"Impassive, fearing but the shame of fear,A stoic of the woods, a man without a tear."
Among his own people, beneath the shield of British justice, with a public to whom oppression never appeals in vain he sank unmanned; and in utter prostration of spirit he signed the recantation in the terms in which it was desired, and marched out of prison a heartbroken and ruined man.
But the cup of the iniquities of his oppressors was now full, and their hour of retribution was at hand. The blow dealt against them was not so severe as injured justice might have required, but it was dealt with an ignominious scorn that made compensation for its want of severity. There were at that time many men of high spirit and great attainments in the Scottish bar. They knew that the age they belonged to was one, in which the safety of the public liberties was intimately allied with the independence of the bar. It was not an uncommon practice for a few of the ablest and most popular advocates to unite together in vindication of the victim of some formidable system of oppression; and, fortunately for Williamson, his case attracted their generous interest. Andrew Crosbie, the prototype of Scott's Pleydell, threw his whole energies, and they were not small, into this cause. The pleadings at our bar at that time were full of philosophy, general declamation, and poetry; and we have before us some papers from Crosbie's pen which are brilliant and pleasing specimens of this class of forensic rhetoric. At the present day the rhetoric of the law appeals only to the jury, and in the shape of vocal oratory. In the days of our grandfathers it was addressed to the learned bench, and was embodied in carefully prepared written pleadings. The intellectual rank of the audience to be influenced, and the medium of communication, would thus naturally invest the pleadings of these old lawyers with a literary turn, not equalled in the corresponding productions of this age. So we find thatCrosbie bursts open the case with these well-turned periods:—
"That liberty which the constitution of this country considers as its favourite object, is the result of the due equipoise which our law has established between the authority of magistrates and the rights of the people. As the relative duties of society must be enforced by the magistrate, and compliance with the laws exacted from the citizens by means of his authority, all the power that is necessary for these salutary purposes is bestowed upon him; and, in the due execution of it, he is not only entitled to the protection of the law, but is an object of its veneration. Yet the same principles that have thus armed him with authority, for the benefit of society, have wisely imposed on him a restraint from abusing it."
The result of these proceedings was, that, in 1762, the Court unanimously awarded to Williamson damages to the extent of £100; and it was declared that, for this sum as well as £80 of costs, the guilty individuals should be personally liable, "and that the same shall be no burden upon the town of Aberdeen." A corporation is a sort of ideal object; it has no personality; it has been pronounced, by a high authority, to have no conscience; it has just one reality about it—it has a purse. Into this purse its members may have been accustomed, from time to time, to dip for the deeds done by them in the flesh—that is, in their corporeal, not their corporate capacity. Perhaps the law, in countenancing this arrangement, considered that the members of a corporation must be so essentially wound up in its interests, that parting with the money of the corporation—that is, with the money of the public—was as great a punishment for their own individual delicts as parting with their own. Be this as it may, the Court decreed that, on this occasion, the public of Aberdeen should not pay for the outrage inflicted on Williamson. Now let us behold the ingenuity with which these worshipful gentlemen baffled the Court, and made the public pay after all. There were certain dues collected by the magistrates, as deputies of the Lord High Admiral of the Coast. It appears that this high official might have applied the sums so levied to his own use, but he had ceased for some considerable time to exact them, and, by consuetude, they had been added to the revenues of the corporation. Now, if the Lord High Admiral had set covetous eyes on this fund, to apply it to his own domestic purposes, the act might have been considered one of unutterable meanness—perhaps the corporation would have resisted it. But, on the other hand, to demand a portion of this money, and use it for getting the members of the corporation out of a scrape, was a highly public-spirited act. The High Admiral assigned £180 from this fund, to pay the damages and costs to Williamson:[21]it need not be said, that of course this application was suggested to him by persons who had the best reason to believe that the corporation would not resist it, and that all the business arrangements for his operation on the fund were simplified to his hand.
Having been so far successful, Williamson, who seems to have had an insuperable objection to half-measures, raised an action of damages against his kidnappers. It has been asserted, though we do not know on what authority, that the Crown was desirous to institute criminal proceedings against them, but that they were protected by a clause of indemnity in some act of parliament. Williamson boldly laid his damages at £1000. His perseverance drove his adversaries to a series of extraordinary, and in this country, fortunately, unprecedented measures. They persuaded Williamson that it would be for the mutual advantage of the parties to have the matter settled by arbitration, without the costly intervention of the Court of Session. He adopted the advice, and the decision fell to be given by James Forbes of Shiels, Sheriff-Substitute of Aberdeenshire, acting as oversman. We are introduced to this gentleman's convivial character in a most startling manner, by the statement of counsel that the Sheriff's mother, Lady Shiels, "died about the 4th of November, and there can be nodoubt that he would get a hearty dose at her burial." It was accordingly on that occasion that the worthy judge appears to have commenced a series of potations, under the pressure of which he speedily followed his parent to the grave. Williamson's affair came through his hands in the very climax of his convivial fit; and both parties seem to have considered it their duty to minister assiduously to these furious cravings, which ever cried with the Cyclop "Δος μοι ἑτι προφρων."
Williamson was not backward in contributing to the Sheriff's conviviality. His own account of his motives was, that knowing Forbes to be prepared to decide unfairly, he wished to keep him so hard at his beloved pursuit of drinking, that he should have no opportunity of exercising his other avocation of judging. Accordingly, he employed a friend "to tenchel and drink" the Sheriff—or, as it is elsewhere expressed, "to drink him hard;" in fact, the operation is talked of quite in an abbreviated and technical form, as a common proceeding in the way of business in the Sheriff Court. The drouthy crony who performed this duty seems to have taken to it with the same disinterested zeal, with which Kean sat up three nights drinking with a friend under depression, for the purpose of keeping up his spirits. The favoured individual must have felt his task coming light to his hands, when he found the Sheriff in a tavern "busy at hot punch about eleven o'clock forenoon." An attempt was made on him by the enemy, but Williamson and his drinking assistant carried him off in triumph to the "New Inn" to dinner, where, however, they were obliged to submit to the presence of the other party, who held a hospitable competition with them in plying the Sheriff with the liquor which he loved. Here they all "sat close drinking, as is the phrase in that part of the country,helter skelter—that is, copiously and alternately of different liquors—till 11 o'clock at night, when Forbes, by this time dead-drunk, was conveyed home by his two servant maids, with the assistance of George Williamson, Gerard, and the Pursuer." This is the counsel's history of the day, and that it is not an exaggerated one, we may infer from an average quotation from the evidence: one of the witnesses thus concludes his narrative:—
"Depones, that from four o'clock in the afternoon to eleven o'clock that night, they all drunk what they call in AberdeenshireHelter Skelter, alternately of different liquors, and plentifully, in such a way that the Sheriff in particular was very drunk, and the deponent himself was also drunk. That the Sheriff's two servant maids came for him with a lantern to carry him home, and came into the room where the company was, and staid there some time—fully a quarter of an hour—and got some drink, but what it was he cannot tell. That the Sheriff called for a good part of the liquor which was drunk. That at last the deponent assisted to carry home the Sheriff, who was not able to walk; and either the pursuer or Mr Gerard assisted the deponent in so doing; and the two maids went before him with a lantern, and placed him in his easy-chair in his bedroom, and then the Sheriff called upon his maids to give the company drink, which the maids refused to give, and then they came away and left him."
"Depones, that from four o'clock in the afternoon to eleven o'clock that night, they all drunk what they call in AberdeenshireHelter Skelter, alternately of different liquors, and plentifully, in such a way that the Sheriff in particular was very drunk, and the deponent himself was also drunk. That the Sheriff's two servant maids came for him with a lantern to carry him home, and came into the room where the company was, and staid there some time—fully a quarter of an hour—and got some drink, but what it was he cannot tell. That the Sheriff called for a good part of the liquor which was drunk. That at last the deponent assisted to carry home the Sheriff, who was not able to walk; and either the pursuer or Mr Gerard assisted the deponent in so doing; and the two maids went before him with a lantern, and placed him in his easy-chair in his bedroom, and then the Sheriff called upon his maids to give the company drink, which the maids refused to give, and then they came away and left him."
Next day the enemy took possession of Forbes by acoup de main. They seized him in bed, half through his drunken sleep, and conveyed him to a favourite houf, kept by a man with the historical name of Archibald Campbell. There "tea and coffee were called for to breakfast, but as these insipid liquors were not to Forbes's mind, a large dose of spirits, white wine, and punch was administered to him, with cooling draughts of porter from time to time." The kidnappers hired a whole floor of the inn for that eventful day—it was the last on which the reference remained valid, so that if it passed without a decision, the question went back to the Court of Session; and the worthy confederates gave express instructions that Williamson was not to obtain access to their conclave, and that Forbes was to be denied to him. That sport of fortune became naturally alarmed when he heard that Forbes was not at home; and knowing instinctively where else he was likely to be, searched for him "in all the taverns in town," as Seldon tells us that the King of Spain was searched for in London when he was outlawed. One of the waiters, in his evidence, stated that Williamson came to the house and "inquired at the deponentif Shiels was there, to which he answered, in obedience to the orders he had received from collector Finlayson, that Shiels wasnotthere; that on this the pursuer left Mr Campbell's house, and (having returned in about an hour) he insisted with the deponent that Shiels was in the house, and that it was to no purpose to deny him, for that he knew by the deponent's face that he was there. But deponent still denied that Shiels was in the house." Deponent was, unfortunately for his professional prospects, not sufficiently brazen-faced for a waiter. The Sheriff was soon brought "up to the mark." Cards were introduced, and they had a roaring day of it. For the sake of appearances, at the time when he was making up his judicial mind, the Sheriff retired to a room alone. Here a message was conveyed to him from his sister, intimating that he had made an appointment for that day, and the time to keep it had arrived. "Whereupon," says a witness, "Shiels touched his nose with his finger, and said 'Jode'—a by-word of his—'Davie, you see from whence this comes'—that Shiels returned for answer to his servant that he could not go, being engaged about peremptory business." He first spoke about awarding "a trifle" to Williamson. In the end he gave a decision entirely against his claim; and the confederates considered this so great a triumph, that next morning, being Sunday, they were reported to have read the "Decree Arbitral" to a circle of impatient well-wishers on the "Plainstones" or market-place, while the citizens were on their way to church. After having pronounced the decree, the Sheriff, according to the testimony of one witness, "was very merry and jocose, and engrossed a good deal of the conversation;" and the waiter who refused Williamson admission to him had to testify that "he conveyed him home to his own house, as he had done many a night besides that."
There were many picturesque little incidents in the whole affair. Thus we are told by one witness, in a very pathetic strain, of abortive efforts made by the Sheriff to go through the public market-place from one tavern to another. "In a little the Sheriff and the deponent came down to go to the New Inn; and upon the Sheriff's observing that there were too many people upon the exchange, and that he was too far gone in liquor to cross the street, he turned in again to John Bain's, and afterwards made another attempt of the same kind, and returned for the same reason; and a little after two o'clock they made a third attempt, and, observing that the exchange was thin of people, they went over to the New Inn." Discreet Sheriff—he had achieved the Greek sage's problem of knowing himself! But other people knew him, too; and thus the hostess of the inn, being asked if "when Shiels was once drunk, he did not keep in a hand—that is, he continued drunk for some days," answered, that "she has observed Shiels as in drink at one time and to continue so for several days after, and that was too commonly his case; that it is her opinion, when Shiels was in liquor, by flattering of his vanity, he might be very easily induced to do things which he would not otherwise do; and the deponent has had occasion to see several instances of this sort, by which she means that she has heard Shiels, when in liquor, promise to do things which she believes he would not have done if sober; nor does the deponent remember or know that ever Shiels did do any of these things when sober that he said he would do when in liquor."
But there are two sides to all questions; and as human nature has a tendency towards extremes, there were some people prepared to testify to the supernatural and alarming intenseness of the Sheriff's sobriety. It was, we believe, a townsman of this same Sheriff who, when thrown from his horse, being asked by a sympathising lady who was passing, if he were hurt? answered in the intenseness of his politeness—"Oh! no, mem! quite the reverse—quitethereverse." So it appeared in the eyes of some of his friends that Forbes was not merely as sober as a judge, but upon the whole a good deal more sober than a well-constituted judge ought to be—if he had any blemish, it was on the reverse side of intoxication. One of the several landladies whose establishments he frequented—not the lady already quoted—was especially eloquent on thispoint. "At dinner-time they only drank a bottle of wine and half a mutchkin of punch [the witness makes no allusion to the consumption before and after.] Mr Forbes also drank tea in the deponent's house, and she had occasion to see Mr Forbes at breakfast and dinner, and when he went out of her house when the company parted after supper at night; and upon all these occasions he, Mr Forbes, was perfectly sober, and sufficiently capable of business, and when he went out of her house, she remembers perfectly, she turned in to her servants and said, that she never knew Mr Forbes sit so long in her house on so little drink; and she added, God grant that neither Mr Forbes nor she might be fey." So awful and portentous was his sobriety! Another witness who testified to the production of so many items of liquor that it makes one giddy to read the list, winds up by saying—"After drinking a few glasses, they were told that supper was on the table in another room, to which they moved: That after supper they drank a moderate quantity of wine, and punch, and parted sober about eleven o'clock: That the deponent had a particular proof of Mr Forbes's sobriety after supper, by his maintaining, with great spirit and elocution, one side of a problematical question that occurred in the company."
The law is extremely averse to review the decision of an arbiter. He may be stupid and careless; he may have utterly misunderstood both the law and the facts; but the parties have adopted the reference as asuccedaneumto litigation, and they "must stand the hazard of the die." In a few instances, however, where there has been gross corruption, or a palpable combination against one of the parties, the law has interfered to reverse the proceedings. The case of Peter Williamson is one of these instances; and on the 3d of December 1768, some years after the poor Sheriff-Substitute had bidden himself from his disgrace by drinking himself into the grave, the Court awarded Peter Williamson damages to the extent of £200 against the persons who, nearly thirty years previously, had spirited him away from the pier of Aberdeen.
The subsequent career of Peter Williamson, though not all directly our present purpose, is so inviting that we cannot pass it over. He was one of those men who, with no settled purpose of life, have their brains perpetually spinning forth projects, and their hands perpetually putting them in operation. Wherever external circumstances placed him, there his internal nature predestined him turn the opportunities afforded him to the best account. We have seen him exercising the isolated energies of the self-sustaining savage in the wilderness; we shall now see him regulating the complex wheels of mutually dependent civilisation. One of his earliest projects was announced, in 1762, through a letter in theEdinburgh Courant. The drain of able-bodied men by the war had, he stated, prompted him to endeavour to discover some labour-saving machine, to facilitate the operations of the harvest; and he had at considerable expense invented an engine which would, "in the hands of a single man, do more execution in a field of oats in one day, and to better purpose, than it is in the power of six shearers to do. This machine," he continues, "is now completed, and is constructed in such a manner that, when the corn is tolerably thick, it will cut down near a sheaf at a stroke, and that without shaking the grain, or disordering the straw, besides laying down the corn as regularly as the most expert shearer can do." The machine possessed other qualifications far too numerous to be recapitulated here; and though the inventor protested that "neither vanity nor conceit," but the sole desire to serve the public, prompted him to expatiate on its merits, it is not absolutely necessary, at the present day, to join in all his anticipations of its wonderful influence on the amelioration of mankind. We are no authority on the abstruse practical subject of reaping-machines; but justice to our hero renders it right to say that his invention found a place in agricultural nomenclature, as "the basket-scythe."[22]We have alreadymentioned some of his achievements in literature. He published a pamphlet on the Militia: and, contemporaneously with the invention of the scythe, we find him advertising, along with his account of his adventures, that "Commissions from the country will be punctually answered for this and all other sorts of books; as also stationery-ware of all sorts;" and in connexion with this general announcement of a stationery-establishment, he enlarges on another book, apparently of his own composition, called "A General View of the Whole World; containing the Names of the principal Countries, Kingdoms, States, and Islands,—their length, breadth, and capital cities, with the longitude and latitude; also the produce, revenue, strength, and religion of each country." This encyclopedia, political, statistical, and theological, was to be had for six shillings sterling. From such comprehensive themes we find him descending to the object of the following curious advertisement, dated 9th April 1772:—
"This day was published, price one shilling the pack, and sold by Peter Williamson, printer, in the head of Forester's Wynd, Edinburgh, theImpenetrable Secretswhich is calledProverb-Cards, containing excellent sentiment, and are so composed, that they discover the thoughts of one's mind in a very curious and extraordinary manner. The explanation of the secret is given gratis with the pack; each set consists of twenty cards, and ten lines upon each card."[23]
"This day was published, price one shilling the pack, and sold by Peter Williamson, printer, in the head of Forester's Wynd, Edinburgh, theImpenetrable Secretswhich is calledProverb-Cards, containing excellent sentiment, and are so composed, that they discover the thoughts of one's mind in a very curious and extraordinary manner. The explanation of the secret is given gratis with the pack; each set consists of twenty cards, and ten lines upon each card."[23]
We may here, perhaps, have traced to its invention the well-known toy called "Conversation-Cards," which has enlivened many a little Christmas party. If this be so, the debt of youth in general, to the poor kidnapped boy, is not small.
In 1776 he started a weekly periodical called "The Scot's Spy, or Critical Observer," which appears to have been continued through the following year with the title of "The New Scot's Spy." In the mean time, he kept a tavern, over the door of which he advertised himself as "from the other world." It appears to have been for some time in the Parliament Square, and subsequently in the interior of the Parliament House itself, part of the wide area of which was partitioned into booths. Every now and then he was dropping before the public some invention great or small. Now it was a "new invented portable printing-press;" next, marking-ink for linen, "which stands washing, boiling, and bleaching, and is more regular and beautiful than any needle." But the chief monument of his energy was the establishment of a penny post-office for the city of Edinburgh, which he supported as a private speculation. It appears to have been soon after the year 1780 that he commenced this undertaking, and contemporaneously with it he published a Street Directory. One might suppose that the post-office, the directory, and the tavern, with an occasional invention or pamphlet, would form sufficient occupation, not only for one head, but one family. Williamson, however, must haveallhis fires full of irons; and so we find that his wife and daughter had to appear before the public as busy as himself in their own department. On the cover of his directory it is intimated, that "Mantua-making is carried on in all its branches as formerly," by "Mrs Williamson and daughter;" who, lest any means of exercising their craft should pass them, by reason either of its insignificance or its gravity, are made to state, that they "engraft silk, cotton, thread, and worsted stockings; make silk gloves, and every article in the engrafting branch, in the neatest manner, and on the most reasonable terms; likewise silk stockings washed in the most approved style; also grave-clothes made on the shortest notice."
One would naturally imagine that all these professions of activity must have indicated a thrifty, industrious, moral, happy home. Alas, no! In 1789 Williamson was obliged to divorce his second wife, the mother of several children; and the revolting details of the inquiry show too plainly that the degraded woman pursued another profession besides those efforts of decentindustry which her husband advertised to the world. She, on her part, charged her husband with having acquired tipling habits, and keeping low dissipated company; while she stated that, notwithstanding the considerable sums that passed through his hands in the course of his various speculations, his family were frequently subjected to great privations. The inquiries connected with the divorce exhibit throughout, tokens of sordid squalor, which show that Williamson was little fitted to seize the tides of fortune that so frequently ran in his favour, or to direct his energies into any satisfactory path of self-advancement. Active and turbulent as he had been—dreaded, admired, nay, respected for his services as a citizen—he had never bettered his condition, or risen above the rank of the vagabond. His total want of early education may have unfitted him to take advantage of his opportunities. "The reader," he says, in one of his pamphlets, "will be here asking what school I was brought up at? I shall only tell them, that the extent of it was upwards of four thousand miles, and the height thereof as high as the heavens, governed by Indians of many nations; and regular education is no way taught among them, but handed down from one generation to another; and their records are kept, marked with tomahawks on the outside of trees, and can be distinguished by themselves for centuries back." It might be a sublime school—but not a hopeful seminary for sober citizens. Yet, among Kay's exquisitely hard etchings there is a portrait of Peter, from which it is evident that lie must have been a very handsome worshipful-looking man, with that well-fed self-assured air—that corporation dignity of manner, and citizen urbanity, if one may use the expression, which beseem the corporate officer. Nature and the tailor seem at the moment to have united to represent in his person a Deacon at least, if not a Bailie. He is depicted in conversation with Abyssinian Bruce, and as saying to the haughty Lord of Kinnaird—"There is more truth in one page of my Edinburgh directory, than in all your five volumes 4to; so, when you talk to me, don't imagine yourself at the source of the Nile." Poor Williamson's eventful life came to an end on the 19th January 1769.
[24]
Nobody doubts that there was hot blood—misunderstanding—difficulty—at the beginning. It is clear enough, also, that many arrangements which followed were not of a soothing kind. Nor can it well be denied;—but stop a little! The other side of the question seems to be perpetually consigned to oblivion. Numbers of people are in ecstasies with the year 1782. The wildest democrats of the present day revert with pride to the glimpse of nationality exhibited by Ireland immediately before the Union. The grand choral cry of Repealers is for a Parliamentonce morein Dublin. Oh, melancholy, deplorable, almost ludicrous inconsistency! The year 1782 and Repeal! The independence of Ireland after 1782 and Repeal! The old Irish Parliament and Repeal! Plunket—a son of Ireland—talked of history being an old almanac. Memorable indeed was the year 1782.But its trophies were, the handiwork of the Saxon. Bright may have been the gleam of independence which succeeded that year. The whole movement owed character and solidity togreat Saxon leaders. Conspicuous is the fame of those men who protested with fiery eloquenceagainst the treaty of the Union; andthese were all Saxons. It is very strange, but very true, that the sinews and loins of the agitation now-a-days are all begotten of Saxon spirit and Saxon freedom. There is not a letter in the alphabet of self-government—there is not a syllable in the code of municipal law—there is not a sentence in the charter of political liberty—of Ireland, which is not the lesson, the example, or the boon of the Saxon. Every thing that Ireland now demands is an imitation of a Saxon institution. And Ireland only demands these things, because for ages Saxon institution have pervaded her soil, and imbued her people.GrattanandCharlemontare Saxon names. In all the principles for which these remarkable men contended, no vestige of a Celtic idea can be traced. Until the Saxon—conqueror as he was—touched the Irish soil, there did not grow, blossom, or bear fruit any intelligible notion of social order, or public liberty. But the gratitude of nations is not different from the gratitude of individuals. Away with the Saxon!
Can nothing cure the madness? Large practical wisdom in legislation, exuberant boundless prodigality of munificence, are equally unavailing. Away with the Saxon! But disgust may at length do what force never could have done. Honest, sober, orderly folks in Britain begin to cherish strange thoughts. And the wings of thoughts are words outspoken.
Are ye ready, O Milesians! for such a dawn when it breaks?
There was nothing either very bright or very dull about the morning. Yet not a single human being you met was inclined even to whistle merrily or recklessly. And was there, then, silence over the whole land? Very far from it, I assure you. At the harbour of every sea-port, where a vessel of any size could come, there was a most unmistakeable noise. Heavily, steadily, dreadfully, came down along the rugged stones of each quay the continual tread and tramp of armed men, who, coldly and speechlessly as statues, marched towards the ships. But there was no other noise. The officers gave no word of command; nor was any command needed. Unbroken as the stream of the river, hundreds after hundreds, without any clash, or din, or tumult, passed from the solid land on board of the floating bulwarks of Old England, and without a shout or a sigh—without a murmur of adieu—without the momentary radiance of a smile on a solitary face—departedfrom Ireland. The Saxons were going. The quick strokes of the paddle-wheels whitened the waters;—the sail bellied bigly to the wind. FromErintheGreen, the Saxons wereGONE. Then rose from earth to sky—what?
For many a day thousands of eyes had been gazing at the bustling scene. At first, the spectacle of such crowds of all sorts of people going leisurely away with all their kith and kin, with all their bag and baggage, brought with it no distinct idea. The first loaded ship which left the harbour with such a freight took its departure beneath a shower of triumphantly derisive shouts. And so did many a vessel afterwards. But people become tired of shouting at the same thing. Likewise, a constant repetition of the same thing, which in certain circumstances will destroy wonder, does in other circumstances beget and spread wonder. The sameness of the business began to be painful. Countless throngs of lookers-on still choked the quay: but the gibe was rarely heard; the cheer had quite died away. It was incredible how time lagged in its flight. Suddenly, once more, a stir ran through these gazing tens of thousands. A feeble cry—more like a cry of pain than of joy—rang from the discord of the innumerable lips. Every body was gone, except the soldiers. Of the hated Saxons, all who lived by the arts or occupations of peace, all were at length away—men, women, and children. The soldiers remained till all their peaceful brethren were safely on the bosom of the treacherous sea—safer than the bosom of ungrateful Ireland. The soldiers now went themselves. It was not an hour or a day, in which that embarkation could be completed. On it went without interruption. And the people stood by, and saw it going on. Why was there not the continuous roar of exultation from moment to moment, as fileafter file, regiment after regiment, mass after mass of the bloody servants of the Saxon sullenly and silently retreated? Strange, surely, that it was not so! Strange, surely, that there was no whisper all this time from the bystanders! Strange, surely, that the bystanders, as the ships, ship after ship, sailed away with those very Saxon soldiers, began to turn their regards off altogether from the ships, and to fling unquiet doubtful glances one on the other! The detested foreigner was gone;—and was there, therefore, more neighbourly love among those that remained?
What! Erin Mavourneen, is not your emancipation come? Why is there no shout? The Saxons are going. The quick strokes of the paddle-wheels whiten the waters. Where is the pæan of the ransomed and redeemed? The sail bellies bigly to the wind. From Erin the Green, the Saxons are gone. Then rose from earth to sky—what?
Ireland is left to itself—wholly, entirely, absolutely to itself. The Repealer has his wish. The sea runs between Ireland and England—and all that is Irish and all that is English. The cable is cut. The Emerald Isle is adrift. No Saxon soldier pollutes her soil; but not a Saxon shilling glistens in her purse. The British Viceroy is no more; neither is the British Chancellor of the Exchequer any more—THERE. Ireland has got its own parliament.Also Ireland has got its own poor. Not a stiver of English millions now crosses St George's Channel. Not for one death by starvation now is England or the Saxon answerable.Ireland has her own exuberant Exchequer. Ireland pours abundance into the myriad mouths of her famine-stricken People. Shout, then, O Ireland! shout!
The sail bellies bigly to the wind. From Erin the Green the Saxons are gone. The sun of Repeal is at its noon. Then rose from earth to sky—what?
And they looked into the faces of each other with a dull, blank look—and from earth to sky arose the yell of wild despair, of irretrievable confusion, and of maddening perdition.
The Repealer had his wish. The cable was cut. Ireland was adrift—andLEFT TO ITSELF. Order, law, justice, peace, trade, industry, money, prosperity, and—oh terrible truth!—Independencewere gone away—quite away with theSaxon.
And the Milesian Republic endured—we blush to number the hours of its ephemeral and horrible existence. Every where the fair face of the beautifulIslewas hideously seamed with scars of civil war. Every where mounted upwards the smoke of roof-trees destroyed, and hearthstones desolated. Every where over the surface of the great surrounding ocean boomed the discordant wail of the land torn by the vultures of anarchy.
Again! at the harbours of sea-ports there was an unmistakeable noise. Over the rugged stones went the continual tramp and tread of armed men, who, with bursts of brutal insolence, marched from the ships. The clang of foreign arms again sounded in the cities, along the plains, and across the hills of Erin. Ireland had become the province of a foreign power which did not speak the English tongue. Ireland was that day trampled on by the iron heel of a new master.
Albion, from its white cliffs, saw the scene. But the ties had been long broken.
Oh lost Madonna, young and fair!O'er-leant by broad embracing trees,A streamlet to the lonely airMurmurs its meek low melodies;And there, as if to drink the tune,And mid the sparkling sands to play,One constant Sunbeam still at noonShoots through the shades its golden way.My lost Madonna, whose glad lifeWas like, that ray of radiant air,The March-wind's violet scents blew rifeWhen last we sought that fountain fair.Blythe as the beam from heaven arriving,—Thy hair held back by hands whose gleamWas white as stars with night-clouds striving—Thy bright lips bent and sipp'd the stream.Fair fawn-like creature! innocentIn soul as faultless in thy form,—As o'er the wave thy beauty bentIt blushed thee back each rosy charm.How soon the senseless wave resign'dThe tints, with thy retiring face,While glass'd within my mournful mindStill glows that scene's enchanting grace.Ah!everyscene, or bright or bleak,Where once thy presence round me shone,To echoing Memory long shall speakThe Past's sweet legends, Worshipp'd One!The wild blue hills, the boundless moor,That, like my lot, stretch'd dark afar,And o'er its edge, thine emblem pure,The never-failing evening star.The lawn on which the Sunset's trackCrimson'd thy home beside the Glen—The village pathway, leading backFrom thee to haunts of hated men—The walk to watch thy chamber's ray,'Mid storm and midnight's rushing wings—These, these were joys, long pass'd away,To dwell with Grief's eternal things.My lost Madonna, fair and young!Before thy slender-sandall'd feetThe dallying wave its silver flung,Then dash'd far ocean's breast to meet;And farther, wider, from thy sideThan unreturning streams could rove,Dark Fate decreed me to divide—To me, my henceforth buried Love!Yes! far for ever from thy side,Madonna, now for ever fair,To death ofDistanceI have died,And all has perished, but—Despair.Whether thy fate with woe be fraught,Or Joy's gay rainbow gleams o'er thee,I've died to all, but the mad thoughtThatwhat was once no more shall be.'Tis well:—at least I shall not knowHow time or tears may change that brow;Thine eyes shall smile, thy cheek shall glowTo me in distant years as now.And when in holier worlds, where Blame,And Blight, and Sorrow, have no birth,Thou'rt mine at last—I'll clasp the sameUnalter'd Angel, loved on earth.
Oh lost Madonna, young and fair!O'er-leant by broad embracing trees,A streamlet to the lonely airMurmurs its meek low melodies;And there, as if to drink the tune,And mid the sparkling sands to play,One constant Sunbeam still at noonShoots through the shades its golden way.
My lost Madonna, whose glad lifeWas like, that ray of radiant air,The March-wind's violet scents blew rifeWhen last we sought that fountain fair.Blythe as the beam from heaven arriving,—Thy hair held back by hands whose gleamWas white as stars with night-clouds striving—Thy bright lips bent and sipp'd the stream.
Fair fawn-like creature! innocentIn soul as faultless in thy form,—As o'er the wave thy beauty bentIt blushed thee back each rosy charm.How soon the senseless wave resign'dThe tints, with thy retiring face,While glass'd within my mournful mindStill glows that scene's enchanting grace.
Ah!everyscene, or bright or bleak,Where once thy presence round me shone,To echoing Memory long shall speakThe Past's sweet legends, Worshipp'd One!The wild blue hills, the boundless moor,That, like my lot, stretch'd dark afar,And o'er its edge, thine emblem pure,The never-failing evening star.
The lawn on which the Sunset's trackCrimson'd thy home beside the Glen—The village pathway, leading backFrom thee to haunts of hated men—The walk to watch thy chamber's ray,'Mid storm and midnight's rushing wings—These, these were joys, long pass'd away,To dwell with Grief's eternal things.
My lost Madonna, fair and young!Before thy slender-sandall'd feetThe dallying wave its silver flung,Then dash'd far ocean's breast to meet;And farther, wider, from thy sideThan unreturning streams could rove,Dark Fate decreed me to divide—To me, my henceforth buried Love!
Yes! far for ever from thy side,Madonna, now for ever fair,To death ofDistanceI have died,And all has perished, but—Despair.Whether thy fate with woe be fraught,Or Joy's gay rainbow gleams o'er thee,I've died to all, but the mad thoughtThatwhat was once no more shall be.
'Tis well:—at least I shall not knowHow time or tears may change that brow;Thine eyes shall smile, thy cheek shall glowTo me in distant years as now.And when in holier worlds, where Blame,And Blight, and Sorrow, have no birth,Thou'rt mine at last—I'll clasp the sameUnalter'd Angel, loved on earth.
I have heard—I saw yesterday that fact enlarged upon in Mrs Thunder'sTales of Passion—that people's hair may be turned gray by intense anxiety, intense fear, intensity of any kind, in a single day. My hair is not exactly gray (far from it, indeed, considering my time of life)—but, if the above physical phenomenon did ever really occur, it ought to be silvery-white. For I have passed through a day, the consequences of which colour, and will colour, my whole existence. Life's fever came to a crisis, and the crisis turned out unfavourably. The threads of my destiny got into a tangle, and Fate in a passion cut the knot with her scissors. My earthly career has been divided into two distinctly-marked portions, and the point where the two are united—the bending-stone (as the Greeks say) of the race-course, is the day on which I wasplucked.
Reader of Maga, as your experiences are possibly confined to the land of Maga's nativity, I will explain to you what it is to be plucked. It is to have your degree refused at one of the English universities. Now don't suppose that, when I have said this, I have said all. The mischief does not end with the refusal. It is bad enough, truly, to have gone through three years of reading and walking, or of port-wine drinking and tandem-driving, and then to get nothing for your trouble. But that's not it. A plucking brings with it consequences quite peculiar to itself—consequences hardly intelligible out of England—hardly intelligible, indeed, out of the sphere of the upper classes in England. The English universities are the nurseries of adolescent English gentlemen—of the whole aristocracy, church, and bar. And the many thousand persons comprised in these very extensive denominations, although they may have nothing else in common, agree in fond and not very discriminating reverence for Oxford and Cambridge. I really believe that many a man, whose actual reminiscences of these seats of learning are confined to the pace of the boats and the badness and dearness of the wine, yet manages to persuade himself that his being was somehow exalted by his three years' course. And then the sacredness which attaches to their verdict! A fellow will pass current any where with the university stamp upon him. Iknowthat Muggleton, who got a medal, and is the slowest dummy in creation, used to be invited occasionally to dinner-parties as a substitute for the late S. S. Besides, university life is common ground to half the world. You place Tories and Whigs, high churchmen and low churchmen, round the same table, and there follows a wrangle or a quarrel; but, let the conversation once veer round to the incidents of "Slogger's year," or the character of Dr ——, and you will find the talk flowing freely, and opinions unanimous.
So you see the unpleasantness of there being nothing to be said about one, under such circumstances, except that one wasplucked. Of Mr Pennefeather, of Elmstead Lodge, Surrey, (my present designation,) little is known in the neighbourhood of the aforesaid Elmstead Lodge, beyond the fact that he and his charming family live there. But the name of Pennefeather of St Saviour's, Cambridge, is common property, and hundreds know it in connexion with certain unfortunate circumstances, already alluded to.
I was always in my college considered rather a reading man. I attended chapel and lecture regularly. I went to few parties or none. Grindham of St John's (the present dean of ——), and Swetter of Trinity (the new Queen's counsel), backed by their respective colleges for the senior wranglership, were old school-fellows of mine, and we continued our acquaintance. By dint of flattering Swetter, and listening to Grindham's endless holdings forth on mathematical subjects, I grew into favour with both. I believe the worthy fellows began to think me one of themselves,—nothing very brilliant, perhaps, but still sure of a decent place in the honour-list. And, indeed, had fate pleased, their influence might have brought things to a better issue. I was induced to keep my outer door scrupulously shut till two o'clockP.M.; and, though I often fell asleep in my chair, andconic sections always made my head ache, I nevertheless made some way. But I was ruined by a flute! I had learned to play in early life—my mother liked me to accompany my sisters; and now the accomplishment, of which I had grown most school-boyishly ashamed, was discovered by a lazy, handsome, perfumed, kid-glovedflaneurof a fellow, Jenkyns of our college, whose rooms were above mine. He was just then getting up a musical association, and of all things wanted a second flute. I have no patience to narrate the steps of the seduction and triumph,—how I resisted his overtures at first, then gave way conditionally, then unconditionally,—how we had meetings, and held committees, and gave concerts,—how the dons first looked suspicious, then indifferent, then applausible,—and how, finally, far conspicuous with my white waistcoat and baton, I led the band on the first anniversary of our foundation, in the presence of the vice-chancellor and a brilliant assemblage of professors and heads of houses. But the degree examination was approaching—unappeasable, inevitable.
Grindham, I confess, had begun to look cold on me; but Swetter, who was a little ambitious of being considered an accomplished gentleman as well as a great mathematician, rather countenanced my proceedings. He never joined us himself—he was a great deal too deep for that—but he largely affected contempt for fellows who maintained that fiddling and reading were incompatible. And indeed, without being in the least aware of it, I had been made, as it were, the pattern-man of our association and the new system. Did any one object to our concerts, rehearsals, and practisings, as occupying too much time, he was referred to Pennefeather of St Saviour's, "a regular leading man, by Jove—pal of Grindham and Swetter—goes home after a concert, and sits up half the night with a wet cloth round his head." So said report—lying as usual; and my fall was the greater in consequence.
The examination was over, and the result was to be announced next morning. I had felt my ideas rather vague on the subject of the questions asked, and half suspected that my answers partook of their looseness. Still I had my hopes—I had covered a good deal of paper with my writing—a wranglership was not so very unlikely. With this conviction I went to bed, and slept, on the whole, very soundly. In the morning I dressed, shaved, and breakfasted, with considerable deliberation; and, just before nine o'clock, walked down to the senate-house. The scene there, on this and like occasions, is sufficiently exciting to an uninterested person—something more than exciting to one in a situation like mine. A crowd of young men, half mad with expectation, beset the doors of the edifice. The fate of themselves and their friends, their bets and the honour of their respective colleges, are at stake. They shout and scream. The doors are thrown open. All rush in. A pandemoniac confusion ensues. Then some patriotic individual volunteers to read aloud the expanded list, and, hoisted on the shoulders of his neighbours, begins,—wranglers, "Grindham, St John's; Swetter, Trinity; Pump, Trinity, ("Hooray!" shouts somebody, and runs off to convey the intelligence to Mr Pump, who is funking in his room)—Mullins, St John's; Shobley, St Saviours; &c., &c." I listened calmly to the first half of the wrangler-list, anxiously to the last, tremblingly to the names in the next class, agonisedly to those in the third and last.My name was not there at all!In the hope that it might have been omitted by mistake, I waited until the crowd thinned, and then, with dim eyes, read the paper myself. There was no mistake at all. I ran, unobserved, to my rooms, locked myself in, and during the next three hours I won't say what I did or thought. Therearemoments—but never mind! I'm a father of a family now.
The day was verging towards the afternoon when I put on my hat, determined to go out and brave the mocking looks of the undergraduate world. I thought I had some notion of what was to be expected, but the bitterness of the draught surpassed all my anticipations. I had hardly got outside the gate of my college, when there turned the nearest corner a walking party of fifteen gentlemen abreast—the centre-piece was Grindham.The two wings were composed of his admiring, flattering friends. My appearance caused a singular alteration in the countenances of the party. Some looked awkwardly; most of them manifested a strong inclination to laugh; but Grindham himself would have passed without recognising me, had not his neighbour whispered something in his ear. He turned and shook hands—I would have given the world so that he had cut me, for I expected some of that pity which "d——d goodnatured" friendship proffers on such occasions. Alas! my friend had forgottenmyposition in his own: he did not seem in the least aware that any person except himself and Swetter, the defeated Swetter, had been interested in the late examination. He talked incoherently for some minutes, for repressed exultation was making his eyes dim, and causing his tongue to stutter; and there we stood, he the victor and I not even worthy to be considered the vanquished, chattering on the most indifferent matters—even about that confounded musical association—and neither of us venturing to touch upon the subject which was filling each of our hearts to overflowing. Had any one of the fourteen young men who were tittering together at a little distance, been a cynic or a psychologist, he might have freely fed his humour, or made a valuable addition to his stock of observation. Grindham, Pennefeather—pride struggling hard to be modest; shame striving to gloss itself over with gay indifference—human nature in either case denying and belying itself—what lesson, or what a caricature! But, just before we separated, something seemed to strike my companion. He suddenly became more confused than ever, and then was clearly striving hard to look sentimental. "By the bye, my dear fellow—oh! ah! I was very sorry ... better luck next time, eh!" And so we parted. But I had lost my friend.
I proceeded. An indistinct object became visible on the other side of the way, which, as I approached, gradually assumed the form and proportions of a man. It was a figure, not unfrequently seen in my day in the streets of Cambridge: a broad-brimmed, low-crowned hat, which completely concealed the countenance of the wearer, just permitted to loom out of its shadow a many-coloured neckhandkerchief, printed with the flags of all nations. This last cosmopolitan habiliment shone in advantageous contrast to a dogskin waistcoat, of indescribable hue, and immensely broad trousers of white flannel. No coat at all was visible in front, but behind you might perceive that one of bright olive-coloured cloth came sharply out immediately below the arms,—a sporting Newmarket coat, exaggerated to intensity. Such was the outer man of Mr Charles Maxey, of St Saviour's; the inner man was full of all corruption and wickedness. This gentleman, being rather at a loss for occupation amid the uncongenial excitements of the day, was engaged in somewhat roughly schooling a small and horribly ugly terrier puppy to follow him up and down the street. I had no acquaintance with him. I knew nothing of him whatever, beyond the fact that he generally entered the College Hall very much after the proper time, dressed in a rough pilot coat, and invariably swearing violently, as he came in, at some unknown person or object outside the door. But it appeared that, if I had lost one friend, I had gained another. He, who would never have ventured to speak to me before—for the credit of our college, let me say that he was completely and universally cut—now rushed across the street, and shaking me by the hand, bade me "cheer up, (I had flattered myself I was looking tolerably cheerful,) and d—n the concern!" The beast then favoured me with a dissertation on the nature, cause, and consequences of mishaps like mine; in the course of which he explained that his own two pluckings had been entirely owing to the remissness of his private tutor, in not providing cigars at his (the private tutor's) rooms, and thereby failing to render Mr Maxey's studies sufficiently agreeable. "B— and T—," censoriously remarked that gentleman, "always do it: so I shall go to one of them, and cut old Z—, next term." Finally, he insisted on taking me off to breakfast, (breakfast at two o'clock!) at the rooms of a friend of his, who had been plucked fifteen times, and meant going on to the twentieth plucking, to entitle himself(according to an old Cambridge tradition,) to a gratuitous degree. I accompanied him in passive helplessness, and found a room some thing more than filled with about thirty Maxeys, smoking and singing. I remember it all to this day;—the indescribable songs—the spiced ale—Maxey's story about trotting the gray mare to Newmarket—the jocular allusions to myself—all this comes over me now like a dream of purgatory. The events of that day are indissolubly linked together in my mind; and I can never recall my misfortune without recalling too the meeting with Grindham and the party at the rooms of Mr Maxey's friend. But hard as these things were to endure in our little world at Cambridge, I have since experienced worse consequences of that accursed plucking among grown men, and in a manner made more painful to a sensitive organisation like mine.
I won't say what my father said when he heard of this termination of my university career. He had been a chancellor's medallist himself, and, in virtue of his medal, was listened to in parliament before the war. I believe he thought that all a man's doings in life were contained in his university exploits, like the chicken in the egg. Me he sent off to read theology with a clergyman in the country, previously to taking orders—for a family living awaited me. In this position I remained two years. I may mention, in passing, that my worthy instructor, a perfect ninny, though a former fellow of his college, despised me utterly for my past failure, and was at no pains to conceal his contempt; and at the end of that time, I set out for the cathedral city of F——, to go through the bishop's preparatory examination. Now, there is a prevalent notion in England, or at least in the English universities, that a bishop's examination is regulated after a peculiar fashion. It is reported that the prelate, or his chaplain, examines beforehand the calendars of the two universities, and adapts his subsequent questions to the information thence derived, in what may be called reverse order. Thus, a wrangler or first-classman, being supposed fit for any thing, is asked nothing in particular. It was even whispered—ay! even in these days of priestly dignity—that when my friend Grindham's eldest son, himself a second senior wrangler, went up a few weeks ago to the Bishop of ——, his lordship merely demanded information respecting the feeling of the university on the Hampden question, and on being satisfactorily answered, remarked that he dined at six, and dismissed his examinee. But, to resume—the questions are said, or rather were said, to increase in difficulty with the decreasing honours of the applicant. A second-classman had questions of average difficulty put to him, a man who took no honours, was stiffly catechised; a plucked man—but how it fared, and perhaps still fares, with plucked men, you shall judge from my case. After a night of excessive nervousness at the inn, I proceeded to the palace at ten o'clock in the morning. A number of serious-looking, white-cravatted, young men were waiting in the outer room, into which I was ushered. It was bitterly cold: there was, it is true, a fire; but it was actually going out, because no one dared to stir the Episcopal embers. An inner door every now and then opened and shut, admitting each time some one individual of the shivering crowd into the dreaded presence. Many old familiar faces were there. I should perhaps have shrunk from their aspect, had not nervousness, and perhaps a feeling that every one of them might in a few minutes find himself in my identical position, placed us all on a level. So I looked almost boldly about me. After a few minutes, I was on the point of addressing an old acquaintance, when, above the shoulder of the man to whom I was about to speak, there appeared a face, often seen but always loathed in my walking and sleeping visions. It was Maxey's. The cosmopolitan handkerchief had disappeared, and the debauched eyes looked brighter and less bloodshot than of old; but it was the same Maxey who fraternised with me on the day of my fall. He was—I am sorry to say—attempting to get into orders. He had been rejected, he told me, once before, but he had now been "coached by so-and-so half a year, and meant to manage it this time." Whether Mr So-and-So provided cigars for theological pupils I did not inquire; I was too much sickened by Maxey's presence,—so much so thatit was really a relief when I was summoned in my turn to the Bishop's apartment. I passed through a long passage, then through an ante-room; lastly, a door opened, and displayed his lordship sitting solemnly at a large green table. The chaplain was leaving the room just as my name was announced. I saw him put his hand to his mouth, and distinctly heard him whisper in a loud aside—"Plucked in18—, my Lord."
The Bishop's face assumed an expression of yet more awful solemnity. He gravely motioned me to sit down, and then, looking me full in the eyes, said—"Ah hem! I have no doubt, Mr Pennefather, you have sufficiently prepared yourself for the—hem—important office you propose to take on yourself. I am sorry to say that this—ah!—hem—most important office is often entered upon without sufficient—hem—preparation."
A pause. Fluency was not his lordship's forte. But if the moral annihilation of the object addressed is the end and aim of oratory, he proved himself in this case a Demosthenes.
He then continued—"Nothing is more—hem—essential to a clergyman than a knowledge of the early history of Christianity. Let me ask you what you know of the Patripassian heresy?"
I don't know what I might have answered under other circumstances, but the chaplain's whisper and the Bishop's exordium were too much for me. I could not utter a word. Other questions followed, to which I answered nothing or nonsense. In the end I recollect that his lordship made me a long speech, from which I gathered—it was not difficult to do this, as it consisted of the same sentence repeated in every variety of collocation—that he was very sorry that he could not admit me into orders with such—hem—ah—insufficient preparation.
I bowed and left the room, passed through the ante-chamber and passage into the apartment where the rest of the candidates were waiting, and thence made my exit with some words of Mr Maxey's dancing and humming in my ears,—"so we're plucked again, old boy!"
Between this scene and the next passage of my life, which I shall sketch or the reader's benefit, there was an interval of several years. I had been abroad most of the time, and had very nearly managed to forget my university misfortune. There was no occasion to revert to the bishop, for my elder brother died, and I stepped into his place—the family living being duly put out to nurse for my brother Tom. From the proximate parson, I had become the bachelor heir, with rooms in Piccadilly, a groom, and a brougham.
One day—it was in the course of my first season in town—I was dining with Jobson in Hamilton Place. Why I went so frequently to Jobson's, any body who remembers Emily Jobson, and what an angel she looked in that lilac silk, will easily guess. I had flattered myself I was not prospering badly with her. But I knew there was a rival in the field—no other person than my old friend Swetter, then a rising junior of five-and-thirty at the chancery bar. We were running on atie, as I fancied—Swetter and I. The dear girl was, I am sure, very much puzzled to decide between us; and I often thought I could see, by the expression of her face, that she was balancing Swetter, his advantages and disadvantages, his possible peerage, and the necessity entailed on his wife of staying in London through the winter, against me and my little place in Surrey. And all the time, I had an uneasy consciousness that my rival could get the start, if he pleased, by confiding to Emily certain awkward antecedents of mine, known to the reader. But, to do him justice, he was too much of a gentleman to head me by such means. This I knew, and though at this very dinner-party he was sitting opposite Emily and myself, and looking exquisitely uncomfortable every time I whispered in her ear between the spoonfuls ofbisque d'écrivisses, I felt certain that even greater provocation would not tempt him to peach. So all went smoothly—as smoothly as things ought to go at one of Jobson's admirable dinners. But towards the middle of the second course, Jobson's voice, which had been growing gradually louder since we sat down, became so overpowering as to beat down and absorb all other conversation. He was talking about Cambridge and his son Plantagenet. Jobson is anouveau riche(some of his friends call him TyburnJobson, because he made his money in hemp), and rather unnecessarily fond of introducing the now well-known facts that Plantagenet is at the university, and Tudor in the Guards. So, Jobson giving the cue, Cambridge became the text of the general conversation. Glauber, who stammers horridly, and, like most stammering men, takes every opportunity of telling long and inextricable stories, began to hold forth, in the midst of general silence, concerning Lady Ligham's son William, whom her ladyship would persist in believing a genius, and whom she had sent to Cambridge expressly to be senior wrangler. "But," added Glauber, "only the other d..d..d..day I heard he was p..p..p..pluck—."
The word was not out of his mouth, when that brute Jones, who was next him, gave him a tremendous admonitory poke in the side. Glauber first turned wrathfully on him, and then, beginning to comprehend, looked straight at me—his red face becoming redder with confusion, and his great goggle eyes almost starting out of his head.
"I b . . b . . b . . beg your p . . p . ." begun the wretch; but Swetter and Jones, who had been writhing with suppressed laughter, here gave vent to such sounds as effectually drowned his miserable voice. I gulped down a glass of champagne, and made things worse by choking myself. Meanwhile Emily looked on with a face of the utmost astonishment.
Well, we concluded dinner, drank Jobson's wine, and ascended to the drawing-room. No sooner did we enter, than I saw Emily go straight up to Swetter, and ask a question. He laughed a good deal at first, and then visibly commenced a long story. I followed it in Emily's face as clearly as if I had been listening to it. Yes! the temptation was too much for Swetter; and, to say the truth, he only did what any one else would have done in like circumstances. He told all. Determined to know my fate, I walked to Emily's chair, and began conversing in my usual strain. She was civil—just civil—but in less than five minutes, she managed to inform me that she hoped her dear brother Plantagenet would work hard at Cambridge—for the honour of his family. It was enough. Swetter and she were married in two months.
I left London without waiting for the season to conclude, and buried myself and a fishing-rod in a lonely Welsh cottage. For months I saw nobody but the old woman whom I brought from Monmouth to cook my dinners. She, I believe, thought me decidedly mad—principally because I once swore dreadfully at her, when,àproposof a chicken on which I was to dine, she used a word vernacularly employed to signify the stripping birds of their feathers. I fished, caught nothing, and mused on Emily. At last, however, on casually extending a ramble to a greater length than usual, I found that a house, five miles from my present residence, and quite as solitary, had been taken by an English family. As a matter of course—though I really cannot precisely remember in what way—we became acquainted. All I know is, that I determined the acquaintance should commence as soon as possible, immediately after meeting a young lady in a pink bonnet, who was sauntering along the side of the stream in which I was pretending to fish. This was Caroline Lumley. They were the Lumleys—Captain and Mrs Lumley, and two daughters. The family had lived the anomalous life common to English semi-genteel families with small incomes. They had resided, now in Jersey, now in Dublin, now on the Continent—every where but in civilised and inhabitable parts of England. At present they had settled themselves down, for the sake of cheapness, in a spot where every thing except mutton and house-rent was twice as expensive as in London, and where they had to walk five miles to meet with a neighbour.
That neighbour was myself. I was sick with disappointed love, and Caroline Lumley was dying with ennui. Need I say that in six weeks we were engaged!
I really believe that she worshipped me as a superior being. There had been few or no men in the out-of-the-way places where they had lived. There never are. They are all draughted off to business and employments of various kinds. So I not only had no equal in her estimation, but could not, by any possibility, have had one. Shethought me the handsomest man in the world. She used to praise my talents and accomplishments to my face. Indeed, by the side of old Captain Lumley, who, prosy by nature, had long ago exhausted all his topics, I might have appeared a Crichton. Every now and then, however, when Caroline had called me clever, there used to come over me a shudder. Couldshebe ever brought to think of me as Emily Jobson probably did? The idea was positively maddening. Many a night did I lie awake, speculating whether, after all, it might not be better to secure myself against another such cross of destiny by freely revealing to her my great secret.
At last, reflection, building on the reminiscences of an old Cambridge tradition, suggested to me a plan which I lost no time in executing.
"My love," said I to Caroline one morning, "did you ever hear of Cambridge?"
"Oh yes!" she replied, apparently quoting from Pinnock; "it's the capital of Cambridgeshire."
"Did you never hear any thing else about it?" rejoined I.
"It's famous for its university, isn't it?" said she, seemingly from the same source.
"On this hint I spake," and told her how that I had been educated at Cambridge, and how that, after three years of intense study, I had received the greatest honour the university had to bestow—a plucking.
"Yes," said I, my face radiant with a triumphant expression—"I was actually plucked."
"I am sure you were, you dear, clever thing!" cried she, throwing her arms round my neck.
We were married at Monmouth, and I took my bride straight to London. I own I was a little desirous of showing Emily Jobson, or rather Emily Swetter, that there was a young lady in the world quite as pretty as herself, and with better taste. Swetter and his wife called on us as soon as he heard we were in town; and shortly afterwards we dined with them at their new house in Torrington Square. Among the guests was Grindham—myGrindham, but how changed! He had become tutor of his college, and had expanded into the most perfect specimen of the university don I ever beheld. He was positively swelling with importance. So inordinately conspicuous, indeed, was his air of self-appreciation, that even my little Caroline noticed it; and I heard her ask Mrs Swetter who and what he was.
"He took the very highest honours at Cambridge," said she in reply.
Caroline smiled, and seemed to think him quite justified in looking as important as he did.
The cloth was removed. Caroline was sitting by Grindham's side. She had spoken little during dinner-time; but I had noticed that several times she had seemed fidgetty, as though she ought to say something to her neighbour. Now my wife had at that time a bad habit of speaking in a very loud voice—in consequence of a deaf father, and of the little society she had seen. The conversation, accordingly, had no sooner stopped (as is its wont) with a dead pause, than she turned to Grindham, and said in a tone of appalling distinctness—
"Mr Grindham,were you ever plucked?"
Had a trumpet been suddenly blown close to Grindham's ear, he could not have looked more thoroughly taken aback.
Caroline repeated her words with yet more frightful clearness—
"I understand that you were plucked at Cambridge."
Grindham's countenance grew purple; we had a room full of university men, and the insulting speech was overheard by all. There was a universal stare and stir; and Mrs Swetter seemed to be saying to herself, "what wild beast have I got here!"
Caroline, perceiving she had done something very much amiss, got frightened, and bent over her plate during the rest of dinner.
When the gentlemen came to the drawing-room, Mrs Swetter and she were sitting together. They had been talking, and Caroline's face was very red. Our eyes met: her look was full of contempt.
She has been more than my better half ever since. There never passes a day on which I am not taunted with my plucking.