No More Learning

The fight was long and well matched; but about
noon we saw a squadron of Nut-tars coming up in rear of the enemy. It
turned out that the two parties were at war; for as soon as our
assailants observed the others, they left us alone and turned to engage
them.

Meanwhile we hoisted sail and made the best of our way off, leaving them
to fight it out. It was clear that the Nut-tars must win, as they had
both superior numbers--there were five sail of them--and stronger
vessels. These were made of nutshells, halved and emptied, measuring
ninety feet from stem to stern. As soon as they were hull down, we
attended to our wounded; and from that time we made a practice of keeping
on our armour, to be in instant readiness for an attack--no vain
precaution either.

Before sunset, for instance, there assailed us from a bare island some
twenty men mounted on large dolphins--pirates again. Their dolphins
carried them quite well, curvetting and neighing. When they got near,
they divided, and subjected us to a cross fire of dry cuttlefish and
crabs' eyes. But our arrows and javelins were too much for them, and
they fled back to the island, few of them unwounded.

At midnight, in calm weather, we found ourselves colliding with an
enormous halcyon's nest; it was full seven miles round. The halcyon was
brooding, not much smaller herself than the nest. She got up, and very
nearly capsized us with the fanning of her wings; however, she went off
with a melancholy cry. When it was getting light, we got on to the nest,
and found on examination that it was composed like a vast raft of large
trees. There were five hundred eggs, larger in girth than a tun of Chian.
We could make out the chicks inside and hear them croaking; we hewed open
one egg with hatchets, and dug out an unfledged chick bulkier than twenty
vultures.

Sailing on, we had left the nest some five and twenty miles behind, when
a miracle happened. The wooden goose of our stern-post suddenly clapped
its wings and started cackling; Scintharus, who was bald, recovered his
hair; most striking of all, the ship's mast came to life, putting forth
branches sideways, and fruit at the top; this fruit was figs, and a bunch
of black grapes, not yet ripe. These sights naturally disturbed us, and
we fell to praying the Gods to avert any disaster they might portend.

We had proceeded something less than fifty miles when we saw a great
forest, thick with pines and cypresses. This we took for the mainland;
but it was in fact deep sea, set with trees; they had no roots, but yet
remained in their places, floating upright, as it were. When we came near
and realized the state of the case, we could not tell what to do; it was
impossible to sail between the trees, which were so close as to touch one
another, and we did not like the thought of turning back. I climbed the
tallest tree to get a good view, and found that the wood was five or six
miles across, and was succeeded by open water. So we determined to hoist
the ship on to the top of the foliage, which was very dense, and get her
across to the other sea, if possible. It proved to be so. We attached a
strong cable, got up on the tree-tops, and hauled her after us with some
difficulty; then we laid her on the branches, hoisted sail, and floating
thus were propelled by the wind. A line of Antimachus came into my head:

And as they voyaged thus the woodland through--

Well, we made our way over and reached the water, into which we let her
down in the same way. We then sailed through clear transparent sea, till
we found ourselves on the edge of a great gorge which divided water from
water, like the land fissures which are often produced by earthquakes. We
got the sails down and brought her to just in time to escape making the
plunge. We could bend over and see an awful mysterious gulf perhaps a
hundred miles deep, the water standing wall against wall. A glance round
showed us not far off to the right a water bridge which spanned the
chasm, and gave a moving surface crossing from one sea to the other. We
got out the sweeps, pulled her to the bridge, and with great exertions
effected that astonishing passage.

There followed a sail through smooth water, and then a small island, easy
of approach, and inhabited; its occupants were the Ox-heads, savage men
with horns, after the fashion of our poets' Minotaur. We landed and went
in search of water and provisions, of which we were now in want. The
water we found easily, but nothing else; we heard, however, not far off,
a numerous lowing; supposing it to indicate a herd of cows, we went a
little way towards it, and came upon these men. They gave chase as soon
as they saw us, and seized three of my comrades, the rest of us getting
off to sea. We then armed--for we would not leave our friends unavenged--
and in full force fell on the Ox-heads as they were dividing our
slaughtered men's flesh. Our combined shout put them to flight, and in
the pursuit we killed about fifty, took two alive, and returned with our
captives. We had found nothing to eat; the general opinion was for
slaughtering the prisoners; but I refused to accede to this, and kept
them in bonds till an embassy came from the Ox-heads to ransom them; so
we understood the motions they made, and their tearful supplicatory
lowings. The ransom consisted of a quantity of cheese, dried fish,
onions, and four deer; these were three-footed, the two forefeet being
joined into one. In exchange for all this we restored the prisoners, and
after one day's further stay departed.

By this time we were beginning to observe fish, birds on the wing, and
other signs of land not far off; and we shortly saw men, practising a
mode of navigation new to us; for they were boat and crew in one. The
method was this: they float on their backs, erect a sail, and then,
holding the sheets with their hands, catch the wind. These were succeeded
by others who sat on corks, to which were harnessed pairs of dolphins,
driven with reins. They neither attacked nor avoided us, but drove along
in all confidence and peace, admiring the shape of our craft and
examining it all round.

That evening we touched at an island of no great size. It was occupied by
what we took for women, talking Greek. They came and greeted us with
kisses, were attired like courtesans, all young and fair, and with long
robes sweeping the ground. Cabbalusa was the name of the island, and
Hydramardia the city's. These women paired off with us and led the way to
their separate homes. I myself tarried a little, under the influence of
some presentiment, and looking more closely observed quantities of human
bones and skulls lying about. I did not care to raise an alarm, gather my
men, and resort to arms; instead, I drew out my mallow, and prayed
earnestly to it for escape from our perilous position. Shortly after, as
my hostess was serving me, I saw that in place of human feet she had
ass's hoofs; whereupon I drew my sword, seized, bound, and closely
questioned her. Reluctantly enough she had to confess; they were sea-
women called Ass-shanks, and their food was travellers. 'When we have
made them drunk,' she said, 'and gone to rest with them, we overpower
them in their sleep. ' After this confession I left her there bound, went
up on to the roof, and shouted for my comrades. When they appeared, I
repeated it all to them, showed them the bones, and brought them in to
see my prisoner; she at once vanished, turning to water; however, I
thrust my sword into this experimentally, upon which the water became
blood.

Then we marched hurriedly down to our ship and sailed away. With the
first glimmering of dawn we made out a mainland, which we took for the
continent that faces our own. We reverently saluted it, made prayer, and
held counsel upon our best course. Some were for merely landing and
turning back at once, others for leaving the ship, and going into the
interior to make trial of the inhabitants. But while we were
deliberating, a great storm arose, which dashed us, a complete wreck, on
the shore. We managed to swim to land, each snatching up his arms and
anything else he could.

Such are the adventures that befell me up to our arrival at that other
continent: our sea-voyage; our cruise among the islands and in the air;
then our experiences in and after the whale; with the Heroes; with the
dreams; and finally with the Ox-heads and the Ass-shanks. Our fortunes on
the continent will be the subject of the following books.




THE TYRANNICIDE

_A man forces his way into the stronghold of a tyrant, with the
intention of killing him. Not finding the tyrant himself, he kills his
son, and leaves the sword sticking in his body. The tyrant, coming, and
finding his son dead, slays himself with the same sword. --The assailant
now claims that the killing of the son entitles him to the reward of
tyrannicide. _


Two tyrants--a father advanced in years, a son in the prime of life,
waiting only to step into his nefarious heritage--have fallen by my hand
on a single day: I come before this court, claiming but one reward for my
twofold service. My case is unique. With one blow I have rid you of two
monsters: with my sword I slew the son; grief for the son slew the
father. The misdeeds of the tyrant are sufficiently punished: he has
lived to see his son perish untimely; and--wondrous sequel! --the tyrant's
own hand has freed us from tyranny. I slew the son, and used his death to
slay another: in his life he shared the iniquities of his father; in his
death, so far as in him lay, he was a parricide. Mine is the hand that
freed you, mine the sword that accomplished all: as to the order and
manner of procedure, there, indeed, I have deviated from the common
practice of tyrannicides: I slew the son, who had strength to resist me,
and left my sword to deal with the aged father. In acting thus, I had
thought to increase your obligation to me; a twofold deliverance--I had
supposed--would entitle me to a twofold reward; for I have freed you not
from tyranny alone, but from the fear of tyranny, and by removing the
heir of iniquity have made your salvation sure. And now it seems that my
services are to go for nothing; I, the preserver of the constitution, am
to forgo the recompense prescribed by its laws. It is surely from no
patriotic motive, as he asserts, that my adversary disputes my claim;
rather it is from grief at the loss of the tyrants, and a desire to
avenge their death.

Bear with me, gentlemen, for a little, while I dwell in some detail upon
those evils of tyranny with which you are only too familiar; I shall thus
enable you to realize the extent of my services, and to enjoy the
contemplation of sufferings from which you have escaped. Ours was not the
common experience: we had not _one_ tyranny, _one_ servitude to
endure, we were not subjected to the caprice of a single master. Other
cities have had their tyrant: it was reserved for us to have two tyrants
at once, to groan beneath a double oppression. That of the old man was
light by comparison, his anger mildness, his resentment long-suffering;
age had blunted his passions, checked their headlong impetus, and curbed
the lust of pleasure. His crimes, so it is said, were involuntary;
resulting from no tyrannical disposition in himself, but from the
instigations of his son. For in him paternal affection had too clearly
become a mania; his son was all in all to him; he did his bidding,
committed every crime at his pleasure, dealt out punishment at his
command, was subservient to him in all things; the minister of a tyrant's
caprice, and that tyrant his son. The young man left him in possession of
the name and semblance of rule; so much he conceded to his years: but in
all essentials _he_ was the real tyrant. By him the power of the
tyrant was upheld; by him and by him alone the fruits of tyranny were
gathered. He it was who maintained the garrison, intimidated the victims
of oppression, and butchered those who meditated resistance; who laid
violent hands on boys and maidens, and trampled on the sanctity of
marriage. Murder, banishment, confiscation, torture, brutality; all
bespeak the wantonness of youth. The father followed his son's lead, and
had no word of blame for the crimes in which he participated. Our
situation became unbearable: for when the promptings of passion draw
support from the authority of rule, then iniquity knows no further
bounds.

We knew moreover (and here was the bitterest thought of all) that our
servitude must endure--ay, endure for ever; that our city was doomed to
pass in unending succession from master to master, to be the heritage of
the oppressor. To others it is no small consolation that they may count
the days, and say in their hearts: 'The end will be soon; he will die,
and we shall be free. ' We had no such hope: there stood the heir of
tyranny before our eyes. There were others--men of spirit--who cherished
like designs with myself; yet all lacked resolution to strike the blow;
freedom was despaired of; to contend against a succession of tyrants
seemed a hopeless task.

Yet I was not deterred. I had reckoned the difficulties of my
undertaking, and shrank not back, but faced the danger. Alone, I issued
forth to cope with tyranny in all its might. Alone, did I say? nay, not
alone; I had my sword for company, my ally and partner in tyrannicide. I
saw what the end was like to be: and, seeing it, resolved to purchase
your freedom with my blood. I grappled with the outer watch, with
difficulty routed the guards, slew all I met, broke down all resistance,
--and so to the fountain-head, the well-spring of tyranny, the source of
all our calamities; within his stronghold I found him, and there slew him
with many wounds, fighting valiantly for his life.

From that moment, my end was gained: tyranny was destroyed; we were free
men. There remained the aged father, alone, unarmed, desolate; his guards
scattered, his strong protector slain; no adversary this for a brave man.
And now I debated within myself: 'My work is done, my aim achieved, all
is as I would have it. And how shall this remnant of tyranny be punished?
He is unworthy of the hand that shed that other blood: the glory of a
noble enterprise shall not be so denied. No, let some other executioner
be found. It were too much happiness for him to die, and never know the
worst; let him see all, for his punishment, and let the sword be ready to
his hand; to that sword I leave the rest. ' In this design I withdrew; and
the sword--as I had foreseen--did its office, slew the tyrant, and put
the finishing touch to my work. And now I come to you, bringing democracy
with me, and call upon all men to take heart, and hear the glad tidings
of liberty. Enjoy the work of my hands! You see the citadel cleared of
the oppressors; you are under no man's orders; the law holds its course;
honours are awarded, judgements given, pleadings heard. And all springs
from one bold stroke, from the slaying of that son whom his father might
not survive. I claim from you the recompense that is my due; and that in
no paltry, grasping spirit; it was not for a wage's sake that I sought to
serve my country; but I would have my deed confirmed by your award; I
would not be disparaged by slanderous tongues, as one who attempted and
failed, and was deemed unworthy of honour.

My adversary tells me that I am unreasonable in asking for reward and
distinction. I did not slay the tyrant; I have not fulfilled the
requirements of the statute; there is a flaw in my claim. --And what more
does he want of me? Say: did I flinch? did I not ascend into the citadel?
did I not slay? are we not free men? have we a master? do we hear a
tyrant's threats? did any of the evil-doers escape me? --No; all is peace;
the laws are in force; freedom is assured; democracy is established; our
wives, our daughters are unmolested, our sons are safe; the city keeps
festival in the general joy. And who is the cause of it all? who has
wrought the change? Has any man a prior claim? Then I withdraw; be his
the honour and the reward. But if not--if mine was the deed, mine the
risk, mine the courage to ascend and smite and punish, dealing vengeance
on the father through the son--then why depreciate my services? why seek
to deprive me of a people's gratitude?

'But you did not kill the _tyrant_; the law assigns the reward to
him who kills the tyrant. ' And pray what is the difference between
killing him and causing his death? I see none. The law-giver had but one
end in view,--freedom, equality, deliverance from oppression. This was
the signal service that he deemed worthy of recompense; and this service
you cannot deny that I have rendered. In slaying one whom the tyrant
could not survive, I myself wrought the tyrant's death. His was the hand:
the deed was mine. Let us not chop logic as to the manner and
circumstances of his death, but rather ask: has he ceased to exist, and
am I the cause? Your scruples might go further, and object to some future
deliverer of his country, that he struck not with the sword, but with a
stick or a stone or the like. Had I blockaded the tyrant, and brought
about his death by starvation, you would still, I suppose, have objected
that it was not the work of my own hand? Again there would have been a
flaw in my claim? The increased bitterness of such a death would have
counted for nothing with you? Confine your attention to this one
question: does any of our oppressors survive? is there any ground for
anxiety, any vestige of our past misery? If not, if all is peace, then
none but an envious detractor would attempt to deprive me of the reward
of my labours by inquiring into the means employed.

Moreover, it is laid down in our laws (unless after all these years of
servitude my memory plays me false) that blood-guiltiness is of two
kinds. A man may slay another with his own hand, or, without slaying him,
he may put death unavoidably in his way; in the latter case the penalty
is the same as in the former; and rightly, it being the intention of the
law that the cause should rank with the act itself; the manner in which
death is brought about is not the question. You would not acquit a man
who in this sense had slain another; you would punish him as a murderer:
how then can you refuse to reward as a benefactor the man who, by parity
of reasoning, has shown himself to be the liberator of his country?

Nor again can it be objected that all I did was to strike the blow, and
that the resulting benefits were accidental, and formed no part of my
design. What had I to fear, when once the stronger of our oppressors was
slain? And why did I leave my sword in the wound, if not because I
foresaw the very thing that would happen? Are you prepared to deny that
the death so occasioned was that of a tyrant both in name and in fact,
or that his death was an event for which the state would gladly pay an
abundant reward? I think not. If then the tyrant is slain, how can you
withhold the reward from him who occasioned his death? What
scrupulousness is this--to concern yourself with the manner of his end,
while you are enjoying the freedom that results from it? Democracy is
restored: what more can you demand from him who restored it? You refer us
to the terms of the law: well, the law looks only at the end; of the
means it says nothing; it has no concern with them. Has not the reward of
tyrannicide been paid before now to him who merely expelled a tyrant? And
rightly so: for he too has made free men of slaves. But I have done more:
banishment may be followed by restitution: but here the family of tyrants
is utterly annihilated and destroyed; the evil thing is exterminated,
root and branch.

I implore you, gentlemen, to review my conduct from beginning to end, and
see whether there has been any such omission on my part as to make my act
appear less than tyrannicide in the eye of the law. The high patriotic
resolve which prompts a man to face danger for the common good, and to
purchase the salvation of his country at the price of his own life; this
is the first requirement. Have I been wanting here? Have I lacked
courage? Have I shrunk back at the prospect of the dangers through which
I must pass? My enemy cannot say it of me. Now at this stage let us
pause. Consider only the intention, the design, apart from its success;
and suppose that I come before you to claim the reward of patriotism
merely on the ground of my resolve. I have failed, and another, following
in my footsteps, has slain the tyrant. Say, is it unreasonable in such a
case to allow my claim? 'Gentlemen,' I might say, 'the will, the
intention, was mine; I made the attempt, I did what I could; my resolve
entitles me of itself to your reward. ' What would my enemy say to that?

But in fact my case stands far otherwise. I mounted into the stronghold,
I faced danger, I had innumerable difficulties to contend with, before I
slew the son. Think not that it was a light or easy matter, to make my
way past the watch, and single-handed to overcome one body of guards
after another and put them to flight: herein is perhaps the greatest
difficulty with which the tyrannicide has to contend. It is no such great
matter to bring the tyrant to bay, and dispatch him. Once overcome the
guards that surround him, and success is ensured; little remains to be
done. I could not make my way to the tyrants till I had mastered every
one of their satellites and bodyguards: each of those preliminary
victories had to be won. Once more I pause, and consider my situation. I
have got the better of the guards; I am master of the garrison; I present
you the tyrant stripped, unarmed, defenceless. May I claim some credit
for this, or do you still require his blood? Well, if blood you must
have, that too is not wanting; my hands are not unstained; the glorious
deed is accomplished; the youthful tyrant, the terror of all men, his
father's sole security and protection, the equivalent of many bodyguards,
is slain in the prime of his strength. Have I not earned my reward? Am I
to have no credit for all that is done? What if I had killed one of his
guards, some underling, some favourite domestic? Would it not have been
thought a great thing, to go up and dispatch the tyrant's friend within
his own walls, in the midst of his armed attendants? But who _was_
my victim? The tyrant's son, himself a more grievous tyrant than his
father, more cruel in his punishments, more violent in his excesses; a
pitiless master; one, above all, whose succession to the supreme power
promised a long continuance of our miseries. Shall I concede that this is
the sum of my achievements? Shall we put it, that the tyrant has escaped,
and lives? Still I claim my recompense. What say you, gentlemen? do you
withhold it? The son, perhaps, caused you no uneasiness; he was no
despot, no grievous oppressor?

And now for the final stroke. All that my adversary demands of me, I have
performed; and that in the most effectual manner. I slew the tyrant when
I slew his son; slew him not with a single blow--he could have asked no
easier expiation of his guilt than that--but with prolonged torment. I
showed him his beloved lying in the dust, in pitiable case, weltering in
blood.
And what if he were a villain? he was still his son, still the old
man's likeness in the pride of youth. These are the wounds that fathers
feel; this the tyrannicide's sword of justice; this the death, the
vengeance, that befits cruelty and oppression. The tyrant who dies in a
moment, and knows not his loss, and sees not such sights as these, dies
unpunished. I knew--we all knew--his affection for his son; knew that not
for one day would he survive his loss. Other fathers may be devoted to
their sons: his devotion was something more than theirs. How should it be
otherwise? In him, and in him alone, the father saw the zealous guardian
of his lawless rule, the champion of his old age, the sole prop of
tyranny. If grief did not kill him on the spot, despair, I knew, must do
so; there could be no further joy in life for him when his protector was
slain. Nature, grief, despair, foreboding, terror,--these were my allies;
with these I hemmed him in, and drove him to his last desperate resolve.
Know that your oppressor died childless, heartbroken, weeping, groaning
in spirit; the time of his mourning was short, but it was a father
mourning for his son; he died by his own hand, bitterest, most awful of
deaths; that death comes lightly, by comparison, which is dealt by
another.

Where is my sword?

Does any one else know anything of this sword? Does any one claim it? Who
took it up into the citadel? The tyrant used this sword. Who had it
before him? Who put it in his way? --Sword, fellow labourer, partner of my
enterprise,--we have faced danger and shed blood to no purpose. We are
slighted. Men say that we have not earned our reward.

Suppose that I had advanced a claim solely on my sword's behalf: suppose
that I had said to you: 'Gentlemen, the tyrant had resolved to slay
himself, but was without a weapon at the moment, when this sword of mine
supplied his need, and thereby played its part in our deliverance. '
Should you not have considered that the owner of a weapon so public-
spirited was entitled to honour and reward? Should you not have
recompensed him, and inscribed his name among those of your benefactors;
consecrated his sword, and worshipped it as a God?

Now consider how the tyrant may be supposed to have acted and spoken as
his end approached. --His son lies mortally wounded at my hand; the wounds
are many, and are exposed to view, that so the father's heart may be torn
asunder at the very first sight of him. He cries out piteously to his
father, not for help--he knows the old man's feebleness--, but for
sympathy in his sufferings. I meanwhile am making my way home: I have
written in the last line of my tragedy, and now I leave the stage clear
for the actor; there is the body, the sword, all that is necessary to
complete the scene. The father enters. He beholds his son, his only son,
gasping, blood-stained, weltering in gore; he sees the wounds--mortal
wound upon wound--and exclaims: 'Son, we are slain, we are destroyed, we
are stricken in the midst of our power. Where is the assassin? For what
fate does he reserve me, who am dead already in thy death, O my son?
Because I am old he fears me not, he withholds his vengeance, and would
prolong my torment. ' Then he looks for a sword; he has always gone
unarmed himself, trusting all to his son. The sword is not wanting; it
has been waiting for him all this time; I left it ready for the deed that
was to follow. He draws it from the wound and speaks: 'Sword, that but a
moment past hast slain me, complete thy work: comfort the stricken
father, aid his aged hand; dispatch, slay, make an end of the tyrant and
his grief. Would that I had met thee first, that my blood had been shed
before his! I could but have died a tyrant's death, and should have left
an avenger behind me. And now I die childless: I have not so much as a
murderer at my need. ' Even as he speaks, with trembling hand he plunges
the sword into his breast: he is in haste to die; but that feeble hand
lacks strength to do its dread office.

Is he punished? Are these wounds? Is this death? A tyrant's death? Is
there reward for this?

The closing scene you have all witnessed: the son--no mean antagonist--
prostrate in death; the father fallen upon him; blood mingling with
blood, the drink-offering of Victory and Freedom; and in the midst my
sword, that wrought all; judge by its presence there, whether the weapon
was unworthy of its master, whether it did him faithful service. Had all
been done by my hand, it had been little; the strangeness of the deed is
its glory. The tyranny was overthrown by me, and no other; but many
actors had their part to play in the drama. The first part was mine; the
second was the son's; the third the tyrant's; and my sword was never
absent from the stage.




THE DISINHERITED

_A disinherited son adopts the medical profession. His father going
mad, and being given up by the other physicians, he treats him
successfully, and is then reinstated in his rights. Subsequently his
step-mother also goes mad; he is bidden to cure her, and, declaring his
inability to do so, is once more disinherited. _


There is neither novelty nor strangeness, gentlemen of the jury, in my
father's present proceedings. It is not the first time his passions have
taken this direction; it has become an instinctive habit with him to pay
a visit to this familiar court. Still, my unfortunate position has this
much of novelty about it: the charge I have to meet is not personal, but
professional; I am to be punished for the inability of Medicine to do my
father's bidding. A curious demand, surely, that healing should be done
to order, and depend not on the limits of one's art, but on the wishes of
one's father. For my part, I should be only too glad to find drugs in the
pharmacopoeia which could relieve not only disordered wits, but
disordered tempers; then I might be serviceable to my father. As it is,
he is completely cured of madness, but is worse-tempered than ever. The
bitterest part of it is, he is sane enough in all other relations, and
mad only where his healer is concerned. You see what my medical fee
amounts to; I am again disinherited, cut off from my family once more, as
though the sole purpose of my brief reinstatement had been the
accentuation of my disgrace by repetition.

When a thing is within the limits of possibility, I require no bidding; I
came before I was summoned, to see what I could do in this case. But when
there is absolutely no hope, I will not meddle. With this particular
patient, such caution is especially incumbent upon me; how my father
would treat me, if I tried and failed, I can judge by his disinheriting
me when I refused to try. Gentlemen, I am sorry for my stepmother's
illness--for she was an excellent woman; I am sorry for my father's
distress thereat; I am most sorry of all that I should seem rebellious,
and be unable to give the required service; but the disease is incurable,
and my art is not omnipotent. I do not see the justice of disinheriting
one who, when he cannot do a thing, refuses to undertake it.

The present case throws a clear light upon the reasons for my first
disinheriting. The allegations of those days I consider to have been
disposed of by my subsequent life; and the present charges I shall do my
best to clear away with a short account of my proceedings. Wilful and
disobedient son that I am, a disgrace to my father, unworthy of my
family, I thought proper to say very little indeed in answer to his long
and vehement denunciations. Banished from my home, I reflected that I
should find my most convincing plea, my best acquittal, in the life I
then led, in practically illustrating the difference between my father's
picture and the reality, in devotion to the worthiest pursuits and
association with the most reputable company. But I had also a
presentiment of what actually happened; it occurred to me even then that
a perfectly sane father does not rage causelessly at his son, nor trump
up false accusations against him. Persons were not wanting who detected
incipient madness; it was the warning and precursor of a stroke which
would fall before long--this unreasoning dislike, this harsh conduct,
this fluent abuse, this malignant prosecution, all this violence,
passion, and general ill temper. Yes, gentlemen, I saw that the time
might come when Medicine would serve me well.

I went abroad, attended lectures by the most famous foreign physicians,
and by hard work and perseverance mastered my craft. Upon my return, I
found that my father's madness had developed, and that he had been given
up by the local doctors, who are not distinguished for insight, and are
much to seek in accurate diagnosis. I did no more than a son's duty when
I forgot and forgave the disinheritance, and visited him without waiting
to be called in; I had in fact nothing to complain of that was properly
his act; his errors were not his, but, as I have implied, those of his
illness. I came unsummoned, then. But I did not treat him at once; that
is not our custom, nor what our art enjoins upon us. What we are taught
to do is first of all to ascertain whether the disease is curable or
incurable--has it passed beyond our control? After that, if it is
susceptible of treatment, we treat it, and do our very best to relieve
the sufferer. But if we realize that the complaint has got the entire
mastery, we have nothing to do with it at all. That is the tradition that
has come down to us from the fathers of our art, who direct us not to
attempt hopeless cases. Well, I found that there was yet hope for my
father; the complaint had not gone too far; I watched him for a long
time; formed my conclusions with scrupulous care; then, I commenced
operations and exhibited my drugs without hesitation--though many of his
friends were suspicious of my prescription, impugned the treatment, and
took notes to be used against me.

My step-mother was present, distressed and doubtful--the result not of
any dislike to me, but of pure anxiety, based on her full knowledge of
his sad condition; no one but her, who had lived with and nursed him,
knew the worst. However, I never faltered; the symptoms would not lie to
me, nor my art fail me; when the right moment came, I applied the
treatment, in spite of the timidity of some of my friends, who were
afraid of the scandal that might result from a failure; it would be said
that the medicine was my vengeful retort to the disinheritance. To make a
long story short, it was at once apparent that he had taken no harm; he
was in his senses again, and aware of all that went on. The company were
amazed; my step-mother thanked me, and every one could see that she was
delighted both at my triumph and at her husband's recovery. He himself--
to give credit where it is due--did not take time to consider, nor to ask
advice, but, as soon as he heard the story, undid what he had done, made
me his son again, hailed me as his preserver and benefactor, confessed
that I had now given my proofs, and withdrew his previous charges. All
this was delightful to the better, who were many, among his friends, but
distasteful to the persons who enjoy a quarrel more than a
reconciliation. I observed at the time that all were not equally pleased;
there were changes of colour, uneasy glances, signs of mortification, in
one quarter at least, which told of envy and hatred. With us, who had
recovered each other, all was naturally affection and rejoicing.

Quite a short time after, my step-mother's disorder commenced--a very
terrible and unaccountable one, gentlemen of the jury. I observed it from
its very beginning; it was no slight superficial case, this; it was a
long-established but hitherto latent mental disease, which now burst out
and forced its way into notice. There are many signs by which we know
that madness is incurable--among them a strange one which I noticed in
this case. Ordinary society has a soothing, alleviating effect; the
patient forgets to be mad; but if he sees a doctor, or even hears one
mentioned, he at once displays acute irritation--an infallible sign that
he is far gone, incurable in fact. I was distressed to notice this
symptom; my step-mother was a worthy person who deserved a better fate,
and I was all compassion for her.

But my father in his simplicity, knowing neither when nor how the trouble
began, and quite unable to gauge its gravity, bade me cure her by the
drugs that had cured him. His idea was that madness was to be nothing
else but mad; the disease was the same, its effects the same, and it must
admit of the same treatment. When I told him, as was perfectly true, that
his wife was incurable, and confessed that the case was beyond me, he
thought it an outrage, said I was refusing because I chose to, and
treating the poor woman shamefully--in short, visited upon me the
limitations of my art. Such ebullitions are common enough in distress; we
all lose our tempers then with the people who tell us the truth. I must
nevertheless defend myself and my profession, as well as I can, against
his strictures.

I will begin with some remarks upon the law under which I am to be
disinherited; my father will please to observe that it is not quite so
much now as before a matter for his absolute discretion. You will find,
sir, that the author of the law has not conferred the right of disherison
upon any father against any son upon any pretext. It is true he has armed
fathers with this weapon; but he has also protected sons against its
illegitimate use. That is the meaning of his insisting that the procedure
shall not be irresponsible and uncontrolled, but come under the legal
cognizance of inspectors whose decision will be uninfluenced by passion
or misrepresentation. He knew how often irritation is unreasonable, and
what can be effected by a lying tale, a trusted slave, or a spiteful
woman. He would not have the deed done without form of law; sons were not
to be condemned unheard and out of hand; they are to have the ear of the
court for so long by the clock, and there is to be adequate inquiry into
the facts.

My father's competence, then, being confined to preferring his
complaints, and the decision whether they are reasonable or not resting
with you, I shall be within my rights in requesting you to defer
consideration of the grievance on which he bases the present suit, until
you have determined whether a second disinheritance is admissible in the
abstract. He has cast me off, has exercised his legal rights, enforced
his parental powers to the full, and then restored me to my position as
his son. Now it is iniquitous, I maintain, that fathers should have these
unlimited penal powers, that disgrace should be multiplied, apprehension
made perpetual, the law now chastize, now relent, now resume its
severity, and justice be the shuttlecock of our fathers' caprices. It is
quite proper for the law to humour, encourage, give effect to, _one_
punitive impulse on the part of him who has begotten us; but if, after
shooting his bolt, insisting on his right, indulging his wrath, he
discovers our merits and takes us back, then he should be held to his
decision, and not allowed to oscillate, waver, do and undo any more.
Originally, he had no means of knowing whether his offspring would turn
out well or ill; that is why parents who have decided to bring up
children before they knew their nature are permitted to reject such as
are found unworthy of their family.

But when a man has taken his son back, not upon compulsion, but of his
own motion and after inquiry, how can further chopping and changing be
justified? What further occasion for the law? Its author might fairly say
to you, sir: _If your son was vicious and deserved to be disinherited,
what were you about to recall him? Why have him home again? Why suspend
the law's operation? You were a free agent; you need not have done it.
The laws are not your play-ground; you are not to put the courts in
motion every time your mood varies; the laws are not to be suspended to-
day and enforced to-morrow, with juries to look on at the proceedings, or
rather to be the ministers of your whims, executioners or peace-makers
according to your taste and fancy. The boy cost you one begetting, and
one rearing; in return for which you may disinherit him, once, always
provided you have reason to show for it. Disinheriting as a regular
habit, a promiscuous pastime, is not included in the_ patria potestas.

Gentlemen of the jury, I entreat you in Heaven's name not to permit him,
after voluntarily reinstating me, reversing the previous decision, and
renouncing his anger, to revive the old sentence and have recourse to the
same paternal rights; the period of their validity is past and gone; his
own act suffices to annul and exhaust their power. You know the general
rule of the courts, that a party dissatisfied with the verdict of a
ballot--provided jury is allowed an appeal to another court; but that is
not so when the parties have agreed upon arbitrators, and, after such
selection, put the matter in their hands. They had the choice, there, of
not recognizing the court _ab initio_; if they nevertheless did so,
they may fairly be expected to abide by its award. Similarly you, sir,
had the choice of never taking back your son, if you thought him
unworthy; having decided that he was worthy, and taken him back, you
cannot be permitted to disinherit him anew; the evidence of his not
deserving it is your own admission of his worth. It is only right that
the reinstatement and reconciliation should be definitive, after such
abundant investigation; there have been two trials, observe: the first,
that in which you rejected me; the second, that in your own conscience,
which reversed the decision of the other; the fact of reversal only adds
force to the later result. Abide, then, by your second thoughts, and
uphold your own verdict. You are to be my father; such was your
determination, approved and ratified.

Suppose I were not your begotten, but only your adopted son, I hold that
you could not then have disinherited me; for what it is originally open
to us not to do, we have no right, having done, to undo. But where there
is both the natural tie, and that of deliberate choice, how can a second
rejection, a repeated deprivation of the one relationship, be justified?
Or again, suppose I had been a slave, and you had seen reason to put me
in irons, and afterwards, convinced of my innocence, made me a free man;
could you, upon an angry impulse, have enslaved me again? Assuredly not;
the law makes these acts binding and irrevocable. Upon this contention,
that the voluntary annulment of a disinheritance precludes a repetition
of the act, I could enlarge further, but will not labour the point.

You have next to consider the character of the man now to be
disinherited. I lay no stress upon the fact that I was then nothing, and
am now a physician; my art will not help me here. As little do I insist
that I was then young, and am now middle-aged, with my years as a
guarantee against misconduct; perhaps there is not much in that either.
But, gentlemen, at the time of my previous expulsion, if I had never done
my father any harm (as I should maintain), neither had I done him any
good; whereas now I have recently been his preserver and benefactor;
could there be worse ingratitude than so, and so soon, to requite me for
saving him from that terrible fate? My care of him goes for nothing; it
is lightly forgotten, and I am driven forth desolate--I, whose wrongs
might have excused my rejoicing at his troubles, but who, so far from
bearing malice, saved him and restored him to his senses.

For, gentlemen, it is no ordinary slight kindness that he is choosing
this way of repaying. You all know (though he may not realize) what he
was capable of doing, what he had to endure, what his state was, in fact,
during those bad days. The doctors had given him up, his relations had
cleared away and dared not come near him; but I undertook his case and
restored him to the power of--accusing me and going to law. Let me help
your imagination, sir. You were very nearly in the state in which your
wife now is, when I gave you back your understanding. It is surely not
right that my reward for that should be this--that your understanding
should be used against me alone. That it is no trifling kindness I have
done you is apparent from the very nature of your accusation. The ground
of your hatred is that she whom I do not cure is in extremities, is
terribly afflicted; then, seeing that I relieved you of just such an
affliction, there is surely better reason for you to love and be grateful
to me for your own release from such horrors. But you are unconscionable
enough to make the first employment of your restored faculties an
indictment of me; you smite your healer, the ancient hate revives, and we
have you reciting the same old law again. My art's handsome fee, the
worthy payment for my drugs, is--your present manifestation of vigour!

But you, gentlemen of the jury, will you allow him to punish his
benefactor, drive away his preserver, pay for his wits with hatred, and
for his recovery with chastisement? I hope better things of your justice.
However flagrantly I had now been misconducting myself, I had a large
balance of gratitude to draw upon. With that consideration in his memory,
he need not have been extreme to mark what is now done amiss; it might
have inspired him with ready indulgence, the more if the antecedent
service was great enough to throw anything that might follow into the
shade. That fairly states my relation to him; I preserved him; he owes
his life absolutely to me; his existence, his sanity, his understanding,
are my gifts, given, moreover, when all others despaired and confessed
that the case was beyond their skill.

The service that I did was the more meritorious, it seems to me, in that
I was not at the time my father's son, nor under any obligation to
undertake the case; I was independent of him, a mere stranger; the
natural bond had been snapped. Yet I was not indifferent; I came as a
volunteer, uninvited, at my own instance. I brought help, I persevered, I
effected the cure, I restored him, thereby securing myself at once a
father and an acquittal; I conquered anger with kindness, disarmed law
with affection, purchased readmission to my family with important
service, proved my filial loyalty at that critical moment, was adopted
(or adopted myself, rather) on the recommendation of my art, while my
conduct in trying circumstances proved me a son by blood also. For I had
anxiety and fatigue enough in being always on the spot, ministering to my
patient, watching for my opportunities, now humouring the disease when it
gathered strength, now availing myself of a remission to combat it. Of
all a physician's tasks the most hazardous is the care of patients like
this, with the personal attendance it involves; for in their moments of
exasperation they are apt to direct their fury upon any one they can come
at. Yet I never shrank or hesitated; I was always there; I had a life-
and-death struggle with the malady, and the final victory was with me and
my drugs.

Now I can fancy a person who hears all this objecting hastily, 'What a
fuss about giving a man a dose of medicine! ' But the fact is, there are
many preliminaries to be gone through; the ground has to be prepared; the
body must first be made susceptible to treatment; the patient's whole
condition has to be studied; he must be purged, reduced, dieted, properly
exercised, enabled to sleep, coaxed into tranquillity. Now other invalids
will submit to all this; but mania robs its victims of self-control; they
are restive and jib; their physicians are in danger, and treatment at a
disadvantage. Constantly, when we are on the very point of success and
full of hope, some slight hitch occurs, and a relapse takes place which
undoes all in a moment, neutralizing our care and tripping up our art.

Now, after my going through all this, after my wrestle with this
formidable disease and my triumph over so elusive an ailment, is it still
your intention to support him in disinheriting me? Shall he interpret the
laws as he will against his benefactor? Will you look on while he makes
war upon nature? I obey nature, gentlemen of the jury, in saving my
father from death, and myself from the loss of him, unjust as he had
been. He on the contrary defers to law (he calls it law) in ruining and
cutting off from his kin the son who has obliged him. He is a cruel
father, I a loving son. I own the authority of nature: he spurns and
flings it from him. How misplaced is this paternal hate! How worse
misplaced this filial love! For I must reproach myself--my father will
have it so. And the reproach? That where I should hate (for I am hated),
I love, and where I should love little, I love much. Yet surely nature
requires of parents that they love their children more than of children
that they love their parents. But he deliberately disregards both the
law, which secures children their family rights during good behaviour,
and nature, which inspires parents with fervent love for their offspring.
Having greater incentives to affection, you might suppose that he would
confer the fruits of it upon me in larger measure, or at the least
reciprocate and emulate my love. Alas, far from it! he returns hate for
love, persecution for devotion, wrong for service, disinheritance for
respect; the laws which guard, he converts into means of assailing, the
rights of children. Ah, my father, how do you force law into your service
in this battle against nature!

The facts, believe me, are not as you would have them. You are a bad
exponent, sir, of good laws. In this matter of affection there is no war
between law and nature; they hunt in couples, they work together for the
remedying of wrongs. When you evil entreat your benefactor, you are
wronging nature; now I ask, do you wrong the laws as well as nature? You
do; it is their intention to be fair and just and give sons their rights;
but you will not allow it; you hound them on again and again upon one
child as though he were many; you keep them ever busy punishing, when
their own desire is peace and goodwill between father and son. I need
hardly add that, as against the innocent, they may be said to have no
existence. But let me tell you, ingratitude also is an offence known to
the law; an action will lie against a person who fails to recompense his
benefactor. If he adds to such failure an attempt to punish, he has
surely reached the uttermost limits of wrong in this sort. And now I
think I have sufficiently established two points: first, my father has
not the right, after once exerting his parental privilege and availing
himself of the law, to disinherit me again; and secondly, it is on
general grounds inadmissible to cast off and expel from his family one
who has rendered service so invaluable.

Let us next proceed to the actual reasons given for the disinheritance;
let us inquire into the nature of the charge. We must first go back for a
moment to the intention of the legislator. We will grant you for the sake
of argument, sir, that it is open to you to disinherit as often as you
please; we will further concede you this right against your benefactor;
but I presume that disinheritance is not to be the beginning and the
ending in itself; you will not resort to it, that is, without sufficient
cause. The legislator's meaning is not that the father can disinherit,
whatever his grievance may be, that nothing is required beyond the wish
and a complaint; in that case, what is the court's function? No,
gentlemen, it is your business to inquire whether the parental anger
rests upon good and sufficient grounds. That is the question which I am
now to put before you; and I will take up the story from the moment when
sanity was restored.

The first-fruits of this was the withdrawal of the disinheritance; I was
preserver, benefactor, everything. So far my conduct is not open to
exception, I take it. Well, and later on what fault has my father to
find? What attention or filial duty did I omit? Did I stay out o' nights,
sir? Do you charge me with untimely drinkings and revellings?