Way of All Flesh

Samuel Butler

Description

Samuel Butler's The Way of All Flesh follows four generations of the Pontifex family. The novel is semi-autobiographical and attacks the hypocrisy that was characteristic in the Victorian era. It was written between 1873 and 1884, but Butler didn't risk publishing it in his life - it was instead finally released a year after Butler's death, in 1903.

Informations

• Publié par: The Floating Press
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781775414995
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE WAY OF ALL FLESH
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SAMUEL BUTLER
 
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The Way of All Flesh From a 1912 edition.
ISBN 978-1-775414-99-5
© 2009 THE FLOATING PRESS.
While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike.
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Contents
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Preface Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII Chapter VIII Chapter IX Chapter X Chapter XI Chapter XII Chapter XIII Chapter XIV Chapter XV Chapter XVI Chapter XVII Chapter XVIII Chapter XIX Chapter XX Chapter XXI Chapter XXII Chapter XXIII Chapter XXIV Chapter XXV Chapter XXVI Chapter XXVII Chapter XXVIII Chapter XXIX Chapter XXX Chapter XXXI Chapter XXXII Chapter XXXIII Chapter XXXIV Chapter XXXV Chapter XXXVI Chapter XXXVII Chapter XXXVIII Chapter XXXIX Chapter XL Chapter XLI Chapter XLII Chapter XLIII Chapter XLIV Chapter XLV Chapter XLVI Chapter XLVII Chapter XLVIII Chapter XLIX Chapter L Chapter LI Chapter LII Chapter LIII Chapter LIV Chapter LV Chapter LVI Chapter LVII Chapter LVIII Chapter LIX Chapter LX Chapter LXI Chapter LXII Chapter LXIII Chapter LXIV Chapter LXV Chapter LXVI Chapter LXVII Chapter LXVIII Chapter LXIX Chapter LXX Chapter LXXI Chapter LXXII Chapter LXXIII Chapter LXXIV Chapter LXXV Chapter LXXVI Chapter LXXVII Chapter LXXVIII Chapter LXXIX Chapter LXXX Chapter LXXXI Chapter LXXXII Chapter LXXXIII Chapter LXXXIV Chapter LXXXV Chapter LXXXVI
 
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"We know that all things work together for good to them that loveGod."—ROM. viii. 28
Preface
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Samuel Butleter began to write "The Way of All Flesh" about the year1872, and was engaged upon it intermittently until 1884. It istherefore, to a great extent, contemporaneous with "Life and Habit," andmay be taken as a practical illustration of the theory of heredityembodied in that book. He did not work at it after 1884, but for variousreasons he postponed its publication. He was occupied in other ways, andhe professed himself dissatisfied with it as a whole, and always intendedto rewrite or at any rate to revise it. His death in 1902 prevented himfrom doing this, and on his death-bed he gave me clearly to understandthat he wished it to be published in its present form. I found that theMS. of the fourth and fifth chapters had disappeared, but by consultingand comparing various notes and sketches, which remained among hispapers, I have been able to supply the missing chapters in a form which Ibelieve does not differ materially from that which he finally adopted.With regard to the chronology of the events recorded, the reader will dowell to bear in mind that the main body of the novel is supposed to havebeen written in the year 1867, and the last chapter added as a postscriptin 1882.
R. A. STREATFEILD.
Chapter I
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When I was a small boy at the beginning of the century I remember an oldman who wore knee-breeches and worsted stockings, and who used to hobbleabout the street of our village with the help of a stick. He must havebeen getting on for eighty in the year 1807, earlier than which date Isuppose I can hardly remember him, for I was born in 1802. A few whitelocks hung about his ears, his shoulders were bent and his knees feeble,but he was still hale, and was much respected in our little world ofPaleham. His name was Pontifex.
His wife was said to be his master; I have been told she brought him alittle money, but it cannot have been much. She was a tall,square-shouldered person (I have heard my father call her a Gothic woman)who had insisted on being married to Mr Pontifex when he was young andtoo good-natured to say nay to any woman who wooed him. The pair hadlived not unhappily together, for Mr Pontifex's temper was easy and hesoon learned to bow before his wife's more stormy moods.
Mr Pontifex was a carpenter by trade; he was also at one time parishclerk; when I remember him, however, he had so far risen in life as to beno longer compelled to work with his own hands. In his earlier days hehad taught himself to draw. I do not say he drew well, but it wassurprising he should draw as well as he did. My father, who took theliving of Paleham about the year 1797, became possessed of a good many ofold Mr Pontifex's drawings, which were always of local subjects, and sounaffectedly painstaking that they might have passed for the work of somegood early master. I remember them as hanging up framed and glazed inthe study at the Rectory, and tinted, as all else in the room was tinted,with the green reflected from the fringe of ivy leaves that grew aroundthe windows. I wonder how they will actually cease and come to an end asdrawings, and into what new phases of being they will then enter.
Not content with being an artist, Mr Pontifex must needs also be amusician. He built the organ in the church with his own hands, and madea smaller one which he kept in his own house. He could play as much ashe could draw, not very well according to professional standards, butmuch better than could have been expected. I myself showed a taste formusic at an early age, and old Mr Pontifex on finding it out, as he soondid, became partial to me in consequence.
It may be thought that with so many irons in the fire he could hardly bea very thriving man, but this was not the case. His father had been aday labourer, and he had himself begun life with no other capital thanhis good sense and good constitution; now, however, there was a goodlyshow of timber about his yard, and a look of solid comfort over his wholeestablishment. Towards the close of the eighteenth century and not longbefore my father came to Paleham, he had taken a farm of about ninetyacres, thus making a considerable rise in life. Along with the farmthere went an old-fashioned but comfortable house with a charming gardenand an orchard. The carpenter's business was now carried on in one ofthe outhouses that had once been part of some conventual buildings, theremains of which could be seen in what was called the Abbey Close. Thehouse itself, embosomed in honeysuckles and creeping roses, was anornament to the whole village, nor were its internal arrangements lessexemplary than its outside was ornamental. Report said that Mrs Pontifexstarched the sheets for her best bed, and I can well believe it.
How well do I remember her parlour half filled with the organ which herhusband had built, and scented with a withered apple or two from the pyrus japonica that grew outside the house; the picture of the prize oxover the chimney-piece, which Mr Pontifex himself had painted; thetransparency of the man coming to show light to a coach upon a snowynight, also by Mr Pontifex; the little old man and little old woman whotold the weather; the china shepherd and shepherdess; the jars offeathery flowering grasses with a peacock's feather or two among them toset them off, and the china bowls full of dead rose leaves dried with baysalt. All has long since vanished and become a memory, faded but stillfragrant to myself.
Nay, but her kitchen—and the glimpses into a cavernous cellar beyond it,wherefrom came gleams from the pale surfaces of milk cans, or it may beof the arms and face of a milkmaid skimming the cream; or again herstoreroom, where among other treasures she kept the famous lipsalve whichwas one of her especial glories, and of which she would present a shapeyearly to those whom she delighted to honour. She wrote out the recipefor this and gave it to my mother a year or two before she died, but wecould never make it as she did. When we were children she used sometimesto send her respects to my mother, and ask leave for us to come and taketea with her. Right well she used to ply us. As for her temper, wenever met such a delightful old lady in our lives; whatever Mr Pontifexmay have had to put up with, we had no cause for complaint, and then MrPontifex would play to us upon the organ, and we would stand round himopen-mouthed and think him the most wonderfully clever man that ever wasborn, except of course our papa.
Mrs Pontifex had no sense of humour, at least I can call to mind no signsof this, but her husband had plenty of fun in him, though few would haveguessed it from his appearance. I remember my father once sent me downto his workship to get some glue, and I happened to come when oldPontifex was in the act of scolding his boy. He had got the lad—apudding-headed fellow—by the ear and was saying, "What? Lostagain—smothered o' wit." (I believe it was the boy who was himselfsupposed to be a wandering soul, and who was thus addressed as lost.)"Now, look here, my lad," he continued, "some boys are born stupid, andthou art one of them; some achieve stupidity—that's thee again, Jim—thouwast both born stupid and hast greatly increased thy birthright—andsome" (and here came a climax during which the boy's head and ear wereswayed from side to side) "have stupidity thrust upon them, which, if itplease the Lord, shall not be thy case, my lad, for I will thruststupidity from thee, though I have to box thine ears in doing so," but Idid not see that the old man really did box Jim's ears, or do more thanpretend to frighten him, for the two understood one another perfectlywell. Another time I remember hearing him call the village rat-catcherby saying, "Come hither, thou three-days-and-three-nights, thou,"alluding, as I afterwards learned, to the rat-catcher's periods ofintoxication; but I will tell no more of such trifles. My father's facewould always brighten when old Pontifex's name was mentioned. "I tellyou, Edward," he would say to me, "old Pontifex was not only an able man,but he was one of the very ablest