CHAPTER XIX. REACTION. Time hath, my lord, a wallet on his back Wherein he puts alms for oblivion. A great-sized monster of ingratitude. Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devoured SHAKSPEARE. TORRENTS and fells are delightful things to look at in fine weather; but one cannot always have fine weather. It is charming also to paint; but one cannot always be painting. The contemplation of man, indeed, under his various appearances, is delightful to the moral observer; and a new or primitive people is a noble field of interest, until it is got by heart. Hence the charm of pastoral life to a man accustomed to cities; and the sweets of repose, to one jaded by the contests of passion. To youth alse, which has all time before it, and all the world to choose in, and which, therefore, can play the prodigal with both time and the world, pleasure seems interminable, because ever seen through the glass of hope. O! its careless uncertainty is delicious! It gilds all prospects, and gives body to wishes; nor can the most successful certainty of after times, not even if it make a prime minister of a clerk, or a commander-inchief of a private soldier, ever equal, in real happiness, that of the simple stripling who hopes all, and believes what he hopes. "Where do you live?" said I once to an erect Irish boy of fifteen. "Wherever there are the best potatoes," was the answer. "And where sleep?" "Wherever there is the best hay." Such beings may roam unheeded and unheeding through pathless wilds, nor sleep the less sound because they know not where they are. Not so with the veterans of the world, particularly if they have sacrificed to any great passion, and only fled from it as a relief, when its mischiefs pressed too sorely upon them; as little with those high and honourable spirits, who are born to serve mankind by directing, and whose province it is, therefore, to live in the midst of them. It is certain, the journey of our travellers to the Pyrenees, the sights they saw, and the life they led there, had opened a source of pleasure and of thought to them both, to which they gave themselves up at first with devotion. But somehow or another, this altered by degrees; and though Wentworth continued to admire the energies of Rivers, in the pursuit of his own peculiar happiness, his admiration began to be mixed with wonder that they did not wear out. De Vere too began to be ashamed, at having suffered that design which so tempted his free spirit when he left England, in favour of the Polish cause, to languish as it had done, even after his first object, that of soothing and restoring Wentworth, had been accomplished. To be sure, both Rivers, and Wentworth himself, had much shaken him from a resolution which, from the constant advices received from the north, appeared now to be Quixotish. But his inclination still bent that way, and his unwillingness to return to England remained undiminished. In this state of abated enjoyment, on the one part, and irresolution on the other, the month of October approaching, and Parliament definitively summoned for the dispatch of business, both the gentlemen felt much excited by a letter, with the London post-mark, and signed "Her bert," on the outside. It was directed to Wentworth, who read it with avidity; and it contained many passages too applicable to our subject, not to be recorded. "What you tell me," said the letter, "of the restoration of your health, and, in part, of your mind, delights me. Your way of life too, and the scenes you describe, would almost make my old age romantic, and long to join you. But I fear I have too long preferred Homer and Thucydides, to Virgil and Ariosto; and the historical plays of Shakspeare, to Oberon and Titania, to hazard what I know would be a disappointment. The regions of fancy, indeed, are still charming; but fancy is often as charming in the closet, as in the supposed realities of what she makes us dream. Shall I own to you, that your visit (if I may so call it) to Bolingbroke was far more interesting than your Pyrenees. All you find there, proves that thereal study of mankind is man." Mr. Rivers is to be sure a wonderful creature; but he is at least a nondescript, and probably unique. Neither you nor De Vere are, however, like him, nor made to doze away life in useless imagination. You say he is happy; but his happiness is not, and cannot be, either yours or your friend's. He cannot direct the world, however he may the shepherds of the Pyrenees. I question if he could even direct the latter; for who does not know that shepherds once were conquerors and kings, and had energies which cannot be his? Upon both of you the world has claims. Your duty is concerned. And in regard to my friend De Vere, however we must respect those dispositions in favour of unhappy Poland, which animated him on leaving England, I trust I need not set forth to his good sense, the nullity, I had almost said the ridicule of supposing that his single arm (and that not an experienced one), can do any good to a cause now universally despaired of. But were this not so, and with even a mere view to your own reputations, no talents in this country can sleep, and yet preserve command. The sword, rusty in its scabbard, is no longer a sword. The brightest diamond withdrawn from sight, is no longer dazzling. In its absence inferior stones begin to shine. Remember Achilles, during whose cessation Ajax filled the eyes of the Grecian camp. 66 Perhaps I should not be thus urgent, or thus free, but for what I see passing here. Lord Oldcastle triumphs; of Lord Mowbray's |