Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm;
Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway,
That, hushed in grim repose, expects his evening prey.--_Gray_.
It was a week before "class day,"--that eventful day which was
virtually to close the college career of Morton and his
contemporaries. The little janitor, commonly called Paddy O'Flinn, was
ringing the evening prayer bell from the cupola of Harvard Hall,--its
tone was dull and muffled, some graceless sophomore having lately
painted it white, inside and out,--and the students were mustering at
the summons. The sedate and the gay, the tender freshman and the
venerable senior, the prosperous city beau and the awkward country
bumpkin, one and all were filing from their respective quarters
towards the chapel in University Hall. The bell ceased; the loiterers
quickened their steps; the last belated freshman, with the dread of
the proctor before his eyes, bounded frantically up the steps; and for
a brief space all was silence and solitude. Then there was a
murmuring, rushing sound, as of a coming tempest, and University Hall
disgorged its contents, casting forth the freshmen and juniors at one
door, and the sophomores and seniors at the other.
Of these last was Morton, who, with three or four of his class, walked
across the college yard, towards the great gateway. By his side was a
young man named Rosny, carelessly dressed, but with a lively,
dare-devil face, and the look of a good-natured game cock.
"I shall be sorry to leave this place," said Morton; "I like it. I
like the elms, and the gravel walks, and the scurvy old brick and
mortar buildings."
"Then I am not of your mind," said Rosny; "gravel or mud, brickbats or
paving stones, they are the same to me, the world over. Halloo, Wren,"
to a mustachioed youth who just then joined them; "we are bound to
your room."
"That's as it should be. But where are the rest?"
"Coming--all in good time; here's one of them."
A dapper little person approached, with a shining beaver, yellow kid
gloves, a switch cane, and a very stiff but somewhat dashing cravat,
surmounted by a round and rubicund face.
"Ah, Chester!" exclaimed Wren; "the very man we were looking for. Come
and take a glass of punch at my room."
"Punch, indeed!" replied Chester, whose face had changed from a prim
expression to one of great hilarity the moment he saw his
friends--"no, no, gentlemen, I renounce punch and all its works. The
pure unmixed, the pure juice of the grape for me."
"But, Chester," urged Wren, "won't the pure mountain dew be a
sufficient inducement?"
"The good company will be a sufficient inducement," said Chester,
waving his hand,--"the good company, gentlemen,--and the good liquor.
But what have we here? Meredith and Vinal walking side by side. Good
Heavens, what a conjunction!"
The objects of Chester's astonishment, on a flattering invitation from
Wren, joined the party, which, however, was weakened by the temporary
secession of Rosny, who, pleading an errand in the village, left them
with a promise to rejoin them soon. His place was in a few moments
more than supplied by a new party of recruits, among whom was Stubb.
Arrived at Wren's room, the desk and other appliances of study were
banished from the table; bottles and glasses usurped their place, and
the company composed themselves for conversation, most of them
permitting their chairs to stand quietly on all fours, though one or
two, like heathen Yankees from the backwoods, forced them to rear
rampant on the hind legs, the occupant's feet resting on the ledge
over the fireplace.
A few minutes passed, when a quick, firm step came up the stairs, and
Rosny entered.
"How are you again, Dick?" said Meredith.
"Good evening, Mr. Rosny," echoed Stubb, who sat alone on the window
seat.
"Eh? what's that?" demanded Rosny, turning sharp round upon the last
speaker, with a face divided between indignation and laughter.
"I said, 'Good evening,'" replied Stubb, much disconcerted.
"And why didn't you say, 'Good morning,' yesterday, eh?--when I met
you in Boston, eh? He gave me the cut direct," turning to the company.
"Mr. Benjamin Stubb, here, gave me the cut direct! It was the
pepper-and-salt coat and the thunder-and-lightning breeches that Stubb
couldn't think of bowing to when he was walking in ---- Street, with a
lady. Look here, Stubb,"--again facing the victim,--"what do you take
me for? and what the devil do you take yourself for? I know your dirty
family history. Your grandfather was a bricklayer, and the Lord knows
who your great grandfather was. The best Huguenot blood of France runs
in _my_ veins! My ancestors were fighting at Ivry and Jarnac, while
yours were peddling coal and potatoes about London streets, or digging
mud in a ditch, for any thing you or I know to the contrary." Stubb
gasped. "Your father has a crest painted on his carriage; but where
did he get it? Why, Cribb, the engraver, stole it for him out of the
British peerage."
Stubb, who was weak and timorous, here rose in great confusion,
muttered something about conduct unbecoming to a gentleman, and
meaning to require an explanation, and abruptly left the room.
"That job is finished," said Rosny, composedly seating himself. "_His_
bill is settled for him."
"But, Dick," said Morton, who had been laughing in his sleeve during
the scene, "do you want to be considered as a Frenchman or an
American?"
"I'm an American," answered Rosny--"an American and a democrat, every
inch."
Rosny had adopted democratic principles and habits partly out of spite
against the class to which Stubb belonged, and which he was pleased to
designate as the "codfish aristocracy," and partly because he thought
that he could thus most effectually gain the ends of his impatient,
hankering ambition. His ancestor, the head of an eminent Huguenot
race, had been driven to America by the persecutions which followed
the revocation of the edict of Nantes. The family had lived ever since
in poverty and obscurity; yet this fiery young democrat nourished an
inordinate pride of birth, and never forgot that he was descended from
a line of warlike nobles.
"No, no," said Rosny, as Morton pushed a glass towards him, "drinking
is against my rule-- Well, as it's about the last time,"--filling the
glass,--"here's to you all."
"The last time!" said Morton; "that's a dismal word. If my next four
years are as pleasant as these last have been, I will never complain
of them."
"I tell you, boys," said Meredith, who was tranquilly puffing at his
cigar, "the cream of our lives is skimmed already. Rough and tumble,
hurry and worry--that will be the story with most of us, more or less,
to the end of our days."
"Rough and tumble!" exclaimed Rosny; "so much the better. 'Scots play
best at the roughest game'--that's just my case. Who wants to be
always paddling about on smooth water? Close reefed topsails, a gale
astern, and breakers all round--that's the game."
"Every one to his taste," said Chester, shrugging his shoulders. "I
suppose a salamander loves the fire, but I don't. 'The race of
ambition'--'the unconquerable will'--pshaw! _Cui bono?_ One chases
after his object, and when he has got it, he turns from it, and chases
another. I profess the philosophy of Horace--enjoy the hour as it
flies. Ah! he was a model man, a man after my own heart, a gentleman
and a man of the world. He could drink his Falernian, and thank the
gods for their gifts."
Rosny whispered in Morton's ear, "Chester ought to have been born a
century ago, among the John Bulls, up in the cockloft of Brazen Nose
College, or some such antediluvian hole."
In spite of these derogatory remarks, Chester, besides being one of
the best scholars in the class, was noted for a social, jovial
disposition, which, though, like Fluellen's valor, a little out of
fashion, made him a general favorite.
"Speaking of the next four years," said Wren, "I wonder what plans
each of us has made for that time. For my part, I have no plan at all,
and should be glad to profit by the suggestions of the rest. Come,
Chester, what do you mean to do?"
"Expatiate," said Chester, expanding his hands, and thereby revealing
an odd little antique ring which he wore; "take mine ease, roaming,
like the bee, from blossom to blossom. I will leave the earnest
men--bah!--the men with a mission--to grub on in their vocation. I
will renounce this land of cotton mills and universal suffrage. First
for Paris, to walk the Boulevards, and go to the masked balls and the
opera;--_vive la bagatelle!_--then for Rome, to saunter through the
Vatican and the picture galleries,--but not to moralize with a long
face over fallen grandeur, and the mutability of human affairs. No,
no, gentlemen, I belong to another school of philosophy. I will sit
among the ruins of the Forum, and laugh, like Democritus, at the image
of Death. Then I will recreate myself at Capri, like the Caesars before
me; then enjoy the _dolce far niente_ at Florence, and read the Tuscan
poets in the shades of Vallombrosa."
"But, Chester," interposed Wren, "don't you ever mean to marry and
settle down?"
"I object to that phrase, 'settle down.' It calls up disagreeable
images. It reminds one of the backwoods, log cabins, men in shirt
sleeves, and piles of pine boards and lumber. Yes, certainly, I mean
to marry. What man of taste would leave matrimony out of his scheme of
life? One likes to gather his treasures round him, his pictures, his
vases, and statues; and how can he adorn his rooms with an ornament
more exquisite--where can he find a piece of furniture more charmingly
moulded--than a beautiful woman?"
This flourish, between jest and earnest, he pronounced with a graceful
wave of his hand.
"If, when you have married your beautiful woman," said Morton, "you
find you have caught a Tartar, it will serve you right."
"Hear him," said Chester; "hear the barbarian. He will always be
conjuring up some image of disquiet. 'Rest, rest, perturbed spirit.'"
"He could not rest, if he tried," said Horace Vinal.
"No, he is one of those unfortunates who lie under a sentence of
endless activity. It is a disease, with which men are afflicted for
the sins of their ancestors; and for the sins of mine I was born among
a whole nation of such. Perpetual motion, bustle and whirl,--I grow
dizzy to think of it. They cannot rest themselves, and will not let
any one else rest. Always pursuing, always doing, never enjoying. A
true American cannot enjoy. He would build a steam saw mill in
Arcadia, and dam up the four rivers of Paradise for cotton factories."
"But, Chester," said Wren, "that is not at all like Morton; you know
he hates utilitarianism."
"Yes, but still he cannot rest. He would not build saw mills and dams;
but he would be sure to fire his rifle at some of Adam's live stock,
and set all Eden by the ears. Come, Morton, I have told the company my
plans. Let us hear what yours are."
"My guardian wishes me to enter the law school."
"You are twenty-one now," said Vinal, "and can do as you please."
Vinal was a very tall and slender young man, with a strongly marked
face, though thin and pale; a grave, thoughtful eye, and compressed
lips, expressing a kind of nervous self-control. His dress was very
elaborate and scrupulous, though without the smallest trace of
foppery. He was less popular in the class than Morton, but had the
reputation of greater talents. This he owed, perhaps, to his habitual
reserve; for every one thought that he understood Morton thoroughly,
while few pretended to fathom the silent and self-contained Vinal.
"I should like well enough to study law," was Morton's non-committal
answer.
"I thought, Morton, that you were more of a philosopher. Here you are,
a young fellow, full of blood, and worth half a million, and yet you
speak of buckling down to the law. That is all well enough for poor
dogs like me, who go into the mill from necessity. We drudge on for
twenty years or more, till we have scraped together a competency, or
something better, perhaps, and then we find that we have forgotten how
to enjoy it. We have grown so used to harness that we are good for
nothing out of it, and sacrifice body and soul to our profession. You
have reached already the point that we are straining for. The world is
all before you, man; launch out and enjoy yourself."
"Didn't you just say," asked Rosny, "that Morton couldn't rest, if he
tried?"
"I said he could not rest, but I did not say he could not enjoy
himself. Look at him: his cheek is ruddier and browner than any of us.
Nobody would believe that a fellow like that was not made to enjoy
life. I know Morton. He could roam from blossom to blossom, as Chester
says, with as good a will as any body. He has an eye for the fair sex,
correct as he is at present. He knows a pretty face from a plain one.
The devil will catch him yet with a black eye and a rosy cheek."
"Then," said Morton, "he will show his good opinion of my taste."
Rosny, who had his own reasons for disliking Vinal, here broke in
without ceremony,--
"Be gad, Vinal, he will bait his hook differently when he fishes for
you."
"How will that be, Dick?" said Meredith.
"With a five dollar bank note, and a lying puff in a newspaper; and
Vinal will jump at it like a mackerel at a red rag."
Vinal laughed, but with a bad grace.
"Riches and fame!" said Chester, anxious to smooth away all traces of
irritation--"riches and fame! I call those legitimate objects of
pursuit; and the black eye is positively praiseworthy. Come, Morton,
let us hear your plan. You have not told it yet."
"I defer to Rosny--he is my senior. Dick, some ten or twelve years
from this, I suppose I shall vote against you for the presidency."
"Thank you. By that time you will have no whig party left to vote
with. The democrats will have it all their own way."
"I have often wondered what could have induced a driving man of the
world like you to come to college at all. You have been here more than
a year; and in the same time, with your previous knowledge, you might
have learned as much any where else at half the cost. You are not the
fellow to regard a degree of A. M. with superstitious veneration."
"You are right there, colonel. I am of no kith nor kin to some of your
New England old fogies, who would give their souls for a D. D. or an
LL. D.--and get it, too, though they know no more Greek or Hebrew than
I know of Choctaw, and can barely manage to stumble along through the
Latin Testament. What's a piece of sheep's skin to me? Humbug is the
current coin all the world over, and just as much in this free and
enlightened country as any where else. I have schemes on foot,--not
political,--no matter what they are,--out in the western country; and
I happen to know that a degree from Harvard University is the medicine
that suits my case; with that for my credentials, I shall carry it
over all competitors. Yes, boys, gammon is the word; and the man who
would rise in the world must use the stepping stones."
"You're a victim of the national disease, Rosny," said Chester.
"Rising in the world!--that's the idea that ruins us. It's that that
makes us lean, starveling, nervous, restless, dyspeptic,
hypochondriac,--the most prosperous and most uncomfortable people on
earth. Sit down, man, and take your ease. What garden will thrive if
every plant in it must be dug up every day, and set out in a better
place?"
"Ah, that's good doctrine for you. You have got nothing to gain, and a
good deal to lose. Stand up for the _status quo_, old boy; I would, in
your place. Look at me, though. I was cut adrift at fourteen,--parents
dead,--not a cent in my pocket,--and since then I have tumbled along
through the world as I could. You can't kill me. I have more lives
than a cat. I have been thrown on my back a dozen times; but the
harder I was flung down, the higher I bounced up again. Why, I have
known the time when I was glad to earn a shilling by shovelling snow
off a sidewalk. I have tried my hand at every thing,--printer's work,
lecturing, politics, editing, keeping school,--and do you suppose I
shall be content to rest in the mud all my days? Not a bit of it. I
know my cue better. The time will come when you'll see me shooting up
like a rocket."
Here a broad glare against the window interrupted him, and, looking
out, his auditors saw a bonfire blazing with peculiar splendor under
the windows of the chamber where the Faculty were at that moment in
solemn session. Three proctors and a tutor were hastening towards the
scene of outrage, when a stentorian voice from the adjacent darkness
roared forth a warning that there was a canister of gunpowder in the
fire expected every moment to explode. The prudent officers therefore
kept their distance, busying themselves with noting down the names of
several innocent spectators, while the bonfire subsided to a natural
death, the gunpowder hoax having perfectly succeeded.
Mr. Wren's guests resumed their seats, mingling with graver matters
the usual badinage of a college gathering; and when at length they
separated, only a lonely light or two glimmered from among the many
windows of the academic barracks which overlook the college green.