"Mr. Lovel, you are hurt—and, believe me, I sympathize in the pain

which I inflict; but can I, in justice to myself, in fairness to you,

do otherwise? Without my father's consent, I never will entertain the

addresses of any one, and how totally impossible it is that he should

countenance the partiality with which you honour me, you are yourself

fully aware; and, indeed"—

"No, Miss Wardour," answered Lovel, in a tone of passionate entreaty;

"do not go farther—is it not enough to crush every hope in our present

relative situation?—do not carry your resolutions farther—why urge what

would be your conduct if Sir Arthur's objections could be removed?"

"It is indeed vain, Mr. Lovel," said Miss Wardour, "because their

removal is impossible; and I only wish, as your friend, and as one who

is obliged to you for her own and her father's life, to entreat you to

suppress this unfortunate attachment—to leave a country which affords

no scope for your talents, and to resume the honourable line of the

profession which you seem to have abandoned."

"Well, Miss Wardour, your wishes shall be obeyed;—have patience with me

one little month, and if, in the course of that space, I cannot show you

such reasons for continuing my residence at Fairport, as even you shall

approve of, I will bid adieu to its vicinity, and, with the same breath,

to all my hopes of happiness."

"Not so, Mr. Lovel; many years of deserved happiness, founded on a more

rational basis than your present wishes, are, I trust, before, you.

But it is full time, to finish this conversation. I cannot force you to

adopt my advice—I cannot shut the door of my father's house against the

preserver of his life and mine; but the sooner Mr. Lovel can teach his

mind to submit to the inevitable disappointment of wishes which have

been so rashly formed, the more highly he will rise in my esteem—and, in

the meanwhile, for his sake as well as mine, he must excuse my putting

an interdict upon conversation on a subject so painful."

A servant at this moment announced that Sir Arthur desired to speak to

Mr. Oldbuck in his dressing-room.

"Let me show you the way," said Miss Wardour, who apparently dreaded

a continuation of her tete-a-tete with Lovel, and she conducted the

Antiquary accordingly to her father's apartment.

Sir Arthur, his legs swathed in flannel, was stretched on the couch.

"Welcome, Mr. Oldbuck," he said; "I trust you have come better off than

I have done from the inclemency of yesterday evening?"

"Truly, Sir Arthur, I was not so much exposed to it—I kept terra

firma—you fairly committed yourself to the cold night-air in the most

literal of all senses. But such adventures become a gallant knight

better than a humble esquire,—to rise on the wings of the night-wind—to

dive into the bowels of the earth. What news from our subterranean Good

Hope!—the terra incognita of Glen-Withershins?"

"Nothing good as yet," said the Baronet, turning himself hastily, as if

stung by a pang of the gout; "but Dousterswivel does not despair."

"Does he not?" quoth Oldbuck; "I do though, under his favour. Why, old

Dr. H—n* told me, when I was in Edinburgh, that we should never find

copper enough, judging from the specimens I showed him, to make a pair

of sixpenny knee-buckles—and I cannot see that those samples on the

table below differ much in quality."

* Probably Dr. Hutton, the celebrated geologist.

"The learned doctor is not infallible, I presume?"

"No; but he is one of our first chemists; and this tramping philosopher

of yours—this Dousterswivel—is, I have a notion, one, of those learned

adventurers described by Kirchner, Artem habent sine arte, partem sine

parte, quorum medium est mentiri, vita eorum mendicatum ire; that is to

say, Miss Wardour"—

"It is unnecessary to translate," said Miss Wardour—"I comprehend your

general meaning; but I hope Mr. Dousterswivel will turn out a more

trustworthy character."

"I doubt it not a little," said the Antiquary,—"and we are a foul way

out if we cannot discover this infernal vein that he has prophesied

about these two years."

"You have no great interest in the matter, Mr. Oldbuck," said the

Baronet.

"Too much, too much, Sir Arthur; and yet, for the sake of my fair foe

here, I would consent to lose it all so you had no more on the venture."

There was a painful silence of a few moments, for Sir Arthur was too

proud to acknowledge the downfall of his golden dreams, though he could

no longer disguise to himself that such was likely to be the termination

of the adventure. "I understand," he at length said, "that the young

gentleman, to whose gallantry and presence of mind we were so much

indebted last night, has favoured me with a visit—I am distressed that I

am unable to see him, or indeed any one, but an old friend like you, Mr.

Oldbuck."

A declination of the Antiquary's stiff backbone acknowledged the

preference.

"You made acquaintance with this young gentleman in Edinburgh, I

suppose?"

Oldbuck told the circumstances of their becoming known to each other.

"Why, then, my daughter is an older acquaintance, of Mr. Lovel than you

are," said the Baronet.

"Indeed! I was not aware of that," answered Oldbuck somewhat surprised.

"I met Mr. Lovel," said Isabella, slightly colouring, "when I resided

this last spring with my aunt, Mrs. Wilmot."

"In Yorkshire?—and what character did he bear then, or how was he

engaged?" said Oldbuck,—"and why did not you recognise him when I

introduced you?"

Isabella answered the least difficult question, and passed over the

other—"He had a commission in the army, and had, I believe, served with

reputation; he was much respected, as an amiable and promising young

man."

"And pray, such being the case," replied the Antiquary, not disposed

to take one reply in answer to two distinct questions, "why did you not

speak to the lad at once when you met him at my house? I thought you had

less of the paltry pride of womankind about you, Miss Wardour."

"There was a reason for it," said Sir Arthur with dignity; "you know the

opinions—prejudices, perhaps you will call them—of our house concerning

purity of birth. This young gentleman is, it seems, the illegitimate

son of a man of fortune; my daughter did not choose to renew their

acquaintance till she should know whether I approved of her holding any

intercourse with him."

"If it had been with his mother instead of himself," answered Oldbuck,

with his usual dry causticity of humour, "I could see an excellent

reason for it. Ah, poor lad! that was the cause, then, that he seemed so

absent and confused while I explained to him the reason of the bend of

bastardy upon the shield yonder under the corner turret!"

"True," said the Baronet, with complacency—"it is the shield of Malcolm

the Usurper, as he is called. The tower which he built is termed, after

him, Malcolm's Tower, but more frequently Misticot's Tower, which I

conceive to be a corruption for Misbegot. He is denominated, in the

Latin pedigree of our family, Milcolumbus Nothus; and his temporary

seizure of our property, and most unjust attempt to establish his own

illegitimate line in the estate of Knockwinnock, gave rise to such

family feuds and misfortunes, as strongly to found us in that horror and

antipathy to defiled blood and illegitimacy which has been handed down

to me from my respected ancestry."

"I know the story," said Oldbuck, "and I was telling it to Lovel this

moment, with some of the wise maxims and consequences which it has

engrafted on your family politics. Poor fellow! he must have been much

hurt: I took the wavering of his attention for negligence, and was

something piqued at it, and it proves to be only an excess of feeling.

I hope, Sir Arthur, you will not think the less of your life because it

has been preserved by such assistance?"

"Nor the less of my assistant either," said the Baronet; "my doors and

table shall be equally open to him as if he had descended of the most

unblemished lineage."

"Come, I am glad of that—he'll know where he can get a dinner, then, if

he wants one. But what views can he have in this neighbourhood? I must

catechise him; and if I find he wants it—or, indeed, whether he does or

not—he shall have my best advice." As the Antiquary made this liberal

promise, he took his leave of Miss Wardour and her father, eager to

commence operations upon Mr. Lovel. He informed him abruptly that Miss

Wardour sent her compliments, and remained in attendance on her father,

and then, taking him by the arm, he led him out of the castle.

Knockwinnock still preserved much of the external attributes of a

baronial castle. It had its drawbridge, though now never drawn up, and

its dry moat, the sides of which had been planted with shrubs, chiefly

of the evergreen tribes. Above these rose the old building, partly from

a foundation of red rock scarped down to the sea-beach, and partly from

the steep green verge of the moat. The trees of the avenue have been

already mentioned, and many others rose around of large size,—as if to

confute the prejudice that timber cannot be raised near to the ocean.

Our walkers paused, and looked back upon the castle, as they attained

the height of a small knoll, over which lay their homeward road; for it

is to be supposed they did not tempt the risk of the tide by returning

along the sands. The building flung its broad shadow upon the tufted

foliage of the shrubs beneath it, while the front windows sparkled in

the sun. They were viewed by the gazers with very different feelings.

Lovel, with the fond eagerness of that passion which derives its food

and nourishment from trifles, as the chameleon is said to live on the

air, or upon the invisible insects which it contains, endeavoured to

conjecture which of the numerous windows belonged to the apartment now

graced by Miss Wardour's presence. The speculations of the Antiquary

were of a more melancholy cast, and were partly indicated by the

ejaculation of cito peritura! as he turned away from the prospect.

Lovel, roused from his reverie, looked at him as if to inquire the

meaning of an exclamation so ominous. The old man shook his head. "Yes,

my young friend," said he, "I doubt greatly—and it wrings my heart to

say it—this ancient family is going fast to the ground!"

"Indeed!" answered Lovel—"you surprise me greatly."

"We harden ourselves in vain," continued the Antiquary, pursuing his own

train of thought and feeling—"we harden ourselves in vain to treat with

the indifference they deserve, the changes of this trumpery whirligig

world. We strive ineffectually to be the self-sufficing invulnerable

being, the teres atque rotundus of the poet;—the stoical exemption which

philosophy affects to give us over the pains and vexations of human

life, is as imaginary as the state of mystical quietism and perfection

aimed at by some crazy enthusiasts."

"And Heaven forbid that it should be otherwise!" said Lovel,

warmly—"Heaven forbid that any process of philosophy were capable so

to sear and indurate our feelings, that nothing should agitate them but

what arose instantly and immediately out of our own selfish interests!

I would as soon wish my hand to be as callous as horn, that it might

escape an occasional cut or scratch, as I would be ambitious of the

stoicism which should render my heart like a piece of the nether

millstone."

The Antiquary regarded his youthful companion with a look half of pity,

half of sympathy, and shrugged up his shoulders as he replied—"Wait,

young man—wait till your bark has been battered by the storm of sixty

years of mortal vicissitude: you will learn by that time, to reef your

sails, that she may obey the helm;—or, in the language of this world,

you will find distresses enough, endured and to endure, to keep your

feelings and sympathies in full exercise, without concerning yourself

more in the fate of others than you cannot possibly avoid."

"Well, Mr. Oldbuck, it may be so;—but as yet I resemble you more in your

practice than in your theory, for I cannot help being deeply interested

in the fate of the family we have just left."

"And well you may," replied Oldbuck. "Sir Arthur's embarrassments have

of late become so many and so pressing, that I am surprised you have not

heard of them. And then his absurd and expensive operations carried on

by this High-German landlouper, Dousterswivel"—

"I think I have seen that person, when, by some rare chance, I

happened to be in the coffee-room at Fairport;—a tall, beetle-browed,

awkward-built man, who entered upon scientific subjects, as it appeared

to my ignorance at least, with more assurance than knowledge—was very

arbitrary in laying down and asserting his opinions, and mixed the terms

of science with a strange jargon of mysticism. A simple youth whispered

me that he was an Illumine', and carried on an intercourse with the

invisible world."

"O, the same—the same. He has enough of practical knowledge to speak

scholarly and wisely to those of whose intelligence he stands in awe;

and, to say the truth, this faculty, joined to his matchless impudence,

imposed upon me for some time when I first knew him. But I have since

understood, that when he is among fools and womankind, he exhibits

himself as a perfect charlatan—talks of the magisterium—of sympathies

and antipathies—of the cabala—of the divining-rod—and all the trumpery

with which the Rosicrucians cheated a darker age, and which, to our

eternal disgrace, has in some degree revived in our own. My friend

Heavysterne knew this fellow abroad, and unintentionally (for he, you

must know, is, God bless the mark! a sort of believer) let me into a

good deal of his real character. Ah! were I caliph for a day, as Honest

Abon Hassan wished to be, I would scourge me these jugglers out of the

commonwealth with rods of scorpions. They debauch the spirit of the

ignorant and credulous with mystical trash, as effectually as if they

had besotted their brains with gin, and then pick their pockets with the

same facility. And now has this strolling blackguard and mountebank put

the finishing blow to the ruin of an ancient and honourable family!"

"But how could he impose upon Sir Arthur to any ruinous extent?"

"Why, I don't know. Sir Arthur is a good honourable gentleman; but, as

you may see from his loose ideas concerning the Pikish language, he is

by no means very strong in the understanding. His estate is strictly

entailed, and he has been always an embarrassed man. This rapparee

promised him mountains of wealth, and an English company was found

to advance large sums of money—I fear on Sir Arthur's guarantee. Some

gentlemen—I was ass enough to be one—took small shares in the concern,

and Sir Arthur himself made great outlay; we were trained on by specious

appearances and more specious lies; and now, like John Bunyan, we awake,

and behold it is a dream!"

"I am surprised that you, Mr. Oldbuck, should have encouraged Sir Arthur

by your example."

"Why," said Oldbuck, dropping his large grizzled eyebrow, "I am

something surprised and ashamed at it myself; it was not the lucre of

gain—nobody cares less for money (to be a prudent man) than I do—but I

thought I might risk this small sum. It will be expected (though I am

sure I cannot see why) that I should give something to any one who

will be kind enough to rid me of that slip of womankind, my niece, Mary

M'Intyre; and perhaps it may be thought I should do something to get

that jackanapes, her brother, on in the army. In either case, to treble

my venture, would have helped me out. And besides, I had some idea that

the Phoenicians had in former times wrought copper in that very spot.

That cunning scoundrel, Dousterswivel, found out my blunt side, and

brought strange tales (d—n him) of appearances of old shafts, and

vestiges of mining operations, conducted in a manner quite different

from those of modern times; and I—in short, I was a fool, and there

is an end. My loss is not much worth speaking about; but Sir Arthur's

engagements are, I understand, very deep, and my heart aches for him and

the poor young lady who must share his distress."

Here the conversation paused, until renewed in the next CHAPTER.

CHAPTER FOURTEENTH.

If I may trust the flattering eye of sleep,

My dreams presage some joyful news at hand:

My bosom's lord sits lightly on his throne,

And all this day, an unaccustomed spirit

Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.

Romeo and Juliet.

The account of Sir Arthur's unhappy adventure had led Oldbuck somewhat

aside from his purpose of catechising Lovel concerning the cause of

his residence at Fairport. He was now, however, resolved to open the

subject. "Miss Wardour was formerly known to you, she tells me, Mr.

Lovel?"

"He had had the pleasure," Lovel answered, to see her at Mrs. Wilmot's,

in Yorkshire."

"Indeed! you never mentioned that to me before, and you did not accost

her as an old acquaintance."

"I—I did not know," said Lovel, a good deal embarrassed, "it was the

same lady, till we met; and then it was my duty to wait till she should

recognise me."

"I am aware of your delicacy: the knight's a punctilious old fool, but

I promise you his daughter is above all nonsensical ceremony and

prejudice. And now, since you have, found a new set of friends here, may

I ask if you intend to leave Fairport as soon as you proposed?"

"What if I should answer your question by another," replied Lovel, "and

ask you what is your opinion of dreams?"

"Of dreams, you foolish lad!—why, what should I think of them but as

the deceptions of imagination when reason drops the reins? I know no

difference betwixt them and the hallucinations of madness—the unguided

horses run away with the carriage in both cases, only in the one the

coachman is drunk, and in the other he slumbers. What says our

Marcus Tullius—Si insanorum visis fides non est habenda, cur credatur

somnientium visis, quae multo etiam perturbatiora sunt, non intelligo."

"Yes, sir; but Cicero also tells us, that as he who passes the whole day

in darting the javelin must sometimes hit the mark, so, amid the cloud

of nightly dreams, some may occur consonant to future events."

"Ay—that is to say, you have hit the mark in your own sage opinion?

Lord! Lord! how this world is given to folly! Well, I will allow for

once the Oneirocritical science—I will give faith to the exposition of

dreams, and say a Daniel hath arisen to interpret them, if you can

prove to me that that dream of yours has pointed to a prudent line of

conduct."

"Tell me, then," answered Lovel, "why when I was hesitating whether to

abandon an enterprise, which I have perhaps rashly undertaken, I

should last night dream I saw your ancestor pointing to a motto which

encouraged me to perseverance?—why should I have thought of those words

which I cannot remember to have heard before, which are in a language

unknown to me, and which yet conveyed, when translated, a lesson which I

could so plainly apply to my own circumstances?"

The Antiquary burst into a fit of laughing. "Excuse me, my young

friend—but it is thus we silly mortals deceive ourselves, and look out

of doors for motives which originate in our own wilful will. I think I

can help out the cause of your vision. You were so abstracted in your

contemplations yesterday after dinner, as to pay little attention to the

discourse between Sir Arthur and me, until we fell upon the controversy

concerning the Piks, which terminated so abruptly;—but I remember

producing to Sir Arthur a book printed by my ancestor, and making

him observe the motto; your mind was bent elsewhere, but your ear had

mechanically received and retained the sounds, and your busy fancy,

stirred by Grizel's legend I presume, had introduced this scrap of

German into your dream. As for the waking wisdom which seized on so

frivolous a circumstance as an apology for persevering in some course

which it could find no better reason to justify, it is exactly one of

those juggling tricks which the sagest of us play off now and then, to

gratify our inclination at the expense of our understanding."

"I own it," said Lovel, blushing deeply;—"I believe you are right, Mr.

Oldbuck, and I ought to sink in your esteem for attaching a moment's

consequence to such a frivolity;—but I was tossed by contradictory

wishes and resolutions, and you know how slight a line will tow a boat

when afloat on the billows, though a cable would hardly move her when

pulled up on the beach."

"Right, right," exclaimed the Antiquary. "Fall in my opinion!—not a

whit—I love thee the better, man;—why, we have story for story against

each other, and I can think with less shame on having exposed myself

about that cursed Praetorium—though I am still convinced Agricola's camp

must have been somewhere in this neighbourhood. And now, Lovel, my good

lad, be sincere with me—What make you from Wittenberg?—why have you left

your own country and professional pursuits, for an idle residence in

such a place as Fairport? A truant disposition, I fear."

"Even so," replied Lovel, patiently submitting to an interrogatory which

he could not well evade. "Yet I am so detached from all the world, have

so few in whom I am interested, or who are interested in me, that my

very state of destitution gives me independence. He whose good or evil

fortune affects himself alone, has the best right to pursue it according

to his own fancy."

"Pardon me, young man," said Oldbuck, laying his hand kindly on his

shoulder, and making a full halt—"sufflamina—a little patience, if you

please. I will suppose that you have no friends to share or rejoice in

your success in life—that you cannot look back to those to whom you owe

gratitude, or forward to those to whom you ought to afford protection;

but it is no less incumbent on you to move steadily in the path of

duty—for your active exertions are due not only to society, but in

humble gratitude to the Being who made you a member of it, with powers

to serve yourself and others."

"But I am unconscious of possessing such powers," said Lovel, somewhat

impatiently. "I ask nothing of society but the permission of walking

innoxiously through the path of life, without jostling others, or

permitting myself to be jostled. I owe no man anything—I have the means

of maintaining, myself with complete independence; and so moderate

are my wishes in this respect, that even these means, however limited,

rather exceed than fall short of them."

"Nay, then," said Oldbuck, removing his hand, and turning again to

the road, "if you are so true a philosopher as to think you have money

enough, there's no more to be said—I cannot pretend to be entitled to

advise you;—you have attained the acme'—the summit of perfection. And

how came Fairport to be the selected abode of so much self-denying

philosophy? It is as if a worshipper of the true religion had set up his

staff by choice among the multifarious idolaters of the land of Egypt.

There is not a man in Fairport who is not a devoted worshipper of the

Golden Calf—the mammon of unrighteousness. Why, even I, man, am so

infected by the bad neighbourhood, that I feel inclined occasionally to

become an idolater myself."

"My principal amusements being literary," answered Lovel, "and

circumstances which I cannot mention having induced me, for a time at

least, to relinquish the military service, I have pitched on Fairport

as a place where I might follow my pursuits without any of those

temptations to society which a more elegant circle might have presented

to me."

"Aha!" replied Oldbuck, knowingly,—"I begin to understand your

application of my ancestor's motto. You are a candidate for public

favour, though not in the way I first suspected,—you are ambitious to

shine as a literary character, and you hope to merit favour by labour

and perseverance?"

Lovel, who was rather closely pressed by the inquisitiveness of the old

gentleman, concluded it would be best to let him remain in the error

which he had gratuitously adopted.

"I have been at times foolish enough," he replied, "to nourish some

thoughts of the kind."

"Ah, poor fellow! nothing can be more melancholy; unless, as young

men sometimes do, you had fancied yourself in love with some trumpery

specimen of womankind, which is indeed, as Shakspeare truly says,

pressing to death, whipping, and hanging all at once."