My Novel Part 39

"You see I am so stupid, Mr. Dale; I never knew I was so stupid till I married. But I am very glad you are come. You can get on some learned subject together, and then he will not miss so much his--"

"His what?" asked Riccabocca, inquisitively.

"His country. Do you think that I cannot sometimes read your thoughts?"

"Very often. But you did not read them just then. The tongue touches where the tooth aches, but the best dentist cannot guess at the tooth unless one open one's mouth.--Basta! Can we offer you some wine of our own making, Mr. Dale?--it is pure."

"I 'd rather have some tea," quoth the parson, hastily. Mrs. Riccabocca, too pleased to be in her natural element of domestic use, hurried into the house to prepare our national beverage. And the parson, sliding into her chair, said,--

"But you are dejected then? Fie! If there's a virtue in the world at which we should always aim, it is cheerfulness."

"I don't dispute it," said Riccabocca, with a heavy sigh. "But though it is said by some Greek, who, I think, is quoted by your favourite Seneca, that a wise man carries his country with him at the soles of his feet, he can't carry also the sunshine over his head."

"I tell you what it is," said the parson, bluntly; "you would have a much keener sense of happiness if you had much less esteem for philosophy."

"Cospetto!" said the doctor, rousing himself. "Just explain, will you?"

"Does not the search after wisdom induce desires not satisfied in this small circle to which your life is confined? It is not so much your country for which you yearn, as it is for s.p.a.ce to your intellect, employment for your thoughts, career for your aspirations."

"You have guessed at the tooth which aches," said Riccabocca, with admiration.

"Easy to do that," answered the parson. "Our wisdom teeth come last and give us the most pain; and if you would just starve the mind a little, and nourish the heart more, you would be less of a philosopher and more of a--" The parson had the word "Christian" at the tip of his tongue; he suppressed a word that, so spoken, would have been exceedingly irritating, and subst.i.tuted, with elegant ant.i.thesis, "and more of a happy man!"

"I do all I can with my heart," quoth the doctor.

"Not you! For a man with such a heart as yours should never feel the want of the sunshine. My friend, we live in an age of over mental cultivation. We neglect too much the simple healthful outer life, in which there is so much positive joy. In turning to the world within us, we grow blind to this beautiful world without; in studying ourselves as men, we almost forget to look up to heaven, and warm to the smile of G.o.d."

The philosopher mechanically shrugged his shoulders, as he always did when another man moralized,--especially if the moralizer were a priest; but there was no irony in his smile, as he answered thoughtfully,--

"There is some truth in what you say. I own that we live too much as if we were all brain. Knowledge has its penalties and pains, as well as its prizes."

"That is just what I want you to say to Leonard."

"How have you settled the object of your journey?"

"I will tell you as we walk down to him after tea. At present, I am rather too much occupied with you."

"Me? The tree is formed--try only to bend the young twig!"

"Trees are trees, and twigs twigs," said the parson, dogmatically; "but man is always growing till he falls into the grave. I think I have heard you say that you once had a narrow escape of a prison?"

"Very narrow."

"Just suppose that you were now in that prison, and that a fairy conjured up the prospect of this quiet home in a safe land; that you saw the orange-trees in flower, felt the evening breeze on your cheek; beheld your child gay or sad, as you smiled or knit your brow; that within this phantom home was a woman, not, indeed, all your young romance might have dreamed of, but faithful and true, every beat of her heart all your own,--would you not cry from the depth of your dungeon, 'O fairy! such a change were a paradise!' Ungrateful man! you want interchange for your mind, and your heart should suffice for all!"

Riccabocca was touched and silent.

"Come hither, my child," said Mr. Dale, turning round to Violante, who stood still among the flowers, out of hearing, but with watchful eyes.

"Come hither," he said, opening his arms.

Violante bounded forward, and nestled to the good man's heart.

"Tell me, Violante, when you are alone in the fields or the garden, and have left your father looking pleased and serene, so that you have no care for him at your heart,--tell me, Violante, though you are all alone, with the flowers below, and the birds singing overhead, do you feel that life itself is happiness or sorrow?"

"Happiness!" answered Violante, half shutting her eyes, and in a measured voice.

"Can you explain what kind of happiness it is?"

"Oh, no, impossible! and it is never the same. Sometimes it is so still--so still, and sometimes so joyous, that I long for wings to fly up to G.o.d, and thank Him!"

"O friend," said the parson, "this is the true sympathy between life and nature, and thus we should feel ever, did we take more care to preserve the health and innocence of a child. We are told that we must become as children to enter into the kingdom of Heaven; methinks we should also become as children to know what delight there is in our heritage of earth!"

CHAPTER XVII.

The maid-servant (for Jackeymo was in the fields) brought the table under the awning, and with the English luxury of tea, there were other drinks as cheap and as grateful on summer evenings,--drinks which Jackeymo had retained and taught from the customs of the South,--unebriate liquors, pressed from cooling fruits, sweetened with honey, and deliciously iced: ice should cost nothing in a country in which one is frozen up half the year! And Jackeymo, too, had added to our good, solid, heavy English bread preparations of wheat much lighter, and more propitious to digestion,--with those crisp grissins, which seem to enjoy being eaten, they make so pleasant a noise between one's teeth.

The parson esteemed it a little treat to drink tea with the Riccaboccas.

There was something of elegance and grace in that homely meal at the poor exile's table, which pleased the eye as well as taste. And the very utensils, plain Wedgwood though they were, had a cla.s.sical simplicity, which made Mrs. Hazeldean's old India delf, and Mrs. Dale's best Worcester china, look tawdry and barbarous in comparison. For it was Flaxman who gave designs to Wedgwood, and the most truly refined of all our manufactures in porcelain (if we do not look to the mere material) is in the reach of the most thrifty.

The little banquet was at first rather a silent one; but Riccabocca threw off his gloom, and became gay and animated. Then poor Mrs.

Riccabocca smiled, and pressed the grissins; and Violante, forgetting all her stateliness, laughed and played tricks on the parson, stealing away his cup of warm tea when his head was turned, and subst.i.tuting iced cherry-juice. Then the parson got up and ran after Violante, making angry faces, and Violante dodged beautifully, till the parson, fairly tired out, was too glad to cry "Peace," and come back to the cherry-juice. Thus time rolled on, till they heard afar the stroke of the distant church-clock, and Mr. Dale started up and cried, "But we shall be too late for Leonard. Come, naughty little girl, get your father his hat."

"And umbrella!" said Riccabocca, looking up at the cloudless, moonlit sky.

"Umbrella against the stars?" asked the parson, laughing. "The stars are no friends of mine," said Riccabocca, "and one never knows what may happen!"

The philosopher and the parson walked on amicably.

"You have done me good," said Riccabocca, "but I hope I am not always so unreasonably melancholic as you seem to suspect. The evenings will sometimes appear long, and dull too, to a man whose thoughts on the past are almost his sole companions."

"Sole companions?--your child?"

"She is so young."

"Your wife?"

"She is so--" the bland Italian appeared to check some disparaging adjective, and mildly added, "so good, I allow; but you must own that she and I cannot have much in common."

"I own nothing of the sort. You have your house and your interests, your happiness and your lives, in common. We men are so exacting, we expect to find ideal nymphs and G.o.ddesses when we condescend to marry a mortal; and if we did, our chickens would be boiled to rags, and our mutton come up as cold as a stone."

"Per Bacco, you are an oracle," said Riccabocca, laughing. "But I am not so sceptical as you are. I honour the fair s.e.x too much. There are a great many women who realize the ideal of men, to be found in--the poets!"

"There's my dear Mrs. Dale," resumed the parson, not heeding the sarcastic compliment to the s.e.x, but sinking his voice into a whisper, and looking round cautiously,--"there's my dear Mrs. Dale, the best woman in the world,--an angel I would say, if the word were not profane; BUT--"

"What's the BUT?" asked the doctor, demurely.