Montagu gave me the paper, and I cherish it as my dearest memorial of my
erring but noble schoolboy friend.
Knowing how strong an interest Mr Rose always took in Eric, I gave him
a copy of these verses when last I visited him at his pleasant vicarage
of Seaford, to which he was presented a year or two ago by Dr Rowlands,
now Bishop of Roslyn, who has also appointed him examining chaplain. I
sat and watched Mr Rose while he read them. A mournful interest was
depicted on his face, his hand trembled a little, and I fancied that he
bent his grey hair over the paper to hide a tear. We always knew at
school that Eric was one of his greatest favourites, as indeed he and
Vernon were with all of us; and when the unhappy boy had run away
without even having the opportunity for bidding any one farewell, Mr
Rose displayed such real grief, that for weeks he was like a man who
went mourning for a son. After those summer holidays, when we returned
to school, Montagu and Wildney brought back with them the intelligence
of Eric's return to Fairholm, and of his death. The news plunged many
of us in sorrow, and when, on the first Sunday in chapel, Mr Rose
alluded to this sad tale, there were few dry eyes among those who
listened to him. I shall never forget that Sunday afternoon. A deep
hush brooded over us, and before the sermon was over, many a face was
hidden to conceal the emotion which could not be suppressed.
"I speak," said Mr Rose, "to a congregation of mourners, for one who
but a few weeks back was sitting among you as one of yourselves. But,
for myself, I do _not_ mourn over his death. Many a time have I mourned
for him in past days, when I marked how widely he went astray--but I do
not mourn now, for after his fiery trials he died penitent and happy,
and at last his sorrows are over for ever, and the dreams of ambition
have vanished, and the fires of passion have been quenched, and for all
eternity the young soul is in the presence of its God. Let none of you
think that his life has been wasted. Possibly, had it pleased Heaven to
spare him, he might have found great works to do among his fellow-men,
and he would have done them as few else could. But do not let us fancy
that our work must cease of necessity with our lives. Not so; far
rather must we believe that it will continue for ever, seeing that we
are all partakers of God's unspeakable blessing, the common mystery of
immortality. Perhaps it may be the glorious destiny of very many here
to recognise that truth more fully when we meet and converse with our
dear departed brother in a holier and happier world."
I have preserved some faint echo of the words he used, but I can give no
conception of the dignity and earnestness of his manner, or the intense
pathos of his tones.
The scene passed before me again as I looked at him, while he lingered
over Eric's verses, and seemed lost in a reverie of thought.
At last he looked up and sighed. "Poor Eric!--But no, I will not call
him poor! After all, he is happier now than we. You loved him well,"
he continued; "why do you not try and preserve some records of his
life?"
The suggestion took me by surprise, but I thought over it, and at once
began to accomplish it. My own reminiscences of Eric were numerous and
vivid, and several of my old school-fellows and friends gladly supplied
me with other particulars, especially the Bishop of Roslyn, Mr Rose,
Montagu, and Wildney. So the story of Eric's ruin has been told, and
told, as he would have wished it done, with simple truth. Poor Eric! I
do not fear that I have wronged your memory, and you, I know, would
rejoice to think how sorrowful hours have lost something of their
sorrow, as I wrote the scenes in so many of which we were engaged
together in our schoolboy days.
I visited Roslyn a short time ago, and walked for hours along the sands,
picturing in my memory the pleasant faces, and recalling the joyous
tones of the many whom I had known and loved. Other boys were playing
by the sea-side, who were strangers to me and I to them; and as I marked
how wave after wave rolled up the shore, with its murmur and its foam,
each sweeping farther than the other, each effacing the traces of the
last, I saw an emblem of the passing generations, and was content to
find that my place knew me no more.
Ah me! the golden time:--
But its hours have passed away,
With the pure and bracing clime,
And the bright and merry day.
And the sea still laughs to the rosy shells ashore,
And the shore still shines in the lustre of the wave;
But the joyaunce and the beauty of the boyish days is o'er,
And many of the beautiful lie quiet in the grave;
And he who comes again
Wears a brow of toil and pain,
And wanders sad and silent by the melancholy main.