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Title: Kenelm Chillingly, Complete

Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton

Release Date: March 16, 2009 [EBook #7658]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KENELM CHILLINGLY, COMPLETE ***




Produced by David Widger and Dagny





KENELM CHILLINGLY

HIS ADVENTURES AND OPINIONS


By Edward Bulwer Lytton

(LORD LYTTON)




BOOK I.



CHAPTER I.

SIR PETER CHILLINGLY, of Exmundham, Baronet, F.R.S. and F.A.S., was the
representative of an ancient family, and a landed proprietor of some
importance. He had married young; not from any ardent inclination for
the connubial state, but in compliance with the request of his parents.
They took the pains to select his bride; and if they might have chosen
better, they might have chosen worse, which is more than can be said for
many men who choose wives for themselves. Miss Caroline Brotherton was
in all respects a suitable connection. She had a pretty fortune, which
was of much use in buying a couple of farms, long desiderated by the
Chillinglys as necessary for the rounding of their property into a
ring-fence. She was highly connected, and brought into the county that
experience of fashionable life acquired by a young lady who has attended
a course of balls for three seasons, and gone out in matrimonial
honours, with credit to herself and her chaperon. She was handsome
enough to satisfy a husband's pride, but not so handsome as to keep
perpetually on the _qui vive_ a husband's jealousy. She was considered
highly accomplished; that is, she played upon the pianoforte so that any
musician would say she "was very well taught;" but no musician would
go out of his way to hear her a second time. She painted in
water-colours--well enough to amuse herself. She knew French and Italian
with an elegance so lady-like that, without having read more than
selected extracts from authors in those languages, she spoke them both
with an accent more correct than we have any reason to attribute to
Rousseau or Ariosto. What else a young lady may acquire in order to be
styled highly accomplished I do not pretend to know; but I am sure that
the young lady in question fulfilled that requirement in the opinion
of the best masters. It was not only an eligible match for Sir
Peter Chillingly,--it was a brilliant match. It was also a very
unexceptionable match for Miss Caroline Brotherton. This excellent
couple got on together as most excellent couples do. A short time after
marriage, Sir Peter, by the death of his parents--who, having married
their heir, had nothing left in life worth the trouble of living
for--succeeded to the hereditary estates; he lived for nine months of
the year at Exmundham, going to town for the other three months. Lady
Chillingly and himself were both very glad to go to town, being bored at
Exmundham; and very glad to go back to Exmundham, being bored in town.
With one exception it was an exceedingly happy marriage, as marriages
go. Lady Chillingly had her way in small things; Sir Peter his way in
great. Small things happen every day; great things once in three years.
Once in three years Lady Chillingly gave way to Sir Peter; households so
managed go on regularly. The exception to their connubial happiness was,
after all, but of a negative description. Their affection was such
that they sighed for a pledge of it; fourteen years had he and Lady
Chillingly remained unvisited by the little stranger.

Now, in default of male issue, Sir Peter's estates passed to a distant
cousin as heir-at-law; and during the last four years this heir-at-law
had evinced his belief that practically speaking he was already
heir-apparent; and (though Sir Peter was a much younger man than
himself, and as healthy as any man well can be) had made his
expectations of a speedy succession unpleasantly conspicuous. He had
refused his consent to a small exchange of lands with a neighbouring
squire, by which Sir Peter would have obtained some good arable land,
for an outlying unprofitable wood that produced nothing but fagots and
rabbits, with the blunt declaration that he, the heir-at-law, was fond
of rabbit-shooting, and that the wood would be convenient to him next
season if he came into the property by that time, which he very possibly
might. He disputed Sir Peter's right to make his customary fall of
timber, and had even threatened him with a bill in Chancery on that
subject. In short, this heir-at-law was exactly one of those persons
to spite whom a landed proprietor would, if single, marry at the age of
eighty in the hope of a family.

Nor was it only on account of his very natural wish to frustrate the
expectations of this unamiable relation that Sir Peter Chillingly
lamented the absence of the little stranger. Although belonging to that
class of country gentlemen to whom certain political reasoners deny the
intelligence vouchsafed to other members of the community, Sir Peter was
not without a considerable degree of book-learning and a great taste
for speculative philosophy. He sighed for a legitimate inheritor to the
stores of his erudition, and, being a very benevolent man, for a more
active and useful dispenser of those benefits to the human race which
philosophers confer by striking hard against each other; just as, how
full soever of sparks a flint may be, they might lurk concealed in the
flint till doomsday, if the flint were not hit by the steel. Sir Peter,
in short, longed for a son amply endowed with the combative quality, in
which he himself was deficient, but which is the first essential to all
seekers after renown, and especially to benevolent philosophers.

Under these circumstances one may well conceive the joy that filled
the household of Exmundham and extended to all the tenantry on that
venerable estate, by whom the present possessor was much beloved and
the prospect of an heir-at-law with a special eye to the preservation
of rabbits much detested, when the medical attendant of the Chillinglys
declared that 'her ladyship was in an interesting way;' and to what
height that joy culminated when, in due course of time, a male baby was
safely entbroned in his cradle. To that cradle Sir Peter was summoned.
He entered the room with a lively bound and a radiant countenance: he
quitted it with a musing step and an overclouded brow.

Yet the baby was no monster. It did not come into the world with two
heads, as some babies are said to have done; it was formed as babies are
in general; was on the whole a thriving baby, a fine baby. Nevertheless,
its aspect awed the father as already it had awed the nurse. The
creature looked so unutterably solemn. It fixed its eyes upon Sir Peter
with a melancholy reproachful stare; its lips were compressed and drawn
downward as if discontentedly meditating its future destinies. The nurse
declared in a frightened whisper that it had uttered no cry on facing
the light. It had taken possession of its cradle in all the dignity of
silent sorrow. A more saddened and a more thoughtful countenance a human
being could not exhibit if he were leaving the world instead of entering
it.

"Hem!" said Sir Peter to himself on regaining the solitude of his
library; "a philosopher who contributes a new inhabitant to this vale of
tears takes upon himself very anxious responsibilities--"

At that moment the joy-bells rang out from the neighbouring church
tower, the summer sun shone into the windows, the bees hummed among the
flowers on the lawn. Sir Peter roused himself and looked forth, "After
all," said he, cheerily, "the vale of tears is not without a smile."



CHAPTER II.

A FAMILY council was held at Exmundham Hall to deliberate on the name
by which this remarkable infant should be admitted into the Christian
community. The junior branches of that ancient house consisted, first,
of the obnoxious heir-at-law--a Scotch branch named Chillingly Gordon.
He was the widowed father of one son, now of the age of three, and
happily unconscious of the injury inflicted on his future prospects by
the advent of the new-born, which could not be truthfully said of his
Caledonian father. Mr. Chillingly Gordon was one of those men who get on
in the world with out our being able to discover why. His parents died
in his infancy and left him nothing; but the family interest procured
him an admission into the Charterhouse School, at which illustrious
academy he obtained no remarkable distinction. Nevertheless, as soon as
he left it the State took him under its special care, and appointed him
to a clerkship in a public office. From that moment he continued to get
on in the world, and was now a Commissioner of Customs, with a salary of
L1500 a year. As soon as he had been thus enabled to maintain a wife,
he selected a wife who assisted to maintain himself. She was an Irish
peer's widow, with a jointure of L2000 a year.

A few months after his marriage, Chillingly Gordon effected insurances
on his wife's life, so as to secure himself an annuity of L1000 a year
in case of her decease. As she appeared to be a fine healthy woman, some
years younger than her husband, the deduction from his income effected
by the annual payments for the insurance seemed an over-sacrifice of
present enjoyment to future contingencies. The result bore witness to
his reputation for sagacity, as the lady died in the second year of
their wedding, a few months after the birth of her only child, and of a
heart-disease which had been latent to the doctors, but which, no doubt,
Gordon had affectionately discovered before he had insured a life too
valuable not to need some compensation for its loss. He was now, then,
in the possession of L2500 a year, and was therefore very well off,
in the pecuniary sense of the phrase. He had, moreover, acquired a
reputation which gave him a social rank beyond that accorded to him by
a discerning State. He was considered a man of solid judgment, and
his opinion upon all matters, private and public, carried weight. The
opinion itself, critically examined, was not worth much, but the way he
announced it was imposing. Mr. Fox said that 'No one ever was so wise as
Lord Thurlow looked.' Lord Thurlow could not have looked wiser than Mr.
Chillingly Gordon. He had a square jaw and large red bushy eyebrows,
which he lowered down with great effect when he delivered judgment.
He had another advantage for acquiring grave reputation. He was a very
unpleasant man. He could be rude if you contradicted him; and as few
persons wish to provoke rudeness, so he was seldom contradicted.

Mr. Chillingly Mivers, another cadet of the house, was also
distinguished, but in a different way. He was a bachelor, now about the
age of thirty-five. He was eminent for a supreme well-bred contempt for
everybody and everything. He was the originator and chief proprietor of
a public journal called "The Londoner," which had lately been set up on
that principle of contempt, and we need not say, was exceedingly popular
with those leading members of the community who admire nobody and
believe in nothing. Mr. Chillingly Mivers was regarded by himself and
by others as a man who might have achieved the highest success in any
branch of literature, if he had deigned to exhibit his talents therein.
But he did not so deign, and therefore he had full right to imply that,
if he had written an epic, a drama, a novel, a history, a metaphysical
treatise, Milton, Shakspeare, Cervantes, Hume, Berkeley would have been
nowhere. He held greatly to the dignity of the anonymous; and even in
the journal which he originated nobody could ever ascertain what he
wrote. But, at all events, Mr. Chillingly Mivers was what Mr. Chillingly
Gordon was not; namely, a very clever man, and by no means an unpleasant
one in general society.

The Rev. John Stalworth Chillingly was a decided adherent to the creed
of what is called "muscular Christianity," and a very fine specimen
of it too. A tall stout man with broad shoulders, and that division of
lower limb which intervenes between the knee and the ankle powerfully
developed. He would have knocked down a deist as soon as looked at
him. It is told by the Sieur de Joinville, in his Memoir of Louis, the
sainted king, that an assembly of divines and theologians convened the
Jews of an Oriental city for the purpose of arguing with them on the
truths of Christianity, and a certain knight, who was at that time
crippled, and supporting himself on crutches, asked and obtained
permission to be present at the debate. The Jews flocked to the summons,
when a prelate, selecting a learned rabbi, mildly put to him the leading
question whether he owned the divine conception of our Lord. "Certainly
not," replied the rabbi; whereon the pious knight, shocked by such
blasphemy, uplifted his crutch and felled the rabbi, and then flung
himself among the other misbelievers, whom he soon dispersed in
ignominious flight and in a very belaboured condition. The conduct of
the knight was reported to the sainted king, with a request that it
should be properly reprimanded; but the sainted king delivered himself
of this wise judgment:--

"If a pious knight is a very learned clerk, and can meet in fair
argument the doctrines of the misbeliever, by all means let him argue
fairly; but if a pious knight is not a learned clerk, and the argument
goes against him, then let the pious knight cut the discussion short by
the edge of his good sword."

The Rev. John Stalworth Chillingly was of the same opinion as Saint
Louis; otherwise, he was a mild and amiable man. He encouraged cricket
and other manly sports among his rural parishioners. He was a skilful
and bold rider, but he did not hunt; a convivial man--and took his
bottle freely. But his tastes in literature were of a refined and
peaceful character, contrasting therein the tendencies some might have
expected from his muscular development of Christianity. He was a great
reader of poetry, but he disliked Scott and Byron, whom he considered
flashy and noisy; he maintained that Pope was only a versifier, and that
the greatest poet in the language was Wordsworth; he did not care much
for the ancient classics; he refused all merit to the French poets; he
knew nothing of the Italian, but he dabbled in German, and was inclined
to bore one about the "Hermann and Dorothea" of Goethe. He was married
to a homely little wife, who revered him in silence, and thought there
would be no schism in the Church if he were in his right place as
Archbishop of Canterbury; in this opinion he entirely agreed with his
wife.

Besides these three male specimens of the Chillingly race, the fairer
sex was represented, in the absence of her ladyship, who still kept her
room, by three female Chillinglys, sisters of Sir Peter, and all three
spinsters. Perhaps one reason why they had remained single was, that
externally they were so like each other that a suitor must have been
puzzled which to choose, and may have been afraid that if he did choose
one, he should be caught next day kissing another one in mistake. They
were all tall, all thin, with long throats--and beneath the throats a
fine development of bone. They had all pale hair, pale eyelids, pale
eyes, and pale complexions. They all dressed exactly alike, and their
favourite colour was a vivid green: they were so dressed on this
occasion.

As there was such similitude in their persons, so, to an ordinary
observer, they were exactly the same in character and mind. Very
well behaved, with proper notions of female decorum: very distant and
reserved in manner to strangers; very affectionate to each other and
their relations or favourites; very good to the poor, whom they looked
upon as a different order of creation, and treated with that sort of
benevolence which humane people bestow upon dumb animals. Their minds
had been nourished on the same books--what one read the others had read.
The books were mainly divided into two classes,--novels, and what they
called "good books." They had a habit of taking a specimen of each
alternately; one day a novel, then a good book, then a novel again, and
so on. Thus if the imagination was overwarmed on Monday, on Tuesday it
was cooled down to a proper temperature; and if frost-bitten on Tuesday,
it took a tepid bath on Wednesday. The novels they chose were indeed
rarely of a nature to raise the intellectual thermometer into blood
heat: the heroes and heroines were models of correct conduct. Mr.
James's novels were then in vogue, and they united in saying that those
"were novels a father might allow his daughters to read." But though an
ordinary observer might have failed to recognize any distinction between
these three ladies, and, finding them habitually dressed in green, would
have said they were as much alike as one pea is to another, they had
their idiosyncratic differences, when duly examined. Miss Margaret, the
eldest, was the commanding one of the three; it was she who regulated
their household (they all lived together), kept the joint purse, and
decided every doubtful point that arose: whether they should or should
not ask Mrs. So-and-so to tea; whether Mary should or should not be
discharged; whether or not they should go to Broadstairs or to Sandgate
for the month of October. In fact, Miss Margaret was the WILL of the
body corporate.

Miss Sibyl was of milder nature and more melancholy temperament; she had
a poetic turn of mind, and occasionally wrote verses. Some of these
had been printed on satin paper, and sold for objects of beneficence
at charity bazaars. The county newspapers said that the verses "were
characterized by all the elegance of a cultured and feminine mind." The
other two sisters agreed that Sibyl was the genius of the household,
but, like all geniuses, not sufficiently practical for the world.
Miss Sarah Chillingly, the youngest of the three, and now just in her
forty-fourth year, was looked upon by the others as "a dear thing,
inclined to be naughty, but such a darling that nobody could have the
heart to scold her." Miss Margaret said "she was a giddy creature." Miss
Sibyl wrote a poem on her, entitled, "Warning to a young Lady against
the Pleasures of the World." They all called her Sally; the other
two sisters had no diminutive synonyms. Sally is a name indicative of
fastness. But this Sally would not have been thought fast in another
household, and she was now little likely to sally out of the one she
belonged to. These sisters, who were all many years older than Sir
Peter, lived in a handsome, old-fashioned, red-brick house, with a large
garden at the back, in the principal street of the capital of their
native county. They had each L10,000 for portion; and if he could have
married all three, the heir-at-law would have married them, and settled
the aggregate L30,000 on himself. But we have not yet come to recognize
Mormonism as legal, though if our social progress continues to slide in
the same grooves as at present, Heaven only knows what triumphs over
the prejudices of our ancestors may not be achieved by the wisdom of our
descendants!



CHAPTER III.

SIR PETER stood on his hearthstone, surveyed the guests seated in
semicircle, and said: "Friends,--in Parliament, before anything
affecting the fate of a Bill is discussed, it is, I believe, necessary
to introduce the Bill." He paused a moment, rang the bell, and said to
the servant who entered, "Tell Nurse to bring in the Baby."

Mr. CHILLINGLY GORDON.--"I don't see the necessity for that, Sir Peter.
We may take the existence of the Baby for granted."

Mr. MIVERS.--"It is an advantage to the reputation of Sir Peter's work
to preserve the incognito. _Omne ignotum pro magnifico_."

THE REV. JOHN STALWORTH CHILLINGLY.--"I don't approve the cynical
levity of such remarks. Of course we must all be anxious to see, in the
earliest stage of being, the future representative of our name and race.
Who would not wish to contemplate the source, however small, of the
Tigris or the Nile!--"

MISS SALLY (tittering).--"He! he!"

MISS MARGARET.--"For shame, you giddy thing!"

The Baby enters in the nurse's arms. All rise and gather round the Baby
with one exception,--Mr. Gordon, who has ceased to be heir-at-law.

The Baby returned the gaze of its relations with the most contemptuous
indifference. Miss Sibyl was the first to pronounce an opinion on the
Baby's attributes. Said she, in a solemn whisper, "What a heavenly
mournful expression! it seems so grieved to have left the angels!"

THE REV. JOHN.--"That is prettily said, Cousin Sibyl; but the infant
must pluck up its courage and fight its way among mortals with a good
heart, if it wants to get back to the angels again. And I think it will;
a fine child." He took it from the nurse, and moving it deliberately up
and down, as if to weigh it, said cheerfully, "Monstrous heavy! by the
time it is twenty it will be a match for a prize-fighter of fifteen
stone!"

Therewith he strode to Gordon, who as if to show that he now considered
himself wholly apart from all interest in the affairs of a family who
had so ill-treated him in the birth of that Baby, had taken up the
"Times" newspaper and concealed his countenance beneath the ample sheet.
The Parson abruptly snatched away the "Times" with one hand, and,
with the other substituting to the indignant eyes of the _ci-devant_
heir-at-law the spectacle of the Baby, said, "Kiss it."

"Kiss it!" echoed Chillingly Gordon, pushing back his chair--"kiss
it! pooh, sir, stand off! I never kissed my own baby: I shall not kiss
another man's. Take the thing away, sir: it is ugly; it has black eyes."

Sir Peter, who was near-sighted, put on his spectacles and examined
the face of the new-born. "True," said he, "it has black eyes,--very
extraordinary: portentous: the first Chillingly that ever had black
eyes."

"Its mamma has black eyes," said Miss Margaret: "it takes after its
mamma; it has not the fair beauty of the Chillinglys, but it is not
ugly."

"Sweet infant!" sighed Sibyl; "and so good; does not cry."

"It has neither cried nor crowed since it was born," said the nurse;
"bless its little heart."

She took the Baby from the Parson's arms, and smoothed back the frill of
its cap, which had got ruffled.

"You may go now, Nurse," said Sir Peter.



CHAPTER IV.

"I AGREE with Mr. Shandy," said Sir Peter, resuming his stand on the
hearthstone, "that among the responsibilities of a parent the choice of
the name which his child is to bear for life is one of the gravest. And
this is especially so with those who belong to the order of baronets.
In the case of a peer his Christian name, fused into his titular
designation, disappears. In the case of a Mister, if his baptismal
be cacophonous or provocative of ridicule, he need not ostentatiously
parade it: he may drop it altogether on his visiting cards, and may be
imprinted as Mr. Jones instead of Mr. Ebenezer Jones. In his signature,
save where the forms of the law demand Ebenezer in full, he may only
use an initial and be your obedient servant E. Jones, leaving it to be
conjectured that E. stands for Edward or Ernest,--names inoffensive, and
not suggestive of a Dissenting Chapel, like Ebenezer. If a man called
Edward or Ernest be detected in some youthful indiscretion, there is
no indelible stain on his moral character: but if an Ebenezer be so
detected he is set down as a hypocrite; it produces that shock on the
public mind which is felt when a professed saint is proved to be a
bit of a sinner. But a baronet never can escape from his baptismal: it
cannot lie _perdu_; it cannot shrink into an initial, it stands forth
glaringly in the light of day; christen him Ebenezer, and he is Sir
Ebenezer in full, with all its perilous consequences if he ever succumb
to those temptations to which even baronets are exposed. But, my
friends, it is not only the effect that the sound of a name has upon
others which is to be thoughtfully considered: the effect that his name
produces on the man himself is perhaps still more important. Some names
stimulate and encourage the owner; others deject and paralyze him: I
am a melancholy instance of that truth. Peter has been for many
generations, as you are aware, the baptismal to which the eldest-born
of our family has been devoted. On the altar of that name I have been
sacrificed. Never has there been a Sir Peter Chillingly who has, in any
way, distinguished himself above his fellows. That name has been a dead
weight on my intellectual energies. In the catalogue of illustrious
Englishmen there is, I think, no immortal Sir Peter, except Sir Peter
Teazle, and he only exists on the comic stage."

MISS SIBYL.--"Sir Peter Lely?"

SIR PETER CHILLINGLY.--"That painter was not an Englishman. He was born
in Westphalia, famous for hams. I confine my remarks to the children of
our native land. I am aware that in foreign countries the name is not an
extinguisher to the genius of its owner. But why? In other countries its
sound is modified. Pierre Corneille was a great man; but I put it to
you whether, had he been an Englishman, he could have been the father of
European tragedy as Peter Crow?"

MISS SIBYL.--"Impossible!"

MISS SALLY.--"He! he!"

MISS MARGARET.--"There is nothing to laugh at, you giddy child!"

SIR PETER.--"My son shall not be petrified into Peter."

MR. CHILLINGLY GORDON.--"If a man is such a fool--and I don't say your
son will not be a fool, Cousin Peter--as to be influenced by the sound
of his own name, and you want the booby to turn the world topsy-turvy,
you had better call him Julius Caesar or Hannibal or Attila or
Charlemagne."

SIR PETER, (who excels mankind in imperturbability of temper).--"On the
contrary, if you inflict upon a man the burden of one of those names,
the glory of which he cannot reasonably expect to eclipse or even to
equal, you crush him beneath the weight. If a poet were called John
Milton or William Shakspeare, he could not dare to publish even a
sonnet. No: the choice of a name lies between the two extremes of
ludicrous insignificance and oppressive renown. For this reason I have
ordered the family pedigree to be suspended on yonder wall. Let us
examine it with care, and see whether, among the Chillinglys themselves
or their alliances, we can discover a name that can be borne with
becoming dignity by the destined head of our house--a name neither too
light nor too heavy."

Sir Peter here led the way to the family tree--a goodly roll of
parchment, with the arms of the family emblazoned at the top. Those arms
were simple, as ancient heraldic coats are,--three fishes _argent_ on
a field _azure_; the crest a mermaid's head. All flocked to inspect the
pedigree except Mr. Gordon, who resumed the "Times" newspaper.

"I never could quite make out what kind of fishes these are," said
the Rev. John Stalworth. "They are certainly not pike which formed the
emblematic blazon of the Hotofts, and are still grim enough to frighten
future Shakspeares on the scutcheon of the Warwickshire Lucys."

"I believe they are tenches," said Mr. Mivers. "The tench is a fish that
knows how to keep itself safe by a philosophical taste for an obscure
existence in deep holes and slush."

SIR PETER.--"No, Mivers; the fishes are dace, a fish that, once
introduced into any pond, never can be got out again. You may drag
the water; you may let off the water; you may say, 'Those dace are
extirpated,'--vain thought!--the dace reappear as before; and in this
respect the arms are really emblematic of the family. All the disorders
and revolutions that have occurred in England since the Heptarchy have
left the Chillinglys the same race in the same place. Somehow or other
the Norman Conquest did not despoil them; they held fiefs under Eudo
Dapifer as peacefully as they had held them under King Harold; they took
no part in the Crusades, nor the Wars of the Roses, nor the Civil Wars
between Charles the First and the Parliament. As the dace sticks to the
water and the water sticks by the dace, so the Chillinglys stuck to the
land and the land stuck by the Chillinglys. Perhaps I am wrong to wish
that the new Chillingly may be a little less like a dace."

"Oh!" cried Miss Margaret, who, mounted on a chair, had been inspecting
the pedigree through an eye-glass, "I don't see a fine Christian name
from the beginning, except Oliver."

SIR PETER.--"That Chillingly was born in Oliver Cromwell's Protectorate,
and named Oliver in compliment to him, as his father, born in the reign
of James I., was christened James. The three fishes always swam with
the stream. Oliver!--Oliver not a bad name, but significant of radical
doctrines."

Mr. MIVERS.--"I don't think so. Oliver Cromwell made short work of
radicals and their doctrines; but perhaps we can find a name less awful
and revolutionary."

"I have it! I have it!" cried the Parson. "Here is a descent from Sir
Kenelm Digby and Venetia Stanley. Sir Kenelm Digby! No finer specimen of
muscular Christianity. He fought as well as he wrote; eccentric, it is
true, but always a gentleman. Call the boy Kenelm!"

"A sweet name," said Miss Sibyl: "it breathes of romance."

"Sir Kenelm Chillingly! It sounds well,--imposing!" said Miss Margaret.

"And," remarked Mr. Mivers, "it has this advantage--that while it has
sufficient association with honourable distinction to affect the mind of
the namesake and rouse his emulation, it is not that of so stupendous
a personage as to defy rivalry. Sir Kenelm Digby was certainly an
accomplished and gallant gentleman; but what with his silly superstition
about sympathetic powders, etc., any man nowadays might be clever in
comparison without being a prodigy. Yes, let us decide on Kenelm."

Sir Peter meditated. "Certainly," said he, after a pause, "certainly
the name of Kenelm carries with it very crotchety associations; and I am
afraid that Sir Kenelm Digby did not make a prudent choice in marriage.
The fair Venetia was no better than she should be; and I should wish
my heir not to be led away by beauty but wed a woman of respectable
character and decorous conduct."

Miss MARGARET.--"A British matron, of course!"

THREE SISTERS (in chorus).--"Of course! of course!"

"But," resumed Sir Peter, "I am crotchety myself, and crotchets are
innocent things enough; and as for marriage the Baby cannot marry
to-morrow, so that we have ample time to consider that matter. Kenelm
Digby was a man any family might be proud of; and, as you say, sister
Margaret, Kenelm Chillingly does not sound amiss: Kenelm Chillingly it
shall be!"

The Baby was accordingly christened Kenelm, after which ceremony its
face grew longer than before.



CHAPTER V.

BEFORE his relations dispersed, Sir Peter summoned Mr. Gordon into his
library.

"Cousin," said he, kindly, "I do not blame you for the want of family
affection, or even of humane interest, which you exhibit towards the
New-born."

"Blame me, Cousin Peter! I should think not. I exhibit as much
family affection and humane interest as could be expected from
me,--circumstances considered."

"I own," said Sir Peter, with all his wonted mildness, "that after
remaining childless for fourteen years of wedded life, the advent of
this little stranger must have occasioned you a disagreeable surprise.
But, after all, as I am many years younger than you, and in the course
of nature shall outlive you, the loss is less to yourself than to your
son, and upon that I wish to say a few words. You know too well the
conditions on which I hold my estate not to be aware that I have
not legally the power to saddle it with any bequest to your boy. The
New-born succeeds to the fee-simple as last in tail. But I intend,
from this moment, to lay by something every year for your son out of my
income; and, fond as I am of London for a part of the year, I shall now
give up my town-house. If I live to the years the Psalmist allots to
man, I shall thus accumulate something handsome for your son, which may
be taken in the way of compensation."

Mr. Gordon was by no means softened by this generous speech. However,
he answered more politely than was his wont, "My son will be very much
obliged to you, should he ever need your intended bequest." Pausing a
moment, he added with a cheerful smile, "A large percentage of infants
die before attaining the age of twenty-one."

"Nay, but I am told your son is an uncommonly fine healthy child."

"My son, Cousin Peter! I was not thinking of my son, but of yours. Yours
has a big head. I should not wonder if he had water in it. I don't wish
to alarm you, but he may go off any day, and in that case it is not
likely that Lady Chillingly will condescend to replace him. So you will
excuse me if I still keep a watchful eye on my rights; and, however
painful to my feelings, I must still dispute your right to cut a stick
of the field timber."

"That is nonsense, Gordon. I am tenant for life without impeachment of
waste, and can cut down all timber not ornamental."

"I advise you not, Cousin Peter. I have told you before that I shall try
the question at law, should you provoke it, amicably, of course. Rights
are rights; and if I am driven to maintain mine, I trust that you are of
a mind too liberal to allow your family affection for me and mine to be
influenced by a decree of the Court of Chancery. But my fly is waiting.
I must not miss the train."

"Well, good-by, Gordon. Shake hands."

"Shake hands!--of course, of course. By the by, as I came through the
lodge, it seemed to me sadly out of repair. I believe you are liable for
dilapidations. Good-by."

"The man is a hog in armour," soliloquized Sir Peter, when his cousin
was gone; "and if it be hard to drive a common pig in the way he don't
choose to go, a hog in armour is indeed undrivable. But his boy ought
not to suffer for his father's hoggishness; and I shall begin at once to
see what I can lay by for him. After all, it is hard upon Gordon. Poor
Gordon; poor fellow! poor fellow! Still I hope he will not go to law
with me. I hate law. And a worm will turn, especially a worm that is put
into Chancery."



CHAPTER VI.

DESPITE the sinister semi-predictions of the _ci-devant_ heir-at-law,
the youthful Chillingly passed with safety, and indeed with dignity,
through the infant stages of existence. He took his measles and
whooping-cough with philosophical equanimity. He gradually acquired
the use of speech, but he did not too lavishly exercise that special
attribute of humanity. During the earlier years of childhood he spoke
as little as if he had been prematurely trained in the school of
Pythagoras. But he evidently spoke the less in order to reflect the
more. He observed closely and pondered deeply over what he observed. At
the age of eight he began to converse more freely, and it was in that
year that he startled his mother with the question, "Mamma, are you not
sometimes overpowered by the sense of your own identity?"

Lady Chillingly,--I was about to say rushed, but Lady Chillingly never
rushed,--Lady Chillingly glided less sedately than her wont to Sir
Peter, and repeating her son's question, said, "The boy is growing
troublesome, too wise for any woman: he must go to school."

Sir Peter was of the same opinion. But where on earth did the child get
hold of so long a word as "identity," and how did so extraordinary and
puzzling a metaphysical question come into his head? Sir Peter summoned
Kenelm, and ascertained that the boy, having free access to the library,
had fastened upon Locke on the Human Understanding, and was prepared to
dispute with that philosopher upon the doctrine of innate ideas. Quoth
Kenelm, gravely, "A want is an idea; and if, as soon as I was born, I
felt the want of food and knew at once where to turn for it, without
being taught, surely I came into the world with an 'innate idea.'"

Sir Peter, though he dabbled in metaphysics, was posed, and scratched
his head without getting out a proper answer as to the distinction
between ideas and instincts. "My child," he said at last, "you don't
know what you are talking about: go and take a good gallop on your black
pony; and I forbid you to read any books that are not given to you by
myself or your mamma. Stick to 'Puss in Boots.'"



CHAPTER VII.

SIR PETER ordered his carriage and drove to the house of the stout
parson. That doughty ecclesiastic held a family living a few miles
distant from the Hall, and was the only one of the cousins with whom Sir
Peter habitually communed on his domestic affairs.

He found the Parson in his study, which exhibited tastes other
than clerical. Over the chimney-piece were ranged fencing-foils,
boxing-gloves, and staffs for the athletic exercise of single-stick;
cricket-bats and fishing-rods filled up the angles. There were
sundry prints on the walls: one of Mr. Wordsworth, flanked by two of
distinguished race-horses; one of a Leicestershire short-horn, with
which the Parson, who farmed his own glebe and bred cattle in its rich
pastures, had won a prize at the county show; and on either side of that
animal were the portraits of Hooker and Jeremy Taylor. There were dwarf
book-cases containing miscellaneous works very handsomely bound; at
the open window, a stand of flower-pots, the flowers in full bloom. The
Parson's flowers were famous.

The appearance of the whole room was that of a man who is tidy and neat
in his habits.

"Cousin," said Sir Peter, "I have come to consult you." And therewith he
related the marvellous precocity of Kenelm Chillingly. "You see the name
begins to work on him rather too much. He must go to school; and now
what school shall it be? Private or public?"

THE REV. JOHN STALWORTH.--"There is a great deal to be said for or
against either. At a public school the chances are that Kenelm will
no longer be overpowered by a sense of his own identity; he will more
probably lose identity altogether. The worst of a public school is that
a sort of common character is substituted for individual character.
The master, of course, can't attend to the separate development of each
boy's idiosyncrasy. All minds are thrown into one great mould, and come
out of it more or less in the same form. An Etonian may be clever or
stupid, but, as either, he remains emphatically Etonian. A public school
ripens talent, but its tendency is to stifle genius. Then, too, a public
school for an only son, heir to a good estate, which will be entirely at
his own disposal, is apt to encourage reckless and extravagant habits;
and your estate requires careful management, and leaves no margin for an
heir's notes-of-hand and post-obits. On the whole, I am against a public
school for Kenelm."

"Well then, we will decide on a private one."

"Hold!" said the Parson: "a private school has its drawbacks. You can
seldom produce large fishes in small ponds. In private schools the
competition is narrowed, the energies stinted. The schoolmaster's wife
interferes, and generally coddles the boys. There is not manliness
enough in those academies; no fagging, and very little fighting. A
clever boy turns out a prig; a boy of feebler intellect turns out a
well-behaved young lady in trousers. Nothing muscular in the system.
Decidedly the namesake and descendant of Kenelm Digby should not go to a
private seminary."

"So far as I gather from your reasoning," said Sir Peter, with
characteristic placidity, "Kenelm Chillingly is not to go to school at
all."

"It does look like it," said the Parson, candidly; "but, on
consideration, there is a medium. There are schools which unite the best
qualities of public and private schools, large enough to stimulate and
develop energies mental and physical, yet not so framed as to melt all
character in one crucible. For instance, there is a school which has
at this moment one of the first scholars in Europe for head-master,--a
school which has turned out some of the most remarkable men of the
rising generation. The master sees at a glance if a boy be clever, and
takes pains with him accordingly. He is not a mere teacher of hexameters
and sapphics. His learning embraces all literature, ancient and modern.
He is a good writer and a fine critic; admires Wordsworth. He winks at
fighting: his boys know how to use their fists; and they are not in the
habit of signing post-obits before they are fifteen. Merton School is
the place for Kenelm."

"Thank you," said Sir Peter. "It is a great comfort in life to find
somebody who can decide for one. I am an irresolute man myself, and in
ordinary matters willingly let Lady Chillingly govern me."

"I should like to see a wife govern _me_," said the stout Parson.

"But you are not married to Lady Chillingly. And now let us go into the
garden and look at your dahlias."



CHAPTER VIII.

THE youthful confuter of Locke was despatched to Merton School, and
ranked, according to his merits, as lag of the penultimate form. When he
came home for the Christmas holidays he was more saturnine than ever;
in fact, his countenance bore the impression of some absorbing grief.
He said, however, that he liked school very well, and eluded all other
questions. But early the next morning he mounted his black pony and
rode to the Parson's rectory. The reverend gentleman was in his farmyard
examining his bullocks when Kenelm accosted him thus briefly,--

"Sir, I am disgraced, and I shall die of it if you cannot help to set me
right in my own eyes."

"My dear boy, don't talk in that way. Come into my study."

As soon as they entered that room, and the Parson had carefully closed
the door, he took the boy's arm, turned him round to the light, and saw
at once that there was something very grave on his mind. Chucking him
under the chin, the Parson said cheerily, "Hold up your head, Kenelm. I
am sure you have done nothing unworthy of a gentleman."

"I don't know that. I fought a boy very little bigger than myself, and
I have been licked. I did not give in, though; but the other boys picked
me up, for I could not stand any longer; and the fellow is a great
bully; and his name is Butt; and he's the son of a lawyer; and he got my
head into chancery; and I have challenged him to fight again next
half; and unless you can help me to lick him, I shall never be good for
anything in the world,--never. It will break my heart."

"I am very glad to hear you have had the pluck to challenge him. Just
let me see how you double your fist. Well, that's not amiss. Now, put
yourself into a fighting attitude, and hit out at me,--hard! harder!
Pooh! that will never do. You should make your blows as straight as
an arrow. And that's not the way to stand. Stop,--so: well on your
haunches; weight on the left leg; good! Now, put on these gloves, and
I'll give you a lesson in boxing."

Five minutes afterwards Mrs. John Chillingly, entering the room to
summon her husband to breakfast, stood astounded to see him with his
coat off, and parrying the blows of Kenelm, who flew at him like a young
tiger. The good pastor at that moment might certainly have appeared a
fine type of muscular Christianity, but not of that kind of Christianity
out of which one makes Archbishops of Canterbury.

"Good gracious me!" faltered Mrs. John Chillingly; and then, wife-like,
flying to the protection of her husband, she seized Kenelm by the
shoulders, and gave him a good shaking. The Parson, who was sadly out
of breath, was not displeased at the interruption, but took that
opportunity to put on his coat, and said, "We'll begin again to-morrow.
Now, come to breakfast." But during breakfast Kenelm's face still
betrayed dejection, and he talked little and ate less.

As soon as the meal was over, he drew the Parson into the garden and
said, "I have been thinking, sir, that perhaps it is not fair to Butt
that I should be taking these lessons; and if it is not fair, I'd rather
not--"

"Give me your hand, my boy!" cried the Parson, transported. "The name
of Kenelm is not thrown away upon you. The natural desire of man in
his attribute of fighting animal (an attribute in which, I believe, he
excels all other animated beings, except a quail and a gamecock) is to
beat his adversary. But the natural desire of that culmination of man
which we call gentleman is to beat his adversary fairly. A gentleman
would rather be beaten fairly than beat unfairly. Is not that your
thought?"

"Yes," replied Kenelm, firmly; and then, beginning to philosophize, he
added, "And it stands to reason; because if I beat a fellow unfairly, I
don't really beat him at all."

"Excellent! But suppose that you and another boy go into examination
upon Caesar's Commentaries or the multiplication table, and the other
boy is cleverer than you, but you have taken the trouble to learn the
subject and he has not: should you say you beat him unfairly?"

Kenelm meditated a moment, and then said decidedly, "No."

"That which applies to the use of your brains applies equally to the use
of your fists. Do you comprehend me?"

"Yes, sir; I do now."

"In the time of your namesake, Sir Kenelm Digby, gentlemen wore swords,
and they learned how to use them, because, in case of quarrel, they had
to fight with them. Nobody, at least in England, fights with swords
now. It is a democratic age, and if you fight at all, you are reduced to
fists; and if Kenelm Digby learned to fence, so Kenelm Chillingly must
learn to box; and if a gentleman thrashes a drayman twice his size, who
has not learned to box, it is not unfair; it is but an exemplification
of the truth that knowledge is power. Come and take another lesson on
boxing to-morrow."

Kenelm remounted his pony and returned home. He found his father
sauntering in the garden with a book in his hand. "Papa," said Kenelm,
"how does one gentleman write to another with whom he has a quarrel,
and he don't want to make it up, but he has something to say about the
quarrel which it is fair the other gentleman should know?"

"I don't understand what you mean."

"Well, just before I went to school I remember hearing you say that you
had a quarrel with Lord Hautfort, and that he was an ass, and you would
write and tell him so. When you wrote did you say, 'You are an ass'? Is
that the way one gentleman writes to another?"

"Upon my honour, Kenelm, you ask very odd questions. But you cannot
learn too early this fact, that irony is to the high-bred what
Billingsgate is to the vulgar; and when one gentleman thinks another
gentleman an ass, he does not say it point-blank: he implies it in the
politest terms he can invent. Lord Hautfort denies my right of free
warren over a trout-stream that runs through his lands. I don't care a
rush about the trout-stream, but there is no doubt of my right to fish
in it. He was an ass to raise the question; for, if he had not, I
should not have exercised the right. As he did raise the question, I was
obliged to catch his trout."

"And you wrote a letter to him?"

"Yes."

"How did you write, Papa? What did you say?"

"Something like this. 'Sir Peter Chillingly presents his compliments
to Lord Hautfort, and thinks it fair to his lordship to say that he has
taken the best legal advice with regard to his rights of free warren;
and trusts to be forgiven if he presumes to suggest that Lord Hautfort
might do well to consult his own lawyer before he decides on disputing
them.'"

"Thank you, Papa. I see."

That evening Kenelm wrote the following letter:--


Mr. Chillingly presents his compliments to Mr. Butt, and thinks it fair
to Mr. Butt to say that he is taking lessons in boxing; and trusts to be
forgiven if he presumes to suggest that Mr. Butt might do well to take
lessons himself before fighting with Mr. Chillingly next half.


"Papa," said Kenelm the next morning, "I want to write to a schoolfellow
whose name is Butt; he is the son of a lawyer who is called a serjeant.
I don't know where to direct to him."

"That is easily ascertained," said Sir Peter. "Serjeant Butt is an
eminent man, and his address will be in the Court Guide."

The address was found,--Bloomsbury Square; and Kenelm directed his
letter accordingly. In due course he received this answer,--


You are an insolent little fool, and I'll thrash you within an inch of
your life.

ROBERT BUTT.


After the receipt of that polite epistle, Kenelm Chillingly's scruples
vanished, and he took daily lessons in muscular Christianity.

Kenelm returned to school with a brow cleared from care, and three days
after his return he wrote to the Reverend John,--


DEAR SIR,--I have licked Butt. Knowledge is power.

Your affectionate KENELM.

P. S.--Now that I have licked Butt, I have made it up with him.


From that time Kenelm prospered. Eulogistic letters from the illustrious
head-master showered in upon Sir Peter. At the age of sixteen Kenelm
Chillingly was the head of the school, and, quitting it finally,
brought home the following letter from his Orbilius to Sir Peter, marked
"confidential":--


DEAR SIR PETER CHILLINGLY,--I have never felt more anxious for the
future career of any of my pupils than I do for that of your son. He is
so clever that, with ease to himself, he may become a great man. He is
so peculiar that it is quite as likely that he may only make himself
known to the world as a great oddity. That distinguished teacher Dr.
Arnold said that the difference between one boy and another was not so
much talent as energy. Your son has talent, has energy: yet he wants
something for success in life; he wants the faculty of amalgamation. He
is of a melancholic and therefore unsocial temperament. He will not act
in concert with others. He is lovable enough: the other boys like him,
especially the smaller ones, with whom he is a sort of hero; but he
has not one intimate friend. So far as school learning is concerned,
he might go to college at once, and with the certainty of distinction
provided he chose to exert himself. But if I may venture to offer an
advice, I should say employ the next two years in letting him see
a little more of real life and acquire a due sense of its practical
objects. Send him to a private tutor who is not a pedant, but a man
of letters or a man of the world, and if in the metropolis so much the
better. In a word, my young friend is unlike other people; and, with
qualities that might do anything in life, I fear, unless you can get
him to be like other people, that he will do nothing. Excuse the freedom
with which I write, and ascribe it to the singular interest with which
your son has inspired me. I have the honour to be, dear Sir Peter,

Yours truly, WILLIAM HORTON.


Upon the strength of this letter Sir Peter did not indeed summon another
family council; for he did not consider that his three maiden sisters
could offer any practical advice on the matter. And as to Mr. Gordon,
that gentleman having gone to law on the great timber question, and
having been signally beaten thereon, had informed Sir Peter that he
disowned him as a cousin and despised him as a man; not exactly in those
words,--more covertly, and therefore more stingingly. But Sir Peter
invited Mr. Mivers for a week's shooting, and requested the Reverend
John to meet him.

Mr. Mivers arrived. The sixteen years that had elapsed since he was
first introduced to the reader had made no perceptible change in his
appearance. It was one of his maxims that in youth a man of the world
should appear older than he is; and in middle age, and thence to his
dying day, younger. And he announced one secret for attaining that art
in these words: "Begin your wig early, thus you never become gray."

Unlike most philosophers, Mivers made his practice conform to his
precepts; and while in the prime of youth inaugurated a wig in a
fashion that defied the flight of time, not curly and hyacinthine, but
straight-haired and unassuming. He looked five-and-thirty from the day
he put on that wig at the age of twenty-five. He looked five-and-thirty
now at the age of fifty-one.

"I mean," said he, "to remain thirty-five all my life. No better age to
stick at. People may choose to say I am more, but I shall not own it. No
one is bound to criminate himself."

Mr. Mivers had some other aphorisms on this important subject. One
was, "Refuse to be ill. Never tell people you are ill; never own it to
yourself. Illness is one of those things which a man should resist on
principle at the onset. It should never be allowed to get in the thin
end of the wedge. But take care of your constitution, and, having
ascertained the best habits for it, keep to them like clockwork." Mr.
Mivers would not have missed his constitutional walk in the Park before
breakfast if, by going in a cab to St. Giles's, he could have saved the
city of London from conflagration.

Another aphorism of his was, "If you want to keep young, live in a
metropolis; never stay above a few weeks at a time in the country. Take
two men of similar constitution at the age of twenty-five; let one live
in London and enjoy a regular sort of club life; send the other to some
rural district, preposterously called 'salubrious.' Look at these men
when they have both reached the age of forty-five. The London man has
preserved his figure: the rural man has a paunch. The London man has
an interesting delicacy of complexion: the face of the rural man is
coarse-grained and perhaps jowly."

A third axiom was, "Don't be a family man; nothing ages one like
matrimonial felicity and paternal ties. Never multiply cares, and pack
up your life in the briefest compass you can. Why add to your carpet-bag
of troubles the contents of a lady's imperials and bonnet-boxes, and the
travelling _fourgon_ required by the nursery? Shun ambition: it is so
gouty. It takes a great deal out of a man's life, and gives him nothing
worth having till he has ceased to enjoy it." Another of his aphorisms
was this, "A fresh mind keeps the body fresh. Take in the ideas of the
day, drain off those of yesterday. As to the morrow, time enough to
consider it when it becomes to-day."

Preserving himself by attention to these rules, Mr. Mivers appeared at
Exmundham _totus, teres_, but not _rotundus_,--a man of middle height,
slender, upright, with well-cut, small, slight features, thin lips,
enclosing an excellent set of teeth, even, white, and not indebted
to the dentist. For the sake of those teeth he shunned acid wines,
especially hock in all its varieties, culinary sweets, and hot drinks.
He drank even his tea cold.

"There are," he said, "two things in life that a sage must preserve at
every sacrifice, the coats of his stomach and the enamel of his teeth.
Some evils admit of consolations: there are no comforters for dyspepsia
and toothache." A man of letters, but a man of the world, he had so
cultivated his mind as both that he was feared as the one and liked as
the other. As a man of letters he despised the world; as a man of the
world he despised letters. As the representative of both he revered
himself.



CHAPTER IX.

ON the evening of the third day from the arrival of Mr. Mivers, he, the
Parson, and Sir Peter were seated in the host's parlour, the Parson in
an armchair by the ingle, smoking a short cutty-pipe; Mivers at length
on the couch, slowly inhaling the perfumes of one of his own choice
_trabucos_. Sir Peter never smoked. There were spirits and hot water and
lemons on the table. The Parson was famed for skill in the composition
of toddy. From time to time the Parson sipped his glass, and Sir Peter
less frequently did the same. It is needless to say that Mr. Mivers
eschewed toddy; but beside him, on a chair, was a tumbler and a large
carafe of iced water.

SIR PETER.--"Cousin Mivers, you have now had time to study Kenelm,
and to compare his character with that assigned to him in the Doctor's
letter."

MIVERS (languidly).--"Ay."

SIR PETER.--"I ask you, as a man of the world, what you think I had
best do with the boy. Shall I send him to such a tutor as the Doctor
suggests? Cousin John is not of the same mind as the Doctor, and thinks
that Kenelm's oddities are fine things in their way, and should not be
prematurely ground out of him by contact with worldly tutors and London
pavements."

"Ay," repeated Mr. Mivers more languidly than before. After a pause he
added, "Parson John, let us hear you."

The Parson laid aside his cutty-pipe and emptied his fourth tumbler of
toddy; then, throwing back his head in the dreamy fashion of the great
Coleridge when he indulged in a monologue, he thus began, speaking
somewhat through his nose,--

"At the morning of life--"

Here Mivers shrugged his shoulders, turned round on his couch, and
closed his eyes with the sigh of a man resigning himself to a homily.

"At the morning of life, when the dews--"

"I knew the dews were coming," said Mivers. "Dry them, if you please;
nothing so unwholesome. We anticipate what you mean to say, which is
plainly this, When a fellow is sixteen he is very fresh: so he is; pass
on; what then?"

"If you mean to interrupt me with your habitual cynicism," said the
Parson, "why did you ask to hear me?"

"That was a mistake I grant; but who on earth could conceive that you
were going to commence in that florid style? Morning of life indeed!
bosh!"

"Cousin Mivers," said Sir Peter, "you are not reviewing John's style in
'The Londoner;' and I will beg you to remember that my son's morning of
life is a serious thing to his father, and not to be nipped in its bud
by a cousin. Proceed, John!"

Quoth the Parson, good-humouredly, "I will adapt my style to the taste
of my critic. When a fellow is at the age of sixteen, and very fresh
to life, the question is whether he should begin thus prematurely to
exchange the ideas that belong to youth for the ideas that properly
belong to middle age,--whether he should begin to acquire that knowledge
of the world which middle-aged men have acquired and can teach. I think
not. I would rather have him yet a while in the company of the poets;
in the indulgence of glorious hopes and beautiful dreams, forming to
himself some type of the Heroic, which he will keep before his eyes as
a standard when he goes into the world as man. There are two schools of
thought for the formation of character,--the Real and the Ideal. I would
form the character in the Ideal school, in order to make it bolder and
grander and lovelier when it takes its place in that every-day life
which is called Real. And therefore I am not for placing the descendant
of Sir Kenelm Digby, in the interval between school and college, with a
man of the world, probably as cynical as Cousin Mivers and living in the
stony thoroughfares of London."

MR. MIVERS (rousing himself).--"Before we plunge into that Serbonian
bog--the controversy between the Realistic and the Idealistic
academicians--I think the first thing to decide is what you want Kenelm
to be hereafter. When I order a pair of shoes, I decide beforehand what
kind of shoes they are to be,--court pumps or strong walking shoes;
and I don't ask the shoemaker to give me a preliminary lecture upon the
different purposes of locomotion to which leather can be applied. If,
Sir Peter, you want Kenelm to scribble lackadaisical poems, listen to
Parson John; if you want to fill his head with pastoral rubbish about
innocent love, which may end in marrying the miller's daughter, listen
to Parson John; if you want him to enter life a soft-headed greenhorn,
who will sign any bill carrying 50 per cent to which a young scamp asks
him to be security, listen to Parson John; in fine, if you wish a clever
lad to become either a pigeon or a ring-dove, a credulous booby or a
sentimental milksop, Parson John is the best adviser you can have."

"But I don't want my son to ripen into either of those imbecile
developments of species."

"Then don't listen to Parson John; and there's an end of the
discussion."

"No, there is not. I have not heard your advice what to do if John's
advice is not to be taken."

Mr. Mivers hesitated. He seemed puzzled.

"The fact is," said the Parson, "that Mivers got up 'The Londoner'
upon a principle that regulates his own mind,--find fault with the way
everything is done, but never commit yourself by saying how anything can
be done better."

"That is true," said Mivers, candidly. "The destructive order of mind is
seldom allied to the constructive. I and 'The Londoner' are destructive
by nature and by policy. We can reduce a building into rubbish, but we
don't profess to turn rubbish into a building. We are critics, and, as
you say, not such fools as to commit ourselves to the proposition of
amendments that can be criticised by others. Nevertheless, for your
sake, Cousin Peter, and on the condition that if I give my advice you
will never say that I gave it, and if you take it that you will never
reproach me if it turns out, as most advice does, very ill,--I will
depart from my custom and hazard my opinion."

"I accept the conditions."

"Well then, with every new generation there springs up a new order of
ideas. The earlier the age at which a man seizes the ideas that will
influence his own generation, the more he has a start in the race with
his contemporaries. If Kenelm comprehends at sixteen those intellectual
signs of the time which, when he goes up to college, he will find young
men of eighteen or twenty only just _prepared_ to comprehend, he
will produce a deep impression of his powers for reasoning and their
adaptation to actual life, which will be of great service to him later.
Now the ideas that influence the mass of the rising generation never
have their well-head in the generation itself. They have their source in
the generation before them, generally in a small minority, neglected or
contemned by the great majority which adopt them later. Therefore a lad
at the age of sixteen, if he wants to get at such ideas, must come
into close contact with some superior mind in which they were conceived
twenty or thirty years before. I am consequently for placing Kenelm with
a person from whom the new ideas can be learned. I am also for his being
placed in the metropolis during the process of this initiation. With
such introductions as are at our command, he may come in contact not
only with new ideas, but with eminent men in all vocations. It is a
great thing to mix betimes with clever people. One picks their brains
unconsciously. There is another advantage, and not a small one, in
this early entrance into good society. A youth learns manners,
self-possession, readiness of resource; and he is much less likely to
get into scrapes and contract tastes for low vices and mean dissipation,
when he comes into life wholly his own master, after having acquired
a predilection for refined companionship under the guidance of those
competent to select it. There, I have talked myself out of breath. And
you had better decide at once in favour of my advice; for as I am of a
contradictory temperament, myself of to-morrow may probably contradict
myself of to-day."

Sir Peter was greatly impressed with his cousin's argumentative
eloquence.

The Parson smoked his cutty-pipe in silence until appealed to by Sir
Peter, and he then said, "In this programme of education for a Christian
gentleman, the part of Christian seems to me left out."

"The tendency of the age," observed Mr. Mivers, calmly, "is towards that
omission. Secular education is the necessary reaction from the special
theological training which arose in the dislike of one set of Christians
to the teaching of another set; and as these antagonists will not agree
how religion is to be taught, either there must be no teaching at all,
or religion must be eliminated from the tuition."

"That may do very well for some huge system of national education," said
Sir Peter, "but it does not apply to Kenelm, as one of a family all of
whose members belong to the Established Church. He may be taught the
creed of his forefathers without offending a Dissenter."

"Which Established Church is he to belong to?" asked Mr. Mivers,--"High
Church, Low Church, Broad Church, Puseyite Church, Ritualistic Church,
or any other Established Church that may be coming into fashion?"

"Pshaw!" said the Parson. "That sneer is out of place. You know very
well that one merit of our Church is the spirit of toleration, which
does not magnify every variety of opinion into a heresy or a schism.
But if Sir Peter sends his son at the age of sixteen to a tutor who
eliminates the religion of Christianity from his teaching, he deserves
to be thrashed within an inch of his life; and," continued the Parson,
eying Sir Peter sternly, and mechanically turning up his cuffs, "I
should _like_ to thrash him."

"Gently, John," said Sir Peter, recoiling; "gently, my dear kinsman. My
heir shall not be educated as a heathen, and Mivers is only bantering
us. Come, Mivers, do you happen to know among your London friends some
man who, though a scholar and a man of the world, is still a Christian?"

"A Christian as by law established?"

"Well--yes."

"And who will receive Kenelm as a pupil?"

"Of course I am not putting, such questions to you out of idle
curiosity."

"I know exactly the man. He was originally intended for orders, and is
a very learned theologian. He relinquished the thought of the clerical
profession on succeeding to a small landed estate by the sudden death of
an elder brother. He then came to London and bought experience: that
is, he was naturally generous; he became easily taken in; got into
difficulties; the estate was transferred to trustees for the benefit of
creditors, and on the payment of L400 a year to himself. By this time
he was married and had two children. He found the necessity of employing
his pen in order to add to his income, and is one of the ablest
contributors to the periodical press. He is an elegant scholar, an
effective writer, much courted by public men, a thorough gentleman, has
a pleasant house, and receives the best society. Having been once taken
in, he defies any one to take him in again. His experience was not
bought too dearly. No more acute and accomplished man of the world. The
three hundred a year or so that you would pay for Kenelm would suit him
very well. His name is Welby, and he lives in Chester Square."

"No doubt he is a contributor to 'The Londoner,'" said the Parson,
sarcastically.

"True. He writes our classical, theological, and metaphysical articles.
Suppose I invite him to come here for a day or two, and you can see him
and judge for yourself, Sir Peter?"

"Do."



CHAPTER X.

MR. WELBY arrived, and pleased everybody. A man of the happiest manners,
easy and courteous. There was no pedantry in him, yet you could soon see
that his reading covered an extensive surface, and here and there
had dived deeply. He enchanted the Parson by his comments on Saint
Chrysostom; he dazzled Sir Peter with his lore in the antiquities of
ancient Britain; he captivated Kenelm by his readiness to enter into
that most disputatious of sciences called metaphysics; while for Lady
Chillingly, and the three sisters who were invited to meet him, he was
more entertaining, but not less instructive. Equally at home in novels
and in good books, he gave to the spinsters a list of innocent works
in either; while for Lady Chillingly he sparkled with anecdotes of
fashionable life, the newest _bons mots_, the latest scandals. In fact,
Mr. Welby was one of those brilliant persons who adorn any society
amidst which they are thrown. If at heart he was a disappointed man,
the disappointment was concealed by an even serenity of spirits; he
had entertained high and justifiable hopes of a brilliant career and a
lasting reputation as a theologian and a preacher; the succession to
his estate at the age of twenty-three had changed the nature of his
ambition. The charm of his manner was such that he sprang at once into
the fashion, and became beguiled by his own genial temperament into that
lesser but pleasanter kind of ambition which contents itself with social
successes and enjoys the present hour. When his circumstances compelled
him to eke out his income by literary profits, he slid into the grooves
of periodical composition, and resigned all thoughts of the labour
required for any complete work, which might take much time and be
attended with scanty profits. He still remained very popular in society,
and perhaps his general reputation for ability made him fearful to
hazard it by any great undertaking. He was not, like Mivers, a despiser
of all men and all things; but he regarded men and things as an
indifferent though good-natured spectator regards the thronging streets
from a drawing-room window. He could not be called _blase_, but he was
thoroughly _desillusionne_. Once over-romantic, his character now was so
entirely imbued with the neutral tints of life that romance offended his
taste as an obtrusion of violent colour into a sober woof. He was become
a thorough Realist in his code of criticism, and in his worldly mode
of action and thought. But Parson John did not perceive this, for
Welby listened to that gentleman's eulogies on the Ideal school without
troubling himself to contradict them. He had grown too indolent to be
combative in conversation, and only as a critic betrayed such pugnacity
as remained to him by the polished cruelty of sarcasm.

He came off with flying colours through an examination into his Church
orthodoxy instituted by the Parson and Sir Peter. Amid a cloud of
ecclesiastical erudition, his own opinions vanished in those of the
Fathers. In truth, he was a Realist, in religion as in everything else.
He regarded Christianity as a type of existent civilization, which
ought to be reverenced, as one might recognize the other types of that
civilization; such as the liberty of the press, the representative
system, white neckcloths and black coats of an evening, etc. He
belonged, therefore, to what he himself called the school of Eclectical
Christiology; and accommodated the reasonings of Deism to the doctrines
of the Church, if not as a creed, at least as an institution. Finally,
he united all the Chillingly votes in his favour; and when he departed
from the Hall carried off Kenelm for his initiation into the new ideas
that were to govern his generation.



CHAPTER XI.

KENELM remained a year and a half with this distinguished preceptor.
During that time he learned much in book-lore; he saw much, too, of the
eminent men of the day, in literature, the law, and the senate. He saw,
also, a good deal of the fashionable world. Fine ladies, who had been
friends of his mother in her youth, took him up, counselled and petted
him,--one in especial, the Marchioness of Glenalvon, to whom he was
endeared by grateful association, for her youngest son had been a
fellow-pupil of Kenelm at Merton School, and Kenelm had saved his life
from drowning. The poor boy died of consumption later, and her grief for
his loss made her affection for Kenelm yet more tender. Lady Glenalvon
was one of the queens of the London world. Though in the fiftieth
year she was still very handsome: she was also very accomplished, very
clever, and very kind-hearted, as some of such queens are; just one
of those women invaluable in forming the manners and elevating the
character of young men destined to make a figure in after-life. But she
was very angry with herself in thinking that she failed to arouse any
such ambition in the heir of the Chillinglys.

It may here be said that Kenelm was not without great advantages of form
and countenance. He was tall, and the youthful grace of his proportions
concealed his physical strength, which was extraordinary rather from the
iron texture than the bulk of his thews and sinews. His face, though it
certainly lacked the roundness of youth, had a grave, sombre, haunting
sort of beauty, not artistically regular, but picturesque, peculiar,
with large dark expressive eyes, and a certain indescribable combination
of sweetness and melancholy in his quiet smile. He never laughed
audibly, but he had a quick sense of the comic, and his eye would laugh
when his lips were silent. He would say queer, droll, unexpected things
which passed for humour; but, save for that gleam in the eye, he could
not have said them with more seeming innocence of intentional joke if he
had been a monk of La Trappe looking up from the grave he was digging in
order to utter "memento mori."

That face of his was a great "take in." Women thought it full of
romantic sentiment; the face of one easily moved to love, and whose love
would be replete alike with poetry and passion. But he remained as proof
as the youthful Hippolytus to all female attraction. He delighted the
Parson by keeping up his practice in athletic pursuits; and obtained a
reputation at the pugilistic school, which he attended regularly, as the
best gentleman boxer about town.

He made many acquaintances, but still formed no friendships. Yet every
one who saw him much conceived affection for him. If he did not return
that affection, he did not repel it. He was exceedingly gentle in voice
and manner, and had all his father's placidity of temper: children and
dogs took to him as by instinct.

On leaving Mr. Welby's, Kenelm carried to Cambridge a mind largely
stocked with the new ideas that were budding into leaf. He certainly
astonished the other freshmen, and occasionally puzzled the mighty
Fellows of Trinity and St. John's. But he gradually withdrew himself
much from general society. In fact, he was too old in mind for his
years; and after having mixed in the choicest circles of a metropolis,
college suppers and wine parties had little charm for him. He maintained
his pugilistic renown; and on certain occasions, when some delicate
undergraduate had been bullied by some gigantic bargeman, his muscular
Christianity nobly developed itself. He did not do as much as he might
have done in the more intellectual ways of academical distinction.
Still, he was always among the first in the college examinations; he won
two university prizes, and took a very creditable degree, after which
he returned home, more odd, more saturnine--in short, less like other
people--than when he had left Merton School. He had woven a solitude
round him out of his own heart, and in that solitude he sat still and
watchful as a spider sits in his web.

Whether from natural temperament or from his educational training under
such teachers as Mr. Mivers, who carried out the new ideas of reform by
revering nothing in the past, and Mr. Welby, who accepted the routine of
the present as realistic, and pooh-poohed all visions of the future as
idealistic, Kenelm's chief mental characteristic was a kind of tranquil
indifferentism. It was difficult to detect in him either of those
ordinary incentives to action,--vanity or ambition, the yearning for
applause or the desire of power. To all female fascinations he had been
hitherto star-proof. He had never experienced love, but he had read
a good deal about it; and that passion seemed to him an unaccountable
aberration of human reason, and an ignominious surrender of the
equanimity of thought which it should be the object of masculine natures
to maintain undisturbed. A very eloquent book in praise of celibacy, and
entitled "The Approach to the Angels," written by that eminent Oxford
scholar, Decimus Roach, had produced so remarkable an effect upon his
youthful mind that, had he been a Roman Catholic, he might have become
a monk. Where he most evinced ardour it was a logician's ardour for
abstract truth; that is, for what he considered truth: and, as what
seems truth to one man is sure to seem falsehood to some other man, this
predilection of his was not without its inconveniences and dangers, as
may probably be seen in the following chapter.

Meanwhile, rightly to appreciate his conduct therein, I entreat thee, O
candid reader (not that any reader ever is candid), to remember that he
is brimful of new ideas, which, met by a deep and hostile undercurrent
of old ideas, become more provocatively billowy and surging.



CHAPTER XII.

THERE had been great festivities at Exmundham, in celebration of the
honour bestowed upon the world by the fact that Kenelm Chillingly had
lived twenty-one years in it.

The young heir had made a speech to the assembled tenants and other
admitted revellers, which had by no means added to the exhilaration of
the proceedings. He spoke with a fluency and self-possession which were
surprising in a youth addressing a multitude for the first time. But his
speech was not cheerful.

The principal tenant on the estate, in proposing his health, had
naturally referred to the long line of his ancestors. His father's
merits as man and landlord had been enthusiastically commemorated; and
many happy auguries for his own future career had been drawn, partly
from the excellences of his parentage, partly from his own youthful
promise in the honours achieved at the University.

Kenelm Chillingly in reply largely availed himself of those new ideas
which were to influence the rising generation, and with which he had
been rendered familiar by the journal of Mr. Mivers and the conversation
of Mr. Welby.

He briefly disposed of the ancestral part of the question. He observed
that it was singular to note how long any given family or, dynasty could
continue to flourish in any given nook of matter in creation, without
any exhibition of intellectual powers beyond those displayed by a
succession of vegetable crops. "It is certainly true," he said, "that
the Chillinglys have lived in this place from father to son for about a
fourth part of the history of the world, since the date which Sir Isaac
Newton assigns to the Deluge. But, so far as can be judged by existent
records, the world has not been in any way wiser or better for their
existence. They were born to eat as long as they could eat, and when
they could eat no longer they died. Not that in this respect they were
a whit less insignificant than the generality of their fellow-creatures.
Most of us now present," continued the youthful orator, "are only born
in order to die; and the chief consolation of our wounded pride in
admitting this fact is in the probability that our posterity will not
be of more consequence to the scheme of Nature than we ourselves are."
Passing from that philosophical view of his own ancestors in particular,
and of the human race in general, Kenelm Chillingly then touched with
serene analysis on the eulogies lavished on his father as man and
landlord.

"As man," he said, "my father no doubt deserves all that can be said
by man in favour of man. But what, at the best, is man? A crude,
struggling, undeveloped embryo, of whom it is the highest attribute that
he feels a vague consciousness that he is only an embryo, and cannot
complete himself till he ceases to be a man; that is, until he becomes
another being in another form of existence. We can praise a dog as
a dog, because a dog is a completed _ens_, and not an embryo. But to
praise a man as man, forgetting that he is only a germ out of which a
form wholly different is ultimately to spring, is equally opposed
to Scriptural belief in his present crudity and imperfection, and to
psychological or metaphysical examination of a mental construction
evidently designed for purposes that he can never fulfil as man. That my
father is an embryo not more incomplete than any present is quite true;
but that, you will see on reflection, is saying very little on his
behalf. Even in the boasted physical formation of us men, you are
aware that the best-shaped amongst us, according to the last scientific
discoveries, is only a development of some hideous hairy animal, such
as a gorilla; and the ancestral gorilla itself had its own aboriginal
forefather in a small marine animal shaped like a two-necked bottle. The
probability is that, some day or other, we shall be exterminated by a
new development of species.

"As for the merits assigned to my father as landlord, I must
respectfully dissent from the panegyrics so rashly bestowed on him. For
all sound reasoners must concur in this, that the first duty of an owner
of land is not to the occupiers to whom he leases it, but to the nation
at large. It is his duty to see that the land yields to the community
the utmost it can yield. In order to effect this object, a landlord
should put up his farms to competition, exacting the highest rent he can
possibly get from responsible competitors. Competitive examination is
the enlightened order of the day, even in professions in which the best
men would have qualities that defy examination. In agriculture, happily,
the principle of competitive examination is not so hostile to the choice
of the best man as it must be, for instance, in diplomacy, where a
Talleyrand would be excluded for knowing no language but his own; and
still more in the army, where promotion would be denied to an officer
who, like Marlborough, could not spell. But in agriculture a landlord
has only to inquire who can give the highest rent, having the largest
capital, subject by the strictest penalties of law to the conditions of
a lease dictated by the most scientific agriculturists under penalties
fixed by the most cautious conveyancers. By this mode of procedure,
recommended by the most liberal economists of our age,--barring those
still more liberal who deny that property in land is any property at
all,--by this mode of procedure, I say, a landlord does his duty to his
country. He secures tenants who can produce the most to the community by
their capital, tested through competitive examination in their bankers'
accounts and the security they can give, and through the rigidity of
covenants suggested by a Liebig and reduced into law by a Chitty. But on
my father's land I see a great many tenants with little skill and less
capital, ignorant of a Liebig and revolting from a Chitty, and no
filial enthusiasm can induce me honestly to say that my father is a good
landlord. He has preferred his affection for individuals to his duties
to the community. It is not, my friends, a question whether a handful of
farmers like yourselves go to the workhouse or not. It is a consumer's
question. Do you produce the maximum of corn to the consumer?

"With respect to myself," continued the orator, warming as the cold
he had engendered in his audience became more freezingly felt,--"with
respect to myself, I do not deny that, owing to the accident of training
for a very faulty and contracted course of education, I have obtained
what are called 'honours' at the University of Cambridge; but you must
not regard that fact as a promise of any worth in my future passage
through life. Some of the most useless persons--especially narrow-minded
and bigoted--have acquired far higher honours at the University than
have fallen to my lot.

"I thank you no less for the civil things you have said of me and of my
family; but I shall endeavour to walk to that grave to which we are all
bound with a tranquil indifference as to what people may say of me in
so short a journey. And the sooner, my friends, we get to our journey's
end, the better our chance of escaping a great many pains, troubles,
sins, and diseases. So that when I drink to your good healths, you must
feel that in reality I wish you an early deliverance from the ills to
which flesh is exposed, and which so generally increase with our years
that good health is scarcely compatible with the decaying faculties of
old age. Gentlemen, your good healths!"



CHAPTER XIII.

THE morning after these birthday rejoicings, Sir Peter and Lady
Chillingly held a long consultation on the peculiarities of their heir,
and the best mode of instilling into his mind the expediency either
of entertaining more pleasing views, or at least of professing less
unpopular sentiments; compatibly of course, though they did not say it,
with the new ideas that were to govern his century. Having come to an
agreement on this delicate subject, they went forth, arm in arm, in
search of their heir. Kenelm seldom met them at breakfast. He was an
early riser, and accustomed to solitary rambles before his parents were
out of bed.

The worthy pair found Kenelm seated on the banks of a trout-stream that
meandered through Chillingly Park, dipping his line into the water, and
yawning, with apparent relief in that operation.

"Does fishing amuse you, my boy?" said Sir Peter, heartily.

"Not in the least, sir," answered Kenelm.

"Then why do you do it?" asked Lady Chillingly.

"Because I know nothing else that amuses me more."

"Ah! that is it," said Sir Peter: "the whole secret of Kenelm's oddities
is to be found in these words, my dear; he needs amusement. Voltaire
says truly, 'Amusement is one of the wants of man.' And if Kenelm could
be amused like other people, he would be like other people."

"In that case," said Kenelm, gravely, and extracting from the water
a small but lively trout, which settled itself in Lady Chillingly's
lap,--"in that case I would rather not be amused. I have no interest
in the absurdities of other people. The instinct of self-preservation
compels me to have some interest in my own."

"Kenelm, sir," exclaimed Lady Chillingly, with an animation into which
her tranquil ladyship was very rarely betrayed, "take away that horrid
damp thing! Put down your rod and attend to what your father says. Your
strange conduct gives us cause of serious anxiety."

Kenelm unhooked the trout, deposited the fish in his basket, and raising
his large eyes to his father's face, said, "What is there in my conduct
that occasions you displeasure?"

"Not displeasure, Kenelm," said Sir Peter, kindly, "but anxiety; your
mother has hit upon the right word. You see, my dear son, that it is
my wish that you should distinguish yourself in the world. You might
represent this county, as your ancestors have done before. I have looked
forward to the proceedings of yesterday as an admirable occasion for
your introduction to your future constituents. Oratory is the talent
most appreciated in a free country, and why should you not be an orator?
Demosthenes says that delivery, delivery, delivery, is the art of
oratory; and your delivery is excellent, graceful, self-possessed,
classical."

"Pardon me, my dear father, Demosthenes does not say delivery,
nor action, as the word is commonly rendered; he says, 'acting, or
stage-play,'--the art by which a man delivers a speech in a feigned
character, whence we get the word hypocrisy. Hypocrisy, hypocrisy,
hypocrisy! is, according to Demosthenes, the triple art of the orator.
Do you wish me to become triply a hypocrite?"

"Kenelm, I am ashamed of you. You know as well as I do that it is only
by metaphor that you can twist the word ascribed to the great Athenian
into the sense of hypocrisy. But assuming it, as you say, to mean not
delivery, but acting, I understand why your debut as an orator was
not successful. Your delivery was excellent, your acting defective.
An orator should please, conciliate, persuade, prepossess. You did the
reverse of all this; and though you produced a great effect, the effect
was so decidedly to your disadvantage that it would have lost you an
election on any hustings in England."

"Am I to understand, my dear father," said Kenelm, in the mournful and
compassionate tones with which a pious minister of the Church reproves
some abandoned and hoary sinner,--"am I to understand that you would
commend to your son the adoption of deliberate falsehood for the gain of
a selfish advantage?"

"Deliberate falsehood! you impertinent puppy!"

"Puppy!" repeated Kenelm, not indignantly but musingly,--"puppy! a
well-bred puppy takes after its parents."

Sir Peter burst out laughing.

Lady Chillingly rose with dignity, shook her gown, unfolded her parasol,
and stalked away speechless.

"Now, look you, Kenelm," said Sir Peter, as soon as he had composed
himself. "These quips and humours of yours are amusing enough to an
eccentric man like myself, but they will not do for the world; and
how at your age, and with the rare advantages you have had in an early
introduction to the best intellectual society, under the guidance of a
tutor acquainted with the new ideas which are to influence the
conduct of statesmen, you could have made so silly a speech as you did
yesterday, I cannot understand."

"My dear father, allow me to assure you that the ideas I expressed are
the new ideas most in vogue,--ideas expressed in still plainer, or, if
you prefer the epithet, still sillier terms than I employed. You will
find them instilled into the public mind by 'The Londoner' and by most
intellectual journals of a liberal character."

"Kenelm, Kenelm, such ideas would turn the world topsy-turvy."

"New ideas always do tend to turn old ideas topsy-turvy. And the world,
after all, is only an idea, which is turned topsy-turvy with every
successive century."

"You make me sick of the word 'ideas.' Leave off your metaphysics and
study real life."

"It is real life which I did study under Mr. Welby. He is the
Archimandrite of Realism. It is sham life which you wish me to study. To
oblige you I am willing to commence it. I dare say it is very pleasant.
Real life is not; on the contrary--dull," and Kenelm yawned again.

"Have you no young friends among your fellow-collegians?"

"Friends! certainly not, sir. But I believe I have some enemies, who
answer the same purpose as friends, only they don't hurt one so much."

"Do you mean to say that you lived alone at Cambridge?"

"No, I lived a good deal with Aristophanes, and a little with Conic
Sections and Hydrostatics."

"Books. Dry company."

"More innocent, at least, than moist company. Did you ever get drunk,
sir?"

"Drunk!"

"I tried to do so once with the young companions whom you would commend
to me as friends. I don't think I succeeded, but I woke with a headache.
Real life at college abounds with headache."

"Kenelm, my boy, one thing is clear: you must travel."

"As you please, sir. Marcus Antoninus says that it is all one to a stone
whether it be thrown upwards or downwards. When shall I start?"

"Very soon. Of course there are preparations to make; you should have a
travelling companion. I don't mean a tutor,--you are too clever and
too steady to need one,--but a pleasant, sensible, well-mannered young
person of your own age."

"My own age,--male or female?"

Sir Peter tried hard to frown. The utmost he could do was to reply
gravely, "FEMALE! If I said you were too steady to need a tutor, it was
because you have hitherto seemed little likely to be led out of your
way by female allurements. Among your other studies may I inquire if you
have included that which no man has ever yet thoroughly mastered,--the
study of women?"

"Certainly. Do you object to my catching another trout?"

"Trout be--blessed, or the reverse. So you have studied woman. I should
never have thought it. Where and when did you commence that department
of science?"

"When? ever since I was ten years old. Where? first in your own house,
then at college. Hush!--a bite," and another trout left its native
element and alighted on Sir Peter's nose, whence it was solemnly
transferred to the basket.

"At ten years old, and in my own house! That flaunting hussy Jane, the
under-housemaid--"

"Jane! No, sir. Pamela, Miss Byron, Clarissa,--females in Richardson,
who, according to Dr. Johnson, 'taught the passions to move at the
command of virtue.' I trust for your sake that Dr. Johnson did not err
in that assertion, for I found all these females at night in your own
private apartments."

"Oh!" said Sir Peter, "that's all?"

"All I remember at ten years old," replied Kenelm.

"And at Mr. Welby's or at college," proceeded Sir Peter, timorously,
"was your acquaintance with females of the same kind?"

Kenelm shook his head. "Much worse: they were very naughty indeed at
college."

"I should think so, with such a lot of young fellows running after
them."

"Very few fellows run after the females. I mean--rather avoid them."

"So much the better."

"No, my father, so much the worse; without an intimate knowledge of
those females there is little use going to college at all."

"Explain yourself."

"Every one who receives a classical education is introduced into their
society,--Pyrrha and Lydia, Glycera and Corinna, and many more of the
same sort; and then the females in Aristophanes, what do you say to
them, sir?"

"Is it only females who lived two thousand or three thousand years ago,
or more probably never lived at all, whose intimacy you have cultivated?
Have you never admired any real women?"

"Real women! I never met one. Never met a woman who was not a sham,
a sham from the moment she is told to be pretty-behaved, conceal her
sentiments, and look fibs when she does not speak them. But if I am to
learn sham life, I suppose I must put up with sham women."

"Have you been crossed in love that you speak so bitterly of the sex?"

"I don't speak bitterly of the sex. Examine any woman on her oath, and
she'll own she is a sham, always has been, and always will be, and is
proud of it."

"I am glad your mother is not by to hear you. You will think differently
one of these days. Meanwhile, to turn to the other sex, is there no
young man of your own rank with whom you would like to travel?"

"Certainly not. I hate quarrelling."

"As you please. But you cannot go quite alone: I will find you a good
travelling-servant. I must write to town to-day about your preparations,
and in another week or so I hope all will be ready. Your allowance will
be whatever you like to fix it at; you have never been extravagant,
and--boy--I love you. Amuse yourself, enjoy yourself, and come back
cured of your oddities, but preserving your honour."

Sir Peter bent down and kissed his son's brow. Kenelm was moved; he
rose, put his arm round his father's shoulder, and lovingly said, in
an undertone, "If ever I am tempted to do a base thing, may I remember
whose son I am: I shall be safe then." He withdrew his arm as he said
this, and took his solitary way along the banks of the stream, forgetful
of rod and line.



CHAPTER XIV.

THE young man continued to skirt the side of the stream until he reached
the boundary pale of the park. Here, placed on a rough grass mound,
some former proprietor, of a social temperament, had built a kind of
belvidere, so as to command a cheerful view of the high road below.
Mechanically the heir of the Chillinglys ascended the mound, seated
himself within the belvidere, and leaned his chin on his hand in a
thoughtful attitude. It was rarely that the building was honoured by a
human visitor: its habitual occupants were spiders. Of those industrious
insects it was a well-populated colony. Their webs, darkened with
dust and ornamented with the wings and legs and skeletons of many an
unfortunate traveller, clung thick to angle and window-sill, festooned
the rickety table on which the young man leaned his elbow, and described
geometrical circles and rhomboids between the gaping rails that formed
the backs of venerable chairs. One large black spider--who was probably
the oldest inhabitant, and held possession of the best place by the
window, ready to offer perfidious welcome to every winged itinerant
who might be tempted to turn aside from the high road for the sake of
a little cool and repose--rushed from its innermost penetralia at the
entrance of Kenelm, and remained motionless in the centre of its meshes,
staring at him. It did not seem quite sure whether the stranger was too
big or not.

"It is a wonderful proof of the wisdom of Providence," said Kenelm,
"that whenever any large number of its creatures forms a community
or class, a secret element of disunion enters into the hearts of the
individuals forming the congregation, and prevents their co-operating
heartily and effectually for their common interest. 'The fleas would
have dragged me out of bed if they had been unanimous,' said the great
Mr. Curran; and there can be no doubt that if all the spiders in this
commonwealth would unite to attack me in a body, I should fall a victim
to their combined nippers. But spiders, though inhabiting the same
region, constituting the same race, animated by the same instincts,
do not combine even against a butterfly: each seeks his own special
advantage, and not that of the community at large. And how completely
the life of each thing resembles a circle in this respect, that it can
never touch another circle at more than one point. Nay, I doubt if it
quite touches it even there,--there is a space between every atom; self
is always selfish: and yet there are eminent masters in the Academe of
New Ideas who wish to make us believe that all the working classes of a
civilized world could merge every difference of race, creed, intellect,
individual propensities and interests into the construction of a single
web, stocked as a larder in common!" Here the soliloquist came to a dead
stop, and, leaning out of the window, contemplated the high road. It was
a very fine high road, straight and level, kept in excellent order by
turn pikes at every eight miles. A pleasant greensward bordered it on
either side, and under the belvidere the benevolence of some mediaeval
Chillingly had placed a little drinking-fountain for the refreshment of
wayfarers. Close to the fountain stood a rude stone bench, overshadowed
by a large willow, and commanding from the high table-ground on which
it was placed a wide view of cornfields, meadows, and distant hills,
suffused in the mellow light of the summer sun. Along that road there
came successively a wagon filled with passengers seated on straw,--an
old woman, a pretty girl, two children; then a stout farmer going to
market in his dog-cart; then three flies carrying fares to the nearest
railway station; then a handsome young man on horseback, a handsome
young lady by his side, a groom behind. It was easy to see that the
young man and young lady were lovers. See it in his ardent looks and
serious lips parted but for whispers only to be heard by her; see it
in her downcast eyes and heightened colour. "'Alas! regardless of
their doom,'" muttered Kenelm, "what trouble those 'little victims'
are preparing for themselves and their progeny! Would I could lend them
Decimus Roach's 'Approach to the Angels'!" The road now for some minutes
became solitary and still, when there was heard to the right a sprightly
sort of carol, half sung, half recited, in musical voice, with a
singularly clear enunciation, so that the words reached Kenelm's ear
distinctly. They ran thus:--


 "Black Karl looked forth from his cottage door,
   He looked on the forest green;
  And down the path, with his dogs before,
   Came the Ritter of Neirestein:
  Singing, singing, lustily singing,
   Down the path with his dogs before,
  Came the Ritter of Neirestein."


At a voice so English, attuned to a strain so Germanic, Kenelm pricked
up attentive ears, and, turning his eye down the road, beheld, emerging
from the shade of beeches that overhung the park pales, a figure that
did not altogether harmonize with the idea of a Ritter of Neirestein. It
was, nevertheless, a picturesque figure enough. The man was attired in a
somewhat threadbare suit of Lincoln green, with a high-crowned Tyrolese
hat; a knapsack was slung behind his shoulders, and he was attended by a
white Pomeranian dog, evidently foot-sore, but doing his best to appear
proficient in the chase by limping some yards in advance of his master,
and sniffing into the hedges for rats and mice, and such small deer.

By the time the pedestrian had reached to the close of his refrain he
had gained the fountain, and greeted it with an exclamation of pleasure.
Slipping the knapsack from his shoulder, he filled the iron ladle
attached to the basin. He then called the dog by the name of Max, and
held the ladle for him to drink. Not till the animal had satisfied his
thirst did the master assuage his own. Then, lifting his hat and bathing
his temples and face, the pedestrian seated himself on the bench,
and the dog nestled on the turf at his feet. After a little pause the
wayfarer began again, though in a lower and slower tone, to chant his
refrain, and proceeded, with abrupt snatches, to link the verse on
to another stanza. It was evident that he was either endeavouring to
remember or to invent, and it seemed rather like the latter and more
laborious operation of mind.


 "'Why on foot, why on foot, Ritter Karl,' quoth he,
   'And not on thy palfrey gray?'


Palfrey gray--hum--gray.


 "'The run of ill-luck was too strong for me,
   'And has galloped my steed away.'


That will do: good!"

"Good indeed! He is easily satisfied," muttered Kenelm. "But such
pedestrians don't pass the road every day. Let us talk to him." So
saying he slipped quietly out of the window, descended the mound,
and letting himself into the road by a screened wicket-gate, took his
noiseless stand behind the wayfarer and beneath the bowery willow.

The man had now sunk into silence. Perhaps he had tired himself of
rhymes; or perhaps the mechanism of verse-making had been replaced by
that kind of sentiment, or that kind of revery, which is common to the
temperaments of those who indulge in verse-making. But the loveliness
of the scene before him had caught his eye, and fixed it into an intent
gaze upon wooded landscapes stretching farther and farther to the range
of hills on which the heaven seemed to rest.

"I should like to hear the rest of that German ballad," said a voice,
abruptly.

The wayfarer started, and, turning round, presented to Kenelm's view
a countenance in the ripest noon of manhood, with locks and beard of a
deep rich auburn, bright blue eyes, and a wonderful nameless charm both
of feature and expression, very cheerful, very frank, and not without a
certain nobleness of character which seemed to exact respect.

"I beg your pardon for my interruption," said Kenelm, lifting his hat:
"but I overheard you reciting; and though I suppose your verses are a
translation from the German, I don't remember anything like them in such
popular German poets as I happen to have read."

"It is not a translation, sir," replied the itinerant. "I was only
trying to string together some ideas that came into my head this fine
morning."

"You are a poet, then?" said Kenelm, seating himself on the bench.

"I dare not say poet. I am a verse-maker."

"Sir, I know there is a distinction. Many poets of the present day,
considered very good, are uncommonly bad verse-makers. For my part, I
could more readily imagine them to be good poets if they did not make
verses at all. But can I not hear the rest of the ballad?"

"Alas! the rest of the ballad is not yet made. It is rather a long
subject, and my flights are very brief."

"That is much in their favour, and very unlike the poetry in fashion.
You do not belong, I think, to this neighbourhood. Are you and your dog
travelling far?"

"It is my holiday time, and I ramble on through the summer. I am
travelling far, for I travel till September. Life amid summer fields is
a very joyous thing."

"Is it indeed?" said Kenelm, with much _naivete_. "I should have thought
that long before September you would have got very much bored with the
fields and the dog and yourself altogether. But, to be sure, you
have the resource of verse-making, and that seems a very pleasant and
absorbing occupation to those who practise it,--from our old friend
Horace, kneading laboured Alcaics into honey in his summer rambles among
the watered woodlands of Tibur, to Cardinal Richelieu, employing himself
on French rhymes in the intervals between chopping off noblemen's heads.
It does not seem to signify much whether the verses be good or bad,
so far as the pleasure of the verse-maker himself is concerned; for
Richelieu was as much charmed with his occupation as Horace was, and his
verses were certainly not Horatian."

"Surely at your age, sir, and with your evident education--"

"Say culture; that's the word in fashion nowadays."

"Well, your evident culture, you must have made verses."

"Latin verses, yes; and occasionally Greek. I was obliged to do so at
school. It did not amuse me."

"Try English."

Kenelm shook his head. "Not I. Every cobbler should stick to his last."

"Well, put aside the verse-making: don't you find a sensible
enjoyment in those solitary summer walks, when you have Nature all to
yourself,--enjoyment in marking all the mobile evanescent changes in her
face,--her laugh, her smile, her tears, her very frown!"

"Assuming that by Nature you mean a mechanical series of external
phenomena, I object to your speaking of a machinery as if it were a
person of the feminine gender,--_her_ laugh, _her_ smile, etc. As
well talk of the laugh and smile of a steam-engine. But to descend to
common-sense. I grant there is some pleasure in solitary rambles in fine
weather and amid varying scenery. You say that it is a holiday excursion
that you are enjoying. I presume, therefore, that you have some
practical occupation which consumes the time that you do not devote to a
holiday?"

"Yes; I am not altogether an idler. I work sometimes, though not so hard
as I ought. 'Life is earnest,' as the poet says. But I and my dog are
rested now, and as I have still a long walk before me I must wish you
good-day."

"I fear," said Kenelm, with a grave and sweet politeness of tone and
manner, which he could command at times, and which, in its difference
from merely conventional urbanity, was not without fascination,--"I
fear that I have offended you by a question that must have seemed to you
inquisitive, perhaps impertinent; accept my excuse: it is very rarely
that I meet any one who interests me; and you do." As he spoke he
offered his hand, which the wayfarer shook very cordially.

"I should be a churl indeed if your question could have given me
offence. It is rather perhaps I who am guilty of impertinence, if I
take advantage of my seniority in years and tender you a counsel. Do not
despise Nature or regard her as a steam-engine; you will find in her
a very agreeable and conversable friend if you will cultivate her
intimacy. And I don't know a better mode of doing so at your age, and
with your strong limbs, than putting a knapsack on your shoulders and
turning foot-traveller like myself."

"Sir, I thank you for your counsel; and I trust we may meet again
and interchange ideas as to the thing you call Nature,--a thing which
science and art never appear to see with the same eyes. If to an artist
Nature has a soul, why, so has a steam-engine. Art gifts with soul all
matter that it contemplates: science turns all that is already gifted
with soul into matter. Good-day, sir."

Here Kenelm turned back abruptly, and the traveller went his way,
silently and thoughtfully.



CHAPTER XV.

KENELM retraced his steps homeward under the shade of his "old
hereditary trees." One might have thought his path along the
greenswards, and by the side of the babbling rivulet, was pleasanter and
more conducive to peaceful thoughts than the broad, dusty thoroughfare
along which plodded the wanderer he had quitted. But the man addicted to
revery forms his own landscapes and colours his own skies.

"It is," soliloquized Kenelm Chillingly, "a strange yearning I have
long felt,--to get out of myself, to get, as it were, into another man's
skin, and have a little variety of thought and emotion. One's self is
always the same self; and that is why I yawn so often. But if I can't
get into another man's skin, the next best thing is to get as unlike
myself as I possibly can do. Let me see what is myself. Myself is
Kenelm Chillingly, son and heir to a rich gentleman. But a fellow with
a knapsack on his back, sleeping at wayside inns, is not at all like
Kenelm Chillingly; especially if he is very short of money and may come
to want a dinner. Perhaps that sort of fellow may take a livelier view
of things: he can't take a duller one. Courage, Myself: you and I can
but try."

For the next two days Kenelm was observed to be unusually pleasant. He
yawned much less frequently, walked with his father, played piquet
with his mother, was more like other people. Sir Peter was charmed:
he ascribed this happy change to the preparations he was making
for Kenelm's travelling in style. The proud father was in active
correspondence with his great London friends, seeking letters of
introduction for Kenelm to all the courts of Europe. Portmanteaus, with
every modern convenience, were ordered; an experienced courier, who
could talk all languages and cook French dishes if required, was
invited to name his terms. In short, every arrangement worthy a young
patrician's entrance into the great world was in rapid progress, when
suddenly Kenelm Chillingly disappeared, leaving behind him on Sir
Peter's library table the following letter:--


MY VERY DEAR FATHER,--Obedient to your desire, I depart in search of
real life and real persons, or of the best imitations of them. Forgive
me, I beseech you, if I commence that search in my own way. I have seen
enough of ladies and gentlemen for the present: they must be all very
much alike in every part of the world. You desired me to be amused. I
go to try if that be possible. Ladies and gentlemen are not amusing; the
more ladylike or gentlemanlike they are, the more insipid I find them.
My dear father, I go in quest of adventure like Amadis of Gaul, like Don
Quixote, like Gil Blas, like Roderick Random; like, in short, the only
people seeking real life, the people who never existed except in books.
I go on foot; I go alone. I have provided myself with a larger amount of
money than I ought to spend, because every man must buy experience,
and the first fees are heavy. In fact, I have put fifty pounds into my
pocket-book and into my purse five sovereigns and seventeen shillings.
This sum ought to last me a year; but I dare say inexperience will do
me out of it in a month, so we will count it as nothing. Since you have
asked me to fix my own allowance, I will beg you kindly to commence it
this day in advance, by an order to your banker to cash my checks to the
amount of five pounds, and to the same amount monthly; namely, at the
rate of sixty pounds a year. With that sum I can't starve, and if I
want more it may be amusing to work for it. Pray don't send after me,
or institute inquiries, or disturb the household and set all the
neighbourhood talking, by any mention either of my project or of your
surprise at it. I will not fail to write to you from time to time.
You will judge best what to say to my dear mother. If you tell her the
truth, which of course I should do did I tell her anything, my request
is virtually frustrated, and I shall be the talk of the county. You,
I know, don't think telling fibs is immoral when it happens to be
convenient, as it would be in this case.

I expect to be absent a year or eighteen months; if I prolong my travels
it shall be in the way you proposed. I will then take my place in polite
society, call upon you to pay all expenses, and fib on my own account
to any extent required by that world of fiction which is peopled by
illusions and governed by shams.

Heaven bless you, my dear Father, and be quite sure that if I get into
any trouble requiring a friend, it is to you I shall turn. As yet I have
no other friend on earth, and with prudence and good luck I may escape
the infliction of any other friend.

   Yours ever affectionately,

     KENELM.

P. S.--Dear Father, I open my letter in your library to say again "Bless
you," and to tell you how fondly I kissed your old beaver gloves, which
I found on the table.


When Sir Peter came to that postscript he took off his spectacles and
wiped them: they were very moist.

Then he fell into a profound meditation. Sir Peter was, as I have said,
a learned man; he was also in some things a sensible man, and he had a
strong sympathy with the humorous side of his son's crotchety character.
What was to be said to Lady Chillingly? That matron was quite guiltless
of any crime which should deprive her of a husband's confidence in
a matter relating to her only son. She was a virtuous matron; morals
irreproachable, manners dignified, and _she-baronety_. Any one seeing
her for the first time would intuitively say, "Your ladyship." Was
this a matron to be suppressed in any well-ordered domestic circle? Sir
Peter's conscience loudly answered, "No;" but when, putting conscience
into his pocket, he regarded the question at issue as a man of the
world, Sir Peter felt that to communicate the contents of his son's
letter to Lady Chillingly would be the foolishest thing he could
possibly do. Did she know that Kenelm had absconded with the family
dignity invested in his very name, no marital authority short of such
abuses of power as constitute the offence of cruelty in a wife's
action for divorce from social board and nuptial bed could prevent Lady
Chillingly from summoning all the grooms, sending them in all directions
with strict orders to bring back the runaway dead or alive; the walls
would be placarded with hand-bills, "Strayed from his home," etc.; the
police would be telegraphing private instructions from town to town;
the scandal would stick to Kenelm Chillingly for life, accompanied with
vague hints of criminal propensities and insane hallucinations; he would
be ever afterwards pointed out as "THE MAN WHO HAD DISAPPEARED." And to
disappear and to turn up again, instead of being murdered, is the most
hateful thing a man can do: all the newspapers bark at him, "Tray,
Blanche, Sweetheart, and all;" strict explanations of the unseemly fact
of his safe existence are demanded in the name of public decorum, and no
explanations are accepted; it is life saved, character lost.

Sir Peter seized his hat and walked forth, not to deliberate whether to
fib or not to fib to the wife of his bosom, but to consider what kind of
fib would the most quickly sink into the bosom of his wife.

A few turns to and fro on the terrace sufficed for the conception and
maturing of the fib selected; a proof that Sir Peter was a practised
fibber. He re-entered the house, passed into her ladyship's habitual
sitting-room, and said with careless gayety, "My old friend the Duke of
Clareville is just setting off on a tour to Switzerland with his family.
His youngest daughter, Lady Jane, is a pretty girl, and would not be a
bad match for Kenelm."

"Lady Jane, the youngest daughter with fair hair, whom I saw last as
a very charming child, nursing a lovely doll presented to her by the
Empress Eugenie,--a good match indeed for Kenelm."

"I am glad you agree with me. Would it not be a favourable step towards
that alliance, and an excellent thing for Kenelm generally, if he were
to visit the Continent as one of the Duke's travelling party?"

"Of course it would."

"Then you approve what I have done; the Duke starts the day after
to-morrow, and I have packed Kenelm off to town, with a letter to my old
friend. You will excuse all leave taking. You know that though the best
of sons he is an odd fellow; and seeing that I had talked him into it,
I struck while the iron was hot, and sent him off by the express at nine
o'clock this morning, for fear that if I allowed any delay he would talk
himself out of it."

"Do you mean to say Kenelm is actually gone? Good gracious."

Sir Peter stole softly from the room, and summoning his valet, said, "I
have sent Mr. Chillingly to London. Pack up the clothes he is likely
to want, so that he can have them sent at once, whenever he writes for
them."

And thus, by a judicious violation of truth on the part of his father,
that exemplary truth-teller Kenelm Chillingly saved the honour of
his house and his own reputation from the breath of scandal and the
inquisition of the police. He was not "THE MAN WHO HAD DISAPPEARED."




BOOK II.



CHAPTER I.

KENELM CHILLINGLY had quitted the paternal home at daybreak before any
of the household was astir. "Unquestionably," said he, as he walked
along the solitary lanes,--"unquestionably I begin the world as poets
begin poetry, an imitator and a plagiarist. I am imitating an itinerant
verse-maker, as, no doubt, he began by imitating some other maker
of verse. But if there be anything in me, it will work itself out in
original form. And, after all, the verse-maker is not the inventor of
ideas. Adventure on foot is a notion that remounts to the age of fable.
Hercules, for instance; that was the way in which he got to heaven, as
a foot-traveller. How solitary the world is at this hour! Is it not for
that reason that this is of all hours the most beautiful?"

Here he paused, and looked around and above. It was the very height of
summer. The sun was just rising over gentle sloping uplands. All the
dews on the hedgerows sparkled. There was not a cloud in the heavens. Up
rose from the green blades of corn a solitary skylark. His voice woke up
the other birds. A few minutes more and the joyous concert began.
Kenelm reverently doffed his hat, and bowed his head in mute homage and
thanksgiving.



CHAPTER II.

ABOUT nine o'clock Kenelm entered a town some twelve miles distant from
his father's house, and towards which he had designedly made his way,
because in that town he was scarcely if at all known by sight, and he
might there make the purchases he required without attracting any
marked observation. He had selected for his travelling costume a
shooting-dress, as the simplest and least likely to belong to his
rank as a gentleman. But still in its very cut there was an air of
distinction, and every labourer he had met on the way had touched his
hat to him. Besides, who wears a shooting-dress in the middle of June,
or a shooting-dress at all, unless he be either a game-keeper or a
gentleman licensed to shoot?

Kenelm entered a large store-shop for ready-made clothes and purchased
a suit such as might be worn on Sundays by a small country yeoman or
tenant-farmer of a petty holding,--a stout coarse broadcloth upper
garment, half coat, half jacket, with waistcoat to match, strong
corduroy trousers, a smart Belcher neckcloth, with a small stock of
linen and woollen socks in harmony with the other raiment. He bought
also a leathern knapsack, just big enough to contain this wardrobe, and
a couple of books, which with his combs and brushes he had brought away
in his pockets; for among all his trunks at home there was no knapsack.

These purchases made and paid for, he passed quickly through the town,
and stopped at a humble inn at the outskirt, to which he was attracted
by the notice, "Refreshment for man and beast." He entered a little
sanded parlour, which at that hour he had all to himself, called for
breakfast, and devoured the best part of a fourpenny loaf with a couple
of hard eggs.

Thus recruited, he again sallied forth, and deviating into a thick wood
by the roadside, he exchanged the habiliments with which he had left
home for those he had purchased, and by the help of one or two big
stones sunk the relinquished garments into a small but deep pool which
he was lucky enough to find in a bush-grown dell much haunted by snipes
in the winter.

"Now," said Kenelm, "I really begin to think I have got out of myself.
I am in another man's skin; for what, after all, is a skin but a soul's
clothing, and what is clothing but a decenter skin? Of its own natural
skin every civilized soul is ashamed. It is the height of impropriety
for any one but the lowest kind of savage to show it. If the purest
soul now existent upon earth, the Pope of Rome's or the Archbishop of
Canterbury's, were to pass down the Strand with the skin which Nature
gave to it bare to the eye, it would be brought up before a magistrate,
prosecuted by the Society for the Suppression of Vice, and committed to
jail as a public nuisance.

"Decidedly I am now in another man's skin. Kenelm Chillingly, I no
longer

   "Remain

     "Yours faithfully;

"But am,

   "With profound consideration,

     "Your obedient humble servant."

With light step and elated crest, the wanderer, thus transformed, sprang
from the wood into the dusty thoroughfare. He had travelled on for about
an hour, meeting but few other passengers, when he heard to the right a
loud shrill young voice, "Help! help! I will not go; I tell you, I will
not!" Just before him stood, by a high five-barred gate, a pensive gray
cob attached to a neat-looking gig. The bridle was loose on the cob's
neck. The animal was evidently accustomed to stand quietly when ordered
to do so, and glad of the opportunity.

The cries, "Help, help!" were renewed, mingled with louder tones in a
rougher voice, tones of wrath and menace. Evidently these sounds did
not come from the cob. Kenelm looked over the gate, and saw a few yards
distant in a grass field a well-dressed boy struggling violently against
a stout middle-aged man who was rudely hauling him along by the arm.

The chivalry natural to a namesake of the valiant Sir Kenelm Digby
was instantly aroused. He vaulted over the gate, seized the man by the
collar, and exclaimed, "For shame! what are you doing to that poor boy?
let him go!"

"Why the devil do you interfere?" cried the stout man, his eyes glaring
and his lips foaming with rage. "Ah, are you the villain? yes, no doubt
of it. I'll give it to you, jackanapes," and still grasping the boy with
one hand, with the other the stout man darted a blow at Kenelm, from
which nothing less than the practised pugilistic skill and natural
alertness of the youth thus suddenly assaulted could have saved his eyes
and nose. As it was, the stout man had the worst of it: the blow was
parried, returned with a dexterous manoeuvre of Kenelm's right foot in
Cornish fashion, and _procumbit humi bos_; the stout man lay sprawling
on his back. The boy, thus released, seized hold of Kenelm by the arm,
and hurrying him along up the field, cried, "Come, come before he gets
up! save me! save me!" Ere he had recovered his own surprise, the boy
had dragged Kenelm to the gate, and jumped into the gig, sobbing forth,
"Get in, get in, I can't drive; get in, and drive--you. Quick! Quick!"

"But--" began Kenelm.

"Get in, or I shall go mad." Kenelm obeyed; the boy gave him the reins,
and seizing the whip himself, applied it lustily to the cob. On sprang
the cob. "Stop, stop, stop, thief! villain! Holloa! thieves! thieves!
thieves! stop!" cried a voice behind. Kenelm involuntarily turned his
head and beheld the stout man perched upon the gate and gesticulating
furiously. It was but a glimpse; again the whip was plied, the cob
frantically broke into a gallop, the gig jolted and bumped and swerved,
and it was not till they had put a good mile between themselves and the
stout man that Kenelm succeeded in obtaining possession of the whip and
calming the cob into a rational trot.

"Young gentleman," then said Kenelm, "perhaps you will have the goodness
to explain."

"By and by; get on, that's a good fellow; you shall be well paid for it,
well and handsomely."

Quoth Kenelm, gravely, "I know that in real life payment and service
naturally go together. But we will put aside the payment till you tell
me what is to be the service. And first, whither am I to drive you? We
are coming to a place where three roads meet; which of the three shall I
take?"

"Oh, I don't know; there is a finger-post. I want to get to,--but it is
a secret; you'll not betray me? Promise,--swear."

"I don't swear except when I am in a passion, which, I am sorry to say,
is very seldom; and I don't promise till I know what I promise; neither
do I go on driving runaway boys in other men's gigs unless I know that I
am taking them to a safe place, where their papas and mammas can get at
them."

"I have no papa, no mamma," said the boy, dolefully and with quivering
lips.

"Poor boy! I suppose that burly brute is your schoolmaster, and you are
running away home for fear of a flogging."

The boy burst out laughing; a pretty, silvery, merry laugh: it thrilled
through Kenelm Chillingly. "No, he would not flog me: he is not a
schoolmaster; he is worse than that."

"Is it possible? What is he?"

"An uncle."

"Hum! uncles are proverbial for cruelty; were so in the classical days,
and Richard III. was the only scholar in his family."

"Eh! classical and Richard III.!" said the boy, startled, and looking
attentively at the pensive driver. "Who are you? you talk like a
gentleman."

"I beg pardon. I'll not do so again if I can help it."--"Decidedly,"
thought Kenelm, "I am beginning to be amused. What a blessing it is to
get into another man's skin, and another man's gig too!" Aloud, "Here
we are at the fingerpost. If you are running away from your uncle, it is
time to inform me where you are running to."

Here the boy leaned over the gig and examined the fingerpost. Then he
clapped his hands joyfully.

"All right! I thought so, 'To Tor-Hadham, eighteen miles.' That's the
road to 'Tor-Hadham."

"Do you mean to say I am to drive you all that way,--eighteen miles?"

"Yes."

"And to whom are you going?"

"I will tell you by and by. Do go on; do, pray. I can't drive--never
drove in my life--or I would not ask you. Pray, pray, don't desert me!
If you are a gentleman you will not; and if you are not a gentleman,
I have got L10 in my purse, which you shall have when I am safe at
Tor-Hadham. Don't hesitate: my whole life is at stake!" And the boy
began once more to sob.

Kenelm directed the pony's head towards Tor-Hadham, and the boy ceased
to sob.

"You are a good, dear fellow," said the boy, wiping his eyes. "I am
afraid I am taking you very much out of your road."

"I have no road in particular, and would as soon go to Tor-Hadham, which
I have never seen, as anywhere else. I am but a wanderer on the face of
the earth."

"Have you lost your papa and mamma too? Why, you are not much older than
I am."

"Little gentleman," said Kenelm, gravely, "I am just of age, and you, I
suppose, are about fourteen."

"What fun!" cried the boy, abruptly. "Isn't it fun?"

"It will not be fun if I am sentenced to penal servitude for stealing
your uncle's gig, and robbing his little nephew of L10. By the by, that
choleric relation of yours meant to knock down somebody else when he
struck at me. He asked, 'Are you the villain?' Pray who is the villain?
he is evidently in your confidence."

"Villain! he is the most honourable, high-minded--But no matter now:
I'll introduce you to him when we reach Tor-Hadham. Whip that pony: he
is crawling."

"It is up hill: a good man spares his beast."

No art and no eloquence could extort from his young companion any
further explanation than Kenelm had yet received; and indeed, as the
journey advanced, and they approached their destination, both parties
sank into silence. Kenelm was seriously considering that his first day's
experience of real life in the skin of another had placed in some peril
his own. He had knocked down a man evidently respectable and well to do,
had carried off that man's nephew, and made free with that man's goods
and chattels; namely, his gig and horse. All this might be explained
satisfactorily to a justice of the peace, but how? By returning to his
former skin; by avowing himself to be Kenelm Chillingly, a distinguished
university medalist, heir to no ignoble name and some L10,000 a year.
But then what a scandal! he who abhorred scandal; in vulgar parlance,
what a "row!" he who denied that the very word "row" was sanctioned
by any classic authorities in the English language. He would have to
explain how he came to be found disguised, carefully disguised, in
garments such as no baronet's eldest son--even though that baronet be
the least ancestral man of mark whom it suits the convenience of a First
Minister to recommend to the Sovereign for exaltation over the rank
of Mister--was ever beheld in, unless he had taken flight to the
gold-diggings. Was this a position in which the heir of the Chillinglys,
a distinguished family, whose coat-of-arms dated from the earliest
authenticated period of English heraldry under Edward III. as Three
Fishes _azure_, could be placed without grievous slur on the cold and
ancient blood of the Three Fishes?

And then individually to himself, Kenelm, irrespectively of the Three
Fishes,--what a humiliation! He had put aside his respected father's
deliberate preparations for his entrance into real life; he had
perversely chosen his own walk on his own responsibility; and here,
before half the first day was over, what an infernal scrape he had
walked himself into! and what was his excuse? A wretched little boy,
sobbing and chuckling by turns, and yet who was clever enough to twist
Kenelm Chillingly round his finger; twist _him_, a man who thought
himself so much wiser than his parents,--a man who had gained honours at
the University,--a man of the gravest temperament,--a man of so nicely
critical a turn of mind that there was not a law of art or nature in
which he did not detect a flaw; that he should get himself into this
mess was, to say the least of it, an uncomfortable reflection.

The boy himself, as Kenelm glanced at him from time to time, became
impish and Will-of-the-Wisp-ish. Sometimes he laughed to himself loudly,
sometimes he wept to himself quietly; sometimes, neither laughing nor
weeping, he seemed absorbed in reflection. Twice as they came nearer to
the town of Tor-Hadham, Kenelm nudged the boy, and said, "My boy, I must
talk with you;" and twice the boy, withdrawing his arm from the nudge,
had answered dreamily, "Hush! I am thinking."

And so they entered the town of Tor-Hadham, the cob very much done up.



CHAPTER III.

"NOW, young sir," said Kenelm, in a tone calm, but peremptory,--"now we
are in the town, where am I to take you? and wherever it be, there to
say good-by."

"No, not good-by. Stay with me a little bit. I begin to feel frightened,
and I am so friendless;" and the boy, who had before resented the
slightest nudge on the part of Kenelm, now wound his arm into Kenelm's,
and clung to him caressingly.

I don't know what my readers have hitherto thought of Kenelm Chillingly:
but, amid all the curves and windings of his whimsical humour, there was
one way that went straight to his heart; you had only to be weaker than
himself and ask his protection.

He turned round abruptly; he forgot all the strangeness of his position,
and replied: "Little brute that you are, I'll be shot if I forsake you
if in trouble. But some compassion is also due to the cob: for his sake
say where we are to stop."

"I am sure I can't say: I never was here before. Let us go to a nice
quiet inn. Drive slowly: we'll look out for one."

Tor-Hadham was a large town, not nominally the capital of the county,
but, in point of trade and bustle and life, virtually the capital. The
straight street, through which the cob went as slowly as if he had
been drawing a Triumphal Car up the Sacred Hill, presented an animated
appearance. The shops had handsome facades and plate-glass windows;
the pavements exhibited a lively concourse, evidently not merely of
business, but of pleasure, for a large proportion of the passers-by was
composed of the fair sex, smartly dressed, many of them young and some
pretty. In fact a regiment of her Majesty's -----th Hussars had been
sent into the town two days before; and, between the officers of that
fortunate regiment and the fair sex in that hospitable town, there was
a natural emulation which should make the greater number of slain and
wounded. The advent of these heroes, professional subtracters from
hostile and multipliers of friendly populations, gave a stimulus to
the caterers for those amusements which bring young folks
together,--archery-meetings, rifle-shootings, concerts, balls, announced
in bills attached to boards and walls and exposed at shop-windows.

The boy looked eagerly forth from the gig, scanning especially these
advertisements, till at length he uttered an excited exclamation, "Ah, I
was right: there it is!"

"There what is?" asked Kenelm,--"the inn?" His companion did not answer,
but Kenelm following the boy's eye perceived an immense hand-bill.


   "TO-MORROW NIGHT THEATRE OPENS.

   "RICHARD III. Mr. COMPTON."


"Do just ask where the theatre is," said the boy, in a whisper, turning
away his head.

Kenelm stopped the cob, made the inquiry, and was directed to take the
next turning to the right. In a few minutes the compo portico of an ugly
dilapidated building, dedicated to the Dramatic Muses, presented itself
at the angle of a dreary, deserted lane. The walls were placarded with
play-bills, in which the name of Compton stood forth as gigantic as
capitals could make it. The boy drew a sigh. "Now," said he, "let us
look out for an inn near here,--the nearest."

No inn, however, beyond the rank of a small and questionable looking
public-house was apparent, until at a distance somewhat remote from the
theatre, and in a quaint, old-fashioned, deserted square, a neat,
newly whitewashed house displayed upon its frontispiece, in large black
letters of funereal aspect, "Temperance Hotel."

"Stop," said the boy; "don't you think that would suit us? it looks
quiet."

"Could not look more quiet if it were a tombstone," replied Kenelm.

The boy put his hand upon the reins and stopped the cob. The cob was in
that condition that the slightest touch sufficed to stop him, though he
turned his head somewhat ruefully as if in doubt whether hay and corn
would be within the regulations of a Temperance Hotel. Kenelm descended
and entered the house. A tidy woman emerged from a sort of glass
cupboard which constituted the bar, minus the comforting drinks
associated with the _beau ideal_ of a bar, but which displayed instead
two large decanters of cold water with tumblers _a discretion_, and
sundry plates of thin biscuits and sponge-cakes. This tidy woman
politely inquired what was his "pleasure."

"Pleasure," answered Kenelm, with his usual gravity, "is not the word I
should myself have chosen. But could you oblige my horse--I mean _that_
horse--with a stall and a feed of oats, and that young gentleman and
myself with a private room and a dinner?"

"Dinner!" echoed the hostess,--"dinner!"

"A thousand pardons, ma'am. But if the word 'dinner' shock you I retract
it, and would say instead something to eat and drink.'"

"Drink! This is strictly a Temperance Hotel, sir."

"Oh, if you don't eat and drink here," exclaimed Kenelm, fiercely, for
he was famished, "I wish you good morning."

"Stay a bit, sir. We do eat and drink here. But we are very simple
folks. We allow no fermented liquors."

"Not even a glass of beer?"

"Only ginger-beer. Alcohols are strictly forbidden. We have tea and
coffee and milk. But most of our customers prefer the pure liquid. As
for eating, sir,--anything you order, in reason."

Kenelm shook his head and was retreating, when the boy, who had sprung
from the gig and overheard the conversation, cried petulantly, "What
does it signify? Who wants fermented liquors? Water will do very well.
And as for dinner,--anything convenient. Please, ma'am, show us into a
private room: I am so tired." The last words were said in a caressing
manner, and so prettily, that the hostess at once changed her tone,
and muttering, "Poor boy!" and, in a still more subdued mutter, "What
a pretty face he has!" nodded, and led the way up a very clean
old-fashioned staircase.

"But the horse and gig, where are they to go?" said Kenelm, with a pang
of conscience on reflecting how ill treated hitherto had been both horse
and owner.

"Oh, as for the horse and gig, sir, you will find Jukes's livery-stables
a few yards farther down. We don't take in horses ourselves; our
customers seldom keep them: but you will find the best of accommodation
at Jukes's."

Kenelm conducted the cob to the livery-stables thus indicated, and
waited to see him walked about to cool, well rubbed down, and made
comfortable over half a peck of oats,--for Kenelm Chillingly was a
humane man to the brute creation,--and then, in a state of ravenous
appetite, returned to the Temperance Hotel, and was ushered into a small
drawing-room, with a small bit of carpet in the centre, six small chairs
with cane seats, prints on the walls descriptive of the various
effects of intoxicating liquors upon sundry specimens of mankind,--some
resembling ghosts, others fiends, and all with a general aspect of
beggary and perdition; contrasted by Happy-Family pictures,--smiling
wives, portly husbands, rosy infants, emblematic of the beatified
condition of members of the Temperance Society.

A table with a spotless cloth, and knives and forks for two, chiefly,
however, attracted Kenelm's attention.

The boy was standing by the window, seemingly gazing on a small aquarium
which was there placed, and contained the usual variety of small fishes,
reptiles, and insects, enjoying the pleasures of Temperance in its
native element, including, of course, an occasional meal upon each
other.

"What are they going to give us to eat?" inquired Kenelm. "It must be
ready by this time I should think."

Here he gave a brisk tug at the bell-pull. The boy advanced from
the window, and as he did so Kenelm was struck with the grace of his
bearing, and the improvement in his looks, now that he was without his
hat, and rest and ablution had refreshed from heat and dust the delicate
bloom of his complexion. There was no doubt about it that he was an
exceedingly pretty boy, and if he lived to be a man would make many a
lady's heart ache. It was with a certain air of gracious superiority
such as is seldom warranted by superior rank if it be less than royal,
and chiefly becomes a marked seniority in years, that this young
gentleman, approaching the solemn heir of the Chillinglys, held out his
hand and said,--

"Sir, you have behaved extremely well, and I thank you very much."

"Your Royal Highness is condescending to say so," replied Kenelm
Chillingly, bowing low, "but have you ordered dinner? and what are
they going to give us? No one seems to answer the bell here. As it is a
Temperance Hotel, probably all the servants are drunk."

"Why should they be drunk at a Temperance Hotel?"

"Why! because, as a general rule, people who flagrantly pretend to
anything are the reverse of that which they pretend to. A man who sets
up for a saint is sure to be a sinner, and a man who boasts that he is a
sinner is sure to have some feeble, maudlin, snivelling bit of saintship
about him which is enough to make him a humbug. Masculine honesty,
whether it be saint-like or sinner-like, does not label itself either
saint or sinner. Fancy Saint Augustine labelling himself saint, or
Robert Burns sinner; and therefore, though, little boy, you have
probably not read the poems of Robert Burns, and have certainly not read
the 'Confessions' of Saint Augustine, take my word for it, that both
those personages were very good fellows; and with a little difference of
training and experience, Burns might have written the 'Confessions' and
Augustine the poems. Powers above! I am starving. What did you order for
dinner, and when is it to appear?"

The boy, who had opened to an enormous width a naturally large pair of
hazel eyes, while his tall companion in fustian trousers and Belcher
neckcloth spoke thus patronizingly of Robert Burns and Saint Augustine,
now replied, with rather a deprecatory and shamefaced aspect, "I am
sorry I was not thinking of dinner. I was not so mindful of you as I
ought to have been. The landlady asked me what we would have. I said,
'What you like;' and the landlady muttered something about--" here the
boy hesitated.

"Yes. About what? Mutton-chops?"

"No. Cauliflowers and rice-pudding."

Kenelm Chillingly never swore, never raged. Where ruder beings of
human mould swore or raged, he vented displeasure in an expression of
countenance so pathetically melancholic and lugubrious that it would
have melted the heart of an Hyrcanian tiger. He turned his countenance
now on the boy, and murmuring "Cauliflower!--Starvation!" sank into
one of the cane-bottomed chairs, and added quietly, "so much for human
gratitude."

The boy was evidently smitten to the heart by the bitter sweetness
of this reproach. There were almost tears in his Voice, as he said
falteringly, "Pray forgive me, I _was_ ungrateful. I'll run down and see
what there is;" and, suiting the action to the word, he disappeared.

Kenelm remained motionless; in fact he was plunged into one of those
reveries, or rather absorptions of inward and spiritual being, into
which it is said that the consciousness of the Indian dervish can be by
prolonged fasting preternaturally resolved. The appetite of all men
of powerful muscular development is of a nature far exceeding the
properties of any reasonable number of cauliflowers and rice-puddings
to satisfy. Witness Hercules himself, whose cravings for substantial
nourishment were the standing joke of the classic poets. I don't know
that Kenelm Chillingly would have beaten the Theban Hercules either in
fighting or in eating; but, when he wanted to fight or when he wanted
to eat, Hercules would have had to put forth all his strength not to be
beaten.

After ten minutes' absence, the boy came back radiant. He tapped Kenelm
on the shoulder, and said playfully, "I made them cut a whole loin into
chops, besides the cauliflower; and such a big rice-pudding, and eggs
and bacon too! Cheer up! it will be served in a minute."

"A-h!" said Kenelm.

"They are good people; they did not mean to stint you: but most of their
customers, it seems, live upon vegetables and farinaceous food. There
is a society here formed upon that principle; the landlady says they are
philosophers!"

At the word "philosophers" Kenelm's crest rose as that of a practised
hunter at the cry of "Yoiks! Tally-ho!" "Philosophers!" said he,
"philosophers indeed! O ignoramuses, who do not even know the structure
of the human tooth! Look you, little boy, if nothing were left on this
earth of the present race of man, as we are assured upon great authority
will be the case one of these days,--and a mighty good riddance it will
be,--if nothing, I say, of man were left except fossils of his teeth and
his thumbs, a philosopher of that superior race which will succeed to
man would at once see in those relics all his characteristics and all
his history; would say, comparing his thumb with the talons of an eagle,
the claws of a tiger, the hoof of a horse, the owner of that thumb must
have been lord over creatures with talons and claws and hoofs. You may
say the monkey tribe has thumbs. True; but compare an ape's thumb with
a man's: could the biggest ape's thumb have built Westminster Abbey? But
even thumbs are trivial evidence of man as compared with his teeth.
Look at his teeth!"--here Kenelm expanded his jaws from ear to ear
and displayed semicircles of ivory, so perfect for the purposes of
mastication that the most artistic dentist might have despaired of
his power to imitate them,--"look, I say, at his teeth!" The
boy involuntarily recoiled. "Are the teeth those of a miserable
cauliflower-eater? or is it purely by farinaceous food that the
proprietor of teeth like man's obtains the rank of the sovereign
destroyer of creation? No, little boy, no," continued Kenelm, closing
his jaws, but advancing upon the infant, who at each stride receded
towards the aquarium,--"no; man is the master of the world, because
of all created beings he devours the greatest variety and the greatest
number of created things. His teeth evince that man can live upon every
soil from the torrid to the frozen zone, because man can eat everything
that other creatures cannot eat. And the formation of his teeth proves
it. A tiger can eat a deer; so can man: but a tiger can't eat an eel;
man can. An elephant can eat cauliflowers and rice-pudding; so can man!
but an elephant can't eat a beefsteak; man can. In sum, man can
live everywhere, because he can eat anything, thanks to his dental
formation!" concluded Kenelm, making a prodigious stride towards the
boy. "Man, when everything else fails him, eats his own species."

"Don't; you frighten me," said the boy. "Aha!" clapping his hands with a
sensation of gleeful relief, "here come the mutton-chops!"

A wonderfully clean, well-washed, indeed well-washed-out, middle-aged
parlour-maid now appeared, dish in hand. Putting the dish on the table
and taking off the cover, the handmaiden said civilly, though frigidly,
like one who lived upon salad and cold water, "Mistress is sorry to have
kept you waiting, but she thought you were Vegetarians."

After helping his young friend to a mutton-chop, Kenelm helped himself,
and replied gravely, "Tell your mistress that if she had only given
us vegetables, I should have eaten you. Tell her that though man is
partially graminivorous, he is principally carnivorous. Tell her that
though a swine eats cabbages and such like, yet where a swine can get
a baby, it eats the baby. Tell her," continued Kenelm (now at his third
chop), "that there is no animal that in digestive organs more resembles
man than a swine. Ask her if there is any baby in the house; if so, it
would be safe for the baby to send up some more chops."

As the acutest observer could rarely be quite sure when Kenelm
Chillingly was in jest or in earnest, the parlour-maid paused a moment
and attempted a pale smile. Kenelm lifted his dark eyes, unspeakably sad
and profound, and said mournfully, "I should be so sorry for the baby.
Bring the chops!" The parlour-maid vanished. The boy laid down his
knife and fork, and looked fixedly and inquisitively on Kenelm. Kenelm,
unheeding the look, placed the last chop on the boy's plate.

"No more," cried the boy, impulsively, and returned the chop to the
dish. "I have dined: I have had enough."

"Little boy, you lie," said Kenelm; "you have not had enough to keep
body and soul together. Eat that chop or I shall thrash you: whatever I
say I do."

Somehow or other the boy felt quelled; he ate the chop in silence, again
looked at Kenelm's face, and said to himself, "I am afraid."

The parlour-maid here entered with a fresh supply of chops and a dish of
bacon and eggs, soon followed by a rice-pudding baked in a tin dish, and
of size sufficient to have nourished a charity school. When the repast
was finished, Kenelm seemed to forget the dangerous properties of the
carnivorous animal; and stretching himself indolently out, appeared
to be as innocently ruminative as the most domestic of animals
graminivorous.

Then said the boy, rather timidly, "May I ask you another favour?"

"Is it to knock down another uncle, or to steal another gig and cob?"

"No, it is very simple: it is merely to find out the address of a friend
here; and when found to give him a note from me."

"Does the commission press? 'After dinner, rest a while,' saith the
proverb; and proverbs are so wise that no one can guess the author
of them. They are supposed to be fragments of the philosophy of the
antediluvians: came to us packed up in the ark."

"Really, indeed," said the boy, seriously. "How interesting! No, my
commission does not press for an hour or so. Do you think, sir, they had
any drama before the Deluge?"

"Drama! not a doubt of it. Men who lived one or two thousand years had
time to invent and improve everything; and a play could have had its
natural length then. It would not have been necessary to crowd the
whole history of Macbeth, from his youth to his old age, into an absurd
epitome of three hours. One cannot trace a touch of real human nature in
any actor's delineation of that very interesting Scotchman, because
the actor always comes on the stage as if he were the same age when he
murdered Duncan, and when, in his sear and yellow leaf, he was lopped
off by Macduff."

"Do you think Macbeth was young when he murdered Duncan?"

"Certainly. No man ever commits a first crime of violent nature, such as
murder, after thirty; if he begins before, he may go on up to any age.
But youth is the season for commencing those wrong calculations which
belong to irrational hope and the sense of physical power. You thus
read in the newspapers that the persons who murder their sweethearts are
generally from two to six and twenty; and persons who murder from other
motives than love--that is, from revenge, avarice, or ambition--are
generally about twenty-eight,--Iago's age. Twenty-eight is the usual
close of the active season for getting rid of one's fellow-creatures; a
prize-fighter falls off after that age. I take it that Macbeth was about
twenty-eight when he murdered Duncan, and from about fifty-four to sixty
when he began to whine about missing the comforts of old age. But
can any audience understand that difference of years in seeing a
three-hours' play? or does any actor ever pretend to impress it on the
audience, and appear as twenty-eight in the first act and a sexagenarian
in the fifth?"

"I never thought of that," said the boy, evidently interested. "But I
never saw 'Macbeth.' I have seen 'Richard III.:' is not that nice? Don't
you dote on the play? I do. What a glorious life an actor's must be!"

Kenelm, who had been hitherto rather talking to himself than to his
youthful companion, here roused his attention, looked on the boy
intently, and said,--

"I see you are stage-stricken. You have run away from home in order to
turn player, and I should not wonder if this note you want me to give is
for the manager of the theatre or one of his company."

The young face that encountered Kenelm's dark eye became very flushed,
but set and defiant in its expression.

"And what if it were? would not you give it?"

"What! help a child of your age run away from his home, to go upon the
stage against the consent of his relations? Certainly not."

"I am not a child; but that has nothing to do with it. I don't want to
go on the stage, at all events without the consent of the person who
has a right to dictate my actions. My note is not to the manager of
the theatre, nor to one of his company; but it is to a gentleman who
condescends to act here for a few nights; a thorough gentleman,--a great
actor,--my friend, the only friend I have in the world. I say frankly I
have run away from home so that he may have that note, and if you will
not give it some one else will!"

The boy had risen while he spoke, and he stood erect beside the
recumbent Kenelm, his lips quivering, his eyes suffused with suppressed
tears, but his whole aspect resolute and determined. Evidently, if he
did not get his own way in this world, it would not be for want of will.

"I will take your note," said Kenelm.

"There it is; give it into the hands of the person it is addressed
to,--Mr. Herbert Compton."



CHAPTER IV.

KENELM took his way to the theatre, and inquired of the door-keeper for
Mr. Herbert Compton. That functionary replied, "Mr. Compton does not act
to-night, and is not in the house."

"Where does he lodge?"

The door-keeper pointed to a grocer's shop on the other side of the way,
and said tersely, "There, private door; knock and ring."

Kenelm did as he was directed. A slatternly maid-servant opened the
door, and, in answer to his interrogatory, said that Mr. Compton was at
home, but at supper.

"I am sorry to disturb him," said Kenelm, raising his voice, for he
heard a clatter of knives and plates within a room hard by at his left,
"but my business requires to see him forthwith;" and, pushing the maid
aside, he entered at once the adjoining banquet-hall.

Before a savoury stew smelling strongly of onions sat a man very much at
his ease, without coat or neckcloth,--a decidedly handsome man, his hair
cut short and his face closely shaven, as befits an actor who has wigs
and beards of all hues and forms at his command. The man was not alone;
opposite to him sat a lady, who might be a few years younger, of a
somewhat faded complexion, but still pretty, with good stage features
and a profusion of blond ringlets.

"Mr. Compton, I presume," said Kenelm, with a solemn bow.

"My name is Compton: any message from the theatre? or what do you want
with me?"

"I--nothing!" replied Kenelm; and then deepening his naturally mournful
voice into tones ominous and tragic, continued, "By whom you are wanted
let this explain;" therewith he placed in Mr. Compton's hand the letter
with which he was charged, and stretching his arms and interlacing his
fingers in the _pose_ of Talma as Julius Caesar, added, "'Qu'en dis-tu,
Brute?'"

Whether it was from the sombre aspect and awe-inspiring delivery of
the messenger, or the sight of the handwriting on the address of the
missive, Mr. Compton's countenance suddenly fell, and his hand rested
irresolute, as if not daring to open the letter.

"Never mind me, dear," said the lady with blond ringlets, in a tone of
stinging affability: "read your _billet-doux_; don't keep the young man
waiting, love!"

"Nonsense, Matilda, nonsense! _billet-doux_ indeed! more likely a bill
from Duke the tailor. Excuse me for a moment, my dear. Follow me, sir,"
and rising, still with shirtsleeves uncovered, he quitted the room,
closing the door after him, motioned Kenelm into a small parlour on the
opposite side of the passage, and by the light of a suspended gas-lamp
ran his eye hastily over the letter, which, though it seemed very short,
drew from him sundry exclamations. "Good heavens, how very absurd!
what's to be done?" Then, thrusting the letter into his trousers-pocket,
he fixed upon Kenelm a very brilliant pair of dark eyes, which soon
dropped before the steadfast look of that saturnine adventurer.

"Are you in the confidence of the writer of this letter?" asked Mr.
Compton, rather confusedly.

"I am not the confidant of the writer," answered Kenelm, "but for the
time being I am the protector!"

"Protector!"

"Protector."

Mr. Compton again eyed the messenger, and this time fully realizing the
gladiatorial development of that dark stranger's physical form, he grew
many shades paler, and involuntarily retreated towards the bell-pull.

After a short pause, he said, "I am requested to call on the writer. If
I do so, may I understand that the interview will be strictly private?"

"So far as I am concerned, yes: on the condition that no attempt be made
to withdraw the writer from the house."

"Certainly not, certainly not; quite the contrary," exclaimed Mr.
Compton, with genuine animation. "Say I will call in half an hour."

"I will give your message," said Kenelm, with a polite inclination of
his head; "and pray pardon me if I remind you that I styled myself the
protector of your correspondent, and if the slightest advantage be
taken of that correspondent's youth and inexperience or the smallest
encouragement be given to plans of abduction from home and friends, the
stage will lose an ornament and Herbert Compton vanish from the scene."
With these words Kenelm left the player standing aghast. Gaining the
street-door, a lad with a band-box ran against him and was nearly upset.

"Stupid," cried the lad, "can't you see where you are going? Give this
to Mrs. Compton."

"I should deserve the title you give if I did for nothing the business
for which you are paid," replied Kenelm, sententiously, and striding on.



CHAPTER V.

"I HAVE fulfilled my mission," said Kenelm, on rejoining his travelling
companion. "Mr. Compton said he would be here in half an hour."

"You saw him?"

"Of course: I promised to give your letter into his own hands."

"Was he alone?"

"No; at supper with his wife."

"His wife! what do you mean, sir?--wife! he has no wife."

"Appearances are deceitful. At least he was with a lady who called him
'dear' and 'love' in as spiteful a tone of voice as if she had been his
wife; and as I was coming out of his street-door a lad who ran against
me asked me to give a band-box to Mrs. Compton."

The boy turned as white as death, staggered back a few steps, and
dropped into a chair.

A suspicion which during his absence had suggested itself to Kenelm's
inquiring mind now took strong confirmation. He approached softly, drew
a chair close to the companion whom fate had forced upon him, and said
in a gentle whisper,--

"This is no boy's agitation. If you have been deceived or misled, and
I can in any way advise or aid you, count on me as women under the
circumstances count on men and gentlemen."

The boy started to his feet, and paced the room with disordered steps,
and a countenance working with passions which he attempted vainly to
suppress. Suddenly arresting his steps, he seized Kenelm's hand, pressed
it convulsively, and said, in a voice struggling against a sob,--

"I thank you,--I bless you. Leave me now: I would be alone. Alone, too,
I must face this man. There may be some mistake yet; go."

"You will promise not to leave the house till I return?"

"Yes, I promise that."

"And if it be as I fear, you will then let me counsel with and advise
you?"

"Heaven help me, if so! Whom else should I trust to? Go, go!"

Kenelm once more found himself in the streets, beneath the mingled light
of gas-lamps and the midsummer moon. He walked on mechanically till he
reached the extremity of the town. There he halted, and seating himself
on a milestone, indulged in these meditations:--

"Kenelm, my friend, you are in a still worse scrape than I thought you
were an hour ago. You have evidently now got a woman on your hands. What
on earth are you to do with her? A runaway woman, who, meaning to run
off with somebody else--such are the crosses and contradictions in human
destiny--has run off with you instead. What mortal can hope to be safe?
The last thing I thought could befall me when I got up this morning was
that I should have any trouble about the other sex before the day was
over. If I were of an amatory temperament, the Fates might have some
justification for leading me into this snare, but, as it is, those
meddling old maids have none. Kenelm, my friend, do you think you ever
can be in love? and, if you were in love, do you think you could be a
greater fool than you are now?"

Kenelm had not decided this knotty question in the conference held with
himself, when a light and soft strain of music came upon his ear. It was
but from a stringed instrument, and might have sounded thin and tinkling
but for the stillness of the night, and that peculiar addition of
fulness which music acquires when it is borne along a tranquil air.
Presently a voice in song was heard from the distance accompanying
the instrument. It was a man's voice, a mellow and a rich voice, but
Kenelm's ear could not catch the words. Mechanically he moved on towards
the quarter from which the sounds came, for Kenelm Chillingly had music
in his soul, though he was not quite aware of it himself. He saw before
him a patch of greensward, on which grew a solitary elm with a seat
for wayfarers beneath it. From this sward the ground receded in a wide
semicircle bordered partly by shops, partly by the tea-gardens of a
pretty cottage-like tavern. Round the tables scattered throughout the
gardens were grouped quiet customers, evidently belonging to the class
of small tradespeople or superior artisans. They had an appearance of
decorous respectability, and were listening intently to the music. So
were many persons at the shop-doors and at the windows of upper rooms.
On the sward, a little in advance of the tree, but beneath its shadow,
stood the musician, and in that musician Kenelm recognized the wanderer
from whose talk he had conceived the idea of the pedestrian excursion
which had already brought him into a very awkward position. The
instrument on which the singer accompanied himself was a guitar, and his
song was evidently a love-song, though, as it was now drawing near to
its close, Kenelm could but imperfectly guess at its general meaning.
He heard enough to perceive that its words were at least free from the
vulgarity which generally characterizes street ballads, and were yet
simple enough to please a very homely audience.

When the singer ended there was no applause; but there was evident
sensation among the audience,--a feeling as if something that had given
a common enjoyment had ceased. Presently the white Pomeranian dog, who
had hitherto kept himself out of sight under the seat of the elm-tree,
advanced, with a small metal tray between his teeth, and, after looking
round him deliberately, as if to select whom of the audience should
be honoured with the commencement of a general subscription, gravely
approached Kenelm, stood on his hind legs, stared at him, and presented
the tray.

Kenelm dropped a shilling into that depository, and the dog, looking
gratified, took his way towards the tea-gardens. Lifting his hat, for he
was, in his way, a very polite man, Kenelm approached the singer, and,
trusting to the alteration in his dress for not being recognized by a
stranger who had only once before encountered him he said,--

"Judging by the little I heard, you sing very well, sir. May I ask who
composed the words?"

"They are mine," replied the singer.

"And the air?"

"Mine too."

"Accept my compliments. I hope you find these manifestations of genius
lucrative?"

The singer, who had not hitherto vouchsafed more than a careless glance
at the rustic garb of the questioner, now fixed his eyes full upon
Kenelm, and said, with a smile, "Your voice betrays you, sir. We have
met before."

"True; but I did not then notice your guitar, nor, though acquainted
with your poetical gifts, suppose that you selected this primitive
method of making them publicly known."

"Nor did I anticipate the pleasure of meeting you again in the character
of Hobnail. Hist! let us keep each other's secret. I am known hereabouts
by no other designation than that of the 'Wandering Minstrel.'"

"It is in the capacity of minstrel that I address you. If it be not an
impertinent question, do you know any songs which take the other side of
the case?"

"What case? I don't understand you, sir."

"The song I heard seemed in praise of that sham called love. Don't you
think you could say something more new and more true, treating that
aberration from reason with the contempt it deserves?"

"Not if I am to get my travelling expenses paid."

"What! the folly is so popular?"

"Does not your own heart tell you so?"

"Not a bit of it,--rather the contrary. Your audience at present
seem folks who live by work, and can have little time for such idle
phantasies; for, as it is well observed by Ovid, a poet who wrote much
on that subject, and professed the most intimate acquaintance with it,
'Idleness is the parent of love.' Can't you sing something in praise of
a good dinner? Everybody who works hard has an appetite for food."

The singer again fixed on Kenelm his inquiring eye, but not detecting a
vestige of humour in the grave face he contemplated, was rather puzzled
how to reply, and therefore remained silent.

"I perceive," resumed Kenelm, "that my observations surprise you: the
surprise will vanish on reflection. It has been said by another poet,
more reflective than Ovid, that 'the world is governed by love and
hunger.' But hunger certainly has the lion's share of the government;
and if a poet is really to do what he pretends to do,--namely, represent
nature,--the greater part of his lays should be addressed to the
stomach." Here, warming with his subject, Kenelm familiarly laid his
band on the musician's shoulder, and his voice took a tone bordering on
enthusiasm. "You will allow that a man in the normal condition of health
does not fall in love every day. But in the normal condition of health
he is hungry every day. Nay, in those early years when you poets say he
is most prone to love, he is so especially disposed to hunger that
less than three meals a day can scarcely satisfy his appetite. You may
imprison a man for months, for years, nay, for his whole life,--from
infancy to any age which Sir Cornewall Lewis may allow him to
attain,--without letting him be in love at all. But if you shut him up
for a week without putting something into his stomach, you will find him
at the end of it as dead as a door-nail."

Here the singer, who had gradually retreated before the energetic
advance of the orator, sank into the seat by the elm-tree and said
pathetically, "Sir, you have fairly argued me down. Will you please to
come to the conclusion which you deduce from your premises?"

"Simply this, that where you find one human being who cares about love,
you will find a thousand susceptible to the charms of a dinner; and if
you wish to be the popular minne-singer or troubadour of the age, appeal
to nature, sir,--appeal to nature; drop all hackneyed rhapsodies about a
rosy cheek, and strike your lyre to the theme of a beefsteak."

The dog had for some minutes regained his master's side, standing on
his hind legs, with the tray, tolerably well filled with copper coins,
between his teeth; and now, justly aggrieved by the inattention which
detained him in that artificial attitude, dropped the tray and growled
at Kenelm.

At the same time there came an impatient sound from the audience in the
tea-garden. They wanted another song for their money.

The singer rose, obedient to the summons. "Excuse me, sir; but I am
called upon to--"

"To sing again?"

"Yes."

"And on the subject I suggest?"

"No, indeed."

"What! love, again?"

"I am afraid so."

"I wish you good evening then. You seem a well-educated man,--more shame
to you. Perhaps we may meet once more in our rambles, when the question
can be properly argued out."

Kenelm lifted his hat, and turned on his heel. Before he reached the
street, the sweet voice of the singer again smote his ears; but the only
word distinguishable in the distance, ringing out at the close of the
refrain, was "love."

"Fiddle-de-dee," said Kenelm.



CHAPTER VI.

AS Kenelm regained the street dignified by the edifice of the Temperance
Hotel, a figure, dressed picturesquely in a Spanish cloak, brushed
hurriedly by him, but not so fast as to be unrecognized as the
tragedian. "Hem!" muttered Kenelm, "I don't think there is much triumph
in that face. I suspect he has been scolded."

The boy--if Kenelm's travelling companion is still to be so
designated--was leaning against the mantelpiece as Kenelm re-entered
the dining-room. There was an air of profound dejection about the boy's
listless attitude and in the drooping tearless eyes.

"My dear child," said Kenelm, in the softest tones of his plaintive
voice, "do not honour me with any confidence that may be painful. But
let me hope that you have dismissed forever all thoughts of going on the
stage."

"Yes," was the scarce audible answer.

"And now only remains the question, 'What is to be done?'"

"I am sure I don't know, and I don't care."

"Then you leave it to me to know and to care; and assuming for the
moment as a fact that which is one of the greatest lies in this
mendacious world--namely, that all men are brothers--you will consider
me as an elder brother, who will counsel and control you as he would
an imprudent young--sister. I see very well how it is. Somehow or other
you, having first admired Mr. Compton as Romeo or Richard III., made his
acquaintance as Mr. Compton. He allowed you to believe him a single
man. In a romantic moment you escaped from your home, with the design of
adopting the profession of the stage and of becoming Mrs. Compton."

"Oh," broke out the girl, since her sex must now be declared, "oh," she
exclaimed, with a passionate sob, "what a fool I have been! Only do not
think worse of me than I deserve. The man did deceive me; he did not
think I should take him at his word, and follow him here, or his wife
would not have appeared. I should not have known he had one and--and--"
here her voice was choked under her passion.

"But now you have discovered the truth, let us thank Heaven that you are
saved from shame and misery. I must despatch a telegram to your uncle:
give me his address."

"No, no."

"There is not a 'No' possible in this case, my child. Your reputation
and your future must be saved. Leave me to explain all to your uncle.
He is your guardian. I must send for him; nay, nay, there is no option.
Hate me now for enforcing your will: you will thank me hereafter. And
listen, young lady; if it does pain you to see your uncle, and encounter
his reproaches, every fault must undergo its punishment. A brave nature
undergoes it cheerfully, as a part of atonement. You are brave. Submit,
and in submitting rejoice!"

There was something in Kenelm's voice and manner at once so kindly and
so commanding that the wayward nature he addressed fairly succumbed.
She gave him her uncle's address, "John Bovill, Esq., Oakdale, near
Westmere." And after giving it, she fixed her eyes mournfully upon her
young adviser, and said with a simple, dreary pathos, "Now, will you
esteem me more, or rather despise me less?"

She looked so young, nay, so childlike, as she thus spoke, that Kenelm
felt a parental inclination to draw her on his lap and kiss away
her tears. But he prudently conquered that impulse, and said, with a
melancholy half-smile,--

"If human beings despise each other for being young and foolish, the
sooner we are exterminated by that superior race which is to succeed us
on earth the better it will be. Adieu, till your uncle comes."

"What! you leave me here--alone?"

"Nay, if your uncle found me under the same roof, now that I know you
are his niece, don't you think he would have a right to throw me out
of the window? Allow me to practise for myself the prudence I preach
to you. Send for the landlady to show you your room, shut yourself in
there, go to bed, and don't cry more than you can help."

Kenelm shouldered the knapsack he had deposited in a corner of the room,
inquired for the telegraph-office, despatched a telegram to Mr. Bovill,
obtained a bedroom at the Commercial Hotel, and fell asleep, muttering
these sensible words,--

"Rouchefoucauld was perfectly right when he said, 'Very few people would
fall in love if they had not heard it so much talked about.'"



CHAPTER VII.

KENELM CHILLINGLY rose with the sun, according to his usual custom, and
took his way to the Temperance Hotel. All in that sober building seemed
still in the arms of Morpheus. He turned towards the stables in which he
had left the gray cob, and had the pleasure to see that ill-used animal
in the healthful process of rubbing down.

"That's right," said he to the hostler. "I am glad to see you are so
early a riser."

"Why," quoth the hostler, "the gentleman as owns the pony knocked me
up at two o'clock in the morning, and pleased enough he was to see the
creature again lying down in the clean straw."

"Oh, he has arrived at the hotel, I presume?--a stout gentleman?"

"Yes, stout enough; and a passionate gentleman too. Came in a yellow and
two posters, knocked up the Temperance and then knocked up me to see
for the pony, and was much put out as he could not get any grog at the
Temperance."

"I dare say he was. I wish he had got his grog: it might have put him in
better humour. Poor little thing!" muttered Kenelm, turning away; "I am
afraid she is in for a regular vituperation. My turn next, I suppose.
But he must be a good fellow to have come at once for his niece in the
dead of the night."

About nine o'clock Kenelm presented himself again at the Temperance
Hotel, inquired for Mr. Bovill, and was shown by the prim maid-servant
into the drawing-room, where he found Mr. Bovill seated amicably at
breakfast with his niece, who of course was still in boy's clothing,
having no other costume at hand. To Kenelm's great relief, Mr. Bovill
rose from the table with a beaming countenance, and extending his hand
to Kenelm, said,--

"Sir, you are a gentleman; sit down, sit down and take breakfast."

Then, as soon as the maid was out of the room, the uncle continued,--

"I have heard all your good conduct from this young simpleton. Things
might have been worse, sir."

Kenelm bowed his head, and drew the loaf towards him in silence. Then,
considering that some apology was due to his entertainer, he said,--

"I hope you forgive me for that unfortunate mistake, when--"

"You knocked me down, or rather tripped me up. All right now. Elsie,
give the gentleman a cup of tea. Pretty little rogue, is she not? and a
good girl, in spite of her nonsense. It was all my fault letting her go
to the play and be intimate with Miss Lockit, a stage-stricken, foolish
old maid, who ought to have known better than to lead her into all this
trouble."

"No, uncle," cried the girl, resolutely; "don't blame her, nor any one
but me."

Kenelm turned his dark eyes approvingly towards the girl, and saw that
her lips were firmly set; there was an expression, not of grief nor
shame, but compressed resolution in her countenance. But when her eyes
met his they fell softly, and a blush mantled over her cheeks up to her
very forehead.

"Ah!" said the uncle, "just like you, Elsie; always ready to take
everybody's fault on your own shoulders. Well, well, say no more about
that. Now, my young friend, what brings you across the country tramping
it on foot, eh? a young man's whim?" As he spoke, he eyed Kenelm very
closely, and his look was that of an intelligent man not unaccustomed to
observe the faces of those he conversed with. In fact a more shrewd man
of business than Mr. Bovill is seldom met with on 'Change or in market.

"I travel on foot to please myself, sir," answered Kenelm, curtly, and
unconsciously set on his guard.

"Of course you do," cried Mr. Bovill, with a jovial laugh. "But it seems
you don't object to a chaise and pony whenever you can get them for
nothing,--ha, ha!--excuse me,--a joke."

Herewith Mr. Bovill, still in excellent good-humour, abruptly changed
the conversation to general matters,--agricultural prospects, chance of
a good harvest, corn trade, money market in general, politics, state of
the nation. Kenelm felt there was an attempt to draw him out, to sound,
to pump him, and replied only by monosyllables, generally significant
of ignorance on the questions broached; and at the close, if the
philosophical heir of the Chillinglys was in the habit of allowing
himself to be surprised he would certainly have been startled when Mr.
Bovill rose, slapped him on the shoulder, and said in a tone of great
satisfaction, "Just as I thought, sir; you know nothing of these
matters: you are a gentleman born and bred; your clothes can't disguise
you, sir. Elsie was right. My dear, just leave us for a few minutes: I
have something to say to our young friend. You can get ready meanwhile
to go with me." Elsie left the table and walked obediently towards the
doorway. There she halted a moment, turned round, and looked timidly
towards Kenelm. He had naturally risen from his seat as she rose, and
advanced some paces as if to open the door for her. Thus their looks
encountered. He could not interpret that shy gaze of hers: it was
tender, it was deprecating, it was humble, it was pleading; a man
accustomed to female conquests might have thought it was something more,
something in which was the key to all. But that something more was an
unknown tongue to Kenelm Chillingly.

When the two men were alone, Mr. Bovill reseated himself and motioned to
Kenelm to do the same. "Now, young sir," said the former, "you and I can
talk at our ease. That adventure of yours yesterday may be the luckiest
thing that could happen to you."

"It is sufficiently lucky if I have been of any service to your niece.
But her own good sense would have been her safeguard if she had been
alone, and discovered, as she would have done, that Mr. Compton had,
knowingly or not, misled her to believe that he was a single man."

"Hang Mr. Compton! we have done with him. I am a plain man, and I come
to the point. It is you who have carried off my niece; it is with you
that she came to this hotel. Now when Elsie told me how well you
had behaved, and that your language and manners were those of a real
gentleman, my mind was made up. I guess pretty well what you are; you
are a gentleman's son; probably a college youth; not overburdened with
cash; had a quarrel with your governor, and he keeps you short. Don't
interrupt me. Well, Elsie is a good girl and a pretty girl, and will
make a good wife, as wives go; and, hark ye, she has L20,000. So just
confide in me; and if you don't like your parents to know about it till
the thing's done and they be only got to forgive and bless you, why, you
shall marry Elsie before you can say Jack Robinson."

For the first time in his life Kenelm Chillingly was seized with
terror,--terror and consternation. His jaw dropped; his tongue was
palsied. If hair ever stands on end, his hair did. At last, with
superhuman effort, he gasped out the word, "Marry!"

"Yes; marry. If you are a gentleman you are bound to it. You have
compromised my niece,--a respectable, virtuous girl, sir; an orphan, but
not unprotected. I repeat, it is you who have plucked her from my very
arms, and with violence and assault eloped with her; and what would the
world say if it knew? Would it believe in your prudent conduct?--conduct
only to be explained by the respect you felt due to your future wife.
And where will you find a better? Where will you find an uncle who will
part with his ward and L20,000 without asking if you have a sixpence?
and the girl has taken a fancy to you; I see it: would she have given up
that player so easily if you had not stolen her heart? Would you break
that heart? No, young man: you are not a villain. Shake hands on it!"

"Mr. Bovill," said Kenelm, recovering his wonted equanimity, "I am
inexpressibly flattered by the honour you propose to me, and I do not
deny that Miss Elsie is worthy of a much better man than myself. But
I have inconceivable prejudices against the connubial state. If it be
permitted to a member of the Established Church to cavil at any sentence
written by Saint Paul,--and I think that liberty may be permitted to a
simple layman, since eminent members of the clergy criticise the whole
Bible as freely as if it were the history of Queen Elizabeth by Mr.
Froude,--I should demur at the doctrine that it is better to marry than
to burn: I myself should prefer burning. With these sentiments it would
ill become any one entitled to that distinction of 'gentleman' which you
confer on me to lead a fellow-victim to the sacrificial altar. As for
any reproach attached to Miss Elsie, since in my telegram I directed you
to ask for a young gentleman at this hotel, her very sex is not known in
this place unless you divulge it. And--"

Here Kenelm was interrupted by a violent explosion of rage from the
uncle. He stamped his feet; he almost foamed at the mouth; he doubled
his fist, and shook it in Kenelm's face.

"Sir, you are mocking me: John Bovill is not a man to be jeered in this
way. You _shall_ marry the girl. I'll not have her thrust back upon me
to be the plague of my life with her whims and tantrums. You have taken
her, and you shall keep her, or I'll break every bone in your skin."

"Break them," said Kenelm, resignedly, but at the same time falling back
into a formidable attitude of defence, which cooled the pugnacity of his
accuser. Mr. Bovill sank into his chair, and wiped his forehead. Kenelm
craftily pursued the advantage he had gained, and in mild accents
proceeded to reason,--

"When you recover your habitual serenity of humour, Mr. Bovill, you
will see how much your very excusable desire to secure your niece's
happiness, and, I may add, to reward what you allow to have been
forbearing and well-bred conduct on my part, has hurried you into an
error of judgment. You know nothing of me. I may be, for what you know,
an impostor or swindler; I may have every bad quality, and yet you are
to be contented with my assurance, or rather your own assumption, that
I am born a gentleman, in order to give me your niece and her L20,000.
This is temporary insanity on your part. Allow me to leave you to
recover from your excitement."

"Stop, sir," said Mr. Bovill, in a changed and sullen tone; "I am not
quite the madman you think me. But I dare say I have been too hasty and
too rough. Nevertheless the facts are as I have stated them, and I do
not see how, as a man of honour, you can get off marrying my niece. The
mistake you made in running away with her was, no doubt, innocent on
your part: but still there it is; and supposing the case came before a
jury, it would be an ugly one for you and your family. Marriage alone
could mend it. Come, come, I own I was too business-like in rushing to
the point at once, and I no longer say, 'Marry my niece off-hand.' You
have only seen her disguised and in a false position. Pay me a visit at
Oakdale; stay with me a month; and if at the end of that time you do not
like her well enough to propose, I'll let you off and say no more about
it."

While Mr. Bovill thus spoke, and Kenelm listened, neither saw that the
door had been noiselessly opened and that Elsie stood at the threshold.
Now, before Kenelm could reply, she advanced into the middle of the
room, and, her small figure drawn up to its fullest height, her cheeks
glowing, her lips quivering, exclaimed,--

"Uncle, for shame!" Then addressing Kenelm in a sharp tone of anguish,
"Oh, do not believe I knew anything of this!" she covered her face with
both hands and stood mute.

All of chivalry that Kenelm had received with his baptismal appellation
was aroused. He sprang up, and, bending his knee as he drew one of her
hands into his own, he said,--

"I am as convinced that your uncle's words are abhorrent to you as I am
that you are a pure-hearted and high-spirited woman, of whose friendship
I shall be proud. We meet again." Then releasing her hand, he addressed
Mr. Bovill: "Sir, you are unworthy the charge of your niece. Had you not
been so, she would have committed no imprudence. If she have any female
relation, to that relation transfer your charge."

"I have! I have!" cried Elsie; "my lost mother's sister: let me go to
her."

"The woman who keeps a school!" said Mr. Bovill sneeringly.

"Why not?" asked Kenelm.

"She never would go there. I proposed it to her a year ago. The minx
would not go into a school."

"I will now, Uncle."

"Well, then, you shall at once; and I hope you'll be put on bread and
water. Fool! fool! you have spoilt your own game. Mr. Chillingly, now
that Miss Elsie has turned her back on herself, I can convince you that
I am not the mad man you thought me. I was at the festive meeting held
when you came of age: my brother is one of your father's tenants. I did
not recognize your face immediately in the excitement of our encounter
and in your change of dress; but in walking home it struck me that I had
seen it before, and I knew it at once when you entered the room to-day.
It has been a tussle between us which should beat the other. You have
beat me; and thanks to that idiot! If she had not put her spoke into my
wheel, she would have lived to be 'my lady.' Now good-day, sir."

"Mr. Bovill, you offered to shake hands: shake hands now, and promise
me, with the good grace of one honourable combatant to another, that
Miss Elsie shall go to her aunt the schoolmistress at once if she wishes
it. Hark ye, my friend" (this in Mr. Bovill's ear): "a man can never
manage a woman. Till a woman marries, a prudent man leaves her to women;
when she does marry, she manages her husband, and there's an end of it."

Kenelm was gone.

"Oh, wise young man!" murmured the uncle. "Elsie, dear, how can you go
to your aunt's while you are in that dress?"

Elsie started as from a trance, her eyes directed towards the
doorway through which Kenelm had vanished. "This dress," she said
contemptuously, "this dress; is not that easily altered with shops in
the town?"

"Gad!" muttered Mr. Bovill, "that youngster is a second Solomon; and if
I can't manage Elsie, she'll manage a husband--whenever she gets one."



CHAPTER VIII.

"BY the powers that guard innocence and celibacy," soliloquized Kenelm
Chillingly, "but I have had a narrow escape! and had that amphibious
creature been in girl's clothes instead of boy's, when she intervened
like the deity of the ancient drama, I might have plunged my armorial
Fishes into hot water. Though, indeed, it is hard to suppose that a
young lady head-over-ears in love with Mr. Compton yesterday could have
consigned her affections to me to-day. Still she looked as if she could,
which proves either that one is never to trust a woman's heart or never
to trust a woman's looks. Decimus Roach is right. Man must never relax
his flight from the women, if he strives to achieve an 'Approach to the
Angels.'"

These reflections were made by Kenelm Chillingly as, having turned his
back upon the town in which such temptations and trials had befallen
him, he took his solitary way along a footpath that wound through meads
and cornfields, and shortened by three miles the distance to a cathedral
town at which he proposed to rest for the night.

He had travelled for some hours, and the sun was beginning to slope
towards a range of blue hills in the west, when he came to the margin
of a fresh rivulet, overshadowed by feathery willows and the quivering
leaves of silvery Italian poplars. Tempted by the quiet and cool of
this pleasant spot, he flung himself down on the banks, drew from his
knapsack some crusts of bread with which he had wisely provided himself,
and, dipping them into the pure lymph as it rippled over its pebbly bed,
enjoyed one of those luxurious repasts for which epicures would exchange
their banquet in return for the appetite of youth. Then, reclining along
the bank, and crushing the wild thyme that grows best and sweetest in
wooded coverts, provided they be neighboured by water, no matter whether
in pool or rill, he resigned himself to that intermediate state between
thought and dream-land which we call "revery." At a little distance he
heard the low still sound of the mower's scythe, and the air came to his
brow sweet with the fragrance of new-mown hay.

He was roused by a gentle tap on the shoulder, and turning lazily round,
saw a good-humoured jovial face upon a pair of massive shoulders, and
heard a hearty and winning voice say,--

"Young man, if you are not too tired, will you lend a hand to get in
my hay? We are very short of hands, and I am afraid we shall have rain
pretty soon."

Kenelm rose and shook himself, gravely contemplated the stranger, and
replied in his customary sententious fashion, "Man is born to help his
fellow-man,--especially to get in hay while the sun shines. I am at your
service."

"That's a good fellow, and I'm greatly obliged to you. You see I had
counted on a gang of roving haymakers, but they were bought up
by another farmer. This way;" and leading on through a gap in the
brushwood, he emerged, followed by Kenelm, into a large meadow,
one-third of which was still under the scythe, the rest being occupied
with persons of both sexes, tossing and spreading the cut grass. Among
the latter, Kenelm, stripped to his shirt-sleeves, soon found himself
tossing and spreading like the rest, with his usual melancholy
resignation of mien and aspect. Though a little awkward at first in
the use of his unfamiliar implements, his practice in all athletic
accomplishments bestowed on him that invaluable quality which is termed
"handiness," and he soon distinguished himself by the superior activity
and neatness with which he performed his work. Something--it might be in
his countenance or in the charm of his being a stranger--attracted the
attention of the feminine section of haymakers, and one very pretty girl
who was nearer to him than the rest attempted to commence conversation.

"This is new to you," she said smiling.

"Nothing is new to me," answered Kenelm, mournfully. "But allow me to
observe that to do things well you should only do one thing at a time. I
am here to make hay and not conversation."

"My!" said the girl, in amazed ejaculation, and turned off with a toss
of her pretty head.

"I wonder if that jade has got an uncle," thought Kenelm. The farmer,
who took his share of work with the men, halting now and then to look
round, noticed Kenelm's vigorous application with much approval, and at
the close of the day's work shook him heartily by the hand, leaving a
two-shilling piece in his palm. The heir of the Chillinglys gazed on
that honorarium, and turned it over with the finger and thumb of the
left hand.

"Be n't it eno'?" said the farmer, nettled.

"Pardon me," answered Kenelm. "But, to tell you the truth, it is the
first money I ever earned by my own bodily labour; and I regard it with
equal curiosity and respect. But if it would not offend you, I would
rather that, instead of the money, you had offered me some supper; for I
have tasted nothing but bread and water since the morning."

"You shall have the money and supper both, my lad," said the farmer,
cheerily. "And if you will stay and help till I have got in the hay, I
dare say my good woman can find you a better bed than you'll get in the
village inn; if, indeed, you can get one there at all."

"You are very kind. But before I accept your hospitality excuse one
question: have you any nieces about you?"

"Nieces!" echoed the farmer, mechanically thrusting his hands into his
breeches-pockets as if in search of something there, "nieces about me!
what do you mean? Be that a newfangled word for coppers?"

"Not for coppers, though perhaps for brass. But I spoke without
metaphor. I object to nieces upon abstract principle, confirmed by the
test of experience."

The farmer stared, and thought his new friend not quite so sound in his
mental as he evidently was in his physical conformation, but replied,
with a laugh, "Make yourself easy, then. I have only one niece, and she
is married to an iron-monger and lives in Exeter."

On entering the farmhouse, Kenelm's host conducted him straight into the
kitchen, and cried out, in a hearty voice, to a comely middle-aged dame,
who, with a stout girl, was intent on culinary operations, "Hulloa! old
woman, I have brought you a guest who has well earned his supper, for he
has done the work of two, and I have promised him a bed."

The farmer's wife turned sharply round. "He is heartily welcome to
supper. As to a bed," she said doubtfully, "I don't know." But here her
eyes settled on Kenelm; and there was something in his aspect so
unlike what she expected to see in an itinerant haymaker, that she
involuntarily dropped a courtesy, and resumed, with a change of tone,
"The gentleman shall have the guest-room: but it will take a little time
to get ready; you know, John, all the furniture is covered up."

"Well, wife, there will be leisure eno' for that. He don't want to go to
roost till he has supped."

"Certainly not," said Kenelm, sniffing a very agreeable odour.

"Where are the girls?" asked the farmer.

"They have been in these five minutes, and gone upstairs to tidy
themselves."

"What girls?" faltered Kenelm, retreating towards the door. "I thought
you said you had no nieces."

"But I did not say I had no daughters. Why, you are not afraid of them,
are you?"

"Sir," replied Kenelm, with a polite and politic evasion of that
question, "if your daughters are like their mother, you can't say that
they are not dangerous."

"Come," cried the farmer, looking very much pleased, while his dame
smiled and blushed, "come, that's as nicely said as if you were
canvassing the county. 'Tis not among haymakers that you learned
manners, I guess; and perhaps I have been making too free with my
betters."

"What!" quoth the courteous Kenelm, "do you mean to imply that you were
too free with your shillings? Apologize for that, if you like, but I
don't think you'll get back the shillings. I have not seen so much of
this life as you have, but, according to my experience, when a man once
parts with his money, whether to his betters or his worsers, the chances
are that he'll never see it again."

At this aphorism the farmer laughed ready to kill himself, his wife
chuckled, and even the maid-of-all-work grinned. Kenelm, preserving his
unalterable gravity, said to himself,--

"Wit consists in the epigrammatic expression of a commonplace truth, and
the dullest remark on the worth of money is almost as sure of successful
appreciation as the dullest remark on the worthlessness of women.
Certainly I am a wit without knowing it."

Here the farmer touched him on the shoulder--touched it, did not slap
it, as he would have done ten minutes before--and said,--

"We must not disturb the Missis or we shall get no supper. I'll just go
and give a look into the cow-sheds. Do you know much about cows?"

"Yes, cows produce cream and butter. The best cows are those which
produce at the least cost the best cream and butter. But how the best
cream and butter can be produced at a price which will place them free
of expense on a poor man's breakfast-table is a question to be settled
by a Reformed Parliament and a Liberal Administration. In the meanwhile
let us not delay the supper."

The farmer and his guest quitted the kitchen and entered the farmyard.

"You are quite a stranger in these parts?"

"Quite."

"You don't even know my name?"

"No, except that I heard your wife call you John."

"My name is John Saunderson."

"Ah! you come from the North, then? That's why you are so sensible and
shrewd. Names that end in 'son' are chiefly borne by the descendants of
the Danes, to whom King Alfred, Heaven bless him! peacefully assigned
no less than sixteen English counties. And when a Dane was called
somebody's son, it is a sign that he was the son of a somebody."

"By gosh! I never heard that before."

"If I thought you had I should not have said it."

"Now I have told you my name, what is yours?"

"A wise man asks questions and a fool answers them. Suppose for a moment
that I am not a fool."

Farmer Saunderson scratched his head, and looked more puzzled than
became the descendant of a Dane settled by King Alfred in the north of
England.

"Dash it," said he at last, "but I think you are Yorkshire too."

"Man, who is the most conceited of all animals, says that he alone has
the prerogative of thought, and condemns the other animals to the meaner
mechanical operation which he calls instinct. But as instincts are
unerring and thoughts generally go wrong, man has not much to boast of
according to his own definition. When you say you think, and take it
for granted, that I am Yorkshire, you err. I am not Yorkshire. Confining
yourself to instinct, can you divine when we shall sup? The cows you are
about to visit divine to a moment when they shall be fed."

Said the farmer, recovering his sense of superiority to the guest whom
he obliged with a supper, "In ten minutes." Then, after a pause, and
in a tone of deprecation, as if he feared he might be thought fine, he
continued, "We don't sup in the kitchen. My father did, and so did I
till I married; but my Bess, though she's as good a farmer's wife as
ever wore shoe-leather, was a tradesman's daughter, and had been brought
up different. You see she was not without a good bit of money: but even
if she had been, I should not have liked her folks to say I had lowered
her; so we sup in the parlour."

Quoth Kenelm, "The first consideration is to sup at all. Supper
conceded, every man is more likely to get on in life who would rather
sup in his parlour than his kitchen. Meanwhile, I see a pump; while you
go to the cows I will stay here and wash my hands of them."

"Hold! you seem a sharp fellow, and certainly no fool. I have a son,
a good smart chap, but stuck up; crows it over us all; thinks no small
beer of himself. You'd do me a service, and him too, if you'd let him
down a peg or two."

Kenelm, who was now hard at work at the pump-handle, only replied by a
gracious nod. But as he seldom lost an opportunity for reflection, he
said to himself, while he laved his face in the stream from the spout,
"One can't wonder why every small man thinks it so pleasant to let down
a big one, when a father asks a stranger to let down his own son for
even fancying that he is not small beer. It is upon that principle in
human nature that criticism wisely relinquishes its pretensions as an
analytical science, and becomes a lucrative profession. It relies on the
pleasure its readers find in letting a man down."



CHAPTER IX.

IT was a pretty, quaint farmhouse, such as might well go with two or
three hundred acres of tolerably good land, tolerably well farmed by an
active old-fashioned tenant, who, though he did not use mowing-machines
nor steam-ploughs nor dabble in chemical experiments, still brought
an adequate capital to his land and made the capital yield a very fair
return of interest. The supper was laid out in a good-sized though
low-pitched parlour with a glazed door, now wide open, as were all the
latticed windows, looking into a small garden, rich in those straggling
old English flowers which are nowadays banished from gardens more
pretentious and; infinitely less fragrant. At one corner was an arbour
covered with honeysuckle, and opposite to it a row of beehives. The room
itself had an air of comfort, and that sort of elegance which indicates
the presiding genius of feminine taste. There were shelves suspended
to the wall by blue ribbons, and filled with small books neatly bound;
there were flower-pots in all the window-sills; there was a small
cottage piano; the walls were graced partly with engraved portraits of
county magnates and prize oxen; partly with samplers in worsted-work,
comprising verses of moral character and the names and birthdays of
the farmer's grandmother, mother, wife, and daughters. Over the
chimney-piece was a small mirror, and above that the trophy of a fox's
brush; while niched into an angle in the room was a glazed cupboard,
rich with specimens of old china, Indian and English.

The party consisted of the farmer, his wife, three buxom daughters, and
a pale-faced slender lad of about twenty, the only son, who did not take
willingly to farming: he had been educated at a superior grammar school,
and had high notions about the March of Intellect and the Progress of
the Age.

Kenelm, though among the gravest of mortals, was one of the least shy.
In fact shyness is the usual symptom of a keen _amour propre_; and of
that quality the youthful Chillingly scarcely possessed more than did
the three Fishes of his hereditary scutcheon. He felt himself perfectly
at home with his entertainers; taking care, however, that his attentions
were so equally divided between the three daughters as to prevent all
suspicion of a particular preference. "There is safety in numbers,"
thought he, "especially in odd numbers. The three Graces never married,
neither did the nine Muses."

"I presume, young ladies, that you are fond of music," said Kenelm,
glancing at the piano.

"Yes, I love it dearly," said the eldest girl, speaking for the others.

Quoth the farmer, as he heaped the stranger's plate with boiled beef and
carrots, "Things are not what they were when I was a boy; then it was
only great tenant-farmers who had their girls taught the piano, and
sent their boys to a good school. Now we small folks are for helping our
children a step or two higher than our own place on the ladder."

"The schoolmaster is abroad," said the son, with the emphasis of a sage
adding an original aphorism to the stores of philosophy.

"There is, no doubt, a greater equality of culture than there was in
the last generation," said Kenelm. "People of all ranks utter the same
commonplace ideas in very much the same arrangements of syntax. And in
proportion as the democracy of intelligence extends--a friend of mine,
who is a doctor, tells me that complaints formerly reserved to what is
called aristocracy (though what that word means in plain English I don't
know) are equally shared by the commonalty--_tic-douloureux_ and other
neuralgic maladies abound. And the human race, in England at least, is
becoming more slight and delicate. There is a fable of a man who, when
he became exceedingly old, was turned into a grasshopper. England
is very old, and is evidently approaching the grasshopper state of
development. Perhaps we don't eat as much beef as our forefathers did.
May I ask you for another slice?"

Kenelm's remarks were somewhat over the heads of his audience. But
the son, taking them as a slur upon the enlightened spirit of the age,
coloured up and said, with a knitted brow, "I hope, sir, that you are
not an enemy to progress."

"That depends: for instance, I prefer staying here, where I am well off,
to going farther and faring worse."

"Well said!" cried the farmer.

Not deigning to notice that interruption, the son took up Kenelm's reply
with a sneer, "I suppose you mean that it is to fare worse, if you march
with the time."

"I am afraid we have no option but to march with the time; but when we
reach that stage when to march any farther is to march into old age, we
should not be sorry if time would be kind enough to stand still; and all
good doctors concur in advising us to do nothing to hurry him."

"There is no sign of old age in this country, sir; and thank Heaven we
are not standing still!"

"Grasshoppers never do; they are always hopping and jumping, and making
what they think 'progress,' till (unless they hop into the water and are
swallowed up prematurely by a carp or a frog) they die of the exhaustion
which hops and jumps unremitting naturally produce. May I ask you, Mrs.
Saunderson, for some of that rice-pudding?"

The farmer, who, though he did not quite comprehend Kenelm's
metaphorical mode of arguing, saw delightedly that his wise son looked
more posed than himself, cried with great glee, "Bob, my boy,--Bob, our
visitor is a little too much for you!"

"Oh, no," said Kenelm, modestly. "But I honestly think Mr. Bob would be
a wiser man, and a weightier man, and more removed from the grasshopper
state, if he would think less and eat more pudding."

When the supper was over the farmer offered Kenelm a clay pipe filled
with shag, which that adventurer accepted with his habitual resignation
to the ills of life; and the whole party, excepting Mrs. Saunderson,
strolled into the garden. Kenelm and Mr. Saunderson seated themselves
in the honeysuckle arbour: the girls and the advocate of progress stood
without among the garden flowers. It was a still and lovely night, the
moon at her full. The farmer, seated facing his hayfields, smoked on
placidly. Kenelm, at the third whiff, laid aside his pipe, and glanced
furtively at the three Graces. They formed a pretty group, all clustered
together near the silenced beehives, the two younger seated on the
grass strip that bordered the flower-beds, their arms over each other's
shoulders, the elder one standing behind them, with the moonlight
shining soft on her auburn hair.

Young Saunderson walked restlessly by himself to and fro the path of
gravel.

"It is a strange thing," ruminated Kenelm, "that girls are not
unpleasant to look at if you take them collectively,--two or three bound
up together; but if you detach any one of them from the bunch, the odds
are that she is as plain as a pikestaff. I wonder whether that bucolical
grasshopper, who is so enamoured of the hop and jump that he calls
'progress,' classes the society of the Mormons among the evidences of
civilized advancement? There is a good deal to be said in favour of
taking a whole lot of wives as one may buy a whole lot of cheap razors.
For it is not impossible that out of a dozen a good one may be found.
And then, too, a whole nosegay of variegated blooms, with a faded
leaf here and there, must be more agreeable to the eye than the same
monotonous solitary lady's smock. But I fear these reflections are
naughty; let us change them. Farmer," he said aloud, "I suppose your
handsome daughters are too fine to assist you much. I did not see them
among the haymakers."

"Oh, they were there, but by themselves, in the back part of the
field. I did not want them to mix with all the girls, many of whom are
strangers from other places. I don't know anything against them; but as
I don't know anything for them, I thought it as well to keep my lasses
apart."

"But I should have supposed it wiser to keep your son apart from them. I
saw him in the thick of those nymphs."

"Well," said the farmer, musingly, and withdrawing his pipe from his
lips, "I don't think lasses not quite well brought up, poor things!
do as much harm to the lads as they can do to proper-behaved lasses;
leastways my wife does not think so. 'Keep good girls from bad girls,'
says she, 'and good girls will never go wrong.' And you will find there
is something in that when you have girls of your own to take care of."

"Without waiting for that time, which I trust may never occur, I can
recognize the wisdom of your excellent wife's observation. My own
opinion is, that a woman can more easily do mischief to her own sex than
to ours; since, of course, she cannot exist without doing mischief to
somebody or other."

"And good, too," said the jovial farmer, thumping his fist on the table.
"What should we be without women?"

"Very much better, I take it, sir. Adam was as good as gold, and never
had a qualm of conscience or stomach till Eve seduced him into eating
raw apples."

"Young man, thou'st been crossed in love. I see it now. That's why thou
look'st so sorrowful."

"Sorrowful! Did you ever know a man crossed in love who looked less
sorrowful when he came across a pudding?"

"Hey! but thou canst ply a good knife and fork, that I will say for
thee." Here the farmer turned round, and gazed on Kenelm with deliberate
scrutiny. That scrutiny accomplished, his voice took a somewhat
more respectful tone, as he resumed, "Do you know that you puzzle me
somewhat?"

"Very likely. I am sure that I puzzle myself. Say on."

"Looking at your dress and--and--"

"The two shillings you gave me? Yes--"

"I took you for the son of some small farmer like myself. But now I
judge from your talk that you are a college chap,--anyhow, a gentleman.
Be n't it so?"

"My dear Mr. Saunderson, I set out on my travels, which is not long
ago, with a strong dislike to telling lies. But I doubt if a man can get
along through this world without finding that the faculty of lying was
bestowed on him by Nature as a necessary means of self-preservation.
If you are going to ask me any questions about myself, I am sure that
I shall tell you lies. Perhaps, therefore, it may be best for both if
I decline the bed you proffered me, and take my night's rest under a
hedge."

"Pooh! I don't want to know more of a man's affairs than he thinks fit
to tell me. Stay and finish the haymaking. And I say, lad, I'm glad you
don't seem to care for the girls; for I saw a very pretty one trying to
flirt with you, and if you don't mind she'll bring you into trouble."

"How? Does she want to run away from her uncle?"

"Uncle! Bless you, she don't live with him! She lives with her
father; and I never knew that she wants to run away. In fact, Jessie
Wiles--that's her name--is, I believe, a very good girl, and everybody
likes her,--perhaps a little too much; but then she knows she's a
beauty, and does not object to admiration."

"No woman ever does, whether she's a beauty or not. But I don't yet
understand why Jessie Wiles should bring me into trouble."

"Because there is a big hulking fellow who has gone half out of his wits
for her; and when he fancies he sees any other chap too sweet on her he
thrashes him into a jelly. So, youngster, you just keep your skin out of
that trap."

"Hem! And what does the girl say to those proofs of affection? Does she
like the man the better for thrashing other admirers into jelly?"

"Poor child! No; she hates the very sight of him. But he swears she
shall marry nobody else if he hangs for it. And, to tell you the truth,
I suspect that if Jessie does seem to trifle with others a little too
lightly, it is to draw away this bully's suspicion from the only man I
think she does care for,--a poor sickly young fellow who was crippled by
an accident, and whom Tom Bowles could brain with his little finger."

"This is really interesting," cried Kenelm, showing something like
excitement. "I should like to know this terrible suitor."

"That's easy eno'," said the farmer, dryly. "You have only to take
a stroll with Jessie Wiles after sunset, and you'll know more of Tom
Bowles than you are likely to forget in a month."

"Thank you very much for your information," said Kenelm, in a soft tone,
grateful but pensive. "I hope to profit by it."

"Do. I should be sorry if any harm came to thee; and Tom Bowles in one
of his furies is as bad to cross as a mad bull. So now, as we must be up
early, I'll just take a look round the stables, and then off to bed; and
I advise you to do the same."

"Thank you for the hint. I see the young ladies have already gone in.
Good-night."

Passing through the garden, Kenelm encountered the junior Saunderson.

"I fear," said the Votary of Progress, "that you have found the governor
awful slow. What have you been talking about?"

"Girls," said Kenelm, "a subject always awful, but not necessarily
slow."

"Girls,--the governor been talking about girls? You joke."

"I wish I did joke, but that is a thing I could never do since I came
upon earth. Even in the cradle, I felt that life was a very serious
matter, and did not allow of jokes. I remember too well my first dose
of castor-oil. You too, Mr. Bob, have doubtless imbibed that initiatory
preparation to the sweets of existence. The corners of your mouth have
not recovered from the downward curves into which it so rigidly dragged
them. Like myself, you are of grave temperament, and not easily moved
to jocularity,--nay, an enthusiast for Progress is of necessity a man
eminently dissatisfied with the present state of affairs. And chronic
dissatisfaction resents the momentary relief of a joke."

"Give off chaffing, if you please," said Bob, lowering the didascular
intonations of his voice, "and just tell me plainly, did not my father
say anything particular about me?"

"Not a word: the only person of the male sex of whom he said anything
particular was Tom Bowles."

"What, fighting Tom! the terror of the whole neighbourhood! Ah, I guess
the old gentleman is afraid lest Tom may fall foul upon me. But Jessie
Wiles is not worth a quarrel with that brute. It is a crying shame in
the Government--"

"What! has the Government failed to appreciate the heroism of Tom
Bowles, or rather to restrain the excesses of its ardour?"

"Stuff! it is a shame in the Government not to have compelled his father
to put him to school. If education were universal--"

"You think there would be no brutes in particular. It may be so; but
education is universal in China, and so is the bastinado. I thought,
however, that you said the schoolmaster was abroad, and that the age of
enlightenment was in full progress."

"Yes, in the towns, but not in these obsolete rural districts; and that
brings me to the point. I feel lost, thrown away here. I have something
in me, sir, and it can only come out by collision with equal minds. So
do me a favour, will you?"

"With the greatest pleasure."

"Give the governor a hint that he can't expect me, after the education
I have had, to follow the plough and fatten pigs; and that Manchester is
the place for ME."

"Why Manchester?"

"Because I have a relation in business there who will give me a
clerkship if the governor will consent. And Manchester rules England."

"Mr. Bob Saunderson, I will do my best to promote your wishes. This is
a land of liberty, and every man should choose his own walk in it, so
that, at the last, if he goes to the dogs, he goes to them without that
disturbance of temper which is naturally occasioned by the sense of
being driven to their jaws by another man against his own will. He has
then no one to blame but himself. And that, Mr. Bob, is a great comfort.
When, having got into a scrape, we blame others, we unconsciously
become unjust, spiteful, uncharitable, malignant, perhaps revengeful.
We indulge in feelings which tend to demoralize the whole character.
But when we only blame ourselves, we become modest and penitent. We make
allowances for others. And indeed self-blame is a salutary exercise of
conscience, which a really good man performs every day of his life. And
now, will you show me the room in which I am to sleep, and forget for a
few hours that I am alive at all: the best thing that can happen to us
in this world, my dear Mr. Bob! There's never much amiss with our days,
so long as we can forget about them the moment we lay our heads on the
pillow."

The two young men entered the house amicably, arm in arm. The girls had
already retired, but Mrs. Saunderson was still up to conduct her
visitor to the guest's chamber,--a pretty room which had been furnished
twenty-two years ago on the occasion of the farmer's marriage, at the
expense of Mrs. Saunderson's mother, for her own occupation when she
paid them a visit, and with its dimity curtains and trellised paper it
still looked as fresh and new as if decorated and furnished yesterday.

Left alone, Kenelm undressed, and before he got into bed, bared
his right arm, and doubling it, gravely contemplated its muscular
development, passing his left hand over that prominence in the upper
part which is vulgarly called the ball. Satisfied apparently with the
size and the firmness of that pugilistic protuberance, he gently sighed
forth, "I fear I shall have to lick Thomas Bowles." In five minutes more
he was asleep.



CHAPTER X.

THE next day the hay-mowing was completed, and a large portion of the
hay already made carted away to be stacked. Kenelm acquitted himself
with a credit not less praiseworthy than had previously won Mr.
Saunderson's approbation. But instead of rejecting as before the
acquaintance of Miss Jessie Wiles, he contrived towards noon to place
himself near to that dangerous beauty, and commenced conversation. "I am
afraid I was rather rude to you yesterday, and I want to beg pardon."

"Oh," answered the girl, in that simple intelligible English which
is more frequent among our village folks nowadays than many popular
novelists would lead us into supposing, "oh, I ought to ask pardon for
taking a liberty in speaking to you. But I thought you'd feel strange,
and I intended it kindly."

"I'm sure you did," returned Kenelm, chivalrously raking her portion of
hay as well as his own, while he spoke. "And I want to be good friends
with you. It is very near the time when we shall leave off for
dinner, and Mrs. Saunderson has filled my pockets with some excellent
beef-sandwiches, which I shall be happy to share with you, if you do not
object to dine with me here, instead of going home for your dinner."

The girl hesitated, and then shook her head in dissent from the
proposition.

"Are you afraid that your neighbours will think it wrong?"

Jessie curled up her lips with a pretty scorn, and said, "I don't much
care what other folks say, but is n't it wrong?"

"Not in the least. Let me make your mind easy. I am here but for a day
or two: we are not likely ever to meet again; but, before I go, I should
be glad if I could do you some little service." As he spoke he had
paused from his work, and, leaning on his rake, fixed his eyes, for the
first time attentively, on the fair haymaker.

Yes, she was decidedly pretty,--pretty to a rare degree: luxuriant brown
hair neatly tied up, under a straw hat doubtless of her own plaiting;
for, as a general rule, nothing more educates the village maid for the
destinies of flirt than the accomplishment of straw-plaiting. She had
large, soft blue eyes, delicate small features, and a complexion more
clear in its healthful bloom than rural beauties generally retain
against the influences of wind and sun. She smiled and slightly coloured
as he gazed on her, and, lifting her eyes, gave him one gentle, trustful
glance, which might have bewitched a philosopher and deceived a _roue_.
And yet Kenelm by that intuitive knowledge of character which is often
truthfulest where it is least disturbed by the doubts and cavils of
acquired knowledge, felt at once that in that girl's mind coquetry,
perhaps unconscious, was conjoined with an innocence of anything
worse than coquetry as complete as a child's. He bowed his head, in
withdrawing his gaze, and took her into his heart as tenderly as if she
had been a child appealing to it for protection.

"Certainly," he said inly, "certainly I must lick Tom Bowles; yet stay,
perhaps after all she likes him."

"But," he continued aloud, "you do not see how I can be of any service
to you. Before I explain, let me ask which of the men in the field is
Tom Bowles?"

"Tom Bowles?" exclaimed Jessie, in a tone of surprise and alarm, and
turning pale as she looked hastily round; "you frightened me, sir: but
he is not here; he does not work in the fields. But how came you to hear
of Tom Bowles?"

"Dine with me and I'll tell you. Look, there is a quiet place in yon
corner under the thorn-trees by that piece of water. See, they are
leaving off work: I will go for a can of beer, and then, pray, let me
join you there."

Jessie paused for a moment as if doubtful still; then again glancing at
Kenelm, and assured by the grave kindness of his countenance, uttered a
scarce audible assent and moved away towards the thorn-trees.

As the sun now stood perpendicularly over their heads, and the hand
of the clock in the village church tower, soaring over the hedgerows,
reached the first hour after noon, all work ceased in a sudden silence:
some of the girls went back to their homes; those who stayed grouped
together, apart from the men, who took their way to the shadows of a
large oak-tree in the hedgerow, where beer kegs and cans awaited them.



CHAPTER XI.

"AND now," said Kenelm, as the two young persons, having finished their
simple repast, sat under the thorn-trees and by the side of the water,
fringed at that part with tall reeds through which the light summer
breeze stirred with a pleasant murmur, "now I will talk to you about Tom
Bowles. Is it true that you don't like that brave young fellow? I say
young, as I take his youth for granted."

"Like him! I hate the sight of him."

"Did you always hate the sight of him? You must surely at one time have
allowed him to think that you did not?"

The girl winced, and made no answer, but plucked a daffodil from the
soil, and tore it ruthlessly to pieces.

"I am afraid you like to serve your admirers as you do that ill-fated
flower," said Kenelm, with some severity of tone. "But concealed in
the flower you may sometimes find the sting of a bee. I see by your
countenance that you did not tell Tom Bowles that you hated him till it
was too late to prevent his losing his wits for you."

"No; I was n't so bad as that," said Jessie, looking, nevertheless,
rather ashamed of herself; "but I was silly and giddy-like, I own; and,
when he first took notice of me, I was pleased, without thinking much of
it, because, you see, Mr. Bowles (emphasis on _Mr._) is higher up than
a poor girl like me. He is a tradesman, and I am only a shepherd's
daughter; though, indeed, Father is more like Mr. Saunderson's foreman
than a mere shepherd. But I never thought anything serious of it, and
did not suppose he did; that is, at first."

"So Tom Bowles is a tradesman. What trade?"

"A farrier, sir."

"And, I am told, a very fine young man."

"I don't know as to that: he is very big."

"And what made you hate him?"

"The first thing that made me hate him was that he insulted Father, who
is a very quiet, timid man, and threatened I don't know what if Father
did not make me keep company with him. Make me indeed! But Mr. Bowles is
a dangerous, bad-hearted, violent man, and--don't laugh at me, sir, but
I dreamed one night he was murdering me. And I think he will too, if he
stays here: and so does his poor mother, who is a very nice woman, and
wants him to go away; but he will not."

"Jessie," said Kenelm, softly, "I said I wanted to make friends with
you. Do you think you can make a friend of me? I can never be more than
friend. But I should like to be that. Can you trust me as one?"

"Yes," answered the girl, firmly, and, as she lifted her eyes to him,
their look was pure from all vestige of coquetry,--guileless, frank,
grateful.

"Is there not another young man who courts you more civilly than Tom
Bowles does, and whom you really could find it in your heart to like?"

Jessie looked round for another daffodil, and not finding one, contented
herself with a bluebell, which she did not tear to pieces, but caressed
with a tender hand. Kenelm bent his eyes down on her charming face
with something in their gaze rarely seen there,--something of that
unreasoning, inexpressible human fondness, for which philosophers of
his school have no excuse. Had ordinary mortals, like you or myself, for
instance, peered through the leaves of the thorn-trees, we should have
sighed or frowned, according to our several temperaments; but we should
all have said, whether spitefully or envyingly, "Happy young lovers!"
and should all have blundered lamentably in so saying.

Still, there is no denying the fact that a pretty face has a very unfair
advantage over a plain one. And, much to the discredit of Kenelm's
philanthropy, it may be reasonably doubted whether, had Jessie Wiles
been endowed by nature with a snub nose and a squint, Kenelm would have
volunteered his friendly services, or meditated battle with Tom Bowles
on her behalf.

But there was no touch of envy or jealousy in the tone with which he
said,--

"I see there is some one you would like well enough to marry, and
that you make a great difference in the way you treat a daffodil and a
bluebell. Who and what is the young man whom the bluebell represents?
Come, confide."

"We were much brought up together," said Jessie, still looking down,
and still smoothing the leaves of the bluebell. "His mother lived in the
next cottage; and my mother was very fond of him, and so was Father
too; and, before I was ten years old, they used to laugh when poor Will
called me his little wife." Here the tears which had started to Jessie's
eyes began to fall over the flower. "But now Father would not hear of
it; and it can't be. And I've tried to care for some one else, and I
can't, and that's the truth."

"But why? Has he turned out ill?--taken to poaching or drink?"

"No, no, no; he's as steady and good a lad as ever lived. But--but--"

"Yes; but--"

"He is a cripple now; and I love him all the better for it." Here Jessie
fairly sobbed.

Kenelm was greatly moved, and prudently held his peace till she had a
little recovered herself; then, in answer to his gentle questionings, he
learned that Will Somers--till then a healthy and strong lad--had fallen
from the height of a scaffolding, at the age of sixteen, and been so
seriously injured that he was moved at once to the hospital. When he
came out of it--what with the fall, and what with the long illness which
had followed the effects of the accident--he was not only crippled for
life, but of health so delicate and weakly that he was no longer fit for
outdoor labour and the hard life of a peasant. He was an only son of a
widowed mother, and his sole mode of assisting her was a very precarious
one. He had taught himself basket-making; and though, Jessie said, his
work was very ingenious and clever, still there were but few customers
for it in that neighbourhood. And, alas! even if Jessie's father would
consent to give his daughter to the poor cripple, how could the poor
cripple earn enough to maintain a wife?

"And," said Jessie, "still I was happy, walking out with him on Sunday
evenings, or going to sit with him and his mother; for we are both
young, and can wait. But I dare n't do it any more now: for Tom Bowles
has sworn that if I do he will beat him before my eyes; and Will has a
high spirit, and I should break my heart if any harm happened to him on
my account."

"As for Mr. Bowles, we'll not think of him at present. But if Will could
maintain himself and you, your father would not object nor you either to
a marriage with the poor cripple?"

"Father would not; and as for me, if it weren't for disobeying Father,
I'd marry him to-morrow. _I_ can work."

"They are going back to the hay now; but after that task is over, let me
walk home with you, and show me Will's cottage and Mr. Bowles's shop or
forge."

"But you'll not say anything to Mr. Bowles. He would n't mind your being
a gentleman, as I now see you are, sir; and he's dangerous,--oh, so
dangerous!--and so strong."

"Never fear," answered Kenelm, with the nearest approach to a laugh he
had ever made since childhood; "but when we are relieved, wait for me a
few minutes at yon gate."



CHAPTER XII.

KENELM spoke no more to his new friend in the hayfields; but when the
day's work was over he looked round for the farmer to make an excuse
for not immediately joining the family supper. However, he did not see
either Mr. Saunderson or his son. Both were busied in the stackyard.
Well pleased to escape excuse and the questions it might provoke, Kenelm
therefore put on the coat he had laid aside and joined Jessie, who
had waited for him at the gate. They entered the lane side by side,
following the stream of villagers who were slowly wending their homeward
way. It was a primitive English village, not adorned on the one hand
with fancy or model cottages, nor on the other hand indicating penury
and squalor. The church rose before them gray and Gothic, backed by the
red clouds in which the sun had set, and bordered by the glebe-land
of the half-seen parsonage. Then came the village green, with a
pretty schoolhouse; and to this succeeded a long street of scattered
whitewashed cottages, in the midst of their own little gardens.

As they walked the moon rose in full splendour, silvering the road
before them.

"Who is the Squire here?" asked Kenelm. "I should guess him to be a good
sort of man, and well off."

"Yes, Squire Travers; he is a great gentleman, and they say very rich.
But his place is a good way from this village. You can see it if you
stay, for he gives a harvest-home supper on Saturday, and Mr. Saunderson
and all his tenants are going. It is a beautiful park, and Miss Travers
is a sight to look at. Oh, she is lovely!" continued Jessie, with an
unaffected burst of admiration; for women are more sensible of the charm
of each other's beauty than men give them credit for.

"As pretty as yourself?"

"Oh, pretty is not the word. She is a thousand times handsomer!"

"Humph!" said Kenelm, incredulously.

There was a pause, broken by a quick sigh from Jessie.

"What are you sighing for?--tell me."

"I was thinking that a very little can make folks happy, but that
somehow or other that very little is as hard to get as if one set one's
heart on a great deal."

"That's very wisely said. Everybody covets a little something for which,
perhaps, nobody else would give a straw. But what's the very little
thing for which you are sighing?"

"Mrs. Bawtrey wants to sell that shop of hers. She is getting old, and
has had fits; and she can get nobody to buy; and if Will had that shop
and I could keep it,--but 'tis no use thinking of that."

"What shop do you mean?"

"There!"

"Where? I see no shop."

"But it is _the_ shop of the village,--the only one,--where the
post-office is."

"Ah! I see something at the windows like a red cloak. What do they
sell?"

"Everything,--tea and sugar and candles and shawls and gowns and cloaks
and mouse-traps and letter-paper; and Mrs. Bawtrey buys poor Will's
baskets, and sells them for a good deal more than she pays."

"It seems a nice cottage, with a field and orchard at the back."

"Yes. Mrs. Bawtrey pays L8 a year for it; but the shop can well afford
it."

Kenelm made no reply. They both walked on in silence, and had now
reached the centre of the village street when Jessie, looking up,
uttered an abrupt exclamation, gave an affrighted start, and then came
to a dead stop.

Kenelm's eye followed the direction of hers, and saw, a few yards
distant, at the other side of the way, a small red brick house, with
thatched sheds adjoining it, the whole standing in a wide yard, over
the gate of which leaned a man smoking a small cutty-pipe. "It is Tom
Bowles," whispered Jessie, and instinctively she twined her arm into
Kenelm's; then, as if on second thoughts, withdrew it, and said, still
in a whisper, "Go back now, sir; do."

"Not I. It is Tom Bowles whom I want to know. Hush!"

For here Tom Bowles had thrown down his pipe and was coming slowly
across the road towards them.

Kenelm eyed him with attention. A singularly powerful man, not so tall
as Kenelm by some inches, but still above the middle height, herculean
shoulders and chest, the lower limbs not in equal proportion,--a sort
of slouching, shambling gait. As he advanced the moonlight fell on his
face; it was a handsome one. He wore no hat, and his hair, of a
light brown, curled close. His face was fresh-coloured, with aquiline
features; his age apparently about six or seven and twenty. Coming
nearer and nearer, whatever favourable impression the first glance
at his physiognomy might have made on Kenelm was dispelled, for the
expression of his face changed and became fierce and lowering.

Kenelm was still walking on, Jessie by his side, when Bowles rudely
thrust himself between them, and seizing the girl's arm with one hand,
he turned his face full on Kenelm, with a menacing wave of the other
hand, and said in a deep burly voice,

"Who be you?"

"Let go that young woman before I tell you."

"If you weren't a stranger," answered Bowles, seeming as if he tried to
suppress a rising fit of wrath, "you'd be in the kennel for those words.
But I s'pose you don't know that I'm Tom Bowles, and I don't choose the
girl as I'm after to keep company with any other man. So you be off."

"And I don't choose any other man to lay violent hands on any girl
walking by my side without telling him that he's a brute; and that I
only wait till he has both his hands at liberty to let him know that he
has not a poor cripple to deal with."

Tom Bowles could scarcely believe his ears. Amaze swallowed up for
the moment every other sentiment. Mechanically he loosened his hold of
Jessie, who fled off like a bird released. But evidently she thought
of her new friend's danger more than her own escape; for instead of
sheltering herself in her father's cottage, she ran towards a group
of labourers who, near at hand, had stopped loitering before the
public-house, and returned with those allies towards the spot in which
she had left the two men. She was very popular with the villagers, who,
strong in the sense of numbers, overcame their awe of Tom Bowles, and
arrived at the place half running, half striding, in time, they hoped,
to interpose between his terrible arm and the bones of the unoffending
stranger.

Meanwhile Bowles, having recovered his first astonishment, and scarcely
noticing Jessie's escape, still left his right arm extended towards the
place she had vacated, and with a quick back-stroke of the left levelled
at Kenelm's face, growled contemptuously, "Thou'lt find one hand enough
for thee."

But quick as was his aim, Kenelm caught the lifted arm just above the
elbow, causing the blow to waste itself on air, and with a simultaneous
advance of his right knee and foot dexterously tripped up his bulky
antagonist, and laid him sprawling on his back. The movement was
so sudden, and the stun it occasioned so utter, morally as well as
physically, that a minute or more elapsed before Tom Bowles picked
himself up. And he then stood another minute glowering at his
antagonist, with a vague sentiment of awe almost like a superstitious
panic. For it is noticeable that, however fierce and fearless a man or
even a wild beast may be, yet if either has hitherto been only familiar
with victory and triumph, never yet having met with a foe that could
cope with its force, the first effect of a defeat, especially from
a despised adversary, unhinges and half paralyzes the whole nervous
system. But as fighting Tom gradually recovered to the consciousness of
his own strength, and the recollection that it had been only foiled by
the skilful trick of a wrestler, and not the hand-to-hand might of a
pugilist, the panic vanished, and Tom Bowles was himself again. "Oh,
that's your sort, is it? We don't fight with our heels hereabouts, like
Cornishers and donkeys: we fight with our fists, youngster; and since
you _will_ have a bout at that, why, you must."

"Providence," answered Kenelm, solemnly, "sent me to this village
for the express purpose of licking Tom Bowles. It is a signal mercy
vouchsafed to yourself, as you will one day acknowledge."

Again a thrill of awe, something like that which the demagogue in
Aristophanes might have felt when braved by the sausage-maker, shot
through the valiant heart of Tom Bowles. He did not like those ominous
words, and still less the lugubrious tone of voice in which they
were uttered, But resolved, at least, to proceed to battle with
more preparation than he had at first designed, he now deliberately
disencumbered himself of his heavy fustian jacket and vest, rolled up
his shirt-sleeves, and then slowly advanced towards the foe.

Kenelm had also, with still greater deliberation, taken off his
coat--which he folded up with care, as being both a new and an only one,
and deposited by the hedge-side--and bared arms, lean indeed and almost
slight, as compared with the vast muscle of his adversary, but firm in
sinew as the hind leg of a stag.

By this time the labourers, led by Jessie, had arrived at the spot, and
were about to crowd in between the combatants, when Kenelm waved them
back and said in a calm and impressive voice,--

"Stand round, my good friends, make a ring, and see that it is fair play
on my side. I am sure it will be fair on Mr. Bowles's. He is big enough
to scorn what is little. And now, Mr. Bowles, just a word with you in
the presence of your neighbours. I am not going to say anything uncivil.
If you are rather rough and hasty, a man is not always master of
himself--at least so I am told--when he thinks more than he ought to
do about a pretty girl. But I can't look at your face even by this
moonlight, and though its expression at this moment is rather cross,
without being sure that you are a fine fellow at bottom, and that if you
give a promise as man to man you will keep it. Is that so?"

One or two of the bystanders murmured assent; the others pressed round
in silent wonder.

"What's all that soft-sawder about?" said Tom Bowles, somewhat
falteringly.

"Simply this: if in the fight between us I beat you, I ask you to
promise before your neighbours that you will not by word or deed molest
or interfere again with Miss Jessie Wiles."

"Eh!" roared Tom. "Is it that you are after her?"

"Suppose I am, if that pleases you; and on my side, I promise that if
you beat me, I quit this place as soon as you leave me well enough to do
so, and will never visit it again. What! do you hesitate to promise? Are
you really afraid I shall lick you?"

"You! I'd smash a dozen of you to powder."

"In that case, you are safe to promise. Come, 'tis a fair bargain. Is
n't it, neighbours?"

Won over by Kenelm's easy show of good temper, and by the sense of
justice, the bystanders joined in a common exclamation of assent.

"Come, Tom," said an old fellow, "the gentleman can't speak fairer; and
we shall all think you be afeard if you hold back."

Tom's face worked: but at last he growled, "Well, I promise; that is, if
he beats me."

"All right," said Kenelm. "You hear, neighbours; and Tom Bowles could
not show that handsome face of his among you if he broke his word. Shake
hands on it."

Fighting Tom sulkily shook hands.

"Well now, that's what I call English," said Kenelm, "all pluck and no
malice. Fall back, friends, and leave a clear space for us."

The men all receded; and as Kenelm took his ground, there was a supple
ease in his posture which at once brought out into clearer evidence the
nervous strength of his build, and, contrasted with Tom's bulk of chest,
made the latter look clumsy and topheavy.

The two men faced each other a minute, the eyes of both vigilant and
steadfast. Tom's blood began to fire up as he gazed; nor, with all his
outward calm; was Kenelm insensible of that proud beat of the heart
which is aroused by the fierce joy of combat. Tom struck out first and
a blow was parried, but not returned; another and another blow,--still
parried, still unreturned. Kenelm, acting evidently on the defensive,
took all the advantages for that strategy which he derived from superior
length of arm and lighter agility of frame. Perhaps he wished to
ascertain the extent of his adversary's skill, or to try the endurance
of his wind, before he ventured on the hazards of attack. Tom, galled to
the quick that blows which might have felled an ox were thus warded
off from their mark, and dimly aware that he was encountering some
mysterious skill which turned his brute strength into waste force and
might overmaster him in the long run, came to a rapid conclusion that
the sooner he brought that brute strength to bear the better it would be
for him. Accordingly, after three rounds, in which without once breaking
the guard of his antagonist he had received a few playful taps on
the nose and mouth, he drew back and made a bull-like rush at his
foe,--bull-like, for it butted full at him with the powerful down-bent
head, and the two fists doing duty as horns. The rush spent, he found
himself in the position of a man milled. I take it for granted that
every Englishman who can call himself a man--that is, every man who
has been an English boy, and, as such, been compelled to the use of
his fists--knows what a "mill" is. But I sing not only "pueris," but
"virginibus." Ladies, "a mill,"--using with reluctance and contempt for
myself that slang in which ladywriters indulge, and Girls of the Period
know much better than they do their Murray,--"a mill,"--speaking not to
ladywriters, not to Girls of the Period, but to innocent damsels, and in
explanation to those foreigners who only understand the English language
as taught by Addison and Macaulay,--a "mill" periphrastically means
this: your adversary, in the noble encounter between fist and fist, has
so plunged his head that it gets caught, as in a vice, between the side
and doubled left arm of the adversary, exposing that head, unprotected
and helpless, to be pounded out of recognizable shape by the right fist
of the opponent. It is a situation in which raw superiority of force
sometimes finds itself, and is seldom spared by disciplined superiority
of skill. Kenelm, his right fist raised, paused for a moment, then,
loosening the left arm, releasing the prisoner, and giving him a
friendly slap on the shoulder, he turned round to the spectators and
said apologetically, "He has a handsome face: it would be a shame to
spoil it."

Tom's position of peril was so obvious to all, and that good-humoured
abnegation of the advantage which the position gave to the adversary
seemed so generous, that the labourers actually hurrahed. Tom, himself
felt as if treated like a child; and alas, and alas for him! in wheeling
round, and regathering himself up, his eye rested on Jessie's face. Her
lips were apart with breathless terror: he fancied they were apart with
a smile of contempt. And now he became formidable. He fought as fights
the bull in the presence of the heifer, who, as he knows too well, will
go with the conqueror.

If Tom had never yet fought with a man taught by a prizefighter, so
never yet had Kenelm encountered a strength which, but for the lack of
that teaching, would have conquered his own. He could act no longer on
the defensive; he could no longer play, like a dexterous fencer, with
the sledge-hammers of those mighty arms. They broke through his guard;
they sounded on his chest as on an anvil. He felt that did they alight
on his head he was a lost man. He felt also that the blows spent on the
chest of his adversary were idle as the stroke of a cane on the hide
of a rhinoceros. But now his nostrils dilated; his eyes flashed fire:
Kenelm Chillingly had ceased to be a philosopher. Crash came his
blow--how unlike the swinging roundabout hits of Tom Bowles!--straight
to its aim as the rifle-ball of a Tyrolese or a British marksman
at Aldershot,--all the strength of nerve, sinew, purpose, and mind
concentred in its vigour,--crash just at that part of the front where
the eyes meet, and followed up with the rapidity of lightning, flash
upon flash, by a more restrained but more disabling blow with the left
hand just where the left ear meets throat and jaw-bone.

At the first blow Tom Bowles had reeled and staggered, at the second he
threw up his hands, made a jump in the air as if shot through the heart,
and then heavily fell forwards, an inert mass.

The spectators pressed round him in terror. They thought he was dead.
Kenelm knelt, passed quickly his hand over Tom's lips, pulse, and heart,
and then rising, said, humbly and with an air of apology,--

"If he had been a less magnificent creature, I assure you on my honour
that I should never have ventured that second blow. The first would have
done for any man less splendidly endowed by nature. Lift him gently;
take him home. Tell his mother, with my kind regards, that I'll call and
see her and him to-morrow. And, stop, does he ever drink too much beer?"

"Well," said one of the villagers, "Tom _can_ drink."

"I thought so. Too much flesh for that muscle. Go for the nearest
doctor. You, my lad? good; off with you; quick. No danger, but perhaps
it may be a case for the lancet."

Tom Bowles was lifted tenderly by four of the stoutest men present and
borne into his home, evincing no sign of consciousness; but his face,
where not clouted with blood, was very pale, very calm, with a slight
froth at the lips.

Kenelm pulled down his shirt-sleeves, put on his coat, and turned to
Jessie,--

"Now, my young friend, show me Will's cottage."

The girl came to him, white and trembling. She did not dare to speak.
The stranger had become a new man in her eyes. Perhaps he frightened her
as much as Tom Bowles had done. But she quickened her pace, leaving the
public-house behind till she came to the farther end of the village.
Kenelm walked beside her, muttering to himself: and though Jessie caught
his words, happily she did not understand; for they repeated one of
those bitter reproaches on her sex as the main cause of all strife,
bloodshed, and mischief in general, with which the classic authors
abound. His spleen soothed by that recourse to the lessons of the
ancients, Kenelm turned at last to his silent companion, and said kindly
but gravely,--

"Mr. Bowles has given me his promise, and it is fair that I should now
ask a promise from you. It is this: just consider how easily a girl so
pretty as you can be the cause of a man's death. Had Bowles struck me
where I struck him I should have been past the help of a surgeon."

"Oh!" groaned Jessie, shuddering, and covering her face with both hands.

"And, putting aside that danger, consider that a man may be hit mortally
on the heart as well as on the head, and that a woman has much to answer
for who, no matter what her excuse, forgets what misery and what guilt
can be inflicted by a word from her lip and a glance from her eye.
Consider this, and promise that, whether you marry Will Somers or not,
you will never again give a man fair cause to think you can like him
unless your own heart tells you that you can. Will you promise that?"

"I will, indeed,--indeed." Poor Jessie's voice died in sobs.

"There, my child, I don't ask you not to cry, because I know how much
women like crying; and in this instance it does you a great deal
of good. But we are just at the end of the village; which is Will's
cottage?"

Jessie lifted her head, and pointed to a solitary, small thatched
cottage.

"I would ask you to come in and introduce me; but that might look too
much like crowing over poor Tom Bowles. So good-night to you, Jessie,
and forgive me for preaching."



CHAPTER XIII.

KENELM knocked at the cottage door; a voice said faintly, "Come in."

He stooped his head, and stepped over the threshold.

Since his encounter with Tom Bowles his sympathies had gone with that
unfortunate lover: it is natural to like a man after you have beaten
him; and he was by no means predisposed to favour Jessie's preference
for a sickly cripple.

Yet, when two bright, soft, dark eyes, and a pale intellectual
countenance, with that nameless aspect of refinement which delicate
health so often gives, especially to the young, greeted his quiet gaze,
his heart was at once won over to the side of the rival. Will Somers was
seated by the hearth, on which a few live embers despite the warmth of
the summer evening still burned; a rude little table was by his side,
on which were laid osier twigs and white peeled chips, together with an
open book. His hands, pale and slender, were at work on a small basket
half finished. His mother was just clearing away the tea-things from
another table that stood by the window. Will rose, with the good
breeding that belongs to the rural peasant, as the stranger entered; the
widow looked round with surprise, and dropped her simple courtesy,--a
little thin woman, with a mild, patient face.

The cottage was very tidily kept, as it is in most village homes where
the woman has it her own way. The deal dresser opposite the door had
its display of humble crockery. The whitewashed walls were relieved with
coloured prints, chiefly Scriptural subjects from the New Testament,
such as the Return of the Prodigal Son, in a blue coat and yellow
inexpressibles, with his stockings about his heels.

At one corner there were piled up baskets of various sizes, and at
another corner was an open cupboard containing books,--an article of
decorative furniture found in cottages much more rarely than coloured
prints and gleaming crockery.

All this, of course, Kenelm could not at a glance comprehend in detail.
But as the mind of a man accustomed to generalization is marvellously
quick in forming a sound judgment, whereas a mind accustomed to dwell
only on detail is wonderfully slow at arriving at any judgment at all,
and when it does, the probability is that it will arrive at a wrong one,
Kenelm judged correctly when he came to this conclusion: "I am among
simple English peasants; but, for some reason or other, not to be
explained by the relative amount of wages, it is a favourable specimen
of that class."

"I beg your pardon for intruding at this hour, Mrs. Somers," said
Kenelm, who had been too familiar with peasants from his earliest
childhood not to know how quickly, when in the presence of their
household gods, they appreciate respect, and how acutely they feel the
want of it. "But my stay in the village is very short, and I should not
like to leave without seeing your son's basket-work, of which I have
heard much."

"You are very good, sir," said Will, with a pleased smile that
wonderfully brightened up his face. "It is only just a few common things
that I keep by me. Any finer sort of work I mostly do by order."

"You see, sir," said Mrs. Somers, "it takes so much more time for pretty
work-baskets, and such like; and unless done to order, it might be
a chance if he could get it sold. But pray be seated, sir," and Mrs.
Somers placed a chair for her visitor, "while I just run up stairs for
the work-basket which my son has made for Miss Travers. It is to go home
to-morrow, and I put it away for fear of accidents."

Kenelm seated himself, and, drawing his chair near to Will's, took up
the half-finished basket which the young man had laid down on the table.

"This seems to me very nice and delicate workmanship," said Kenelm; "and
the shape, when you have finished it, will be elegant enough to please
the taste of a lady."

"It is for Mrs. Lethbridge," said Will: "she wanted something to hold
cards and letters; and I took the shape from a book of drawings which
Mr. Lethbridge kindly lent me. You know Mr. Lethbridge, sir? He is a
very good gentleman."

"No, I don't know him. Who is he?"

"Our clergyman, sir. This is the book."

To Kenelm's surprise, it was a work on Pompeii, and contained woodcuts
of the implements and ornaments, mosaics and frescos, found in that
memorable little city.

"I see this is your model," said Kenelm; "what they call a _patera_,
and rather a famous one. You are copying it much more truthfully than I
should have supposed it possible to do in substituting basket-work for
bronze. But you observe that much of the beauty of this shallow bowl
depends on the two doves perched on the brim. You can't manage that
ornamental addition."

"Mrs. Lethbridge thought of putting there two little stuffed
canary-birds."

"Did she? Good heavens!" exclaimed Kenelm.

"But somehow," continued Will, "I did not like that, and I made bold to
say so."

"Why did not you do it?"

"Well, I don't know; but I did not think it would be the right thing."

"It would have been very bad taste, and spoiled the effect of your
basket-work; and I'll endeavour to explain why. You see here, in the
next page, a drawing of a very beautiful statue. Of course this statue
is intended to be a representation of nature, but nature idealized. You
don't know the meaning of that hard word, idealized, and very few people
do. But it means the performance of a something in art according to the
idea which a man's mind forms to itself out of a something in nature.
That something in nature must, of course, have been carefully studied
before the man can work out anything in art by which it is faithfully
represented. The artist, for instance, who made that statue, must have
known the proportions of the human frame. He must have made studies
of various parts of it,--heads and hands, and arms and legs, and so
forth,--and having done so, he then puts together all his various
studies of details, so as to form a new whole, which is intended to
personate an idea formed in his own mind. Do you go with me?"

"Partly, sir; but I am puzzled a little still."

"Of course you are; but you'll puzzle yourself right if you think over
what I say. Now if, in order to make this statue, which is composed of
metal or stone, more natural, I stuck on it a wig of real hair, would
not you feel at once that I had spoilt the work; that as you clearly
express it, 'it would not be the right thing'? and instead of making the
work of art more natural, I should have made it laughably unnatural, by
forcing insensibly upon the mind of him who looked at it the contrast
between the real life, represented by a wig of actual hair, and the
artistic life, represented by an idea embodied in stone or metal. The
higher the work of art (that is, the higher the idea it represents as a
new combination of details taken from nature), the more it is degraded
or spoilt by an attempt to give it a kind of reality which is out
of keeping with the materials employed. But the same rule applies to
everything in art, however humble. And a couple of stuffed canary-birds
at the brim of a basket-work imitation of a Greek drinking-cup would be
as bad taste as a wig from the barber's on the head of a marble statue
of Apollo."

"I see," said Will, his head downcast, like a man pondering,--"at least
I think I see; and I'm very much obliged to you, sir."

Mrs. Somers had long since returned with the work-basket, but stood with
it in her hands, not daring to interrupt the gentleman, and listening to
his discourse with as much patience and as little comprehension as if it
had been one of the controversial sermons upon Ritualism with which on
great occasions Mr. Lethbridge favoured his congregation.

Kenelm having now exhausted his critical lecture--from which certain
poets and novelists who contrive to caricature the ideal by their
attempt to put wigs of real hair upon the heads of stone statues might
borrow a useful hint or two if they would condescend to do so, which
is not likely--perceived Mrs. Somers standing by him, took from her
the basket, which was really very pretty and elegant, subdivided
into various compartments for the implements in use among ladies, and
bestowed on it a well-merited eulogium.

"The young lady means to finish it herself with ribbons, and line it
with satin," said Mrs. Somers, proudly.

"The ribbons will not be amiss, sir?" said Will, interrogatively.

"Not at all. Your natural sense of the fitness of things tells you
that ribbons go well with straw and light straw-like work such as this;
though you would not put ribbons on those rude hampers and game-baskets
in the corner. Like to like; a stout cord goes suitably with them: just
as a poet who understands his art employs pretty expressions for poems
intended to be pretty and suit a fashionable drawing-room, and carefully
shuns them to substitute a simple cord for poems intended to be strong
and travel far, despite of rough usage by the way. But you really
ought to make much more money by this fancy-work than you could as a
day-labourer."

Will sighed. "Not in this neighbourhood, sir; I might in a town."

"Why not move to a town, then?"

The young man coloured, and shook his head.

Kenelm turned appealingly to Mrs. Somers. "I'll be willing to go
wherever it would be best for my boy, sir. But--" and here she checked
herself, and a tear trickled silently down her cheeks.

Will resumed, in a more cheerful tone, "I am getting a little known
now, and work will come if one waits for it." Kenelm did not deem it
courteous or discreet to intrude further on Will's confidence in the
first interview; and he began to feel, more than he had done at first,
not only the dull pain of the bruises he had received in the recent
combat, but also somewhat more than the weariness which follows long
summer-day's work in the open air. He therefore, rather abruptly, now
took his leave, saying that he should be very glad of a few specimens of
Will's ingenuity and skill, and would call or write to give directions
about them.

Just as he came in sight of Tom Bowles's house on his way back to Mr.
Saunderson's, Kenelm saw a man mounting a pony that stood tied up at the
gate, and exchanging a few words with a respectable-looking woman
before he rode on. He was passing by Kenelm without notice, when that
philosophical vagrant stopped him, saying, "If I am not mistaken, sir,
you are the doctor. There is not much the matter with Mr. Bowles?"

The doctor shook his head. "I can't say yet. He has had a very ugly blow
somewhere."

"It was just under the left ear. I did not aim at that exact spot:
but Bowles unluckily swerved a little aside at the moment, perhaps in
surprise at a tap between his eyes immediately preceding it: and so, as
you say, it was an ugly blow that he received. But if it cures him of
the habit of giving ugly blows to other people who can bear them less
safely, perhaps it may be all for his good, as, no doubt, sir, your
schoolmaster said when he flogged you."

"Bless my soul! are you the man who fought with him,--you? I can't
believe it."

"Why not?"

"Why not! So far as I can judge by this light, though you are a tall
fellow, Tom Bowles must be a much heavier weight than you are."

"Tom Spring was the champion of England; and according to the records of
his weight, which history has preserved in her archives, Tom Spring was
a lighter weight than I am."

"But are you a prize-fighter?"

"I am as much that as I am anything else. But to return to Mr. Bowles,
was it necessary to bleed him?"

"Yes; he was unconscious, or nearly so, when I came. I took away a few
ounces; and I am happy to say he is now sensible, but must be kept very
quiet."

"No doubt; but I hope he will be well enough to see me to-morrow."

"I hope so too; but I can't say yet. Quarrel about a girl,--eh?"

"It was not about money. And I suppose if there were no money and no
women in the world, there would be no quarrels and very few doctors.
Good-night, Sir."

"It is a strange thing to me," said Kenelm, as he now opened the
garden-gate of Mr. Saunderson's homestead, "that though I've had nothing
to eat all day, except a few pitiful sandwiches, I don't feel the least
hungry. Such arrest of the lawful duties of the digestive organs never
happened to me before. There must be something weird and ominous in it."

On entering the parlour, the family party, though they had long since
finished supper, were still seated round the table. They all rose at
the sight of Kenelm. The fame of his achievements had preceded him. He
checked the congratulations, the compliments, and the questions
which the hearty farmer rapidly heaped upon him, with a melancholic
exclamation, "But I have lost my appetite! No honours can compensate for
that. Let me go to bed peaceably, and perhaps in the magic land of sleep
Nature may restore me by a dream of supper."



CHAPTER XIV.

KENELM rose betimes the next morning somewhat stiff and uneasy, but
sufficiently recovered to feel ravenous. Fortunately, one of the
young ladies, who attended specially to the dairy, was already up, and
supplied the starving hero with a vast bowl of bread and milk. He then
strolled into the hayfield, in which there was now very little left
to do, and but few hands besides his own were employed. Jessie was not
there. Kenelm was glad of that. By nine o'clock his work was over, and
the farmer and his men were in the yard completing the ricks. Kenelm
stole away unobserved, bent on a round of visits. He called first at the
village shop kept by Mrs. Bawtrey, which Jessie had pointed out to
him, on pretence of buying a gaudy neckerchief; and soon, thanks to his
habitual civility, made familiar acquaintance with the shopwoman. She
was a little sickly old lady, her head shaking, as with palsy, somewhat
deaf, but still shrewd and sharp, rendered mechanically so by long
habits of shrewdness and sharpness. She became very communicative, spoke
freely of her desire to give up the shop, and pass the rest of her days
with a sister, widowed like herself, in a neighbouring town. Since she
had lost her husband, the field and orchard attached to the shop had
ceased to be profitable, and become a great care and trouble; and the
attention the shop required was wearisome. But she had twelve years
unexpired of the lease granted for twenty-one years to her husband on
low terms, and she wanted a premium for its transfer, and a purchaser
for the stock of the shop. Kenelm soon drew from her the amount of the
sum she required for all,--L45.

"You be n't thinking of it for yourself?" she asked, putting on her
spectacles, and examining him with care.

"Perhaps so, if one could get a decent living out of it. Do you keep a
book of your losses and your gains?"

"In course, sir," she said proudly. "I kept the books in my goodman's
time, and he was one who could find out if there was a farthing wrong,
for he had been in a lawyer's office when a lad."

"Why did he leave a lawyer's office to keep a little shop?"

"Well, he was born a farmer's son in this neighbourhood, and he always
had a hankering after the country, and--and besides that--"

"Yes."

"I'll tell you the truth; he had got into a way of drinking speerrits,
and he was a good young man, and wanted to break himself of it, and he
took the temperance oath; but it was too hard on him, for he could not
break himself of the company that led him into liquor. And so, one time
when he came into the neighbourhood to see his parents for the Christmas
holiday, he took a bit of liking to me; and my father, who was Squire
Travers's bailiff, had just died, and left me a little money. And so,
somehow or other, we came together, and got this house and the land
from the Squire on lease very reasonable; and my goodman being well
eddyeated, and much thought of, and never being tempted to drink, now
that he had a missis to keep him in order, had a many little things put
into his way. He could help to measure timber, and knew about draining,
and he got some bookkeeping from the farmers about; and we kept cows
and pigs and poultry, and so we did very well, specially as the Lord was
merciful and sent us no children."

"And what does the shop bring in a year since your husband died?"

"You had best judge for yourself. Will you look at the book, and take
a peep at the land and apple-trees? But they's been neglected since my
goodman died."

In another minute the heir of the Chillinglys was seated in a neat
little back parlour, with a pretty though confined view of the orchard
and grass slope behind it, and bending over Mrs. Bawtrey's ledger.

Some customers for cheese and bacon coming now into the shop, the old
woman left him to his studies. Though they were not of a nature familiar
to him, he brought to them, at least, that general clearness of head and
quick seizure of important points which are common to most men who have
gone through some disciplined training of intellect, and been accustomed
to extract the pith and marrow out of many books on many subjects. The
result of his examination was satisfactory; there appeared to him a
clear balance of gain from the shop alone of somewhat over L40 a year,
taking the average of the last three years. Closing the book, he then
let himself out of the window into the orchard, and thence into the
neighbouring grass field. Both were, indeed, much neglected; the trees
wanted pruning, the field manure. But the soil was evidently of rich
loam, and the fruit-trees were abundant and of ripe age, generally
looking healthy in spite of neglect. With the quick intuition of a man
born and bred in the country, and picking up scraps of rural knowledge
unconsciously, Kenelm convinced himself that the land, properly managed,
would far more than cover the rent, rates, tithes, and all incidental
outgoings, leaving the profits of the shop as the clear income of the
occupiers. And no doubt with clever young people to manage the shop, its
profits might be increased.

Not thinking it necessary to return at present to Mrs. Bawtrey's, Kenelm
now bent his way to Tom Bowles's.

The house-door was closed. At the summons of his knock it was quickly
opened by a tall, stout, remarkably fine-looking woman, who might have
told fifty years, and carried them off lightly on her ample shoulders.
She was dressed very respectably in black, her brown hair braided simply
under a neat tight-fitting cap. Her features were aquiline and
very regular: altogether there was something about her majestic and
Cornelia-like. She might have sat for the model of that Roman matron,
except for the fairness of her Anglo-Saxon complexion.

"What's your pleasure?" she asked, in a cold and somewhat stern voice.

"Ma'am," answered Kenelm, uncovering, "I have called to see Mr. Bowles,
and I sincerely hope he is well enough to let me do so."

"No, sir, he is not well enough for that; he is lying down in his own
room, and must be kept quiet."

"May I then ask you the favour to let me in? I would say a few words to
you, who are his mother if I mistake not." Mrs. Bowles paused a moment
as if in doubt; but she was at no loss to detect in Kenelm's manner
something superior to the fashion of his dress, and supposing the visit
might refer to her son's professional business, she opened the door
wider, drew aside to let him pass first, and when he stood midway in
the parlour, requested him to take a seat, and, to set him the example,
seated herself.

"Ma'am," said Kenelm, "do not regret to have admitted me, and do not
think hardly of me when I inform you that I am the unfortunate cause of
your son's accident."

Mrs. Bowles rose with a start. "You're the man who beat my boy?"

"No, ma'am, do not say I beat him. He is not beaten. He is so brave
and so strong that he would easily have beaten me if I had not, by good
luck, knocked him down before he had time to do so. Pray, ma'am, retain
your seat and listen to me patiently for a few moments."

Mrs. Bowles, with an indignant heave of her Juno-like bosom, and with
a superbly haughty expression of countenance which suited well with its
aquiline formation, tacitly obeyed.

"You will allow, ma'am," recommenced Kenelm, "that this is not the first
time by many that Mr. Bowles has come to blows with another man. Am I
not right in that assumption?"

"My son is of hasty temper," replied Mrs. Bowles, reluctantly, "and
people should not aggravate him."

"You grant the fact, then?" said Kenelm, imperturbably, but with a
polite inclination of head. "Mr. Bowles has often been engaged in these
encounters, and in all of them it is quite clear that he provoked the
battle; for you must be aware that he is not the sort of man to whom any
other would be disposed to give the first blow. Yet, after these little
incidents had occurred, and Mr. Bowles had, say, half killed the person
who aggravated him, you did not feel any resentment against that person,
did you? Nay, if he had wanted nursing, you would have gone and nursed
him."

"I don't know as to nursing," said Mrs. Bowles, beginning to lose her
dignity of mien; "but certainly I should have been very sorry for him.
And as for Tom,--though I say it who should not say,--he has no more
malice than a baby: he'd go and make it up with any man, however badly
he had beaten him."

"Just as I supposed; and if the man had sulked and would not make it up,
Tom would have called him a bad fellow, and felt inclined to beat him
again."

Mrs. Bowles's face relaxed into a stately smile.

"Well, then," pursued Kenelm, "I do but humbly imitate Mr. Bowles, and I
come to make it up and shake hands with him."

"No, sir,--no," exclaimed Mrs. Bowles, though in a low voice, and
turning pale. "Don't think of it. 'Tis not the blows; he'll get over
those fast enough: 'tis his pride that's hurt; and if he saw you there
might be mischief. But you're a stranger, and going away: do go soon; do
keep out of his way; do!" And the mother clasped her hands.

"Mrs. Bowles," said Kenelm, with a change of voice and aspect,--a
voice and aspect so earnest and impressive that they stilled and awed
her,--"will you not help me to save your son from the dangers into which
that hasty temper and that mischievous pride may at any moment hurry
him? Does it never occur to you that these are the causes of terrible
crime, bringing terrible punishment; and that against brute force,
impelled by savage passions, society protects itself by the hulks and
the gallows?"

"Sir; how dare you--"

"Hush! If one man kill another in a moment of ungovernable wrath, that
is a crime which, though heavily punished by the conscience, is gently
dealt with by the law, which calls it only manslaughter; but if a motive
to the violence, such as jealousy or revenge, can be assigned, and there
should be no witness by to prove that the violence was not premeditated,
then the law does not call it manslaughter, but murder. Was it not that
thought which made you so imploringly exclaim, 'Go soon; keep out of his
way'?"

The woman made no answer, but, sinking back in her chair, gasped for
breath.

"Nay, madam," resumed Kenelm, mildly; "banish your fears. If you will
help me I feel sure that I can save your son from such perils, and I
only ask you to let me save him. I am convinced that he has a good and
a noble nature, and he is worth saving." And as he thus said he took her
hand. She resigned it to him and returned the pressure, all her pride
softening as she began to weep.

At length, when she recovered voice, she said,--

"It is all along of that girl. He was not so till she crossed him, and
made him half mad. He is not the same man since then,--my poor Tom!"

"Do you know that he has given me his word, and before his
fellow-villagers, that if he had the worst of the fight he would never
molest Jessie Wiles again?"

"Yes, he told me so himself; and it is that which weighs on him now. He
broods and broods and mutters, and will not be comforted; and--and I do
fear that he means revenge. And again, I implore you to keep out of his
way."

"It is not revenge on me that he thinks of. Suppose I go and am seen no
more, do you think in your own heart that that girl's life is safe?"

"What! My Tom kill a woman!"

"Do you never read in your newspaper of a man who kills his sweetheart,
or the girl who refuses to be his sweetheart? At all events, you
yourself do not approve this frantic suit of his. If I have heard
rightly, you have wished to get Tom out of the village for some time,
till Jessie Wiles is--we'll say, married, or gone elsewhere for good."

"Yes, indeed, I have wished and prayed for it many's the time, both for
her sake and for his. And I am sure I don't know what we shall do if
he stays, for he has been losing custom fast. The Squire has taken away
his, and so have many of the farmers; and such a trade as it was in his
good father's time! And if he would go, his uncle, the veterinary at
Luscombe, would take him into partnership; for he has no son of his own,
and he knows how clever Tom is: there be n't a man who knows more about
horses; and cows, too, for the matter of that."

"And if Luscombe is a large place, the business there must be more
profitable than it can be here, even if Tom got back his custom?"

"Oh yes! five times as good,--if he would but go; but he'll not hear of
it."

"Mrs. Bowles, I am very much obliged to you for your confidence, and I
feel sure that all will end happily now we have had this talk. I'll not
press further on you at present. Tom will not stir out, I suppose, till
the evening."

"Ah, sir, he seems as if he had no heart to stir out again, unless for
something dreadful."

"Courage! I will call again in the evening, and then you just take me
up to Tom's room, and leave me there to make friends with him, as I have
with you. Don't say a word about me in the meanwhile."

"But--"

"'But,' Mrs. Bowles, is a word that cools many a warm impulse, stifles
many a kindly thought, puts a dead stop to many a brotherly deed. Nobody
would ever love his neighbour as himself if he listened to all the Buts
that could be said on the other side of the question."

CHAPTER XV.

KENELM now bent his way towards the parsonage, but just as he neared
its glebe-lands he met a gentleman whose dress was so evidently clerical
that he stopped and said,--

"Have I the honour to address Mr. Lethbridge?"

"That is my name," said the clergyman, smiling pleasantly. "Anything I
can do for you?"

"Yes, a great deal, if you will let me talk to you about a few of your
parishioners."

"My parishioners! I beg your pardon, but you are quite a stranger to me,
and, I should think, to the parish."

"To the parish,--no, I am quite at home in it; and I honestly believe
that it has never known a more officious busybody, thrusting himself
into its most private affairs."

Mr. Lethbridge stared, and, after a short pause, said, "I have heard of
a young man who has been staying at Mr. Saunderson's, and is indeed at
this moment the talk of the village. You are--"

"That young man. Alas! yes."

"Nay," said Mr. Lethbridge, kindly, "I cannot myself, as a minister
of the Gospel, approve of your profession, and, if I might take the
liberty, I would try and dissuade you from it; but still, as for the
one act of freeing a poor girl from the most scandalous persecution, and
administering, though in a rough way, a lesson to a savage brute who
has long been the disgrace and terror of the neighbourhood, I cannot
honestly say that it has my condemnation. The moral sense of a community
is generally a right one: you have won the praise of the village. Under
all the circumstances, I do not withhold mine. You woke this morning and
found yourself famous. Do not sigh 'Alas.'"

"Lord Byron woke one morning and found himself famous, and the result
was that he sighed 'Alas' for the rest of his life. If there be two
things which a wise man should avoid, they are fame and love. Heaven
defend me from both!"

Again the parson stared; but being of compassionate nature, and inclined
to take mild views of everything that belongs to humanity, he said, with
a slight inclination of his head,--

"I have always heard that the Americans in general enjoy the advantage
of a better education than we do in England, and their reading public
is infinitely larger than ours; still, when I hear one of a calling
not highly considered in this country for intellectual cultivation or
ethical philosophy cite Lord Byron, and utter a sentiment at variance
with the impetuosity of inexperienced youth, but which has much to
commend it in the eyes of a reflective Christian impressed with the
nothingness of the objects mostly coveted by the human heart, I am
surprised, and--oh, my dear young friend, surely your education might
fit you for something better!"

It was among the maxims of Kenelm Chillingly's creed that a sensible man
should never allow himself to be surprised; but here he was, to use
a popular idiom, "taken aback," and lowered himself to the rank of
ordinary minds by saying, simply, "I don't understand."

"I see," resumed the clergyman, shaking his head gently, "as I always
suspected, that in the vaunted education bestowed on Americans, the
elementary principles of Christian right and wrong are more neglected
than they are among our own humble classes. Yes, my young friend, you
may quote poets, you may startle me by remarks on the nothingness of
human fame and human love, derived from the precepts of heathen poets,
and yet not understand with what compassion, and, in the judgment
of most sober-minded persons, with what contempt, a human being who
practises your vocation is regarded."

"Have I a vocation?" said Kenelm. "I am very glad to hear it. What is my
vocation? And why must I be an American?"

"Why, surely I am not misinformed? You are the American--I forget his
name--who has come over to contest the belt of prize-fighting with
the champion of England. You are silent; you hang your head. By your
appearance, your length of limb, your gravity of countenance, your
evident education, you confirm the impression of your birth. Your
prowess has proved your profession."

"Reverend sir," said Kenelm, with his unutterable seriousness of aspect,
"I am on my travels in search of truth and in flight from shams, but
so great a take-in as myself I have not yet encountered. Remember me in
your prayers. I am not an American; I am not a prize-fighter. I
honour the first as the citizen of a grand republic trying his best to
accomplish an experiment in government in which he will find the
very prosperity he tends to create will sooner or later destroy his
experiment. I honour the last because strength, courage, and sobriety
are essential to the prize-fighter, and are among the chiefest ornaments
of kings and heroes. But I am neither one nor the other. And all I
can say for myself is, that I belong to that very vague class commonly
called English gentlemen, and that, by birth and education, I have a
right to ask you to shake hands with me as such."

Mr. Lethbridge stared again, raised his hat, bowed, and shook hands.

"You will allow me now to speak to you about your parishioners. You take
an interest in Will Somers; so do I. He is clever and ingenious. But it
seems there is not sufficient demand here for his baskets, and he would,
no doubt, do better in some neighbouring town. Why does he object to
move?"

"I fear that poor Will would pine away to death if he lost sight of that
pretty girl for whom you did such chivalrous battle with Tom Bowles."

"The unhappy man, then, is really in love with Jessie Wiles? And do you
think she no less really cares for him?"

"I am sure of it."

"And would make him a good wife; that is, as wives go?"

"A good daughter generally makes a good wife. And there is not a father
in the place who has a better child than Jessie is to hers. She really
is a girl of a superior nature. She was the cleverest pupil at our
school, and my wife is much attached to her. But she has something
better than mere cleverness: she has an excellent heart."

"What you say confirms my own impressions. And the girl's father has no
other objection to Will Somers than his fear that Will could not support
a wife and family comfortably.

"He can have no other objection save that which would apply equally to
all suitors. I mean his fear lest Tom Bowles might do her some mischief,
if he knew she was about to marry any one else."

"You think, then, that Mr. Bowles is a thoroughly bad and dangerous
person?"

"Thoroughly bad and dangerous, and worse since he has taken to
drinking."

"I suppose he did not take to drinking till he lost his wits for Jessie
Wiles?"

"No, I don't think he did."

"But, Mr. Lethbridge, have you never used your influence over this
dangerous man?"

"Of course, I did try, but I only got insulted. He is a godless animal,
and has not been inside a church for years. He seems to have got
a smattering of such vile learning as may be found in infidel
publications, and I doubt if he has any religion at all."

"Poor Polyphemus! no wonder his Galatea shuns him."

"Old Wiles is terribly frightened, and asked my wife to find Jessie a
place as servant at a distance. But Jessie can't bear the thoughts of
leaving."

"For the same reason which attaches Will Somers to the native soil?"

"My wife thinks so."

"Do you believe that if Tom Bowles were out of the way, and Jessie
and Will were man and wife, they could earn a sufficient livelihood as
successors to Mrs. Bawtrey, Will adding the profits of his basket-work
to those of the shop and land?"

"A sufficient livelihood! of course. They would be quite rich. I know
the shop used to turn a great deal of money. The old woman, to be sure,
is no longer up to the business, but still she retains a good custom."

"Will Somers seems in delicate health. Perhaps if he had a less weary
struggle for a livelihood, and no fear of losing Jessie, his health
would improve."

"His life would be saved, sir."

"Then," said Kenelm, with a heavy sigh and a face as long as an
undertaker's, "though I myself entertain a profound compassion for that
disturbance to our mental equilibrium which goes by the name of 'love,'
and I am the last person who ought to add to the cares and sorrows which
marriage entails upon its victims,--I say nothing of the woes
destined to those whom marriage usually adds to a population already
overcrowded,--I fear that I must be the means of bringing these two
love-birds into the same cage. I am ready to purchase the shop and its
appurtenances on their behalf, on the condition that you will kindly
obtain the consent of Jessie's father to their union. As for my brave
friend Tom Bowles, I undertake to deliver them and the village from that
exuberant nature, which requires a larger field for its energies. Pardon
me for not letting you interrupt me. I have not yet finished what I have
to say. Allow me to ask if Mrs. Grundy resides in this village."

"Mrs. Grundy! Oh, I understand. Of course; wherever a woman has a
tongue, there Mrs. Grundy has a home."

"And seeing that Jessie is very pretty, and that in walking with her I
encountered Mr. Bowles, might not Mrs. Grundy say, with a toss of her
head, 'that it was not out of pure charity that the stranger had been so
liberal to Jessie Wiles'? But if the money for the shop be paid through
you to Mrs. Bawtrey, and you kindly undertake all the contingent
arrangements, Mrs. Grundy will have nothing to say against any one."

Mr. Lethbridge gazed with amaze at the solemn countenance before him.

"Sir," he said, after a long pause, "I scarcely know how to express my
admiration of a generosity so noble, so thoughtful, and accompanied with
a delicacy, and, indeed, with a wisdom, which--which--"

"Pray, my dear sir, do not make me still more ashamed of myself than I
am at present for an interference in love matters quite alien to my own
convictions as to the best mode of making an 'Approach to the Angels.'
To conclude this business, I think it better to deposit in your hands
the sum of L45, for which Mrs. Bawtrey has agreed to sell the remainder
of her lease and stock-in-hand; but, of course, you will not make
anything public till I am gone, and Tom Bowles too. I hope I may get
him away to-morrow; but I shall know to-night when I can depend on his
departure, and till he goes I must stay."

As he spoke, Kenelm transferred from his pocket-book to Mr. Lethbridge's
hand bank-notes to the amount specified.

"May I at least ask the name of the gentleman who honours me with his
confidence, and has bestowed so much happiness on members of my flock?"

"There is no great reason why I should not tell you my name, but I see
no reason why I should. You remember Talleyrand's advice, 'If you are
in doubt whether to write a letter or not, don't.' The advice applies to
many doubts in life besides that of letter-writing. Farewell, sir!"

"A most extraordinary young man," muttered the parson, gazing at the
receding form of the tall stranger; then gently shaking his head, he
added, "Quite an original." He was contented with that solution of the
difficulties which had puzzled him. May the reader be the same.



CHAPTER XVI.

AFTER the family dinner, at which the farmer's guest displayed more
than his usual powers of appetite, Kenelm followed his host towards the
stackyard, and said,--

"My dear Mr. Saunderson, though you have no longer any work for me to
do, and I ought not to trespass further on your hospitality, yet if I
might stay with you another day or so, I should be very grateful."

"My dear lad," cried the farmer, in whose estimation Kenelm had risen
prodigiously since the victory over Tom Bowles, "you are welcome to stay
as long as you like, and we shall be all sorry when you go. Indeed, at
all events, you must stay over Saturday, for you shall go with us to
the squire's harvest-supper. It will be a pretty sight, and my girls are
already counting on you for a dance."

"Saturday,--the day after to-morrow. You are very kind; but merrymakings
are not much in my way, and I think I shall be on my road before you set
off to the Squire's supper."

"Pooh! you shall stay; and, I say, young 'un, if you want more to do, I
have a job for you quite in your line."

"What is it?"

"Thrash my ploughman. He has been insolent this morning, and he is the
biggest fellow in the county, next to Tom Bowles."

Here the farmer laughed heartily, enjoying his own joke.

"Thank you for nothing," said Kenelm, rubbing his bruises. "A burnt
child dreads the fire."

The young man wandered alone into the fields. The day was becoming
overcast, and the clouds threatened rain. The air was exceedingly still;
the landscape, missing the sunshine, wore an aspect of gloomy solitude.
Kenelm came to the banks of the rivulet not far from the spot on which
the farmer had first found him. There he sat down, and leaned his cheek
on his hand, with eyes fixed on the still and darkened stream lapsing
mournfully away: sorrow entered into his heart and tinged its musings.

"Is it then true," said he, soliloquizing, "that I am born to pass
through life utterly alone; asking, indeed, for no sister-half of
myself, disbelieving its possibility, shrinking from the thought
of it,--half scorning, half pitying those who sigh for it?--thing
unattainable,--better sigh for the moon!

"Yet if other men sigh for it, why do I stand apart from them? If the
world be a stage, and all the men and women in it merely players, am I
to be the solitary spectator, with no part in the drama and no interest
in the vicissitudes of its plot? Many there are, no doubt, who covet as
little as I do the part of 'Lover,' 'with a woful ballad, made to his
mistress's eyebrow;' but then they covet some other part in the drama,
such as that of Soldier 'bearded as a pard,' or that of Justice 'in fair
round belly with fat capon lined.' But me no ambition fires: I have no
longing either to rise or to shine. I don't desire to be a colonel, nor
an admiral, nor a member of Parliament, nor an alderman; I do not yearn
for the fame of a wit, or a poet, or a philosopher, or a diner-out, or
a crack shot at a rifle-match or a _battue_. Decidedly, I am the one
looker-on, the one bystander, and have no more concern with the active
world than a stone has. It is a horrible phantasmal crotchet of Goethe,
that originally we were all monads, little segregated atoms adrift in
the atmosphere, and carried hither and thither by forces over which we
had no control, especially by the attraction of other monads, so
that one monad, compelled by porcine monads, crystallizes into a pig;
another, hurried along by heroic monads, becomes a lion or an Alexander.
Now it is quite clear," continued Kenelm, shifting his position and
crossing the right leg over the left, "that a monad intended or
fitted for some other planet may, on its way to that destination, be
encountered by a current of other monads blowing earthward, and be
caught up in the stream and whirled on, till, to the marring of
its whole proper purpose and scene of action, it settles
here,--conglomerated into a baby. Probably that lot has befallen me: my
monad, meant for another region in space, has been dropped into this,
where it can never be at home, never amalgamate with other monads nor
comprehend why they are in such a perpetual fidget. I declare I know
no more why the minds of human beings should be so restlessly agitated
about things which, as most of them own, give more pain than pleasure,
than I understand why that swarm of gnats, which has such a very short
time to live, does not give itself a moment's repose, but goes up and
down, rising and falling as if it were on a seesaw, and making as much
noise about its insignificant alternations of ascent and descent as if
it were the hum of men. And yet, perhaps, in another planet my monad
would have frisked and jumped and danced and seesawed with congenial
monads, as contentedly and as sillily as do the monads of men and gnats
in this alien Vale of Tears."

Kenelm had just arrived at that conjectural solution of his perplexities
when a voice was heard singing, or rather modulated to that kind of
chant between recitative and song, which is so pleasingly effective
where the intonations are pure and musical. They were so in this
instance, and Kenelm's ear caught every word in the following song:--


     CONTENT.

 "There are times when the troubles of life are still;
   The bees wandered lost in the depths of June,
  And I paused where the chime of a silver rill
   Sang the linnet and lark to their rest at noon.

 "Said my soul, 'See how calmly the wavelets glide,
   Though so narrow their way to their ocean vent;
  And the world that I traverse is wide, is wide,
   And yet is too narrow to hold content'

 "O my son, never say that the world is wide;
   The rill in its banks is less closely pent:
  It is thou who art shoreless on every side,
   And thy width will not let thee enclose content."


As the voice ceased Kenelm lifted his head. But the banks of the brook
were so curving and so clothed with brushwood that for some minutes the
singer was invisible. At last the boughs before him were put aside, and
within a few paces of himself paused the man to whom he had commended
the praises of a beefsteak, instead of those which minstrelsy in its
immemorial error dedicates to love.

"Sir," said Kenelm, half rising, "well met once more. Have you ever
listened to the cuckoo?"

"Sir," answered the minstrel, "have you ever felt the presence of the
summer?"

"Permit me to shake hands with you. I admire the question by which you
have countermet and rebuked my own. If you are not in a hurry, will you
sit down and let us talk?"

The minstrel inclined his head and seated himself. His dog--now emerged
from the brushwood--gravely approached Kenelm, who with greater gravity
regarded him; then, wagging his tail, reposed on his haunches,
intent with ear erect on a stir in the neighbouring reeds, evidently
considering whether it was caused by a fish or a water-rat.

"I asked you, sir, if you had ever listened to the cuckoo from no
irrelevant curiosity; for often on summer days, when one is talking with
one's self,--and, of course, puzzling one's self,--a voice breaks out,
as it were from the heart of Nature, so far is it and yet so near; and
it says something very quieting, very musical, so that one is tempted
inconsiderately and foolishly to exclaim, 'Nature replies to me.' The
cuckoo has served me that trick pretty often. Your song is a better
answer to a man's self-questionings than he can ever get from a cuckoo."

"I doubt that," said the minstrel. "Song, at the best, is but the echo
of some voice from the heart of Nature. And if the cuckoo's note seemed
to you such a voice, it was an answer to your questionings perhaps more
simply truthful than man can utter, if you had rightly construed the
language."

"My good friend," answered Kenelm, "what you say sounds very prettily;
and it contains a sentiment which has been amplified by certain critics
into that measureless domain of dunderheads which is vulgarly called
BOSH. But though Nature is never silent, though she abuses the privilege
of her age in being tediously gossiping and garrulous, Nature never
replies to our questions: she can't understand an argument; she has
never read Mr. Mill's work on Logic. In fact, as it is truly said by a
great philosopher, 'Nature has no mind.' Every man who addresses her is
compelled to force upon her for a moment the loan of his own mind. And
if she answers a question which his own mind puts to her, it is only
by such a reply as his own mind teaches to her parrot-like lips. And as
every man has a different mind, so every man gets a different answer.
Nature is a lying old humbug."

The minstrel laughed merrily; and his laugh was as sweet as his chant.

"Poets would have a great deal to unlearn if they are to look upon
Nature in that light."

"Bad poets would, and so much the better for them and their readers."

"Are not good poets students of Nature?"

"Students of Nature, certainly, as surgeons study anatomy by dissecting
a dead body. But the good poet, like the good surgeon, is the man who
considers that study merely as the necessary A B C, and not as the
all-in-all essential to skill in his practice. I do not give the fame
of a good surgeon to a man who fills a book with details, more or less
accurate, of fibres and nerves and muscles; and I don't give the fame of
a good poet to a man who makes an inventory of the Rhine or the Vale of
Gloucester. The good surgeon and the good poet are they who understand
the living man. What is that poetry of drama which Aristotle justly
ranks as the highest? Is it not a poetry in which description of
inanimate Nature must of necessity be very brief and general; in which
even the external form of man is so indifferent a consideration that it
will vary with each actor who performs the part? A Hamlet may be fair
or dark. A Macbeth may be short or tall. The merit of dramatic poetry
consists in the substituting for what is commonly called Nature (namely,
external and material Nature) creatures intellectual, emotional, but
so purely immaterial that they may be said to be all mind and soul,
accepting the temporary loans of any such bodies at hand as actors may
offer, in order to be made palpable and visible to the audience, but
needing no such bodies to be palpable and visible to readers. The
highest kind of poetry is therefore that which has least to do with
external Nature. But every grade has its merit more or less genuinely
great, according as it instils into Nature that which is not there,--the
reason and the soul of man."

"I am not much disposed," said the minstrel, "to acknowledge any one
form of poetry to be practically higher than another; that is, so far as
to elevate the poet who cultivates what you call the highest with some
success above the rank of the poet who cultivates what you call a very
inferior school with a success much more triumphant. In theory, dramatic
poetry may be higher than lyric, and 'Venice Preserved' is a very
successful drama; but I think Burns a greater poet than Otway."

"Possibly he may be; but I know of no lyrical poet, at least among the
moderns, who treats less of Nature as the mere outward form of things,
or more passionately animates her framework with his own human heart,
than does Robert Burns. Do you suppose when a Greek, in some perplexity
of reason or conscience, addressed a question to the oracular oak-leaves
of Dodona that the oak-leaves answered him? Don't you rather believe
that the question suggested by his mind was answered by the mind of
his fellow-man, the priest, who made the oak-leaves the mere vehicle
of communication, as you and I might make such vehicle in a sheet of
writing-paper? Is not the history of superstition a chronicle of the
follies of man in attempting to get answers from external Nature?"

"But," said the minstrel, "have I not somewhere heard or read that the
experiments of Science are the answers made by Nature to the questions
put to her by man?"

"They are the answers which his own mind suggests to her,--nothing more.
His mind studies the laws of matter, and in that study makes experiments
on matter; out of those experiments his mind, according to its previous
knowledge or natural acuteness, arrives at its own deductions, and
hence arise the sciences of mechanics and chemistry, etc. But the matter
itself gives no answer: the answer varies according to the mind that
puts the question; and the progress of science consists in the perpetual
correction of the errors and falsehoods which preceding minds conceived
to be the correct answers they received from Nature. It is the
supernatural within us,--namely, Mind,--which can alone guess at the
mechanism of the natural, namely, Matter. A stone cannot question a
stone."

The minstrel made no reply. And there was a long silence, broken but by
the hum of the insects, the ripple of onward waves, and the sigh of the
wind through reeds.



CHAPTER XVII.

SAID Kenelm, at last breaking silence--


     "'Rapiamus, amici,
   Occasionem de die, dumque virent genua,
   Et decet, obducta solvatur fronte senectus!'"


"Is not that quotation from Horace?" asked the minstrel.

"Yes; and I made it insidiously, in order to see if you had not acquired
what is called a classical education."

"I might have received such education, if my tastes and my destinies
had not withdrawn me in boyhood from studies of which I did not then
comprehend the full value. But I did pick up a smattering of Latin at
school; and from time to time since I left school I have endeavoured to
gain some little knowledge of the most popular Latin poets; chiefly, I
own to my shame, by the help of literal English translations."

"As a poet yourself, I am not sure that it would be an advantage to know
a dead language so well that its forms and modes of thought ran,
though perhaps unconsciously, into those of the living one in which you
compose. Horace might have been a still better poet if he had not known
Greek better than you know Latin."

"It is at least courteous in you to say so," answered the singer, with a
pleased smile.

"You would be still more courteous," said Kenelm, "if you would pardon
an impertinent question, and tell me whether it is for a wager that you
wander through the land, Homer-like, as a wandering minstrel, and allow
that intelligent quadruped your companion to carry a tray in his mouth
for the reception of pennies?"

"No, it is not for a wager; it is a whim of mine, which I fancy from
the tone of your conversation you could understand, being apparently
somewhat whimsical yourself."

"So far as whim goes, be assured of my sympathy."

"Well, then, though I follow a calling by the exercise of which I secure
a modest income, my passion is verse. If the seasons were always summer,
and life were always youth, I should like to pass through the world
singing. But I have never ventured to publish any verses of mine. If
they fell still-born it would give me more pain than such wounds to
vanity ought to give to a bearded man; and if they were assailed or
ridiculed it might seriously injure me in my practical vocation. That
last consideration, were I quite alone in the world, might not much
weigh on me; but there are others for whose sake I should like to make
fortune and preserve station. Many years ago--it was in Germany--I fell
in with a German student who was very poor, and who did make money by
wandering about the country with lute and song. He has since become a
poet of no mean popularity, and he has told me that he is sure he found
the secret of that popularity in habitually consulting popular tastes
during his roving apprenticeship to song. His example strongly impressed
me. So I began this experiment; and for several years my summers have
been all partly spent in this way. I am only known, as I think I told
you before, in the rounds I take as 'The Wandering Minstrel;' I receive
the trifling moneys that are bestowed on me as proofs of a certain
merit. I should not be paid by poor people if I did not please; and the
songs which please them best are generally those I love best myself.
For the rest, my time is not thrown away,--not only as regards bodily
health, but healthfulness of mind: all the current of one's ideas
becomes so freshened by months of playful exercise and varied
adventure."

"Yes, the adventure is varied enough," said Kenelm, somewhat ruefully;
for he felt, in shifting his posture, a sharp twinge of his bruised
muscles. "But don't you find those mischief-makers, the women, always
mix themselves up with adventure?"

"Bless them! of course," said the minstrel, with a ringing laugh. "In
life, as on the stage, the petticoat interest is always the strongest."

"I don't agree with you there," said Kenelm, dryly. "And you seem to
me to utter a claptrap beneath the rank of your understanding. However,
this warm weather indisposes one to disputation; and I own that a
petticoat, provided it be red, is not without the interest of colour in
a picture."

"Well, young gentleman," said the minstrel, rising, "the day is wearing
on, and I must wish you good-by; probably, if you were to ramble about
the country as I do, you would see too many pretty girls not to teach
you the strength of petticoat interest,--not in pictures alone; and
should I meet you again I may find you writing love-verses yourself."

"After a conjecture so unwarrantable, I part company with you less
reluctantly than I otherwise might do. But I hope we shall meet again."

"Your wish flatters me much; but, if we do, pray respect the confidence
I have placed in you, and regard my wandering minstrelsy and my dog's
tray as sacred secrets. Should we not so meet, it is but a prudent
reserve on my part if I do not give you my right name and address."

"There you show the cautious common-sense which belongs rarely to lovers
of verse and petticoat interest. What have you done with your guitar?"

"I do not pace the roads with that instrument: it is forwarded to me
from town to town under a borrowed name, together with other raiment
that this, should I have cause to drop my character of wandering
minstrel."

The two men here exchanged a cordial shake of the hand. And as the
minstrel went his way along the river-side, his voice in chanting seemed
to lend to the wavelets a livelier murmur, to the reeds a less plaintive
sigh.



CHAPTER XVIII.

IN his room, solitary and brooding, sat the defeated hero of a hundred
fights. It was now twilight; but the shutters had been partially closed
all day, in order to exclude the sun, which had never before been
unwelcome to Tom Bowles, and they still remained so, making the twilight
doubly twilight, till the harvest moon, rising early, shot its ray
through the crevice, and forced a silvery track amid the shadows of the
floor.

The man's head drooped on his breast; his strong hands rested
listlessly on his knees: his attitude was that of utter despondency and
prostration. But in the expression of his face there were the signs of
some dangerous and restless thought which belied not the gloom but the
stillness of the posture. His brow, which was habitually open and
frank, in its defying aggressive boldness, was now contracted into deep
furrows, and lowered darkly over his downcast, half-closed eyes. His
lips were so tightly compressed that the face lost its roundness, and
the massive bone of the jaw stood out hard and salient. Now and then,
indeed, the lips opened, giving vent to a deep, impatient sigh, but they
reclosed as quickly as they had parted. It was one of those crises in
life which find all the elements that make up a man's former self in
lawless anarchy; in which the Evil One seems to enter and direct the
storm; in which a rude untutored mind, never before harbouring a thought
of crime, sees the crime start up from an abyss, feels it to be an
enemy, yet yields to it as a fate. So that when, at the last, some
wretch, sentenced to the gibbet, shudderingly looks back to the moment
"that trembled between two worlds,"--the world of the man guiltless,
the world of the man guilty,--he says to the holy, highly educated,
rational, passionless priest who confesses him and calls him "brother,"
"The devil put it into my head."

At that moment the door opened; at its threshold there stood the man's
mother--whom he had never allowed to influence his conduct, though he
loved her well in his rough way--and the hated fellow-man whom he longed
to see dead at his feet. The door reclosed: the mother was gone, without
a word, for her tears choked her; the fellow-man was alone with him. Tom
Bowles looked up, recognized his visitor, cleared his brow, and rubbed
his mighty hands.



CHAPTER XIX.

KENELM CHILLINGLY drew a chair close to his antagonist's, and silently
laid a hand on his.

Tom Bowles took up the hand in both his own, turned it curiously towards
the moonlight, gazed at it, poised it, then with a sound between groan
and laugh tossed it away as a thing hostile but trivial, rose and locked
the door, came back to his seat and said bluffly,--

"What do you want with me now?"

"I want to ask you a favour."

"Favour?"

"The greatest which man can ask from man,--friendship. You see, my dear
Tom," continued Kenelm, making himself quite at home, throwing his arm
over the back of Tom's chair, and stretching his legs comfortably as
one does by one's own fireside; "you see, my dear Tom, that men like
us--young, single, not on the whole bad-looking as men go--can
find sweethearts in plenty. If one does not like us, another will;
sweethearts are sown everywhere like nettles and thistles. But the
rarest thing in life is a friend. Now, tell me frankly, in the course
of your wanderings did you ever come into a village where you could not
have got a sweetheart if you had asked for one; and if, having got
a sweetheart, you had lost her, do you think you would have had any
difficulty in finding another? But have you such a thing in the world,
beyond the pale of your own family, as a true friend,--a man friend; and
supposing that you had such a friend,--a friend who would stand by you
through thick and thin; who would tell you your faults to your face, and
praise you for your good qualities behind your back; who would do all
he could to save you from a danger, and all he could to get you out of
one,--supposing you had such a friend and lost him, do you believe that
if you lived to the age of Methuselah you could find another? You don't
answer me; you are silent. Well, Tom, I ask you to be such a friend to
me, and I will be such a friend to you."

Tom was so thoroughly "taken aback" by this address that he remained
dumfounded. But he felt as if the clouds in his soul were breaking, and
a ray of sunlight were forcing its way through the sullen darkness.
At length, however, the receding rage within him returned, though with
vacillating step, and he growled between his teeth,--

"A pretty friend indeed, robbing me of my girl! Go along with you!"

"She was not your girl any more than she was or ever can be mine."

"What, you be n't after her?"

"Certainly not; I am going to Luscombe, and I ask you to come with me.
Do you think I am going to leave you here?"

"What is it to you?"

"Everything. Providence has permitted me to save you from the most
lifelong of all sorrows. For--think! Can any sorrow be more lasting
than had been yours if you had attained your wish; if you had forced or
frightened a woman to be your partner till death do part,--you loving
her, she loathing you; you conscious, night and day, that your very love
had insured her misery, and that misery haunting you like a ghost!--that
sorrow I have saved you. May Providence permit me to complete my work,
and save you also from the most irredeemable of all crimes! Look into
your soul, then recall the thoughts which all day long, and not least at
the moment I crossed this threshold, were rising up, making reason dumb
and conscience blind, and then lay your hand on your heart and say, 'I
am guiltless of a dream of murder.'"

The wretched man sprang up erect, menacing, and, meeting Kenelm's calm,
steadfast, pitying gaze, dropped no less suddenly,--dropped on the
floor, covered his face with his hands, and a great cry came forth
between sob and howl.

"Brother," said Kenelm, kneeling beside him, and twining his arm round
the man's heaving breast, "it is over now; with that cry the demon that
maddened you has fled forever."



CHAPTER XX.

WHEN, some time after, Kenelm quitted the room and joined Mrs. Bowles
below, he said cheerily, "All right; Tom and I are sworn friends. We are
going together to Luscombe the day after to-morrow,--Sunday; just write
a line to his uncle to prepare him for Tom's visit, and send thither
his clothes, as we shall walk, and steal forth unobserved betimes in
the morning. Now go up and talk to him; he wants a mother's soothing and
petting. He is a noble fellow at heart, and we shall be all proud of him
some day or other."

As he walked towards the farmhouse, Kenelm encountered Mr. Lethbridge,
who said, "I have come from Mr. Saunderson's, where I went in search of
you. There is an unexpected hitch in the negotiation for Mrs. Bawtrey's
shop. After seeing you this morning I fell in with Mr. Travers's
bailiff, and he tells me that her lease does not give her the power
to sublet without the Squire's consent; and that as the premises were
originally let on very low terms to a favoured and responsible tenant,
Mr. Travers cannot be expected to sanction the transfer of the lease
to a poor basket-marker: in fact, though he will accept Mrs. Bawtrey's
resignation, it must be in favour of an applicant whom he desires to
oblige. On hearing this, I rode over to the Park and saw Mr. Travers
himself. But he was obdurate to my pleadings. All I could get him to say
was, 'Let the stranger who interests himself in the matter come and talk
to me. I should like to see the man who thrashed that brute Tom Bowles:
if he got the better of him perhaps he may get the better of me. Bring
him with you to my harvest-supper to-morrow evening.' Now, will you
come?"

"Nay," said Kenelm, reluctantly; "but if he only asks me in order to
gratify a very vulgar curiosity, I don't think I have much chance of
serving Will Somers. What do you say?"

"The Squire is a good man of business, and, though no one can call him
unjust or grasping, still he is very little touched by sentiment; and
we must own that a sickly cripple like poor Will is not a very eligible
tenant. If, therefore, it depended only on your chance with the Squire,
I should not be very sanguine. But we have an ally in his daughter. She
is very fond of Jessie Wiles, and she has shown great kindness to Will.
In fact, a sweeter, more benevolent, sympathizing nature than that of
Cecilia Travers does not exist. She has great influence with her father,
and through her you may win him."

"I particularly dislike having anything to do with women," said Kenelm,
churlishly. "Parsons are accustomed to get round them. Surely, my dear
sir, you are more fit for that work than I am."

"Permit me humbly to doubt that proposition; one does n't get very
quickly round the women when one carries the weight of years on one's
back. But whenever you want the aid of a parson to bring your own wooing
to a happy conclusion, I shall be happy, in my special capacity of
parson, to perform the ceremony required."

"_Dii meliora_!" said Kenelm, gravely. "Some ills are too serious to be
approached even in joke. As for Miss Travers, the moment you call her
benevolent you inspire me with horror. I know too well what a benevolent
girl is,--officious, restless, fidgety, with a snub nose, and her pocket
full of tracts. I will not go to the harvest-supper."

"Hist!" said the Parson, softly. They were now passing the cottage of
Mrs. Somers; and while Kenelm was haranguing against benevolent girls,
Mr. Lethbridge had paused before it, and was furtively looking in at the
window. "Hist! and come here,--gently."

Kenelm obeyed, and looked in through the window. Will was seated; Jessie
Wiles had nestled herself at his feet, and was holding his hand in both
hers, looking up into his face. Her profile alone was seen, but its
expression was unutterably soft and tender. His face, bent downwards
towards her, wore a mournful expression; nay, the tears were rolling
silently down his cheeks. Kenelm listened and heard her say, "Don't talk
so, Will, you break my heart; it is I who am not worthy of you."

"Parson," said Kenelm, as they walked on, "I must go to that confounded
harvest-supper. I begin to think there is something true in the
venerable platitude about love in a cottage. And Will Somers must be
married in haste, in order to repent at leisure."

"I don't see why a man should repent having married a good girl whom he
loves."

"You don't? Answer me candidly. Did you ever meet a man who repented
having married?"

"Of course I have; very often."

"Well, think again, and answer as candidly. Did you ever meet a man who
repented not having married?"

The Parson mused, and was silent.

"Sir," said Kenelm, "your reticence proves your honesty, and I respect
it." So saying, he bounded off, and left the Parson crying out wildly,
"But--but--"



CHAPTER XXI.

MR. SAUNDERSON and Kenelm sat in the arbour: the former sipping his grog
and smoking his pipe; the latter looking forth into the summer night
skies with an earnest yet abstracted gaze, as if he were trying to count
the stars in the Milky Way.

"Ha!" said Mr. Saunderson, who was concluding an argument; "you see it
now, don't you?"

"I? not a bit of it. You tell me that your grandfather was a farmer,
and your father was a farmer, and that you have been a farmer for thirty
years; and from these premises you deduce the illogical and irrational
conclusion that therefore your son must be a farmer."

"Young man, you may think yourself very knowing 'cause you have been at
the 'Varsity, and swept away a headful of book-learning."

"Stop," quoth Kenelm. "You grant that a university is learned."

"Well, I suppose so."

"But how could it be learned if those who quitted it brought the
learning away? We leave it all behind us in the care of the tutors. But
I know what you were going to say,--that it is not because I had read
more books than you have that I was to give myself airs and pretend to
have more knowledge of life than a man of your years and experience.
Agreed, as a general rule. But does not every doctor, however wise and
skilful, prefer taking another doctor's opinion about himself, even
though that other doctor has just started in practice? And seeing that
doctors, taking them as a body, are monstrous clever fellows, is not
the example they set us worth following? Does it not prove that no man,
however wise, is a good judge of his own case? Now, your son's case
is really your case: you see it through the medium of your likings and
dislikings; and insist upon forcing a square peg into a round hole,
because in a round hole you, being a round peg, feel tight and
comfortable. Now I call that irrational."

"I don't see why my son has any right to fancy himself a square peg,"
said the farmer, doggedly, "when his father and his grandfather and his
great-grandfather have been round pegs; and it is agin' nature for
any creature not to take after its own kind. A dog is a pointer or
a sheep-dog according as its forebears were pointers or sheep-dogs.
There," cried the farmer, triumphantly, shaking the ashes out of his
pipe. "I think I have posed you, young master!"

"No; for you have taken it for granted that the breeds have not been
crossed. But suppose that a sheep-dog has married a pointer, are you
sure that his son will not be more of a pointer than a sheep-dog?"

Mr. Saunderson arrested himself in the task of refilling his pipe, and
scratched his head.

"You see," continued Kenelm, "that you have crossed the breed. You
married a tradesman's daughter, and I dare say her grandfather and
great-grandfather were tradesmen too. Now, most sons take after their
mothers, and therefore Mr. Saunderson junior takes after his kind on the
distaff side, and comes into the world a square peg, which can only be
tight and comfortable in a square hole. It is no use arguing, Farmer:
your boy must go to his uncle; and there's an end of the matter."

"By goles!" said the farmer, "you seem to think you can talk me out of
my senses."

"No; but I think if you had your own way you would talk your son into
the workhouse."

"What! by sticking to the land like his father before him? Let a man
stick by the land, and the land will stick by him."

"Let a man stick in the mud, and the mud will stick to him. You put
your heart in your farm, and your son would only put his foot into it.
Courage! Don't you see that Time is a whirligig, and all things come
round? Every day somebody leaves the land and goes off into trade. By
and by he grows rich, and then his great desire is to get back to
the land again. He left it the son of a farmer: he returns to it as a
squire. Your son, when he gets to be fifty, will invest his savings in
acres, and have tenants of his own. Lord, how he will lay down the law
to them! I would not advise you to take a farm under him."

"Catch me at it!" said the farmer. "He would turn all the contents of
the 'pothecary's shop into my fallows, and call it 'progress.'"

"Let him physic the fallows when he has farms of his own: keep yours out
of his chemical clutches. Come, I shall tell him to pack up and be off
to his uncle's next week?"

"Well, well," said the farmer, in a resigned tone: "a wilful man must
e'en have his way."

"And the best thing a sensible man can do is not to cross it. Mr.
Saunderson, give me your honest hand. You are one of those men who put
the sons of good fathers in mind of their own; and I think of mine when
I say 'God bless you!'"

Quitting the farmer, Kenelm re-entered the house, and sought Mr.
Saunderson junior in his own room. He found that young gentleman still
up, and reading an eloquent tract on the Emancipation of the Human Race
from all Tyrannical Control,--Political, Social, Ecclesiastical, and
Domestic.

The lad looked up sulkily, and said, on encountering Kenelm's
melancholic visage, "Ah! I see you have talked with the old governor,
and he'll not hear of it."

"In the first place," answered Kenelm, "since you value yourself on
a superior education, allow me to advise you to study the English
language, as the forms of it are maintained by the elder authors, whom,
in spite of an Age of Progress, men of superior education esteem. No one
who has gone through that study; no one, indeed, who has studied the Ten
Commandments in the vernacular,--commits the mistake of supposing that
'the old governor' is a synonymous expression for 'father.' In the
second place, since you pretend to the superior enlightenment which
results from a superior education, learn to know better your own self
before you set up as a teacher of mankind. Excuse the liberty I take,
as your sincere well-wisher, when I tell you that you are at present
a conceited fool,--in short, that which makes one boy call another an
'ass.' But when one has a poor head he may redeem the average balance of
humanity by increasing the wealth of the heart. Try and increase yours.
Your father consents to your choice of your lot at the sacrifice of
all his own inclinations. This is a sore trial to a father's pride, a
father's affection; and few fathers make such sacrifices with a good
grace. I have thus kept my promise to you, and enforced your wishes on
Mr. Saunderson's judgment, because I am sure you would have been a very
bad farmer. It now remains for you to show that you can be a very good
tradesman. You are bound in honour to me and to your father to try your
best to be so; and meanwhile leave the task of upsetting the world
to those who have no shop in it, which would go crash in the general
tumble. And so good-night to you."

To these admonitory words, _sacro digna silentio_, Saunderson junior
listened with a dropping jaw and fascinated staring eyes. He felt like
an infant to whom the nurse has given a hasty shake, and who is too
stupefied by that operation to know whether he is hurt or not.

A minute after Kenelm had quitted the room he reappeared at the door,
and said in a conciliatory whisper, "Don't take it to heart that I
called you a conceited fool and an ass. These terms are no doubt just as
applicable to myself. But there is a more conceited fool and a greater
ass than either of us; and that is the Age in which we have the
misfortune to be born,--an Age of Progress, Mr. Saunderson, junior!--an
Age of Prigs."




BOOK III.



CHAPTER I.

IF there were a woman in the world who might be formed and fitted
to reconcile Kenelm Chillingly to the sweet troubles of love and the
pleasant bickerings of wedded life, one might reasonably suppose that
that woman could be found in Cecilia Travers. An only daughter and
losing her mother in childhood, she had been raised to the mistress-ship
of a household at an age in which most girls are still putting their
dolls to bed; and thus had early acquired that sense of responsibility,
accompanied with the habits of self-reliance, which seldom fails to give
a certain nobility to character; though almost as often, in the case of
women, it steals away the tender gentleness which constitutes the charm
of their sex.

It had not done so in the instance of Cecilia Travers, because she was
so womanlike that even the exercise of power could not make her manlike.
There was in the depth of her nature such an instinct of sweetness that
wherever her mind toiled and wandered it gathered and hoarded honey.

She had one advantage over most girls in the same rank of life,--she
had not been taught to fritter away such capacities for culture as
Providence gave her in the sterile nothingnesses which are called
feminine accomplishments. She did not paint figures out of drawing
in meagre water-colours; she had not devoted years of her life to the
inflicting on polite audiences the boredom of Italian bravuras, which
they could hear better sung by a third-rate professional singer in
a metropolitan music-hall. I am afraid she had no other female
accomplishments than those by which the sempstress or embroideress earns
her daily bread. That sort of work she loved, and she did it deftly.

But if she had not been profitlessly plagued by masters, Cecilia Travers
had been singularly favoured by her father's choice of a teacher: no
great merit in him either. He had a prejudice against professional
governesses, and it chanced that among his own family connections was a
certain Mrs. Campion, a lady of some literary distinction, whose husband
had held a high situation in one of our public offices, and living, much
to his satisfaction, up to a very handsome income, had died, much to the
astonishment of others, without leaving a farthing behind him.

Fortunately, there were no children to provide for. A small government
pension was allotted to the widow; and as her husband's house had been
made by her one of the pleasantest in London, she was popular enough to
be invited by numerous friends to their country seats; among others, by
Mr. Travers. She came intending to stay a fortnight. At the end of that
time she had grown so attached to Cecilia, and Cecilia to her, and her
presence had become so pleasant and so useful to her host, that
the Squire entreated her to stay and undertake the education of his
daughter. Mrs. Campion, after some hesitation, gratefully consented; and
thus Cecilia, from the age of eight to her present age of nineteen, had
the inestimable advantage of living in constant companionship with a
woman of richly cultivated mind, accustomed to hear the best criticisms
on the best books, and adding to no small accomplishment in literature
the refinement of manners and that sort of prudent judgment which result
from habitual intercourse with an intellectual and gracefully world-wise
circle of society: so that Cecilia herself, without being at all blue or
pedantic, became one of those rare young women with whom a well-educated
man can converse on equal terms; from whom he gains as much as he can
impart to her; while a man who, not caring much about books, is still
gentleman enough to value good breeding, felt a relief in exchanging the
forms of his native language without the shock of hearing that a bishop
was "a swell" or a croquet-party "awfully jolly."

In a word, Cecilia was one of those women whom Heaven forms for man's
helpmate; who, if he were born to rank and wealth, would, as his
partner, reflect on them a new dignity, and add to their enjoyment by
bringing forth their duties; who, not less if the husband she chose were
poor and struggling, would encourage, sustain, and soothe him, take her
own share of his burdens, and temper the bitterness of life with the
all-recompensing sweetness of her smile.

Little, indeed, as yet had she ever thought of love or of lovers. She
had not even formed to herself any of those ideals which float before
the eyes of most girls when they enter their teens. But of two things
she felt inly convinced: first, that she could never wed where she did
not love; and secondly, that where she did love it would be for life.

And now I close this sketch with a picture of the girl herself. She has
just come into her room from inspecting the preparations for the evening
entertainment which her father is to give to his tenants and rural
neighbours.

She has thrown aside her straw hat, and put down the large basket which
she has emptied of flowers. She pauses before the glass, smoothing back
the ruffled bands of her hair,--hair of a dark, soft chestnut, silky
and luxuriant,--never polluted, and never, so long as she lives, to be
polluted by auricomous cosmetics, far from that delicate darkness, every
tint of the colours traditionally dedicated to the locks of Judas.

Her complexion, usually of that soft bloom which inclines to paleness,
is now heightened into glow by exercise and sunlight. The features are
small and feminine; the eyes dark with long lashes; the mouth singularly
beautiful, with a dimple on either side, and parted now in a half-smile
at some pleasant recollection, giving a glimpse of small teeth
glistening as pearls. But the peculiar charm of her face is in an
expression of serene happiness, that sort of happiness which seems as if
it had never been interrupted by a sorrow, had never been troubled by a
sin,--that holy kind of happiness which belongs to innocence, the light
reflected from a heart and conscience alike at peace.



CHAPTER II.

IT was a lovely summer evening for the Squire's rural entertainment. Mr.
Travers had some guests staying with him: they had dined early for
the occasion, and were now grouped with their host a little before six
o'clock on the lawn. The house was of irregular architecture, altered
or added to at various periods from the reign of Elizabeth to that of
Victoria: at one end, the oldest part, a gable with mullion windows;
at the other, the newest part, a flat-roofed wing, with modern sashes
opening to the ground, the intermediate part much hidden by a veranda
covered with creepers in full bloom. The lawn was a spacious table-land
facing the west, and backed by a green and gentle hill, crowned with
the ruins of an ancient priory. On one side of the lawn stretched a
flower-garden and pleasure-ground, originally planned by Repton; on the
opposite angles of the sward were placed two large marquees,--one for
dancing, the other for supper. Towards the south the view was left open,
and commanded the prospect of an old English park, not of the stateliest
character; not intersected with ancient avenues, nor clothed
with profitless fern as lairs for deer: but the park of a careful
agriculturist, uniting profit with show, the sward duly drained and
nourished, fit to fatten bullocks in an incredibly short time, and
somewhat spoilt to the eye by subdivisions of wire fence. Mr. Travers
was renowned for skilful husbandry, and the general management of
land to the best advantage. He had come into the estate while still in
childhood, and thus enjoyed the accumulations of a long minority. He had
entered the Guards at the age of eighteen, and having more command of
money than most of his contemporaries, though they might be of higher
rank and the sons of richer men, he had been much courted and much
plundered. At the age of twenty-five he found himself one of the leaders
of fashion, renowned chiefly for reckless daring where-ever honour could
be plucked out of the nettle danger: a steeple-chaser, whose exploits
made a quiet man's hair stand on end; a rider across country, taking
leaps which a more cautious huntsman carefully avoided. Known at Paris
as well as in London, he had been admired by ladies whose smiles had
cost him duels, the marks of which still remained in glorious scars
on his person. No man ever seemed more likely to come to direst
grief before attaining the age of thirty, for at twenty-seven all the
accumulations of his minority were gone; and his estate, which, when he
came of age, was scarcely three thousand a year, but entirely at his own
disposal, was mortgaged up to its eyes.

His friends began to shake their heads and call him "poor fellow;" but,
with all his wild faults, Leopold Travers had been wholly pure from the
two vices out of which a man does not often redeem himself. He had never
drunk and he had never gambled. His nerves were not broken, his brain
was not besotted. There was plenty of health in him yet, mind and body.
At the critical period of his life he married for love, and his choice
was a most felicitous one. The lady had no fortune; but though handsome
and high-born, she had no taste for extravagance, and no desire for
other society than that of the man she loved. So when he said, "Let us
settle in the country and try our best to live on a few hundreds, lay
by, and keep the old place out of the market," she consented with a
joyful heart: and marvel it was to all how this wild Leopold Travers
did settle down; did take to cultivating his home farm with his men from
sunrise to sunset like a common tenant-farmer; did contrive to pay the
interest on the mortgages, and keep his head above water. After some
years of pupilage in this school of thrift, during which his habits
became formed and his whole character braced, Leopold Travers suddenly
found himself again rich, through the wife whom he had so prudently
married without other dower than her love and her virtues. Her only
brother, Lord Eagleton, a Scotch peer, had been engaged in marriage to a
young lady, considered to be a rare prize in the lottery of wedlock.
The marriage was broken off under very disastrous circumstances; but the
young lord, good-looking and agreeable, was naturally expected to seek
speedy consolation in some other alliance. Nevertheless he did not
do so: he became a confirmed invalid, and died single, leaving to his
sister all in his power to save from the distant kinsman who succeeded
to his lands and title,--a goodly sum, which not only sufficed to pay
off the mortgages on Neesdale Park but bestowed on its owner a surplus
which the practical knowledge of country life that he had acquired
enabled him to devote with extraordinary profit to the general
improvement of his estate. He replaced tumble-down old farm buildings
with new constructions on the most approved principles; bought or
pensioned off certain slovenly incompetent tenants; threw sundry petty
holdings into large farms suited to the buildings he constructed;
purchased here and there small bits of land, commodious to the farms
they adjoined, and completing the integrity of his ring-fence; stubbed
up profitless woods which diminished the value of neighbouring arables
by obstructing sun and air and harbouring legions of rabbits; and
then, seeking tenants of enterprise and capital, more than doubled his
original yearly rental, and perhaps more than tripled the market value
of his property. Simultaneously with this acquisition of fortune, he
emerged from the inhospitable and unsocial obscurity which his previous
poverty had compelled, took an active part in county business, proved
himself an excellent speaker at public meetings, subscribed liberally to
the hunt, and occasionally joined in it,--a less bold but a wiser rider
than of yore. In short, as Themistocles boasted that he could make a
small state great, so Leopold Travers might boast with equal truth,
that, by his energies, his judgment, and the weight of his personal
character, he had made the owner of a property which had been at
his accession to it of third-rate rank in the county a personage so
considerable that no knight of the shire against whom he declared could
have been elected, and if he had determined to stand himself he would
have been chosen free of expense.

But he said, on being solicited to become a candidate, "When a man once
gives himself up to the care and improvement of a landed estate, he
has no time and no heart for anything else. An estate is an income or
a kingdom, according as the owner chooses to take it. I take it as a
kingdom, and I cannot be _roi faineant_, with a steward for _maire du
palais_. A king does not go into the House of Commons."

Three years after this rise in the social ladder, Mrs. Travers was
seized with congestion of the lungs followed by pleurisy, and died after
less than a week's illness. Leopold never wholly recovered her loss.
Though still young and always handsome, the idea of another wife, the
love of another woman, were notions which he dismissed from his, mind
with a quiet scorn. He was too masculine a creature to parade grief.
For some weeks, indeed, he shut himself up in his own room, so rigidly
secluded that he would not see even his daughter. But one morning he
appeared in his fields as usual, and from that day resumed his old
habits, and gradually renewed that cordial interchange of hospitalities
which had popularly distinguished him since his accession to wealth.
Still people felt that the man was changed; he was more taciturn,
more grave: if always just in his dealings, he took the harder side of
justice, where in his wife's time he had taken the gentler. Perhaps, to
a man of strong will, the habitual intercourse with an amiable woman is
essential for those occasions in which Will best proves the fineness of
its temper by the facility with which it can be bent.

It may be said that Leopold Travers might have found such intercourse in
the intimate companionship of his own daughter. But she was a mere child
when his wife died, and she grew up to womanhood too insensibly for
him to note the change. Besides, where a man has found a wife his
all-in-all, a daughter can never supply her place. The very reverence
due to children precludes unrestrained confidence; and there is not
that sense of permanent fellowship in a daughter which a man has in a
wife,--any day a stranger may appear and carry her off from him. At all
events Leopold did not own in Cecilia the softening influence to
which he had yielded in her mother. He was fond of her, proud of her,
indulgent to her; but the indulgence had its set limits. Whatever she
asked solely for herself he granted; whatever she wished for matters
under feminine control--the domestic household, the parish school, the
alms-receiving poor--obtained his gentlest consideration. But when she
had been solicited by some offending out-of-door dependant or some petty
defaulting tenant to use her good offices in favour of the culprit, Mr.
Travers checked her interference by a firm "No," though uttered in a
mild accent, and accompanied with a masculine aphorism to the effect
that "there would be no such things as strict justice and disciplined
order in the world if a man yielded to a woman's pleadings in any matter
of business between man and man." From this it will be seen that
Mr. Lethbridge had overrated the value of Cecilia's alliance in the
negotiation respecting Mrs. Bawtrey's premium and shop.



CHAPTER III.

IF, having just perused what has thus been written on the biographical
antecedents and mental characteristics of Leopold Travers, you, my dear
reader, were to be personally presented to that gentleman as he now
stands, the central figure of the group gathered round him, on his
terrace, you would probably be surprised,--nay, I have no doubt you
would say to yourself, "Not at all the sort of man I expected." In that
slender form, somewhat below the middle height; in that fair countenance
which still, at the age of forty-eight, retains a delicacy of feature
and of colouring which is of almost womanlike beauty, and, from the
quiet placidity of its expression, conveys at first glance the notion of
almost womanlike mildness,--it would be difficult to recognize a man who
in youth had been renowned for reckless daring, in maturer years more
honourably distinguished for steadfast prudence and determined purpose,
and who, alike in faults or in merits, was as emphatically masculine as
a biped in trousers can possibly be.

Mr. Travers is listening to a young man of about two and twenty, the
eldest son of the richest nobleman of the county, and who intends to
start for the representation of the shire at the next general election,
which is close at hand. The Hon. George Belvoir is tall, inclined to be
stout, and will look well on the hustings. He has had those pains taken
with his education which an English peer generally does take with the
son intended to succeed to the representation of an honourable name and
the responsibilities of high station. If eldest sons do not often make
as great a figure in the world as their younger brothers, it is not
because their minds are less cultivated, but because they have less
motive power for action. George Belvoir was well read, especially
in that sort of reading which befits a future senator,--history,
statistics, political economy, so far as that dismal science is
compatible with the agricultural interest. He was also well-principled,
had a strong sense of discipline and duty, was prepared in politics
firmly to uphold as right whatever was proposed by his own party, and
to reject as wrong whatever was proposed by the other. At present he was
rather loud and noisy in the assertion of his opinions,--young men fresh
from the University generally are. It was the secret wish of Mr. Travers
that George Belvoir should become his son-in-law; less because of his
rank and wealth (though such advantages were not of a nature to be
despised by a practical man like Leopold Travers) than on account of
those qualities in his personal character which were likely to render
him an excellent husband.

Seated on wire benches, just without the veranda, but shaded by its
fragrant festoons, were Mrs. Campion and three ladies, the wives of
neighbouring squires. Cecilia stood a little apart from them, bending
over a long-backed Skye terrier, whom she was teaching to stand on his
hind legs.

But see, the company are arriving! How suddenly that green space, ten
minutes ago so solitary, has become animated and populous!

Indeed the park now presented a very lively appearance: vans, carts, and
farmers' chaises were seen in crowded procession along the winding road;
foot-passengers were swarming towards the house in all directions. The
herds and flocks in the various enclosures stopped grazing to stare at
the unwonted invaders of their pasture: yet the orderly nature of their
host imparted a respect for order to his ruder visitors; not even a
turbulent boy attempted to scale the fences, or creep through their
wires; all threaded the narrow turnstiles which gave egress from one
subdivision of the sward to another.

Mr. Travers turned to George Belvoir: "I see old farmer Steen's
yellow gig. Mind how you talk to him, George. He is full of whims and
crotchets, and if you once brush his feathers the wrong way he will be
as vindictive as a parrot. But he is the man who must second you at
the nomination. No other tenant-farmer carries the same weight with his
class."

"I suppose," said George, "that if Mr. Steen is the best man to second
me at the hustings, he is a good speaker?"

"A good speaker? in one sense he is. He never says a word too much. The
last time he seconded the nomination of the man you are to succeed, this
was his speech: 'Brother Electors, for twenty years I have been one of
the judges at our county cattle-show. I know one animal from another.
Looking at the specimens before us to-day none of them are as good
of their kind as I've seen elsewhere. But if you choose Sir John Hogg
you'll not get the wrong sow by the ear!'"

"At least," said George, after a laugh at this sample of eloquence
unadorned, "Mr. Steen does not err on the side of flattery in his
commendations of a candidate. But what makes him such an authority with
the farmers? Is he a first-rate agriculturist?"

"In thrift, yes!--in spirit, no! He says that all expensive experiments
should be left to gentlemen farmers. He is an authority with other
tenants: firstly, because he is a very keen censor of their landlords;
secondly, because he holds himself thoroughly independent of his own;
thirdly, because he is supposed to have studied the political bearings
of questions that affect the landed interest, and has more than once
been summoned to give his opinion on such subjects to Committees of both
Houses of Parliament. Here he comes. Observe, when I leave you to talk
to him: firstly, that you confess utter ignorance of practical farming;
nothing enrages him like the presumption of a gentleman farmer like
myself: secondly, that you ask his opinion on the publication of
Agricultural Statistics, just modestly intimating that you, as at
present advised, think that inquisitorial researches into a man's
business involve principles opposed to the British Constitution. And on
all that he may say as to the shortcomings of landlords in general, and
of your father in particular, make no reply, but listen with an air of
melancholy conviction. How do you do, Mr. Steen, and how's the mistress?
Why have you not brought her with you?"

"My good woman is in the straw again, Squire. Who is that youngster?"

"Hist! let me introduce Mr. Belvoir."

Mr. Belvoir offers his hand.

"No, sir!" vociferates Steen, putting both his own hands behind him. "No
offence, young gentleman. But I don't give my hand at first sight to
a man who wants to shake a vote out of it. Not that I know anything
against you. But, if you be a farmer's friend rabbits are not, and my
lord your father is a great one for rabbits."

"Indeed you are mistaken there!" cries George, with vehement
earnestness. Mr. Travers gave him a nudge, as much as to say, "Hold your
tongue." George understood the hint, and is carried off meekly by Mr.
Steen down the solitude of the plantations.

The guests now arrived fast and thick. They consisted chiefly not only
of Mr. Travers's tenants, but of farmers and their families within
the range of eight or ten miles from the Park, with a few of the
neighbouring gentry and clergy.

It was not a supper intended to include the labouring class; for Mr.
Travers had an especial dislike to the custom of exhibiting peasants
at feeding-time, as if they were so many tamed animals of an inferior
species. When he entertained work-people, he made them comfortable in
their own way; and peasants feel more comfortable when not invited to be
stared out of countenance.

"Well, Lethbridge," said Mr. Travers, "where is the young gladiator you
promised to bring?"

"I did bring him, and he was by my side not a minute ago. He has
suddenly given me the slip: 'abiit, evasit, erupit.' I was looking round
for him in vain when you accosted me."

"I hope he has not seen some guest of mine whom he wants to fight."

"I hope not," answered the Parson, doubtfully. "He's a strange fellow.
But I think you will be pleased with him; that is, if he can be found.
Oh, Mr. Saunderson, how do you do? Have you seen your visitor?"

"No, sir, I have just come. My mistress, Squire, and my three girls; and
this is my son."

"A hearty welcome to all," said the graceful Squire; (turning to
Saunderson junior), "I suppose you are fond of dancing. Get yourself a
partner. We may as well open the ball."

"Thank you, sir, but I never dance," said Saunderson junior, with an air
of austere superiority to an amusement which the March of Intellect had
left behind.

"Then you'll have less to regret when you are grown old. But the band
is striking up; we must adjourn to the marquee. George" (Mr. Belvoir,
escaped from Mr. Steen, had just made his appearance), "will you give
your arm to Cecilia, to whom I think you are engaged for the first
quadrille?"

"I hope," said George to Cecilia, as they walked towards the marquee,
"that Mr. Steen is not an average specimen of the electors I shall have
to canvass. Whether he has been brought up to honour his own father and
mother I can't pretend to say, but he seems bent upon teaching me not
to honour mine. Having taken away my father's moral character upon the
unfounded allegation that he loved rabbits better than mankind, he then
assailed my innocent mother on the score of religion, and inquired when
she was going over to the Church of Rome, basing that inquiry on the
assertion that she had taken away her custom from a Protestant grocer
and conferred it on a Papist."

"Those are favourable signs, Mr. Belvoir. Mr. Steen always prefaces a
kindness by a great deal of incivility. I asked him once to lend me a
pony, my own being suddenly taken lame, and he seized that opportunity
to tell me that my father was an impostor in pretending to be a judge of
cattle; that he was a tyrant, screwing his tenants in order to indulge
extravagant habits of hospitality; and implied that it would be a
great mercy if we did not live to apply to him, not for a pony, but for
parochial relief. I went away indignant. But he sent me the pony. I am
sure he will give you his vote."

"Meanwhile," said George, with a timid attempt at gallantry, as they now
commenced the quadrille, "I take encouragement from the belief that I
have the good wishes of Miss Travers. If ladies had votes, as Mr. Mill
recommends, why, then--"

"Why, then, I should vote as Papa does," said Miss Travers, simply. "And
if women had votes, I suspect there would be very little peace in any
household where they did not vote as the man at the head of it wished
them."

"But I believe, after all," said the aspirant to Parliament, seriously,
"that the advocates for female suffrage would limit it to women
independent of masculine control, widows and spinsters voting in right
of their own independent tenements."

"In that case," said Cecilia, "I suppose they would still generally go
by the opinion of some man they relied on, or make a very silly choice
if they did not."

"You underrate the good sense of your sex."

"I hope not. Do you underrate the good sense of yours, if, in far more
than half the things appertaining to daily life, the wisest men say,
'Better leave _them_ to the _women_'? But you're forgetting the figure,
_cavalier seul_."

"By the way," said George, in another interval of the dance, "do
you know a Mr. Chillingly, the son of Sir Peter, of Exmundham, in
Westshire?"

"No; why do you ask?"

"Because I thought I caught a glimpse of his face: it was just as Mr.
Steen was bearing me away down that plantation. From what you say, I
must suppose I was mistaken."

"Chillingly! But surely some persons were talking yesterday at dinner
about a young gentleman of that name as being likely to stand for
Westshire at the next election, but who had made a very unpopular and
eccentric speech on the occasion of his coming of age."

"The same man: I was at college with him,--a very singular character. He
was thought clever; won a prize or two; took a good degree: but it was
generally said that he would have deserved a much higher one if some of
his papers had not contained covert jests either on the subject or the
examiners. It is a dangerous thing to set up as a humourist in practical
life,--especially public life. They say Mr. Pitt had naturally a great
deal of wit and humour, but he wisely suppressed any evidence of those
qualities in his Parliamentary speeches. Just like Chillingly, to turn
into ridicule the important event of festivities in honour of his coming
of age,--an occasion that can never occur again in the whole course of
his life."

"It was bad taste," said Cecilia, "if intentional. But perhaps he was
misunderstood, or taken by surprise."

"Misunderstood,--possibly; but taken by surprise,--no. The coolest
fellow I ever met. Not that I have met him very often. Latterly, indeed,
at Cambridge he lived much alone. It was said that he read hard. I doubt
that; for my rooms were just over his, and I know that he was much
more frequently out of doors than in. He rambled a good deal about the
country on foot. I have seen him in by-lanes a dozen miles distant from
the town when I have been riding back from the bunt. He was fond of the
water, and pulled a mighty strong oar, but declined to belong to our
University crew; yet if ever there was a fight between undergraduates
and bargemen, he was sure to be in the midst of it. Yes, a very great
oddity indeed, full of contradictions, for a milder, quieter fellow in
general intercourse you could not see; and as for the jests of which
he was accused in his examination papers, his very face should
have acquitted him of the charge before any impartial jury of his
countrymen."

"You sketch quite an interesting picture of him," said Cecilia. "I wish
we did know him: he would be worth seeing."

"And, once seen, you would not easily forget him,--a dark, handsome
face, with large melancholy eyes, and with one of those spare slender
figures which enable a man to disguise his strength, as a fraudulent
billiard-player disguises his play."

The dance had ceased during this conversation, and the speakers were now
walking slowly to and fro the lawn amid the general crowd.

"How well your father plays the part of host to these rural folks!" said
George, with a secret envy. "Do observe how quietly he puts that shy
young farmer at his ease, and now how kindly he deposits that lame old
lady on the bench, and places the stool under her feet. What a canvasser
he would be! and how young he still looks, and how monstrous handsome!"

This last compliment was uttered as Travers, having made the old
lady comfortable, had joined the three Miss Saundersons, dividing his
pleasant smile equally between them; and seemingly unconscious of the
admiring glances which many another rural beauty directed towards him
as he passed along. About the man there was a certain indescribable
elegance, a natural suavity free from all that affectation, whether
of forced heartiness or condescending civility, which too often
characterizes the well-meant efforts of provincial magnates to
accommodate themselves to persons of inferior station and breeding. It
is a great advantage to a man to have passed his early youth in that
most equal and most polished of all democracies,--the best society of
large capitals. And to such acquired advantage Leopold Travers added the
inborn qualities that please.

Later in the evening Travers, again accosting Mr. Lethbridge, said, "I
have been talking much to the Saundersons about that young man who did
us the inestimable service of punishing your ferocious parishioner,
Tom Bowles; and all I hear so confirms the interest your own
account inspired me with that I should really like much to make his
acquaintance. Has not he turned up yet?"

"No; I fear he must have gone. But in that case I hope you will take
his generous desire to serve my poor basket-maker into benevolent
consideration."

"Do not press me; I feel so reluctant to refuse any request of yours.
But I have my own theory as to the management of an estate, and my
system does not allow of favour. I should wish to explain that to the
young stranger himself; for I hold courage in such honour that I do not
like a brave man to leave these parts with an impression that Leopold
Travers is an ungracious churl. However, he may not have gone. I will
go and look for him myself. Just tell Cecilia that she has danced enough
with the gentry, and that I have told Farmer Turby's son, a fine young
fellow and a capital rider across country, that I expect him to show my
daughter that he can dance as well as he rides."



CHAPTER IV.

QUITTING Mr. Lethbridge, Travers turned with quick step towards the more
solitary part of the grounds. He did not find the object of his search
in the walks of the plantation; and, on taking the circuit of his
demesne, wound his way back towards the lawn through a sequestered rocky
hollow in the rear of the marquee, which had been devoted to a fernery.
Here he came to a sudden pause; for, seated a few yards before him on
a gray crag, and the moonlight full on his face, he saw a solitary man,
looking upwards with a still and mournful gaze, evidently absorbed in
abstract contemplation.

Recalling the description of the stranger which he had heard from Mr.
Lethbridge and the Saundersons, Mr. Travers felt sure that he had come
on him at last. He approached gently; and, being much concealed by the
tall ferns, Kenelm (for that itinerant it was) did not see him advance,
until he felt a hand on his shoulder, and, turning round, beheld a
winning smile and heard a pleasant voice.

"I think I am not mistaken," said Leopold Travers, "in assuming you to
be the gentleman whom Mr. Lethbridge promised to introduce to me, and
who is staying with my tenant, Mr. Saunderson?"

Kenelm rose and bowed. Travers saw at once that it was the bow of a man
in his own world, and not in keeping with the Sunday costume of a petty
farmer. "Nay," said he, "let us talk seated;" and placing himself on the
crag, he made room for Kenelm beside him.

"In the first place," resumed Travers, "I must thank you for having
done a public service in putting down the brute force which has long
tyrannized over the neighbourhood. Often in my young days I have felt
the disadvantage of height and sinews, whenever it would have been a
great convenience to terminate dispute or chastise insolence by a
resort to man's primitive weapons; but I never more lamented my physical
inferiority than on certain occasions when I would have given my ears to
be able to thrash Tom Bowles myself. It has been as great a disgrace to
my estate that that bully should so long have infested it as it is
to the King of Italy not to be able with all his armies to put down a
brigand in Calabria."

"Pardon me, Mr. Travers, but I am one of those rare persons who do not
like to hear ill of their friends. Mr. Thomas Bowles is a particular
friend of mine."

"Eh!" cried Travers, aghast. "'Friend!' you are joking.

"You would not accuse me of joking if you knew me better. But surely you
have felt that there are few friends one likes more cordially, and ought
to respect more heedfully, than the enemy with whom one has just made it
up."

"You say well, and I accept the rebuke," said Travers, more and more
surprised. "And I certainly have less right to abuse Mr. Bowles than
you have, since I had not the courage to fight him. To turn to another
subject less provocative. Mr. Lethbridge has told me of your amiable
desire to serve two of his young parishioners, Will Somers and Jessie
Wiles, and of your generous offer to pay the money Mrs. Bawtrey demands
for the transfer of her lease. To that negotiation my consent is
necessary, and that consent I cannot give. Shall I tell you why?"

"Pray do. Your reasons may admit of argument."

"Every reason admits of argument," said Mr. Travers, amused at the calm
assurance of a youthful stranger in anticipating argument with a skilful
proprietor on the management of his own property. "I do not, however,
tell you my reasons for the sake of argument, but in vindication of my
seeming want of courtesy towards yourself. I have had a very hard and a
very difficult task to perform in bringing the rental of my estate up
to its proper value. In doing so, I have been compelled to adopt one
uniform system, equally applied to my largest and my pettiest holdings.
That system consists in securing the best and safest tenants I can,
at the rents computed by a valuer in whom I have confidence. To this
system, universally adopted on my estate, though it incurred much
unpopularity at first, I have at length succeeded in reconciling the
public opinion of my neighbourhood. People began by saying I was
hard; they now acknowledge I am just. If I once give way to favour or
sentiment, I unhinge my whole system. Every day I am subjected to moving
solicitations. Lord Twostars, a keen politician, begs me to give a
vacant farm to a tenant because he is an excellent canvasser, and has
always voted straight with the party. Mrs. Fourstars, a most benevolent
woman, entreats me not to dismiss another tenant, because he is in
distressed circumstances and has a large family; very good reasons
perhaps for my excusing him an arrear, or allowing him a retiring
pension, but the worst reasons in the world for letting him continue to
ruin himself and my land. Now, Mrs. Bawtrey has a small holding on lease
at the inadequate rent of L8 a year. She asks L45 for its transfer, but
she can't transfer the lease without my consent; and I can get L12 a
year as a moderate rental from a large choice of competent tenants. It
will better answer me to pay her the L45 myself, which I have no doubt
the incoming tenant would pay me back, at least in part; and if he did
not, the additional rent would be good interest for my expenditure.
Now, you happen to take a sentimental interest, as you pass through the
village, in the loves of a needy cripple whose utmost industry has but
served to save himself from parish relief, and a giddy girl without a
sixpence, and you ask me to accept these very equivocal tenants instead
of substantial ones, and at a rent one-third less than the market value.
Suppose that I yielded to your request, what becomes of my reputation
for practical, business-like justice? I shall have made an inroad into
the system by which my whole estate is managed, and have invited all
manner of solicitations on the part of friends and neighbours, which I
could no longer consistently refuse, having shown how easily I can be
persuaded into compliance by a stranger whom I may never see again. And
are you sure, after all, that, if you did prevail on me, you would do
the individual good you aim at? It is, no doubt, very pleasant to think
one has made a young couple happy. But if that young couple fail in
keeping the little shop to which you would transplant them (and
nothing more likely: peasants seldom become good shopkeepers), and find
themselves, with a family of children, dependent solely, not on the arm
of a strong labourer, but the ten fingers of a sickly cripple, who makes
clever baskets, for which there is but slight and precarious demand in
the neighbourhood, may you not have insured the misery of the couple you
wished to render happy?"

"I withdraw all argument," said Kenelm, with an aspect so humiliated and
dejected, that it would have softened a Greenland bear, or a Counsel for
the Prosecution. "I am more and more convinced that of all the shams in
the world that of benevolence is the greatest. It seems so easy to
do good, and it is so difficult to do it. Everywhere, in this hateful
civilized life, one runs one's head against a system. A system, Mr.
Travers, is man's servile imitation of the blind tyranny of what in our
ignorance we call 'Natural Laws,' a mechanical something through which
the world is ruled by the cruelty of General Principles, to the utter
disregard of individual welfare. By Natural Laws creatures prey on each
other, and big fishes eat little ones upon system. It is, nevertheless,
a hard thing for the little fish. Every nation, every town, every
hamlet, every occupation, has a system, by which, somehow or other, the
pond swarms with fishes, of which a great many inferiors contribute to
increase the size of a superior. It is an idle benevolence to keep
one solitary gudgeon out of the jaws of a pike. Here am I doing what I
thought the simplest thing in the world, asking a gentleman, evidently
as good-natured as myself, to allow an old woman to let her premises to
a deserving young couple, and paying what she asks for it out of my own
money. And I find that I am running against a system, and invading all
the laws by which a rental is increased and an estate improved. Mr.
Travers, you have no cause for regret in not having beaten Tom Bowles.
You have beaten his victor, and I now give up all dream of further
interference with the Natural Laws that govern the village which I
have visited in vain. I had meant to remove Tom Bowles from that quiet
community. I shall now leave him to return to his former habits,--to
marry Jessie Wiles, which he certainly will do, and--"

"Hold!" cried Mr. Travers. "Do you mean to say that you can induce Tom
Bowles to leave the village?"

"I had induced him to do it, provided Jessie Wiles married the
basket-maker; but, as that is out of the question, I am bound to tell
him so, and he will stay."

"But if he left, what would become of his business? His mother could
not keep it on; his little place is a freehold; the only house in the
village that does not belong to me, or I should have ejected him long
ago. Would he sell the premises to me?"

"Not if he stays and marries Jessie Wiles. But if he goes with me to
Luscombe and settles in that town as a partner to his uncle, I suppose
he would be too glad to sell a house of which he can have no pleasant
recollections. But what then? You cannot violate your system for the
sake of a miserable forge."

"It would not violate my system if, instead of yielding to a sentiment,
I gained an advantage; and, to say truth, I should be very glad to buy
that forge and the fields that go with it."

"'Tis your affair now, not mine, Mr. Travers. I no longer presume to
interfere. I leave the neighbourhood to-morrow: see if you can negotiate
with Mr. Bowles. I have the honour to wish you a good evening."

"Nay, young gentleman, I cannot allow you to quit me thus. You have
declined apparently to join the dancers, but you will at least join the
supper. Come!"

"Thank you sincerely, no. I came here merely on the business which your
system has settled."

"But I am not sure that it is settled." Here Mr. Travers wound his arm
within Kenelm's, and looking him full in the face, said, "I know that
I am speaking to a gentleman at least equal in rank to myself, but as
I enjoy the melancholy privilege of being the older man, do not think
I take an unwarrantable liberty in asking if you object to tell me your
name. I should like to introduce you to my daughter, who is very partial
to Jessie Wiles and to Will Somers. But I can't venture to inflame her
imagination by designating you as a prince in disguise."

"Mr. Travers, you express yourself with exquisite delicacy. But I
am just starting in life, and I shrink from mortifying my father by
associating my name with a signal failure. Suppose I were an anonymous
contributor, say, to 'The Londoner,' and I had just brought that
highly intellectual journal into discredit by a feeble attempt at
a good-natured criticism or a generous sentiment, would that be the
fitting occasion to throw off the mask, and parade myself to a mocking
world as the imbecile violator of an established system? Should I not,
in a moment so untoward, more than ever desire to merge my insignificant
unit in the mysterious importance which the smallest Singular obtains
when he makes himself a Plural, and speaks not as 'I,' but as 'We'?
_We_ are insensible to the charm of young ladies; _We_ are not bribed
by suppers; _We_, like the witches of 'Macbeth,' have no name on earth;
_We_ are the greatest wisdom of the greatest number; _We_ are so upon
system; _We_ salute you, Mr. Travers, and depart unassailable."

Here Kenelm rose, doffed and replaced his hat in majestic salutation,
turned towards the entrance of the fernery, and found himself suddenly
face to face with George Belvoir, behind whom followed, with a throng
of guests, the fair form of Cecilia. George Belvoir caught Kenelm by the
hand, and exclaimed, "Chillingly! I thought I could not be mistaken."

"Chillingly!" echoed Leopold Travers from behind. "Are you the son of my
old friend Sir Peter?"

Thus discovered and environed, Kenelm did not lose his wonted presence
of mind; he turned round to Leopold Travers, who was now close in his
rear, and whispered, "If my father was your friend, do not disgrace his
son. Do not say I am a failure. Deviate from your system, and let Will
Somers succeed Mrs. Bawtrey." Then reverting his face to Mr. Belvoir, he
said tranquilly, "Yes; we have met before."

"Cecilia," said Travers, now interposing, "I am happy to introduce to
you as Mr. Chillingly, not only the son of an old friend of mine,
not only the knight-errant of whose gallant conduct on behalf of your
protegee Jessie Wiles we have heard so much, but the eloquent arguer who
has conquered my better judgment in a matter on which I thought myself
infallible. Tell Mr. Lethbridge that I accept Will Somers as a tenant
for Mrs. Bawtrey's premises."

Kenelm grasped the Squire's hand cordially. "May it be in my power to do
a kind thing to you, in spite of any system to the contrary!"

"Mr. Chillingly, give your arm to my daughter. You will not now object
to join the dancers?"



CHAPTER V.

CECILIA stole a shy glance at Kenelm as the two emerged from the fernery
into the open space of the lawn. His countenance pleased her. She
thought she discovered much latent gentleness under the cold and
mournful gravity of its expression; and, attributing the silence he
maintained to some painful sense of an awkward position in the abrupt
betrayal of his incognito, sought with womanly tact to dispel his
supposed embarrassment.

"You have chosen a delightful mode of seeing the country this lovely
summer weather, Mr. Chillingly. I believe such pedestrian exercises are
very common with university students during the long vacation."

"Very common, though they generally wander in packs like wild dogs or
Australian dingoes. It is only a tame dog that one finds on the road
travelling by himself; and then, unless he behaves very quietly, it is
ten to one that he is stoned as a mad dog."

"But I am afraid, from what I hear, that you have not been travelling
very quietly."

"You are quite right, Miss Travers, and I am a sad dog if not a mad one.
But pardon me: we are nearing the marquee; the band is striking up, and,
alas! I am not a dancing dog."

He released Cecilia's arm, and bowed.

"Let us sit here a while, then," said she, motioning to a garden-bench.
"I have no engagement for the next dance, and, as I am a little tired, I
shall be glad of a reprieve."

Kenelm sighed, and, with the air of a martyr stretching himself on the
rack, took his place beside the fairest girl in the county.

"You were at college with Mr. Belvoir?"

"I was."

"He was thought clever there?"

"I have not a doubt of it."

"You know he is canvassing our county for the next election. My father
takes a warm interest in his success, and thinks he will be a useful
member of Parliament."

"Of that I am certain. For the first five years he will be called
pushing, noisy, and conceited, much sneered at by men of his own age,
and coughed down on great occasions; for the five following years he
will be considered a sensible man in committees, and a necessary feature
in debate; at the end of those years he will be an under-secretary; in
five years more he will be a Cabinet Minister, and the representative of
an important section of opinions; he will be an irreproachable private
character, and his wife will be seen wearing the family diamonds at all
the great parties. She will take an interest in politics and theology;
and if she die before him, her husband will show his sense of wedded
happiness by choosing another lady, equally fitted to wear the family
diamonds and to maintain the family consequences."

In spite of her laughter, Cecilia felt a certain awe at the solemnity of
voice and manner with which Kenelm delivered these oracular sentences,
and the whole prediction seemed strangely in unison with her own
impressions of the character whose fate was thus shadowed out.

"Are you a fortune-teller, Mr. Chillingly?" she asked, falteringly, and
after a pause.

"As good a one as any whose hand you could cross with a shilling."

"Will you tell me my fortune?"

"No; I never tell the fortunes of ladies, because your sex is credulous,
and a lady might believe what I tell her. And when we believe such and
such is to be our fate, we are too apt to work out our life into the
verification of the belief. If Lady Macbeth had disbelieved in the
witches, she would never have persuaded her lord to murder Duncan."

"But can you not predict me a more cheerful fortune than that tragical
illustration of yours seems to threaten?"

"The future is never cheerful to those who look on the dark side of
the question. Mr. Gray is too good a poet for people to read nowadays,
otherwise I should refer you to his lines in the 'Ode to Eton
College,'--


   "'See how all around us wait
    The ministers of human fate,
      And black Misfortune's baleful train.'


"Meanwhile it is something to enjoy the present. We are young; we
are listening to music; there is no cloud over the summer stars; our
conscience is clear; our hearts untroubled: why look forward in search
of happiness? shall we ever be happier than we are at this moment?"

Here Mr. Travers came up. "We are going to supper in a few minutes,"
said he; "and before we lose sight of each other, Mr. Chillingly, I wish
to impress on you the moral fact that one good turn deserves another. I
have yielded to your wish, and now you must yield to mine. Come and stay
a few days with me, and see your benevolent intentions carried out."

Kenelm paused. Now that he was discovered, why should he not pass a few
days among his equals? Realities or shams might be studied with squires
no less than with farmers; besides, he had taken a liking to Travers.
That graceful _ci-devant_ Wildair, with the slight form and the delicate
face, was unlike rural squires in general. Kenelm paused, and then said
frankly,--

"I accept your invitation. Would the middle of next week suit you?"

"The sooner the better. Why not to-morrow?"

"To-morrow I am pre-engaged to an excursion with Mr. Bowles. That may
occupy two or three days, and meanwhile I must write home for other
garments than those in which I am a sham."

"Come any day you like."

"Agreed."

"Agreed; and, hark! the supper-bell."

"Supper," said Kenelm, offering his arm to Miss Travers,--"supper is a
word truly interesting, truly poetical. It associates itself with the
entertainments of the ancients, with the Augustan age, with Horace and
Maecenas; with the only elegant but too fleeting period of the modern
world; with the nobles and wits of Paris, when Paris had wits and
nobles; with Moliere and the warm-hearted Duke who is said to have been
the original of Moliere's Misanthrope; with Madame de Sevigne and the
Racine whom that inimitable letter-writer denied to be a poet; with
Swift and Bolingbroke; with Johnson, Goldsmith, and Garrick. Epochs are
signalized by their eatings. I honour him who revives the Golden Age of
suppers." So saying, his face brightened.



CHAPTER VI.


KENELM CHILLINGLY, ESQ., TO SIR PETER CHILLINGLY, BART., ETC.

MY DEAR FATHER,--I am alive and unmarried. Providence has watched over
me in these respects; but I have had narrow escapes. Hitherto I have not
acquired much worldly wisdom in my travels. It is true that I have been
paid two shillings as a day labourer, and, in fact, have fairly earned
at least six shillings more; but against that additional claim I
generously set off, as an equivalent, my board and lodging. On the other
hand, I have spent forty-five pounds out of the fifty which I devoted
to the purchase of experience. But I hope you will be a gainer by
that investment. Send an order to Mr. William Somers, basket-maker,
Graveleigh, -----shire, for the hampers and game-baskets you require,
and I undertake to say that you will save twenty per cent on that
article (all expenses of carriage deducted) and do a good action into
the bargain. You know, from long habit, what a good action is worth
better than I do. I dare say you will be more pleased to learn than I
am to record the fact that I have been again decoyed into the society of
ladies and gentlemen, and have accepted an invitation to pass a few days
at Neesdale Park with Mr. Travers,--christened Leopold, who calls you
"his old friend,"--a term which I take for granted belongs to that class
of poetic exaggeration in which the "dears" and "darlings" of conjugal
intercourse may be categorized. Having for that visit no suitable
garments in my knapsack, kindly tell Jenkes to forward me a portmanteau
full of those which I habitually wore as Kenelm Chillingly, directed
to me at "Neesdale Park, near Beaverston." Let me find it there on
Wednesday.

I leave this place to-morrow morning in company with a friend of the
name of Bowles: no relation to the reverend gentleman of that name who
held the doctrine that a poet should bore us to death with fiddle-faddle
minutia of natural objects in preference to that study of the
insignificant creature Man, in his relations to his species, to which
Mr. Pope limited the range of his inferior muse; and who, practising as
he preached, wrote some very nice verses, to which the Lake school and
its successors are largely indebted. My Mr. Bowles has exercised his
faculty upon Man, and has a powerful inborn gift in that line which
only requires cultivation to render him a match for any one. His more
masculine nature is at present much obscured by that passing cloud
which, in conventional language, is called "a hopeless attachment." But
I trust, in the course of our excursion, which is to be taken on foot,
that this vapour may consolidate by motion, as some old-fashioned
astronomers held that the nebula does consolidate into a matter-of-fact
world. Is it Rochefoucauld who says that a man is never more likely to
form a hopeful attachment for one than when his heart is softened by a
hopeless attachment to another? May it be long, my dear father, before
you condole with me on the first or congratulate me on the second.

   Your affectionate son,

     KENELM.

Direct to me at Mr. Travers's. Kindest love to my mother.


The answer to this letter is here subjoined as the most convenient place
for its insertion, though of course it was not received till some days
after the date of my next chapter.


SIR PETER CHILLINGLY, BART., TO KENELM CHILLINGLY, ESQ.

MY DEAR Boy,--With this I despatch the portmanteau you require to the
address that you give. I remember well Leopold Travers when he was in
the Guards,--a very handsome and a very wild young fellow. But he
had much more sense than people gave him credit for, and frequented
intellectual society; at least I met him very often at my friend
Campion's, whose house was then the favourite rendezvous of
distinguished persons. He had very winning manners, and one could not
help taking an interest in him. I was very glad when I heard he had
married and reformed. Here I beg to observe that a man who contracts a
taste for low company may indeed often marry, but he seldom reforms when
he does so. And, on the whole, I should be much pleased to hear that the
experience which has cost you forty-five pounds had convinced you that
you might be better employed than earning two, or even six shillings as
a day-labourer.

I have not given your love to your mother, as you requested. In fact,
you have placed me in a very false position towards that other author of
your eccentric being. I could only guard you from the inquisition of the
police and the notoriety of descriptive hand-bills by allowing my lady
to suppose that you had gone abroad with the Duke of Clairville and his
family. It is easy to tell a fib, but it is very difficult to untell
it. However, as soon as you have made up your mind to resume your normal
position among ladies and gentlemen, I should be greatly obliged if
you would apprise me. I don't wish to keep a fib on my conscience a
day longer than may be necessary to prevent the necessity of telling
another.

From what you say of Mr. Bowles's study of Man, and his inborn talent
for that scientific investigation, I suppose that he is a professed
Metaphysician, and I should be glad of his candid opinion upon the
Primary Basis of Morals, a subject upon which I have for three years
meditated the consideration of a critical paper. But having lately read
a controversy thereon between two eminent philosophers, in which each
accuses the other of not understanding him, I have resolved for the
present to leave the Basis in its unsettled condition.

You rather alarm me when you say you have had a narrow escape from
marriage. Should you, in order to increase the experience you set out
to acquire, decide on trying the effect of a Mrs. Chillingly upon your
nervous system, it would be well to let me know a little beforehand, so
that I might prepare your mother's mind for that event. Such household
trifles are within her special province; and she would be much put out
if a Mrs. Chillingly dropped on her unawares.

This subject, however, is too serious to admit of a jest even between
two persons who understand, so well as you and I do, the secret cipher
by which each other's outward style of jest is to be gravely interpreted
into the irony which says one thing and means another. My dear boy, you
are very young; you are wandering about in a very strange manner, and
may, no doubt, meet with many a pretty face by the way, with which you
may fancy that you fall in love. You cannot think me a barbarous, tyrant
if I ask you to promise me, on your honour, that you will not propose
to any young lady before you come first to me and submit the case to my
examination and approval. You know me too well to suppose that I should
unreasonably withhold my consent if convinced that your happiness was
at stake. But while what a young man may fancy to be love is often a
trivial incident in his life, marriage is the greatest event in it;
if on one side it may involve his happiness, on the other side it
may insure his misery. Dearest, best, and oddest of sons, give me the
promise I ask, and you will free my breast from a terribly anxious
thought which now sits on it like a nightmare.

Your recommendation of a basket-maker comes opportunely. All such
matters go through the bailiff's hands, and it was but the other day
that Green was complaining of the high prices of the man he employed for
hampers and game-baskets. Green shall write to your protege.

Keep me informed of your proceedings as much as your anomalous character
will permit; so that nothing may diminish my confidence that the man who
had the honour to be christened Kenelm will not disgrace his name, but
acquire the distinction denied to a Peter.

Your affectionate father.



CHAPTER VII.

VILLAGERS lie abed on Sundays later than on workdays, and no shutter was
unclosed in a window of the rural street through which Kenelm Chillingly
and Tom Bowles went, side by side, in the still soft air of the Sabbath
morn. Side by side they went on, crossing the pastoral glebe-lands,
where the kine still drowsily reclined under the bowery shade of
glinting chestnut leaves; and diving thence into a narrow lane or
by-road, winding deep between lofty banks all tangled with convolvulus
and wild-rose and honeysuckle.

They walked in silence, for Kenelm, after one or two vain attempts at
conversation, had the tact to discover that his companion was in no mood
for talk; and being himself one of those creatures whose minds glide
easily into the dreamy monologue of revery, he was not displeased to
muse on undisturbed, drinking quietly into his heart the subdued joy of
the summer morn, with the freshness of its sparkling dews, the wayward
carol of its earliest birds, the serene quietude of its limpid breezy
air. Only when they came to fresh turnings in the road that led towards
the town to which they were bound, Tom Bowles stepped before his
companion, indicating the way by a monosyllable or a gesture. Thus they
journeyed for hours, till the sun attained power, and a little wayside
inn near a hamlet invited Kenelm to the thought of rest and food.

"Tom," said he then, rousing from his revery, "what do you say to
breakfast?"

Answered Tom sullenly, "I am not hungry; but as you like."

"Thank you, then we will stop here a while. I find it difficult to
believe that you are not hungry, for you are very strong, and there are
two things which generally accompany great physical strength: the one is
a keen appetite; the other is--though you may not suppose it, and it is
not commonly known--a melancholic temperament."

"Eh!--a what?"

"A tendency to melancholy. Of course you have heard of Hercules: you
know the saying 'as strong as Hercules'?"

"Yes, of course."

"Well, I was first led to the connection between strength, appetite, and
melancholy, by reading in an old author named Plutarch that Hercules
was among the most notable instances of melancholy temperament which the
author was enabled to quote. That must have been the traditional notion
of the Herculean constitution; and as for appetite, the appetite of
Hercules was a standard joke of the comic writers. When I read that
observation it set me thinking, being myself melancholic and having
an exceedingly good appetite. Sure enough, when I began to collect
evidence, I found that the strongest men with whom I made acquaintance,
including prize-fighters and Irish draymen, were disposed to look upon
life more on the shady than the sunny side of the way; in short, they
were melancholic. But the kindness of Providence allowed them to enjoy
their meals, as you and I are about to do." In the utterance of this
extraordinary crotchet Kenelm had halted his steps; but now striding
briskly forward he entered the little inn, and after a glance at its
larder, ordered the whole contents to be brought out and placed within a
honeysuckle arbour which he spied in the angle of a bowling-green at the
rear of the house.

In addition to the ordinary condiments of loaf and butter and eggs and
milk and tea, the board soon groaned beneath the weight of pigeon-pie,
cold ribs of beef, and shoulder of mutton, remains of a feast which the
members of a monthly rustic club had held there the day before. Tom ate
little at first; but example is contagious, and gradually he vied with
his companion in the diminution of the solid viands before him. Then he
called for brandy.

"No," said Kenelm. "No, Tom; you have promised me friendship, and that
is not compatible with brandy. Brandy is the worst enemy a man like
you can have; and would make you quarrel even with me. If you want a
stimulus I allow you a pipe. I don't smoke myself, as a rule, but there
have been times in my life when I required soothing, and then I have
felt that a whiff of tobacco stills and softens one like the kiss of a
little child. Bring this gentleman a pipe."

Tom grunted, but took to the pipe kindly, and in a few minutes, during
which Kenelm left him in silence, a lowering furrow between his brows
smoothed itself away.

Gradually he felt the sweetening influences of the day and the place, of
the merry sunbeams at play amid the leaves of the arbour, of the frank
perfume of the honeysuckle, of the warble of the birds before they sank
into the taciturn repose of a summer noon.

It was with a reluctant sigh that he rose at last, when Kenelm said, "We
have yet far to go: we must push on."

The landlady, indeed, had already given them a hint that she and
the family wanted to go to church, and to shut up the house in their
absence. Kenelm drew out his purse, but Tom did the same with a return
of cloud on his brow, and Kenelm saw that he would be mortally offended
if suffered to be treated as an inferior; so each paid his due share,
and the two men resumed their wandering. This time it was along a
by-path amid fields, which was a shorter cut than the lane they had
previously followed, to the main road to Luscombe. They walked
slowly till they came to a rustic foot-bridge which spanned a gloomy
trout-stream, not noisy, but with a low, sweet murmur, doubtless the
same stream beside which, many miles away, Kenelm had conversed with the
minstrel. Just as they came to this bridge there floated to their ears
the distant sound of the hamlet church-bell.

"Now let us sit here a while and listen," said Kenelm, seating himself
on the baluster of the bridge. "I see that you brought away your pipe
from the inn, and provided yourself with tobacco: refill the pipe and
listen."

Tom half smiled and obeyed.

"O friend," said Kenelm, earnestly, and after a long pause of thought,
"do you not feel what a blessed thing it is in this mortal life to be
ever and anon reminded that you have a soul?"

Tom, startled, withdrew the pipe from his lips, and muttered,--

"Eh!"

Kenelm continued,--

"You and I, Tom, are not so good as we ought to be: of that there is no
doubt; and good people would say justly that we should now be within
yon church itself rather than listening to its bell. Granted, my friend,
granted; but still it is something to hear that bell, and to feel by the
train of thought which began in our innocent childhood, when we said
our prayers at the knees of a mother, that we were lifted beyond this
visible Nature, beyond these fields and woods and waters, in which, fair
though they be, you and I miss something; in which neither you nor I are
as happy as the kine in the fields, as the birds on the bough, as the
fishes in the water: lifted to a consciousness of a sense vouchsafed to
you and to me, not vouchsafed to the kine, to the bird, and the fish,--a
sense to comprehend that Nature has a God, and Man has a life hereafter.
The bell says that to you and to me. Were that bell a thousand times
more musical it could not say that to beast, bird, and fish. Do you
understand me, Tom?"

Tom remains silent for a minute, and then replies, "I never thought of
it before; but, as you put it, I understand."

"Nature never gives to a living thing capacities not practically meant
for its benefit and use. If Nature gives to us capacities to believe
that we have a Creator whom we never saw, of whom we have no direct
proof, who is kind and good and tender beyond all that we know of kind
and good and tender on earth, it is because the endowment of capacities
to conceive such a Being must be for our benefit and use: it would not
be for our benefit and use if it were a lie. Again, if Nature has given
to us a capacity to receive the notion that we live again, no matter
whether some of us refuse so to believe, and argue against it,--why, the
very capacity to receive the idea (for unless we receive it we could
not argue against it) proves that it is for our benefit and use; and if
there were no such life hereafter, we should be governed and influenced,
arrange our modes of life, and mature our civilization, by obedience
to a lie, which Nature falsified herself in giving us the capacity to
believe. You still understand me?"

"Yes; it bothers me a little, for you see I am not a parson's man; but I
do understand."

"Then, my friend, study to apply,--for it requires constant
study,--study to apply that which you understand to your own case. You
are something more than Tom Bowles, the smith and doctor of horses;
something more than the magnificent animal who rages for his mate and
fights every rival: the bull does that. You are a soul endowed with the
capacity to receive the idea of a Creator so divinely wise and great
and good that, though acting by the agency of general laws, He can
accommodate them to all individual cases, so that--taking into account
the life hereafter, which He grants to you the capacity to believe--all
that troubles you now will be proved to you wise and great and good
either in this life or the other. Lay that truth to your heart, friend,
now--before the bell stops ringing; recall it every time you hear the
church-bell ring again. And oh, Tom, you have such a noble nature!--"

"I--I! don't jeer me,--don't."

"Such a noble nature; for you can love so passionately, you can war so
fiercely, and yet, when convinced that your love would be misery to
her you love, can resign it; and yet, when beaten in your war, can so
forgive your victor that you are walking in this solitude with him as a
friend, knowing that you have but to drop a foot behind him in order to
take his life in an unguarded moment; and rather than take his life, you
would defend it against an army. Do you think I am so dull as not to see
all that? and is not all that a noble nature?"

Tom Bowles covered his face with his hands, and his broad breast heaved.

"Well, then, to that noble nature I now trust. I myself have done little
good in life. I may never do much; but let me think that I have not
crossed your life in vain for you and for those whom your life can
colour for good or for bad. As you are strong, be gentle; as you
can love one, be kind to all; as you have so much that is grand as
Man,--that is, the highest of God's works on earth,--let all your acts
attach your manhood to the idea of Him, to whom the voice of the bell
appeals. Ah! the bell is hushed; but not your heart, Tom,--that speaks
still."

Tom was weeping like a child.



CHAPTER VIII.

NOW when our two travellers resumed their journey, the relationship
between them had undergone a change; nay, you might have said that their
characters were also changed. For Tom found himself pouring out his
turbulent heart to Kenelm, confiding to this philosophical scoffer at
love all the passionate humanities of love,--its hope, its anguish, its
jealousy, its wrath,--the all that links the gentlest of emotions to
tragedy and terror. And Kenelm, listening tenderly, with softened eyes,
uttered not one cynic word,--nay, not one playful jest. He, felt that
the gravity of all he heard was too solemn for mockery, too deep even
for comfort. True love of this sort was a thing he had never known,
never wished to know, never thought he could know, but he sympathized
in it not the less. Strange, indeed, how much we do sympathize, on
the stage, for instance, or in a book, with passions that have never
agitated ourselves! Had Kenelm jested or reasoned or preached, Tom would
have shrunk at once into dreary silence; but Kenelm said nothing, save
now and then, as he rested his arm, brother-like, on the strong man's
shoulder, he murmured, "Poor fellow!" So, then, when Tom had finished
his confessions, he felt wondrously relieved and comforted. He had
cleansed his bosom of the perilous stuff that weighed upon the heart.

Was this good result effected by Kenelm's artful diplomacy, or by that
insight into human passions vouchsafed unconsciously to himself, by
gleams or in flashes, to this strange man who surveyed the objects and
pursuits of his fellows with a yearning desire to share them, murmuring
to himself, "I cannot, I do not stand in this world; like a ghost I
glide beside it, and look on "?

Thus the two men continued their way slowly, amid soft pastures and
yellowing cornfields, out at length into the dusty thoroughfares of
the main road. That gained, their talk insensibly changed its tone: it
became more commonplace; and Kenelm permitted himself the license of
those crotchets by which he extracted a sort of quaint pleasantry out of
commonplace itself; so that from time to time Tom was startled into the
mirth of laughter. This big fellow had one very agreeable gift, which
is only granted, I think, to men of genuine character and affectionate
dispositions,--a spontaneous and sweet laugh, manly and frank, but not
boisterous, as you might have supposed it would be. But that sort of
laugh had not before come from his lips, since the day on which his love
for Jessie Wiles had made him at war with himself and the world.

The sun was setting when from the brow of a hill they beheld the spires
of Luscombe, imbedded amid the level meadows that stretched below,
watered by the same stream that had wound along their more rural
pathway, but which now expanded into stately width, and needed, to span
it, a mighty bridge fit for the convenience of civilized traffic. The
town seemed near, but it was full two miles off by road.

"There is a short cut across the fields beyond that stile, which leads
straight to my uncle's house," said Tom; "and I dare say, sir, that you
will be glad to escape the dirty suburb by which the road passes before
we get into the town."

"A good thought, Tom. It is very odd that fine towns always are
approached by dirty suburbs; a covert symbolical satire, perhaps, on the
ways to success in fine towns. Avarice or ambition go through very mean
little streets before they gain the place which they jostle the crowd to
win,--in the Townhall or on 'Change. Happy the man who, like you, Tom,
finds that there is a shorter and a cleaner and a pleasanter way to goal
or to resting-place than that through the dirty suburbs!"

They met but few passengers on their path through the fields,--a
respectable, staid, elderly couple, who had the air of a Dissenting
minister and his wife; a girl of fourteen leading a little boy seven
years younger by the hand; a pair of lovers, evidently lovers at
least to the eye of Tom Bowles; for, on regarding them as they passed
unheeding him, he winced, and his face changed. Even after they had
passed, Kenelm saw on the face that pain lingered there: the lips were
tightly compressed, and their corners gloomily drawn down.

Just at this moment a dog rushed towards them with a short quick
bark,--a Pomeranian dog with pointed nose and pricked ears. It hushed
its bark as it neared Kenelm, sniffed his trousers, and wagged its tail.

"By the sacred Nine," cried Kenelm, "thou art the dog with the tin tray!
where is thy master?"

The dog seemed to understand the question, for it turned its head
significantly; and Kenelm saw, seated under a lime-tree, at a good
distance from the path, a man, with book in hand, evidently employed in
sketching.

"Come this way," he said to Tom: "I recognize an acquaintance. You
will like him." Tom desired no new acquaintance at that moment, but he
followed Kenelm submissively.



CHAPTER IX.

"YOU see we are fated to meet again," said Kenelm, stretching himself
at his ease beside the Wandering Minstrel, and motioning Tom to do the
same. "But you seem to add the accomplishment of drawing to that of
verse-making! You sketch from what you call Nature?"

"From what I call Nature! yes, sometimes."

"And do you not find in drawing, as in verse-making, the truth that I
have before sought to din into your reluctant ears; namely, that Nature
has no voice except that which man breathes into her out of his mind?
I would lay a wager that the sketch you are now taking is rather an
attempt to make her embody some thought of your own, than to present her
outlines as they appear to any other observer. Permit me to judge for
myself." And he bent over the sketch-book. It is often difficult for
one who is not himself an artist nor a connoisseur to judge whether the
pencilled jottings in an impromptu sketch are by the hand of a professed
master or a mere amateur. Kenelm was neither artist nor connoisseur, but
the mere pencil-work seemed to him much what might be expected from any
man with an accurate eye who had taken a certain number of lessons from
a good drawing-master. It was enough for him, however, that it furnished
an illustration of his own theory. "I was right," he cried triumphantly.
"From this height there is a beautiful view, as it presents itself to
me; a beautiful view of the town, its meadows, its river, harmonized by
the sunset; for sunset, like gilding, unites conflicting colours, and
softens them in uniting. But I see nothing of that view in your sketch.
What I do see is to me mysterious."

"The view you suggest," said the minstrel, "is no doubt very fine, but
it is for a Turner or a Claude to treat it. My grasp is not wide enough
for such a landscape."

"I see indeed in your sketch but one figure, a child."

"Hist! there she stands. Hist! while I put in this last touch."

Kenelm strained his sight, and saw far off a solitary little girl, who
was tossing something in the air (he could not distinguish what), and
catching it as it fell. She seemed standing on the very verge of the
upland, backed by rose-clouds gathered round the setting sun; below lay
in confused outlines the great town. In the sketch those outlines seemed
infinitely more confused, being only indicated by a few bold strokes;
but the figure and face of the child were distinct and lovely. There
was an ineffable sentiment in her solitude; there was a depth of quiet
enjoyment in her mirthful play, and in her upturned eyes.

"But at that distance," asked Kenelm, when the wanderer had finished his
last touch, and, after contemplating it, silently closed his book, and
turned round with a genial smile, "but at that distance, how can you
distinguish the girl's face? How can you discover that the dim object
she has just thrown up and recaught is a ball made of flowers? Do you
know the child?"

"I never saw her before this evening; but as I was seated here she was
straying around me alone, weaving into chains some wild-flowers which
she had gathered by the hedgerows yonder, next the high road; and as she
strung them she was chanting to herself some pretty nursery rhymes.
You can well understand that when I heard her thus chanting I became
interested, and as she came near me I spoke to her, and we soon made
friends. She told me she was an orphan, and brought up by a very old man
distantly related to her, who had been in some small trade and now lived
in a crowded lane in the heart of the town. He was very kind to her, and
being confined himself to the house by age or ailment he sent her out to
play in the fields on summer Sundays. She had no companions of her own
age. She said she did not like the other little girls in the lane; and
the only little girl she liked at school had a grander station in life,
and was not allowed to play with her, and so she came out to play alone;
and as long as the sun shines and the flowers bloom, she says she never
wants other society."

"Tom, do you hear that? As you will be residing in Luscombe, find out
this strange little girl, and be kind to her, Tom, for my sake."

Tom put his large hand upon Kenelm's, making no other answer; but he
looked hard at the minstrel, recognized the genial charm of his voice
and face, and slid along the grass nearer to him.

The minstrel continued: "While the child was talking to me I
mechanically took the flower-chains from her hands, and not thinking
what I was about, gathered them up into a ball. Suddenly she saw what
I had done, and instead of scolding me for spoiling her pretty chains,
which I richly deserved, was delighted to find I had twisted them into a
new plaything. She ran off with the ball, tossing it about till, excited
with her own joy, she got to the brow of the hill, and I began my
sketch."

"Is that charming face you have drawn like hers?"

"No; only in part. I was thinking of another face while I sketched, but
it is not like that either; in fact, it is one of those patchworks which
we call 'fancy heads,' and I meant it to be another version of a thought
that I had just put into rhyme when the child came across me."

"May we hear the rhyme?"

"I fear that if it did not bore yourself it would bore your friend."

"I am sure not. Tom, do you sing?"

"Well, I _have_ sung," said Tom, hanging his head sheepishly, "and I
should like to hear this gentleman."

"But I do not know these verses, just made, well enough to sing them; it
is enough if I can recall them well enough to recite." Here the minstrel
paused a minute or so as if for recollection, and then, in the sweet
clear tones and the rare purity of enunciation which characterized his
utterance, whether in recital or song, gave to the following verses a
touching and a varied expression which no one could discover in merely
reading them.


     THE FLOWER-GIRL BY THE CROSSING.

   "By the muddy crossing in the crowded streets
    Stands a little maid with her basket full of posies,
   Proffering all who pass her choice of knitted sweets,
    Tempting Age with heart's-ease, courting Youth with roses.

   "Age disdains the heart's-ease,
    Love rejects the roses;
   London life is busy,--
    Who can stop for posies?

   "One man is too grave, another is too gay;
    This man has his hothouse, that man not a penny:
   Flowerets too are common in the month of May,
    And the things most common least attract the many.

   "Ill, on London crossings,
    Fares the sale of posies;
   Age disdains the heart's-ease,
    Youth rejects the roses."


When the verse-maker had done, he did not pause for approbation, nor
look modestly down, as do most people who recite their own verses, but
unaffectedly thinking much more of his art than his audience, hurried on
somewhat disconsolately,--

"I see with great grief that I am better at sketching than rhyming. Can
you" (appealing to Kenelm) "even comprehend what I mean by the verses?"

KENELM.--"Do you comprehend, Tom?"

TOM (in a whisper).--"No."

KENELM.--"I presume that by his flower-girl our friend means to
represent not only poetry, but a poetry like his own, which is not at
all the sort of poetry now in fashion. I, however, expand his meaning,
and by his flower-girl I understand any image of natural truth or beauty
for which, when we are living the artificial life of crowded streets, we
are too busy to give a penny."

"Take it as you please," said the minstrel, smiling and sighing at the
same time; "but I have not expressed in words that which I did mean half
so well as I have expressed it in my sketch-book."

"Ah! and how?" asked Kenelm.

"The image of my thought in the sketch, be it poetry or whatever you
prefer to call it, does not stand forlorn in the crowded streets: the
child stands on the brow of the green hill, with the city stretched in
confused fragments below, and, thoughtless of pennies and passers-by,
she is playing with the flowers she has gathered; but in play casting
them heavenward, and following them with heavenward eyes."

"Good!" muttered Kenelm, "good!" and then, after a long pause, he added,
in a still lower mutter, "Pardon me that remark of mine the other day
about a beefsteak. But own that I am right: what you call a sketch from
Nature is but a sketch of your own thought."



CHAPTER X.

THE child with the flower-ball had vanished from the brow of the hill;
sinking down amid the streets below, the rose-clouds had faded from the
horizon; and night was closing round, as the three men entered the
thick of the town. Tom pressed Kenelm to accompany him to his uncle's,
promising him a hearty welcome and bed and board, but Kenelm declined.
He entertained a strong persuasion that it would be better for the
desired effect on Tom's mind that he should be left alone with his
relations that night, but proposed that they should spend the next day
together, and agreed to call at the veterinary surgeon's in the morning.

When Tom quitted them at his uncle's door, Kenelm said to the minstrel,
"I suppose you are going to some inn; may I accompany you? We can sup
together, and I should like to hear you talk upon poetry and Nature."

"You flatter me much; but I have friends in the town, with whom I lodge,
and they are expecting me. Do you not observe that I have changed my
dress? I am not known here as the 'Wandering Minstrel.'"

Kenelm glanced at the man's attire, and for the first time observed
the change. It was still picturesque in its way, but it was such as
gentlemen of the highest rank frequently wear in the country,--the
knickerbocker costume,--very neat, very new, and complete, to the
square-toed shoes with their latchets and buckles.

"I fear," said Kenelm, gravely, "that your change of dress betokens
the neighbourhood of those pretty girls of whom you spoke in an earlier
meeting. According to the Darwinian doctrine of selection, fine plumage
goes far in deciding the preference of Jenny Wren and her sex, only we
are told that fine-feathered birds are very seldom songsters as well. It
is rather unfair to rivals when you unite both attractions."

The minstrel laughed. "There is but one girl in my friend's house,--his
niece; she is very plain, and only thirteen. But to me the society of
women, whether ugly or pretty, is an absolute necessity; and I have been
trudging without it for so many days that I can scarcely tell you how
my thoughts seemed to shake off the dust of travel when I found myself
again in the presence of--"

"Petticoat interest," interrupted Kenelm. "Take care of yourself. My
poor friend with whom you found me is a grave warning against petticoat
interest, from which I hope to profit. He is passing through a great
sorrow; it might have been worse than sorrow. My friend is going to stay
in this town. If you are staying here too, pray let him see something
of you. It will do him a wondrous good if you can beguile him from this
real life into the gardens of poetland; but do not sing or talk of love
to him."

"I honour all lovers," said the minstrel, with real tenderness in his
tone, "and would willingly serve to cheer or comfort your friend, if I
could; but I am bound elsewhere, and must leave Luscombe, which I visit
on business--money business--the day after to-morrow."

"So, too, must I. At least give us both some hours of your time
to-morrow."

"Certainly; from twelve to sunset I shall be roving about,--a mere
idler. If you will both come with me, it will be a great pleasure to
myself. Agreed! Well, then, I will call at your inn to-morrow at twelve;
and I recommend for your inn the one facing us,--The Golden Lamb. I have
heard it recommended for the attributes of civil people and good fare."

Kenelm felt that he here received his _conge_, and well comprehended the
fact that the minstrel, desiring to preserve the secret of his name, did
not give the address of the family with whom he was a guest.

"But one word more," said Kenelm. "Your host or hostess, if resident
here, can, no doubt, from your description of the little girl and the
old man her protector, learn the child's address. If so, I should like
my companion to make friends with her. Petticoat interest there at least
will be innocent and safe. And I know nothing so likely to keep a big,
passionate heart like Tom's, now aching with a horrible void,
occupied and softened, and turned to directions pure and gentle, as an
affectionate interest in a little child."

The minstrel changed colour: he even started. "Sir, are you a wizard
that you say that to me?"

"I am not a wizard, but I guess from your question that you have a
little child of your own. So much the better: the child may keep you out
of much mischief. Remember the little child. Good evening."

Kenelm crossed the threshold of The Golden Lamb, engaged his room, made
his ablutions, ordered, and, with his usual zest, partook of his evening
meal; and then, feeling the pressure of that melancholic temperament
which he so strangely associated with Herculean constitutions, roused
himself up, and, seeking a distraction from thought, sauntered forth
into the gaslit streets.

It was a large handsome town,--handsomer than Tor-Hadham, on account of
its site in a valley surrounded by wooded hills, and watered by the fair
stream whose windings we have seen as a brook,--handsomer, also, because
it boasted a fair cathedral, well cleared to the sight, and surrounded
by venerable old houses, the residences of the clergy or of the quiet
lay gentry with mediaeval tastes. The main street was thronged with
passengers,--some soberly returning home from the evening service; some,
the younger, lingering in pleasant promenade with their sweethearts or
families, or arm in arm with each other, and having the air of
bachelors or maidens unattached. Through this street Kenelm passed with
inattentive eye. A turn to the right took him towards the cathedral and
its surroundings. There all was solitary. The solitude pleased him,
and he lingered long, gazing on the noble church lifting its spires and
turrets into the deep blue starry air.

Musingly, then, he strayed on, entering a labyrinth of gloomy lanes, in
which, though the shops were closed, many a door stood open, with men
of the working class lolling against the threshold, idly smoking their
pipes, or women seated on the doorsteps gossiping, while noisy children
were playing or quarrelling in the kennel. The whole did not present the
indolent side of an English Sabbath in the pleasantest and rosiest point
of view. Somewhat quickening his steps, he entered a broader street,
attracted to it involuntarily by a bright light in the centre. On
nearing the light he found that it shone forth from a gin-palace, of
which the mahogany doors opened and shut momently as customers went in
and out. It was the handsomest building he had seen in his walk, next to
that of the cathedral. "The new civilization versus the old," murmured
Kenelm. As he so murmured, a hand was laid on his arm with a sort
of timid impudence. He looked down and saw a young face, but it had
survived the look of youth; it was worn and hard, and the bloom on it
was not that of Nature's giving. "Are you kind to-night?" asked a husky
voice.

"Kind!" said Kenelm, with mournful tones and softened eyes, "kind! Alas,
my poor sister mortal! if pity be kindness, who can see you and not be
kind?"

The girl released his arm, and he walked on. She stood some moments
gazing after him till out of sight, then she drew her hand suddenly
across her eyes, and retracing her steps, was, in her turn, caught hold
of by a rougher hand than hers, as she passed the gin-palace. She shook
off the grasp with a passionate scorn, and went straight home. Home! is
that the right word? Poor sister mortal!



CHAPTER XI.

AND now Kenelm found himself at the extremity of the town, and on the
banks of the river. Small squalid houses still lined the bank for some
way, till, nearing the bridge, they abruptly ceased, and he passed
through a broad square again into the main street. On the other side
of the street there was a row of villa-like mansions, with gardens
stretching towards the river.

All around in the thoroughfare was silent and deserted. By this time
the passengers had gone home. The scent of night-flowers from the
villa-gardens came sweet on the starlit air. Kenelm paused to inhale it,
and then lifting his eyes, hitherto downcast, as are the eyes of men
in meditative moods, he beheld, on the balcony of the nearest villa,
a group of well-dressed persons. The balcony was unusually wide and
spacious. On it was a small round table, on which were placed wine and
fruits. Three ladies were seated round the table on wire-work chairs,
and on the side nearest to Kenelm, one man. In that man, now slightly
turning his profile, as if to look towards the river, Kenelm recognized
the minstrel. He was still in his picturesque knickerbocker dress,
and his clear-cut features, with the clustering curls of hair, and
Rubens-like hue and shape of beard, had more than their usual beauty,
softened in the light of skies, to which the moon, just risen, added
deeper and fuller radiance. The ladies were in evening dress, but Kenelm
could not distinguish their faces hidden behind the minstrel. He moved
softly across the street, and took his stand behind a buttress in
the low wall of the garden, from which he could have full view of the
balcony, unseen himself. In this watch he had no other object than
that of a vague pleasure. The whole grouping had in it a kind of scenic
romance, and he stopped as one stops before a picture.

He then saw that of the three ladies one was old; another was a
slight girl of the age of twelve or thirteen; the third appeared to be
somewhere about seven or eight and twenty. She was dressed with more
elegance than the others. On her neck, only partially veiled by a thin
scarf, there was the glitter of jewels; and, as she now turned her
full face towards the moon, Kenelm saw that she was very handsome,--a
striking kind of beauty, calculated to fascinate a poet or an
artist,--not unlike Raphael's Fornarina, dark, with warm tints.

Now there appeared at the open window a stout, burly, middle-aged
gentleman, looking every inch of him a family man, a moneyed man, sleek
and prosperous. He was bald, fresh-coloured, and with light whiskers.

"Holloa," he said, in an accent very slightly foreign, and with a loud
clear voice, which Kenelm heard distinctly, "is it not time for you to
come in?"

"Don't be so tiresome, Fritz," said the handsome lady, half petulantly,
half playfully, in the way ladies address the tiresome spouses they lord
it over. "Your friend has been sulking the whole evening, and is only
just beginning to be pleasant as the moon rises."

"The moon has a good effect on poets and other mad folks, I dare say,"
said the bald man, with a good-humoured laugh. "But I can't have my
little niece laid up again just as she is on the mend: Annie, come in."

The girl obeyed reluctantly. The old lady rose too.

"Ah, Mother, you are wise," said the bald man; "and a game at euchre is
safer than poetizing in night air." He wound his arm round the old lady
with a careful fondness, for she moved with some difficulty as if rather
lame. "As for you two sentimentalists and moon-gazers, I give you ten
minutes' time,--not more, mind."

"Tyrant!" said the minstrel.

The balcony now held only two forms,--the minstrel and the handsome
lady. The window was closed, and partially veiled by muslin draperies,
but Kenelm caught glimpses of the room within. He could see that the
room, lit by a lamp on the centre table and candles elsewhere, was
decorated and fitted up with cost and in a taste not English. He could
see, for instance, that the ceiling was painted, and the walls were not
papered, but painted in panels between arabesque pilasters.

"They are foreigners," thought Kenelm, "though the man does speak
English so well. That accounts for playing euchre of a Sunday evening,
as if there were no harm in it. Euchre is an American game. The man
is called Fritz. Ah! I guess--Germans who have lived a good deal in
America; and the verse-maker said he was at Luscombe on pecuniary
business. Doubtless his host is a merchant, and the verse-maker in some
commercial firm. That accounts for his concealment of name, and fear of
its being known that he was addicted in his holiday to tastes and habits
so opposed to his calling."

While he was thus thinking, the lady had drawn her chair close to the
minstrel, and was speaking to him with evident earnestness, but in tones
too low for Kenelm to hear. Still it seemed to him, by her manner and by
the man's look, as if she were speaking in some sort of reproach,
which he sought to deprecate. Then he spoke, also in a whisper, and
she averted her face for a moment; then she held out her hand, and the
minstrel kissed it. Certainly, thus seen, the two might well be taken
for lovers; and the soft night, the fragrance of the flowers, silence
and solitude, stars and moon light, all girt them as with an atmosphere
of love. Presently the man rose and leaned over the balcony, propping
his cheek on his hand, and gazing on the river. The lady rose too,
and also leaned over the balustrade, her dark hair almost touching the
auburn locks of her companion.

Kenelm sighed. Was it from envy, from pity, from fear? I know not; but
he sighed.

After a brief pause, the lady said, still in low tones, but not too low
this time to escape Kenelm's fine sense of hearing,--

"Tell me those verses again. I must remember every word of them when you
are gone."

The man shook his head gently, and answered, but inaudibly.

"Do," said the lady; "set them to music later; and the next time you
come I will sing them. I have thought of a title for them."

"What?" asked the minstrel.

"Love's quarrel."

The minstrel turned his head, and their eyes met, and, in meeting,
lingered long. Then he moved away, and with face turned from her
and towards the river, gave the melody of his wondrous voice to the
following lines:--


     LOVE'S QUARREL.

 "Standing by the river, gazing on the river,
   See it paved with starbeams,--heaven is at our feet;
  Now the wave is troubled, now the rushes quiver;
   Vanished is the starlight: it was a deceit.

 "Comes a little cloudlet 'twixt ourselves and heaven,
   And from all the river fades the silver track;
  Put thine arms around me, whisper low, 'Forgiven!'
   See how on the river starlight settles back."


When he had finished, still with face turned aside, the lady did not,
indeed, whisper "Forgiven," nor put her arms around him; but, as if by
irresistible impulse, she laid her hand lightly on his shoulder.

The minstrel started.

There came to his ear,--he knew not from whence, from whom,--

"Mischief! mischief! Remember the little child!"

"Hush!" he said, staring round. "Did you not hear a voice?"

"Only yours," said the lady.

"It was our guardian angel's, Amalie. It came in time. We will go
within."



CHAPTER XII.

THE next morning betimes Kenelm visited Tom at his uncle's home. A
comfortable and respectable home it was, like that of an owner in easy
circumstances. The veterinary surgeon himself was intelligent, and
apparently educated beyond the range of his calling; a childless
widower, between sixty and seventy, living with a sister, an old maid.
They were evidently much attached to Tom, and delighted by the hope of
keeping him with them. Tom himself looked rather sad, but not sullen,
and his face brightened wonderfully at first sight of Kenelm. That
oddity made himself as pleasant and as much like other people as he
could in conversing with the old widower and the old maid, and took
leave, engaging Tom to be at his inn at half past twelve, and spend the
day with him and the minstrel. He then returned to the Golden Lamb, and
waited there for his first visitant; the minstrel. That votary of the
muse arrived punctually at twelve o'clock. His countenance was less
cheerful and sunny than usual. Kenelm made no allusion to the scene
he had witnessed, nor did his visitor seem to suspect that Kenelm had
witnessed it or been the utterer of that warning voice.

KENELM.--"I have asked my friend Tom Bowles to come a little later,
because I wished you to be of use to him, and, in order to be so, I
should suggest how."

THE MINSTREL.--"Pray do."

KENELM.--"You know that I am not a poet, and I do not have much
reverence for verse-making merely as a craft."

THE MINSTREL.--"Neither have I."

KENELM.--"But I have a great reverence for poetry as a priesthood. I
felt that reverence for you when you sketched and talked priesthood
last evening, and placed in my heart--I hope forever while it beats--the
image of the child on the sunlit hill, high above the abodes of men,
tossing her flower-ball heavenward and with heavenward eyes."

The singer's cheek coloured high, and his lip quivered: he was very
sensitive to praise; most singers are.

Kenelm resumed, "I have been educated in the Realistic school, and with
realism I am discontented, because in realism as a school there is no
truth. It contains but a bit of truth, and that the coldest and hardest
bit of it, and he who utters a bit of truth and suppresses the rest of
it tells a lie."

THE MINSTREL (slyly).--"Does the critic who says to me, 'Sing of
beefsteak, because the appetite for food is a real want of daily life,
and don't sing of art and glory and love, because in daily life a man
may do without such ideas,'--tell a lie?"

KENELM.--"Thank you for that rebuke. I submit to it. No doubt I did tell
a lie,--that is, if I were quite in earnest in my recommendation, and if
not in earnest, why--"

THE MINSTREL.--"You belied yourself."

KENELM.--"Very likely. I set out on my travels to escape from shams, and
begin to discover that I am a sham _par excellence_. But I suddenly
come across you, as a boy dulled by his syntax and his vulgar fractions
suddenly comes across a pleasant poem or a picture-book, and feels his
wits brighten up. I owe you much: you have done me a world of good."

"I cannot guess how."

"Possibly not, but you have shown me how the realism of Nature herself
takes colour and life and soul when seen on the ideal or poetic side
of it. It is not exactly the words that you say or sing that do me the
good, but they awaken within me new trains of thought, which I seek
to follow out. The best teacher is the one who suggests rather than
dogmatizes, and inspires his listener with the wish to teach himself.
Therefore, O singer! whatever be the worth in critical eyes of your
songs, I am glad to remember that you would like to go through the world
always singing."

"Pardon me: you forget that I added, 'if life were always young, and the
seasons were always summer.'"

"I do not forget. But if youth and summer fade for you, you leave youth
and summer behind you as you pass along,--behind in hearts which mere
realism would make always old, and counting their slothful beats under
the gray of a sky without sun or stars; wherefore I pray you to consider
how magnificent a mission the singer's is,--to harmonize your life with
your song, and toss your flowers, as your child does, heavenward, with
heavenward eyes. Think only of this when you talk with my sorrowing
friend, and you will do him good, as you have done me, without being
able to guess how a seeker after the Beautiful, such as you, carries us
along with him on his way; so that we, too, look out for beauty, and see
it in the wild-flowers to which we had been blind before."

Here Tom entered the little sanded parlour where this dialogue had been
held, and the three men sallied forth, taking the shortest cut from the
town into the fields and woodlands.



CHAPTER XIII.

WHETHER or not his spirits were raised by Kenelm's praise and
exhortations, the minstrel that day talked with a charm that spellbound
Tom, and Kenelm was satisfied with brief remarks on his side tending to
draw out the principal performer.

The talk was drawn from outward things, from natural objects,--objects
that interest children, and men who, like Tom Bowles, have been
accustomed to view surroundings more with the heart's eye than the
mind's eye. This rover about the country knew much of the habits of
birds and beasts and insects, and told anecdotes of them with a mixture
of humour and pathos, which fascinated Tom's attention, made him laugh
heartily, and sometimes brought tears into his big blue eyes.

They dined at an inn by the wayside, and the dinner was mirthful; then
they wended their way slowly back. By the declining daylight their talk
grew somewhat graver, and Kenelm took more part in it. Tom listened
mute,--still fascinated. At length, as the town came in sight, they
agreed to halt a while, in a bosky nook soft with mosses and sweet with
wild thyme.

There, as they lay stretched at their ease, the birds hymning vesper
songs amid the boughs above, or dropping, noiseless and fearless, for
their evening food on the swards around them, the wanderer said to
Kenelm, "You tell me that you are no poet, yet I am sure you have a
poet's perception: you must have written poetry?"

"Not I; as I before told you, only school verses in dead languages: but
I found in my knapsack this morning a copy of some rhymes, made by a
fellow-collegian, which I put into my pocket meaning to read them to
you both. They are not verses like yours, which evidently burst from you
spontaneously, and are not imitated from any other poets. These verses
were written by a Scotchman, and smack of imitation from the old ballad
style. There is little to admire in the words themselves, but there
is something in the idea which struck me as original, and impressed me
sufficiently to keep a copy, and somehow or other it got into the leaves
of one of the two books I carried with me from home."

"What are those books? Books of poetry both, I will venture to wager--"

"Wrong! Both metaphysical, and dry as a bone. Tom, light your pipe, and
you, sir, lean more at ease on your elbow; I should warn you that the
ballad is long. Patience!"

"Attention!" said the minstrel.

"Fire!" added Tom.

Kenelm began to read,--and he read well.


     LORD RONALD'S BRIDE.

        PART I.

 "WHY gathers the crowd in the market-place
  Ere the stars have yet left the sky?"
 "For a holiday show and an act of grace,--
   At the sunrise a witch shall die."

 "What deed has she done to deserve that doom?
   Has she blighted the standing corn,
  Or rifled for philters a dead man's tomb,
   Or rid mothers of babes new-born?"

 "Her pact with the fiend was not thus revealed,
   She taught sinners the Word to hear;
  The hungry she fed, and the sick she healed,
   And was held as a Saint last year.

 "But a holy man, who at Rome had been,
   Had discovered, by book and bell,
  That the marvels she wrought were through arts unclean,
   And the lies of the Prince of Hell.

 "And our Mother the Church, for the dame was rich,
   And her husband was Lord of Clyde,
  Would fain have been mild to this saint-like witch
   If her sins she had not denied.

 "But hush, and come nearer to see the sight,
   Sheriff, halberds, and torchmen,--look!
  That's the witch standing mute in her garb of white,
   By the priest with his bell and book."

  So the witch was consumed on the sacred pyre,
   And the priest grew in power and pride,
  And the witch left a son to succeed his sire
   In the halls and the lands of Clyde.

  And the infant waxed comely and strong and brave,
   But his manhood had scarce begun,
  When his vessel was launched on the northern wave
   To the shores which are near the sun.

        PART II.

  Lord Ronald has come to his halls in Clyde
   With a bride of some unknown race;
  Compared with the man who would kiss that bride
   Wallace wight were a coward base.

  Her eyes had the glare of the mountain-cat
   When it springs on the hunter's spear,
  At the head of the board when that lady sate
   Hungry men could not eat for fear.

  And the tones of her voice had that deadly growl
   Of the bloodhound that scents its prey;
  No storm was so dark as that lady's scowl
   Under tresses of wintry gray.

 "Lord Ronald! men marry for love or gold,
   Mickle rich must have been thy bride!"
 "Man's heart may be bought, woman's hand be sold,
   On the banks of our northern Clyde.

 "My bride is, in sooth, mickle rich to me
   Though she brought not a groat in dower,
  For her face, couldst thou see it as I do see,
   Is the fairest in hall or bower!"

  Quoth the bishop one day to our lord the king,
  "Satan reigns on the Clyde alway,
  And the taint in the blood of the witch doth cling
   To the child that she brought to day.

 "Lord Ronald hath come from the Paynim land
   With a bride that appals the sight;
  Like his dam she hath moles on her dread right hand,
   And she turns to a snake at night.

 "It is plain that a Scot who can blindly dote
   On the face of an Eastern ghoul,
  And a ghoul who was worth not a silver groat,
   Is a Scot who has lost his soul.

  "It were wise to have done with this demon tree
   Which has teemed with such caukered fruit;
  Add the soil where it stands to my holy See,
   And consign to the flames its root."

 "Holy man!" quoth King James, and he laughed, "we know
   That thy tongue never wags in vain,
  But the Church cist is full, and the king's is low,
   And the Clyde is a fair domain.

 "Yet a knight that's bewitched by a laidly fere
   Needs not much to dissolve the spell;
  We will summon the bride and the bridegroom here
   Be at hand with thy book and bell."

        PART III.

  Lord Ronald stood up in King James's court,
   And his dame by his dauntless side;
  The barons who came in the hopes of sport
   Shook with fright when they saw the bride.

  The bishop, though armed with his bell and book,
   Grew as white as if turned to stone;
  It was only our king who could face that look,
   But he spoke with a trembling tone.

 "Lord Ronald, the knights of thy race and mine
   Should have mates in their own degree;
  What parentage, say, hath that bride of thine
   Who hath come from the far countree?

 "And what was her dowry in gold or land,
   Or what was the charm, I pray,
  That a comely young gallant should woo the hand
   Of the ladye we see to-day?"

  And the lords would have laughed, but that awful dame
   Struck them dumb with her thunder-frown:
 "Saucy king, did I utter my father's name,
   Thou wouldst kneel as his liegeman down.

 "Though I brought to Lord Ronald nor lands nor gold,
   Nor the bloom of a fading cheek;
  Yet, were I a widow, both young and old
   Would my hand and my dowry seek.

 "For the wish that he covets the most below,
   And would hide from the saints above,
  Which he dares not to pray for in weal or woe,
   Is the dowry I bring my love.

 "Let every man look in his heart and see
   What the wish he most lusts to win,
  And then let him fasten his eyes on me
   While he thinks of his darling sin."

  And every man--bishop, and lord, and king
   Thought of what he most wished to win,
  And, fixing his eye on that grewsome thing,
   He beheld his own darling sin.

  No longer a ghoul in that face he saw;
   It was fair as a boy's first love:
  The voice that had curdled his veins with awe
   Was the coo of the woodland dove.

  Each heart was on flame for the peerless dame
   At the price of the husband's life;
  Bright claymores flash out, and loud voices shout,
  "In thy widow shall be my wife."

  Then darkness fell over the palace hall,
   More dark and more dark it fell,
  And a death-groan boomed hoarse underneath the pall,
   And was drowned amid roar and yell.

  When light through the lattice-pane stole once more,
   It was gray as a wintry dawn,
  And the bishop lay cold on the regal floor,
   With a stain on his robes of lawn.

  Lord Ronald was standing beside the dead,
   In the scabbard he plunged his sword,
  And with visage as wan as the corpse, he said,
  "Lo! my ladye hath kept her word.

 "Now I leave her to others to woo and win,
   For no longer I find her fair;
  Could I look on the face of my darling sin,
   I should see but a dead man's there.

 "And the dowry she brought me is here returned,
   For the wish of my heart has died,
  It is quenched in the blood of the priest who burned
   My sweet mother, the Saint of Clyde."

  Lord Ronald strode over the stony floor,
   Not a hand was outstretched to stay;
  Lord Ronald has passed through the gaping door,
   Not an eye ever traced the way.

  And the ladye, left widowed, was prized above
   All the maidens in hall and bower,
  Many bartered their lives for that ladye's love,
   And their souls for that ladye's dower.

  God grant that the wish which I dare not pray
   Be not that which I lust to win,
  And that ever I look with my first dismay
   On the face of my darling sin!


As he ceased, Kenelm's eye fell on Tom's face upturned to his own, with
open lips, an intent stare, and paled cheeks, and a look of that higher
sort of terror which belongs to awe. The man, then recovering himself,
tried to speak, and attempted a sickly smile, but neither would do.
He rose abruptly and walked away, crept under the shadow of a dark
beech-tree, and stood there leaning against the trunk.

"What say you to the ballad?" asked Kenelm of the singer.

"It is not without power," answered he.

"Ay, of a certain kind."

The minstrel looked hard at Kenelm, and dropped his eyes, with a
heightened glow on his cheek.

"The Scotch are a thoughtful race. The Scot who wrote this thing may
have thought of a day when he saw beauty in the face of a darling sin;
but, if so, it is evident that his sight recovered from that glamoury.
Shall we walk on? Come, Tom."

The minstrel left them at the entrance of the town, saying, "I regret
that I cannot see more of either of you, as I quit Luscombe at daybreak.
Here, by the by, I forgot to give it before, is the address you wanted."

KENELM.--"Of the little child. I am glad you remembered her."

The minstrel again looked hard at Kenelm, this time without dropping his
eyes. Kenelm's expression of face was so simply quiet that it might be
almost called vacant.

Kenelm and Tom continued to walk on towards the veterinary surgeon's
house, for some minutes silently. Then Tom said in a whisper, "Did you
not mean those rhymes to hit me here--_here_?" and he struck his breast.

"The rhymes were written long before I saw you, Tom; but it is well if
their meaning strike us all. Of you, my friend, I have no fear now. Are
you not already a changed man?"

"I feel as if I were going through a change," answered Tom, in slow,
dreary accents. "In hearing you and that gentleman talk so much of
things that I never thought of, I felt something in me,--you will laugh
when I tell you,--something like a bird."

"Like a bird,--good!--a bird has wings."

"Just so."

"And you felt wings that you were unconscious of before, fluttering and
beating themselves as against the wires of a cage. You were true to
your instincts then, my dear fellow-man,--instincts of space and Heaven.
Courage!--the cage-door will open soon. And now, practically speaking,
I give you this advice in parting: You have a quick and sensitive mind
which you have allowed that strong body of yours to incarcerate and
suppress. Give that mind fair play. Attend to the business of your
calling diligently; the craving for regular work is the healthful
appetite of mind: but in your spare hours cultivate the new ideas which
your talk with men who have been accustomed to cultivate the mind more
than the body has sown within you. Belong to a book-club, and interest
yourself in books. A wise man has said, 'Books widen the present by
adding to it the past and the future.' Seek the company of educated men
and educated women too; and when you are angry with another, reason
with him: don't knock him down; and don't be knocked down yourself by an
enemy much stronger than yourself,--Drink. Do all this, and when I see
you again you will be--"

"Stop, sir,--you will see me again?"

"Yes, if we both live, I promise it."

"When?"

"You see, Tom, we have both of us something in our old selves which we
must work off. You will work off your something by repose, and I must
work off mine, if I can, by moving about. So I am on my travels. May
we both have new selves better than the old selves, when we again shake
hands! For your part try your best, dear Tom, and Heaven prosper you."

"And Heaven bless you!" cried Tom, fervently, with tears rolling
unheeded from his bold blue eyes.



CHAPTER XIV.

THOUGH Kenelm left Luscombe on Tuesday morning, he did not appear at
Neesdale Park till the Wednesday, a little before the dressing-bell for
dinner. His adventures in the interim are not worth repeating. He had
hoped he might fall in again with the minstrel, but he did not.

His portmanteau had arrived, and he heaved a sigh as he cased himself in
a gentleman's evening dress. "Alas! I have soon got back again into my
own skin."

There were several other guests in the house, though not a
large party,--they had been asked with an eye to the approaching
election,--consisting of squires and clergy from remoter parts of the
county. Chief among the guests in rank and importance, and rendered by
the occasion the central object of interest, was George Belvoir.

Kenelm bore his part in this society with a resignation that partook of
repentance.

The first day he spoke very little, and was considered a very dull young
man by the lady he took in to dinner. Mr. Travers in vain tried to draw
him out. He had anticipated much amusement from the eccentricities of
his guest, who had talked volubly enough in the fernery, and was sadly
disappointed. "I feel," he whispered to Mrs. Campion, "like poor Lord
Pomfret, who, charmed with Punch's lively conversation, bought him, and
was greatly surprised that, when he had once brought him home, Punch
would not talk."

"But your Punch listens," said Mrs. Campion, "and he observes."

George Belvoir, on the other hand, was universally declared to be very
agreeable. Though not naturally jovial, he forced himself to appear
so,--laughing loud with the squires, and entering heartily with
their wives and daughters into such topics as county-balls and
croquet-parties; and when after dinner he had, Cato-like, 'warmed his
virtue with wine,' the virtue came out very lustily in praise of good
men,--namely, men of his own party,--and anathemas on bad men,--namely,
men of the other party.

Now and then he appealed to Kenelm, and Kenelm always returned the same
answer, "There is much in what you say."

The first evening closed in the usual way in country houses. There was
some lounging under moonlight on the terrace before the house; then
there was some singing by young lady amateurs, and a rubber of whist for
the elders; then wine-and-water, hand-candlesticks, a smoking-room for
those who smoked, and bed for those who did not.

In the course of the evening, Cecilia, partly in obedience to the duties
of hostess and partly from that compassion for shyness which kindly and
high-bred persons entertain, had gone a little out of her way to allure
Kenelm forth from the estranged solitude he had contrived to weave
around him. In vain for the daughter as for the father. He replied to
her with the quiet self-possession which should have convinced her that
no man on earth was less entitled to indulgence for the gentlemanlike
infirmity of shyness, and no man less needed the duties of any hostess
for the augmentation of his comforts, or rather for his diminished sense
of discomfort; but his replies were in monosyllables, and made with the
air of a man who says in his heart, "If this creature would but leave me
alone!"

Cecilia, for the first time in her life, was piqued, and, strange to
say, began to feel more interest about this indifferent stranger than
about the popular, animated, pleasant George Belvoir, who she knew by
womanly instinct was as much in love with her as he could be.

Cecilia Travers that night on retiring to rest told her maid, smilingly,
that she was too tired to have her hair done; and yet, when the maid
was dismissed, she looked at herself in the glass more gravely and more
discontentedly than she had ever looked there before; and, tired though
she was, stood at the window gazing into the moonlit night for a good
hour after the maid left her.



CHAPTER XV.

KENELM CHILLINGLY has now been several days a guest at Neesdale Park.
He has recovered speech; the other guests have gone, including George
Belvoir. Leopold Travers has taken a great fancy to Kenelm. Leopold
was one of those men, not uncommon perhaps in England, who, with great
mental energies, have little book-knowledge, and when they come
in contact with a book-reader who is not a pedant feel a pleasant
excitement in his society, a source of interest in comparing notes with
him, a constant surprise in finding by what venerable authorities the
deductions which their own mother-wit has drawn from life are supported,
or by what cogent arguments derived from books those deductions are
contravened or upset. Leopold Travers had in him that sense of humour
which generally accompanies a strong practical understanding (no man,
for instance, has more practical understanding than a Scot, and no man
has a keener susceptibility to humour), and not only enjoyed Kenelm's
odd way of expressing himself, but very often mistook Kenelm's irony for
opinion spoken in earnest.

Since his early removal from the capital and his devotion to
agricultural pursuits, it was so seldom that Leopold Travers met a man
by whose conversation his mind was diverted to other subjects than those
which were incidental to the commonplace routine of his life that he
found in Kenelm's views of men and things a source of novel amusement,
and a stirring appeal to such metaphysical creeds of his own as had been
formed unconsciously, and had long reposed unexamined in the recesses of
an intellect shrewd and strong, but more accustomed to dictate than to
argue. Kenelm, on his side, saw much in his host to like and to admire;
but, reversing their relative positions in point of years, he conversed
with Travers as with a mind younger than his own. Indeed, it was one
of his crotchety theories that each generation is in substance mentally
older than the generation preceding it, especially in all that relates
to science; and, as he would say, "The study of life is a science, and
not an art."

But Cecilia,--what impression did she create upon the young visitor?
Was he alive to the charm of her rare beauty, to the grace of a mind
sufficiently stored for commune with those who love to think and to
imagine, and yet sufficiently feminine and playful to seize the sportive
side of realities, and allow their proper place to the trifles which
make the sum of human things? An impression she did make, and that
impression was new to him and pleasing. Nay, sometimes in her presence
and sometimes when alone, he fell into abstracted consultations with
himself, saying, "Kenelm Chillingly, now that thou hast got back into
thy proper skin, dost thou not think that thou hadst better remain
there? Couldst thou not be contented with thy lot as erring descendant
of Adam, if thou couldst win for thy mate so faultless a descendant of
Eve as now flits before thee?" But he could not abstract from himself
any satisfactory answer to the question he had addressed to himself.

Once he said abruptly to Travers, as, on their return from their
rambles, they caught a glimpse of Cecilia's light form bending over the
flower-beds on the lawn, "Do you admire Virgil?"

"To say truth I have not read Virgil since I was a boy; and, between you
and me, I then thought him rather monotonous."

"Perhaps because his verse is so smooth in its beauty?"

"Probably. When one is very young one's taste is faulty; and if a poet
is not faulty, we are apt to think he wants vivacity and fire."

"Thank you for your lucid explanation," answered Kenelm, adding musingly
to himself, "I am afraid I should yawn very often if I were married to a
Miss Virgil."



CHAPTER XVI.

THE house of Mr. Travers contained a considerable collection of family
portraits, few of them well painted, but the Squire was evidently proud
of such evidences of ancestry. They not only occupied a considerable
space on the walls of the reception rooms, but swarmed into the
principal sleeping-chambers, and smiled or frowned on the beholder from
dark passages and remote lobbies. One morning, Cecilia, on her way
to the china closet, found Kenelm gazing very intently upon a female
portrait consigned to one of those obscure receptacles by which through
a back staircase he gained the only approach from the hall to his
chamber.

"I don't pretend to be a good judge of paintings," said Kenelm, as
Cecilia paused beside him; "but it strikes me that this picture is very
much better than most of those to which places of honour are assigned in
your collection. And the face itself is so lovely that it would add an
embellishment to the princeliest galleries."

"Yes," said Cecilia, with a half-sigh. "The face is lovely, and the
portrait is considered one of Lely's rarest masterpieces. It used to
hang over the chimney-piece in the drawing-room. My father had it placed
here many years ago."

"Perhaps because he discovered it was not a family portrait?"

"On the contrary,--because it grieves him to think it is a family
portrait. Hush! I hear his footstep: don't speak of it to him; don't let
him see you looking at it. The subject is very painful to him."

Here Cecilia vanished into the china closet and Kenelm turned off to his
own room.

What sin committed by the original in the time of Charles II. but only
discovered in the reign of Victoria could have justified Leopold Travers
in removing the most pleasing portrait in the house from the honoured
place it had occupied, and banishing it to so obscure a recess? Kenelm
said no more on the subject, and indeed an hour afterwards had dismissed
it from his thoughts. The next day he rode out with Travers and
Cecilia. Their way passed through quiet shady lanes without any purposed
direction, when suddenly, at the spot where three of those lanes met on
an angle of common ground, a lonely gray tower, in the midst of a wide
space of grass-land which looked as if it had once been a park, with
huge boles of pollarded oak dotting the space here and there, rose
before them.

"Cissy!" cried Travers, angrily reining in his horse and stopping short
in a political discussion which he had forced upon Kenelm, "Cissy!
How comes this? We have taken the wrong turn! No matter, I see there,"
pointing to the right, "the chimney-pots of old Mondell's homestead. He
has not yet promised his vote to George Belvoir. I'll go and have a talk
with him. Turn back, you and Mr. Chillingly,--meet me at Terner's Green,
and wait for me there till I come. I need not excuse myself to you,
Chillingly. A vote is a vote." So saying, the Squire, whose ordinary
riding-horse was an old hunter, halted, turned, and, no gate being
visible, put the horse over a stiff fence and vanished in the direction
of old Mondell's chimney-pots. Kenelm, scarcely hearing his host's
instructions to Cecilia and excuses to himself, remained still and
gazing on the old tower thus abruptly obtruded on his view.

Though no learned antiquarian like his father, Kenelm had a strange
fascinating interest in all relics of the past; and old gray towers,
where they are not church towers, are very rarely to be seen in England.
All around the old gray tower spoke with an unutterable mournfulness
of a past in ruins: you could see remains of some large Gothic building
once attached to it, rising here and there in fragments of deeply
buttressed walls; you could see in a dry ditch, between high ridges,
where there had been a fortified moat: nay, you could even see where
once had been the bailey hill from which a baron of old had dispensed
justice. Seldom indeed does the most acute of antiquarians discover
that remnant of Norman times on lands still held by the oldest of
Anglo-Norman families. Then, the wild nature of the demesne around;
those ranges of sward, with those old giant oak-trunks, hollowed within
and pollarded at top,--all spoke, in unison with the gray tower, of a
past as remote from the reign of Victoria as the Pyramids are from the
sway of the Viceroy of Egypt.

"Let us turn back," said Miss Travers; "my father would not like me to
stay here."

"Pardon me a moment. I wish my father were here; he would stay till
sunset. But what is the history of that old tower? a history it must
have."

"Every home has a history, even a peasant's hut," said Cecilia. "But do
pardon me if I ask you to comply with my father's request. I at least
must turn back."

Thus commanded, Kenelm reluctantly withdrew his gaze from the ruin and
regained Cecilia, who was already some paces in return down the lane.

"I am far from a very inquisitive man by temperament," said Kenelm, "so
far as the affairs of the living are concerned. But I should not care to
open a book if I had no interest in the past. Pray indulge my curiosity
to learn something about that old tower. It could not look more
melancholy and solitary if I had built it myself."

"Its most melancholy associations are with a very recent past," answered
Cecilia. "The tower, in remote times, formed the keep of a castle
belonging to the most ancient and once the most powerful family in these
parts. The owners were barons who took active share in the Wars of the
Roses. The last of them sided with Richard III., and after the battle
of Bosworth the title was attainted, and the larger portion of the lands
was confiscated. Loyalty to a Plantagenet was of course treason to
a Tudor. But the regeneration of the family rested with their direct
descendants, who had saved from the general wreck of their fortunes what
may be called a good squire's estate,--about, perhaps, the same rental
as my father's, but of much larger acreage. These squires, however,
were more looked up to in the county than the wealthiest peer. They
were still by far the oldest family in the county; and traced in their
pedigree alliances with the most illustrious houses in English history.
In themselves too for many generations they were a high-spirited,
hospitable, popular race, living unostentatiously on their income, and
contented with their rank of squires. The castle, ruined by time and
siege, they did not attempt to restore. They dwelt in a house near to
it, built about Elizabeth's time, which you could not see, for it lies
in a hollow behind the tower,--a moderate-sized, picturesque, country
gentleman's house. Our family intermarried with them,--the portrait you
saw was a daughter of their house,--and very proud was any squire in the
county of intermarriage with the Fletwodes."

"Fletwode,--that was their name? I have a vague recollection of having
heard the name connected with some disastrous--oh, but it can't be the
same family: pray go on."

"I fear it is the same family. But I will finish the story as I have
heard it. The property descended at last to one Bertram Fletwode, who,
unfortunately, obtained the reputation of being a very clever man of
business. There was some mining company in which, with other gentlemen
in the county, he took great interest; invested largely in shares;
became the head of the direction--"

"I see; and was of course ruined."

"No; worse than that: he became very rich; and, unhappily, became
desirous of being richer still. I have heard that there was a great
mania for speculations just about that time. He embarked in these, and
prospered, till at last he was induced to invest a large share of the
fortune thus acquired in the partnership of a bank which enjoyed a high
character. Up to that time he had retained popularity and esteem in
the county; but the squires who shared in the adventures of the mining
company, and knew little or nothing about other speculations in which
his name did not appear, professed to be shocked at the idea of a
Fletwode of Fletwode being ostensibly joined in partnership with a Jones
of Clapham in a London bank."

"Slow folks, those country squires,--behind the progress of the age.
Well?"

"I have heard that Bertram Fletwode was himself very reluctant to take
this step, but was persuaded to do so by his son. This son, Alfred, was
said to have still greater talents for business than the father, and
had been not only associated with but consulted by him in all the later
speculations which had proved so fortunate. Mrs. Campion knew Alfred
Fletwode very well. She describes him as handsome, with quick, eager
eyes; showy and imposing in his talk; immensely ambitious, more
ambitious than avaricious,--collecting money less for its own sake than
for that which it could give,--rank and power. According to her it was
the dearest wish of his heart to claim the old barony, but not before
there could go with the barony a fortune adequate to the lustre of a
title so ancient, and equal to the wealth of modern peers with higher
nominal rank."

"A poor ambition at the best; of the two I should prefer that of a poet
in a garret. But I am no judge. Thank Heaven I have no ambition.
Still, all ambition, all desire to rise, is interesting to him who is
ignominiously contented if he does not fall. So the son had his way,
and Fletwode joined company with Jones on the road to wealth and the
peerage; meanwhile did the son marry? if so, of course the daughter of
a duke or a millionnaire. Tuft-hunting, or money-making, at the risk of
degradation and the workhouse. Progress of the age!"

"No," replied Cecilia, smiling at this outburst, but smiling sadly,
"Fletwode did not marry the daughter of a duke or a millionnaire; but
still his wife belonged to a noble family,--very poor, but very proud.
Perhaps he married from motives of ambition, though not of gain. Her
father was of much political influence that might perhaps assist his
claim to the barony. The mother, a woman of the world, enjoying a high
social position, and nearly related to a connection of ours,--Lady
Glenalvon."

"Lady Glenalvon, the dearest of my lady friends! You are connected with
her?"

"Yes; Lord Glenalvon was my mother's uncle. But I wish to finish my
story before my father joins us. Alfred Fletwode did not marry till long
after the partnership in the bank. His father, at his desire, had bought
up the whole business, Mr. Jones having died. The bank was carried on
in the names of Fletwode and Son. But the father had become merely a
nominal or what I believe is called a 'sleeping' partner. He had long
ceased to reside in the county. The old house was not grand enough for
him. He had purchased a palatial residence in one of the home counties;
lived there in great splendour; was a munificent patron of science
and art; and in spite of his earlier addictions to business-like
speculations he appears to have been a singularly accomplished,
high-bred gentleman. Some years before his son's marriage, Mr. Fletwode
had been afflicted with partial paralysis, and his medical attendant
enjoined rigid abstention from business. From that time he never
interfered with his son's management of the bank. He had an only
daughter, much younger than Alfred. Lord Eagleton, my mother's brother,
was engaged to be married to her. The wedding-day was fixed,--when the
world was startled by the news that the great firm of Fletwode and Son
had stopped payment; is that the right phrase?"

"I believe so."

"A great many people were ruined in that failure. The public indignation
was very great. Of course all the Fletwode property went to the
creditors. Old Mr. Fletwode was legally acquitted of all other offence
than that of overconfidence in his son. Alfred was convicted of
fraud,--of forgery. I don't, of course, know the particulars, they are
very complicated. He was sentenced to a long term of servitude, but
died the day he was condemned; apparently by poison, which he had long
secreted about his person. Now you can understand why my father, who
is almost gratuitously sensitive on the point of honour, removed into a
dark corner the portrait of Arabella Fletwode,--his own ancestress, but
also the ancestress of a convicted felon: you can understand why the
whole subject is so painful to him. His wife's brother was to have
married the felon's sister; and though, of course, that marriage was
tacitly broken off by the terrible disgrace that had befallen the
Fletwodes, yet I don't think my poor uncle ever recovered the blow to
his hopes. He went abroad, and died in Madeira of a slow decline."

"And the felon's sister, did she die too?"

"No; not that I know of. Mrs. Campion says that she saw in a newspaper
the announcement of old Mr. Fletwode's death, and a paragraph to the
effect that after that event Miss Fletwode had sailed from Liverpool to
New York."

"Alfred Fletwode's wife went back, of course, to her family?"

"Alas! no,--poor thing! She had not been many months married when the
bank broke; and among his friends her wretched husband appears to have
forged the names of the trustees to her marriage settlement, and sold
out the sums which would otherwise have served her as a competence.
Her father, too, was a great sufferer by the bankruptcy, having by
his son-in-law's advice placed a considerable portion of his moderate
fortune in Alfred's hands for investment, all of which was involved in
the general wreck. I am afraid he was a very hard-hearted man: at all
events his poor daughter never returned to him. She died, I think, even
before the death of Bertram Fletwode. The whole story is very dismal."

"Dismal indeed, but pregnant with salutary warnings to those who live
in an age of progress. Here you see a family of fair fortune, living
hospitably, beloved, revered, more looked up to by their neighbours than
the wealthiest nobles; no family not proud to boast alliance with it.
All at once, in the tranquil record of this happy race, appears that
darling of the age, that hero of progress,--a clever man of business. He
be contented to live as his fathers! He be contented with such trifles
as competence, respect, and love! Much too clever for that. The age is
money-making,--go with the age! He goes with the age. Born a gentleman
only, he exalts himself into a trader. But at least he, it seems, if
greedy, was not dishonest. He was born a gentleman, but his son was
born a trader. The son is a still cleverer man of business; the son is
consulted and trusted. Aha! He too goes with the age; to greed he
links ambition. The trader's son wishes to return--what? to the rank of
gentleman?--gentleman! nonsense! everybody is a gentleman nowadays,--to
the title of Lord. How ends it all! Could I sit but for twelve hours in
the innermost heart of that Alfred Fletwode; could I see how, step by
step from his childhood, the dishonest son was avariciously led on by
the honest father to depart from the old _vestigia_ of Fletwodes of
Fletwode,--scorning The Enough to covet The More, gaining The More to
sigh, 'It is not The Enough,'--I think I might show that the age lives
in a house of glass, and had better not for its own sake throw stones on
the felon!"

"Ah, but, Mr. Chillingly, surely this is a very rare exception in the
general--"

"Rare!" interrupted Kenelm, who was excited to a warmth of passion which
would have startled his most intimate friend,-if indeed an intimate
friend had ever been vouchsafed to him,--"rare! nay, how common--I don't
say to the extent of forgery and fraud, but to the extent of degradation
and ruin--is the greed of a Little More to those who have The Enough! is
the discontent with competence, respect, and love, when catching sight
of a money-bag! How many well-descended county families, cursed with
an heir who is called a clever man of business, have vanished from the
soil! A company starts, the clever man joins it one bright day. Pouf!
the old estates and the old name are powder. Ascend higher. Take nobles
whose ancestral titles ought to be to English ears like the sound of
clarions, awakening the most slothful to the scorn of money-bags and
the passion for renown. Lo! in that mocking dance of death called
the Progress of the Age, one who did not find Enough in a sovereign's
revenue, and seeks The Little More as a gambler on the turf by the
advice of blacklegs! Lo! another, with lands wider than his greatest
ancestors ever possessed, must still go in for The Little More, adding
acre to acre, heaping debt upon debt! Lo! a third, whose name, borne by
his ancestors, was once the terror of England's foes,--the landlord of
a hotel! A fourth,--but why go on through the list? Another and another
still succeeds; each on the Road to Ruin, each in the Age of Progress.
Ah, Miss Travers! in the old time it was through the Temple of Honour
that one passed to the Temple of Fortune. In this wise age the process
is reversed. But here comes your father."

"A thousand pardons!" said Leopold Travers. "That numskull Mondell kept
me so long with his old-fashioned Tory doubts whether liberal politics
are favourable to agricultural prospects. But as he owes a round sum to
a Whig lawyer I had to talk with his wife, a prudent woman; convinced
her that his own agricultural prospects were safest on the Whig side of
the question; and, after kissing his baby and shaking his hand, booked
his vote for George Belvoir,--a plumper."

"I suppose," said Kenelm to himself, and with that candour which
characterized him whenever he talked to himself, "that Travers has taken
the right road to the Temple, not of Honour, but of honours, in every
country, ancient or modern, which has adopted the system of popular
suffrage."



CHAPTER XVII.

THE next day Mrs. Campion and Cecilia were seated under the veranda.
They were both ostensibly employed on two several pieces of embroidery,
one intended for a screen, the other for a sofa-cushion; but the mind of
neither was on her work.

MRS. CAMPION.--"Has Mr. Chillingly said when he means to take leave?"

CECILIA.--"Not to me. How much my dear father enjoys his conversation!"

MRS. CAMPION.--"Cynicism and mockery were not so much the fashion among
young men in your father's day as I suppose they are now, and therefore
they seem new to Mr. Travers. To me they are not new, because I saw
more of the old than the young when I lived in London, and cynicism and
mockery are more natural to men who are leaving the world than to those
who are entering it."

CECILIA.--"Dear Mrs. Campion, how bitter you are, and how unjust!
You take much too literally the jesting way in which Mr. Chillingly
expresses himself. There can be no cynicism in one who goes out of his
way to make others happy."

MRS. CAMPION.--"You mean in the whim of making an ill-assorted marriage
between a pretty village flirt and a sickly cripple, and settling a
couple of peasants in a business for which they are wholly unfitted."

CECILIA.--"Jessie Wiles is not a flirt, and I am convinced that she will
make Will Somers a very good wife, and that the shop will be a great
success."

MRS. CAMPION.--"We shall see. Still, if Mr. Chillingly's talk belies his
actions, he may be a good man, but he is a very affected one."

CECILIA.--"Have I not heard you say that there are persons so natural
that they seem affected to those who do not understand them?"

Mrs. Campion raised her eyes to Cecilia's face, dropped them again over
her work, and said, in grave undertones,--"Take care, Cecilia."

"Take care of what?"

"My dearest child, forgive me; but I do not like the warmth with which
you defend Mr. Chillingly."

"Would not my father defend him still more warmly if he had heard you?"

"Men judge of men in their relations to men. I am a woman, and judge of
men in their relations to women. I should tremble for the happiness of
any woman who joined her fate with that of Kenelm Chillingly."

"My dear friend, I do not understand you to-day."

"Nay; I did not mean to be so solemn, my love. After all, it is nothing
to us whom Mr. Chillingly may or may not marry. He is but a passing
visitor, and, once gone, the chances are that we may not see him again
for years."

Thus speaking, Mrs. Campion again raised her eyes from her work,
stealing a sidelong glance at Cecilia; and her mother-like heart sank
within her, on noticing how suddenly pale the girl had become, and how
her lips quivered. Mrs. Campion had enough knowledge of life to feel
aware that she had committed a grievous blunder. In that earliest stage
of virgin affection, when a girl is unconscious of more than a certain
vague interest in one man which distinguishes him from others in her
thoughts,--if she hears him unjustly disparaged, if some warning against
him is implied, if the probability that he will never be more to her
than a passing acquaintance is forcibly obtruded on her,--suddenly that
vague interest, which might otherwise have faded away with many another
girlish fancy, becomes arrested, consolidated; the quick pang it
occasions makes her involuntarily, and for the first time, question
herself, and ask, "Do I love?" But when a girl of a nature so delicate
as that of Cecilia Travers can ask herself the question, "Do I love?"
her very modesty, her very shrinking from acknowledging that any power
over her thoughts for weal or for woe can be acquired by a man, except
through the sanction of that love which only becomes divine in her eyes
when it is earnest and pure and self-devoted, makes her prematurely
disposed to answer "yes." And when a girl of such a nature in her own
heart answers "yes" to such a question, even if she deceive herself at
the moment, she begins to cherish the deceit till the belief in her love
becomes a reality. She has adopted a religion, false or true, and she
would despise herself if she could be easily converted.

Mrs. Campion had so contrived that she had forced that question upon
Cecilia, and she feared, by the girl's change of countenance, that the
girl's heart had answered "yes."



CHAPTER XVIII.

WHILE the conversation just narrated took place, Kenelm had walked forth
to pay a visit to Will Somers. All obstacles to Will's marriage were now
cleared away; the transfer of lease for the shop had been signed, and
the banns were to be published for the first time on the following
Sunday. We need not say that Will was very happy. Kenelm then paid a
visit to Mrs. Bowles, with whom he stayed an hour. On reentering the
Park, he saw Travers, walking slowly, with downcast eyes and his hands
clasped behind him (his habit when in thought). He did not observe
Kenelm's approach till within a few feet of him, and he then greeted his
guest in listless accents, unlike his usual cheerful tones.

"I have been visiting the man you have made so happy," said Kenelm.

"Who can that be?"

"Will Somers. Do you make so many people happy that your reminiscence of
them is lost in their number?"

Travers smiled faintly, and shook his head.

Kenelm went on. "I have also seen Mrs. Bowles, and you will be pleased
to hear that Tom is satisfied with his change of abode: there is no
chance of his returning to Graveleigh; and Mrs. Bowles took very kindly
to my suggestion that the little property you wish for should be sold
to you, and, in that case, she would remove to Luscombe to be near her
son."

"I thank you much for your thought of me," said Travers, "and the affair
shall be seen to at once, though the purchase is no longer important to
me. I ought to have told you three days ago, but it slipped my memory,
that a neighbouring squire, a young fellow just come into his property,
has offered to exchange a capital farm, much nearer to my residence,
for the lands I hold in Graveleigh, including Saunderson's farm and the
cottages: they are quite at the outskirts of my estate, but run into
his, and the exchange will be advantageous to both. Still I am glad that
the neighbourhood should be thoroughly rid of a brute like Tom Bowles."

"You would not call him brute if you knew him; but I am sorry to hear
that Will Somers will be under another landlord."

"It does not matter, since his tenure is secured for fourteen years."

"What sort of man is the new landlord?"

"I don't know much of him. He was in the army till his father died,
and has only just made his appearance in the county. He has, however,
already earned the character of being too fond of the other sex: it is
well that pretty Jessie is to be safely married."

Travers then relapsed into a moody silence from which Kenelm found it
difficult to rouse him. At length the latter said kindly,--

"My dear Mr. Travers, do not think I take a liberty if I venture to
guess that something has happened this morning which troubles or vexes
you. When that is the case, it is often a relief to say what it is, even
to a confidant so unable to advise or to comfort as myself."

"You are a good fellow, Chillingly, and I know not, at least in these
parts, a man to whom I would unburden myself more freely. I am put out,
I confess; disappointed unreasonably, in a cherished wish, and," he
added, with a slight laugh, "it always annoys me when I don't have my
own way."

"So it does me."

"Don't you think that George Belvoir is a very fine young man?"

"Certainly."

"_I_ call him handsome; he is steadier, too, than most men of his
age, and of his command of money; and yet he does not want spirit nor
knowledge of life. To every advantage of rank and fortune he adds the
industry and the ambition which attain distinction in public life."

"Quite true. Is he going to withdraw from the election after all?"

"Good heavens, no!"

"Then how does he not let you have your own way?"

"It is not he," said Travers, peevishly; "it is Cecilia. Don't you
understand that George is precisely the husband I would choose for her;
and this morning came a very well written manly letter from him, asking
my permission to pay his addresses to her."

"But that is your own way so far."

"Yes, and here comes the balk. Of course I had to refer it to Cecilia,
and she positively declines, and has no reasons to give; does not deny
that George is good-looking and sensible, that he is a man of whose
preference any girl might be proud; but she chooses to say she cannot
love him, and when I ask why she cannot love him, has no other answer
than that 'she cannot say.' It is too provoking."

"It is provoking," answered Kenelm; "but then Love is the most
dunderheaded of all the passions; it never will listen to reason. The
very rudiments of logic are unknown to it. 'Love has no wherefore,' says
one of those Latin poets who wrote love-verses called elegies,--a name
which we moderns appropriate to funeral dirges. For my own part, I can't
understand how any one can be expected voluntarily to make up his mind
to go out of his mind. And if Miss Travers cannot go out of her mind
because George Belvoir does, you could not argue her into doing so if
you talked till doomsday."

Travers smiled in spite of himself, but he answered gravely, "Certainly,
I would not wish Cissy to marry any man she disliked, but she does not
dislike George; no girl could: and where that is the case, a girl so
sensible, so affectionate, so well brought up, is sure to love, after
marriage, a thoroughly kind and estimable man, especially when she has
no previous attachment,--which, of course, Cissy never had. In fact,
though I do not wish to force my daughter's will, I am not yet disposed
to give up my own. Do you understand?"

"Perfectly."

"I am the more inclined to a marriage so desirable in every way, because
when Cissy comes out in London, which she has not yet done, she is
sure to collect round her face and her presumptive inheritance all the
handsome fortune-hunters and titled _vauriens_; and if in love there
is no wherefore, how can I be sure that she may not fall in love with a
scamp?"

"I think you may be sure of that," said Kenelm. "Miss Travers has too
much mind."

"Yes, at present; but did you not say that in love people go out of
their mind?"

"True! I forgot that."

"I am not then disposed to dismiss poor George's offer with a decided
negative, and yet it would be unfair to mislead him by encouragement. In
fact, I'll be hanged if I know how to reply."

"You think Miss Travers does not dislike George Belvoir, and if she saw
more of him may like him better, and it would be good for her as well as
for him not to put an end to that, chance?"

"Exactly so."

"Why not then write: 'My dear George,--You have my best wishes, but my
daughter does not seem disposed to marry at present. Let me consider
your letter not written, and continue on the same terms as we were
before.' Perhaps, as George knows Virgil, you might find your own
schoolboy recollections of that poet useful here, and add, _Varium et
mutabile semper femina_; hackneyed, but true."

"My dear Chillingly, your suggestion is capital. How the deuce at your
age have you contrived to know the world so well?"

Kenelm answered in the pathetic tones so natural to his voice, "By being
only a looker-on; alas!"

Leopold Travers felt much relieved after he had written his reply
to George. He had not been quite so ingenuous in his revelation to
Chillingly as he may have seemed. Conscious, like all proud and
fond fathers, of his daughter's attractions, he was not without some
apprehension that Kenelm himself might entertain an ambition at variance
with that of George Belvoir: if so, he deemed it well to put an end to
such ambition while yet in time: partly because his interest was already
pledged to George; partly because, in rank and fortune, George was the
better match; partly because George was of the same political party as
himself,--while Sir Peter, and probably Sir Peter's heir, espoused the
opposite side; and partly also because, with all his personal liking to
Kenelm, Leopold Travers, as a very sensible, practical man of the world,
was not sure that a baronet's heir who tramped the country on foot in
the dress of a petty farmer, and indulged pugilistic propensities in
martial encounters with stalwart farriers, was likely to make a safe
husband and a comfortable son-in-law. Kenelm's words, and still more his
manner, convinced Travers that any apprehensions of rivalry that he had
previously conceived were utterly groundless.



CHAPTER XIX.

THE same evening, after dinner (during that lovely summer month they
dined at Neesdale Park at an unfashionably early hour), Kenelm, in
company with Travers and Cecilia, ascended a gentle eminence at the back
of the gardens, on which there were some picturesque ivy-grown ruins of
an ancient priory, and commanding the best view of a glorious sunset and
a subject landscape of vale and wood, rivulet and distant hills.

"Is the delight in scenery," said Kenelm, "really an acquired gift,
as some philosophers tell us? Is it true that young children and rude
savages do not feel it; that the eye must be educated to comprehend its
charm, and that the eye can be only educated through the mind?"

"I should think your philosophers are right," said Travers. "When I was
a schoolboy, I thought no scenery was like the flat of a cricket ground;
when I hunted at Melton, I thought that unpicturesque country more
beautiful than Devonshire. It is only of late years that I feel a
sensible pleasure in scenery for its own sake, apart from associations
of custom or the uses to which we apply them."

"And what say you, Miss Travers?"

"I scarcely know what to say," answered Cecilia, musingly. "I can
remember no time in my childhood when I did not feel delight in that
which seemed to me beautiful in scenery, but I suspect that I vaguely
distinguished one kind of beauty from another. A common field with
daisies and buttercups was beautiful to me then, and I doubt if I saw
anything more beautiful in extensive landscapes."

"True," said Kenelm: "it is not in early childhood that we carry the
sight into distance: as is the mind so is the eye; in early childhood
the mind revels in the present, and the eye rejoices most in the things
nearest to it. I don't think in childhood that we--

 "'Watched with wistful eyes the setting sun.'"

"Ah! what a world of thought in that word 'wistful'!" murmured Cecilia,
as her gaze riveted itself on the western heavens, towards which Kenelm
had pointed as he spoke, where the enlarging orb rested half its disk on
the rim of the horizon.

She had seated herself on a fragment of the ruin, backed by the hollows
of a broken arch. The last rays of the sun lingered on her young face,
and then lost themselves in the gloom of the arch behind. There was a
silence for some minutes, during which the sun had sunk. Rosy clouds in
thin flakes still floated, momently waning: and the eve-star stole forth
steadfast, bright, and lonely,--nay, lonely not now; that sentinel has
aroused a host.

Said a voice, "No sign of rain yet, Squire. What will become of the
turnips?"

"Real life again! Who can escape it?" muttered Kenelm, as his eye rested
on the burly figure of the Squire's bailiff.

"Ha! North," said Travers, "what brings you here? No bad news, I hope?"

"Indeed, yes, Squire. The Durham bull--"

"The Durham bull! What of him? You frighten me."

"Taken bad. Colic."

"Excuse me, Chillingly," cried Travers; "I must be off. A most valuable
animal, and no one I can trust to doctor him but myself."

"That's true enough," said the bailiff, admiringly. "There's not a
veterinary in the county like the Squire."

Travers was already gone, and the panting bailiff had hard work to catch
him up.

Kenelm seated himself beside Cecilia on the ruined fragment.

"How I envy your father!" said he.

"Why just at this moment,--because he knows how to doctor the bull?"
said Cecilia, with a sweet low laugh.

"Well, that is something to envy. It is a pleasure to relieve from pain
any of God's creatures,--even a Durham bull."

"Indeed, yes. I am justly rebuked."

"On the contrary you are to be justly praised. Your question suggested
to me an amiable sentiment in place of the selfish one which was
uppermost in my thoughts. I envied your father because he creates for
himself so many objects of interest; because while he can appreciate the
mere sensuous enjoyment of a landscape and a sunset, he can find mental
excitement in turnip crops and bulls. Happy, Miss Travers, is the
Practical Man."

"When my dear father was as young as you, Mr. Chillingly, I am sure that
he had no more interest in turnips and bulls than you have. I do not
doubt that some day you will be as practical as he is in that respect."

"Do you think so--sincerely?"

Cecilia made no answer.

Kenelm repeated the question.

"Sincerely, then, I do not know whether you will take interest in
precisely the same things that interest my father; but there are other
things than turnips and cattle which belong to what you call 'practical
life,' and in these you will take interest, as you took in the fortunes
of Will Somers and Jessie Wiles."

"That was no practical interest. I got nothing by it. But even if that
interest were practical,--I mean productive, as cattle and turnip crops
are,--a succession of Somerses and Wileses is not to be hoped for.
History never repeats itself."

"May I answer you, though very humbly?"

"Miss Travers, the wisest man that ever existed never was wise enough
to know woman; but I think most men ordinarily wise will agree in this,
that woman is by no means a humble creature, and that when she says she
'answers very humbly,' she does not mean what she says. Permit me to
entreat you to answer very loftily."

Cecilia laughed and blushed. The laugh was musical; the blush was--what?
Let any man, seated beside a girl like Cecilia at starry twilight, find
the right epithet for that blush. I pass it by epithetless. But she
answered, firmly though sweetly,--

"Are there not things very practical, and affecting the happiness, not
of one or two individuals, but of innumerable thousands, in which a man
like Mr. Chillingly cannot fail to feel interest, long before he is my
father's age?"

"Forgive me: you do not answer; you question. I imitate you, and ask
what are those things as applicable to a man like Mr. Chillingly?"

Cecilia gathered herself up, as with the desire to express a great deal
in short substance, and then said,--

"In the expression of thought, literature; in the conduct of action,
politics."

Kenelm Chillingly stared, dumfounded. I suppose the greatest enthusiast
for woman's rights could not assert more reverentially than he did the
cleverness of women; but among the things which the cleverness of woman
did not achieve, he had always placed "laconics." "No woman," he was
wont to say, "ever invented an axiom or a proverb."

"Miss Travers," he said at last, "before we proceed further, vouchsafe
to tell me if that very terse reply of yours is spontaneous and
original; or whether you have not borrowed it from some book which I
have not chanced to read?"

Cecilia pondered honestly, and then said, "I don't think it is from any
book; but I owe so many of my thoughts to Mrs. Campion, and she lived so
much among clever men, that--"

"I see it all, and accept your definition, no matter whence it came.
You think I might become an author or a politician. Did you ever read an
essay by a living author called 'Motive Power'?"

"No."

"That essay is designed to intimate that without motive power a man,
whatever his talents or his culture, does nothing practical. The
mainsprings of motive power are Want and Ambition. They are absent
from my mechanism. By the accident of birth I do not require bread and
cheese; by the accident of temperament and of philosophical culture
I care nothing about praise or blame. But without want of bread and
cheese, and with a most stolid indifference to praise and blame, do you
honestly think that a man will do anything practical in literature or
politics? Ask Mrs. Campion."

"I will not ask her. Is the sense of duty nothing?"

"Alas! we interpret duty so variously. Of mere duty, as we commonly
understand the word, I do not think I shall fail more than other men.
But for the fair development of all the good that is in us, do you
believe that we should adopt some line of conduct against which our
whole heart rebels? Can you say to the clerk, 'Be a poet'? Can you say
to the poet, 'Be a clerk'? It is no more to the happiness of a man's
being to order him to take to one career when his whole heart is set
on another, than it is to order him to marry one woman when it is to
another woman that his heart will turn."

Cecilia here winced and looked away. Kenelm had more tact than most men
of his age,--that is, a keener perception of subjects to avoid; but then
Kenelm had a wretched habit of forgetting the person he talked to and
talking to himself. Utterly oblivious of George Belvoir, he was talking
to himself now. Not then observing the effect his _mal-a-propos_ dogma
had produced on his listener, he went on, "Happiness is a word very
lightly used. It may mean little; it may mean much. By the word
happiness I would signify, not the momentary joy of a child who gets
a plaything, but the lasting harmony between our inclinations and our
objects; and without that harmony we are a discord to ourselves, we are
incompletions, we are failures. Yet there are plenty of advisers who say
to us, 'It is a duty to be a discord.' I deny it."

Here Cecilia rose and said in a low voice, "It is getting late. We must
go homeward."

They descended the green eminence slowly, and at first in silence.
The bats, emerging from the ivied ruins they left behind, flitted and
skimmed before them, chasing the insects of the night. A moth, escaping
from its pursuer, alighted on Cecilia's breast, as if for refuge.

"The bats are practical," said Kenelm; "they are hungry, and their
motive power to-night is strong. Their interest is in the insects they
chase. They have no interest in the stars; but the stars lure the moth."

Cecilia drew her slight scarf over the moth, so that it might not
fly off and become a prey to the bats. "Yet," said she, "the moth is
practical too."

"Ay, just now, since it has found an asylum from the danger that
threatened it in its course towards the stars."

Cecilia felt the beating of her heart, upon which lay the moth
concealed. Did she think that a deeper and more tender meaning than they
outwardly expressed was couched in these words? If so, she erred. They
now neared the garden gate, and Kenelm paused as he opened it. "See,"
he said, "the moon has just risen over those dark firs, making the still
night stiller. Is it not strange that we mortals, placed amid perpetual
agitation and tumult and strife, as if our natural element, conceive a
sense of holiness in the images antagonistic to our real life; I mean
in images of repose? I feel at the moment as if I suddenly were
made better, now that heaven and earth have suddenly become yet more
tranquil. I am now conscious of a purer and sweeter moral than either I
or you drew from the insect you have sheltered. I must come to the poets
to express it,--


 "'The desire of the moth for the star,
   Of the night for the morrow;
  The devotion to something afar
   From the sphere of our sorrow.'


"Oh, that something afar! that something afar! never to be reached on
this earth,--never, never!"

There was such a wail in that cry from the man's heart that Cecilia
could not resist the impulse of a divine compassion. She laid her hand
on his, and looked on the dark wildness of his upward face with eyes
that Heaven meant to be wells of comfort to grieving man. At the light
touch of that hand Kenelm started, looked down, and met those soothing
eyes.

"I am happy to tell you that I have saved my Durham," cried out Mr.
Travers from the other side of the gate.



CHAPTER XX.

AS Kenelm that night retired to his own room, he paused on the
landing-place opposite to the portrait which Mr. Travers had consigned
to that desolate exile. This daughter of a race dishonoured in its
extinction might well have been the glory of the house she had entered
as a bride. The countenance was singularly beautiful, and of a character
of beauty eminently patrician; there was in its expression a gentleness
and modesty not often found in the female portraits of Sir Peter
Lely, and in the eyes and in the smile a wonderful aspect of innocent
happiness.

"What a speaking homily," soliloquized Kenelm, addressing the picture,
"against the ambition thy fair descendant would awake in me, art thou,
O lovely image! For generations thy beauty lived in this canvas, a thing
of joy, the pride of the race it adorned. Owner after owner said
to admiring guests, 'Yes, a fine portrait, by Lely; she was my
ancestress,--a Fletwode of Fletwode.' Now, lest guests should remember
that a Fletwode married a Travers thou art thrust out of sight; not even
Lely's art can make thee of value, can redeem thine innocent self from
disgrace. And the last of the Fletwodes, doubtless the most ambitious of
all, the most bent on restoring and regilding the old lordly name, dies
a felon; the infamy of one living man is so large that it can blot
out the honour of the dead." He turned his eyes from the smile of
the portrait, entered his own room, and, seating himself by the
writing-table, drew blotting-book and note-paper towards him, took
up the pen, and instead of writing fell into deep revery. There was a
slight frown on his brow, on which frowns were rare. He was very angry
with himself.

"Kenelm," he said, entering into his customary dialogue with that self,
"it becomes you, forsooth, to moralize about the honour of races which
have no affinity with you. Son of Sir Peter Chillingly, look at home.
Are you quite sure that you have not said or done or looked a something
that may bring trouble to the hearth on which you are received as guest?
What right had you to be moaning forth your egotisms, not remembering
that your words fell on compassionate ears, and that such words, heard
at moonlight by a girl whose heart they move to pity, may have dangers
for her peace? Shame on you, Kenelm! shame! knowing too what her
father's wish is; and knowing too that you have not the excuse of
desiring to win that fair creature for yourself. What do you mean,
Kenelm? I don't hear you; speak out. Oh, 'that I am a vain coxcomb to
fancy that she could take a fancy to me:' well, perhaps I am; I hope so
earnestly; and at all events, there has been and shall be no time for
much mischief. We are off to-morrow, Kenelm; bestir yourself and pack
up, write your letters, and then 'put out the light,--put out _the_
light!'"

But this converser with himself did not immediately set to work, as
agreed upon by that twofold one. He rose and walked restlessly to and
fro the floor, stopping ever and anon to look at the pictures on the
walls.

Several of the worst painted of the family portraits had been consigned
to the room tenanted by Kenelm, which, though both the oldest and
largest bed-chamber in the house, was always appropriated to a bachelor
male guest, partly because it was without dressing-room, remote, and
only approached by the small back-staircase, to the landing-place of
which Arabella had been banished in disgrace; and partly because it had
the reputation of being haunted, and ladies are more alarmed by that
superstition than men are supposed to be. The portraits on which Kenelm
now paused to gaze were of various dates, from the reign of Elizabeth to
that of George III., none of them by eminent artists, and none of them
the effigies of ancestors who had left names in history,--in short, such
portraits as are often seen in the country houses of well-born squires.
One family type of features or expression pervaded most of these
portraits; features clear-cut and hardy, expression open and honest.
And though not one of those dead men had been famous, each of them had
contributed his unostentatious share, in his own simple way, to the
movements of his time. That worthy in ruff and corselet had manned his
own ship at his own cost against the Armada; never had been repaid by
the thrifty Burleigh the expenses which had harassed him and diminished
his patrimony; never had been even knighted. That gentleman with short
straight hair, which overhung his forehead, leaning on his sword
with one hand, and a book open in the other hand, had served as
representative of his county town in the Long Parliament, fought under
Cromwell at Marston Moor, and, resisting the Protector when he removed
the "bauble," was one of the patriots incarcerated in "Hell hole." He,
too, had diminished his patrimony, maintaining two troopers and two
horses at his own charge, and "Hell hole" was all he got in return.
A third, with a sleeker expression of countenance, and a large wig,
flourishing in the quiet times of Charles II., had only been a justice
of the peace, but his alert look showed that he had been a very active
one. He had neither increased nor diminished his ancestral fortune. A
fourth, in the costume of William III.'s reign, had somewhat added to
the patrimony by becoming a lawyer. He must have been a successful one.
He is inscribed "Sergeant-at-law." A fifth, a lieutenant in the army,
was killed at Blenheim; his portrait was that of a very young and
handsome man, taken the year before his death. His wife's portrait is
placed in the drawing-room because it was painted by Kneller. She was
handsome too, and married again a nobleman, whose portrait, of course,
was not in the family collection. Here there was a gap in chronological
arrangement, the lieutenant's heir being an infant; but in the time
of George II. another Travers appeared as the governor of a West India
colony. His son took part in a very different movement of the age. He is
represented old, venerable, with white hair, and underneath his
effigy is inscribed, "Follower of Wesley." His successor completes the
collection. He is in naval uniform; he is in full length, and one of his
legs is a wooden one. He is Captain, R.N., and inscribed, "Fought under
Nelson at Trafalgar." That portrait would have found more dignified
place in the reception-rooms if the face had not been forbiddingly ugly,
and the picture itself a villanous daub.

"I see," said Kenelm, stopping short, "why Cecilia Travers has been
reared to talk of duty as a practical interest in life. These men of a
former time seem to have lived to discharge a duty, and not to follow
the progress of the age in the chase of a money-bag,--except perhaps
one, but then to be sure he was a lawyer. Kenelm, rouse up and listen
to me; whatever we are, whether active or indolent, is not my favourite
maxim a just and a true one; namely, 'A good man does good by living'?
But, for that, he must be a harmony and not a discord. Kenelm, you lazy
dog, we must pack up."

Kenelm then refilled his portmanteau, and labelled and directed it to
Exmundham, after which he wrote these three notes:--


NOTE I.

TO THE MARCHIONESS OF GLENALVON.

MY DEAR FRIEND AND MONITRESS,--I have left your last letter a month
unanswered. I could not reply to your congratulations on the event of my
attaining the age of twenty-one. That event is a conventional sham,
and you know how I abhor shams and conventions. The truth is that I am
either much younger than twenty-one or much older. As to all designs on
my peace in standing for our county at the next election, I wished to
defeat them, and I have done so; and now I have commenced a course of
travel. I had intended on starting to confine it to my native country.
Intentions are mutable. I am going abroad. You shall hear of my
whereabout. I write this from the house of Leopold Travers, who, I
understand from his fair daughter, is a connection of yours; a man to be
highly esteemed and cordially liked.

No, in spite of all your flattering predictions, I shall never be
anything in this life more distinguished than what I am now. Lady
Glenalvon allows me to sign myself her grateful friend,

K. C.


NOTE II.

DEAR COUSIN MIVERS,--I am going abroad. I may want money; for, in order
to rouse motive power within me, I mean to want money if I can. When I
was a boy of sixteen you offered me money to write attacks upon veteran
authors for "The Londoner." Will you give me money now for a similar
display of that grand New Idea of our generation; namely, that the less
a man knows of a subject the better he understands it? I am about to
travel into countries which I have never seen, and among races I have
never known. My arbitrary judgments on both will be invaluable to "The
Londoner" from a Special Correspondent who shares your respect for the
anonymous, and whose name is never to be divulged. Direct your answer by
return to me, _poste restante_, Calais.

Yours truly,

K. C.


NOTE III.

MY DEAR FATHER,--I found your letter here, whence I depart to-morrow.
Excuse haste. I go abroad, and shall write to you from Calais.

I admire Leopold Travers very much. After all, how much of self-balance
there is in a true English gentleman! Toss him up and down where you
will, and he always alights on his feet,--a gentleman. He has one child,
a daughter named Cecilia,--handsome enough to allure into wedlock any
mortal whom Decimus Roach had not convinced that in celibacy lay the
right "Approach to the Angels." Moreover, she is a girl whom one can
talk with. Even you could talk with her. Travers wishes her to marry
a very respectable, good-looking, promising gentleman, in every way
"suitable," as they say. And if she does, she will rival that pink and
perfection of polished womanhood, Lady Glenalvon. I send you back my
portmanteau. I have pretty well exhausted my experience-money, but have
not yet encroached on my monthly allowance. I mean still to live upon
that, eking it out, if necessary, by the sweat of my brow or brains. But
if any case requiring extra funds should occur,--a case in which that
extra would do such real good to another that I feel _you_ would do
it,--why, I must draw a check on your bankers. But understand that is
your expense, not mine, and it is _you_ who are to be repaid in Heaven.
Dear father, how I do love and honour you every day more and more!
Promise you not to propose to any young lady till I come first to you
for consent!--oh, my dear father, how could you doubt it? how doubt
that I could not be happy with any wife whom you could not love as a
daughter? Accept that promise as sacred. But I wish you had asked me
something in which obedience was not much too facile to be a test of
duty. I could not have obeyed you more cheerfully if you had asked me to
promise never to propose to any young lady at all. Had you asked me to
promise that I would renounce the dignity of reason for the frenzy of
love, or the freedom of man for the servitude of husband, then I might
have sought to achieve the impossible; but I should have died in the
effort!--and thou wouldst have known that remorse which haunts the bed
of the tyrant.

Your affectionate son,

K. C.



CHAPTER XXI.

THE next morning Kenelm surprised the party at breakfast by appearing
in the coarse habiliments in which he had first made his host's
acquaintance. He did not glance towards Cecilia when he announced his
departure; but, his eye resting on Mrs. Campion, he smiled, perhaps a
little sadly, at seeing her countenance brighten up and hearing her give
a short sigh of relief. Travers tried hard to induce him to stay a few
days longer, but Kenelm was firm. "The summer is wearing away," said he,
"and I have far to go before the flowers fade and the snows fall. On the
third night from this I shall sleep on foreign soil."

"You are going abroad, then?" asked Mrs. Campion.

"Yes."

"A sudden resolution, Mr. Chillingly. The other day you talked of
visiting the Scotch lakes."

"True; but, on reflection, they will be crowded with holiday tourists,
many of whom I shall probably know. Abroad I shall be free, for I shall
be unknown."

"I suppose you will be back for the hunting season," said Travers.

"I think not. I do not hunt foxes."

"Probably we shall at all events meet in London," said Travers. "I
think, after long rustication, that a season or two in the bustling
capital may be a salutary change for mind as well as for body; and it
is time that Cecilia were presented and her court-dress specially
commemorated in the columns of the 'Morning Post.'"

Cecilia was seemingly too busied behind the tea-urn to heed this
reference to her debut.

"I shall miss you terribly," cried Travers, a few moments afterwards,
and with a hearty emphasis. "I declare that you have quite unsettled me.
Your quaint sayings will be ringing in my ears long after you are gone."

There was a rustle as of a woman's dress in sudden change of movement
behind the tea-urn.

"Cissy," said Mrs. Campion, "are we ever to have our tea?"

"I beg pardon," answered a voice behind the urn. "I hear Pompey" (the
Skye terrier) "whining on the lawn. They have shut him out. I will be
back presently."

Cecilia rose and was gone. Mrs. Campion took her place at the tea-urn.

"It is quite absurd of Cissy to be so fond of that hideous dog," said
Travers, petulantly.

"Its hideousness is its beauty," returned Mrs. Campion, laughing. "Mr.
Belvoir selected it for her as having the longest back and the shortest
legs of any dog he could find in Scotland."

"Ah, George gave it to her; I forgot that," said Travers, laughing
pleasantly.

It was some minutes before Miss Travers returned with the Skye
terrier, and she seemed to have recovered her spirits in regaining that
ornamental accession to the party; talking very quickly and gayly, and
with flushed cheeks, like a young person excited by her own overflow of
mirth.

But when, half an hour afterwards, Kenelm took leave of her and Mrs.
Campion at the hall-door, the flush was gone, her lips were tightly
compressed, and her parting words were not audible. Then, as his figure
(side by side with her father, who accompanied his guest to the lodge)
swiftly passed across the lawn and vanished amid the trees beyond, Mrs.
Campion wound a mother-like arm around her waist and kissed her.
Cecilia shivered and turned her face to her friend smiling; but such a
smile,--one of those smiles that seem brimful of tears.

"Thank you, dear," she said meekly; and, gliding away towards the
flower-garden, lingered a while by the gate which Kenelm had opened
the night before. Then she went with languid steps up the green slopes
towards the ruined priory.




BOOK IV.



CHAPTER I.

IT is somewhat more than a year and a half since Kenelm Chillingly left
England, and the scene now is in London, during that earlier and more
sociable season which precedes the Easter holidays,--season in which
the charm of intellectual companionship is not yet withered away in the
heated atmosphere of crowded rooms,--season in which parties are small,
and conversation extends beyond the interchange of commonplace with
one's next neighbour at a dinner-table,--season in which you have a
fair chance of finding your warmest friends not absorbed by the superior
claims of their chilliest acquaintances.

There was what is called a _conversazione_ at the house of one of those
Whig noblemen who yet retain the graceful art of bringing agreeable
people together, and collecting round them the true aristocracy, which
combines letters and art and science with hereditary rank and political
distinction,--that art which was the happy secret of the Lansdownes and
Hollands of the last generation. Lord Beaumanoir was himself a genial,
well-read man, a good judge of art, and a pleasant talker. He had a
charming wife, devoted to him and to her children, but with enough love
of general approbation to make herself as popular in the fashionable
world as if she sought in its gayeties a refuge from the dulness of
domestic life.

Amongst the guests at the Beaumanoirs, this evening were two men, seated
apart in a small room, and conversing familiarly. The one might be about
fifty-four; he was tall, strongly built, but not corpulent, somewhat
bald, with black eyebrows, dark eyes, bright and keen, mobile lips round
which there played a shrewd and sometimes sarcastic smile.

This gentleman, the Right Hon. Gerard Danvers, was a very influential
member of Parliament. He had, when young for English public life,
attained to high office; but--partly from a great distaste to the
drudgery of administration; partly from a pride of temperament, which
unfitted him for the subordination that a Cabinet owes to its chief;
partly, also, from a not uncommon kind of epicurean philosophy, at once
joyous and cynical, which sought the pleasures of life and held very
cheap its honours--he had obstinately declined to re-enter office, and
only spoke on rare occasions. On such occasions he carried great weight,
and, by the brief expression of his opinions, commanded more votes than
many an orator infinitely more eloquent. Despite his want of ambition,
he was fond of power in his own way,--power over the people who _had_
power; and, in the love of political intrigue, he found an amusement for
an intellect very subtle and very active. At this moment he was bent on
a new combination among the leaders of different sections in the same
party, by which certain veterans were to retire, and certain younger men
to be admitted into the Administration. It was an amiable feature in his
character that he had a sympathy with the young, and had helped to
bring into Parliament, as well as into office, some of the ablest of
a generation later than his own. He gave them sensible counsel,
was pleased when they succeeded, and encouraged them when they
failed,--always provided that they had stuff enough in them to redeem
the failure; if not, he gently dropped them from his intimacy, but
maintained sufficiently familiar terms with them to be pretty sure that
he could influence their votes whenever he so desired.

The gentleman with whom he was now conversing was young, about
five-and-twenty; not yet in Parliament, but with an intense desire to
obtain a seat in it, and with one of those reputations which a youth
carries away from school and college, justified, not by honours purely
academical, but by an impression of ability and power created on the
minds of his contemporaries and endorsed by his elders. He had done
little at the University beyond taking a fair degree, except acquiring
at the debating society the fame of an exceedingly ready and adroit
speaker. On quitting college he had written one or two political
articles in a quarterly review, which created a sensation; and though
belonging to no profession, and having but a small yet independent
income, society was very civil to him, as to a man who would some day or
other attain a position in which he could damage his enemies and serve
his friends. Something in this young man's countenance and bearing
tended to favour the credit given to his ability and his promise. In his
countenance there was no beauty; in his bearing no elegance. But in that
countenance there was vigour, there was energy, there was audacity. A
forehead wide but low, protuberant in those organs over the brow which
indicate the qualities fitted for perception and judgment,--qualities
for every-day life; eyes of the clear English blue, small, somewhat
sunken, vigilant, sagacious, penetrating; a long straight upper
lip, significant of resolute purpose; a mouth in which a student
of physiognomy would have detected a dangerous charm. The smile
was captivating, but it was artificial, surrounded by dimples, and
displaying teeth white, small, strong, but divided from each other. The
expression of that smile would have been frank and candid to all who
failed to notice that it was not in harmony with the brooding forehead
and the steely eye; that it seemed to stand distinct from the rest
of the face, like a feature that had learned its part. There was that
physical power in the back of the head which belongs to men who make
their way in life,--combative and destructive. All gladiators have it;
so have great debaters and great reformers,--that is, reformers who can
destroy, but not necessarily reconstruct. So, too, in the bearing of the
man there was a hardy self-confidence, much too simple and unaffected
for his worst enemy to call it self-conceit. It was the bearing of one
who knew how to maintain personal dignity without seeming to care about
it. Never servile to the great, never arrogant to the little; so little
over-refined that it was never vulgar,--a popular bearing.

The room in which these gentlemen were seated was separated from the
general suite of apartments by a lobby off the landing-place, and served
for Lady Beaumanoir's boudoir. Very pretty it was, but simply furnished,
with chintz draperies. The walls were adorned with drawings in
water-colours, and precious specimens of china on fanciful Parian
brackets. At one corner, by a window that looked southward and opened
on a spacious balcony, glazed in and filled with flowers, stood one of
those high trellised screens, first invented, I believe, in Vienna, and
along which ivy is so trained as to form an arbour.

The recess thus constructed, and which was completely out of sight from
the rest of the room, was the hostess's favourite writing-nook. The two
men I have described were seated near the screen, and had certainly no
suspicion that any one could be behind it.

"Yes," said Mr. Danvers, from an ottoman niched in another recess of the
room, "I think there will be an opening at Saxboro' soon: Milroy wants a
Colonial Government; and if we can reconstruct the Cabinet as I propose,
he would get one. Saxboro' would thus be vacant. But, my dear fellow,
Saxboro' is a place to be wooed through love, and only won through
money. It demands liberalism from a candidate,--two kinds of liberalism
seldom united; the liberalism in opinion which is natural enough to a
very poor man, and the liberalism in expenditure which is scarcely to
be obtained except from a very rich one. You may compute the cost of
Saxboro' at L3000 to get in, and about L2000 more to defend your seat
against a petition,--the defeated candidate nearly always petitions.
L5000 is a large sum; and the worst of it is, that the extreme opinions
to which the member for Saxboro' must pledge himself are a drawback to
an official career. Violent politicians are not the best raw material
out of which to manufacture fortunate placemen."

"The opinions do not so much matter; the expense does. I cannot afford
L5000, or even L3000."

"Would not Sir Peter assist? He has, you say, only one son; and if
anything happen to that son, you are the next heir."

"My father quarrelled with Sir Peter, and harassed him by an imprudent
and ungracious litigation. I scarcely think I could apply to him for
money to obtain a seat in Parliament upon the democratic side of the
question; for, though I know little of his politics, I take it for
granted that a country gentleman of old family and L10,000 a year cannot
well be a democrat."

"Then I presume you would not be a democrat if, by the death of your
cousin, you became heir to the Chillinglys."

"I am not sure what I might be in that case. There are times when a
democrat of ancient lineage and good estates could take a very high
place amongst the aristocracy."

"Humph! my dear Gordon, _vous irez loin_."

"I hope to do so. Measuring myself against the men of my own day, I do
not see many who should outstrip me."

"What sort of a fellow is your cousin Kenelm? I met him once or twice
when he was very young, and reading with Welby in London. People then
said that he was very clever; he struck me as very odd."

"I never saw him, but from all I hear, whether he be clever or whether
he be odd, he is not likely to do anything in life,--a dreamer."

"Writes poetry perhaps?"

"Capable of it, I dare say."

Just then some other guests came into the room, amongst them a lady
of an appearance at once singularly distinguished and singularly
prepossessing, rather above the common height, and with a certain
indescribable nobility of air and presence. Lady Glenalvon was one of
the queens of the London world, and no queen of that world was ever
less worldly or more queen-like. Side by side with the lady was Mr.
Chillingly Mivers. Gordon and Mivers interchanged friendly nods, and the
former sauntered away and was soon lost amid a crowd of other young
men, with whom, as he could converse well and lightly on things which
interested them, he was rather a favourite, though he was not an
intimate associate. Mr. Danvers retired into a corner of the adjoining
lobby, where he favoured the French ambassador with his views on the
state of Europe and the reconstruction of Cabinets in general.

"But," said Lady Glenalvon to Chillingly Mivers, "are you quite sure
that my old young friend Kenelm is here? Since you told me so, I have
looked everywhere for him in vain. I should so much like to see him
again."

"I certainly caught a glimpse of him half an hour ago; but before I
could escape from a geologist who was boring me about the Silurian
system, Kenelm had vanished."

"Perhaps it was his ghost!"

"Well, we certainly live in the most credulous and superstitious age
upon record; and so many people tell me that they converse with the
dead under the table that it seems impertinent in me to say that I don't
believe in ghosts."

"Tell me some of those incomprehensible stories about table-rapping,"
said Lady Glenalvon. "There is a charming, snug recess here behind the
screen."

Scarcely had she entered the recess when she drew back with a start and
an exclamation of amaze. Seated at the table within the recess, his chin
resting on his hand, and his face cast down in abstracted revery, was a
young man. So still was his attitude, so calmly mournful the expression
of his face, so estranged did he seem from all the motley but brilliant
assemblage which circled around the solitude he had made for himself,
that he might well have been deemed one of those visitants from another
world whose secrets the intruder had wished to learn. Of that intruder's
presence he was evidently unconscious. Recovering her surprise, she
stole up to him, placed her hand on his shoulder, and uttered his name
in a low gentle voice. At that sound Kenelm Chillingly looked up.

"Do you not remember me?" asked Lady Glenalvon. Before he could answer,
Mivers, who had followed the marchioness into the recess, interposed.

"My dear Kenelm, how are you? When did you come to London? Why have you
not called on me; and what on earth are you hiding yourself for?"

Kenelm had now recovered the self-possession which he rarely lost long
in the presence of others. He returned cordially his kinsman's greeting,
and kissed with his wonted chivalrous grace the fair hand which the lady
withdrew from his shoulder and extended to his pressure. "Remember you!"
he said to Lady Glenalvon with the kindliest expression of his soft dark
eyes; "I am not so far advanced towards the noon of life as to forget
the sunshine that brightened its morning. My dear Mivers, your questions
are easily answered. I arrived in England two weeks ago, stayed at
Exmundham till this morning, to-day dined with Lord Thetford, whose
acquaintance I made abroad, and was persuaded by him to come here and
be introduced to his father and mother, the Beaumanoirs. After I had
undergone that ceremony, the sight of so many strange faces frightened
me into shyness. Entering this room at a moment when it was quite
deserted, I resolved to turn hermit behind the screen."

"Why, you must have seen your cousin Gordon as you came into the room."

"But you forget I don't know him by sight. However, there was no one in
the room when I entered; a little later some others came in, for I heard
a faint buzz, like that of persons talking in a whisper. However, I was
no eavesdropper, as a person behind a screen is on the dramatic stage."

This was true. Even had Gordon and Danvers talked in a louder tone,
Kenelm had been too absorbed in his own thoughts to have heard a word of
their conversation.

"You ought to know young Gordon; he is a very clever fellow, and has an
ambition to enter Parliament. I hope no old family quarrel between his
bear of a father and dear Sir Peter will make you object to meet him."

"Sir Peter is the most forgiving of men, but he would scarcely forgive
me if I declined to meet a cousin who had never offended him."

"Well said. Come and meet Gordon at breakfast to-morrow,--ten o'clock. I
am still in the old rooms."

While the kinsmen thus conversed, Lady Glenalvon had seated herself on
the couch beside Kenelm, and was quietly observing his countenance.
Now she spoke. "My dear Mr. Mivers, you will have many opportunities of
talking with Kenelm; do not grudge me five minutes' talk with him now."

"I leave your ladyship alone in your hermitage. How all the men in this
assembly will envy the hermit!"



CHAPTER II.

"I AM glad to see you once more in the world," said Lady Glenalvon; "and
I trust that you are now prepared to take that part in it which ought to
be no mean one if you do justice to your talents and your nature."

KENELM.--"When you go to the theatre, and see one of the pieces which
appear now to be the fashion, which would you rather be,--an actor or a
looker-on?"

LADY GLENALVON.--"My dear young friend, your question saddens me."
(After a pause.)--"But though I used a stage metaphor when I expressed
my hope that you would take no mean part in the world, the world is not
really a theatre. Life admits of no lookers-on. Speak to me frankly, as
you used to do. Your face retains its old melancholy expression. Are you
not happy?"

KENELM.--"Happy, as mortals go, I ought to be. I do not think I am
unhappy. If my temper be melancholic, melancholy has a happiness of its
own. Milton shows that there are as many charms in life to be found on
the _Penseroso_ side of it as there are on the _Allegro_."

LADY GLENALVON.--"Kenelm, you saved the life of my poor son, and when,
later, he was taken from me, I felt as if he had commended you to my
care. When at the age of sixteen, with a boy's years and a man's heart,
you came to London, did I not try to be to you almost as a mother? and
did you not often tell me that you could confide to me the secrets of
your heart more readily than to any other?"

"You were to me," said Kenelm, with emotion, "that most precious and
sustaining good genius which a youth can find at the threshold of
life,--a woman gently wise, kindly sympathizing, shaming him by the
spectacle of her own purity from all grosser errors, elevating him from
mean tastes and objects by the exquisite, ineffable loftiness of soul
which is only found in the noblest order of womanhood. Come, I will open
my heart to you still. I fear it is more wayward than ever. It still
feels estranged from the companionship and pursuits natural to my age
and station. However, I have been seeking to brace and harden my nature,
for the practical ends of life, by travel and adventure, chiefly among
rougher varieties of mankind than we meet in drawing-rooms. Now, in
compliance with the duty I owe to my dear father's wishes, I come back
to these circles, which under your auspices I entered in boyhood, and
which even then seemed to me so inane and artificial. Take a part in the
world of these circles; such is your wish. My answer is brief. I have
been doing my best to acquire a motive power, and have not succeeded. I
see nothing that I care to strive for, nothing that I care to gain. The
very times in which we live are to me, as to