|FOR four reasons we purpose now to move, by summery stages and many an
ocean isle, to Portate, whither these, my written words, will perhaps
not long precede us.
The four reasons: First; the poet Sadler claims to have been once
banished by executive edict from the city of Portate, and has a notion
he would like to examine his condition of exile, so to speak, at close
range; to poke once more a certain irascible Jefe Municipal, or Mayor,
doubtless of your acquaintance, in the midriff of his temper. Second;
Mrs. Ulswater seems to have a singular hankering affection for one
who, she says, “was the nicest boy there is,”--a distinct opinion in a
confusion of tenses.
Third; the poet Susannah. Now what the bearing may be, in Mrs.
Ulswater's mind, of Portate on Susannah, is not so clear to me. But to
me this is clear, that Susannah is in a way outgrowing the capacity of
islands. She is in need, I admit, of a continental connection. Fourth; I
have some researches to make in South-American archaeology.
Ah, Susannah! What is there about this frank maidenhood that a mist
sometimes gathers in Mrs. Ulswater's lucid eyes in looking at her.
Susannah's nature is not, as yet, I should say, compact of softest
sentiment. Passionate in affection, sudden in resolve, terrific in
action, given to valour and wrath, why about her should the emotions of
this vessel all dance in a species of harmonious jig? Why should this
concussive and rebounding person rouse in my own glutinous nature a
phosphorescent glow, as of a jelly fish, and cause my languid tentacles
of emotion to flutter about like a flag in the wind? Why lies the
melancholy Sadler tonight on the small of his back in a deck chair, his
knees hooked over the rail, his feet pendant above the sea, and, in a
foggy voice, to an abominable tune and the twankle of an exasperating
banjo, sing:
“Good night, my Starlight,
Queen of my heart.
You are my star bright,
We are apart.
Me where the high seas
Thunder and smite,
You in your sky dreams,
Good night, Starlight.”
I do not, indeed, apprehend Sadler to be directly addressing Susannah,
as such, in these terms and with that inharmonious vocalisation; but I
apprehend the impact of Susannah upon Sadler to arouse in him something
other than jubilation, something within the sunless caverns of his
memory, certain uneasy glimmerings of an old romance. And I ask, why?
To the eye of pure reason, Susannah contains as much of the vapour of
moonlit sentiment as a coal scuttle. The eye of pure reason, after any
continuous examination of Susannah, feels as if it had been in a prize
fight, and emerged therefrom a blackened optic and out of business for
the time. And yet there arises--hark! again, above the low breath of the
sea wind, rises that melancholy song:
“ Good night, my Starlight,
Trembling to tears,
White is my hair, white
In the wake of the years.
Over the lee wave
You shine on my night,
Me, the old sea waif,
Good night, Starlight?”
Yours--Ulswater.
(End of Dr. Ulswater's Fourth and Last Manuscript. )