The voice of youth! the air is rife
With a dream of glorious things,
And our harp is thrilling with the life
Of all its shining strings.--_Newspaper_.
The famed drinking song of Rabelais "_Remplio tous verre vuide_," the
offspring of that wonderful man whose humor electrified an age, and
whose sarcasm did as much for religious reformation as the logic of
Luther, greeted my ears when I descended at the Raleigh in
Williamsburg. Before me was a huge and curiously misshapen edifice,
surmounted by a box, which looked more like a coffin than a porch.
Over it the frowning head of the immortal patron of tobacco and
potatoes ghastly smiled through its gamboge and vermilion, looking
like one of those rough portraits, which in the earlier maps of
Virginia, are placed amid the _terra incognito_, where "divers
salvages inhabit." The porch was filled with young men, sitting in
that peculiar posture, which resembled them to the mortars which
grimly flank some armed fort, moving themselves and their legs from
the banisters, only to examine a case of pistols, on which an
atrabilarious youth was lecturing with great spirit. A few seemed to
be absorbed in a newspaper, while more than one was employed in
catching the echo of the bacchanial song, and murmuring it back to the
festive board. The arrival of Arthur Ludwell and myself, produced a
momentary sensation of curiosity and attention, and we had scarcely
dismounted from our horses, ere we were frankly invited to join in the
festivities of the club. With his accustomed prudence, Arthur declined
the dangerous honor, while I, through an utter recklessness of heart,
and a burning thirst for excitement, quickly accepted the offer, and
was immediately ushered into the "_Apollo_," a long and dimly lighted
room, in which, around a table, were gathered the bloom of boyhood and
the bud of adolescence. Wine, adulterated into poison by its union
with brandy, and that original sin of southern intemperance mint
julap, stood forth the bold heralds of an incipient debauch. A young
man of dark complexion and melancholy countenance, acted as the
president of the board, occasionally struggling with himself for a bad
pun, or joining in the chorus of each mirthful song.
"How has the affair between Leger and Allan terminated?" inquired a
faint voice near me.
"Diffugere _vives_," responded the president, "for they fought this
morning at the hay-yard with my pistols. Leger had the advantage of
the ground, '_mutat terra vices_,' and hit Allan at the third fire.
However, his wound is not dangerous; they are now friends. Here's to
their health, and to the ball, which in purifying honor, exalts
friendship."
I did not comprehend either the logic or morality of this toast--yet I
drank it through common civility; and from my desire to be considered
as a youth of spirit, I soon reeled in the full grossness of
intoxication. The lights were now extinguished, and we sallied forth,
fired with the ambition of "putting the town to rights." At the door I
met Scipio, who gazing on me for a moment, averted his face and burst
into tears. I passed rapidly by him, and with difficulty smothered a
curse which my pride aimed at his weakness. Unnoticed by my companions
he silently followed me; and it was his hand which raised me from the
earth where I had fallen, and his arm which bore me to my room.
I arose the next morning with a shattered frame and an aching heart,
nor could my crazed philosophy destroy the blush with which memory
every moment bitterly suffused my cheek. But was not drunkenness the
attribute of genius! the unerring characteristic of intellect!--for
while tradition sighed over the memory of the victims of intemperance,
the lustre of genius awoke the pity of sympathy, the pardon of virtue,
and the emulation of folly. All the promising young men who have sunk
into a drunkard's grave, were full of high and lofty intelligence, and
would have realized the proudest hope of fame but for this fatal
excess of genius. Strange fatuity! and stranger that its rottenness
should excite either our pity or forgiveness!
College life is a little dream of human passion and human infirmity.
It is the same eternal track of disappointment, over which folly
vaults and ambition staggers--a record of youthful happiness written
on a summer's leaf, it glitters for the moment, and fades away beneath
the spirit which freshens it into beauty. 'Tis the miniature arena in
which human life first disports its vices, its hopes, and its
imaginings--and if no other knowledge be acquired, the collegian can
look with pride on his acquaintance with the world, its follies and
its pleasures, and hug to his bosom that kernel of truth which has
been wrested from the hard husk of disappointment. We had numerous
debating societies, where the elements of government, the subtleties
of law, and the vagaries of taste were nightly discussed. We were
either orators or philosophers--the former declaiming in all the pomp
of verbosity, the latter deciding in all the solemnity of silence.
Newspapers were eagerly read, and many a maiden pen first fleshed
itself in these shambles of faction. All write in Virginia for these
greedy receptacles of morbid ire and political venom--and he who can
sketch the hundredth-told tale, in improved bombast, or provincial
dialect, becomes the little great man of the cross-roads, or struts
the swelling Junius of the courtyard. Write in jagged orthography--the
dictionary is at hand; scuffle through the rules of grammar--the
printer has a happy talent of correcting by his own grammar; violate
the sense of language and the chastity of style, for this is a trait
of towering genius; but write, and write again, until you can gaze
with triumph on the tenth number of some masterly Cato--some learned
Sidney--or some eloquent Curtius. These compliments are the certain
rewards of your labors--for the printer's praise is measured by your
fustian, and that of his readers is gained by the length of your
numbers.
I found Pilton, a student of reputation and character, which added
bitterness to the malignity of my hate. Our meeting was cold, formal
and ceremonious; and on my part, I was repulsive almost to direct
insult. My hate was fierce, violent and untamed--but still it was open
and undisguised, apparently losing its malice in good breeding, and
its assassin-like propensity in honor. As usual, his habits of intense
application had given him a high rank both in his class and in the
esteem of the professors, while his ill-breeding was forgotten in the
light which learning threw around him. To all my open attacks, secret
insinuations, and malevolent hints, he exposed that affected candor
and subtle magnanimity, which neutralized the poison and blunted the
edge of my weapons.
There was a ball at the Old Raleigh during the Christmas holydays, to
which the city as well as its vicinity sent a numerous representation
of those soft, fragile and dove-like females, who, springing like so
many Venus' from the bosom of the sea, claim their home only in the
tranquil and affectionate hearths of tide-water Virginia. Like the
mocking bird, their dwelling place is amid the ripple of the murmuring
tide, while their song is the melody which thrills into life the
fearful and eternal solitude of the pine forests. When I entered the
room, the dance was exultingly triumphant, and each mazy figure was
softened into intense interest by that joyousness of mirth which takes
its pride of place only from early hearts and youthful hopes. One girl
instantly arrested my attention; and the long, deep and ardent gaze
which I directed towards her, mantled her cheek with a deep and
struggling blush, giving that delicate tint which, like the fabled
rose, twines itself around, only to bloom over the pallid countenance
of disease. She was pale, attenuated and fragile, with that dewy-like
softness which is stolen from the couch of sickness, and that tranquil
firmness which shows both a capability of happiness, and a peaceful
resignation at the want of it. Her form was full of grace and
symmetrical beauty, and her eye, like a glow-worm, lit up the saddened
paleness of her face. How wonderful is the contagion of friendship!
How curious are the hallowed sympathies of love! Unseen though
felt--unknown though experienced, they breathe that pathos of
congeniality, which in exciting attachment, confirms constancy, and
which ever leaves us to wonder not so much at their commencement as at
their continuance. I do not know that my appearance was calculated to
impress the heart of the fair girl who trembled under my searching
gaze; but her blush truly responded to the passion, poetry and
sympathy which my eyes discoursed, and I soon found that the shadowy
gloom of my countenance had arrested her kindness and excited her
curiosity. I was soon formally introduced, though in the confusion of
the moment I did not hear her name; and on her complaint of fatigue, I
led her to a retired seat, and in a short time we were fairly launched
into that great sea of conversation, the mental difference of the
sexes--a subject on which man ever shows his ill-nature, and woman her
superiority. I found her mind opening like the flowers of the
wilderness in richness, variety and freshness, and her wit leaping and
gambolling like an uncaged bird. I poured out all the long-hived
treasures of my erudition, disclosed the whole extent of my learning,
and disported all the little elegancies and graces of my nature. I
could tell her no secret of taste, or display no gem of literature,
with which she was not familiar; and looking up in her tranquil and
placid face, I took no note of time, or of the whispers of the crowd,
which had declared me "a case."
Towards the conclusion of the ball, a gentleman taking advantage of a
pause in our conversation, addressed her by the name of Miss Pilton.
Good God! how that word rang and tingled through the deepest recesses
of my heart, and how quickly did my hate leap up to it as a fortuitous
gift for its demoniac revenge.
"Are you the sister," I inquired, "of Mr. Henry Pilton, now at William
and Mary?"
"I am his only sister," was her reply. "You certainly know him, and if
you do not, you must seek his acquaintance. I will tell him that I am
about to make you my friend, and he will love you for my sake."
"I do know him," I answered; "he is studious and intelligent, and
possesses the esteem and confidence of all the professors."
She rewarded this constrained, though frank avowal, with a smile--and
in the rapture of her joy, she betrayed all that confidence which her
brother's pride had deposited in her bosom, and told with enthusiasm
the little history of his ambition, his fears, and his hopes. He
boldly anticipated every honor within the compass of society; and that
proud determination to be great, which invigorated his youthful
ambition, added a deeper hue of malignity to the venom of my hate.
"He hardly gives me time," she said, "to love him; for gazing like the
eagle on the sun, he never looks down on the insipid dulness of earth.
I do not admire students, Mr. Granby; they are cold and selfish, and
though they gain our flattery, they rarely win our hearts."
I construed this remark, though made at the expense of her brother, as
a compliment to myself, and soon gained her smiles, by many sarcasms
which I levelled at pedants, scholars and students. Without professing
flattery, I pleased her by a ready acquiescence of sentiment and
opinion; and anticipating her pride of sex and her tenderness of
heart, I lauded in the richest language of quotation, woman's love,
and woman's constancy. The artlessness of her character, and the
simplicity of her nature, could not hide from my vanity the favorable
impression I had made on her heart. I looked on my victim with some
emotions of pity, and paused for a moment under the goading sting of
conscience; yet the fiend-like passion which rioted on my life, told
me that the ruin of her peace, and the destruction of her happiness,
would be the proudest victory which my hate could achieve.
Leaving her for a few moments, I looked around at the mirthful throng
which filled the room, and sauntered to the _bar_, which was a point
where conversation converged its focus. About a table prodigally
ornamented with decanters and glasses, were collected numerous groups
of young men, who were all talking at the same time on beauty,
horseracing, politics and duelling. Here and there a solitary tobacco
chewer might be seen, stealing to some fire place or window, and
enjoying in mute rapture, the filth, excitement and grossness of his
depraved appetite. Two or three youthful legislators from the
adjoining counties, were flaunting their maiden honors in the broad
light of political vanity--while four elderly gentlemen, in
embroidered waistcoats and fair-top boots, were eloquently deprecating
the onward march of democracy, which made the legislature a mob of
demagogues, and the ball room a collection of fine clothes and
vulgarity. This was my uncle's favorite theme, and from the folly of
such croaking aristocracy, common sense and not education had
delivered me. An aged negro, the "harmonious Phillips" of the country,
dressed in the ample costume of the old school, with a powdered head,
a large knob of watch seals, and a silver ship in his bosom,
controlled with fierce tyranny his partners of the bow, fife and
triangle. Bowing almost to the floor, he would ever and anon cry out
in a magisterial tone, _cross over_--_forward_--_turn your
partners_--_done_, and catching the inspiration of catgut and rosin,
his ivory teeth were displayed like the keys of a piano-forte, while
his broad face fairly laughed itself into ecstasy.
At the conclusion of the ball, I became the solitary escort of Miss
Pilton. The moon was shining coldly and brightly over the world; and
when I was about to leave my fair charge, looking up she exclaimed,
"How beautiful!--how melancholy!--it makes me almost a poetess. What a
contrast to the busy crowd we have just left; oh! that human life was
as cloudless, and human love as pure!"
There was no affectation in this rhapsody--no girlish sentiment in the
display; for nature called forth the gushing softness of her heart,
and I quickly took advantage of this moment of philosophic
romance.--Where is the lover who has not found the moon his silent yet
most impassioned advocate, and who, when gazing on its mellow light,
has not caught that saddened sympathy which brightens every dark spot
in the horizon of the heart.
"Yes," I replied, "it is the same cloud-wrapt sphere which has always
looked down on the little drama of human folly, unmoved amid the
desolations of death and the fall of empires, forever whispering love,
and exalting the best affections of our nature. Marriages must be made
in _heaven_--and this pale messenger, in expanding the heart, almost
persuades me that it is commissioned to teach love and awaken
affection."
Ere she could reply, I placed a leaf of evergreen in her hand, and
uttered enough of love to call a burning blush to her cheek. I
lingered for a few moments at the door, and on leaving the scene, I
turned around to gaze on the being who was thus insensibly falling
into the toils of my duplicity. I saw her place in her bosom the
treacherous emblem which I had given her; and as the silvery light of
the moon trembled over her marbled brow and placid countenance, I
almost believed that its rays had claimed that spot, as the only
tranquil home in the wide world on which they might kiss themselves
into slumber.