Hamlet. How chances it they travel? their residence,
both in reputation and profit, was better both ways.
Rosencrantz. I think their inhibition comes by the means
of the late innovation.
Many, wearing rapiers, are afraid of goose-quills.
What imports the nomination of this gentleman?
Hamlet.
|AWAY from the glens and the heather-clad mountains, from the blue
loughs and their islands of arbutus, from the harp-music, and from the
ocean-music which makes those who hear it ripe for revolt; away from the
land whose life is the memory of ancient deeds of nobleness; away from
the land that has given birth to more heroes than any nation in the
world, the land whose inhabitants live in thousands in squalor and look
out from mud windows upon the most glorious scenery in the world; away
from all these one must now be borne.
Upon the evening of the fourth day after the chanting of that lament
by the bard O'Brian from the depths of Glenmara, the good steamship
_Cardwell Castle_ was making its way down Channel with a full cargo and
heavy mails for Madeira, St. Helena, and the Cape. It had left its port
but a few hours and already the coast had become dim with distance. The
red shoreway of the south-west was now so far away that the level rays
of sunlight which swept across the water were not seen to shine upon the
faces of the rocks, or to show where the green fields joined the brown
moorland; the windmills crowning every height were not seen to be in
motion.
The passengers were for the most part very cheerful, as passengers
generally are during the first couple of hours of a voyage, when only
the gentle ripples of the Channel lap the sides of the vessel. The old
voyagers, who had thought it prudent to dine off a piece of sea-biscuit
and a glass of brandy and water, while they watched with grim smiles the
novices trifling with roast pork and apricot-dumplings, were now sitting
in seats they had arranged for themselves in such places as they knew
would be well to leeward for the greater part of the voyage, and here
they smoked their cigars and read their newspapers just as they would be
doing every day for three weeks. To them the phenomenon of the lessening
land was not particularly interesting. The novices were endeavouring to
look as if they had been used to knock about the sea all their lives;
they carried their telescopes under their arms quite jauntily, and gave
critical glances aloft every now and again, consulting their pocket
compasses gravely at regular intervals to convince themselves that they
were not being trifled with in the navigation of the vessel.
Then there were, of course, those who had come aboard with the
determination of learning in three weeks as much seamanship as should
enable them to accept any post of marine responsibility that they might
be called upon to fill in after life. They handled the loose tackle with
a view of determining its exact utility, and endeavoured to trace stray
lines to their source. They placed the captain entirely at his ease
with them by asking him a number of questions regarding the dangers of
boiler-bursting, and the perils of storms; they begged that he would let
them know if there was any truth in the report which had reached them to
the effect that the Atlantic was a very stormy place; and they left him
with the entreaty that in case of any danger arising suddenly he would
at once communicate with them; they then went down to put a few casual
questions to the quartermaster who was at the wheel, and doubtless felt
that they were making most of the people about them cheerful with their
converse.
Then there were the young ladies who had just completed their education
in England and were now on their way to join their relations abroad.
Having read in the course of their studies of English literature the
poems of the late Samuel Rogers, they were much amazed to find that the
mariners were not leaning over the ship's bulwarks sighing to behold the
sinking of their native land, and that not an individual had climbed the
mast to partake of the ocular banquet with indulging in which the poet
has accredited the sailor. Towards this section the glances of several
male eyes were turned, for most of the young men had roved sufficiently
far to become aware of the fact that the relief of the monotony of a
lengthened voyage is principally dependent on--well, on the relieving
capacities of the young ladies, lately sundered from school and just
commencing their education in the world.
But far away from the groups that hung about the stern stood a girl
looking over the side of the ship towards the west--towards the sun that
was almost touching the horizon. She heard the laughter of the groups of
girls and the silly questions of the uninformed, but all sounded to her
like the strange voices of a dream; for as she gazed towards the west
she seemed to see a fair landscape of purple slopes and green woods;
the dash of the ripples against the ship's side came to her as the
rustle of the breaking ripples amongst the shells of a blue lough upon
whose surface a number of green islets raised their heads. She saw them
all--every islet, with its moveless I shadow beneath it, and the light
touching the edges of the leaves with red. Daireen Gerald it was who
stood there looking out to the sunset, but seeing in the golden lands of
the west the Irish land she knew so well.
She remained motionless, with her eyes far away and her heart still
farther, until the red sun had disappeared, and the delicate twilight
change was slipping over the bright gray water. With every change she
seemed to see the shifting of the hues over the heather of Slieve Docas
and the pulsating of the tremulous red light through the foliage of the
deer ground. It was only now that the tears forced themselves into her
eyes, for she had not wept at parting from her grandfather, who had gone
with her from Ireland and had left her aboard the steamer a few hours
before; and while her tears made everything misty to her, the light
laughter of the groups scattered about the quarter-deck sounded in her
ears. It did not come harshly to her, for it seemed to come from a world
in which she had no part. The things about her were as the things of a
dream. The reality in which she was living was that which she saw out in
the west.
“Come, my dear,” said a voice behind her--“Come and walk with me on the
deck. I fancied I had lost you, and you may guess what a state I was in,
after all the promises I made to Mr. Gerald.”
“I was just looking out there, and wondering what they were all doing
at home--at the foot of the dear old mountain,” said Daireen, allowing
herself to be led away.
“That is what most people would call moping, dear,” said the lady who
had come up. She was a middle-aged lady with a pleasant face, though her
figure was hardly what a scrupulous painter would choose as a model for
a Nausicaa.
“Perhaps I was moping, Mrs. Crawford,” Daireen replied; “but I feel the
better for it now.”
“My dear, I don't disapprove of moping now and again, though as a habit
it should not be encouraged. I was down in my cabin, and when I came on
deck I couldn't understand where you had disappeared to. I asked the
major, but of course, you know, he was quite oblivious to everything but
the mutiny at Cawnpore, through being beside Doctor Campion.”
“But you have found me, you see, Mrs. Crawford.”
“Yes, thanks to Mr. Glaston; he knew where you had gone; he had been
watching you.” Daireen felt her face turning red as she thought of this
Mr. Glaston, whoever he was, with his eyes fixed upon her movements.
“You don't know Mr. Glaston, Daireen?--I shall call you 'Daireen'
of course, though we have only known each other a couple of hours,”
continued the lady. “No, of course you don't. Never mind, I'll show
him to you.” For the promise of this treat Daireen did not express her
gratitude. She had come to think the most unfavourable things regarding
this Mr. Glaston. Mrs. Crawford, however, did not seem to expect an
acknowledgment. Her chat ran on as briskly as ever. “I shall point him
out to you, but on no account look near him for some time--young men are
so conceited, you know.”
Daireen had heard this peculiarity ascribed to the race before, and
so when her guide, as they walked towards the stern of the vessel,
indicated to her that a young man sitting in a deck-chair smoking a
cigar was Mr. Glaston, she certainly did not do anything that might
possibly increase in Mr. Glaston this dangerous tendency which Mrs.
Crawford had assigned to young men generally.
“What do you think of him, my dear?” asked Mrs. Crawford, when they had
strolled up the deck once more.
“Of whom?” inquired Daireen.
“Good gracious,” cried the lady, “are your thoughts still straying? Why,
I mean Mr. Glaston, to be sure. What do you think of him?”
“I didn't look at him,” the girl answered.
Mrs. Crawford searched the fair face beside her to find out if its
expression agreed with her words, and the scrutiny being satisfactory
she gave a little laugh. “How do you ever mean to know what he is like
if you don't look at him?” she asked.
Daireen did not stop to explain how she thought it possible that
contentment might exist aboard the steamer even though she remained in
ignorance for ever of Mr. Glaston's qualities; but presently she glanced
along the deck, and saw sitting at graceful ease upon the chair Mrs.
Crawford had indicated, a tall man of apparently a year or two under
thirty. He had black hair which he had allowed to grow long behind, and
a black moustache which gave every indication of having been subjected
to the most careful youthful training. His face would not have been
thought expressive but for his eyes, and the expression that these
organs gave out could hardly be called anything except a neutral one:
they indicated nothing except that nothing was meant to be indicated
by them. No suggestion of passion, feeling, or even thoughtfulness, did
they give; and in fact the only possible result of looking at this face
which some people called expressive, was a feeling that the man himself
was calmly conscious of the fact that some people were in the habit of
calling his face expressive.
“And what _do_ you think of him now, my dear?” asked Mrs. Crawford,
after Daireen had gratified her by taking that look.
“I really don't think that I think anything,” she answered with a little
laugh.
“That is the beauty of his face,” cried Mrs. Crawford. “It sets one
thinking.”
“But that is not what I said, Mrs. Crawford.”
“You said you did not think you were thinking anything, Daireen; and
that meant, I know, that there was more in his face than you could read
at a first glance. Never mind; every one is set thinking when one sees
Mr. Glaston.”
Daireen had almost become interested in this Mr. Glaston, even though
she could not forget that he had watched her when she did not want to
be watched. She gave another glance towards him, but with no more
profitable conclusion than her previous look had attained.
“I will tell you all about him, my child,” said Mrs. Crawford
confidentially; “but first let us make ourselves comfortable. Dear old
England, there is the last of it for us for some time. Adieu, adieu,
dear old country!” There was not much sentimentality in the stout little
lady's tone, as she looked towards the faint line of mist far astern
that marked the English coast. She sat down with Daireen to the leeward
of the deck-house where she had laid her rugs, and until the tea-bell
rang Daireen had certainly no opportunity for moping.
Mrs. Crawford told her that this Mr. Glaston was a young man of such
immense capacities that nothing lay outside his grasp either in art or
science. He had not thought it necessary to devote his attention to
any subject in particular; but that, Mrs. Crawford thought, was rather
because there existed no single subject that he considered worthy of an
expenditure of all his energies. As things unfortunately existed, there
was nothing left for him but to get rid of the unbounded resources of
his mind by applying them to a variety of subjects. He had, in fact,
written poetry--never an entire volume of course, but exceedingly clever
pieces that had been published in his college magazine. He was capable
of painting a great picture if he chose, though he had contented himself
with giving ideas to other men who had worked them out through the
medium of pictures. He was one of the most accomplished of musicians;
and if he had not yet produced an opera or composed even a song,
instances were on record of his having performed impromptus that would
undoubtedly have made the fame of a professor. He was the son of a
Colonial Bishop, Mrs. Crawford told Daireen, and though he lived in
England he was still dutiful enough to go out to pay a month's visit to
his father every year.
“But we must not make him conceited, Daireen,” said Mrs. Crawford,
ending her discourse; “we must not, dear; and if he should look over
and see us together this way, he would conclude that we were talking of
him.”
Daireen rose with her instructive companion with an uneasy sense of
feeling that all they could by their combined efforts contribute to the
conceit of a young man who would, upon grounds so slight, come to such a
conclusion as Mrs. Crawford feared he might, would be but trifling.
Then the tea-bell rang, and all the novices who had enjoyed the roast
pork and dumplings at dinner, descended to make a hearty meal of
buttered toast and banana jelly. The sea air had given them an appetite,
they declared with much merriment. The chief steward, however, being an
experienced man, and knowing that in a few hours the Bay of Biscay
would be entered, did not, from observing the hearty manner in which the
novices were eating, feel uneasy on the matter of the endurance of the
ship's stores. He knew it would be their last meal for some days at
least, and he smiled grimly as he laid down another plate of buttered
toast, and hastened off to send up some more brandy and biscuits to
Major Crawford and Doctor Campion, whose hoarse chuckles called forth
by pleasing reminiscences of Cawnpore were dimly heard from the deck
through the cabin skylight.