LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1499, 5 December 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

♦ WHAT WAS IT?

["All the Year Round."] There was nothing in the weather to produce a morbid state of mind, nothing in my surroundings, or the book I was reading, to account for the facts lam about to relate. I have no particular theory to put forward in connection with them. I only say they are facts, and if anyone can tell me the meaning of them, I shall feel much oblig d. £'o, without any futther preface, I will tell you to what I refer. On a lovely afternoon in March, 1875, I was lying on my sofa reading an article in 'Kingsleys Miscellanies,' I think called 'Chalk Strtarns,' but at any rate, that was the subject treated of. Taking a keen interest in the writer's style, I was fully absorbed iu what I read, until I was arrested by the feeling that someone was looking intently at me. Now, when I took up my book for my u*ual afternoon's treat of a quiet read, when the servants had gone to dinner, and everything was still, there was no one in the room. The room was large, and my sofa at the farthest end from the door, which had opened without my noticing it, and our man-t errant, Pearson, stood in the entrance as I afterwards observed. But my first impression was that someone stronglv wished to attract my attention, and on looking up from my book, I saw a man standing a few yards away from me resting his hand ou a chair, and with such an earnest expression in his eyes, as I have never seen on any face before or since. Being a stranger in the place, I naturally thought of a visitor, annoyed at having to stand unnoticed, and went forward to apologise for having been so absorbed in my book that I had not observed his entrance. But as I walked towards him (noting with surprise that he was dressed in a suit of clothes exactly resembling one my husband had worn a year before) I found myself alone. That is to say, my visitor was gone, but at the farther end of the room stcd Pearson, holding the dnor, and apparently looking hard at the spot which he hid just left. For a moment I thought I must have been dreaming, and that possibly my servant also existed only in my imagination, so I put it to the test by asking, ' Has anyone called this afternoon V

•No, ma'am,' waa the answer, and without any explanation of hia <jwn appearance at the door, the man left the room. Still I determined to test myself, and looking at the clock I saw I had been lying down ten minutes, repeated to myself tbe gist of what I thought I had read, took up my book again, and in ten minutes more had reached the same point. It seemed then evident that 1 had not wandered from the subject, and it was not one which could in any way excite my imagination, or bring to mind the person whose story I will presently tell you. Some hours later, when my husband came in. I mentioned the circumstance to him. His first question naturally was, 'But did you not know the face ?' To which I could only auswer, ' Well, I did and I did not. That is to say, it is perfectly familiar to me, and yet the expression was so unlike any I have ever seen, that I cannot tell whose face it was. But the suit of clothes he had on I could swear were those you pave Ramsay last year. Who he was. or why he didn't say what he was so anxious to say, I can't imagine, but I shall never forget the look on his face It was intensely grave, and yet it seemed lighted up by a most earnest wish to speak, and to me personally, for he looked straight into my eyes.' We talked over it again and again, and I mentioned it to one or two intimate friends, but having no idea that any explanation of the circumstance would ever bo likely to come before us, I unfortunately did not make a note of the day on which it happened. But in as short a time as a leUer could reach us from home—we were, in a garrison town abroad—my husband received a letter from a sergeant. w!;p had been employed on civil &iider him the previous year. It contained these words : 'You will be sorry to, hear your old servant, Ramsay, is dead.' We wrote to express our regret, and to ask for any particulars of hia last illness, which must have been short, as we had left him in health two months previously. The answer was this ; 'Ramsay died in hospital. I have made inquiries, and have learnt that he died raving, and calling incessantly for Mrs EL' That waa myself and this is Ramsay's story : Two y:;iu'3 previous to the time of which I am writing, I chanced to be sitting in a ! E ighland cemetery, when a poor man, bent with sickness, laid himself down to rest in the suushiue a little way from where I sat His face intcested me, and I felt he had, as they say. seen better d&ya. I remarked to the frund who \y,as with mo, that it scorned to bo ratb,ei; false sentiment to sit dpco'v.tiii'.- o, sheave as we were doing, whilst wo lei a fello.w-creature gi away to starve, without holding out a hand. By this time the nun had gone, but we agreed to iind him, and a few days afterwards .succeed; d in d' ing so. He had been a private : ja the —th, hia father a gentleman, 1i.13 mother a poor Scotch lasßio, who loved him so well that she deserted, he» little one when he was four yaa/j old, to follow the father's forduu. s, aiid was heard of no more excepting ■ihvongh such rumors as wrung the boy's heivt, remembering and loving her to the, Irt'al, as f c&n vouch that he did. I c;;bj o kniw those thinus by deg ecs, for «''for we had found that there was no uuraing or comfort to be had in the little hut wnere ha

lived with an old aunt, who worked in the fields for fchoir mutual support, we had him taken to the infirmary. Many a time have I sat by his bed, thinking it might be the last, for ho had a complication of disorder, and the doctors feared the worst; and between bi asms of pain which left the poor face covered with moisture, and the hand", which lay on the coverlet, trembling, poor Ramsey would tell ine all his sad story. How he supposed he had inherited some of hs father's feelings, for he never felt at home or happy with his comrades ; and yet how he hated him, and longed only to find his mother, and hear her speak lovingly to him once more before he died. We put advertisements in the papers for him, as he thought he had some clue to her late history. But it was all useless : no answers came, and he gave up all hope on that subject, and was resigned to die. It happened that we were then leaving Scotland for two months, and, with many regrets, L said good-bye to my poor protege, exacting a promise that he should writu if I could do anything for him. He wrote to me several times, each time giving a more cheerful account of himself, and at last saying that he was so much better as to be about to be discharged. It was a d übtful blessing, as it seemed to him, poor fellow, for he had no home, and no means of support, and was not strong enough to obtain work. However, we were just then about to return to Scotland, and we took him into our house to train as a servant. He learnt everything quickly and well. I found plenty of my husband's clothes which I could give him ; and with enough of the gentlemen in him to refine his manner, and of the soldier to make him methodical, we thought he did credit to the house. For a time all went on well ; but whether sudden prosperity spoilt him, or what, I cannot say. I only know he was a changed person; lazy, untidy, unwilling, and going from bad to worse, he made the other servants discontented, untruthful, and even dishonest. So there was no help for it; he had to go, and he went. It was a great disappointment to both my husband and myself, for we had hoped to take him abroad with us, and he had seemed most anxious to go. This, however, we agreed to forget. The man was strong and able to work, and had, moreover, learnt to be a good servant, and we had left him filling the place of waiter at a club, where there was every prospect of his doing well, if he profited by his former experience, and was steady. This was what we said to each other when we spoke of him last, before going abroad in February, 1875, and we heard no more of him till he was dead. I can see all the weak points in the story, and am quite prepared to be asked if what I saw was indeed my late servant, why did I not recognise him, and above all, how could I mistake him for a visitor? This is the only explanation I give to myself. In the first place, I had kno*n the face well when death was in near prospect, and anxious thoughts filled the mind ; but since then the man had grown strong, and I had been accustomed to see him in health so long, that the recollection of his illness had passed away for the time. Bat the face I saw at last was the one I had seen at first, dying, and in earnest, with the addid regret that he had been UDgrateful (which I, who knew the man, could well understand that h<s would feel), giving an intentness to the speechless look which was the last he was to give. I remember one day in his illnesß, when he had been talking of his mother, and other things which troubled him and I had eiven him such comfort as I could, he said, ' Ma'am, you must forgive a dying man for saying you are the only woman who has ever been good to him. I mem something better than if I called you a ' lady.'' The doubt as to whother I should understood or be offended at his speech was expressed so strongly in his fac, that the matron of the hospital, who stood beside me, at once s»id: 'I am sure the lady is glad (you think that of her, b 't sorry you won't cheer up about yourself. ' And then I found voice to say ' Yes,' and went away. It was the last time I saw him as an invalid. All very well, you will say, but don't tell me you can mistake your man servant for an equal, and stand up to receive him as a visitor 1 I can only answer again, I have told you the facts as they happened. Perhaps, I have my own crude ideas as to the meaning of them, perhaps, I have not; but at any rate, lam not going to enter into them now. I will only remind you that, as far as appearances went, the man was a gentlemen. He had gentle birth on one side, was always refined in his manners, and moreover, was dressed in a suit of ciothes of which no gentleman need have been ashamed. That is all I can tell you about it. But there is one odd fact as a pendant to this little story. The man Pearson, whom we bad just brought all tue way from the Ultima Thule of the ancients at great expense, gave warning that day, because he said 'the house *<as haunted.' Ho gave no explanation, and I said nothing, as the reason of his sudden wish to go only reached ma through my maid. You will lvmember that he stood at the door, apparently having shown in my mysterious visitor. Had his notice to quit oome a day later, I should have said he heard other servants spea.k of the circumstance, in houses where I had mentioned it. But he gave it that day, and before I had npoken of it at all. Nor have I heard, up to this moment, what he meant. Puzzled, but not alarmed myself, 1 would not risk frightening my household, eo when my maid told mo what he had said, I only replied ' nonsense I' and that was an end of it. He left us, and the news of Ramsay's death came after he had gone, or I think I should have felt inclined then to question him.