CHAPTER LIX

 Change and time take together their flight. --Golden Violet. 

One evening in autumn, about three years after the date of our lastchapter, a stranger on horseback, in deep mourning, dismounted at thedoor of the Golden Fleece, in the memorable town of W----. He walkedinto the taproom, and asked for a private apartment and accommodationfor the night. The landlady, grown considerably plumper than when wefirst made her acquaintance, just lifted up her eyes to the stranger'sface, and summoning a short stout man (formerly the waiter, now thesecond helpmate of the comely hostess), desired him, in a tone whichpartook somewhat more of the authority indicative of their formerrelative situations than of the obedience which should havecharacterized their present, "to show the gentleman to the Griffin, No. 4. "

The stranger smiled as the sound greeted his ears, and he followed notso much the host as the hostess's spouse into the apartment thusdesignated. A young lady, who some eight years ago little thoughtthat she should still be in a state of single blessedness, and whoalways honoured with an attentive eye the stray travellers who, fromtheir youth, loneliness, or that ineffable air which usuallydesignates the unmarried man, might be in the same solitary state oflife, turned to the landlady and said, --

"Mother, did you observe what a handsome gentleman that was?"

"No, " replied the landlady; "I only observed that he brought noservant"

"I wonder, " said the daughter, "if he is in the army? he has amilitary air!"

"I suppose he has dined, " muttered the landlady to herself, lookingtowards the larder. 

"Have you seen Squire Mordaunt within a short period of time?" asked, somewhat abruptly, a little thick-set man, who was enjoying his pipeand negus in a sociable way at the window-seat. The characteristicsof this personage were, a spruce wig, a bottle nose, an elevatedeyebrow, a snuff-coloured skin and coat, and an air of thatconsequential self-respect which distinguishes the philosopher whoagrees with the French sage, and sees "no reason in the world why aman should not esteem himself. "

"No, indeed, Mr. Bossolton, " returned the landlady; "but I supposethat, as he is now in the Parliament House, he will live less retired. It is a pity that the inside of that noble old Hall of his should notbe more seen; and after all the old gentleman's improvements too!They say that the estate now, since the mortgages were paid off, isabove 10, 000 pounds a year, clear!"

"And if I am not induced into an error, " rejoined Mr. Bossolton, refilling his pipe, "old Vavasour left a great sum of ready moneybesides, which must have been an aid, and an assistance, and anadvantage, mark me, Mistress Merrylack, to the owner of Mordaunt Hall, that has escaped the calculation of your faculty, --and the--and the--faculty of your calculation!"

"You mistake, Mr. Boss, " as, in the friendliness of diminutives, Mrs. Merrylack sometimes styled the grandiloquent practitioner, "youmistake: the old gentleman left all his ready money in two bequests, --the one to the College of ----, in the University of Cambridge, andthe other to an hospital in London. I remember the very words of thewill; they ran thus, Mr. Boss. 'And whereas my beloved son, had helived, would have been a member of the College of ---- in theUniversity of Cambridge, which he would have adorned by his genius, learning, youthful virtue, and the various qualities which did equalhonour to his head and heart, and would have rendered him alikedistinguished as the scholar and the Christian, I do devise andbequeath the sum of thirty-seven thousand pounds sterling, now in theEnglish Funds, ' etc; and then follows the manner in which he will havehis charity vested and bestowed, and all about the prize which shallbe forever designated and termed 'The Vavasour Prize, ' and what shallbe the words of the Latin speech which shall be spoken when the saidprize be delivered, and a great deal more to that effect: so, then, hepasses to the other legacy, of exactly the same sum, to the hospital, usually called and styled ----, in the city of London, and says, 'Andwhereas we are assured by the Holy Scriptures, which, in these days ofblasphemy and sedition, it becomes every true Briton and member of theEstablished Church to support, that "charity doth cover a multitude ofsins, " so I do give and devise, ' etc. , 'to be forever termed in thedeeds, ' etc. , 'of the said hospital, "The Vavasour Charity;" andalways provided that on the anniversary of the day of my death asermon shall be preached in the chapel attached to the said hospitalby a clergyman of the Established Church, on any text appropriate tothe day and deed so commemorated. ' But the conclusion is mostbeautiful, Mr. Bossolton: 'And now having discharged my duties, to thebest of my humble ability, to my God, my king, and my country, anddying in the full belief of the Protestant Church, as by lawestablished, I do set my hand and seal, ' etc. "

"A very pleasing and charitable and devout and virtuous testament orwill, Mistress Merrylack, " said Mr. Bossolton; "and in a time whenanarchy with gigantic strides does devastate and devour and harm thegood old customs of our ancestors and forefathers, and tramples withits poisonous breath the Magna Charta and the glorious revolution, itis beautiful, ay, and sweet, mark you, Mrs. Merrylack, to behold agentleman of the aristocratic classes or grades supporting theinstitutions of his country with such remarkable energy of sentimentsand with--and with, Mistress Merrylack, with sentiments of suchremarkable energy. "

"Pray, " said the daughter, adjusting her ringlets by a little glasswhich hung over the tap, "how long has Mr. Mordaunt's lady been dead?"

"Oh! she died just before the squire came to the property, " quoth themother. "Poor thing! she was so pretty! I am sure I cried for awhole hour when I heard it! I think it was three years last monthwhen it happened. Old Mr. Vavasour died about two months afterwards. "

"The afflicted husband" (said Mr. Bossolton, who was the victim of amost fiery Mrs. Boss at home) "went into foreign lands or parts, or, as it is vulgarly termed, the Continent, immediately after an event oroccurrence so fatal to the cup of his prosperity and the sunshine ofhis enjoyment, did he not, Mrs. Merrylack?"

"He did. And you know, Mr. Boss, he only returned about six monthsago. "

"And of what borough or burgh or town or city is he the member andrepresentative?" asked Mr. Jeremiah Bossolton, putting another lump ofsugar into his negus. "I have heard, it is true, but my memory isshort; and, in the multitude and multifariousness of my professionalengagements, I am often led into a forgetfulness of matters lessimportant in their variety, and less--less various in theirimportance. "

"Why, " answered Mrs. Merrylack, "somehow or other, I quite forget too;but it is some distant borough. The gentleman wanted him to stand forthe county, but he would not hear of it; perhaps he did not like thepublicity of the thing, for he is mighty reserved. "

"Proud, haughty, arrogant, and assumptious!" said Mr. Bossolton, witha puff of unusual length. 

"Nay, nay, " said the daughter (young people are always the first todefend), "I'm sure he's not proud: he does a mort of good, and has thesweetest smile possible! I wonder if he'll marry again! He is veryyoung yet, not above two or three and thirty. " (The kind damsel wouldnot have thought two or three and thirty very young some years ago;but we grow wonderfully indulgent to the age of other people as wegrow older ourselves!)

"And what an eye he has!" said the landlady. "Well, for my part, --but, bless me. Here, John, John, John, waiter, husband I mean, --here's a carriage and four at the door. Lizzy, dear, is my capright?"

And mother, daughter, and husband all flocked, charged with simper, courtesy, and bow, to receive their expected guests. With adisappointment which we who keep not inns can but very imperfectlyconceive, the trio beheld a single personage, --a valet, descend fromthe box, open the carriage door, and take out--a desk! Of all thingshuman, male or female, the said carriage was utterly empty. 

The valet bustled up to the landlady: "My master's here, ma'am, Ithink; rode on before!"

"And who is your master?" asked Mrs. Merrylack, a thrill of alarm, andthe thought of No. 4, coming across her at the same time. 

"Who!" said the valet, rubbing his hands; "who!--why, Clarence TalbotLinden, Esq. , of Scarsdale Park, county of York, late Secretary ofLegation at the court of ----, now M. P. , and one of his Majesty'sUnder Secretaries of State. "

"Mercy upon us!" cried the astounded landlady, "and No. 4! only thinkof it. Run, John, --John, --run, light a fire (the night's cold, Ithink) in the Elephant, No. 16; beg the gentleman's pardon; say it wasoccupied till now; ask what he'll have for dinner, --fish, flesh, fowl, steaks, joints, chops, tarts; or, if it's too late (but it's quiteearly yet; you may put back the day an hour or so), ask what he'llhave for supper; run, John, run: what's the oaf staying for? run, Itell you! Pray, sir, walk in (to the valet, our old friend Mr. Harrison)--you'll be hungry after your journey, I think; no ceremony, I beg. "

"He's not so handsome as his master, " said Miss Elizabeth, glancing atHarrison discontentedly; "but he does not look like a married man, somehow. I'll just step up stairs and change my cap: it would be butcivil if the gentleman's gentleman sups with us. "

Meanwhile Clarence, having been left alone in the quiet enjoyment ofNo. 4, had examined the little apartment with an interest notaltogether unmingled with painful reflections. There are few persons, however fortunate, who can look back to eight years of their life, andnot feel somewhat of disappointment in the retrospect; few persons, whose fortunes the world envy, to whom the token of past time suddenlyobtruded on their remembrance does not awaken hopes destroyed andwishes deceived which that world has never known. We tell ourtriumphs to the crowd, but our own hearts are the sole confidants ofour sorrows. "Twice, " said Clarence to himself, "twice before have Ibeen in this humble room; the first was when, at the age of eighteen, I was just launched into the world, --a vessel which had for its onlyhope the motto of the chivalrous Sidney, --

 'Aut viam inveniam, aut--faciam;' ["I will either find my way, or--make it. ]

yet, humble and nameless as I was, how well I can recall theexaggerated ambition, nay, the certainty of success, as well as itsdesire, which then burned within me. I smile now at the overweeningvanity of those hopes, --some, indeed, realized, but how many nippedand withered forever! seeds, of which a few fell upon rich ground andprospered, but of which how far the greater number were scattered:some upon the wayside, and were devoured by immediate cares; some onstony places, and when the sun of manhood was up they were scorched, and because they had no root withered away; and some among thorns, andthe thorns sprang up and choked them. I am now rich, honoured, highin the favour of courts, and not altogether unknown or unesteemedarbitrio popularis aurae: and yet I almost think I was happier when, in that flush of youth and inexperience, I looked forth into the wideworld, and imagined that from every corner would spring up a triumphfor my vanity or an object for my affections. The next time I stoodin this little spot, I was no longer the dependant of a precariouscharity, or the idle adventurer who had no stepping-stone but hisambition. I was then just declared the heir of wealth, which I couldnot rationally have hoped for five years before, and which was initself sufficient to satisfy the aspirings of ordinary men. But I wascorroded with anxieties for the object of my love, and regret for thefriend whom I had lost: perhaps the eagerness of my heart for the onerendered me, for the moment, too little mindful of the other; but, inafter years, memory took ample atonement for that temporary suspensionof her duties. How often have I recalled, in this world of cold tiesand false hearts, that true and generous friend, from whose lessons mymind took improvement, and from whose warnings example; who was to me, living, a father, and from whose generosity whatever worldlyadvantages I have enjoyed or distinctions I have gained are derived!Then I was going, with a torn yet credulous heart, to pour forth mysecret and my passion to her, and, within one little week thence, howshipwrecked of all hope, object, and future happiness I was! Perhaps, at that time, I did not sufficiently consider the excusable cautionsof the world: I should not have taken such umbrage at her father'sletter; I should have revealed to him my birth and accession offortune; nor bartered the truth of certain happiness for the trialsand manoeuvres of romance. But it is too late to repent now. By thistime my image must be wholly obliterated from her heart: she has seenme in the crowd, and passed me coldly by; her cheek is pale, but notfor me; and in a little, little while, she will be another's, and lostto me forever! Yet have I never forgotten her through change or time, the hard and harsh projects of ambition, the labours of business, orthe engrossing schemes of political intrigue. Never! but this is avain and foolish subject of reflection now. "

And not the less reflecting upon it for that sage and veraciousrecollection, Clarence turned from the window, against which he hadbeen leaning, and drawing one of the four chairs to the solitarytable, he sat down, moody and disconsolate, and leaning his face uponhis hands, pursued the confused yet not disconnected thread of hismeditations. 

The door abruptly opened, and Mr. Merrylack appeared. 

"Dear me, sir!" cried he, "a thousand pities you should have been puthere, sir! Pray step upstairs, sir; the front drawing-room is justvacant, sir; what will you please to have for dinner, sir?" etc. , according to the instructions of his wife. To Mr. Merrylack's greatdismay, Clarence, however, resolutely refused all attempts atlocomotion, and contenting himself with entrusting the dinner to thediscretion of the landlady, desired to be left alone till it wasprepared. 

Now, when Mr. John Merrylack returned to the taproom, and communicatedthe stubborn adherence to No. 4 manifested by its occupier, our goodhostess felt exceedingly discomposed. "You are so stupid, John, " saidshe: "I'll go and expostulate like with him;" and she was rising forthat purpose when Harrison, who was taking particularly good care ofhimself, drew her back; "I know my master's temper better than you do, ma'am, " said he; "and when he is in the humour to be stubborn, thevery devil himself could not get him out of it. I dare say he wantsto be left to himself: he is very fond of being alone now and then;state affairs, you know" (added the valet, mysteriously touching hisforehead), "and even I dare not disturb him for the world; so makeyourself easy, and I'll go to him when he has dined, and I supped. There is time enough for No. 4 when we have taken care of number one. Miss, your health!"

The landlady, reluctantly overruled in her design, reseated herself. 

"Mr. Clarence Linden, M. P. , did you say, sir?" said the learnedJeremiah: "surely, I have had that name or appellation in my books, but I cannot, at this instant of time, recall to my recollection theexact date and circumstance of my professional services to thegentleman so designated, styled, or, I may say, termed. "

"Can't say, I am sure, sir, " said Harrison; "lived with my master manyyears; never had the pleasure of seeing you before, nor of travellingthis road, --a very hilly road it is, sir. Miss, this negus is asbright as your eyes and as warm as my admiration. "

"Oh, sir!"

"Pray, " said Mr. Merrylack, who like most of his tribe was a bit of apolitician; "is it the Mr. Linden who made that long speech in theHouse the other day?"

"Precisely, sir. He is a very eloquent gentleman, indeed: pity hespeaks so little; never made but that one long speech since he hasbeen in the House, and a capital one it was too. You saw how theprime minister complimented him upon it. 'A speech, ' said hislordship, 'which had united the graces of youthful genius with thesound calculations of matured experience. "'

"Did the prime minister really so speak?" said Jeremiah "what abeautiful, and noble, and sensible compliment! I will examine mybooks when I go home, --'the graces of youthful genius with the soundcalculations of matured experience'!"

"If he is in the Parliament House, " quoth the landlady, "I suppose hewill know our Mr. Mordaunt, when the squire takes his seat next--whatdo you call it--sessions?"

"Know Mr. Mordaunt!" said the valet. "It is to see him that we havecome down here. We intended to have gone there to-night, but Masterthought it too late, and I saw he was in a melancholy humour: wetherefore resolved to come here; and so Master took one of the horsesfrom the groom, whom we have left behind with the other, and came onalone. I take it, he must have been in this town before, for hedescribed the inn so well. --Capital cheese this! as mild, --as mild asyour sweet smile, miss. "

"Oh, sir!"

"Pray, Mistress Merrylack, " said Mr. Jeremiah Bossolton, depositinghis pipe on the table, and awakening from a profound revery, in whichfor the last five minutes his senses had been buried, "pray, MistressMerrylack, do you not call to your mind or your reminiscence or your--your recollection, a young gentleman, equally comely in his aspect andblandiloquent (ehem!) in his address, who had the misfortune to havehis arm severely contused and afflicted by a violent kick from Mr. Mordaunt's horse, even in the yard in which your stables are situated, and who remained for two or three days in your house or tavern orhotel? I do remember that you were grievously perplexed because ofhis name, the initials of which only he gave or entrusted orcommunicated to you, until you did exam--"

"I remember, " interrupted Miss Elizabeth, "I remember well, --a verybeautiful young gentleman, who had a letter directed to be left here, addressed to him by the letters C. L. , and who was afterwards kicked, and who admired your cap, Mother, and whose name was Clarence Linden. You remember it well enough, Mother, surely?"

"I think I do, Lizzy, " said the landlady, slowly; for her memory, notso much occupied as her daughter's by beautiful young gentlemen, struggled slowly amidst dim ideas of the various travellers andvisitors with whom her house had been honoured, before she came, atlast, to the reminiscence of Clarence Linden, "I think I do; andSquire Mordaunt was very attentive to him; and he broke one of thepanes of glass in No. 8 and gave me half a guinea to pay for it. I doremember perfectly, Lizzy. So that is the Mr. Linden now here?--onlythink!"

"I should not have known him, certainly, " said Miss Elizabeth; "he isgrown so much taller, and his hair looks quite dark now, and his faceis much thinner than it was; but he's very handsome still; is he not, sir?" turning to the valet. 

"Ah! ah! well enough, " said Mr. Harrison, stretching out his rightleg, and falling away a little to the left, in the manner adopted bythe renowned Gil Blas, in his address to the fair Laura, "well enough;but he's a little too tall and thin, I think. "

Mr. Harrison's faults in shape were certainly not those of being tootall and thin. 

"Perhaps so!" said Miss Elizabeth, who scented the vanity by a kindredinstinct, and had her own reasons for pampering it, "perhaps so!"

"But he is a great favourite with the ladies all the same; however, heonly loves one lady. Ah, but I must not say who, though I know. However, she is so handsome: such eyes, they would go through you likea skewer; but not like yours, --yours, miss, which I vow and protestare as bright as a service of plate. "

"Oh, sir!"

And amidst these graceful compliments the time slipped away, tillClarence's dinner and his valet's supper being fairly over, Mr. Harrison presented himself to his master, a perfectly different beingin attendance to what he was in companionship: flippancy, impertinence, forwardness, all merged in the steady, sober, seriousdemeanour which characterize the respectful and well-bred domestic. 

Clarence's orders were soon given. They were limited to theappurtenances of writing; and as soon as Harrison reappeared with hismaster's writing-desk, he was dismissed for the night. 

Very slowly did Clarence settle himself to his task, and attempt toescape the ennui of his solitude, or the restlessness of thoughtfeeding upon itself, by inditing the following epistle:--

TO THE DUKE OF HAVERFIELD. 

I was very unfortunate, my dear Duke, to miss seeing you, when Icalled in Arlington Street the evening before last, for I had a greatdeal to say to you, --something upon public and a little upon privateaffairs. I will reserve the latter, since I only am the personconcerned, for a future opportunity. With respect to the former-- . . . . . . . . . 

And now, having finished the political part of my letter, let mecongratulate you most sincerely upon your approaching marriage withMiss Trevanion. I do not know her myself; but I remember that she wasthe bosom friend of Lady Flora Ardenne, whom I have often heard speakof her in the highest and most affectionate terms, so that I imagineher brother could not better atone to you for dishonestly carrying offthe fair Julia some three years ago, than by giving you his sister inhonourable and orthodox exchange, --the gold amour for the brazen. 

As for my lot, though I ought not, at this moment, to dim yours bydwelling upon it, you know how long, how constantly, how ardently Ihave loved Lady Flora Ardenne; how, for her sake, I have refusedopportunities of alliance which might have gratified to the utmostthat worldliness of heart which so many who saw me only in the crowdhave been pleased to impute to me. You know that neither pleasure, nor change, nor the insult I received from her parents, nor the suddenindifference which I so little deserved from herself, has been able toobliterate her image. You will therefore sympathize with me, when Iinform you that there is no longer any doubt of her marriage withBorodaile (or rather Lord Ulswater, since his father's death), as soonas the sixth month of his mourning expires; to this period only twomonths remain. 

Heavens! when one thinks over the past, how incredulous one couldbecome to the future: when I recall all the tokens of love I received. From that woman, I cannot persuade myself that they are now allforgotten, or rather, all lavished upon another. 

But I do not blame her: may she be happier with him than she couldhave been with me! and that hope shall whisper peace to regrets whichI have been foolish to indulge so long, and it is perhaps well for methat they are about to be rendered forever unavailing. 

I am staying at an inn, without books, companions, or anything tobeguile time and thought, but this pen, ink, and paper. You will see, therefore, a reason and an excuse for my scribbling on to you, till mytwo sheets are filled, and the hour of ten (one can't well go to bedearlier) arrived. 

You remember having often heard me speak of a very extraordinary manwhom I met in Italy, and with whom I became intimate. He returned toEngland some months ago; and on hearing it my desire of renewing ouracquaintance was so great that I wrote to invite myself to his house. He gave me what is termed a very obliging answer, and left the choiceof time to myself. You see now, most noble Festus, the reason of myjourney hitherwards. 

His house, a fine old mansion, is situated about five or six milesfrom this town: and as I arrived here late in the evening, and knewthat his habits were reserved and peculiar, I thought it better totake "mine ease in my inn" for this night, and defer my visit toMordaunt Court till to-morrow morning. In truth, I was not averse torenewing an old acquaintance, --not, as you in your malice wouldsuspect, with my hostess, but with her house. Some years ago, when Iwas eighteen, I first made a slight acquaintance with Mordaunt at thisvery inn, and now, at twenty-six, I am glad to have one evening tomyself on the same spot, and retrace here all that has since happenedto me. 

Now do not be alarmed: I am not going to inflict upon you the unquietretrospect with which I have just been vexing myself; no, I willrather speak to you of my acquaintance and host to be. I have saidthat I first met Mordaunt some years since at this inn, --an accident, for which his horse was to blame, brought us acquainted, --I spent aday at his house, and was much interested in his conversation; sincethen, we did not meet till about two years and a half ago, when wewere in Italy together. During the intermediate interval Mordaunt hadmarried; lost his property by a lawsuit; disappeared from the world(whither none knew) for some years; recovered the estate he had lostby the death of his kinsman's heir, and shortly afterwards by that ofthe kinsman himself; and had become a widower, with one only child, abeautiful little girl of about four years old. He lived in perfectseclusion, avoided all intercourse with society, and seemed soperfectly unconscious of having ever seen me before, whenever in ourrides or walks we met, that I could not venture to intrude myself on areserve so rigid and unbroken as that which characterized his habitsand life. 

The gloom and loneliness, however, in which Mordaunt's days werespent, were far from partaking of that selfishness so common, almostso necessarily common, to recluses. Wherever he had gone in histravels through Italy, he had left light and rejoicing behind him. Inhis residence at ----, while unknown to the great and gay, he wasfamiliar with the outcast and the destitute. The prison, thehospital, the sordid cabins of want, the abodes (so frequent in Italy, that emporium of artists and poets) where genius struggled againstpoverty and its own improvidence, --all these were the spots to whichhis visits were paid, and in which "the very stones prated of hiswhereabout. " It was a strange and striking contrast to compare thesickly enthusiasm of those who flocked to Italy to lavish theirsentiments on statues, and their wealth on the modern impositionspalmed upon their taste as the masterpieces of ancient art, --it was anoble contrast, I say, to compare that ludicrous and idle enthusiasmwith the quiet and wholesome energy of mind and heart which ledMordaunt, not to pour forth worship and homage to the unconsciousmonuments of the dead but to console, to relieve, and to sustain thewoes, the wants, the feebleness of the living. 

Yet while he was thus employed in reducing the miseries and enlargingthe happiness of others, the most settled melancholy seemed to markhimself "as her own. " Clad in the deepest mourning, a stern and unbroken gloom sat forever upon his countenance. I have observed, thatif in his walks or rides any one, especially of the better classes, appeared to approach, he would strike into a new path. He could notbear even the scrutiny of a glance or the fellowship of a moment: andhis mien, high and haughty, seemed not only to repel others, but tocontradict the meekness and charity which his own actions soinvariably and unequivocally displayed. It must, indeed, have been apowerful exertion of principle over feeling which induced himvoluntarily to seek the abodes and intercourse of the rude beings heblessed and relieved. 

We met at two or three places to which my weak and imperfect charityhad led me, especially at the house of a sickly and distressed artist:for in former life I had intimately known one of that profession; andI have since attempted to transfer to his brethren that debt ofkindness which an early death forbade me to discharge to himself. Itwas thus that I first became acquainted with Mordaunt's occupationsand pursuits; for what ennobled his benevolence was the remarkableobscurity in which it was veiled. It was in disguise and in secretthat his generosity flowed; and so studiously did he conceal his name, and hide even his features, during his brief visits to "the house ofmourning, " that only one like myself, a close and minute investigatorof whatever has once become an object of interest, could have tracedhis hand in the various works of happiness it had aided or created. 

One day, among some old ruins, I met him with his young daughter. Bygreat good-fortune I preserved the latter, who had wandered away fromher father, from a fall of loose stones, which would inevitably havecrushed her. I was myself much hurt by my effort, having receivedupon my shoulder a fragment of the falling stones; and thus our oldacquaintance was renewed, and gradually ripened into intimacy; not, Imust own, without great patience and constant endeavour on my part;for his gloom and lonely habits rendered him utterly impracticable ofaccess to any (as Lord Aspeden would say) but a diplomatist. I saw agreat deal of him during the six months I remained in Italy, and--butyou know already how warmly I admire his extraordinary powers andvenerate his character--Lord Aspeden's recall to England separated us. 

A general election ensued. I was returned for ----. I enteredeagerly into domestic politics; your friendship, Lord Aspeden'skindness, my own wealth and industry, made my success almostunprecedentedly rapid. Engaged heart and hand in those minute yetengrossing labours for which the aspirant in parliamentary and stateintrigue must unhappily forego the more enlarged though abstruserspeculations of general philosophy, and of that morality which may betermed universal, politics, I have necessarily been employed in verydifferent pursuits from those to which Mordaunt's contemplations aredevoted, yet have I often recalled his maxims, with admiration attheir depth, and obtained applause for opinions which were onlyimperfectly filtered from the pure springs of his own. 

It is about six months since he has returned to England, and he hasvery lately obtained a seat in Parliament: so that we may trust soonto see his talents displayed upon a more public and enlarged theatrethan they hitherto have been; and though I fear his politics will beopposed to ours, I anticipate his public debut with that interestwhich genius, even when adverse to one's self, always inspires. Yet Iconfess that I am desirous to see and converse with him once more inthe familiarity and kindness of private intercourse. The rage ofparty, the narrowness of sectarian zeal, soon exclude from ourfriendship all those who differ from our opinions; and it is likesailors holding commune for the last time with each other, beforetheir several vessels are divided by the perilous and uncertain sea, to confer in peace and retirement for a little while with those whoare about to be launched with us on that same unquiet ocean where anymomentary caprice of the winds may disjoin us forever, and where ourvery union is only a sympathy in toil and a fellowship in danger. 

Adieu, my dear duke! it is fortunate for me that our public opinionsare so closely allied, and that I may so reasonably calculate inprivate upon the happiness and honour of subscribing myself youraffectionate friend, C. L. 

Such was the letter to which we shall leave the explanation of muchthat has taken place within the last three years of our tale, andwhich, in its tone, will serve to show the kindness and generosity ofheart and feeling that mingled (rather increased than abated by thetime which brought wisdom) with the hardy activity and resoluteambition that characterized the mind of our "Disowned. " We nowconsign him to such repose as the best bedroom in the Golden Fleececan afford, and conclude the chapter. 

CHAPTER LX. 

 Though the wilds of enchantment all vernal and bright, In the days of delusion by fancy combined With the vanishing phantoms of love and delight, Abandon my soul, like a dream of the night, And leave but a desert behind, Be hush'd my dark spirit, for Wisdom condemns When the faint and the feeble deplore; Be strong as the rock of the ocean that stems A thousand wild waves on the shore. --CAMPBELL. 

"Shall I order the carriage round, sir?" said Harrison; "it is pastone. "

"Yes; yet stay: the day is fine; I will ride; let the carriage come onin the evening; see that my horse is saddled; you looked to his mashlast night?"

"I did, sir. He seems wonderfully fresh: would you please to have mestay here with the carriage, sir, till the groom comes on with theother horse?"

"Ay, do: I don't know yet how far strange servants may be welcomewhere I am going. "

"Now, that's lucky!" said Harrison to himself, as he shut the door: "Ishall have a good five hours' opportunity of making my court here. Miss Elizabeth is really a very pretty girl, and might not be a badmatch. I don't see any brothers; who knows but she may succeed to theinn--hem! A servant may be ambitious as well as his master, Isuppose. "

So meditating, Harrison sauntered to the stables; saw (for he was anadmirable servant, and could, at a pinch, dress a horse as well as itsmaster) that Clarence's beautiful steed received the utmost nicety ofgrooming which the ostler could bestow; led it himself to the door;held the stirrup for his master, with the mingled humility and graceof his profession, and then strutted away--"pride on his brow andglory in his eye"--to be the cynosure and oracle of the taproom. 

Meanwhile Linden rode slowly onwards. As he passed that turn of thetown by which he had for the first time entered it, the recollectionof the eccentric and would-be gypsy flashed upon him. "I wonder, "thought he, "where that singular man is now, whether he stillpreserves his itinerant and woodland tastes, --

 'Si flumina sylvasque inglorius amet, ' ["If, unknown to fame, he love the streams and the woods. "]

or whether, as his family increased in age or number, he has turnedfrom his wanderings, and at length found out 'the peaceful hermitage?'How glowingly the whole scene of that night comes across me, --the wildtents, their wilder habitants, the mingled bluntness, poetry, honestgood-nature, and spirit of enterprise which constituted the chief'snature; the jovial meal and mirth round the wood fire, and beneath thequiet stars, and the eagerness and zest with which I then mingled inthe merriment. Alas! how ill the fastidiousness and refinement ofafter days repay us for the elastic, buoyant, ready zeal with whichour first youth enters into whatever is joyous, without pausing to askif its cause and nature be congenial to our habits or kindred to ourtastes. After all, there really was something philosophical in theromance of the jovial gypsy, childish as it seemed; and I should likemuch to know if the philosophy has got the better of the romance, orthe romance, growing into habit, become commonplace and lost both itsphilosophy and its enthusiasm. Well, after I leave Mordaunt, I willtry and find out my old friend. "

With this resolution Clarence's thoughts took a new channel, and hesoon entered upon Mordaunt's domain. As he rode through the parkwhere brake and tree were glowing in the yellow tints which Autumn, like Ambition, gilds ere it withers, he paused for a moment to recallthe scene as he last beheld it. It was then spring--spring in itsfirst and flushest glory--when not a blade of grass but sent a perfumeto the air, the happy air, --

 "Making sweet music while the young leaves danced:"

when every cluster of the brown fern, that now lay dull and motionlessaround him, and amidst which the melancholy deer stood afar off gazingupon the intruder, was vocal with the blithe melodies of the infantyear, --the sharp, yet sweet, voices of birds, --and (heard atintervals) the chirp of the merry grasshopper or the hum of theawakened bee. He sighed, as he now looked around, and recalled thechange both of time and season; and with that fondness of heart whichcauses man to knit his own little life to the varieties of time, thesigns of heaven, or the revolutions of Nature, he recognized somethingkindred in the change of scene to the change of thought and feelingwhich years had wrought in the beholder. 

Awaking from his revery, he hastened his horse's pace, and was soonwithin sight of the house. Vavasour, during the few years he hadpossessed the place, had conducted and carried through improvementsand additions to the old mansion, upon a scale equally costly andjudicious. The heavy and motley magnificence of the architecture inwhich the house had been built remained unaltered; but a wing oneither side, though exactly corresponding in style to the intermediatebuilding, gave, by the long colonnade which ran across the one and thestately windows which adorned the other, an air not only of granderextent, but more cheerful lightness to the massy and antiquated pile. It was, assuredly, in the point of view by which Clarence nowapproached it, a structure which possessed few superiors in point ofsize and effect; and harmonized so well with the nobly extent of thepark, the ancient woods, and the venerable avenues, that a very slighteffort of imagination might have poured from the massive portals thepageantries of old days, and the gay galliard of chivalric romancewith which the scene was in such accordance, and which in a former ageit had so often witnessed. 

Ah, little could any one who looked upon that gorgeous pile, and thebroad lands which, beyond the boundaries of the park, swelled on thehills of the distant landscape, studded at frequent intervals with thespires and villages, which adorned the wide baronies of Mordaunt, --little could he who thus gazed around have imagined that the owner ofall he surveyed had passed the glory and verdure of his manhood in thebitterest struggles with gnawing want, rebellious pride, and urgentpassion, without friend or aid but his own haughty and supportingvirtue, sentenced to bear yet in his wasted and barren heart the signof the storm he had resisted, and the scathed token of the lightninghe had braved. None but Crauford, who had his own reasons fortaciturnity, and the itinerant broker, easily bribed into silence, hadever known of the extreme poverty from which Mordaunt had passed tohis rightful possessions. It was whispered, indeed, that he had beenreduced to narrow and straitened circumstances; but the whisper hadbeen only the breath of rumour, and the imagined poverty far short ofthe reality: for the pride of Mordaunt (the great, almost the sole, failing in his character) could not endure that all he had borne andbaffled should be bared to the vulgar eye; and by a rare anomaly ofmind, indifferent as he was to renown, he was morbidly susceptible ofshame. 

When Clarence rang at the ivy-covered porch, and made inquiry forMordaunt, he was informed that the latter was in the park, by theriver, where most of his hours during the day-time were spent. 

"Shall I send to acquaint him that you are come, sir?" said theservant. 

"No, " answered Clarence, "I will leave my horse to one of the grooms, and stroll down to the river in search of your master. "

Suiting the action to the word, he dismounted, consigned his steed tothe groom, and following the direction indicated to him, bent his wayto the "river. "

As he descended the hill, the brook (for it did not deserve, though itreceived, a higher name) opened enchantingly upon his view. Amidstthe fragrant reed and the wild-flower, still sweet though fading, andtufts of tedded grass, all of which, when crushed beneath the foot, sent a mingled tribute to its sparkling waves, the wild stream tookits gladsome course, now contracted by gloomy firs, which, bendingover the water, cast somewhat of their own sadness upon its surface;now glancing forth from the shade, as it "broke into dimples andlaughed in the sun;" now washing the gnarled and spreading roots ofsome lonely ash, which, hanging over it still and droopingly, seemed--the hermit of the scene--to moralize on its noisy and variouswanderings; now winding round the hill and losing itself at lastamidst thick copses, where day did never more than wink and glimmer, and where, at night, its waters, brawling through their stony channel, seemed like a spirit's wail, and harmonized well with the scream ofthe gray owl wheeling from her dim retreat, or the moaning and raresound of some solitary deer. 

As Clarence's eye roved admiringly over the scene before him, it dweltat last upon a small building situated on the wildest part of theopposite bank; it was entirely overgrown with ivy, and the outlineonly remained to show the Gothic antiquity of the architecture. Itwas a single square tower, built none knew when or wherefore, and, consequently, the spot of many vagrant guesses and wild legends amongthe surrounding gossips. On approaching yet nearer, he perceived, alone and seated on a little mound beside the tower, the object of hissearch. 

Mordaunt was gazing with vacant yet earnest eye upon the watersbeneath; and so intent was either his mood or look that he was unawareof Clarence's approach. Tears fast and large were rolling from thosehaughty eyes, which men who shrank from their indifferent glancelittle deemed were capable of such weak and feminine emotion. Far, far through the aching void of time were the thoughts of the reft andsolitary mourner; they were dwelling, in all the vivid and keenintensity of grief which dies not, upon the day when, about that hourand on that spot, he sat with Isabel's young cheek upon his bosom, andlistened to a voice now only heard in dreams. He recalled the momentwhen the fatal letter, charged with change and poverty, was given tohim, and the pang which had rent his heart as he looked around upon ascene over which spring had just then breathed, and which he was aboutto leave to a fresh summer and a new lord; and then that deep, fond, half-fearful gaze with which Isabel had met his eye, and the feeling, proud even in its melancholy, with which he had drawn towards hisbreast all that earth had left to him, and thanked God in his heart ofhearts that she was spared. 

"And I am once more master, " thought he, "not only of all I then held, but of all which my wealthier forefathers possessed. But she who wasthe sharer of my sorrows and want, --oh, where is she? Rather, ah, rather a hundredfold that her hand was still clasped in mine, herspirit supporting me through poverty and trial, and her soft voicemurmuring the comfort that steals away care, than to be thus heapedwith wealth and honour, and alone, --alone, where never more can comelove or hope, or the yearnings of affection or the sweet fulness of aheart that seems fathomless in its tenderness, yet overflows! Had mylot, when she left me, been still the steepings of bitterness, thestings of penury, the moody silence of hope, the damp and chill ofsunless and aidless years, which rust the very iron of the soul away;had my lot been thus, as it had been, I could have borne her death, Icould have looked upon her grave, and wept not, --nay, I could havecomforted my own struggles with the memory of her escape; but thus, atthe very moment of prosperity, to leave the altered and promisingearth, 'to house with darkness and with death;' no little gleam ofsunshine, no brief recompense for the agonizing past, no momentaryrespite between tears and the tomb. Oh, Heaven! what--what avail is awealth which comes too late, when she, who could alone have madewealth bliss, is dust; and the light that should have gilded many andhappy days flings only a ghastly glare upon the tomb?"

Starting from these reflections, Mordaunt half-unconsciously rose, anddashing the tears from his eyes, was about to plunge into theneighbouring thicket, when, looking up, he beheld Clarence, now withina few paces of him. He started, and seemed for one moment irresolutewhether to meet or shun his advance, but probably deeming it too latefor the latter, he banished, by one of those violent efforts withwhich men of proud and strong minds vanquish emotion, all outward signof the past agony; and hastening towards his guest, greeted him with awelcome which, though from ordinary hosts it might have seemed cold, appeared to Clarence, who knew his temper, more cordial than he hadventured to anticipate. 

CHAPTER LXI. 

 Mr father urged me sair, But my mither didna speak, Though she looked into my face, Till my heart was like to break. --Auld Robin Gray. 

"It is rather singular, " said Lady Westborough to her daughter as theysat alone one afternoon in the music-room at Westborough Park, --"it israther singular that Lord Ulswater should not have come yet. He saidhe should certainly be here before three o'clock. "

"You know, Mamma, that he has some military duties to detain him atW----, " answered Lady Flora, bending over a drawing in which sheappeared to be earnestly engaged. 

"True, my dear, and it was very kind in Lord ---- to quarter the troophe commands in his native county; and very fortunate that W----, beinghis head-quarters, should also be so near us. But I cannot conceivethat any duty can be sufficiently strong to detain him from you, "added Lady Westborough, who had been accustomed all her life to adevotion unparalleled in this age. "You seem very indulgent, Flora. "

"Alas! she should rather say very indifferent, " thought Lady Flora:but she did not give her thought utterance; she only looked up at hermother for a moment, and smiled faintly. 

Whether there was something in that smile or in the pale cheek of herdaughter that touched her we know not, but Lady Westborough wastouched: she threw her arms round Lady Flora's neck, kissed herfondly, and said, "You do not seem well to-day, my love, are you?"

"Oh!--very--very well, " answered Lady Flora, returning her mother'scaress, and hiding her eyes, to which the tears had started. 

"My child, " said Lady Westborough, "you know that both myself and yourfather are very desirous to see you married to Lord Ulswater, --of highand ancient birth, of great wealth, young, unexceptionable in personand character, and warmly attached to you, it would be impossible evenfor the sanguine heart of a parent to ask for you a more eligiblematch. But if the thought really does make you wretched, --and yet, --how can it?"

"I have consented, " said Flora, gently; "all I ask is, do not speak tome more of the--the event than you can avoid. "

Lady Westborough pressed her hand, sighed, and replied not. 

The door opened, and the marquis, who had within the last year becomea cripple, with the great man's malady, dire podagra, was wheeled inon his easy-chair; close behind him followed Lord Ulswater. 

"I have brought you, " said the marquis, who piqued himself on a veinof dry humour, --"I have brought you, young lady, a consolation for myill humours. Few gouty old fathers make themselves as welcome as Ido; eh, Ulswater?"

"Dare I apply to myself Lord Westborough's compliment?" said the youngnobleman, advancing towards Lady Flora; and drawing his seat near her, he entered into that whispered conversation so significant ofcourtship. But there was little in Lady Flora's manner by which anexperienced eye would have detected the bride elect: no sudden blush, no downcast, yet sidelong look, no trembling of the hand, noindistinct confusion of the voice, struggling with unanalyzedemotions. No: all was calm, cold, listless; her cheek changed nottint nor hue, and her words, clear and collected, seemed to contradictwhatever the low murmurs of her betrothed might well be supposed toinsinuate. But, even in his behaviour, there was something which, hadLady Westborough been less contented than she was with the externalsand surface of manner, would have alarmed her for her daughter. Acloud, sullen and gloomy, sat upon his brow; and his lip alternatelyquivered with something like scorn, or was compressed with a kind ofstifled passion. Even in the exultation that sparkled in his eye, when he alluded to their approaching marriage, there was an expressionthat almost might have been termed fierce, and certainly was as littlelike the true orthodox ardour of "gentle swain, " as Lady Flora's sadand half unconscious coldness resembled the diffident passion of the"blushing maiden. "

"You have considerably passed the time in which we expected you, mylord, " said Lady Westborough, who, as a beauty herself, was a littlejealous of the deference due to the beauty of her daughter. 

"It is true. , " said Lord Ulswater, glancing towards the oppositeglass, and smoothing his right eyebrow with his forefinger, "it istrue, but I could not help it. I had a great deal of business to dowith my troop: I have put them into a new manoeuvre. Do you know, mylord [turning to the marquis], I think it very likely the soldiers mayhave some work on the ---- of this month?"

"Where, and wherefore?" asked Lord Westborough, whom a sudden twingeforced into the laconic. 

"At W----. Some idle fellows hold a meeting there on that day; and ifI may judge by bills and advertisements, chalkings on the walls, and, more than all popular rumour, I have no doubt but what riot andsedition are intended: the magistrates are terribly frightened. Ihope we shall have some cutting and hewing: I have no patience withthe rebellious dogs. "

"For shame! for shame!" cried Lady Westborough, who, though a worldly, was by no means an unfeeling, woman "the poor people are misguided;they mean no harm. "

Lord Ulswater smiled scornfully. "I never dispute upon politics, butat the head of my men, " said he, and turned the conversation. 

Shortly afterwards Lady Flora, complaining of indisposition, rose, left the apartment, and retired to her own room. There she satmotionless and white as death for more than an hour. A day or twoafterwards Miss Trevanion received the following letter from her:--

Most heartily, most truly do I congratulate you, my dearest Eleanor, upon your approaching marriage. You may reasonably hope for all thathappiness can afford; and though you do affect (for I do not thinkthat you feel) a fear lest you should not be able to fix a character, volatile and light, like your lover's; yet when I recollect his warmthof heart and high sense, and your beauty, gentleness, charms ofconversation, and purely disinterested love for one whose greatworldly advantages might so easily bias or adulterate affection, I ownthat I have no dread for your future fate, no feeling that can at alldarken the brightness of anticipation. Thank you, dearest, for thedelicate kindness with which you allude to my destiny: me indeed youcannot congratulate as I can you. But do not grieve for me, mygenerous Eleanor: if not happy, I shall, I trust, be at leastcontented. My poor father implored me with tears in his eyes; mymother pressed my hand, but spoke not; and I, whose affections werewithered and hopes strewn, should I not have been hard-hearted indeedif they had not wrung from me a consent? And oh should I not beutterly lost, if in that consent which blessed them I did not findsomething of peace and consolation?

Yes, dearest, in two months, only two months, I shall be LordUlswater's wife; and when we meet, you shall look narrowly at me, andsee if he or you have any right to complain of me. 

Have you seen Mr. Linden lately? Yet do not answer the question: Iought not to cherish still that fatal clinging interest for one whohas so utterly forgotten me. But I do rejoice in his prosperity; andwhen I hear his praises, and watch his career, I feel proud that Ishould once have loved him! Oh, how could he be so false, so cruel, in the very midst of his professions of undying, unswerving faith tome; at the very moment when I was ill, miserable, wasting my veryheart, for anxiety on his account, --and such a woman too! And had beloved me, even though his letter was returned, would not hisconscience have told him he deserved it, and would he not have soughtme out in person, and endeavoured to win from my folly hisforgiveness? But without attempting to see me, or speak to me, orsoothe a displeasure so natural, to leave the country in silence, almost in disdain; and when we met again, to greet me with coldnessand hauteur, and never betray, by word, sign, or look, that he hadever been to me more than the merest stranger! Fool! Fool! that I am, to waste another thought upon him; but I will not, and ought not to doso. In two months I shall not even have the privilege of remembrance. 

I wish, Eleanor, --for I assure you that I have tried and tried, --thatI could find anything to like and esteem (since love is out of thequestion) in this man, who seems so great, and, to me, sounaccountable a favourite with my parents. His countenance and voiceare so harsh and stern; his manner at once so self-complacent andgloomy; his very sentiments so narrow, even in their notions ofhonour; his very courage so savage, and his pride so constant andoffensive, --that I in vain endeavour to persuade myself of hisvirtues, and recur, at least, to the unwearying affection for me whichhe professes. It is true that he has been three times refused; that Ihave told him I cannot love him; that I have even owned former love toanother: he still continues his suit, and by dint of long hope has atlength succeeded. But at times I could almost think that he marriedme from very hate, rather than love: there is such an artificialsmoothness in his stern voice, such a latent meaning in his eye; andwhen he thinks I have not noticed him, I have, on suddenly turningtowards him, perceived so dark and lowering an expression upon hiscountenance that my heart has died within me for very fear. 

Had my mother been the least less kind, my father the least lessurgent, I think, nay, I know, I could not have gained such a victoryover myself as I have done in consenting to the day. But enough ofthis. I did not think I should have run on so long and so foolishly;but we, dearest, have been children and girls and women together: wehave loved each other with such fondness and unreserve that opening myheart to you seems only another phrase for thinking aloud. 

However, in two months I shall have no right even to thoughts; perhapsI may not even love you: till then, dearest Eleanor, I am, as ever, your affectionate and faithful friend, F. A. 

Had Lord Westborough, indeed, been "less urgent, " or her mother "lesskind, " nothing could ever have wrung from Lady Flora her consent to amarriage so ungenial and ill-omened. 

Thrice had Lord Ulswater (then Lord Borodaile) been refused, beforefinally accepted; and those who judge only from the ordinary effectsof pride would be astonished that he should have still persevered. But his pride was that deep-rooted feeling which, so far from beingrepelled by a single blow, fights stubbornly and doggedly onward, tillthe battle is over and its object gained. From the moment he hadresolved to address Lady Flora Ardenne he had also resolved to winher. For three years, despite of a refusal, first gently, then moreperemptorily, urged, he fixed himself in her train. He gave out thathe was her affianced. In all parties, in all places, he forcedhimself near her, unheeding alike of her frowns or indifference; andhis rank, his hauteur, his fierceness of mien, and acknowledgedcourage kept aloof all the less arrogant and hardy pretenders to LadyFlora's favour. For this, indeed, she rather thanked than blamed him;and it was the only thing which in the least reconciled her modesty tohis advances or her pride to his presumption. 

He had been prudent as well as bold. The father he had served, andthe mother he had won. Lord Westborough, addicted a little topolitics, a good deal to show, and devotedly to gaming, was oftengreatly and seriously embarrassed. Lord Ulswater, even during thelife of his father (who was lavishly generous to him), was providedwith the means of relieving his intended father-in-law's necessities;and caring little for money in comparison to a desired object, he waswilling enough, we do not say to bribe, but to influence, LordWestborough's consent. These matters of arrangement were by no meansconcealed from the marchioness, who, herself ostentatious and profuse, was in no small degree benefited by them; and though they did notsolely procure, yet they certainly contributed to conciliate, herfavour. 

Few people are designedly and systematically wicked: even the worstfind good motives for bad deeds, and are as intent upon discoveringglosses for conduct to deceive themselves as to delude others. Whatwonder, then, that poor Lady Westborough, never too rigidly addictedto self-examination, and viewing all things through a very worldlymedium, saw only, in the alternate art and urgency employed againsther daughter's real happiness, the various praiseworthy motives ofpermanently disentangling Lady Flora from an unworthy attachment, ofprocuring for her an establishment proportioned to her rank, and ahusband whose attachment, already shown by such singular perseverance, was so likely to afford her everything which, in Lady Westborough'seyes, constituted felicity?

All our friends, perhaps, desire our happiness; but then it mustinvariably be in their own way. What a pity that they do not employthe same zeal in making us happy in ours!

CHAPTER LXII. 

If thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding;If thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasures:Then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. --Proverbs ii. 3, 4, 5. 

While Clarence was thus misjudged by one whose affections and conducthe, in turn, naturally misinterpreted; while Lady Flora wasalternately struggling against and submitting to the fate which LadyWestborough saw approach with gladness, the father with indifference, and the bridegroom with a pride that partook less of rapture thanrevenge, --our unfortunate lover was endeavouring to glean, fromMordaunt's conversation and example, somewhat of that philosophy sorare except in the theories of the civilized and the occasionalpractice of the barbarian, which, though it cannot give us a charmagainst misfortune, bestows, at least, upon us the energy to supportit. 

We have said already that when the first impression produced byMordaunt's apparent pride and coldness wore away, it required littlepenetration to discover the benevolence and warmth of his mind. Butnone ignorant of his original disposition, or the misfortunes of hislife, could ever have pierced the depth of his self-sacrificingnature, or measured the height of his lofty and devoted virtue. Manymen may perhaps be found who will give up to duty a cherished wish oreven a darling vice; but few will ever renounce to it their rootedtastes, or the indulgence of those habits which have almost become bylong use their happiness itself. Naturally melancholy and thoughtful, feeding the sensibilities of his heart upon fiction, and thoughaddicted to the cultivation of reason rather than fancy, havingperhaps more of the deeper and acuter characteristics of the poet thanthose calm and half-callous properties of nature supposed to belong tothe metaphysician and the calculating moralist, Mordaunt was above allmen fondly addicted to solitude, and inclined to contemplations lessuseful than profound. The untimely death of Isabel, whom he had lovedwith that love which is the vent of hoarded and passionate musingslong nourished upon romance, and lavishing the wealth of a soul thatoverflows with secreted tenderness upon the first object that canbring reality to fiction, --that event had not only darkened melancholyinto gloom, but had made loneliness still more dear to his habits byall the ties of memory and all the consecrations of regret. Thecompanionless wanderings; the midnight closet; the thoughts which, asHume said of his own, could not exist in the world, but were all busywith life in seclusion, --these were rendered sweeter than ever to amind for which the ordinary objects of the world were now utterlyloveless; and the musings of solitude had become, as it were, arightful homage and offering to the dead. We may form, then, someidea of the extent to which, in Mordaunt's character, principlepredominated over inclination, and regard for others over the love ofself, when we see him tearing his spirit from its beloved retreats andabstracted contemplations, and devoting it to duties from which itsfastidious and refined characteristics were particularly calculated torevolt. When we have considered his attachment to the hermitage, wecan appreciate the virtue which made him among the most activecitizens in the great world; when we have considered the naturalselfishness of grief, the pride of philosophy, the indolence ofmeditation, the eloquence of wealth, which says, "Rest, and toil not, "and the temptation within, which says, "Obey the voice, "--when we haveconsidered these, we can perhaps do justice to the man who, sometimeson foot and in the coarsest attire, travelled from inn to inn and fromhut to hut; who made human misery the object of his search and humanhappiness of his desire; who, breaking aside an aversion to rudecontact, almost feminine in its extreme, voluntarily sought themeanest companions, and subjected himself to the coarsest intrusions;for whom the wail of affliction or the moan of hunger was as a summonswhich allowed neither hesitation nor appeal; who seemed possessed of aubiquity for the purposes of good almost resembling that attributed tothe wanderer in the magnificent fable of Melmoth for the temptationsto evil; who, by a zeal and labour that brought to habit andinclination a thousand martyrdoms, made his life a very hour-glass, inwhich each sand was a good deed or a virtuous design. 

Many plunge into public affairs, to which they have had a previousdistaste, from the desire of losing the memory of a privateaffliction; but so far from wishing to heal the wounds of remembranceby the anodynes which society can afford, it was only in retirementthat Mordaunt found the flowers from which balm could be distilled. Many are through vanity magnanimous, and benevolent from theselfishness of fame but so far from seeking applause where he bestowedfavour, Mordaunt had sedulously shrouded himself in darkness anddisguise. And by that increasing propensity to quiet, so often foundamong those addicted to lofty or abstruse contemplation, he hadconquered the ambition of youth with the philosophy of a manhood thathad forestalled the affections of age. Many, in short, have becomegreat or good to the community by individual motives easily resolvedinto common and earthly elements of desire; but they who inquirediligently into human nature have not often the exalted happiness torecord a character like Mordaunt's, actuated purely by a systematicprinciple of love, which covered mankind, as heaven does earth, withan atmosphere of light extending to the remotest corners andpenetrating the darkest recesses. 

It was one of those violent and gusty evenings which give to anEnglish autumn something rude, rather than gentle, in itscharacteristics, that Mordaunt and Clarence sat together, "And sowed the hours with various seeds of talk. "

The young Isabel, the only living relic of the departed one, sat byher father's side upon the floor; and though their discourse was farbeyond the comprehension of her years, yet did she seem to listen witha quiet and absorbed attention. In truth, child as she was, she soloved, and almost worshipped, her father that the very tones of hisvoice had in them a charm which could always vibrate, as it were, toher heart; and hush her into silence; and that melancholy and deepthough somewhat low voice, when it swelled or trembled with thought, --which in Mordaunt was feeling, --made her sad, she knew not why; andwhen she heard it, she would creep to his side, and put her littlehand on his, and look up to him with eyes in whose tender andglistening blue the spirit of her mother seemed to float. She wasserious and thoughtful and loving beyond the usual capacities ofchildhood; perhaps her solitary condition and habits of constantintercourse with one so grave as Mordaunt, and who always, when notabsent on his excursions of charity, loved her to be with him, hadgiven to her mind a precocity of feeling, and tinctured the simplicityof infancy with what ought to have been the colours of after years. She was not inclined to the sports of her age; she loved, rather, andabove all else, to sit by Mordaunt's side and silently pore over somebooks or feminine task, and to steal her eyes every now and then awayfrom her employment, in order to watch his motions or provide forwhatever her vigilant kindness of heart imagined he desired. Andoften, when he saw her fairy and lithe form hovering about him andattending on his wants, or her beautiful countenance glow withpleasure, when she fancied she supplied them, he almost believed thatIsabel yet lived, though in another form, and that a love so intenseand holy as hers had been, might transmigrate, but could not perish. 

The young Isabel had displayed a passion for music so early that italmost seemed innate; and as, from the mild and wise education shereceived, her ardour had never been repelled on the one hand oroverstrained on the other, so, though she had but just passed herseventh year, she had attained to a singular proficiency in the art, --an art that suited well with her lovely face and fond feelings andinnocent heart; and it was almost heavenly, in the literal acceptationof the word, to hear her sweet though childish voice swell along thestill pure airs of summer, and to see her angelic countenance all raptand brilliant with the enthusiasm which her own melodies created. 

Never had she borne the bitter breath of unkindness, nor writhedbeneath that customary injustice which punishes in others the sins ofour own temper and the varied fretfulness of caprice; and so she hadnone of the fears and meannesses and acted untruths which so usuallypollute and debase the innocence of childhood. But the promise of heringenuous brow (over which the silken hair flowed, parted into twostreams of gold), and of the fearless but tender eyes, and of thequiet smile which sat forever upon the rosy mouth, like Joy watchingLove, was kept in its fullest extent by the mind, from which allthoughts, pure, kind, and guileless, flowed like waters from a wellwhich a spirit has made holy for its own dwelling. 

On this evening we have said that she sat by her father's side andlistened, though she only in part drank in its sense, to hisconversation with his guest. 

The room was of great extent and surrounded with books, over which atclose intervals the busts of the departed Great and the immortal Wiselooked down. There was the sublime beauty of Plato, the harsher andmore earthly countenance of Tully, the only Roman (except Lucretius)who might have been a Greek. There the mute marble gave the broadfront of Bacon (itself a world), and there the features of Lockeshowed how the mind wears away the links of flesh with the file ofthought. And over other departments of those works which remind usthat man is made little lower than the angels, the stern face of theFlorentine who sung of hell contrasted with the quiet grandeurenthroned on the fair brow of the English poet, --"blind but bold, "--and there the glorious but genial countenance of him who has found inall humanity a friend, conspicuous among sages and minstrels, claimedbrotherhood with all. 

The fire burned clear and high, casting a rich twilight (for there wasno other light in the room) over that Gothic chamber, and shiningcheerily upon the varying countenance of Clarence and the morecontemplative features of his host. In the latter you might see thatcare and thought had been harsh but not unhallowed companions. In thelines which crossed his expanse of brow, time seemed to have buriedmany hopes; but his mien and air, if loftier, were gentler than inyounger days; and though they had gained somewhat in dignity, had lostgreatly in reserve. 

There was in the old chamber, with its fretted roof and ancient"garniture, " the various books which surrounded it, walls that thelearned built to survive themselves, and in the marble likenesses ofthose for whom thought had won eternity, joined to the hour, thebreathing quiet, and the hearth-light, by whose solitary rays we lovebest in the eves of autumn to discourse on graver or subtler themes, --there was in all this a spell which seemed particularly to invite andto harmonize with that tone of conversation, some portions of which weare now about to relate. 

"How loudly, " said Clarence, "that last gust swept by; you rememberthat beautiful couplet in Tibullus, --

 'Quam juvat immites ventos audire cubantem, Et dominam tenero detinuisse sinu. '" ["Sweet on our couch to hear the winds above, And cling with closer heart to her we love. "]

"Ay, " answered Mordaunt, with a scarcely audible sigh, "that is thefeeling of the lover at the immites ventos, but we sages of the lampmake our mistress Wisdom, and when the winds rage without it is to herthat we cling. See how, from the same object, different conclusionsare drawn! The most common externals of nature, the wind and thewave, the stars and the heavens, the very earth on which we tread, never excite in different bosoms the same ideas; and it is from ourown hearts, and not from an outward source, that we draw the hueswhich colour the web of our existence. "

"It is true, " answered Clarence. "You remember that in two specks ofthe moon the enamoured maiden perceived two unfortunate lovers, whilethe ambitious curate conjectured that they were the spires of acathedral? But it is not only to our feelings, but also to ourreasonings, that we give the colours which they wear. The moral, forinstance, which to one man seems atrocious, to another is divine. Onthe tendency of the same work what three people will agree? And howshall the most sanguine moralist hope to benefit mankind when he findsthat, by the multitude, his wisest endeavours to instruct are oftenconsidered but as instruments to pervert?"

"I believe, " answered Mordaunt, "that it is from our ignorance thatour contentions flow: we debate with strife and with wrath, withbickering and with hatred; but of the thing debated upon we remain inthe profoundest darkness. Like the labourers of Babel, while weendeavour in vain to express our meaning to each other, the fabric bywhich, for a common end, we would have ascended to heaven from theills of earth remains forever unadvanced and incomplete. Let us hopethat knowledge is the universal language which shall reunite us. As, in their sublime allegory, the Ancients signified that only throughvirtue we arrive at honour, so let us believe that only throughknowledge can we arrive at virtue!"

"And yet, " said Clarence, "that seems a melancholy truth for the massof the people, who have no time for the researches of wisdom. "

"Not so much so as at first we might imagine, " answered Mordaunt: "thefew smooth all paths for the many. The precepts of knowledge it isdifficult to extricate from error but, once discovered, they graduallypass into maxims; and thus what the sage's life was consumed inacquiring becomes the acquisition of a moment to posterity. Knowledgeis like the atmosphere: in order to dispel the vapour and dislodge thefrost, our ancestors felled the forest, drained the marsh, andcultivated the waste, and we now breathe without an effort, in thepurified air and the chastened climate, the result of the labour ofgenerations and the progress of ages! As to-day, the common mechanicmay equal in science, however inferior in genius, the friar [RogerBacon] whom his contemporaries feared as a magician, so the opinionswhich now startle as well as astonish may be received hereafter asacknowledged axioms, and pass into ordinary practice. We cannot eventell how far the sanguine theories of certain philosophers [SeeCondorcet "On the Progress of the Human Mind, " written some yearsafter the supposed date of this conversation, but in which there is aslight, but eloquent and affecting, view of the philosophy to whichMordaunt refers. ] deceive them when they anticipate, for future ages, a knowledge which shall bring perfection to the mind, baffle thediseases of the body, and even protract to a date now utterly unknownthe final destination of life: for Wisdom is a palace of which onlythe vestibule has been entered; nor can we guess what treasures arehid in those chambers of which the experience of the past can affordus neither analogy nor clew. "

"It was, then, " said Clarence, who wished to draw his companion intospeaking of himself, "it was, then, from your addiction to studies notordinarily made the subject of acquisition that you date (pardon me)your generosity, your devotedness, your feeling for others, and yourindifference to self?"

"You flatter me, " said Mordaunt, modestly (and we may be permitted tocrave attention to his reply, since it unfolds the secret springs of acharacter so singularly good and pure), "you flatter me: but I willanswer you as if you had put the question without the compliment; nor, perhaps, will it be wholly uninstructive, as it will certainly be new, to sketch, without recurrence to events or what I may call exteriorfacts, a brief and progressive History of One Human Mind. "

"Our first era of life is under the influence of the primitivefeelings: we are pleased, and we laugh; hurt, and we weep: we vent ourlittle passions the moment they are excited: and so much of noveltyhave we to perceive, that we have little leisure to reflect. By andby, fear teaches us to restrain our feelings: when displeased, we seekto revenge the displeasure, and are punished; we find the excess ofour joy, our sorrow, our anger, alike considered criminal, and chiddeninto restraint. From harshness we become acquainted with deceit: thepromise made is not fulfilled, the threat not executed, the fearfalsely excited, and the hope wilfully disappointed; we are surroundedby systematized delusion, and we imbibe the contagion. "

"From being forced into concealing thoughts which we do conceive, webegin to affect those which we do not: so early do we learn the twomain tasks of life, To Suppress and To Feign, that our memory will notcarry us beyond that period of artifice to a state of nature when thetwin principles of veracity and belief were so strong as to lead thephilosophers of a modern school into the error of terming theminnate. " [Reid: On the Human Mind. ]

"It was with a mind restless and confused, feelings which werealternately chilled and counterfeited (the necessary results of myfirst tuition), that I was driven to mix with others of my age. Theydid not like me, nor do I blame them. 'Les manieres que l'on negligecomme de petites choses, sont souvent ce qui fait que les hommesdecident de vous en bien ou en mal. ["Those manners which oneneglects as trifling are often the cause of the opinion, good or bad, formed of you by men. "] Manner is acquired so imperceptibly that wehave given its origin to Nature, as we do the origin of all else forwhich our ignorance can find no other source. Mine wasunprepossessing: I was disliked, and I returned the feeling; I soughtnot, and I was shunned. Then I thought that all were unjust to me, and I grew bitter and sullen and morose: I cased myself in thestubbornness of pride; I pored over the books which spoke of theworthlessness of man; and I indulged the discontent of myself bybrooding over the frailties of my kind. "

"My passions were strong: they told me to suppress them. The preceptwas old, and seemed wise: I attempted to enforce it. I had alreadybegun, in earlier infancy, the lesson: I had now only to renew it. Fortunately I was diverted from this task, or my mind in conqueringits passions would have conquered its powers. I learned in afterlessons that the passions are not to be suppressed; they are to bedirected; and, when directed, rather to be strengthened than subdued. "

"Observe how a word may influence a life: a man whose opinion Iesteemed, made of me the casual and trite remark, that 'my nature wasone of which it was impossible to augur evil or good: it might beextreme in either. ' This observation roused me into thought: could Iindeed be all that was good or evil? had I the choice, and could Ihesitate which to choose? But what was good and what was evil? Thatseemed the most difficult inquiry. "

"I asked and received no satisfactory reply: in the words of Erasmus, 'Totius negotii caput ac fontem ignorant, divinant, ac delirantomnes;' ["All ignore, guess, and rave about the head and fountain ofthe whole question at issue. "] so I resolved myself to inquire and todecide. I subjected to my scrutiny the moralist and the philosopher. I saw that on all sides they disputed, but I saw that they grewvirtuous in the dispute: they uttered much that was absurd about theorigin of good, but much more that was exalted in its praise; and Inever rose from any work which treated ably upon morals, whatever wereits peculiar opinions, but I felt my breast enlightened and my mindennobled by my studies. The professor of one sect commanded me toavoid the dogmatist of another as the propagator of moral poison; andthe dogmatist retaliated on the professor: but I avoided neither; Iread both, and turned all 'into honey and fine gold. ' No inquiry intowisdom, however superficial, is undeserving attention. The vagariesof the idlest fancy will often chance, as it were, upon the mostuseful discoveries of truth, and serve as a guide to after and toslower disciples of wisdom; even as the peckings of birds in anunknown country indicate to the adventurous seamen the best and thesafest fruits. "

"From the works of men I looked into their lives; and I found thatthere was a vast difference (though I am not aware that it has beforebeen remarked) between those who cultivated a talent, and those whocultivated the mind: I found that the mere men of genius were oftenerring or criminal in their lives; but that vice or crime in thedisciples of philosophy was strikingly unfrequent and rare. Theextremest culture of reason had not, it is true, been yet carried farenough to preserve the labourer from follies of opinion, but amoderate culture had been sufficient to deter him from the vices oflife. And only to the sons of Wisdom, as of old to the sages of theEast, seemed given the unerring star, which, through the travail ofEarth and the clouds of Heaven, led them at the last to their God!"

"When I gleaned this fact from biography, I paused, and said, 'Thenmust there be something excellent in Wisdom, if it can even in itsmost imperfect disciples be thus beneficial to morality. ' Pursuingthis sentiment, I redoubled my researches, and, behold, the object ofmy quest was won! I had before sought a satisfactory answer to thequestion, 'What is Virtue?' from men of a thousand tenets, and myheart had rejected all I had received. 'Virtue, ' said some, and mysoul bowed reverently to the dictate, 'Virtue is Religion. ' I heardand humbled myself before the Divine Book. Let me trust that I didnot humble myself in vain! But the dictate satisfied less than itawed; for either it limited Virtue to the mere belief, or by extendingit to the practice, of Religion, it extended also the inquiry to themethod in which the practice should be applied. But with the firstinterpretation of the dictate who could rest contented?--for while, inthe perfect enforcement of the tenets of our faith, all virtue may befound, so in the passive and the mere belief in its divinity, we findonly an engine as applicable to evil as to good: the torch whichshould illumine the altar has also lighted the stake, and the zeal ofthe persecutor has been no less sincere than the heroism of themartyr. Rejecting, therefore, this interpretation, I accepted theother: I felt in my heart, and I rejoiced as I felt it, that in thepractice of Religion the body of all virtue could be found. But, inthat conviction, had I at once an answer to my inquiries? Could themere desire of good be sufficient to attain it; and was the attempt atvirtue synonymous with success? On the contrary, have not those mostdesirous of obeying the precepts of God often sinned the most againsttheir spirit, and has not zeal been frequently the most ardent whencrime was the most rife? [There can be no doubt that they whoexterminated the Albigenses, established the Inquisition, lighted thefires at Smithfield, were actuated, not by a desire to do evil, but(monstrous as it may seem) to do good; not to counteract, but toenforce what they believed the wishes of the Almighty; so that a goodintention, without the enlightenment to direct it to a fitting object, may be as pernicious to human happiness as one the most fiendish. Weare told of a whole people who used to murder their guests, not fromferocity or interest, but from the pure and praiseworthy motive ofobtaining the good qualities, which they believed, by the murder ofthe deceased, devolved upon them!] But what, if neither sincerity norzeal was sufficient to constitute goodness; what if in the breasts ofthe best-intentioned crime had been fostered the more dangerouslybecause the more disguised, --what ensued? That the religion whichthey professed, they believed, they adored, they had alsomisunderstood; and that the precepts to be drawn from the Holy Bookthey had darkened by their ignorance or perverted by their passions!Here then, at once, my enigma was solved; here then, at once, I wasled to the goal of my inquiry! Ignorance and the perversion ofpassion are but the same thing, though under different names; for onlyby our ignorance are our passions perverted. Therefore, whatfollowed?--that, if by ignorance the greatest of God's gifts had beenturned to evil, Knowledge alone was the light by which even the pagesof Religion should be read. It followed that the Providence that knewthat the nature it had created should be constantly in exercise, andthat only through labour comes improvement, had wisely ordained thatwe should toil even for the blessing of its holiest and clearest laws. It had given us in Religion, as in this magnificent world, treasuresand harvests which might be called forth in incalculable abundance;but had decreed that through our exertions only should they be calledforth a palace more gorgeous than the palaces of enchantment wasbefore us, but its chambers were a labyrinth which required a clew. "

"What was that clew? Was it to be sought for in the corners of earth, or was it not beneficially centred in ourselves? Was it not theexercise of a power easy for us to use, if we would dare to do so?Was it not the simple exertion of the discernment granted to us forall else? Was it not the exercise of our reason? 'Reason!' cried theZealot, 'pernicious and hateful instrument, it is fraught with perilto yourself and to others: do not think for a moment of employing anengine so fallacious and so dangerous. ' But I listened not to theZealot: could the steady and bright torch which, even where the Starof Bethlehem had withheld its diviner light, had guided some patientand unwearied steps to the very throne of Virtue, become but adeceitful meteor to him who kindled it for the aid of Religion, and inan eternal cause? Could it be perilous to task our reason, even tothe utmost, in the investigation of the true utility and hidden wisdomof the works of God, when God himself had ordained that only throughsome exertion of our reason should we know either from Nature orRevelation that He himself existed? 'But, ' cried the Zealot again, 'but mere mortal wisdom teaches men presumption, and presumptiondoubt. ' 'Pardon me, ' I answered; 'it is not Wisdom, but Ignorance, which teaches men presumption: Genius may be sometimes arrogant, butnothing is so diffident as Knowledge. ' 'But, ' resumed the Zealot, 'those accustomed to subtle inquiries may dwell only on the minutiaeof faith, --inexplicable, because useless to explain, and argue fromthose minutiae against the grand and universal truth. ' Pardon meagain: it is the petty not the enlarged mind which prefers casuistryto conviction; it is the confined and short sight of Ignorance which, unable to comprehend the great bearings of truth, pries only into itsnarrow and obscure corners, occupying itself in scrutinizing the atomsof a part, while the eagle eye of Wisdom contemplates, in its widestscale, the luminous majesty of the whole. Survey our faults, ourerrors, our vices, --fearful and fertile field! Trace them to theircauses: all those causes resolve themselves into one, --Ignorance! Foras we have already seen that from this source flow the abuses ofReligion, so also from this source flow the abuses of all otherblessings, --of talents, of riches, of power; for we abuse things, either because we know not their real use, or because, with an equalblindness, we imagine the abuse more adapted to our happiness. But asignorance, then, is the sole spring of evil, so, as the antidote toignorance is knowledge, it necessarily follows that, were weconsummate in knowledge, we should be perfect in good. He, therefore, who retards the progress of intellect countenances crime, --nay, to aState, is the greatest of criminals; while he who circulates thatmental light more precious than the visual is the holiest improver andthe surest benefactor of his race. Nor let us believe, with thedupes, of a shallow policy, that there exists upon the earth oneprejudice that can be called salutary or one error beneficial toperpetrate. As the petty fish which is fabled to possess the propertyof arresting the progress of the largest vessel to which it clings, even so may a single prejudice, unnoticed or despised, more than theadverse blast or the dead calm, delay the bark of Knowledge in thevast seas of Time. "

"It is true that the sanguineness of philanthropists may have carriedthem too far; it is true (for the experiment has not yet been made)that God may have denied to us, in this state, the consummation ofknowledge, and the consequent perfection in good; but because wecannot be perfect are we to resolve we will be evil? One step inknowledge is one step from sin: one step from sin is one step nearerto Heaven: Oh! never let us be deluded by those who, for politicalmotives, would adulterate the divinity of religious truths; never letus believe that our Father in Heaven rewards most the one talentunemployed, or that prejudice and indolence and folly find the mostfavour in His sight! The very heathen has bequeathed to us a noblerestimate of His nature; and the same sentence which so sublimelydeclares 'TRUTH IS THE BODY OF GOD' declares also 'AND LIGHT IS HISSHADOW. '" [Plato. ]

"Persuaded, then, that knowledge contained the key to virtue, it wasto knowledge that I applied. The first grand lesson which it taughtme was the solution of a phrase most hackneyed, least understood;namely, 'common-sense. ' [Koinonoaemosunae, sensus communis. ] It isin the Portico of the Greek sage that that phrase has received itslegitimate explanation; it is there we are taught that 'common-sense'signifies 'the sense of the common interest. ' Yes! it is the mostbeautiful truth in morals that we have no such thing as a distinct ordivided interest from our race. In their welfare is ours; and, bychoosing the broadest paths to effect their happiness, we choose thesurest and the shortest to our own. As I read and pondered over thesetruths, I was sensible that a great change was working a fresh worldout of the former materials of my mind. My passions, which before Ihad checked into uselessness, or exerted to destruction, now startedforth in a nobler shape, and prepared for a new direction: instead ofurging me to individual aggrandizement, they panted for universalgood, and coveted the reward of Ambition only for the triumphs ofBenevolence. "

"This is one stage of virtue; I cannot resist the belief that there isa higher: it is when we begin to love virtue, not for its objects, butitself. For there are in knowledge these two excellences: first, thatit offers to every man, the most selfish and the most exalted, hispeculiar inducement to good. It says to the former, 'Serve mankind, and you serve yourself;' to the latter, 'In choosing the best means tosecure your own happiness, you will have the sublime inducement ofpromoting the happiness of mankind. '"

"The second excellence of Knowledge is that even the selfish man, whenhe has once begun to love Virtue from little motives, loses themotives as he increases the love; and at last worships the deity, where before he only coveted the gold upon its altar. "

"And thus I learned to love Virtue solely for its own beauty. I saidwith one who, among much dross, has many particles of ore, 'If it benot estimable in itself, I can see nothing estimable in following itfor the sake of a bargain. ' [Lord Shaftesbury. ]

"I looked round the world, and saw often Virtue in rags and Vice inpurple: the former conduces to happiness, it is true, but thehappiness lies within and not in externals. I contemned the deceitfulfolly with which writers have termed it poetical justice to make thegood ultimately prosperous in wealth, honour, fortunate love, orsuccessful desires. Nothing false, even in poetry, can be just; andthat pretended moral is, of all, the falsest. Virtue is not moreexempt than Vice from the ills of fate, but it contains within itselfalways an energy to resist them, and sometimes an anodyne to soothe, --to repay your quotation from Tibullus, --

 'Crura sonant ferro, sed canit inter opus!'" ["The chains clank on its limbs, but it sings amidst its tasks. "]

"When in the depths of my soul I set up that divinity of this netherearth, which Brutus never really understood, if, because unsuccessfulin its efforts, he doubted its existence, I said in the proud prayerwith which I worshipped it, 'Poverty may humble my lot, but it shallnot debase thee; Temptation may shake my nature, but not the rock onwhich thy temple is based; Misfortune may wither all the hopes thathave blossomed around thine altar, but I will sacrifice dead leaveswhen the flowers are no more. Though all that I have loved perish, all that I have coveted fade away, I may murmur at fate, but I willhave no voice but that of homage for thee! Nor, while thou smilestupon my way, would I exchange with the loftiest and happiest of thyfoes! More bitter than aught of what I then dreamed have been mytrials, but I have fulfilled my vow!'"

"I believe that alone to be a true description of Virtue which makesit all-sufficient to itself, that alone a just portraiture of itsexcellence which does not lessen its internal power by exaggeratingits outward advantages, nor degrade its nobility by dwelling only onits rewards. The grandest moral of ancient lore has ever seemed to methat which the picture of Prometheus affords; in whom neither theshaking earth, nor the rending heaven, nor the rock without, nor thevulture within, could cause regret for past benevolence, or terror forfuture evil, or envy, even amidst tortures, for the dishonourableprosperity of his insulter! [Mercury. --See the "Prometheus" ofAeschylus. ] Who that has glowed over this exalted picture will tellus that we must make Virtue prosperous in order to allure to it, orclothe Vice with misery in order to revolt us from its image? Oh!who, on the contrary, would not learn to adore Virtue, from thebitterest sufferings of such a votary, a hundredfold more than hewould learn to love Vice from the gaudiest triumphs of its mostfortunate disciples?"

Something there was in Mordaunt's voice and air, and the impassionedglow of his countenance, that, long after he had ceased, thrilled inClarence's heart, "like the remembered tone of a mute lyre. " And whena subsequent event led him at rash moments to doubt whether Virtue wasindeed the chief good, Linden recalled the words of that night and theenthusiasm with which they were uttered, repented that in his doubt hehad wronged the truth, and felt that there is a power in the deepheart of man to which even Destiny is submitted!

CHAPTER LXIII. 

 Will you hear the letter? . . . . . This is the motley-minded gentleman that I have before met in the forest. --As You Like It. 

A morning or two after the conversation with which our last chapterconcluded, Clarence received the following letter from the Duke ofHaverfield:--

Your letter, my dear Linden, would have been answered before, but foran occurrence which is generally supposed to engross the wholeattention of the persons concerned in it. Let me see, --ay, three, --yes, I have been exactly three days married! Upon my honour, there ismuch less in the event than one would imagine; and the next time ithappens I will not put myself to such amazing trouble andinconvenience about it. But one buys wisdom only by experience. Now, however, that I have communicated to you the fact, I expect you, inthe first place, to excuse my negligence for not writing before; for(as I know you are fond of the literae humaniores, I will give thesentiment the dignity of a quotation)--

 "Un veritable amant ne connoit point d'amis;" ["A true lover recognizes no friends. "--CORNEILLE. ]

and though I have been three days married, I am still a lover! In thesecond place, I expect you to be very grateful that, all thingsconsidered, I write to you so soon; it would indeed not be an ordinaryinducement that could make me "put pen to paper" (is not that the truevulgar, commercial, academical, metaphorical, epistolary style?) soshortly after the fatal ceremony. So, had I nothing to say but inreply to your comments on state affairs (hang them!) or in applause ofyour Italian friend, of whom I say, as Charles II. Said of the honestyeoman, "I can admire virtue, though I can't imitate it, " I think ithighly probable that your letter might still remain in a certain boxof tortoise-shell and gold (formerly belonging to the great Richelieu, and now in my possession), in which I at this instant descry, "withmany a glance of woe and boding dire, " sundry epistles, in manifoldhandwritings, all classed under the one fearful denomination, --"unanswered. "

No, my good Linden, my heart is inditing of a better matter than this. Listen to me, and then stay at your host's or order your swifteststeed, as seems most meet to you. 

You said rightly that Miss Trevanion, now her Grace of Haverfield, wasthe intimate friend of Lady Flora Ardenne. I have often talked toher--namely, Eleanor, not Lady Flora--about you, and was renewing theconversation yesterday, when your letter, accidentally lying beforeme, reminded me of you. 

Sundry little secrets passed in due conjugal course from herpossession into mine. I find that you have been believed by LadyFlora to have played the perfidious with La Meronville; that she neverknew of your application to her father! and his reply; that, on thecontrary, she accused you of indifference in going abroad withoutattempting to obtain an interview or excuse your supposed infidelity;that her heart is utterly averse to a union with that odious LordBoro--bah! I mean Lord Ulswater; and that--prepare, Linden--she stillcherishes your memory, even through time, change, and fancieddesertion, with a tenderness which--which--deuce take it, I nevercould write sentiment: but you understand me; so I will not concludethe phrase. "Nothing in oratory, " said my cousin D----, who was, entre nous, more honest than eloquent, "like a break!"--"down! youshould have added, " said I. 

I now, my dear Linden, leave you to your fate. For my part, though Iown Lord Ulswater is a lord whom ladies in love with the et ceteras ofmarried pomp might well desire, yet I do think it would be nodifficult matter for you to eclipse him. I cannot, it is true, adviseyou to run away with Lady Flora. Gentlemen don't run away with thedaughters of gentlemen; but, without running away, you may win yourbetrothed and Lord Ulswater's intended. A distinguished member of theHouse of Commons, owner of Scarsdale, and representative of the mostancient branch of the Talbots, --mon Dieu! you might marry a queendowager, and decline settlements!

And so, committing thee to the guidance of that winged god, who, ifthree days afford any experience, has made thy friend forsake pleasureonly to find happiness, I bid thee, most gentle Linden, farewell. HAVERFIELD. 

Upon reading this letter, Clarence felt as a man suddenly transformed. From an exterior of calm and apathy, at the bottom of which lay onebitter and corroding recollection, he passed at once into a state ofemotion, wild, agitated, and confused; yet, amidst all, was foremost aburning and intense hope, which for long years he had not permittedhimself to form. 

He descended into the breakfast parlour. Mordaunt, whose hours ofappearing, though not of rising, were much later than Clarence's, wasnot yet down; and our lover had full leisure to form his plans, beforehis host made his entree. 

"Will you ride to-day?" said Mordaunt; "there are some old ruins inthe neighbourhood well worth the trouble of a visit. "

"I grieve to say, " answered Clarence, "that I must take my leave ofyou. I have received intelligence this morning which may greatlyinfluence my future life, and by which I am obliged to make anexcursion to another part of the country, nearly a day's journey, onhorseback. "

Mordaunt looked at his guest, and conjectured by his heightenedcolour, and an embarrassment which he in vain endeavoured to conceal, that the journey might have some cause for its suddenness and despatchwhich the young senator had his peculiar reasons for concealing. Algernon contented himself, therefore, with expressing his regret atLinden's abrupt departure, without incurring the indiscreethospitality of pressing a longer sojourn beneath his roof. 

Immediately after breakfast, Clarence's horse was brought to the door, and Harrison received orders to wait with the carriage at W---- untilhis master returned. Not a little surprised, we trow, was the worthyvalet at his master's sudden attachment to equestrian excursions. Mordaunt accompanied his visitor through the park, and took leave ofhim with a warmth which sensibly touched Clarence, in spite of theabsence and excitement of his thoughts; indeed, the unaffected andsimple character of Linden, joined to his acute, bold, and cultivatedmind, had taken strong hold of Mordaunt's interest and esteem. 

It was a mild autumnal morning, but thick clouds in the rearprognosticated rain; and the stillness of the wind, the low flight ofthe swallows, and the lowing of the cattle, slowly gathering towardsthe nearest shelter within their appointed boundaries, confirmed theinauspicious omen. Clarence had passed the town of W----, and wasentering into a road singularly hilly, when he "was aware, " as thequaint old writers of former days expressed themselves, of a tallstranger, mounted on a neat well-trimmed galloway, who had for thelast two minutes been advancing towards a closely parallel line withClarence, and had, by sundry glances and hems, denoted a desire ofcommencing acquaintance and conversation with his fellow traveller. 

At last he summoned courage, and said, with a respectful, thoughsomewhat free, air, "That is a very fine horse of yours, sir; I haveseldom seen so fast a walker: if all his other paces are equally good, he must be quite a treasure. "

All men have their vanities. Clarence's was as much in his horse'sexcellence as his own; and, gratified even with the compliment of astranger, he replied to it by joining in the praise, though with amodest and measured forbearance, which the stranger, if gifted withpenetration, could easily have discerned was more affected thansincere. 

"And yet, sir;" resumed Clarence's new companion, "my little palfreymight perhaps keep pace with your steed; look, I lay the rein on hisneck, and, you see, he rivals--by heaven, he outwalks--yours. "

Not a little piqued and incensed, Linden also relaxed his rein, andurged his horse to a quicker step: but the lesser competitor not onlysustained, but increased, his superiority; and it was only by breakinginto a trot that Linden's impatient and spirited steed could overtakehim. Hitherto Clarence had not honoured his new companion with morethan a rapid and slight glance; but rivalry, even in trifles, begetsrespect, and our defeated hero now examined him with a more curiouseye. 

The stranger was between forty and fifty, --an age in which, generally, very little of the boy has survived the advance of manhood; yet wasthere a hearty and frank exhilaration in the manner and look of theperson we describe which is rarely found beyond the first stage ofyouth. His features were comely and clearly cut, and his air andappearance indicative of a man who might equally have belonged to themiddle or the upper orders. But Clarence's memory, as well asattention, was employed in his survey of the stranger; and herecognized, in a countenance on which time had passed very lightly, anold and ofttimes recalled acquaintance. However, he did notimmediately make himself known. "I will first see, " thought he, "whether he can remember his young guest in the bronzed stranger aftereight years' absence. "

"Well, " said Clarence, as he approached the owner of the palfrey, whowas laughing with childish glee at his conquest, "well, you have won, sir; but the tortoise might beat the hare in walking, and I contentmyself with thinking that at a trot or a gallop the result of a racewould have been very different. "

"I am not so sure of that, sir, " said the sturdy stranger, patting thearched neck of his little favourite: "if you would like to try either, I should have no objection to venture a trifling wager on the event. "

"You are very good, " said Clarence, with a smile in which urbanity wasa little mingled with contemptuous incredulity; "but I am not now atleisure to win your money: I have a long day's journey before me, andmust not tire a faithful servant; yet I do candidly confess that Ithink" (and Clarence's recollection of the person he addressed madehim introduce the quotation) "that my horse

 'Excels a common one In shape, in courage, colour, pace, and bone. '"

"Eh, sir, " cried our stranger, as his eyes sparkled at the verses: "Iwould own that your horse were worth all the horses in the kingdom, ifyou brought Will Shakspeare to prove it. And I am also willing toconfess that your steed does fairly merit the splendid praise whichfollows the lines you have quoted, --

 'Round hoofed, short jointed, fetlocks shag and long, Broad breast, full eyes, small head, and nostril wide, High crest, short ears, straight legs, and passing strong, Thin mane, thick tale, broad buttock, tender hide. '"

"Come, " said Clarence, "your memory has atoned for your horse'svictory, and I quite forgive your conquest in return for yourcompliment; but suffer me to ask how long you have commenced cavalier. The Arab's tent is, if I err not, more a badge of your profession thanthe Arab's steed. "

King Cole (for the stranger was no less a person) looked at hiscompanion in surprise. "So you know me, then, sir! Well, it is ahard thing for a man to turn honest, when people have so much readiera recollection of his sins than his reform. "

"Reform!" quoth Clarence, "am I then to understand that your Majestyhas abdicated your dominions under the greenwood tree?"

"You are, " said Cole, eying his acquaintance inquisitively; "you are. 

 'I fear no more the heat of the sun, Nor the furious winter's rages; I my worldly task have done, Home am gone, and ta'en my wages. '"

"I congratulate you, " said Clarence: "but only in part; for I haveoften envied your past state, and do not know enough of your presentto say whether I should equally envy that. "

"Why, " answered Cole, "after all, we commit a great error in imaginingthat it is the living wood or the dead wall which makes happiness. 'My mind to me a kingdom is;' and it is that which you must envy, ifyou honour anything belonging to me with that feeling. "

"The precept is both good and old, " answered Clarence; "yet I think itwas not a very favourite maxim of yours some years ago. I remember atime when you thought no happiness could exist out of 'dingle andbosky dell. ' If not very intrusive on your secrets, may I know howlong you have changed your sentiments and manner of life? The reasonof the change I dare not presume to ask. "

"Certainly, " said the quondam gypsy, musingly, "certainly I have seenyour face before, and even the tone of your voice strikes me as notwholly unfamiliar: yet I cannot for the life of me guess whom I havethe honour of addressing. However, sir, I have no hesitation inanswering your questions. It was just five years ago, last summer, when I left the Tents of Kedar. I now reside about a mile hence. Itis but a hundred yards off the high road, and if you would not objectto step aside and suffer a rasher, or aught else, to be 'the shoeing-horn to draw on a cup of ale, ' as our plain forefathers were wontwittily to say, why, I shall be very happy to show you my habitation. You will have a double welcome, from the circumstance of my havingbeen absent from home for the last three days. "

Clarence, mindful of his journey, was about to decline the invitation, when a few heavy drops falling began to fulfil the cloudy promise ofthe morning. "Trust, " said Cole, "one who has been for years awatcher of the signs and menaces of the weather: we shall have aviolent shower immediately. You have now no choice but to accompanyme home. "

"Well, " said Clarence, yielding with a good grace, "I am glad of sogood an excuse for intruding on your hospitality. 

 'O sky! Why didst thou promise such a beauteous day, And make me travel forth without my cloak?'"

"Bravo!" cried the ex-chief, too delighted to find a comrade so wellacquainted with Shakspeare's sonnets to heed the little injusticeClarence had done the sky, in accusing it of a treachery its blackclouds had by no means deserved. "Bravo, sir; and now, my palfreyagainst your steed, --trot, eh? or gallop?"

"Trot, if it must be so, " said Clarence, superciliously; "but I am afew paces before you. "

"So much the better, " cried the jovial chief. "Little John's mettlewill be the more up: on with you, sir; he who breaks into a canterloses; on!"

And Clarence slightly touching his beautiful steed, the race wasbegun. At first his horse, which was a remarkable stepper, as themodern Messrs. Anderson and Dyson would say, greatly gained theadvantage. "To the right, " cried the ci-devant gypsy, as Linden hadnearly passed a narrow lane which led to the domain of the ex-king. The turn gave "Little John" an opportunity which he seized toadvantage; and, to Clarence's indignant surprise, he beheld Cole nowclose behind, now beside, and now--now--before! In the heat of themoment he put spurs rather too sharply to his horse, and the spiritedanimal immediately passed his competitor, but--in a canter!

"Victoria!" cried Cole, keeping back his own steed. "Victoria!confess it!"

"Pshaw, " said Clarence, petulantly. 

"Nay, sir, never mind it, " quoth the retired sovereign; "perhaps itwas but a venial transgression of your horse, and on other ground Ishould not have beat you. "

It is very easy to be generous when one is quite sure one is thevictor. Clarence felt this, and, muttering out something about thesharp angle in the road, turned abruptly from all further comment onthe subject by saying, "We are now, I suppose, entering yourterritory. Does not this white gate lead to your new (at least new tome) abode?"

"It does, " replied Cole, opening the said gate, and pausing as if tosuffer his guest and rival to look round and admire. The house, infull view, was of red brick, small and square, faced with stonecopings, and adorned in the centre with a gable roof, on which was aball of glittering metal. A flight of stone steps led to the porch, which was of fair size and stately, considering the proportions of themansion: over the door was a stone shield of arms, surmounted by astag's head; and above this heraldic ornament was a window of greatbreadth, compared to the other conveniences of a similar nature. Oneither side of the house ran a slight iron fence, the protection ofsundry plots of gay flowers and garden shrubs, while two peacocks wereseen slowly stalking towards the enclosure to seek a shelter from theincreasing shower. At the back of the building, thick trees and arising hill gave a meet defence from the winds of winter; and, infront, a sloping and small lawn afforded pasture for few sheep and twopet deer. Towards the end of this lawn were two large fishponds, shaded by rows of feathered trees. On the margin of each of these, asif emblematic of ancient customs, was a common tent; and in theintermediate space was a rustic pleasure-house, fenced from theencroaching cattle, and half hid by surrounding laurel and theparasite ivy. 

All together there was a quiet and old-fashioned comfort, and evenluxury, about the place, which suited well with the eccentriccharacter of the abdicated chief; and Clarence, as he gazed around, really felt that he might perhaps deem the last state of the owner notworse than the first. 

Unmindful of the rain, which now began to pour fast and full, Colesuffered "Little John's" rein to fall over his neck, and the spoiledfavourite to pluck the smooth grass beneath, while he pointed out toClarence the various beauties of his seat. 

"There, sir, " said he, "by those ponds in which, I assure you, oldIsaac might have fished with delight, I pass many a summer's day. Iwas always a lover of the angle, and the farthest pool is the mostbeautiful bathing-place imaginable;--as glorious Geoffrey Chaucersays, --

 'The gravel's gold; the water pure as glass, The baukes round the well environing; And softe as velvet the younge grass That thereupon lustily come springing. '"

"And in that arbour, Lucy--that is, my wife--sits in the summerevenings with her father and our children; and then--ah! see our petscome to welcome me, " pointing to the deer, who had advanced within afew yards of him, but, intimidated by the stranger, would not venturewithin reach--"Lucy loved choosing her favourites among animals whichhad formerly been wild, and, faith, I loved it too. But you observethe house, sir: it was built in the reign of Queen Anne; it belongedto my mother's family; but my father sold it, and his son five yearsago rebought it. Those arms belonged to my maternal ancestry. Look, look at the peacocks creeping along: poor pride theirs that can'tstand the shower! But, egad, that reminds me of the rain. Come, sir, let us make for our shelter. " And, resuming their progress, a minutemore brought them to the old-fashioned porch. Cole's ring summoned aman, not decked in "livery gay, " but, "clad in serving frock, " whotook the horses with a nod, half familiar, half respectful, at hismaster's injunctions of attention and hospitality to the stranger'sbeast; and then our old acquaintance, striking through a small lowhall, ushered Clarence into the chief sitting-room of the mansion. 

CHAPTER LXIV. 

 We are not poor; although we have No roofs of cedar, nor our brave Baiae, nor keep Account of such a flock of sheep, Nor bullocks fed To lard the shambles; barbles bred To kiss our hands; nor do we wish For Pollio's lampreys in our dish. 

 If we can meet and so confer Both by a shining salt-cellar, And have our roof, Although not arched, yet weather-proof, And ceiling free From that cheap candle-bawdery, We'll eat our bean with that full mirth As we were lords of all the earth. HERRICK, from HORACE. 

On entering the room, Clarence recognized Lucy, whom eight years hadconverted into a sleek and portly matron of about thirty-two, withoutstealing from her countenance its original expression of mingledmodesty and good-nature. She hastened to meet her husband, with aneager and joyous air of welcome seldom seen on matrimonial faces afterso many years of wedlock. 

A fine, stout boy, of about eleven years old, left a crossbow, whichon his father's entrance he had appeared earnestly employed inmending, to share with his mother the salutations of the Returned. Anold man sat in an armchair by the fire, gazing on the three with anaffectionate and gladdening eye, and playfully detaining a child ofabout four years old, who was struggling to escape to dear "papa"!

The room was of oak wainscot, and the furniture plain, solid, andstrong, and cast in the fashion still frequently found in thosecountry houses which have remained unaltered by innovation since thedays of George II. 

Three rough-coated dogs, of a breed that would have puzzled aconnoisseur, gave themselves the rousing shake, and, deserting theluxurious hearth, came in various welcome to their master. 

One rubbed himself against Cole's sturdy legs, murmuring softrejoicings: he was the grandsire of the canine race, and his wick oflife burned low in the socket. Another sprang up almost to the faceof his master, and yelled his very heart out with joy; that was theson, exulting in the vigour of matured doghood; and the thirdscrambled and tumbled over the others, uttering his paeans in a shrilltreble, and chiding most snappishly at his two progenitors forinterfering with his pretensions to notice; that was the infant dog, the little reveller in puppy childishness! Clarence stood by thedoor, with his fine countenance smiling benevolently at the happinesshe beheld, and congratulating himself that for one moment the grouphad forgot that he was a stranger. 

As soon as our gypsy friend had kissed his wife, shaken hands with hiseldest hope, shaken his head at his youngest, smiled his salutation atthe father-in-law, and patted into silence the canine claimants of hisfavour, he turned to Clarence, and saying, half bashfully, half good-humouredly, "See what a troublesome thing it is to return home, evenafter three days' absence. Lucy, dearest, welcome a new friend!" heplaced a chair by the fireside for his guest, and motioned him to beseated. 

The chief expression of Clarence's open and bold countenance wascentred in the eyes and forehead; and, as he now doffed his hat, whichhad hitherto concealed that expression, Lucy and her husbandrecognized him simultaneously. 

"I am sure, sir, " cried the former, "that I am glad to see you oncemore!"

"Ah! my young guest under the gypsy awning!" exclaimed the latter, shaking him heartily by the hand: "where were my eyes that they didnot recognize you before?

"Eight years, " answered Clarence, "have worked more change with me andmy friend here" (pointing to the boy, whom he had left last so mere achild) "than they have with you and his blooming mother. The wonderis, not that you did not remember me before, but that you remember menow!"

"You are altered, sir, certainly, " said the frank chief. "Your face isthinner, and far graver, and the smooth cheeks of the boy (for, craving your pardon, you were little more then) are somewhat darkenedby the bronzed complexion with which time honours the man. "

And the good Cole sighed, as he contrasted Linden's ardent countenanceand elastic figure, when he had last beheld him, with the serious andthoughtful face of the person now before him: yet did he inly own thatyears, if they had in some things deteriorated from, had in othersimproved the effect of Clarence's appearance; they had broughtdecision to his mien and command to his brow, and had enlarged, to anampler measure of dignity and power, the proportions of his form. Something, too, there was in his look, like that of a man who hasstemmed fate and won success; and the omen of future triumph, whichour fortune-telling chief had drawn from his features when firstbeheld, seemed already in no small degree to have been fulfilled. 

Having seen her guest stationed in the seat of honour opposite herfather, Lucy withdrew for a few moments, and, when she reappeared, wasfollowed by a neat-handed sort of Phillis for a country-maiden, bearing such kind of "savoury messes" as the house might be supposedto afford. 

"At all events, mine host, " said Clarence, "you did not desert theflesh-pots of Egypt when you forsook its tents. "

"Nay, " quoth the worthy Cole, seating himself at the table, "eitherunder the roof or the awning we may say, in the words of the oldepilogue, --[To the play of "All Fools, " by Chapman. ]

 'We can but bring you meat and set you stools, And to our best cheer say, You all are welcome. '"

"We are plain people still; but if you can stay till dinner, you shallhave a bottle of such wine as our fathers' honest souls would haverejoiced in. "

"I am truly sorry that I cannot tarry with you, after so fair apromise, " replied Clarence; "but before night I must be many mileshence. "

Lucy came forward timidly. "Do you remember this ring, sir?" said she(presenting one); "you dropped it in my boy's frock when we saw youlast. "

"I did so, " answered Clarence. "I trust that he will not now disdaina stranger's offering. May it be as ominous of good luck to him as mynight in your caravan has proved to me!"

"I am heartily glad to hear that you have prospered, " said Cole; "now, let us fall to. "

CHAPTER LXV. 

 Out of these convertites There is much matter to be heard and learned. --SHAKSPEARE. 

"If you are bent upon leaving us so soon, " said the honest Cole, asClarence, refusing all further solicitation to stay, seized theopportunity which the cessation of the rain afforded him, and rose todepart, "if you are bent upon leaving us so soon, I will accompany youback again into the main road, as in duty bound. "

"What, immediately on your return!" said Clarence. "No, no; not astep. What would my fair hostess say to me if I suffered it?"

"Rather, what would she say to me if I neglected such a courtesy?Why, sir, when I meet one who knows Shakspeare's sonnets, to saynothing of the lights of the lesser stars, as well as you, only oncein eight years, do you not think I would make the most of him?Besides, it is but a quarter of a mile to the road, and I love walkingafter a shower. "

"I am afraid, Mrs. Cole, " said Clarence, "that I must be selfishenough to accept the offer. " And Mrs. Cole, blushing and smiling herassent and adieu, Clarence shook hands with the whole party, grandfather and child included, and took his departure. 

As Cole was now a pedestrian, Linden threw the rein over his arm, andwalked on foot by his host's side. 

"So, " said he, smiling, "I must not inquire into the reasons of yourretirement?"

"On the contrary, " replied Cole: "I have walked with you the moregladly from my desire of telling them to you; for we all love to seemconsistent, even in our chimeras. About six years ago, I confess thatI began to wax a little weary of my wandering life: my child, ingrowing up, required playmates; shall I own that I did not like him tofind them among the children of my own comrades? The old scamps weregood enough for me, but the young ones were a little too bad for myson. Between you and me only be it said, my juvenile hope was alreadya little corrupted. The dog Mim--you remember Mim, sir--secretlytaught him to filch as well as if he had been a bantling of his own;and, faith, our smaller goods and chattels, especially of an ediblenature, began to disappear, with a rapidity and secrecy that ouritinerant palace could very ill sustain. Among us (i. E. Gypsies)there is a law by which no member of the gang may steal from another:but my little heaven-instructed youth would by no means abide by thatdistinction; and so boldly designed and well executed were hisrogueries that my paternal anxiety saw nothing before him but BotanyBay on the one hand and Newgate courtyard on the other. "

"A sad prospect for the heir apparent!" quoth Clarence. 

"It was so!" answered Cole; "and it made me deliberate. Then, as onegets older one's romance oozes out a little in rheums and catarrhs. Ibegan to perceive that, though I had been bred I had not been educatedas a gypsy; and, what was worse, Lucy, though she never complained, felt that the walls of our palace were not exempt from the damps ofwinter, nor our royal state from the Caliban curses of--

 'Cramps and Side stitches that do pen our breath up. '"

"She fell ill; and during her illness I had sundry bright visions ofwarm rooms and coal fires, a friend with whom I could converse uponChaucer, and a tutor for my son who would teach him other arts thanthose of picking pockets and pilfering larders. Nevertheless, I was alittle ashamed of my own thoughts; and I do not know whether theywould have been yet put into practice, but for a trifling circumstancewhich converted doubt and longing into certainty. "

"Our crank cuffins had for some time looked upon me with suspicion andcoldness: my superior privileges and comforts they had at firstforgiven, on account of my birth and my generosity to them; but bydegrees they lost respect for the one and gratitude for the other; andas I had in a great measure ceased from participating in theiradventures, or, during Lucy's illness, which lasted several months, joining in their festivities, they at length considered me as a dronein a hive, by no means compensating by my services as an ally for myadmittance into their horde as a stranger. You will easily conceive, when this once became the state of their feelings towards me, with howill a temper they brooked the lordship of my stately caravan and myassumption of superior command. Above all, the women, who were verymuch incensed at Lucy's constant seclusion from their orgies, fannedthe increasing discontent; and, at last, I verily believe that noeyesore could have been more grievous to the Egyptians than my woodenhabitation and the smoke of its single chimney. "

"From ill-will the rascals proceeded to ill acts; and one dark night, when we were encamped on the very same ground as that which weoccupied when we received you, three of them, Mim at their head, attacked me in mine own habitation. I verily believe, if they hadmastered me, they would have robbed and murdered us all; exceptperhaps my son, whom they thought ill-used by depriving him of Mim'sinstructive society. Howbeit, I was still stirring when they invadedme, and, by the help of the poker and a tolerably strong arm, Irepelled the assailants; but that very night I passed from the land ofEgypt, and made with all possible expedition to the nearest town, which was, as you may remember, W----. "

"Here, the very next day, I learned that the house I now inhabit wasto be sold. It had (as I before said) belonged to my mother's family, and my father had sold it a little before his death. It was the homefrom which I had been stolen, and to which I had been returned: oftenin my star-lit wanderings had I flown to it in thought; and now itseemed as if Providence itself, in offering to my age the asylum I hadabove all others coveted for it, was interested in my retirement fromthe empire of an ungrateful people and my atonement in rest for mypast sins in migration. "

"Well, sir, in short, I became the purchaser of the place you havejust seen, and I now think that, after all, there is more happiness inreality than romance: like the laverock, here will I build my nest, --

 'Here give my weary spirit rest, And raise my low-pitched thoughts above Earth, or what poor mortals love. '"

"And your son, " said Clarence, "has he reformed?"

"Oh, yes, " answered Cole. "For my part, I believe the mind is lessevil than people say it is; its great characteristic is imitation, andit will imitate the good as well as the bad, if we will set theexample. I thank Heaven, sir, that my boy now might go from Dan toBeersheba and not filch a groat by the way. "

"What do you intend him for?" said Clarence. 

"Why, he loves adventure, and, faith, I can't break him of that, for Ilove it too; so I think I shall get him a commission in the army, inorder to give him a fitting and legitimate sphere wherein to indulgehis propensities. "

"You could not do better, " said Clarence. "But your fine sister, whatsays she to your amendment?"

"Oh! she wrote me a long letter of congratulation upon it and everyother summer she is graciously pleased to pay me a visit of threemonths long; at which time, I observe, that poor Lucy is unusuallysmart and uncomfortable. We sit in the best room, and turn out thedogs; my father-in-law smokes his pipe in the arbour, instead of thedrawing-room; and I receive sundry hints, all in vain, on thepropriety of dressing for dinner. In return for these attentions onour part, my sister invariably brings my boy a present of a pair ofwhite gloves, and my wife a French ribbon of the newest pattern; inthe evening, instead of my reading Shakspeare, she tells us anecdotesof high life, and, when she goes away, she gives us, in return for ourhospitality, a very general and very gingerly invitation to her house. Lucy sometimes talks to me about accepting it; but I turn a deaf earto all such overtures, and so we continue much better friends than weshould be if we saw more of each other. "

"And how long has your father-in-law been with you?"

"Ever since we have been here. He gave up his farm, and cultivatesmine for me; for I know nothing of those agricultural matters. I madehis coming a little surprise, in order to please Lucy: you should havewitnessed their meeting. "

"I think I have now learned all particulars, " said Clarence; "it onlyremains for me to congratulate you: but are you, in truth, never tiredof the monotony and sameness of domestic life?"

"Yes! and then I do, as I have just done, saddle Little John, and goon an excursion of three or four days, or even weeks, just as the whimseizes me; for I never return till I am driven back by the yearningfor home, and the feeling that after all one's wanderings there is noplace like it. Whether in private life or public, sir, in partingwith a little of one's liberty one gets a great deal of comfort inexchange. "

"I thank you truly for your frankness, " said Clarence; "it has solvedmany doubts with respect to you that have often occurred to me. Andnow we are in the main road, and I must bid you farewell: we part, butour paths lead to the same object; you return to happiness, and I seekit. "

"May you find it, and I not lose it, sir, " said the wandererreclaimed; and, shaking hands, the pair parted. 

CHAPTER LXVI. 

 Quicquid agit Rufus, nihil est, nisi Naevia Rufo, Si gaudet, si flet, si tacet, hanc loquitur; Coenat, propinat, poscit, negat, annuit, una est Naevia; si non sit Naevia, mutus erit. Scriberet hesterna patri cum luce salutem Naevia lux, inquit, Naevia numen, ave. --MART. 

 ["Whatever Rufus does is nothing, except Naevia be at his elbow. Be he joyful or sorrowful, be he even silent, he is still harping upon her. He eats, he drinks, he talks, he denies, he assents; Naevia is his sole theme: no Naevia, and he's dumb. Yesterday at daybreak, he would fain write a letter of salutation to his father: 'Hail, Naevia, light of my eyes, ' quoth he; 'hail, Naevia, my divine one. '"]

"The last time, " said Clarence to himself, "that I travelled thisroad, on exactly the same errand that I travel now, I do remember thatI was honoured by the company of one in all respects the opposite tomine honest host; for, whereas in the latter there is a luxuriant andwild eccentricity, an open and blunt simplicity, and a shrewd sense, which looks not after pence, but peace; so, in the mind of the friendof the late Lady Waddilove there was a flat and hedged-in primness andnarrowness of thought; an enclosure of bargains and profits of allspecies, --mustard-pots, rings, monkeys, chains, jars, and plum-coloured velvet inexpressibles; his ideas, with the true alchemy oftrade, turned them all into gold: yet was he also as shrewd and acuteas he with whose character he contrasts, --equally with him seekingcomfort and gladness, and an asylum for his old age. Strange that alltempers should have a common object, and never a common road to it!But since I have begun the contrast, let me hope that it may beextended in its omen unto me; let me hope that as my encountering withthe mercantile Brown brought me ill-luck in my enterprise, therebysignifying the crosses and vexations of those who labour in thecheateries and overreachings which constitute the vocation of theworld; so my meeting with the philosophical Cole, who has, both invagrancy and rest, found cause to boast of happiness, authorities fromhis studies to favour his inclination to each, and reason to despisewhat he, with Sir Kenelm Digby, would wisely call--

 'The fading blossoms of the earth;'

so my meeting with him may prove a token of good speed to mine errand, and thereby denote prosperity to one who seeks not riches, nor honour, nor the conquest of knaves, nor the good word of fools, but happylove, and the bourne of its quiet home. "

Thus, half meditating, half moralizing, and drawing, like a truelover, an omen of fear or hope from occurrences in which plain reasoncould have perceived neither type nor token, Clarence continued andconcluded his day's journey. He put up at the same little inn he hadvisited three years ago, and watched his opportunity of seeing LadyFlora alone. More fortunate in that respect than he had been before, such opportunity the very next day presented to him. 

CHAPTER LXVII. 

Duke. --Sir Valentine!Thur. --Yonder is Silvia, and Silvia's mine. Val. --Thurio, give back. --The Two Gentlemen of Verona. 

"I think, Mamma, " said Lady Flora to her mother, "that as the morningis so beautiful, I will go into the pavilion to finish my drawing. "

"But Lord Ulswater will be here in an hour, or perhaps less: may Itell him where you are, and suffer him to join you?"

"If you will accompany him, " answered Lady Flora, coldly, as she tookup her portefeuille and withdrew. 

Now the pavilion was a small summer-house of stone, situated in themost retired part of the grounds belonging to Westborough Park. Itwas a favourite retreat with Lady Flora, even in the winter months, for warm carpeting, a sheltered site, and a fireplace constructed morefor comfort than economy made it scarcely less adapted to that seasonthan to the more genial suns of summer. 

The morning was so bright and mild that Lady Flora left open the dooras she entered; she seated herself at the table, and, unmindful of herpretended employment, suffered the portefeuille to remain unopened. Leaning her cheek upon her hand, she gazed vacantly on the ground, andscarcely felt the tears which gathered slowly to her eyes, but, falling not, remained within the fair lids, chill and motionless, asif the thought which drew them there was born of a sorrow lessagitated than fixed and silent. 

The shadow of a man darkened the threshold, and there paused. 

Slowly did Flora raise her eyes, and the next moment Clarence Lindenwas by her side and at her feet. 

"Flora, " said he, in a tone trembling with its own emotions, "Flora, have years indeed separated us forever, or dare I hope that we havemisconstrued each other's hearts, and that at this moment they yearnto be united with more than the fondness and fidelity of old? Speakto me, Flora, one word. "

But she had sunk on the chair overpowered, surprised, and almostinsensible; and it was not for some moments that she could utter wordsrather wrung from than dictated by her thoughts. 

"Cruel and insulting, for what have you come? is it at such a timethat you taunt me with the remembrance of my past folly, or your--your--" She paused for a moment, confused and hesitating, butpresently recovering herself, rose, and added, in a calmer tone, "Surely you have no excuse for this intrusion: you will suffer me toleave you. "

"No, " exclaimed Clarence, violently agitated, "no! Have you notwronged me, stung me, wounded me to the core by your injustice? andwill you not hear now how differently I have deserved from you? On abed of fever and pain I thought only of you; I rose from it animatedby the hope of winning you! Though, during the danger of my wound andmy consequent illness, your parents alone, of all my intimateacquaintances, neglected to honour with an inquiry the man whom youprofessed to consecrate with your regard, yet scarcely could my handtrace a single sentence before I wrote to you requesting an interview, in order to disclose my birth and claim your plighted faith! Thatletter was returned to me unanswered, unopened. My friend andbenefactor, whose fortune I now inherit, promised to call upon yourfather and advocate my cause. Death anticipated his kindness. Assoon as my sorrow for his loss permitted me, I came to this very spot!For three days I hovered about your house, seeking the meeting thatyou would fain deny me now. I could not any longer bear the torturingsuspense I endured: I wrote to you; your father answered the letter. Here, here I have it still: read! note well the cool, the damninginsult of each line. I see that you knew not of this: I rejoice atit! Can you wonder that, on receiving it, I subjected myself no moreto such affronts? I hastened abroad. On my return I met you. Where?In crowds, in the glitter of midnight assemblies, in the whirl of whatthe vain call pleasure! I observed your countenance, your manner; wasthere in either a single token of endearing or regretful remembrance?None! I strove to harden my heart; I entered into politics, business, intrigue; I hoped, I longed, I burned to forget you, but in vain!"

"At last I heard that Rumour, though it had long preceded, had notbelied, the truth, and that you were to be married, --married to LordUlswater! I will not say what I suffered, or how idly I summonedpride to resist affection! But I would not have come now to molestyou, Flora, to trouble your nuptial rejoicings with one thought of me, if, forgive me, I had not suddenly dreamed that I had cause to hopeyou had mistaken, not rejected my heart; that--you turn away, Flora, you blush, you weep! Oh, tell me, by one word, one look, that I wasnot deceived!"

"No, no, Clarence, " said Flora, struggling with her tears: "it is toolate, too late now! Why, why did I not know this before? I havepromised, I am pledged; in less than two months I shall be the wife ofanother!"

"Never!" cried Clarence, "never! You promised on a false belief: theywill not bind you to such a promise. Who is he that claims you? I amhis equal in birth, in the world's name, --and oh, by what worlds hissuperior in love! I will advance my claim to you in his very teeth, --nay, I will not stir from these domains till you, your father, and myrival, have repaired my wrongs. "

"Be it so, sir!" cried a voice behind, and Clarence turned and beheldLord Ulswater! His dark countenance was flushed with rage, which hein vain endeavoured to conceal; and the smile of scorn that he stroveto summon to his lip made a ghastly and unnatural contrast with thelowering of his brow and the fire of his eyes. "Be it so, sir, " hesaid, slowly advancing, and confronting Clarence. "You will disputemy claims to the hand Lady Flora Ardenne has long promised to one who, however unworthy of the gift, knows, at least, how to defend it. Itis well; let us finish the dispute elsewhere. It is not the firsttime we shall have met, if not as rivals, as foes. "

Clarence turned from him without reply, for he saw Lady Westboroughhad just entered the pavilion, and stood mute and transfixed at thedoor, with surprise, fear, and anger depicted upon her regal andbeautiful countenance. 

"It is to you, madam, " said Clarence, approaching towards her, "that Iventure to appeal. Your daughter and I, four long years ago, exchanged our vows: you flattered me with the hope that those vowswere not displeasing to you; since then a misunderstanding, deadly tomy happiness and to hers, divided us. I come now to explain it. Mybirth may have seemed obscure; I come to clear it: my conductdoubtful; I come to vindicate it. I find Lord Ulswater my rival. Iam willing to compare my pretensions to his. I acknowledge that hehas titles which I have not; that he has wealth, to which mine is butcompetence: but titles and wealth, as the means of happiness, are tobe referred to your daughter, to none else. You have only, in analliance with me, to consider my character and my lineage: the latterflows from blood as pure as that which warms the veins of my rival;the former stands already upon an eminence to which Lord Ulswater inhis loftiest visions could never aspire. For the rest, madam, Iadjure you, solemnly, as you value your peace of mind, your daughter'shappiness, your freedom from the agonies of future remorse andunavailing regret, --I adjure you not to divorce those whom God, whospeaks in the deep heart and the plighted vow, has already joined. This is a question in which your daughter's permanent woe or lastinghappiness from this present hour to the last sand of life isconcerned. It is to her that I refer it: let her be the judge. "

And Clarence moved from Lady Westborough, who, agitated, confused, awed by the spell of a power and a nature of which she had notdreamed, stood pale and speechless, vainly endeavouring to reply: hemoved from her towards Lady Flora, who leaned, sobbing and convulsedwith contending emotions, against the wall; but Lord Ulswater, whosefiery blood was boiling with passion, placed himself between Clarenceand the unfortunate object of the contention. 

"Touch her not, approach her not!" he said, with a fierce and menacingtone. "Till you have proved your pretensions superior to mine, unknown, presuming, and probably base-born as you are, you will onlypass over my body to your claims. "

Clarence stood still for one moment, evidently striving to master thewrath which literally swelled his form beyond its ordinaryproportions; and Lady Westborough, recovering herself in the briefpause, passed between the two, and, taking her daughter's arm, led herfrom the pavilion. 

"Stay, madam, for one instant!" cried Clarence, and he caught hold ofher robe. 

Lady Westborough stood quite erect and still; and, drawing her statelyfigure to its full height, said with that quiet dignity by which awoman so often stills the angrier passions of men, "I lay the prayerand command of a mother upon you, Lord Ulswater, and on you, sir, whatever be your real rank and name, not to make mine and mydaughter's presence the scene of a contest which dishonours both. Still further, if Lady Flora's hand and my approval be an object ofdesire to either, I make it a peremptory condition with both of you, that a dispute already degrading to her name pass not from word toact. For you, Mr. Linden, if so I may call you, I promise that mydaughter shall be left free and unbiased to give that reply to yoursingular conduct which I doubt not her own dignity and sense willsuggest. "

"By Heaven!" exclaimed Lord Ulswater, utterly beside himself with ragewhich, suppressed at the beginning of Lady Westborough's speech, hadbeen kindled into double fury by its conclusion, "you will not sufferLady Flora, no, nor any one but her affianced bridegroom, her onlylegitimate defender, to answer this arrogant intruder! You cannotthink that her hand, the hand of my future wife, shall trace line orword to one who has so insulted her with his addresses and me with hisrivalry. "

"Man!" cried Clarence, abruptly, and seizing Lord Ulswater fiercely bythe arm, "there are some causes which will draw fire from ice: beware, beware how you incense me to pollute my soul with the blood of a--"

"What!" exclaimed Lord Ulswater. 

Clarence bent down and whispered one word in his ear. 

Had that word been the spell with which the sorcerers of old disarmedthe fiend, it could not have wrought a greater change upon LordUlswater's mien and face. He staggered back several paces, the glowof his swarthy cheek faded into a deathlike paleness; the word whichpassion had conjured to his tongue died there in silence; and he stoodwith eyes dilated and fixed on Clarence's face, on which their gazeseemed to force some unwilling certainty. 

But Linden did not wait for him to recover his self-possession: hehurried after Lady Westborough, who, with her daughter, was hasteninghome. 

"Pardon me, Lady Westborough, " he said, as he approached, with a toneand air of deep respect, "pardon me; but will you suffer me to hopethat Lady Flora and yourself will, in a moment of greater calmness, consider over all I have said? and-that she--that you, Lady Flora"(added he, changing the object of his address), "will vouchsafe oneline of unprejudiced, unbiased reply, to a love which, howevermisrepresented and calumniated, has in it, I dare to say, nothing thatcan disgrace her to whom, with an enduring constancy, and undimmed, though unhoping, ardour, it has been inviolably dedicated?"

Lady Flora, though she spoke not, lifted her eyes to his; and in thatglance was a magic which made his heart burn with a sudden andflashing joy that atoned for the darkness of years. 

"I assure you, sir, " said Lady Westborough, touched, in spite ofherself, with the sincerity and respect of Clarence's bearing, "thatLady Flora will reply to any letter of explanation or proposal: formyself, I will not even see her answer. Where shall it be sent toyou?"

"I have taken my lodgings at the inn by your park gates. I shallremain there till--till--"

Clarence paused, for his heart was full; and, leaving the sentence tobe concluded as his listeners pleased, he drew himself aside fromtheir path and suffered them to proceed. 

As he was feeding his eyes with the last glimpse of their forms, ere aturn in the grounds snatched them from his view, he heard a rapid stepbehind, and Lord Ulswater, approaching, laid his hand upon Linden'sshoulder, and said calmly, --

"Are you furnished with proof to support the word you uttered?"

"I am!" replied Clarence, haughtily. 

"And will you favour me with it?"

"At your leisure, my lord, " rejoined Clarence. 

"Enough! Name your time and I will attend you. "

"On Tuesday: I require till then to produce my witnesses. "

"So be it; yet stay: on Tuesday I have military business at W----, some miles hence; the next day let it be; the place of meeting whereyou please. "

"Here, then, my lord, " answered Clarence; "you have insulted megrossly before Lady Westborough and your affianced bride, and beforethem my vindication and answer should be given. "

"You are right, " said Lord Ulswater; "be it here, at the hour oftwelve. " Clarence bowed his assent and withdrew. Lord Ulswaterremained on the spot, with downcast eyes, and a brow on which thoughthad succeeded passion. 

"If true, " said he aloud, though unconsciously, "if this be true, why, then I owe him reparation, and he shall have it at my hands. I owe itto him on my account, and that of one now no more. Till we meet, Iwill not again see Lady Flora; after that meeting, perhaps I mayresign her forever. "

And with these words the young nobleman, who, despite of many evil andoverbearing qualities, had, as we have said, his redeeming virtues, inwhich a capricious and unsteady generosity was one, walked slowly tothe house; wrote a brief note to Lady Westborough, the purport ofwhich the next chapter will disclose; and then, summoning his horse, flung himself on its back, and rode hastily away.