My intercourse with Margrave grew habitual and familiar. He came to
my house every morning before sunrise; in the evenings we were again
brought together: sometimes in the houses to which we were both invited,
sometimes at his hotel, sometimes in my own home.
Nothing more perplexed me than his aspect of extreme youthfulness,
contrasted with the extent of the travels, which, if he were to be
believed, had left little of the known world unexplored. One day I asked
him bluntly how old he was.
“How old do I look? How old should you suppose me to be?”
“I should have guessed you to be about twenty, till you spoke of having
come of age some years ago.”
“Is it a sign of longevity when a man looks much younger than he is?”
“Conjoined with other signs, certainly!”
“Have I the other signs?”
“Yes, a magnificent, perhaps a matchless, constitutional organization.
But you have evaded my question as to your age; was it an impertinence
to put it?”
“No. I came of age--let me see--three years ago.”
“So long since? Is it possible? I wish I had your secret!”
“Secret! What secret?”
“The secret of preserving so much of boyish freshness in the wear and
tear of man-like passions and man-like thoughts.”
“You are still young yourself,--under forty?”
“Oh, yes! some years under forty.”
“And Nature gave you a grander frame and a finer symmetry of feature
than she bestowed on me.”
“Pooh! pooh! You have the beauty that must charm the eyes of woman, and
that beauty in its sunny forenoon of youth. Happy man! if you love and
wish to be sure that you are loved again.”
“What you call love--the unhealthy sentiment, the feverish folly--left
behind me, I think forever, when--”
“Ay, indeed,--when?”
“I came of age!”
“Hoary cynic! and you despise love! So did I once. Your time may come.”
“I think not. Does any animal, except man, love its fellow she-animal as
man loves woman?”
“As man loves woman? No, I suppose not.”
“And why should the subject animals be wiser than their king? But to
return: you would like to have my youth and my careless enjoyment of
youth?”
“Can you ask,--who would not?” Margrave looked at me for a moment with
unusual seriousness, and then, in the abrupt changes common to his
capricious temperament, began to sing softly one of his barbaric
chants,--a chant different from any I had heard him sing before, made,
either by the modulation of his voice or the nature of the tune, so
sweet that, little as music generally affected me, this thrilled to my
very heart’s core. I drew closer and closer to him, and murmured when he
paused,--
“Is not that a love-song?”
“No;” said he, “it is the song by which the serpent-charmer charms the
serpent.”