We will have done with the philosophy of the human heart; we will talk
no more of abstract sensations--at least, for the present; we will
enter into no further investigations of causes and effects; but
will tell a simple story to the end; never deviating into
discussions--except when it suits us; for, as the gentle reader is
well aware that resolutions, whether made by man or woman, are
intended from the very first to be broken, it would be hard upon a
poor writer to force him to keep his better than kings, or ministers,
or philosophers.
The thoughtful fit into which Morley Ernstein had fallen did not last
long. The entrance of a servant dispelled it in a moment; and starting
up, as if half ashamed of the gloom that had fallen upon him, he
resumed the tone of ordinary life. Youth, with its consciousness,
feels as if man's bosom were but a glass case, where thoughts may be
examined like curious insects, and the young man doubted not that the
servant would see all that was passing within if he cleared not his
brow of the shadows that covered it.
"Bring me round a horse!" he said; "I will ride out." And after taking
his hat, his gloves, and his cane, he went into the old portico before
the door, and sat down on one of the stone benches which flanked it on
either side. The air was warm and balmy, for it was the month of May,
the period of the year in which Morley had been born. There is surely
something in the season of our birth which transfuses itself into our
character, and, I have sometimes been inclined to think, influences
our fate. Byron was born in the dark and stormy winter; Napoleon, in
the fiery and blazing month of August.
Morley had first seen the light in the fitful spring; and now, in that
month, when very often the heat of summer and the cold of winter
struggle with each other on alternate days, especially in the land
that gave him birth, he sat and watched the bright sunshine and the
dark cloud chase each other over the blue sky. The scene impressed
itself upon his heart and gave its hue to his feelings, for he was one
of those whose bosoms are like a deep, clear lake, reflecting vividly
the aspect of nature, except when the demon of the tempest sweeps over
it with his ruffling wing. He felt himself falling into a new fit of
thought, but resisted the inclination; and when the horse was brought
round, he sprang at once into the saddle, and struck the flank with
his heel. The animal darted forward, but instead of turning its head
towards the gate the rider took his way at full gallop across the
park, leaped the enclosure at a bound, and was soon out of the old
servant's sight, who beheld him depart, with the exclamation--"He is
but a boy after all!"
There was as much envy and admiration as anything else in the old
man's speech; for who would not be a boy if they could?--who would not
go back to the freshness of early years?--who would not shake off the
burden of age and its heavy thoughts? At that very moment Morley was
flying from thoughts too old for his years; the animal spirit had
resumed its sway, and, in the fiery career of the high-bred beast he
rode, the energies of his own corporeal nature found exercise and joy.
A little accident happened, however, almost at the outset of his ride,
which checked the speed at which he was flying over the country. We
have said he leaped the enclosure of the park at a bound; but he
certainly did so without thinking that any one might be upon the high
road at the other side. Such was the case, however; and, as Morley
Ernstein darted over the fence, he perceived a lady and a gentleman on
horseback, riding gently along.
The sudden and unexpected apparition of a mounted horseman at full
speed, where there had been nothing but solitude the moment before,
made the lady start, but it made her horse start still more; and being
of that race of animals that is restive without being spirited, the
beast plunged, reared, and would have fallen backwards, but, as quick
as light, Morley was upon his feet by the lady's side, and with her
bridle in his firm, manly grasp. The horse became quiet instantly; it
seemed as if the animal felt at once that it could not resist; and
though it passaged away from him who held it, it no longer tried to
rear with that strong determination of crushing its fair rider which
it had shewn at first.
The lady, however, agitated with all that had happened, slipped from
the saddle, quickly but gracefully, and of course Morley Ernstein
aided her to the best of his abilities, apologizing for frightening
her horse, and assuring her that the animal was now quiet, that the
danger was over, and adding a multitude of other things of the same
kind, in a breath.
Our measures of time are all false and absurd together; we might
find a thousand better clocks than any that have ever been carried
up into the sky by a church steeple. Thoughts, feelings, passions,
events--these are the real moral time-keepers. What is to me the
ticking of a pendulum? There is many a five minutes, as they are
called when measured by that false scale, that form two-thirds of a
lifetime. One fortnight of existence has withered more than twenty
years, cast down the barrier between youth and age, and dried up the
fountains of the heart, like the simoon.
It was not exactly thus with Morley Ernstein and the lady; but the
brief moments in which all passed that I have just narrated, comprised
for the young gentleman a world of other things besides. She was young
and very beautiful.--Is not that enough to load the wings of a single
minute with the thoughts of years, for a young man of one-and-twenty?
But that was not all; hers was the sort of beauty that he had always
most admired, most thought of, most wondered at. It was all gentleness
and brightness, but withal resplendent with high feeling and thought.
It was the mixture that we so seldom see of all that is lovely in mere
corporeal form and colouring: the rich contour, the flowing lines, the
warmth but softness of hue, the contrasted tints of the hair, the
eyes, the cheeks, the forehead, and the lips, with the lofty, yet
gentle, the tender, yet deep in expression. The young horseman had
remarked all this in a moment, and he had seen that beautiful face
agitated, that graceful form rendered more graceful by the effort to
keep her seat upon the vicious beast that bore her. At the same time,
the morning sun shone, mellowed through the foliage of a tree over
head, and cast that rich mysterious yellow light upon the whole scene
which is only produced when the sun-shine falls through the green
leaves that owe their brief and strange existence to his glorious
beams. That light seemed to give a peculiar lustre to her face--a
something that the youth, in his fond enthusiasm, could have fancied
unearthly, had not the soft hand that rested upon his as he aided her
to dismount, and the deep-drawn sigh of apprehension relieved, told
him that she was but a being of the same nature as himself. It was all
done in a moment, as I have said, and the manifold thoughts, or we may
call them impressions, which took place in his bosom, were like the
ripples of a moonlight sea; a thousand bright things received all at
once into the mind.
Scarcely, however, had Morley Ernstein time to utter the few words
which have been mentioned when the lady's companion interposed,
saying--"At this time of the year sir, one does not expect to see
people flying over a park fence like madmen. The periodical season of
insanity--I mean the hunting season--is at an end, and I do not wonder
at the horse being surprised and alarmed."
Morley turned his eyes suddenly to the speaker's face; but he was an
old man, with grey hair, and the youth had a certain foolish reverence
for age, which was much inculcated amongst those weak people, our
ancestors; though it has given way very generally now, under the
influence of improvement and the diffusion of knowledge. He refrained,
therefore, and strangled an angry reply between his teeth, merely
saying--
"I am extremely sorry I have alarmed the lady, and trust she will
forgive me. You still look frightened," he continued, addressing her
with a voice in which some young timidity, and the slight agitation of
admiration mixed strangely with a consciousness, not so much of varied
powers as of high purpose and noble feelings; "you still look
frightened, and somewhat faint. Were it not better for you to repose
for a moment at my house, hard by?"
"At your house!" said the gentleman, with peculiar emphasis, and
gazing at him from head to foot; "I thank you, sir, but the lady can
very well pursue her ride. The horse, too, will be perfectly quiet,
unless he be again startled, and it is not reasonable to expect two
such pleasant occurrences in one day."
The young lady bowed her head with a smile that seemed intended and
fully sufficient to compensate for the harsh coldness of her
companion. "I am not faint," she said--"a little frightened; but I can
well go on." She thanked him, too, for his kindness, in a somewhat
lower tone; not so low, indeed, as to be unheard by either of the two
who stood beside her, but still softened, and with somewhat of
timidity in her manner, as if she felt that what she said to the one
might not be pleasing to the other.
Morley aided her to remount, and gave her the rein, for her companion
made no effort to assist her. As he did so, he gazed for one instant
in her face, and his eyes met the deep blue heavenly light of hers,
pouring through the dark lashes, like the first dawn of morning
through the clouds of night. It was but for an instant, and bowing her
head once more, she rode on, leaving him standing on the road, and
marvelling still at the bright vision which had thus crossed his path,
and vanished. Who has not, in his childhood, seen a shooting star
cross the sky and disappear, on a bright autumn night?--and who has
not then gazed long into the wide vacant heaven, to see if the shining
wanderer would not appear again? Thus gazed Morley Ernstein after the
fair being that had just left him, with that sort of admiration in
which wonder has so great a share.
He stood motionless, his horse's bridle over one arm, his cane
drooping from his wrist, and his eyes fixed upon the receding figures,
till they reached an angle of the road. They were riding slowly, and
by no movement in either did it appear that they gave another thought
to what had occurred--to that momentary meeting which had furnished
him with so many thoughts. He had no reason to suppose they would.
Perhaps, indeed, with man's true perversity, Morley might have deemed
it not quite feminine if the lady had turned her head as she rode
away; but yet he was mortified that she did not do so; and sighed to
think that he should most likely never see her more. At the angle of
the road, however--it was, perhaps, some three hundred yards distant
from the spot where he stood, far enough, in short, to render features
indistinct, but not to hide the gestures of the body--the two riders
directed their course to the left, and then--but only for a single
instant, with a glance withdrawn as soon as given--the lady turned her
face towards the scene of the little incident which had delayed her on
her way. It was but for an instant, we have said; but Morley felt that
in that instant she must have seen him standing and gazing after her,
and in his young enthusiasm he could not but fancy that she must have
seen, too, the admiration she had excited in his bosom.
Who could she be? he asked himself--Who and what? Was she the old
man's daughter? He did not like to think it was so. He persuaded
himself that it was not. There was not the slightest resemblance
between them; his aspect was harsh, and hers was gentle; his eyes were
dim, and hers were bright; his brow was brown and wrinkled, hers was
fair and smooth; his hair was gray, and hers--. But as he thus thought
he smiled at himself, seeing that all the differences he had found
might be solely those of age. "'Tis but that he is old and she is
young," he thought; "but no! there is no resemblance, and then the
voices were as different as the croak of the raven and the song of the
lark--the voice which is almost always hereditary."
If not his daughter, who could she be? was the next question; and as
there is always in the bosom of every one, a ready devil to suggest
that which may torment us most, he next inquired, "May she not be
his wife?" In England, however, it is not so common as in other
countries--where marriages are mercantile transactions, and the altar
and the commune often become a mere slave-market--for men to marry
girls who might be their grand-daughters; and Morley Ernstein soon
determined that she could not be his wife. She might be cousin, niece,
connexion--anything, in short: but neither his daughter nor his wife.
His daughter! No, she was too lovely, too gentle, too bright, for the
same blood to run in her veins, and in the cold icehouse of her
companion's heart. His wife!--Heaven and earth! it was impossible!
The young man mounted his horse, and rode on, but more slowly than
before. The very sight that he had seen had calmed him, for such is
generally the first effect of very exquisite beauty. There is power in
it as well as loveliness--we are impressed as much as attracted; it
awakens admiration before it excites passion, and, with love as with
the ocean, the calm precedes the storm. He rode on, then,
thoughtfully, and many were the workings of his spirit within him.
Not long after, he reached a village, which stood upon his own
property; the cottagers were all people who had known him in his
youth, and though they had not seen him for six years, they all
remembered him well. It was, by this time, the peasant's hour of
dinner, but some one caught a sight of the young landlord as he
entered the place, and the tiding spread like lightning. Every door
had its occupants, and low courtesies and respectful bows greeted him
as he advanced. There was a kindliness in Morley's heart, that would
not let him deal coldly with any one; and, though he would fain have
gone on, thinking of the engrossing subject that had taken hold of
him, he could not resist the good cottagers' looks of recognition;
and, dismounting from his horse, he called a boy to lead it through
the village, while, walking from door to door, he spoke a few words to
his humble friends.
"God bless him!" cried one, as soon as he had gone on; "he is a nice
young gentleman."
"He is very like his father," observed another. "I remember his father
well."
"He has got his mother's beautiful eyes, though," said a third. "Well,
I do think she was the prettiest creature I ever yet did see!"
At the fourth or fifth cottage an idea seemed to strike Morley
Ernstein suddenly, and he asked if any of the inhabitants thereof had
seen a lady and a gentleman pass through the place on horseback,
intending to follow up that enquiry by demanding who they were. But he
got no satisfaction there. The cottager had been out in the fields,
his wife had been cooking the dinner, and no such persons as the young
gentleman described had been seen by either. He put the same question
again and again at other houses, but no tidings were to be obtained;
and, vexed and disappointed, he returned to his home and made
enquiries there.
To the old servants he described the gentleman he had met with
accurately enough; on the lady he would not venture to say much, for
like all Englishmen he was keenly sensitive to a laugh, and feared to
awaken the least feeling of ridicule, even in the mind of a dependent.
He dwelt upon the person and dress of the horseman at large; but in
regard to the lady, added only that she was young and handsome.
Human nature is very obtuse to description, and we seldom if ever find
any one who either attends to or applies the details that we give,
respecting any object which we wish to call up before the mind's eye
by means of the ear. Do not let poets or historians ever believe that,
by the lengthened descriptions they give, the reader ever becomes
impressed with the very scene or person that they themselves behold.
Oh, no! the reader manufactures a scene of his own, out of some of the
writer's words and many of his own imaginations or memories; or
fabricates a personage out of his own fancies and predilections; but
both scene and personage as unlike that which we have wished to
represent as possible. Thus was it, too, with Morley Ernstein and his
servants. One declared that the persons he had seen must be Mr.
Ferdinand Beckford and his young wife. Mr. Beckford was the good
priest of a neighbouring parish, and was just six-and-twenty years of
age. Another vowed that the horseman must be Mr. Thomas Ogden, Member
of Parliament for the town hard by, and the lady must be his wife.
Mrs. Ogden was somewhere between forty and fifty, and though she still
preserved a pretty face, her person was as round as a tub of Dutch
butter. A third insisted that it was Lawyer Chancery; but Ernstein
knew the lawyer, and replied--"Why he is six feet high, and I told you
this person was short."
He saw that it was in vain to enquire further in that quarter, at
least; and he now resolved to pursue another plan, to reverse the
course of proceeding which he had proposed to follow, when he had
first arrived, and to visit immediately every gentleman's house within
twenty miles. His eager spirit would bear no delay, and before night
he had called on five or six of the principal personages in the
neighbourhood. All the gentlemen around declared that it was evident
Sir Morley Ernstein intended to be very sociable; and all the ladies,
who had daughters to marry, pronounced him a very charming young man;
but Morley did not find what he sought.
He dined, wandered out through his beautiful park, hurried here and
there till bed-time, and then cast himself down to repose, but found
it not, thinking only of the places where he would call the next day,
and the chances of his finding the fair girl who had so much excited
his imagination. In short, _the spirit of the animal_ was triumphant
in his bosom for the time. Let us guard, however, the expression well
against mistake. Do not let it be supposed that one evil thought found
place in his bosom at that moment. He was far too young, and fresh in
heart, to admit aught to the council chamber of his bosom, which the
fair girl ho had seen might not herself have witnessed and approved,
even supposing her to be all that her countenance bespoke her--pure,
and bright, and holy, as the spirits of a better world. No! but we
still say that the spirit of the animal was triumphant--the eager,
active, impetuous spirit, the same that leads the lion to rush after
his prey, the same that carries the warrior through the battle
field--the spirit of this world's things, of mortal hopes, and
passions, and affections--the spirit which, in all its shapes, in all
its forms, in camps and cities, courts and cabinets, gaining both high
worldly renown and the visionary immortality of fame, is still but an
animal energy--the spirit of dust and ashes.
Early the next morning he rose and pursued his eager course; another
and another round of hours and visits succeeded, till at length he had
called on every one that he could hear or think of, within the reach
of a lady's riding, and yet he had neither seen, nor obtained the
least intelligence of the horseman and his fair companion. The
disappointment but excited him the more for some days, and he left no
means untried to relieve himself from the irritable curiosity into
which he had wrought himself.
Still, all excitements come to an end; and in time he learned to feel
angry at himself for what he began to call boyish enthusiasm. He felt
somewhat disgusted with the life of the country, however; and as the
London season was then at its height, and everybody was carrying up
their stock of faults and follies to that great mart of wickedness and
vanity, from the less profitable markets of the country, he determined
to see what was passing in the metropolis, and to take his part in all
its energetic idleness. Be it said to his honour that he knew London
well, and loved it not; but he had seen it only as a boy, under the
somewhat rigid tutelage of others, and he was now to see it as a man,
master of himself and of a princely fortune.