There was on the occasion a numerous assembly of portly ecclesiastics, and jolly laymen, who loved the church well, and gave largely to it. The ceremony was followed by a jovial festival. The refectory of the old abbey was too small to accommodate the party, and, as it was a bright calm summer day, the tables were spread under the shade of a circle of gigantic elms, of which the wide-spreading branches mingled from side to side, excluding the sun, and leaving ample space for the feast.
The sun had not long passed the meridian when the party sate down, and was not far from the north-western horizon when they rose from their seats. All but the friars departed for their homes. Some rode, oscillating on their horses like pendulums reflected in water: others walked, describing every possible variety of curve. Some reached home: — others made to themselves temporary hostelries under trees by the way-side, and on the following morning had very advantageous views of the rising sun. Brother John, and some of the more hard-headed friars, piously carried the Father Abbot to bed. Some of the brethren went to bed of themselves: some slept quietly within the circle of elms. The whole affair passed off with great decorum.
In the morning, the Abbot had a confused recollection of something having been said by Brother John, and asked him to repeat his remark.
“I said,” replied Brother John, “These walls will survive their foundation.”
“You are always speaking in riddles, Brother John,” said the Abbot, “and when they are explained, there is always a touch of heresy in them.
I recommend you a little caution, or you may find yourself in a dilemma with the Heads of the Church.”
“I have no fear of that,” said Brother John. “I am ready with a most orthodox profession of faith, and most sturdy denial, or penitential retractation, of any errors that may be charged against me. I have tried it more than once, and have been always not only absolved, but extolled and honoured as a pillar of the faith.”
“You may try it once too often, Brother John,” said the Abbot. “But what is this new riddle of yours, which seems to be nonsense, about walls surviving their foundation?”
“Their foundation is faith,” said Brother John.
“The walls will be standing when the faith has departed. I have been a crusader and a pilgrim.
I have seen many temples of the old world, without a single votary of the divinities to whom they were raised.”
“They were false divinities,” said the Abbot.
“All is one for that,” said Brother John. “True or false, after a lapse of centuries, the result will be the same. I have seen Pagan temples become Christian Churches, and Christian Churches become Mahometan mosques. That which has been is that which shall be. There is nothing new under the sun.”
“The foundation will last our time,” said the Abbot.
“No doubt,” said Brother John.
“Then look to your own charge,” said the Abbot, “which is the cellar. See it well stocked with choice vintages. You have in your day drained many flasks—”
“Casks,” said Brother John:
“Casks, if you please,” said the Abbot, “and you were not always very scrupulous how you came by them. You were a pilgrim, you say. You used your pilgrim’s staff as a collector of revenue, to pay the cost of your pilgrimage.”
“I collected,” said Brother John, “no more than I wanted for the poor needs of the day. I took no thought of the morrow.”
“You were a crusader too,” said the Abbot. “You took some questionable followers to the Holy Land, and brought them back no better than they went.”
“Much better,” said Brother John: “much better, for what they had to do.”
“After your return,” said the Abbot, “how did you employ them?”
“In very efficient public service,” said Brother John. “I occupied a stronghold over a great highway, and kept it clear of thieves.”
“Paying yourself for your public service,” said the Abbot, “by levying toll on travellers.”
“A fair and equitable tariff,” said Brother John: “An ad valorem duty on their baggage.”
“You lived,” said the Abbot, “like Rinaldo di Montalbano. They say, you sometimes took young women in commutation of tax.”
“Only with their own consent,” said Brother John. “If one of my followers wanted a wife, and a young maid were willing to stay and marry him, where was the harm in retaining her, with the concurrence of all parties concerned?”
“That was not all,” said the Abbot. “They say you were not over scrupulous in retaining another man’s wife.”
“Always with her own consent,” said Brother John:— “and sometimes with her husband’s.
When there was an ill-assorted pair, I acted as a high Court of Divorce, and relieved them of one another.”
“Condemning the husband in costs,” said the Abbot, “confiscating his baggage to pay them, and taking the wife to yourself.”
“Only once,” said Brother John, “only one wife.”
“One at a time, I suppose,” said the Abbot.
“No,” said Brother John, “only one once for all. I divorced her lawfully, and I married her lawfully.”
“By your own code,” said the Abbot.
“As good a code as any,” said Brother John, “and better, inasmuch as it had the advantage of brevity.”
“Of course,” said the Abbot, “you enjoyed your life in your stronghold.”
“Indeed I did,” said Brother John, “and so did all about me. My wife was an excellent wife. Her first husband did not appreciate the blessing he possessed.”
“So you appreciated her for him,” said the Abbot. “But how came you to give up this moral and agreeable life?”
“The king,” said Brother John, “grew jealous of my keeping better order in his dominions than he could do, and invested my stronghold with a large force. I kept him at bay till my provisions fell short. Then I capitulated and was allowed to march out with the honours of war.”
“And what then?” said the Abbot.
“Why, then,” said Brother John, “my men dispersed.”
“And what then?” said the Abbot. “You and your wife—”
A sudden change came over the face of Brother John. He smote his forehead with his clenched fist and walked silently away.
“There is a mystery,” said the Abbot to himself, “about my good son John. For he is a good fellow at bottom, with all his aberrations. He has never been so communicative as he has been to-day. He has often seemed disposed to be so: but he has always stopped short. To-day he has gone a step further. He has had a wife and has lost her, and the remembrance is painful. I will not press him on the subject, but no doubt in due time he will be more confidential. I am inclined to think, he exaggerates his natural joviality to conceal a hidden sorrow, and suffers most at heart when he is most hyperbolically merry.”
Cotswald Chace
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER I
ONE WINTER AFTERNOON, under a bright sunny sky with ice on the water, and snow on the ground, a young gentleman alighted at a railway station, and asked, if a post-chaise were waiting for him, as a visitor to Cotswold Chace. The answer being affirmative, he took his seat, and the chaise drove off. He passed, first, through a tract of cultivated country; then through a tract of woodland; then across a wide space of open undulating land; then past a tract of woodland clothing a hillside and bordering the road, which rose by a continuous ascent to the summit of open undulating land: then arrived at a lodge with a pair of iron gates, through which he entered on another woodland tract, which continued unbroken till he arrived at his destination.
The chaise stopped at the door of a large ancient mansion, which seemed to stand as the representative of three hundred years ago. To the right and left of it were several gigantic cedars, each wide apart, in single majesty. Before these again, were oak, and beech, and chestnut and wild cherr
y, and ash, all insulated like the cedars, all of vast size, showing their old trunks, one beyond the other, till they were masked by their numbers; diverging from the house on both sides, till they met a deep mass of woodland at some distance in front, which bounded the prospect.
Entering a spacious hall, he was ushered, through a door on the left, into a large room, of which the sides were composed of alternations of tapestried pannels and dark oaken book-shelves, with a large stained-glass window in the middle of each of three sides, the middle of the fourth being assigned to the fire-place. This was of great width, with enormous logs of wood burning on andirons: above it was an old carving of oak, representing the arms of the family, with on each side figures as large as life: on one side a forester, with bow, arrows and bugle, and a hound at his feet: on the other a lady, in forest apparel, with a falcon on her wrist.
On each side of the fire was a large old arm-chair, in one of which was seated a young gentleman, the only modern article in the apartment, who, on the announcement of his visitor, rose to welcome him, which he did very cordially.
Refreshment having been offered to the newcomer, and declined on the ground that he had taken care of himself with a basket of sandwiches and Madeira on the railway, they took their seats in the opposite chairs. “I rejoice to meet you again, Richard,” said the visitor. “We have not met since we were boys. You have been a fixture, while I have been a wanderer: and here you are, sole lord and master of an extensive property: Cotswold of Cotswold: but I rather wonder at the name: for I have always understood a wold to be a place bare of trees, and this place is all trees.”
RICHARD COTSWOLD
There are places without trees, which are still called forests, and a wold may have been planted, and retained its name after the trees grew up. But, in fact, there is still a belt of wold all round the Chace, and the part may stand for the whole. And, though a place of some extent in itself, it occupies but a small portion of the Cotswold Hills.
CHARLES
I passed, then, over a part of the Wold, a perfectly bare tract: and on the other side of it, just as I emerged from the woodland, I saw a pair of iron gates, with a lodge: almost the only sign of habitation in the whole way, excepting a small village, and a few scattered cottages. So you have a neighbour, within carriage distance.
RICHARD
Yes: but it is a fair spinster, who has come, at an early age, into possession of a large property, which has gone through many revolutions. There is a great deal of woodland, still in a primitive state: but the house and all about it are things of yesterday.
CHARLES
You call her a fair spinster, and you say she is young. Is she handsome?
RICHARD
Very handsome.
CHARLES
Can you describe her?
RICHARD
I think I can: for there is nothing complicated about her. The elements of the description are few and simple. She dresses almost always in very fine cloth, usually blue: with a black hat and feather, and very neat boots, laced over a small and very pretty foot. She wears no crinoline, and, if I might venture to divine, no stays. In short, she is like a Greek statue, only in thicker, but still fine and graceful, drapery: and all her movements are graceful. Her dress closes round her neck, and descends to her ancles. Her features are as regular as sculpture could make them. Her complexion is, I imagine, naturally fair, but slightly embrowned by air and exercise: and there is over it a pure roseate glow of health, that makes her literally radiant. Her hair is very fine, and slightly darker than her eyes, which are hazel: and there is a brilliancy of expression about them, that seems to emanate from a very high order of mind. Her voice, in speaking, is at once soft and full: sweet and distinct: the natural articulation of graceful and unruffled thoughts. I imagine, that she sings, and that her singing voice is no less charming, but I have never heard her.
CHARLES
No! That is strange.
RICHARD
It is so, however. I sometimes meet her, and we exchange salutations: but I have never been in her house.
CHARLES
That is still more strange. Have you never presented yourself at her doors?
RICHARD
No: for I have the most distinct assurance that I should not be admitted. No man is: nor woman either, her own servants excepted, so far as I can learn. She neither visits, nor receives visitors. And she has neither man nor boy as indoor servants, though she has a sufficient establishment of them for out-door work.
CHARLES
Well, but have you never taken any step towards intimacy? Being, as you are, in love —
RICHARD
That is just what I am not.
CHARLES
Indeed! You described her, as I should have thought none but a lover could do. And so, you are contented with exchanging salutations. How did you get so far as that?
RICHARD
Our acquaintance, such as it is, began with a letter from her, which I will shew you. Here it is.
CHARLES
Beautiful hand-writing.
RICHARD
Like herself. She is all beauty.
CHARLES
And you are not in love with her?
RICHARD
No. Read the letter.
CHARLES (reading)
“Sir, Your people and mine are frequently in dispute about our respective manorial rights on the wold. I propose that we should meet on the spot, with two or three of the oldest tenants on each side, and draw a line of demarcation. I am disposed to make all reasonable concessions.
Your obedient servant, Cecilia Dorimer.”
Short, and conciliatory. Well?
RICHARD
I answered, that I should be happy to meet her. We met accordingly. I offered her the boundary claimed by her own people. She offered me that claimed by mine. Neither of us would accept the concession, and we ended by drawing a middle line.
CHARLES
Now, I am as sure as I can be of any thing, that she cared nothing about the boundary, and would have ordered her people not to dispute it, if she had not found it a good pretext to make your acquaintance. Had your people and hers been fighting, like the servants of Capulet and Montague?
RICHARD
The first I heard of the dispute was from her letter. And I should have conceded the point at once, if I had not wished to meet her.
CHARLES
A clear case of pretext, made by her, and accepted by you.
RICHARD
Possibly. I am delighted to have seen her. “A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”
CHARLES
When you exchange salutations, how does she look, serious or smiling?
RICHARD
Neither, exactly. Something like a smile: the dawn before the sun: — such as might precede, though it does not, “Il lampeggiar de l’angelico riso, Che sembra aprire in terra un paradiso.”
CHARLES
You apply to her what Petrarch says of Laura, and you are not in love with her?
RICHARD
I am not in love with her.
CHARLES
This is a riddle.
RICHARD
No: it is merely a fact.
In due time, they dined in a corresponding apartment on the opposite side of the hall, and, over Madeira and claret, talked of their earlier days, with occasional recurrence to the present, and especially to the lady on the other side of the Wold. Charles renewed the subject from time to time, and found that, as the wine sunk in the bottles, his host grew more eloquent and expansive in praise of his beautiful neighbour: still persisting most emphatically, that he was not in love with her.
There was on each side of the hall a large oaken stair-case. They ascended together the one nearest to the dining-room: and, as they were parting for the night, at the door of Charles’s apartment, the visitor suddenly said to his host: “Though you are not in love with the young lady, I am, with your description of her. Have you any objection to my try
ing my fortune in that quarter?”
“A decided objection,” answered Richard, and walked off hastily. “A curious specimen,” said Charles to himself, laughing as he closed his chamber door, “of a man who is not in love.”
CHAPTER II
RICHARD AND CHARLES were first cousins by the mother’s side. They had often met in their early days, but Richard had been brought up in seclusion and Charles at a public school and university. They had met at the house of Charles’s parents: but through a feud between the brothers-in-law, Charles had never been at Cotswold. Richard had been little else than a fixture on his paternal estate: Charles had wandered over half the world. Returning after a long absence, his first thought was to propose a visit to his cousin, and the proposal having been cordially accepted, he made his appearance at the Chace.
On the day after his arrival, Richard showed him over his house and partly over his grounds.
There were on the upper floor, — for there was only one, — many large and lofty chambers on each side of two wide corridors, with doors at each end, leading to the apartments of the male servants on one side and to those of the female servants on the other. At the end of the hall opposite the main entrance were large folding-doors. Above them was an organ-loft, with a large organ. The folding-doors led to a suite of three rooms, communicating by double doors at the sides. Every thing wore the same appearance of antiquity, though there was not an absolute rejection of all modern appliances to domestic comfort: the number of these, which were worth adopting, having been, nevertheless, in the opinion of the proprietors, past and present, exceedingly few.
Complete Works of Thomas Love Peacock Page 105