“Listen to me, Morton,” said Aubrey, suppressing his emotion; “you have always been my favourite brother. From our first childhood my heart yearned to you. Do you remember the time when an enraged bull pursued me, and you, then only ten years old, placed yourself before it and defended me at the risk of your own life? Do you think I could ever forget that,—child as I was?—never, Morton, never!”
Before I could answer the door was thrown open, and the Abbe entered. “Children,” said he, and the single light of the room shone full upon his unmoved, rigid, commanding features—“children, be as Heaven intended you,—friends and brothers. Morton, I have wronged you, I own it; here is my hand: Aubrey, let all but early love, and the present promise of excellence which your brother displays, be forgotten.”
With these words the priest joined our hands. I looked on my brother, and my heart melted. I flung myself into his arms and wept.
“This is well,” said Montreuil, surveying us with a kind of grim complacency, and, taking my brother’s arm, he blest us both, and led Aubrey away.
That day was a new era in my boyish life. I grew henceforth both better and worse. Application and I having once shaken hands became very good acquaintance. I had hitherto valued myself upon supplying the frailties of a delicate frame by an uncommon agility in all bodily exercises. I now strove rather to improve the deficiencies of my mind, and became orderly, industrious, and devoted to study. So far so well; but as I grew wiser, I grew also more wary. Candour no longer seemed to me the finest of virtues. I thought before I spoke: and second thought sometimes quite changed the nature of the intended speech; in short, gentlemen of the next century, to tell you the exact truth, the little Count Devereux became somewhat of a hypocrite!
CHAPTER IV
A CONTEST OF ART AND A LEAGUE OF FRIENDSHIP.—TWO CHARACTERS IN MUTUAL IGNORANCE OF EACH OTHER, AND THE READER NO WISER THAN EITHER OF THEM
THE Abbe was now particularly courteous to me. He made Gerald and myself breakfast with him, and told us nothing was so amiable as friendship among brothers. We agreed to the sentiment, and, like all philosophers, did not agree a bit the better for acknowledging the same first principles. Perhaps, notwithstanding his fine speeches, the Abbe was the real cause of our continued want of cordiality. However, we did not fight any more: we avoided each other, and at last became as civil and as distant as those mathematical lines which appear to be taking all possible pains to approach one another and never get a jot the nearer for it. Oh! your civility is the prettiest invention possible for dislike! Aubrey and I were inseparable, and we both gained by the intercourse. I grew more gentle, and he more masculine; and, for my part, the kindness of his temper so softened the satire of mine that I learned at last to smile full as often as to sneer.
The Abbe had obtained a wonderful hold over Aubrey; he had made the poor boy think so much of the next world, that he had lost all relish for this. He lived in a perpetual fear of offence: he was like a chemist of conscience, and weighed minutiae by scruples. To play, to ride, to run, to laugh at a jest, or to banquet on a melon, were all sins to be atoned for; and I have found (as a penance for eating twenty-three cherries instead of eighteen) the penitent of fourteen standing, barefooted, in the coldest nights of winter, upon the hearthstones, almost utterly naked, and shivering like a leaf, beneath the mingled effect of frost and devotion. At first I attempted to wrestle with this exceeding holiness, but finding my admonitions received with great distaste and some horror, I suffered my brother to be happy in his own way. I only looked with a very evil and jealous eye upon the good Abbe, and examined, while I encouraged them, the motives of his advances to myself. What doubled my suspicions of the purity of the priest was my perceiving that he appeared to hold out different inducements for trusting him to each of us, according to his notions of our respective characters. My brother Gerald he alternately awed and persuaded, by the sole effect of superior intellect. With Aubrey he used the mechanism of superstition. To me, he, on the one hand, never spoke of religion, nor, on the other, ever used threats or persuasion, to induce me to follow any plan suggested to my adoption; everything seemed to be left to my reason and my ambition. He would converse with me for hours upon the world and its affairs, speak of courts and kings, in an easy and unpedantic strain; point out the advantage of intellect in acquiring power and controlling one’s species; and, whenever I was disposed to be sarcastic upon the human nature I had read of, he supported my sarcasm by illustrations of the human nature he had seen. We were both, I think (for myself I can answer), endeavouring to pierce the real nature of the other; and perhaps the talent of diplomacy for which, years afterwards, I obtained some applause, was first learnt in my skirmishing warfare with the Abbe Montreuil.
At last, the evening before we quitted school for good arrived. Aubrey had just left me for solitary prayers, and I was sitting alone by my fire, when Montreuil entered gently. He sat himself down by me, and, after giving me the salutation of the evening, sank into a silence which I was the first to break.
“Pray, Abbe,” said I, “have one’s years anything to do with one’s age?”
The priest was accustomed to the peculiar tone of my sagacious remarks, and answered dryly,—
“Mankind in general imagine that they have.”
“Faith, then,” said I, “mankind know very little about the matter. To-day I am at school, and a boy; to-morrow I leave school; if I hasten to town I am presented at court; and lo! I am a man; and this change within half-a-dozen changes of the sun! therefore, most reverend father, I humbly opine that age is measured by events, not years.”
“And are you not happy at the idea of passing the age of thraldom, and seeing arrayed before you the numberless and dazzling pomps and pleasures of the great world?” said Montreuil, abruptly, fixing his dark and keen eye upon me.
“I have not yet fully made up my mind whether to be happy or not,” said I, carelessly.
“It is a strange answer;” said the priest; “but” (after a pause) “you are a strange youth: a character that resembles a riddle is at your age uncommon, and, pardon me, unamiable. Age, naturally repulsive, requires a mask; and in every wrinkle you may behold the ambush of a scheme: but the heart of youth should be open as its countenance! However, I will not weary you with homilies; let us change the topic. Tell me, Morton, do you repent having turned your attention of late to those graver and more systematic studies which can alone hereafter obtain you distinction?”
“No, father,” said I, with a courtly bow, “for the change has gained me your good opinion.”
A smile, of peculiar and undefinable expression, crossed the thin lips of the priest; he rose, walked to the door, and saw that it was carefully closed. I expected some important communication, but in vain; pacing the small room to and fro, as if in a musing mood, the Abbe remained silent, till, pausing opposite some fencing foils, which among various matters (books, papers, quoits, etc.) were thrown idly in one corner of the room, he said,—
“They tell me that you are the best fencer in the school—is it so?”
“I hope not, for fencing is an accomplishment in which Gerald is very nearly my equal,” I replied.
“You run, ride, leap, too, better than any one else, according to the votes of your comrades?”
“It is a noble reputation,” said I, “in which I believe I am only excelled by our huntsman’s eldest son.”
“You are a strange youth,” repeated the priest; “no pursuit seems to give you pleasure, and no success to gratify your vanity. Can you not think of any triumph which would elate you?”
I was silent.
“Yes,” cried Montreuil, approaching me,—“yes,” cried he, “I read your heart, and I respect it; these are petty competitions and worthless honours. You require a nobler goal, and a more glorious reward. He who feels in his soul that Fate has reserved for him a great and exalted part in this world’s drama may reasonably look with indifference on these paltry rehearsals of common characters.”
I raised my eye, and as it met that of the priest, I was irresistibly struck with the proud and luminous expression which Montreuil’s look had assumed. Perhaps something kindred to its nature was perceptible in my own; for, after surveying me with an air of more approbation than he had ever honoured me with before, he grasped my arm firmly, and said, “Morton, you know me not; for many years I have not known you: that time is past. No sooner did your talents develop themselves than I was the first to do homage to their power: let us henceforth be more to each other than we have been; let us not be pupil and teacher; let us be friends. Do not think that I invite you to an unequal exchange of good offices: you may be the heir to wealth and a distinguished name; I may seem to you but an unknown and undignified priest; but the authority of the Almighty can raise up, from the sheepfold and the cotter’s shed, a power, which, as the organ of His own, can trample upon sceptres and dictate to the supremacy of kings. And I—I”—the priest abruptly paused, checked the warmth of his manner, as if he thought it about to encroach on indiscretion, and, sinking into a calmer tone, continued, “yes, I, Morton, insignificant as I appear to you, can, in every path through this intricate labyrinth of life, be more useful to your desires than you can ever be to mine. I offer to you in my friendship a fervour of zeal and energy of power which in none of your equals, in age and station, you can hope to find. Do you accept my offer?”
“Can you doubt,” said I, with eagerness, “that I would avail myself of the services of any man, however displeasing to me, and worthless in himself? How, then, can I avoid embracing the friendship of one so extraordinary in knowledge and intellect as yourself? I do embrace it, and with rapture.”
The priest pressed my hand. “But,” continued he, fixing his eyes upon mine, “all alliances have their conditions: I require implicit confidence; and for some years, till time gives you experience, regard for your interests induces me also to require obedience. Name any wish you may form for worldly advancement, opulence, honour, the smile of kings, the gifts of states, and—I—I will pledge myself to carry that wish into effect. Never had eastern prince so faithful a servant among the Dives and Genii as Morton Devereux shall find in me: but question me not of the sources of my power; be satisfied when their channel wafts you the success you covet. And, more, when I in my turn (and this shall be but rarely) request a favour of you, ask me not for what end nor hesitate to adopt the means I shall propose. You seem startled; are you content at this understanding between us, or will you retract the bond?”
“My father,” said I, “there is enough to startle me in your proposal; it greatly resembles that made by the Old Man of the Mountains to his vassals, and it would not exactly suit my inclinations to be called upon some morning to act the part of a private executioner.”
The priest smiled. “My young friend,” said he, “those days have passed; neither religion nor friendship requires of her votaries sacrifices of blood. But make yourself easy; whenever I ask of you what offends your conscience, even in a punctilio, refuse my request. With this exception, what say you?”
“That I think I will agree to the bond: but, father, I am an irresolute person; I must have time to consider.”
“Be it so. To-morrow, having surrendered my charge to your uncle, I depart for France.”
“For France!” said I; “and how? Surely the war will prevent your passage.”
The priest smiled. Nothing ever displeased me more than that priest’s smile. “The ecclesiastics,” said he, “are the ambassadors of Heaven, and have nothing to do with the wars of earth. I shall find no difficulty in crossing the Channel. I shall not return for several months, perhaps not till the expiration of a year: I leave you, till then, to decide upon the terms I have proposed to you. Meanwhile, gratify my vanity by employing my power; name some commission in France which you wish me to execute.”
“I can think of none,—yet, stay;” and I felt some curiosity to try the power of which he boasted,—“I have read that kings are blest with a most accommodating memory, and perfectly forget their favourites when they can be no longer useful. You will see, perhaps, if my father’s name has become a Gothic and unknown sound at the court of the Great King. I confess myself curious to learn this, though I can have no personal interest in it.”
“Enough, the commission shall be done. And now, my child, Heaven bless you! and send you many such friends as the humble priest, who, whatever be his failings, has, at least, the merit of wishing to serve those whom he loves.”
So saying, the priest closed the door. Sinking into a revery, as his footsteps died upon my ear, I muttered to myself: “Well, well, my sage ecclesiastic, the game is not over yet; let us see if, at sixteen, we cannot shuffle cards, and play tricks with the gamester of thirty. Yet he may be in earnest, and faith I believe he is; but I must look well before I leap, or consign my actions into such spiritual keeping. However, if the worst come to the worst, if I do make this compact, and am deceived,—if, above all, I am ever seduced, or led blindfold into one of those snares which priestcraft sometimes lays to the cost of honour,—why, I shall have a sword, which I shall never be at a loss to use, and it can find its way through a priest’s gown as well as a soldier’s corselet.”
Confess that a youth who could think so promptly of his sword was well fitted to wear one!
CHAPTER V
RURAL HOSPITALITY.—AN EXTRAORDINARY GUEST.—A FIN$ GENTLEMAN IS NOT NECESSARILY A FOOL
WE were all three (my brothers and myself) precocious geniuses. Our early instructions, under a man like the Abbe, at once learned and worldly, and the society into which we had been initiated from our childhood, made us premature adepts in the manners of the world; and I, in especial, flattered myself that a quick habit of observation rendered me no despicable profiter by my experience. Our academy, too, had been more like a college than a school; and we had enjoyed a license that seemed to the superficial more likely to benefit our manners than to strengthen our morals. I do not think, however, that the latter suffered by our freedom from restraint. On the contrary, we the earlier learned that vice, but for the piquancy of its unlawfulness, would never be so captivating a goddess; and our errors and crimes in after life had certainly not their origin in our wanderings out of academical bounds.
It is right that I should mention our prematurity of intellect, because, otherwise, much of my language and reflections, as detailed in the first book of this history, might seem ill suited to the tender age at which they occurred. However, they approach, as nearly as possible, to my state of mind at that period; and I have, indeed, often mortified my vanity in later life by thinking how little the march of time has ripened my abilities, and how petty would have been the intellectual acquisitions of manhood, if they had not brought me something like content!
My uncle had always, during his retirement, seen as many people as he could assemble out of the “mob of gentlemen who live at ease.” But, on our quitting school and becoming men, he resolved to set no bounds to his hospitality. His doors were literally thrown open; and as he was by far the greatest person in the district—to say nothing of his wines, and his French cook—many of the good people of London did not think it too great an honour to confer upon the wealthy representative of the Devereuxs the distinction of their company and compliments. Heavens! what notable samples of court breeding and furbelows did the crane-neck coaches, which made our own family vehicle look like a gilt tortoise, pour forth by couples and leashes into the great hall; while my gallant uncle, in new periwig and a pair of silver-clocked stockings (a present from a ci-devant fine lady), stood at the far end of the picture-gallery to receive his visitors with all the graces of the last age.
My mother, who had preserved her beauty wonderfully, sat in a chair of green velvet, and astonished the courtiers by the fashion of a dress only just imported. The worthy Countess (she had dropped in England the loftier distinction of Madame la Marechale) was however quite innocent of any intentional affectation of the mode; for the new stomacher, so admired in London, had been the last alteration in female garniture at Paris a month before my father died. Is not this “Fashion” a noble divinity to possess such zealous adherents?—a pitiful, lackey-like creature, which struts through one country with the cast-off finery of another!
As for Aubrey and Gerald, they produced quite an effect; and I should most certainly have been thrown irrevocably into the background had I not been born to the good fortune of an eldest son. This was far more than sufficient to atone for the comparative plainness of my person; and when it was discovered that I was also Sir William’s favourite, it is quite astonishing what a beauty I became! Aubrey was declared too effeminate; Gerald too tall. And the Duchess of Lackland one day, when she had placed a lean, sallow ghost of a daughter on either side of me, whispered my uncle in a voice, like the aside of a player, intended for none but the whole audience, that the young Count had the most imposing air and the finest eyes she had ever seen. All this inspired me with courage, as well as contempt; and not liking to be beholden solely to my priority of birth for my priority of distinction, I resolved to become as agreeable as possible. If I had not in the vanity of my heart resolved also to be “myself alone,” Fate would have furnished me at the happiest age for successful imitation with an admirable model.
Time rolled on; two years were flown since I had left school, and Montreuil was not yet returned. I had passed the age of eighteen, when the whole house, which, as it was summer, when none but cats and physicians were supposed gifted by Providence with the power to exist in town, was uncommonly full,—the whole house, I say, was thrown into a positive fever of expectation. The visit of a guest, if not of greater consequence at least of greater interest than any who had hitherto honoured my uncle, was announced. Even the young Count, with the most imposing air in the world and the finest eyes, was forgotten by everybody but the Duchess of Lackland and her daughters, who had just returned to Devereux Court to observe how amazingly the Count had grown! Oh! what a prodigy wisdom would be, if it were but blest with a memory as keen and constant as that of interest!
Struck with the universal excitement, I went to my uncle to inquire the name of the expected guest. My uncle was occupied in fanning the Lady Hasselton, a daughter of one of King Charles’s Beauties. He had only time to answer me literally, and without comment; the guest’s name was Mr. St. John.
I had never conned the “Flying Post,” and I knew nothing about politics. “Who is Mr. St. John?” said I; my uncle had renewed the office of a zephyr. The daughter of the Beauty heard and answered, “The most charming person in England.” I bowed and turned away. “How vastly explanatory!” said I. I met a furious politician. “Who is Mr. St. John?” I asked.
“The cleverest man in England,” answered the politician, hurrying off with a pamphlet in his hand.
“Nothing can be more satisfactory,” thought I. Stopping a coxcomb of the first water, “Who is Mr. St. John?” I asked.
“The finest gentleman in England,” answered the coxcomb, settling his cravat.
“Perfectly intelligible!” was my reflection on this reply; and I forthwith arrested a Whig parson,—“Who is Mr. St. John?” said I.
“The greatest reprobate in England!” answered the Whig parson, and I was too stunned to inquire more.
Five minutes afterwards the sound of carriage wheels was heard in the courtyard, then a slight bustle in the hall, and the door of the ante-room being thrown open Mr. St. John entered.
He was in the very prime of life, about the middle height, and of a mien and air so strikingly noble that it was some time before you recovered the general effect of his person sufficiently to examine its peculiar claims to admiration. However, he lost nothing by a further survey: he possessed not only an eminently handsome but a very extraordinary countenance. Through an air of nonchalance, and even something of lassitude; through an ease of manners sometimes sinking into effeminate softness, sometimes bordering upon licentious effrontery,—his eye thoughtful, yet wandering, seemed to announce that the mind partook but little of the whim of the moment, or of those levities of ordinary life over which the grace of his manner threw so peculiar a charm. His brow was, perhaps, rather too large and prominent for the exactness of perfect symmetry, but it had an expression of great mental power and determination. His features were high, yet delicate, and his mouth, which, when closed, assumed a firm and rather severe expression, softened, when speaking, into a smile of almost magical enchantment. Richly but not extravagantly dressed, he appeared to cultivate rather than disdain the ornaments of outward appearance; and whatever can fascinate or attract was so inherent in this singular man that all which in others would have been most artificial was in him most natural: so that it is no exaggeration to add that to be well dressed seemed to the elegance of his person not so much the result of art as of a property innate and peculiar to himself.
Such was the outward appearance of Henry St. John; one well suited to the qualities of a mind at once more vigorous and more accomplished than that of any other person with whom the vicissitudes of my life have ever brought me into contact.
I kept my eye on the new guest throughout the whole day: I observed the mingled liveliness and softness which pervaded his attentions to women, the intellectual yet unpedantic superiority he possessed in his conversations with men; his respectful demeanour to age; his careless, yet not over-familiar, ease with the young; and, what interested me more than all, the occasional cloud which passed over his countenance at moments when he seemed sunk into a revery that had for its objects nothing in common with those around him.
Just before dinner St. John was talking to a little group, among whom curiosity seemed to have drawn the Whig parson whom I have before mentioned. He stood at a little distance, shy and uneasy; one of the company took advantage of so favourable a butt for jests, and alluded to the bystander in a witticism which drew laughter from all but St. John, who, turning suddenly towards the parson, addressed an observation to him in the most respectful tone. Nor did he cease talking with him (fatiguing as the conference must have been, for never was there a duller ecclesiastic than the gentleman conversed with) until we descended to dinner. Then, for the first time, I learned that nothing can constitute good breeding that has not good-nature for its foundation; and then, too, as I was leading Lady Barbara Lackland to the great hall by the tip of her forefinger I made another observation. Passing the priest, I heard him say to a fellow-clerk,—
“Certainly, he is the greatest man in England;” and I mentally remarked, “There is no policy like politeness; and a good manner is the best thing in the world, either to get one a good name or to supply the want of it.”