericordie, vest.i.ta de i lampi del Sole, e coronata de i raggi delle Stelle, prese il sottile, il delicato, ed il sacro dito di Catarina, humile di core e mansueta di vita, ed il largo, il clemente, ed il pictoso figliuol suo 'o cinse con lo anello.--Vita di Santa Catarina, 1. ii.

Vinegia, 1541.

Four of these wheels, armed with iron teeth, and revolving towards each other, were to cut her to pieces. Angels broke the wheels. He then brought her to the stake, and the angels extinguished the flames. He then ordered her to be beheaded by the sword. This was permitted, and in the meantime the day had closed. The body, reserved for exposure to wild beasts, was left under guard at the place of execution. Intense darkness fell on the night, and in the morning the body had disappeared. The angels had borne it to the summit of the loftiest mountain of the h.o.r.eb range, where still a rock, bearing the form of a natural sarcophagus, meets the eye of the traveller. Here it was watched by angel-guards, and preserved in unchanging beauty, till, in the fulness of time, it was revealed to a holy man, who removed it to the shrine, under which it lies to this day, with the ring still on its hand, in the convent which was then founded, and which bears her name--the convent Saint Catharine of Mount Sinai.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ Most of this is new to me. Yet I am not unfamiliar with pictures of the marriage of Saint Catharine, which was a favourite subject with the great Italian masters. But here is a picture which the legend, as you have related it, does not ill.u.s.trate. What is this tomb, with flames bursting from it, and monks and others recoiling in dismay?

_Mr. Falconer._ It represents a remarkable incident at the tomb of the saint. The Empress Catharine II. was a great benefactress to the Convent of Mount Sinai, and desired to possess Saint Catharine's ring. She sent a mitred abbot as an envoy to request it from the brotherhood.

The monks, unwilling to displease the empress, replied that they did not dare to remove it themselves, but that they would open the tomb, and the envoy might take it. They opened the tomb accordingly, and the envoy looked on the hand and the ring. He approached to draw it off; but flames burst forth: he recoiled, and the tomb closed. Under such a manifestation of the saint's displeasure, the fathers could not again attempt to open it.{1}

1 Ill.u.s.trations of Jerusalem and Mount Sinai (1837), p. 27.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ I should like to have seen the empress receiving the envoy's report.

_Mr. Falconer._ Her reception of it would depend on the degree of faith which she either actually felt, or might have thought it politic to a.s.sume. At any rate, the fathers had shown their devotion, and afforded her a good opportunity for exhibiting hers. She did not again seek to obtain the ring.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ Now, what are these three pictures in one frame, of chapels on hills?

_Mr. Falconer._ These chapels are here represented as they may be supposed to have been in the Catholic days of England. Three sisters, named Catharine, Martha, and Anne, built them to their namesake saints, on the summits of three hills, which took from these dedications the names they still bear. From the summit of each of these chapels the other two were visible. The sisters thought the chapels would long remain memorials of Catholic piety and sisterly love. The Reformation laid them in ruins. Nothing remains of the chapel of St. Anne but a few gray stones, built into an earthen wall, which, some half-century ago, enclosed a plantation. The hill is now better known by the memory of Charles Fox than by that of its ancient saint. The chapel of Saint Martha has been restored and applied to Protestant worship. The chapel of Saint Catharine remains a picturesque ruin, on the banks of the Wey, near Guildford.

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ And that old church?

_Mr. Falconer._ That was the church of Saint Catharine, which was pulled down to make way for the dock by which her name is now profaned; an act of desecration which has been followed by others, and will be followed by many more, whenever it may suit the interests of commerce to commit sacrilege on consecrated ground, and dissipate the ashes of the dead; an act which, even when that of a barbarian invader, Horace thought it would be profanation even to look on.{1} Whatever may be in other respects the superiority of modern piety, we are far inferior to the ancients in reverence for temples and tombs.

1 The saint whom I have chosen frequently to my mind the most perfect ideality of physical, moral, and intellectual beauty.'

_The Rev. Dr. Opimian._ I am afraid I cannot gainsay that observation.

But what is that stained gla.s.s window?