Tales from Blackwood Volume Iv Part 19

"I suppose so," said I; "no one can feel more for him than I do. It was well, perhaps, that this did not happen in term time."

"It has spared him some mortification, certainly. You will see him, perhaps, before you leave town; he will take it kind. And if you have any influence with him--(he will be inclined to listen just now to you, perhaps, more than to me; being more of his own age, he will give you credit for entering into his feelings)--do try and dissuade him from forming any wild schemes, to which he seems rather inclined. He has some kind friends, no doubt; and remember, if there is anything in which I can be of use to him, he shall have my aid even to the half of my kingdom--that is, my tutorship."

And with a smile and tone which seemed a mixture of jest and earnest, Mr Ormiston wished me good-morning. He was to leave for Oxford that night.

Of Russell's address in town I was up to this moment ignorant, but resolved to find it out, and see him before my return to the University.

The next morning, however, a note arrived from him, containing a simple request that I would call. I found him at the place from which he wrote--one of those dull quiet streets that lead out of the Strand--in very humble lodgings; his father's private establishment having been given up, it appeared, immediately. The moment we met, I saw at once, as I expected, that the blow which to Ormiston had naturally seemed so terrible a one--no less than the loss, to a young man, of the wealth, rank, and prospects in life to which he had been taught to look forward--had been, in fact, to Russell a merciful relief. The failure of that long-celebrated and trusted house, which was causing in the public mind, according to the papers, so much "consternation" and "excitement,"

was to him a consummation long foreseen, and scarcely dreaded. It was only the shadow of wealth and happiness which he had lost now; its substance had vanished long since. And the conscious hollowness and hypocrisy, as he called it, of his late position, had been a far more bitter trial to a mind like his, than any which could result from its exposure. He was one to hail with joy any change which brought him back to truth and reality, no matter how rude and sudden the revulsion.

He met me with a smile; a really honest, almost a light-hearted smile.

"It is come at last, Hawthorne; perhaps it would be wrong, or I feel as if I could say, thank G.o.d. There is but one point which touches me at all; what do they say about my father?" I told him--fortunately, my acquaintance lying but little among men of business, I could tell him so honestly--that I had heard nothing stated to his discredit.

"Well, well; but they will soon. Oh! Hawthorne; the utter misery, the curse that money-making brings with it! That joining house to house, and field to field, how it corrupts all the better part of a man's nature! I vow to you, I believe my father would have been an honest man if he had but been a poor one! If he had never had anything to do with interest tables, and had but spent his capital, instead of trying to double and redouble it! One thing I have to thank him for; that he never would suffer me to imbibe any taste for business; he knew the evil and the pollution money-handling brings with it--I am sure he did; he encouraged me, I fear, in extravagance; but I bless him that he never encouraged me in covetousness."

He grew a little calmer by degrees, and we sat down and took counsel as to his future plans. He was not, of course, without friends, and had already had many offers of a.s.sistance for himself and his sister; but his heart appeared, for the present, firmly bent upon independence. Much to my surprise, he decided on returning at once to Oxford, and reading for his degree. His sister had some little property settled upon her--some hundred and fifty pounds a-year; and this she had insisted on devoting to this purpose.

"I love her too well," said Russell, "to refuse her: and trifling as this sum is,--I remember the time when I should have thought it little to keep me in gloves and handkerchiefs--yet, with management, it will be more than I shall spend in Oxford. Of course, I play the gentleman-commoner no longer; I shall descend to the plain stuff gown."

"You'll go to a hall, of course?" said I; for I concluded he would at least avoid the mortification of so palpable a confession of reduced circ.u.mstances as this degradation of rank in his old college would be.

"I can see no occasion for it; that is, if they will allow me to change; I have done nothing to be ashamed of, and shall be much happier than I was before. I only strike my false colours; and you know they were never carried willingly."

I did not attempt to dissuade him, and soon after rose to take my leave.

"I cannot ask my sister to see you now," he said, as we shook hands: "she is not equal to it. But some other time, I hope"----

"At any other time, I shall be most proud of the introduction. By the way, have you seen Ormiston? He met me this morning, and sent some kind messages, to offer any service in his power."

"He did, did he?"

"Yes; and, depend upon it, he will do all he can for you in college; you don't know him very well, I think; but I am sure he takes an interest in you now, at all events," I continued, "and no man is a more sincere and zealous friend."

"I beg your pardon, Hawthorne, but I fancy I _do_ know Mr Ormiston very well."

"Oh! I remember, there seemed some coolness between you, because you never would accept his invitations. Ormiston thought you were too proud to dine with him; and then _his_ pride, which he has his share of, took fire. But that misunderstanding must be all over now."

"My dear Hawthorne, I believe Mr Ormiston and I understand each other perfectly. Good-morning; I am sorry to seem abrupt, but I have a host of things, not the most agreeable, to attend to."

It seemed quite evident that there was some little prejudice on Russell's part against Ormiston. Possibly he did not like his attentions to his sister. But that was no business of mine, and I knew the other too well to doubt his earnest wish to aid and encourage a man of Russell's high principles, and in his unfortunate position. None of us always know our best friends.

The step which Russell had resolved on taking was, of course, an unusual one. Even the college authorities strongly advised him to remove his name to the books of one of the halls, where he would enter comparatively as a stranger, and where his altered position would not entail so many painful feelings. Every facility was offered him of doing so at one of them where a relative of our Princ.i.p.al's was the head, and even a saving in expense might thus be effected. But this evident kindness and consideration on their part, only confirmed him in the resolution of remaining where he was. He met their representations with the graceful reply, that he had an attachment to the college which did not depend upon the rank he held in it, and that he trusted he should not be turned out of two homes at once. Even the heart of the splenetic little vice-princ.i.p.al was moved by this genuine tribute to the venerable walls, which to him, as his mistress's girdle to the poet, encircled all he loved, or hoped, or cared for; and had the date been some century earlier--in those remarkable times when a certain fellow was said to have owed his election into that body to a wondrous knack he had at compounding sherry-posset--it is probable Charles Russell would have stepped into a fellowship by special license at once.

He had harder work before him, however, and he set stoutly to it. He got permission to lodge out of college--a privilege quite unusual, and apparently without any sufficient object in his case. A day or two after his return, he begged me to go with him to see the rooms he had taken: and I was surprised to find that although small, and not in a good part of the town, they were furnished in a style by no means, I thought, in accordance with the strict economy I knew him to be practising in every other respect. They contained, on a small scale, all the appointments of a lady's drawing-room. It was soon explained. His sister was coming to live with him. "We are but two, now," said Russell in explanation; "and though poor Mary has been offered what might have been a comfortable home elsewhere, which perhaps would have been more prudent, we both thought, why should we be separated? As to these little things you see, they are nearly all hers: we offered them to the creditors, but even the lawyers would not touch them: and here Mary and I shall live. Very strange, you think, for her to be here in Oxford with no one to take care of her but me; but she does not mind that, and we shall be together. However, Hawthorne, we shall keep a dragon: there is an old housekeeper who would not be turned off, and she comes down with Mary, and may pa.s.s for her aunt, if that's all; so don't, pray, be shocked at us."

And so the old housekeeper did come down, and Mary with her; and under such guardianship, a brother and an old servant, was that fair girl installed within the perilous precincts of the University of Oxford; perilous in more senses than one, as many a speculative and disappointed mamma can testify, whose daughters, brought to market at the annual "show" at commemoration, have left uncaught those dons of dignity, and heirs-apparent of property, whom they ought to have caught, and caught those well-dressed and good-looking, but undesirable young men, whom they ought not to have caught. Mary Russell, however, was in little peril herself, and, as little as she could help it, an occasion of peril to others. Seldom did she move out from her humble abode, except for an early morning walk with her brother, or sometimes leaning on the arm of her old domestic, so plainly dressed that you might have mistaken her for her daughter, and wondered how those intensely expressive features, and queen-like graces, should have been bestowed by nature on one so humble. Many a thoughtful student, pacing slowly the parks or Christchurch meadow after early chapel, book in hand, cheating himself into the vain idea that he was taking a healthful walk, and roused by the flutter of approaching female dress, and unwillingly looking up to avoid the possible and unwelcome collision with a smirking nurse-maid and an unresisting baby--has met those eyes, and spoilt his reading for the morning; or has paused in the running tour of Headington hill, or Magdalen walk (by which he was endeavouring to cram his whole allotted animal exercise for the day into an hour), as that sweet vision crossed his path, and wondered in his heart by what happy tie of relationship, or still dearer claim, his fellow-undergraduate had secured to himself so lovely a companion; and has tried in vain, over his solitary breakfast, to rid himself of the heterodox notion which would still creep in upon his thoughts, that in the world there might be, after all, things better worth living and working for, prizes more valuable--and perhaps not harder to win--than a first cla.s.s, and living impersonations of the beautiful which Aristotle had unaccountably left out. Forgive me, dear reader, if I seem to be somewhat sentimental: I am not, and I honestly believe I never was, in love with Mary Russell; I am not--I fear I never was or shall be--much of a reading man or an early riser; but I will confess, it would have been a great inducement to me to adopt such habits, if I could have insured such pleasant company in my morning walks.

To the general world of Oxford, for a long time, I have no doubt the very existence of such a jewel within it was unknown; for at the hours when liberated tutors and idle undergraduates are wont to walk abroad, Mary was sitting, hid within a little ambush of geraniums, either busy at her work, or helping--as she loved to fancy she helped him--her brother at his studies. Few men, I believe, ever worked harder than Russell did in his last year. With the exception of the occasional early walk, and the necessary attendance at chapel and lecture, he read hard nearly the whole day; and I always attributed the fact of his being able to do so with comparatively little effort, and no injury to his health, to his having such a sweet face always present, to turn his eyes upon, when wearied with a page of Greek, and such a kind voice always ready to speak or to be silent.

It was not for want of access to any other society that Mary Russell spent her time so constantly with her brother. The Princ.i.p.al, with his usual kind-heartedness, had insisted--a thing he seldom did--upon his lady making her acquaintance; and though Mrs Meredith, who plumed herself much upon her dignity, had made some show of resistance at first to calling upon a young lady who was living in lodgings by herself in one of the most out-of-the-way streets in Oxford, yet, after her first interview with Miss Russell, so much did her sweetness of manner win upon Mrs Princ.i.p.al's fancy--or perhaps it will be doing that lady but justice to say, so much did her more than orphan unprotectedness and changed fortunes soften the woman's heart that beat beneath that formidable exterior of silk and ceremony, that before the first ten minutes of what had been intended as a very condescending and very formal call were over, she had been offered a seat in Mrs Meredith's official pew in St Mary's; the pattern of a mysterious bag, which that good lady carried everywhere about with her, it was believed for no other purpose; and an airing the next day behind the fat old greys, which their affectionate coachman--in commemoration of his master's having purchased them at the time he held that dignity--always called by the name of the "Vice-Chancellors." Possibly an absurd incident, which Mary related with great glee to her brother and myself, had helped to thaw the ice in which "our governess" usually encased herself. When the little girl belonging to the lodgings opened the door to these dignified visitors, upon being informed that Miss Russell was at home, the Princ.i.p.al gave the name simply as "Dr and Mrs Meredith:" which, not appearing to his more pompous half at all calculated to convey a due impression of the honour conveyed by the visit, she corrected him, and in a tone quite audible--as indeed every word of the conversation had been--up the half-dozen steep stairs which led to the little drawing-room, gave out "the Master of ---- and lady, if you please." The word "master" was quite within the comprehension of the little domestic, and dropping an additional courtesy of respect to an office which reminded her of her catechism and the Sunday school, she selected the appropriate feminine from her own vocabulary, and threw open the door with "the master and mistress of ----, if you please, Miss." Dr Meredith laughed, as he entered, so heartily, that even Mary could not help smiling, and the "mistress," seeing the odds against her, smiled too. An acquaintance begun in such good humour, could hardly a.s.sume a very formal character; and, in fact, had Mary Russell not resolutely declined all society, Mrs Meredith would have felt rather a pleasure in patronising her. But both her straitened means and the painful circ.u.mstances of her position--her father already spoken of almost as a criminal--led her to court strict retirement; while she clung with redoubled affection to her brother. He, on his part, seemed to have improved in health and spirits since his change of fortunes; the apparent haughtiness and coldness with which many had charged him before, had quite vanished; he showed no embarra.s.sment, far less any consciousness of degradation, in his conversation with any of his old messmates at the gentlemen-commoners' table; and, though his communication with the college was but comparatively slight, nearly all his time being spent in his lodgings, he was becoming quite a popular character.

Meanwhile, a change of a different kind seemed to be coming over Ormiston. It was remarked, even by those not much given to observation, that his lectures, which were once considered endurable, even by idle men, from his happy talent of remark and ill.u.s.tration, were fast becoming as dull and uninteresting as the common run of all such business. Moreover, he had been in the habit of giving, occasionally, capital dinners, invitations to which were sent out frequently and widely among the young men of his own college; these ceased almost entirely; or, when they occurred, had but the shadow of their former joyousness. Even some of the fellows were known to have remarked that Ormiston was much altered lately; some said he was engaged to be married--a misfortune which would account for any imaginable eccentricities; but one of the best of the college livings falling vacant about the time, and, on its refusal by the two senior fellows, coming within Ormiston's acceptance, and being pa.s.sed by him, tended very much to do away with any suspicion of that kind.

Between him and Russell there was an evident coolness, though noticed by few men but myself; yet Ormiston always spoke most kindly of him, while on Russell's part there seemed to be a feeling almost approaching to bitterness, ill concealed, whenever the tutor became the subject of conversation. I pressed him once or twice upon the subject, but he always affected to misunderstand me, or laughed off any sarcastic remark he might have made, as meaning nothing; so that at last the name was seldom mentioned between us, and almost the only point on which we differed seemed to be our estimation of Ormiston.

CHAPTER II.

It was the last night of the boat-races. All Oxford, town and gown, was on the move between Iffley and Christchurch meadow. The reading man had left his ethics only half understood, the rowing man his bottle more than half finished, to enjoy as beautiful a summer evening as ever gladdened the banks of Isis. One continued heterogeneous living stream was pouring on from St "_Ole's_" to King's barge, and thence across the river in punts, down to the starting-place by the lasher. One moment your tailor puffed a cigar in your face, and the next, just as you made some critical remark to your companion on the pretty girl you just pa.s.sed, and turned round to catch a second glimpse of her, you trod on the toes of your college tutor. The contest that evening was of more than ordinary interest. The new Oriel boat, a London-built clipper, an innovation in those days, had b.u.mped its other compet.i.tor easily in the previous race, and only Christchurch now stood between her and the head of the river. And would they, could they, b.u.mp Christchurch to-night?

That was the question to which, for the time being, the coming examination and the coming St Leger both gave way. Christchurch, that had not been b.u.mped for ten years before--whose old blue and white flag stuck at the top of the mast as if it had been nailed there--whose motto on the river had so long been "Nulli secundus?" It was an important question, and the Christchurch men evidently thought so. Steersman and pullers had been summoned up from the country, as soon as that impertinent new boat had begun to show symptoms of being a dangerous antagonist, by the rapid progress she was making from the bottom towards the head of the racing-boats. The old heroes of bygone contests were enlisted again, like the Roman legionaries, to fight the battles of their _vexillum_, the little three-cornered bit of blue-and-white silk before mentioned; and the whole betting society of Oxford were divided into two great parties, the Oriel and the Christchurch,--the supporters of the old, or of the new dynasty of eight oars.

Never was signal more impatiently waited for than the pistol-shot which was to set the boats in motion that night. Hark! "Gentlemen, are--you--ready?" "No, no!" shouts some umpire, dissatisfied with the position of his own boat at the moment. "Gentlemen, are--you--ready?"

Again "No, no, no!" How provoking! Christchurch and Oriel both beautifully placed, and that provoking Exeter, or Worcester, or some boat that no one but its own crew takes the slightest interest in to-night, right across the river! And it will be getting dusk soon. Once more--and even Wyatt, the starter, is getting impatient--"Are you ready?" Still a cry of "No, no," from some crew who evidently never will be satisfied. But there goes the pistol. They're off, by all that's glorious! "Now Oriel!" "Now Christchurch!" Hurrah! beautifully are both boats pulled--how they lash along the water! Oriel gains evidently! But they have not got into their speed yet, and the light boat has the best of it at starting. "Hurrah, Oriel, it's all your own way!" "Now, Christchurch, away with her!" Scarcely is an eye turned on the boats behind; and, indeed, the two first are going fast away from them. They reach the Gut, and at the turn Oriel presses her rival hard. The cheers are deafening; bets are three to one. She must b.u.mp her! "Now, Christchurch, go to work in the straight water!" Never did a crew pull so well, and never at such a disadvantage. Their boat is a tub compared with the Oriel. See how she buries her bow at every stroke. Hurrah, Christchurch! The old boat for ever! Those last three strokes gained a yard on Oriel! She holds her own still! Away they go, those old steady practised oars, with that long slashing stroke, and the strength and pluck begins to tell. Well pulled, Oriel! Now for it! Not an oar out of time, but as true together as a set of teeth! But it won't do! Still Christchurch, by sheer dint of muscle, keeps her distance, and the old flag floats triumphant yet another year.

Nearly hustled to death in the rush up with the racing boats, I panted into the stern sheets of a four-oar lying under the bank, in which I saw Leicester and some others of my acquaintance. "Well, Horace," said I, "what do you think of Christchurch now?" (I had sufficient Tory principle about me at all times to be a zealous supporter of the "old cause," even in the matter of boat-racing.) "How are your bets upon the London clipper, eh?" "Lost, by Jove," said he; "but Oriel ought to have done it to-night; why, they b.u.mped all the other boats easily, and Christchurch was not so much better; but it was the old oars coming up from the country that did it. But what on earth is all that rush about up by the barges? They surely are not going to fight it out after all?"

Something had evidently occurred which was causing great confusion; the cheering a moment before had been deafening from the partisans of Christchurch, as the victorious crew, pale and exhausted with the prodigious efforts they had made, mustered their last strength to throw their oars aloft in triumph, and then slowly, one by one, ascended into the house-boat which formed their floating dressing-room; it had now suddenly ceased, and confused shouts and murmurs, rather of alarm than of triumph, were heard instead: men were running to and fro on both banks of the river, but the crowd both in the boats on the river and on sh.o.r.e made it impossible for us to see what was going on. We scrambled up the bank, and were making for the scene of action, when one of the river-officials ran hastily by in the direction of Iffley.

"What's the matter, Jack?"

"Punt gone down, sir," he replied without stopping; "going for the drags."

"Anybody drowning?" we shouted after him.

"Don't know how many was in her, sir," sung out Jack in the distance. We ran on. The confusion was terrible; every one was anxious to be of use, and more likely therefore to increase the danger. The punt which had sunk had been, as usual on such occasions, overloaded with men, some of whom had soon made good their footing on the neighbouring barges; others were still clinging to their sides, or by their endeavours to raise themselves into some of the light wherries and four oars, which, with more zeal than prudence, were crowding to their a.s.sistance, were evidently bringing a new risk upon themselves and their rescuers. Two of the last of the racing eights, too, coming up to the winning-post at the moment of the accident, and endeavouring vainly to back water in time, had run into each other, and lay helplessly across the channel, adding to the confusion, and preventing the approach of more efficient aid to the parties in the water. For some minutes it seemed that the disaster must infallibly extend itself. One boat, whose crew had incautiously crowded too much to one side, in their eagerness to aid one of the sufferers in his struggles to get on board, had already been upset, though fortunately not in the deepest water, so that the men, with a little a.s.sistance, easily got on sh.o.r.e. Hundreds were vociferating orders and advice, which few could hear, and none attended to. The most effectual aid that had been rendered was the launching of two large planks from the University barge, with ropes attached to them, which several of those who had been immersed succeeded in reaching, and so were towed safely ash.o.r.e. Still, however, several were seen struggling in the water, two or three with evidently relaxing efforts; and the unfortunate punt, which had righted and come up again, though full of water, had two of her late pa.s.sengers clinging to her gunwale, and thus barely keeping their heads above the water's edge. The watermen had done their utmost to be of service, but the University men crowded so rashly into every punt that put off to the aid of their companions, that their efforts would have been comparatively abortive, had not one of the pro-proctors jumped into one, with two steady hands, and authoritatively ordering every man back who attempted to accompany him, reached the middle of the river, and having rescued those who were in most imminent danger, succeeded in clearing a sufficient s.p.a.ce round the spot to enable the drags to be used (for it was quite uncertain whether there might not still be some individuals missing). Loud cheers from each bank followed this very sensible and seasonable exercise of authority; another boat, by this example, was enabled to disenc.u.mber herself of superfluous hands, and by their united exertions all who could be seen in the water were soon picked up and placed in safety.

When the excitement had in some degree subsided, there followed a suspense which was even more painful, as the drags were slowly moved again and again across the spot where the accident had taken place.

Happily our alarm proved groundless. One body was recovered, not an University man, and in his case the means promptly used to restore animation were successful. But it was not until late in the evening that the search was given up, and even the next morning it was a sensible relief to hear that no college had found any of its members missing.

I returned to my rooms as soon as all reasonable apprehension of a fatal result had subsided, though before the men had left off dragging; and was somewhat surprised, and at first amused, to recognise, sitting before the fire in the disguise of my own dressing-gown and slippers, Charles Russell.

"Hah! Russell, what brings you here at this time of night?" said I; "however, I'm very glad to see you."

"Well, I'm not sorry to find myself here, I can tell you; I have been in a less comfortable place to-night."

"What do you mean?" said I, as a suspicion of the truth flashed upon me--"Surely"----

"I have been in the water, that's all," replied Russell quietly; "don't be alarmed, my good fellow, I'm all right now. John has made me quite at home here, you see. We found your clothes a pretty good fit, got up a capital fire at last, and I was only waiting for you to have some brandy-and-water. Now, don't look so horrified, pray."

In spite of his good spirits, I thought he looked pale; and I was somewhat shocked at the danger he had been in--more so from the suddenness of the information.

"Why," said I, as I began to recall the circ.u.mstance, "Leicester and I came up not two minutes after it happened, and watched nearly every man that was got out. You could not have been in the water long then, I hope?"

"Nay, as to that," said Russell, "it seemed long enough to me, I can tell you, though I don't recollect all of it. I got underneath a punt or something, which prevented my coming up as soon as I ought."

"How did you get out at last?"

"Why, that I don't quite remember; I found myself on the walk by King's barge; but they had to turn me upside down, I fancy, to empty me. I'll take that brandy by itself, Hawthorne, for I think I have the necessary quant.i.ty of water stowed away already."

"Good heavens! don't joke about it; why, what an escape you must have had!"