"Have you ambition?"
"As much as ever budded the brow of young Ammon."
"Have you enterprize?"
"Else my ambition had never been avowed."
"Can you dare the world's obloquy?"
"In a noble cause, I would risk its hisses." The Duke caught him
in his arms.--"By all the host of heaven," exclaimed he, "Yours is
a spirit, with which mine shall have no disguises!--You know I am
_reported_, _slandered_! But, on your own principle, I exult in the
hooting of the mob; and I would direct your flight to the point whereon
I stand, and laugh triumphant on the fools below! Mark my progress,
de Montemar.--You see in Warwick, what nine-tenths of nobility
are; distinguished from the crowd by nothing but their titles and
extravagance. I would sooner hang like Absalom on a tree, than so pass
away amongst the herd of my cotemporaries!
"My father did not understand my character; and when he died,
bequeathed me doctors of law and doctors of divinity, to teach me the
way I should go. They tried to break the spirit they could not bend;
and often hard words, and harder usage, shook their heads as well as
their canes, and pronounced me an unmanagable colt. In the very heat
and tempest of my rebellion, I told them I was a Bucephalus they could
not tame! And so, breaking from their bridle, wonder not I scoured the
field in the very wantonness of liberty!"
Louis joined in the gay laugh of his friend, and Wharton proceeded.
"I was then hardly nineteen, but I spurned the tedious tutelage of
schools and colleges, and threw myself at once into the university of
nature; the wide and populous world. I went to the continent.--But not
to visit the _garden of the Hourii_! At Geneva, I became the friend of
philosophers; at Paris, the companion of wits; in Italy, the counsellor
of princes.--Do you mark me?"
"I do, with wonder and admiration."
"What I then dared to advise, I am now come to execute." He paused a
moment, then resumed, "De Montemar, there are objects at Avignon, of
more interest than Vaucluse!"--again he paused, and looked at Louis,
expecting a reply.
"I do not understand you, my Lord."
"Expound my riddle, and you shall have a better fate than Oedipus."
"I should deserve a worse, were I to waste the time in guesses; when I
may profit by its exposition from yourself."
The Duke did not like this dullness, but he proceeded.--"De Montemar,
what is your opinion of the Marquis of Montrose? He who Cromwell sent
to the scaffold for attachment to the house of Stuart."
"I consider his gallant patriotism," replied Louis, "as hardly second
to that of his immortal country-man William Wallace; and could almost
envy him his feelings, when the executioner bound to his neck the
catalogue of his battles against the regicides. What a consciousness of
true greatness must have been in the smile with which he welcomed this
intended badge of disgrace, as a brighter testimony to his honour,
than the star of Saint George which they tore from his breast!"
"Well answered, my promising catechumen!" cried the Duke, "now for
another question, and I have done.--In what respect do you hold honest
George Monk, who deserted the blockhead chief of the Roundheads,
and recalled the son of his murdered sovereign to the throne of his
ancestors?"
"Monk does not fire my heart, like Montrose," replied Louis, "I love
the direct path; and _honest_ George was most inclined to crooked
ones.--However, he walked straight at last, and for that I honour him."
"Then you love the Stuarts?"
"Their line is of mingled yarn!--I revere, love, blame, pity them."
"De Montemar, you must know the Chevalier de Saint George!"
"How?--where?" "At Avignon.--Now, do you read me?"
Louis met the powerful glance of Wharton's eye, and it shot into his
soul. At the same instant the words of his guardian seemed to ring in
his ear:--_The wily Duke will teach you to be a traitor!_--Hot and cold
damps burst from every pore of his body.
"You do not answer me, de Montemar?--I see you are discomposed,--you
are agitated;--and it is a cause to stir up every vital spring in
the breast of free-born man! My blood is ready to follow the course
of Derwentwater and Kenmuir; or to purchase, in some happy field of
victory, the re-establishment of my lawful king!"
Louis had been taken unawares, and was still incapable of reply. He
verified the remark, that no history is so little understood by young
persons as that of their country near their own times. The false
lights of party have not sufficiently subsided, to allow the regular
historian a clear view of events; and the prejudiced memoirs of the
day are too numerous and contradictory to be put into the hands of
youth, without making a waste of that time which ought to be devoted
to building up a future judgement on the well-founded basis of the
history of past ages. The subject proposed by the Duke, was therefore
new to the reflections of Louis. He had never questioned, nor confirmed
his loyalty to the House of Hanover, by considering the change of
succession with any reference to his own peculiar opinions. He had
never seen any thing at the parsonage but peaceful submission to
authority, _not for wrath, but conscience sake_. At the castle, another
sentiment was often agitated; but the speakers were usually violent,
unreflecting characters, whose praise or blame were equally worthless.
However, he could not deny to himself that he had shrunk in horror from
recitals of what passed ten years ago, with regard to the rebel lords;
and he also could not forget that his uncle of Lindisfarne had often
lamented the severe policy of their execution, and wished the State had
thought it possible to unite mercy with judgement. "Had His Majesty
pardoned them," said Mr. Athelstone, "rebellion would have perished in
their stead; for the honour of a British heart is stronger than death."
All this rushed confusedly to the recollection of Louis. His
partialities, romantic associations, and generous enthusiam, were all
on the side of the suffering party; but his habits of submission had
been directed by his best friends to the reigning family. He felt his
own indecision he saw the Duke's advantage; and repeating to himself
his uncle's warning, again determined not to linger another hour near
the dangerous contagion.
Wharton's observing eye perceived fluctuation in the mind of his
friend; and as there _was_ fluctuation on so portentous a subject,
he boded a favourable issue to his side of the argument, could he
detain him a little longer from the island. Should Louis return thither
before his faith were actually pledged to the Stuart cause, it could
not be doubted he would impart his scruples to the Pastor; and that
true minister of the reformation, would keep him firm to the House
of Hanover. Full of this apprehension, and aware that his proselyte
must soon be summoned to the boat, unless he could prevent it by some
unsuspected manoeuvre, Wharton was not sorry when he saw Sir Anthony
and several of the party advancing fast upon them from the house.--The
tongues of the ladies proclaimed their vicinity.
"Gird your loins, my friend!" cried the Duke, resuming his usual
merriment; and laughing at the stern air with which Louis turned to
their voices:--"Dalilah and the Philistines are upon you!" "And if
every hair on my head were a rope by which they held me," replied
Louis, "I would escape them!" As he spoke, he suddenly turned on his
heel, and darted down a vista of firs towards the sea-beach. Wharton
did no more than wave his hand to the light-footed Violante. She shot
by a cross path through the shrubbery, and at a curve in the avenue
met the flying object of her pursuit with such force, that she was
struck to the ground. The rest of the party soon hastened forward,
by the cries of Louis for help; for on raising her, and finding her
insensible, he thought she was killed by the violence of the shock.
When they came up he was on one knee, with her head leaning on the
other, and gazing with horror on her pale face. The pallid hue of his
own, told all that he feared, to the Duke and Sir Anthony. But the
ladies found the case not so desperate; and by the help of essences
soon restored the fair sufferer to animation.
Sir Anthony proposed her being taken into the house. But on attempting
to rise, she sunk back, almost fainting a second time from the
excessive pain of a sprained ancle. Wharton called for a sofa, which
being brought, the invalid was carefully placed in it on cushions; and
the gentlemen present, insisted on being its bearers into the castle.
As the sofa was raised from the ground, Violante turned to Louis with
a languid smile; "you will not leave me, Mr. de Montemar?" said she,
and stretched out her hand to him, with a look more persuasive than her
words.
To disappoint the wish and expectation these words and action implied,
he found impossible.--He had no suspicion that she was running to
intercept him, when the accident happened; and now, turning with a
respectful bow to her summons, he silently followed the sofa into the
breakfast-room. Her gallant bearers placed it by the fire, at a small
distance from the table. The Duke offered his services to the reclining
beauty; but she would accept of no hand to bring her coffee and toast,
but that of Louis: saying, that he who wounded, was in duty bound to
administer the restoratives. Recovered from his dismay at what might
have been the fatal effect of the accident he had so unintentionally
occasioned, he gladly took the opportunity to make the _amende
honourable_, and express his concern at what had happened.
Time rolled away, and he heard no tidings of the boat. It was an
unusual inattention in his uncle's servants, who always vied with
each other who should be most prompt in obeying every wish of their
beloved Mr. de Montemar. But Wharton had contrived to have the little
vessel countermanded, without appearing in the orders. Ignorant of
this, Louis seized the first moment the invalid addressed herself
to another person; and in a low voice asked the butler whether the
boat were in waiting. The man, not aware of the commands which had
been given one way or the other, simply answered the tide had been
at ebb two hours. Stung with vexation, Louis started from his chair.
Violante observed his disorder, and softly enquired the cause.--It was
no sooner explained, than casting on him a reproachful look, she burst
into tears and turned her head silently away. Louis felt himself in
a very embarrassing situation; and almost unconsciously resuming his
seat beside her, he drew a vexatious sigh as he said to himself,--"I am
caught, and coiled in spite of myself!"
Violante mistook its meaning; and withdrawing her hand from her eyes,
gave him a glance that mantled his face with crimson. Though apparently
engaged in gay badinage with the other ladies, Wharton did not lose an
expression of his friend's countenance, as the alluring Frenchwoman
continued to converse with him in a tone of mingled tenderness and
raillery. "If he stand this," thought the Duke, "he has even more ice,
of a certain kind, in his composition, than he forced me this morning
to believe!"
Sir Anthony entered from the hall, calling aloud, "Who rides this
morning? I have ordered horses round to the court."
"De Montemar, what are you for?" said the Duke, "I see victory is in
the hands where I would always have it; but as the ladies may not wish
to have their captive in their way all day;--are you inclined for a
steeple-hunt this morning?"
Louis eagerly embraced the proposal.--Violante coloured, touched his
arm; and pressing it with strong emotion, whispered something in his
ear. Wharton laughed, and turned on his heel. Louis believed himself
turned idiot. Abandoned of his usual presence of mind, he knew not
what to say, or how to look; though he felt perfectly resolved not
to sleep another night in the castle, while it contained its present
extraordinary inmates. The seductive scenes of the preceding night,
seemed disenchanted before him; men and women, all were divested of
their magic garments, excepting Wharton, and he still wore the vesture
of light.
"Why will he mingle his noble nature with creatures base as these?"
again he said to himself; "are they his toys? his tools?--To what
purpose?"
He was gazing on the Duke, as these thoughts occurred to him, and
deepened his reflections. Wharton caught the look; its expression
went through him: but waving his hand, as if that would glance it
aside, he shook his head sportively and exclaimed; "You want me
to pledge my guarantee to Violante, that there shall be no more
desertions!--Believe me, pretty one! For the bright Pleiades are not
more inseparable above, than are your swain and humble servant below."
"----We rise and set together."
He spoke the last sentence without any reference to the subject which
had first suggested the idea; and having in the utterance as much
forgotten Violante, as though she had never existed, he put his arm
through Louis's, and turned with him out of the room.
"De Montemar," said he, as they crossed the hall; "the conversation
which was interrupted this morning, must be finished. I have put a
packet open into your hand, which must be sealed this evening; else
the vagrant leaves may follow the sybil's trick; and I know nothing of
the gatherer, till that doughty Lictor, Jack Ketch, makes me his bow
on Tower-Hill." "Surely, my Lord, you cannot doubt my honour, if you
could my heart?"
"I will doubt every thing, till that heart is laid open to me.--I vowed
to have no disguises with you.--Repay me in kind.--Heart for heart, De
Montemar, is the only true exchange!"
Louis did not immediately answer; for he felt what he would not fairly
acknowledge to himself, that a mist did sometime appear to rise over
this professed frankness of the Duke, which often made it uncertain
whether he had really shewn his heart at all.--In the midst of a
sentiment that seemed direct from the soul, a sudden quirk of fancy
would present itself, that turned all athwart into whim and laughter.
And the freest disclosure would as frequently start aside, to appear
nothing more than a fantastic figure of speech, or break off into
irreconcilable fragments, without apparent aim or connexion. But
for all this, an apology came to the breast of his friend. "He has
embraced the desperate fortunes of a dethroned prince.--And perhaps
it depends upon the caution of this, that prince's ablest confident,
whether they are to be redeemed, or finally consigned to despair!"
The horses were at the hall door; and Sir Anthony, and his other male
guests, mounted. On sight of the friends, he called to them, and the
grooms bringing forward more horses, the Duke vaulted into his seat,
and Louis, with a sensation of a double release, gladly followed his
example.--As they turned merrily down the rocky path-way which led by
the ancient fosse to the open country, every man had something to say
according to his own humour, of the pleasures of the preceding night;
but all concurred in so overcharging their anticipations of the coming
evening, that it was easily to be foreseen the revelry of the past,
would be encreased to an excess in the future, which would destroy
all, by drowning pleasure and consciousness in the same stream.
Sir Anthony appeared to take it for granted, his nephew had completely
surrendered himself to the impulse which governed them all; but with
redoubling disgust, Louis tried to make his uncle comprehend, that so
far from intending to partake the projected festivity, he would not go
back to the castle, but return to Lindisfarne immediately after their
ride. Astonishment, remonstrance, raillery, entreaties, reproaches; all
were successively and successlessly brought forward: Louis found his
spirit rise with the clamour of opposition. He was now steadily doing,
what he always knew was his only proper conduct; the padlock which had
seemed to chain down his faculties under a sense of committing wrong,
now burst asunder, and he was all himself again.--Sir Anthony affected
not to believe him serious; talked of Violante, then declared, it was
his belief, he only wanted to be forced to do the thing he liked; and
whispering the noisy sheriff and others, a loud laugh peeled through
the party, and they instantly drew around Louis.
"What do you mean, gentlemen?" cried he, glad to be manually opposed by
others beside his uncle.
"To bear you, as the Loves bore Adonis"--cried Wharton gaily, and
planting his steed also, before that of his friend.
"_Et tu Brute?_" cried Louis; and striking his spurs into the sides of
his horse, the high mettled animal sprang through the foremost rank,
dispersed the rest; and speeding forward with the wings of the wind,
was plunged by his determined rider into the receding waters of the
tide.