THE CLEEVE.
I have said that Sir Peregrine Orme was not a rich man, meaning
thereby that he was not a rich man considering his acknowledged
position in the county. Such men not uncommonly have their tens,
twelves, and twenty thousands a year; but Sir Peregrine's estate
did not give him above three or four. He was lord of the manor of
Hamworth, and possessed seignorial rights, or rather the skeleton and
remembrance of such rights with reference to a very large district of
country; but his actual property--that from which he still received
the substantial benefits of ownership--was not so large as those
of some of his neighbours. There was, however, no place within the
county which was so beautifully situated as The Cleeve, or which had
about it so many of the attractions of age. The house itself had been
built at two periods,--a new set of rooms having been added to the
remains of the old Elizabethan structure in the time of Charles II.
It had not about it anything that was peculiarly grand or imposing,
nor were the rooms large or even commodious; but everything was old,
venerable, and picturesque. Both the dining-room and the library were
panelled with black wainscoating; and though the drawing-rooms were
papered, the tall, elaborately-worked wooden chimney-pieces still
stood in them, and a wooden band or belt round the rooms showed that
the panels were still there, although hidden by the modern paper.
But it was for the beauty and wildness of its grounds that The Cleeve
was remarkable. The land fell here and there into narrow, wild
ravines and woody crevices. The soil of the park was not rich, and
could give but little assistance to the chemists in supplying the
plentiful food expected by Mr. Mason for the coming multitudes of the
world; it produced in some parts heather instead of grass, and was
as wild and unprofitable as Cleeve Common, which stretched for miles
outside the park palings; but it seemed admirably adapted for deer
and for the maintenance of half-decayed venerable oaks. Young timber
also throve well about the place, and in this respect Sir Peregrine
was a careful landlord. There ran a river through the park,--the
River Cleeve, from which the place and parish are said to have
taken their names;--a river, or rather a stream, very narrow and
inconsiderable as to its volume of water, but which passed for some
two miles through so narrow a passage as to give to it the appearance
of a cleft or fissure in the rocks. The water tumbled over stones
through this entire course, making it seem to be fordable almost
everywhere without danger of wet feet; but in truth there was hardly
a spot at which it could be crossed without a bold leap from rock to
rock. Narrow as was the aperture through which the water had cut its
way, nevertheless a path had been contrived now on one side of the
stream and now on the other, crossing it here and there by slight
hanging wooden bridges. The air here was always damp with spray, and
the rocks on both sides were covered with long mosses, as were also
the overhanging boughs of the old trees. This place was the glory
of The Cleeve, and as far as picturesque beauty goes it was very
glorious. There was a spot in the river from whence a steep path led
down from the park to the water, and at this spot the deer would come
to drink. I know nothing more beautiful than this sight, when three
or four of them could be so seen from one of the wooden bridges
towards the hour of sunset in the autumn.
Sir Peregrine himself at this time was an old man, having passed his
seventieth year. He was a fine, handsome English gentleman with white
hair, keen gray eyes, a nose slightly aquiline, and lips now too
closely pressed together in consequence of the havoc which time had
made among his teeth. He was tall, but had lost something of his
height from stooping,--was slight in his form, but well made, and
vain of the smallness of his feet and the whiteness of his hands. He
was generous, quick tempered, and opinionated; generally very mild to
those who would agree with him and submit to him, but intolerant of
contradiction, and conceited as to his experience of the world and
the wisdom which he had thence derived. To those who were manifestly
his inferiors he was affable, to his recognised equals he was
courteous, to women he was almost always gentle;--but to men who
claimed an equality which he would not acknowledge, he could make
himself particularly disagreeable. In judging the position which a
man should hold in the world, Sir Peregrine was very resolute in
ignoring all claims made by wealth alone. Even property in land could
not in his eyes create a gentleman. A gentleman, according to his
ideas, should at any rate have great-grandfathers capable of being
traced in the world's history; and the greater the number of such,
and the more easily traceable they might be on the world's surface,
the more unquestionable would be the status of the claimant in
question. Such being the case, it may be imagined that Joseph Mason,
Esq., of Groby Park did not rank high in the estimation of Sir
Peregrine Orme.
I have said that Sir Peregrine was fond of his own opinion; but
nevertheless he was a man whom it was by no means difficult to lead.
In the first place he was singularly devoid of suspicion. The word of
a man or of a woman was to him always credible, until full proof had
come home to him that it was utterly unworthy of credit. After that
such a man or woman might as well spare all speech as regards the
hope of any effect on the mind of Sir Peregrine Orme. He did not
easily believe a fellow-creature to be a liar, but a liar to him once
was a liar always. And then he was amenable to flattery, and few that
are so are proof against the leading-strings of their flatterers. All
this was well understood of Sir Peregrine by those about him. His
gardener, his groom, and his woodman all knew his foibles. They all
loved him, respected him, and worked for him faithfully; but each of
them had his own way in his own branch.
And there was another person at The Cleeve who took into her own
hands a considerable share of the management and leading of Sir
Peregrine, though, in truth, she made no efforts in that direction.
This was Mrs. Orme, the widow of his only child, and the mother of
his heir. Mrs. Orme was a younger woman than Mrs. Mason of Orley Farm
by nearly five years, though her son was but twelve months junior to
Lucius Mason. She had been the daughter of a brother baronet, whose
family was nearly as old as that of the Ormes; and therefore, though
she had come penniless to her husband, Sir Peregrine had considered
that his son had married well. She had been a great beauty, very
small in size and delicate of limb, fair haired, with soft blue
wondering eyes, and a dimpled cheek. Such she had been when young
Peregrine Orme brought her home to The Cleeve, and the bride at once
became the darling of her father-in-law. One year she had owned
of married joy, and then all the happiness of the family had been
utterly destroyed, and for the few following years there had been no
sadder household in all the country-side than that of Sir Peregrine
Orme. His son, his only son, the pride of all who knew him, the hope
of his political party in the county, the brightest among the bright
ones of the day for whom the world was just opening her richest
treasures, fell from his horse as he was crossing into a road, and
his lifeless body was brought home to The Cleeve.
All this happened now twenty years since, but the widow still wears
the colours of mourning. Of her also the world of course said that
she would soon console herself with a second love; but she too has
given the world the lie. From that day to the present she has never
left the house of her father-in-law; she has been a true child to
him, and she has enjoyed all a child's privileges. There has been
but little favour for any one at The Cleeve who has been considered
by the baronet to disregard the wishes of the mistress of the
establishment. Any word from her has been law to him, and he has of
course expected also that her word should be law to others. He has
yielded to her in all things, and attended to her will as though she
were a little queen, recognizing in her feminine weakness a sovereign
power, as some men can and do; and having thus for years indulged
himself in a quixotic gallantry to the lady of his household, he has
demanded of others that they also should bow the knee.
During the last twenty years The Cleeve has not been a gay house.
During the last ten those living there have been contented, and in
the main happy; but there has seldom been many guests in the old
hall, and Sir Peregrine has not been fond of going to other men's
feasts. He inherited the property very early in life, and then there
were on it some few encumbrances. While yet a young man he added
something to these, and now, since his own son's death, he has been
setting his house in order, that his grandson should receive the
family acres intact. Every shilling due on the property has been paid
off; and it is well that this should be so, for there is reason to
fear that the heir will want a helping hand out of some of youth's
difficulties,--perhaps once or twice before his passion for rats
gives place to a good English gentleman-like resolve to hunt twice a
week, look after his timber, and live well within his means.
The chief fault in the character of young Peregrine Orme was that
he was so young. There are men who are old at one-and-twenty,--are
quite fit for Parliament, the magistrate's bench, the care of a wife,
and even for that much sterner duty, the care of a balance at the
bankers; but there are others who at that age are still boys,--whose
inner persons and characters have not begun to clothe themselves with
the "toga virilis." I am not sure that those whose boyhoods are so
protracted have the worst of it, if in this hurrying and competitive
age they can be saved from being absolutely trampled in the dust
before they are able to do a little trampling on their own account.
Fruit that grows ripe the quickest is not the sweetest; nor when
housed and garnered will it keep the longest. For young Peregrine
there was no need of competitive struggles. The days have not yet
come, though they are no doubt coming, when "detur digniori" shall
be the rule of succession to all titles, honours, and privileges
whatsoever. Only think what a life it would give to the education of
the country in general, if any lad from seventeen to twenty-one could
go in for a vacant dukedom; and if a goodly inheritance could be
made absolutely incompatible with incorrect spelling and doubtful
proficiency in rule of three!
Luckily for Peregrine junior these days are not yet at hand, or I
fear that there would be little chance for him. While Lucius Mason
was beginning to think that the chemists might be hurried, and that
agriculture might be beneficially added to philology, our friend
Peregrine had just been rusticated, and the head of his college had
intimated to the baronet that it would be well to take the young
man's name off the college books. This accordingly had been done,
and the heir of The Cleeve was at present at home with his mother
and grandfather. What special act of grace had led to this severity
we need not inquire, but we may be sure that the frolics of which
he had been guilty had been essentially young in their nature. He
had assisted in driving a farmer's sow into the man's best parlour,
or had daubed the top of the tutor's cap with white paint, or had
perhaps given liberty to a bag full of rats in the college hall at
dinner-time. Such were the youth's academical amusements, and as they
were pursued with unremitting energy it was thought well that he
should be removed from Oxford.
Then had come the terrible question of his university bills. One
after another, half a score of them reached Sir Peregrine, and then
took place that terrible interview,--such as most young men have had
to undergo at least once,--in which he was asked how he intended to
absolve himself from the pecuniary liabilities which he had incurred.
"I am sure I don't know," said young Orme, sadly.
"But I shall be glad, sir, if you will favour me with your
intentions," said Sir Peregrine, with severity. "A gentleman does
not, I presume, send his orders to a tradesman without having some
intention of paying him for his goods."
[Illustration: SIR PEREGRINE AND HIS HEIR.]
"I intended that they should all be paid, of course."
"And how, sir? by whom?"
"Well, sir,--I suppose I intended that you should pay them;" and
the scapegrace as he spoke looked full up into the baronet's face
with his bright blue eyes,--not impudently, as though defying his
grandfather, but with a bold confidence which at once softened the
old man's heart.
Sir Peregrine turned away and walked twice the length of the library;
then, returning to the spot where the other stood, he put his hand on
his grandson's shoulder. "Well, Peregrine, I will pay them," he said.
"I have no doubt that you did so intend when you incurred them;--and
that was perhaps natural. I will pay them; but for your own sake, and
for your dear mother's sake, I hope that they are not very heavy. Can
you give me a list of all that you owe?"
Young Peregrine said that he thought he could, and sitting down at
once he made a clean breast of it. With all his foibles, follies, and
youthful ignorances, in two respects he stood on good ground. He was
neither false nor a coward. He continued to scrawl down items as long
as there were any of which he could think, and then handed over the
list in order that his grandfather might add them up. It was the
last he ever heard of the matter; and when he revisited Oxford some
twelve months afterwards, the tradesmen whom he had honoured with his
custom bowed to him as low as though he had already inherited twenty
thousand a year.
Peregrine Orme was short in stature as was his mother, and he also
had his mother's wonderfully bright blue eyes; but in other respects
he was very like his father and grandfather;--very like all the
Ormes who had lived for ages past. His hair was light; his forehead
was not large, but well formed and somewhat prominent; his nose
had something, though not much, of the eagle's beak; his mouth was
handsome in its curve, and his teeth were good, and his chin was
divided by a deep dimple. His figure was not only short, but stouter
than that of the Ormes in general. He was very strong on his legs; he
could wrestle, and box, and use the single-stick with a quickness and
precision that was the terror of all the freshmen who had come in his
way.
Mrs. Orme, his mother, no doubt thought that he was perfect. Looking
at the reflex of her own eyes in his, and seeing in his face so sweet
a portraiture of the nose and mouth and forehead of him whom she
had loved so dearly and lost so soon, she could not but think him
perfect. When she was told that the master of Lazarus had desired
that her son should be removed from his college, she had accused the
tyrant of unrelenting, persecuting tyranny; and the gentle arguments
of Sir Peregrine had no effect towards changing her ideas. On that
disagreeable matter of the bills little or nothing was said to her.
Indeed, money was a subject with which she was never troubled. Sir
Peregrine conceived that money was a man's business, and that the
softness of a woman's character should be preserved by a total
absence of all pecuniary thoughts and cares.
And then there arose at The Cleeve a question as to what should
immediately be done with the heir. He himself was by no means so well
prepared with an answer as had been his friend Lucius Mason. When
consulted by his grandfather, he said that he did not know. He would
do anything that Sir Peregrine wished. Would Sir Peregrine think
it well that he should prepare himself for the arduous duties of a
master of hounds? Sir Peregrine did not think this at all well, but
it did not appear that he himself was prepared with any immediate
proposition. Then Peregrine discussed the matter with his mother,
explaining that he had hoped at any rate to get the next winter's
hunting with the H.H.;--which letters have represented the Hamworth
Fox Hunt among sporting men for many years past. To this his mother
made no objection, expressing a hope, however, that he would go
abroad in the spring. "Home-staying youths have ever homely wits,"
she said to him, smiling on him ever so sweetly.
"That's quite true, mother," he said. "And that's why I should like
to go to Leicestershire this winter." But going to Leicestershire
this winter was out of the question.