Sir Jasper Carew: His Life and Experience

There may be nothing of artistic excellence in the appreciation, but the sense of pleasure, of happiness even, is to the full as great.

It was in such a mood that Fagan found himself that morning slowly stealing along a woodland-path, his daughter at his side; halting wherever a chance opening afforded a view of the landscape, they walked leisurely on, each, as it were, respecting the other’s silence. Not that their secret thoughts were indeed alike, – far from it! The daughter had marked the tranquil look, the unembarrassed expression of those features so habitually agitated and careworn: she saw the sense of relief even one day, one single day of rest, had brought with it. Why should it not be always thus? thought she. He needs no longer to toil and strive. His might be a life of quietude and peace. Our fortune is far above our wants, beyond even our wishes. We might at last make friendships, real friendships, amongst those who would look on us as equals and neighbors, not as usurers and oppressors.

While such was passing in the daughter’s mind, the father’s thoughts ran thus: Can she see these old woods, these waving lawns, these battlemented towers, topping the great oaks of centuries, and yet not wish to be their mistress? Does no ambition stir her heart to think, These might be mine? He scanned her features closely, but in her drooping eyelids and pensive look he could read no signs of the spirit he sought for.

“Polly,” said he, at length, “this is finer, far finer than I expected; the timber is better grown, the demesne itself more spacious. I hardly looked for such a princely place.”

“It is very beautiful,” said she, pensively.

“A proud thing to be the owner of, Polly, – a proud thing! This is not the home of some wealthy citizen; these trees are like blazons of nobility, girl.”

“One might be very happy here, father,” said she, in the same low voice.

“The very thought of my own mind, Polly,” cried he, eagerly. “The highest in the land could ask for nothing better. The estate has been in his family for four or five generations. The owner of such a place has but to choose what he would become. If he be talented, and with capacity for public life, think of him in Parliament, taking up some great question, assailing some time-worn abuse, – some remnant of that barbarous code that once enslaved us, – and standing forward as the leader of an Irish party. How gracefully patriotism would sit on one who could call this his own! Not the sham patriotism of your envious plebeian, nor the mock independence of the needy lawyer, but the sturdy determination to make his country second to none. There ‘s the Castle itself,” cried he, suddenly, as they emerged into an open space in front of the building; and, amazed at the spacious and splendid edifice before them, they both stood several minutes in silent admiration.

“I scarcely thought any Irish gentleman had a fortune to suit this,” said she, at length.

“You are right, Polly; nor has Carew himself. The debts he will have incurred to build that Castle will hamper his estate, and cripple him and those that are to come after him. Nothing short of a large sum of ready money, enough to clear off every mortgage and incumbrance at once, could enable this young fellow to save them. Even then, his style should not be the spendthrift waste they say he is fond of. A princely household he might have, nobly maintained, and perfect in all its details, but with good management, girl. You must remember that, Polly.”

She started at this direct appeal to herself; and, as her cheeks grew crimson with conscious shame, she turned away to avoid his glance, – not that the precaution was needed, for he was far too much immersed in his own thoughts to observa her. Polly had on more than one occasion seen through the ambitious schemes of her father. She had detected many a deep-laid plot he had devised to secure for her that eminence and station he longed for. Deep and painful were the wounds of her offended pride at the slights, the insults of these defeated plans. Resentments that were to last her lifetime had grown of them, and in her heart a secret grudge towards that class from which they sprung. Over and over had she endeavored to summon up courage to tell him that, to her, these schemes were become hateful; that all dignity, all self-respect, were sacrificed in this unworthy struggle. At last came the moment of hardihood; and in a few words, at first broken and indistinct, but more assured and distinct as she went on, she said that she, at least, could never partake in his ambitious views.

“I have seen you yourself, father, after a meeting with one of these – these high and titled personages, come home pale, careworn, and ill. The contumely of their manner had so offended you that you sat down to your meal without appetite. You could not speak to me; or, in a few words you dropped, I could read the bitter chagrin that was corroding your heart. You owned to me, that in the very moment of receiving favors from you, they never forgot the wide difference of rank that separated you, – nay more, that they accepted your services as a rightful homage to their high estate, and made you feel a kind of serfdom in your very generosity.”

“Why all this? To what end do you tell me these things, girl?” cried he, angrily, while his cheek trembled with passion.

“Because if I conceal them longer, – if I do not speak them, – they will break my heart,” said she, in an accent of deepest emotion; “because the grief they give me has worn me to very wretchedness. Is it not clear to you, father, that they wish none of us, – that our blood is not their blood, nor our traditions their traditions?”

“Hold – stop – be silent, I say, or you will drive me distracted,” said he, grasping her wrist in a paroxysm of rage.

“I will speak out,” said she, resolutely. “The courage I now feel may, perhaps, never return to me. There is nothing humiliating in our position, save what we owe to ourselves; there is no meanness in our rank in life, save when we are ashamed of it! Our efforts to be what we were not born to be, what we ought not to be, what we cannot be, – these may, indeed, make us despicable and ridiculous, for there are things in this world, father, that not even gold can buy.”

“By Heaven, that is not true!” said he, fiercely. “There never yet was that in rank, honor, and distinction that was not ticketed with its own price! Our haughtiest nobility – the proudest duke in the land – knows well what his alliance with a plebeian order has done for him. Look about you, girl. Who are these marchionesses, these countesses, who sweep past us in their pride? The daughters of men of my own station, – the wealthy traders of the country – ”

“And what is their position, father? A living lie. What is their haughty carriage? The assumption of a state they were not born to, – the insolent pretension to despise all amidst which they passed their youth, their earliest friendships, their purest, best days. Let them, on the other hand, cling to these; let them love what has grown into their natures from infancy, – the home, the companions of their happy childhood, – and see how the world will scoff at their vulgarity, their innate degeneracy, their low-born habits: vulgar if generous, vulgar when saving; their costly tastes a reproach, their parsimony a sneer.”

There was a passionate energy in her tone and manner, which, heightening the expression of her handsome features, made her actually beautiful; and her father half forgot the opposition to his opinions, in his admiration of her. As he still gazed at her, the sharp sound of a horse’s canter was heard behind them; and, on turning round, they saw advancing towards them a young man, mounted on a blood horse, which he rode with all the careless ease of one accustomed to the saddle; his feet dangling loosely out of the stirrups, and one hand thurst into the pocket of his shooting-jacket.

“Stand where you are!” he cried, as the father and daughter were about to move aside, and give him room to pass; and immediately after he rushed his horse at the huge trunk of a fallen beech-tree, and cleared it with a spring.

“He ‘ll be perfect at timber, when he gets a little cooler in temper,” said he, turning on his saddle; and then, recognizing Fagan, he reined short in, and called out, “Halloo, Tony! who ever expected to see you here? – Miss Polly, your servant. A most unexpected pleasure this,” added he, springing from his saddle, and advancing towards them with his hat off.

“It is not often I indulge myself with a holiday, Mr. MacNaghten,” said Fagan, as though half ashamed of the confession.

“So much the worse for you, Fagan, and for your handsome daughter here, – not to speak of the poor thriftless devils, like myself, who are the objects of your industrious hours. Eh, Tony, is n’t that true?” and he laughed heartily at his impudent joke.

“And if it were not for such industry, sir,” said the daughter, sternly, “how many like you would be abroad to-day?”

“By Jove, you are quite right, Miss Polly. It is exactly as you say. Your excellent father is the providence of us younger sons; and I, for one, will never prove ungrateful to him. But pray let us turn to another theme. Shall I show you the grounds and the gardens? The house is in such a mess of confusion that it is scarcely worth seeing. The conservatory, however, and the dairy are nearly finished; and if you can breakfast on grapes and a pineapple, with fresh cream to wash them down, I ‘ll promise to entertain you.”

“We ask for nothing better, Mr. MacNaghten,” said Fagan, who was not sorry to prolong an interview that might afford him the information he sought for.

“Now for breakfast, and then for sight-seeing,” said Dan, politely offering his arm to the young lady, and leading the way towards the house.

CHAPTER IV. A BREAKFAST AND ITS CONSEQUENCES

To do the honors of another man’s house is a tremendous test of tact. In point of skill or address, we know of few things more difficult. The ease which sits so gracefully on a host becomes assurance when practised by a representative; and there is a species of monarchy about the lord of a household that degenerates into usurpation in the hands of a pretender. It is not improbable, then, Dan MacNaghten’s success in this trying part was mainly attributable to the fact that he had never thought of its difficulty. He had gone through a fine property in a few years of dissipation, during which he had played the entertainer so often and so well that nothing seemed to him more natural than a seat at the head of a table, nor any task more simple or agreeable than to dispense its hospitalities.

The servants of the Castle were well accustomed to obey him, and when he gave his orders for breakfast to be speedily laid out in the conservatory, they set about the preparations with zeal and activity. With such promptitude, indeed, were the arrangements made that by the time MacNaghten had conducted his guests to the spot, all was in readiness awaiting them.

The place was admirably chosen, being a central point in the conservatory, from which alleys branched out in different directions; some opening upon little plots of flowers or ornamental shrubbery, others disclosing views of the woodland scenery or the distant mountains beyond it. The table was spread beside a marble basin, into which a little group of sportive Titans were seen spouting. Great Nile lilies floated on the crystal surface, and gold and silver fish flashed and glittered below. The board itself, covered with luscious fruit, most temptingly arranged amidst beautiful flowers, displayed, besides, some gorgeous specimens of Sèvres and Saxony, hastily taken from their packing-cases, while a large vase of silver, richly chased, stood in the centre, and exhibited four views of the Castle, painted in medallions on its sides.

“If you’ll sit here, Miss Polly,” said MacNaghten, “you’ll have a prettier view, for you’ll see the lake, and catch a peep, too, of the Swiss Cottage on the crag above it. I must show you the cottage after breakfast. It was a bit of fancy of my own, – copied, I am free to confess, from one I saw in the Oberland. – Fagan, help yourself; you ‘ll find these cutlets excellent. Our friend Carew has made an admirable choice of a cook.”

“You treat us in princely fashion, sir,” said Fagan, whose eyes glanced from the splendor before him to his daughter, and there tried to read her thoughts.

“You gave me no time for that; had you told me you were coming down, I ‘d have tried to receive you properly. As it is, pray make up your mind to stay a day or two, – Carew will be so delighted; nothing flatters him so much as to hear praise of this place.”

“Ah, sir, you forget that men like myself have but few holidays.”

“So much the worse, Fagan; remember what the adage says about all work and no play. Not, by Jove, but I ‘m sure that the converse of the proposition must have its penalty, too; for if not, I should have been a marvellously clever fellow. – Ay, Miss Polly, my life has been all play.”

“A greater fault than the other, sir, and with this addition, too, that it makes proselytes,” said she, gravely; “my father’s theory finds fewer followers.”

“And you not one of them?” said MacNaghten, rapidly; while he fixed a look of shrewd inquiry on her.

“Assuredly not,” replied she, in a calm and collected tone.

“By Jove, I could have sworn to it,” cried he, with a burst of enthusiastic delight. “There, Fagan, you see Miss Polly takes my side, after all.”

“I have not said so,” rejoined she, gravely. “Gain and waste are nearer relatives than they suspect.”

“I must own that I have never known but one of the family,” said Dan, with one of those hearty laughs which seemed to reconcile him to any turn of fortune.

Fagan all this time was ill at ease and uncomfortable; the topic annoyed him, and he gladly took occasion to change it by an allusion to the wine.

“And yet there are people who will tell you not to drink champagne for breakfast,” exclaimed Dan, draining his glass as he spoke; “as if any man could be other than better with this glorious tipple. Miss Polly, your good health, though it seems superfluous to wish you anything.”

She bowed half coldly to the compliment, and Fagan added hurriedly, “We are at least contented with our lot in life, Mr. MacNaghten.”

“Egad, I should think you were, Tony, and no great merit in the resignation, after all. Put yourself in my position, however, – fancy yourself Dan MacNaghten for one brief twenty-four hours. Think of a fellow who began the world – ay, and that not so very long ago either – with something over five thousand a-year, and a good large sum in bank, and who now, as he sits here, only spends five shillings when he writes his name on a stamp; who once had houses and hounds and horses, but who now sits in the rumble, and rides a borrowed hack. If you want to make a virtue of your contentment, Fagan, change places with me.”

“But would you take mine, Mr. MacNaghten? Would you toil, and slave, and fag, – would you shut out the sun, that your daily labor should have no suggestive temptings to enjoyment, – would you satisfy yourself that the world should be to you one everlasting struggle, till at last the very capacity to feel it otherwise was lost to you forever?”

“That’s more than I am able to picture to myself,” said MacNaghten, sipping his wine. “I ‘ve lain in a ditch for two hours with a broken thigh-bone, thinking all the time of the jolly things I ‘d do when I ‘d get well again; I ‘ve spent some very rainy weeks in a debtor’s prison, weaving innumerable enjoyments for the days when I should be at liberty; so that as to any conception of a period when I should not be able to be happy, it ‘s clean and clear beyond me.”

Polly’s eyes were fixed on him as he spoke, and while their expression was almost severe, the heightened color of her cheeks showed that she listened to him with a sense of pleasure.

“I suppose it’s in the family,” continued Dan, gayly. “My poor father used to say that no men have such excellent digestion as those that have nothing to eat.”

“And has it never occurred to you, sir,” said Polly, with a degree of earnestness in her voice and manner, – “has it never occurred to you that this same buoyant temperament could be turned to other and better account than mere “ – she stopped, and blushed, and then, as if by an effort, went on – “mere selfish enjoyment? Do you not feel that he who can reckon on such resources but applies them to base uses when he condescends to make them the accessories of his pleasures? Is there nothing within your heart to whisper that a nature such as this was given for higher and nobler purposes; and that he who has the spirit to confront real danger should not sit down contented with a mere indifference to shame?”

“Polly, Polly!” cried her father, alike overwhelmed by the boldness and the severity of her speech.

“By Jove, the young lady has given me a canter,” cried MacNaghten, who, in spite of all his good temper, grew crimson; “and I only wish the lesson had come earlier. Yes, Miss Polly,” added he, in a voice of more feeling, “it ‘s too late now.”

“You must forgive my daughter, Mr. MacNaghten, – she is not usually so presumptuous,” said Fagan, rising from the table, while he darted a reproving glance towards Polly; “besides, we are encroaching most unfairly on your time.”

“Are you so?” cried Dan, laughing. “I never heard it called mine before! Why, Tony, it’s yours, and everybody’s that has need of it. But if you ‘ll not eat more, let me show you the grounds. They are too extensive for a walk, Miss Polly, so, with your leave, we ‘ll have something to drive; meanwhile I’ll tell the gardener to pluck you some flowers.”

Fagan waited till MacNaghten was out of hearing, and then turned angrily towards his daughter.

“You have given him a sorry specimen of your breeding, Polly; I thought, indeed, you would have known better.”

“You forget already, then, the speech with which he accosted us,” said she, haughtily; “but my memory is better, sir.”

“His courtesy might have effaced the recollection, I think,” said Fagan, testily.

“His courtesy! Has he not told you himself that every gift he possesses is but an emanation of his selfishness? The man who can be anything so easily, will be nothing if it cost a sacrifice.”

“I don’t care what he is,” said Fagan, in a low, distinct voice, as though he wanted every word to be heard attentively. “For what he has been, and what he will be, I care just as little. It is where he moves, and lives, and exerts influence, – these are what concern me.”

“Are the chance glimpses that we catch of that high world so attractive, father?” said she, in an accent of almost imploring eagerness. “Do they, indeed, requite us for the cost we pay for them? When we leave the vulgar circle of our equals, is it to hear of generous actions, exalted sentiments, high-souled motives; or is it not to find every vice that stains the low pampered up into greater infamy amongst the noble?”

“This is romance and folly, girl. Who ever dreamed it should be otherwise? Nature stamped no nobility on gold, nor made copper plebeian. This has been the work of men; and so of the distinctions among themselves, and it will not do for us to dispute the ordinance. Station is power, wealth is power; he who has neither, is but a slave; he who has both, may be all that he would be!”

A sudden gesture to enforce caution followed these words; and at the same time MacNaghten’s merry voice was heard, singing as he came along, —

“‘Kneel down there, and say a prayer,Before my hounds shall eat you.’‘I have no prayer,’ the Fox replied,‘For I was bred a Quaker.’

“All right, Miss Polly. Out of compliment to you, I suppose, Kitty Dwyer, that would never suffer a collar over her head for the last six weeks, has consented to be harnessed as gently as a lamb; and my own namesake, ‘Dan the Smasher,’ has been traced up, without as much as one strap broken. They ‘re a little pair I have been breaking in for Carew; for he’s intolerably lazy, and expects to find his nags trained to perfection. Look at them, how they come along, – no bearing reins, no blinkers. That ‘s what I call a very neat turn-out.”

The praise was, assuredly, not unmerited, as two highbred black ponies swept past with a beautiful phaeton, and drew up at the door of the conservatory.

The restless eyes, the wide-spread nostrils and quivering flanks of the animals, not less than the noiseless caution of the grooms at their heads, showed that their education had not yet been completed; and so Fagan remarked at once.

“They look rakish, – there’s no denying it!” said Mac-Naghten; “but they are gentleness itself. The only difficulty is to put the traps on them; once fairly on, there’s nothing to apprehend. You are not afraid of them, Miss Polly?” said he, with a strong emphasis on the “you.”

“When you tell me that I need not be, I have no fears,” said she, calmly.

“I must be uncourteous enough to say that I do not concur in the sentiment,” said Fagan; “and, with your leave, Mr. MacNaghten, we will walk.”

“Walk! why, to see anything, you’ll have twelve miles a-foot. It must n’t be thought of, Miss Polly, – I cannot hear of it!” She bowed, as though in half assent; and he continued: “Thanks for the confidence; you shall see it is not misplaced. Now, Fagan – ”

“I am decided, Mr. MacNaghten; I’ll not venture; nor will I permit my daughter to risk her life.”

“Neither would I, I should hope,” said MacNaghten; and, although the words were uttered with something of irritation, there was that in the tone that made Polly blush deeply.

“It’s too bad, by Jove!” muttered he, half aloud, “when a man has so few things that he really can do, to deny his skill in the one he knows best.”

“I am quite ready, sir,” said Polly, in that tone of determination which she was often accustomed to assume, and against which her father rarely or never disputed.

“There now, Fagan, get up into the rumble. I ‘ll not ask you to be the coachman. Come, come, – no more opposition; we shall make them impatient if we keep them standing much longer.”

As he spoke, he offered his arm to Polly, who, with a smile, – the first she had deigned to give him, – accepted it, and then, hastily leading her forward, he handed her into the carriage. In an instant MacNaghten was beside her. With the instinct of hot-tempered cattle, they no sooner felt a hand upon the reins than they became eager to move forward, and, while one pawed the ground with impatience, the other, retiring to the very limit of the pole-strap, prepared for a desperate plunge.

“Up with you, Fagan; be quick – be quick!” cried Dan. “It won’t do to hold them in. Let them go, lads, or they ‘ll smash everything!” and the words were hardly out, when, with a tremendous bound, that carried the front wheels off the road, away they went. “Meet us at the other gate, – they ‘ll show you the way,” cried MacNaghten, as, standing up, he pointed with his whip in the direction he meant. He had no time for more; for all his attention was now needed to the horses, as, each exciting the other, they dashed madly on down the road.

“This comes of keeping them standing,” muttered Dan; “and the scoundrels have curbed them up too tight. You’re not afraid, Miss Polly? By Jove, that was a dash, – Kitty showed her heels over the splash-board. Look at that devil Dan, – see how he ‘s bearing on the pole-piece! – an old trick of his.”

A tremendous cut on his flank now drove him almost furious, and the enraged animal set off at speed.

“We must let them blow themselves, Miss Polly. It all comes of their standing so long. You’re not afraid? – Well, then, they may do their worst.”

By this time the pace had become a tearing gallop, and seeing that nothing short of some miles would suffice to tame them down, MacNaghten turned their heads in the direction of a long avenue which led towards the sea.

It was all in vain that Fagan fastened through the flower-garden, and across a private shrubbery; when he reached the “gate,” there was no sign of the phaeton. The cuckoo and the thrush were the only voices heard in the stillness; and, at intervals, the deep booming of the sea, miles distant, told how unbroken was the silence around. His mind was a conflict of fear and anger; terrible anxieties for his daughter were mixed up with passion at this evidence of her wayward nature, and he walked along, reproaching himself bitterly for having accepted the civilities of MacNaghten.