Delphi Complete Works of William Godwin 1st ed. (2022), page 295
part #1 of Delphi Classics Series
IT WAS NOW that the solitary observations and rambles in which Catherine had occasionally engaged, were brought into use. She had found a path at the bottom of the declivity, little frequented indeed, but which ran round a part of the mountain on level ground, and which it was to be presumed led to some practicable route. Other sheep-tracks there were insufficient numbers, which seemed promising in the beginning, but which speedily lost themselves, and only served to mislead the person who should venture on them. We descended the rock with wary and cautious steps, aware of the point we were desirous to reach. We came to the path of which we were in search. This presently divided into two, the one continuing along the roots of the mountain, the other diverging into the open country. We pursued the last. Our object being to place our followers, if followers we had, at fault, we adopted in preference the direction which it might seem beforehand the least likely we should have adopted.
By break of day we observed an obscure village at no great distance from us. We were somewhat weary from the length of way we had measured, and were glad to resort to a place which seemed to promise us some refreshment and rest. We purposed to enter the obscurest public house, or cabaret, for that purpose. We were no sooner however in the street, if a few mean and scattered cottages might deserve the name, and were passing certain sheds, which the villagers perhaps dignified with the name of a market-house, than we perceived from ten to twenty persons gathered together in a sort of commotion. A cry was presently raised, ‘Stop him! stop him! there is the felon’.
The words struck us both at the same moment. A secret consciousness brings a thing home to the individual, and is no less powerful to oppress and dismay than the voice of a trumpet. I did not doubt that I was pursued, that I was indicated, that I was on the point to be apprehended. I looked round me in the deepest confusion. Despair entered my soul, sharp as the point of a sword. I said to myself, Every effort I make is vain: the decree of heaven is gone out against me; and what heaven ordains, it finds its own means of carrying into execution!
Catherine recovered sooner than I did, and immediately exclaimed, I will go and see what occasions this uproar. It may be nothing to us.
I grasped her arm in a significant manner, and held her back. If this clamour is pointed at me, I cried, every thing is at an end. Meanwhile do not force these persons to attend to us! I felt at once, that, when a cry is raised against any one as an offender, no matter whether it is a murderer, or one whose only crime is the picking a pocket, the whole body of vulgar bystanders are in arms against him, are ready to intercept his flight, and feel like so many sworn constables, whose function is the summary execution of the law.
It turned out that the object of the clamour was a man charged with having stolen a horse. The man was innocent. It happened, as is so often seen in these cases, that a forward and confident fellow, who in his life never knew what it was to doubt of any thing he had taken in his head, saw something in the air, the features, the complexion, or the demeanour of an individual, whose whole life was peaceable, and all his thoughts inoffensive and blameless, authorising him in his opinion to swear to his identity with a desperate ruffian, whose only mode of subsistence had habitually been the daringly appropriating to himself the chattels of others.
We took some refreshment in the cabaret I have mentioned, and then, wandering into certain fields, at a distance from any public road, seated ourselves in an obscure and well-shaded nook, with the design of considering what it would be advisable to do next. We canvassed various projects; but the more maturely they were considered, the less did any of them appear to afford a reasonable ground of hope. Travers was so indefatigable, so resolute in pursuing his purpose in defiance of discouragement, so qualified in point of expenditure to execute whatever his thoughts suggested to him, so subtle in recovering and following up every scent that was afforded him, and, above all, was so deeply imbued with the passion of thoroughly avenging his unfortunate friend, that never-ending terror seemed to dog my footsteps, with the assurance that, however often I escaped him, I should infallibly be caught at last. Had such a contest any temptation in it, that should lead me to continue it further? Assuredly not. Had it not been for the thought of Catherine, and what she would endure from the disgrace, perhaps the ignominious fate of her father, I would immediately have surrendered myself to my country and its laws, with the possibility that the issue might not prove the worst that my fears suggested; but if it did, that I might at least arrive at an undoubted end, close this feverish state of intolerable existence, and finally lay down my head in the silence and insensibility of the grave.
CHAPTER XV
FOR THE SAKE of Catherine there was still one experiment that I was contented to try. And this was how far, by a well concerted enterprise, I could divest myself of the indications of my identity so completely, that I might face my enemies, and appear in the midst of them without danger of being detected. I had heard, and I believed, that such an experiment had been made, and with success. The most striking examples of this that have hitherto been known, have been of persons happily endowed, either in bodily conformation or intellectual temperament, for the purpose, who, in mere wantonness and the pride of what has been supposed an unique talent, have imposed successfully upon those to whom they have been familiarly known, nay upon their most intimate and sacred connections, satisfying them that they were the strangers they pretended to be. But, if this has been done in sport, and for the mere exhibition of superior skill, sometimes perhaps solely for the amusement and wonder of a convivial party, who were several of them in the secret, why should I suppose that, when life and fame and all that was dear to me were at stake, when the alternative was a dungeon, public conviction before a court of justice, and an ignominious execution, I could not be equally adroit, persevering and successful? I had heard one of the persons most renowned for this sort of experiment say, I would undertake to keep up this disguise for any length of time; I would go though France and Switzerland, not less successful and triumphant at the last stage of my journey than at the first.
This is certainly a wonderful speculation. The moral government of man in society to a great degree hinges upon the question of identity, in other words, that every man is recognisable by his fellows. The system of the world is such, that, amidst the thousands of millions of human creatures that inhabit this globe of earth, each one is individualised by his features, his figure, his carriage, his voice, and a multitude of almost unassignable particulars, so that he is at once identified by the most superficial observer. There is something in the outline and carriage of every man, by which he does not fail to be singled out and challenged by his acquaintance, as far as he can be seen. The distinctions are subtle, and, as we might at first think, in a manner undefinable, yet are such as to answer every practical purpose. Were it not for this, what would be the moral and civil government of mankind? There may perhaps be persons so firm in rectitude, that, if no human creature were privy to their offence, if only ‘the midnight moon and silent stars had seen it’, they yet would not endure the consciousness of their own degradation. But the mass of mankind are not thus constituted. They are held in awe by the opinions and censure of each other. Reputation is the breath of their nostrils, the element by which they respire. The construction that shall be made of their proceedings is the thought that awes them; and even the judgment they shall make of themselves is regulated by the judgment of their neighbours. We are members of a community, and can be scarcely said, any one of us, to have a rational existence independent of our fellows. And, if this is the case in comparatively trifling particulars, and what may be called the minor morals, how much more essential will it be found in those weightier matters by which society is prevented from falling into anarchy and barbarism? Who can tell how few are those individuals who would be withheld from invading the property of others, infringing their freedom, or breaking into the chamber of their lives, were not the rest of mankind set as it were as a watch upon their actions, and did they not severely retaliate, by legal proceeding or otherwise, upon the aberrations of the transgressor?
Such however is the constitution of things in the globe we inhabit, that the law of the social intercourse of man will in almost all cases proceed with regularity. Few men have the power, and still fewer will believe they have the power, of imposing upon their fellows by the obliteration of their identity. An imposition of this sort implies such a tax upon the impostor, as would require him to suppress all the spontaneous suggestions of his soul, to put off his nature, and to act under a perpetual restraint. A man must be held under the terror of an alternative no less awful than that of life and death, before he can prevail upon himself for a continuance thus to divest himself of nature, and become the mere creature of art.
It is true that I was placed in a tremendous emergency, and was driven by the most distressful considerations to make an election of the conduct I should hold in my present situation. Yet my mind was essentially reflective, and I could not refrain even under these circumstances from speculating upon the principles of society, and the laws of morality to man. It was necessary for me however to put a speedy end to this digression, and to plunge again into the stream of action in which I had been hurried on, ever since the fatal morning in which I had taken away the life of William, and quitted for ever the mansion in which I first drew the breath of existence. Involved in this stream, I should never be my own master for a moment, could never act from any genuine impulses, or launch into a free and generous course, but must evermore be driven, compelled to regulate my proceedings by the dark and perplexing anticipation what would be the proceedings of my enemy. Indeed both parties in this unnatural contest are chained down to a perpetual dependency, each speculating what would be the conduct of the other, the one having for his object to surprise and to capture, and the other to elude and escape.
I resolved however upon a totally new mode of proceeding. For a considerable time it had been my ruling purpose to make the place of my concealment unknown, either by putting it at a distance wholly remote from the point to which suspicion or sagacity should direct my pursuer, or by so covering it from the discovery of the keenest sight, that the pursuer might cross it a thousand times without so much as conceiving that he approached it. This was slavery. It was attended with momentary and incessant terror. The individual who acts on this design, should be able to creep into indivisible space, or to make himself penetrable, and impalpable to human touch or sight. It would be a very different thing, if I could boldly face my pursuer, and say to him, I am not the person you suppose me to be. The more narrowly you survey me, the more will you be convinced of your error. Or rather, if, preventing the very thought, I could, by first perplexing the senses of the observer, and then carrying him away with an audacious composure and incredible presence of mind, at once impose myself upon him for a stranger whom he had never seen before.
In execution of this plan I deemed it necessary immediately to pass over to England. This I did not doubt I could easily accomplish, as it would necessarily throw out in their calculation those who sought me, who would look for me in any other direction, and never believe that, by voluntarily repairing to the country where my offence had been committed, I should apparently shorten their labour by taking half their business on myself. The advantages I should purchase in England, when I was once there, are obvious. In the disguises it was my plan to assume, in the transmutation of myself into the person of another, it would be most essential that I should possess a perplexing fluency of speech, the most copious variety of brogue and intonation, and all the subtle shades of difference in the modes of expression used by persons in one profession and walk of life and another.
I had arranged these particulars of my scheme, and had already set out on my journey, using all the precautions of obscurity and circuitous routes which my terrors suggested, when to my utter surprise I encountered, in one of the first towns of Holland I came to, that young man, mentioned in an early part of my narrative, from whose kindness I reaped such essential benefit in my state of widowhood after the death of my first wife, and when I was slowly recovering from an obstinate typhus fever, which had reduced me to the brink of the grave. I there related that this young man, whose name was Thornton, had been the son of one of my earliest friends. I stated that he accompanied me, in my journey for the reestablishment of my health at that time through several counties of England, and proved the most accommodating companion in the world. He was all gentleness, all vigilance, and of the sweetest temper imaginable. When I was disposed to retire into myself, he took care not to disturb me. When I shewed indications of a frame inclined to communication and amusement, he had a particular adroitness in accommodating himself to my humour. He could talk of poetry, of history, of scenery, of arts, and the world. His society had done me a world of good, and I never tired of it. – Such was the man, whom, as I have said, I suddenly and without the smallest preparation lighted upon in one of the small towns of Holland, at no great distance from Nimeguen.
I had just set my foot upon land from an insignificant shallop, and was hurrying with Catherine into a cabaret, when I caught sight of him. I had my hat, as usual, pulled down over my eyes, and my cloak close muffled about my neck, that I might the better pass without notice. Thornton however instantly recognised me, and, finding that I was about to pass as if I had not seen him, pulled me by the cloak. I would have shaken him off, but I could not. I perceived that he knew me, and therefore, after a moment’s hesitation, judged it most prudent to change a few sentences with him. My recollection of his exceeding humanity and kindness to me on the occasion I have mentioned, rendered it impossible for me to treat him with hardness and disdain. And I believed that his temper would not allow him to make himself a means of injury to me.
I drew him into the cabaret, and, having seen Catherine safely housed, accompanied him into a private corner of the yard annexed to the inn. I said:
Thornton, I suppose you cannot be unacquainted with my unfortunate situation. I am an exile and a fugitive. It is as much as my life is worth, to be known to any one. Why have you been so imprudent as to speak to me? But I know that I may trust you, and have therefore only to intreat that you will on no account open your lips respecting me, or intimate to any one that you know whether I am dead or alive.
My dear Deloraine, answered the young man, how could you imagine that I would injure you? There is scarcely the person in existence to whom I am so much attached as yourself. I received you as a legacy from my father, he and you having been old friends. From childhood I regarded you as nearer to me than many relatives. The month that I spent in your sole society in travelling, when you were just escaped as by miracle from the doors of the grave, gave an additional sacredness to my sentiments towards you. I gazed on you with intentness from the first, when the colour of your skin was dark and inky, and you looked rather as if you had been a corpse newly dug out of a grave, than a living man. I watched you when the fresh breezes of the spring fanned your cadaverous lineaments, gradually restored you to the congregation of living men, and from time to time brought a faint red into your colourless cheeks. I left you at Harrowgate to a great degree restored; and I visited you repeatedly afterwards, when you married a second time. It gave me delight to see you, as you grew as it were young again, and were reinstated, in your primary robustness and contentment. But, oh, how are you altered now! How much more fearful and pitiable is your appearance! In your valetudinarian journey you were feeble and languid, with a sort of premature old age; but you were resigned, and displayed no tokens of inward disquietude and contention. Now you are fleshless and emaciated: but that is not the worst. Your countenance is haggard; your eyes are roving and wild; you seem for ever to be looking for something, which, though you do not see, you apprehend; you are always uneasy, haunted with terrors, appearing like one that has done some terrible thing, the recollection of which he cannot endure.
And have I not occasion? replied I. You speak as if you were not aware of the terrible revolution that has overtaken me, casting me down from a station which the mass of my species might envy, and rendering me an object of universal execration and abhorrence.
Thornton expressed himself towards me with a kindness and unreserved sympathy, which I had experienced in no human creature, from the hour that I took an everlasting leave of the halls of my ancestors. This kindness had the effect of opening my heart, and healing for a moment the wound in my bosom. I had no longer any reserve with the young man, and led him at once to the apartment in which I had left my Catherine.
Here he explained to us the particulars of his present situation. He had come to Holland to reap the succession of a near relation of his mother, a citizen of that country. He had now completed the business on which he came, and was on the point of returning to his native residence in the county of Essex. Won by his friendship and cordiality, I disclosed to him my new project, so far as related to the putting an end for the present, and as I believed for ever, to my wanderings as an exile, and taking my chance of concealing myself, perhaps as effectually, in England. Thornton did not exactly understand by what process of reasoning I was led to this conclusion; but he regarded my design with a certain complacency, inasmuch as it afforded him a prospect of being further useful to me. He had a small vessel lying at Helvoetsluys in readiness to transport him to Harwich, in which if I would consent to embark, I should be more secure from the inquisition of idle or curious persons, than I could have the hope of being by any other means. I consented to his proposal; and my consent gave him unequivocal pleasure. We planned that he should go on before, to have every thing in readiness, and that Catherine and I should follow obscurely, and with such precautions as unfortunately we were too much under the necessity to practise. Every thing happened as favourably as we could have wished; and we had the advantage to embark without obstacle or accident.
