I did meet them,
accordingly. As they approached me, I observed in Hollingsworth's face
a depressed and melancholy look, that seemed habitual; the powerfully
built man showed a self-distrustful weakness, and a childlike or
childish tendency to press close, and closer still, to the side of the
slender woman whose arm was within his. In Priscilla's manner there
was a protective and watchful quality, as if she felt herself the
guardian of her companion; but, likewise, a deep, submissive,
unquestioning reverence, and also a veiled happiness in her fair and
quiet countenance.
Drawing nearer, Priscilla recognized me, and gave me a kind and
friendly smile, but with a slight gesture, which I could not help
interpreting as an entreaty not to make myself known to Hollingsworth.
Nevertheless, an impulse took possession of me, and compelled me to
address him.
"I have come, Hollingsworth," said I, "to view your grand edifice for
the reformation of criminals. Is it finished yet?"
"No, nor begun," answered he, without raising his eyes. "A very small
one answers all my purposes."
Priscilla threw me an upbraiding glance. But I spoke again, with a
bitter and revengeful emotion, as if flinging a poisoned arrow at
Hollingsworth's heart.
"Up to this moment," I inquired, "how many criminals have you reformed?"
"Not one," said Hollingsworth, with his eyes still fixed on the ground.
"Ever since we parted, I have been busy with a single murderer."
Then the tears gushed into my eyes, and I forgave him; for I remembered
the wild energy, the passionate shriek, with which Zenobia had spoken
those words, "Tell him he has murdered me! Tell him that I'll haunt
him!"--and I knew what murderer he meant, and whose vindictive shadow
dogged the side where Priscilla was not.
The moral which presents itself to my reflections, as drawn from
Hollingsworth's character and errors, is simply this, that, admitting
what is called philanthropy, when adopted as a profession, to be often
useful by its energetic impulse to society at large, it is perilous to
the individual whose ruling passion, in one exclusive channel, it thus
becomes. It ruins, or is fearfully apt to ruin, the heart, the rich
juices of which God never meant should be pressed violently out and
distilled into alcoholic liquor by an unnatural process, but should
render life sweet, bland, and gently beneficent, and insensibly
influence other hearts and other lives to the same blessed end. I see
in Hollingsworth an exemplification of the most awful truth in Bunyan's
book of such, from the very gate of heaven there is a by-way to the pit!