The next morning my mother redeemed her promise. It was directly after
breakfast when she had placed herself in the chair at the parlor
window. She made no allusion to the evening before until she completed
this arrangement of hers, and then she looked so serious, as I stood
before her, that I fully expected something I should not like.
"Charles," she said, "you are very dear to me, and perhaps you have
given me more care than all my children, though you are the youngest.
I have often wondered what you would be or become as a member of
society, and it was the last of all my thoughts for you that you must
leave me to be educated. But if you are to be a musician, you must be
taken from me soon, or you will never grow into what we should both of
us desire,--a first-rate artist. I could not wish you to be anything
less than first rate, and now you are very backward."
"Am I to go to London then, mother?" I shook in every limb.
"I believe a first-rate musical education for you in London would be
beyond my means. It is upon this subject your friend Mr. Davy is to be
so good as to write to Santonio, who can tell us all about Germany,
where higher advantages can be obtained more easily than anywhere in
England. But, Charles, you will have to give up a great deal if you
go, and learn to do everything for yourself. If you are ill, you will
have to do without nursing and petting as you would have here; and if
you are unhappy, you must not complain away from home. Also you must
work hard, or you will lose your free self-approval, and be miserable
at the end. I should be afraid to let you go if I did not know you are
musical enough to do your duty by music, and loving enough to do your
duty by your mother; also, that you are a true boy, and will not take
to false persons. But it is hard to part with you, my child; and
indeed, we need not think of that just yet."
I did though, I am ashamed to say; and I wanted to set off on the next
day. I knew this to be impossible, and the fact that consoled me was
the very one of my unstrung ignorance; for I had a vague impression
that Davy would tune me up before I left home. I could not see him
that morning. My excitement was intense; I could not even cut a caper,
for I had to do my lessons, and Clo always behaved about my lessons as
if they were to go on forever, and I was by no means to grow any
older. She was especially stationary on this morning, and I had
nothing for it but to apply very hard indeed. My copy was more crabbed
than ever; but while she commented so gravely thereupon, I thought of
what Santonio had said about my arm and hand. I was not vain,--I have
not a tincture of vanity all through me,--but I was very proud, and
also most demurely humble.
At dinner Millicent talked to me of my prospects; but I pretended not
to admit them in all their magnificence: the prophetic longing was so
painful to me that I dared not irritate it. So she rallied me in vain,
and I ate a great deal of rice pudding to simulate occupation. Dinner
over, they all retired to their rooms,--I to my violin in a corner of
the parlor. I hung over it as it lay in its case, I fed upon it in
spirit; but I did not take it out, I was afraid of any one coming in.
At last I spread my pocket-handkerchief upon the case, and sitting
down upon it, went to sleep in scarcely conscious possession. I did
not dream anything particular, though I suppose I ought to have done
so, and it had been better for these unilluminated pages; but when I
awoke it was late,--that is, late for my engagement with Miss Benette.
I ran all the way; and as I reached my resting-place, it occurred to
me that I should have to tell her I was going to Germany. How glad she
would be, and yet a little sorry; for I had an idea she liked me, or I
should never have gone near her. Vaulting into the passage, I heard
strange sounds--singing, but not only singing. More and more wonders,
I thought, and I dashed upstairs. The sounds ceased when I knocked at
the door, which Clara came to open. I gazed in first, before I even
noticed her, and beheld in the centre of the room a small polished
pianoforte. I flew in and up to it, and breathlessly surveyed it.
"Miss Benette, where did that come from? I thought you were not to
have a pianoforte for ever so long."
She came to me, and replied with her steady, sweet voice a little
agitated,--
"Oh! Master Auchester, I wish you could tell me who it came from, that
I might give that person my heart quite full of thanks. I can only
believe it comes from some one who loves music more than all
things,--some one rich, whom music has made richer than could all
money. It is such a sweet, darling, beautiful thing to come to me!
Such a precious glory to make my heart so bright!"
The tears filled her eyes, and looking at her, I perceived that she
had lately wept; the veins of harebell-blue seemed to quiver round the
lids.
"Oh, Miss Benette! I had a violin sent to me too, and I thought it was
from Mr. Davy; but now I feel quite sure it was from that lady."
Clara could scarcely speak,--I had never seen her so overcome; but she
presently answered,--
"I believe it was the young lady. I hope so, because I should like her
to be made happy by remembering we have both got through her what we
wanted more than anything in the world. She would not like to be
thanked, though; so we ought not to grieve that we cannot express our
gratitude."
"I should like to know really, though, because it seems so strange she
should recollect _me_."
"Oh, Master Auchester, no! Any one can see the music in your face who
has the music in his heart. Besides, she saw you at the festival, and
how anxious you were to serve the great gentleman."
"Now, Miss Benette, I am to tell you something."
"How good! Do go on."
I laid my arm on the piano, but scarcely knew how to begin.
"What is it to do, then?" asked Clara, winningly.
"I am going really to be a musician, Miss Benette; I am going to
Germany."
She did not reply at first; but when I looked up, it was as though she
had not wept, so bright she beamed.
"That's all right, I knew you would. Oh! if she knew how much good she
had done, how happy she would be! How happy she will be when she goes
to a concert some day, in some year to come, and sees you stand up,
and hears you praise music in the voice it loves best!"
"Do you think so? Do you think it is the best voice of music?"
"Because it is like the voice of a single soul, I do. But Mr. Davy
says we cannot know the power of an orchestra of souls."
"_I_ can."
"Oh! I beg your pardon! I forgot."
"But I don't think that I remember well; for whenever I try to think
of it, I seem only to see his face, and hear his voice speaking to me,
saying, 'Above all, the little ones!'"
"How pretty it was! You will be sure to see him in Germany, and then
you can ask him whether he wrote the 'Tone-Wreath.'"
Oh, how I laughed again!
"What sort of place shall I go to, should you think?"
"I don't know any place really, Master Auchester. I can't tell what
places they have to learn at, upon the Continent. I know no places
besides this house, and Mr. Davy's, and the class, and church, and
Miss Lenhart's house in London."
"Are you not very dull?"
Alas for the excitable nature of my own temperament! I was sure I
should be dull in her place, though I had never felt it until my
violin came upon me, stealthy and stirring as first love. She looked
at me with serene wonder.
"I don't know what 'dull' means. I do not want anything I have not
got, because I shall have everything I want,--some day, I mean; and I
would rather not have all at once."
I did not think anything could be wanting to her, indeed, in
loveliness or aspiration, for my religious belief was in both for her;
still I fancied it impossible she should not sometimes feel
impatient, and especially as those blue shadows I have mentioned had
softened the sweetness of her eyes, and the sensation of tears stole
over me as I gazed upon her.
"We shall not practise much, I am afraid, Master Auchester, for I want
to talk, and I am so silly that when I sing, I begin to cry."
"For pleasure, I suppose. I always do."
"Not all for pleasure. I am vexed, and I do not love myself for being
vexed. Laura is going to Paris, Master Auchester, to study under a
certain master there. Her papa is going too, and that woman I do not
like. She is unhappy to leave me, but they have filled her head with
pictures, and she is wild for the big theatres. She came to see me
this morning, and I talked to her a long time. It was that made me
cry."
"Why, particularly?"
"Because I told her so many things about the sort of people she will
see, and how to know what is beautiful in people who are not wise. She
promised to come and live with me when I have been to Italy, and
become a singer; but till then, I shall, perhaps, never meet her, for
our ways are not the same. She looked with her clear eyes right
through me, to see if I was grave; and if she only finds her art is
fair, I shall not be afraid for her."
"But is she not ill? I never saw anybody look so strange."
"That is because her hair is shorter. You do not like her, Master
Auchester?"
I shook my shoulders. "No; not a great deal."
"You will try, please. She will be an artist."
"But don't you consider,--of course I don't know,--but don't you
consider dancing the lowest art?"
"Oh, Master Auchester! all the arts help each other, and are all in
themselves so pure that we cannot say one is purer than the other.
Besides, was it not in the dream of that Jew, in the Bible, that the
angels descended as well as ascended?"
"You are like Martin Luther."
"Why so?"
"Clo--that is my clever sister--told me what he said about the arts
and religion."
"Oh, Mr. Davy tells that story."
"Miss Benette, you are very naughty! You seem to know everything that
everybody says."
"No; it is because I see so few people that I remember all they say."
"Are you not at _all_ fonder of music than of dancing? Oh, Miss
Benette!"
She laughed heartily, showing one or two of her twinkling teeth.
"I am fonder of music than of anything that lives or is, or rather I
am not fond of it at all; but it is my life, though I am only a young
child in that life at present. But I am rather fond of dancing, I must
confess."
"I think it is charming; and I can dance very well, particularly on
the top of a wall. But I do not care about it, you know."
"You mean, it is not enough for you to make you either glad or sorry.
But be thankful that it is enough for some people."
"All things make me glad, and sorry too, I think, going away now. When
I come back--"
"I shall be gone," said Clara.
"I shall be a man--"
"And I an old woman--"
"For shame, Miss Benette! you will never grow old, I believe."
"Oh, yes, I shall; but I do not mind, it will be like a summer to grow
old."
"I am sure it will!" I cried, with an enthusiasm that seemed to
surprise her, so unconscious was she ever of any effect she had.
"But I shall grow old too; and there is not so very much difference
between us. So then I shall seem your age; and, Miss Benette, when I
do grow up, will you be my friend?"
"Always, Master Auchester, if you still wish it. And in my heart I do
believe that friends are friends forever."
The sweet smile she gave me, the sweeter words she spoke, were
sufficient to assure me I should not be forgotten; and it was all I
wished, for then my heart was fixed upon my future.
"But you will not be going to-morrow, I suppose?"
"No, I wish I were."
"So do I."
"Thank you," said I, rather disconcerted; "I shall go very soon, I
suppose."
"It will not be long, I daresay," she answered, with another sweetest
smile; and I felt it to be her kind wish for me, and was consoled. And
when I left her she was standing quietly by her piano; nor did she
raise her eyes to follow me to the door.
By one of those curious chances that befall some people more than
others, I had a cold the next class-night. I was in an extremity of
passion to be kept at home,--that is to say, I rolled in my stifling
bed with the sulks pressing heavily on my heart, and the headache upon
my forehead. Millicent sat by me, and laughingly assured me I should
soon be quite well again; I solemnly averred I should never be well,
should never get up, should never see Davy any more, never go to
Germany. But I went to sleep after all; for Davy, with his usual
philanthropy, came all the way up to the house to inquire for me after
the class, and his voice aroused and soothed me together. I may say
that such a cold was a godsend just then, as it prevented my having to
do any lessons. The next day, being idle, I heard nothing of Davy;
neither the next. I thought it very odd; but on the third morning I
was permitted to go out, as it was very clear and bright. The smoke
looked beautiful, almost like another kind of flame, as it swelled
skywards, and I met Davy quite glowing with exercise.
"What a day for December!" said he, and cheerily held up a letter.
"Oh, Mr. Davy!" I cried; but he would not suffer me even to read the
superscription.
"First for your mother. Will you turn back and walk home with me?"
"I must not, sir; I am to walk to the turnpike and back."
"Away, then! and I am very glad to hear it."
To do myself justice, I did not even run. I could, indeed, for all my
impatient hope, scarcely help feeling there is no such blessing as
pure fresh air that fans a brow whose fever has lately faded. I came
at length to the toll-gate, and returned, braced for any adventure, to
the door of my own home. I flew into the parlor; my mother and Davy
were alone. My mother was wiping off a tear or two, and he seemed
smiling on purpose.
"Oh, mother!" I exclaimed, running up to her, "please don't cry."
"My dear Charles, you are a silly little boy. After all, what will you
do in Germany?"
She lifted me upon her lap. Davy walked up to the book-case.
"I find, Charles, that you must go immediately,--and, indeed, it will
be best if you travel with Mr. Santonio. And how could I send you
alone, with such an opportunity to be taken care of! Mr. Davy, will
you have the kindness to read that letter to my little boy?"
Davy, thus admonished, gathered up the letter now lying open upon the
table, and began to read it quite in his class voice, as if we two had
been an imposing audience.
DEAR MADAM,--Although I have not had the pleasure of an
introduction to you, I think the certificate of my cognizance
by my friend Davy will be sufficient to induce you to allow
me to take charge of your son at the end of this week, if he
can then be ready, as I must leave England then, and return
to Paris by the middle of February. Between this journey and
that time I shall be in Germany to attend the examinations of
the Cecilia School at Lorbeerstadt.[12] The Cecilia School
now is exactly the place for your son, though he is six
months too young to be admitted. At the same time, if he is
to be admitted at all, he should at once be placed under
direct training, and there are out-professors who undertake
precisely this responsibility. My own experience proves that
anything is better than beginning too late, or beginning too
soon to work alone. I have made every inquiry which could be
a proviso with you.
"Then here follows what would scarcely interest you," said Davy,
breaking off.
"Your friend is quite right, Charles. Now can you say you are sure I
may put faith in you?"
"What do you mean, mother? If you mean that I am to practise, _indeed_
I will; I never want to do anything else, and I won't have any money
to spend."
Davy came up to us and smiled: "I really think he is safe. You will
let him come to me one evening, dear madam?"
"Perhaps you can come to us. I really do not think we can spare him;
we have so much to do in the way of preparation."
It was an admirable providence that my whole time was, from morning to
night, taken up with my family. My sisters, assisted by Margareth,
made me a dozen shirts, and hemmed for me three dozen handkerchiefs. I
was being measured or fitted all day, and all the evening was running
up and down stairs with the completed items. Oh! if you had seen my
boxes you would have said that I ought to be very good to be so cared
for, and very beautiful besides; yet I was neither, and was sorely
longing to be away,--such kindness pained me more than it pleased. I
had a little jointed bed, which you would not have believed _was_ a
bed until it was set up. My mother admonished me if I found my bed
comfortable to keep that in my box; but she had some experience of
German beds, and English ones too, under certain circumstances. I had
a gridiron, and a coffee-pot, a spirit-lamp, and a case containing one
knife and fork, one plate, one spoon. I had everything I could
possibly want, and felt dreadfully bewildered. Clo was marking my
stockings one morning when Davy came in; he gave me one of his little
brown boxes, and in the box was a single cup and saucer of that
glowing, delicate china. When he pulled it out of his pocket I little
knew what it was, and when I found out, how I cried!
"I have, indeed, brought you a small remembrance, Charles; but I am a
small man, and you are a small boy, and I understand you are to have a
very small establishment."
He said this cheerily, but I could not laugh; he put his kind arm
round me, and I only wept the more. Clo was all the time quite
seriously, as I have said, tracing ineffaceably my initials in German
text, with crimson cotton,--none of your delible inks,--and Davy
pretended to be very much interested in them.
"What! all those stockings, Charles?"
"Yes, sir: you see we have provided for summer and winter," responded
Clo, as seriously as I have mentioned. "He will not want any till we
see him again, for he is to pay us a visit, if God spares him, next
Christmas."
Davy sighed, and kissed my forehead; I clung to him. "Shall I see you
again, Mr. Davy?"
"I have come to ask your mother whether I may take you to London; it
is precisely what I came for, and I have a little plan."
Davy had actually an engagement in London, or feigned to have one,--I
have never been able to discover whether it was a fact or a fiction;
and he proposed to my mother that I should sleep with him at his
aunt's house one night before I was deposited at the hotel where
Santonio rested, and to which he had advised I should be brought.
I was in fits of delight at the idea of Davy's company; yet, after
all, I did not have much of that, for he travelled to London on the
top of the coach, and I was an inside passenger at my mother's
request.
Then comes a sleep of memory, not unaccompanied by dreams,--a dream
of being hurled into a corner by a lady, and of jamming myself so that
I could not stir hand or foot between her and the window; a dream of
desperate efforts to extricate myself; a dream of sudden respite, cold
air, and high stars beyond and above the houses, a cracked horn, a
flashing lantern; a dream of dark in a hackney-coach, and of stopping
in a stilly street before a many-windowed mansion, as it seemed to me.
Then I am aware to this hour of a dense headache, and bones almost
knotted together, till there arrives the worst nightmare reality can
breed,--the smell of toast, muffins, and tea; the feeling of a knife
and fork you cannot manage for sleepfulness; and the utter depression
of your quicksilver.
I could not even look at Miss Lenhart; but I heard that her voice was
going on all the time, and felt that she looked at me now and then. I
was conveyed into bed by Davy without any exercise on my own part, and
I slumbered in that sleep which absorbs all time, till very bright
day. Then I awoke and found myself alone, though Davy had left a neat
impression in the great soft bed. Presently I heard his steps, and his
fingers on the lock. He brought my breakfast in his own hand, and
while I forced myself to partake of it, he told me he should carry me
to Santonio at two o'clock, the steamboat leaving London Bridge at six
the same evening. And at two o'clock we arrived at the hotel. In a
lofty apartment sat Santonio near a table laid for dinner.
I beheld my boxes in one corner, and my violin-case strapped to the
largest; but all Santonio's luggage consisted of that case of his
which had been wrapped up warm in baize, and one portmanteau. He arose
and welcomed us with a smile most amiable; and having shaken hands
with Davy, took hold of both mine and held them, while still rallying
in a few words about our punctuality. Then he rang for dinner, and I
made stupendous efforts not to be a baby, which I should not have been
sorry to find myself at that instant. The two masters talked together
without noticing me, and presently I recovered; but only to be put
upon the sofa, which was soft as a powder-puff, and told to go to
sleep. I made magnificent determinations to keep awake, but in vain;
and it was just as well I could not, though I did not think so when I
awoke. For just then starting and sitting up, I beheld a lamp upon the
table, and heard Santonio's voice in the entry, haranguing a waiter
about a coach. But looking round and round into every corner I saw no
Davy, and I cannot describe how I felt when I found he had kissed me
asleep, and gone away altogether. As Santonio re-entered, the sweet
cordiality with which he tempered his address to me was more painful
than the roughest demeanor would have been just then, thrilling as I
was with the sympathy I had never drawn except from Davy's heart, and
which I had never lost since I had known him. It was as if my soul
were suddenly unclad, and left to writhe naked in a sunless
atmosphere; still I am glad to say I was grateful to Santonio. It was
about five o'clock when we entered a hackney-coach, and were conveyed
to the city from the wide West End. The great river lay as a leaden
dream while we ran across the bridge; but how dreamily, drowsily, I
can never describe, was conveyed to me that arched darkness spanning
the lesser gloom as we turned down dank sweeping steps, and alighted
amidst the heavy splash of that rolling tide. There was a confusion
and hurry here that mazed my faculties; and most dreadfully alarmed I
became at the thought of passing into that vessel set so deep into the
water, and looking so large and helpless. I was on board, however,
before I could calculate the possibilities of running away, and so
getting home again. Santonio put his arm around me as I crossed to the
deck, and I could not but feel how careful the great violin was of the
little human instrument committed to his care. Fairly on deck, the
whirling and booming, the crowd not too great, but so busy and
anxious, the head-hung lamp, and the cheery peeps into cabins lighter
still through glittering wires, all gave motion to my spirit. I was
soon more excited than ever, and glorified myself so much that I very
nearly fell over the side of the vessel into the Thames, while I was
watching the wheel that every now and then gave a sleepy start from
the oily, dark water. Santonio was looking after our effects for a
while, but it was he who rescued me in this instance, by pulling my
great-coat (exactly like Fred's) that had been made expressly, for me
in the festival-town, and which, feeling very new, made me think about
it a great deal more than it was worth. Then laughing heartily, but
still not speaking, he led me downstairs. How magnificent I found all
there! I was quite overpowered, never having been in any kind of
vessel; but what most charmed me was a glimpse of a second wonderful
region within the long dining-room,--the feminine retreat, whose door
was a little bit ajar.
The smothered noise of gathering steam came from above, and most
strange was it to hear the many footed tramp overhead, as we sat upon
the sofa, and spread beneath the oval windows all around. And
presently I realized the long tables, and all that there was upon
them, and was especially delighted to perceive some flowers mounted
upon the epergnes.
I was cravingly hungry by this time, for the first time since I had
left my home, and everything here reminded me of eating. Santonio, I
suppose, anticipated this fact, for he asked me immediately what I
should like. I said I should like some tea and a slice of cold meat.
He seemed amused at my choice, and while he drank a glass of some wine
or other and ate a crust, I had all to myself a little round tray,
with a short, stout tea-pot and enormous breakfast cup set before me;
with butter as white as milk, and cream as thick as butter, the butter
being developed in a tiny pat, with the semblance of the steamship we
were then in stamped upon the top; also a plate covered with meat all
over, upon beginning to clear which, I discovered another cartoon in
blue of the same subject. After getting to the bottom of the cup, and
a quarter uncovering the plate, I could do no more in that line, and
Santonio asked me what I should like to do about sleeping. I was
startled, for I had not thought about the coming night at all. He led
me on the instant to a certain other door, and bade me peep in; I
could only think of a picture I had seen of some catacombs,--in fact,
I think a catacomb preferable in every respect to a sleeping cabin.
The odors that rushed out, of brandy and lamp-oil, were but visionary
terrors compared with the aspect of those supernaturally constructed
enclosed berths, in not a few of which the victims of that entombment
had already deposited themselves.
"I can't sleep in there!" I said shudderingly as I withdrew, and
withdrawing, was inexpressibly revived by the air blowing down the
staircase. "Oh, let us sit up all night! on the sea too!"
Santonio replied, with great cordiality, that he should prefer such an
arrangement to any other, and would see what could be contrived for
me.
And so he did; and I can never surpass my own sensations of mere
satisfaction as I lay upon a seat on deck by ten o'clock, with a
boat-cloak for my pillow and a tarpaulin over my feet, Santonio by my
side, with a cloak all over him like a skin, his feet on his
fiddle-case, and an exquisitely fragrant regalia in his mouth.
My feelings soon became those of careering ecstasy,--careering among
stars all clear in the darkness over us; of passionate delight, rocked
to a dream by the undulation I began to perceive in our seaward
motion. I fell asleep about midnight, and woke again at dawn; but I
experienced just enough then of existing circumstances in our position
to retreat again beneath the handkerchief I had spread upon my face,
and again I slept and dreamed.
FOOTNOTE:
[12] The Cecilia School at Lorbeerstadt is probably intended to
represent the Conservatory at Leipsic, which Mendelssohn founded in
1843.