The Danes Sketched by Themselves Volume Ii Part 19

There was one of her cousins in particular to whom Damon soon attached himself. He was a young man who had exactly the qualities which were wanting in Damon. He was, among other things, witty, lively, amusing; he was at all times ready for anything, and knew how to make the best of everything. Damon soon found that he could not do without him, and he became a daily guest at his house, which there was nothing in the way of business to prevent his being, as he lived in a state of _il dolce far niente_, waiting until some good appointment might offer itself, which might suit a person of his talents and pretensions.

Before the expiration of a year, I observed that by degrees a change had taken place in their relative positions. Damon had by this time nearly undermined his own happiness. His old Pythias folly had awoke again in him, almost without his being conscious of it. His interest in his young wife was actually cast into the shade by his friendship for her cousin, who had become Pythias the Fourth. She discovered at length that she was quite set aside, and was jealous of this neglect; at the same time she grew more and more intimate with her cousin, whose lively conversation pleased her. That he had fallen in love with his young cousin I will not a.s.sert, but he paid her at times such marked attention, that I often thought this was the only reasonable inference to be drawn from his conduct; at other times there was so much levity and carelessness in his manners, so much flightiness in his way of talking, that I felt myself compelled to discard the supposition.

Certain it is, however, that he was always hovering around her; that her reputation might run the risk of being injured by his demeanour towards her, and that dangerous consequences really might arise from their being so much together in the intimacy of daily life, yet--who was to blame except Damon?

With his accustomed blindness, the husband could not see anything of this; he made quite sure that it was entirely for _his_ sake that the young man played chess, talked politics, smoked tobacco, and went out to walk or to fish whenever Damon wished to go. In order that they might manage to be still more together, he had prevailed upon the cousin to come out and stay with him at a country-house he had hired at a few miles from town, where they had plenty of room. This invitation was given much against the wishes of his wife, who had tried to prevent it, but she had consented to it when she found that Damon had set his heart on it. He said, jestingly, that he could not do without some male society, and a trio would be pleasant in their pastoral life. In this trio he himself voluntarily a.s.signed the second part to the cousin, while he took the third to himself.

Damon, however, was a little changed; he felt no longer inclined to be _quite_ so subservient in his friendship as he had formerly been with his two-and his four-footed friends. By degrees, a desire had crept into his mind to take his revenge, and for once become himself the domineering party. He began to be somewhat importunate in his claims on the time and companionship of the cousin, who, on his side, showed decided symptoms of wishing to emanc.i.p.ate himself, especially from the tiresome and frequent fishing expeditions to the neighbouring lake; but fishing was perhaps Damon's greatest pleasure, especially when he had the company of a good friend. Damon was annoyed that the cousin had several times latterly excused himself from accompanying him, and, not caring to go alone, he had been obliged to relinquish his favourite amus.e.m.e.nt. One day--it was too bad--on a beautiful evening in the very height of summer, he refused to go fishing, when there could be no earthly reason for his doing so--none that Damon could discover, except that he preferred to parade up and down the alley of linden-trees at the other end of the garden with his wife--while he himself sat at the top of the stone stairs, and fretted until he was quite out of humour.

He could see that they spoke eagerly to each other, and laughed, and amused themselves, while he was wearying himself; and neither of them seemed to be thinking of him or his _ennui_. What were they going to do now? So! They were actually setting off to walk in the very direction of the lake, where he would so gladly have gone to fish; but _then_, it was too far to go, forsooth!--now, they could go notwithstanding the distance. It was almost like defying him; that was probably the cousin's intention.

A disagreeable light seemed to dawn on his mind. And when this operation first begins to take place, a man is apt to fancy more than he has valid grounds for supposing. And this was the case with Damon.

In an exceedingly unpleasant state of mind, he returned to the usual sitting-room in search of some employment to make time pa.s.s less heavily. The comfortable room spoke volumes to his excited mind, with its quiet and peace. It was arranged by his wife's taste, everything bore witness in her favour. There stood her work-table, there lay her work, the half-finished embroidery which she was preparing for his birthday, and at which he therefore avoided looking. Upon a table close by hers lay the cousin's portfolios and drawing materials. There was no necessity for the tables being so near each other, and he pushed the table with the drawings a little way from the work-table. The young man certainly had talent--there were comical sketches and little landscapes, thrown off as ill.u.s.trations of poems, not without genius; he thought he would just look into the portfolios, when, in opening one of them, a sheet of paper, with pencil drawings, slipped out of it.

What were these? He must see. They were a whole row of caricatures, in doing which the cousin excelled. There was a man with his nightcap on, evidently asleep and snoring; a man with a pipe in his mouth, half-asleep over a fishing-rod; a man half-asleep over a chessboard; a man half-asleep over a Berlin newspaper; and lastly, a man half asleep over his tobacco-pipe, while his pretty young wife seemed dreaming over the work she had in her hand. Of what was _she_ dreaming while _he_ was dozing? This question forced itself upon him. The sleepy-headed man was no other than himself, caricatured in the most laughable manner; the young wife might have been taken from nature: it was a charming likeness. Damon sat as if he had fallen from the skies, with the sheet of paper in his hand; he could scarcely conceive the ingrat.i.tude which had suggested these sketches, or the barefaced impudence of leaving them in an open portfolio, in his own daily sitting-room, where anyone might see them--not only himself and his wife, but his guests and his servants also.

Fate brought me to him for a second time at a critical moment. I came accidentally to pay him a visit, and found him somewhat in the same state as on the evening Hector had been doing battle with him. I entered into his angry feelings, but nevertheless could hardly refrain from bursting into a fit of laughter at the exceedingly impertinent, but very droll drawings. We had a serious conversation on the position in which he was placed; with great difficulty I brought him, at length, to perceive that much of the blame rested with himself, and that his young wife had nothing to reproach herself with. I combated his a.s.sertion that she must have been cognizant of the existence of these caricatures, and must have sat for the likeness of herself; and I even went so far as to promise to prove to him her ignorance of the drawings, though I did not know how that was to be effected without occasioning a _scene_--and I had the greatest horror of scenes.

We had a long conversation, we two, for the wife and the cousin remained a good while absent--longer than I thought was exactly right, especially as it was getting late; but Damon did not seem to think about it; he was engaged in speculating on the theme I had suggested for his consideration--namely, that a husband who never makes the slightest effort to find amus.e.m.e.nt for his young wife, but, without the least compunction, leaves her to solitude or weariness, has himself to blame if another succeeds in interesting and amusing her. It is this unfortunate transition from the devoted a.s.siduity of the days of courtship, to the sleepy security of married life, that so often undermines love, and renders the heart empty; and nature has decreed that a woman's heart can never remain long perfectly vacant.

At last the truants returned. It was evident that the lady, at least, felt it was not quite right to have stayed out till so long after the usual hour for tea; she bustled about to get the tea ready, and was very attentive in helping us to it. Damon maintained a grave silence, and I felt somewhat embarra.s.sed; the cousin alone seemed quite at his ease, and not at all _gene_; I could not make out whether this was nature or art. Perhaps it was politic to appear as if he had no idea that there could be any cause for animadversion on account of their unusually long walk. My confidence in her began to waver a little, whilst my anger at him increased.

After tea the conversation fell, by mere accident, on portrait painting. It was the lady who brought the subject forward, by speaking of a picture of a female which she had observed in pa.s.sing, hanging like a sign, over the open door of a garden. Nothing could have been more _a propos_. I hastened to ask the young wife if she had ever had her likeness taken. No, she never had, and she never intended to have it taken, for she could not bear the idea that anyone should sit down and stare at her. The cousin declared this was a silly objection, and appealed to me if he were not right.

'Oh! that is because he wants to make a sketch of me himself,' she said, in rather a hurried manner; 'he has often begged me to permit it, but I won't do so.'

The cousin remarked that there was no question of permission, only of complaisance; if he chose to make a portrait of her, he could do it without asking her leave; he could take her likeness without her knowing anything about it; he could do it from memory. His cousin laughed at these a.s.sertions, and laughed so naturally, that I felt quite convinced I was right about her. Damon, on the contrary, looked more and more distressed as this conversation proceeded; it was quite apparent to me that he was miserable, and in a painful state of doubt, and I had promised him a proof of his wife's innocence. Without uttering a word, I laid hold of a corner of the paper on which were the treacherous drawings, drew it out of the portfolio, and handed it to her. I admit that this was very hard on the cousin, but why should I spare the young jackanapes, from whom no mercy for others was to be expected, as his caricatures showed plainly enough?

She evidently did not know what I meant by showing the drawings to her, or what she was to do with them. On the first glance at the paper, she seemed about to burst into a fit of laughter, and no one who had seen these capital caricatures of Damon could have blamed the child of nature for doing so. But on the second look, her eye had had time to run over the whole sheet, and she had beheld her own likeness; the contrast was too glaring, and there now did not linger the slightest trace of a smile on her countenance. She blushed crimson, threw the sketches far away from her, as if they had burned her hand, which for a short time she placed over her eyes, as one does when suddenly coming to the brink of a precipice. And her womanly tact had a.s.suredly told her that such had been her position. It was a moment for a painter of scenes from domestic life to have taken a sketch. In the background were the open doors leading from the pretty sitting-room to the garden, whose trees seemed drawn on the clear evening skies in their full beauty. On the sofa sat a man, apparently very unhappy, with his cheek resting on his hand, and a look expressive of the deepest anxiety fixed upon a young woman, whose guiltless countenance rivalled the glow of the evening sky; whose whole bearing evinced mingled anger and humility, innocence and embarra.s.sment, while her eyes were riveted on the paper she had cast from her, which had revealed to her one of the dark shades of life. At a little distance from her stood a grave-looking man, whose face expressed perfect confidence in, and esteem for, the young wife; he stood as if he wished to inspire her with courage to follow the dictates of her own heart. And nearest the door leading to the entrance-hall sat a young gentleman, whose a.s.sured, careless deportment formed a strong contrast to his perplexed and irresolute glances; no one could have doubted that he was the cause of the dismal mood which had seized upon all the rest of the party, and that he was aware of this himself.

But it was only for a few short moments that the young wife stood as described. Presently she looked up fearlessly, although tears were streaming down her cheeks; without vouchsafing a single glance to the young gentleman, she swept past him, threw her arms round her husband's neck, and sank, weeping, by his side on the sofa. And this charming, natural act found a response in his heart; he flung his arm round her waist, and pressed her to his breast. It was a dumb and yet an eloquent scene!

The friend and the cousin were now _de trop_. I made a sign to him, and he left the room with me, without the others appearing to notice our departure.

It was rather an embarra.s.sing situation in which we two found ourselves placed as we walked along the high road together. But as I have always considered that 'honesty is the best policy,' I did not, on this occasion, depart from my general rule. I began by telling him frankly that the ingrat.i.tude which he had displayed towards my friend, who was also his friend, and his cousin's husband, by caricaturing him so ill-naturedly, and his hardihood in leaving the drawings in an open portfolio in a sitting-room common to all the family, as if he wished them to be seen by at least _one_ member of it, had convinced me that his remaining in that house would be productive of unhappiness to his host, and would be disagreeable to all parties. It was Damon himself who by accident had found the caricatures. It was impossible, of course, that he could pa.s.s them over in silence, and their discovery might have caused an extremely unpleasant scene. I had sought to avoid this, as I knew that no explanation or apology could have been accepted; in fact, none satisfactorily could have been offered. I pointed out to the young man that it was not likely his intercourse with the family could be renewed; that it would be necessary for him to determine what he was to do with himself for the future, as he could no longer reckon on their kindness.

'Soft and fair goes far,' says the proverb, and its truth was shown here. My words were taken in good part; the cousin and I continued to walk back and forwards on the high road half the night. He accompanied me at length to town, and then there was nothing for it--if he were to have a roof over his head at all--but to give him a bed at my house. We laid our heads together to think of what could be done to procure a situation for him, which might give him some profitable employment for the present, and some prospect of advantage for the future; and at last we both agreed that he had better look after an appointment in one of the provincial towns, which had just become vacant, and in the disposal of which I had some influence. Security, however, to a certain small extent, would be required, but I would help him to obtain this. I was quite certain, I said, that if I asked Damon, he would be his security, for he had a most amiable and forgiving temper. I wished Damon to have this satisfaction, and the cousin this humiliation; _that_ should be his only punishment. I am now inclined to believe, however, that he found the punishment tolerably light, and bore it with great equanimity, notwithstanding that he vapoured a great deal about obligation, mortification, contrition, &c. &c.

To cut a long story short, the plan we had hit upon that night was carried out. The cousin went to the country town and obtained the situation, Damon became his security, and was not sorry to have this little revenge upon him. And his young wife, who, through my indiscretion, found out afterwards what Damon had done, was quite overcome by her husband's generosity, and thought more of him than ever. A man is never sorry that his wife should entertain the belief that he is generous and n.o.ble-minded; that raises him much more in her estimation than if he gave her occasion for the vain satisfaction of admiring his wit. That, certainly, Damon's wife had no opportunity of doing, for he possessed neither wit nor genius, but he was a good, kind-hearted person. Their married life, which had been so nearly rendered unhappy, after the cloud above referred to had cleared off, glided on in a calm and even tenour, and nothing occurred to disturb their serenity.

But man is his own worst enemy, an old philosopher has said, and not without truth. Before twelve months had expired Damon's old whim had revived: he longed again for a friend, and began to lament that he had no one to whom he might speak on many subjects on which he could not converse with his wife.

'To speak the honest truth,' he said to me one day, 'I miss my wife's cousin exceedingly. He was a pleasant, sociable young man as could be, and I really do believe that we did him injustice--at least as far as my wife was concerned--and that she never would have troubled herself about him if he had remained in our house till doomsday. I really do miss him often.'

I opened my eyes in amazement at hearing this speech. But he was in earnest. Notwithstanding his domestic comforts, and all his previous unfortunate' experience, he longed for--his phantom, his patented friend, his Pythias the Fifth! The old fixed idea was again in the ascendant! His folly almost made me ill, but it also made me very angry, and this time I did not let him off easily. I remonstrated with him on the injustice with which he had during his whole life treated me, who had always been his true friend, a fact which no one could deny, though he had scarcely considered me as such, while he had run up friendship after friendship with a set of worthless creatures. His Pythias-fancy was a positive frenzy with him, approaching to insanity.

But he had never had the least idea of what friendship _really was_.

And as he was ignorant of it, I would tell him that friendship is the reward of affection, and it is not to be found in the street, like acquaintances, the mere result of chance. But what had he gained by his various friendships? Had they not been for a long time a wretched slavery, and in the last instance an equally wretched attempt at governing? The absurdity had merged at length into a perfect monomania, which deserved no mercy, for it had nearly made his poor wife thoroughly unhappy. If he could not give up the indulgence of this caprice, I advised him to engage a Pythias by the month for certain stipulated wages; some poor devil whom he could order to go with him to fish, or sit down to a chessboard whenever he pleased, for he required no other companion. Such an arrangement would be very convenient, because he could dismiss the hired Pythias when he pleased without further ado. As to myself, I said, I should continue to visit at his house only on his wife's account, for, as she was to be so neglected by him, she might require in her isolation the occasional society of a sincere friend. I should not come any longer for his sake, as he had shown me plainly enough how little he cared, or had ever cared, for me.

Damon was quite dumbfounded at the warmth with which I spoke, and at the unvarnished truths with which I overwhelmed him; his conscience must have told him that my accusations were not without foundation. He gave in, and concord was restored between us upon the condition that, for the future, he should renounce all search after his Pythias puppets. It was further resolved that the pacification should be 'firm and lasting,' as it is called in all treaties of peace.

I had been two or three months travelling abroad, when I received a letter from Damon, giving me to understand that an event was expected in his house which was looked forward to with much pleasure. I was delighted to hear it, hoping that it would add so much to the happiness of my friends in the future. At length, to my joy, came another letter, announcing the birth of a son, his exact image, and he was so expansive in his descriptions of the little stranger, whom he seemed to look upon as a prodigy, that he scarcely left himself room to mention his wife.

As soon as I returned home, I went to see him, and found him, like a fond papa, in the nursery' where he was pacing up and down, holding a monologue about the boy's education and future prospects. The young mother was sitting on the sofa with that languid, touching expression of heartfelt joy, which is so becoming to young mothers, and with a dreamy look, as if she, too, were beholding in her mind's eye the future for her child, and in thought were bestowing on him the cherub form more meet for an angel than a child of mortality. I congratulated them both with all my heart. Damon lifted his 'exact image' from the cradle, raised the infant high in the air, and exclaimed with pleasure and pride:

'See here! here is my new born friend--my rightful Pythias!'

I could not help smiling at this truly unexpected outburst. What obstinacy!

The young mother held out her arms, and cried: 'Oh, give him to me--give me my child, my own little man, my darling!'

And when the infant was placed in her arms she caressed him with that tenderness which only a mother can show.

'My Pythias!--My darling!' They had both spoken from their hearts, and found the word which made them happiest.

When the boy was to be christened, the mother proposed that he should be named Charles, and the father that he should also be called Pythias.

Charles was after me; Pythias was after him, the other--the phantom. I could not refrain from whispering to Damon, if it would not be well to have the child also christened 'the Fifth.' He laughed, and pushed me so, that I had nearly gone head-foremost into the cradle, to 'the new-born Pythias.'

And Charles Pythias united in his own person that which makes the happiness of marriage--love and friendship. I do not believe that either of the parents bethought them how long these feelings had been shared among various individuals, so entirely were they now united and concentrated in this one little child.

But I pleaded earnestly that the boy should on no account be called Pythias, and insisted that it was quite enough for him to bear my name, as his father's friend. I was determined to free myself from hearing anything more of Pythias. Happily I carried my point, and I _did_ hear no more of him. The new-born Pythias, however, took, in due time, his rightful place, though he had escaped bearing the ridiculous name.

THE FATAL CHAIN.

FROM THE SWEDISH OF UNCLE ADAM.

One dreary autumn evening, shortly after I had taken possession of my living (thus my friend, the Rev. Mr. Z., began his narrative), I was sitting alone in my study, the same which I occupy to this day, and from which I overlook the church and the churchyard, when a servant-girl entered, and announced that a strange gentleman was waiting in the drawing-room, who wished to speak to me. I hastened downstairs, and found a good-looking young man, although he appeared to be unusually pale, with an expression of wild grief in his eyes, which led me to conclude that he was the bearer of some unpleasant intelligence.

'I come to beg you for the key of the Lejonsward'schen family vault,'

said he; 'I believe you have it.'

'What!' I demanded in astonishment, 'do you wish it now, at this late hour?'

'Yes; I must have it,' said the stranger, impatiently, 'for a corpse.

Alas! a corpse is to be interred immediately.'

The stranger's manners seemed to me to be so very peculiar that I still hesitated. On perceiving this he cried,

'You appear to be unwilling to give it, sir. You need not hesitate; my name is Lejonsward, and the corpse which is to be laid in the narrow tomb is that of my wife. I have one key, but require the other from you. Will you still refuse it to me?'

I gave him the key, and with scarcely a word of thanks he hastened away. I returned to my chamber, and gazed forth into the darkness which shrouded the churchyard. I soon perceived lights moving over the graves towards the vaults; the vault lies here, on this side, and the wall at the entrance is ornamented by a lion holding in its paw a pierced heart. The tomb was opened, and I saw the torchlight through the grating. It was a gloomy sight, which I shall never forget.

The simple burial was over, and immediately afterwards a servant brought me back the key.

Several years had pa.s.sed, when the same gentleman entered my room one morning.

'Do you recollect me?' he asked. I answered in the affirmative. 'It is well,' continued he; 'I am going to become your parishioner, yonder at Lejonsnas.'