At Christmas the tables were turned. Ned had a friend at the Park, a boy called Ponsonby, who struck me as singularly dull, though my sisters voted him a capital dancer. And Ponsonby rode the mare which I had hitherto regarded as my especial property, though in fact she belonged to Ned.
It had never occurred to me that I could not hunt because I had no horse. At the Parsonage we had three beasts: my father’s horse, a pony which drew my mother’s little carriage, and another pony used by anybody for errands. My father seldom hunted, but Eustace was with us, he was at home on leave, and we all planned to go out together. Eustace, who is a typical sailor and never cares how he looks, said that he would ride the errand pony. The meet was at Ribstone. After an early breakfast I set off to the Park stables to get ‘my’ mare. To my astonishment she had been taken out, ‘for young Squire Ponsonby,’ so a grinning stable-boy informed me, nor was any mount left for me. A large party from the Park was out, and all available animals taken, unless I chose to ride a broken-winded, wall-eyed beast kept for the use of Charlotte’s governess.
I returned home in a very ill humour. Ned, of course, had a perfect right to do as he chose with his own horses, but I thought that he should have sent me some message. I said so to him, at the first opportunity, without getting much in the way of an apology. Ned said he thought I should have known that he must mount his guest, and how else could he, save on the mare?
‘I wonder Ponsonby don’t bring his own horses,’ said I.
‘’Tis too far. His father is very indulgent, but the expense of sending horses down into Gloucestershire would not occur to him.’
To hear that Ponsonby had got horses, even though they could not be sent into Gloucestershire, by no means mollified me. I did not hunt during the whole of those holidays, even after Ponsonby had gone and the offer of the mare reverted to me. I did not choose to be obliged to Ned, after the way that I had thrown him off in the summer, and I did not choose to ride the errand pony. I would have tried to persuade my father to buy another animal, had I not feared my mother’s silence. When displeased, it was her custom to say less than usual. I had a notion that she thought all this pother about the mare very foolish and could not see why I should not ride the errand pony, as Eustace did.
I returned to College, for my last Long Half, in a sulky mood. The period of my greatness would soon be at an end, and I began to see that it would go for nothing, once I had quitted Winchester. Even Ned, in the world’s view, was of more consequence than I, and many pleasures at Bramfield, which I had hitherto taken for granted, were, as I now saw, only mine through Ned’s good nature. This did not suit me, since I reckoned myself superior to Ned.
Ludovic
HAVING READ OVER my memoir thus far, I ask myself how nearly these reported conversations resemble those which took place so long ago. Very little, I daresay, though certain words and phrases are firmly lodged in my memory. I recollect, as though I had seen it this morning, the little frowning pause with which my mother considered whether she would resent any slight upon my father. And I can hear most clearly the decisive tones in which she said that she should scold herself for any resentment that she might feel. I can see Ned’s look too, when I upbraided him about the mare. We were standing by the gate into the stable paddock. He had a switch in his hand and he kept switching the top rail of the gate as we talked.
I think that I have translated the sense of these conversations very well, although the chief part must now of course, be invention; and I daresay that which I recall as a single interchange may be the essence of several upon the same point. But I believe that I shall continue in this manner, for it brings back looks and accents which were often more important than words. How else can I fully recall my mother, and others now lost to me? It will not serve that I should merely epitomise their opinions; I must depict their style, as far as I can, if I am to fetch them whole out of the past.
I quitted Winchester and went to Oxford, where disparities of fortune were even more significant. It became clear to me that my first object must be to provide myself with the necessaries of life, and I applied myself diligently to my studies. I was destined for Orders and would probably have taken them, and now might be heading for that mitre, had I not made the acquaintance of Ludovic, a circumstance which profoundly affected the course of my life.
It was by the merest chance that I came to know him, for he was not in my college and sought nobody’s acquaintance. He had come to Christ Church from Eton where he had been, I suspect, as comfortable as a felon in a convict ship. He never speaks of his school days, but I know that their memory fills him with terror. Even now he will not willingly walk along Piccadilly or St. James’s, for fear of meeting a former school fellow; and when Prinney succeeds I fancy Ludovic will take to his bed rather than face the peerage, in an Abbey full of Etonians.
Strangely enough it was Ponsonby brought us together, – that same Ponsonby who rode my mare at Bramfield. He came up when I did and, meeting me during the first week, in Turl Street, he greeted me as heartily as though he had been my oldest friend. Indeed, I think that he was very glad to see me, for he had, as yet, made no acquaintance. He had never been at a public school, whereas I, at New College, was surrounded by former Wykehamists. I was able to patronise him a little and recommended a barber as coolly as though I had lived in Oxford all my life. We proceeded to take a look at those famous horses of his, which could not be brought to Bramfield, but which had come to Oxford and were stabled near the Castle Inn. The poor fellow had had nothing to do save look at them, two or three times a day, since he came up. I, very obligingly, rode one of them for him, for about a fortnight, during which time that magnetism began to operate which enables the Ponsonbys of this world to discover their rightful friends. Our intimacy gradually dissolved and he took to riding with men who also kept horses.
I meet him occasionally nowadays, and got a place for his younger brother a couple of years ago. He was infinitely obliged to me and remembered that we used to ride together at Oxford. But he has managed to forget our first encounter with Lord Chalfont.
It was towards the end of that first fortnight that we returned, after riding, to Ponsonby’s chambers in Brasenose. We crossed the quadrangle to the music of a flute which somebody was playing in the vicinity. I recognised the air, – my sister Caroline sang it – and I hummed the words as we mounted the staircase.
What though I trace each herb and flower
That drinks the morning dew?
Did I not own Jehovah’s power
How vain were all I knew!
By now we had reached Ponsonby’s door, from behind which these strains seemed to issue. Ponsonby changed colour a trifle and hesitated. In every college there are wags who divert themselves at the expense of freshmen, and I daresay he had already suffered at their hands. Those who have survived a public school are more likely to be spared. At length he plucked up his spirits and strode in. I tactfully hung back.
‘And who the devil may you be, sir?’ I heard him demand.
Handel ceased and a shrill voice pronounced the name of Ponsonby.
‘That is my name. But who are you and why do you play the flute in my chamber?’
‘I am here, Mr. Ponsonby, because your scout brought me here, assuring me that you would return very shortly. I play the flute because I have nothing else to do, you know.’
‘And where might you get a flute?’ asks Ponsonby, very suspiciously.
‘I brought it with me. But I should tell you my name, which is Chalfont. My father desired me to call upon you, since he is a friend of your father.’
‘Oh!’ says Ponsonby.
I can tell by his tone that he does not believe a word of it. Neither do I. I take a peep through the crack of the door. Our visitor is a wizened little creature, standing perhaps at five foot four, and of no calculable age; he might be an elderly fifteen, he might be a juvenile fifty. He wears his hair long and cut straight across the brow, in imitation of Buonaparte, whom
he does not otherwise resemble. His finger-nails are very black, his cravat under his ear, and a button is missing from his coat.
‘Did your father say nothing about me?’ he enquires.
Ponsonby had already told me that he expected the acquaintance of Lord Chalfont and the reason for it. I daresay he had informed a good many people of his expectations. This visitor had a spurious appearance, but poor Ponsonby, unused to being foxed, knew not how to act. Straightening my face as well as I could, I went to his aid, for I had, after all, spent the morning upon his horse.
‘Lord Chalfont?’ said I hastily, joining them. ‘How do you do? How charmingly your lordship plays the flute! Pray continue! We love the flute, don’t we, Ponsonby?’
‘Do you indeed?’ cried the little fellow.
‘Oh, beyond all things. We have been pining for a little music. We must beg, we must insist, that you continue!’
He did so, nothing loath, which was as well for him, for, if he had refused, I should have dropped him out of the window. I meant to turn the tables by forcing him to play until he was completely blown. But the air which he gave us was so charming that I felt inclined to let him off short of that. I am very fond of music and he played exceedingly well.
Ponsonby meanwhile, too stupid to understand my tactics, stood gaping at us both.
‘What’s this?’ I cried, when the air was over. ‘I never heard it before. Who is the composer?’
Our visitor explained that it was from Idomeneo. I asked where it might be procured, for I had it in mind to send a copy home. My mother and sisters were always very glad to get hold of new songs.
My question brought down upon me a torrent of information. I had never heard of Mozart, but I heard of nothing else for the rest of the day. Ludovic’s dotes are like a hurricane. This one swept us all out of Brasenose and into his chambers in Peckwater, where he undertook to play us all the works of Mozart upon his pianoforte. As we walked he chattered incessantly, occasionally breaking into song and beating time with his flute. The bewildered Ponsonby trotted at our heels. I had ceased to care whom the queer little fellow might be; I was charmed by his talk and eager to hear him play again. But Ponsonby, finding himself actually in Christ Church, reading the name of Chalfont upon the staircase, and perceiving the luxury of the quarters into which we were got, comes out with a bellow:
‘Then you ARE Chalfont!’
‘Batti! Batti!’ carols our host, at the instrument.
He passes from one air to another and after a while I observe that Ponsonby has disappeared. I ask what has become of him. My host is puzzled, since he has now got it into his head that I am Ponsonby. We have got through a good deal of port wine, between songs. If I am not Ponsonby, says he, then the fellow was lying who said I would return very shortly. When I try to set him right he exclaims:
‘’Tis of no consequence since that other man is not here.’
Within a very short time we are ‘Miles’ and ‘Ludovic’ to one another, but it is months before he is certain of my surname. He is liable to introduce me everywhere as Ponsonby.
I am exceedingly fond of Ludovic. I cannot follow him in all his dotes, but he has introduced me to so many pleasures, since that first evening of Mozart, that I am deeply grateful to him. His enthusiasm for all the arts is prodigious but I am not sure that his judgment is entirely to be trusted. I have yet to be persuaded, for instance, that La clemenza di Tito is Mozart’s finest work.
In the realms of poetry he is equally eccentric. Neither Scott nor Southey will do, and he has not very much to say for Byron. He insists that Wordsworth and Coleridge are superior in genius and execution, yet is hard put to it to say why. He cannot criticise; he can only dote, chirrup his favourite airs, and declaim his favourite verses, with so much absurdity of expression and gesture that the most elegant lines could scarcely come off well. I shall never forget one summer at Brailsford when he was in perpetual lamentation for a young woman called Lucy, bewailing her untimely death in verses which struck me, at that time, as sad doggerel, though I have since come to understand and share his enthusiasm. He would mutter them to himself, as he went up and down stairs, with so much woe in his countenance that I could not forbear laughing. I can see him now, pausing suddenly during a ramble across the meadows, and addressing one of his father’s pedigree cows in these terms:
She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be.
But she is in her grave and OH!
The difference to ME!
It was the more ridiculous in that a genuine Lucy, in a material grave, would not have made a tittle of difference to him. The whole human race, with the exception of his valet, might have perished without his taking much notice of it. He would, I think, have thought that something must be amiss if nobody brought him his morning chocolate.
Immense wealth and noble birth may enable a man to patronise the arts, but I suspect that they impede his capacity as a critic. Nobody restrains his extravagance and nobody bids him hold his tongue. Your aristocrat is a fish out of water among the artists: they don’t talk to him as they talk to one another. And among his own kind he finds few companions, for these people, though they learn early the jargon of taste, and can cry up the masterpieces of the day, do not really take the matter seriously, nor are they taken seriously by the fellows whom they patronise. Ludovic has actually spoken to Mozart. Lord Amersham was our minister at Vienna before the wars broke out, and Ludovic, in infancy, was often taken to the Opera. During some performance the composer was brought to Lord Amersham’s box to receive the compliments of the Quality. His little lordship was, I am sure, very gracious.
‘He made me,’ said Ludovic, ‘a low bow, but said nothing.’
In appearance Ludovic continues to be eccentric. No valet can keep him fit to be seen for any length of time. He never knows what he eats and spills food upon his clothes. I had some conversation about him once with his sister, Lady Sophia Harnish, and she asked me to tell her frankly if I thought him deranged.
‘We fear so,’ she said, ‘but there is nothing to be done. It is my father’s fault. His severity caused a brain fever from which I think poor Ludovic has never fully recovered.’
She told me that the family had spent a winter in Naples when Ludovic was eight years old. While they were there a servant, a young lad to whom he was extravagantly attached, had been discovered in the act of theft. It transpired that his thievery had been carrying on for some time and had been known to Ludovic, who held his tongue out of loyalty to his friend. Lord Amersham was very angry and thought it right that the child should witness the punishment of the criminal; in this case, to be broken upon the wheel. Ludovic was brought home insensible and lay for many weeks between life and death. Ever since that time he has been subject to fits and seizures.
‘He never speaks of it,’ said Lady Sophia. ‘But I believe he is still very unhappy about it. Have you ever heard him laugh?’
I realised, in some astonishment, that I had not. Ludovic will go off into a transport. Pictures, poetry and music will move him to ecstasy. But he is never merry.
At the end of our first year at Oxford, our intimacy had become so close that he invited me to stay at Brailsford. It is but a long day’s ride from Bramfield, and I have been staying there a good deal ever since. I was received with the greatest kindness by his family, who were delighted that he should, for once, bring home a friend who looked and behaved like a gentleman. He had made no friends at school and his former dotes, in the way of human affection, had been of a kind to disturb his friends; such attachments as he formed were all for lads much inferior to himself in station, – for grooms and ploughboys whom he admired, I suppose, because they were his opposites in everything.
My ad portas manner was of great reassurance to the Amershams. I think I really did a good deal for Ludovic. I got him to cut his hair and pare his nails. His confidence in me was so great that he would, when with me, occasionally venture into company. I could ne
ver induce him to shoot; the loud reports of the guns startled him too much. But he took to riding with me and would even hunt, so long as he was not expected to be present at the kill. I cannot think that he is fond of me; he is fond of nobody. But he has feeling for me of a sort. He admires my looks; that has always great power with him. We have many ideas and tastes in common. And my manners are gentler than those to which he has been accustomed among men of his own station, or women either.
The Amershams were grateful for this improvement and would have had me live at Brailsford, if I would have stayed. My position there has always been more comfortable than it has been in any other great house. I came there first as a benefactor, which put me upon a footing with them which Pronto has never been able to command elsewhere, among people of rank.
Ludovic came to stay with me, and, though my sisters and cousins thought him a quiz, my parents liked him. He supported my father in a notion that there might be Roman remains in Farmer Roundhay’s meadow. They grew so positive that they began to dig, or rather cause a number of little scare-the-crow boys to dig, and did indeed uncover part of a mosaic pavement. They might, I believe, have dug up a whole villa, had Roundhay not rebelled.
As for my mother, he came as near to loving her as he did anyone. While she lived he talked of her continually, though I have never heard her name upon his lips since she died. From the Sex in general he has a decided aversion, though he admires my sisters for their beauty and good humour. He is, in a way, attached to Lady Sophia, I think, nor was he indifferent to his mother, to whom he paid more attention than to anyone else. He would generally try to do what she wished, as far as it was in his power. But I don’t think that he loved her. His strongest feeling, in her case, appeared to be compassion, which puzzled me a little at first, for no woman asked for pity less than did Lady Amersham. She always seemed to be perfectly satisfied with herself and her lot. But I suspect that she interceded for him, and interceded in vain, upon that dreadful occasion in Naples and that this failure, in a singularly powerful woman, had made a deep impression upon him. He hated his father.
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