Hollow House, part 2

or, the Concluding Part, of the foregoing.

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public..."
Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations

I have call'd on the Professors of physic; I have no hesitation, when the bloody Inevitable looms over my people. But I am the exception; the most of my neighbors are now afflict'd by that Rottenness, Pilamania.

There are now scores of Pills, each coat'd with a slight Layer of sugar, so that it may rest easily on a tender Tongue. The Tablet, bone-white, of the size of a baby's digit, usually has enscrib'd upon its surface some inscrutable pink Writing; no doubt part of the Apothecary's arcane Arts.

I met Teuffeldreck's beloved Apothecary just yesterday, as I was requir'd to visit town for a most distressing Complaint. I found that, seemingly without connexion to my comestibles, my Buttocks had begun to erupt most fearfully.

I had ignor'd the Problem, and done my best to ignore the complications attendant upon such Issue, in polite Society; that is, I found myself treating my Gas as a kind of Bastard, an offspring unbidden, unwant'd, that I tried my best to pass off as another's Child, all the while nursing a secret, eager Pride. I cou'd stand the grimaces of my serving-People , and the mutters & wafting Paws of Mme. Bainton; but I knew that the End was near, when dear Ned Bearskin ask'd me, Epaph, have ye consum'd the Bear-fat? Or have you been hoodoo'd again, by King Bettie?

This was warning enough, so I took myself to the Dispensary, under the guise of asking for my Wife(which I thought an able disguise). I question'd the counter-man:

-If one was to be unduly troubl'd by wind, what might one do?
-Sir, perhaps eat earlier? For it troubles me mightily to take a meal and then lie abed, and my wife says that I stench up the bed awfully in such cases...
-Yes, yes; but if 'twere more than just a passing fancy - if it appear'd almost as a gaining occupation?
-Sir, there can be no such permanent Flatulence, for it fades, and passes, easy as it comes!
-I tell you, you must needs offer me a Remedy!

And here I slapp'd the counter, with a most grievous Consequence. The Apothecary, reclus'd in a hidden room, leapt forth. "Are ye distemper'd, sir? Are ye troubl'd by the complaint? Dearth of lusty tales? Need ye more Concentration?

He wink'd most lasciviously at me, as tho' I myself were the object of these suggestions, rather than the subject. I told him that I had no such issues, but Issues of a much different kind, that troubl'd me. He grinn'd at me, his leering lip split by a sore, "but surely - sire, - you wou'd find yourself better equipp'd to tackle the Day with a clearer head?"

-I know not what you mean, sirrah. I want only a remedy for my Wife, who is taken to bed with Wind.
-Taken to bed, ma-hah! (here he snuffed at his wrist, and appear'd to lick his cuff, which I believe held the remnants of his sup;)
-She is! I must needs help her!
-You can help her, Sire, by adjusting yr diseas'd Temper! Plainly, you have not flux'd yrself enough of that most perilous bile...

Here he gestur'd me over, but I refus'd, at which time he made various grunting Insinuations, about the wandering Uterus, and the necessity of periodically riding a See-saw, and of mucus collecting in the Brain, because not expell'd via the nostril.

I made neither head nor tail of it, but it was his haggling manner, that most attract'd my attention. He would let himself run riot, and then most disconcertingly quell his tongue, so that I found myself finishing his sentences in my Mind, most uncouth tho' they were. Even the counter-man, who had ample chance to tire of this Hectoring, listen'd rapt, as the Apothecary dispens'd wisdom on:
-the perils of self-abuse;
-inattention, as a valuable trait;
-inattention, as a disgusting canker that must needs medicative adjustment;
-bile, the lava that most overheats the heart;
-creativity, alloy of tar-bile & inattention (ergo, Tho. Jefferson, Geo. Washington, Col. Parke)
-women, a kind of cosmic bile - the primeval ether given appealing shape, so as to encourage unification with it, which we avoid at our peril.

I return'd most dissatisfied. Judging by his disquisition, I assum'd that Mrs. T. would soon discuss with him the dirty books my servants had been passing about, and that soon, he wou'd call at my house, pushing bottles of herbed Honey, & Dates rubb'd in the Waters of the James Flu., as a Panacea for dissolution. For, in such a world, where men candy the pills & dole them as Treats, will the Placebo be mistook for the Panacea.

At night, Mme. Bainton lay with me, reading the penultimate volume of some feminine epic - the disordering of the Curtains by the villainous Miss Mopsley results in, etc., or, the True & disordering Tale of a Poor innocent Handsome Braggart, betray'd by various Harpies who, etc. She is as obscure to me as the far side of the Mountain.

-Epaph, did you visit today the Apothecary?
-Aye (I was at this time translating Propertius into hexameters - a proposition less pleasing, certainly, than pentameter, but one assign'd me by some Freak of will). I ask'd & receiv'd.
-Well, I trust we shall have a calm and pleasing night. Oh, Lord save us - what is that Stench!

Of Signs and Wonders

"There was another method of capnomancy which consisted of observing the smoke arising from poppy and jessamin seeds cast on burning coals."
---John Bumpus, Demonologia, 1827

"I been watchin' the roads, I been studyin' the dust."
--- B. Dylan

Just this night, I took myself en promenade to the Stadium, to do my dance in the chill Evening. While Exercises give enjoyment enough, trimming the Belly & quickening my sluggish Blood, the viscous & frigid Air adds a piquancy all its own. For what man does not enjoy the Shadow of his own breath on the ground? That most insubstantial part of him, made thick enough to catch light in its twirling curlicues? Or perhaps the razor-sharp thrill of a harsh Breeze, blown south by way of the Great Lakes?

I shudder to think that those self-same breezes that brush my branches have also touched a redoubt of Ft. Duquesne, or jolted an Acadian into watchfulness. Some nights, I think that I can see the very Eyes through the trees - as tho' a baleful visage appeared in the Face of the Appalachians, and mouth'd its Gallic nonsense at me.

My father was a great Interpreter of signs; he studied most prodigiously the Dents of Traffick-signs, the Colours of horse-Mucus, the arrays of Pine-needles, the emissions of Pocosins, and most especially what Wrinkles & stains happen'd to the rare English Pound he cou'd find. But his friends, esp. the noble Doctor Wigham Dodd, wou'd counsel him, ye have but little wisdom in ye, if ye wou'd seek the word of God in the flecks & Daubs of a fallen World!

But my father held it different; that just as Christ liv'd with the Sinners, so too he would betake his Intelligence to the meagerest Figures of God's creation; so he would seek the natural Philosophy in the Crannies. Sic, on the subject: Epaph, the world is a glorious, whirring Machine; the Great God wou'd have us check its parts & manage well the Grease.

& it is true that the Ancients held their mancies & Predictions in the highest. For who appears most as Wisdom's body in the Greek Dramatists, but sexless Tiresias, teller of hidden Truth? Who gives the Ides for Caesar's death, but a broken old Hag? And what gave Rome the sign of Caesar's Ascension, but a streaking Comet?

It wou'd appear that, tho' lacking a Caesar, the Heavens nonetheless offer Wonders. First in California, that distant shore of unparalleled Villainy; then in New York, quagmire of that peculiar business-wisdom, that pretends to Vision, but only by vast Ignorance. For ne'er have I met a Trader, dealer or worker of the Docks generally that did not boast eagerly of his Ignorance - that did not make it a very Badge of his manhood.
& this from them that would deal most with the Work of the World! But here we revisit a Common-place, that a professor of Literature hath no Ear for Poetry, and that a Engineer wou'd ignore an aqueduct, that a man wou'd sooner gaze upon a fresh Beauty than on his long-practic'd Wife - no matter how lovely she may be.

But so it is with the world, that Beauty, in the sense of the Philosophers, disappears when we stand too close to her. We must make a hard Journey past siren & Cyclops before we may see Ithaca afresh. It is no accident that Pausanias shows us an instance of divination with a Mirror - Captroptomancy - for it shows us the world again.

Thus it may well benefit the be-numb'd soul to have ghostly Strands, or fiery Comets, or phantom Missiles running thro' the skies, if only to bolden the glass and stone Skyline. Tho' the threat of Gallic duplicity & Weroance-wickedness has no mean weight, I wou'd not sacrifice the Wonder of a water-fall for the safe Trickle of a Creek.

When I walk'd across the Macadam-path that lines the Sherando Valley, to the Stadium for a moment of Exertion, I saw a Comet break through the heavenly Spheres like a flaming Pearl.