The Bed-Book of Happiness. Harold Begbie
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wondered at us, but we could not resist the pleasure of watching the absurdly life-like gestures which the night-gowns made. I should like a Santa Famiglia with clothes drying in the background.
A love-story might be told in a series of sketches of the clothes of two families hanging out to dry in adjacent gardens. Then a gentleman's night-shirt from one garden and a lady's night-gown from the other should be shown hanging in a third garden by themselves. By and by there should be added a little night-shirt.
A philosopher might be tempted, on seeing the little night-shirt, to suppose that the big night-shirts had made it. What we do is much the same, for the body of a baby is not much more made by the two old babies, after whose pattern it has cut itself out, than the little night-shirt is made by the big ones. The thing that makes either the little night-shirt or the little baby is something about which we know nothing whatever at all.
DOES MAMMA KNOW?
[Sidenote: Samuel Butler]
A father was telling his eldest daughter, aged about six, that she had a little sister, and was explaining to her how nice it all was. The child said it was delightful, and added:
"Does mamma know? Let's go and tell her."
CROESUS AND HIS KITCHEN-MAID
[Sidenote: Samuel Butler]
I want people to see either their cells as less parts of themselves than they do, or their servants as more.
Croesus's kitchen-maid is part of him, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, for she eats what comes from his table, and, being fed of one flesh, are they not brother and sister to one another in virtue of community of nutriment, which is but a thinly veiled travesty of descent? When she eats peas with her knife, he does so too; there is not a bit of bread and butter she puts into her mouth, nor a lump of sugar she drops into her tea, but he knoweth it altogether, though he knows nothing whatever about it. She is en-Croesused and he en-scullery-maided so long as she remains linked to him by the golden chain which passes from his pocket to hers, and which is greatest of all unifiers.
True, neither party is aware of the connection at all as long as things go smoothly. Croesus no more knows the name of, or feels the existence of, his kitchen-maid than a peasant in health knows about his liver; nevertheless, he is awakened to a dim sense of an undefined something when he pays his grocer or his baker. She is more definitely aware of him than he of her, but it is by way of an overshadowing presence rather than a clear and intelligent comprehension. And though Croesus does not eat his kitchen-maid's meals otherwise than vicariously, still to eat vicariously is to eat: the meals so eaten by his kitchen-maid nourish the better ordering of the dinner which nourishes and engenders the better ordering of Croesus himself. He is fed, therefore, by the feeding of his kitchen-maid.
And so with sleep. When she goes to bed he, in part, does so too. When she gets up and lays the fire in the back kitchen he, in part, does so. He lays it through her and in her, though knowing no more what he is doing than we know when we digest, but still doing it as by what we call a reflex action. Qui facit per alium facit per se, and when the back-kitchen fire is lighted on Croesus's behalf it is Croesus who lights it, though he is all the time fast asleep in bed.
Sometimes things do not go smoothly. Suppose the kitchen-maid to be taken with fits just before dinner-time; there will be a reverberating echo of disturbance throughout the whole organisation of the palace. But the oftener she has fits, the more easily will the household know what it is all about when she is taken with them. On the first occasion Lady Croesus will send some one rushing down into the kitchen; there will, in fact, be a general flow of blood (i.e. household) to the part affected (that is to say, to the scullery-maid); the doctor will be sent for and all the rest of it. On each repetition of the fits the neighbouring organs, reverting to a more primary undifferentiated condition, will discharge duties for which they were not engaged, in a manner for which no one would have given them credit; and the disturbance will be less and less each time, till by and by, at the sound of the crockery smashing below, Lady Croesus will just look up to papa and say:
"My dear, I am afraid Sarah has got another fit."
And papa will say she will probably be better again soon, and will go on reading his newspaper.
In course of time the whole thing will come to be managed automatically downstairs without any references either to papa, the cerebrum, or to mamma, the cerebellum, or even to the medulla oblongata, the housekeeper. A precedent or routine will be established, after which everything will work quite smoothly.
But though papa and mamma are unconscious of the reflex action which has been going on within their organisation, the kitchen-maid and the cells in her immediate vicinity (that is to say, her fellow-servants) will know all about it. Perhaps the neighbours will think that nobody in the house knows, and that, because the master and mistress show no sign of disturbance, therefore there is no consciousness. They forget that the scullery-maid becomes more and more conscious of the fits if they grow upon her, as they probably will, and that Croesus and his lady do show more signs of consciousness, if they are watched closely, than can be detected on first inspection. There is not the same violent perturbation that there was on the previous occasions, but the tone of the palace is lowered. A dinner-party has to be put off; the cooking is more homogeneous and uncertain, it is less highly differentiated than when the scullery-maid was well; and there is a grumble when the doctor has to be paid, and also when the smashed crockery has to be replaced.
If Croesus discharges his kitchen-maid and gets another, it is as though he cut out a small piece of his finger and replaced it in due course by growth. But even the slightest cut may lead to blood-poisoning, and so even the dismissal of a kitchen-maid may be big with the fate of empires. Thus the cook—a valued servant—may take the kitchen-maid's part and go too. The next cook may spoil the dinner and upset Croesus's temper, and from this all manner of consequences may be evolved, even to the dethronement and death of the King himself. Nevertheless, as a general rule, an injury to such a low part of a great monarch's organism as a kitchen-maid has no important results. It is only when we are attacked in such vital organs as the solicitor or the banker that we need be uneasy. A wound in the solicitor is a very serious thing, and many a man has died from failure of his bank's action.
It is certain, as we have seen, that when the kitchen-maid lights the fire it is really Croesus who is lighting it, but it is less obvious that when Croesus goes to a ball the scullery-maid goes also. Still, this should be held in the same way as it should be also held that she eats vicariously when Croesus dines. For he must return from the ball and the dinner-parties, and this comes out in his requiring to keep a large establishment whereby the scullery-maid retains her place as part of his organism and is nourished and amused also.
On the other hand, when Croesus dies it does not follow that the scullery-maid should die at the same time. She may grow a new Croesus, as Croesus, if the maid dies, will probably grow a new kitchen-maid; Croesus's son or successor may take over the kingdom and palace, and the kitchen-maid, beyond having to wash up a few extra plates and dishes at coronation time, will know little about the change. It is as though the establishment had had its hair cut and its beard trimmed; it is smartened up a little, but there is no other change. If, on the other hand, he goes bankrupt, or his kingdom is taken from him and his whole establishment is broken and dissipated at the auction-mart, then, even though not one of its component cells actually dies, the organism as a whole does so, and it is interesting to see that the lowest, least specialised, and least highly differentiated parts of the organism, such as the scullery-maid and the stable-boys, most readily find an entry into the life of some new system, while the more specialised and highly differentiated parts, such as the steward, the old housekeeper, and, still more so, the librarian or the chaplain, may never be able to attach themselves to any new combination, and may die in consequence. I heard once of a large builder who retired unexpectedly from business and broke up his establishment, to the actual death of several of his older employés.
So a bit of flesh, or even a finger, may be taken from one body and grafted on to another, but a leg cannot be grafted; if a leg is cut off it must die. It may, however, be maintained that the owner dies, too, even though he recovers, for a man who