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Page 6
The THIRD Chapter
The hour was about eight. I had written a letter or two after our six
o'clock supper, and was now idle. By my side, in the centre of the room,
stood a table on which lay several periodicals--monthly and weekly,
English and American--a newspaper or two, and a few books. A rap came at
my door, and on opening it I found Doctor Bainbridge standing in the
hallway. He wore a black "Prince Albert" coat, a high silk hat, and, the
evening having blown-up chilly, a summer overcoat. I received him
perhaps a little more warmly than was in the best of taste, considering
that we had not before exchanged more than a dozen words. But I had, as
I have said, frequently seen him from my window; he was almost as much
of a stranger in the town as was I, and I received him cordially because
my feelings were really cordial. I assisted him to remove his coat, and
in other ways did all in my power to make him comfortable. He was of
slightly more than medium height, of rather delicate build, with a fair,
almost colorless complexion. His movements, his language, his attire,
indicated the gentleman--this I should have conceded him in my club at
home, or in my own drawing-room, quite as readily as here, alone, in an
obscure hotel in the State of Illinois. As we sat conversing, I was much
surprised to find in him a considerable degree of culture. He seemed to
possess that particular air which we are accustomed to think, and
generally with reason, is not to be found apart from a familiarity with
metropolitan life on its highest plane. I did not on that evening, nor
did I later, think him thoroughly schooled, except in his profession. He
was, however, fairly well educated, and his opinions seemed to me from
my own stand-point to be sound. I had observed, in a history of the
county just from the press, which lay on a table in the office of the
hotel, that in 1869 he had been graduated from an educational
institution somewhere in Pennsylvania; and, in 1873, from the Medical
Department of Columbia University. Later, I learned from himself, that,
from the age of seven to the age of eleven, he had been instructed at
home by a sister who was some nine or ten years his senior.
I seated him with the large centre-table between us, and immediately
opened the conversation on some topic of local interest. It is probable
that of the many persons whom I know and continue to like, that I liked
nine out of ten of them from our first meeting. Doctor Bainbridge had
not been long in my presence before I knew that my first impressions of
him were not deceptive; and I felt that his impression of myself was
certainly not unfavorable.
It appeared to me as we talked through the evening, that he had read
about all that I had read, and much besides. He talked of English and
French history with minute familiarity. Not only had he read English,
French, and German literature, with such Spanish, Russian, and Italian
works as had been translated into English; but he shamed me with the
thoroughness of his knowledge of Scott, Dickens, Bulwer, Thackeray, and
others of our best writers of fiction. Goethe he particularly admired.
Of Cervantes he thought with the rest of us: He had read "Don Quixote,"
for the first time, when he was eighteen, and during a severe illness
accompanied with intense melancholia; and he had laughed himself out of
bed, and out of his melancholy. "Don Quixote" was, he said, the only
book which he had ever read in solitude--that is, read to himself--which
had compelled him to laugh aloud. Works of science, particularly
scientific works in the domain of physics, he delighted in. His
imagination was of a most charming character. It was at that time in my
life almost a passion with me to analyze human nature--to theorize over
the motives and the results of human action; over the probable causes of
known or assumed effects, and the reverse--in short, I thought myself a
philosopher. I have never met another person whom it so much interested
me to study as it did this young American. But after ample opportunity
to know him, even now as I sit writing more than twenty years later, and
I think of the pleasure of that temporary friendship in far-away
Illinois, I am puzzled about many things concerning Doctor Bainbridge.
He certainly possessed a scientific mind. He himself said that he had no
very great love for written poetry: had he a poetic mind? He loved the
beautiful in life: he loved symmetry in form, he loved harmony in color,
he loved good music. And yet, though he had read the English-writing
poets, he seemed to care less for their work than for anything else in
literature. The thought of this inconsistency has perplexed me whenever
I have thought of it through all these years. As I have intimated, he
was charmed by the beautiful, and by every known expression of beauty;
but for the strictly metrical in language-expression, he evinced almost
a distaste. I have often thought that he had, through some peculiar
circumstance in his earlier life, acquired a suggestive dislike to the
very form of verse. To this peculiarity there was, however, exception,
to which I am about to allude.
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