Lorna Doone

Mine went hard with fires of pain, being of such size and thickness; and I was ashamed of him for breaking by reason of a pistol-ball, and the mere hug of a man. And it fetched me down in conceit of strength; so that I was careful afterwards.

All this was a lesson to me. All this made me very humble; illness being a thing, as yet, altogether unknown to me. Not that I cried small, or skulked, or feared the death which some foretold; shaking their heads about mortification, and a green appearance. Only that I seemed quite fit to go to heaven, and Lorna. For in my sick distracted mind (stirred with many tossings), like the bead in the spread of frog-spawn carried by the current, hung the black and central essence of my future life. A life without Lorna; a tadpole life. All stupid head; and no body.

Many men may like such life; anchorites, fakirs, high-priests, and so on; but to my mind, it is not the native thing God meant for us. My dearest mother was a show, with crying and with fretting. The Doones, as she thought, were born to destroy us. Scarce had she come to some liveliness (though sprinkled with tears, every now and then) after her great bereavement, and ten years’ time to dwell on it—when lo, here was her husband’s son, the pet child of her own good John, murdered like his father! Well, the ways of God were wonderful!

So they were, and so they are; and so they ever will be. Let us debate them as we will, our ways are His, and much the same; only second-hand from Him. And I expected something from Him, even in my worst of times, knowing that I had done my best.

This is not edifying talk—as our Nonconformist parson says, when he can get no more to drink—therefore let me only tell what became of Lorna. One day, I was sitting in my bedroom, for I could not get downstairs, and there was no one strong enough to carry me, even if I would have allowed it.

Though it cost me sore trouble and weariness, I had put on all my Sunday clothes, out of respect for the doctor, who was coming to bleed me again (as he always did twice a week); and it struck me that he had seemed hurt in his mind, because I wore my worst clothes to be bled in—for lie in bed I would not, after six o’clock; and even that was great laziness.

I looked at my right hand, whose grasp had been like that of a blacksmith’s vice; and it seemed to myself impossible that this could be John Ridd’s. The great frame of the hand was there, as well as the muscles, standing forth like the guttering of a candle, and the broad blue veins, going up the back, and crossing every finger. But as for colour, even Lorna’s could scarcely have been whiter; and as for strength, little Ensie Doone might have come and held it fast. I laughed as I tried in vain to lift the basin set for bleeding me.

Then I thought of all the lovely things going on out-of-doors just now, concerning which the drowsy song of the bees came to me. These must be among the thyme, by the sound of their great content. Therefore the roses must be in blossom, and the woodbine, and clove-gilly-flower; the cherries on the wall must be turning red, the yellow Sally must be on the brook, wheat must be callow with quavering bloom, and the early meadows swathed with hay.

Yet here was I, a helpless creature quite unfit to stir among them, gifted with no sight, no scent of all the changes that move our love, and lead our hearts, from month to month, along the quiet path of life. And what was worse, I had no hope of caring ever for them more.

Presently a little knock sounded through my gloomy room, and supposing it to be the doctor, I tried to rise and make my bow. But to my surprise it was little Ruth, who had never once come to visit me, since I was placed under the doctor’s hands. Ruth was dressed so gaily, with rosettes, and flowers, and what not, that I was sorry for her bad manners; and thought she was come to conquer me, now that Lorna was done with.

Ruth ran towards me with sparkling eyes, being rather short of sight; then suddenly she stopped, and I saw entire amazement in her face.

“Can you receive visitors, Cousin Ridd?—why, they never told me of this!” she cried: “I knew that you were weak, dear John; but not that you were dying. Whatever is that basin for?”

“I have no intention of dying, Ruth; and I like not to talk about it. But that basin, if you must know, is for the doctor’s purpose.”

“What, do you mean bleeding you? You poor weak cousin! Is it possible that he does that still?”

“Twice a week for the last six weeks, dear. Nothing else has kept me alive.”

“Nothing else has killed you, nearly. There!” and she set her little boot across the basin, and crushed it. “Not another drop shall they have from you. Is Annie such a fool as that? And Lizzie, like a zany, at her books! And killing her brother, between them!”

I was surprised to see Ruth excited; her character being so calm and quiet. And I tried to soothe her with my feeble hand, as now she knelt before me.

“Dear cousin, the doctor must know best. Annie says so, every day. What has he been brought up for?”

“Brought up for slaying and murdering. Twenty doctors killed King Charles, in spite of all the women. Will you leave it to me, John? I have a little will of my own; and I am not afraid of doctors. Will you leave it to me, dear John? I have saved your Lorna’s life. And now I will save yours; which is a far, far easier business.”

“You have saved my Lorna’s life! What do you mean by talking so?”

“Only what I say, Cousin John. Though perhaps I overprize my work. But at any rate she says so.”

“I do not understand,” I said, falling back with bewilderment; “all women are such liars.”

“Have you ever known me tell a lie?” Ruth in great indignation—more feigned, I doubt, than real—“your mother may tell a story, now and then when she feels it right; and so may both your sisters. But so you cannot do, John Ridd; and no more than you can I do it.”

If ever there was virtuous truth in the eyes of any woman, it was now in Ruth Huckaback’s: and my brain began very slowly to move, the heart being almost torpid from perpetual loss of blood.

“I do not understand,” was all I could say for a very long time.

“Will you understand, if I show you Lorna? I have feared to do it, for the sake of you both. But now Lorna is well enough, if you think that you are, Cousin John. Surely you will understand, when you see your wife.”

Following her, to the very utmost of my mind and heart, I felt that all she said was truth; and yet I could not make it out. And in her last few words there was such a power of sadness rising through the cover of gaiety, that I said to myself, half in a dream, “Ruth is very beautiful.”

Before I had time to listen much for the approach of footsteps, Ruth came back, and behind her Lorna; coy as if of her bridegroom; and hanging back with her beauty. Ruth banged the door, and ran away; and Lorna stood before me.

But she did not stand for an instant, when she saw what I was like. At the risk of all thick bandages, and upsetting a dozen medicine bottles, and scattering leeches right and left, she managed to get into my arms, although they could not hold her. She laid her panting warm young breast on the place where they meant to bleed me, and she set my pale face up; and she would not look at me, having greater faith in kissing.

I felt my life come back, and warm; I felt my trust in women flow; I felt the joys of living now, and the power of doing it. It is not a moment to describe; who feels can never tell of it. But the rush of Lorna’s tears, and the challenge of my bride’s lips, and the throbbing of my wife’s heart (now at last at home on mine), made me feel that the world was good, and not a thing to be weary of.

Little more have I to tell. The doctor was turned out at once; and slowly came back my former strength, with a darling wife, and good victuals. As for Lorna, she never tired of sitting and watching me eat and eat. And such is her heart that she never tires of being with me here and there, among the beautiful places, and talking with her arm around me—so far at least as it can go, though half of mine may go round her—of the many fears and troubles, dangers and discouragements, and worst of all the bitter partings, which we used to have, somehow.

There is no need for my farming harder than becomes a man of weight. Lorna has great stores of money, though we never draw it out, except for some poor neighbor; unless I find her a sumptuous dress, out of her own perquisites. And this she always looks upon as a wondrous gift from me; and kisses me much when she puts it on, and walks like the noble woman she is. And yet I may never behold it again; for she gets back to her simple clothes, and I love her the better in them. I believe that she gives half the grandeur away, and keeps the other half for the children.

As for poor Tom Faggus, every one knows his bitter adventures, when his pardon was recalled, because of his journey to Sedgemoor. Not a child in the country, I doubt, but knows far more than I do of Tom’s most desperate doings. The law had ruined him once, he said; and then he had been too much for the law: and now that a quiet life was his object, here the base thing came after him. And such was his dread of this evil spirit, that being caught upon Barnstaple Bridge, with soldiers at either end of it (yet doubtful about approaching him), he set his strawberry mare, sweet Winnie, at the left-hand parapet, with a whisper into her dove-coloured ear. Without a moment’s doubt she leaped it, into the foaming tide, and swam, and landed according to orders. Also his flight from a public-house (where a trap was set for him, but Winnie came and broke down the door, and put two men under, and trod on them,) is as well known as any ballad. It was reported for awhile that poor Tom had been caught at last, by means of his fondness for liquor, and was hanged before Taunton Jail; but luckily we knew better. With a good wife, and a wonderful horse, and all the country attached to him, he kept the law at a wholesome distance, until it became too much for its master; and a new king arose. Upon this, Tom sued his pardon afresh; and Jeremy Stickles, who suited the times, was glad to help him in getting it, as well as a compensation. Thereafter the good and respectable Tom lived a godly (though not always sober) life; and brought up his children to honesty, as the first of all qualifications.

My dear mother was as happy as possibly need be with us; having no cause for jealousy, as others arose around her. And everybody was well pleased, when Lizzy came in one day and tossed her bookshelf over, and declared that she would have Captain Bloxham, and nobody should prevent her. For that he alone, of all the men she had ever met with, knew good writing when he saw it, and could spell a word when told. As he had now succeeded to Captain Stickle’s position (Stickles going up the tree), and had the power of collecting, and of keeping, what he liked, there was nothing to be said against it; and we hoped that he would pay her out.

I sent little Ensie to Blundell’s school, at my own cost and charges, having changed his name, for fear of what anyone might do to him. I called him Ensie Jones; and we got him a commission, and after many scrapes of spirit, he did great things in the Low Countries. He looks upon me as his father; and without my leave will not lay claim to the heritage and title of the Doones, which clearly belong to him.

Ruth Huckaback is not married yet; although upon Uncle Reuben’s death she came into all his property; except, indeed, 2000 pounds, which Uncle Ben, in his driest manner, bequeathed “to Sir John Ridd, the worshipful knight, for greasing of the testator’s boots.” And he left almost a mint of money, not from the mine, but from the shop, and the good use of usury. For the mine had brought in just what it cost, when the vein of gold ended suddenly; leaving all concerned much older, and some, I fear, much poorer; but no one utterly ruined, as is the case with most of them. Ruth herself was his true mine, as upon death-bed he found. I know a man even worthy of her: and though she is not very young, he loves her, as I love Lorna. It is my firm conviction, that in the end he will win her; and I do not mean to dance again, except at dear Ruth’s wedding; if the floor be strong enough.

Of Lorna, of my lifelong darling, of my more and more loved wife, I will not talk; for it is not seemly that a man should exalt his pride. Year by year her beauty grows, with the growth of goodness, kindness, and true happiness—above all with loving. For change, she makes a joke of this, and plays with it, and laughs at it; and then, when my slow nature marvels, back she comes to the earnest thing. And if I wish to pay her out for something very dreadful—as may happen once or twice, when we become too gladsome—I bring her to forgotten sadness, and to me for cure of it, by the two words “Lorna Doone.”

1

This vile deed was done, beyond all doubt.

2

Lest John Fry seem to under-rate the erudition of Devonshire magistrates, I venture to offer copy of a letter from a Justice of the Peace to his bookseller, circa 1810 A.D., now in my possession:—

‘Sur.

‘plez to zen me the aks relatting to A-gustus-paks,’

—Ed. of L.D.

[Emphasized this in original]

3

The truth of this story is well established by first-rate tradition.

4

If John Ridd lived until the year 1740 (as so strong a man was bound to do), he must have seen almost a harder frost; and perhaps it put an end to him; for then he would be some fourscore years old. But tradition makes him “keep yatt,” as he says, up to fivescore years.—Ed. L.D.

5

The frost of 1625.

6

The reason is very simple, as all nature’s reasons are; though the subject has not yet been investigated thoroughly. In some trees the vascular tissue is more open on the upper side, in others on the under side, of the spreading branches; according to the form of growth, and habit of the sap. Hence in very severe cold, when the vessels (comparatively empty) are constricted, some have more power of contraction on the upper side, and some upon the under.

Ed. L.D.

7

There are said to be no loach now in Lynn. This proves that John Ridd caught them all.

8

“A maid with an elbow sharp, or knee,Hath cross words two, out of every three.”

9

The following story is strictly true; and true it is that the country-people rose, to a man, at this dastard cruelty, and did what the Government failed to do.—Ed. L.D.

10

Always pronounced “Badgery.”

11

Not our parson Bowden, nor any more a friend of his. Our Parson Bowden never had naught whatever to do with it; and never smoked a pipe with Parson Powell after it.—J.R.

12

A far more terrible clutch than this is handed down, to weaker ages, of the great John Ridd.—Ed.