The Actress in High Life Part 12

CHAPTER IX.

When at morn the muleteer, With early call announces day, Sorrowing that early call I hear That scares the visions of delight away; For dear to me the silent hour, When sleep exerts its wizard power.

Southey.

"I trust you rested well last night, under the protection of your saintly guardians," L'Isle said to Lady Mabel, when she made her appearance down stairs, before the sun was yet up.

"Do not speak of last night," she said, throwing up her hands in a deprecatory manner, "let it be utterly forgotten, and not reckoned among the number of the nights. It was one of penance, not repose!

Never will I speak lightly of the saints again. I can only hope that that and all my other sins are expiated, if I can infer any thing from the number of my tormentors."

"Were they so numerous?" L'Isle asked, in a tone of sympathy.

"And various!" emphasized Lady Mabel. "Whole legions of various orders, light and heavy armed. I could have forgiven the first, were it only for their magnanimous mode of making war, always sounding the trumpet, and giving fair warning before they charged; and the attack being openly made, I could revenge myself on some of them by the free use of my hands, and protect my face by covering it with my veil, at the risk of being smothered. But the next band were so minute and active, and secret in their movements, that I never knew where to expect them. But the last slow, heavy legion which came crawling insidiously on, were the most tormenting and sickening of all. To be tortured by such a crowd of little fiends was enough to produce delirium. But I will not recall the visions of the night. It was worse than dreaming of being in purgatory!"

"I am sorry to hear that you had such shocking dreams," said Mrs.

Shortridge, who, as she came down the stairs, heard Lady Mabel's last words, "I would have been thankful to be able to dream; but the mule bells jingling under us all night were a trifling annoyance compared to the mosquitos, fleas, and bugs, which scarcely allowed me a wink of sleep."

"Sleep!" Lady Mabel exclaimed, "they murdered sleep, and mine were waking torments."

"It is all owing to the filthy habits of the nation," continued Mrs. Shortridge. "The very pigs and a.s.ses are as much a part of the family as the children of the house."

"The fraternization of the human race with brutes, which prevails here," L'Isle remarked, "certainly, promotes neither comfort nor cleanliness. Indeed, it is curious, that as you go from north to south, cleanliness should decline in the inverse ratio with the need of it. Compared with ourselves, the French are not a cleanly people, but become so when contrasted with their neighbors, the Spaniards, who are, in turn, less filthy than the Portuguese, whose climate renders cleanliness still more necessary."

"By that ratio, what standard of cleanliness will you find in Morocco?" asked Lady Mabel.

"Perhaps a prominent and redeeming feature in their religion," said L'Isle, "may exalt the standard there. Mahomedan ablutions may avail much in this world, though little in the next."

"I am afraid," said Lady Mabel, "that their cleanly superst.i.tion will make me almost regret the expulsion of the Moors."

The commissary was now bustling about, hurrying the preparations for breakfast, and L'Isle went to see if the servants were getting ready for the journey; but Mrs. Shortridge, full of the annoyances she had suffered, continued to denounce their small enemies. Her talk was of vermin.

Lady Mabel, thinking the subject had been sufficiently discussed, interrupted her, saying, "you do not take the most philosophical and poetical view of the subject. Is it not consolatory to reflect, that while men, on suffering a reverse of fortune, too often experience nothing but ingrat.i.tude and desertion from their fellows, and sadly learn that

"'Tis ever thus: Those shadows we call friends, Attend us through the sunshine of success, To vanish in adversity's dark hour."

"Yet there are followers that adhere to them in their fallen fortunes with more than canine fidelity, sticking to them like their sins, clinging to their persons, cleaving to their garments, with an attachment and in numbers that grow with their patron's dest.i.tution."

"But I maintain," Mrs. Shortridge replied, "that it is not only the poor and dest.i.tute that here support such a retinue. I have repeatedly seen in Lisbon, and elsewhere, young ladies, and among others a young widow of high rank, the sister of the Bishop of Oporto, lying with her head in the lap of her friend, who parted the locks of her hair to search--"

"Stop!" said Lady Mabel, laying her hand on Mrs. Shortridge's mouth, "you need not chase those small deer any further through the wood. Leave that privileged sport to the natives."

Breakfast was now ready, and Shortridge called to the ladies to lose no time. L'Isle, seeing the young friar in front of the _venda_, brought him in and seated him beside him. He pressed upon him many good things, which the house did not furnish; and this being no fast-day, the friar eat a meal better proportioned to his youth, his bulk, and his health, than his last night's meagre fare. He showed his patriotism by his approval of one of those hams of marvelous flavor, the boast of Portugal, the product of her swine, not stuffed into obesity in prison, but gently swelling to rotundity while ranging the free forest, and selecting the _bolotas_, and other acorns, as they drop fresh from the boughs. The friar was not so busy with his meal but what he continued to observe his new friends closely, and while the servants were getting their breakfast, he seized the leisure afforded to converse with L'Isle, and with Lady Mabel through him. After many questions asked and answered, the friar became thoughtful and abstracted, as if he had been brought in contact with a new cla.s.s of persons and ideas, which he could not at once comprehend.

L'Isle now asked him, "When and why he had put on St. Francis' frock?"

"I do not remember when I wore any other dress. I was not four years old when I was seized with a violent sickness, and soon at the point of death. My mother vowed that if St. Francis would hear her prayer, and spare me, her only son, she would devote me to his service. From that moment, as my mother has often told me, I began to mend. As soon as a dress of the order could be made for me, I put it on. From that day I grew and strengthened rapidly, and have not had a day's sickness since. When old enough I was sent to school, and then served my noviciate in the Franciscan convent in Villa Vicosa. I am now on leave to visit my mother and sisters, who live near Ameixial."

"If you had chosen for yourself," L'Isle suggested, "perhaps you would not have been a friar."

"Perhaps not," said the young friar, hesitating. "Indeed, I have been lately told, though I am loath to admit it, that, urgent as the necessity was that gave rise to our order, and great as its services have been, especially in former days, our holy mother, the Church, can be better served now, by servants who a.s.sume a more polished exterior, and obeying St. Paul's injunction to be all things to all men, mingle on a footing of equality with men of this world, although they are not of it."

"Who told you this?" asked L'Isle.

"A learned and traveled priest, whom I lately met with. He delighted me with his knowledge, while he startled me by the boldness of some of his opinions."

"But, perhaps," L'Isle persisted, "if left to your own unbia.s.sed choice, you would not have taken orders at all."

The young man paused, evidently unable to shut out the thought, "Are there callings, which, without doing violence to my nature, are compatible with the service of G.o.d?" At length he answered, with a reserve not usual to him, "It is not every man whose way of life is, or can be, chosen by himself." Then, crossing himself earnestly, as if stifling the thought, and trampling down the tempting devil within him, he exclaimed, "I _must_ believe that my instant recovery from deadly sickness as soon as I was devoted to St. Francis, proves that he has chosen me for his service and G.o.d's."

He said this eagerly and with an air of sincerity, and again made the sign of the cross. Yet the doubting devil seemed to linger about him, and he sunk into silence, seeming little satisfied with himself.

Meanwhile, during his conference with L'Isle and Lady Mabel, old Moodie stood near, eyeing him with sinister looks, as if he had been the inventor, not the victim, of the popish system, and all its corruptions rested on his head. The old man now urged them to take horse, and allowed them no respite from his bustling interference until the party was again on the road.

The friar watched their motions with interest; and when, after crossing the valley and ascending the hill before them, Lady Mabel turned to take a last look at the ruinous old venda, she saw him still standing like a statue in the archway, doubtless with eye and thought following their steps.

"I am afraid," said L'Isle, "that our young gownsman will have to undergo a ruinous conflict in the struggle between his nature and his fate. His is the worst possible condition for a man of vigorous character and inquiring mind. He has not arrived at his convictions, but had prematurely thrust upon him the convictions he is professedly bound to hold."

"And you have helped him into the conflict," said Lady Mabel, "without staying to see him through it."

"I trust not. But, anyhow, it would have come. Were he a monk even, seclusion and devotion might protect, study might withdraw him from many temptations. Were he a secular priest, the active and definite duties of a parish, fulfilling and inculcating the obligations of Christian morals, which are the same in every church, might have tasked his energies. But, to be all his life a wandering beggar, in the name of G.o.d and St. Francis! If enthusiasts are to be pitied, how much more those who, without being, are compelled to lead the life of enthusiasts! Is it wonderful that many of these men are apostles only of ignorance and profligacy?"

"But this young man has a mind too active and enquiring for contented ignorance," said Lady Mabel. "From his very nature he must go on adding fact to fact, and thought to thought."

"Until he has built up a system of his own," answered L'Isle. "And, a hundred chances to one, that will not coincide with the teachings of St. Francis and of Rome. What must he do, then? He, a professed Franciscan, has lost his faith in St. Francis, in Rome, perhaps in Christ!--known to him only through Rome. Must he persevere? or shall he abjure? Between hypocrisy and martyrdom, he now must choose. Think not, because the fires of the _auto da fe_ are extinct, a churchman here can safely abjure his profession and his faith. A man may live a life of martyrdom, although he escape a martyr's death."

They had ridden on some miles, and new scenes had suggested other topics, when they heard a shout behind them, and, looking round, saw the old man of the _Venda_ displaying unwonted energy. He was vigorously pummeling with his heels the vicious _burro_ on which he followed them, while he held up some article of clothing, and shouted after them at the top of his voice.

They stopped for him to come up, and he handed to Lady Mabel a rich shawl, which she had left behind in her bed-room, and a sc.r.a.p of dingy white paper. Refusing any reward for his trouble and honesty, he at once took leave and turned back, the a.s.s showing a more willing spirit on his homeward path.

After trying in vain to decipher the scroll, Lady Mabel handed it to L'Isle. "_Cito, tute, jucunde peregrineris_." "Swift, safe and pleasant may your journey be," said L'Isle, translating it. "This is, doubtless, from the young friar. He is anxious to show you at once his scholarship and his good-will. We must not find fault with his Latin, which is capital--for a friar!"

"Give it to me. I will keep it as a talisman of safety, and as a memorial of our friar. Poor fellow!" continued Lady Mabel, "I suppose the best wish I can return him is, that enthusiasm may carry him, in sincerity and purity, through the path others have chosen for him."

"He is an impudent fellow!" growled out old Moodie. "You set too great store, my lady, by this young vagabond!"

"Vagabond!" she exclaimed, with a look and tone of grave rebuke, "I am afraid, Moodie, if you had met St. Paul wandering through Macedonia without staff or scrip, or the cloak he left behind at Troas, you would have found no better t.i.tle for him."

"Is this man like St. Paul?" asked Moodie, startled at the profane supposition.

"I do not say so. But the whole order of friars, renouncing worldly objects, devote themselves to the imitation of the seventy disciples in Scripture, who were sent out by two and two to evangelize the Jews."

"I never expected, my lady, to hear you liken these lazy monks to our Lord's disciples."

"They are not monks, but friars," said Lady Mabel quietly, "and, without answering for their practice, I cannot but approve of what they profess. They do not shut themselves up from the world, like the monks, under pretence of escaping contamination, but devote themselves to the mission of traveling about in apostolic poverty from house to house, and, by prayer and preaching, by inculcating charity, and receiving alms, sow every where the seeds of the faith they profess."

"The words old Chaucer puts into the mouth of his friar," said L'Isle, "well express the objects of the order:

"In shrift, in preaching is my diligence, And study in Peter's words and in Paul's; I walk and fish Christian men's souls, To yield my Lord Jesu his proper rent; To spread his word is set all mine intent."