Our life at the Rosary--for it was _our_ life now of which I have to
speak--was one of unbroken enjoyment. On fine days we fished; that is,
Crofton did, and I loitered along some river's bank till I found a quiet
spot to plant my rod, and stretch myself on the grass, now reading, of
tender dreaming, such glorious dreams as only come in the leafy shading
of summer time, to a mind enraptured with all around it The lovely
scenery and the perfect solitude of the spot ministered well to my
fanciful mood, and left me free to weave the most glittering web of
incident for my future. So utterly was all the past blotted from my
memory that I recalled nothing of existence more remote than my first
evening at the cottage. If for a parting instant a thought of
bygones would obtrude, I hastened to escape from it as from a gloomy
reminiscence. I turned away as would a dreamer who dreaded to awaken
out of some delicious vision, and who would not face the dull aspect of
reality. Three weeks thus glided by of such happiness as I can scarcely
yet recall without emotion! The Croftons had come to treat me like a
brother; they spoke of family events in all freedom before me; talked of
the most confidential things in my presence, and discussed their future
plans and their means as freely in my hearing as though I had been
kith and kin with them. I learned that they were orphans, educated and
brought up by a rich, eccentric uncle, who lived in a sort of costly
reclusion in one of the Cumberland dales; Edward, who had served in the
army, and been wounded in an Indian campaign, had given up the service
in a fit of impatience of being passed over in promotion.
His uncle resented the rash step by withdrawing the liberal allowance he
had usually made him, and they quarrelled. Mary Crofton, espousing her
brother's side, quitted her guardian's roof to join his; and thus had
they rambled about the world for two or three years, on means scanty
enough, but still sufficient to provide for those who neither sought to
enter society nor partake of its pleasures.
As I advanced in the intimacy, I became depository of the secrets of
each. Edward's was the sorrow he felt for having involved his sister in
his own ruin, and been the means of separating her from one so well able
and so willing to befriend her. Hers was the more bitter thought that
their narrow means should prejudice her brother's chances of recovery,
for his chest had shown symptoms of dangerous disease requiring all that
climate and consummate care might do to overcome. Preyed on incessantly
by this reflection, unable to banish it, equally unable to resist its
force, he took the first and only step she had ever adventured
without his knowledge, and had written to her uncle a long letter of
explanations and entreaty.
I saw the letter, and read it carefully. It was all that sisterly love
and affection could dictate, accompanied by a sense of dignity, that if
her appeal should be unsuccessful, no slight should be passed upon
her brother, who was unaware of the step thus taken. To express this
sufficiently, she was driven to the acknowledgment that Edward would
never have himself stooped to the appeal; and so careful was she of
his honor in this respect, that she repeated--with what appeared to me
unnecessary insistence--that the request should be regarded as hers,
and hers only. In fact, this was the uppermost sentiment in the whole
epistle. I ventured to say as much, and endeavored to induce her to
moderate in some degree the amount of this pretension; but she resisted
firmly and decidedly. Now, I have recorded this circumstance here,--less
for itself than to mention how by its means this little controversy
led to a great intimacy between us,--inducing us, while defending our
separate views, to discuss each other's motives, and even characters,
with the widest freedom. I called her enthusiast, and in return she
styled me worldly and calculating; and, indeed, I tried to seem so,
and fortified my opinions by prudential maxims and severe reflections
I should have been sorely indisposed to adopt in my own case. I believe
she saw all this. I am sure she read me aright, and perceived that I was
arguing against my own convictions. At all events, day after day went
over, and no answer came to the letter. I used to go each morning to
the post in the village to inquire, but always returned with the same
disheartening tidings, “Nothing to-day!”
One of these mornings it was, that I was returning disconsolately from
the village, Crofton, whom I believed at the time miles away on the
mountains, overtook me. He came up from behind, and, passing his arm
within mine, walked on some minutes without speaking. I saw plainly
there was something on his mind, and I half dreaded lest he might have
discovered his sister's secret and have disapproved of my share in it.
“Algy,” said he, calling me by my Christian name, which he very rarely
did, “I have something to say to you. Can I be quite certain that you
'll take my frankness in good part?”
“You can,” I said, with a great effort to seem calm and assured.
“You give me your word upon it?”
“I do,” said I, trying to appear bold; “and my hand be witness of it”
“Well,” he resumed, drawing a long breath, “here it is. I have remarked
that for above a week back you have never waited for the postboy's
return to the cottage, but always have come down to the village
yourself.”
I nodded assent, but said nothing.
“I have remarked, besides,” said he, “that when told at the office there
was no letter for you, you came away sad-looking and fretted, scarcely
spoke for some time, and seemed altogether downcast and depressed.”
“I don't deny it,” I said calmly.
“Well,” continued he, “some old experiences, of mine have taught me that
this sort of anxiety has generally but one source, with fellows of _our_
age, and which simply means that the remittance we have counted upon
as certain has been, from some cause or other, delayed. Is n't that the
truth?”
“No,” said I, joyfully, for I was greatly relieved by his words; “no, on
my honor, nothing of the kind.”
“I may not have hit the thing exactly,” said he, hurriedly, “but I 'll
be sworn it is a money matter; and if a couple of hundred pounds be of
the least service--”
“My dear, kind-hearted fellow,” I broke in, “I can't endure this longer:
it is no question of money; it is nothing that affects my means, though
I half wish it were, to show you how cheerfully I could owe you my
escape from a difficulty,--not, indeed, that I need another tie to bind
me to you--” But I could say no more, for my eyes were swimming over, and
my lips trembling.
“Then,” cried he, “I have only to ask pardon for thus obtruding upon
your confidence.”
I was too full of emotion to do more than squeeze his hand
affectionately, and thus we walked along, side by side, neither uttering
a word. At last, and as it were with an effort, by a bold transition,
to carry our thoughts into another and very different channel, he said:
“Here's a letter from old Dyke, our landlord. The worthy father has
been enjoying himself in a tour of English watering-places, and has now
started for a few weeks up the Rhine. His account of his holiday, as he
calls it, is amusing; nor less so is the financial accident to which
he owes the excursion. Take it, and read it,” he added, giving me the
epistle. “If the style be the man, his reverence is not difficult to
decipher.”
I bestowed little attention on this speech, uttered, as I perceived,
rather from the impulse of starting a new topic than anything else, and,
taking the letter half mechanically, I thrust it in my pocket. One or
two efforts we made at conversation were equally failures, and it was a
relief to me when Crofton, suddenly remembering some night-lines be
had laid in a mountain lake a few miles off, hastily shook my hand, and
said, “Good-bye till dinner-time.”
When I reached the cottage, instead of entering I strolled into
the garden, and sought out a little summer-house of sweet-brier and
honeysuckle, on the edge of the river. Some strange, vague impression
was on me, that I needed time and place to commune with myself and be
alone; that a large unsettled account lay between me and my conscience,
which could not be longer deferred; but of what nature, how originating,
and how tending, I know nothing whatever.
I resolved to submit myself to a searching examination, to ascertain
what I might about myself. In my favorite German authors I had
frequently read that men's failures in life were chiefly owing to
neglect of this habit of self-investigation; that though we calculate
well the dangers and difficulties of an enterprise, we omit the more
important estimate of what may be our capacity to effect an object, what
are our resources, wherein our deficiencies.
“Now for it,” I thought, as I entered the little arbor,--“now for it,
Potts; kiss the book, and tell the whole truth and nothing but the
truth.”
As I said this, I took off my hat and bowed respectfully around to
the members of an imaginary court. “My name,” said I, in a clear and
respectful voice, “is Algernon Sydney Potts. If I be pushed to the
avowal, I am sorry it _is_ Potts. Algernon Sydney do a deal, but they
can't do everything,--not to say that captious folk see a certain bathos
in the collocation with my surname. Can a man hope to make such a name
illustrious? Can be aspire to the notion of a time when people will
allude to the great Potts, the celebrated Potts, the immortal Potts?” I
grew very red, I felt my cheek on fire as I uttered this, and I suddenly
bethought me of Mr. Pitt, and I said aloud, “And, if Pitt, why not
Potts?” That was a most healing recollection. I revelled in it for a
long time. “How true is it,” I continued, “that the halo of greatness
illumines all within its circle, and the man is merged in the grandeur
of his achievements. The men who start in life with high sounding
designations have but to fill a foregone pledge,--to pay the bill that
fortune has endorsed. Not so was our case, Pitt. To us is it to lay
every foundation stone of our future greatness. There was nothing
in _your_ surname to foretell you would be a Minister of State at
one-and-thirty,--there is no letter of _mine_ to indicate what I shall
be. But what is it that I am to be? Is it Poet, Philosopher, Politician,
Soldier, or Discoverer? Am I to be great in Art, or illustrious in
Letters? Is there to be an ice tract of Behring's Straits called Potts's
Point, or a planet styled Pottsium Sidus? And when centuries have rolled
over, will historians have their difficulty about the first Potts, and
what his opinions were on this subject or that?”
Then came a low soft sound of half-suppressed laughter, and then the
rustle of a muslin dress hastily brushing through the trees. I rushed
out from my retreat, and hurried down the walk. No one to be seen,--not
a soul; not a sound, either, to be heard.
“No use hiding, Mary,” I called out, “I saw you all the time; my mock
confession was got up merely to amuse you. Come out boldly and laugh
as long as you will.” No answer. This refusal amazed me. It was like a
disbelief in my assertion. “Come, come!” I cried, “you can't pretend to
think I was serious in all this vainglorious nonsense. Come, Mary, and
let us enjoy the laugh at it together. If you don't, I shall be angry.
I'll take it ill,--very ill.”
Still no reply. Could I, then, have been deceived? Was it a mere
delusion? But no; I heard the low laugh, and the rustle of the dress,
and the quick tread upon the gravel, too plainly for any mistake, and
so I returned to the cottage in chagrin and ill-temper. As I passed the
open windows' of the little drawing-room I saw Mary seated at her work,
with, as was her custom, an open book on a little table beside her.
Absorbed as she was, she did not lift her head, nor notice my approach
till I entered the room.
“You have no letter for me?” she cried, in a voice of sorrowful meaning.
“None,” said I scrutinizing her closely, and sorely puzzled what to make
of her calm deportment. “Have you been out in the garden this morning?”
I asked, abruptly.
“No,” said she, frankly.
“Not quitted the house at all?”
“No. Why do you ask?” cried she, in some surprise.
“I 'll tell you,” I said, sitting down at her side, and speaking in a
low and confidential tone; “a strange thing has just happened to me.”
And with that I narrated the incident, glossing over, as best I
might, the absurdity of my soliloquizing, and the nature of the
self-examination I was engaged in. Without waiting for me to finish, she
broke in suddenly with a low laugh, and said,--
“It must have been Rose.”
“And who is Rose?” I asked half sternly.
“A cousin of ours, a mere school-girl, who has just arrived. She came by
the mail this morning, when you were out. But here she is, coming up
the walk. Just step behind that screen, and you shall have your revenge.
I'll make her tell everything.”
I had barely time to conceal myself, when, with a merry laugh, a fresh,
girlish voice called out, “I 've seen him! I have seen him, Mary! I
was sitting on the rock beside the river, when he came into the
summer-house, and, fancying himself alone and unseen, proceeded to make
his confession to himself.”
“His confession! What do you mean?”
“I don't exactly know whether that be the proper name for it, but it was
a sort of self-examination, not very painful, certainly, inasmuch as it
was rather flattering than otherwise.”
“I really cannot understand you, Rose.”
“I'm not surprised,” said she, laughing again. “It was some time before
I could satisfy myself that he was not talking to somebody else, or
reading ont of a book; and when, peeping through the leaves, I perceived
he was quite alone, I almost screamed out with laughing.”
“But why, child? What was the absurdity that amused you?”
“Fancy the creature. I need not describe him, Molly. You know him well,
with his great staring light-green eyes, and his wild yellow hair.
Imagine his walking madly to and fro, tossing his long arms about in
uncouth gestures, while he asked himself seriously whether he would
n't be Shakspeare, or Milton, or Michael Angelo, or Nelson. Fancy his
gravely inquiring of himself what remarkable qualities predominated
in his nature: was he more of a sculptor, or a politician, or had fate
destined him to discover new worlds, or to conquer the old ones? If
I had n't been actually listening to the creature, and occasionally
looking at him, too, I 'd have doubted my senses. Oh dear! shall I ever
forget the earnest absurdity of his manner as he said something about
the 'immortal Potts'?”
The reminiscence was too much for her, for she threw herself on a sofa
and laughed immoderately. As for me, unable to endure more, and fearful
that Mary might finish by discovering me, I stole from the room, and
rushed out into the wood.
What is it that renders ridicule more insupportable than vituperation?
Why is the violence of passion itself more easy to endure than the sting
of sarcastic satire? What weak spot in our nature does this peculiar
passion assail? And, again, why are all the noble aspirations of
high-hearted enthusiasm, the grand self-reliance of daring minds, ever
to be made the theme of such scoffings? Have the scorners never read of
Wolfe, of Murat, or of Nelson? Has not a more familiar instance reached
them of one who foretold to an unwilling senate the time when they would
hang in expectancy on his words, and treasure them as wisdom? Cruel,
narrow-minded, and unjust world, with whom nothing succeeds except
success!
The man who contracts a debt is never called cheat till his inability
to discharge it has been proven clearly and beyond a doubt; but he who
enters into an engagement with his own heart to gain a certain prize,
or reach a certain goal, is made a mockery and a sneer by all whose own
humble faculties represent such striving as impossible. From thoughts
like these I went on to speculate whether I should ever be able, in the
zenith of my great success, to forgive those captious and disparaging
critics who had once endeavored to damp my ardor and bar my career. I
own I found it exceedingly difficult to be generous, and in particular
to that young minx of sixteen who had dared to make a jest of my
pretensions.
I wandered along thus for hours. Many a grassy path of even sward led
through the forest, and, taking one of those which skirted the stream,
I strolled along, unconscious alike of time and place. Out of the purely
personal interests which occupied my mind sprang others, and I bethought
me with a grim satisfaction of the severe lesson Mary must have, ere
this, read Rose upon her presumption and her flippancy, telling her, in
stern accents, how behind that screen the man was standing she had dared
to make the subject of her laughter. Oh, how she blushes! what flush
of crimson shame spreads over her face, her temples, and her neck; what
large tears overflow her lids, and fall along her cheeks! I actually
pity her suffering, and am pained at her grief.
“Spare her, dear Mary!” I cry out; “after all, she is but a child. Why
blame her that she cannot measure greatness, as philosophers measure
mountains, by the shadow?”
Egotism, in every one of its moods and tenses, must have a strong
fascination. I walked on for many a mile while thus thinking, without
the slightest sense of weariness, or any want of food. The morning
glided over, and the hot noon was passed, and the day was sobering down
into the more solemn tints of coming evening, and I still loitered, or
lay in the tall grass deep in my musings.
In taking my handkerchief from my pocket, I accidentally drew forth the
priest's letter, and in a sort of half-indolent curiosity, proceeded to
read it. The hand was cramped and rugged, the writing that of a man
to whom the manual part of correspondence is a heavy burden, and who
consequently incurs such labor as rarely as is possible. The composition
had all the charm of ease, and was as unstudied as need be; the writer
being evidently one who cared little for the graces of style,
satisfied to discuss his subject in the familiar terms of his ordinary
conversation.
Although I did not mean to impose more than an extract from it on my
reader, I must reserve even that much for my next chapter.