Chapter 9. The Plague

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_ CHAPTER IX. THE PLAGUE

There is a mighty Potentate among us here below, the secrets of whose existence are still unknown to our wise men, although they have a lot to tell us about her power; a Potentate whom they have not yet taught us to fear, or else everybody would not still be turning to her full of hope.

This Potentate is not Hell, but the Earth.

Yes, the good, the blessed, the peaceful Earth. She is not violent like the other elements, fire, water, and air. She calmly allows herself to be trampled underfoot; lets us make great wounds in her; lets us load her broad back with cities and towns; crush her bones by driving deep mining-shafts into her--and for all that she allows us who plague her so, to live and multiply in the midst of her dust.

Has anyone ever inquired of her: Oh, my sovereign mistress! thou good and blessed Earth! art thou pleased with the deeds we do upon thee? Can it please thee, perchance, to see us root up thy beauteous fresh woods from off thee, leaving thy tormented body all naked in the blaze of the Sun? Can it please thee to see us constrain thy flowing rivers within narrow basins, dry up thy lakes and leave thee athirst? Can it please thee to see us tear open thy body, break it up into little fragments, and compel these fragments to produce meat and drink for us? Can it please thee to see us drench thy flowery meads with blood and hide away the bones of our dead in thy bosom? Can it please thee that we live upon thee here, and bless and curse thee that thou mayest nourish us, and rack our brains as to how we may best multiply our species in those portions of the earth where men are still but few?

Nevertheless, the Earth patiently endures all this ill-treatment. Only now and then does she tremble with a fleeting horror, and then the palaces heaped upon her totter to their very foundations. Yet are there any among us who understand the hint?

And then for centuries afterwards she gives not a single sign of life. She puts up with her naughty children as every good mother does. She overlooks and hides away their faults and endures in their stead the visitations of Heaven. She is never angry with them, she never punishes them. She cherishes and nourishes them, and expects no gratitude in return. She only pines and pines, she only frets within herself, she only grieves and is anxious about the fate of her children, her selfish, heartless children: grief and anguish, the nastiness and the wickedness of man slowly undermine her strength and suddenly the Earth sickens.

Oh! how man falls down and perishes when the earth is sick!--like the parasitical aphis-grub from the jaundiced leaves!

New sorts of death for which there is no name appear in the midst of the terrified peoples, and a breath of air carries off the bravest and the strongest. In vain they shut themselves up within stone walls, anoint their bodies with salutary balms, and hold their very breath. Death invisible stalks through the fast-closed doors and seeks out them that fear him. No vitiated air, no contagion is necessary; men have but to hear the name of this strange death and they tremble and die.

This is no mere mortal malady, the Earth, the Earth herself is sick.

* * * * *

And how comical too this terror is!

I remember those times. I was only a child then, I fancy, and the general terror affected me but little; nay, the novelty of the situation rather diverted me. We were not allowed to go to school, we had a vacation for an indefinite period at which I was much delighted I must confess. Our towns were separated from each other by military cordons, and all strangers passing to and fro were rigorously examined. My good father, whose gentle, serious face is one of my most pleasant memories, buckled on his silver-hilted sword and went off himself to mount guard somewhere. I had greater confidence in that sword than in the whole English navy. My blessed, thoughtful, mother hung round each of our necks little bags with large bits of camphor in them, in the beneficial effects of which we believed absolutely, and strictly forbade us to eat melons and peaches. And we were good dutiful children and strictly obeyed her commands. And yet in that very year, just as if Nature had resolved to be satirical at our expense, our gardens and orchards overflowed with an abundance of magnificent fruit. And there we allowed them all to rot. We had a doctor in those days, a fine old fellow, who, when the danger was at its height, went fearlessly from house to house. He had white hair, rosy cheeks, and a slim, erect figure, and was always cracking jokes with us. He used to say: "No funk, no risk of Death!" and would pick up the beautiful golden melons before our eyes and eat them with the best appetite in the world, and he took no harm from them, for he feared no danger. You had only to live regularly and trust in God, he used to say. He would laugh when we asked him: "Is it true that the air is full of tiny scarce visible insects, the inhaling of which brings about the disease?" "If you believe in these insects you had better keep your mouths shut lest they fly into them while you are talking," he would say. And subsequently when we heard the drowsy monotonous tolling of the bells and the funeral dirges sung day after day, morning and evening, beneath our windows, and saw orphans following in the track of the lumbering corpse-carts; when they told us that everyone in the neighbouring houses had died off in two days, and we saw all the windows of the house opposite fast-closed, and not a soul looking through them; at such a time it was good to fold one's hands in prayer and reflect that we were still all together, and that not one of us had been taken away, but God had preserved us from all calamity. Our hope was weak, for there was no foundation for it to build upon, but our faith was strong and all-sufficing.

Such is the sole impression I have retained of that memorable year.

Ah! elsewhere that same year was not content with embroidering its mourning robe with mere tears, it used blood also, and taught the land a twofold lesson at a heavy cost.

* * * * *

The circular letters issued by the county authorities flew from village to village, informing the local sages of the approaching peril of which even the well-formed knew no more than they had known ten years before, no more than they actually know now.

The local sages, that is to say the justices and the schoolmasters, were directed to explain to the ignorant people the contents of these circular letters.

Explain indeed! Men whose own knowledge was of the most elementary description, men who looked for supernatural causes in the most natural phenomena, were to explain what was still a profound mystery to the collective wisdom of the world!

Mr. Kordé, whom we remember as one of the two schoolmasters of Hétfalu, accordingly, by dint of bellowing, gathered all his subjects around him. It was the day before breaking up for the holidays, and drawing from his pocket the folded and corded vellum document, he gave them to understand that he was going to explain it to them. They, in their turn, were to explain it when they got home to their dear parents.

"Blockheads!" this was his usual mode of addressing his _jeunesse dorée_--"blockheads! you see here before you the letter patent of His Honour, the magistrate, signifying that all the schools are to be shut up, and the whole village is to be on the alert, inasmuch as a terrible disease, called the 'morbus,' is about to enter the kingdom. When the morbus lays hold of anybody the individual in question has not even time to look over his shoulder, but falls down dead on the spot. Down he drops, and there he stays.

"The morbus begins in this way. The gall overflows into the vital essences, and becomes gall-fever or cholera, consequently take care you don't aggravate me.

"Moreover, the morbus in question is to be found inside this year's melons, apricots, and all sorts of fruit; so every man jack of you who doesn't want to be a dead 'un mustn't go guzzling berries and such like."

Here a couple of Scythians from the northern counties began squabbling loudly on the back benches.

"Hie, there, you blockhead! Mike Turlyik, I know it is you--what was I talking about?"

"You was saying that--that--that--no more apricots were to be sneaked from his reverence's garden."

"Come out here, my son, wilt thou? I've a word to say in thine ear!"

And he leathered the unfortunate Mike soundly. Yet the lad after all had reasoned not illogically, for he had started from the assumption that the prohibition in question had been inserted in the letter patent for the express purpose of scaring the people away from the priest's orchard, his reverence being the only man in the village who cultivated fruit-trees.

"And now let us return to the matter in hand. Listen now, you addlepates!

"Bathing, too, is very dangerous just now, and, in fact, every sort of washing with cold water, for thereby the vital essence within a man is easily upset. On the other hand, brandy-drinking is very wholesome, for thereby the volume of spiritual essence in man is at any rate increased. Work on an empty stomach is also dangerous, as also are too much reflection and brain-racking. On the other hand the eating of roast meat and as little walking about in the sun as possible are very profitable."

This passage delighted the addlepates immensely.

"Inasmuch, however, as it is quite possible that a man from a neighbouring village might easily convey to us in his jacket or knapsack this morbus, which, by the way, is as catching as sheep-ticks; therefore it is ordered that nobody is to quit his own village, either by cart or on foot, and no stranger is to be admitted from without. Should anyone require, however, to pass through the district, he must first of all be locked securely in a cowshed beyond the limits of the village, and there his clothes must be well smoked ('fumigated' they call it), and he himself well doused in a ducking-tub, and if he has any coin about him it must be rubbed with ashes, which life-imperilling occupation will be duly attended to by the local gipsies."

After a pause, Mr. Kordé resumed his learned instructions as follows:

"If, nevertheless, anyone, despite these wise regulations, _should_ catch the morbus, there is only one antidote, the name whereof is Vismuthum. Vismuthum, vismuthi, neuter gender, second declension. In Hungarian viszmuta, in Slovak vismuthium, in English bismuth."

At this point the worthy preceptor was overcome by a violent fit of coughing, for he was now bound by his directions to explain the properties of this mysterious substance whose name he himself had just that moment learnt for the first time from his letter patent.

"Well, now! listen all of you, for I shall examine you presently upon all that I have been telling you. Vismuthum is a powder, or rather a fluid, or perhaps 'twere better to say a powder of a--a quite indefinable colour. It is prepared in all sorts of ways, and has no particular odour, and in substance much resembles piskotum.[2] Everyone who partakes of it instantly becomes quite well again. First of all it is to be taken in a coffee spoon (his reverence will supply the spoon gratis), and then, if that has no effect, in a tablespoon. If that also has no effect, then two tablespoons must be taken, and so on in increasing doses, until the morbus leaves the patient altogether. It is to be had in the apothecary's shop at Kassa, so whoever does not go and get some has only himself to blame if he dies. Poor men will receive it gratis from Dr. Sarkantyús, and those who won't take it willingly will have it crammed down their throats by force, and it will be also sprinkled in all the wells of drinking water that the people may get some of it that way. It will therefore be much better to make the acquaintance of vismuthum in a friendly manner, than go to the devil one way or other for not taking it."

[Footnote 2: Antimony.]

The young people appreciated this last witticism and roared with laughter.

One of Mr. Kordé's cubs took the liberty, however, of stretching out two fingers, which signified that he had a question to ask.

"Well, Slipik, out with it!"

"Mr. Rector, is the stuff sweetish like?"

"Asine! have I not told you what it was? You have not been attending; hold out your paw!"

The urchin got a smart rap on the palm of his hand with the ruler.

"And now the other!"

And so both hands smarted instead of his ears.

"And now, Guszti Klimpa, stand out and repeat to these blockheads what I have been saying."

Guszti Klimpa was the head boy, because his father rented the village pot-house, and he himself wore the best jacket of them all, so he was the master's favourite. The urchin hastily pocketed the pen-knife with which he had hitherto been carving his bench, blushed deeply in his embarrassment, and his eyes almost started from his head in his endeavours to find an answer to the question put to him.

"Well, my son, come, what did I say now?"

The lad took a plunge at random.

"Nixnus is a fluid which becomes a powder, which, can be made from anything, and very much resembles a piskota."[3]

[Footnote 3: Biscuit.]

"_Bene, prœstanter, eminentissime._ Only not _piskota_ but _piskotum_;[4] not feminine, you know, but neuter gender, second declension."

[Footnote 4: Antimony.]

So Guszti Klimpa returned to his seat very well satisfied with himself.

"Moreover, this I must add--and mind you tell it to your parents when you get home--that nothing is so good in these dangerous times as to drink one glass of brandy in the early morning on an empty stomach, another in the afternoon, a third on lying down, and as many times more as one feels any foreign substance in the stomach. That is the best remedy of all. And, Guszti Klimpa! mind you don't forget to inform your dear father that your schoolmaster, the rector, is very much afraid of the morbus, and that my spirit flask is still with you."

Guszti Klimpa's face assumed a pious expression at this reminder, and shoving beneath his hymn-book the shaft of his quill pen out of which he was manufacturing a pocket pistol, he promised to deliver the message at home.

"And now let us sing a hymn and say a prayer. And after that there will be no more school till the morbus has departed."

Great was the joy of the promising youths at these words. Guszti Klimpa fired off his improvised pistol underneath the bench, and the pellet hit Mr. Kordé full on the nose, whereupon he well trounced Jóska Slipik, though he knew very well that he was not the culprit.

Whilst the wrongfully flogged urchin was still howling, the others began singing the hymn. So long as the low notes predominated Mr. Kordé's voice was alone audible, but at the crescendoes the youthful believers had it all their own way, and shrieked till the windows rattled, the rector beating time the while by lightly tapping the heads of the Faithful with his ruler whenever they departed from the impracticable melody.

After that, Guszti Klimpa grappled with a prayer, and recited the morning devotions instead of the evening devotions by mistake, a lapse of which the rector, however, took no notice. The Amen was no sooner uttered than the youngsters, with a wild yell, made a solid rush for the door, bearing in mind Mr. Kordé's laudable habit on such occasions of lambing it into the hindermost by way of protesting against the general uproar. When the whole class was fairly out in the street again, its delight at being released from school for some time to come was too much for it, and in the exuberance of its high spirits it fell tooth and nail upon the Lutheran lads who were playing at ball in front of their own church, broke a couple of their heads, scribbled: "Vivat vacatio" on the walls of every house they came to, slammed to every gate they passed, and roused every dog in the village to fury pitch--thus giving the whole world to understand that the rector, Mr. Michael Kordé, had given his promising pupils an extraordinary holiday, because the morbus was coming, and it was not good for people to congregate together at such times.

* * * * *

And now the village ancients and the women were trooping home from church.

Every face was dominated by an expression of dumb terror.

In the church the priest also had read aloud the letter from the county authorities, adding a short discourse of his own to the effect that a calm confidence in the providence of God and a clear Christian conscience were worth far more than all the medicaments, cordons, and bismuth powder in the world.

"We are all, however, in the hands of God," he said, "and if we live well we shall die well. A righteous man need never fear Death."

The old hag, "the death-bird," was crouching there on the church steps with a bundle of healing herbs in her lap, and her crutch under her armpits, and with her chin resting on her knee. She kept counting all who came out of the church: "One! two! three!" Every time she came to three she began all over again--every third person was superfluous.

And now all had gone, only she remained behind, she and shaggy Hanák, the bellringer.

After the departure of the people a little white dog came running along, and, as often happens, peeped into the church.

"Clear out of that!" cried the sexton, flinging the large church door key after him.

The aged sybil lifted a skinny finger and shook it menacingly at the sexton.

"Hanák! shaggy Hanák! Why dost thou drive away the dog? I tell thee, and I tell thee the truth, that it were better for thee, aye! and for others also, if they could be as such dogs instead of the two-legged beasts they really are, for ere long we shall be in a world where not the voice of thy bell, but the howling of dogs will accompany the dead to their last resting-place. Therefore trouble not thyself about the dogs, Hanák, shaggy Hanák."

The bellringer durst not reply. He closed the church door softly, got out of the woman's way, and while he hastened off, it seemed to him as if his head was dizzy from some cause or other, and his feet were tottering beneath him.

When he handed the church door key over to the priest, his reverence gave him to understand that by order of the authorities the church bells were not to be tolled for the dead during the outbreak of the plague to avoid alarming the people.

As he went home that evening shaggy Hanák's head waggled from side to side, as if every hair upon it was a heavy debt. As he went along he heard all the dogs howling. Well, henceforth _they_ would have to follow the dead to their graves.

After that Hanák had not the heart to go home, but sought comfort in the pot-house, where the village sages were already sitting in council together and discussing the problems of the Future. _

Read next: Chapter 10. A Leader Of The People

Read previous: Chapter 8. The Polish Woman

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