Kenelm Chillingly — Complete

“I doubt that,” said the minstrel. “Song, at the best, is but the echo of some voice from the heart of Nature. And if the cuckoo’s note seemed to you such a voice, it was an answer to your questionings perhaps more simply truthful than man can utter, if you had rightly construed the language.”

“My good friend,” answered Kenelm, “what you say sounds very prettily; and it contains a sentiment which has been amplified by certain critics into that measureless domain of dunderheads which is vulgarly called BOSH. But though Nature is never silent, though she abuses the privilege of her age in being tediously gossiping and garrulous, Nature never replies to our questions: she can’t understand an argument; she has never read Mr. Mill’s work on Logic. In fact, as it is truly said by a great philosopher, ‘Nature has no mind.’ Every man who addresses her is compelled to force upon her for a moment the loan of his own mind. And if she answers a question which his own mind puts to her, it is only by such a reply as his own mind teaches to her parrot-like lips. And as every man has a different mind, so every man gets a different answer. Nature is a lying old humbug.”

The minstrel laughed merrily; and his laugh was as sweet as his chant.

“Poets would have a great deal to unlearn if they are to look upon Nature in that light.”

“Bad poets would, and so much the better for them and their readers.”

“Are not good poets students of Nature?”

“Students of Nature, certainly, as surgeons study anatomy by dissecting a dead body. But the good poet, like the good surgeon, is the man who considers that study merely as the necessary A B C, and not as the all-in-all essential to skill in his practice. I do not give the fame of a good surgeon to a man who fills a book with details, more or less accurate, of fibres and nerves and muscles; and I don’t give the fame of a good poet to a man who makes an inventory of the Rhine or the Vale of Gloucester. The good surgeon and the good poet are they who understand the living man. What is that poetry of drama which Aristotle justly ranks as the highest? Is it not a poetry in which description of inanimate Nature must of necessity be very brief and general; in which even the external form of man is so indifferent a consideration that it will vary with each actor who performs the part? A Hamlet may be fair or dark. A Macbeth may be short or tall. The merit of dramatic poetry consists in the substituting for what is commonly called Nature (namely, external and material Nature) creatures intellectual, emotional, but so purely immaterial that they may be said to be all mind and soul, accepting the temporary loans of any such bodies at hand as actors may offer, in order to be made palpable and visible to the audience, but needing no such bodies to be palpable and visible to readers. The highest kind of poetry is therefore that which has least to do with external Nature. But every grade has its merit more or less genuinely great, according as it instils into Nature that which is not there,—the reason and the soul of man.”

“I am not much disposed,” said the minstrel, “to acknowledge any one form of poetry to be practically higher than another; that is, so far as to elevate the poet who cultivates what you call the highest with some success above the rank of the poet who cultivates what you call a very inferior school with a success much more triumphant. In theory, dramatic poetry may be higher than lyric, and ‘Venice Preserved’ is a very successful drama; but I think Burns a greater poet than Otway.”

“Possibly he may be; but I know of no lyrical poet, at least among the moderns, who treats less of Nature as the mere outward form of things, or more passionately animates her framework with his own human heart, than does Robert Burns. Do you suppose when a Greek, in some perplexity of reason or conscience, addressed a question to the oracular oak-leaves of Dodona that the oak-leaves answered him? Don’t you rather believe that the question suggested by his mind was answered by the mind of his fellow-man, the priest, who made the oak-leaves the mere vehicle of communication, as you and I might make such vehicle in a sheet of writing-paper? Is not the history of superstition a chronicle of the follies of man in attempting to get answers from external Nature?”

“But,” said the minstrel, “have I not somewhere heard or read that the experiments of Science are the answers made by Nature to the questions put to her by man?”

“They are the answers which his own mind suggests to her,—nothing more. His mind studies the laws of matter, and in that study makes experiments on matter; out of those experiments his mind, according to its previous knowledge or natural acuteness, arrives at its own deductions, and hence arise the sciences of mechanics and chemistry, etc. But the matter itself gives no answer: the answer varies according to the mind that puts the question; and the progress of science consists in the perpetual correction of the errors and falsehoods which preceding minds conceived to be the correct answers they received from Nature. It is the supernatural within us,—namely, Mind,—which can alone guess at the mechanism of the natural, namely, Matter. A stone cannot question a stone.”

The minstrel made no reply. And there was a long silence, broken but by the hum of the insects, the ripple of onward waves, and the sigh of the wind through reeds.

CHAPTER XVII

SAID Kenelm, at last breaking silence—      “‘Rapiamus, amici,    Occasionem de die, dumque virent genua,    Et decet, obducta solvatur fronte senectus!’”

“Is not that quotation from Horace?” asked the minstrel.

“Yes; and I made it insidiously, in order to see if you had not acquired what is called a classical education.”

“I might have received such education, if my tastes and my destinies had not withdrawn me in boyhood from studies of which I did not then comprehend the full value. But I did pick up a smattering of Latin at school; and from time to time since I left school I have endeavoured to gain some little knowledge of the most popular Latin poets; chiefly, I own to my shame, by the help of literal English translations.”

“As a poet yourself, I am not sure that it would be an advantage to know a dead language so well that its forms and modes of thought ran, though perhaps unconsciously, into those of the living one in which you compose. Horace might have been a still better poet if he had not known Greek better than you know Latin.”

“It is at least courteous in you to say so,” answered the singer, with a pleased smile.

“You would be still more courteous,” said Kenelm, “if you would pardon an impertinent question, and tell me whether it is for a wager that you wander through the land, Homer-like, as a wandering minstrel, and allow that intelligent quadruped your companion to carry a tray in his mouth for the reception of pennies?”

“No, it is not for a wager; it is a whim of mine, which I fancy from the tone of your conversation you could understand, being apparently somewhat whimsical yourself.”

“So far as whim goes, be assured of my sympathy.”

“Well, then, though I follow a calling by the exercise of which I secure a modest income, my passion is verse. If the seasons were always summer, and life were always youth, I should like to pass through the world singing. But I have never ventured to publish any verses of mine. If they fell still-born it would give me more pain than such wounds to vanity ought to give to a bearded man; and if they were assailed or ridiculed it might seriously injure me in my practical vocation. That last consideration, were I quite alone in the world, might not much weigh on me; but there are others for whose sake I should like to make fortune and preserve station. Many years ago—it was in Germany—I fell in with a German student who was very poor, and who did make money by wandering about the country with lute and song. He has since become a poet of no mean popularity, and he has told me that he is sure he found the secret of that popularity in habitually consulting popular tastes during his roving apprenticeship to song. His example strongly impressed me. So I began this experiment; and for several years my summers have been all partly spent in this way. I am only known, as I think I told you before, in the rounds I take as ‘The Wandering Minstrel;’ I receive the trifling moneys that are bestowed on me as proofs of a certain merit. I should not be paid by poor people if I did not please; and the songs which please them best are generally those I love best myself. For the rest, my time is not thrown away,—not only as regards bodily health, but healthfulness of mind: all the current of one’s ideas becomes so freshened by months of playful exercise and varied adventure.”

“Yes, the adventure is varied enough,” said Kenelm, somewhat ruefully; for he felt, in shifting his posture, a sharp twinge of his bruised muscles. “But don’t you find those mischief-makers, the women, always mix themselves up with adventure?”

“Bless them! of course,” said the minstrel, with a ringing laugh. “In life, as on the stage, the petticoat interest is always the strongest.”

“I don’t agree with you there,” said Kenelm, dryly. “And you seem to me to utter a claptrap beneath the rank of your understanding. However, this warm weather indisposes one to disputation; and I own that a petticoat, provided it be red, is not without the interest of colour in a picture.”

“Well, young gentleman,” said the minstrel, rising, “the day is wearing on, and I must wish you good-by; probably, if you were to ramble about the country as I do, you would see too many pretty girls not to teach you the strength of petticoat interest,—not in pictures alone; and should I meet you again I may find you writing love-verses yourself.”

“After a conjecture so unwarrantable, I part company with you less reluctantly than I otherwise might do. But I hope we shall meet again.”

“Your wish flatters me much; but, if we do, pray respect the confidence I have placed in you, and regard my wandering minstrelsy and my dog’s tray as sacred secrets. Should we not so meet, it is but a prudent reserve on my part if I do not give you my right name and address.”

“There you show the cautious common-sense which belongs rarely to lovers of verse and petticoat interest. What have you done with your guitar?”

“I do not pace the roads with that instrument: it is forwarded to me from town to town under a borrowed name, together with other raiment that this, should I have cause to drop my character of wandering minstrel.”

The two men here exchanged a cordial shake of the hand. And as the minstrel went his way along the river-side, his voice in chanting seemed to lend to the wavelets a livelier murmur, to the reeds a less plaintive sigh.

CHAPTER XVIII

IN his room, solitary and brooding, sat the defeated hero of a hundred fights. It was now twilight; but the shutters had been partially closed all day, in order to exclude the sun, which had never before been unwelcome to Tom Bowles, and they still remained so, making the twilight doubly twilight, till the harvest moon, rising early, shot its ray through the crevice, and forced a silvery track amid the shadows of the floor.

The man’s head drooped on his breast; his strong hands rested listlessly on his knees: his attitude was that of utter despondency and prostration. But in the expression of his face there were the signs of some dangerous and restless thought which belied not the gloom but the stillness of the posture. His brow, which was habitually open and frank, in its defying aggressive boldness, was now contracted into deep furrows, and lowered darkly over his downcast, half-closed eyes. His lips were so tightly compressed that the face lost its roundness, and the massive bone of the jaw stood out hard and salient. Now and then, indeed, the lips opened, giving vent to a deep, impatient sigh, but they reclosed as quickly as they had parted. It was one of those crises in life which find all the elements that make up a man’s former self in lawless anarchy; in which the Evil One seems to enter and direct the storm; in which a rude untutored mind, never before harbouring a thought of crime, sees the crime start up from an abyss, feels it to be an enemy, yet yields to it as a fate. So that when, at the last, some wretch, sentenced to the gibbet, shudderingly looks back to the moment “that trembled between two worlds,”—the world of the man guiltless, the world of the man guilty,—he says to the holy, highly educated, rational, passionless priest who confesses him and calls him “brother,” “The devil put it into my head.”

At that moment the door opened; at its threshold there stood the man’s mother—whom he had never allowed to influence his conduct, though he loved her well in his rough way—and the hated fellow-man whom he longed to see dead at his feet. The door reclosed: the mother was gone, without a word, for her tears choked her; the fellow-man was alone with him. Tom Bowles looked up, recognized his visitor, cleared his brow, and rubbed his mighty hands.

CHAPTER XIX

KENELM CHILLINGLY drew a chair close to his antagonist’s, and silently laid a hand on his.

Tom Bowles took up the hand in both his own, turned it curiously towards the moonlight, gazed at it, poised it, then with a sound between groan and laugh tossed it away as a thing hostile but trivial, rose and locked the door, came back to his seat and said bluffly,—

“What do you want with me now?”

“I want to ask you a favour.”

“Favour?”

“The greatest which man can ask from man,—friendship. You see, my dear Tom,” continued Kenelm, making himself quite at home, throwing his arm over the back of Tom’s chair, and stretching his legs comfortably as one does by one’s own fireside; “you see, my dear Tom, that men like us—young, single, not on the whole bad-looking as men go—can find sweethearts in plenty. If one does not like us, another will; sweethearts are sown everywhere like nettles and thistles. But the rarest thing in life is a friend. Now, tell me frankly, in the course of your wanderings did you ever come into a village where you could not have got a sweetheart if you had asked for one; and if, having got a sweetheart, you had lost her, do you think you would have had any difficulty in finding another? But have you such a thing in the world, beyond the pale of your own family, as a true friend,—a man friend; and supposing that you had such a friend,—a friend who would stand by you through thick and thin; who would tell you your faults to your face, and praise you for your good qualities behind your back; who would do all he could to save you from a danger, and all he could to get you out of one,—supposing you had such a friend and lost him, do you believe that if you lived to the age of Methuselah you could find another? You don’t answer me; you are silent. Well, Tom, I ask you to be such a friend to me, and I will be such a friend to you.”

Tom was so thoroughly “taken aback” by this address that he remained dumfounded. But he felt as if the clouds in his soul were breaking, and a ray of sunlight were forcing its way through the sullen darkness. At length, however, the receding rage within him returned, though with vacillating step, and he growled between his teeth,—

“A pretty friend indeed, robbing me of my girl! Go along with you!”

“She was not your girl any more than she was or ever can be mine.”

“What, you be n’t after her?”

“Certainly not; I am going to Luscombe, and I ask you to come with me. Do you think I am going to leave you here?”

“What is it to you?”

“Everything. Providence has permitted me to save you from the most lifelong of all sorrows. For—think! Can any sorrow be more lasting than had been yours if you had attained your wish; if you had forced or frightened a woman to be your partner till death do part,—you loving her, she loathing you; you conscious, night and day, that your very love had insured her misery, and that misery haunting you like a ghost!—that sorrow I have saved you. May Providence permit me to complete my work, and save you also from the most irredeemable of all crimes! Look into your soul, then recall the thoughts which all day long, and not least at the moment I crossed this threshold, were rising up, making reason dumb and conscience blind, and then lay your hand on your heart and say, ‘I am guiltless of a dream of murder.’”

The wretched man sprang up erect, menacing, and, meeting Kenelm’s calm, steadfast, pitying gaze, dropped no less suddenly,—dropped on the floor, covered his face with his hands, and a great cry came forth between sob and howl.

“Brother,” said Kenelm, kneeling beside him, and twining his arm round the man’s heaving breast, “it is over now; with that cry the demon that maddened you has fled forever.”

CHAPTER XX

WHEN, some time after, Kenelm quitted the room and joined Mrs. Bowles below, he said cheerily, “All right; Tom and I are sworn friends. We are going together to Luscombe the day after to-morrow,—Sunday; just write a line to his uncle to prepare him for Tom’s visit, and send thither his clothes, as we shall walk, and steal forth unobserved betimes in the morning. Now go up and talk to him; he wants a mother’s soothing and petting. He is a noble fellow at heart, and we shall be all proud of him some day or other.”

As he walked towards the farmhouse, Kenelm encountered Mr. Lethbridge, who said, “I have come from Mr. Saunderson’s, where I went in search of you. There is an unexpected hitch in the negotiation for Mrs. Bawtrey’s shop. After seeing you this morning I fell in with Mr. Travers’s bailiff, and he tells me that her lease does not give her the power to sublet without the Squire’s consent; and that as the premises were originally let on very low terms to a favoured and responsible tenant, Mr. Travers cannot be expected to sanction the transfer of the lease to a poor basket-marker: in fact, though he will accept Mrs. Bawtrey’s resignation, it must be in favour of an applicant whom he desires to oblige. On hearing this, I rode over to the Park and saw Mr. Travers himself. But he was obdurate to my pleadings. All I could get him to say was, ‘Let the stranger who interests himself in the matter come and talk to me. I should like to see the man who thrashed that brute Tom Bowles: if he got the better of him perhaps he may get the better of me. Bring him with you to my harvest-supper to-morrow evening.’ Now, will you come?”

“Nay,” said Kenelm, reluctantly; “but if he only asks me in order to gratify a very vulgar curiosity, I don’t think I have much chance of serving Will Somers. What do you say?”

“The Squire is a good man of business, and, though no one can call him unjust or grasping, still he is very little touched by sentiment; and we must own that a sickly cripple like poor Will is not a very eligible tenant. If, therefore, it depended only on your chance with the Squire, I should not be very sanguine. But we have an ally in his daughter. She is very fond of Jessie Wiles, and she has shown great kindness to Will. In fact, a sweeter, more benevolent, sympathizing nature than that of Cecilia Travers does not exist. She has great influence with her father, and through her you may win him.”

“I particularly dislike having anything to do with women,” said Kenelm, churlishly. “Parsons are accustomed to get round them. Surely, my dear sir, you are more fit for that work than I am.”

“Permit me humbly to doubt that proposition; one does n’t get very quickly round the women when one carries the weight of years on one’s back. But whenever you want the aid of a parson to bring your own wooing to a happy conclusion, I shall be happy, in my special capacity of parson, to perform the ceremony required.”

“Dii meliora!” said Kenelm, gravely. “Some ills are too serious to be approached even in joke. As for Miss Travers, the moment you call her benevolent you inspire me with horror. I know too well what a benevolent girl is,—officious, restless, fidgety, with a snub nose, and her pocket full of tracts. I will not go to the harvest-supper.”

“Hist!” said the Parson, softly. They were now passing the cottage of Mrs. Somers; and while Kenelm was haranguing against benevolent girls, Mr. Lethbridge had paused before it, and was furtively looking in at the window. “Hist! and come here,—gently.”

Kenelm obeyed, and looked in through the window. Will was seated; Jessie Wiles had nestled herself at his feet, and was holding his hand in both hers, looking up into his face. Her profile alone was seen, but its expression was unutterably soft and tender. His face, bent downwards towards her, wore a mournful expression; nay, the tears were rolling silently down his cheeks. Kenelm listened and heard her say, “Don’t talk so, Will, you break my heart; it is I who am not worthy of you.”

“Parson,” said Kenelm, as they walked on, “I must go to that confounded harvest-supper. I begin to think there is something true in the venerable platitude about love in a cottage. And Will Somers must be married in haste, in order to repent at leisure.”

“I don’t see why a man should repent having married a good girl whom he loves.”

“You don’t? Answer me candidly. Did you ever meet a man who repented having married?”

“Of course I have; very often.”

“Well, think again, and answer as candidly. Did you ever meet a man who repented not having married?”

The Parson mused, and was silent.

“Sir,” said Kenelm, “your reticence proves your honesty, and I respect it.” So saying, he bounded off, and left the Parson crying out wildly, “But—but—”

CHAPTER XXI

MR. SAUNDERSON and Kenelm sat in the arbour: the former sipping his grog and smoking his pipe; the latter looking forth into the summer night skies with an earnest yet abstracted gaze, as if he were trying to count the stars in the Milky Way.

“Ha!” said Mr. Saunderson, who was concluding an argument; “you see it now, don’t you?”

“I? not a bit of it. You tell me that your grandfather was a farmer, and your father was a farmer, and that you have been a farmer for thirty years; and from these premises you deduce the illogical and irrational conclusion that therefore your son must be a farmer.”

“Young man, you may think yourself very knowing ‘cause you have been at the ‘Varsity, and swept away a headful of book-learning.”

“Stop,” quoth Kenelm. “You grant that a university is learned.”

“Well, I suppose so.”

“But how could it be learned if those who quitted it brought the learning away? We leave it all behind us in the care of the tutors. But I know what you were going to say,—that it is not because I had read more books than you have that I was to give myself airs and pretend to have more knowledge of life than a man of your years and experience. Agreed, as a general rule. But does not every doctor, however wise and skilful, prefer taking another doctor’s opinion about himself, even though that other doctor has just started in practice? And seeing that doctors, taking them as a body, are monstrous clever fellows, is not the example they set us worth following? Does it not prove that no man, however wise, is a good judge of his own case? Now, your son’s case is really your case: you see it through the medium of your likings and dislikings; and insist upon forcing a square peg into a round hole, because in a round hole you, being a round peg, feel tight and comfortable. Now I call that irrational.”

“I don’t see why my son has any right to fancy himself a square peg,” said the farmer, doggedly, “when his father and his grandfather and his great-grandfather have been round pegs; and it is agin’ nature for any creature not to take after its own kind. A dog is a pointer or a sheep-dog according as its forebears were pointers or sheep-dogs. There,” cried the farmer, triumphantly, shaking the ashes out of his pipe. “I think I have posed you, young master!”