THE ALDERMAN'S FUNERAL. BY ROBERT SOUTHEY. Stranger. Whom are they ushering from the world, with all This pageantry and long parade of death? Townsman. A long parade, indeed, sir; and yet here! Stranger. Why judge you, then, Townsman. For what he left Undone,- for sins not one of which is mention'd Stranger. It is but a mournful sight, and yet the To honour his dead father; did no murder; pomp Tempts me to stand a gazer. Townsman. Yonder schoolboy, Who plays the truant, says, the proclamation Never pick'd pockets; never bore false witness; The virtues of your hundred-thousanders; Ay, who was worth, last week, a good half million, Tomnsman. We track the streamlet by the brigher Screw'd down in yonder hearse. Stranger. Then he was born Under a lucky planet, who to-day Puts mourning on for his inheritance. Townsman. When first I heard his death, that very wish Leap'd to my lips; but now the closing scene Stranger. The camel and needle- Townsman. Even so. The text Is gospel wisdom. I would ride the camel- Stranger. Your pardon, sir, But sure this lack of Christian charity Townsman. Your pardon, too, sir, If with this text before me, I should feel green And livelier growth it gives; but as for this- Stranger. Yet even these Are reservoirs, whence public charity Townsman. Now, sir, you touch Upon the point. This man of half a million In the preaching mood! But for these barren fig trees, Plead his own cause as plaintiff. With all their flourish and their leafiness, Stranger. Was his wealth Stored fraudfully, the spoils of orphans wronged, Stranger. I must needs Believe you, sir; these are your witnesses, Than the old servant of the family! How can this man have lived, that thus his death Townsman. Who should lament for him, sir, in whose heart Love had no place, nor natural charity? His paternoster and his decalogue. When yet he was a boy, and should have breathed Stranger. Yet your next newspaper will blazon him Townsman. Even half a million Gets him no other praise. But come this way Some twelvemonths hence, and you will find his BY RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH. A dewdrop falling on the wild sea wave, A COMMISSION OF LUNACY. to swathe me in wet sheets. my presence, the lunatic. Him, too, I drove from Yet these are the men BY CHARLES F. BRIGGS who come here to swear to my insanity. Ah, gen I was once called to decide upon the case of a per-tlemen, I am not mad, but I wonder that I am not. son who was thought by his friends to be insane. The combined powers have taken away my Bessy He had been sent to a mad-house, and in one of his and my little boy, and I shall never, never, never see them more. Never." lucid intervals had demanded a trial of the county It was a perfectly clear case of lunacy, and a pitijudge, and a trial was granted. A jury of six men, able one. But when we retired to the jury-room, one of whom I was one, were to decide upon his case. He was a healthy looking gentleman, with nothing of the jurors would not agree with the other five. unusual in his appearance excepting a restlessness He stretched himself upon a bench, threw a handof his eyes, which might not have been observed had kerchief over his head, and requested us to wake him he not been accused of insanity. The proofs of his when we had come over to his way of thinking. madness were very clear, but he showed so much For myself, I was not disposed to be bullied out of coolness and clear thinking in his cross-questioning my opinion, so I too lay down upon a bench, deterof witnesses, that I felt some hesitation in pronounc-mined not to yield an inch of my right to think for ing him unsound of mind. His case was a very sad myself, and in a few minutes fell fast asleep; but I one, and he melted the hearts of all who heard him had better have kept awake, for the moment that my eyelids fell, I had to perform the part of a juror when he appealed to the jury. again. It was the same ill-lighted room, the same dull Judge who slept through half the trial, the same clownish spectators, the same everything, except the defendant, who yet seemed to be the same person in a different habit. "I deny that I am insane, gentlemen," he said, "but that when the Judge gave him leave to speak, is a matter of course. No man ever thought himself insane; neither can any man ever think himself so; for, having no standard of soundness but what exists in his own mind, he cannot be unsound to himself, He was a good looking youth; indeed, I have never though he may be manifestly so in the mind of anoseen a finer; his dark chesnut hair and sandy beard ther. But who shall determine what is madness and what is not? Be careful, gentlemen, how you were equal to a patent of nobility, for they proclaimpronounce me mad, lest to-morrow I be called to pro-ed his Saxon blood, and proved him of a race that came upon the earth to conquer it. His eyes were nounce you so. The proofs that have been offered to But, poor man! he you of my madness, are to me proofs of entire sound-gray and his complexion fair. was out of his mind. His father was a merchant, ness of mind. I would be mad were I anything dif ferent from what I have been represented. They and he wept while he gave evidence to his son's inhave brought three physicians, who all say that I sanity. He, the son, would wear his beard, and this am mad. Yet I will compel you to admit that the was the proof of his madness. In spite of the jeers, madness is in them and not in me. I was sick, very the sneers, and the laughter of the world, he would siek, sick at heart, for you must know that I had lost let his beard grow as nature intended. Poor fellow! So intelligent, so gentle in his my Bessy and my little boy-my little boy." Here We all pitied him. the unfortunate hesitated and seemed to lose him- manners, so happily circumstanced, and yet mad! He had the hardihood to declare in open court, that self entirely. "I said that I was sick, but it was But it must have been me. Bessy. Yes, I was he saw no reason why he should deprive his face of sick, very sick, sick at heart, for my little boy and the covering which God had put upon it. Bessy. Bessy again. Yes, Bessy had been sick, but now it was I. I was sick, and they brought me a He felt my pulse, he looked upon me physician. with his cold gray eyes, and then reached me a tumbler half full of a nauseous liquid, which he said would quiet me, and do me good. But all the while I was quieter than a rock, and colder, and harder. I thought that he needed the stuff more than myself, so I caught his head between my knees, and though he struggled hard, yet I poured it down his throat, gentlemen, and he was glad enough to escape. Then they brought another to me, who gave me a little globule of sugar, a pin's head was a cannon ball beside it, and told me that it would cure my fever. Do you blame me for thrusting the madman out of my chamber? Then they brought me another, who would give me no medicine at all, but ordered them "No reason," cried his mother, "O, my son, does not your father shave, your uncle, your brother, all the world shave but yourself? No reason for shaving? O! my son!" "True," replied the unfortunate youth, as he stroked his beard with ineffable content, «true, but I need my they are all mad or they would not. beard to protect my face and throat from the wet and cold. It helps to hide the sharp angles of my jaws, it makes me more comely, adds to my strength, and keeps me in health. Do I not look more like a man than my father, with his smooth, pale face, who has nothing but his clothes to distinguish him from a Look at him; he has scraped all the hair woman? off his chin, and placed another man's hair on his head. Beautiful consistency. To shave his chin and put What a mad outrage upon false hair on his head! nature. Hair is not always necessary to the head, I me to this dreadful alternative," said the old man for it often falls off as we grow old, but it never after he had been sworn. My poor son has been drops from the chin. I appeal to this honorable afflicted with his disorder for two years. We have court-" tried all gentle means to cure him, but he grows "Silence!" cried the honorable court, who at that worse and worse. The proofs of his madness are so moment woke up. glaring that he cannot be kept from the mad-house. "Justice never sleeps, excepting on the bench," He is now in his twenty-fifth year; he has had a good observed the youth, in a low voice. "Go on," said the honorable court, whose business, when out of court, was horse dealing, which fitted him in an eminent degree for the responsibilities of his office. I appeal to this honorable court," continued the insane youth, "I appeal to you, gentlemen of the jury, and I would, if I were permitted, appeal to these fair ladies (there were several old gossips in the room) to say whether I am not more sane than my father." "I can't allow such audacious remarks as those in this place," said the honorable court, rising and wiping its honorable face with a dingy handkerchief. "This thing mus'n't proceed no further. I don't know, gentlemen of the jury, as I have ever been more seriously affected in my life, than I have been by this melancholy trial." Probably not," said the maniac. "The court will allow no interruption from no one," said the honorable court, fixing its dreadfully stern eyes on the madman, and stretching out its stumpy fore-finger in a threatening manner. "My heart has been melted by the scene we have witnessed." education, the best that money could procure; he has made the tour of Europe; he has had all the advantages which my extensive business connections could give him, and yet, gentlemen, regardless of my wishes, and his own welfare, he has married a poor young woman, and gone to bury his splendid accomplishments on a farm. Is it not dreadful, gentlemen, to witness such a sacrifice? I offered him a share in my business, I proposed to establish him in a splendid distillery, but such was the poor creature's derangement of intellect that even this brilliant offer conld not draw him from the obscurity of the country. Look at his dress, gentlemen; if the court please, is not that prima facie evidence of his insanity?" The court thought it was, but would not give a decided opinion without first looking into somebody's reports. "Look at him, gentlemen, would anybody believe that he was the son of a rich merchant? That disgraceful blouse, like a common laborer's. That coarse straw hat! O, gentlemen, pardon a father's weakness! I can say no more.' The mother of the insane man appeared next, but her distress was too great to admit of her giving "A very little heat will melt ice," said the mad her evidence in a straight forward manner. youth. My feelings is too much for me to proceed," continued the honorable court, "I resign the case into your hands, gentlemen of the jury, only remarking that the young man is mad, and so you must give in your werdick." She believed her son to be crazy. Had first suspected it on his return from Paris, on account of his plain clothes; he had left off coffee and tea, and drank nothing but cold water; he talked strangely about the country; quite unlike her other children, who were fond of style, and lived respectably; insan her husband; had seen her son laugh with the coachman; had opposed his marriage; thought it a decided proof of insanity to marry out of one's own circle; had been the first to propose sending her son to the insane retreat. After the witnesses delivered their testimony, the court told the maniac that he might address the jury. The poor youth was immediately put into a strait-ity not peculiar to the family; was not influenced by jacket and dragged away, yet he still seemed to stand at the bar, but his appearance was changed. He wore a broad-brimmed hat made of oaten straw, a linen blouse which reached below his knees, and a shirt of snowy whiteness open at the throat, so that his manly neck was fully exposed. His complexion was brown, his eye clear and bright, his laughing mouth displayed teeth of a pearly lustre, and he appeared to receive great pleasure in snuffing the fragrance of a bunch of field flowers which he held in his hand. I thought, as I looked at him, that I had never seen a youth who bore so many marks of unequivocal soundness of mind and body. But he was mad, notwithstanding all. His own father was the first witness examined. Poor old man! he could hardly articulate the words which a sense of duty to his child compelled him to utter. "I have nothing to say in regard to the testimony," said the youth "but that it is all true. I prefer the sweets of a country life to the bitter toils of business. I have a wife whom I love; she brought me no fortune, it is true, but she helps me daily to earn one. I have a little farm which yields more than I need; I have good health, a quiet conscience, and two lovely children whose minds and bodies I am striving to rear in conformity with the dictates of nature. For these I prefer a moderate fortune in Be "Nothing but a hope that judicious medical treat- the country to an immoderate one in the city. ment may restore my son to his senses, could induce I sides I look upon the judgment pronounced upon Adam in the light of a command, and I was never happy until the sweat of my own brow seasoned my daily food." The jury pronounced him mad without leaving their seats. "A righteous werdick!" said the honorable court. He was led from the court room, and yet he still stood there, such are the inconsistencies of dreams. He was now dressed in rusty clothes; his countenance was subdued by thought; he was unhappy but not uneasy; his eyes were cast down, his lips were more closely pressed together, and the vigorous look of youth was changed for a gravity of demeanor that sat upon him well, though it seemed too grave for his years. There was literally a cloud of witnesses to his insanity. He had been heard to pity a condemned felon; he had said irreverent things of the law; he had spoken against the clergy; he had abused physic; he had given his money to vagabonds; he laughed at the fashions; he had cried at a wedding; he was opposed to war; he had been struck without returning the blow; he had pitied a slaveholder; he had. But the jury would hear no more. They pronounced him mad with one voice. All Bedlam seemed now broken loose. No sooner was one maniac pronounced upon than another occu pied the stand. The obscure little court-room began to look like the ante-room of the revolutionary tribunal. To expedite business a whole lot of maniacs were put up together and judged in a lump. One was a young girl of eighteen who had married her father's poor clerk whom she loved, when she might have married her father's rich partner whose money her friends loved; a Wall-street broker who had refused usury on a note; a grocer who had recommended a customer not to buy his sugar because he could buy cheaper elsewhere; a man who corrected a post office error when his letter had been undercharged; a political orator who had refused an office because he did not think himself entitled to one; a lawyer who refused to advocate the cause of a rogue on the pretence of conscientious scruples; a critic who doubted his own infallibility; a lieutenant of marines who gave up his commission and earned his bread by his own labor; an editor of a newspaper who had never called names; an English traveller without national prejudices; a midshipman who never damned the service; an artist who painted from nature; an author who was satisfied with a review of his book; a young lady who was offended at being told that she was pretty; a poet who considered himself inferior to Shakspeare. These were all pronounced mad. But the noise of their removal woke me, and finding that the other jurors had gone over to the one who was for rendering a vedict of not insane, I too, instructed by my dream, concluded to coincide with them, lest I should establish a precedent by which I might at some future day be pronounced mad myself. |