If there be none, then
wipe away that none,
he communicated to his uncle what the reader hath
been just before acquainted with.
Allworthy received the news with concern, with patience,
and with resignation. He dropt a tender tear,
then composed his countenance, and at last cried,
“The Lord’s will be done in everything.”
He now enquired for the messenger; but Blifil told
him it had been impossible to detain him a moment;
for he appeared by the great hurry he was in to have
some business of importance on his hands; that he
complained of being hurried and driven and torn out
of his life, and repeated many times, that if he could
divide himself into four quarters, he knew how to
dispose of every one.
Allworthy then desired Blifil to take care of the
funeral. He said, he would have his sister deposited
in his own chapel; and as to the particulars, he left
them to his own discretion, only mentioning the person
whom he would have employed on this occasion.
Which, among other things, may serve as a comment
on that saying of Aeschines, that “drunkenness
shows the mind of a man, as a mirrour reflects his
person.”
The reader may perhaps wonder at hearing nothing of
Mr Jones in the last chapter. In fact, his behaviour
was so different from that of the persons there mentioned,
that we chose not to confound his name with theirs.
When the good man had ended his speech, Jones was
the last who deserted the room. Thence he retired
to his own apartment, to give vent to his concern;
but the restlessness of his mind would not suffer
him to remain long there; he slipped softly therefore
to Allworthy’s chamber-door, where he listened
a considerable time without hearing any kind of motion
within, unless a violent snoring, which at last his
fears misrepresented as groans. This so alarmed
him, that he could not forbear entering the room;
where he found the good man in the bed, in a sweet
composed sleep, and his nurse snoring in the above
mentioned hearty manner, at the bed’s feet.
He immediately took the only method of silencing this
thorough bass, whose music he feared might disturb
Mr Allworthy; and then sitting down by the nurse, he
remained motionless till Blifil and the doctor came
in together and waked the sick man, in order that
the doctor might feel his pulse, and that the other
might communicate to him that piece of news, which,
had Jones been apprized of it, would have had great
difficulty of finding its way to Mr Allworthy’s
ear at such a season.
When he first heard Blifil tell his uncle this story,
Jones could hardly contain the wrath which kindled
in him at the other’s indiscretion, especially
as the doctor shook his head, and declared his unwillingness
to have the matter mentioned to his patient. But
as his passion did not so far deprive him of all use
of his understanding, as to hide from him the consequences
which any violent expression towards Blifil might
have on the sick, this apprehension stilled his rage
at the present; and he grew afterwards so satisfied
with finding that this news had, in fact, produced
no mischief, that he suffered his anger to die in
his own bosom, without ever mentioning it to Blifil.
