_STRUGGLES_.
Esther sat, swallowed up of excitement, poring over this letter, longer
than she knew; whether it gave her most pain or pleasure she could not
have told. Pleasure came in a great wave at first; and then pricks of
pain began to make themselves felt, as if the pleasure wave had been
full of sharp points. Her cheeks glowed, her eyes sent looks, or rather
one steady look, at the paper, which would certainly have bored it
through or set it on fire if moral qualities had taken to themselves
material power. At last, remembering that she must not stay too long,
she folded the letter up and returned to her father. He had taken _his_
letter coolly, she saw, and gone back to his book. How far his world
was from hers! Absolutely, Pitt's letter was nothing to him.
'Well, my dear,' said he, after a while observing her, 'what does he
say?'
'I suppose he told you, papa, what happened to him?'
'No, he did not; he only told me what is happening to the world. He has
gone to Europe at a grand time!'
'What is happening to the world, papa?'
'My dear, that arch-usurper and mischief-maker, Napoleon Buonaparte,
has been beaten by the allied armies at Leipzig--driven back over the
Rhine. It's glorious news! I wish I was with Lord Wellington.'
'To fight, papa?'
'Certainly. I would like to have a hand in what is going on. If I
could,' he added with a sigh.
'But papa, I should think fighting was not pleasant work?'
'Women's fighting is not.'
'Is men's fighting, papa? _Pleasant?_'
'It is pleasant to have a blow at a rascal. Ah, well! my fighting days
are over. What does Pitt tell you?'
'About his voyage, papa; nothing else.'
'Are you going to let me hear it?'
Esther would a little rather have kept it to herself, simply because it
was so precious to her. However, this question was a command, and she
read the letter aloud to her father. With that the matter was disposed
of, in all but her own mind. For the final result of the letter was to
stir up all the pain the writer's absence had caused, and to add to it
some new elements of aggravation. Esther had not realized, till those
letters came, how entirely the writer of them had gone out of her
world. In love and memory she had in a sort still kept him near;
without vision she had yet been not fully separated from him. Now these
pictures of the other world and of Pitt's life in it came like a
bright, sheer blade severing the connection which had until then
subsisted between her life and his. Yes, he was in another world! and
there was no connection any longer. He had not forgotten her yet, but
he would forget; how should he not? how could he help it? In the rich
sweep of variety and change and eager action which filled his
experience, what thought could he have any more for that quiet figure
on the sofa, or this lonely little child, whose life contained no
interest whatever! or how could his thoughts return at all to this dull
room, where everything remained with no change from morning to night
and from one week to another? Always Colonel Gainsborough there on the
sofa; always that same green cloth covering the table in the middle of
the floor, and the view of the snow-covered garden and road and fields
outside the windows, with those everlasting pollard poplars along the
fence. While Europe was in commotion, and armies rolling their masses
over it, and Napoleon fleeing and Lord Wellington chasing, and every
breath was full of eagerness and hope and triumph and purpose in that
world without.
Esther fell back into a kind of despair. Pitt was gone from her; now
she realized that fact thoroughly; not only gone in person, but moved
far off in mind. Maybe he might write again, once or twice; very likely
he would, for he was kind; but his life was henceforth separated from
Seaforth and from all the other life that had its home there. The old
cry for comfort began to sound in Esther's heart with a terrible
urgency. Where was it to come from? And as the child had only one
possible outlook for comfort, she began to set her face that way in a
kind of resolute determination. That is, she began to shut herself up
with her Bible and search it as a man who is poor searches for a hid
treasure, or as one who is starving looks for something to eat. Nobody
knew. She shut herself up and carried on her search alone, and troubled
nobody with questions. Nobody ever noticed the air of the child; the
grave, far-away look of her eyes; the pale face; the unnaturally quiet
demeanour. At least nobody noticed it to any purpose. Mrs. Barker did
communicate to Christopher her belief that that child was 'mopin'
herself into ninety years old;' and they were both agreed that she
ought to be sent to school. 'A girl don't grow just like one o' my
cabbages,' said Mr. Bounder; '_that_'ll make a head for itself.'
'Miss Esther's got a head,' put in Mrs. Barker.
''Twon't be solid and that, if it ain't looked after,' retorted her
brother. 'I don't s'pose you understand the natural world, though.
What's the colonel thinkin' about?'
'That ain't your and my business, Christopher. But I do worrit myself
about Miss Esther's face, the way I sees it sometimes.'
The colonel, it is true, did not see it as Mrs. Barker saw it. Not but
that he might, if he had ever watched her. But he did not watch. It
never occurred to him but that everything went right with Esther. When
she made him his tea, she was attentive and womanly; when she read
aloud to him, she read intelligently; and in the reciting of the few
lessons she did with her father, there was always no fault to find. How
could the colonel suppose anything was wrong? Life had become a dull,
sad story to him; why should it be different to anybody else? Nay, the
colonel would not have said that in words; it was rather the supine
condition into which he had lapsed, than any conclusion of his
intelligence; but the fact was, he had no realization of the fact that
a child's life ought to be bright and gay. He accepted Esther's sedate
unvarying tone and manner as quite the right thing, and found it suit
him perfectly. Nobody else saw the girl, except at church. The family
had not cultivated the society of their neighbours in the place, and
Esther had no friends among them.
There was a long succession of months during which things went on after
this fashion. Very weary months to Esther; indeed, months covered by so
thick a gloom that part of the child's life consisted in the struggle
to break it. Letters did not come frequently from Pitt, even to his
father and mother; he wrote that it was difficult to get a vessel to
take American letters at all, and that the chances were ten to one, if
accepted, that they would never get to the hands they were intended
for. American letters or American passengers were sometimes held to
vitiate the neutrality of a vessel; and if chased she would be likely
to throw them, that is, the former, overboard. Pitt was detained still
in Lisbon by the difficulty of getting passports, as late as the middle
of March, but expected then soon to sail for England. His passage was
taken. So Mr. and Mrs. Dallas reported on one of their evening visits.
They talked a great deal of politics at these visits, which sometimes
interested Esther and sometimes bored her excessively; but this last
bit of private news was brought one evening about the end of April.
'He has not gained much by his winter's work,' remarked the colonel.
'He might as well have studied this term at Yale.'
'He will not have lost his time,' said Mr. Dallas comfortably. 'He is
there, that is one thing; and he is looking about him; and now he will
have time to feel a little at home in England and make all his
arrangements before his studies begin. It is very well as it is.'
'If you think so, it is,' said the colonel drily.
The next news was that Pitt had landed at Falmouth, and was going by
post-chaise to London in a day or two. He reported having just got Lord
Byron's two last poems,--'The Corsair' and 'The Bride of Abydos';
wished he could send them home, but that was not so easy.
'He had better send them home, or send them anywhere,' said the
colonel; 'and give his attention to Sophocles and Euclid. Light poetry
does not amount to anything; it is worse than waste of time.'
'I don't want a man to be made of Greek and Latin,' said Mrs. Dallas.
'Do you think, only the Ancients wrote what is worthy to be read,
colonel?'
'They didn't write nonsense, my dear madam; and Byron does.'
'Nonsense!'
'Worse than nonsense.'
'Won't do to enquire too strictly into what the old Greeks and Romans
wrote, if folks say true,' remarked Mr. Dallas slyly.
'In the dead languages it won't do a young man so much harm,' said the
colonel. 'I hope William will give himself now to his Greek, since you
have afforded him such opportunity.'
Mrs. Dallas's air, as she rose to take leave, was inimitably expressive
of proud confidence and rejection of the question. Mr. Dallas laughed
carelessly and said, as he shook the colonel's hand, 'No fear!'
The next news they had came direct. Another letter from Pitt to the
colonel; and, as before, it enclosed one for Esther. Esther ran away
again to have the first reading and indulge herself in the first
impressions of it alone and free from question or observation. She even
locked her door. This letter was written from London, and dated May
1814.
'MY DEAR QUEEN ESTHER,--I wish you were here, for we certainly would
have some famous walks together. Do you know, I am in London? and that
means, in one of the most wonderful places in the world. You can have
no idea what sort of a place it is, and no words I can write will tell
you. I have not got over my own sense of astonishment and admiration
yet; indeed it is growing, not lessening; and every time I go out I
come home more bewildered with what I have seen. Do you ask me why? In
the first place, because it is so big. Next, because of the
unimaginable throng of human beings of every grade and variety. Such a
multitude of human lives crossing each other in an intraceable and
interminable network; intraceable to the human eye, but what a sight it
must be to the eye that sees all! All these people, so many hundreds of
thousands, acting and reacting upon one another's happiness,
prosperity, goodness, and badness. Now at such a place as Seaforth
people are left a good deal to their individuality, and are
comparatively independent of one another; but here I feel what a
pressure and bondage men's lives draw round each other. It makes me
catch my breath. You will not care about this, however, nor be able to
understand me.
'But another thing you would care for, and delight in; and that is the
historical associations of London. Queen Esther, it is delightful! You
and I have looked at coins and read books together, and looked at
history so; but here I seem to touch it. I have been to-day to Charing
Cross, standing and wandering about, and wondering at the things that
have happened there. Ask your father to tell you about Charing Cross. I
could hardly come away. If you ask me how _I_ know so well what
happened there, I will tell you. I have found an old uncle here. You
knew I had one? He lives just a little out of London, or out of the
thick of London, in a place that is called Kensington; in a queer old
house, which, however, I like very much, and that is filled with
curiosities. It is in a pleasant situation, not far from one of the
public parks,--though it is not called a park, but "Garden,"--and with
one or two palaces and a number of noble mansions about it. My uncle
received me very hospitably, and would have me come and make my home
with him while I am in London. That is nice for me, and in many ways.
He is a character, this old uncle of mine; something of an antiquary, a
good deal of a hermit, a little eccentric, but stuffed with local
knowledge, and indeed with knowledge of many sorts. I think he has
taken a fancy to me somehow, Queen Esther; at any rate, he is very
kind. He seems to like to go about with me and show me London, and
explain to me what London is. He was there at Charing Cross with me,
holding forth on history and politics--he's a great Tory; ask the
colonel what that is; and really I seemed to see the ages rolling
before me as he talked, and I looked at Northumberland House and at the
brazen statue of Charles I. If I had time I would tell you about them,
as Mr. Strahan told me. And yesterday I was in the House of Commons,
and heard some great talking; and to-morrow we are going to the Tower.
I think, if you were only here to go too, we should have a first-rate
sort of a time. But I will try and tell you about it.
'And talking of history,--Mr. Strahan has some beautiful coins. There
is one of Philip of Macedon, and two of Alexander; think of that, Queen
Esther; and some exquisite gold pieces of Tarentum and Syracuse. How
your eyes would look at them! Well, study up everything, so that when
we meet again we may talk up all the world. I shall be very hard at
work myself soon, as soon as I go to Oxford. In the meantime I am
rather hard at work here, although to be sure the work is play.
'This is a very miserable bit of a letter, and nothing in it, just
because I have so much to say. If I had time I would write it over, but
I have not time. The next shall be better. I am a great deal with Mr.
Strahan, in-doors as well as out. I wish I could show you his house,
Queen. It is old and odd and pretty. Thick old walls, little windows in
deep recesses; low ceilings and high ceilings, for different parts of
the house are unlike each other; most beautiful dark oaken
wainscotings, carved deliciously, and grown black with time; and big,
hospitable chimney-pieces, with fires of English soft coal. Some of the
rooms are rather dark, to me who am accustomed to the sun of America
pouring in at a wealth of big windows; but others are to me quite
charming. And this quaint old house is filled with treasures and
curiosities. Mr. Strahan lives in it quite alone with two servants, a
factotum of a housekeeper and another factotum of a man-servant. I must
say I find it intelligible that he should take pleasure in having me
with him. Good-bye for to-night. I'll write soon again.
'WM. PITT DALLAS.'
As on occasion of the former letter, Esther lingered long over the
reading of this; her uneasiness not appeased by it at all; then at last
went down to her father, to whom the uneasiness was quite unknown and
unsuspected.
'I think William writes the longest letters to you,' he remarked. 'What
does he say this time?'
Esther read her letter aloud.
'Will has fallen on his feet,' was the comment.
'What does he say to you, papa?'
'Not much; and yet a good deal. You may read for yourself.'
Which Esther did, eagerly. Pitt had told her father about his visit to
the House of Commons.
'I had yesterday,' he wrote, 'a rare pleasure, which you, my dear
colonel, would have appreciated. Mr. Strahan took me to the House of
Commons; and I heard Mr. Canning, Mr. Whitbread, Mr. Wilberforce, Mr.
Ponsonby, and others, on what question, do you think? Nothing less than
the duty which lies upon England just at this moment, to use the
advantage of her influence with her allies in Europe to get them to
join with her in putting down the slave trade. It was a royal occasion;
and the enjoyment of it quite beyond description. To-day I have been
standing at Charing Cross, looking at the statue of Charles I., and
wondering at the world. My grand-uncle is a good Tory and held forth
eloquently as we stood there. Don't tell my mother! but privately, my
dear colonel, I seem to discover in myself traces of Whiggism. Whether
it be nature, or your influence, or the air of America, that has caused
it to grow, I know not; but there it is. My mother would be very
seriously disturbed if she suspected the fact. As to my father, I
really never discovered to my satisfaction what his politics are. To
Mr. Strahan I listen reverently. It is not necessary for me to say to
him all that comes into my head. _But_ it came into my head to-day, as
I stood gazing up at the equestrian statue at Charing Cross, that it
would better become the English people to have John Hampden there than
that miserable old trickster, Charles Stuart.'
Esther read and re-read.
'Papa,' she said at last, 'what is a Tory?'
'It is a party name, my dear; it is given to a certain political party.'
'You are not a Tory?'
'No! If I had been, I should never have found my way here.' The colonel
said it with a sigh.
'Then I suppose you are a Whig. And are Mr. and Mrs. Dallas Tories?'
'Humph!--Will says his mother is. He ought to know.'
'What is the difference, papa?'
'My dear, I don't know that you can understand. The names grew up in
the old days when the Stuarts were trying to get all the power of the
government into their own hands and to leave none to the people. Those
who stood by the king, through thick and thin, were called Tories;
those who tried to limit him and guard the people's liberties, were
Whigs.'
'What queer names! Papa, are there Whigs and Tories in England now?'
'What are called so.'
'Are the kings still trying to get away the liberties of the people?'
'No, my child. Those are pretty well secured.'
'And here we have no king at all. I don't see how you can be a Whig, or
Mrs. Dallas a Tory.'
'There are always the two parties. One, that sticks by the government
and aims to strengthen its hands, right or wrong; and the other, that
looks out for the liberties of the people and watches that they be not
infringed or tampered with.'
Esther thought a while, but not exclusively over the political
question. It might have occurred to an older person to wonder how
William Pitt had got his name from parents who were both Tories. The
fact was that here, as in many another case, money was the solution of
the difficulty. A rich relation, who was also a radical, had promised a
fine legacy to the boy if he were given the name of the famous Whig
statesman, and Mr. Mrs. and Dallas had swallowed the pill per help of
the sugar. About this Esther knew nothing.
'Papa,' she said, 'don't you think Pitt will get so fond of England
that he will never want to come back?'
'It would not be strange if he did.'
'Is England so much better than America, papa?'
'It is England, my dear!' the colonel said, with an expression which
meant, she could not tell what.