THOUGHTS.
When Malcolm took Kelpie to her stall the night of the arrival of Lady
Bellair and her nephew, he was rushed upon by Demon, and nearly prostrated
between his immoderate welcome and the startled rearing of the mare. The
hound had arrived a couple of hours before, while Malcolm was out. He
wondered he had not seen him with the carnage he had passed, never
suspecting he had had another conductress, or dreaming what his presence
there signified for him.
I have not said much concerning Malcolm's feelings with regard to Lady
Clementina, but all this time the sense of her existence had been like an
atmosphere surrounding and pervading his thought. He saw in her the
promise of all he could desire to see in woman. His love was not of the
blind-little-boy sort, but of a deeper, more exacting, keen-eyed kind,
that sees faults where even a true mother will not, so jealous is it of
the perfection of the beloved. But one thing was plain, even to this
seraphic dragon that dwelt sleepless in him--and there was eternal content
in the thought--that such a woman, once started on the right way, would
soon leave fault and weakness behind her, and become as one of the grand
women of old, whose religion was simply what religion is--life, neither
more nor less than life. She would be a saint without knowing it, the only
grand kind of sainthood. Whoever can think of religion as an addition to
life, however glorious--a starry crown, say, set upon the head of
humanity--is not yet the least in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever thinks of
life as a something that could be without religion is in deathly ignorance
of both. Life and religion are one, or neither is anything: I will not say
neither is growing to be anything. Religion is no way of life, no show of
life, no observance of any sort. It is neither the food nor medicine of
being. It is life essential. To think otherwise is as if a man should
pride himself on his honesty or his parental kindness, or hold up his head
amongst men because he never killed one: were he less than honest or kind
or free from blood, he would yet think something of himself. The man to
whom virtue is but the ornament of character, something over and above,
not essential to it, is not yet a man.
If I say, then, that Malcolm was always thinking about Lady Clementina
when he was not thinking about something he _had_ to think about, have I
not said nearly enough on the matter? Should I ever dream of attempting to
set forth what love is in such a man for such a woman? There are
comparatively few that have more than the glimmer of a notion of what love
means. God only knows how grandly, how passionately, yet how calmly, how
divinely, the man and the woman he has made might, may, shall love each
other. One thing only I will dare to say--that the love that belonged to
Malcolm's nature was one through the very nerves of which the love of God
must rise and flow and return as its essential life. If any man think that
such a love could no longer be the love of the man for the woman, he knows
his own nature, and that of the woman he pretends or thinks he adores, but
in the darkest of glasses.
Malcolm's lowly idea of himself did not at all interfere with his loving
Clementina, for at first his love was entirely dissociated from any
thought of hers. When the idea, the mere idea, of her loving him presented
itself, from whatever quarter suggested, he turned from it with shame and
self-reproof: the thought was in its own nature too unfit. That splendor
regard him! From a social point of view there was of course little
presumption in it. The marquis of Lossies bore a name that might pair
itself with any in the land; but Malcolm did not yet feel that the title
made much difference to the fisherman. He was what he was, and that was
something very lowly indeed. Yet the thought would at times dawn up from
somewhere in the infinite matrix of thought that perhaps if he went to
college and graduated and dressed like a gentleman, and did everything as
gentlemen do--in short, claimed his rank and lived as a marquis should, as
well as a fisherman might--then--then--was it not, might it not be, within
the bounds of possibility--just within them--that the great-hearted,
generous, liberty-loving Lady Clementina, groom as he had been, _menial_
as he had heard himself called, and as, ere yet he knew his birth, he had
laughed to hear, knowing that his service was true--that she, who despised
nothing human, would be neither disgusted nor contemptuous nor wrathful
if, from a great way off, at an awful remove of humility and worship, he
were to wake in her a surmise that he dared feel toward her as he had
never felt and never could feel toward any other? For would it not be
altogether counter to the principles he had so often heard her announce
and defend to despise him because he had earned his bread by doing
honorable work--work hearty and up to the worth of his wages? Was she one
to say and not see, to opine and not believe? or was she one to hold and
not practice--to believe for the heart, and not for the hand--to say _I
go_, and not go--_I love_, and not help? If such she were, then there were
for him no further searchings of the heart upon her account: he could but
hold up her name in the common prayer for all men, only praying besides
not to dream about her when he slept.
At length, such thoughts rising again and again, and ever accompanied by
such reflections concerning the truth of her character, and by the growing
certainty that her convictions were the souls of actions to be born of
them, his daring of belief in her strengthened until he began to think
that perhaps it would be neither his early history nor his defective
education nor his clumsiness that would prevent her from listening to such
words wherewith he burned to throw open the gates of his world and pray
her to enter and sit upon its loftiest throne--its loftiest throne but
one. And with the thought he felt as if he must run to her, calling aloud
that he was the marquis of Lossie, and throw himself at her feet.
But the wheels of his thought-chariot, self moved, were rushing, and here
was no goal at which to halt or turn; for, feeling thus, where was his
faith in her principles? how now was he treating the truth of her nature?
where now were his convictions of the genuineness of her professions?
Where were those principles, that truth, those professions, if after all
she would listen to a marquis and would not listen to a groom? To suppose
such a thing was to wrong her grievously. To herald his suit with his rank
would be to insult her, declaring that he regarded her theories of
humanity as wordy froth. And what a chance of proving her truth would he
not deprive her of if, as he approached her, he called on the marquis to
supplement the man!--But what, then, was the man, fisherman or marquis, to
dare _even himself_ to such a glory as the Lady Clementina? This much of a
man, at least, answered his waking dignity, that he could not condescend
to be accepted as Malcolm, marquis of Lossie, knowing he would have been
rejected as Malcolm MacPhail, fisherman and groom. Accepted as marquis, he
would for ever be haunted with the _channering_ question whether she would
have accepted him as groom. And if in his pain he were one day to utter
it, and she in her honesty were to confess she would not, must she not
then fall prone from her pedestal in his imagination? Could he, then, in
love for the woman herself, condescend as marquis to marry one who _might_
not have married him as any something else he could honestly have been
under the all-enlightening sun? Ah, but again, was that fair to her yet?
Might she not see in the marquis the truth and worth which the blinding
falsehoods of society prevented her from seeing in the groom? Might not a
lady--he tried to think of a lady in the abstract--might not a lady in
marrying a marquis--a lady to whom from her own position a marquis was
just a man on the level--marry in him the man he was, and not the marquis
he seemed? Most certainly, he answered: he must not be unfair. Not the
less, however, did he shrink from the thought of taking her prisoner under
the shield of his marquisate, beclouding her nobility, and depriving her
of the rare chance of shining forth as the sun in the splendor of womanly
truth. No: he would choose the greater risk of losing her for the chance
of winning her greater.
So far Malcolm got with his theories, but the moment he began to think in
the least practically he recoiled altogether from the presumption. Under
no circumstances could he ever have the courage to approach Lady
Clementina with a thought of himself in his mind. How could he have dared
even raise her imagined eidolon for his thoughts to deal withal? She had
never shown him personal favor. He could not tell whether she had listened
to what he had tried to lay before her. He did not know that she had gone
to hear his master: Florimel had never referred to their visit to Hope
chapel. His surprise would have equaled his delight at the news that she
had already become as a daughter to the schoolmaster.
And what had been Clementina's thoughts since learning that Florimel had
not run away with her groom? It were hard to say with completeness.
Accuracy, however, may not be equally unattainable. Her first feeling was
an utterly inarticulate, undefined pleasure that Malcolm was free to be
thought about. She was clear next that it would be matter for honest
rejoicing if the truest man she had ever met except his master was not
going to marry such an unreality as Florimel--one concerning whom, as
things had been going of late, it was impossible to say that she was not
more likely to turn to evil than to good. Clementina with all her
generosity could not help being doubtful of a woman who could make a
companion of such a man as Liftore--a man to whom every individual
particle of Clementina's nature seemed for itself to object. But she was
not yet past befriending.
Then she began to grow more _curious_ about Malcolm. She had already much
real knowledge of him, gathered both from himself and from Mr. Graham. As
to what went to make the man, she knew him, indeed, not thoroughly, but
well; and just therefore, she said to herself, there were some points in
his history and condition concerning which she had _curiosity_. The
principal of these was whether he might not be engaged to some young woman
in his own station of life. It was not merely possible, but was it likely
he could have escaped it? In the lower ranks of society men married
younger--they had no false aims to prevent them: that implied earlier
engagements. On the other hand, was it likely that in a fishing-village
there would be any choice of girls who could understand him when he talked
about Plato and the New Testament? If there were _one_, however, that
might be--_worse?_ Yes, _worse_: she accepted the word. Neither was it
absolutely necessary in a wife that she should understand more of her
husband than his heart. Many learned men had had mere housekeepers for
wives, and been satisfied--at least never complained. And what did she
know about the fishers, men or women? There were none at Wastbeach. For
anything she knew to the contrary, they might all be philosophers
together, and a fitting match for Malcolm might be far more easy to find
amongst them than in the society to which she herself belonged, where in
truth the philosophical element was rare enough. Then arose in her mind,
she could not have told how, the vision, half logical, half pictorial, of
a whole family of brave, believing, daring, saving fisherfolk, father,
mother, boys and girls, each sacrificing to the rest, each sacrificed to
by all, and all devoted to their neighbors. Grand it was and blissful, and
the borders of the great sea alone seemed fit place for such beings
amphibious of time and eternity. Their very toils and dangers were but
additional atmospheres to press their souls together. It was glorious!
Why had she been born an earl's daughter, never to look a danger in the
face, never to have a chance of a true life--that is, a grand, simple,
noble one? Who, then, denied her the chance? Had she _no_ power to order
her own steps, to determine her own being? Was she nailed to her rank? Or
who was there that could part her from it? Was she a prisoner in the
dungeons of the House of Pride? When the gates of Paradise closed behind
Adam and Eve, they had this consolation left, that "the world was all
before them where to choose." Was she not a free woman, without even a
guardian to trouble her with advice? She had no excuse to act ignobly, but
had she any for being unmaidenly? Would it then be--would it be a _very_
unmaidenly thing if--? The rest of the sentence did not even take the
shape of words. But she answered it nevertheless in the words, "Not so
unmaidenly as presumptuous." And, alas! there was little hope that _he_
would ever presume to--He was such a modest youth with all his directness
and fearlessness. If he had no respect for rank--and that was--yes, she
would say the word, _hopeful_--he had, on the other hand, the profoundest
respect for the human, and she could not tell how that might in the
individual matter operate.
Then she fell a-thinking of the difference between Malcolm and any other
servant she had ever known. She hated the _servile_. She knew that it was
false as well as low: she had not got so far as to see that it was low
through its being false. She knew that most servants, while they spoke
with the appearance of respect in presence, altered their tone entirely
when beyond the circle of the eye: theirs was eye-service, they were
men-pleasers, they were servile. She had overheard her maid speak of her
as Lady Clem, and that not without a streak of contempt in the tone. But
here was a man who touched no imaginary hat while he stood in the presence
of his mistress, neither swore at her in the stable-yard. He looked her
straight in the face, and would upon occasion speak, not his _mind_, but
the truth to her. Even his slight mistress had the conviction that if one
dared in his presence but utter her name lightly, whoever he were, he
would have to answer to him for it. What a lovely thing was true
service!--absolutely divine! But, alas! such a youth would never, could
never, dare offer other than such service. Were she even to encourage him
as a maiden might, he would but serve her the better--would but embody his
recognition of her favor in fervor of ministering devotion. Was it not a
recognized law, however, in the relation of superiors and inferiors, that
with regard to such matters, as well as others of no moment, the lady--Ah,
but for her to take the initiative would provoke the conclusion--as
revolting to her as unavoidable to him--that she judged herself his
superior--so greatly his superior as to be absolved from the necessity of
behaving to him on the ordinary footing of man and woman. What a ground to
start from with a husband! The idea was hateful to her. She tried the
argument that such a procedure arrogated merely a superiority in social
standing, but it made her recoil from it the more. He was so immeasurably
her superior that the poor little advantage on her side vanished like a
candle in the sunlight, and she laughed herself to scorn. "Fancy," she
laughed, "a midge, on the strength of having wings, condescending to offer
marriage to a horse!" It would argue the assumption of equality in other
and more important things than rank, or at least the confidence that her
social superiority not only counterbalanced the difference, but left
enough over to her credit to justify her initiative. And what a miserable
fiction that money and position had a right to the first move before
greatness of living fact--that _having_ had the precedence of being! That
Malcolm should imagine such _her_ judgment! No, let all go--let himself go
rather! And then he might not choose to accept her munificent offer! Or
worse, far worse, what if he should be tempted by rank and wealth, and,
accepting her, be shorn of his glory and proved of the ordinary human type
after all? A thousand times rather would she see the bright particular
star blazing unreachable above her. What! would she carry it about a
cinder in her pocket? And yet if he _could_ be "turned to a coal," why
should she go on worshiping him? Alas! the offer itself was the only test
severe enough to try him withal, and if he proved a cinder she would by
the very use of the test be bound to love, honor and obey her cinder. She
could not well reject him for accepting her, neither could she marry him
if he rose grandly superior to her temptations. No! he could be nothing to
her nearer than the bright particular star.
Thus went the thoughts to and fro in the minds of each. Neither could see
the way. Both feared the risk of loss: neither could hope greatly for
gain.