"Ah! I fear you still bear me some malice. If so, I regret it very
much. As I said before, you have no truer friend in Rome than the Order
and its unworthy General. I am convinced, both by my own experience and
by the reports of others, that you are an invaluable friend and agent of
the Society in countries where men like you, gentlemen of honour, bold,
unflinching, and of spotless name, are wanted at every turn,--men who
have the confidence of both parties, of enemies as well as friends. But
long ere this you will have seen that here in Rome we do things
differently; here we strike openly and at once, and we require agents of
a far lower type, not so much agents, indeed, as hammers ready to our
hand. Your refined nature is altogether out of place. As a friend I
recommend your return to England. Father St. Clare is there, and no
doubt requires you, and I am very certain that the climate of Rome will
not suit your health. You have passed some years very pleasantly in
Italy, as I believe, in spite of your share in those great sorrows to
which we all are heir; and though I am grieved to separate you from your
friends, the noblest in Rome, yet it is better that you should be parted
in this manner than by sharper and more sudden means. Every facility
shall be given you for transferring your property to England, and I hope
you will take with you no unpleasant recollections of this city, and of
the poor Fathers of Jesus, who wish you well."
He pronounced these last words with so much feeling that Inglesant could
only reply,--
"I have nothing to say of the Society but what is good. It has ever been
most tender and parental to me. I shall go away with nothing but
sadness and affection in my heart; with nothing but gratitude towards
you, Father, with nothing but reverence towards this city--the Mother of
the World."
*CHAPTER XIX.*
For a long time nothing was found among the papers from which these
memoirs have been compiled relative to Mr. Inglesant's life subsequent
to his return to England; but at last the following imperfect letter was
found, which is here given as containing all the information on the
subject which at present is known to exist.
The date, with the first part of the letter, is torn off. The first
perfect line is given. The spelling has been modernized throughout.
The superscription is as follows:--
Mr. Anthony Paschall,
Physician,
London,
from his friend,
Mr. Valentine Lee,
Chirurgeon,
Of Reading.
From a certain tone in parts of the letter it would seem that the writer
was one of those who gave cause for the accusation of scepticism brought
in those days against the medical profession generally.
* * * * * that vine, laden with grapes worked in gold and precious
stones, after the manner of Phrygian work, which, according to Josephus,
Tacitus, and other writers, adorned the Temple at Jerusalem, and was
seen of many when that Temple was destroyed; a manifest continuance of
the old Eastern worship of Bacchus, so dear to the human fraility. As
says the poet Anacreon, "Make me, good Vulcan, a deep bowl and carve on
it neither Charles's wain, nor the sad Orion, but carve me out a vine
with its swelling grapes, and Cupid, Bacchus, and Bathillus pressing
them together." For it is a gallant philosophy, and the deepest wisdom,
which, under the shadow of talismans and austere emblems, wears the
colours of enjoyment and of life.
Methinks if the Puritans of the last age had known that the same word in
Latin means both worship and the culture of polite life, they would not
have condemned both themselves and us to so many years of shadowy gloom
and of a morose antipathy to all delight. And though they will
perchance retort upon me that the same word in the Greek meaneth both
worship and bondage, yet I shall reply that it was a service of love and
pleasure--a service in which all the beauties of earth were called upon
to aid, and in which the Deity was best pleased by the happiness of His
creatures, whose every faculty of delight had been fully husbanded and
trained. In these last happy days, since his gracious Majesty's return,
we have seen a restoration of a cheerful gaiety, and adorning of men's
lives, when painting and poetry, and, beyond all, music, have smoothed
the rough ways and softened the hard manners of men.
I came to Oxford, travelling in the Flying Coach with a Quaker who
inveighed greatly against the iniquity of the age. At Oxford I saw more
than I have space to tell you of; amongst others, Francis Tatton, who,
you will recollect, left his religion since the King's return, and
sheltered himself amongst the Jesuits. He was but lately come to
Oxford, and lodged at Francis Alder's against the Fleur-de-lis. I dined
with him there along with some others, and it being a Friday, they had a
good fish dinner with white wine. Among the guests was one Father
Lovel, a Jesuit. He has lived in Oxford many years to supply service
for the Catholics, so bold and free are the Papists now.
I conversed with another of the guests, a physician, who after dinner
took me to his house in Bear Lane, and showed me his study, in a
pleasant room to the south, overlooking some of Christ Church gardens.
Here he began to complain of the Royal Society, and the Virtuosi, and I
soon saw that he was a follower of Dr. Gideon Harvey and Mr. Stubbes.
"The country owes much," he said, "to such men as Burleigh, Walsingham,
Jewel, Abbot, Usher, Casaubon; but if this new-fangled philosophy and
mechanical education is to bear the bell, I foresee that we shall look
in vain in England for such men again. In these deep and subtle
inquiries into natural philosophy and the intricate mechanisms by which
this world is said to be governed, neither physic will be unconcerned
nor will religion remain unshaken amidst the writings of these Virtuosi.
That art of reasoning by which the prudent are discriminated from fools,
which methodizes and facilitates our discourse, which informs us of the
validity of consequences and the probability of arguments--that art
which gives life to solid eloquence, and which renders statesmen,
divines, physicians, and lawyers accomplished--how is this cried down
and vilified by the ignoramuses of these days!"
I pleased myself with inspecting this man's books, with which his study
was well stored, and with the view from his window; but I let his tongue
run on uncontradicted, seeing that he was of the old Protestant and
scholastic learning, which is never open to let in new light. He
entertained me, besides, with a long discourse to prove that Geber the
chemist was not an Indian King, and informed me with great glee that the
Royal Society, among other new-fangled propositions, had conceived the
idea of working silk into hats, which project, though the hatters
laughed at it, yet to satisfy them trial was made, and for twenty
shillings they had a hat made, but it proved so bad that any one might
have bought a better one for eighteenpence.
He was entering upon a long argument against Descartes, to refute whom
he was obliged to contradict much that he had said before, but at this
time I excused myself and left him.
When I came out from this man's house the college bells were going for
Chapel, as they used to do in the old time; methought it was the
prettiest music I had heard for many a day. I went to see an old man I
remembered in Jesus Lane. I found him in the same little house, dressed
in his gown tied round the middle, the sleeves pinned behind, and his
dudgeon with a knife and bodkin; it was the fashion for grave people to
wear such gowns in the latter end of Queen Elizabeth's days. He says he
is 104. When I was a boy at Oxon I used to be always inquiring of him
of the old time, the rood lofts, the ceremonies in the College Chapels;
and his talk is still of Queen Bess her days, and of the old people who
remembered the host and the wafer bread and the roods in the Churches.
In my time, at Oxford, crucifixes were common in the glass in the study
windows, and in the chamber windows pictures of saints. This was
"before the wars." What a different world it was before the wars! What
strange old-world customs and thoughts and stories vanished like
phantoms when the war trumpets sounded, and great houses and proud
names, and dominions and manors, and stately woods, crumbled into dust,
and every man did as seemed good to himself, and thought as he liked.
On the Sunday I went to St. Mary's, and heard a preacher and herbalist,
who spoke of the virtues of plants and of the Christian life in one
breath. He told us that Homer writ sublimely and called them [Greek:
cheires theon], the hands of the Gods, and that we ought to reach to
them religiously with praise and thanksgiving. "God Almighty," he said,
"hath furnished us with plants to cure us within a few miles of our own
abodes, and we know it not."
The next day I came to Worcester by the post, to the house of my old
friend Nathaniel Tomkins, who is now one of the Prebends and Receptor.
He lives in the close, or college green, as they call it here. He comes
of a family of musicians. His grandfather was chanter of the choir of
Gloucester; his father organist to this same Cathedral of Worcester, and
one of his uncles organist of St. Paul's and gentleman of the Chapel
Royal, and another, of whom more anon, gentleman of the Privy Chamber to
His Majesty Charles the First, and well skilled in the practical part of
music, and was happily translated to the celestial choir of angels
before the troubles.
I was pleased to see the faithful city recovered from the ashes in which
she sat when I was here last, and the daily service of song again
restored to the Cathedral Church, though the latter is much out of
repair and dimmed as to its splendour. I like that religion the best
which gives us sweet anthems and solemn organ music and lively parts of
melody.
I had not been here long when my friend the Receptor told me that if I
should stay two or three days longer, I should hear as good a concert of
violins as any in England, and also hear a gentleman lately come from
Italy, whose skill as a lutinist and player on the violin had preceded
him. When I asked for the name of this gentleman, he told me it was
that Mr. John Inglesant who was servant to the late King, and of whom so
much was spoken in the time of the Irish Rebellion. When I heard this I
resolved to stay, as you may suppose, considering that we have more than
once spoken together of this person and desired to see him, especially
since it had been reported that he was returned to England.
I therefore willingly promised to remain, and spent my time in
practising on the violin, and in the city and cathedral. I walked upon
the river bank, and up and down the fine broad streets leading from the
bridge to the cathedral. From the gates of the chancel down the stone
steps the strange light streamed on to the paved floor of the nave,
chill and silent as the grave until the strains of the organs awoke.
Mr. Tomkins told me that the loyal gentry of the surrounding counties
had, during the usurpation, made it a point of honour to purchase and
trade in Worcester, for the relief and encouragement of the citizens,
who were reduced to so low an ebb by the battle and taking of the city.
Thursday was the day appointed for the music meeting, and on that day I
accompanied Mr. Tomkins to the house of Mr. Barnabas Oley, another of
the Prebends, who, you may remember, wrote a preface, a year or two ago,
to Mr. Herbert's "Country Parson." He also lives in the College Green,
and we found the company assembling in an oak parlour, which looked upon
an orchard where the trees were in full blossom. There were present
several of the clergy, and two or three physicians and other gentlemen,
who practised upon the violin.
As we entered the room, Mr. Oley was speaking of Mr. Inglesant, who was
expected to come presently with the Dean. "I remember him well," he was
saying, "when I was in poverty and sequestration in the late troubles.
He was supposed to be in all the King's secrets, and was constantly
employed in private messages and errands. Some said that he was a
concealed Papist, but I have known him to attend the Church service very
devoutly. I recollect when I was in the garrison at Pontefract Castle,
and used to preach there as long as it held out for His Majesty, that
this Mr. Inglesant suddenly appeared amongst us, though the leaguer was
very close, and I know he attended service there once or twice. I was
often at that time in want of bread, during my hidings and wanderings,
and obliged to change my habit, and did constantly appear in a cloak and
grey clothes. On one of these occasions, when I was in great distress
and was diligently and particularly sought for by the rebels, who would
willingly have gratified those that would have discovered me, I fell in
with this Mr. Inglesant at an inn in Buckinghamshire. He was then in
company with one whom I knew to be a Popish priest, but they both
exerted themselves very kindly in my behalf, and conducted me to the
house of a Catholic gentleman in those parts by whom I was entertained
several days. Before this, I now recollect, at the beginning of the
wars, I met Mr. Inglesant at Oxford. I was in the shop of a bookseller
named Forrest, against All Soul's College. I remember that I took up
Plato's select dialogues 'De rebus divinis,' in Greek and Latin, and
excepted against some things as superfluous and cabalistical, and that
Mr. Inglesant, who was then a very young man, defended the author in a
way that showed his scholarship. It was summer weather and very warm,
and the enemy's cannon were playing upon the city as we could hear as we
talked in the shop."
While Mr. Oley was thus recollecting his past troubles, Mr. Dean was
announced, and entered the room accompanied by Mr. Inglesant and by a
servant who carried their violins. You are, I know, acquainted with the
Dean, who is also Bishop of St. David's, and who, they say, will be
Bishop of Worcester also before long, so I need not describe him. The
first sight of Mr. Inglesant pleased me very much. He wore his own hair
long, after the fashion of the last age, but in other respects he was
dressed in the mode, in a French suit of black satin, with cravat and
ruffles of Mechlin lace. His expression was lofty and abstracted, his
features pale and somewhat thin, and his carriage gave me the idea of a
man who had seen the world, and in whom few things were capable of
exciting any extreme interest or attention. His eyes were light blue,
of that peculiar shade which gives a dreamy and indifferent expression
to the face. His manner was courteous and polite, almost to excess, yet
he seemed to me to be a man who was habitually superior to his company,
and I felt in his presence almost as I should do in that of a prince.
Something of this doubtless was due to the sense I had of the part he
had played in the great events of the late troubles, and of the nearness
of intercourse and of the confidence he had enjoyed with his late
Majesty of blessed memory. It was impossible not to look with interest
upon a man who had been so familiar with the secret history of those
times, and who had been taken into the confidence both of Papists and
Churchmen.
When he had been introduced to the company, Mr. Oley reminded him of the
incidents he had been relating before his arrival. When he mentioned
the meeting in the inn in Buckinghamshire, Mr. Inglesant seemed
affected.
"I remember it well," he said. "I was with Father St. Clare, whose
deathbed I attended not two months after my return to England. Do you
remember, Mr. Oley," he went on to say, "the sermons at St. Martin's in
Oxford, where Mr. Giles Widdowes preached? I remember seeing you there,
sir, and indeed his high and loyal sermons were much frequented by the
royal party and soldiers of the garrison; and I have heard that he was
most benevolent to many of the most needy in their distress. I remember
that poor Whitford played the organs there often, before he was killed
in the trenches."
"Ah," said Mr. Oley, "we have heard strange music in our day. I was in
York when it was besieged by three very notable and great armies--the
Scotch, the Northern under Lord Fairfax, and the Southern under the Earl
of Manchester and Oliver. At that time the service at the Cathedral
every Sunday morning was attended by more than a thousand ladies,
knights, and gentlemen, besides soldiers and citizens; when the booming
of cannon broke in upon the singing of the psalms, and more than once a
cannon bullet burst into the Minster amongst the people, like a furious
fiend or evil spirit, yet no one hurt."
After some talk of this nature we settled ourselves to our music and to
tune our instruments. Mr. Inglesant's violin was inscribed "Jacobus
Stainer in Absam prope OEnipontem 1647;" OEnipons is the Latin name of
Inspruck in Germany, the chief city of the Tyrol, where this maker
lived. As soon as Mr. Inglesant drew his bow across the strings I was
astonished at the full and piercing tone, which seemed to me to exceed
even that of the Cremonas.
We played a concert or two, with a double bass part for the violone,
which had a noble effect; and Mr. Inglesant being pressed to oblige the
company, played a descant upon a ground bass in the Italian manner. I
should fail were I to attempt to describe to you what I felt during the
performance of this piece. It seemed to me as though thoughts, which I
had long sought and seemed ever and anon on the point of realizing, were
at last given me, as I listened to chords of plaintive sweetness broken
now and again by cruel and bitter discords--a theme into which were
wrought street and tavern music and people's songs, which lively airs
and catches, upon the mere pressure of the string, trembled into
pathetic and melancholy cadences. In these dying falls and closes all
the several parts were gathered up and brought together, yet so that
what before was joy was now translated into sorrow, and the sorrowful
transfigured to peace, as indeed the many shifting scenes of life vary
upon the stage of men's affairs.
The concert being over, Mr. Dean informed us that it was his intention
to attend the afternoon service in the Cathedral, and Mr. Inglesant
accompanying him, the physicians departed to visit their patients, and
my host and some of the clergy and myself went to the Cathedral also,
entering rather late.
After the service, in which was sung an anthem by Dr. Nathaniel Giles,
Mr. Dean retired to the vestry, and Mr. Inglesant coming down the
Church, I found myself close to him at the west door. We stopped
opposite to the monument of Bishop Gauden, who is depicted in his effigy
holding a book, presumably the "_Icon Basilike_" in his hand. I
inquired of Mr. Inglesant what his opinions were concerning the
authorship of that work, and finding that he was disposed to converse,
we went down to the river side, the evening being remarkably fine, and,
crossing by the ferry, walked for some time in the chapter meadows upon
the farther bank. The evening sun was setting towards the range of the
Malvern Hills, and the towers and spires of the city were shining in its
glow, and were reflected in the water at our feet.
I said to Mr. Inglesant that I was greatly interested in the events of
the last age, in which he had been so trusted and prominent an actor,
and that I hoped to learn from him many interesting particulars, but he
informed me that he knew but little except what the world was already
possessed of. He said that he very deeply regretted that, during the
last two years of the life of the late King, he himself was a close
prisoner in the Tower; and was therefore prevented from assisting in any
way, or being useful to His Majesty. He said that there was something
peculiarly affecting in the position of the King in those days, as he
was isolated from his friends, and entirely dependant upon three or four
faithful and subordinate servants. He said that, since his return to
England, he had made it his business to seek out several of these, and
had received much interesting information from them, which, as he hoped
it would soon be made public, he was not at present at liberty to
communicate. Mr. Inglesant, however, told me one incident relating to
the last days of the King of so affecting a character that, as it is too
long to be repeated here, I shall hope to inform you of when we meet
together. He said, moreover, that the fatal mistake the King made was
consenting to the death of Lord Strafford; that on many occasions he had
yielded when he should have been firm; but that most of his misfortunes,
such as reverses and indecisions in the field, were caused by
circumstances entirely beyond his control. There is nothing new in
these opinions, but I give them just as Mr. Inglesant stated them, lest
you should think I had not taken advantage of the opportunity presented
to me. It appeared to me that he was not very willing to discourse upon
these bygone matters of State intrigue.
Seeing this I changed the topic, and said that as Mr. Inglesant had had
much experience in the working of the Romish system, I should be glad to
know his opinion of it, and whether he preferred it to that of the
English Church. Here I found I was on different ground. I saw at once
beneath the veil of polite manner, which was this man's second nature,
that his whole life and being was in this question.
"This is the supreme quarrel of all," he said. "This is not a dispute
between sects and kingdoms; it is a conflict within a man's own
nature--nay, between the noblest parts of man's nature arrayed against
each other. On the one side obedience and faith, on the other, freedom
and the reason. What can come of such a conflict as this but throes and
agony? I was not brought up by the Papists in England, nor, indeed, did
I receive my book learning from them. I was trained for a special
purpose by one of the Jesuits, but the course he took with me was
different from that which he would have taken with other pupils whom he
did not design for such work. I derived my training from various
sources, and especially, instead of Aristotle, and the school-men, I was
fed upon Plato. The difference is immense. I was trained to obedience
and devotion; but the reason in my mind for this conduct was that
obedience and devotion and gratitude were ideal virtues, not that they
benefited the order to which I belonged, nor the world in which I lived.
This I take to be the difference between the Papists and myself. The
Jesuits do not like Plato, as lately they do not like Lord Bacon.
Aristotle, as interpreted by the school-men, is more to their mind.
According to their reading of Aristotle, all his Ethics are subordinated
to an end, and in such a system they see a weapon which they can turn to
their own purpose of maintaining dogma, no matter at what sacrifice of
the individual conscience or reason. This is what the Church of Rome
has ever done. She has traded upon the highest instincts of humanity,
upon its faith and love, its passionate remorse, its self-abnegation and
denial, its imagination and yearning after the unseen. It has based its
system upon the profoundest truths, and upon this platform it has raised
a power which has, whether foreseen by its authors or not, played the
part of human tyranny, greed, and cruelty. To support this system it
has habitually set itself to suppress knowledge and freedom of thought,
before thought had taught itself to grapple with religious subjects,
because it foresaw that this would follow. It has, therefore, for the
sake of preserving intact its dogma, risked the growth and welfare of
humanity, and has, in the eyes of all except those who value this dogma
above all other things, constituted itself the enemy of the human race.
I have perhaps occupied a position which enables me to judge somewhat
advantageously between the Churches, and my earnest advice is this. You
will do wrong--mankind will do wrong--if it allows to drop out of
existence, merely because the position on which it stands seems to be
illogical, an agency by which the devotional instincts of human nature
are enabled to exist side by side with the rational. The English
Church, as established by the law of England, offers the supernatural to
all who choose to come. It is like the Divine Being Himself, whose sun
shines alike on the evil and on the good. Upon the altars of the Church
the divine presence hovers as surely, to those who believe it, as it
does upon the splendid altars of Rome. Thanks to circumstances which the
founders of our Church did not contemplate, the way is open; it is
barred by no confession, no human priest. Shall we throw this aside?
It has been won for us by the death and torture of men like ourselves in
bodily frame, infinitely superior to some of us in self-denial and
endurance. God knows--those who know my life know too well--that I am
not worthy to be named with such men; nevertheless, though we cannot
endure as they did, at least do not let us needlessly throw away what
they have won. It is not even a question of religious freedom only; it
is a question of learning and culture in every form. I am not blind to
the peculiar dangers that beset the English Church. I fear that its
position, standing, as it does, a mean between two extremes, will
engender indifference and sloth; and that its freedom will prevent its
preserving a discipline and organizing power, without which any
community will suffer grievous damage; nevertheless, as a Church it is
unique: if suffered to drop out of existence, nothing like it can ever
take its place."
"The Church of England," I said, seeing that Mr. Inglesant paused, "is
no doubt a compromise, and is powerless to exert its discipline, as the
events of the late troubles have shown. It speaks with bated assurance,
while the Church of Rome never falters in its utterance, and I confess
seems to me to have a logical position. If there be absolute truth
revealed, there must be an inspired exponent of it, else from age to age
it could not get itself revealed to mankind."
"This is the Papist argument," said Mr. Inglesant; "there is only one
answer to it--Absolute truth is not revealed. There were certain
dangers which Christianity could not, as it would seem, escape. As it
brought down the sublimest teaching of Platonism to the humblest
understanding, so it was compelled, by this very action, to reduce
spiritual and abstract truth to hard and inadequate dogma. As it
inculcated a sublime indifference to the things of this life, and a
steadfast gaze upon the future; so, by this very means, it encouraged
the growth of a wild unreasoning superstition. It is easy to draw
pictures of martyrs suffering the torture unmoved in the face of a
glorious hereafter; but we must acknowledge, unless we choose to call
these men absolute fiends, that it was these selfsame ideas of the
future, and its relation to this life, that actuated their tormentors.
If these things are true,--if the future of mankind is parcelled out
between happiness and eternal torture,--then, to ensure the safety of
mankind at large, the death and torment for a few moments of
comparatively few need excite but little regret. From the instant that
the founder of Christianity left the earth, perhaps even before, this
ghastly spectre of superstition ranged itself side by side with the
advancing faith. It is confined to no Church or sect; it exists in all.
Faith in the noble, the unseen, the unselfish, by its very nature
encourages this fatal growth; and it is nourished even by those who have
sufficient strength to live above it; because, forsooth, its removal may
be dangerous to the well-being of society at large, as though anything
could be more fatal than falsehood against the Divine Truth."
"But if absolute truth is not revealed," I said, "how can we know the
truth at all?"
"We cannot say how we know it," replied Mr. Inglesant, "but this very
ignorance proves that we can know. We are the creatures of this
ignorance against which we rebel. From the earliest dawn of existence
we have known nothing. How then could we question for a moment? What
thought should we have other than this ignorance which we had imbibed
from our growth, but for the existence of some divine principle, 'Fons
veri lucidus' within us? The Founder of Christianity said, 'The kingdom
of God is within you.' We may not only know the truth, but we may live
even in this life in the very household and court of God. We are the
creatures of birth, of ancestry, of circumstance; we are surrounded by
law, physical and psychical, and the physical very often dominates and
rules the soul. As the chemist, the navigator, the naturalist, attain
their ends by means of law, which is beyond their power to alter, which
they cannot change, but with which they can work in harmony, and by so
doing produce definite results, so may we. We find ourselves immersed in
physical and psychical laws, in accordance with which we act, or from
which we diverge. Whether we are free to act or not we can at least
fancy that we resolve. Let us cheat ourselves, if it be a cheat, with
this fancy, for we shall find that by so doing we actually attain the
end we seek. Virtue, truth, love, are not mere names; they stand for
actual qualities which are well known and recognized among men. These
qualities are the elements of an ideal life, of that absolute and
perfect life of which our highest culture can catch but a glimpse. As
Mr. Hobbes has traced the individual man up to the perfect state, or
Civitas, let us work still lower, and trace the individual man from
small origins to the position he at present fills. We shall find that
he has attained any position of vantage he may occupy by following the
laws which our instinct and conscience tell us are Divine. Terror and
superstition are the invariable enemies of culture and progress. They
are used as rods and bogies to frighten the ignorant and the base, but
they depress all mankind to the same level of abject slavery. The ways
are dark and foul, and the grey years bring a mysterious future which we
cannot see. We are like children, or men in a tennis court, and before
our conquest is half won the dim twilight comes and stops the game;
nevertheless, let us keep our places, and above all things hold fast by
the law of life we feel within. This was the method which Christ
followed, and He won the world by placing Himself in harmony with that
law of gradual development which the Divine Wisdom has planned. Let us
follow in His steps and we shall attain to the ideal life; and, without
waiting for our 'mortal passage,' tread the free and spacious streets of
that Jerusalem which is above."
He spoke more to himself than to me. The sun, which was just setting
behind the distant hills, shone with dazzling splendour for a moment
upon the towers and spires of the city across the placid water. Behind
this fair vision were dark rain clouds, before which gloomy background
it stood in fairy radiance and light. For a moment it seemed a glorious
city, bathed in life and hope, full of happy people who thronged its
streets and bridge, and the margin of its gentle stream. But it was
"breve gaudium." Then the sunset faded, and the ethereal vision
vanished, and the landscape lay dark and chill.
"The sun is set," Mr. Inglesant said cheerfully, "but it will rise
again. Let us go home."
I have writ much more largely in this letter than I intended, but I have
been led onward by the interest which I deny not I feel in this man.
When we meet I will tell you more.
Your ever true friend,
VALENTINE LEE.