"Randal," said Mrs. Leslie, on this memorable Sunday--"Randal, do you
think of going to Mr. Hazeldean's?"
"Yes, ma'am," answered Randal. "Mr. Egerton does not object to it; and
as I do not return to Eaton, I may have no other opportunity of seeing
Frank for some time. I ought not to fail in respect to Mr. Egerton's
natural heir!"
"Gracious me!" cried Mrs. Leslie, who, like many women of her cast and
kind, had a sort of worldliness in her notions, which she never evinced
in her conduct--"gracious me!--natural heir to the old Leslie property!"
"He is Mr. Egerton's nephew, and," added Randal, ingenuously letting out
his thoughts, "I am no relation to Mr. Egerton at all."
"But," said poor Mrs. Leslie, with tears in her eyes, "it would be a
shame in the man, after paying your schooling and sending you to Oxford,
and having you to stay with him in the holidays, if he did not mean any
thing by it."
"Any thing, mother--yes--but not the thing you suppose. No matter. It is
enough that he has armed me for life, and I shall use the weapons as
seems to me best."
Here the dialogue was suspended, by the entrance of the other members of
the family, dressed for church.
"It can't be time for church! No! it can't!" exclaimed Mrs. Leslie. She
was never in time for any thing.
"Last bell ringing," said Mr. Leslie, who, though a slow man, was
methodical and punctual. Mrs. Leslie made a frantic rush at the door,
the Montfydget blood being now in a blaze--whirled up the stairs--gained
her room, tore her best bonnet from the peg, snatched her newest shawl
from the drawers, crushed the bonnet on her head, flung the shawl on her
shoulders, thrust a desperate pin into its folds, in order to conceal a
buttonless yawn in the body of her gown, and then flew back like a
whirlwind. Meanwhile the family were already out of doors, in waiting;
and just as the bell ceased, the procession moved from the shabby house
to the dilapidated church.
The church was a large one, but the congregation was small, and so was
the income of the Parson. It was a lay rectory, and the great tithes had
belonged to the Leslies, but they had been long since sold. The
vicarage, still in their gift, might be worth a little more than L100 a
year. The present incumbent had nothing else to live upon. He was a good
man, and not originally a stupid one; but penury and the anxious cares
for wife and family, combined with what may be called _solitary
confinement_ for the cultivated mind, when, amidst the two legged
creatures round, it sees no other cultivated mind with which it can
exchange an extra-parochial thought--had lulled him into a lazy
mournfulness, which at times was very like imbecility. His income
allowed him to do no good to the parish, whether in work, trade, or
charity; and thus he had no moral weight with the parishioners beyond
the example of his sinless life, and such negative effect as might be
produced by his slumberous exhortations.
Therefore his parishioners troubled him very little; and but for the
influence which in hours of Montfydget activity, Mrs. Leslie exercised
over the most tractable--that is, the children and the aged--not
half-a-dozen persons would have known or cared whether he shut up his
church or not.
But our family were seated in state in their old seignorial pew, and Mr.
Dumdrum, with a nasal twang, went lugubriously through the prayers; and
the old people who could sin no more, and the children who had not yet
learned to sin, croaked forth responses that might have come from the
choral frogs in Aristophanes. And there was a long sermon _apropos_ to
nothing which could possibly interest the congregation, being, in fact,
some controversial homily, which Mr. Dumdrum had composed and preached
years before. And when this discourse was over, there was a loud
universal grunt, as if of release and thanksgiving, and a great clatter
of shoes--and the old hobbled, and the young scrambled to the church
door.
Immediately after church, the Leslie family dined; and, as soon as
dinner was over, Randal set out on his foot journey to Hazeldean Hall.
Delicate and even feeble though his frame, he had the energy and
quickness of movement which belongs to nervous temperaments; and he
tasked the slow stride of a peasant, whom he took to serve him as a
guide for the first two or three miles. Though Randal had not the
gracious, open manner with the poor which Frank inherited from his
father, he was still (despite many a secret, hypocritical vice, at war
with the character of a gentleman) gentleman enough to have no churlish
pride to his inferiors. He talked little, but he suffered his guide to
talk; and the boor, who was the same whom Frank had accosted, indulged
in eulogistic comments on that young gentleman's pony, from which he
diverged into some compliments on the young gentleman himself. Randal
drew his hat over his brows. There is a wonderful tact and fine breeding
in your agricultural peasant; and though Tom Stowell was but a brutish
specimen of the class, he suddenly perceived that he was giving pain. He
paused, scratched his head, and glancing affectionately toward his
companion, exclaimed,
"But I shall live to see you on a handsomer beastis than that little
pony, Master Randal; and sure I ought, for you be as good a gentleman as
any in the land."
"Thank you," said Randal. "But I like walking better than riding--I am
more used to it."
"Well, and you walk bra'ly--there ben't a better walker in the county.
And very pleasant it is walking; and 'tis a pretty country afore you,
all the way to the Hall."
Randal strode on, as if impatient of these attempts to flatter or to
soothe; and, coming at length into a broader lane, said, "I think I can
find my way now. Many thanks to you, Tom;" and he forced a shilling into
Tom's horny palm. The man took it reluctantly, and a tear started to his
eye. He felt more grateful for that shilling than he had for Frank's
liberal half-crown; and he thought of the poor fallen family, and forgot
his own dire wrestle with the wolf at his door.
He staid lingering in the lane till the figure of Randal was out of
sight, and then returned slowly. Young Leslie continued to walk on at a
quick pace. With all his intellectual culture, and his restless
aspirations, his breast afforded him no thought so generous, no
sentiment so poetic, as those with which the unlettered clown crept
slouchingly homeward.
As Randal gained a point where several lanes met on a broad piece of
waste land, he began to feel tired, and his step slackened. Just then a
gig emerged from one of these by-roads, and took the same direction as
the pedestrian. The road was rough and hilly, and the driver proceeded
at a foot's-pace; so that the gig and the pedestrian went pretty well
abreast.
"You seem tired, sir," said the driver, a stout young farmer of the
higher class of tenants, and he looked down compassionately on the boy's
pale countenance and weary stride. "Perhaps we are going the same way,
and I can give you a lift?"
It was Randal's habitual policy to make use of every advantage proffered
to him, and he accepted the proposal frankly enough to please the honest
farmer.
"A nice day, sir," said the latter, as Randal sat by his side. "Have you
come far?"
"From Rood Hall."
"Oh, you be young Squire Leslie," said the farmer, more respectfully,
and lifting his hat.
"Yes, my name is Leslie. You know Rood, then?"
"I was brought up on your father's land, sir. You may have heard of
Farmer Bruce?"
RANDAL.--"I remember, when I was a little boy, a Mr. Bruce, who rented,
I believe, the best part of our land, and who used to bring us cakes
when he called to see my father. He is a relation of yours?"
FARMER BRUCE.--"He was my uncle. He is dead now, poor man."
RANDAL.--"Dead! I am grieved to hear it. He was very kind to us
children. But it is long since he left my father's farm."
FARMER BRUCE, apologetically.--"I am sure he was very sorry to go. But,
you see, he had an unexpected legacy--"
RANDAL.--"And retired from business?"
FARMER BRUCE.--"No. But having capital, he could afford to pay a good
rent for a real good farm."
RANDAL, bitterly.--"All capital seems to fly from the lands of Rood. And
whose farm did he take?"
FARMER BRUCE.--"He took Hawleigh, under Squire Hazeldean. I rent it now.
We've laid out a power o' money on it. But I don't complain. It pays
well."
RANDAL.--"Would the money have paid as well, sunk on my father's land?"
FARMER BRUCE.--"Perhaps it might, in the long run. But then, sir, we
wanted new premises--barns, and cattle-sheds, and a deal more--which the
landlord should do; but it is not every landlord as can afford that.
Squire Hazeldean's a rich man."
RANDAL.--"Ay!"
The road now became pretty good, and the farmer put his horse into a
brisk trot.
"But which way be you going, sir? I don't care for a few miles more or
less, if I can be of service."
"I am going to Hazeldean," said Randal, rousing himself from a reverie.
"Don't let me take you out of your way."
"Oh, Hawleigh Farm is on the other side of the village, so it be quite
my way, sir."
The farmer then, who was really a smart young fellow--one of that race
which the application of capital to land has produced, and which in
point of education and refinement, are at least on a par with the
squires of a former generation--began to talk about his handsome horse,
about horses in general, about hunting and coursing: he handled all
these subjects with spirit, yet with modesty. Randal pulled his hat
still lower down over his brows, and did not interrupt him till past the
Casino, when, struck by the classic air of the place, and catching a
scent from the orange-trees, the boy asked, abruptly, "Whose house is
that?"
"Oh, it belongs to Squire Hazeldean, but it is let or lent to a foreign
Mounseer. They say he is quite the gentleman, but uncommonly poor."
"Poor," said Randal, turning back to gaze on the trim garden, the neat
terrace, the pretty belvidere, and (the door of the house being open)
catching a glimpse of the painted hall within--"poor, the place seems
well kept. What do you call poor, Mr. Bruce?"
The farmer laughed. "Well, that's a home question, sir. But I believe
the Mounseer is as poor as a man can be who makes no debts and does not
actually starve."
"As poor as my father?" asked Randal openly and abruptly.
"Lord, sir! your father be a very rich man compared to him."
Randal continued to gaze, and his mind's eye conjured up the contrast of
his slovenly, shabby home, with all its neglected appurtenances! No trim
garden at Rood Hall, no scent from odorous orange blossoms. Here
poverty, at least, was elegant--there, how squalid! He did not
comprehend at how cheap a rate the luxury of the Beautiful can be
effected. They now approached the extremity of the Squire's park pales;
and, Randal, seeing a little gate, bade the farmer stop his gig, and
descended. The boy plunged amidst the thick oak groves; the farmer went
his way blithely, and his mellow, merry whistle came to Randal's moody
ear, as he glided quick under the shadow of the trees.
He arrived at the Hall, to find that all the family were at church; and,
according to the patriarchal custom, the church-going family embraced
nearly all the servants. It was therefore an old invalid housemaid who
opened the door to him. She was rather deaf, and seemed so stupid, that
Randal did not ask leave to enter and wait for Frank's return. He
therefore said briefly that he would just stroll on the lawn, and call
again when church was over.
The old woman stared, and strove to hear him; meanwhile Randal turned
round abruptly, and sauntered toward the garden side of the handsome old
house.
There was enough to attract any eye in the smooth greensward of the
spacious lawn--in the numerous parterres of varying flowers--in the
venerable grandeur of the two mighty cedars, which threw their still
shadows over the grass--and in the picturesque building, with its
projecting mullions and heavy gables; yet I fear that it was with no
poet's nor painter's eye that this young old man gazed on the scene
before him.
He beheld the evidence of wealth--and the envy of wealth jaundiced his
soul.
Folding his arms on his breast, he stood awhile, looking all around him
with closed lips and lowering brow; then he walked slowly on, his eyes
fixed on the ground, and muttered to himself--"The heir to this property
is little better than a dunce; and they tell me I have talents and
learning, and I have taken to my heart the maxim, 'Knowledge is power.'
And yet, with all my struggles, will knowledge ever place me on the same
level as that on which this dunce is born? I don't wonder that the poor
should hate the rich. But of all the poor, who should hate the rich like
the pauper gentleman? I suppose Audley Egerton means me to come into
Parliament, and be a Tory like himself. What! keep things as they are!
No; for me not even Democracy, unless there first come Revolution. I
understand the cry of a Marat--'More blood!' Marat had lived as a poor
man, and cultivated science--in the sight of a prince's palace."
He turned sharply round, and glared vindictively on the poor old Hall,
which, though a very comfortable habitation, was certainly no palace;
and, with his arms still folded on his breast, he walked backward, as if
not to lose the view, nor the chain of ideas it conjured up.
"But," he continued to soliloquize--"but of revolution there is no
chance. Yet the same wit and will that would thrive in revolutions
should thrive in this commonplace life. Knowledge is power. Well, then
shall I have no power to oust this blockhead? Oust him--what from? His
father's halls? Well--but if he were dead, who would be the heir of
Hazeldean? Have I not heard my mother say that I am as near in blood to
this Squire as any one, if he had no children? Oh, but the boy's life is
worth ten of mine! Oust him from what? At least from the thoughts of his
uncle Egerton--an uncle who has never even seen him! That, at least, is
more feasible. 'Make my way in life,' sayest thou, Audley Egerton.
Ay, and to the fortune thou hast robbed from my ancestors.
Simulation--simulation. Lord Bacon allows simulation. Lord Bacon
practiced it--and--"
Here the soliloquy came to a sudden end; for as, rapt in his thoughts,
the boy had continued to walk backward; he had come to the verge where
the lawn slided off into the ditch of the ha-ha--and, just as he was
fortifying himself by the precept and practice of my Lord Bacon, the
ground went from under him, and slap into the ditch went Randal Leslie!
It so happened that the Squire, whose active genius was always at some
repair or improvement, had been but a few days before widening and
sloping off the ditch just in that part, so that the earth was fresh and
damp, and not yet either turfed or flattened down. Thus when Randal,
recovering his first surprise and shock, rose to his feet, he found his
clothes covered with mud; while the rudeness of the fall was evinced by
the fantastic and extraordinary appearance of his hat, which, hollowed
here, bulging there, and crushed out of all recognition generally, was
as little like the hat of a decorous, hard-reading young
gentleman--_protege_ of the dignified Mr. Audley Egerton--as any hat
picked out of a kennel after some drunken brawl possibly could be.
Randal was dizzy, and stunned, and bruised, and it was some moments
before he took heed of his raiment. When he did so, his spleen was
greatly aggravated. He was still boy enough not to like the idea of
presenting himself to the unknown Squire, and the dandy Frank, in such a
trim: he resolved at once to regain the lane and return home, without
accomplishing the object of his journey; and seeing the footpath right
before him, which led to a gate that he conceived would admit him into
the highway sooner than the path by which he had come, he took it at
once.
It is surprising how little we human creatures heed the warnings of our
good genius. I have no doubt that some benignant Power had precipitated
Randal Leslie into the ditch, as a significant hint of the fate of all
who choose what is, nowadays, by no means an uncommon step in the march
of intellect--viz., the walking backward, in order to gratify a
vindictive view of one's neighbor's property! I suspect that, before
this century is out, many a fine fellow will thus have found his ha-ha,
and scrambled out of the ditch with a much shabbier coat than he had on
when he fell into it. But Randal did not thank his good genius for
giving him a premonitory tumble; and I never yet knew a man who did!