Working in the Shade Part 4

At length, all the trains having reached the Lakeside Terminus, the entire party of temporary exiles were duly and speedily conveyed in steamers to the island of Comoro, where they were put on sh.o.r.e with their goods.

The climate of the island was delightful, and subject to but few variations, so that nothing was to be feared by the new-comers from inclemency of weather. Care had been also taken by the lord chancellor, to whom the carrying out of the details had been committed, that a sufficient number of tents should be ready for the use of those who chose to avail themselves of them, while building materials and tools had been duly provided, as well as an ample store of provisions.

When the last steamer had discharged its pa.s.sengers and cargo, proclamation was made by a herald that a commissioner from the king would visit Comoro once a month, to hear any complaints and record any misconduct; and that those who should be found guilty of any grave offence would receive condign punishment at the close of the term of banishment.

The community was then left to follow its own devices. And what would these be? Of course the obvious thing was for each to look after "number one;" but he soon became painfully conscious that he could not do this without the help of "number two," and that to obtain this help he must be willing to do his own part. One gentleman, indeed, apparently entirely unconscious of any other duty than that of taking care of himself, set to work at once to make himself as comfortable as circ.u.mstances would permit. Having selected the most roomy and convenient tent he could find, he removed his most easily portable possessions into it, and proceeded to regale himself on some cold provisions which he had brought with him. After these were finished, he rang violently several times a hand-bell which he had brought with him, expecting that his valet would at once answer the summons; but he soon found that he could not calculate on his servant's attendance in Comoro.

It was true that the man had come on the same steamer as his master, having been one of the guests at the royal banquet; but he had no thought now of looking after any one but himself, and was, when his master rang for him, busily engaged in a drinking-bout with a few like- minded companions.

And what could the females do? The spoilt children had, of course, their mothers with them--for none but selfish mothers would spoil their children--and these mothers with their little ones were preparing to form themselves into a distinct community; but such a frightful contention and uproar arose amongst the children themselves, that before nightfall their parents had to abandon their original idea and seek separate homes among their neighbours. As for the young ladies, they soon managed to enlist the services of the female domestics who had come to the island, and then placed themselves under the protection of two elderly maiden sisters, on the express understanding that their guardians were to be handsomely remunerated for looking after them.

The young gentlemen, having no intention to exert themselves unnecessarily, lounged about with cigars in their mouths, and voted the whole thing "a bore;" while several of the elders of both s.e.xes, suppressing for the time the exhibition of their specialities of selfishness, indulged in a prolonged chorus of grumbling and mutual condolence. But, in one way or other, all had been fed and housed before midnight, and sleep buried for a while in forgetfulness the troubles of the bewildered settlers on Comoro.

We pa.s.s over the first month, and how does the commissioner, on his arrival at the island, find the exiles bearing their lot? Proclamation was at once made that those who had anything to complain of should meet him in a s.p.a.cious marquee which he had caused to be set up on a large open piece of ground near the sh.o.r.e, immediately on his arrival. He was rather dismayed, however, when he found the place of hearing crowded without a moment's delay by nine-tenths of the islanders, while many were clamouring outside because unable to obtain admission. After a few moments' consideration, he ordered his officers to clear the marquee, and then to admit a hundred of the more elderly of each s.e.x. This was done with some considerable difficulty, and the commissioner then addressed himself to a crabbed-looking old gentleman, who had elbowed his way to the front with a vigour hardly to have been looked for in one of his years and apparent infirmities.

"May I request, sir, to be informed what it is you have to complain of?"

asked the commissioner.

"I complain of everything and everybody," was the reply.

"Is that _all_ you have to complain of?" the commissioner then asked.

Before the old gentleman could frame an answer to this second question, the judge, having paused to give a few moments for reply, exclaimed, "Officer, dismiss this complainant;" and the old man was forthwith removed from the tent in a state of boiling indignation.

"And now, madam," continued the commissioner, addressing a middle-aged lady of dignified mien and commanding stature, "may I ask what is your complaint?"

"I complain, sir," replied the lady sternly, "of general neglect and ill-treatment."

"Excuse me, madam," was the judge's reply, "but I can see no evidence of this in your personal appearance. So far from it, that, having met you not unfrequently in the streets of our city, I am constrained to congratulate you on the manifest improvement in health which you have gained from a month's residence in this delightful climate.--Officer, conduct this lady with all due ceremony to the outside of our court."

"And you, sir," speaking to a gentleman of very severe countenance, who had been used at home to "show his slaves how choleric he was, and make his bondmen tremble,"--"let me hear what charge you have to allege."

"Charge, Mr Commissioner! Charge enough, I'm sure! Why, I can't get any one to mind a word that I say."

"Then, I am sure, sir, the fault must be wholly or for the most part your own.--Officer, remove him."

"Has no one anything more definite to complain of?" he again asked, looking round the a.s.sembly, which by this time had begun to thin, as it became obvious to all present that no attention would be given to mere vague grumblings.

"I'm sure it's very hard," sighed a knot of young ladies, who had listened from the outside to what had been going on, and were afraid to speak out more plainly. "We shall be moped to death if we're kept here any longer," muttered one or two fast young men, shrugging their shoulders. But to these remarks the commissioner turned a deaf ear; and no one coming forward to lodge any distinct charge against another, the court broke up, and the commissioner proceeded to make a tour of inspection among the islanders.

He found, as he had indeed expected to find, that the necessity for exertion, and the peculiarity of the circ.u.mstances in which they were now placed, had already got rid of a good deal of the selfishness which had only formed a sort of crust over the characters of many who, in the main, were not without kind and generous feelings; so that the looking after the due supply of provisions, and the cooking of them and serving them to the different families, had been cheerfully undertaken by a duly organised body of young and middle-aged workers of both s.e.xes,--the result of which was, not only an improvement in character in the workers themselves, but also a drawing forth of expressions of grat.i.tude from some who formerly took all attentions as a right, but now had been made to feel their dependence on their fellows. And it was pleasant to see how cordially working men and women were united in striving for the good of the community in conjunction with those who had hitherto occupied a higher social position than themselves.

Some, indeed, of the lower orders, whose tastes had been of an utterly low and degraded cast, had been summarily ejected from the island after they had more than once endangered the lives and stores of the islanders in their brutal drunken sprees. They had talked big, indeed, and made at first a show of resistance; but the general body of the exiles had authorised a powerful force of young and middle-aged men to take them into custody, and convey them on a raft, constructed for the purpose, to an island some ten miles distant. Here the rioters were left with a sufficient supply of provisions; a warning being given them that, should they attempt to return to Comoro, they would be put in irons, and kept in custody till they could be brought up before the commissioner. The island being thus happily rid of this disturbing element, there was, at any rate, outward peace among the inhabitants of Comoro, though, of course, there was yet abundance of discontent and bitterness beneath the surface in the hearts of many.

As the commissioner was making his way to the sh.o.r.e preparatory to his return to the mainland, he pa.s.sed a tent from which there issued such deep-fetched sighs that, having obtained permission to enter, he inquired of the inmate the cause of so much trouble.

"Ah, sir!" replied the poor sufferer, who was a man some sixty years of age, with grey hair, and a countenance whose expression was one of mingled shrewdness, discontent, and ill-temper, "our sovereign little knows the cruelty he has been guilty of in sending me all alone to a place like this."

"How alone, my friend?" asked the other; "you have plenty of companions within reach."

"Why, sir," was the poor man's reply, "I have been torn from the best and most loving of wives--I who am so entirely dependent on her for my happiness--I who love her so tenderly;--alas! Wretched man that I am, what shall I do?"

"Do you know this gentleman?" said the commissioner, turning to his secretary, who had accompanied him into the tent.

"I know him well, your excellency," was the reply; "and a more selfish man does not exist. He tells the truth, however, when he says that he is entirely dependent on his wife for his happiness; but it was impossible for her to accompany him hither, as she is the most unselfish of women. On her he has ever made it a practice to vent his chief spleen and bitterness, exacting from her at the same time perpetual service, and rarely repaying her with anything but sneers and insults, holding her up even to the scorn and ridicule of his acquaintance."

As the secretary uttered these words, a burning blush covered the face of the unhappy man, who ceased his sighs and bent his head upon his hands.

"My friend," said the commissioner gently, "I am truly sorry for you; but I am in hopes that your solitude will work for your good. Think over the past with contrition, and be up and joining in some useful work for the good of others; and when you return home, treat your injured, long-suffering, and admirable wife as a human being, a lady, a companion, a friend, an equal, and not, as you have hitherto done, like a slave or a brute beast."

There was no reply, and the commissioner hastened to the sh.o.r.e. He was about to step into the boat that was to convey him to the steamer, when a young man of dandified appearance and affected manner requested to know whether he could have one moment's private interview with the commissioner before his departure.

"Well, sir," said the other, somewhat impatiently, "you must be brief, for I am anxious to lose no time, as business matters at home are pressing."

"Sir," said the young man, dropping, at the same time, his affected drawl, "my case is a hard one, and I would ask if you could not grant me a pa.s.sage home in the vessel by which you are returning."

"On what grounds?" asked the commissioner.

"Why, sir, I have an old mother and a sister, both in infirm health, who can hardly get on without me; and it is only just that I should be allowed to return, as my mother, who is a widow, has no other son."

"Do you know this young man?" inquired the commissioner, turning to his secretary.

"Far too well, your excellency; he is the clog of his home, the laughing-stock of his companions behind his back, and is despised by all wise and sensible people. He has had situation after situation offered him, in which he could have earned an honest and respectable livelihood, but he has declined one after another as not to his taste. He is far too much of a gentleman, in his own estimation, to enter upon any work that will involve any steady exertion; but he does not scruple to sponge upon his poor mother, to whose support he contributes nothing, and who has barely enough to meet her own needs, while he borrows--that is, appropriates--the savings of his delicate sister, who, though in feeble health, has undertaken tuition, because this brother of hers is too fine a gentleman to live in anything but idleness, and spends those hard- earned savings of hers as pocket-money on his own elegant pleasures and follies."

"Contemptible wretch!" exclaimed the commissioner with flashing eyes; "stay where you are, and learn, if it is possible, by the end of these six months, to see that you have a duty to others as well as to your own despicable self."

Amazed at this exposure and reply, the young man dropped his eye-gla.s.s from his eye, and his cigar from his mouth, and stood staring in bewilderment at the commissioner as he sprang into the boat and made for the steamer which was to convey him home.

Only one other incident worth recording happened during the commissioner's subsequent visits; for the discipline involved in their banishment had produced the good result of making the various exiles feel the necessity of bearing and forbearing, giving and taking, and of each doing his and her part in contributing to the comfort and happiness of the whole. The incident referred to happened during the commissioner's third monthly visit.

Soon after his arrival he received a respectful note from the secretary of a Ladies' Working Committee, requesting him to receive a deputation from their society at the place of audience. This request having been graciously acceded to, and the deputation received by his excellency in due form, the spokeswoman of the party, a young lady in spectacles, expressed the conviction, on behalf of herself and companions, that a sad but no doubt unintentional mistake had been made by his majesty in including themselves in the party sent to Comoro. They were a.s.sociated, and had been so for years past, as workers together for many benevolent objects and therefore this sending of them to the "Selfish Island" was a double wrong; for it not only threw a slur on their society, whose members were banded together for the purpose of working for the good of others, but it also deprived many suffering ones at home of the help and comfort they had been used to derive from the united and self-denying efforts of these their true and loving friends.

The commissioner having listened with due politeness and attention to this address, a.s.sured the deputation that the king would be sorry to have done them any wrong, should such prove to have been the case, and that he would duly report the matter to his majesty. He could not, however, release them on the present occasion; but he hoped, after having made full inquiry into the case on his return, that he should be able to bring them, on his next monthly visit, the welcome permission to leave the island.

Having returned to Comoro in due time, his first care was to request the Ladies' Working Committee to meet him again by deputation. This was accordingly done, and the commissioner addressed them as follows:--

"I exceedingly regret, ladies, that I cannot promise you any shortening of your time of banishment. His majesty has received your complaint, and has caused due investigation to be made; and the result of that investigation has not led him to make any relaxation in your case. For it has been clearly ascertained that the good works and charitable deeds of which you informed me on my last visit, consisted in your attending to work to which you were not called, to the neglect of duties which plainly belonged to you; and that for any seeming sacrifice you made in the bestowal of your time and labour, you more than repaid yourselves in the applause which you managed to obtain from a troop of ignorant or interested admirers. It would, in fact, appear that your benevolence and labour for others involved no real self-denial in it, but was only, after all, another but less obvious form of selfishness. His majesty admires and respects nothing more than genuine co-operation in working for the benefit of the suffering and the needy; but in your case this stamp of genuineness is found to be wanting. We trust, however, that your present work may prove to be of a better character, and that at the expiry of your exile you will return home prepared to do good from truly pure and unselfish motives."

Murmurs followed, as they had accompanied, this speech, but the commissioner was inexorable.

And now at last the six months had come to an end, and the exiles of Comoro flocked to the steamers which were to convey them back to the mainland. The discipline had been with most very salutary. Roughing it for the first time in their lives had been the means with many of smoothing out the wrinkles of grosser selfishness from their characters.

Others had learned to look at things through their neighbours' eyes, and thus had come to think less about themselves and about consulting their own pleasure merely. Some also who had moved up and down in a groove all their previous lives, and had made all about them miserable or uncomfortable by their unbending and ungracious habits, had learned the wisdom, and happiness, too, of bending aside a little from the path of their own prejudices to accommodate a neighbour. Many likewise, having been forced to do things of which, on their first landing on Comoro, they had loudly proclaimed themselves physically incapable, now found, to no one's surprise so much as their own, that their former impossibilities could henceforth be performed by themselves with ease.

While a few, who had been in the habit of glorying in unselfishness as their strong point, had come to detect their own weakness when they got little or no credit from their neighbours for their ambitious acts of self-denial. And one thing was specially worthy of remark,--so far from suffering in health, everyone returned home greatly improved in looks and vigour by this compulsory stay in the clear and bracing atmosphere of Comoro. As for the hypochondriacal gentleman, who had felt so keenly the refusal to be allowed to take his packing-case of medicines with him, he had returned in such a state of spirits that he at once sold his extensive stock of drugs by auction, and gave the money to an hospital for incurables. And, indeed, so great was the gain to the metropolis, in the first place by the absence of the exiles, and afterwards by their altered character, for the most part, on their return to their homes, that the king, when talking over the matter with the commissioner,--whom he had selected for the post as, by general acknowledgment, the most upright, downright, straightforward, honest-minded man in his kingdom,-- declared that he should like to try the atmosphere of Comoro himself some day, as it was proved to be so healthy and improving.

"I most heartily advise your majesty to do so," said the commissioner, somewhat bluntly; "and if your majesty will only take the entire cabinet with you, I have little doubt but that the benefit to yourself and your ministers will be most heartily acknowledged and thoroughly appreciated by your subjects on your majesty's auspicious return."

CHAPTER EIGHT.

A LITTLE MYSTERIOUS.