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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/7588.txt b/7588.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ad2f0f0 --- /dev/null +++ b/7588.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1657 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook The Caxtons, by Bulwer-Lytton, Part 3 +#17 in our series by Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers***** + + +Title: The Caxtons, Part 3 + +Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Release Date: February 2005 [EBook #7588] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on January 1, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 3 *** + + + +This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens +and David Widger + + + + + +PART III. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +It was a beautiful summer afternoon when the coach set me down at my +father's gate. Mrs. Primmins herself ran out to welcome me; and I had +scarcely escaped from the warm clasp of her friendly hand before I was +in the arms of my mother. + +As soon as that tenderest of parents was convinced that I was not +famished, seeing that I had dined two hours ago at Dr. Herman's, she led +me gently across the garden towards the arbor. "You will find your +father so cheerful," said she, wiping away a tear. "His brother is with +him." + +I stopped. His brother! Will the reader believe it? I had never heard +that he had a brother, so little were family affairs ever discussed in +my hearing. + +"His brother!" said I. "Have I then an Uncle Caxton as well as an Uncle +Jack?" + +"Yes, my love," said my mother. And then she added, "Your father and he +were not such good friends as they ought to have been, and the Captain +has been abroad. However, thank Heaven! they are now quite reconciled." + +We had time for no more,--we were in the arbor. There, a table was +spread with wine and fruit,--the gentlemen were at their dessert; and +those gentlemen were my father, Uncle Jack, Mr. Squills, and--tall, +lean, buttoned-to-the-chin--an erect, martial, majestic, and imposing +personage, who seemed worthy of a place in my great ancestor's "Boke of +Chivalrie." + +All rose as I entered; but my poor father, who was always slow in his +movements, had the last of me. Uncle Jack had left the very powerful +impression of his great seal-ring on my fingers; Mr. Squills had patted +me on the shoulder and pronounced me "wonderfully grown;" my new-found +relative had with great dignity said, "Nephew, your hand, sir,--I am +Captain de Caxton;" and even the tame duck had taken her beak from her +wing and rubbed it gently between my legs, which was her usual mode of +salutation, before my father placed his pale hand on my forehead, and +looking at me for a moment with unutterable sweetness, said, "More and +more like your mother,--God bless you!" + +A chair had been kept vacant for me between my father and his brother. +I sat down in haste, and with a tingling color on my cheeks and a rising +at my throat, so much had the unusual kindness of my father's greeting +affected me; and then there came over me a sense of my new position. I +was no longer a schoolboy at home for his brief holiday: I had returned +to the shelter of the roof-tree to become myself one of its supports. I +was at last a man, privileged to aid or solace those dear ones who had +ministered, as yet without return, to me. That is a very strange crisis +in our life when we come home for good. Home seems a different thing; +before, one has been but a sort of guest after all, only welcomed and +indulged, and little festivities held in honor of the released and happy +child. But to come home for good,--to have done with school and +boyhood,--is to be a guest, a child no more. It is to share the +everyday life of cares and duties; it is to enter into the confidences +of home. Is it not so? I could have buried my face in my hands and +wept! + +My father, with all his abstraction and all his simplicity, had a knack +now and then of penetrating at once to the heart. I verily believe he +read all that was passing in mine as easily as if it had been Greek. He +stole his arm gently round my waist and whispered, "Hush!" Then, +lifting his voice, he cried aloud, "Brother Roland, you must not let +Jack have the best of the argument." + +"Brother Austin," replied the Captain, very formally, "Mr. Jack, if I +may take the liberty so to call him--" + +"You may indeed," cried Uncle Jack. + +"Sir," said the Captain, bowing, "it is a familiarity that does me +honor. I was about to say that Mr. Jack has retired from the field." + +"Far from it," said Squills, dropping an effervescing powder into a +chemical mixture which he had been preparing with great attention, +composed of sherry and lemon-juice--"far from it. Mr. Tibbets--whose +organ of combativeness is finely developed, by the by--was saying--" + +"That it is a rank sin and shame in the nineteenth century," quoth Uncle +Jack, "that a man like my friend Captain Caxton--" + +"De Caxton, sir--Mr. Jack." + +"De Caxton,--of the highest military talents, of the most illustrious +descent,--a hero sprung from heroes,--should have served so many years, +and with such distinction, in his Majesty's service, and should now be +only a captain on half-pay. This, I say, comes of the infamous system +of purchase, which sets up the highest honors for sale, as they did in +the Roman empire--" + +My father pricked up his ears; but Uncle jack pushed on before my father +could get ready the forces of his meditated interruption. + +"A system which a little effort, a little union, can so easily +terminate. Yes, sir," and Uncle Jack thumped the table, and two +cherries bobbed up and smote Captain de Caxton on the nose, "yes, sir, I +will undertake to say that I could put the army upon a very different +footing. If the poorer and more meritorious gentlemen, like Captain de +Caxton, would, as I was just observing, but unite in a grand anti- +aristocratic association, each paying a small sum quarterly, we could +realize a capital sufficient to out-purchase all these undeserving +individuals, and every man of merit should have his fair chance of +promotion." + +"Egad! sir," said Squills, "there is something grand in that, eh, +Captain?" + +"No, sir," replied the Captain, quite seriously; "there is in monarchies +but one fountain of honor. It would be an interference with a soldier's +first duty,--his respect for his sovereign." + +"On the contrary," said Mr. Squills, "it would still be to the +sovereigns that one would owe the promotion." + +"Honor," pursued the Captain, coloring up, and unheeding this witty +interruption, "is the reward of a soldier. What do I care that a young +jackanapes buys his colonelcy over my head? Sir, he does not buy from +me my wounds and my services. Sir, he does not buy from me the medal I +won at Waterloo. He is a rich man, and I am a poor man; he is called-- +colonel, because he paid money for the name. That pleases him; well and +good. It would not please me; I had rather remain a captain, and feel +my dignity, not in my title, but in the services by which it has been +won. A beggarly, rascally association of stock-brokers, for aught I +know, buy me a company! I don't want to be uncivil, or I would say damn +'em--Mr.--sir--Jack!" + +A sort of thrill ran through the Captain's audience; even Uncle Jack +seemed touched, for he stared very hard at the grim veteran, and said +nothing. The pause was awkward; Mr. Squills broke it. "I should like," +quoth he, "to see your Waterloo medal,--you have it not about you?" + +"Mr. Squills," answered the Captain, "it lies next to my heart while I +live. It shall be buried in my coffin, and I shall rise with it, at the +word of command, on the day of the Grand Review!" So saying, the +Captain leisurely unbuttoned his coat, and detaching from a piece of +striped ribbon as ugly a specimen of the art of the silversmith (begging +its pardon) as ever rewarded merit at the expense of taste, placed the +medal on the table. + +The medal passed round, without a word, from hand to hand. + +"It is strange," at last said my father, "how such trifles can be made +of such value,--how in one age a man sells his life for what in the next +age he would not give a button! A Greek esteemed beyond price a few +leaves of olive twisted into a circular shape and set upon his head,--a +very ridiculous head-gear we should now call it. An American Indian +prefers a decoration of human scalps, which, I apprehend, we should all +agree (save and except Mr. Squills, who is accustomed to such things) to +be a very disgusting addition to one's personal attractions; and my +brother values this piece of silver, which may be worth about five +shillings, more than Jack does a gold mine, or I do the library of the +London Museum. A time will come when people will think that as idle a +decoration as leaves and scalps." + +"Brother," said the Captain, "there is nothing strange in the matter. +It is as plain as a pike-staff to a man who understands the principles +of honor." + +"Possibly," said my father, mildly. "I should like to hear what you +have to say upon honor. I am sure it would very much edify us all." + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +"Gentlemen," began the Captain, at the distinct appeal thus made to +him,--"Gentlemen, God made the earth, but man made the garden. God made +man, but man re-creates himself." + +"True, by knowledge," said my father. + +"By industry," said Uncle Jack. + +"By the physical conditions of his body," said Mr. Squills. He could +not have made himself other than he was at first in the woods and wilds +if he had fins like a fish, or could only chatter gibberish like a +monkey. Hands and a tongue, sir,--these are the instruments of +progress." + +"Mr. Squills," said my father, nodding, "Anaxagoras said very much the +same thing before you, touching the hands." + +"I cannot help that," answered Mr. Squills; "one could not open one's +lips, if one were bound to say what nobody else had said. But after +all, our superiority is less in our hands than the greatness, of our +thumbs." + +"Albinus, 'De Sceleto,' and our own learned William Lawrence, have made +a similar remark," again put in my father. "Hang it, sir!" exclaimed +Squills, "what business have you to know everything?" + +"Everything! No; but thumbs furnish subjects of investigation to the +simplest understanding," said my father, modestly. + +"Gentlemen," re-commenced my Uncle Roland, "thumbs and hands are given +to an Esquimaux, as well as to scholars and surgeons,--and what the +deuce are they the wiser for them? Sirs, you cannot reduce us thus into +mechanism. Look within. Man, I say, re-creates himself. How? By The +Principle Of Honor. His first desire is to excel some one else; his +first impulse is distinction above his fellows. Heaven places in his +soul, as if it were a compass, a needle that always points to one end; +namely, to honor in that which those around him consider honorable. +Therefore, as man at first is exposed to all dangers from wild beasts, +and from men as savage as himself, Courage becomes the first quality +mankind must honor: therefore the savage is courageous; therefore he +covets the praise for courage; therefore he decorates himself with the +skins of the beasts he has subdued, or the the scalps of the foes he has +slain. Sirs, don't tell me that the skins and the scalps are only hide +and leather: they are trophies of honor. Don't tell me that they are +ridiculous and disgusting: they become glorious as proofs that the +savage has emerged out of the first brute-like egotism, and attached +price to the praise which men never give except for works that secure or +advance their welfare. By and by, sirs, our savages discover that they +cannot live in safety amongst themselves unless they agree to speak the +truth to each other: therefore Truth becomes valued, and grows into a +principle of honor; so brother Austin will tell us that in the primitive +times truth was always the attribute of a hero." + +"Right," said my father; "Homer emphatically assigns it to Achilles." + +"Out of truth comes the necessity for some kind of rude justice and law. +Therefore men, after courage in the warrior, and truth in all, begin to +attach honor to the elder, whom they intrust with preserving justice +amongst them. So, sirs, Law is born--" + +"But the first lawgivers were priests," quoth my father. + +"Sirs, I am coming to that. Whence arises the desire of honor, but from +man's necessity of excelling,--in other words, of improving his +faculties for the benefit of others; though, unconscious of that +consequence, man only strives for their praise? But that desire for +honor is unextinguishable, and man is naturally anxious to carry its +rewards beyond the grave. Therefore he who has slain most lions or +enemies, is naturally prone to believe that he shall have the best +hunting fields in the country beyond, and take the best place at the +banquet. Nature, in all its operations, impresses man with the idea of +an invisible Power; and the principle of honorthat is, the desire of +praise and reward-snakes him anxious for the approval which that Power +can bestow. Thence comes the first rude idea of Religion; and in the +death-hymn at the stake, the savage chants songs prophetic of the +distinctions he is about to receive. Society goes on; hamlets are +built; property is established. He who has more than another has more +power than another. Power is honored. Alan covets the honor attached +to the power which is attached to possession. Thus the soil is +cultivated; thus the rafts are constructed; thus tribe trades with +tribe; thus Commerce is founded, and Civilization commenced. Sirs, all +that seems least connected with honor, as we approach the vulgar days of +the present, has its origin in honor, and is but an abuse of its +principles. If men nowadays are hucksters and traders, if even military +honors are purchased, and a rogue buys his way to a peerage, still all +arises from the desire for honor, which society, as it grows old, gives +to the outward signs of titles and gold, instead of, as once, to its +inward essentials,--courage, truth, justice, enterprise. Therefore I +say, sirs, that honor is the foundation of all improvement in mankind." + +"You have argued like a sclioolman, brother," said Mr. Caxton, +admiringly; "but still, as to this round piece of silver, don't we go +back to the most barbarous ages in estimating so highly such things as +have no real value in themselves,--as could not give us one opportunity +for instructing our minds?" + +"Could not pay for a pair of boots," added Uncle Jack. + +"Or," said Mr. Squills, "save you one twinge of the cursed rheumatism +you have got for life from that night's bivouac in the Portuguese +marshes,--to say nothing of the bullet in your cranium, and that cork- +leg, which must much diminish the salutary effects of your +constitutional walk." + +"Gentlemen," resumed the Captain, nothing abashed, "in going back to +those barbarous ages, I go back to the true principles of honor. It is +precisely because this round piece of silver has no value in the market +that it is priceless, for thus it is only a proof of desert. Where +would be the sense of service in this medal, if it could buy back my +leg, or if I could bargain it away for forty thousand a year? No, sirs, +its value is this,--that when I wear it on my breast, men shall say, +'That formal old fellow is not so useless as he seems. He was one of +those who saved England and freed Europe.' And even when I conceal it +here," and, devoutly kissing the medal, Uncle Roland restored it to its +ribbon and its resting-place, "and no eye sees it, its value is yet +greater in the thought that my country has not degraded the old and true +principles of honor, by paying the soldier who fought for her in the +same coin as that in which you, Mr. Jack, sir, pay your bootmaker's +bill. No, no, gentlemen. As courage was the first virtue that honor +called forth, the first virtue from which all safety and civilization +proceed, so we do right to keep that one virtue at least clear and +unsullied from all the money-making, mercenary, pay-me-in-cash +abominations which are the vices, not the virtues, of the civilization +it has produced." + +My Uncle Roland here came to a full stop; and, filling his glass, rose +and said solemnly: "A last bumper, gentlemen,--'To the dead who died for +England!'" + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +"Indeed, my dear, you must take it. You certainly have caught cold; you +sneezed three times together." + +"Yes, ma'am, because I would take a pinch of Uncle Roland's snuff, just +to say that I had taken a pinch out of his box,--the honor of the thing, +you know." + +"Ah, my dear! what was that very clever remark you made at the same +time, which so pleased your father,--something about Jews and the +college?" + +"Jews and--oh! pulverem Olgmpicum collegisse juvat, my dear mother,-- +which means that it is a pleasure to take a pinch out of a brave man's +snuff-box. I say, mother, put down the posset. Yes, I'll take it; I +will, indeed. Now, then, sit here,--that's right,--and tell me all you +know about this famous old Captain. Imprimis, he is older than my +father?" + +"To be sure!" exclaimed my mother, indignantly. "He looks twenty years +older; but there is only five years' real difference. Your father must +always look young." + +"And why does Uncle Roland put that absurd French de before his name; +and why were my father and he not good friends; and is he married; and +has he any children?" + +Scene of this conference: my own little room, new papered on purpose for +my return for good,--trellis-work paper, flowers and birds, all so fresh +and so new and so clean and so gay, with my books ranged in neat +shelves, and a writing-table by the window; and, without the window, +shines the still summer moon. The window is a little open: you scent +the flowers and the new-mown hay. Past eleven; and the boy and his dear +mother are all alone. + +"My dear, my dear, you ask so many questions at once!" + +"Don't answer them, then. Begin at the beginning, as Nurse Primmins +does with her fairy tales, 'Once on a time.' + +"Once on a time, then," said my mother, kissing me between the eyes,-- +"once on a time, my love, there was a certain clergyman in Cumberland +who had two sons; he had but a small living, and the boys were to make +their own way in the world. But close to the parsonage, on the brow of +a hill, rose an old ruin with one tower left, and this, with half the +country round it, had once belonged to the clergyman's family; but all +had been sold,--all gone piece by piece, you see, my dear, except the +presentation to the living (what they call the advowson was sold too), +which had been secured to the last of the family. The elder of these +sons was your Uncle Roland; the younger was your father. Now I believe +the first quarrel arose from the absurdist thing possible, as your +father says; but Roland was exceedingly touchy on all things connected +with his ancestors. He was always poring over the old pedigree, or +wandering amongst the ruins, or reading books of knight-errantry. Well, +where this pedigree began, I know not, but it seems that King Henry II. +gave some lands in Cumberland to one Sir Adam de Caxton; and from that +time, you see, the pedigree went regularly from father to son till Henry +V. Then, apparently from the disorders produced, as your father says, +by the Wars of the Roses, there was a sad blank left,--only one or two +names, without dates or marriages, till the time of Henry VIL, except +that in the reign of Edward IV. there was one insertion of a William +Caxton (named in a deed). Now in the village church there was a +beautiful brass monument to one Sir William de Caxton, who had been +killed at the battle of Bosworth, fighting for that wicked king Richard +III. And about the same time there lived, as you know, the great +printer, William Caxton. Well, your father, happening to be in town on +a visit to his aunt, took great trouble in hunting up all the old papers +he could find at the Heralds' College; and, sure enough, he was +overjoyed to satisfy himself that he was descended, not from that poor +Sir William who had been killed in so bad a cause, but from the great +printer, who was from a younger branch of the same family, and to whose +descendants the estate came in the reign of Henry VIII. It was upon +this that your Uncle Roland quarrelled with him,--and, indeed, I tremble +to think that they may touch on that matter again." + +"Then, my dear mother, I must say my uncle was wrong there so far as +common-sense is concerned; but still, somehow or other, I can understand +it. Surely, this was not the only cause of estrangement?" + +My mother looked down, and moved one hand gently over the other, which +was her way when embarrassed. "What was it, my own mother?" said I, +coaxingly. + +"I believe--that is, I--I think that they were both attached to the same +young lady." + +"How! you don't mean to say that my father was ever in love with any one +but you?" + +"Yes, Sisty,--yes, and deeply! And," added my mother, after a slight +pause, and with a very low sigh, "he never was in love with me; and what +is more, he had the frankness to tell me so!" + +"And yet you--" + +"Married him--yes!" said my mother, raising the softest and purest eyes +that ever lover could have wished to read his fate in; "yes, for the old +love was hopeless. I knew that I could make him happy. I knew that he +would love me at last, and he does so! My son, your father loves me!" + +As she spoke, there came a blush, as innocent as virgin ever knew, to my +mother's smooth cheek; and she looked so fair, so good, and still so +young all the while that you would have said that either Dusius, the +Teuton fiend, or Nock, the Scandinavian sea-imp, from whom the learned +assure us we derive our modern Daimones, "The Deuce," and Old Nick, had +possessed my father, if he had not learned to love such a creature. + +I pressed her hand to my lips; but my heart was too full tot speak for a +moment or so, and then I partially changed the subject. + +"Well, and this rivalry estranged them more? And who was the lady?" + +"Your father never told me, and I never asked," said my mother, simply. +But she was very different from me, I know. Very accomplished, very +beautiful, very highborn." + +"For all that, my father was a lucky man to escape her. Pass on. What +did the Captain do?" + +"Why, about that time your grandfather died; and shortly after an aunt, +on the mother's side, who was rich and saving, died, and unexpectedly +left each sixteen thousand pounds. Your uncle, with his share, bought +back, at an enormous price, the old castle and some land round it, which +they say does not bring him in three hundred a year. With the little +that remained, he purchased a commission in the army; and the brothers +met no more till last week, when Roland suddenly arrived." + +"He did not marry this accomplished young lady?" "No! but he married +another, and is a widower." + +"Why, he was as inconstant as my father, and I am sure without so good +an excuse. How was that?" + +"I don't know. He says nothing about it." + +"Has he any children?" + +"Two, a son--By the by, you must never speak about him. Your uncle +briefly said, when I asked him what was his family, 'A girl, ma'am. I +had a son, but--' + +"'He is dead,' cried your father, in his kind, pitying voice." + +"'Dead to me, brother; and you will never mention his name!' You should +have seen how stern your uncle looked. I was terrified." + +"But the girl,--why did not he bring her here?" + +"She is still in France, but he talks of going over for her; and we have +half promised to visit them both in Cumberland. But, bless me! is that +twelve? and the posset quite cold!" + +"One word more, dearest mother,--one word. My father's book,--is he +still going on with it?" + +"Oh yes, indeed!" cried my mother, clasping her hands; "and he must read +it to you, as he does to me,--you will understand it so well. I have +always been so anxious that the world should know him, and be proud of +him as we are,--so--so anxious! For perhaps, Sisty, if he had married +that great lady, he would have roused himself, been more ambitious,--and +I could only make him happy, I could not make him great!" + +"So he has listened to you at last?" + +"To me?" said my mother, shaking her head and smiling gently. "No, +rather to your Uncle Jack, who, I am happy to say, has at length got a +proper hold over him." + +"A proper hold, my dear mother! Pray beware of Uncle Jack, or we shall +all be swept into a coal-mine, or explode with a grand national company +for making gunpowder out of tea-leaves!" + +"Wicked child!" said my mother, laughing; and then, as she took up her +candle and lingered a moment while I wound my watch, she said, musingly: +"Yet Jack is very, very clever; and if for your sake we could make a +fortune, Sisty!" + +"You frighten me out of my wits, mother! You are not in earnest?" + +"And if my brother could be the means of raising him in the world--" + +"Your brother would be enough to sink all the ships in the Channel, +ma'am," said I, quite irreverently. I was shocked before the words were +well out of my mouth; and throwing my arms round my mother's neck, I +kissed away the pain I had inflicted. + +When I was left alone and in my own little crib, in which my slumber had +ever been so soft and easy, I might as well have been lying upon cut +straw. I tossed to and fro; I could not sleep. I rose, threw on my +dressing-gown, lighted my candle, and sat down by the table near the +window. First I thought of the unfinished outline of my father's youth, +so suddenly sketched before me. I filled up the missing colors, and +fancied the picture explained all that had often perplexed my +conjectures. I comprehended, I suppose by some secret sympathy in my +own nature (for experience in mankind could have taught me little +enough), how an ardent, serious, inquiring mind, struggling into passion +under the load of knowledge, had, with that stimulus sadly and abruptly +withdrawn, sunk into the quiet of passive, aimless study. I +comprehended how, in the indolence of a happy but unimpassioned +marriage, with a companion so gentle, so provident and watchful, yet so +little formed to rouse and task and fire an intellect naturally calm and +meditative, years upon years had crept away in the learned idleness of a +solitary scholar. I comprehended, too, how gradually and slowly, as my +father entered that stage of middle life when all men are most prone to +ambition, the long-silenced whispers were heard again, and the mind, at +last escaping from the listless weight which a baffled and disappointed +heart had laid upon it, saw once more, fair as in youth, the only true +mistress of Genius,--Fame. + +Oh! how I sympathized, too, in my mother's gentle triumph. Looking over +the past, I could see, year after year, how she had stolen more and more +into my father's heart of hearts; how what had been kindness had grown +into love; how custom and habit, and the countless links in the sweet +charities of home, had supplied that sympathy with the genial man which +had been missed at first by the lonely scholar. + +Next I thought of the gray, eagle-eyed old soldier, with his ruined +tower and barren acres, and saw before me his proud, prejudiced, +chivalrous boyhood, gliding through the ruins or poring over the mouldy +pedigree. And this son, so disowned,--for what dark offence? An awe +crept over me. And this girl,--his ewe-lamb, his all,--was she fair? +had she blue eyes like my mother, or a high Roman nose and beetle brows +like Captain Roland? I mused and mused and mused; and the candle went +out, and the moonlight grew broader and stiller; till at last I was +sailing in a balloon with Uncle Jack, and had just tumbled into the Red +Sea, when the well-known voice of Nurse Primmins restored me to life +with a "God bless my heart! the boy has not been in bed all this 'varsal +night!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +As soon as I was dressed I hastened downstairs, for I longed to revisit +my old haunts,--the little plot of garden I had sown with anemones and +tresses; the walk by the peach wall; the pond wherein I had angled for +roach and perch. + +Entering the hall, I discovered my Uncle Roland in a great state of +embarrassment. The maid-servant was scrubbing the stones at the hall- +door; she was naturally plump,--and it is astonishing how much more +plump a female becomes when she is on all-fours! The maid-servant, +then, was scrubbing the stones, her face turned from the Captain; and +the Captain, evidently meditating a sortie, stood ruefully gazing at the +obstacle before him and hemming aloud. Alas, the maidservant was deaf! +I stopped, curious to see how Uncle Roland would extricate himself from +the dilemma. + +Finding that his hems were in vain, my uncle made himself as small as he +could, and glided close to the left of the wall; at that instant the +maid turned abruptly round towards the right, and completely obstructed, +by this manoeuvre, the slight crevice through which hope had dawned on +her captive. My uncle stood stock-still,--and, to say the truth, he +could not have stirred an inch without coming into personal contact with +the rounded charms which blockaded his movements. My uncle took off his +hat and scratched his forehead in great perplexity. Presently, by a +slight turn of the flanks, the opposing party, while leaving him an +opportunity of return, entirely precluded all chance of egress in that +quarter. My uncle retreated in haste, and now presented himself to the +right wing of the enemy. He had scarcely done so, when, without looking +behind her, the blockading party shoved aside the pail that crippled the +range of her operations, and so placed it that it formed a formidable +barricade, which my uncle's cork leg had no chance of surmounting. +Therewith Captain Roland lifted his eyes appealingly to Heaven, and I +heard him distinctly ejaculate-- + +"Would to Heaven she were a creature in breeches!" + +But happily at this moment the maid-servant turned her head sharply +round, and seeing the Captain, rose in an instant, moved away the pail, +and dropped a frightened courtesy. + +My uncle Roland touched his hat. "I beg you a thousand pardons, my good +girl," said he; and, with a half bow, he slid into the open air. + +"You have a soldier's politeness, uncle," said I, tucking my arm into +Captain Roland's. + +"Tush, my boy," said he, smiling seriously, and coloring up to the +temples; "tush, say a gentleman's! To us, sir, every woman is a lady, +in right of her sex." + +Now, I had often occasion later to recall that aphorism of my uncle's; +and it served to explain to me how a man, so prejudiced on the score of +family pride, never seemed to consider it an offence in my father to +have married a woman whose pedigree was as brief as my dear mother's. +Had she been a Montmorenci, my uncle could not have been more respectful +and gallant than he was to that meek descendant of the Tibbetses. He +held, indeed, which I never knew any other man, vain of family, approve +or support,--a doctrine deduced from the following syllogisms: First, +that birth was not valuable in itself, but as a transmission of certain +qualities which descent from a race of warriors should perpetuate; +namely, truth, courage, honor; secondly, that whereas from the woman's +side we derive our more intellectual faculties, from the man's we derive +our moral: a clever and witty man generally has a clever and witty +mother; a brave and honorable man, a brave and honorable father. +Therefore all the qualities which attention to race should perpetuate +are the manly qualities, traceable only from the father's side. Again, +he held that while the aristocracy have higher and more chivalrous +notions, the people generally have shrewder and livelier ideas. +Therefore, to prevent gentlemen from degenerating into complete +dunderheads, an admixture with the people, provided always it was on the +female side, was not only excusable, but expedient; and, finally, my +uncle held that whereas a man is a rude, coarse, sensual animal, and +requires all manner of associations to dignify and refine him, women are +so naturally susceptible of everything beautiful in sentiment and +generous in purpose that she who is a true woman is a fit peer for a +king. Odd and preposterous notions, no doubt, and capable of much +controversy, so far as the doctrine of race (if that be any way tenable) +is concerned; but then the plain fact is that my Uncle Roland was as +eccentric and contradictory a gentleman--as--as--why, as you and I are, +if we once venture to think for ourselves. + +"Well, sir, and what profession are you meant for?" asked my uncle. +"Not the army, I fear?" + +"I have never thought of the subject, uncle." + +"Thank Heaven," said Captain Roland, "we have never yet had a lawyer in +the family, nor a stockbroker, nor a tradesman--ahem!" + +I saw that my great ancestor the printer suddenly rose up in that hem. + +"Why, uncle, there are honorable men in all callings." + +"Certainly, sir. But in all callings honor is not the first principle +of action." + +"But it may be, sir, if a man of honor pursue it! There are some +soldiers who have been great rascals!" + +My uncle looked posed, and his black brows met thoughtfully. "You are +right, boy, I dare say," he answered, somewhat mildly. "But do you +think that it ought to give me as much pleasure to look on my old ruined +tower if I knew it had been bought by some herring-dealer, like the +first ancestor of the Poles, as I do now, when I know it was given to a +knight and gentleman (who traced his descent from an Anglo-Dane in the +time of King Alfred) for services done in Aquitaine and Gascony, by +Henry the Plantagenet? And do you mean to tell me that I should have +been the same man if I had not from a boy associated that old tower with +all ideas of what its owners were, and should be, as knights and +gentlemen? Sir, you would have made a different being of me if at the +head of my pedigree you had clapped a herring-dealer,--though, I dare +say, the herring-dealer might have been as good a man as ever the Anglo- +Dane was, God rest him!" + +"And for the same reason I suppose, sir, that you think my father never +would have been quite the same being he is if he had not made that +notable discovery touching our descent from the great William Caxton, +the printer." + +My uncle bounded as if he had been shot,--bounded so incautiously, +considering the materials of which one leg was composed, that he would +have fallen into a strawberry-bed if I had not caught him by the arm. + +"Why, you--you--you young jackanapes!" cried the Captain, shaking me off +as soon as he had regained his equilibrium. "You do not mean to inherit +that infamous crotchet my brother has got into his head? You do not +mean to exchange Sir William de Caxton, who fought and fell at Bosworth, +for the mechanic who sold black-letter pamphlets in the Sanctuary at +Westminster?" + +"That depends on the evidence, uncle!" + +"No, sir; like all noble truths, it depends upon faith. Men, nowadays," +continued my uncle, with a look of ineffable disgust, "actually require +that truths should be proved." + +"It is a sad conceit on their part, no doubt, my dear uncle; but till a +truth is proved, how can we know that it is a truth?" + +I thought that in that very sagacious question I had effectually caught +my uncle. Not I. He slipped through it like an eel. + +"Sir," said he, "whatever in Truth makes a man's heart warmer and his +soul purer, is a belief, not a knowledge. Proof, sir, is a handcuff; +belief is a wing! Want proof as to an ancestor in the reign of King +Richard? Sir, you cannot even prove to the satisfaction of a logician +that you are the son of your own father. Sir, a religious man does not +want to reason about his religion; religion is not mathematics. +Religion is to be felt, not proved. There are a great many things in +the religion of a good man which are not in the catechism. Proof!" +continued my uncle, growing violent--"Proof, sir, is a low, vulgar, +levelling, rascally Jacobin; Belief is a loyal, generous, chivalrous +gentleman! No, no; prove what you please, you shall never rob me of one +belief that has made me--" + +"The finest-hearted creature that ever talked nonsense," said my father, +who came up, like Horace's deity, at the right moment. "What is it you +must believe in, brother, no matter what the proof against you?" + +My uncle was silent, and with great energy dug the point of his cane +into the gravel. + +"He will not believe in our great ancestor the printer," said I, +maliciously. + +My father's calm brow was overcast in a moment. "Brother," said the +Captain, loftily, "you have a right to your own ideas; but you should +take care how they contaminate your child." + +"Contaminate!" said my father, and for the first time I saw an angry +sparkle flash from his eyes; but he checked himself on the instant. +"Change the word, my dear brother." + +"No, sir, I will not change it! To belie the records of the family!" + +"Records! A brass plate in a village church against all the books of +the College of Arms!" + +"To renounce your ancestor, a knight who died in the field!" + +"For the worst cause that man ever fought for!" + +"On behalf of his king!" + +"Who had murdered his nephews!" + +"A knight! with our crest on his helmet." + +"And no brains underneath it, or he would never have had them knocked +out for so bloody a villain!" + +"A rascally, drudging, money-making printer!" + +"The wise and glorious introducer of the art that has enlightened a +world. Prefer for an ancestor, to one whom scholar and sage never name +but in homage, a worthless, obscure, jolter-headed booby in mail, whose +only record to men is a brass plate in a church in a village!" + +My uncle turned round perfectly livid. "Enough, sir! enough! I am +insulted sufficiently. I ought to have expected it. I wish you and +your son a very good day." + +My father stood aghast. The Captain was hobbling off to the iron gate; +in another moment he would have been out of our precincts. I ran up and +hung upon him. "Uncle, it is all my fault. Between you and me, I am +quite of your side; pray forgive us both. What could I have been +thinking of, to vex you so? And my father, whom your visit has made so +happy!" My uncle paused, feeling for the latch of the gate. My father +had now come up, and caught his hand. "What are all the printers that +ever lived, and all the books they ever printed, to one wrong to thy +fine heart, brother Roland? Shame on me! A bookman's weak point, you +know! It is very true, I should never have taught the boy one thing to +give you pain, brother Roland,--though I don't remember," continued my +father, with a perplexed look, "that I ever did teach it him, either! +Pisistratus, as you value my blessing, respect as your ancestor Sir +William de Caxton, the hero of Bosworth. Come, come, brother!" + +"I am an old fool," said Uncle Roland, "whichever way we look at it. +Ah, you young dog, you are laughing at us both!" + +"I have ordered breakfast on the lawn," said my mother, coming out from +the porch, with her cheerful smile on her lips; "and I think the devil +will be done to your liking to-day, brother Roland." + +"We have had enough of the devil already, my love," said my father, +wiping his forehead. + +So, while the birds sang overhead or hopped familiarly across the sward +for the crumbs thrown forth to them, while the sun was still cool in the +east, and the leaves yet rustled with the sweet air of morning, we all +sat down to our table, with hearts as reconciled to each other, and as +peaceably disposed to thank God for the fair world around us, as if the +river had never run red through the field of Bosworth, and that +excellent Mr. Caxton had never set all mankind by the ears with an +irritating invention a thousand times more provocative of our combative +tendencies than the blast of the trumpet and the gleam of the banner! + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +"Brother," said Mr. Caxton, "will walk with you to the Roman +encampment." + +The Captain felt that this proposal was meant as the greatest peace- +offering my father could think of; for, first, it was a very long walk, +and my father detested long walks; secondly, it was the sacrifice of a +whole day's labor at the Great Work. And yet, with that quick +sensibility which only the generous possess, Uncle Roland accepted at +once the proposal. If he had not done so, my father would have had a +heavier heart for a month to come. And how could the Great Work have +got on while the author was every now and then disturbed by a twinge of +remorse? + +Half an hour after breakfast, the brothers set off arm-inarm; and I +followed, a little apart, admiring how sturdily the old soldier got over +the ground, in spite of the cork leg. It was pleasant enough to listen +to their conversation, and notice the contrasts between these two +eccentric stamps from Dame Nature's ever-variable mould,--Nature, who +casts nothing in stereotype; for I do believe that not even two fleas +can be found identically the same. + +My father was not a quick or minute observer of rural beauties. He had +so little of the organ of locality that I suspect he could have lost his +way in his own garden. But the Captain was exquisitely alive to +external impressions,--not a feature in the landscape escaped him. At +every fantastic gnarled pollard he halted to gaze; his eye followed the +lark soaring up from his feet; when a fresher air came from the hill-top +his nostrils dilated, as if voluptuously to inhale its delight. My +father, with all his learning, and though his study had been in the +stores of all language, was very rarely eloquent. The Captain had a +glow and a passion in his words which, what with his deep, tremulous +voice and animated gestures, gave something poetic to half of what he +uttered. In every sentence of Roland's, in every tone of his voice and +every play of his face, there was some outbreak of pride; but unless you +set him on his hobby of that great ancestor the printer, my father had +not as much pride as a homeeopathist could have put into a globule. He +was not proud even of not being proud. Chafe all his feathers, and +still you could rouse but the dove. My father was slow and mild, my +uncle quick and fiery; my father reasoned, my uncle imagined; my father +was very seldom wrong, my uncle never quite in the right; but, as my +father once said of him, "Roland beats about the bush till he sends out +the very bird that we went to search for. He is never in the wrong +without suggesting to us what is the right." All in my uncle was stern, +rough, and angular; all in my father was sweet, polished, and rounded +into a natural grace. My uncle's character cast out a multiplicity of +shadows, like a Gothic pile in a northern sky. My father stood serene +in the light, like a Greek temple at mid-day in a southern clime. Their +persons corresponded with their natures. My uncle's high, aquiline +features, bronzed hue, rapid fire of eye, and upper lip that always +quivered, were a notable contrast to my father's delicate profile, +quiet, abstracted gaze, and the steady sweetness that rested on his +musing smile. Roland's forehead was singularly high, and rose to a peak +in the summit where phrenologists place the organ of veneration; but it +was narrow, and deeply furrowed. Augustine's might be as high, but then +soft, silky hair waved carelessly over it, concealing its height, but +not its vast breadth, on which not a wrinkle was visible. And yet, +withal, there was a great family likeness between the two brothers. +When some softer sentiment subdued him, Roland caught the very look of +Augustine; when some high emotion animated my father, you might have +taken him for Roland. I have often thought since, in the greater +experience of mankind which life has afforded me, that if, in early +years, their destinies had been exchanged,--if Roland had taken to +literature, and my father had been forced into action,--each would have +had greater worldly success. For Roland's passion and energy would have +given immediate and forcible effect to study; he might have been a +historian or a poet. It is not study alone that produces a writer, it +is intensity. In the mind, as in yonder chimney, to make the fire burn +hot and quick, you must narrow the draught. Whereas, had my father been +forced into the practical world, his calm depth of comprehension, his +clearness of reason, his general accuracy in such notions as he once +entertained and pondered over, joined to a temper that crosses and +losses could never ruffle, and utter freedom from vanity and self-love, +from prejudice and passion, might have made him a very wise and +enlightened counsellor in the great affairs of life,--a lawyer, a +diplomatist, a statesman, for what I know, even a great general, if his +tender humanity had not stood in the way of his military mathematics. + +But as it was,--with his slow pulse never stimulated by action, and too +little stirred by even scholarly ambition,--my father's mind went on +widening and widening till the circle was lost in the great ocean of +contemplation; and Roland's passionate energy, fretted into fever by +every let and hindrance in the struggle with his kind, and narrowed more +and more as it was curbed within the channels of active discipline and +duty, missed its due career altogether, and what might have been the +poet, contracted into the humorist. + +Yet who that had ever known ye, could have wished you other than ye +were, ye guileless, affectionate, honest, simple creatures?---simple +both, in spite of all the learning of the one, all the prejudices, +whims, irritabilities, and crotchets of the other. There you are, +seated on the height of the old Roman camp, with a volume of the +Stratagems of Polyaenus (or is it Frontinus?) open on my father's lap; +the sheep grazing in the furrows of the circumvallations; the curious +steer gazing at you where it halts in the space whence the Roman cohorts +glittered forth; and your boy-biographer standing behind you with folded +arms, and--as the scholar read, or the soldier pointed his cane to each +fancied post in the war--filling up the pastoral landscape with the +eagles of Agricola and the scythed cars of Boadicea! + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +"It is never the same two hours together in this country," said my Uncle +Roland, as, after dinner, or rather after dessert, we joined my mother +in the drawing-room. + +Indeed, a cold, drizzling rain had come on within the last two hours, +and though it was July, it was as chilly as if it had been October. My +mother whispered to me, and I went out; in ten minutes more, the logs +(for we live in a wooded country) blazed merrily in the grate. Why +could not my mother have rung the bell and ordered the servant to light +a fire? My dear reader, Captain Roland was poor, and he made a capital +virtue of economy! + +The two brothers drew their chairs near to the hearth, my father at the +left, my uncle at the right; and I and my mother sat down to "Fox and +Geese." + +Coffee came in,--one cup for the Captain, for the rest of the party +avoided that exciting beverage. And on that cup was a picture of--His +Grace the Duke of Wellington! + +During our visit to the Roman camp my mother had borrowed Mr. Squills's +chaise and driven over to our market-town, for the express purpose of +greeting the Captain's eyes with the face of his old chief. + +My uncle changed color, rose, lifted my mother's hand to his lips, and +sat himself down again in silence. + +"I have heard," said the Captain after a pause, "that the Marquis of +Hastings, who is every inch a soldier and a gentleman,--and that is +saying not a little, for he measures seventyfive inches from the crown +to the sole,--when he received Louis XVIII. (then an exile) at +Donnington, fitted up his apartments exactly like those his Majesty had +occupied at the Tuileries. It was a kingly attention (my Lord Hastings, +you know, is sprung from the Plantagenets),--a kingly attention to a +king. It cost some money and made some noise. A woman can show the +same royal delicacy of heart in this bit of porcelain, and so quietly +that we men all think it a matter of course, brother Austin." + +"You are such a worshipper of women, Roland, that it is melancholy to +see you single. You must marry again!" + +My uncle first smiled, then frowned, and lastly sighed somewhat heavily. + +"Your time will pass slowly in your old tower, poor brother," continued +my father, "with only your little girl for a companion." + +"And the past!" said my uncle; "the past, that mighty world--" + +"Do you still read your old books of chivalry,--Froissart and the +Chronicles, Palmerin of England, and Amadis of Gaul?" + +"Why," said my uncle, reddening, "I have tried to improve myself with +studies a little more substantial. And," he added with a sly smile, +"there will be your great book for many a long winter to come." + +"Um!" said my father, bashfully. + +"Do you know," quoth my uncle, "that Dame Primmins is a very intelligent +woman,--full of fancy, and a capital story-teller?" + +"Is not she, uncle?" cried I, leaving my fox in the corner. "Oh, if you +could hear her tell the tale of King Arthur and the Enchanted Lake, or +the Grim White Woman!" + +"I have already heard her tell both," said my uncle. + +"The deuce you have, brother! My dear, we must look to this. These +captains are dangerous gentlemen in an orderly household. Pray, where +could you have had the opportunity of such private communications with +Mrs. Primmins?" + +"Once," said my uncle, readily, "when I went into her room, while she +mended my stock; and once--" He stopped short, and looked down. + +"Once when? Out with it." + +"When she was warming my bed," said my uncle, in a half-whisper. + +"Dear!" said my mother, innocently, "that's how the sheets came by that +bad hole in the middle. I thought it was the warming-pan." + +"I am quite shocked!" faltered my uncle. + +"You well may be," said my father. "A woman who has been heretofore +above all suspicion! But come," he said, seeing that my uncle looked +sad, and was no doubt casting up the probable price of twice six yards +of holland, "but come, you were always a famous rhapsodist or tale- +teller yourself. Come, Roland, let us have some story of your own,-- +something which your experience has left strong in your impressions." + +"Let us first have the candles," said my mother. + +The candles were brought, the curtains let down; we all drew our chairs +to the hearth. But in the interval my uncle had sunk into a gloomy +revery; and when we called upon him to begin, he seemed to shake off +with effort some recollections of pain. + +"You ask me," he said, "to tell you some tale which my own experience +has left deeply marked in my impressions,--I will tell you one, apart +from my own life, but which has often haunted me. It is sad and +strange, ma'am." + +"Ma'am, brother?" said my mother, reproachfully, letting her small hand +drop upon that which, large and sunburnt, the Captain waved towards her +as he spoke. + +"Austin, you have married an angel!" said my uncle; and he was, I +believe, the only brother-in-law who ever made so hazardous an +assertion. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +MY UNCLE ROLAND'S TALE. + + +"It was in Spain--no matter where or how--that it was my fortune to take +prisoner a French officer of the same rank that I then held,--a +lieutenant; and there was so much similarity in our sentiments that we +became intimate friends,--the most intimate friend I ever had, sister, +out of this dear circle. He was a rough soldier, whom the world had not +well treated; but he never railed at the world, and maintained that he +had had his deserts. Honor was his idol, and the sense of honor paid +him for the loss of all else. + +"We were both at that time volunteers in a foreign service,--in that +worst of service, civil war,--he on one side, I the other, both, +perhaps, disappointed in the cause we had severally espoused. There was +something similar, too, in our domestic relationships. He had a son--a +boy--who was all in life to him, next to his country and his duty. I +too had then such a son, though of fewer years." (The Captain paused an +instant; we exchanged glances, and a stifling sensation of pain and +suspense was felt by all his listeners.) "We were accustomed, brother, +to talk of these children, to picture their future, to compare our hopes +and dreams. We hoped and dreamed alike. A short time sufficed to +establish this confidence. My prisoner was sent to head-quarters, and +soon afterwards exchanged. + +"We met no more till last year. Being then at Paris, I inquired for my +old friend, and learned that he was living at R--, a few miles from the +capital. I went to visit him. I found his house empty and deserted. +That very day he had been led to prison, charged with a terrible crime. +I saw him in that prison, and from his own lips learned his story. His +son had been brought up, as he fondly believed, in the habits and +principles of honorable men, and having finished his education, came to +reside with him at R--. The young man was accustomed to go frequently +to Paris. A young Frenchman loves pleasure, sister; and pleasure is +found at Paris. The father thought it natural, and stripped his age of +some comforts to supply luxuries to the son's youth. + +"Shortly after the young man's arrival, my friend perceived that he was +robbed. Moneys kept in his bureau were abstracted, he knew not how, nor +could guess by whom. It must be done in the night. He concealed +himself and watched. He saw a stealthy figure glide in, he saw a false +key applied to the lock; he started forward, seized the felon, and +recognized his son. What should the father have done? I do not ask +you, sister! I ask these men: son and father, I ask you." + +"Expelled him the house," cried I. + +"Done his duty, and reformed the unhappy wretch," said my father. "Nemo +repente turpissinus semper fait,--No man is wholly bad all at once." + +"The father did as you would have advised, brother. He kept the youth; +he remonstrated with him: he did more,--he gave him the key of the +bureau. 'Take what I have to give,' said he; 'I would rather be a +beggar than know my son a thief.'" + +"Right! And the youth repented, and became a good man?" exclaimed my +father. + +Captain Roland shook his head. "The youth promised amendment, and +seemed penitent. He spoke of the temptations of Paris, the gaming- +table, and what not. He gave up his daily visits to the capital. He +seemed to apply to study. Shortly after this, the neighborhood was +alarmed by reports of night robberies on the road. Men, masked and +armed, plundered travellers, and even broke into houses. + +"The police were on the alert. One night an old brother officer knocked +at my friend's door. It was late; the veteran (he was a cripple, by the +way, like myself,--strange coincidence!) was in bed. He came down in +haste, when his servant woke, and told him that his old friend, wounded +and bleeding, sought an asylum under his roof. The wound, however, was +slight. The guest had been attacked and robbed on the road. The next +morning the proper authority of the town was sent for. The plundered +man described his loss,--some billets of five hundred francs in a +pocketbook, on which was embroidered his name and coronet (he was a +vicomte). The guest stayed to dinner. Late in the forenoon, the son +looked in. The guest started to see him; my friend noticed his +paleness. Shortly after, on pretence of faintness, the guest retired to +his room, and sent for his host. 'My friend,' said he, 'can you do me a +favor? Go to the magistrate and recall the evidence I have given.' + +"'Impossible,' said the host. 'What crotchet is this?' + +"The guest shuddered. 'Peste!' said he, 'I do not wish in my old age to +be hard on others. Who knows how the robber may have been tempted, and +who knows what relations he may have,--honest men, whom his crime would +degrade forever! Good heavens! if detected, it is the galleys, the +galleys!' + +"And what then? The robber knew what he braved. 'But did his father +know it?' cried the guest. + +"A light broke upon my unhappy comrade in arms; he caught his friend by +the hand: 'You turned pale at my son's sight,--where did you ever see +him before? Speak!' + +"'Last night on the road to Paris. The mask slipped aside. Call back my +evidence!' + +"'You are mistaken,' said my friend, calmly. 'I saw my son in his bed, +and blessed him, before I went to my own.' + +"'I will believe you,' said the guest; 'and never shall my hasty +suspicion pass my lips,--but call back the evidence.' + +"The guest returned to Paris before dusk. The father conversed with his +son on the subject of his studies; he followed him to his room, waited +till he was in bed, and was then about to retire, when the youth said, +'Father, you have forgotten your blessing.' + +"The father went back, laid his hand on the boy's head and prayed. He +was credulous--fathers are so! He was persuaded that his friend had +been deceived. He retired to rest, and fell asleep. He woke suddenly +in the middle of the night, and felt (I here quote his words)--'I felt,' +said he, 'as if a voice had awakened me,--a voice that said, "Rise and +search." I rose at once, struck a light, and went to my son's room. +The door was locked. I knocked once, twice, thrice no answer. I dared +not call aloud, lest I should rouse the servants. I went down the +stairs, I opened the back-door, I passed to the stables. My own horse +was there, not my son's. My horse neighed; it was old, like myself,--my +old charger at Mont St. Jean. I stole back, I crept into the shadow of +the wall by my son's door, and extinguished my light. I felt as if I +were a thief myself.'" + +"Brother," interrupted my mother, under her breath; "speak in your own +words, not in this wretched father's. I know not why, but it would +shock me less." + +The Captain nodded. + +"Before daybreak, my friend heard the back-door open gently; a foot +ascended the stair, a key grated in the door of the room close at hand: +the father glided through the dark into that chamber behind his unseen +son. + +"He heard the clink of the tinder-box; a light was struck; it spread +over the room, but he had time to place himself behind the window- +curtain which was close at hand. The figure before him stood a moment +or so motionless, and seemed to listen, for it turned to the right, to +the left, its visage covered with the black, hideous mask which is worn +in carnivals. Slowly the mask was removed. Could that be his son's +face,--the son of a brave man? It was pale and ghastly with scoundrel +fears; the base drops stood on the brow; the eye was haggard and +bloodshot. He looked as a coward looks when death stands before him. + +"The youth walked, or rather skulked, to the secretaire, unlocked it, +opened a secret drawer, placed within it the contents of his pockets and +his frightful mask; the father approached softly, looked over his +shoulder, and saw in the drawer the pocketbook embroidered with his +friend's name. Meanwhile, the son took out his pistols, uncocked them +cautiously, and was about also to secrete them, when his father arrested +his arm. 'Robber, the use of these is yet to come!' + +"The son's knees knocked together, an exclamation for mercy burst from +his lips; but when, recovering the mere shock of his dastard nerves, he +perceived it was not the gripe of some hireling of the law, but a +father's hand that had clutched his arm, the vile audacity which knows +fear only from a bodily cause, none from the awe of shame, returned to +him. + +"Tush, sir!' he said, 'waste not time in reproaches, for, I fear, the +gendarmes are on my track. It is well that you are here; you can swear +that I have spent the night at home. Unhand me, old man; I have these +witnesses still to secrete,' and he pointed to the garments wet and +dabbled with the mud of the roads. He had scarcely spoken when the +walls shook; there was the heavy clatter of hoofs on the ringing +pavement without. + +"'They come!' cried the son. 'Off, dotard! save your son from the +galleys.' + +"'The galleys, the galleys!' said the father, staggering back; 'it is +true; he said--"the galleys!"' + +"There was a loud knocking at the gate. The gendarmes surrounded the +house. 'Open, in the name of the law!' No answer came, no door was +opened. Some of the gendarmes rode to the rear of the house, in which +was placed the stable yard. From the window of the son's room the +father saw the sudden blaze of torches, the shadowy forms of the men- +hunters. He heard the clatter of arms as they swung themselves from +their horses. He heard a voice cry, 'Yes, this is the robber's gray +horse,--see, it still reeks with sweat!' And behind and in front, at +either door, again came the knocking, and again the shout, 'Open, in the +name of the law!' + +"Then lights began to gleam from the casements of the neighboring +houses; then the space filled rapidly with curious wonderers startled +from their sleep: the world was astir, and the crowd came round to know +what crime or what shame had entered the old soldier's home. + +"Suddenly, within, there was heard the report of a fire-arm; and a minute +or so afterwards the front door was opened, and the soldier appeared. + +"'Enter,' he said to the gendarmes: 'what would you?' + +"'We seek a robber who is within your walls.' + +"I know it; mount and find him: I will lead the way.' + +"He ascended the stairs; he threw open his son's room: the officers of +justice poured in, and on the floor lay the robber's corpse. + +"They looked at each other in amazement. 'Take what is left you,' said +the father. 'Take the dead man rescued from the galleys; take the +living man on whose hands rests the dead man's blood!' + +"I was present at my friend's trial. The facts had become known +beforehand. He stood there with his gray hair, and his mutilated limbs, +and the deep scar on his visage, and the Cross of the Legion of Honor on +his breast; and when he had told his tale, he ended with these words: 'I +have saved the son whom I reared for France from a doom that would have +spared the life to brand it with disgrace. Is this a crime? I give you +my life in exchange for my son's disgrace. Does my country need a +victim? I have lived for my country's glory, and I can die contented to +satisfy its laws, sure that, if you blame me, you will not despise; sure +that the hands that give me to the headsman will scatter flowers over my +grave. Thus I confess all. I, a soldier, look round amongst a nation +of soldiers; and in the name of the star which glitters on my breast I +dare the fathers of France to condemn me!' + +"They acquitted the soldier,--at least they gave a verdict answering to +what in our courts is called 'justifiable homicide.' A shout rose in the +court which no ceremonial voice could still; the crowd would have borne +him in triumph to his house, but his look repelled such vanities. To +his house he returned indeed; and the day afterwards they found him +dead, beside the cradle in which his first prayer had been breathed over +his sinless child. Now, father and son, I ask you, do you condemn that +man?" + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +My father took three strides up and down the room, and then, halting on +his hearth, and facing his brother, he thus spoke: "I condemn his deed, +Roland! At best he was but a haughty egotist. I understand why Brutus +should slay his sons. By that sacrifice he saved his country! What did +this poor dupe of an exaggeration save? Nothing but his own name. He +could not lift the crime from his son's soul, nor the dishonor from his +son's memory. He could but gratify his own vain pride; and insensibly +to himself, his act was whispered to him by the fiend that ever whispers +to the heart of man, 'Dread men's opinions more than God's law!' Oh, my +dear brother! what minds like yours should guard against the most is not +the meanness of evil,--it is the evil that takes false nobility, by +garbing itself in the royal magnificence of good." My uncle walked to +the window, opened it, looked out a moment, as if to draw in fresh air, +closed it gently, and came back again to his seat; but during the short +time the window had been left open, a moth flew in. + +"Tales like these," renewed my father, pityingly,--"whether told by some +great tragedian, or in thy simple style, my brother,--tales like these +have their uses: they penetrate the heart to make it wiser; but all +wisdom is meek, my Roland. They invite us to put the question to +ourselves that thou hast asked, 'Can we condemn this man?' and reason +answers as I have answered, 'We pity the man, we condemn the deed.' +We--take care, my love! that moth will be in the candle. We--whisk! +whisk!" and my father stopped to drive away the moth. My uncle turned, +and taking his handkerchief from the lower part of his face, of which he +had wished to conceal the workings, he flapped away the moth from the +flame. My mother moved the candles from the moth. + +I tried to catch the moth in my father's straw-hat. The deuce was in +the moth! it baffled us all, now circling against the ceiling, now +sweeping down at the fatal lights. As if by a simultaneous impulse, my +father approached one candle, my uncle approached the other; and just as +the moth was wheeling round and round, irresolute which to choose for +its funeral pyre, both candles were put out. The fire had burned down +low in the grate, and in the sudden dimness my father's soft, sweet +voice came forth, as if from an invisible being: "We leave ourselves in +the dark to save a moth from the flame, brother! Shall we do less for +our fellow-men? Extinguish, oh! humanely extinguish, the light of our +reason when the darkness more favors our mercy." Before the lights were +relit, my uncle had left the room; his brother followed him. My mother +and I drew near to each other and talked in whispers. + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 3 *** + +********* This file should be named 7588.txt or 7588.zip ********** + +This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens +and David Widger + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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