CHAPTER XIL

Jura:\'i lingua,, mentem injuratam gero. ■ ■
Who brought you first acquainted with the devil? Shirley's St Patrick for Ireland.
I RAN on till I had no longer breath or strength, (without perceiving that I was in a dark passage), till I was stopt by a door. In falling against it, I burst it open, and found myself in a low dark room. When I raised myself, for I had fallen on my hands and knees, I looked round, and saw something so singular, as to suspend even my personal anxiety and terror for a moment.
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" The room was very small ; and I could perceive by the rents, that I had not only broken open a door, but a large curtain which hung before it, whose ample folds still afforded me concealment if I required it. There was no one in the room, and I had time to study its singular furniture at leisure.
" There was a table covered with cloth ; on it were placed a vessel of a singular con- struction, a book, into whose pages I look- ed, but could not make out a single letter. I therefore wisely took it for a book of ma- gic, and closed it with a feeling of excul- patory horror. (It happened to be a copy of the Hebrew Bible, marked with the Samaritan points). There was a knife too ; and a cock was fastened to the leg of the table, whose loud crows announced his impatience of further constraint *.
* Quilibet postea paterfamilias, cum gallo prae ma- nibus, in medium primus prodit. * *
A TALK. 8
" I felt that this apparatus was some- what singular — it looked like a prepara- tion for a sacrifice. I shuddered, and wrapt myself in the volumes of the dra- pery which hung before the door my fall had broken open. A dim lamp, suspended from the ceiling, discovered to me all these objects, and enabled me to observe what followed almost immediately. A man of middle age, but whose physiognomy had something peculiar in it, even to the eye of a Spaniard, from the clustering darkness of his eye-brows, his prominent nose, and a certain lustre in the balls of his eyes, en-
Deinde expiationem aggreditur et capiti suo ter gallum allidit,, singulosque ictus his vocibus prose- quitur. Hie Gallus sit permutio pro me, &c. *
* * * * ill- * "
Gallo delnde imponens manus, cum statim mactat_, &c. Vide Buxtorf^ as quoted in Dr Magee (Bishop of Raphoe's) work on the atonement. Cumberland in his Observer, I think, mentions the discovery to have been reserved for the feast of the Passover. It is just as probable it was made on the day of expiation.
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tered the room, knelt before the table, kiss- ed the book that lay on it, and read from it some sentences that were to precede, as I imagined, some horrible sacrifice; — felt the edge of the knife, knelt again, uttered some words which I did not understand, (as they were in the language of that book), and then called aloud on some one by the name of Manasseh-ben-Solomon. No one answered. He sighed, passed his hand over his eyes with the air of a man who is asking pardon of himself for a short forget- fulness, and then pronounced the name of " Antonio." A young man immediately entered, and answered, " Did you call me. Father ?" — But Avhile he spoke, he threw a hollow and wandering glance on the sin- gular furniture of the room.
" I called you, my son, and why did you not answer me ?" — " I did not hear you, fa- ther— I mean, I did not think it was on me you called. I heard only a name I was never called by before. When you said ' Antonio,' I obeyed you — I came." —
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" But t/iat is the name by which you must in future be called and be known, to me at least, unless you prefer another. — You shall have your choice." — " My father, I shall adopt whatever name you choose." — " No; the choice of your new name must be your own — you must, for the fu- ture, either adopt the name you have heard, or another."— " What other, Sir?"—" That of parricide J' The youth shuddered with horror, less at the words than at the ex- pression that accompanied them ; and, af- ter looking at his father for some time in a posture of tremulous and supplicating inquiry, he burst into tears. The father seized the moment. He grasped the arms of his son, " My child, I gave you life, and you may repay the gift — my life is in your power. You think mc a Catholic — 1 have brought you up as one for the preserva- tion of our mutual lives, in a country where the confession of the true faith would in- fallibly cost both. I am one of that un- happy race every where stigmatized and
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spoken against, yet on whose industry and talent the ungrateful country that anathe- matizes us, depends for half the sources of its national prosperity. I am a Jew, " an Israelite," one of those to whom, even by the confession of a Christian apostle, " per- tain the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh — " Here he paused, not willing to go on with a quotation that would have contradicted his sentiments. He added, " The Messias will come, whether suffer- ing or triumphant *. I am a Jew. I call- ed you at the hour of your birth by the name of Manasseh-ben- Solomon. I called on you by that name, which I felt had clung to the bottom of my heart from that liour, and which, echoing from its abyss,
* The Jews believe in two Messias, a suffering and a triumphant one, to reconcile the prophecies with their own expectations.
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I almost hoped you would have reeogniz- ed. It was a dream, but will you not, my beloved child, realize that dream ? Will you not? — will you not? The God of your fathers is waiting to embrace you — and your father is at your feet, imploring you to follow the faith of your father A- braham, the prophet Moses, and all the holy prophets who are with God, and who look down on this moment of your soul's vacillation between the abominable idolatries of those who not only adore the Son of the cai*penter, but even im- piously compel you to fall down before the image of the woman his mother, and adore her by the blasphemous name of Mother of God, — and the pure voice of those who call on you to worship the God of your fathers, the God of ages, the eter- nal God of heaven and earth, without son or mother, without child or descendant, (as impiously presumed in their blasphemous creed), without even worshipper, save those who, like me, sacrifice their hearts to him
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in solitude, at the risk of those hearts be- ing PIERCED BY THEIR OWN CHILDREN.
" At these words, the young man, over- come by all he saw and heard, and quite unprepared for this sudden transition from Catholicism to Judaism, burst into tears. The father seized the moment, " My child, you are now to profess yourself the slave of these idolaters, who are cursed in the law of Moses, and by the commandment of God, — or to enrol yourself among the faithful, whose rest shall be in the bosom of Abraham, and who, reposing there, shall see the unbelieving crawling over the burn- ing ashes of hell, and supplicate you in vain for a drop of water, according to the legends of their own prophet. And does not such a picture excite your pride to de- ny them a drop?"—" I would not deny them a drop," sobbed the youth, " I would give them these tears." — " Reserve them for your father's grave," added the Jew, " for to the grav^e you have doomed me. — I have lived, sparing, watching, temporiz* .
A TALE. y
ing, with these accursed idolaters, for you. And now — and now you reject a God who is alone able to save, and a father kneeling to implore you to accept that salvation." — " No, I do not," said the bewildered youth. — " What, then, do you determine ?— I am at your feet to know your resolution. Be- hold, the mysterious instruments of your initiation are ready. There is the uncor- rupted book of INIoses, the prophet of God, as these idolaters themselves confess. There are all the preparations for the year of expiation — determine w^hether those rites shall now dedicate you to the true God, or seize your father, (who has put his life into your hands), and drag him by the throat into the prisons of the Inquisition. You may — you can-— will you V
" In prostrate and tremulous agony, the father held up his locked hands to his child. I seized the moment — despair had made me reckless. I understood not a word of what was said, except the refe- rence to the Inquisition. I seized on that
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last word — I grasped, in my despair, at the heart of father and child. I rushed from behind the curtain, and exclaiming, " If he does not betray you to the Inquisition, / will:' I fell at his feet. This mix- ture of defiance and prostration, my squa- lid figure, my inquisitorial habit, and my bursting on this secret and solemn in- terview, struck the Jew with a horror he vainly gasped to express, till, rising from my knees, on which I had fallen from my weakness, I added, " Yes, I will betray you to the Inquisition, unless you instant- ly promise to shelter me from it." The Jew glanced at my dress, perceived his danger and mine, and, with 2i physical pre- sence of mind unparalleled, except in a man under strong impressions of mental excitation and personal danger, bustled a- bout to remove every trace of the expiato- ry sacrifice, and of my inquisitorial cos- tume, in a moment. In the same breath he called aloud for Rehekah, to remove the vessels fijom the table ; bid Antonio quit
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the apartment, and hastened to clothe me in some dress that he had snatched from a wardrobe collected from centuries ; while he tore off my inquisitorial dress with a violence that left me actually naked, and the habit in rags.
" There was something at once fear- ful and ludicrous in the scene that follow ed, Rebekah, an old Jewish woman, came at his call ; but, seeing a third person, re- treated in terror, while her master, in his confusion, called her in vain by her Cluis- tiaji name of Maria. Obliged to remove the table alone, he overthrew it, and broke the leg of the unfortunate animal fasten- ed to it, who, not to be without his share in the tumult, uttered the most shrill and intolerable screams, while the Jew, snatch- ing up the sacrificial knife, repeated eager- ly, " Statim mactat gallum," and put the wretched bird out of its pain ; then, trem- bling at this open avowal of his Judaism, he sat down amid the ruins of the over thrown table, the fragments of the broken
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vessels, and the remains of the martyred cock. He gazed at me with a look of stu- pified and ludicrous inanity, and demand- ed in delirious tones, what " my lords the Inquisitors had pleased to visit his humble but highly-honoured mansion for ?" I was scarce less deranged than he was ; and, though we both spoke the same lan- guage, and were forced by circumstances into the same strange and desperate confi- dence with each other, we really needed, for the first half-hour, a rational interpreter of our exclamations, starts of fear, and bursts of disclosure. At last our mutual terror acted honestly between us, and we understood each other. The end of the matter was, that, in less than an hour, I felt myself clad in a comfortable garment, seated at a table amply spread, watched over by my involuntary host, and watch- ing him in turn with red wolfish eyes, which glanced from his board to his per- son, as if I could, at a moment's hint of danger from his treachery, have chang-
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ed my meal, and feasted on his life-blood. No such danger occurred, — my host was more afraid of me than I had reason to be of him, and for many causes. He was a Jew innate, an impostor, — a wretch, who, drawing sustenance from the bosom of our holy mother the church, had turned her nutriment to poison, and attempted to in- fuse that poison into the lips of his son. I was but a fugitive from the Inquisition, — a prisoner, who had a kind of instinc- tive and very venial dislike to giving the Inquisitors the trouble of lighting the fag- gots for me, which would be much better employed in consuming the adherent to the law of Moses. In fact, impartiality considered, there was every thing in my favour, and the Jew just acted as if he felt so, — but all this I ascribed to his terrors of the Inquisition.
" That night I slept,—! know not how or where. I had wild dreams before I slept, if I did sleep ; and after, — such vi- sions,—such things, passed in dread and
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stem reality before me. I have often in my memory searched for the traces of the first night I passed under the roof of the Jew, but can find nothing,— nothing except a conviction of my utter insanity. It might not have been so, — I know not how it was. I remember his lighting me up a narrow stair, and my asking him, was he lighting me down the steps of the dungeons of the Inquisition ? — his throwing open a door, and my asking him, was it the door of the torture-room ? — his attempting to undress me, and my exclaiming, " Do not bind me too tight, — I know I must suffer, but be merciful ;" — his throwing me on the bed, while I shrieked, " Well, you have bound me on the rack, then ? — strain it hard, that I may forget myself the sooner ; but let your surgeon not be near to watch my pulse, — let it cease to throb, and let me cease to suffer." I remember no more for many days, though I have struggled to do so, and caught from time to time glimpses of thoughts better lost. Oh, Sir,
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there are some criininals of the imagina- tioiij whom if we could plunge into the oubliettes of its magnificent but lightly- based fabric, its lord would reign more happy. * * *
* # * *
" Many days elapsed, indeed, before the Jew began to feel his immunity somewhat dearly purchased, by the additional main- tenance of a troublesome, and, I fear, a deranged inmate. He took the first op- portunity that the recovery of my intel- lect offered, of hinting this to me, and in- quired mildly what 1 purposed to do, and where I meant to go. This question for the first time opened to my view that range of hopeless and interminable desola- tion that lay before me, — the Inquisition had laid waste the whole track of life, as with fire and sword. I had not a spot to stand on, a meal to earn, a hand to grasp, a voice to greet, a roof to crouch under, in the whole realm of Spain.
" You are not to learn, Sir, that the power
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of the Inquisition, like that of death, sepa- rates you, by its single touch, from all mor- tal relations. From the moment its grasp has seized you, all human hands unlock their hold of yours, — you have no longer father, mother, sister, or child. The most devot- ed and affectionate of all those relatives, who, in the natural intercourse of human life, would have laid their hands under your feet to procure you a smoother pas- sage over its roughnesses, would be the first to grasp the faggot that was to reduce you to ashes, if the Inquisition were to demand the sacrifice. I knew all this ; and I felt, besides, that, had I never been a prisoner in the Inquisition, I was an iso- lated being, rejected by father and mother, — the involuntary murderer of my brother, the only being on earth who loved me, or whom I could love or profit by, — that be- ing who seemed to flash across my brief human existence, to illuminate and to blast. The bolt had perished with the vic- tim. In Spain it was impossible for me
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to live without detection, unless I plung- ed myself into an imprisonment as pro- found and hopeless as that of the Inquisi- tion. And, if a miracle were wrought to convey me out of Spain, ignorant as I was of the language, the habits, and the modes of obtaining subsistence, in that or any other country, how could I support my- self even for a day. Absolute famine stared me in the face, and a sense of de- gradation accompanying my consciousness of my own utter and desolate helplessness, was the keenest shaft in the quiver, whose contents were lodged in my heart. My consequence was actually lessened in my own eyes, by ceasing to become the victim of persecution, by which I had suffered so long. While people think it "vcorth their while to torment us, we are never without some dignity, though pain- ful and imaginary. Even in the Inquisi- tion I belonged to somebody, — I was watched and guarded; — now, I was the
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outcast of the whole earth, and I wept with equal bitterness and depression at the hopeless vastness of the desert I had to traverse.
" The Jew, not at all disturbed by these feelings, went daily out for intelligence, and returned one evening in such raptures, that I could easily discover he had ascer- tained his own safety at least, if not mine. He informed me that the current report in Madrid was, that I had perished in the fall of the burning ruins on the night of the fire. He added, that this report had received additional currency and strength from the fact, that the bodies of those who had perished by the fall of the arch, were, when discovered, so defaced by fire, and so crushed by the massive fragments, as to be utterly undistinguishable ; — their re- mains had been collected, however, and mine were supposed to be among the num- ber. A mass had been performed for them, and their cinders, occupying but a
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single coffin *, were interred in the vaults of the Dominican church, while some of the first families of Spain, in the deepest mourning, and their faces veiled, testified their grief in silence for those whom they would have shuddered to acknowledge their mortal relationship to, had they been still living. Certainly a lump of cinders was no longer an object even of religi- ous hostility. My mother, he added, was among the number of mourners, but with a veil so long and thick, and attendance so few, that it would have been impossible to have known the Duchess di Mon^ada, but for the whisper that her appearance there had been enjoined for penance. He added, what gave me more perfect satis- faction, that the holy office was very glad
* This extraordinary fact occurred after the dread- ful fire which consumed sixteen persons in one house, in Stephen's Green, Dublin, 1816. The writer of this heard the screams of sufferers whom it was im« possible to save, for an hour and a half
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to accredit the story of my death ; they wished me to be believed dead, and what the Inquisition wishes to be believed, is rarely denied belief in Madrid. This sign, ing my certificate of death, was to me the best security for life. In the communica- tiveness of his joy, which had expanded his heart, if not his hospitality, the Jew, as I swallowed my bread and water, (for my stomach still loathed all animal food), informed me that there was a procession to take place that evening, the most solemn and superb ever witnessed in Madrid. The holy office was to appear in all the pomp and plenitude of its glory, accompa- nied by the standards of St Dominic and the cross, while all the ecclesiastical orders in Madrid were to attend with their ap- propriate insignia, invested by a strong military guard, (which, for some reason or other, was judged necessary or proper), and, attended by the whole populace of Madrid, was to proceed to the principal church to humihate themselves for the re-
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cent calamity they had undergone, and implore the saints to be more personally active in the event of a future conflagra- tion.
" The evening came on — the Jew left me ; and, under an impression at once un- accountable and irresistible, I ascended to the highest apartment in his house, and, with a beating heart, listened for the toll of the bells that was to announce the commencement of the ceremony. I had not long to wait. At the close of twilight, every steeple in the city was vibrating with the tolls of their well-plied bells. I was in an upper room of the house. There was but one window ; but, hiding myself behind the blind, which I withdrew from time to time, I had a full view of the spectacle. The house of the Jew looked out on an open space, through which the procession was to pass, and which was al- ready so filled, that I wondered how the procession could ever make its way through such a wedged and impenetrable mass. A t
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last, I could distinguish a motion like that of a distant power, giving a kind of inde- finite impulse to the vast body that rolled and blackened beneath me, like the ocean under the first and far-felt agitations of the storm.
" The crowd rocked and reeled, but did not seem to give way an inch. The pro- cession commenced. I could see it ap- proach, marked as it was by the crucifix, banner, and taper — (for they had reserved the procession till a late hour, to give it the imposing effect of torch-light.) And I saw the multitude at a vast distance give way at once. Then came on the stream of the procession, rushing, like a magnificent river, between two banks of human bo- dies, who kept as regular an4 strict dis- tance, as if they had been ramparts of stone, — the banners, and crucifixes, and tapers, appearing like the crests of foam on advancing billows, sometimes rising, sometimes sinking. At last they came on, and the whole grandeur of tlie procession
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burst on my view, and nothing was ever more imposing, or more magnificent. The habits of the ecclesiastics, the glare of the torches struggling with the dying twihght, and seeming to say to heaven, We have a sun though yours is set ;— the solemn and resolute look of the whole party, who trod as if their march were on the bodies of kings, and looked as if they would have said. What is the sceptre to the cross ? — the black crucifix itself, trembling in the rear, attended by the banner of St Domi- nick, with its awful inscription. — It was a sight to convert all hearts, and I exulted I was a Catholic. Suddenly a tumult seem- ed to arise among the crowd — I knew not from what it could arise — all seemed so pleased and so elated.
" I drew away the blind, and saw, by torch-light, among a crowd of officials who clustered round the standard of St Domi- nick, the figure of my companion. His story was well known. At first a faint hiss was heard, then a wikl and smothered
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howl. Then I heard voices among the crowd repeat, in audible sounds, " What is this for ? Why do they ask why the Inquisition has been half-burned ? — why the virgin has withdrawn her protection ? — why the saints turn away their faces from us? — when a parricide marches a- mong the officials of the Inquisition. Are the hands that have cut a father's throat fit to support the banner of the cross?" These were the words but of a few at first, but the whisper spread rapidly among the crowd ; and fierce looks were darted, and hands were clenched and raised, and some stooped to the earth for stones. The pro- cession went on, however, and every one knelt to the crucifixes as they advanced, held aloft by the priests. But the mur- murs increased too, and the words, " par- ricide, profanation, and victim," resounded on every side, even from those who knelt in the mire as the cross passed by. The murmur increased — it could no longer be mistaken for that of adoration. The fore-
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most priests paused in terror ill concealed — and this seemed the sio'nal for the terri- ble scene that was about to follow. All officer belonging to the guard at this time ventured to intimate to the chief Inquisi- tor the danger that might be apprehended, but was dismissed with the short and sul- len answer, " Move on — the servants of Christ have nothing to fear." The proces- sion attempted to proceed, but their pro- gress was obstructed by the multitude, who now seemed bent on some deadly purpose. A few stones were thrown ; but the moment the priests raised their cruci- fixes, the multitude were on their knees again, still, however, holding the stones in their hands. The military officers a- gain addressed the chief Inquisitor, and intreated his permission to disperse the crowd. They received the same dull and stern answer, " The cross is sufficient for the protection of its servants — what- ever fears you may feel, I feel none." Incensed at the reply, a young officer
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sprung on his horse, which he had quitted from respect while addressing the Supre- lua, and was in a moment levelled by the blow of a stone that fractured his skull. He turned his blood-swimming eyes on the Inquisitor, and died. The multitude raised a wild shout, and pressed closer. Their intentions were now too plain. They pressed close on that part of the pro- cession among which their victim was placed. Again, and in the most urgent terms, the officers implored leave to dis- perse the crowd, or at least cover the re- treat of the obnoxious object to some neighbouring church, or even to the walls of the Inquisition. And the wretched man himself, with loud outcries, (as he saw the danger thickening around him), joined in their petition. The Supre- ma, though looking pale, bated not a jot of his pride. " These are my arms !" he exclaimed, pointing to the crucifixes, " and their inscription is tv-mrej^nxtc. I forbid a sword to be drawn, or a musket to be
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levelled. On, in the name of God." And. on they attempted to move, but the pres* sure now rendered it impossible. The mul- titude, unrepressed by the military, became ungovernable ; the'crosses reeled and rock- ed like standards in a battle ; the eccle- siastics, in confusion and terror, pressed on each other. Amid that vast mass, every particle of which seemed in motion, there was but one emphatic and discriminate movement — that wiiich bore a certain part of tlie crowd strait on to the spot where their victim, though inclosed and inwrapt by all that is formidable in earthly, and all that is awful in spiritual power — sheltered by the crucifix and the sword — stood trem- bling to the bottom of his soul. The Su- prema saw his error too late, and now call- ed loudly on the military to advance, and disperse the crowd by any means. They attempted to obey him ; but by this time they were mingled among the crowd them- selves. All order had ceased; and besides, there appeared a kind of indisposition to
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this service, from the very first, among the military. They attempted to charge, how- ever ; but, entangled as they were among the crowd, who clung round their horses hoofs, it was impossible for them even to form, and the first shower of stones threw them into total confusion. The danger increased every moment, for one spirit now seemed to animate the whole multitude. What had been the stifled growl of a few, was now the audible yell of all — " Give him to us — we must have him ;" and they tossed and roared like a thousand waves assailing a wreck. As the military re- treated, a hundred priests instantly closed round the unhappy man, and with gene- rous despair exposed themselves to the fu- ry of the multitude. While the Suprema, hastening to the dreadful spot, stood in the front of the priests, with the cross uplifted, — his face was like that of the dead, but his eye had not lost a single flash of its fire, nor his voice a tone of
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its pride. It ^vas in vain ; the multi- tude proceeded calmly, and even respect- fully, (when not resisted), to remove all that obstructed their progress; in doing so, they took every care of the persons of priests ^vhom they were compelled to re- move, repeatedly asking their pardon for the violence they were guilty of. And this tranquilUty of resolved vengeance \vas the most direful indication of its never desisting till its purpose was accomplished. The last ring was broken — the last resister overcome. Amid yells like those of a thousand tigers, the victim ^vas seized and dragged forth, grasping in both hands frag- ments of the robes of those he had clung to in vain, and holding them up in the impotence of despair.
" The cry w^as huslied for a moment, as they felt him in their talons, and gazed on him with thirsty eyes. Then it was re- newed, and the work of blood began. They dashed him to the earth — tore him
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up again — flung him into the air — tossed him from hand to hand, as a bull gores the howling mastiff with horns right and left. Bloody, defaced, blackened with earth, and battered wdth stones, he struggled and roared among them, till a loud cry an- nounced the hope of a termination to a scene alike horrible to humanity, and dis- graceful to civilization. The military, strongly reinforced, came galloping on, and all the ecclesiastics, with torn habits, and broken crucifixes, following fast in the rear, — all eager in the cause of hu- man nature— all on fire to prevent this base and barbarous disgrace to the name of Christianity and of human nature.
" Alas ! this interference only hastened the horrible catastrophe. There was but a shorter space for the multitude to work their furious will. I saw, I felt, but I can- not describe, the last moments of this hor- rible scene. Dragged from the mud and stones, they daslied a mangled lump of
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fiesii right against the door of the house where I was. With his tongue hanging from his lacerated mouth, like that of a baited bull ; with one eye torn from the socket, and dangling on his bloody cheek ; wath a fracture in every limb, and a wound for every pore, he still howled for " life — life — life — mercy !" till a stone, aimed by some pitying hand, struck him down. He fell, trodden in one moment into san- guine and discoloured nciud by a thou- sand feet. The cavalry came on, charg- ing with fury. The crowd, saturated with cruelty and blood, gave way in grim silence. But they had not left a joint of his little finger — a hair of his head — a slip of his skin. Had Spain mortgaged all her reliques from JMadrid to Monserrat, from the Pyrennees to Gibraltar, she could not have recovered the paring of a nail to ca- nonize. The officer who headed the troop dashed his horse's hoofs into a bloody form- less mass, and demanded, " Where was the victim ?" He was answered, " Beneath
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your horse's feet *;" and they depart- ed. * * * *
* * * * ^-
" It is a fact, Sh', that while witnessing this horrible execution, I felt all the effects vulgarly ascribed to fascination. I shud- dered at the first movement — the dull and deep whisper among the crowd. I shriek- ed involuntarily when the first decisive movements began among them ; but when at last the human shapeless carrion was dashed against the door, I. echoed the wild shouts of the multitude with a kind of sa- vage instinct. I bounded — I clasped my hands for a moment — then I echoed the screams of the thing that seemed no lon- ger to live, but still could scream ; and T screamed aloud and wildly for life — Ufe — and mercy ! One face was turned towards
* This circumstance occurred in Ireland 1797, after the murder of the unfortunate Dr Hamilton, The officer was answered, on inquiring what was that heap of mud at his horse's feet, — " The man you came for."
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me as I shrieked in unconscious tones. The glance, fixed on me for a moment, was in a moment withdrawn. The flash of the well-known eyes made no impression on me then. My existence was so purely mechanical, that, without the least consciousness of my own danger, (scarce less than that of the victim, had I been detected), I remained uttering shout for shout, and scream for scream — offering worlds in imagination to be able to remove from the window, yet feeling as if every shriek I uttered was as a nail that fastened me to it — dropping my eye-lids, and feel- ing as if a hand held them open, or cut them away — forcing me to gaze on all that passed below, like Regulus, with his lids cut off, compelled to gaze on the sun that withered up his eye-balls — till sense, and sight, and soul, failed me, and I fell grasp- ing by the bars of the window, and mi- micking, in my horrid trance, the shouts of the multitude, and the veil of the de-
B 2
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voted ^•■. I actually for a moment believed myself the object of their cruelty. The drama of terror has the irresistible power of converting its audience into its victims. *^ The Jew had kept apart from the tu- mult of the night. He had, I suppose.
* In the year 180S, when Emmett's insurrection broke out in Dublin — {the fact from which this ac- count is drawn was related to me by an eye-witness) — Lord Kilwarden_, in passing tln*ough Thomas Street, was dragged from his carriage, and murdered in the most horrid manner. Pike after pike was thrust thi'ough his body, till at last he was nailed to a door, and called out to his murderers to '^ put him out of his pain." At this moment, a shoemaker, who lodged in the garret of an opposite house, was drawn to the window by the hoiTible cries he heard. He stood at the window, gasping with hoiTor, his wife attempting vainly to drag him away. He saw the last blow struck — he heard the last groan uttered, as the suf- ferer cried, '^ put me out of pain," while sixty pikes were thrusting at him. The man stood at his win- dow as if nailed to it ; and when dragged from it, became — an idiot for life.
A TALE. S5
been saying within himself, in the lan- guage of your admirable poet,
'' Oh, Father Abraham, what these Christians are !'*
But when he returned at a late hour, he was struck with horror at the state in which he found me. I was delirious, — raving, and all he could say or do to soothe me, was in vain. My imagination had been fearfully impressed, and the conster- nation of the poor Jew was, I have been told, equally ludicrous and dismal. In his terror, he forgot all the technical formaUty of the Christian names by which he had uniformly signalized his household, since his residence in JNIadrid at least. He call- ed aloud on ]\Iai":asseh-ben- Solomon his son, and Rebekah his maid, to assist in holding me. " Oh, Father Abraham, my ruin is certain, this maniac will discover all, and ]Manasseh-ben -Solomon, my son^ will die uncircumcised."
" These words operating on my deli- rium, I started up, and, grasping the Jew
36 MELMOTH :
by the throat, arraigned him as a prisoner of the Inquisition. The terrified wretch, falHng on his knees, vociferated, " My cock, — my cock, — my cock ! oh ! I am un- done !" Then, grasping my knees, " I am no Jew, — my son, Manasseh-ben- Solomon, is a Christian ; you will not betray him, you will not betray me, — me who have saved your life. Manasseh, — I mean An- tonio,— Hebekah, — no, Maria, help me to hold him. Oh God of Abraham, my cock, and my sacrifice of expiation, and this maniac to burst on the recesses of our privacy, to tear open the veil of the taber- nacle !" — " Shut the tabernacle," said Re- bekah, the old domestic whom I have be- fore mentioned ; " yea, shut the tabernacle, and close up the veils thereof, for behold there be men knocking at 4he door, — men who are children of Belial, and they knock with staff and stone ; and, verily, they are about to break in the door, and demolish the carved work thereof with axes and hammers." — " Thou liest,"' said the Jew,
A TxVLE. 37
in much perturbation : " there is no carved work thereabout, nor dare they break it down with axes and hammers ; perad ven- ture it is but an assault of the children of Belial, in their rioting and drunkenness. I pray thee, Rebekah, to watch the door, and keep off the sons of Belial, even the sons of the mighty of the sinful city — the city of jNladrid, while I remove this blas- pheming carrion, who struggleth with me, — yea, struggleth mightily," (and struggle I did mightily). But, as I struggled, the knocks at the door became louder and stronger ; and, as I was carried off, the Jew continued to repeat, " Set thy face a- gainst them, Rebekah ; yea, set thy face like a flint." As he retired, Rebekah ex- claimed, " Behold I have set my back a- gainst them, for my face now availeth not. My back is that which I will oppose, and verily I shall prevail." — " I pray thee, Re- bekah," cried the Jew, " oppose thy face unto them, and verily that shall prevail. Try not the adversary with thy back, but
38 MELMOTH :
oppose thy face unto them ; and behold, if they are men, they shall flee, even though they were a thousand, at the rebuke of one. I pray thee try thy face once more, Rebekah, while I send this scape-goat into the wilderness. Surely thy face is enough to drive away those who knocked by night at the door of that house in Gi- beah, in the matter of the wife of the Ben- jamite." The knocking all this time in- creased. " Behold my back is broken," cried Rebekah, giving up her watch and ward, *' for, of a verity, the wea- pons of the mighty do smite the lintels and door-posts ; and mine arms are not steel, neither are my ribs iron, and behold I fail, — yea, I fail, and fall backwards into the hands of the uncircumcised." And so saying, she fell backwards as the door gave wav, and fell not, as she feared, into the hands of the uncircumcised, but into those of two of her countrymen, who, it appear- ed, had some extraordinary reason for this late visit and forcible entrance.
A TALE. 39
" The Jew, apprized who they w^ere, quitted me, after securing the door, and sat up the greater part of the night, in earnest conversation with his visitors. Whatever was their subject, it left traces of the most intense anxiety on the coun- tenance of the Jew the next mornmg. He went out early, did not return till a late hour, and then hastened to the room I occupied, and expressed the utmost de- light at finding me sane and composed. Candles were placed on the table, Rebe- kah dismissed, the door secured, and the Jew, after taking many uneasy turns about the narrow apartment, and often clearing his throat, at length sat down, and ven- tured to entrust me with the cause of his perturbation, in which, with the fatal con- sciousness of the unhappy, I already be- gan to feel / must have a share. He told me, that though the report of my death, so universally credited through Madrid, had at first set his mind at ease, there was now a wild story, which, with all its false-
40 MELMOTH :
hood and impossibility, might, in its circu- lation, menace us with the most fearful consequences. He asked me, was it pos- sible I could have been so imprudent as to expose myself to view on the day of that horrible execution ? and when I confessed that 1 had stood at a window, and had in- voluntarily uttered cries that I feared might have reached some ears, he wrung his hands, and a sweat of consternation burst out on his pallid features. When he recovered himself, he told me it was uni- versally believed that my spectre had ap- peared on that terrible occasion, — that I had been seen hovering in the air, to wit- ness the sufferings of the dying wretch, — and that my voice had been heard sum- moning him to his eternal doom. He added, that this story, possessing all the credibility of superstition, was now repeat- ed by a thousand mouths ; and whatever contempt might be attached to its absur- dity, it would infallibly operate as a hint to the restless vigilance, and unrelaxing
A TALE. 41
industry of the holy office, and might ulti- mately lead to my discovery. He there- fore was about to disclose to me a secret, the knowledge of which would enable me to remain in perfect security even in the centre of INladrid, until some means might be devised of effecting my escape, and procuring me the means of subsistence in some Protestant country, beyond the reach of the Inquisition.
" As he w^as about to disclose this secret on which the safety of both depended, and which I bent in speechless agony to hear, a knock was heard at the door, very unlike the knocks of the preceding night. It was single, solemn, peremptory, — and followed by a demand to open the doors of the house in the name of the most holy Inquisition. At these terrible words, the wretched Jew flung himself on his knees, blew out the candles, called on the names of the twelve patriarchs, and slipped a large rosary on his arm, in less time than it is possible to conceive any human frame could go
42 MELMOTH :
through such a variety of movements. The knock was repeated, — I stood para- lyzed ; but the Jew, springing on his feet, raised one of the boards of the floor in a moment, and, with a motion between con- vulsion and instinct, pointed to me to de- scend. I did so, and found myself in a moment in darkness and in safety.
" I had descended but a few steps, on the last of which I stood trembling, when the officers of the Inquisition entered the room, and stalked over the very board that concealed me. I could hear every word that passed. " Don Fernan," said an officer to the Jew, who re-entered with them, after respectfully opening the door, *' why were we not admitted sooner ?" — " Holy Father," said the trembling Jew, '' my only domestic, Maria, is old and deaf, the youth my son is in his bed, and I was myself engaged in my devotions." — " It seems you can perform them in the dark," said another, pointing to the can- dles, which the Jew was re-lighting. —
A TALE. 43
" AVlien the eye of God is on me, most reverend fathers, I am never in darkness." — " The eye of God is on you," said the officer, sternly seating himself; " and so is another eye, to which he has deputed the sleepless vigilance and resistless penetra- tion of his own, — the eye of the holy of- fice. Don Fernan di Nunez," the name by which the Jew went, " you are not ig norant of the indulgence extended by the church, to those who have renounced the errors of that accursed and misbelieving race from which you are descended, but you must be also aware of its incessant vi- gilance being directed towards such indi- viduals, from the suspicion necessarily at- tached to their doubtful conversion, and possible relapse. We know that the black blood of Grenada flowed in the tainted veins of your ancestry, and that not more than four centuries have elapsed, since your forefathers trampled on that cross before which you are now prostrate. You are an old man, Don Fernan, but . not an old
44 MELMOTH :
Christian; and, under these circumstan- ces, it behoves the holy office to have a watchful scrutiny over your conduct."
" The unfortunate Jew, invoking all the saints, protested he would feel the strictest scrutiny with which the holy office might honour him, as a ground of obHgation and a matter of thanksgiving, — renouncing at the same time the creed of his race in terms of such exaggeration and vehemence, as made me tremble for his probable sin- cerity in any creed, and his fidelity to me. The officers of the Inquisition, taking little notice of his protestations, went on to inform him of the object of their visit. They stated that a wild and incredible tale of the spectre of a deceased prisoner of the Inquisition having been seen hovering in the air near his house, had suggested to the wisdom of the holy office, that the living individual might be concealed with- in its walls.
" I could not see the trepidation of the Jew, but I could feel the vibration of the
A TALK. 45
boards on which he stood communicated to the steps that supported me. In a choaked and tremulous voice, he implored the officers to search every apartment of his house, and to raze it to the ground, and inter him under its dust, if aught v^ere found in it which a faithful and or- thodox son of the church might not har- bour. " That shall doubtless be done," said the officer, taking him at his word with the utmost sangfroid ; " but, in the mean time, suffer me to apprize you, Don Fernan, of the peril you incur, if at any future time, however remote, it shall be discovered that you harboured or aided in concealing a prisoner of the Inquisition, and an enemy of the holy church, — the very fost and lightest part of that penalty will be yoiu' dwelling being razed to the ground." The Inquisitor raised his voice, and paused with emphatic deliberation be- tween every clause of the following sen- tences, measuring as it were the effect of his blows on the increasing terror of liis
4t6 melmoth:
auditor, " You will be conveyed to our prison, under the suspected character of a relapsed Jew. Your son will be commit- ted to a convent, to remove him from the pestilential influence of your presence ; — and your whole property shall be confis- cated, to the last stone in your walls, the last garment on your person, and the last denier in your purse.
" The poor Jew, who had marked the gradations of his fear by groans more audi- ble and prolonged at the end of every tre- mendous denunciatory clause, at the men- tion of confiscation so total and desolating, lost all self-possession, and, ejaculating — " Oh Father Abraham, and all the holy prophets !" — fell, as I conjectured from the sound, prostrate on the floor. I gave my- self up for lost. Exclusive of his pusilla- nimity, the words he had uttered were e- nough to betray him to the oflicers of the Inquisition ; and, without a moment's he- sitation between the danger of falling into their hands, and plunging into the dark-
A TALE. 47
ness of the recess into which I had de- scended, I staggered down a few remain- ing steps, and attempted to feel my way along a passage, in which they seemed to terminate.