Domrémy

“ In all ages the valley had suffered cruelly from war: first, the war between duke and monarch for its possession; and now, the war between the Burgundians and the Armagnacs. At a time when the whole of Christendom was given up to pillage the men-at-arms of the Lorraine-Marches were renowned as the greatest plunderers in the world. Therefore, life at Domremy was one perpetual alarm. All day and all night a watchman was stationed on the square tower of the monastery, and the inhabitants held themselves ready to fly at a moment’s warning. And yet men sowed and reaped; women spun and wove ”

“ Jeanne d’Arc was the child of a laborer of Domrémy, a little village in the neighborhood of Vaucouleurs on the borders of Lorraine and Champagne. Just without the cottage where she was born began the great woods of the Vosges, where the children of Domrémy drank in poetry and legend from fairy ring and haunted well, hung their flower garlands on the sacred trees, and sang songs to the “good people,” who might not drink of the fountain because of their sins. ”

“ One day there galloped into Domremy a squadron of spearmen, who rode through the fields driving together the cattle of the villagers, among them the cows of Joan's father. The country [29] people could make no resistance; they were glad enough if their houses were not burned. So off rode Henri d'Orly's men, driving the cattle with their spear-points along the track to the castle of Doulevant. But cows are not fast travellers, and when the robbers had reached a little village called Dommartin le France they rested, and went to the tavern to make merry. ”

“ Unable to exact ransom from the villeins who had taken flight, the men-at-arms had destroyed all their goods. The monastery once as proud as a fortress, with its watchman's tower, was now nothing but a heap of blackened ruins. And [Pg i.75] now on holy days the folk of Domremy must needs go to hear mass in the church of Greux. [372]
So full of danger were the times that the villagers were ordered to keep in fortified houses and castles. [373]
Meanwhile the English were laying siege to the town of Orléans, which belonged to their prisoner Duke Charles. ”

“ Madam, bear with me, and remember my intercourse with Mr Dombey, and my knowledge of him, and my reverence for him, almost from childhood, when I say that if he has a fault, it is a lofty stubbornness, rooted in that noble pride and sense of power which belong to him, and which we must all defer to; which is not assailable like the obstinacy of other characters; and which grows upon itself from day to day, and year to year. ”

“ And now, among the knot of servants dressed in mourning, and the weeping women, Mr Dombey passes through the hall to the other carriage that is waiting to receive him. He is not 'brought down,' these observers think, by sorrow and distress of mind. His walk is as erect, his bearing is as stiff as ever it has been. He hides his face behind no handkerchief, and looks before him. ”

“ I congratulate you, Dombey. By the Lord, Sir,’ says the Major, ‘you are more to be envied, this day, than any man in England!’
Here again Mr Dombey’s assent is qualified; because he is going to confer a great distinction on a lady; and, no doubt, she is to be envied most.
‘As to Edith Granger, Sir,’ pursues the Major, ‘there is not a woman in all Europe but might—and would, Sir, you will allow Bagstock to add—and would—give her ears, and her earrings, too, to be in Edith Granger’s place.’
‘You are good enough to say so, Major,’ says Mr Dombey. ”

“ Mr Dombey is a white-haired gentleman, whose face bears heavy marks of care and suffering; but they are traces of a storm that has passed on for ever, and left a clear evening in its track.
Ambitious projects trouble him no more. His only pride is in his daughter and her husband. He has a silent, thoughtful, quiet manner, and is always with his daughter. ”

“ Madam, in the midst of my uneasiness and apprehension on this subject, I was summoned by Mr Dombey to Leamington. There I saw you. There I could not help knowing what relation you would shortly occupy towards him—to his enduring happiness and yours. There I resolved to await the time of your establishment at home here, and to do as I have now done. I have, at heart, no fear that I shall be wanting in my duty to Mr Dombey, if I bury what I know in your breast; for where there is but one heart and mind between two persons—as in such a marriage—one almost represents the other. ”

“ Through a whole year, the famous House of Dombey and Son had fought a fight for life, against cross accidents, doubtful rumours, unsuccessful ventures, unpropitious times, and most of all, against the infatuation of its head, who would not contract its enterprises by a hair's breadth, and would not listen to a word of warning that the ship he strained so hard against the storm, was weak, and could not bear it. ”

“ He directed a sharp glance and a sharp smile at Mr Dombey as he spoke, and a sharper glance, and a sharper smile yet, when Mr Dombey, drawing himself up before the fire, in the attitude so often copied by his second in command, looked round at the pictures on the walls. Cursorily as his cold eye wandered over them, Carker's keen glance accompanied his, and kept pace with his, marking exactly where it went, and what it saw. ”

“ Mr Dombey, entering the house, noticed, as he had reason to do, the complete arrangement of the rooms, and the numerous contrivances for comfort and effect that abounded there. Mr Carker, in his ostentation of humility, received this notice with a deferential smile, and said he understood its delicate meaning, and appreciated it, but in truth the cottage was good enough for one in his position - better, perhaps, than such a man should occupy, poor as it was. ”

“ Is it not natural that John and I should have been thinking and speaking very much of late of these great changes? Mr Dombey, whom he served so many years - you know upon what terms - reduced, as you describe; and we quite rich!'
Good, true face, as that face of hers was, and pleasant as it had been to him, Mr Morfin, the hazel-eyed bachelor, since the first time he had ever looked upon it, it pleased him less at that moment, lighted with a ray of exultation, than it had ever pleased him before. ”

“ If Mr Dombey had any lingering idea that the Major, as a man accustomed, in the way of his calling, to make light of the ruthless hand that had lately crushed his hopes, might unconsciously impart some useful philosophy to him, and scare away his weak regrets, he hid it from himself, and left it lying at the bottom of his pride, unexamined. ”

“ Mr Dombey put his hand to his neckcloth, settled his chin in it, coughed, and stood looking at his faithful friend and servant for a few moments in silence.
'I shall have the pleasure, Carker,' said Mr Dombey at length: making as if he swallowed something a little too large for his throat: 'to present you to my - to the Major's friends. Highly agreeable people.'
'Ladies among them, I presume?' insinuated the smooth Manager. ”

“ A great creature like our friend Dombey, Sir," said the Major, lowering his voice, but not lowering it so much as to render it inaudible to that gentleman, "cannot help improving and exalting his friends. He strengthens and invigorates a man, Sir, does Dombey, in his moral nature."
Mr. Carker snapped at the expression. In his moral nature. Exactly. The very words he had been on the point of suggesting.
"But when my friend Dombey, Sir," added the Major, "talks to you of Major Bagstock, I must crave leave to set him and you right. ”

“ When Perch the messenger, whose place was on a little bracket, like a timepiece, saw Mr. Dombey come in—or rather when he felt that he was coming, for he had usually an instinctive sense of his approach—he hurried into Mr. Dombey’s room, stirred the fire, carried fresh coals from the bowels of the coal-box, hung the newspaper to air upon the fender, put the chair ready, and the screen in its place, and was round upon his heel on the instant of Mr. Dombey’s entrance, to take his great coat and hat, and hang them up. ”

“ Dombey’s household subsided into their several places in the domestic system. That small world, like the great one out of doors, had the capacity of easily forgetting its dead; and when the cook had said she was a quiet-tempered lady, and the house-keeper had said it was the common lot, and the butler had said who’d have thought it, and the housemaid had said she couldn’t hardly believe it, and the footman had said it seemed exactly like a dream, they had quite worn the subject out, and began to think their mourning was wearing rusty too. ”

“ Walking his white-legged horse thus, to the counting-house of Dombey and Son one day, he was as unconscious of the observation of two pairs of women’s eyes, as of the fascinated orbs of Rob the Grinder, who, in waiting a street’s length from the appointed place, as a demonstration of punctuality, vainly touched and retouched his hat to attract attention, and trotted along on foot, by his master’s side, prepared to hold his stirrup when he should alight. ”

“ The simple father was beginning to submit that he hoped his son, the quondam Grinder, huffed and cuffed, and flogged and badged, and taught, as parrots are, by a brute jobbed into his place of schoolmaster with as much fitness for it as a hound, might not have been educated on quite a right plan in some undiscovered respect, when Mr Dombey angrily repeating 'The usual return!' led the Major away. ”

“ Mr Carker bowed his head, and rising from the table, and standing thoughtfully before the fire, with his hand to his smooth chin, looked down at Mr Dombey with the evil slyness of some monkish carving, half human and half brute; or like a leering face on an old water-spout. Mr Dombey, recovering his composure by degrees, or cooling his emotion in his sense of having taken a high position, sat gradually stiffening again, and looking at the parrot as she swung to and fro, in her great wedding ring. ”

“ I have the honour of addressing Mr Dombey, I believe?’
‘I am the present unworthy representative of that name, Major,’ returned Mr Dombey.
‘By G—, Sir!’ said the Major, ‘it’s a great name. It’s a name, Sir,’ said the Major firmly, as if he defied Mr Dombey to contradict him, and would feel it his painful duty to bully him if he did, ‘that is known and honoured in the British possessions abroad. It is a name, Sir, that a man is proud to recognise. ”

“ Mr Dombey retired to nurse his wholesome thoughts in his own way. The Major, attended by the Native carrying a camp-stool, a great-coat, and an umbrella, swaggered up and down through all the public places: looking into subscription books to find out who was there, looking up old ladies by whom he was much admired, reporting J. B. tougher than ever, and puffing his rich friend Dombey wherever he went. There never was a man who stood by a friend more staunchly than the Major, when in puffing him, he puffed himself. ”

“ Dombey’s world was busiest with the elopement of his wife, that the window of the room in which the brother and sister sat at their early breakfast, was darkened by the unexpected shadow of a man coming to the little porch: which man was Perch the Messenger. ”

“ But when you consider that Mrs Dombey, by living in this house, and making it as you have said, a scene of contention, not only has her part in that contention, but compromises Miss Dombey every day (for I know how determined you are) , will you not relieve her from a continual irritation of spirit, and a continual sense of being unjust to another, almost intolerable? ”

“ Dombey shall have possessed the interest of the rest for the remainder of his life; that you will keep our secret, faithfully—but that I am sure you will; and that, from this time, it may seldom be whispered, even between you and me, but may live in my thoughts only as a new reason for thankfulness to Heaven, and joy and pride in my brother."
Such a look of exultation there may be on Angels’ faces when the one repentant sinner enters Heaven, among ninety-nine just men. ”

“ His Royal Highness the late Duke of York did me the honour to say, deservedly or undeservedly—never mind that—‘If there is a man in the service on whom I can depend for coming to the point, that man is Joe—Joe Bagstock.’”
Mr Dombey intimates his acquiescence.
“Now, Dombey,” says the Major, “I am a man of the world. Our friend Feenix—if I may presume to—”
“Honoured, I am sure,” says Cousin Feenix.
“—is,” proceeds the Major, with a wag of his head, “also a man of the world. Dombey, you are a man of the world. ”

“ Mr Dombey acknowledged this display of interest on the part of his second in command, by twirling his watch-chain, and slightly moving his head.
'You were formed for society,' said Carker. 'Of all the men I know, you are the best adapted, by nature and by position, for society. ”

“ There is a hush through Mr Dombey's house. Servants gliding up and down stairs rustle, but make no sound of footsteps. They talk together constantly, and sit long at meals, making much of their meat and drink, and enjoying themselves after a grim unholy fashion. ”

“ But these were lonely thoughts, bred late at night in the sullen despondency and gloom of his retirement, and pride easily found its reassurance in many testimonies to the truth, as unimpeachable and precious as the Major’s. Mr Dombey, in his friendlessness, inclined to the Major. It cannot be said that he warmed towards him, but he thawed a little, The Major had had some part—and not too much—in the days by the seaside. He was a man of the world, and knew some great people. ”