Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850

The sense of this discovery, and of the whole strange scene of the last evening, hung powerfully upon me through the following day. I sat on the bench of my cottage window, with a book in my hand, the greater part of it, but my thoughts continually reverted to the image of the preacher in the midst of his audience; when, at evening, in walked the old man with his usual quiet smile, and shaking me affectionately by the hand, sat down in a wooden chair opposite me. I looked again and again, but in vain, to recognize the floating figure and the exalted countenance of the evening.

The old man took up my book, and began to read. A sudden impulse seized me which I have never ceased to regret. I did not wish abruptly to tell the old man that I had seen him in the pulpit, but I longed to discuss with him the ground of his peculiar views, and said,

“What do you think, my friend, of the actual future destiny of the – ?”

I made the question include his peculiar doctrines. He laid down the volume with a remarkable quickness of action. He gazed at me for a moment with a look humbled but not confused, such as I had never seen in him before, and, in a low voice, said,

“You were then at my chapel last night?”

“I was,” I replied.

“I am sorry – I am sorry,” he said, rising with a sigh. “It has been a pleasant time, but it is ended. Good-by, my dear young friend, and may God bless you!”

He turned silently but quickly away.

“Stop!” I cried. “Stop!” But he heard or heeded not. I ran to the gate to lay hold on him, and assure him that his sentiments would not alter my regard for him, but I observed him already hastening down the lane at such a speed that I judged it rude and useless at that moment to pursue.

I went down that day to his lodgings, to assure him of my sentiments toward him, but door and window were closed, and if he were in he would not hear me. Early next morning a little ragged boy brought me a note, saying a gentleman in the lane had given it to him. It simply said:

“Dear young friend, good-by. You wonder at my abruptness; but my religion has always been fatal to my friendship. You will say it would not with you: so has many another assured me; but I am too well schooled by bitter experience. I have had a call to a distant place. No one knows of it, and I trust the name to no one. The pleasure of your society has detained me, or I had obeyed the call a month ago. May we meet in Heaven! C.M.”

He was actually gone, and no one knew whither.

Time had passed over, and I had long imagined this strange and gifted being in his grave, when in a wild and remote part of the kingdom, the other day, I accidentally stumbled upon his retreat, and found him in his pulpit with the same rapt aspect, uttering an harangue as exciting, and surrounded by an audience as eagerly devouring his words.

[From Chesney’s Expedition to the Euphrates and Tigris.]

ASSYRIAN SECTS

There are two remarkable sects, one of which, called the Mendajaha (disciples of John), is found scattered in small communities in Basrah, Kurnah, Mohammarah, and, lastly, Sheikh el Shuyukh, where there are about three hundred families. Those of Basrah are noticed by Pietro de la Valle who says the Arabs call them Sabeans. Their religion is evidently a mixture of Paganism, Hebrew, Mohammedan, and Christian. They profess to regulate their lives by a book called the Sidra, containing many moral precepts, which, according to tradition, have been handed down from Adam, through Seth and Enoch; and it is understood to be in their language (the Chaldee), but written in a peculiar character. They abhor circumcision, but are very particular in distinguishing between clean and unclean animals, and likewise in keeping the Sabbath with extraordinary strictness. The Psalms of David are in use, but they are held to be inferior to their own book. They abstain from garlic, beans, and several kinds of pulse, and likewise most carefully from every description of food between sunrise and sunset during a whole moon before the vernal equinox; in addition to which, an annual festival is kept, called the feast of five days. Much respect is entertained for the city of Mecca, and a still greater reverence for the Pyramids of Egypt, in one of which they believe that their great progenitor, Saba, son of Seth, is buried; and to his original residence at Haran they make very particular pilgrimages, sacrificing on these occasions a ram and a hen. They pray seven times a day, turning sometimes to the south and sometimes to the north. But, at the same time, they retain a part of the ancient worship of the heavenly bodies, adding that of angels, with the belief that the souls of the wicked are to enjoy a happier state after nine hundred centuries of suffering. The priests, who are called sheikhs, or chiefs, use a particular kind of baptism, which, they say, was instituted by St. John; and the Chaldee language is used in this and other ceremonies.

The other religion, that of a more numerous branch, the Yezidis, is, in some respects, like the Mendajaha, but with the addition of the evil principle, the exalted doctor, who, as an instrument of the divine will, is propitiated rather than worshiped, as had been once supposed. The Yezidis reverence Moses, Christ, and Mohammed, in addition to many of the saints and prophets held in veneration both by Christians and Moslems. They adore the sun, as symbolical of Christ, and believe in an intermediate state after death. The Yezidis of Sinjar do not practice circumcision, nor do they eat pork; but they freely partake of the blood of other animals. Their manners are simple, and their habits, both within and without, remarkable for cleanliness. They are, besides, brave, hospitable, sober, faithful, and, with the exception of the Mohammedan, are inclined to tolerate other religions; they are, however, lamentably deficient in every branch of education. Polygamy is not permitted, and the tribes intermarry with each other. The families of the father and sons live under the same roof, and the patriarchal system is carried out still further, each village being under its own hereditary chief.

THE APPROACH OF CHRISTMAS

The time draws near the birth of Christ,The moon is hid, the night is still;A single church below the hillIs pealing, folded in the mistA single peal of bells below,That wakens at this hour of restA single murmur in the breast,That these are not the bells I knowLike strangers’ voices here they sound,In lands where not a memory strays,Nor landmark breathes of other days.But all is new unhallow’d ground.Tennyson’s “In Memoriam”.[From Dickens’s Household Words.]

UGLINESS REDEEMED – A TALE OF A LONDON DUST-HEAP

On a murky morning in November, wind northeast, a poor old woman with a wooden leg was seen struggling against the fitful gusts of the bitter breeze, along a stony, zig-zag road full of deep and irregular cart-ruts. Her ragged petticoat was blue, and so was her wretched nose. A stick was in her left hand, which assisted her to dig and hobble her way along; and in her other hand, supported also beneath her withered arm, was a large, rusty, iron sieve. Dust and fine ashes filled up all the wrinkles in her face; and of these there were a prodigious number, for she was eighty-three years old. Her name was Peg Dotting.

About a quarter of a mile distant, having a long ditch and a broken-down fence as a foreground, there rose against the muddled-gray sky, a huge dust-heap of a dirty-black color – being, in fact, one of those immense mounds of cinders, ashes, and other emptyings from dust-holes and bins, which have conferred celebrity on certain suburban neighborhoods of a great city. Toward this dusky mountain old Peg Dotting was now making her way.

Advancing toward the dust-heap by an opposite path, very narrow and just reclaimed from the mud by a thick layer of freshly broken flints, there came at the same time Gaffer Doubleyear, with his bone-bag slung over his shoulder. The rags of his coat fluttered in the east-wind, which also whistled keenly round his almost rimless hat, and troubled his one eye. The other eye, having met with an accident last week, he had covered neatly with an oyster-shell, which was kept in its place by a string at each side, fastened through a hole. He used no staff to help him along, though his body was nearly bent double, so that his face was constantly turned to the earth, like that of a four-footed creature. He was ninety-seven years of age.

As these two patriarchal laborers approached the great dust-heap, a discordant voice hallooed to them from the top of a broken wall. It was meant as a greeting of the morning, and proceeded from little Jem Clinker, a poor deformed lad, whose back had been broken when a child. His nose and chin were much too large for the rest of his face, and he had lost nearly all his teeth from premature decay. But he had an eye gleaming with intelligence and life, and an expression at once patient and hopeful. He had balanced his misshapen frame on the top of the old wall, over which one shriveled leg dangled, as if by the weight of a hob-nailed boot, that covered a foot large enough for a plowman.

In addition to his first morning’s salutation of his two aged friends, he now shouted out in a tone of triumph and self-gratulation, in which he felt assured of their sympathy – “Two white skins, and a tor’shell-un.”

It may be requisite to state that little Jem Clinker belonged to the dead-cat department of the dust-heap, and now announced that a prize of three skins, in superior condition, had rewarded him for being first in the field. He was enjoying a seat on the wall in order to recover himself from the excitement of his good fortune.

At the base of the great dust-heap the two old people now met their young friend – a sort of great-grandson by mutual adoption – and they at once joined the party who had by this time assembled as usual, and were already busy at their several occupations.

But besides all these, another individual, belonging to a very different class, formed a part of the scene, though appearing only on its outskirts. A canal ran along at the rear of the dust-heap, and on the banks of its opposite side slowly wandered by – with hands clasped and hanging down in front of him, and eyes bent vacantly upon his hands – the forlorn figure of a man in a very shabby great-coat, which had evidently once belonged to one in the position of a gentleman. And to a gentleman it still belonged – but in what a position! A scholar, a man of wit, of high sentiment, of refinement, and a good fortune withal – now by a sudden “turn of law” bereft of the last only, and finding that none of the rest, for which (having his fortune) he had been so much admired, enabled him to gain a livelihood. His title deeds had been lost or stolen, and so he was bereft of every thing he possessed. He had talents, and such as would have been profitably available had he known how to use them for this new purpose; but he did not; he was misdirected; he made fruitless efforts, in his want of experience; and he was now starving. As he passed the great dust-heap, he gave one vague, melancholy gaze that way, and then looked wistfully into the canal. And he continued to look into the canal as he slowly moved along, till he was out of sight.

A dust-heap of this kind is often worth thousands of pounds. The present one was very large and very valuable. It was in fact a large hill, and being in the vicinity of small suburb cottages, it rose above them like a great black mountain. Thistles, groundsel, and rank grass grew in knots on small parts which had remained for a long time undisturbed; crows often alighted on its top, and seemed to put on their spectacles and become very busy and serious; flocks of sparrows often made predatory descents upon it; an old goose and gander might sometimes be seen following each other up its side, nearly midway; pigs rooted round its base, and, now and then, one bolder than the rest would venture some way up, attracted by the mixed odors of some hidden marrow-bone enveloped in a decayed cabbage leaf – a rare event, both of these articles being unusual oversights of the searchers below.

The principal ingredient of all these dust-heaps is fine cinders and ashes; but as they are accumulated from the contents of all the dust-holes and bins of the vicinity, and as many more as possible, the fresh arrivals in their original state present very heterogeneous materials. We can not better describe them, than by presenting a brief sketch of the different departments of the searchers and sorters, who are assembled below to busy themselves upon the mass of original matters which are shot out from the carts of the dustmen.

The bits of coal, the pretty numerous results of accident and servants’ carelessness, are picked out, to be sold forthwith; the largest and best of the cinders are also selected, by another party, who sell them to laundresses, or to braziers (for whose purposes coke would not do so well); and the next sort of cinders, called the breeze, because it is left after the wind has blown the finer cinders through an upright sieve, is sold to the brick-makers.

Two other departments, called the “soft-ware” and the “hard-ware,” are very important. The former includes all vegetable and animal matters – every thing that will decompose. These are selected and bagged at once, and carried off as soon as possible, to be sold as manure for ploughed land, wheat, barley, &c. Under this head, also, the dead cats are comprised. They are, generally, the perquisites of the women searchers. Dealers come to the wharf, or dust-field, every evening; they give sixpence for a white cat, fourpence for a colored cat, and for a black one according to her quality. The “hard-ware” includes all broken pottery, pans, crockery, earthenware, oyster-shells, &c., which are sold to make new roads.

“The bones” are selected with care, and sold to the soap-boiler. He boils out the fat and marrow first, for special use, and the bones are then crushed and sold for manure.

Of “rags,” the woolen rags are bagged and sent off for hop-manure; the white linen rags are washed, and sold to make paper, &c.

The “tin things” are collected and put into an oven with a grating at the bottom, so that the solder which unites the parts melts, and runs through into a receiver. This is sold separately; the detached pieces of tin are then sold to be melted up with old iron, &c.

Bits of old brass, lead, &c., are sold to be melted up separately, or in the mixture of ores.

All broken glass vessels, as cruets, mustard-pots, tumblers, wine-glasses, bottles, &c., are sold to the old-glass shops.

As for any articles of jewelry, silver-spoons, forks, thimbles, or other plate and valuables, they are pocketed off-hand by the first finder. Coins of gold and silver are often found, and many “coppers.”

Meantime, every body is hard at work near the base of the great dust-heap. A certain number of cart-loads having been raked and searched for all the different things just described, the whole of it now undergoes the process of sifting. The men throw up the stuff, and the women sift it.

“When I was a young girl,” said Peg Dotting —

“That’s a long while ago, Peggy,” interrupted one of the sifters: but Peg did not hear her.

“When I was quite a young thing,” continued she, addressing old John Doubleyear, who threw up the dust into her sieve, “it was the fashion to wear pink roses in the shoes, as bright as that morsel of ribbon Sally has just picked out of the dust; yes, and sometimes in the hair, too, on one side of the head, to set off the white powder and salve-stuff. I never wore one of these head-dresses myself – don’t throw up the dust so high, John – but I lived only a few doors lower down from those as did. Don’t throw up the dust so high, I tell ’ee – the wind takes it into my face.”

“Ah! There! What’s that?” suddenly exclaimed little Jem, running as fast as his poor withered legs would allow him, toward a fresh heap, which had just been shot down on the wharf from a dustman’s cart. He made a dive and a search – then another – then one deeper still. “I’m sure I saw it!” cried he, and again made a dash with both hands into a fresh place, and began to distribute the ashes, and dust, and rubbish on every side, to the great merriment of all the rest.

“What did you see, Jemmy?” asked old Doubleyear, in a compassionate tone.

“Oh, I don’t know,” said the boy, “only it was like a bit of something made of real gold!”

A fresh burst of laughter from the company assembled followed this somewhat vague declaration, to which the dustmen added one or two elegant epithets, expressive of their contempt of the notion that they could have overlooked a bit of any thing valuable in the process of emptying sundry dust-holes, and carting them away.

“Ah,” said one of the sifters, “poor Jem’s always a-fancying something or other good – but it never comes.”

“Didn’t I find three cats this morning!” cried Jem; “two on ’em white ’uns! How you go on!”

“I meant something quite different from the like o’ that,” said the other; “I was a-thinking of the rare sights all you three there have had, one time and another.”

The wind having changed and the day become bright, the party at work all seemed disposed to be more merry than usual. The foregoing remark excited the curiosity of several of the sifters, who had recently joined the “company,” the parties alluded to were requested to favor them with the recital; and though the request was made with only a half-concealed irony, still it was all in good-natured pleasantry, and was immediately complied with. Old Doubleyear spoke first.

“I had a bad night of it with the rats some years ago – they run’d all over the floor, and over the bed, and one on ’em come’d and guv a squeak close into my ear – so I couldn’t sleep comfortable. I wouldn’t ha’ minded a trifle of at; but this was too much of a good thing. So, I got up before sun-rise, and went out for a walk; and thinking I might as well be near our work-place, I slowly come’d down this way. I worked in a brick-field at that time, near the canal yonder. The sun was just a-rising up behind the dust-heap as I got in sight of it; and soon it rose above, and was very bright; and though I had two eyes then, I was obligated to shut them both. When I opened them again, the sun was higher up; but in his haste to get over the dust-heap, he had dropped something. You may laugh. I say he had dropped something. Well – I can’t say what it was, in course – a bit of his-self, I suppose. It was just like him – a bit on him, I mean – quite as bright – just the same – only not so big. And not up in the sky, but a-lying and sparkling all on fire upon the dust-heap. Thinks I – I was a younger man then by some years than I am now – I’ll go and have a nearer look. Though you be a bit o’ the sun, maybe you won’t hurt a poor man. So, I walked toward the dust-heap, and up I went, keeping the piece of sparkling fire in sight all the while. But before I got up to it, the sun went behind a cloud – and as he went out-like, so the young ’un he had dropped, went out after him. And I had my climb up the heap for nothing, though I had marked the place were it lay very percizely. But there was no signs at all on him, and no morsel left of the light as had been there. I searched all about; but found nothing ’cept a bit o’ broken glass as had got stuck in the heel of an old shoe. And that’s my story. But if ever a man saw any thing at all, I saw a bit o’ the sun; and I thank God for it. It was a blessed sight for a poor ragged old man of three score and ten, which was my age at that time.”

“Now, Peggy!” cried several voices, “tell us what you saw. Peg saw a bit o’ the moon.”

“No,” said Mrs. Dotting, rather indignantly; “I’m no moon-raker. Not a sign of the moon was there, nor a spark of a star – the time I speak on.”

“Well – go on, Peggy – go on.”

“I don’t know as I will,” said Peggy.

But being pacified by a few good-tempered, though somewhat humorous compliments, she thus favored them with her little adventure:

“There was no moon, nor stars, nor comet, in the ’versal heavens, nor lamp nor lantern along the road, when I walked home one winter’s night from the cottage of Widow Pin, where I had been to tea, with her and Mrs. Dry, as lived in the almshouses. They wanted Davy, the son of Bill Davy the milkman, to see me home with the lantern, but I wouldn’t let him ’cause of his sore throat. Throat! – no, it wasn’t his throat as was rare sore – it was – no, it wasn’t – yes, it was – it was his toe as was sore. His big toe. A nail out of his boot had got into it. I told him he’d be sure to have a bad toe, if he didn’t go to church more regular, but he wouldn’t listen; and so my words come’d true. But, as I was a-saying, I wouldn’t let him light me with the lantern by reason of his sore throat —toe, I mean – and as I went along, the night seemed to grow darker and darker. A straight road, though, and I was so used to it by day-time, it didn’t matter for the darkness. Hows’ever, when I come’d near the bottom of the dust-heap as I had to pass, the great dark heap was so zackly the same as the night, you couldn’t tell one from t’other. So, thinks I to myself —what was I thinking of at this moment? – for the life o’ me I can’t call it to mind; but that’s neither here nor there, only for this – it was a something that led me to remember the story of how the devil goes about like a roaring lion. And while I was a-hoping he might not be out a-roaring that night, what should I see rise out of one side of the dust-heap, but a beautiful shining star of a violet color. I stood as still – as stock-still as any I don’t-know-what! There it lay, as beautiful as a new-born babe, all a-shining in the dust! By degrees I got courage to go a little nearer – and then a little nearer still – for, says I to myself, I’m a sinful woman, I know, but I have repented, and do repent constantly of all the sins of my youth, and the backslidings of my age – which have been numerous; and once I had a very heavy backsliding – but that’s neither here nor there. So, as I was a-saying, having collected all my sinfulness of life, and humbleness before heaven, into a goodish bit of courage, forward I steps – little furder – and a leetle furder more —un-til I come’d just up to the beautiful shining star lying upon the dust. Well, it was a long time I stood a-looking down at it, before I ventured to do, what I arterwards did. But at last I did stoop down with both hands slowly – in case it might burn, or bite – and gathering up a good scoop of ashes as my hands went along, I took it up, and began a-carrying it home, all shining before me, and with a soft, blue mist rising up round about it. Heaven forgive me! – I was punished for meddling with what Providence had sent for some better purpose than to be carried home by an old woman like me, whom it has pleased heaven to afflict with the loss of one leg, and the pain, ixpinse, and inconvenience of a wooden one. Well – I was punished; covetousness had its reward; for, presently, the violet light got very pale, and then went out; and when I reached home, still holding in both hands all I had gathered up, and when I took it to the candle, it had turned into the red shell of a lobsky’s head, and its two black eyes poked up at me with a long stare – and I may say, a strong smell too – enough to knock a poor body down.”

Great applause, and no little laughter, followed the conclusion of old Peggy’s story, but she did not join in the merriment. She said it was all very well for young people to laugh, but at her age she had enough to do to pray; and she had never said so many prayers, nor with so much fervency, as she had done since she received the blessed sight of the blue star on the dust-heap, and the chastising rod of the lobster’s head at home.

Little Jem’s turn now came; the poor lad was, however, so excited by the recollection of what his companions called “Jem’s Ghost,” that he was unable to describe it in any coherent language. To his imagination it had been a lovely vision – the one “bright consummate flower” of his life, which he treasured up as the most sacred image in his heart. He endeavored, in wild and hasty words, to set forth, how that he had been bred a chimney-sweep; that one Sunday afternoon he had left a set of companions, most on ’em sweeps, who were all playing at marbles in the church-yard, and he had wandered to the dust-heap, where he had fallen asleep; that he was awoke by a sweet voice in the air, which said something about some one having lost her way! – that he, being now wide awake, looked up, and saw with his own eyes a young angel, with fair hair and rosy cheeks, and large white wings at her shoulders, floating about like bright clouds, rise out of the dust! She had on a garment of shining crimson, which changed as he looked upon her to shining gold, then to purple and gold. She then exclaimed, with a joyful smile, “I see the right way!” and the next moment the angel was gone.