HARRY CLAVERING CHOOSES HIS PROFESSION.
Harry Clavering might not be an usher, but, nevertheless, he was
home for the holidays. And who can say where the usher ends and the
schoolmaster begins? He, perhaps, may properly be called an usher,
who is hired by a private schoolmaster to assist himself in his
private occupation, whereas Harry Clavering had been selected by a
public body out of a hundred candidates, with much real or pretended
reference to certificates of qualification. He was certainly not an
usher, as he was paid three hundred a year for his work,--which is
quite beyond the mark of ushers. So much was certain; but yet the
word stuck in his throat and made him uncomfortable. He did not like
to reflect that he was home for the holidays.
But he had determined that he would never come home for the holidays
again. At Christmas he would leave the school at which he had won
his appointment with so much trouble, and go into an open profession.
Indeed he had chosen his profession, and his mode of entering it. He
would become a civil engineer, and perhaps a land surveyor, and with
this view he would enter himself as a pupil in the great house of
Beilby and Burton. The terms even had been settled. He was to pay a
premium of five hundred pounds and join Mr. Burton, who was settled
in the town of Stratton, for twelve months before he placed himself
in Mr. Beilby's office in London. Stratton was less than twenty miles
from Clavering. It was a comfort to him to think that he could pay
this five hundred pounds out of his own earnings, without troubling
his father. It was a comfort, even though he had earned that money by
"ushering" for the last two years.
When he left Julia Brabazon in the garden, Harry Clavering did not
go at once home to the rectory, but sauntered out all alone into the
park, intending to indulge in reminiscences of his past romance. It
was all over, that idea of having Julia Brabazon for his love; and
now he had to ask himself whether he intended to be made permanently
miserable by her worldly falseness, or whether he would borrow
something of her worldly wisdom, and agree with himself to look back
on what was past as a pleasurable excitement in his boyhood. Of
course we all know that really permanent misery was in truth out of
the question. Nature had not made him physically or mentally so poor
a creature as to be incapable of a cure. But on this occasion he
decided on permanent misery. There was about his heart,--about his
actual anatomical heart, with its internal arrangement of valves
and blood-vessels,--a heavy dragging feeling that almost amounted
to corporeal pain, and which he described to himself as agony. Why
should this rich, debauched, disreputable lord have the power of
taking the cup from his lip, the one morsel of bread which he coveted
from his mouth, his one ingot of treasure out of his coffer? Fight
him! No, he knew he could not fight Lord Ongar. The world was against
such an arrangement. And in truth Harry Clavering had so much
contempt for Lord Ongar, that he had no wish to fight so poor a
creature. The man had had delirium tremens, and was a worn-out
miserable object. So at least Harry Clavering was only too ready to
believe. He did not care much for Lord Ongar in the matter. His anger
was against her;--that she should have deserted him for a miserable
creature, who had nothing to back him but wealth and rank!
There was wretchedness in every view of the matter. He loved her so
well, and yet he could do nothing! He could take no step towards
saving her or assisting himself. The marriage bells would ring within
a month from the present time, and his own father would go to the
church and marry them. Unless Lord Ongar were to die before then
by God's hand, there could be no escape,--and of such escape Harry
Clavering had no thought. He felt a weary, dragging soreness at his
heart, and told himself that he must be miserable for ever,--not so
miserable but what he would work, but so wretched that the world
could have for him no satisfaction.
What could he do? What thing could he achieve so that she should
know that he did not let her go from him without more thought than
his poor words had expressed? He was perfectly aware that in their
conversation she had had the best of the argument,--that he had
talked almost like a boy, while she had talked quite like a woman.
She had treated him de haut en bas with all that superiority which
youth and beauty give to a young woman over a very young man. What
could he do? Before he returned to the rectory, he had made up his
mind what he would do, and on the following morning Julia Brabazon
received by the hands of her maid the following note:--
"I think I understood all that you said to me yesterday. At any
rate, I understand that you have one trouble left, and that I have
the means of curing it." In the first draft of his letter he said
something about ushering, but that he omitted afterwards. "You may be
assured that the enclosed is all my own, and that it is entirely at
my own disposal. You may also be quite sure of good faith on the part
of the lender.--H. C." And in this letter he enclosed a cheque for
six hundred pounds. It was the money which he had saved since he
took his degree, and had been intended for Messrs. Beilby and Burton.
But he would wait another two years,--continuing to do his ushering
for her sake. What did it matter to a man who must, under any
circumstances, be permanently miserable?
Sir Hugh was not yet at Clavering. He was to come with Lord Ongar
on the eve of the partridge-shooting. The two sisters, therefore,
had the house all to themselves. At about twelve they sat down to
breakfast together in a little upstairs chamber adjoining Lady
Clavering's own room, Julia Brabazon at that time having her lover's
generous letter in her pocket. She knew that it was as improper as it
was generous, and that, moreover, it was very dangerous. There was no
knowing what might be the result of such a letter should Lord Ongar
even know that she had received it. She was not absolutely angry
with Harry, but had, to herself, twenty times called him a foolish,
indiscreet, dear generous boy. But what was she to do with the
cheque? As to that, she had hardly as yet made up her mind when she
joined her sister on the morning in question. Even to Hermione she
did not dare to tell the fact that such a letter had been received by
her.
But in truth her debts were a great torment to her; and yet how
trifling they were when compared with the wealth of the man who
was to become her husband in six weeks! Let her marry him, and not
pay them, and he probably would never be the wiser. They would get
themselves paid almost without his knowledge, perhaps altogether
without his hearing of them. But yet she feared him, knowing him to
be greedy about money; and, to give her such merit as was due to
her, she felt the meanness of going to her husband with debts on
her shoulder. She had five thousand pounds of her own; but the very
settlement which gave her a noble dower, and which made the marriage
so brilliant, made over this small sum in its entirety to her lord.
She had been wrong not to tell the lawyer of her trouble when he had
brought the paper for her to sign; but she had not told him. If Sir
Hugh Clavering had been her own brother there would have been no
difficulty, but he was only her brother-in-law, and she feared to
speak to him. Her sister, however, knew that there were debts, and on
that subject she was not afraid to speak to Hermione.
"Hermy," said she, "what am I to do about this money that I owe? I
got a bill from Colclugh's this morning."
"Just because he knows you're going to be married; that's all."
"But how am I to pay him?"
"Take no notice of it till next spring. I don't know what else you
can do. You'll be sure to have money when you come back from the
Continent."
"You couldn't lend it me; could you?"
"Who? I? Did you ever know me have any money in hand since I was
married? I have the name of an allowance, but it is always spent
before it comes to me, and I am always in debt."
"Would Hugh--let me have it?"
"What, give it you?"
"Well, it wouldn't be so very much for him. I never asked him for a
pound yet."
"I think he would say something you wouldn't like if you were to ask
him; but, of course, you can try it if you please."
"Then what am I to do?"
"Lord Ongar should have let you keep your own fortune. It would have
been nothing to him."
"Hugh didn't let you keep your own fortune."
"But the money which will be nothing to Lord Ongar was a good deal to
Hugh. You're going to have sixty thousand a year, while we have to
do with seven or eight. Besides, I hadn't been out in London, and it
wasn't likely I should owe much in Nice. He did ask me, and there was
something."
"What am I to do, Hermy?"
"Write and ask Lord Ongar to let you have what you want out of your
own money. Write to-day, so that he may get your letter before he
comes."
"Oh, dear! oh, dear! I never wrote a word to him yet, and to begin
with asking him for money!"
"I don't think he can be angry with you for that."
"I shouldn't know what to say. Would you write it for me, and let me
see how it looks?"
This Lady Clavering did; and had she refused to do it, I think that
poor Harry Clavering's cheque would have been used. As it was, Lady
Clavering wrote the letter to "My dear Lord Ongar," and it was copied
and signed by "Yours most affectionately, Julia Brabazon." The effect
of this was the receipt of a cheque for a thousand pounds in a very
pretty note from Lord Ongar, which the lord brought with him to
Clavering, and sent up to Julia as he was dressing for dinner. It was
an extremely comfortable arrangement, and Julia was very glad of the
money,--feeling it to be a portion of that which was her own. And
Harry's cheque had been returned to him on the day of its receipt.
"Of course I cannot take it, and of course you should not have sent
it." These words were written on the morsel of paper in which the
money was returned. But Miss Brabazon had torn the signature off the
cheque, so that it might be safe, whereas Harry Clavering had taken
no precaution with it whatever. But then Harry Clavering had not
lived two years in London.
During the hours that the cheque was away from him, Harry had told
his father that perhaps, even yet, he might change his purpose as to
going to Messrs. Beilby and Burton. He did not know, he said, but he
was still in doubt. This had sprung from some chance question which
his father had asked, and which had seemed to demand an answer. Mr.
Clavering greatly disliked the scheme of life which his son had made.
Harry's life hitherto had been prosperous and very creditable. He had
gone early to Cambridge, and at twenty-two had become a fellow of his
college. This fellowship he could hold for five or six years without
going into orders. It would then lead to a living, and would in the
meantime afford a livelihood. But, beyond this, Harry, with an energy
which he certainly had not inherited from his father, had become a
schoolmaster, and was already a rich man. He had done more than well,
and there was a great probability that between them they might be
able to buy the next presentation to Clavering, when the time should
come in which Sir Hugh should determine on selling it. That Sir
Hugh should give the family living to his cousin was never thought
probable by any of the family at the rectory; but he might perhaps
part with it under such circumstances on favourable terms. For all
these reasons the father was very anxious that his son should follow
out the course for which he had been intended; but that he, being
unenergetic and having hitherto done little for his son, should
dictate to a young man who had been energetic, and who had done much
for himself, was out of the question. Harry, therefore, was to be the
arbiter of his own fate. But when Harry received back the cheque from
Julia Brabazon, then he again returned to his resolution respecting
Messrs. Beilby and Burton, and took the first opportunity of telling
his father that such was the case.
After breakfast he followed his father into his study, and there,
sitting in two easy-chairs opposite to each other, they lit each a
cigar. Such was the reverend gentleman's custom in the afternoon,
and such also in the morning. I do not know whether the smoking of
four or five cigars daily by the parson of a parish may now-a-day be
considered as a vice in him, but if so, it was the only vice with
which Mr. Clavering could be charged. He was a kind, soft-hearted,
gracious man, tender to his wife, whom he ever regarded as the
angel of his house, indulgent to his daughters, whom he idolized,
ever patient with his parishioners, and awake,--though not widely
awake,--to the responsibilities of his calling. The world had been
too comfortable for him, and also too narrow; so that he had sunk
into idleness. The world had given him much to eat and drink, but it
had given him little to do, and thus he had gradually fallen away
from his early purposes, till his energy hardly sufficed for the
doing of that little. His living gave him eight hundred a year; his
wife's fortune nearly doubled that. He had married early, and had
got his living early, and had been very prosperous. But he was not
a happy man. He knew that he had put off the day of action till
the power of action had passed away from him. His library was well
furnished, but he rarely read much else than novels and poetry; and
of late years the reading even of poetry had given way to the reading
of novels. Till within ten years of the hour of which I speak, he had
been a hunting parson,--not hunting loudly, but following his sport
as it is followed by moderate sportsmen. Then there had come a new
bishop, and the new bishop had sent for him,--nay, finally had come
to him, and had lectured him with blatant authority. "My lord," said
the parson of Clavering, plucking up something of his past energy,
as the colour rose to his face, "I think you are wrong in this. I
think you are specially wrong to interfere with me in this way on
your first coming among us. You feel it to be your duty, no doubt;
but to me it seems that you mistake your duty. But, as the matter
is one simply of my own pleasure, I shall give it up." After that
Mr. Clavering hunted no more, and never spoke a good word to any one
of the bishop of his diocese. For myself, I think it as well that
clergymen should not hunt; but had I been the parson of Clavering,
I should, under those circumstances, have hunted double.
Mr. Clavering hunted no more, and probably smoked a greater number
of cigars in consequence. He had an increased amount of time at his
disposal, but did not, therefore, give more time to his duties. Alas!
what time did he give to his duties? He kept a most energetic curate,
whom he allowed to do almost what he would with the parish. Every-day
services he did prohibit, declaring that he would not have the parish
church made ridiculous; but in other respects his curate was the
pastor. Once every Sunday he read the service, and once every Sunday
he preached, and he resided in his parsonage ten months every year.
His wife and daughters went among the poor,--and he smoked cigars
in his library. Though not yet fifty, he was becoming fat and
idle,--unwilling to walk, and not caring much even for such riding as
the bishop had left to him. And, to make matters worse,--far worse,
he knew all this of himself, and understood it thoroughly. "I see a
better path, and know how good it is, but I follow ever the worse."
He was saying that to himself daily, and was saying it always without
hope.
And his wife had given him up. She had given him up, not with
disdainful rejection, nor with contempt in her eye, or censure in her
voice, not with diminution of love or of outward respect. She had
given him up as a man abandons his attempts to make his favourite dog
take the water. He would fain that the dog he loves should dash into
the stream as other dogs will do. It is, to his thinking, a noble
instinct in a dog. But his dog dreads the water. As, however, he
has learned to love the beast, he puts up with this mischance, and
never dreams of banishing poor Ponto from his hearth because of this
failure. And so it was with Mrs. Clavering and her husband at the
rectory. He understood it all. He knew that he was so far rejected;
and he acknowledged to himself the necessity for such rejection.
"It is a very serious thing to decide upon," he said, when his son
had spoken to him.
"Yes; it is serious,--about as serious a thing as a man can think of;
but a man cannot put it off on that account. If I mean to make such a
change in my plans, the sooner I do it the better."
"But yesterday you were in another mind."
"No, father, not in another mind. I did not tell you then, nor can
I tell you all now. I had thought that I should want my money for
another purpose for a year or two; but that I have abandoned."
"Is the purpose a secret, Harry?"
"It is a secret, because it concerns another person."
"You were going to lend your money to some one?"
"I must keep it a secret, though you know I seldom have any secrets
from you. That idea, however, is abandoned, and I mean to go over to
Stratton to-morrow, and tell Mr. Burton that I shall be there after
Christmas. I must be at St. Cuthbert's on Tuesday."
Then they both sat silent for a while, silently blowing out their
clouds of smoke. The son had said all that he cared to say, and would
have wished that there might then be an end of it; but he knew that
his father had much on his mind, and would fain express, if he could
express it without too much trouble, or without too evident a need
of self-reproach, his own thoughts on the subject. "You have made
up your mind, then, altogether that you do not like the church as a
profession," he said at last.
"I think I have, father."
"And on what grounds? The grounds which recommend it to you are very
strong. Your education has adapted you for it. Your success in it
is already ensured by your fellowship. In a great degree you have
entered it as a profession already, by taking a fellowship. What you
are doing is not choosing a line in life, but changing one already
chosen. You are making of yourself a rolling stone."
"A stone should roll till it has come to the spot that suits it."
"Why not give up the school if it irks you?"
"And become a Cambridge Don, and practise deportment among the
undergraduates."
"I don't see that you need do that. You need not even live at
Cambridge. Take a church in London. You would be sure to get one
by holding up your hand. If that, with your fellowship, is not
sufficient, I will give you what more you want."
"No, father--no. By God's blessing I will never ask you for a pound.
I can hold my fellowship for four years longer without orders, and in
four years' time I think I can earn my bread."
"I don't doubt that, Harry."
"Then why should I not follow my wishes in this matter? The truth is,
I do not feel myself qualified to be a good clergyman."
"It is not that you have doubts, is it?"
"I might have them if I came to think much about it,--as I must do if
I took orders. And I do not wish to be crippled in doing what I think
lawful by conventional rules. A rebellious clergyman is, I think, a
sorry object. It seems to me that he is a bird fouling his own nest.
Now, I know I should be a rebellious clergyman."
"In our church the life of a clergyman is as the life of any other
gentleman,--within very broad limits."
"Then why did Bishop Proudie interfere with your hunting?"
"Limits may be very broad, Harry, and yet exclude hunting. Bishop
Proudie was vulgar and intrusive, such being the nature of his wife,
who instructs him; but if you were in orders I should be very sorry
to see you take to hunting."
"It seems to me that a clergyman has nothing to do in life unless
he is always preaching and teaching. Look at Saul,"--Mr. Saul was
the curate of Clavering--"he is always preaching and teaching. He is
doing the best he can; and what a life of it he has. He has literally
thrown off all worldly cares,--and consequently everybody laughs at
him, and nobody loves him. I don't believe a better man breathes, but
I shouldn't like his life."
At this point there was another pause, which lasted till the cigars
had come to an end. Then, as he threw the stump into the fire, Mr.
Clavering spoke again. "The truth is, Harry, that you have had, all
your life, a bad example before you."
"No, father."
"Yes, my son;--let me speak on to the end, and then you can say what
you please. In me you have had a bad example on one side, and now, in
poor Saul, you have a bad example on the other side. Can you fancy no
life between the two, which would fit your physical nature, which is
larger than his, and your mental wants, which are higher than mine?
Yes, they are, Harry. It is my duty to say this, but it would be
unseemly that there should be any controversy between us on the
subject."
"If you choose to stop me in that way--"
"I do choose to stop you in that way. As for Saul, it is impossible
that you should become such a man as he. It is not that he mortifies
his flesh, but that he has no flesh to mortify. He is unconscious
of the flavour of venison, or the scent of roses, or the beauty of
women. He is an exceptional specimen of a man, and you need no more
fear, than you should venture to hope, that you could become such as
he is."
At this point they were interrupted by the entrance of Fanny
Clavering, who came to say that Mr. Saul was in the drawing-room.
"What does he want, Fanny?" This question Mr. Clavering asked half in
a whisper, but with something of comic humour in his face, as though
partly afraid that Mr. Saul should hear it, and partly intending to
convey a wish that he might escape Mr. Saul, if it were possible.
"It's about the iron church, papa. He says it is come,--or part of
it has come,--and he wants you to go out to Cumberly Green about the
site."
"I thought that was all settled."
"He says not."
"What does it matter where it is? He can put it anywhere he likes on
the Green. However, I had better go to him." So Mr. Clavering went.
Cumberly Green was a hamlet in the parish of Clavering, three miles
distant from the church, the people of which had got into a wicked
habit of going to a dissenting chapel near to them. By Mr. Saul's
energy, but chiefly out of Mr. Clavering's purse, an iron chapel had
been purchased for a hundred and fifty pounds, and Mr. Saul proposed
to add to his own duties the pleasing occupation of walking to
Cumberly Green every Sunday morning before breakfast, and every
Wednesday evening after dinner, to perform a service and bring back
to the true flock as many of the erring sheep of Cumberly Green as he
might be able to catch. Towards the purchase of this iron church Mr.
Clavering had at first given a hundred pounds. Sir Hugh, in answer to
the fifth application, had very ungraciously, through his steward,
bestowed ten pounds. Among the farmers one pound nine and eightpence
had been collected. Mr. Saul had given two pounds; Mrs. Clavering
gave five pounds; the girls gave ten shillings each; Henry Clavering
gave five pounds;--and then the parson made up the remainder. But Mr.
Saul had journeyed thrice painfully to Bristol, making the bargain
for the church, going and coming each time by third-class, and he had
written all the letters; but Mrs. Clavering had paid the postage,
and she and the girls between them were making the covering for the
little altar.
"Is it all settled, Harry?" said Fanny, stopping with her brother,
and hanging over his chair. She was a pretty, gay-spirited girl, with
bright eyes and dark brown hair, which fell in two curls behind her
ears.
"He has said nothing to unsettle it."
"I know it makes him very unhappy."
"No, Fanny, not very unhappy. He would rather that I should go into
the church, but that is about all."
"I think you are quite right."
"And Mary thinks I am quite wrong."
"Mary thinks so, of course. So should I too, perhaps, if I were
engaged to a clergyman. That's the old story of the fox who had lost
his tail."
"And your tail isn't gone yet?"
"No, my tail isn't gone yet. Mary thinks that no life is like a
clergyman's life. But, Harry, though mamma hasn't said so, I'm sure
she thinks you are right. She won't say so as long as it may seem to
interfere with anything papa may choose to say; but I'm sure she's
glad in her heart."
"And I am glad in my heart, Fanny. And as I'm the person most
concerned, I suppose that's the most material thing." Then they
followed their father into the drawing-room.
"Couldn't you drive Mrs. Clavering over in the pony chair, and settle
it between you," said Mr. Clavering to his curate. Mr. Saul looked
disappointed. In the first place, he hated driving the pony, which
was a rapid-footed little beast, that had a will of his own; and in
the next place, he thought the rector ought to visit the spot on such
an occasion. "Or Mrs. Clavering will drive you," said the rector,
remembering Mr. Saul's objection to the pony. Still Mr. Saul looked
unhappy. Mr. Saul was very tall and very thin, with a tall thin head,
and weak eyes, and a sharp, well-cut nose, and, so to say, no lips,
and very white teeth, with no beard, and a well-cut chin. His face
was so thin that his cheekbones obtruded themselves unpleasantly.
He wore a long rusty black coat, and a high rusty black waistcoat,
and trousers that were brown with dirty roads and general ill-usage.
Nevertheless, it never occurred to any one that Mr. Saul did not look
like a gentleman, not even to himself, to whom no ideas whatever on
that subject ever presented themselves. But that he was a gentleman
I think he knew well enough, and was able to carry himself before
Sir Hugh and his wife with quite as much ease as he could do in the
rectory. Once or twice he had dined at the great house; but Lady
Clavering had declared him to be a bore, and Sir Hugh had called
him "that most offensive of all animals, a clerical prig." It had
therefore been decided that he was not to be asked to the great
house any more. It may be as well to state here, as elsewhere, that
Mr. Clavering very rarely went to his nephew's table. On certain
occasions he did do so, so that there might be no recognized quarrel
between him and Sir Hugh; but such visits were few and far between.
After a few more words from Mr. Saul, and a glance from his wife's
eye, Mr. Clavering consented to go to Cumberly Green, though there
was nothing he liked so little as a morning spent with his curate.
When he had started, Harry told his mother also of his final
decision. "I shall go to Stratton to-morrow and settle it all."
"And what does papa say?" asked the mother.
"Just what he has said before. It is not so much that he wishes me to
be a clergyman, as that he does not wish me to have lost all my time
up to this."
"It is more than that, I think, Harry," said his elder sister, a tall
girl, less pretty than her sister, apparently less careful of her
prettiness, very quiet, or, as some said, demure, but known to be
good as gold by all who knew her well.
"I doubt it," said Harry, stoutly. "But, however that may be, a man
must choose for himself."
"We all thought you had chosen," said Mary.
"If it is settled," said the mother, "I suppose we shall do no good
by opposing it."
"Would you wish to oppose it, mamma?" said Harry.
"No, my dear. I think you should judge for yourself."
"You see I could have no scope in the church for that sort of
ambition which would satisfy me. Look at such men as Locke, and
Stephenson, and Brassey. They are the men who seem to me to do most
in the world. They were all self-educated, but surely a man can't
have a worse chance because he has learned something. Look at old
Beilby with a seat in Parliament, and a property worth two or three
hundred thousand pounds! When he was my age he had nothing but his
weekly wages."
"I don't know whether Mr. Beilby is a very happy man or a very good
man," said Mary.
"I don't know, either," said Harry; "but I do know that he has thrown
a single arch over a wider span of water than ever was done before,
and that ought to make him happy." After saying this in a tone of
high authority, befitting his dignity as a fellow of his college,
Harry Clavering went out, leaving his mother and sisters to discuss
the subject which to two of them was all-important. As to Mary,
she had hopes of her own, vested in the clerical concerns of a
neighbouring parish.