The Pilgrim by Hugh Nissenson Page B

must abstain from drinking wine or strong spirits.”
    â€œHenceforth, I will.”
    â€œGood! Now harken unto me. Over the years, these are what I have found are most effective against melancholy. First, exercise thyself, frequently and heartily, with violent labour, even though Hippocrates forbids it. For I have discovered that in this instance he is wrong.
    â€œNext, and most important: the world, as you know, is composed of opposites—God and the Devil, light and dark, wet and dry, &c. The humour of melancholy, for example, is cold and dry, that of choler, fiery and moist. Taken together, opposites make up the whole of everything. Therefore, act the opposite of what you feel. You feel vile, useless, and unworthy, therefore constantly do something that makes you feel good, useful, and worthy in God’s eyes.”
    My aunt Eliza, who was standing by my bed, said to me, “That is why I nursed you and Ben, even though I was terrified of the smallpox. It made me feel good, useful, and worthy in God’s eyes, as Doctor Troth said, and doing thus, when I can, keeps my melancholy at bay. The Lord judged me right to do so, for He spared me from catching the disease.”
    I was always in pain between my breasts—as if a great weight were pressing thereon. I suffered palpitations and, like my late father, shortness of breath. I lived in fear, never free, resolute, or secure, and always anxious without reason. Either I was unable to sleep or slept away the day. My aunt Eliza said that both were caused by the melancholic dryness of my brain. My uncle Roger roused me to work, and I exhausted myself with vigorous labor.
    I searched for another occupation on the farm that would make me feel useful and worthy, but found none. One day, I watched Hal, Patch’s sheep dog, throw a big black ram that had challenged the dog for supremacy over the ewes. Hal ran along the ram’s flank, shoved against his shoulder, and as it turned to butt, threw him down. Hal then led the flock away, returned, and with a pull on the black ram’s shoulder wool, set him upon his feet again. I laughed for the first time in months. Patch stood by playing upon his shepherd’s pipe. The air was filled with his music.
    In June, my uncle hired five shearmen. They, Patch, Jacob, Esau, Foot, and I washed Roger’s flock of two hundred fifty-one sheep in his dammed-up stream with a gravel bed, by the pen. We plucked the foul and loose wool from about their udders, while Patch examined their legs and hooves. It took half a day to drive all the sheep through the washing pool. An old ewe, distressed that I had washed her behind the ears, placed her two front hooves upon my breast and shoved me over backwards into the water. I laughed again.
    We spent three days shearing the sheep. We sorted them first, letting the young lambs go. We then sheared the ewes that were still suckling. The rams were done apart. Rooks and magpies picked over the sheep for maggots. Patch carried a small box of Stockholm tar to treat blow-fly, maggots, and broken skin. He smeared on the tar and sang the old song:
    A shepherd on a hill he sat,
    He had his tar box and his hat
    And his name was Jolly-Jolly Watt.
    In the late afternoon of the second day, a ewe caught her right foreleg in a hole and broke it. Patch slashed her throat with a pair of shears and wept; his tears ran down the sides of his nose. He walked with me into the midst of some green-winged orchids growing in the west meadow and said, “That ewe whose throat I just cut was very like the darling I buggered near the honey tree. I cannot help myself. Whenever I spy a frisky and comely ewe, with a long, thick, soft, and curly fleece, the Devil stretches my yard.
    â€œGoodwife Barret hath a charm for me, a special something wore upon a string about my neck. I know not what. But it costs ten pence. Can you lend me the money until New Year’s Day? Goodwife Barret also tells me I must