The sky sank down before dawn , muddy , flat , immovable .
The air is thick , clammy with the breath of
crowded human beings 2
.
It stifles me 3
.
I 3
open the window , and , looking out , can scarcely see through the rain opposite , where a crowd of
drunken Irishmen 7
6 are puffing Lynchburg 8
tobacco in their 6
pipes .
I 3
can detect the scent through all the foul smells ranging loose in the air .
The idiosyncrasy of this town 1
is smoke .
It rolls sullenly in slow folds from the great chimneys of the iron-foundries 9
, and settles down in black , slimy pools on the muddy streets 10
.
Smoke on the wharves 11
, smoke on the dingy boats 12
, on the yellow river 13
, -- clinging in a coating of greasy soot to the house-front 14
, the two faded poplars , the faces of the passers-by 15
.
The long train of mules , dragging masses of pig-iron through the narrow street 16
, have a foul vapor hanging to their reeking sides .
Here , inside , is a little broken figure of an angel pointing upward from the mantel-shelf 17
; but even its wings are covered with smoke , clotted and black .
Smoke everywhere !
A dirty canary chirps desolately in a cage beside me 3
.
Its dream of green fields 18
and sunshine is a very old dream , -- almost worn out , I 3
think .
From the back-window I 3
can see a narrow brick-yard sloping down to
the river-side 20
, strewed with rain-butts and tubs
19 .
The river 21
, dull and tawny-colored , ( la belle riviere 21
! )
drags itself 21
sluggishly along , tired of the heavy weight of boats 22
and coal-barges 23
.
What wonder ?
When I 3
was a child 135
, I 3
used to fancy a look of weary , dumb appeal upon the face of the negro-like river slavishly bearing
its 21
burden day after day
21 .
Something of the same idle notion comes to me 3
to-day , when from the street-window I 3
look on the slow stream of
human life 25
creeping past , night and morning , to
the great mills 26
24 .
Masses of
men 27
, with dull , besotted faces bent to the ground , sharpened here and there by pain or cunning
24 ; skin and muscle and flesh begrimed with smoke and ashes ; stooping all night over boiling caldrons of metal , laired by day in dens of drunkenness and infamy 28
; breathing from infancy to death an air saturated with fog and grease and soot , vileness for soul and body .
What do you 29
make of a case like that , amateur psychologist 30
?
You 31
call it an altogether serious thing to be alive : to these men 24
it is a drunken jest , a joke , -- horrible to angels 32
perhaps , to them 24
commonplace enough .
My 3
fancy about the river 21
was an idle one : it is no type of such a life .
What if it be stagnant and slimy here ?
It knows that beyond there waits for it odorous sunlight , quaint old gardens , dusky with soft , green foliage of apple-trees , and flushing crimson with roses 33
, -- air , and fields 34
, and mountains 35
.
The future of the Welsh puddler passing just now 36
is not so pleasant .
To be stowed away , after his 36
grimy work is done , in a hole in the muddy graveyard 37
, and after that , not air , nor green fields 38
, nor curious roses .
Can you 39
see how foggy the day is ?
As I 3
stand here , idly tapping the windowpane , and looking out through the rain at the dirty back-yard 40
and the coalboats 41
below , fragments of an old story float up before me 3
, -- a story of this house 42
into which I 3
happened to come to-day .
You 43
may think it a tiresome story enough , as foggy as the day , sharpened by no sudden flashes of pain or pleasure .
-- I 3
know : only the outline of a dull life , that long since , with thousands of dull lives like its own , was vainly lived and lost : thousands of them , massed , vile , slimy lives , like those of the torpid lizards in yonder stagnant water-butt 44
.
-- Lost ?
There is a curious point for you 45
to settle , , who study psychology in a lazy , dilettante way .
Stop a moment .
I 3
am going to be honest .
This is what I 3
want you 46
to do .
I 3
want you 47
to hide your 48
disgust , take no heed to your 49
clean clothes , and come right down with me 3
, -- here , into the thickest of the fog and mud and foul effluvia .
I 3
want you 50
to hear this story .
There is a secret down here , in this nightmare fog , that has lain dumb for centuries : I 3
want to make it a real thing to you 51
.
You 52
, Egoist 136
, or Pantheist 131
, or Arminian 132
, busy in making straight paths for your 53
feet on the hills 54
, do not see it clearly , -- this terrible question which men here 55
have gone mad and died trying to answer .
I 3
dare not put this secret into words .
I 3
told you 56
it was dumb .
These men 57
, going by with drunken faces and brains full of unawakened power
58 , do not ask it of Society or of God 59
.
Their 58
lives ask it ; their 58
deaths ask it .
There is no reply .
I 3
will tell you 60
plainly that I 3
have a great hope ; and I 3
bring it to you 61
to be tested .
It is this : that this terrible dumb question is its own reply ; that it is not the sentence of death we 62
think it , but , from the very extremity of its darkness , the most solemn prophecy which the world 63
has known of the Hope to come .
I 3
dare make my 3
meaning no clearer , but will only tell my 3
story .
It will , perhaps , seem to you 64
as foul and dark as this thick vapor about us 65
, and as pregnant with death ; but if your 66
eyes are free as mine are to look deeper , no perfume-tinted dawn will be so fair with promise of the day that shall surely come .
My 3
story is very simple , -- Only what I 3
remember of the life of , -- a furnace-tender in
one of
Kirby 70
&
John 71
's rolling-mills
69 137 , -- Hugh Wolfe 138
.
You 72
know the mills 73
?
They 76
took the great order for the lower
Virginia 75
railroads
74 there 73
last winter ; run usually with about a thousand men 77
.
I 3
can not tell why I 3
choose the half-forgotten story of this Wolfe 67
more than that of myriads of
these furnace-hands 79
78 .
Perhaps because there is a secret , underlying sympathy between that story and this day with its impure fog and thwarted sunshine , -- or perhaps simply for the reason that this house 42
is the one where the Wolfes 80
lived .
There were the father 81
and son 67
, -- both hands , as
I 3
said , in
one of
Kirby 70
&
John 71
's mills
69 for making railroad-iron
82 , -- and Deborah 112
, , a picker in
some of
the cotton-mills 83
130 133 .
The house 42
was rented then to half a dozen families 84
.
The Wolfes 82
had two of the cellar-rooms 85
.
The old man 81
, like many of the puddlers and feeders of
the mills 87
86 , was Welsh 88
, -- had spent half of his 81
life in the Cornish tin-mines 89
.
You 90
may pick the Welsh emigrants 91
, Cornish miners 92
, out of the throng passing the windows 93
, any day .
They 94
are a trifle more filthy ; their 94
muscles are not so brawny ; they 94
stoop more .
When they 94
are drunk , they 94
neither yell , nor shout , nor stagger , but skulk along like beaten hounds .
A pure , unmixed blood , I 3
fancy : shows itself in the slight angular bodies 95
and sharply-cut facial lines .
It is nearly thirty years since the Wolfes 82
lived here 42
.
Their 82
lives were like those of : incessant labor , sleeping in kennel-like rooms 97
, eating rank pork and molasses , drinking -- God 98
and the distillers 99
only know what ; with an occasional night in jail 100
, to atone for some drunken excess .
Is that all of their 82
lives ?
-- of the portion given to them 82
and these their 82
duplicates swarming
the streets 102
to-day
101 ?
-- nothing beneath ?
-- all ?
So many a political reformer 103
will tell you 104
, -- and many a private reformer , too , who has gone among
them 101
with a heart tender with
Christ 106
's charity , and come out outraged , hardened
105 .
One rainy night , about eleven o'clock , a crowd of
half-clothed women 108
107 stopped outside of the cellar-door 109
.
They 107
were going home 110
from the cotton-mill 111
.
“ Good-night , Deb 112
, ” said one 113
, a mulatto 139
, steadying herself 113
against the gas-post .
She 113
needed the post to steady her 113
.
So did more than one of them 114
.
“ Dah 's a ball to Miss Potts ' 115
to-night .
Ye 'd best come . ”
“ Inteet , Deb 116
, if hur 'll come , hur 'll hef fun , ” said a shrill Welsh voice in the crowd 117
.
Two or three dirty hands were thrust out to catch the gown of the woman 118
, who was groping for the latch of the door .
“ No . ”
“ No ?
Where 's Kit Small 119
, then ? ”
“ Begorra !
on the spools .
Alleys behint , though we 120
helped her 119
, we 120
dud .
An wid ye !
Let Deb 112
alone !
It 's ondacent frettin ' a quite body 121
.
Be the powers , an we 120
'll have a night of it !
there 'll be lashin 's o ' drink , -- the Vargent 122
be blessed and praised for ' t ! ”
They 107
went on , the mulatto 123
inclining for a moment to show fight , and drag the woman Wolfe 112
off with them 107
; but , being pacified , she 112
staggered away .
Deborah 112
groped her 112
way into the cellar 124
, and , after considerable stumbling , kindled a match , and lighted a tallow dip , that sent a yellow glimmer over the room 124
.
It was low , damp , -- the earthen floor covered with a green , slimy moss , -- a fetid air smothering the breath .
Old Wolfe 81
lay asleep on a heap of straw , wrapped in a torn horse-blanket .
He 81
was a pale , meek little man , with a white face and red rabbit-eyes 140
.
The woman 112
Deborah 112
was like him 81
; only her 112
face was even more ghastly , her 112
lips bluer , her 112
eyes more watery .
She 112
wore a faded cotton gown and a slouching bonnet .
When she 112
walked , one could see that she 112
was deformed , almost a hunchback 125
.
She 112
trod softly , so as not to waken him 81
, and went through into the room beyond 126
.
There she 112
found by the half-extinguished fire an iron saucepan filled with cold boiled potatoes , which she 112
put upon a broken chair with a pint-cup of ale .
Placing the old candlestick beside this dainty repast , she 112
untied her 112
bonnet , which hung limp and wet over her 112
face , and prepared to eat her 112
supper .
It was the first food that had touched her 112
lips since morning .
There was enough of it , however : there is not always .
She 112
was hungry , -- one could see that easily enough , -- and not drunk , as most of
her 112
companions
127 would have been found at this hour .
She 112
did not drink , this woman 112
, -- her 112
face told that , too , -- nothing stronger than ale .
Perhaps the weak , flaccid wretch 112
had some stimulant in her 112
pale life to keep her 112
up , -- some love or hope , it might be , or urgent need .
When that stimulant was gone , she 112
would take to whiskey .
Man 128
can not live by work alone .
While she 112
was skinning the potatoes , and munching them , a noise behind her 112
made her 112
stop .