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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/7598.txt b/7598.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7b4a63d --- /dev/null +++ b/7598.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1115 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook The Caxtons, by Bulwer-Lytton, Part 13 +#27 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 13 + +Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Release Date: February 2005 [EBook #7598] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on January 7, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 13 *** + + + +This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens +and David Widger + + + + + +THE CAXTONS + +A FAMILY PICTURE + + +BY + +EDWARD BULWER LYTTON (LORD LYTTON) + + + + + +THE CAXTONS. + + +PART XIII, + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +Saint Chrysostom, in his work on "The Priesthood," defends deceit, if +for a good purpose, by many Scriptural examples; ends his first book by +asserting that it is often necessary, and that much benefit may arise +from it; and begins his second book by saying that it ought not to be +called "deceit," but "good management." (1) + +"Good management," then, let me call the innocent arts by which I now +sought to insinuate my project into favor and assent with my +unsuspecting family. At first I began with Roland. I easily induced +him to read some of the books, full of the charm of Australian life, +which Trevanion had sent me; and so happily did those descriptions suit +his own erratic tastes, and the free, half-savage man that lay rough and +large within that soldierly nature, that he himself, as it were, seemed +to suggest my own ardent desire, sighed, as the careworn Trevanion had +done, that "he was not my age," and blew the flame that consumed me, +with his own willing breath. So that when at last--wandering one day +over the wild moors--I said, knowing his hatred of law and lawyers: +"Alas, uncle, that nothing should be left for me but the Bar!" Captain +Roland struck his cane into the peat and exclaimed, "Zounds, +sir! the Bar and lying, with truth and a world fresh from God before +you!" + +"Your hand, uncle,--we understand each other. Now help me with those +two quiet hearts at home!" + +"Plague on my tongue! what have I done?" said the Captain, looking +aghast. Then, after musing a little time, he turned his dark eye on me +and growled out, "I suspect, young sir, you have been laying a trap for +me; and I have fallen into it, like an old fool as I am." + +"Oh, sir, I? you prefer the Bar!--" + +"Rogue!" + +"Or, indeed, I might perhaps get a clerkship in a merchant's office?" + +"If you do, I will scratch you out of the pedigree!" + +"Huzza, then, for Australasia!" + +"Well, well, well!" said my uncle,-- + + "With a smile on his lip, and a tear in his eye,"-- + +"the old sea-king's blood will force its way,--a soldier or a rover, +there is no other choice for you. We shall mourn and miss you; but who +can chain the young eagles to the eyrie?" + +I had a harder task with my father, who at first seemed to listen to me +as if I had been talking of an excursion to the moon. But I threw in a +dexterous dose of the old Greek Cleruchioe cited by Trevanion, which set +him off full trot on his hobby, till after a short excursion to Euboea +and the Chersonese, he was fairly lost amidst the Ionian colonies of +Asia Minor. I then gradually and artfully decoyed him into his favorite +science of Ethnology; and while he was speculating on the origin of the +American savages, and considering the rival claims of Cimmerians, +Israelites, and Scandinavians, I said quietly: "And you, sir, who think +that all human improvement depends on the mixture of races; you, whose +whole theory is an absolute sermon upon emigration, and the +transplanting and interpolity of our species,--you, sir, should be the +last man to chain your son, your elder son, to the soil, while your +younger is the very missionary of rovers." + +"Pisistratus," said my father, "you reason by synecdoche,--ornamental, +but illogical;" and therewith, resolved to hear no more, my father rose +and retreated into his study. + +But his observation, now quickened, began from that day to follow my +moods and humors; then he himself grew silent and thoughtful, and +finally he took to long conferences with Roland. The result was that +one evening in spring, as I lay listless amidst the weeds and fern that +sprang up through the melancholy ruins, I felt a hand on my shoulder; +and my father, seating himself beside me on a fragment of stone, said +earnestly; "Pisistratus, let us talk. I had hoped better things from +your study of Robert Hall." + +"Nay, dear father, the medicine did me great good: I have not repined +since, and I look steadfastly and cheerfully on life. But Robert Hall +fulfilled his mission, and I would fulfil mine." + +"Is there no mission in thy native land, O planeticose and exallotriote +spirit?" (2) asked my father, with compassionate rebuke. + +"Alas, yes! But what the impulse of genius is to the great, the +instinct of vocation is to the mediocre. In every man there is a +magnet; in that thing which the man can do best there is a loadstone." + +"Papoe!" said my father, opening his eyes; "and are no loadstones to be +found for you nearer than the Great Australasian Bight?" + +"Ah,--sir, if you resort to irony I can say no more!" My father looked +down on me tenderly as I hung my head, moody and abashed. + +"Son," said he, "do you think that there is any real jest at my heart +when the matter discussed is whether you are to put wide seas and long +years between us?" I pressed nearer to his side, and made no answer. + +"But I have noted you of late," continued my father, "and I have +observed that your old studies are grown distasteful to you; and I have +talked with Roland, and I see that your desire is deeper than a boy's +mere whim. And then I have asked myself what prospect I can hold out at +home to induce you to be contented here, and I see none; and therefore I +should say to you, 'Go thy ways, and God shield thee,'--but, +Pisistratus, your mother!" + +"Ah, sir, that is indeed the question; and there indeed I shrink! But, +after all, whatever I were,--whether toiling at the Bar or in some +public office,--I should be still so much from home and her. And then +you, sir, she loves you so entirely that--" + +"No," interrupted my father; "you can advance no arguments like these to +touch a mother's heart. There is but one argument that comes home +there: is it for your good to leave her? If so, there will be no need +of further words. But let us not decide that question hastily; let you +and I be together the next two months. Bring your books and sit with +me; when you want to go out, tap me on the shoulder, and say 'Come.' At +the end of those two months I will say to you 'Go' or 'Stay.' And you +will trust me; and if I say the last, you will submit?" + +"Oh yes, sir, yes!" + +(1) Hohler's translation. + +(2) Words coined by Mr. Caxton from (Greek word), "disposed to roaming," +and (Greek word), "to export, to alienate." + + + + +Chapter II. + + +This compact made, my father roused himself from all his studies, +devoted his whole thoughts to me, sought with all his gentle wisdom to +wean me imperceptibly from my one fixed, tyrannical idea, ranged through +his wide pharmacy of books for such medicaments as might alter the +system of my thoughts. And little thought he that his very tenderness +and wisdom worked against him, for at each new instance of either my +heart called aloud, "Is it not that thy tenderness may be repaid, and +thy wisdom be known abroad, that I go from thee into the strange land, O +my father?" + +And the two months expired, and my father saw that the magnet had turned +unalterably to the loadstone in the Great Australasian Bight; and he +said to me, "Go, and comfort your mother. I have told her your wish, +and authorized it by my consent, for I believe now that it is for your +good." + +I found my mother in the little room she had appropriated to herself +next my father's study. And in that room there was a pathos which I +have no words to express; for my mother's meek, gentle, womanly soul +spoke there, so that it was the Home of Home. The care with which she +had transplanted from the brick house, and lovingly arranged, all the +humble memorials of old times dear to her affections,--the black +silhouette of my father's profile cut in paper, in the full pomp of +academics, cap and gown (how had he ever consented to sit for it?), +framed and glazed in the place of honor over the little hearth; and +boyish sketches of mine at the Hellenic Institute, first essays in sepia +and Indian ink, to animate the walls, and bring her back, when she sat +there in the twilight, musing alone, to sunny hours, when Sisty and the +young mother threw daisies at each other; and covered with a great +glass: shade, and dusted each day with her own hand, the flower-pot +Sisty had bought with the proceeds of the domino-box on that memorable +occasion on which he had learned "how bad deeds are repaired with good." +There, in one corner, stood the little cottage piano which I remembered +all my life,--old-fashioned, and with the jingling voice of approaching +decrepitude, but still associated with such melodies as, after +childhood, we hear never more! And in the modest hanging shelves, which +looked so gay with ribbons and tassels and silken cords, my mother's own +library, saying more to the heart than all the cold wise poets whose +souls my father invoked in his grand Heraclea. The Bible over which, +with eyes yet untaught to read, I had hung in vague awe and love as it +lay open on my mother's lap, while her sweet voice, then only serious, +was made the oracle of its truths. And my first lesson-books were +there, all hoarded. And bound in blue and gold, but elaborately papered +up, Cowper's Poems,--a gift from my father in the days of courtship: +sacred treasure; which not even I had the privilege to touch, and which +my mother took out only in the great crosses and trials of conjugal +life, whenever some words less kind than usual had dropped unawares from +her scholar's absent lips. Ah! all these poor household gods, all +seemed to look on me with mild anger; and from all came a voice to my +soul, "Cruel, dost thou forsake us?" And amongst them sat my mother, +desolate as Rachel, and weeping silently. + +"Mother! mother!" I cried, falling on her neck, "forgive me,--it is +past; I cannot leave you!" + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +"No, no! it is for your good,--Austin says so. Go,--it is but the first +shock." + +Then to my mother I opened the sluices of that deep I had concealed from +scholar and soldier. To her I poured all the wild, restless thoughts +which wandered through the ruins of love destroyed; to her I confessed +what to myself I had scarcely before avowed. And when the picture of +that, the darker, side of my mind was shown, it was with a prouder face +and less broken voice that I spoke of the manlier hopes and nobler aims +that gleamed across the wrecks and the desert and showed me my escape. + +"Did you not once say, mother, that you had felt it like a remorse that +my father's genius passed so noiselessly away,--half accusing the +happiness you gave him for the death of his ambition in the content of +his mind? Did you not feel a new object in life when the ambition +revived at last, and you thought you heard the applause of the world +murmuring round your scholar's cell? Did you not share in the day +dreams your brother conjured up, and exclaim, 'If my brother could be +the means of raising him in the world!' And when you thought we had +found the way to fame and fortune, did you not sob out from your full +heart, 'And it is my brother who will pay back to his son all--all he +gave up for me'?" + +"I cannot bear this, Sisty! Cease, cease!" + +"No; for do you not yet understand me? Will it not be better still if +your son--yours--restore to your Austin all that he lost, no matter how? +If through your son, mother, you do indeed make the world hear of your +husband's genius, restore the spring to his mind, the glory to his +pursuits; if you rebuild even that vaunted ancestral name which is glory +to our poor sonless Roland; if your son can restore the decay of +generations, and reconstruct from the dust the whole house into which +you have entered, its meek, presiding angel,--all, mother! if this can +be done, it will be your work; for unless you can share my ambition, +unless you can dry those eyes, and smile in my face, and bid me go, with +a cheerful voice, all my courage melts from my heart, and again I say, I +cannot leave you!" + +Then my mother folded her arms round me, and we both wept, and could not +speak; but we were both happy. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +Now the worst was over, and my mother was the most heroic of us all. So +I began to prepare myself in good earnest, and I followed Trevanion's +instructions with a perseverance which I could never, at that young day, +have thrown into the dead life of books. I was in a good school, +amongst our Cumberland sheep-walks, to learn those simple elements of +rural art which belong to the pastoral state. Mr. Sidney, in his +admirable "Australian Hand-Book," recommends young gentlemen who think +of becoming settlers in the Bush to bivouac for three months on +Salisbury Plain. That book was not then written, or I might have taken +the advice; meanwhile I think, with due respect to such authority, that +I went through a preparatory training quite as useful in seasoning the +future emigrant. I associated readily with the kindly peasants and +craftsmen, who became my teachers. With what pride I presented my +father with a desk, and my mother with a work-box, fashioned by my own +hands! I made Bolt a lock for his plate-chest, and (that last was my +magnum opus, my great masterpiece) I repaired and absolutely set going +an old turret-clock in the tower that had stood at 2 p.m. since the +memory of man. I loved to think, each time the hour sounded, that those +who heard its deep chime would remember me. But the flocks were my main +care. The sheep that I tended and helped to shear, and the lamb that I +hooked out of the great marsh, and the three venerable ewes that I +nursed through a mysterious sort of murrain which puzzled all the +neighborhood,--are they not written in thy loving chronicles, O House of +Caxton? + +And now, since much of the success of my experiment must depend on the +friendly terms I could establish with my intended partner, I wrote to +Trevanion, begging him to get the young gentleman who was to join me, +and whose capital I was to administer, to come and visit us. Trevanion +complied; and there arrived a tall fellow, somewhat more than six feet +high, answering to the name of Guy Bolding, in a cut-away sporting-coat, +with a dog whistle tied to the button-hole, drab shorts and gaiters, and +a waistcoat with all manner of strange furtive pockets. Guy Bolding had +lived a year and a half at Oxford as a "fast man,"--so "fast" had he +lived that there was scarcely a tradesman at Oxford into whose books he +had not contrived to run. + +His father was compelled to withdraw him from the University, at which +he had already had the honor of being plucked for "the little-go;" and +the young gentleman, on being asked for what profession he was fit, had +replied, with conscious pride, that he could "tool a coach!" In +despair, the sire, who owed his living to Trevanion, had asked the +states man's advice; and the advice had fixed me with a partner in +expatriation. + +My first feeling in greeting the "fast" man was certainly that of deep +disappointment and strong repugnance. But I was determined not to be +too fastidious; and, having a lucky knack of suiting myself pretty well +to all tempers (without which a man had better not think of loadstones +in the Great Australasian Bight), I contrived before the first week was +out to establish so many points of connection between us that we became +the best friends in the world. Indeed, it would have been my fault if +we had not; for Guy Bolding, with all his faults, was one of those +excellent creatures who are nobody's enemies but their own. His good- +humor was inexhaustible. Not a hardship or privation came amiss to him. +He had a phrase, "Such fun!" that always rushed laughingly to his lips +when another man would have cursed and groaned. If we lost our way in +the great trackless moors, missed our dinner, and were half-famished, +Guy rubbed hands that would have felled an ox, and chuckled out, "Such +fun!" If we stuck in a bog, if we were caught in a thunder-storm, if we +were pitched head-over-heels by the wild colts we undertook to break in, +Guy Bolding's sole elegy was "Such fun!" That grand shibboleth of +philosophy only forsook him at the sight of an open book. I don't think +that at that time he could have found "fun" even in Don Quixote. This +hilarious temperament had no insensibility; a kinder heart never beat,-- +but, to be sure, it beat to a strange, restless, tarantula sort of +measure, which kept it in a perpetual dance. It made him one of those +officiously good fellows who are never quiet themselves, and never let +any one else be quiet if they can help it. But Guy's great fault, in +this prudent world, was his absolute incontinence of money. If you had +turned a Euphrates of gold into his pockets at morning, it would have +been as dry as the Great Sahara by twelve at noon. What he did with the +money was a mystery as much to himself as to every one else. His father +said, in a letter to me, that "he had seen him shying at sparrows with +half-crowns!" That such a young man could come to no good in England, +seemed perfectly clear. + +Still, it is recorded of many great men, who did not end their days in a +workhouse, that they were equally non-retentive of money. Schiller, +when he had nothing else to give away, gave the clothes from his back, +and Goldsmith the blankets from his bed. Tender hands found it +necessary to pick Beethoven's pockets at home before he walked out. +Great heroes, who have made no scruple of robbing the whole world, have +been just as lavish as poor poets and musicians. Alexander, in +parcelling out his spoils, left himself "hope"! And as for Julius +Caesar, he was two millions in debt when he shied his last half-crown at +the sparrows in Gaul. Encouraged by these illustrious examples, I had +hopes of Guy Bolding; and the more as he was so aware of his own +infirmity that he was perfectly contented with the arrangement which +made me treasurer of his capital, and even besought me, on no account, +let him beg ever so hard, to permit his own money to come in his own +way. In fact, I contrived to gain a great ascendency over his simple, +generous, thoughtless nature; and by artful appeals to his affections,-- +to all he owed to his father for many bootless sacrifices, and to the +duty of providing a little dower for his infant sister, whose meditated +portion had half gone to pay his college debts,--I at last succeeded in +fixing into his mind an object to save for. + +Three other companions did I select for our Cleruchia. The first was +the son of our old shepherd, who had lately married, but was not yet +encumbered with children,--a good shepherd, and an intelligent, steady +fellow. The second was a very different character. He had been the +dread of the whole squirearchy. A more bold and dexterous poacher did +not exist. Now my acquaintance with this latter person, named Will +Peterson, and more popularly "Will o' the Wisp," had commenced thus: +Bolt had managed to rear, in a small copse about a mile from the house, +--and which was the only bit of ground in my uncle's domains that might +by courtesy be called "a wood,"--a young colony of pheasants, that he +dignified by the title of a "preserve." This colony was audaciously +despoiled and grievously depopulated, in spite of two watchers, who, +with Bolt, guarded for seven nights successively the slumbers of the +infant settlement. So insolent was the assault that bang, bang! went +the felonious gun,--behind, before, within but a few yards of the +sentinels,--and the gunner was off and the prey seized, before they +could rush to the spot. The boldness and skill of the enemy soon +proclaimed him, to the experienced watchers, to be Will o' the Wisp; and +so great was their dread of this fellow's strength and courage, and so +complete their despair of being a match for his swiftness and cunning, +that after the seventh night the watchers refused to go out any longer; +and poor Bolt himself was confined to his bed by an attack of what a +doctor would have called rheumatism, and a moralist, rage. My +indignation and sympathy were greatly excited by this mortifying +failure, and my interest romantically aroused by the anecdotes I had +heard of Will o' the Wisp; accordingly, armed with a thick bludgeon, I +stole out at night, and took my way to the copse. The leaves were not +off the trees, and how the poacher contrived to see his victims I know +not; but five shots did he fire, and not in vain, without allowing me to +catch a glimpse of him. I then retreated to the outskirt of the copse, +and waited patiently by an angle which commanded two sides of the wood. +Just as the dawn began to peep, I saw my roan emerge within twenty yards +of me. I held my breath, suffered him to get a few steps from the wood, +crept on so as to intercept his retreat, and then pounce--such a bound! +My hand was on his shoulder,--prr, prr; no eel was ever more lubricate. +He slid from me like a thing immaterial, and was off over the moors with +a swiftness which might well have baffled any clodhopper,--a race whose +calves are generally absorbed in the soles of their hobnail shoes. But +the Hellenic Institute, with its classical gymnasia, had trained its +pupils in all bodily exercises; and though the Will o' the Wisp was +swift for a clodhopper, he was no match at running for any youth who has +spent his boyhood in the discipline of cricket, prisoner's bar, and +hunt-the-hare. I reached him at length, and brought him to bay. + +"Stand back!" said he, panting, and taking aim with his gun: "it is +loaded." + +"Yes," said I; "but though you're a brave poacher, you dare not fire at +your fellow-man. Give up the gun this instant." + +My address took him by surprise; he did not fire. I struck up the +barrel, and closed on him. We grappled pretty tightly, and in the +wrestle the gun went off. The man loosened his hold. "Lord ha' mercy! +I have not hurt you?" he said falteringly. + +"My good fellow,--no," said I; "and now let us throw aside gun and +bludgeon, and fight it out like Englishmen, or else let us sit down and +talk it over like friends." + +The Will o' the Wisp scratched its head and laughed. + +"Well, you're a queer one!" quoth it. And the poacher dropped the gun +and sat down. + +We did talk it over, and I obtained Peterson's promise to respect the +preserve henceforth; and we thereon grew so cordial that he walked home +with me, and even presented me, shyly and apologetically, with the five +pheasants he had shot. From that time I sought him out. He was a young +fellow not four and twenty, who had taken to poaching from the wild +sport of the thing, and from some confused notions that he had a license +from Nature to poach. I soon found out that he was meant for better +things than to spend six months of the twelve in prison, and finish his +life on the gallows after killing a gamekeeper. That seemed to me his +most probable destiny in the Old World, so I talked him into a burning +desire for the New one; and a most valuable aid in the Bush he proved +too. + +My third selection was in a personage who could bring little physical +strength to help us, but who had more mind (though with a wrong twist in +it) than both the others put together. + +A worthy couple in the village had a son, who, being slight and puny, +compared to the Cumberland breed, was shouldered out of the market of +agricultural labor, and went off, yet a boy, to a manufacturing town. +Now about the age of thirty, this mechanic, disabled for his work by a +long illness, came home to recover; and in a short time we heard of +nothing but the pestilential doctrines with which he was either shocking +or infecting our primitive villagers. According to report, Corcyra +itself never engendered a democrat more awful. The poor man was really +very ill, and his parents very poor; but his unfortunate doctrines dried +up all the streams of charity that usually flowed through our kindly +hamlet. The clergyman (an excellent man, but of the old school) walked +by the house as if it were tabooed. The apothecary said, "Miles Square +ought to have wine;" but he did not send him any. The farmers held his +name in execration, for he had incited all their laborers to strike for +another shilling a week. And but for the old Tower, Miles Square would +soon have found his way to the only republic in which he could obtain +that democratic fraternization for which he sighed; the grave being, I +suspect, the sole commonwealth which attains that dead flat of social +equality that life in its every principle so heartily abhors. + +My uncle went to see Miles Square, and came back the color of purple. +Miles Square had preached him a long sermon on the unholiness of war. +"Even in defence of your king and country!" had roared the Captain; and +Miles Square had replied with a remark upon kings in general that the +Captain could not have repeated without expecting to see the old Tower +fall about his ears, and with an observation about the country in +particular, to the effect that "the country would be much better off if +it were conquered!" On hearing the report of these loyal and patriotic +replies, my father said "Papoe!" and roused out of his usual +philosophical indifference, went himself to visit Miles Square. My +father returned as pale as my uncle had been purple. "And to think," +said he mournfully, "that in the town whence this man comes there are, +he tells me, ten thousand other of God's creatures who speed the work of +civilization while execrating its laws!" + +But neither father nor uncle made any opposition when, with a basket +laden with wine and arrowroot, and a neat little Bible bound in brown, +my mother took her way to the excommunicated cottage. Her visit was as +signal a failure as those that preceded it. Miles Square refused the +basket,--"he was not going to accept alms and eat the bread of charity;" +and on my mother meekly suggesting that "if Mr. Miles Square would +condescend to look into the Bible, he would see that even charity was no +sin in giver or recipient," Mr. Miles Square had undertaken to prove +"that, according to the Bible, he had as much a right to my mother's +property as she had; that all things should be in common; and when all +things were in common, what became of charity? No, he could not eat my +uncle's arrowroot and drink his wine while my uncle was improperly +withholding from him and his fellow-creatures so many unprofitable +acres: the land belonged to the people." It was now the turn of +Pisistratus to go. He went once, and he went often. Miles Square and +Pisistratus wrangled and argued, argued and wrangled, and ended by +taking a fancy to each other; for this poor Miles Square was not half so +bad as his doctrines. His errors arose from intense sympathy with the +sufferings he had witnessed amidst the misery which accompanies the +reign of millocratism, and from the vague aspirations of a half-taught, +impassioned, earnest nature. By degrees I persuaded him to drink the +wine and eat the arrowroot en attendant that millennium which was to +restore the land to the people. And then my mother came again and +softened his heart, and for the first time in his life let into its cold +crotchets the warm light of human gratitude. I lent him some books, +amongst others a few volumes on Australia. A passage in one of the +latter, in which it was said "that an intelligent mechanic usually made +his way in the colony, even as a shepherd, better than a dull +agricultural laborer," caught hold of his fancy and seduced his +aspirations into a healthful direction. Finally, as he recovered, he +entreated me to let him accompany me. And as I may not have to return +to Miles Square, I think it right here to state that he did go with me +to Australia, and did succeed, first as a shepherd, next as a +superintendent, and finally, on saving money, as a landowner; and that +in spite of his opinions of the unholiness of war, he was no sooner in +possession of a comfortable log homestead than he defended it with +uncommon gallantry against an attack of the aborigines, whose right to +the soil was, to say the least of it, as good as his claim to my uncle's +acres; that he commemorated his subsequent acquisition of a fresh +allotment, with the stock on it, by a little pamphlet, published at +Sydney, on the "Sanctity of the Rights of Property;" and that when I +left the colony, having been much pestered by two refractory "helps" +that he had added to his establishment, he had just distinguished +himself by a very anti-levelling lecture upon the duties of servants to +their employers. What would the Old World have done for this man? + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +I had not been in haste to conclude my arrangements, for, independently +of my wish to render myself acquainted with the small useful crafts that +might be necessary to me in a life that makes the individual man a state +in himself, I naturally desired to habituate my kindred to the idea of +our separation, and to plan and provide for them all such substitutes or +distractions, in compensation for my loss, as my fertile imagination +could suggest. At first, for the sake of Blanche, Roland, and my +mother, I talked the Captain into reluctant sanction of his sister-in- +law's proposal to unite their incomes and share alike, without +considering which party brought the larger proportion into the firm. I +represented to him that unless he made that sacrifice of his pride, my +mother would be wholly without those little notable uses and objects, +those small household pleasures, so dear to woman; that all society in +the neighborhood would be impossible, and that my mother's time would +hang so heavily on her hands that her only resource would be to muse on +the absent one and fret. Nay, if he persisted in so false a pride, I +told him, fairly, that I should urge my father to leave the Tower. +These representations succeeded; and hospitality had commenced in the +old hall, and a knot of gossips had centred round my mother, groups of +laughing children had relaxed the still brow of Blanche, and the Captain +himself was a more cheerful and social man. My next point was to engage +my father in the completion of the Great Book. "Ah! sir," said I, "give +me an inducement to toil,--a reward for my industry. Let me think, in +each tempting pleasure, each costly vice,--No, no; I will save for the +Great Book! And the memory of the father shall still keep the son from +error. Ah, look you, sir! Mr. Trevanion offered me the loan of L1,500 +necessary to commence with; but you generously and at once said 'No; you +must not begin life under the load of debt.' And I knew you were right +and yielded,--yielded the more gratefully that I could not but forfeit +something of the just pride of manhood in incurring such an obligation +to the father of--Miss Trevanion. Therefore I have taken that sum from +you,--a sum that would almost have sufficed to establish your younger +and worthier child in the world forever. To that child let me repay it, +otherwise I will not take it. Let me hold it as a trust for the Great +Book; and promise me that the Great Book shall be ready when your +wanderer returns and accounts for the missing talent." + +And my father pished a little, and rubbed off the dew that bad gathered +on his spectacles. But I would not leave him in peace till he had given +me his word that the Great Book should go on a pas de great,--nay, till +I had seen him sit down to it with good heart, and the wheel went round +again in the quiet mechanism of that gentle life. + +Finally, and as the culminating acme of my diplomacy, I effected the +purchase of the neighboring apothecary's practice and good-will for +Squills, upon terms which he willingly subscribed to; for the poor man +had pined at the loss of his favorite patients,--though Heaven knows +they did not add much to his income. And as for my father, there was no +man who diverted him more than Squills, though he accused him of being a +materialist, and set his whole spiritual pack of sages to worry and bark +at him, from Plato and Zeno to Reid and Abraham Tucker. + +Thus, although I have very loosely intimated the flight of time, more +than a whole year elapsed from the date of our settlement at the Tower +and that fixed for my departure. + +In the mean while, despite the rarity amongst us of that phenomenon, a +newspaper, we were not so utterly cut off from the sounds of the far- +booming world beyond, but what the intelligence of a change in the +Administration and the appointment of Mr. Trevanion to one of the great +offices of state reached our ears. I had kept up no correspondence with +Trevanion subsequent to the letter that occasioned Guy Belding's visit; +I wrote now to congratulate him: his reply was short and hurried. + +An intelligence that startled me more, and more deeply moved my heart, +was conveyed to me, some three months or so before my departure, by +Trevanion's steward. The ill health of Lord Castleton had deferred his +marriage, intended originally to be celebrated as soon as he arrived of +age. He left the University with the honors of "a double-first class;" +and his constitution appeared to rally from the effects of studies more +severe to him than they might have been to a man of quicker and more +brilliant capacities, when a feverish cold, caught at a county meeting +in which his first public appearance was so creditable as fully to +justify the warmest hopes of his party, produced inflammation of the +lungs and ended fatally. The startling contrast forced on my mind,-- +here, sudden death and cold clay; there, youth in its first flower, +princely rank, boundless wealth, the sanguine expectation of an +illustrious career, and the prospect of that happiness which smiled from +the eyes of Fanny,--that contrast impressed me with a strange awe: death +seems so near to us when it strikes those whom life most flatters and +caresses. Whence is that curious sympathy that we all have with the +possessors of worldly greatness when the hour-glass is shaken and the +scythe descends? If the famous meeting between Diogenes and Alexander +had taken place, not before, but after the achievements which gave to +Alexander the name of Great, the Cynic would not, perhaps, have envied +the hero his pleasures nor his splendors,--neither the charms of Statira +nor the tiara of the Mede; but if, the day after, a cry had gone forth, +"Alexander the Great is dead!" verily I believe that Diogenes would have +coiled himself up in his tub and felt that with the shadow of the +stately hero something of glory and of warmth had gone from that sun +which it should darken never more. In the nature of man, the humblest +or the hardest, there is a something that lives in all of the Beautiful +or the Fortunate, which hope and desire have appropriated, even in the +vanities of a childish dream. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +"Why are you here all alone, cousin? How cold and still it is amongst +the graves!" + +"Sit down beside me, Blanche: it is not colder in the churchyard than on +the village green." + +And Blanche sat down beside me, nestled close to me, and leaned her head +upon my shoulder. We were both long silent. It was an evening in the +early spring, clear and serene; the roseate streaks were fading +gradually from the dark gray of long, narrow, fantastic clouds. Tall, +leafless poplars, that stood in orderly level line on the lowland +between the churchyard and the hill, with its crown of ruins, left their +sharp summits distinct against the sky. But the shadows coiled dull and +heavy round the evergreens that skirted the churchyard, so that their +outline was vague and confused; and there was a depth in that lonely +stillness, broken only when the thrush flew out from the lower bushes, +and the thick laurel-leaves stirred reluctantly, and again were rigid in +repose. There is a certain melancholy in the evenings of early spring +which is among those influences of Nature the most universally +recognized, the most difficult to explain. The silent stir of reviving +life, which does not yet betray signs in the bud and blossom, only in a +softer clearness in the air, a more lingering pause in the slowly +lengthening day; a more delicate freshness and balm in the twilight +atmosphere; a more lively, yet still unquiet, note from the birds, +settling down into their Coverts; the vague sense under all that hush, +which still outwardly wears the bleak sterility of winter, of the busy +change, hourly, modestly, at work, renewing the youth of the world, re- +clothing with vigorous bloom the skeletons of things,--all these +messages from the heart of Nature to the heart of Man may well affect +and move us. But why with melancholy? No thought on our part connects +and construes the low, gentle voices. It is not thought that replies +and reasons, it is feeling that hears and dreams. Examine not, O child +of man!--examine not that mysterious melancholy with the hard eyes of +thy reason; thou canst not impale it on the spikes of thy thorny logic, +nor describe its enchanted circle by problems conned from thy schools. +Borderer thyself of two worlds,--the Dead and the Living,--give thine +ear to the tones, bow thy soul to the shadows, that steal, in the Season +of Change, from the dim Border Land. + +Blanche (in a whisper).--"What are you thinking of? Speak, pray!" + +Pisistratus.--"I was not thinking, Blanche,--or, if I were, the thought +is gone at the mere effort to seize or detain it." + +Blanche (after a pause).--"I know what you mean. It is the same with me +often,--so often when I am sitting by my self, quite still. It is just +like the story Primmins was telling us the other evening, 'how there was +a woman in her village who saw things and people in a piece of crystal +not bigger than my hand;(1) they passed along as large as life, but they +were only pictures in the crystal.' Since I heard the story, when aunt +asks me what I am thinking of, I long to say, 'I'm not thinking, I'm +seeing pictures in the crystal!'" + +Pisistratus.--"Tell my father that,--it will please him; there is more +philosophy in it than you are aware of, Blanche. There are wise men who +have thought the whole world, its 'pride, pomp, and circumstance,' only +a phantom image,--a picture in the crystal." + +Blanche.--"And I shall see you,--see us both, as we are sitting here; +and that star which has just risen yonder,--see it all in my crystal, +when you are gone!--gone, cousin!" (And Blanche's head drooped.) + +There was something so quiet and deep in the tenderness of this poor +motherless child that it did not affect one superficially, like a +child's loud momentary affection, in which we know that the first toy +will replace us. I kissed my little cousin's pale face and said, "And I +too, Blanche, have my crystal; and when I consult it, I shall be very +angry if I see you sad and fretting, or seated alone. For you must +know, Blanche, that that is all selfishness. God made us, not to +indulge only in crystal pictures, weave idle fancies, pine alone, and +mourn over what we cannot help, but to be alert and active,--givers of +happiness. Now, Blanche, see what a trust I am going to bequeath you. +You are to supply my place to all whom I leave; you are to bring +sunshine wherever you glide with that shy, soft step,--whether to your +father when you see his brows knit and his arms crossed (that, indeed, +you always do), or to mine when the volume drops from his hand, when he +walks to and fro the room, restless, and murmuring to himself, then you +are to steal up to him, put your hand in his, lead him back to his +books, and whisper, 'What will Sisty say if his younger brother, the +Great Book, is not grown up when he comes back?' And my poor mother, +Blanche! Ah, how can I counsel you there,--how tell you where to find +comfort for her? Only, Blanche, steal into her heart and be her +daughter. And to fulfil this threefold trust, you must not content +yourself with seeing pictures in the crystal,--do you understand me? + +"Oh, yes!" said Blanche, raising her eyes, while the tears rolled from +them, and folding her arms resolutely on her breast. + +"And so," said I, "as we two, sitting in this quiet burial-ground, take +new heart for the duties and cares of life, so see, Blanche, how the +stars come out, one by one, to smile upon us; for they, too, glorious +orbs as they are, perform their appointed tasks. Things seem to +approximate to God in proportion to their vitality and movement. Of all +things, least inert and sullen should be the soul of man. How the grass +grows up over the very graves,--quickly it grows and greenly; but +neither so quick nor so green, my Blanche, as hope and comfort from +human sorrows." + +(1) In primitive villages in the West of England the belief that the +absent may be seen in a piece of crystal is, or was not many years ago, +by no means an uncommon superstition. I have seen more than one of +these magic mirrors, which Spenser, by the way, has beautifully +described. They are about the size and shape of a swan's egg. It is +not every one, however, who can be a crystal-seer; like second-sight, it +is a special gift. N. B.--Since the above note (appended to the first +edition of this work) was written, crystals and crystal-seers have +become very familiar to those who interest themselves in speculations +upon the disputed phenomena ascribed to Mesmerical Clairvoyance. + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 13 *** + +********** This file should be named 7598.txt or 7598.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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