{"id":30,"date":"2019-02-25T20:46:59","date_gmt":"2019-02-25T20:46:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.ryerson.ca\/dracula\/chapter\/dracula-6\/"},"modified":"2019-02-26T18:12:07","modified_gmt":"2019-02-26T18:12:07","slug":"6","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/chapter\/6\/","title":{"raw":"Chapter 6 - Mina Murray's Journal","rendered":"Chapter 6 – Mina Murray’s Journal"},"content":{"raw":"
\r\n\r\n24 July. Whitby.\u2014Lucy met me at the station, looking sweeter and\r\nlovlier than ever, and we drove up to the house at the Crescent in\r\nwhich they have rooms. This is a lovely place. The little river,\r\nthe Esk, runs through a deep valley, which broadens out as it comes\r\nnear the harbour. A great viaduct runs across, with high piers,\r\nthrough which the view seems somehow further away than it really\r\nis. The valley is beautifully green, and it is so steep that when\r\nyou are on the high land on either side you look right across it,\r\nunless you are near enough to see down. The houses of the old\r\ntown\u2014the side away from us, are all red-roofed, and seem piled up\r\none over the other anyhow, like the pictures we see of Nuremberg.\r\nRight over the town is the ruin of Whitby Abbey, which was sacked\r\nby the Danes, and which is the scene of part of \"Marmion,\" where\r\nthe girl was built up in the wall. It is a most noble ruin, of\r\nimmense size, and full of beautiful and romantic bits. There is a\r\nlegend that a white lady is seen in one of the windows. Between it\r\nand the town there is another church, the parish one, round which\r\nis a big graveyard, all full of tombstones. This is to my mind the\r\nnicest spot in Whitby, for it lies right over the town, and has a\r\nfull view of the harbour and all up the bay to where the headland\r\ncalled Kettleness stretches out into the sea. It descends so\r\nsteeply over the harbour that part of the bank has fallen away, and\r\nsome of the graves have been destroyed.\r\n\r\nIn one place part of the stonework of the graves stretches out\r\nover the sandy pathway far below. There are walks, with seats\r\nbeside them, through the churchyard, and people go and sit there\r\nall day long looking at the beautiful view and enjoying the\r\nbreeze.\r\n\r\nI shall come and sit here often myself and work. Indeed, I am\r\nwriting now, with my book on my knee, and listening to the talk of\r\nthree old men who are sitting beside me. They seem to do nothing\r\nall day but sit here and talk.\r\n\r\nThe harbour lies below me, with, on the far side, one long\r\ngranite wall stretching out into the sea, with a curve outwards at\r\nthe end of it, in the middle of which is a lighthouse. A heavy\r\nseawall runs along outside of it. On the near side, the seawall\r\nmakes an elbow crooked inversely, and its end too has a lighthouse.\r\nBetween the two piers there is a narrow opening into the harbour,\r\nwhich then suddenly widens.\r\n\r\nIt is nice at high water, but when the tide is out it shoals\r\naway to nothing, and there is merely the stream of the Esk, running\r\nbetween banks of sand, with rocks here and there. Outside the\r\nharbour on this side there rises for about half a mile a great\r\nreef, the sharp of which runs straight out from behind the south\r\nlighthouse. At the end of it is a buoy with a bell, which swings in\r\nbad weather, and sends in a mournful sound on the wind.\r\n\r\nThey have a legend here that when a ship is lost bells are heard\r\nout at sea. I must ask the old man about this. He is coming this\r\nway\u00a0\u2026\r\n\r\nHe is a funny old man. He must be awfully old, for his face is\r\ngnarled and twisted like the bark of a tree. He tells me that he is\r\nnearly a hundred, and that he was a sailor in the Greenland fishing\r\nfleet when Waterloo was fought. He is, I am afraid, a very\r\nsceptical person, for when I asked him about the bells at sea and\r\nthe White Lady at the abbey he said very brusquely,\r\n\r\n\"I wouldn't fash masel' about them, miss. Them things be all\r\nwore out. Mind, I don't say that they never was, but I do say that\r\nthey wasn't in my time. They be all very well for comers and\r\ntrippers, an' the like, but not for a nice young lady like you.\r\nThem feet-folks from York and Leeds that be always eatin'cured\r\nherrin's and drinkin' tea an' lookin' out to buy cheap jet would\r\ncreed aught. I wonder masel' who'd be bothered tellin' lies to\r\nthem, even the newspapers, which is full of fool-talk.\"\r\n\r\nI thought he would be a good person to learn interesting things\r\nfrom, so I asked him if he would mind telling me something about\r\nthe whale fishing in the old days. He was just settling himself to\r\nbegin when the clock struck six, whereupon he laboured to get up,\r\nand said,\r\n\r\n\"I must gang ageeanwards home now, miss. My granddaughter\r\ndoesn't like to be kept waitin' when the tea is ready, for it takes\r\nme time to crammle aboon the grees, for there be a many of `em, and\r\nmiss, I lack belly-timber sairly by the clock.\"\r\n\r\nHe hobbled away, and I could see him hurrying, as well as he\r\ncould, down the steps. The steps are a great feature on the place.\r\nThey lead from the town to the church, there are hundreds of them,\r\nI do not know how many, and they wind up in a delicate curve. The\r\nslope is so gentle that a horse could easily walk up and down them.\r\nI think they must originally have had something to do with the\r\nabbey. I shall go home too. Lucy went out, visiting with her\r\nmother, and as they were only duty calls, I did not go.\r\n\r\n1 August.\u2014I came up here an hour ago with Lucy, and we had a\r\nmost interesting talk with my old friend and the two others who\r\nalways come and join him. He is evidently the Sir Oracle of them,\r\nand I should think must have been in his time a most dictatorial\r\nperson.\r\n\r\nHe will not admit anything, and down faces everybody. If he\r\ncan't out-argue them he bullies them, and then takes their silence\r\nfor agreement with his views.\r\n\r\nLucy was looking sweetly pretty in her white lawn frock. She has\r\ngot a beautiful colour since she has been here.\r\n\r\nI noticed that the old men did not lose any time in coming and\r\nsitting near her when we sat down. She is so sweet with old people,\r\nI think they all fell in love with her on the spot. Even my old man\r\nsuccumbed and did not contradict her, but gave me double share\r\ninstead. I got him on the subject of the legends , and he went off\r\nat once into a sort of sermon. I must try to remember it and put it\r\ndown.\r\n\r\n\"It be all fool-talk, lock, stock, and barrel, that's what it be\r\nand nowt else. These bans an' wafts an' boh-ghosts an' bar-guests\r\nan' bogles an' all anent them is only fit to set bairns an' dizzy\r\nwomen a'belderin'. They be nowt but air-blebs. They, an' all grims\r\nan' signs an' warnin's, be all invented by parsons an' illsome\r\nberk-bodies an' railway touters to skeer an' scunner hafflin's, an'\r\nto get folks to do somethin' that they don't other incline to. It\r\nmakes me ireful to think o' them. Why, it's them that, not content\r\nwith printin' lies on paper an' preachin' them ou t of pulpits,\r\ndoes want to be cuttin' them on the tombstones. Look here all\r\naround you in what airt ye will. All them steans, holdin' up their\r\nheads as well as they can out of their pride, is acant, simply\r\ntumblin' down with the weight o' the lies wrote on them, `Here lies\r\nthe body' or `Sacred to the memory' wrote on all of them, an' yet\r\nin nigh half of them there bean't no bodies at all, an' the\r\nmemories of them bean't cared a pinch of snuff about, much less\r\nsacred. Lies all of them, nothin' but lies of one kind or another!\r\nMy gog, but it'll be a quare scowderment at the Day of Judgment\r\nwhen they come tumblin' up in their death-sarks, all jouped\r\ntogether an' trying' to drag their tombsteans with them to prove\r\nhow good they was, some of them trimmlin' an' dithering, with their\r\nhands that dozzened an' slippery from lyin' in the sea that they\r\ncan't even keep their gurp o' them.\"\r\n\r\nI could see from the old fellow's self-satisfied air and the way\r\nin which he looked round for the approval of his cronies that he\r\nwas \"showing off,\" so I put in a word to keep him going.\r\n\r\n\"Oh, Mr. Swales, you can't be serious. Surely these tombstones\r\nare not all wrong?\"\r\n\r\n\"Yabblins! There may be a poorish few not wrong, savin' where\r\nthey make out the people too good, for there be folk that do think\r\na balm-bowl be like the sea, if only it be their own. The whole\r\nthing be only lies. Now look you here. You come here a stranger,\r\nan' you see this kirkgarth.\"\r\n\r\nI nodded, for I thought it better to assent, though I did not\r\nquite understand his dialect. I knew it had something to do with\r\nthe church.\r\n\r\nHe went on, \"And you consate that all these steans be aboon folk\r\nthat be haped here, snod an' snog?\" I assented again. \"Then that be\r\njust where the lie comes in. Why, there be scores of these laybeds\r\nthat be toom as old Dun's `baccabox on Friday night.\"\r\n\r\nHe nudged one of his companions, and they all laughed. \"And, my\r\ngog! How could they be otherwise? Look at that one, the aftest\r\nabaft the bier-bank, read it!\"\r\n\r\nI went over and read, \"Edward Spencelagh, master mariner,\r\nmurdered by pirates off the coast of Andres, April, 1854, age 30.\"\r\nWhen I came back Mr. Swales went on,\r\n\r\n\"Who brought him home, I wonder, to hap him here? Murdered off\r\nthe coast of Andres! An' you consated his body lay under! Why, I\r\ncould name ye a dozen whose bones lie in the Greenland seas above,\"\r\nhe pointed northwards, \"or where the currants may have drifted\r\nthem. There be the steans around ye. Ye can, with your young eyes,\r\nread the small print of the lies from here. This Braithwaite\r\nLowery, I knew his father, lost in the Lively off Greenland in `20,\r\nor Andrew Woodhouse, drowned in the same seas in 1777, or John\r\nPaxton, drowned off Cape Farewell a year later, or old John\r\nRawlings, whose grandfather sailed with me, drowned in the Gulf of\r\nFinland in `50. Do ye think that all these men will have to make a\r\nrush to Whitby when the trumpet sounds? I have me antherums aboot\r\nit! I tell ye that when they got here they'd be jommlin' and\r\njostlin' one another that way that it `ud be like a fight up on the\r\nice in the old days, when we'd be at one another from daylight to\r\ndark, an' tryin' to tie up our cuts by the aurora borealis.\" This\r\nwas evidently local pleasantry, for the old man cackled over it,\r\nand his cronies joined in with gusto.\r\n\r\n\"But,\" I said, \"surely you are not quite correct, for you start\r\non the assumption that all the poor people, or their spirits, will\r\nhave to take their tombstones with them on the Day of Judgment. Do\r\nyou think that will be really necessary?\"\r\n\r\n\"Well, what else be they tombstones for? Answer me that,\r\nmiss!\"\r\n\r\n\"To please their relatives, I suppose.\"\r\n\r\n\"To please their relatives, you suppose!\" This he said with\r\nintense scorn. \"How will it pleasure their relatives to know that\r\nlies is wrote over them, and that everybody in the place knows that\r\nthey be lies?\"\r\n\r\nHe pointed to a stone at our feet which had been laid down as a\r\nslab, on which the seat was rested, close to the edge of the cliff.\r\n\"Read the lies on that thruff-stone,\" he said.\r\n\r\nThe letters were upside down to me from where I sat, but Lucy\r\nwas more opposite to them, so she leant over and read, \"Sacred to\r\nthe memory of George Canon, who died, in the hope of a glorious\r\nresurrection, on July 29,1873,falling from the rocks at Kettleness.\r\nThis tomb was erected by his sorrowing mother to her dearly beloved\r\nson.`He was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow.'\r\nReally, Mr. Swales, I don't see anything very funny in that!\" She\r\nspoke her comment very gravely and somewhat severely.\r\n\r\n\"Ye don't see aught funny! Ha-ha! But that's because ye don't\r\ngawm the sorrowin'mother was a hell-cat that hated him because he\r\nwas acrewk'd, a regular lamiter he was, an' he hated her so that he\r\ncommitted suicide in order that she mightn't get an insurance she\r\nput on his life. He blew nigh the top of his head off with an old\r\nmusket that they had for scarin' crows with. `twarn't for crows\r\nthen, for it brought the clegs and the dowps to him. That's the way\r\nhe fell off the rocks. And, as to hopes of a glorious resurrection,\r\nI've often heard him say masel' that he hoped he'd go to hell, for\r\nhis mother was so pious that she'd be sure to go to heaven, an' he\r\ndidn't want to addle where she was. Now isn't that stean at any\r\nrate,\"he hammered it with his stick as he spoke, \"a pack of lies?\r\nAnd won't it make Gabriel keckle when Geordie comes pantin' ut the\r\ngrees with the tompstean balanced on his hump, and asks to be took\r\nas evidence!\"\r\n\r\nI did not know what to say, but Lucy turned the conversation as\r\nshe said, rising up, \"Oh, why did you tell us of this? It is my\r\nfavorite seat, and I cannot leave it, and now I find I must go on\r\nsitting over the grave of a suicide.\"\r\n\r\n\"That won't harm ye, my pretty, an' it may make poor Geordie\r\ngladsome to have so trim a lass sittin' on his lap. That won't hurt\r\nye. Why, I've sat here off an' on for nigh twenty years past, an'\r\nit hasn't done me no harm. Don't ye fash about them as lies under\r\nye, or that doesn' lie there either! It'll be time for ye to be\r\ngetting scart when ye see the tombsteans all run away with, and the\r\nplace as bare as a stubble-field. There's the clock, and'I must\r\ngang. My service to ye, ladies!\" And off he hobbled.\r\n\r\nLucy and I sat awhile, and it was all so beautiful before us\r\nthat we took hands as we sat, and she told me all over again about\r\nArthur and their coming marriage. That made me just a little\r\nheart-sick, for I haven't heard from Jonathan for a whole\r\nmonth.\r\n\r\nThe same day. I came up here alone, for I am very sad. There was\r\nno letter for me. I hope there cannot be anything the matter with\r\nJonathan. The clock has just struck nine. I see the lights\r\nscattered all over the town, sometimes in rows where the streets\r\nare, and sometimes singly. They run right up the Esk and die away\r\nin the curve of the valley. To my left the view is cut off by a\r\nblack line of roof of the old house next to the abbey. The sheep\r\nand lambs are bleating in the fields away behind me, and there is a\r\nclatter of donkeys' hoofs up the paved road below. The band on the\r\npier is playing a harsh waltz in good time, and further along the\r\nquay there is a Salvation Army meeting in a back street. Neither of\r\nthe bands hears the other, but up here I hear and see them both. I\r\nwonder where Jonathan is and if he is thinking of me! I wish he\r\nwere here.\r\n\r\nDR. SEWARD'S DIARY\r\n\r\n5 June.\u2014The case of Renfield grows more interesting the more I\r\nget to understand the man. He has certain qualities very largely\r\ndeveloped, selfishness, secrecy, and purpose.\r\n\r\nI wish I could get at what is the object of the latter. He seems\r\nto have some settled scheme of his own, but what it is I do not\r\nknow. His redeeming quality is a love of animals, though, indeed,\r\nhe has such curious turns in it that I sometimes imagine he is only\r\nabnormally cruel. His pets are of odd sorts.\r\n\r\nJust now his hobby is catching flies. He has at present such a\r\nquantity that I have had myself to expostulate. To my astonishment,\r\nhe did not break out into a fury, as I expected, but took the\r\nmatter in simple seriousness. He thought for a moment, and then\r\nsaid, \"May I have three days? I shall clear them away.\" Of course,\r\nI said that would do. I must watch him.\r\n\r\n18 June.\u2014He has turned his mind now to spiders, and has got\r\nseveral very big fellows in a box. He keeps feeding them his flies,\r\nand the number of the latter is becoming sensibly diminished,\r\nalthough he has used half his food in attracting more flies from\r\noutside to his room.\r\n\r\n1 July.\u2014His spiders are now becoming as great a nuisance as his\r\nflies, and today I told him that he must get rid of them.\r\n\r\nHe looked very sad at this, so I said that he must some of them,\r\nat all events. He cheerfully acquiesced in this, and I gave him the\r\nsame time as before for reduction.\r\n\r\nHe disgusted me much while with him, for when a horrid blowfly,\r\nbloated with some carrion food, buzzed into the room, he caught it,\r\nheld it exultantly for a few moments between his finger and thumb,\r\nand before I knew what he was going to do, put it in his mouth and\r\nate it.\r\n\r\nI scolded him for it, but he argued quietly that it was very\r\ngood and very wholesome, that it was life, strong life, and gave\r\nlife to him. This gave me an idea, or the rudiment of one. I must\r\nwatch how he gets rid of his spiders.\r\n\r\nHe has evidently some deep problem in his mind, for he keeps a\r\nlittle notebook in which he is always jotting down something. whole\r\npages of it are filled with masses of figures, generally single\r\nnumbers added up in batches, and then the totals added in batches\r\nagain, as though he were focussing some account, as the auditors\r\nput it.\r\n\r\n8 July.\u2014There is a method in his madness, and the rudimentary\r\nidea in my mind is growing. It will be a whole idea soon, and then,\r\noh, unconscious cerebration, you will have to give the wall to your\r\nconscious brother.\r\n\r\nI kept away from my friend for a few days, so that I might\r\nnotice if there were any change. Things remain as they were except\r\nthat he has parted with some of his pets and got a new one.\r\n\r\nHe has managed to get a sparrow, and has already partially tamed\r\nit. His means of taming is simple, for already the spiders have\r\ndiminshed. Those that do remain, however, are well fed, for he\r\nstill brings in the flies by tempting them with his food.\r\n\r\n19 July\u2014We are progressing. My friend has now a whole colony of\r\nsparrows, and his flies and spiders are almost obliterated. When I\r\ncame in he ran to me and said he wanted to ask me a great favour, a\r\nvery, very great favour. And as he spoke, he fawned on me like a\r\ndog.\r\n\r\nI asked him what it was, and he said, with a sort of rapture in\r\nhis voice and bearing, \"A kitten, a nice, little, sleek playful\r\nkitten, that I can play with, and teach, and feed, and feed, and\r\nfeed!\"\r\n\r\nI was not unprepared for this request, for I had noticed how his\r\npets went on increasing in size and vivacity, but I did not care\r\nthat his pretty family of tame sparrows should be wiped out in the\r\nsame manner as the flies and spiders. So I said I would see about\r\nit, and asked him if he would not rather have a cat than a\r\nkitten.\r\n\r\nHis eagerness betrayed him as he answered, \"Oh, yes, I would\r\nlike a cat! I only asked for a kitten lest you should refuse me a\r\ncat. No one would refuse me a kitten, would they?\"\r\n\r\nI shook my head, and said that at present I feared it would not\r\nbe possible, but that I would see about it. His face fell, and I\r\ncould see a warning of danger in it, for there was a sudden fierce,\r\nsidelong look which meant killing. The man is an undeveloped\r\nhomicidal maniac. I shall test him with his present craving and see\r\nhow it will work out, then I shall know more.\r\n\r\n10 pm.\u2014I have visited him again and found him sitting in a\r\ncorner brooding. When I came in he threw himself on his knees\r\nbefore me and implored me to let him have a cat, that his salvation\r\ndepended upon it.\r\n\r\nI was firm, however, and told him that he could not have it,\r\nwhereupon he went without a word, and sat down, gnawing his\r\nfingers, in the corner where I had found him. I shall see him in\r\nthe morning early.\r\n\r\n20 July.\u2014Visited Renfield very early, before attendant went his\r\nrounds. Found him up and humming a tune. He was spreading out his\r\nsugar, which he had saved, in the window, and was manifestly\r\nbeginning his fly catching again, and beginning it cheerfully and\r\nwith a good grace.\r\n\r\nI looked around for his birds, and not seeing them,asked him\r\nwhere they were. He replied, without turning round, that they had\r\nall flown away. There were a few feathers about the room and on his\r\npillow a drop of blood. I said nothing, but went and told the\r\nkeeper to report to me if there were anything odd about him during\r\nthe day.\r\n\r\n11 am.\u2014The attendant has just been to see me to say that\r\nRenfield has been very sick and has disgorged a whole lot of\r\nfeathers. \"My belief is, doctor,\" he said, \"that he has eaten his\r\nbirds, and that he just took and ate them raw!\"\r\n\r\n11 pm.\u2014I gave Renfield a strong opiate tonight, enough to make\r\neven him sleep, and took away his pocketbook to look at it. The\r\nthought that has been buzzing about my brain lately is complete,\r\nand the theory proved.\r\n\r\nMy homicidal maniac is of a peculiar kind. I shall have to\r\ninvent a new classification for him, and call him a zoophagous\r\n(life-eating) maniac. What he desires is to absorb as many lives as\r\nhe can, and he has laid himself out to achieve it in a cumulative\r\nway. He gave many flies to one spider and many spiders to one bird,\r\nand then wanted a cat to eat the many birds. What would have been\r\nhis later steps?\r\n\r\nIt would almost be worth while to complete the experiment. It\r\nmight be done if there were only a sufficient cause. Men sneered at\r\nvivisection, and yet look at its results today! Why not advance\r\nscience in its most difficult and vital aspect, the knowledge of\r\nthe brain?\r\n\r\nHad I even the secret of one such mind, did I hold the key to\r\nthe fancy of even one lunatic, I might advance my own branch of\r\nscience to a pitch compared with which Burdon-Sanderson's\r\nphysiology or Ferrier's brain knowledge would be as nothing. If\r\nonly there were a sufficient cause! I must not think too much of\r\nthis, or I may be tempted. A good cause might turn the scale with\r\nme, for may not I too be of an exceptional brain, congenitally?\r\n\r\nHow well the man reasoned. Lunatics always do within their own\r\nscope. I wonder at how many lives he values a man, or if at only\r\none. He has closed the account most accurately, and today begun a\r\nnew record. How many of us begin a new record with each day of our\r\nlives?\r\n\r\nTo me it seems only yesterday that my whole life ended with my\r\nnew hope, and that truly I began a new record. So it shall be until\r\nthe Great Recorder sums me up and closes my ledger account with a\r\nbalance to profit or loss.\r\n\r\nOh, Lucy, Lucy, I cannot be angry with you, nor can I be angry\r\nwith my friend whose happiness is yours, but I must only wait on\r\nhopeless and work. Work! Work!\r\n\r\nIf I could have as strong a cause as my poor mad friend there, a\r\ngood, unselfish cause to make me work, that would be indeed\r\nhappiness.\r\n\r\nMINA MURRAY'S JOURNAL\r\n\r\n26 July.\u2014I am anxious, and it soothes me to express myself here.\r\nIt is like whispering to one's self and listening at the same time.\r\nAnd there is also something about the shorthand symbols that makes\r\nit different from writing. I am unhappy about Lucy and about\r\nJonathan. I had not heard from Jonathan for some time, and was very\r\nconcerned, but yesterday dear Mr. Hawkins, who is always so kind,\r\nsent me a letter from him. I had written asking him if he had\r\nheard, and he said the enclosed had just been received. It is only\r\na line dated from Castle Dracula, and says that he is just starting\r\nfor home. That is not like Jonathan. I do not understand it, and it\r\nmakes me uneasy.\r\n\r\nThen, too, Lucy , although she is so well, has lately taken to\r\nher old habit of walking in her sleep. Her mother has spoken to me\r\nabout it, and we have decided that I am to lock the door of our\r\nroom every night.\r\n\r\nMrs. Westenra has got an idea that sleep-walkers always go out\r\non roofs of houses and along the edges of cliffs and then get\r\nsuddenly wakened and fall over with a despairing cry that echoes\r\nall over the place.\r\n\r\nPoor dear, she is naturally anxious about Lucy, and she tells me\r\nthat her husband, Lucy's father, had the same habit, that he would\r\nget up in the night and dress himself and go out, if he were not\r\nstopped.\r\n\r\nLucy is to be married in the autumn, and she is already planning\r\nout her dresses and how her house is to be arranged. I sympathise\r\nwith her, for I do the same, only Jonathan and I will start in life\r\nin a very simple way, and shall have to try to make both ends\r\nmeet.\r\n\r\nMr. Holmwood, he is the Hon. Arthur Holmwood, only son of Lord\r\nGodalming, is coming up here very shortly, as soon as he can leave\r\ntown, for his father is not very well, and I think dear Lucy is\r\ncounting the moments till he comes.\r\n\r\nShe wants to take him up in the seat on the churchyard cliff and\r\nshow him the beauty of Whitby. I daresay it is the waiting which\r\ndisturbs her. She will be all right when he arrives.\r\n\r\n27 July.\u2014No news from Jonathan. I am getting quite uneasy about\r\nhim, though why I should I do not know, but I do wish that he would\r\nwrite, if it were only a single line.\r\n\r\nLucy walks more than ever, and each night I am awakened by her\r\nmoving about the room. Fortunately, the weather is so hot that she\r\ncannot get cold. But still, the anxiety and the perpetually being\r\nawakened is beginning to tell on me, and I am getting nervous and\r\nwakeful myself. Thank God, Lucy's health keeps up. Mr. Holmwood has\r\nbeen suddenly called to Ring to see his father, who has been taken\r\nseriously ill. Lucy frets at the postponement of seeing him, but it\r\ndoes not touch her looks. She is a trifle stouter, and her cheeks\r\nare a lovely rose-pink. She has lost the anemic look which she had.\r\nI pray it will all last.\r\n\r\n3 August.\u2014Another week gone by, and no news from Jonathan, not\r\neven to Mr. Hawkins, from whom I have heard. Oh, I do hope he is\r\nnot ill. He surely would have written. I look at that last letter\r\nof his, but somehow it does not satisfy me. It does not read like\r\nhim, and yet it is his writing. There is no mistake of that.\r\n\r\nLucy has not walked much in her sleep the last week, but there\r\nis an odd concentration about her which I do not understand, even\r\nin her sleep she seems to be watching me. She tries the door, and\r\nfinding it locked, goes about the room searching for the key.\r\n\r\n6 August.\u2014Another three days, and no news. This suspense is\r\ngetting dreadful. If I only knew where to write to or where to go\r\nto, I should feel easier. But no one has heard a word of Jonathan\r\nsince that last letter. I must only pray to God for patience.\r\n\r\nLucy is more excitable than ever, but is otherwise well. Last\r\nnight was very threatening, and the fishermen say that we are in\r\nfor a storm. I must try to watch it and learn the weather\r\nsigns.\r\n\r\nToday is a gray day, and the sun as I write is hidden in thick\r\nclouds, high over Kettleness. Everything is gray except the green\r\ngrass, which seems like emerald amongst it, gray earthy rock, gray\r\nclouds, tinged with the sunburst at the far edge, hang over the\r\ngray sea, into which the sandpoints stretch like gray figures. The\r\nsea is tumbling in over the shallows and the sandy flats with a\r\nroar, muffled in the sea-mists drifting inland. The horizon is lost\r\nin a gray mist. All vastness, the clouds are piled up like giant\r\nrocks, and there is a `brool' over the sea that sounds like some\r\npassage of doom. Dark figures are on the beach here and there,\r\nsometimes half shrouded in the mist, and seem `men like trees\r\nwalking'. The fishing boats are racing for home, and rise and dip\r\nin the ground swell as they sweep into the harbour, bending to the\r\nscuppers. Here comes old Mr. Swales. He is making straight for me,\r\nand I can see, by the way he lifts his hat, that he wants to\r\ntalk.\r\n\r\nI have been quite touched by the change in the poor old man.\r\nWhen he sat down beside me, he said in a very gentle way, \"I want\r\nto say something to you, miss.\"\r\n\r\nI could see he was not at ease, so I took his poor old wrinkled\r\nhand in mine and asked him to speak fully.\r\n\r\nSo he said, leaving his hand in mine, \"I'm afraid, my deary,\r\nthat I must have shocked you by all the wicked things I've been\r\nsayin' about the dead, and such like, for weeks past, but I didn't\r\nmean them, and I want ye to remember that when I'm gone. We aud\r\nfolks that be daffled, and with one foot abaft the krok-hooal,\r\ndon't altogether like to think of it, and we don't want to feel\r\nscart of it, and that's why I've took to makin' light of it, so\r\nthat I'd cheer up my own heart a bit. But, Lord love ye, miss, I\r\nain't afraid of dyin', not a bit, only I don't want to die if I can\r\nhelp it. My time must be nigh at hand now, for I be aud, and a\r\nhundred years is too much for any man to expect. And I'm so nigh it\r\nthat the Aud Man is already whettin' his scythe. Ye see, I can't\r\nget out o' the habit of caffin' about it all at once. The chafts\r\nwill wag as they be used to. Some day soon the Angel of Death will\r\nsound his trumpet for me. But don't ye dooal an' greet, my\r\ndeary!\"\u2014for he saw that I was crying\u2014 \"if he should come this very\r\nnight I'd not refuse to answer his call. For life be, after all,\r\nonly a waitin' for somethin' else than what we're doin', and death\r\nbe all that we can rightly depend on. But I'm content, for it's\r\ncomin' to me, my deary, and comin' quick. It may be comin' while we\r\nbe lookin' and wonderin'. Maybe it's in that wind out over the sea\r\nthat's bringin' with it loss and wreck, and sore distress, and sad\r\nhearts. Look! Look!\" he cried suddenly. \"There's something in that\r\nwind and in the hoast beyont that sounds, and looks, and tastes,\r\nand smells like death. It's in the air. I feel it comin'. Lord,\r\nmake me answer cheerful, when my call comes!\" He held up his arms\r\ndevoutly, and raised his hat. His mouth moved as though he were\r\npraying. After a few minutes' silence, he got up, shook hands with\r\nme, and blessed me, and said good-bye, and hobbled off. It all\r\ntouched me, and upset me very much.\r\n\r\nI was glad when the coastguard came along, with his spyglass\r\nunder his arm. He stopped to talk with me, as he always does, but\r\nall the time kept looking at a strange ship.\r\n\r\n\"I can't make her out,\" he said. \"She's a Russian, by the look\r\nof her. But she's knocking about in the queerest way. She doesn't\r\nknow her mind a bit. She seems to see the storm coming, but can't\r\ndecide whether to run up north in the open, or to put in here. Look\r\nthere again! She is steered mighty strangely, for she doesn't mind\r\nthe hand on the wheel, changes about with every puff of wind. We'll\r\nhear more of her before this time tomorrow.\"\r\n\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"
\n

24 July. Whitby.\u2014Lucy met me at the station, looking sweeter and
\nlovlier than ever, and we drove up to the house at the Crescent in
\nwhich they have rooms. This is a lovely place. The little river,
\nthe Esk, runs through a deep valley, which broadens out as it comes
\nnear the harbour. A great viaduct runs across, with high piers,
\nthrough which the view seems somehow further away than it really
\nis. The valley is beautifully green, and it is so steep that when
\nyou are on the high land on either side you look right across it,
\nunless you are near enough to see down. The houses of the old
\ntown\u2014the side away from us, are all red-roofed, and seem piled up
\none over the other anyhow, like the pictures we see of Nuremberg.
\nRight over the town is the ruin of Whitby Abbey, which was sacked
\nby the Danes, and which is the scene of part of “Marmion,” where
\nthe girl was built up in the wall. It is a most noble ruin, of
\nimmense size, and full of beautiful and romantic bits. There is a
\nlegend that a white lady is seen in one of the windows. Between it
\nand the town there is another church, the parish one, round which
\nis a big graveyard, all full of tombstones. This is to my mind the
\nnicest spot in Whitby, for it lies right over the town, and has a
\nfull view of the harbour and all up the bay to where the headland
\ncalled Kettleness stretches out into the sea. It descends so
\nsteeply over the harbour that part of the bank has fallen away, and
\nsome of the graves have been destroyed.<\/p>\n

In one place part of the stonework of the graves stretches out
\nover the sandy pathway far below. There are walks, with seats
\nbeside them, through the churchyard, and people go and sit there
\nall day long looking at the beautiful view and enjoying the
\nbreeze.<\/p>\n

I shall come and sit here often myself and work. Indeed, I am
\nwriting now, with my book on my knee, and listening to the talk of
\nthree old men who are sitting beside me. They seem to do nothing
\nall day but sit here and talk.<\/p>\n

The harbour lies below me, with, on the far side, one long
\ngranite wall stretching out into the sea, with a curve outwards at
\nthe end of it, in the middle of which is a lighthouse. A heavy
\nseawall runs along outside of it. On the near side, the seawall
\nmakes an elbow crooked inversely, and its end too has a lighthouse.
\nBetween the two piers there is a narrow opening into the harbour,
\nwhich then suddenly widens.<\/p>\n

It is nice at high water, but when the tide is out it shoals
\naway to nothing, and there is merely the stream of the Esk, running
\nbetween banks of sand, with rocks here and there. Outside the
\nharbour on this side there rises for about half a mile a great
\nreef, the sharp of which runs straight out from behind the south
\nlighthouse. At the end of it is a buoy with a bell, which swings in
\nbad weather, and sends in a mournful sound on the wind.<\/p>\n

They have a legend here that when a ship is lost bells are heard
\nout at sea. I must ask the old man about this. He is coming this
\nway\u00a0\u2026<\/p>\n

He is a funny old man. He must be awfully old, for his face is
\ngnarled and twisted like the bark of a tree. He tells me that he is
\nnearly a hundred, and that he was a sailor in the Greenland fishing
\nfleet when Waterloo was fought. He is, I am afraid, a very
\nsceptical person, for when I asked him about the bells at sea and
\nthe White Lady at the abbey he said very brusquely,<\/p>\n

“I wouldn’t fash masel’ about them, miss. Them things be all
\nwore out. Mind, I don’t say that they never was, but I do say that
\nthey wasn’t in my time. They be all very well for comers and
\ntrippers, an’ the like, but not for a nice young lady like you.
\nThem feet-folks from York and Leeds that be always eatin’cured
\nherrin’s and drinkin’ tea an’ lookin’ out to buy cheap jet would
\ncreed aught. I wonder masel’ who’d be bothered tellin’ lies to
\nthem, even the newspapers, which is full of fool-talk.”<\/p>\n

I thought he would be a good person to learn interesting things
\nfrom, so I asked him if he would mind telling me something about
\nthe whale fishing in the old days. He was just settling himself to
\nbegin when the clock struck six, whereupon he laboured to get up,
\nand said,<\/p>\n

“I must gang ageeanwards home now, miss. My granddaughter
\ndoesn’t like to be kept waitin’ when the tea is ready, for it takes
\nme time to crammle aboon the grees, for there be a many of `em, and
\nmiss, I lack belly-timber sairly by the clock.”<\/p>\n

He hobbled away, and I could see him hurrying, as well as he
\ncould, down the steps. The steps are a great feature on the place.
\nThey lead from the town to the church, there are hundreds of them,
\nI do not know how many, and they wind up in a delicate curve. The
\nslope is so gentle that a horse could easily walk up and down them.
\nI think they must originally have had something to do with the
\nabbey. I shall go home too. Lucy went out, visiting with her
\nmother, and as they were only duty calls, I did not go.<\/p>\n

1 August.\u2014I came up here an hour ago with Lucy, and we had a
\nmost interesting talk with my old friend and the two others who
\nalways come and join him. He is evidently the Sir Oracle of them,
\nand I should think must have been in his time a most dictatorial
\nperson.<\/p>\n

He will not admit anything, and down faces everybody. If he
\ncan’t out-argue them he bullies them, and then takes their silence
\nfor agreement with his views.<\/p>\n

Lucy was looking sweetly pretty in her white lawn frock. She has
\ngot a beautiful colour since she has been here.<\/p>\n

I noticed that the old men did not lose any time in coming and
\nsitting near her when we sat down. She is so sweet with old people,
\nI think they all fell in love with her on the spot. Even my old man
\nsuccumbed and did not contradict her, but gave me double share
\ninstead. I got him on the subject of the legends , and he went off
\nat once into a sort of sermon. I must try to remember it and put it
\ndown.<\/p>\n

“It be all fool-talk, lock, stock, and barrel, that’s what it be
\nand nowt else. These bans an’ wafts an’ boh-ghosts an’ bar-guests
\nan’ bogles an’ all anent them is only fit to set bairns an’ dizzy
\nwomen a’belderin’. They be nowt but air-blebs. They, an’ all grims
\nan’ signs an’ warnin’s, be all invented by parsons an’ illsome
\nberk-bodies an’ railway touters to skeer an’ scunner hafflin’s, an’
\nto get folks to do somethin’ that they don’t other incline to. It
\nmakes me ireful to think o’ them. Why, it’s them that, not content
\nwith printin’ lies on paper an’ preachin’ them ou t of pulpits,
\ndoes want to be cuttin’ them on the tombstones. Look here all
\naround you in what airt ye will. All them steans, holdin’ up their
\nheads as well as they can out of their pride, is acant, simply
\ntumblin’ down with the weight o’ the lies wrote on them, `Here lies
\nthe body’ or `Sacred to the memory’ wrote on all of them, an’ yet
\nin nigh half of them there bean’t no bodies at all, an’ the
\nmemories of them bean’t cared a pinch of snuff about, much less
\nsacred. Lies all of them, nothin’ but lies of one kind or another!
\nMy gog, but it’ll be a quare scowderment at the Day of Judgment
\nwhen they come tumblin’ up in their death-sarks, all jouped
\ntogether an’ trying’ to drag their tombsteans with them to prove
\nhow good they was, some of them trimmlin’ an’ dithering, with their
\nhands that dozzened an’ slippery from lyin’ in the sea that they
\ncan’t even keep their gurp o’ them.”<\/p>\n

I could see from the old fellow’s self-satisfied air and the way
\nin which he looked round for the approval of his cronies that he
\nwas “showing off,” so I put in a word to keep him going.<\/p>\n

“Oh, Mr. Swales, you can’t be serious. Surely these tombstones
\nare not all wrong?”<\/p>\n

“Yabblins! There may be a poorish few not wrong, savin’ where
\nthey make out the people too good, for there be folk that do think
\na balm-bowl be like the sea, if only it be their own. The whole
\nthing be only lies. Now look you here. You come here a stranger,
\nan’ you see this kirkgarth.”<\/p>\n

I nodded, for I thought it better to assent, though I did not
\nquite understand his dialect. I knew it had something to do with
\nthe church.<\/p>\n

He went on, “And you consate that all these steans be aboon folk
\nthat be haped here, snod an’ snog?” I assented again. “Then that be
\njust where the lie comes in. Why, there be scores of these laybeds
\nthat be toom as old Dun’s `baccabox on Friday night.”<\/p>\n

He nudged one of his companions, and they all laughed. “And, my
\ngog! How could they be otherwise? Look at that one, the aftest
\nabaft the bier-bank, read it!”<\/p>\n

I went over and read, “Edward Spencelagh, master mariner,
\nmurdered by pirates off the coast of Andres, April, 1854, age 30.”
\nWhen I came back Mr. Swales went on,<\/p>\n

“Who brought him home, I wonder, to hap him here? Murdered off
\nthe coast of Andres! An’ you consated his body lay under! Why, I
\ncould name ye a dozen whose bones lie in the Greenland seas above,”
\nhe pointed northwards, “or where the currants may have drifted
\nthem. There be the steans around ye. Ye can, with your young eyes,
\nread the small print of the lies from here. This Braithwaite
\nLowery, I knew his father, lost in the Lively off Greenland in `20,
\nor Andrew Woodhouse, drowned in the same seas in 1777, or John
\nPaxton, drowned off Cape Farewell a year later, or old John
\nRawlings, whose grandfather sailed with me, drowned in the Gulf of
\nFinland in `50. Do ye think that all these men will have to make a
\nrush to Whitby when the trumpet sounds? I have me antherums aboot
\nit! I tell ye that when they got here they’d be jommlin’ and
\njostlin’ one another that way that it `ud be like a fight up on the
\nice in the old days, when we’d be at one another from daylight to
\ndark, an’ tryin’ to tie up our cuts by the aurora borealis.” This
\nwas evidently local pleasantry, for the old man cackled over it,
\nand his cronies joined in with gusto.<\/p>\n

“But,” I said, “surely you are not quite correct, for you start
\non the assumption that all the poor people, or their spirits, will
\nhave to take their tombstones with them on the Day of Judgment. Do
\nyou think that will be really necessary?”<\/p>\n

“Well, what else be they tombstones for? Answer me that,
\nmiss!”<\/p>\n

“To please their relatives, I suppose.”<\/p>\n

“To please their relatives, you suppose!” This he said with
\nintense scorn. “How will it pleasure their relatives to know that
\nlies is wrote over them, and that everybody in the place knows that
\nthey be lies?”<\/p>\n

He pointed to a stone at our feet which had been laid down as a
\nslab, on which the seat was rested, close to the edge of the cliff.
\n“Read the lies on that thruff-stone,” he said.<\/p>\n

The letters were upside down to me from where I sat, but Lucy
\nwas more opposite to them, so she leant over and read, “Sacred to
\nthe memory of George Canon, who died, in the hope of a glorious
\nresurrection, on July 29,1873,falling from the rocks at Kettleness.
\nThis tomb was erected by his sorrowing mother to her dearly beloved
\nson.`He was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow.’
\nReally, Mr. Swales, I don’t see anything very funny in that!” She
\nspoke her comment very gravely and somewhat severely.<\/p>\n

“Ye don’t see aught funny! Ha-ha! But that’s because ye don’t
\ngawm the sorrowin’mother was a hell-cat that hated him because he
\nwas acrewk’d, a regular lamiter he was, an’ he hated her so that he
\ncommitted suicide in order that she mightn’t get an insurance she
\nput on his life. He blew nigh the top of his head off with an old
\nmusket that they had for scarin’ crows with. `twarn’t for crows
\nthen, for it brought the clegs and the dowps to him. That’s the way
\nhe fell off the rocks. And, as to hopes of a glorious resurrection,
\nI’ve often heard him say masel’ that he hoped he’d go to hell, for
\nhis mother was so pious that she’d be sure to go to heaven, an’ he
\ndidn’t want to addle where she was. Now isn’t that stean at any
\nrate,”he hammered it with his stick as he spoke, “a pack of lies?
\nAnd won’t it make Gabriel keckle when Geordie comes pantin’ ut the
\ngrees with the tompstean balanced on his hump, and asks to be took
\nas evidence!”<\/p>\n

I did not know what to say, but Lucy turned the conversation as
\nshe said, rising up, “Oh, why did you tell us of this? It is my
\nfavorite seat, and I cannot leave it, and now I find I must go on
\nsitting over the grave of a suicide.”<\/p>\n

“That won’t harm ye, my pretty, an’ it may make poor Geordie
\ngladsome to have so trim a lass sittin’ on his lap. That won’t hurt
\nye. Why, I’ve sat here off an’ on for nigh twenty years past, an’
\nit hasn’t done me no harm. Don’t ye fash about them as lies under
\nye, or that doesn’ lie there either! It’ll be time for ye to be
\ngetting scart when ye see the tombsteans all run away with, and the
\nplace as bare as a stubble-field. There’s the clock, and’I must
\ngang. My service to ye, ladies!” And off he hobbled.<\/p>\n

Lucy and I sat awhile, and it was all so beautiful before us
\nthat we took hands as we sat, and she told me all over again about
\nArthur and their coming marriage. That made me just a little
\nheart-sick, for I haven’t heard from Jonathan for a whole
\nmonth.<\/p>\n

The same day. I came up here alone, for I am very sad. There was
\nno letter for me. I hope there cannot be anything the matter with
\nJonathan. The clock has just struck nine. I see the lights
\nscattered all over the town, sometimes in rows where the streets
\nare, and sometimes singly. They run right up the Esk and die away
\nin the curve of the valley. To my left the view is cut off by a
\nblack line of roof of the old house next to the abbey. The sheep
\nand lambs are bleating in the fields away behind me, and there is a
\nclatter of donkeys’ hoofs up the paved road below. The band on the
\npier is playing a harsh waltz in good time, and further along the
\nquay there is a Salvation Army meeting in a back street. Neither of
\nthe bands hears the other, but up here I hear and see them both. I
\nwonder where Jonathan is and if he is thinking of me! I wish he
\nwere here.<\/p>\n

DR. SEWARD’S DIARY<\/p>\n

5 June.\u2014The case of Renfield grows more interesting the more I
\nget to understand the man. He has certain qualities very largely
\ndeveloped, selfishness, secrecy, and purpose.<\/p>\n

I wish I could get at what is the object of the latter. He seems
\nto have some settled scheme of his own, but what it is I do not
\nknow. His redeeming quality is a love of animals, though, indeed,
\nhe has such curious turns in it that I sometimes imagine he is only
\nabnormally cruel. His pets are of odd sorts.<\/p>\n

Just now his hobby is catching flies. He has at present such a
\nquantity that I have had myself to expostulate. To my astonishment,
\nhe did not break out into a fury, as I expected, but took the
\nmatter in simple seriousness. He thought for a moment, and then
\nsaid, “May I have three days? I shall clear them away.” Of course,
\nI said that would do. I must watch him.<\/p>\n

18 June.\u2014He has turned his mind now to spiders, and has got
\nseveral very big fellows in a box. He keeps feeding them his flies,
\nand the number of the latter is becoming sensibly diminished,
\nalthough he has used half his food in attracting more flies from
\noutside to his room.<\/p>\n

1 July.\u2014His spiders are now becoming as great a nuisance as his
\nflies, and today I told him that he must get rid of them.<\/p>\n

He looked very sad at this, so I said that he must some of them,
\nat all events. He cheerfully acquiesced in this, and I gave him the
\nsame time as before for reduction.<\/p>\n

He disgusted me much while with him, for when a horrid blowfly,
\nbloated with some carrion food, buzzed into the room, he caught it,
\nheld it exultantly for a few moments between his finger and thumb,
\nand before I knew what he was going to do, put it in his mouth and
\nate it.<\/p>\n

I scolded him for it, but he argued quietly that it was very
\ngood and very wholesome, that it was life, strong life, and gave
\nlife to him. This gave me an idea, or the rudiment of one. I must
\nwatch how he gets rid of his spiders.<\/p>\n

He has evidently some deep problem in his mind, for he keeps a
\nlittle notebook in which he is always jotting down something. whole
\npages of it are filled with masses of figures, generally single
\nnumbers added up in batches, and then the totals added in batches
\nagain, as though he were focussing some account, as the auditors
\nput it.<\/p>\n

8 July.\u2014There is a method in his madness, and the rudimentary
\nidea in my mind is growing. It will be a whole idea soon, and then,
\noh, unconscious cerebration, you will have to give the wall to your
\nconscious brother.<\/p>\n

I kept away from my friend for a few days, so that I might
\nnotice if there were any change. Things remain as they were except
\nthat he has parted with some of his pets and got a new one.<\/p>\n

He has managed to get a sparrow, and has already partially tamed
\nit. His means of taming is simple, for already the spiders have
\ndiminshed. Those that do remain, however, are well fed, for he
\nstill brings in the flies by tempting them with his food.<\/p>\n

19 July\u2014We are progressing. My friend has now a whole colony of
\nsparrows, and his flies and spiders are almost obliterated. When I
\ncame in he ran to me and said he wanted to ask me a great favour, a
\nvery, very great favour. And as he spoke, he fawned on me like a
\ndog.<\/p>\n

I asked him what it was, and he said, with a sort of rapture in
\nhis voice and bearing, “A kitten, a nice, little, sleek playful
\nkitten, that I can play with, and teach, and feed, and feed, and
\nfeed!”<\/p>\n

I was not unprepared for this request, for I had noticed how his
\npets went on increasing in size and vivacity, but I did not care
\nthat his pretty family of tame sparrows should be wiped out in the
\nsame manner as the flies and spiders. So I said I would see about
\nit, and asked him if he would not rather have a cat than a
\nkitten.<\/p>\n

His eagerness betrayed him as he answered, “Oh, yes, I would
\nlike a cat! I only asked for a kitten lest you should refuse me a
\ncat. No one would refuse me a kitten, would they?”<\/p>\n

I shook my head, and said that at present I feared it would not
\nbe possible, but that I would see about it. His face fell, and I
\ncould see a warning of danger in it, for there was a sudden fierce,
\nsidelong look which meant killing. The man is an undeveloped
\nhomicidal maniac. I shall test him with his present craving and see
\nhow it will work out, then I shall know more.<\/p>\n

10 pm.\u2014I have visited him again and found him sitting in a
\ncorner brooding. When I came in he threw himself on his knees
\nbefore me and implored me to let him have a cat, that his salvation
\ndepended upon it.<\/p>\n

I was firm, however, and told him that he could not have it,
\nwhereupon he went without a word, and sat down, gnawing his
\nfingers, in the corner where I had found him. I shall see him in
\nthe morning early.<\/p>\n

20 July.\u2014Visited Renfield very early, before attendant went his
\nrounds. Found him up and humming a tune. He was spreading out his
\nsugar, which he had saved, in the window, and was manifestly
\nbeginning his fly catching again, and beginning it cheerfully and
\nwith a good grace.<\/p>\n

I looked around for his birds, and not seeing them,asked him
\nwhere they were. He replied, without turning round, that they had
\nall flown away. There were a few feathers about the room and on his
\npillow a drop of blood. I said nothing, but went and told the
\nkeeper to report to me if there were anything odd about him during
\nthe day.<\/p>\n

11 am.\u2014The attendant has just been to see me to say that
\nRenfield has been very sick and has disgorged a whole lot of
\nfeathers. “My belief is, doctor,” he said, “that he has eaten his
\nbirds, and that he just took and ate them raw!”<\/p>\n

11 pm.\u2014I gave Renfield a strong opiate tonight, enough to make
\neven him sleep, and took away his pocketbook to look at it. The
\nthought that has been buzzing about my brain lately is complete,
\nand the theory proved.<\/p>\n

My homicidal maniac is of a peculiar kind. I shall have to
\ninvent a new classification for him, and call him a zoophagous
\n(life-eating) maniac. What he desires is to absorb as many lives as
\nhe can, and he has laid himself out to achieve it in a cumulative
\nway. He gave many flies to one spider and many spiders to one bird,
\nand then wanted a cat to eat the many birds. What would have been
\nhis later steps?<\/p>\n

It would almost be worth while to complete the experiment. It
\nmight be done if there were only a sufficient cause. Men sneered at
\nvivisection, and yet look at its results today! Why not advance
\nscience in its most difficult and vital aspect, the knowledge of
\nthe brain?<\/p>\n

Had I even the secret of one such mind, did I hold the key to
\nthe fancy of even one lunatic, I might advance my own branch of
\nscience to a pitch compared with which Burdon-Sanderson’s
\nphysiology or Ferrier’s brain knowledge would be as nothing. If
\nonly there were a sufficient cause! I must not think too much of
\nthis, or I may be tempted. A good cause might turn the scale with
\nme, for may not I too be of an exceptional brain, congenitally?<\/p>\n

How well the man reasoned. Lunatics always do within their own
\nscope. I wonder at how many lives he values a man, or if at only
\none. He has closed the account most accurately, and today begun a
\nnew record. How many of us begin a new record with each day of our
\nlives?<\/p>\n

To me it seems only yesterday that my whole life ended with my
\nnew hope, and that truly I began a new record. So it shall be until
\nthe Great Recorder sums me up and closes my ledger account with a
\nbalance to profit or loss.<\/p>\n

Oh, Lucy, Lucy, I cannot be angry with you, nor can I be angry
\nwith my friend whose happiness is yours, but I must only wait on
\nhopeless and work. Work! Work!<\/p>\n

If I could have as strong a cause as my poor mad friend there, a
\ngood, unselfish cause to make me work, that would be indeed
\nhappiness.<\/p>\n

MINA MURRAY’S JOURNAL<\/p>\n

26 July.\u2014I am anxious, and it soothes me to express myself here.
\nIt is like whispering to one’s self and listening at the same time.
\nAnd there is also something about the shorthand symbols that makes
\nit different from writing. I am unhappy about Lucy and about
\nJonathan. I had not heard from Jonathan for some time, and was very
\nconcerned, but yesterday dear Mr. Hawkins, who is always so kind,
\nsent me a letter from him. I had written asking him if he had
\nheard, and he said the enclosed had just been received. It is only
\na line dated from Castle Dracula, and says that he is just starting
\nfor home. That is not like Jonathan. I do not understand it, and it
\nmakes me uneasy.<\/p>\n

Then, too, Lucy , although she is so well, has lately taken to
\nher old habit of walking in her sleep. Her mother has spoken to me
\nabout it, and we have decided that I am to lock the door of our
\nroom every night.<\/p>\n

Mrs. Westenra has got an idea that sleep-walkers always go out
\non roofs of houses and along the edges of cliffs and then get
\nsuddenly wakened and fall over with a despairing cry that echoes
\nall over the place.<\/p>\n

Poor dear, she is naturally anxious about Lucy, and she tells me
\nthat her husband, Lucy’s father, had the same habit, that he would
\nget up in the night and dress himself and go out, if he were not
\nstopped.<\/p>\n

Lucy is to be married in the autumn, and she is already planning
\nout her dresses and how her house is to be arranged. I sympathise
\nwith her, for I do the same, only Jonathan and I will start in life
\nin a very simple way, and shall have to try to make both ends
\nmeet.<\/p>\n

Mr. Holmwood, he is the Hon. Arthur Holmwood, only son of Lord
\nGodalming, is coming up here very shortly, as soon as he can leave
\ntown, for his father is not very well, and I think dear Lucy is
\ncounting the moments till he comes.<\/p>\n

She wants to take him up in the seat on the churchyard cliff and
\nshow him the beauty of Whitby. I daresay it is the waiting which
\ndisturbs her. She will be all right when he arrives.<\/p>\n

27 July.\u2014No news from Jonathan. I am getting quite uneasy about
\nhim, though why I should I do not know, but I do wish that he would
\nwrite, if it were only a single line.<\/p>\n

Lucy walks more than ever, and each night I am awakened by her
\nmoving about the room. Fortunately, the weather is so hot that she
\ncannot get cold. But still, the anxiety and the perpetually being
\nawakened is beginning to tell on me, and I am getting nervous and
\nwakeful myself. Thank God, Lucy’s health keeps up. Mr. Holmwood has
\nbeen suddenly called to Ring to see his father, who has been taken
\nseriously ill. Lucy frets at the postponement of seeing him, but it
\ndoes not touch her looks. She is a trifle stouter, and her cheeks
\nare a lovely rose-pink. She has lost the anemic look which she had.
\nI pray it will all last.<\/p>\n

3 August.\u2014Another week gone by, and no news from Jonathan, not
\neven to Mr. Hawkins, from whom I have heard. Oh, I do hope he is
\nnot ill. He surely would have written. I look at that last letter
\nof his, but somehow it does not satisfy me. It does not read like
\nhim, and yet it is his writing. There is no mistake of that.<\/p>\n

Lucy has not walked much in her sleep the last week, but there
\nis an odd concentration about her which I do not understand, even
\nin her sleep she seems to be watching me. She tries the door, and
\nfinding it locked, goes about the room searching for the key.<\/p>\n

6 August.\u2014Another three days, and no news. This suspense is
\ngetting dreadful. If I only knew where to write to or where to go
\nto, I should feel easier. But no one has heard a word of Jonathan
\nsince that last letter. I must only pray to God for patience.<\/p>\n

Lucy is more excitable than ever, but is otherwise well. Last
\nnight was very threatening, and the fishermen say that we are in
\nfor a storm. I must try to watch it and learn the weather
\nsigns.<\/p>\n

Today is a gray day, and the sun as I write is hidden in thick
\nclouds, high over Kettleness. Everything is gray except the green
\ngrass, which seems like emerald amongst it, gray earthy rock, gray
\nclouds, tinged with the sunburst at the far edge, hang over the
\ngray sea, into which the sandpoints stretch like gray figures. The
\nsea is tumbling in over the shallows and the sandy flats with a
\nroar, muffled in the sea-mists drifting inland. The horizon is lost
\nin a gray mist. All vastness, the clouds are piled up like giant
\nrocks, and there is a `brool’ over the sea that sounds like some
\npassage of doom. Dark figures are on the beach here and there,
\nsometimes half shrouded in the mist, and seem `men like trees
\nwalking’. The fishing boats are racing for home, and rise and dip
\nin the ground swell as they sweep into the harbour, bending to the
\nscuppers. Here comes old Mr. Swales. He is making straight for me,
\nand I can see, by the way he lifts his hat, that he wants to
\ntalk.<\/p>\n

I have been quite touched by the change in the poor old man.
\nWhen he sat down beside me, he said in a very gentle way, “I want
\nto say something to you, miss.”<\/p>\n

I could see he was not at ease, so I took his poor old wrinkled
\nhand in mine and asked him to speak fully.<\/p>\n

So he said, leaving his hand in mine, “I’m afraid, my deary,
\nthat I must have shocked you by all the wicked things I’ve been
\nsayin’ about the dead, and such like, for weeks past, but I didn’t
\nmean them, and I want ye to remember that when I’m gone. We aud
\nfolks that be daffled, and with one foot abaft the krok-hooal,
\ndon’t altogether like to think of it, and we don’t want to feel
\nscart of it, and that’s why I’ve took to makin’ light of it, so
\nthat I’d cheer up my own heart a bit. But, Lord love ye, miss, I
\nain’t afraid of dyin’, not a bit, only I don’t want to die if I can
\nhelp it. My time must be nigh at hand now, for I be aud, and a
\nhundred years is too much for any man to expect. And I’m so nigh it
\nthat the Aud Man is already whettin’ his scythe. Ye see, I can’t
\nget out o’ the habit of caffin’ about it all at once. The chafts
\nwill wag as they be used to. Some day soon the Angel of Death will
\nsound his trumpet for me. But don’t ye dooal an’ greet, my
\ndeary!”\u2014for he saw that I was crying\u2014 “if he should come this very
\nnight I’d not refuse to answer his call. For life be, after all,
\nonly a waitin’ for somethin’ else than what we’re doin’, and death
\nbe all that we can rightly depend on. But I’m content, for it’s
\ncomin’ to me, my deary, and comin’ quick. It may be comin’ while we
\nbe lookin’ and wonderin’. Maybe it’s in that wind out over the sea
\nthat’s bringin’ with it loss and wreck, and sore distress, and sad
\nhearts. Look! Look!” he cried suddenly. “There’s something in that
\nwind and in the hoast beyont that sounds, and looks, and tastes,
\nand smells like death. It’s in the air. I feel it comin’. Lord,
\nmake me answer cheerful, when my call comes!” He held up his arms
\ndevoutly, and raised his hat. His mouth moved as though he were
\npraying. After a few minutes’ silence, he got up, shook hands with
\nme, and blessed me, and said good-bye, and hobbled off. It all
\ntouched me, and upset me very much.<\/p>\n

I was glad when the coastguard came along, with his spyglass
\nunder his arm. He stopped to talk with me, as he always does, but
\nall the time kept looking at a strange ship.<\/p>\n

“I can’t make her out,” he said. “She’s a Russian, by the look
\nof her. But she’s knocking about in the queerest way. She doesn’t
\nknow her mind a bit. She seems to see the storm coming, but can’t
\ndecide whether to run up north in the open, or to put in here. Look
\nthere again! She is steered mighty strangely, for she doesn’t mind
\nthe hand on the wheel, changes about with every puff of wind. We’ll
\nhear more of her before this time tomorrow.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"menu_order":6,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-30","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/30","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/30\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/30\/revisions\/100"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/3"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/30\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=30"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=30"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/dracula\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=30"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}