time to spare, Ben soon made his admiration of Miss Ruth known to that
lady, who, timid and retiring as she was always, was even shyer—more
frightened, it seemed to Ben—on the revelation being made, than he had
expected. But a middle-aged man, who had served a long apprenticeship
in the mines of California and Colorado, was not likely to be easily
checked when once he had broken the ice; and so Ben persevered,
until it became at last an understood thing that he was engaged to
the schoolmarm, and that as soon as the new partner arrived, and was
fairly initiated in the business, so that Mr Showle might have some
assistance, the pair were to be married, and take a trip east, to see
Ruth’s native village and what friends she had remaining.
Miss Alken had expressed a great wish not to live in Cincinnati after
they were married; and Ben, who had been so long used to a far wilder
and lonelier life than any Ohio or Kentucky village could furnish,
cared not how quiet his home might be. So he entered into treaty for
purchasing and enlarging a pretty little homestead at a village some
eight or ten miles from the city—an hour’s drive for the fast trotter
he meant to buy. He sometimes wondered at this whim on Miss Alken’s
part, as not in accordance with her usual manner, so calm, and so
easily pleased. There was another little odd way she had, too, which
attracted his notice; for several times he fancied she was about to say
something to him of special importance; but nothing had ever come of
it, so he decided at last that it was only her manner.
Just now, it was announced that the new partner—the distant relation
of Mr Bynnes, previously mentioned—was really coming, the delay in his
joining the firm having arisen from a severe illness under which he had
been labouring. In brief, he did come; and the new warehouse having
just been completed, he was put in charge of it. It so happened that
his arrival in Cincinnati took place during the temporary absence on
business of Mr Ben Creelock. Ben returned later-on on the very day of
the other’s arrival, but missed him at the time; and as he had much to
do on his return, while the new-comer was immersed in his duties, they
did not meet on the first day.
We need hardly stop to explain that Ben saw Miss Alken on the day of
his return; but he was alarmed to see how unwell she looked. There was
a dark, swollen look about her eyes, which seemed to tell of weeping or
sleeplessness. But she smiled when he spoke of it, and declared she was
quite well. Ben was only half satisfied, and decided that she required
a change, that her duties were too heavy for her, and therefore—as the
new partner had come—she had better give in her notice to the school;
and he would arrange for their marriage, so that the desired change of
air and the release from her duties would be at once secured. This he
determined should not be delayed; he would begin the very next day by
mentioning the matter to Mr Showle.
Like nearly everybody in business there, Mr Creelock dined at a hotel;
it saved trouble, and saved the expense of servants; the latter being
no trifling item in Cincinnati. On the day after his return, he went
at mid-day to the _Ocean House_, his favourite hotel, to dine. He took
his seat at his accustomed table. The reader probably knows that it is
the usual custom in the States for the hotels to be furnished with a
number of small tables, accommodating from two to four persons each;
and at one particular table in the _Ocean House_, Mr Ben was wont to
seat himself. He took his usual place and began his dinner; as he did
so, a stranger seated himself in the chair opposite to him. Ben glanced
involuntarily at the new-comer; but the latter’s head was turned away,
while speaking to an attendant, so Ben did not see his face. Being a
matter of no consequence, he went on with his dinner, and the stranger
proceeded with his meal.
In a little time, Ben had occasion for a sauce cruet, and reached
out his hand mechanically to where it had been a moment before. The
bottle was gone; but the stranger saw his movement, and with some
indistinct syllables, pushed it towards him. Ben lifted his head and
parted his lips to thank him, the stranger smiling pleasantly as Ben
moved. But not a sound proceeded from the lips of the latter. Had he
been struck suddenly dumb—had he gazed upon the head of the Gorgon, he
could not have been more petrified by amazement, by terror, by a chaos
of uncontrollable emotions; for the man before him, separated only by
the breadth of the narrow table—the man into whose eyes he was looking
straight and close—the man who was smiling pleasantly in anticipation
of his thanks, was the man who had been his most implacable foe—was
none other than the man whom he had last seen lying stark and
apparently dead on the banks of a mining pool in Colorado—was Rube
Steele!
There was no doubt about it; there was no room for speculating upon a
strong accidental resemblance. The man was Rube Steele, his partner at
the mine, and no one else.
‘I see you have the _New York Beacon_ there,’ said the stranger,
nodding, with another easy smile, to the journal which Ben had been
reading. ‘Your own paper, I reckon, as they do not keep it on file
here. I should be much obliged, stranger, by a sight of it.’
Ben stretched his hand to the journal, and passed it to the speaker
without removing his eyes from his face for an instant; and with the
slightest gesture or change of position on the part of the stranger,
perpetually recurred the thought: ‘Now he knows me! Now for the
plunge!’ But the other moved not from his seat. He took the paper with
another easy smile and nod, then, first saying a few words about the
great heat of the weather, at once commenced its perusal.
It was worse than any horrible dream or nightmare under which Ben had
ever suffered. The certainty that this pleasant civil stranger was Rube
Steele, became stronger and stronger, for not only was his whole aspect
and his every feature sufficient proof of his identity, but his voice
alone would have been enough to convince Ben, had his face been wholly
hidden. The tone and certain little peculiarities in his speech, of
which every man has some—easily to be recognised by those who know him
well, although indescribable in themselves—were there, just as Ben had
heard and noticed them, hundreds of times in days gone by, in the voice
and manner of his former partner. And yet—and yet he sat opposite to
him now, smiling amicably, and without, so far as Ben could see, the
faintest recognition of the man with whom he had lived so long in close
intimacy—an intimacy which had found its end in a deadly struggle.
The meal was concluded leisurely, and apparently with complete
satisfaction on the part of the stranger; but Ben had been unable to
swallow a mouthful from the moment he recognised him. Then Rube—if
Rube it were—rose, nodded civilly, bade him ‘good-evening,’ as is the
western fashion, after early morning is past, and left. By an enormous
effort, Ben, on his return to the store, mastered himself sufficiently
to avoid questioning on the part of Mr Showle, who nevertheless told
him that he was looking somewhat scared.
Ben turned the conversation from his looks, a diversion he was able
to effect the more easily as Mr Showle was particularly anxious for
him to come round to his house that evening to meet Mr Morede, the new
partner, who was certain to be there, and who was most desirous of
seeing Mr Creelock. ‘He wants,’ concluded the old merchant, ‘to hear
all about the West and the mines. I thought he had once been there
himself; but seems not, and he wants to hear all about them.’
Ben returned a dubious answer. He could not pledge himself to go to
the merchant’s house that night, as he really felt too unwell. His
nerves—articles of which he had not previously had the slightest idea
that he was the possessor—had received such a shock, that he felt he
was not fit for general company—that the slightest incident would jar
and upset them.
He called at the house where Miss Alken boarded, to explain that he
should not be at the merchant’s that night, for he knew she was going
there; and when he saw her, he was struck by the increased haggardness
of her aspect.
‘Say, Ruth, what is the matter?’ began Ben. ‘If you have heard no bad
news, and have nothing to upset your mind, it is time we had Doctor
Burt to see you; that is so.’
Miss Alken hesitated a moment, and then said: ‘Mr Creelock—well, Ben,
then!’—as the ex-miner made a gesture of impatience; ‘I have indeed
something on my mind, which I ought to have told you earlier, and which
I see I had better tell now.—Nay; do not look so alarmed. It is nothing
which ought to give me pain, or yourself, yet it does distress me.
Shall I go on?’
‘Go on!’ echoed Ben; ‘of course you must go on. And you know, Ruth,
that if it is in the power of man or money to relieve you, I am the
man—and ought to be the man—who will do it.’
Miss Alken smiled faintly, then proceeded: ‘I had thought to keep back
the information until you had met the person most concerned in it; but
as I learn now there will be another delay, and as the suspense is
terrible to me, I will hesitate no longer. The new partner in Showle
and Bynnes—Mr Morede—is my brother. My half-brother, I should say,’
continued Ruth. ‘I had hoped, until his arrival actually took place,
that he would not come; for he has been uncertain and unreliable all
his life. But he has kept to his purpose now, it seems. He has been the
bane of our family. His recklessness and extravagance brought down our
home, from which, eventually, his quarrelsome and revengeful spirit
forced him to fly to save his life. I suffered, as did my sisters; and
but for the kindness of Mr Bynnes, who was distantly akin to my mother,
it would have been worse for us. Very strangely, however, Mr Bynnes
never quite lost his liking for Morede, and has, I believe, supplied
part of the capital necessary to make him a partner here. But stranger
still, although he has reduced me, with the rest of the family, to
poverty, I believe my brother, as we have always called him, is, in
his way, really fond of me. Yet I dreaded his presence here, as being
certain in some sort to bring evil with it I cannot tell how, but I
dread it. Yet, now I have seen him, he appears changed. It may be that
added years have given him reflection and steadiness; yet I do not
think it is _that_. There is something utterly inexplicable in him,
which of course no stranger could see. He is entirely silent about his
life of late years, although willing enough to speak of early days at
home. He has heard me speak of you, and says he knows he shall like
you, and is anxious to know you. And all this is so very different from
what I remember of him, that I hope he is changed.’
‘Changed! Of course he is, Ruth!’ exclaimed Ben. ‘As they say in the
old country, he has sown his wild-oats. Don’t think that because a boy
has once been bad, he is never to be good; or once wild, that he will
never be steady. I shall like him for his own sake, and for yours too,
Ruth, I am quite certain. I cannot see him to-night, for a reason I
have; but to-morrow I will meet him, and reckon I shall have gained a
fresh friend in Ruth’s brother.’
THE TROUBADOURS.
There is a charm in the very name of the troubadours that surrounds
those wandering minstrels of old with peculiar interest. Their canzons,
sirventés, and pastorelas carry us back to the picturesque ages of
colour and splendour, and are almost our only source of information
as to those heroes of medieval romance whose names have acquired a
legendary fame. During the brilliant period in which they sang, the
country of the Langue d’Oc was awake with the din of arms, the stir of
thousands in the crusades against the Saracens, which had their origin
in the south of France; and in the chivalrous character of the holy
wars; the quarrels of rival families, the gorgeous pageantry of the
tournaments, and above all, in the glorification of love and martial
fame, were found inexhaustible materials for descriptive poetry.
The troubadours—harbingers of reviving culture in the middle
ages—displayed in their highly finished literature a refinement and
splendour of imagination, an intensity and warmth, which, with the
power they wielded, gradually changed the life, the tastes, the
manners, of their times; whilst the quaint imagery, with the richness
of colouring of Provençal song, left traces of its ascendency in the
works of more than one celebrated Italian poet, as well as in English
poetry long before the Elizabethan age. It was between the tenth and
thirteenth centuries that all the varied forms of Provençal poetry
flourished, affording the means of livelihood—even, in some instances,
the acquisition of considerable wealth—to many wandering minstrels.
Thierry says: ‘In the twelfth century, the songs of the troubadours
circulating rapidly from castle to castle, and from town to town,
supplied the place of periodical gazettes in all the country between
the rivers Isère and Vienne, the mountains of Auvergne and the two
seas.’
By far the greater number of troubadours known to us were nobles of
high birth, or soldiers who had won knighthood on the field, with
whom poetry was a passion, and who devoted themselves with enthusiasm
to the cultivation of the gay science. Such were the Barons of the
March, the Dauphin of Auvergne, the Viscounts of Limoges, Ventadour,
and Camborn, with many other renowned princes and knights. Who has
not heard of the lays of Richard Cœur-de-Lion, and of Alfonso, king
of Portugal—those paladins of old, whose heroic exploits against the
Infidel were the theme of wandering minstrels in every Christian court
throughout Europe? In those days, when chivalry surrounded woman with
an atmosphere of sacredness, and love was looked upon as a sort of
feudal service, wherein the knight played the part of vassal, and the
lady that of suzerain, it was part of the code of honour to become
the champion of some one mistress, whose charms were extolled in
verse; and each powerful châtelain, in the intervals of war, after
ruthless slaughter, battles, and treason, would indite to his lady-love
pastorals full of tender sentiment, and redolent of the fragrance of
fields and flowers.
The aristocracy of fair Provence, in its heyday of glory and
prosperity, was, notwithstanding this addiction to verse, perhaps
the most reckless and profligate the world has ever seen. One of the
foremost Barons of the March was Bertrand Von Born, a typical war-like
troubadour of the twelfth century. Prominent in the political quarrels
of the day, a perfect firebrand of war, he was courted and dreaded
by princes and kings; ever in search of new lands and new loves,
wielding with equal vigour the lyre and the sword, in the science of
war and the art of love he was without a rival. Sometimes fighting with
Cœur-de-Lion, sometimes against him, this true child of the Langue
d’Oc, after many gallant defences, was captured, but through the
extraordinary influence he exerted over his captors, escaped with life
and liberty. After a long and stormy career, Bertrand Von Born ended
his days as a monk in the monastery of Coteaux.
In the gallery of noble and stately figures furnished by Provençal
poetry, we have a picture of enduring historic interest left us by
the troubadour Rambaud of Vaquieras, of the famous Boniface, Marquis
of Montferrat, one of an heroic family of crusaders, who was himself
a troubadour and the _beau-idéal_ of a knight-errant, comforting the
afflicted, punishing the wicked, and relieving distressed damsels.
When the preaching of Fulk of Neuilly roused the chivalry of France,
Champagne, and Flanders to a new crusade, Rambaud followed the banner
of his brother-in-arms the Marquis to Palestine, winning knighthood,
singing and fighting his way through all the perils of the holy war.
His songs are a record of splendidly dramatic incidents; and in the
vivid sketches of his surroundings, we are enabled to trace the events
in the life of the great soldier-poet, in whom all the virtues and
vices of his ancestors seem to have been personified.
To Raymond de Miravals, who, Nostradamus informs us, was ‘deeply
learned in the science of love,’ we are indebted for a series of
life-like portraits of some of the loveliest women of the period. This
fashionable poet, notorious for his misfortunes in love, died ‘poor,
and worn out in body and mind,’ after spending many years of his life
sighing in the train of a noted beauty. An old French chronicler
writes: ‘Through the songs of Raymond, was Adelais admired and sought
of all the barons far and near, and she became the subject of curiosity
even at the courts of Aragon and Toulouse, and the king and the count
sent her messages and presents of jewels, which she willingly accepted.’
The great ambition of ladies in the days of chivalry was to be
eulogised in song, and made famous by the canzons and madrigals of
the troubadours; so long as they were the theme, it mattered not how
gallant and equivocal was the poetry. The Countess of Tripolis was
the cause of the melancholy and dramatic episode which cut short the
brilliant career of Rudel, a minstrel attached to the service of
Cœur-de-Lion, who ‘became beyond measure the lover’ of this lady, whom
he had never seen! Having sung her praises through all Provence, he
set out on a pilgrimage in search of the far-famed beauty; but after
enduring many miseries on his disastrous journey, he reached the shores
of Palestine only to die in the arms of his ladye-love. The Countess,
who had hastened to welcome him on his arrival, placed his body, we
are told, ‘in a rich and honourable tomb of porphyry, on which were
inscribed some verses in the Arabic tongue.’
Another minstrel in the train of Richard was the world-renowned Peter
Vidal, unrivalled as an improvisatore, and gifted with an exquisite
voice. He travelled far and wide, scattering canzons and sirventés
over Christendom; and his Jongleur’s Story produces perhaps a greater
impression, and clings to the memory with more strange fascination,
than any lyrical composition of the period. Vidal was for some time
in the household of the lord of Baux, whose fame as a troubadour was
also great. It was in return for the lays of this high-born minstrel
that Frederick Barbarossa presented to him the ancient city of
Orange. Conquered by the Saracens, re-conquered by Charlemagne, this
interesting old place boasts of one of the most romantic histories in
the annals of French towns, and its vicissitudes were commemorated in
Provençal song. Marseilles, Toulouse, Carcassonne, were all famous
cities of the Langue d’Oc; but perhaps the favourite haunt of the
wandering troubadours was Aix, the ancient capital of Provence, where
the richest rewards of jewels, money, arms, &c., besides unbounded
hospitality, were sure to follow the exhibition of their skill.
Who could imagine that this little moribund town, a few miles from
Marseilles, was at one time the dwelling-place of a noble family, the
centre of the most brilliant circle in Southern France? Who can realise
in its picturesque decay, the pomp and pageantry of its old historic
aspect in the days of chivalry, when Giovanni the troubadour Count of
Provence, the last inheritor of a mighty name, sang in his court at
Aix? The fondest and proudest memories have gathered round the name of
Count Giovanni, his country, his people, his valour.
It is curious to note in the records of the troubadours how many
successful followers of the ‘gentle craft’ were connected with the
cloister. The witty and dissolute monk of Montaudon was known as a
fashionable poet; whilst his superior, Folquet, afterwards Bishop of
Toulouse, from a gay troubadour became a fierce religious despot.
Many ecclesiastics were sent from the monasteries to preach a sort
of musical crusade against the heretics in the Langue d’Oc, who also
had their champions in the land of song. Some even became military
chiefs of high renown. Conspicuous amongst them was the monk Louis
Lascaris, a son of the Count of Ventimiglia. To quote from Nostradamus,
who discourses much on this member of an ancient and noble family:
‘He was of such a happy wit, not only in the poetical Provençal, but
also in the vulgar dialects, that nobody could equal his sweetness or
his invention. While yet a youth, he took holy orders in a monastery;
but afterwards falling in love with a lady of the neighbourhood, the
sister of the great Isnard of Glanderes, he married her, and had five
children. The queen Giovanna having a powerful army in Provence for the
expulsion of the free-companies, gave the command thereof to Lascaris,
who was valiant and skilled in war. At the end of the campaign, the
envy and malice of his ill-wishers caused him to be persecuted by Pope
Urban V., who desired that he should return to his convent. But he, who
would rather have chosen death in preference, and who saw that the pope
was every day becoming more and more exasperated against him, went with
a fine equipage to the court of the queen Giovanna, whose protection
he claimed.’ The queen of Naples ‘duly considered the services that
the poet had rendered, and those that he might yet render her crown.
Seeing, besides, that he was a gentleman of handsome person and gay and
generous disposition, she wrote so earnestly in his favour to the pope
at Avignon, that His Holiness consented to fix a period of twenty-five
years at the end of which the poet was to return to his cell.’
Lascaris, however, did not outlive the allotted time.
In this cursory sketch of the troubadours, it would be impossible to
enumerate each of the fifty-seven poets whose names are associated with
Provençal literature; but we must not forget two or three of those best
remembered of their age and country. The unfortunate Luc de la Barre,
whose songs reflecting on Henry II., roused the vengeance of that
monarch, was hunted from place to place and blinded, when he refused
all sustenance, and died of famine and despair. The love-affair of
Bertrand of Pezers, a professor of Provençal poetry, with a young and
lovely girl in his school, whom he married in spite of all opposition,
excited great sympathy and interest. The adventurous couple commenced a
life of wandering minstrelsy; and the ‘Monk of the Golden Isle’ informs
us that before entering a château, they would make inquiries as to the
occupants; and ‘then, with wonderful quickness, they would compose a
song ornamented with the memorable deeds in love, war, and the chase,
of the châtelain and his progenitors.’
Another wandering couple were the celebrated Raymond Ferrand and the
lady of Courbon, who retired from the world, after some years of joyous
minstrelsy, to convents within sight of each other. This lady of
Courbon was notorious as one of the presidents of the ‘Court of Love,’
held in the castle of Romanini. Queen Eleanor, wife of Henry II.,
the Countess of Champagne, the Countess of Narbonne, and many noted
beauties, gave sentences in these courts, which Hallam speaks of as
‘fantastical solemnities where ridiculous questions of gallantry were
debated.’ To borrow the language of Sismondi—the noble ladies of that
period ‘instituted courts of love, in which questions of gallantry were
gravely discussed and determined by their suffrages; in a word, they
had brought the whole of the south of France into a state of carnival,
which forms a singular contrast to the ideas of reserve, virtue, and
modesty which we ascribe to the good old times.’
In Provence, during the middle ages, the serenade was a custom, with
the charming alba and serena—morning and evening songs. Many chivalrous
singers were adepts in this light and characteristic form of Provençal
poetry.
An old proverb says, ‘The Arabs’ registers are the verses of their
bards;’ and so these medieval canzons and madrigals—which are
inseparably connected with a most romantic era—present the old life
with all its grand ideas and great actions; bringing many illustrious
names out of the dim mists of fable into the clear daylight of history.
‘HOME! SWEET HOME!’
’Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.
The hearts of thousands have thrilled at these words, so pregnant with
home-love—words that have made home dearer and more precious than it
was before—words expressing the tenderest feelings of thousands, to
whom expression had previously been denied. Many a sweet singer, as she
warbles the familiar song, knows not who was its author; therefore, it
may be well to give a slight sketch of his character and somewhat sad
career.