I am almost ashamed to confess how deeply the scene she had witnessed
affected Cecil Tresilyan. The exhibition of Keene's fierce temper ought
certainly to have warned, if it did not disgust her. She could only
think--"It was for my sake that he was so angry, and he yielded to my
first word."
There is rather a heavy run just now against the "physical force"
doctrine. It seems to me that some of its opponents are somewhat
hypercritical. For many, many years romancists persisted in attributing
to their principal heroes every point of bodily perfection and
accomplishment; no one thought then of caviling at such a
well-understood and established type. That most fertile and meritorious
of writers, for instance, Mr. G. P. R. James, invariably makes his _jeun
premier_ at least moderately athletic; so much so, that when he has the
villain of the tale at his sword's point we feel a comfortable
confidence that virtue will triumph as it deserves. As such a
contingency is certain to occur twice or thrice in the course of the
narrative, a nervous reader is spared much anxiety and trouble of mind
by this satisfactory arrangement. _Nous avons changé tout cela._ Modern
refinement requires that the chief character shall be made interesting
in spite of his being dwarfish, plain-featured, and a victim to
pulmonary or some more prosaic disease. Clearly we are right. What is
the use of advancing civilization if it does not correct our taste? What
have we to do with the "manners and customs of the English" in the
eighteenth century, or with the fictions that beguiled our boyhood? Let
our motto still be "Forward;" we have pleasures of which our grandsires
never dreamed, and inventions that they were inexcusable in ignoring. We
are so great that we can afford to be generous. Let them sleep well,
those honest but benighted ancients, who went down to their graves
unconscious of "Aunt Sally," and perhaps never properly appreciated
_caviare_!
It is true that there are some writers--not the weakest--who still
cling to the old-fashioned mould. Putting Lancelot and Amyas out of the
question, I think I would sooner have "stood up" to most heroes of
romance than to sturdy Adam Bede. It can't be a question of religion or
morality, for "muscular _Christianity_" is the stock-sarcasm of the
opposite party: it must be a question of good taste. Well, ancient
Greece is supposed to have had some floating ideas on _that_ subject,
and she deified Strength. It is perfectly true, that to thrash a
prize-fighter unnecessarily is not a virtuous or glorious action, but I
contend that the _capability_ of doing so is an admirable and enviable
attribute. There are grades of physical as well as of moral perfection;
and, after all, the same Hand created both.
Have I been replying against the critics? _Absit omen!_ They are more
often right, I fear, than authors are willing to allow; for it _is_
aggravating to have one's pet bits of pathos put between inverted commas
for the world in general to make a mock at (we could hardly write them
down without tears in our eyes), and to have our story condensed into a
few clever, pithy sentences (all in the present tense), till its
weakness becomes painfully apparent. More than this, our candid friends
are impalpable. Real life can furnish us with enough substantial
opponents for us not to trouble ourselves about Junius. Neither in war
nor love is it expedient to grasp at shadows. Ah! Mr. Reade, why were
you not warned by Ixion?
One thing is certain: however sound your arguments in depreciation of
personal prowess may be, you will never gain a unanimous feminine
verdict. It must be an extraordinary exhibition of mental excellence
that will really interest the generality of our sisters for the moment
as deeply as a very ordinary feat of strength or skill. It is not that
they can not thoroughly appreciate rectitude of feeling, brilliancy of
conversation, and distinguished talent; but remember the hackneyed
quotation:
Segnius irritant animum demissa per aures,
Quam quæ sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus.
If you want a proof of the correctness of Horace's opinion, go up to
"Lord's" this month, and watch the flutter among the fair spectators,
just after a "forward drive" over the Pavilion; or, better still, the
next time the "Grand Military" comes off at Warwick, mark the reception
that the man who rides a winner will meet with in the stand.
Conventionality has done a good deal, but it has not refined away all
the frank, impulsive woman-nature yet. The knights are dust, and their
good swords rust; but dame and demoiselle are very much the same as they
were in the old days, when the Queen of Scots could sing
How they reveled through the summer night,
And by day made lanceshafts flee,
For Mary Beatoun, and Mary Seatoun,
And Mary Fleming, and me.
Will this long and rather rash _tirade_ in the least excuse Cecil
Tresilyan? Of course not. My poor heroine! It was very unnecessary--that
advertisement that she was not superior to the weaknesses of her sex;
for it seems to me, with every chapter, she has been growing more
fallible and frail. She was utterly incapable of being at all
demonstrative or "gushing;" but her preference for Royston Keene was now
quite undisguised.
Mrs. Danvers was bitterly exasperated. It would be unjust to deny that
she was greatly actuated by a sincere interest in her _ci-devant_
pupil's welfare; but other feelings were at work.
It is very remarkable how a perfectly well-principled woman will connive
at what she can not approve so long as she is taken unreservedly into
confidence; but when once one secret is kept back the danger of her
antagonism begins; the magic draught that has lulled the vigilant
Gryphon to sleep loses its potency; the guardian of the treasure
awakes--more savage because conscious of a dereliction in duty--and woe
to the Arimaspian! The cold, pale, chaste moon comes forth from behind
the cloud, determined to reveal every iota of transgression: no farther
chance of concealment here--_Reparat sua cornua Phoebe_.
So, to the utmost of her small powers, Bessie did endeavor to thwart and
counteract the adversary. Her line was consistently plaintive. In season
and out of season she whined and wept profusely. This was the last
resource of her simple strategy: when the enemy was getting too strong
to be met in open field, she adopted the Dutch plan of opening the
sluices and trying to drown him. It is painful to be obliged to state
that the inundation did not greatly avail. As she had done from the
first, Cecil declined to make any confidences, or indeed to discuss the
question at all.
Mr. Fullarton, too, felt keenly the defection of a promising proselyte.
Since that unfortunate afternoon Miss Tresilyan had been perfectly
civil, but always very cold; and he could not but be aware that he had
lost ground then that he never could hope to regain. The divine must
have been very desperate when he ventured to attack that impracticable
brother. It was not a judicious move; nor would any one have tried it
who knew Dick Tresilyan. It was not only that he liked and admired
Royston Keene, but he had a blind confidence in his sister that nothing
on earth could disturb: the evidence of his own senses would not have
affected it in the least. "Whatever _she_ does is right," he thought;
and he clung to that idea, as many other true believers will do to a
creed that they can not understand. So when the question was broached he
was not very angry (for he did _more_ than justice to the chaplain's
sense of duty), but he stubbornly declined to enter upon it at all. Mr.
Fullarton was so provoked that he was goaded into a taunt that he ought
to have been ashamed of.
"Perhaps you are right," he said; "Major Keene is so formidable an
adversary, that it is hardly safe to interfere with him." (These "men of
peace"--_quand ils s'y prennent_! I believe the most exasperating man in
England, at this moment, to be an influential Quaker.)
Dick Tresilyan took a long time (as was his wont) in finding out what
was meant; when he did, even his limited intellect appreciated its bad
taste and absurdity. A hundred sarcasms would not have disconcerted the
pastor so completely as his honest, hearty laugh.
"Ah! you think I'm afraid of him? No--they don't breed cowards where I
come from. I never heard that idea but once before; that was at the
Truro fair. I wasn't in very good company, and they 'planted' a big
miner on me at last. He wanted me to wrestle, and when I wouldn't, he
said--just what you did. But I remember all the others laughed at him.
They know _us_ in those parts, you see. He'd better have kept quiet; for
though he puzzled me at first with a 'back trick' he had, I knew more
than he did, and he got an awkward fall; I don't think he'll ever do a
good day's work again." He paused, and his brow darkened strangely, and
all his face changed, till it resembled more closely than it had often
done the portraits of come of the "bitter, bad Tresilyans." "I suppose
you mean well, Mr. Fullarton, but I'm not going to thank you. We can
manage our affairs without your meddling; and if you're wise you'll
leave us alone." It will be seen that the chaplain did not take much by
his motion.
Neither was Fanny Molyneux well satisfied with the turn affairs had
taken lately. That poor little "white witch" was really alarmed by the
unruly character of the spirit that she had been anxious to raise; she
did not know the proper formula for sending it back to its own place;
and, if she had, the stubborn demon would only have mocked at her simple
incantations. Though she loved Cecil dearly, she was too much in awe of
her to venture upon remonstrance or warning; indeed, the few mild hints
that she _did_ throw out had not met with such success as to tempt her
to follow them up. So she was, perforce, reduced to an unarmed
neutrality.
Her husband was perhaps the most thoroughly uncomfortable of the party.
He knew the circumstances and bearings of the question better than any
one else, and would have sacrificed a good deal ("his right hand," I
believe, is the proper phrase) to have averted the probable result. But
he had not sufficient strength of mind to take the decided measures that
might have been of some avail; in fact, he had a vague idea that to act
on the offensive against his old comrade would be unpardonable
treachery. Arguing with the latter was simply absurd; for this reason,
if for no other, that from the moment his feelings became really
interested, no amount of diplomacy would have induced him to enter upon
the subject. Harry went about with a miserable, helpless sense of
complicity weighing him down, which was much aggravated by a few words
which dropped one morning from Dick Tresilyan.
Dick had been dining _tête-à-tête_ with Keene on the previous evening
after a hard day's snipe shooting, and bore evident traces about him of
a heavy night--a fact which he lost no time in alluding to, not without
a certain pride, like the man in Congreve's play, who exults in having
"been drunk in excellent company." "We had a very big drink," he said,
confidentially, "and the major got more than his allowance. He didn't
know what he was talking about at last, and he told me more of his
affairs than most people know, I think; of course, I'm as safe as a
church;" and Dick made a gallant but abortive attempt to wink with one
of his swollen eyelids.
Molyneux shrank away from the speaker with something very like a
suppressed groan--he had heard _that_ said before, and remembered what
came of it. Credulity was as dangerous when men thought Royston Keene
had lost his head as when women flattered themselves he had lost his
heart.