Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 3).djvu/234

 A word is whispered across the table—"Carlyle!"

"I knew Carlyle intimately," Professor Blackie said, responding to the whispered name, "but I was not one of his out-and-out worshippers at all. His work was to rouse the world; but I was wide awake, and required no rousing. I thought him somewhat despotic and tyrannical; though, mark you, he possessed extraordinary pictorial power, and was a good Scotchman. I admired his genius, and perhaps his bark was worse than his bite. He was hard-hearted, and hated sinners. He called here once just when the great noise was going on about the convicts being underfed. He began talking about them. 'Puir fellows! puir fellows!' he said, 'give them brown soup and a footstool, and kick them to the devil!'

"Carlyle was a great talker, and he would talk, talk, talk, and never give one a chance to contradict his assertions. I have a habit—one of many years' standing—of going up to London once every year. I do it now. I always called on Carlyle at Chelsea, generally on Sunday evenings. One night I contrived, by starting as soon as I got into the room, to open the conversation, and went on from topic to topic, till they mounted to a dozen; but to none of my themes would my stout old friend give an assenting reply. At last in desperation I shouted out, 'Very well, I think you've come to "The Everlasting No," so you and I can't agree.' Off I went, but we remained good friends for all that.

"One night I shook him—yes, shook him. His poor wife used to sit there and never speak. I was in his room on this particular Sunday, and his wife particularly wanted to say something. But there was not the smallest chance. I got up, took hold of him, and giving him a good shaking, cried, 'Let your wife speak, you monster!'; but for all that he wouldn't."

Poor Mrs. Carlyle! She suffered from heart disease. Even when she heard that her husband had made his successful oration as Lord Rector of Edinburgh University she fainted. The circumstances surrounding her death, too, are both painful and tragic. Whilst out in her carriage her little pet dog contrived to get out and was run over. The coachman drove on and on, until at last, receiving no orders, he looked in at the carriage. Whether it was the shock or not will never be known, but his mistress lay there dead.

Carlyle lies buried with his own people at Ecclefechan, whilst his wife rests by the side of her father at Haddington.

Still the name of Carlyle hovers about the dinner table, and Mrs. Blackie contributes her story about him thus:—

"One day," said Mrs. Blackie, "I went to call on Mrs. Carlyle. It was in the afternoon of a very, very hot day. I was just