iiVrnw(mm i mti*mittvvHri^fvm * '.m >»i a ^ fwp'miif:i t . iiwi w « u'' i | i w «<5<' !™PW i >- The person charging this material is re- sponsible for its return to the library from which it was withdrawn on or before the Latest Date stamped below. Theft, mutilation, and underlining of books are reasons for disciplinary action and may result in dismissal from the University. To renew call Telephone Center, 333-8400 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN L161— O-1096 ^> THE CCEEULEANS THE CCERULEANS ^ ^Ecation IbjjU BY H. S. CUNNINGHAM AUTHOR OF ' CHRONICLES OF DUSTYPORE,' ' WHEAT AN'U TARES, ETC. to the sessions of sweet, silent thought I suiamon up remembrance of things past IN TWO VOLS.— VOL. L JLonUon MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK 1887 All rights reser7>ed fX3 ^ \ TO H E C ' The idea of her life shall sweetly creep Into his study of imagination. Simla, September 1886, ^ ^ 4 CONTENTS CHAPTEE I p^oE Cgerulea 1 CHAPTER II Chichele 7 CHAPTER III Prince Charming ....... 18 CHAPTER IV Vale ! Vale ! 29 CHAPTER V Sir Theophilus Prance 52 CHAPTER VI A Kindly Welcome 65 CHAPTER VII Descensus Averni 82 CHAPTER VIII An Entanglement 90 viil CONTENTS CHAPTER IX A Wounded Heart . . . . . . .111 CHAPTER X Mr. Montem loses his Temper . . . . 122 CHAPTER XI Gather your Roses while ye may . . . .135 CHAPTER XII The True Rose 148 CHAPTER XIII Chateau qui Parle . . . . . . .165 CHAPTER XIV Last Days in England 179 CHAPTER XV Sinclair 192 CHAPTER XVI At Sea . . . 208 CHAPTER XVII Camilla's Birthday 219 CHAPTEE I CCERULEA ' qui me gelidis in vallibus Hsemi Sistat et ingenti ramorum protegat umbra ! ' English travellers, and still more English exiles in the east, love the Ccerulean Mountains for their suggestive resemblance to the Surrey Hills. They love them, too, for their blue, transparent atmosphere ; their sweet syl- van vistas ; their woodlands thick with wild roses ; their undulating stretches of sward, where the horseman may gallop as freely as on the Brighton downs. Unlike the gorgeous outlines of the great ranges of the north, — Simla with its wide perspective and snow-clad horizon, Naini-Tal clinging to its precipitous mountain side, or the far-off, awful, chilling majesty of Everest and Kin- chinjunga, — the Cceruleans win you by a loveliness which owes much of its fascination to being essentially homely. The unpretentious landscape smiles suggestively VOL. I. B 2 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. of the possibility of hamlets clustering round well- kept mansions, of village spires embosomed in imme- morial elms, and comfortable homesteads nestling in some sheltered bend. As you wander over the great uplands, you would scarcely be startled to meet a ruddy English farmer, jogging homeward from the market- town, or a smock-frocked shepherd, sheltering his ewes and lambs from the keen Christmas frost. But you will meet no one — unless, perchance, you come upon a group of startled buffaloes or the tiny-rounded abodes of primitive hillsmen, who have lingered on from a dim legendary past into the modern world, and whose wild shouts to their cattle sound like the cry of Faun or Dryad rather than the articulate utterances of civilised humanity. If you part from your comrades and, as you easily may, miss the landmarks that would guide you home, you will speedily enjoy the unac- customed sensation of being lost. The path, which just now looked so inviting, turns out to be an impracticable swamp ; the woodland behind is tangled and rugged ; the track by which you came has suddenly disappeared ; the fast-setting afternoon sun is throwing the shadows higher and higher on the mountain's side ; a weird howl recalls with disagreeable vividness the exploits of CCERULEA 3 the leopard that is reported in the neighbourhood. Except this all is silent ; and the oppressive tranquillity reminds you that, to conventional mankind, solitude, to be quite enjoyable, needs to be shared with some one who will sympathise in its enjoyment and express his sympathy in living words. Such, at any rate, was the mood of the modern occu- pants of Ccerulea, — a kindly, sociable race, little given to solitary wanderings or other egoistic, self-inspective practices. Few of them, it may safely be affirmed, ran any risk of getting lost. Rather they clustered in closely-serried groups, — talked and laughed, — loved and quarrelled, — dined and danced, — occupied themselves intensely with each other's affairs, and lived generally in the keenest and completest enjoyment of one another's company. Among the various shortcomings against which the successive Chaplains of Ccerulea felt them- selves called, from time to time, to warn their flocks, no one had ever been unreasonable enough to include the sin of unsociability. Mr. Chichele, who, at the moment when this story opens, guided the fortunes of Ccerulea, was as fond of society as his subjects, but, perhaps, more discriminating in his sociability. He was sometimes condemned as 4 THE CCERULEANS chap. inhospitable by dull people, in whom, with the kindest intentions, he found it impossible to take an interest, and by pretentious ones, to whom his laboured polite- ness betrayed a lurking touch of sarcasm. Such per- sons he, no doubt, banished, as often as official etiquette would allow, from banquets at which it was his hobby to collect all that Coerulea could produce of the best ingredients of agreeable society. For the experience of life had convinced Chichele — by this time middle-aged and philosophic — that an official day ought to be ended by a good dinner, and that good dinners are most en- joyed and best digested when partaken of in the com- pany of agreeable and intelligent women. If they were beautiful to boot, the effect was still more complete. Soothed by such pleasant influences, Chichele's nature, which froze into a sort of long- enduring apathy under the routine of officialdom and the expositions of secre- taries, blossomed into a geniality, which those who shared it appreciated all the more for its intermit- tent and fugitive character. Chief among the alleviations of existence was a pleasant little mountain settlement whither he was wont, as the summer drew on, to betake himself and his surroundings. Here life was, if uneventful, picturesque. I CCERULEA 5 and, at any rate, free from many of the ingredients of active boredom. Chichele was something of an artist, and Mature was everywhere around him close at hand and lavish with interesting effects. He was sportsman enough to enjoy an occasional gallop after jackal over the wide upland, sloping gently to the precipitous ghat, which, all along the western confines of CoBrulea, frowns upon the steamy Malabar lowlands, and sheds upon them the swollen torrents of the south-west mon- soon. He had plenty of work, and Masterly, his Chief Secretary, brought it all to him in a form, which gave the dullest subject a touch of brightness. Nothing, not even a box full of Coerulean office papers, could baffle Masterly's diligence or damp his fun. The two men often sat laughing together over the monuments of other people's dulness. Masterly could knock a spark of merriment out of anything, even out of blunders of CoBrulean ofi&cials. Mrs. Paragon, also, was a near neighbour and a good one. She was distinguished by an agreeable person, a fine turn of wit, a ready flow of conversation, and a feminine appreciation of the foibles of her neighbours. When, as not unfrequently happened, the two met at Chichele's hospitable board, they generally managed to pass an amusing evening. 6 THE CCERULEANS chap, i The amusement was apt to take a more cynical turn on those evenings, when Mr. Montem, who, as president of the Wear and Tear Department, naturally saw a good deal of the seamy side of men and institutions, accepted Mr. Chichele's invitation to a quiet rubber. His gloomy view of life was the wholesome bitter in the salad of which Mrs. Paragon's good humour was the freshness and sweetness, and Chichele relished the one as much as the other. CHAPTEE II CHICHELE ' It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, I mete and dole Unequal laws unto a savage race. That hoard and sleep and feed, and know not me.' Ulysses. When Mr. Chichele (two years before the time at which this story opens) accepted the Secretary of State's in- vitation to become ' Governor of Coerulea and the Hilly Tracts,' he was labouring under one of those accesses of boredom and disappointment which occasionally drive Englishmen to make essays into the region of the unex- pected. Ten years before he would have resented the sug- gestion as an implied disparagement of pretensions, which justified a higher flight of ambition. He would have sneered at such an appointment as a shelf Now shelves are excellent things, but one does not like to get on them 8 THE CGERULEANS chap. too early in life. Every man, who has a grain of ' am- bition's perilous stuff' in his composition, feels himself, till he is forty, capable of great things, if only luck will bring the opportunity in his way. He sees his con- temporaries go on to glory, and he knows, in many instances, that their qualifications for glory are in no way exceptional. Boys, whose Latin verses he used to do for them at school, have blossomed out into Cabinet Ministers, Parliamentary Orators, or brilliant Generals. The fag, whom he used to thrash for carelessness, has become a Queen's Counsel. The pleasant comrade of idle summer afternoons has become an Ambassador. By degrees such a man's ambition grows tamer. He recognises that luck is for the lucky few, and that, besides luck, a great many things go to command suc- cess or to make it possible. Audacity, diligence, adroit- ness, the quick knack of seizing the right occasion and taking Fortune at the turn, — the clear, keen sight that is all the keener for having a narrow area of vision, — the moral levity that glides with happy and unconscious grace over difficulties which bring thoughtful men to grief — all these are ingredients of success, as well as genius, surpassing ability or preter-human energy. The man who does not succeed may console himself with II CHICHELE 9 the reflection that it is to the want of these, as much as of nobler claims to greatness, that his failure is attribut- able. By fifty a man is beginning to grow modest, and to doubt whether, after all, he has not had fully as much as, or even more than, he deserved. Despite such philosophical consolation, however, the life of unsuc- cessful men has doubtless its reactionary moments of melancholy ; and when a man is dull and melancholy, there is no saying what he will not do. Chichele's career, so far, had not been fruitful in great results. He had left Christ Church with no other reputation than that of a popular member of a cultured set, and had betaken himself, by way of completing his education, to reading for the law. A few months in an eminent Conveyancer's chambers had convinced him that his chances of eminence at the Bar were not such as to justify years of uncongenial toil. His patrimony — though too modest to allow of any extravagance — was yet sufficient to enable him to dispense with the question- able advantages of a profession. The influence of a rich, unmarried uncle, whose presumptive heir he was, secured him an easy seat for a Borough, which made but small demands on his energy or his purse. A few dinners, a few visits, still fewer speeches, straight votes 10 THE CCERULEANS chap. with his party, and a large number of local subscriptions, satisfied all the political requirements of his constitu- ency. Meanwhile Chichele drank deep of the pleasures and excitements of society, and formed a large circle of agreeable friends. In course of time he fell in love, or believed that he did so, with a very smart young lady, with whom he had valsed and chatted through half a London season. The smart young lady, on being brought to the test, lost no time in explaining to him that her ambition had a higher flight, and that an agreeable valser is not necessarily an eligible husband for a lady, whose affairs of the heart were in strict sub- ordination to the necessity of providing adequately for the maintenance of a brilliant position in polite society, and the gratification of a large number of expensive tastes. Then Chichele, in a fit of disgust at the heart- lessness of smart young ladies, had become more indolent than ever, had renounced conventionality and taken a plunge into Bohemianism, from which he emerged a wiser and a sadder man, fettered with the extremely inconvenient appendage of a wife, whom it was impos- sible to introduce to his friends, and whose society — when the first outburst of boyish passion had died away — he himself found to be entirely insupportable. II CHICHELE 11 His wife was not long in affording him legal justifica- tion for an arrangement which secured him — what he now felt the most paramount of necessities — a home, which should never be darkened by her presence, and a circle of friends, in which her name should be never mentioned except in the bated breath due to a misfor- tune of the past. Chichele's separation had been a three- days' gossip in his own set, into which he was speedily readmitted on the footing — not altogether without its redeeming comforts — of a man whom it was impossible to dislike, but equally impossible to marry. But he was weary of purposeless enjoyment. His conscience rebelled at the idea of becoming a mere idler. On the other hand, it was not particularly easy to find anything to do. Having satisfied himself that he was not in the running as a future Cabinet Minister, that nobody thought much about his speeches in Parliament, and that, somehow, he did not feel inspired to write a book worth ^\Titing, Chichele began to look further a-field for active achievement; and when the opportunity pre- sented itself of reigning over a discernible fraction of British India, of which he knew about as much as of the internal economy of Kamschatka, he accepted it, if not with enthusiasm, at anv rate with a laudable deter- 12 THE CCERULEANS chap. mination to do the job as well as his resources, moral and physical, would allow him. He had worked really- hard at his task, and had been rewarded by becoming far more interested in it than either he or his friends would have believed it possible that he could be in anytliing which Parliament recognised as only a far-off colonial detail, and as to which no human being in his London set could affect to possess the most rudimentary knowledge, or to feel the very slightest concern. Chichele's new post, however, was not without some distinguished associations. Coerulea had, from time to time, welcomed a succession of rulers, each of whom had, in his own particular line, a substantial claim to be considered remarkable. Again and again had one of these heaven-sent despots come sailing sublimely up from the southern horizon, and the official world of Coerulea had donned its gayest attire and its gravest looks, and honoured with unquestioning alacrity the latest beat of that imperial pulse, which throbbed from the far-off, tiny island of the west, l^o one knew exactly why they came ; for sometimes, so Fortune willed, an interval occurred; and then the Coerulean sun still rose and glowed according to precedent : the south-west monsoon still came raging, as usual, over II CHICHELE 13 the mountains : the melancholy ocean still heaved and howled on the low AVinclipatam coas:-line : the ships rolled and stagr^ered in the roads : and the husje car2o boats, with their innumerable rowers shouting in wild cadence, came, as heretofore, tumbling and crashing through the surf. Life, in fact, went on as usual ; and the more advanced Cceruleans confessed a dawning consciousness that Governors were an expensive super- fluity, which, if so Heaven willed, might be spared with something short of a convulsion. Then the new Governor's vessel would appear in the horizon, and with the first applausive wliiff of gunpowder, all these an- archic ideas died away ; Coerulea chanted its accus- tomed welcome, and tlie new Sovereign was led off. — serene, bland, and condescending, — by smiling Secre- taries, like a Queen Bee by her attendant males, first to take the oaths of office, and then to be fostei*ed, taught, and managed as his predecessors had been before him. For, from the nature of the case, the Governors of Cceriilea needed a great deal of education and no little management. It was a gi-eat thing people felt to get freshness, but freshness has its price, and part o: the price was unbounded ignorance. Some of them were accomplished, courtly gentlemen. — learned their lesson 14 THE CCERULEANS chap. with quick intelligence, and practised what they were taught with laudable tact and promptitude, — presided at Missionary Meetings and proposed the bride's health at weddings with affable condescension, — evinced a thrilling interest in female education, shed a ray of fostering benignity on hospitals and zenanas, and stirred the pure depths of female loveliness by a smile which told its happy recipient that Governors, after all, were mortal, compounded of the ordinary ingredients of flesh and blood, and animated by the same genial im- pulses as thrilled their fellowmen. But others of these imperial emissaries were of less malleable material and of more stubborn wits. There had been, so tradition whispered, Governors who would be taught by no one ; whom Nature had intended, so their outward man asserted, to succeed by muscle and sinew ; but whom Fortune, in one of her playful moods, doomed to be rulers of mankind. The succession of a ruler of this order naturally produced an embarrassing result of independ- ence of judgment, stiff-neckedness of purpose, the vehe- ment self-assertion of one who knew his own will, and intended that others should share that knowledge. Panoplied against conviction, he would mipress his personality on Coerulean affairs with a painful distinct- II CHICHELE 15 ness, — would do what he pleased, and in the way he chose to do it, and ' would have his way ' in that dis- agreeable fashion in which a resolute man, who goes trampling through a crowd regardless of the wishes and toes of aU who are unlucky enough to cross his path, may be said to have it. The reign of chaos would seem about to set in, and the Coerulean officials would be looking very grave when Providence, tempering the wind to the shorn Coerulean lambs, would send another Pharaoh to restore order to a convulsed administration and a community quivering with discomfort. Such a saviour of society presented himself in Chichele's im- mediate predecessor. The new ruler was accomplished, erudite, with a wide experience of courts, salons, libraries, and studios. Under him the Coeruleans speedily became aware of the high privileges of their position. His inaugural address became at once a land- mark in provincial annals. It was followed by many others, which explained exhaustively to the Coeruleans the grandeur of the British Empire, the weight of the Coerulean Governor's Crown, the dignity of the Pro- Consular Office, and the fact — hitherto but scantily recognised — that it was round the Governor, as around a sort of sacred omphalos, that the various atoms of 16 THE CCERULEANS chap. Coerulean existence were destined to live and move, and have their being. -'Eound me,' he oracularly apprised his subjects, ' for the future you will all revolve.' ' A sort of solar system!' whispered a fair member of his audience, rather awed, 'what does he mean?' 'He must mean,' suggested Mrs. Paragon, whom nothing could awe, ' that he intends to give plenty of balls. I hope that he will honour me with a valse.' Mrs. Paragon's hopes were disappointed, for the Saviour of society was not an enthusiastic valser, and had other and deeper interests than the aspirations of ball-goers to satisfy. He travelled about his dominions with a truly heroic zeal ; harangued his subjects, and submitted to be harangued by them on every possible occasion ; piled up masses of invaluable information, and took an interest in every local product — even the Coerulean butterflies — of which he and his Aides-de- Camp formed an excellent collection. Mr. Chichele, when he ascended the throne, fell far short of his predecessor's standard both in interest and zeal. He danced more; he minuted less; he made speeches on the rarest possible occasions, and then in a manner which proclaimed at once that he contemplated no oratorical effect. On the whole, his popularity with his subjects ir CHICHELE 17 was, perhaps, none the fainter for a less pretentious programme and a more human theory of humanity. On the other hand, he now and then achieved, to all appearance unintentionally, a witticism which told the Coeruleans that their ruler was something more than a mere official ; and it not unfrequently happened that impostors, social or official, whose fate it was to inter- view Chichele, left him, after a few searcliing questions, with a disagreeable impression that the new Governor understood them and their machinations a good deal better than they intended or approved. VOL. I. CHAPTER III PRINCE CHARMING ' Embroided was he, as it were a mede, All full of freshe flowres, white and rede ; Singing he was, or playing all the day ; He was as freshe as is the moneth of May ; Short was his goune, with sleeves long and wide ; Well coude he sitte on hors and fayre ride ; He could songs make and wel endite, Juste and eke dance and wel portraie and write. ' Canterbury Pilgrim. Philip Ambrose was a young gentleman who had always been a source of bewilderment to those who were responsible for his education. There was a sort of caressing familiarity about him, which his father con- stantly felt to be impertinent, and yet did not know how to check without surliness. An amiability which nothing could ruffle, made any attempt to deal seriously with him seem morose. His time at school had been a disappointment, an anxiety and vexation. All his CHAP. Ill PRINCE CHARMING 19 monthly reports had been in one key, of which Mr. Ambrose was absolutely sick. They all pronounced Philip's abilities excellent, his disposition amiable, and his tastes correct, but his character weak, and his energy fitful and evanescent. 'He wants backbone,' one of his complaining tutors had roughly said, and his father had a cruel conviction that the criticism was just. Every one agreed that he could do much better if he only chose, but then young Ambrose never did choose, and came back from school and college alike with manifold stories of failure, and fluent explanations of his reverses, which were so perfectly satisfactory to his own mind that his father felt it in vain to endeavour to refute them. ' My dear Philip,' he said, bitterly, ' you're like that General whom Napoleon cashiered because he had a perfect genius for scientific disasters.' ' Only,' said Ambrose, with a sweet, pleasant smile, *dear father, you can't cashier me, unfortunately, and my disasters are not scientific at all, but accidental — I am so frightfully unlucky.' ' Well,' said his father, with a fatigued air, ' I am un- lucky myself; perhaps it is hereditary.' * You are lucky,' said Philip, taking his father's arm with an air of affectionate familiarity, ' in having the 20 THE CCERULEANS chap. most dutiful, exemplary, and admirable son in the world ; so now don't scold me any more to-day, there is a dear, good father.' Philip's shortcomings were rendered all the more provoking by his occasional exhibitions of capacity for better things. He had a good memory for anything that pleased him, a delicate ear for rhythm, a pretty knack of style, a nice perception of the delicate shades of tense and mood, and a reverential love — the only form of reverence, perhaps, that he ever achieved — for the grand classical beauties, which form the inspiring sentiment of academic life. His translations of Theo- critus brought a flush of pleasure into his tutor's cheeks, and inclined even that austere functionary to condone the wild irregularity of Philip's attendances at morning chapel. He won the Newdegate with a Prize Poem, which, though ornate with conventional plagiarisms, was admitted even by the stern censorship of Oxford common-rooms to be extremely pretty. Its subject was the Girondins, and Philip's description of Madame Poland, as he recited it to an applauding audience of undergraduates and young ladies in the Theatre, made his father, who had come into Oxford for the occasion, feel a proud and happy man. Many sympathising spirits Ill PRINCE CHARMING 21 understood his pride and joy; and brilliant were the vaticinations on his behalf uttered by the young prize- man's guests at the banquet, which he gave that night in honour of his father and himself. Philip's delight in his achievement, and his modesty as to its real merits, were in the best of good taste. ' After all,' his father thought, as he walked through the silent Oxford streets back to his hotel, in a happier mood than he often experienced — ' he is a clever fellow, and a nice fellow, and I ought to be content.' Prize Poems, unhappily, shed but an evanescent glory, and, despite his niceness and cleverness, and the nicely-rounded couplets about Madame Poland, Philip came as badly as ever to grief in his next examination. So matters had slid, and as the time for the close of young Ambrose's college career drew near without any achievement wdiich promised future result, it be- came a more and more pressing problem to decide what could be done with so accomplished, irresolute, and unpractical a young gentleman. None of the ordinary professions, it was quite clear, would suit him. The Church would have been a natural refuge for a man of culture, who came of a stock with several good family livings in its gift, and who was lacking in mental and 22 THE CCERULEANS chap. physical vigour; but the Church was, his father felt with some bitterness, out of the question. Philip, whatever else he was vague about, was perfectly clear that he had no vocation for anything theological. His father was a student, and had brought away from college a deep-set reverence for Church history and Church institutions, and a real veneration for Church authority, however difficult it might be to ascertain its origin or define its limits. He had succeeded early to a College Eectory, and had brought to it all a student's tastes and habits. Here he had been for years working, more or less fitfully, at a heap of learned curiosities about the early Councils. He had a project, too, more or less incomplete, of some ' Studies in mysticism,' to which he had devoted many laborious hours of affectionate re- search. The result was the accumulation of a large amount of somewhat obsolete learning, and of many portraits of characters more remarkable for self-con- templative piety than for practical robustness. He was annoyed and discouraged to find that Philip could not affect to take the slightest interest in his work, and could scarcely speak of it with proper respect. Once, when Philip was at home for the Long Vacation, his father had proposed to him to read some of the Ill PKIXCE CHAEMIXG 23 manuscript of his book, and Philip had readily assented, as he assented to everything which cost no immediate exertion or sacrifice. But he was in no hurry to begin the perusal ; and when he did, Mr. Ambrose perceived, in a few minutes, that the task was more than Philip's energies could support. He fidgeted over it just as he had been used to fidget in old days, when Mr. Ambrose had insisted on his sitting down in the Library to his holiday task. Before he had read a dozen pages, he got up with a sigh, put a marker into the manuscript, and went out on to the lawn, where Mr. Ambrose found him, an hour later, lying on his back in the shade, smoking a cigar, and enjoying the pleasant ripple of the stream, down to which the garden sloped. * That's a stiff chapter, father,' Philip said, apologeti- cally, ' about the Council of Cappadocia ; it has given me a headache. What fellows those old Popes were — were they not? They stuck at nothing — did they? By Jove ! there's a trout rising ; shall I go and get my rod, and see if I can make him rise to me? Shall I try that brown moth I had on yesterday, or what?' ' Yes, Philip,' said his father, ' try it ' ; Philip went for his rod, and Mr. Ambrose retired sadly to his study, put away the discarded manuscript, and did not renew 24 THE CCERULEANS chap. his invitation to Philip to peruse it. ISTor did it occur to Philip to ask for it again. He had no turn, it was evident, for Church history. Equally bootless were his father's attempts to interest him in the mystics. 'I had always fancied,' Philip said, when his father told him about his project, ' that a mystic was the most useless and unintelligible thing in the world — next to a metaphysician.' 'That,' said Mr. Ambrose, for once betrayed into showing that he was provoked, ' is because you know as little about theology as you do about metaphysics. In my days it was the fashion at Oxford to learn some- thing of both.' ' Well,' said Philip, ' I should like to learn something about it too. Eead me what you are writing, father.' 'It is St. Bernard,' said his father; and then Mr. Ambrose read : ' External nature is but the shadow of God, the soul His image. The chief, the special mirror is the rational soul seeking itself. ... If the invisible things of God are understood and clearly seen by the things which have been made, where, I ask, rather than in His image within us, can be found more deeply imprinted the traces of the knowledge of Him ? Whosoever, therefore, thirsteth to see his God, let him Ill PKINCE CHARMING 25 cleanse from every stain his mirror; let him purify his heart by faith.' * Now do you think that interesting ? ' ' It is beautiful/ said Philip, for a moment sobered into seriousness. ' You are right.' said his father : ' there is nothing so beautiful as a pure and elevated soul busying itself with the noblest and most sacred thoughts : " ardentis- sima divini caliginis intuitio." Dear fellow, Life would be a poor affair without something of that sort in it. Sometimes, do you know, Philip, I am afraid that you are a heathen, — a pleasure-seeking, pagan, apolaustic Greek.' 'Come, come, father,' said Philip good-naturedly, anxious to ward off a lecture on his own shortcomings ; ' don't call a poor fellow bad names. I am a very good Christian, you know, and a very dutiful son. All the same I could not be a mystic if I tried ever so, could I ? That is not the way that Nature made me.' ' No,' said his father ; ' but I would give my right hand, Philip, to see you for half an hour in earnest about something, mysticism or anything else. You had better go out now and see if you cannot catch another trout.' 26 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. Scenes such as these had made it a recognised fact between father and son that Philip could not go into the Church. Mr. Ambrose would have regarded it as an irreverence, his son as a bore. Nor did any other opening present itself as acceptable. Philip himself was completely at a loss, and provoked his father by his serene indifference to the subject, and his light- hearted unconsciousness that it was his business, any more than anybody else's, to decide how he would make a living. Something, he felt certain, would turn up. Certainty of this kind is only another word for indifference. Then the Indian Civil Service was suggested, and Philip, after a spell of Mr. Wren, passed a very decent examination, and was numbered among the future officials of Coerulea. For once he had gained a practical success. His father felt an inward relief that Philip was at last tied down to some definite line of life, and could no longer trifle with existence as if it were a bouquet of roses. Philip accepted his fate without demur, rather enjoyed the vague idea of life in India, and was less unhappy than his father felt that he ought to be at leaving his home. To Mr. Ambrose, in his heart of hearts, his son's Ill PRINCE CHAEMING 27 choice of a profession was the crowning disappointment of the long series to which Philip had accustomed him. He had lived on for years in that lonely Eectory, and the one thing that he really cared about was this light- hearted lad, who was going off now, without a pang, to seek his fortune in another hemisphere. He had pictured to himself all sorts of pleasant schemes in which Philip figured as his companion; and now all vanished into air. Philip little suspected the pangs which his adoption of an Indian career was costing his father. He felt no pang himself. He was conscious of a sort of fondness for his home ; but a little of it went a long way. He never had been able to fancy how his father could live on in that dreary house, consorting with stolid farmers, and preaching, Sunday after Sunday, to a handful of boors. It came, he supposed, from his father having been a College Don, and so having learnt to like a sort of half-monastic life. But Philip had no touch in him of the monk. For him a week of it at a time was as much as he could stand ; so the thought of leaving it fell very far short of agony. INIr. Ambrose, on his part, buried his disap- pointment deeper and deeper under a calm exterior ; hardened his heart as best he could against a tender- 28 THE CGERULEANS chap, hi ness which he felt to be irrational ; and set himself with Stoical philosophy to endure his son's departure as he had borne other troubles, each one as it came. He so far indulged his affectionate mood as to accom- pany the young adventurer to Paris, and at Paris he fell in with an old friend, and Philip closed one chapter of his life with a romantic incident. CHAPTEE IV vale! vale! ' Injurious Time now, vdih a robber's haste, Crams liis rich thievery up, he knows not how : As many farewells as be stars in heaven, "With distinct breath and consigned kisses to them, He fumbles up into a loose adieu, And scants us with a single, famished kiss, Distasted with the salt of broken tears.' The Hotel Melancthon was a quiet little Parisian establishment, frequented by the countryfolk of Mr. Ambrose's neighbourhood in their visits to the Conti- nent. The host was an enterprising Swiss, the hostess a lady who had, in earlier life, served as a maid in various comfortable English families, and who had managed, on her marriage, to retain and expand her English connection. Hither Mr. Ambrose used to come because he knew the ways of the place and its prices, and was sure of a good bath, an airy room, and a wholesome dinner without ruinous expenditure. Hither, 30 THE CCERULEANS chap. too, came Sir Marmadiike Croft, — baronet, banker, country gentleman, politician, and theologian, — and with him his two maiden sisters and his orphan niece. What mysterious influence led Sir Marmaduke year by year to exchange the comforts, pleasures, and dignities of his home for the vicissitudes of foreign travel, we shall never know. It was not, presumably, amusement ; for amusement was not one of the forces in life with which Sir Marmaduke reckoned ; and his tours can hardly, in the most liberal acceptation of the word, have been re- garded as amusing. His view of Paris and French life in general was not that of sympathetic approval. It presented itself to his mental vision as an irreligious, expensive place, in wdiich the ill results of Popery, Sabbath -breaking, republicanism, and other objection- able phases of human error were aggressively displayed. There were, however, a few fine old faded mansions which recalled to Sir Marmaduke the gaiety and flirta- tions of his youth. There were, too, in Paris good little English societies, where excellent people met from time to time to raise a feeble protest against the prevailing enormities, and to proclaim the truth, as they modestly termed their views of morals and theology. At these functions Sir Marmaduke was accustomed to assist with IV VALE ! VALE ! 31 a prowess that gave him great satisfaction. But these performances gave less satisfaction to his companions, and to his niece Camilla they were occasions of the acutest suffering. The general feeling of discomfort and repression, in which she habitually lived, rose at these moments to absolute effervescence. Camilla's mental constitution was such as continually to prompt longings for a bolder flight than her present surroundings allowed her. Her mother, Sir Marmaduke's youngest sister, was considered to have been the flighty member of the family. She defied its traditions of dull decorum, scandalised her elder sisters by outbursts of ill-regulated sentiment, and shook the family creed to its very base by an independence of thought, taste, and action, which Sir Marmaduke — a man with firm prejudices and a great deal of fine, old, stupid blood in his veins — could neither understand nor condone. Her want of self-control had been at last exhibited, with distressing emphasis, in her de- cision to marry, against her brother's wishes, a too charm- ine^ officer of small means and extravagant habits, who shortly afterwards committed the crowning extravagance of going off on a campaign and getting killed in his first engagement. His young widow had, for a year or two, with her little daughter endured, with what grace she 32 THE CCERULEANS chap. might, the penance of Sir Marmaduke's grave and re- proachful charity. From this she presently escaped by dying herself. Camilla since then had been the guest of her uncle and the victim of her maiden aunts. The two worthy ladies had laid their feeble heads together for the purpose of oppressing her. They discovered, even in her childhood, the symptoms of hereditary flightiness, and warned by the mother's example, they determined to crush it in the bud. Camilla, though she had now arrived at the mature age of fifteen, was still untamed. She had proved a reluctant and refractory pupil in the arts of conventionality. Her sorrows were mitigated by long intervals of school-life, which, how- ever, had the ill result of making her home seem all the more unendurable on her return. The general sense which her surroundings had produced upon her was one of impending suffocation. There must be a world out- side, — Camilla instinctively felt, — beautiful, interesting, wonderful, alive with every sort of pleasure and excite- ment. Around himself Sir Marmaduke seemed to create a sort of moral vacuum of decorous inanities and imrealities, — an oasis of dulness into which no really living thought from without could ever find its way, or could have existed in it for an instant if it did. IV VALE ! VALE ! 33 At Paris Camilla always experienced this disagree- able sensation with especial acuteness. Here loas the world, she knew, — the grand stream of life raging along only a few yards away, — rapid, sparkling, brilliant, mys- teriously delightful ; but her uncle's party were safely moored in a little, dull backwater ; no eddy could find its way to them to disturb the stillness of the pool. When the regular sight-seeing of the day had been done, the due quota of churches and picture-galleries in- spected, and her uncle was engaged with his home corre- spondence, and her aunts had retired to repose, there were still hours when Camilla felt in need of anything rather than repose, and the quiet hotel began to feel like a sort of respectable prison. She would have liked to glide invisibly through the knot of servants who guarded its portals, and fly out, — she knew not whither, nor cared, so long as she could indulge a passionate desire to escape from something she felt to be asphyxiat- ing her. She longed for a fresh atmosphere, however boisterous and shaken by whatever storms. Surely kind Heaven would some day send the refreshing gust that was to revive her drooping soul and to make real existence begin. The hoped-for relief presented itself in the form of VOL. L D 34 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. two unexpected visitors, whom Camilla, coming into the salon one afternoon, in a condition of despair, found calling upon her aunts. She had often seen Mr. Ambrose before at her uncle's, and Philip, too, had occasionally, in his holidays, come with his father on a visit to the 'Vines.' Neither of them had, hitherto, impressed themselves on her mental con- sciousness with any deeper import than attached to a neighbouring clergyman and a Harrow schoolboy. She now hailed both in the light of deliverers. They came from the outer world, and broke down the sense of isolation which her uncle's society always engendered. Both visitors lost no time in securing their position in Camilla's good graces, which, on the first impression, she had assigned to them. Mr. Ambrose was agreeably gentle and courteous, and treated her with a politeness that Camilla felt very gratifying. Philip's boisterous, restless, irrepressible good humour were a delightful relief. It was like a rush of ozone into a stifling atmosphere. What Camilla especially wanted just now was contact with the outer world, and Philip at once established connection of a most efficient kind. He was enjoying Paris and its pleasures to the full, and described his enjoyment with infectious vivacity. IV VALE ! VALE ! 35 He and his father had been to half the sights of Paris, — amongst the rest to various amusing theatres, each of which Philip described with natural frankness. He had ' crammed ' modern languages at Mr. Wren's to good purpose, talked French fluently, and joked, criti- cised and mimicked with the daring of an experienced Parisian. Even Sir Marmaduke felt himseK reduced to playing second-fiddle to this impressive youth. Philip accepted the role of his instructor without the least hesitation, explained to him his mistakes about the French and their doings, and laughed away the elder ladies' pedantic scruples with an airy politeness that could not be resisted. Camilla, as she listened to his pleasant, eager talk, felt herself almost afloat on the great stream of life. Both parties were equally well pleased with a for- tunate meeting. Sir Marmaduke was tired of har- anguing his sisters, and found it a relief to have some other men of the party. It was only natural to go about Paris together ; and the fact that Philip was in a few days to disappear on his journey to India and to begin to belong to another world, gave their brief time together, Camilla felt, a strange, melancholy charm, and made it right and natural to waive all ceremony. 36 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. 'When people go to India, for how long do they go ? ' she asked. ' Oh/ said her companion lightly, ' twenty or thirty years, I believe.' 'Now twenty or thirty years at Camilla's age seems a lifetime. If Philip had been going to start for the moon, the departure could hardly have seemed more absolute. She felt that the idea of it exercised a sort of mysterious influence over herself, and invested the pleasures, partaken in such exceptional circumstances, with something of romantic, half-mournful interest. The days sped all too quickly away. Every one seemed determined to make them as pleasant as possible. Sir Marmaduke relaxed his accustomed severity of moral tone, and was several degrees less dogmatic and didactic than usual. The two maiden ladies, infected by their brother's mood and encouraged by his example, became absolutely frisky. Mr. Ambrose took the greatest fancy to Camilla. Philip was charming to every one, and used the privileges of his position with grace, dexterity, and a courage which almost took the two Miss Crofts' breath away. The limited range of these ladies' experi- ence had never yet exhibited their august brother in the position of being ' chaffed,' nor would they, antecedently, IV VALE ! VALE ! 37 have regarded such a proceeding as within the scope of human audacity. Philip, however, was quite unawed, joked with Sir Marmaduke quite at his ease, quizzed him with a graceful deference, and carried him off in triumph for a game of pyramids in the billiard-room of the hotel. As for sitting still in the salon all the evening when one was in Paris, the idea, Philip felt, and made all the party feel, was not to be heard of for an instant. ' Let us see what there is to-night at the theatres,' he said, gaily, taking up a newspaper. ' Here is the list — Ambigu Comique — '' Bicn n'est sacr4" etc. etc.? Palais Eoyal: Les escapades de — hm-hm. That will hardly do — will it. Sir — for the ladies ? ' The two Miss Crofts looked at each other as if expecting some frightful physical cataclysm to follow upon such unhallowed suggestions. Sir Marmaduke did not look as if a French farce at the Palais Eoyal was likely to suit him any better than the ladies ; but Philip's irrepressible cheerfulness was in truth somewhat of a relief to the monotony of his Paris visit, and Sir Marmaduke's spirit rose to the occasion. ' The Paris stage is a national curiosity and a painful 38 THE CCERULEANS chap. one/ he said, oracularly. ' Its tone is deplorable — low, corrupt, debased, infamous.' Camilla knew what this sort of beginning meant, de- spaired of the play, and made up her mind for a sermon. ' The days of the great writers,' continued Sir Mar- maduke — by this time getting himself into full swing for a speech — ' the days of the great writers, Corneille, Eacine, Moliere, when the stage was a real school of fine manners and refined thought ' ' Are happily not extinct,' cried Philip, cutting short Sir Marmaduke's oration with an evident impatience that Camilla shared but dared not to exhibit : ' Look here. Sir, there is Polyeucte at the Comedie Fran- Qaise, and Moliere's Le Mariage Forc6 to follow. What could you wish for more ? Let me go and get a box for us all.' The Miss Crofts' hearts began to beat. They had never been to a French theatre ; they had never been so nearly going as at this moment. The very prox- imity of such an event was agitating. As for Camilla, lier vehement desire drove her into unusual action. She seized Sir Marmaduke's hand and added her entreaties to Philip's courageous counsels. Her uncle began to waver. IV VALE ! YALE ! 39 ' I should like Camilla to see some fine acting/ he said, ' and to hear French properly pronounced and spoken. The right use of such a language is a fine art in itself.' ' It is,' said Philip, resolutely. ' Now, Sir, do let me go and order the box.' Sir Marmaduke was not a man to be hurried. His mind travelled, as he liked to travel himself, with a dignified leisure. ' Le Mariage Ford — dear me,' he said — ' I remember having a good laugh over that when I was a boy. We all used to go to the French theatre when I was a young man : all young Englishmen did as part of our education.' ' Yes,' said Philip, ' and that is why English gentle- men talk French so beautifully.' Camilla, with whom Philip had been taking off Sir Marmaduke's British French, half an hour before, in a highly amusing manner, cast her eyes downward, as if to refuse participation in this piece of audacious hypocrisy. The victory, however, was now nearly won. ' By the way,' Sir Marmaduke said, ' Polyemte is all right and proper, — is it not V 'Eight and proper!' cried Philip, with a laugh, — 40 THE CCERULEANS chap. ' why, all the people get converted to Christianity and go to martyrdom in turn, — it is as good as a sermon : don't you remember. Sir V 'Yes, I remember, of course,' said Sir Marmaduke, with that unscrupulous generosity to himself which people generally exhibit in matters in which their memory is in question. 'Well, Philip, go and get a good box for to-morrow, and we will make a night of it. What do you say, Ambrose ?' ' Hurrah !' cried Camilla, clapping her hands in the excitement of so unexpected a victory ; while the two Miss Crofts, more self-restrained, performed little silent hurrahs in their own gentle bosoms, and felt that Mr. Philip's influence over their brother was something quite remarkable. Mr. Ambrose readily agreed. Sir Marma- duke, in high good nature with himself for being so good- natured, became positively facetious, quizzed his sisters about old forgotten topics, which brought the blushes into their faded cheeks, and was evidently resolved to recall, so far as might be, the pleasures of his youthful days in Paris. ' We will go and have a dinner at a restaurant. I will be host. Camilla has never dined at a restaurant, and 1 am heartily sick of the Melancthon cuisine. Ambrose IV VALE ! VALE ! 41 — you will come, will you not? and Philip and I will go this afternoon and order dinner at the Trois Freres. They used to have capital chambertin there in old days.' And so the old gentleman went off, arm in arm with Philip, and came back an hour later, delighted with his companion, having confided to him a host of his juvenile experiences, and actually smoking a cigarette which Philip had given him to try as a new experience. The Miss Crofts looked on in silent amazement. They had often been told that they lived in a revolu- tionary age ; but now they felt it. The next night at the theatre concerns us only in so far as a little incident, which occurred in the course of the evening, and was witnessed by no one but the two parties concerned, converted the mutual liking, which had been growing for some days between Mr. Ambrose and Camilla, into a friendship, which, gathering strength through after-years, became a permanent possession to them both. After each act they all changed seats, and as the evening went on, it became Philip's turn to sit in front. On either side sat one of the maiden ladies. Philip, however, was quite lost to their neighbourhood, and, indeed, to everything but the story enacted on the stage, which he watched with intense interest, and 42 THE CGERULEANS CHAP. applauded at intervals with vehement delight. Behind him sat his father, to whom, in truth, Sir Marmaduke's hilarious mood had not been very congenial. The fine dinner at the Trois Freres had been dust and ashes : the choice chambertin had quite failed to raise him out of the melancholy mood which had settled upon him like a gathering cloud, growing but the blacker at every effort to dispel it. Every one was laughing around him. Le Mariage Fotc6 was exquisitely funny. Sir Marma- duke had forgotten his dignity, his party, the prospects of the Church, — the crimes of the Communists — his unlet farms — everything, in the unusual sense of intense amusement, and was shaking in hearty guffaws, — the maiden ladies were rippling in gentle cachinnations, — Philip was breaking out into gleeful bursts of laughter at each new turn in the piece, — meanwhile poor Ambrose felt his soul growing darker and colder. His sorrow was taking possession of him. There was the lad who, with all his shortcomings, was dearer to him than anything in the world ; who had plagued him so by his weak will and passionate desire for enjoyment ; who had fallen so often and come home to be forgiven and restored to favour and petted as before ; and who was now leaving his father and his home, practically, IV VALE ! VALE ! 43 for life, and going, with a light heart, to seek his fortunes in a world, so strange, unknown, remote, — and all, it seemed, without a pang. How would he fare, poor fellow, with no kind, fatherly hand to catch him as he stumbled, and to help him on his pilgrim's path, so beset with dangers and temptations ? Then Ambrose's thoughts wandered back to years long past, and showed him Philip again lying in his cradle, a little smiling, crooning baby, and a sweet gentle form bending over him, — the dear companion of the only really happy hours that Ambrose had ever known. And then he recalled a dark day when that tender friend, about to leave him and life for ever, had held his hand in hers, and bade him be mother as well as father to the child who was presently to be motherless. All this was a very familiar train of thought to poor Ambrose. That last scene had stirred his nature to its inmost depths, and as it closed, all the colour and taste had faded out of his existence. Nothing since then had ever seemed really to touch him. None of the prizes of life had fired his ambition even if they had come within his reach. His book — never yet beyond the stage of fragmentary manuscript and half- finished sketches — had grown obsolete before it was born. He had failed in every- 44 THE CGERULEANS CHAP. thing, nor had his failures cost him any keen pang of regret. But he had, at any rate, kept his vow to his lost darling. He had loyally, with a pious constancy, put all his heart into doing his very best for Philip. He had grudged him nothing. He had pinched and scraped in order that Philip might have everything in abundance. He had never said an unkind word to him. He had borne from him, again and again, things that were hard to bear. He had forgiven — when to forgive was almost weakness : and now the trust was done, and Philip was to sail away into the mysterious, unknown future, and make his way through life on his own account. In another week he would be gone, and Ambrose would be back in his lonely Eectory, — lone- lier, and grayer, and duller than ever. ' I have done my best, — I have loved him,' Ambrose thought sadly to himself, ' and he cares no more about leaving me — not so much as when I sent off Eed Hazard the other day, and the poor old chap turned round in his stall and whinnied as I patted him for the last time.' Mr. Ambrose sat in a dark corner of the box, and no one but Camilla had the least idea that he was not enjoying the play as much as the rest of the world. She, too, was not finding the performance as IV VALE ! VALE ! 45 amusing as she felt that she ought. Something was jarring on her nerves. She was feeling sad at Philip's departure, — sad for herself, sad for Philip, and sad for the sorrow which she knew it must cost his father. She watched Mr. Ambrose in his reverie with eyes bent on the stage, but with thoughts evidently far, far away ; and as she watched and pitied, Ambrose, happening to turn, bent his eyes — by this time dim with tears — suddenly towards her, met hers, and read in them the touching story of a kind woman's sympathy. A sudden, tender impulse seized Camilla. She felt a pang of compassion. Poor, sad, solitary father ! She longed to comfort him or to share his sorrow. She put her hand on his as it lay beside her, with a tender, furtive, half- frightened air of pity. She pressed it for an instant ; it was a moment's act ; it was nothing ; but its meaning was lifelong. Many a time in after years did Ambrose, in hours of solitude and gloom, feel that kindly touch. The curtain fell presently amidst peals of hilarious applause. Mr. Ambrose gave Camilla her cloak, and took care of her through the crowd, with a sort of paternal tenderness. They walked home together along the Boulevard, still ablaze with light and gaiety. Philip was on her other side. Camilla's heart ached for father 46 THE CCERULEANS chap. and son. ' Good-night, dear,' Mr. Ambrose said to her in his gentle, pathetic way, as if he were blessing her, Camilla felt. They had become fast friends. As the day for his departure came close, Philip grew increasingly demonstrative in his tenderness. He petted his father in a hundred little gracious ways. He accepted the petting that everybody gave him with amiable appreciativeness. His manner and speeches had a caressing gentleness. The two Miss Crofts fell into a melting mood, and watched the opportunity to do Mr. Ambrose or his son some little kindness. They sallied out one morning and bought Philip a cigar-case ; Miss Augusta presented it with a blush and a little nervous air, which told that she was really moved. Camilla felt that she had suddenly come upon a chapter of existence that was painfully spirit-stirring. One day Philip insisted on his father coming with him to be photographed. ' We will be done together, dear father, arm in arm, just as we used to like to stroll about the garden at home. It will be a pleasure to have that in India.' So they all went to a famous photographer's, who exercised his best skill in producing a pretty picture of father and son, and did full justice to Philip Ambrose's upright form, IV VALE ! VALE ! 47 comely features, bright aspect, and general picturesque- ness of appearance. ' But, dear old father, how grave you look in it,' Philip exclaimed, when the copies came home. 'One of them is for you,' he said to Camilla, 'and, in return, you must give me one of yourself, please. I shall like to look at it, and remember these pleasant Paris days.' ' I shall like to remember them, too,' said Camilla, with her sweet, serious air, and the exchange was forth- with effected. The whole time seemed to Camilla strangely interesting and romantic, and to justify and even demand proceedings that were not commonplace or conventional. Such meetings, such friendships — so sweet — so soon to end — how full of pathos did Hfe become when stirred by incidents such as these. Once, as the party walked homeward across the garden of the Tuilleries, Philip and Camilla fell to each other's lot, and Philip began sketching the career which his youthful imagination, enriched by the study of various Indian biographies, suggested as his own. ' At first,' he said, ' you ride about the country and hold trials under big, spreading banian trees. You have a lot of horses, and you fill up your spare time with hunting pigs and tigers, and shooting peacocks and wild 48 THE CCERULEANS chap. deer. Then you distinguish yourself. There is an 4meute, and you come out strong in the way of calmness and resolution, — or there is a famous dacoit, who is a terror to the neighbourhood. You start off at night with a handful of policemen, ride a hundred miles to his lair, post your little force round it, descend the chimney of the house where he is sleeping, and appear at his bedside. Moral ascendency carries the day. The dacoit surrenders, and you carry him off in triumph. This sort of thing goes on till you become a Lieutenant-Governor or some great swell of that sort.' ' Well,' Camilla had said with great animation, ' I hope you will catch plenty of dacoits and come back a great swell, as you say, — with a great reputation, — a Lieutenant-Governor at least.' Philip was in a melting mood; and charmed with his companion, he was touched and delighted with her ready enthusiasm. ' Yes,' he said ; ' and when I do, I shall come with all my honours and lay them at your feet. That will make them worth having.' Light words, and lightly said : Philip himself could not have exactly defined what meaning he attached to them, except that he was very much touched by his IV VALE ! YALE ! 49 charming companion. She was enough of a child to make it permissible to talk fond nonsense to her. His own position, too, justified an affectionate outspokenness. He was a lad without a shilling of his own, except the moderate endowment with which the Indian Civil Service rewards the labours of beginners. One of the compensations of such a lot is that one's love-making is not taken too seriously. Philip thought no more of the scene except as an agreeable incident which had thrown a romantic charm over these few days at Paris. He felt at the moment extremely affectionate and in need of saying something tender. Camilla treasured it up in her recollection, a ray of heavenly light that illumined her dreary existence and filled her girlhood's dream-land with a thousand visions of delight. He would come back, this charming friend, some day — and then — and then — what golden landscapes does fancy draw for young and hopeful hearts. The excitement and the interest intensified as the inevitable last moment arrived. ' You must come with us to the station,' Philip said to Camilla, ' and keep my poor father's spirits up when he comes back without me.' ' Yes/ said Camilla, ' I should like to come.' VOL. I. E 50 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. 'And I shall like to have you,' Mr. Ambrose said kindly — ' my kind and tender little friend.' And so the three started. At the station Philip became very tearful, threw off all convention, and gave his father a hearty, childish hug with no sort of mauvaise Iwnte. How natural that, when it came to Camilla's turn to wish good-bye, in that great busy crowd of total strangers, Philip's brotherly feelings should require something more demonstrative than the frigid hand- shaking of an everyday farewell. 'Give me a kiss, dear, to think about in India — sweet, sweet Camilla ! ' Every one was in too great a bustle to notice the little group — Camilla's pretty child-form — as she stood, with the blush still lingering on her cheek, smiling heroically through her tears, unconscious of everything but her present interest — Philip holding his father's hand and trying to encourage him, with the cheerful- ness which, even, in the darkest hour, youth has close at hand — Mr. Ambrose, grave with the sorrow of a man old enough to know beforehand what his sorrow will be to him and to feel its weight. Meanwhile the hubbub roared higher and higher : a belated passenger came panting up, just in time to be hustled into his place : at the next carriage a voluble IV YALE ! VALE ! 51 group of French ladies were indulging in some hysterical good-byes. 'En voihire !' cried the bustling officials, ruthlessly slamming the carriage -doors, and cutting short a long string of leave-takings. A bell rang, flags waved, the engine gave an admonitory shriek ; the train went clashing and banging out of the station into the darkness beyond, and Mr. Ambrose and Camilla drove back to the Hotel Melancthon with aching hearts. LIBRARY UNIVERSITy OF ILUNOIS CHAPTEE V SIR THEOPHILUS PEANCE ' Faites galoper vos agents, Extirpez les erreurs funestes ; Mais, pour Dieu, soyez bonnes gens, Et, si vous pouvez, plus modestes.' If there was one thorn in the rose of Chichele's official existence which marred its sweetness more than another, it was the troublesome activity of his next- door neighbour, Sir Theophilus Prance. Sir Theophilus was at this time the most conspicuous civilian of his day. He was Governor of the adjoining province, where he had made his presence felt in acts and speeches, which excited the enthusiasm of the populace, and the alarms of the prudent, and which provoked the sneers of cynics like Chichele, who despised alike the popularity and the arts by which it was achieved. His popularity was but one phase of his success, for Sir Theophilus had been immensely successful. He had exhausted the supply of CHAP. V SIR THEOPHILUS PRAXCE 53 Indian honours while he had still youth enough to be ambitious. He meant to go home and achieve some- thing in England — something more, too, than the respect- able interment in the committee -rooms of the India Office, which bounded the hopes of his less pretentious compeers. To preside at charitable meetings, to swell the mob of second-rate busybodies at a Social Science Congress, and wait for a seat in Council, was not the programme which Prance imagined for himself He had resolved on parliamentary life, and instinct and antecedents alike led him to the camp of advanced liberalism. He had been a Liberal all his life. Liberal- ism, moreover, was the winning cause, and the win- ning cause had a charm for Sir Theophilus. Too busy to be discerning, and too well satisfied with himself to be anxious to discern, he had reached middle life with a touching belief in the formulae of his party, the soundness of its principles, and the goal to which they were tending. If, as it has been asserted, every genius has a vein of scepticism, and moments of mistrust in its mission and itself. Sir Theophilus lacked this stamp of genius ; for his faith in himself was firm, unwavering, and unembarrassed by scruple, unclouded by doubt. It was the sort of faith that can move mountains, and Sir 54 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. Theophilus was quite prepared to try it on the Hima- layas. A temperament of this order is more alive to broad effects than to nice shades of distinction, and Sir Theophilus, naturally, applied the commonplaces of English politics, without any of the narrowing reserva- tions which an English mob - meeting of ordinary intel- ligence unconsciously takes for granted. His convictions were eternal truths, whose applicability, no less than their verity, was as unquestionable in the East as in the West, and which needed only vigorous enforce- ment to achieve demonstration and acceptance. Thus Sir Theophilus not unfrequently found himself in conflict with the fears, tastes, and convictions of those whose temperament shrank from innovation, whose sagacity protested against the peril of experimenting with human nature, or whose experience supplied a practical refutation of theoretic hopes. Such collisions cost him no pang of hesitation, no whisper of self-dis- trust. It was natural that minds dwarfed in the narrow confines of bureaucracy, reared on the unwholesome dietary of officialdom, should lag behind his flight or refuse to move at all except in an opposite direction. Sir Theophilus went his way, self-satisfied, confident, rejoicing ; and he had reason to rejoice. To be certain V SIR THEOPHILUS PEAXCE 55 that one is right, to enjoy an equally absolute conviction that other people are wrong — to be placed by fortune on an eminence, from which one can carry out one's views on a grand scale, amid the plaudits of adherents and the general admiration of the universe, how should not Sir Theophilus accept his splendid role with thank- fulness and pride ! So he went from height to height, from one glory to another, till he achieved a sort of provincial deification. Even here, however — such is mortal destiny — there was an amari aliquid in the cup of joy — the slave in the Eoman triumph, the corpse at the Egyptian feast. Europe and Asia might applaud, and newspapers and deputations exalt the hero of the hour beyond the roll of common men ; but his own colleagues and subordinates denied his divinity and ridiculed its assumption as vulgar, political acrobatism ; and discriminating friends in England, while vociferously applauding the performer, were, even now, giving him a quiet hint that the interests of his party demanded that the performance, delightful as it was, should come to a close at the earliest possible date. Sir Theophilus, however, was in no mood to take the hint. He was riding on buoyant waves of popularity, and wafted by breezes, so balmy, so caressing, that the 56 THE CGERULEANS CHAP. particular direction in which they were bearing him became a matter of indifference. All must be well where all was so pleasant ; and Prance, as he perused the well-rounded peroration of his last manifesto on the true basis of power, or the last address which assured him of the undying gratitude of emancipated India for all that he had done for her emancipation, was not to be troubled by the reflection that his secretaries saw through him, that his contemporaries deprecated his reforms as unreal, premature, and dangerous, and that privileged onlookers, such as Chichele, could not be induced to evince the slightest sympathy with his doc- trines, or the least approval of his acts. Chichele, no doubt, found much in Sir Theophilus that was intensely antipathetic. He resented his shal- lowness, his self-satisfaction, his glib hardihood of thought, his inveterate habit of mistaking hackneyed commonplaces for eternal principles. There are natures, it must be supposed, to which the India of to-day pre- sents itself merely as a convenient arena in which to exercise their political or social hobby-horses, — a tabula rasa expressly designed for the inscription of theories or arguments which otherwise might fail to get a hear- ing in the hurly-burly of English politics. A man, it V SIR THEOPHILUS PRANCE 57 is felt, may think pretty much what he likes about thinjjs so alien, so different, so remote from home ex- perience as the shadowy politics of Asia, and may say what he thinks without risk of too violent refutation. There are other minds, like Chichele's, to whom India, such as a century of English rule has made it, seems so replete with unknown and incalculable influences, with unseen and unpreventible dangers, that anything like confidence about it is the attribute of a fool. A chapter of accidents, among the strangest and most romantic that history records, has resulted in an equilibrium of transcendent forces. It has its own law of stability; once disturbed, it may defy the universe to restore it, and its crash may mean a second chaos. Sir Theo- philus never troubled his head about the equilibrium ; Chichele never forgot it. Prance's political courage never sank below a cheerful assurance that all would go well with the British Empire and the great Liberal cause ; Chichele's never arose above the hope that, as the chapter of lucky accidents was already a long one, one more lucky accident might, when the next emer- gency arrived, be added to the chapter. Thus it was natural that Chichele's powers of politeness should be sometimes strained to conceal his disapproval of his 58 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. neighbour's proceedings, and that, in the secret con- claves of the Ccerulean Court, many things were said about Sir Theophikis which that gentleman (who, amongst other opinions, had a very good opinion of himself) would have been excessively surprised to hear. Chichele was a man of calm temper and measured words : but the mornings on which Prance's speeches appeared in the Ca?rulean papers, specially telegraphed, in impressively large type, and enforced by applausive editorials, his equanimity was shaken and his language strong. It was on these occasions that he found Mr. Montem's society especially congenial. Montem's im- perturbable cynicism, his sarcastic mood, his disbelief in short cuts, his hard common sense, his contempt for fine phrases and pretty theories — to say nothing of a Junius -like faculty of denunciation — were, Chichele felt, a real comfort. Montem at such times used to blow off the steam of his indignation in highly con- densed phrases of vituperation and in official orders, which made the Wear and Tear Department a real scourge to the unfortunate officials who came within its reach. As, from the effects of the south-west monsoon, or some other subtle stimulant of decay, everything V SIR THEOPHILUS PRANCE 59 wore out in Coerulea more quickly than it ouglit, its reach was pretty wide, and Montem, it must be feared, was not a general favourite. In private life, however, his severity was mellowed by good humour and en- livened by a dry wit, and, after a day spent in wither- ing public delinquents, he would come over, tamely enough, to Chichele's little dinners, and sit down to whist with a determined air, as if thankful for a sanc- tuary into which liuman imbecility could not intrude, where no reformer could suggest a revolution, and where every blunder avenged itself by immediate exposure and certain retribution, which could be measured in rupees. One of the ways in which Sir Theophilus Prance gave his neighbour the acutest annoyance was his habit of making his headquarters the rendezvous of all sorts of objectionable tourists, reinforcing them with supplies of congenial information, and then sending them on to Ccerulea with letters of introduction, which Chichele could not ignore without impoliteness, nor act upon without extending his hospitality to guests whose tone he heartily disliked and disapproved. It was part of Sir Theophilus's programme to keep open house and to welcome any sympathising spirit with encouragement 60 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. and good cheer. The sympathising spirits responded freely to the call, and Prance's residence became a sort of house of call for radicals and revolutionists on the loose in Asia. Here they found the mood, the method, and the material for which they were in search. Here, so rumour whispered, were laid the foundations of many a fair edifice of criticism, theory, or denunciation, which shortly established the reputation of a pamphleteer, or ran a lucky magazine into a second edition. Here hints were dropped, which reappeared, a few weeks later, in the form of parliamentary interpellations, each of which imputed a blunder, an oppression, or a job, until the laconic contempt of an under-secretary revealed them in the light of ignorant and silly im- pertinences. Here amateur administrators qualified themselves to demonstrate the shortsighted apathy of the Government, the cynical cliquism of the Civil Ser- vice, the Sybarite habits of idle and overpaid officials, the crushing taxation, the beggared Exchequer, and the generally prostrate and bleeding condition of the country at large. Here young India met silly England, and embraced with the affectionate recklessness of youth. Here it was that 'My. Frontinbras — poet, diplomatist, and incendiary — came to drink the inspiration for a V SIE THEOPHILUS PRAXCE 61 metrical tirade against his country, which some thought blasphemous and others dull, but all admitted to be a tissue of absurdities. Here Sir Joseph Plant, of the Tillage and Manure Inquiry, intoxicated with the heady beverage of Sir Theophilus's talk, and oblivious of the humbler claims cf chemicals and rotation crops, broke out into a dissertation on the art of governing India, so consummately foolish, that the Secretary of State, on decency intent and ashamed of so ridiculous a coun- sellor, buried it, as speedily as might be, with the dull liic jacet of a Blue Book. Here Stain, the renegade civilian, rested in his tours of treasonable propaganda, and consulted, in camera, with the wire-pullers of dis- affection. Prance's headquarters had become, in fact, a large and active officina for the manufacture and dis- semination of inflammatory material, and more of the inflammatory material than Chichele cared to have found its way to Ccerulea. Chichele had learnt by experience how the infliction of these visitors could be best endured. He was accus- tomed, on their arrival, to immure hunself in his study on the plea of a severe pressure of public business. Entrenched behind a barricade of despatches and oflice- boxes, he awaited the onset ; and if ever his guests 62 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. requested to be put in communication with a judicious cicerone, he was used, with a certain Saturnine pleasure, to hand them over to Mr. Montem. This naturally ruffled Montem, and the result not unfrequently was mutual dissatisfaction. Montem retired from the en- counter with protests against the dispensation which brought all the most idiotic travellers to India; his interviewers with the conviction that, of all narrow, bigoted and illiberal bureaucrats, the Head of the Coerulean Wear and Tear Department was the worst. They came to him with a vague, pleasurable idea that India was a stage, on which ' the great Liberal Cause ' was being exhibited in a phase of rapid progress for the edification of Asia and mankind : that freedom of the press was accomplishing its beneficent mission ; that public opinion was successfully combating administra- tive abuses, and trial by jury judicial oppression ; that a great nation was rallying for self-assertion ; that, with the development of institutions, as near as possible on the model of those in force at "Westminster, the future of India, as a prosperous, enlightened, and orderly mem- ber of the community of nations was assured. The effect of this sort of thing on Montem's nerves was to create a morbid activity, which discharged itself in V SIR THEOPHILUS PRANCE 63 electrical discharges of cynicism, and the gloomiest pos- sible prophecies as to the future of mankind at large and India in particular. He would point out that the process of filling some of the oldest bottles in the world with the strong wine of modern civilisation was a highly perilous one alike for bottlers and bottles ; it should be done — if it must be done — with extraordinary precautions, like the iron-masks in soda-water manufactories. Chaos being the condition to which all mundane things naturally recur, it was interesting to observe in India the rapid growth of the conditions under which such a recurrence would be inevitable ; and, the world being a collection of colossal jokes, no joke could be better than that of an English democracy administering a vast military despotism on the basis of universal equality. Explo- sions were another great natural and, probably, benefi- cent law, and it was curious to speculate how soon India would explode. The chances of an explosion were not, Montem went on to observe, rendered more remote by people who went about the country — like children with lighted sticks in a powder magazine — delighted with the brilliancy of their performance and sublimely unconscious of its risks. This sort of thing is not exhilarating, nor, Montem's visitors felt, congenial 64 THE CCERULEANS chap, v to radicals in search of aids to radical faith. They went away sadder, if not wiser, men, regretting no doubt that they had quitted for such a stony moor as this the fair mountain pastures where Theophilus had led them, with a shepherd's care, from one agreeable demonstration to another of the safest and best-administered of all possible worlds. CHAPTEE VI A KINDLY WELCOME * .... In speech, in gait, In diet, in affections of delight, In military rules, humours of blood, He was the mask and glass, copy and book. That fashioned others.' Young Ambrose made a better start in India than his father had ventured to hope for him. The disappointing barrenness of his coUege career had assumed in Mr. Ambrose's mind a deeper tinge of failure from a long list of debts, which had to be disposed of, somehow or other, before the young civilian could be allowed to leave England. ' I am very sorry, dear father,' Philip had said with his usual facile repentance, ' I had no idea that I owed anything like as much. Now I shall earn somethings and I will pay you back.' ' jSTo/ said his father, who had an instinctive dread VOL. L F 6Q THE CCERULEANS CHAP. of Philip's good resolutions, ' make no rash promises. You will find it hard enough to live on your pay with- out any old debts hanging round your neck. You start clear now. Keep out of debt for the future, like a good fellow, and I will forgive you your Oxford follies, and try to forget them.' The tears sprung to Philip's eyes. ' You are too good to me, dear father ; you always have been, and I have been a bad son to you. I know these horrid debts of mine have given you a lot of bother, — haven't they now?* * I have had to borrow the money,' said his father, wearily, 'and to insure my life. It will make me poorer, of course, and be an inconvenience. However, I must not buy so many books, and I mean to sell Eed Hazard. I shall get on very well with Piobin and the gig.' Now Eed Hazard was a fine old favourite hunter, on which Mr. Ambrose used to ride about the lanes of his parish, and sometimes, when the hunt was near, would go to the meet, have a chat with the neighbour- ing squires and farmers, and get a gallop with the hounds. It was, Philip knew, his father's only out-of- door amusement, and it was a great one. Tlie doctors greatly approved it as a main condition of his father's yi A KIXDLY WELCOME 67 health. A sharp pang of shame and remorse cut him to the heart. ' Sell Eed Hazard ! no,' he cried, in sincere conster- nation ; ' you shall never do it, father. I would sooner not go to India. Let me borrow the money myself.' ' No, Philip,' said his father, with grave decisiveness ; ' that would cost us both a great deal more. You would have to pay high interest ; I know you could not do it. All I beg and pray now is that you will keep out of debt, and not come to me again to be set on your legs.' 'Never! never!' cried Philip, and for his first year in India he seemed in a fair way to turn his good reso- lutions to practical account. He threw himself with eagerness into his new work ; by a spasmodic effort mastered a vernacular language, and passed his exami- nations early and well. All gave good promise of a brilliant career. Everything just now looked bright to him. His new home was full of life and colour and picturesque effects. The great wide roads, shaded on either side by grand avenues of primeval-looking trees, whose huge knotted trunks, confusion of sinuous boughs and pendant down- growth of suckers, made each one like the beginning of 68 THE CCERULEANS chap. a small forest in itself, — the endless streams of way- farers trudging into the city, — the bullocks moving deliberately on their task, as if in constant protest against a world where motion was a necessity, or chew- ing a peaceful cud in some dusty halting-place beside the road — the villages nestling thick amid clumps of palms, with innumerable little blackamoors playing in the sand, or trotting by mothers hardly less children than themselves, or scampering into the jungle at the stranger's approach ; outside, the blazing parade-ground, where, morning after morning, the rigid red battalions wheeled and formed, and the horse artillery went rattling by in a dusty whirlwind of its own creation, or roared its harmless thunders to the sleeping world around — the inland lakes where the toil of past generations had accumulated a precious store, presently to find its way to the steaming rice -beds — the Englishmen's homes with their deep verandahs and vast expanse of thatch, as if shrinking from the cruel glare of the outer world, — the sea-breeze, which, as the day warmed, came raging inland with life and refreshment upon its wings, — the bay, where the sea was heaving and breaking in an ancrry surf-line on the shallow shore, — the fishermen, astride the bare log that serves for boat, riding across .VI A KINDLY WELCOME 69 the ridges of the waves as they came homeward with the spoils of their morning's fishing — all fell on Philip's young eye with the effect of a fresh and graphic picture. He was untravelled, and this first bit of travelling was full of charm. There were other charms, too, about his new life, of which Philip presently became aware. He was in the land of hospitality. Coerulean society, with one consent, accorded a kindly welcome to a newcomer, whose good looks were an excellent letter of introduction, and whose manners implied a frank eagerness to please and be pleased. Mr. Montem forgot his accustomed cynicism in the dis- covery of a youngster, who took whist seriously and played a better rubber than he did himself. The young ladies felt a similar satisfaction in Philip's pro- ficiency at lawn tennis. Chichele found Philip's cheer- ful, boyish gossip a pleasant reminder of his under- graduate days. jMrs. Paragon, with a keen eye for masculine merit, pounced at once on the fortunate youth, — in the most unblushing manner, threw over three of her established favourites in his behalf, and rained all her sweetest influences upon her latest protege. Philip, in common gratitude, was bound to find Mrs. 70 THE CCERULEANS chap. Paragon not the reverse of fascinating, and accepted with alacrity the opportunity of making his first essays in Indian society under the guidance of so accomplished a patroness. The Fates had decided that he was to remain at headquarters for a while ; and Mrs. Paragon set all her genial powers at work to make his sojourn in a world of strangers as little melancholy as might be. She gave a rechercM little dinner, the express raison d'Stre of which was to help Philip to intimacy with the people whom he would like to know, and who would like to know him. She talked this dinner over, beforehand, with Philip, told him about each of the guests, and admonished him as to tlie directions in which it behoved him to be specially polite. ' I hope you will be duly grateful,' she said ; ' I have done the most disinterested thing in the world ; I am sending you into dinner with our choicest Coerulean beauty. Miss Eashleigh, the daughter of our General. When once you have seen her you will have no eyes or thoughts left for any one else. In self-defence I have asked Mr. Montem — I must have some one to talk to me while you and Miss Eashleigh are flirting ; for you will have a desperate flirtation ; my prophetic eye fore- sees it even now. You will think her adorable ; and so VI A KINDLY WELCOME 71 she is : I wish I were a man to flirt with her myself. I beheve, though, by your guilty looks, you have begun already.' Philip, with some blushes, was obliged to confess that he had been to pay his respects at the General's, and had found Mrs. Eashleigh gracious and the young- lady as charming as Mrs. Paragon described her. * Well,' said Mrs. Paragon, ' if I allow you to take her into dmner, you must promise me not to devote yourself to her for the rest of the evening. Talk to Mr. Chichele about politics or art, or the last new book you have read — I never read anything myself, I must tell you, life is too short and books are too long — or ask the General about the battle of Ahmednugger, where he got his Victoria Cross ; or get that little crosspatch, Montem, to snarl to you about the last batch of Globe-Trotters who have invaded his domain. You cannot afford to go about the world simply amusing yourself. You see I am a businesslike woman.' * I see you are a very kind one,' Philip said, with effusion, for Mrs. Paragon's interest in his fortunes, and zeal to promote them, gave him a new and most agree- able sensation. Xo woman had ever before troubled her head about him or his affairs ; and what flattery is 72 THE CCERULEANS chap. more seductive than that unspoken form of it, which bids the happy recipient understand that he is watched by sympathetic eyes — that his failure or success, is a matter of importance to another besides himself. Philip, as he looked at his bright, kindly companion, beaming with high spirits, at the same time busy with plans to make things pleasant for him, began to think that he should like India very much indeed. Mrs. Paragon's dinner convinced Philip that she was not only a good-natured friend, but an admirable hostess. Expert in all the arts by which mankind can be enslaved, this was the art she understood the best, and practised with the most effect. Her guests always came to her with the peace-giving assurance of an excellent dinner and congenial company. In such a mood men are easily pleased, so that half Mrs. Paragon's battle was won before the action commenced. Her table was small, and no power on earth would have induced her to enlarge it ; but round it flowed a stream of pleasant talk which the vivacious mistress of the feast kept ever at the proper pitch of effervescence, and guided, with a fine dexterity, in the direction where most amusement would be had. Dinners occupy so considerable a fraction of human existence that it is strange that so many people go VI A KINDLY WELCOME 73 through a dyspeptic existence without an effort to improve them. 'Talk to me/ Talleyrand said, 'of a pleasure which comes every day and lasts for an hour.' Mrs. Paragoa's dinner lasted just an hour, but that hour was one of pure enjoyment, checkered by no con- tretemps, prolonged by no delay, dimmed by no possi- bility of failure. If Mrs. Paragon was frivolous, she was never ill-natured, and on this occasion she was sweetness itself. Philip had never experienced anything of the sort before, and it all came to him with the charm of a new sensation. Mrs. Paragon let him clearly understand the entertainment was for him. * Come a few minutes before dinner,' she had said, *so that we may have a little chat;' and so eight o'clock had hardly done striking before Philip arrived, well pleased at his privileged position, and found the enchantress arrayed in artistic simplicity — putting the final touches to a little trophy of fruit and flowers that was to grace the centre of the banquet. ' Not too high to talk across, or look across, you see,' she said ; * I hate dining in solitude, shut off from my opposite neighbour by a wilderness of flowers or a barri- cade of silver. Nothing pleases me so much as the human face divine. I shall see how you behave, and 74 THE CCERULEANS chap. miiid, I allow no tete-a-tetes at dinner. There are the people coming. What distracting punctuality ! I must fly to the drawing-room. You may follow in a minute, and remember about the General and Ahmednugger.' ]\Irs. Paragon, in providing an agreeable companion for Philip, had not been forgetful of herself. Chichele took her into dinner, and left her with little leisure to listen to any one else. On her other side was Mr. Caro, a devoted adherent, who, she knew, would be more than compensated for not having a lady to himself by being allowed to come and sit by her. Mrs. Paragon con- sidered Caro indispensable to the success of her enter- tainments, and Caro did his best to maintain his prestige as an agreeable necessity. He seemed, his friendly critics were accustomed to tell him, to have walked, ready made, in typical completeness, out of an American novel. There was the same high finish, the same air of exaggerated culture, the same gentle, innocent amative- ness, copious but well controlled — the same comfortable cynicism, the same sense of having seen through every- thing, ascertained its delusiveness, and acquiesced with cheerfulness in the discovery. His tolerance was un- bounded, for it was co-extensive with his indifference* He was, however, a severe critic of champagne, an VI A KINDLY WELCOME 75 unflinching dogmatist on whist, entertained deep con- victions as to the right way of dressing ortolans, and rose to absohite enthusiasm about Circassian mats and old Indian pottery. From these sublime topics he con- descended, in intervals of weakness, to the duties of life and the problems of humanity. The human problem, in which he just now took most interest, was his hostess. Montem, who was a great recluse, and regarded the social amusements of life as amongst its heaviest burthens, had, for a wonder, been inveigled to a ball the night before, and was naturally the object of some gentle satire on Mrs. Paragon's part for this lapse into frivolity. 'I am glad you came to look at us, if nothing more,' she said. ' A ball would be an interesting study, I suppose, if one had time to philosophise.' ' But why philosophise when one can valse ? ' said Caro. ' Ah, but,' said Montem, * some of us can't valse, and are driven to look on. For my part I improved my opportunity. The astronomer De Vico, I was reading somewhere, made 10,000 observations of the rotation of Venus, and lengthened its period by twenty -two 76 THE CCERULEANS chap. seconds. I shall soon be in a position to contribute a like discovery to the planetary science of Coerulean society.' 'And/ said Mrs. Paragon, appropriating her share of the compliment without hesitation, 'how fast do I go?' ' You ! ' said Montem, one of whose foibles it was to humour Mrs. Paragon's taste for homage, and to lavish on her the politeness he refused to the rest of the species — * "You move Too fast for science, not too slow for love " — just the right pace, I am convinced, to make you a delightful partner. I looked on with envy, and only wished that I were two-and-twenty and knew how to dance.' ' I shall be delighted to teach you,' said Mrs. Para- gon ; ' you shall come away with the ladies after dinner, and Miss Eashleigh will play to us, while I initiate you into the mysteries of the art. I object to men's standing about at balls, doing nothing themselves, and criticising other people's dresses and behaviour.' *You are safe from me as far as the dresses are concerned,' said Mr. Montem ; ' I know nothing about VI A KINDLY WELCOME 77 them and I hear too much. The modern Novel, especi- ally the American one, is always full of fashion-plates — the ambrosial dresses that fitted like gloves, and all that sort of thing.' ' Naturally,' said Mrs. Paragon. ' It is most im- portant that they should : it is a great feature of modern life/ ' Of course,' Chichele put in. ' The survival of the fittest means the survival of the woman whose dress fits her the best. That is the way that women rule the world.' ' But, do you know,' said Mrs. Paragon, ' that there are 180,000 more unmarried women in England than there are bachelors to marry them? What is to be- come of them ? ' ' I can tliink of nothing,' said Chichele, ' except allowing the 1000 richest men in England to have 180 wives apiece. It would add a charm to wealth, and modern wealth — your Mackays and that sort of person — requires a new field. I suppose 180 wives — each with an account at Madame Elise's — would make an impression on the resources even of an American millionaire who has "struck oil," had a "boom" in hogs, or a ring in a silver lode.' 78 THE CCERULEANS chap. 'But, only think,' said Mrs. Paragon, who seemed much impressed with the idea, and spoke now with the air of a person exhibiting an unquestionable mathe- matical demonstration, ' 180,000 of them ! that makes the odds 180,000 to 1 that no woman ever gets an offer! What a comfort to have got safe to the paradise of matrimony against such fearful odds 1 My dear Miss Eashleigh, what do you think of your chance ? ' 'It is something,' said Miss Eashleigh, 'to have 179,999 companions in misery. If nothing but poly- gamy will save us, I submit to the inevitable.' ' But,' said Montem, ' I return to my charge, women think too much about dress and nonsense generally. Every woman should have an object.' ' I agree,' said Mrs. Paragon, ' but no woman should he one. That is just the point ; and then, think of our education ! Just look at me ! ' ^ Delightful mandate,' said Montem. ' For my part, I am dead against education. I had an examination for a clerkship in my office yesterday, and found a young gentleman, who was under the impression that " romans de cape et d'epee " was French for " Eomans from head to foot." ' VI A KINDLY WELCOME 79 ' An excellent translation ! ' cried Chichele. ' I hope you gave him the appointment. It is no worse than the radicals in England, who fancy that, when Tory gentle- men talk about striking " pro aris et focis," they mean their hares and foxes.' ' But that is what they do mean,' said Montem, ' as Sydney Smith said, a long while ago, " God save the Queen " means " God save my country seat, my town house, my precious rents, my balance at my bankers, my seat in Parliament, and a great many other comfort- able things with which no patriot could conveniently dispense." ' ' But, talking of pretty dresses, now,' said Mrs. Para- gon, instinctively appreliensive of an approach to serious conversation, ' what did you think of Miss Aureous V Miss Aureous was the daucjhter of a distinf]juished tourist, who had recently been exploring Coerulea ; she was a topic of general interest. Her toilettes were by acclamation admitted to be incomparable; but public opinion was divided as to her good looks. Mr. Chichele liked to tease Mrs. Paragon by his uncompromising championship. ' She is a most beautiful young woman,' he now said, with authority. 80 THE CGERULEANS chap. * A beauty, of course/ said his companion, ' but how common ! ' * Common ! ' cried Chichele ; ' I wish they were commoner ! What a lovely smile ! ' ' A maid-of-all-work smile/ suggested the other. 'It's a very pretty maid at any rate/ said Caro, * which is something.' ' It is all jealousy/ said Montem ; ' that is another feminine failing, if one is to be candid.' ' And being candid is a masculine failing,' said Mrs. Paragon, who was just a shade ruffled by the extrava- gance of Chichele's partisanship of a woman she dis- liked, ' and not always a pleasant one.' 'But you like us candid, do you not?' asked Montem. 'Sugar- candied/ said Mrs. Paragon, recovering her equanimity, and leaving a sweet smile behind her as she rose to carry off the ladies to the drawing-room. Mrs. Paragon, as during dinner she looked at Am- brose across the flowers, had found no reason to be dissatisfied with the results of her admonitions. He paid his homage to Miss Eashleigh with discreet reserve, and showed as little inclination as she did to fall out of the current of the s^eneral conversation. VI A KIXDLY WELCOME 81 Miss Eashleigh greatly liked amusement, and all the gentlemen, CMchele among the rest, were prepared to amuse her. Her smile was so bright, her laughter so gay, that even Montem was glad to be able to provoke it. Philip went home that night with the conviction that his lines had fallen in pleasant places, and that Mrs. Paragon and Miss Piashleigh were, each in her own way, among the most delightful women he had ever known. VOL. L CHAPTEE VIl DESCENSUS AVERNI ' ' I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse : bor- rowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease is incur- able." As the months went on, Philip was moved from one post to another with a rapidity which implied that the dispensers of patronage regarded him as a promising recipient of their favours. In fact, he was very pleas- ing ; above the average in ability ; and Harrow and Christ Church had turned him out with an air of distinction and a keen polish of culture which con- trasted, much to his advantage, with the commonplace ruggedness and unpretentious diligence of many of those with whom he found himself consorted. From the first he was a marked man ; and high officials, ever on the look-out for any sign of exceptional ability, soon o-ave him the chance of showincr of what metal he was CHAP. VII DESCENSUS AVERNI 83 made. Ambrose had naturally an eye for style, and without conscious effort wrote his reports and state- ments with the ease and neatness of an Oxford Essay. He got on capitally with his subordinates, who were at once won by his ready affability and impressed by his magnificent ways. The native gentry found him courteous, accessible, and a gentleman. Even those whom he was constrained to disoblige, recognised that he was a good-natured fellow, who had no touch of the rough swagger of office, and whose natural tendency was the reverse of tyrannical. His native friends, with the sensitive intuition of Orientals, recognised in him — what is always a delightful discovery — the possible perpetrator of a job, — not a job in any criminal sense, but that kindly, gracious exercise of personal interest in one's behalf, the consciousness of which helps to lend a sense of calm and comfort to existence. Am- brose was evidently a Sahib, from whom such pleasant influences Avould be apt to emanate, and whom, accord- ingly, it was expedient and — so kind Heaven willed — not difficult to conciliate. So Philip soon had a little court of smiling, obsequious admirers who gave him to understand, in terms of pleasant flattery and by a judicious deference, that his highness's pleasure was 84 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. law, and his highness's favour the great object of then- existence. His highness felt this a congenial and asrreeable condition of affairs. Ambrose had a natural turn for good-natured despotism, — for having his own w\ay, and for pleasing others when to do so did not interfere with his own gratification. It was right, everybody said, for an English official to be influential — and here was influence in a practical and pleasur- able form. Muggins and M'Trant, two uncouth nortli countrymen who had passed in the same examination as Ambrose — and, it so happened, a good many places above him — showed no such happy aptitude. Philip laid this flattering unction to his soul in grasping the situation. They toiled at their work in a way that their ornamental and gifted companion felt to be really servile. They went about, looking like mechanics, in shabby, old clothes and outrageously hideous sun-hats, presenting nothing to the world that was in the slightest degree impressive. Their appearance at the lawn-tennis court and reading-room, — where the polite society of Philip's first station assembled in the even- ings for exercise and conversation, and where he was conspicuous by his good looks, smart clothes, and general magnificence, — was really a disgrace. Magni- VII DESCENSUS AVERXI 85 ficence, however, cannot, even in Carulea, be achieved for nothing ; and Ambrose speedily found that the few hundred rupees, with which a grateful Government rewarded his services at the end of the month, proved an income which was wholly inadequate to the neces- sities of the case as he understood them. If a man is to receive native gentlemen wdth becoming dignity, and to impress and influence European society around him, he must have a decent house and a decent cook, and a few dozen of wines, such as a gentleman need not be afraid to drink himself or ashamed to set before his friends. The exigencies of the occasion demanded also a brand of fine cigars and their liberal consumption. One of the duties of a district officer was, everybody acknowledged, to be constantly in the saddle ; and three saddle-horses were the very least that a con- scientious view of his obligations in this respect allowed Philip to regard as an adequate equipment. He picked up a couple of good Australians at not much over £100 apiece, and a nice little Arab, which did well enough for hacking about the station and lending to any young lady who happened to be in need of it, and who, by way of acknowledgment of his good nature, would allow Philip to accompany her in her morning 86 THE CCERULEANS chap. rides. This little Arab was in constant request. The supply of young ladies in need of early exercise, at other people's expense, proved to be unfailing. Philip, too, was so good-natured about it and dispensed his favours with such agreeable modesty, that many of the fair recipients considered that they were doing him a favour when they rode his horses and occupied his time. Philip's bill to Abdoolah, the Arab Dealer, was, however, a long one. Nothing, so he assured his father, could be a greater mistake than to fancy that India was a country where horses were to be had for the asking ; and yet it would never do not to have a good stable. Muggins and M'Trant might go shambling about the district on their shabby ponies, with their clumsy shoes and their trousers halfway to their knees, just as they might hob-a-nob over their whisky-toddy in the humble bungalow, which they shared for the sake of economy, and which, with its dusty garden-path, camp equipage, and camels, — its great bare whitewashed walls, its tables littered with ofi&ce memoranda. Civil Procedure Codes, and Administration Pteports, — its passages beset with clerks and moonshees, squatting in every available corner, filled Philip's aesthetic soul with absolute horror. A gentleman's horse should be a VII DESCENSUS AYERXI 87 gentleman, and Ms house an abode where ladies may come for five-o'clock tea without incongruity, — where Generals may be regaled without a loss of dignity, and where the business-side of life may be kept duly sub- servient to the tastes of a cultured and refined society. So Philip's drawing-room speedily became one of the prettiest places in his Station ; and society, which always rejoices in every new form of gratuitous enter- tainment, congratulated itself on the advent of a young official, so alive to the duties of the position, and so ready to perform them with magnificent indifference to the pecuniary results of the performance. Everybody speedily recognised the fact that Ambrose kept an open house, and rushed to the conclusion that he was pos- sessed of private means. A large number of his friends showed the greatest alacrity in enjoying the rechercM dinners which Ambrose and his Major Domo concocted for their benefit. The fairest hands in Ccerulea often wrote the menus, and oracular mouths pronounced Philip Ambrose's Perrier Jouet the best champagne that had been tasted in the Station for many a day. What with horses, champagne, elegant five-o'clock teas, and well- considered dinners, Ambrose found himself, before two years were past, not only at the end of his resources, 88 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. but — what was of more immediate importance — at the end of the accommodation which the local European bank was disposed to afford. He had no alternative but to confide his embarrassments to a portly native gentleman, who had been bowing and scraping in his verandah, on every possible occasion, for a twelvemonth, and who now, with more obsequiousness than ever, made Ambrose feel that he conferred a favour instead of receiving one, when, in exchange for his note of hand, he allowed the trifling sum of Es. 10,000 to be placed to his credit at his bankers. As Ambrose arrived at the bank for the completion of this little transaction, he . met M'Trant, who was coming away with a rueful face. ' Are you going to remit to England ? ' he asked ; ' Exchange is down again, and likely to be worse, the Manager says : I have to send £20 a month to my people at home, and, by Jove, it costs me more each time I do it.' Ambrose said that at present, luckily, he had no occasion to remit money to England, and went into the bank with a heavier heart than usual, and with some- thing almost approaching to a pang in his conscience. There was something, after all, he acknowledged to VII DESCENSUS AVEENI 89 himself, to be said for men like M'Trant, despite their hirsute ponies, shabby clothes, and nondescript manners. His searchings of conscience, however, whatever they might have been, were cut short by the practical neces- sity of hurrying home, inasmuch as Mrs. Eashleigh and her pretty daughter were coming to have tea, and to admire some lovely bits of old Indian pottery, which Ambrose — already a judicious and daring virtuoso — had picked up the week before in the bazaar. CHAPTEE VIII AN ENTANGLEMENT Polonms. — •' I do know, When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul Lends the tongue vows : these blazes, daughter, Giving more light than heat — extinct in both. Even in their promise, as it is a making. You must not take for fire.' There are, it has been well observed, a great many ways of being the loveliest girl in the world. There are transcendent beauties whose very pre-eminence in loveliness strikes a sort of moral chill. We admire them as we do some distant snow-summit, set about with impracticable precipices, dark ravines, and chilling glaciers. They rise in superb isolation, far, far beyond the reach of ordinary humanity. Here and there some adventurous Alpine-Club man may try to invade the august precinct and scale the dizzy height, and comes back, humbled, footsore, and benumbed, even if he CHAP. VIII AN ENTANGLEMENT 91 escapes without actual catastrophe. To the generality of mortals they are about as interesting as the top of Monte Eosa. There is, happily for mankind, another and more genial order of feminine perfection, — the charm which appeals less to respectful admiration than to the warm pulses of sympathetic interest — a beauty which wears its honours with affability and graciousness not too high for human hearts or human attainments, — which is ready for intimacy, which invites friendship, and accepts the ready homage of mankind with a cordial and appreciative frankness. It was in this latter, agreeable view that Ccerulean mankind recognised Miss Eashleigh as the most charm- ing of her sex. She was greatly admired, and the admiration, which she aroused, was not only well deserved but ungrudged. No one, not even Mrs. Para- gon, who had a great faculty for satirical comment, and who, with the natural instinct of self-preservation, might have been expected to use her gift for the depre- ciation of a dangerous newcomer, — not even the two Miss Scratchlys who, under the embittering effects of neglect and years, had hardened into a mood incompat- ible with goodwill either towards man or woman, — nay, not even their mother, a well-known female Tartar 92 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. of the most uncompromising order : — no one, in short, had a word to say against Miss Eashleigh. She had come out, two years before, to join her parents in India. Her father, the General in Command of one of the Ca?rulean Divisions, was a soldier of many campaigns and mucli well-earned renown. The manly expanse of Ids wide chest scarcely gave room for the glittering array of medals which commemorated a long list of successes or of actions which deserved success. General Eashleigh was justly proud of his country and his pro- fession, — the regiment he had often led to action, his honours, and himself But he had felt that, with his daughter's arrival, a new splendour and new delight had broken into his existence. His feelings were speedily shared by the rest of the community. Miss Kashleigh's presence vibrated with an agreeable pul- sation through the CceruJean body corporate. Her English beauty, fresh from its island home, her radiant expression, young and credulous of joy, her air of courage, her cordial manners, her ready appreciation of all the pleasant aspects of existence established her at once as an acknowledged Queen of society. Her ascend- ency had been undisputed. Votaries in abundance had been anxious to assure her of her position, in their viii AX EXTANGLExMENT 93 thoughts at any rate, as the paragon of womankind ; but none of them had, in the slightest degree, come near her heart, or even aroused her interest. All men pro- nounced her adorable, but none of them found adora- tion, except when practised at the most respectful dis- tance, at all an easy task. What Miss Eashleigh wanted was, not adoration, but amusement ; and the men with whom she came in contact, speedily discovered that, if they wished their offerings to be acceptable, the incense burnt at her shrine must be as highly spiced as possible with this latter ingredient. With the exception of a fugitive affection for one of her cousins when she was quite a little girl, Florence Eashleigh was inexperienced in the cares and joys of love, nor did she feel in the least impatient for the arrival of this sentimental stage of existence. She was perfectly happy with her father, who petted her as so charming a daughter deserved to be petted. Her mother was equally indulgent, still more sympathetic, — shielded her from the fatigues of society, — banished, unbeknown to her, its less agreeable elements, and guided her course with dexterity, none the less sedulous for being unobtru- sive, through the shoals and shallows which, even in the microcosm of an Indian Station, beset a handsome 94 THE CCERULEANS chap. oirl's existence. Her father, who had been a notable pigsticker in his younger days, was still a gallant rider ; and Florence found riding with him — when her riding had ceased to be a topic of paternal criticism — a most delightful way of beginning the day. When on field days she accompanied him to the parade-ground, a thrill of admiration pervaded the staff, melted the sturdy sergeants and corporals, and flashed, like an agreeable electric shock, through the ranks. By general admission she lent lustre to the scene, and inspired each martial bosom with chivalrous devotion. It was natural that every one should wish to make love to her. The difficulty in doing so arose, not from any active or conscious resistance on her part, but because the mood, in which such things are possible, was wholly absent. It was hopeless to be sentimental with one whose gaiety was never overcast, whose merriment never knew a cloud, and who found the whole of life amusing. Some of the disappointed ones disparaged her as heartless ; only the utterly reckless denounced her as a flirt. Miss Eashleigh was no flirt, she was simply enjoying life and the many pleasures and excitements which it brought to her. It was inevitable that Philip Ambrose, keenly sus- ceptible to every form of attraction and promptly VIII AX ENTANGLEMENT 95 obedient to its impulses, should, at an early date, be numbered among the other adorers. He had succeeded conspicuously in making himself agreeable. He tempted the General with quiet dinners and a well -assorted rubber, which his own proficiency rendered especially interesting. He laid siege to Lady Eashleigh's gentle soul with five-o'clock tea-parties, at which flowers, fruit, and a little music added new charms to a refined repast. With the young lady herself he had established rela- tions of the pleasantest familiarity. Perhaps the obvi- ous absence of any designs upon her recommended him ; perhaps his unreflecting good nature was congenial ; perhaps the simple explanation was that he was young, good-looking, an accomplished valser, and generally a charming fellow ; or, perhaps, it was that, from some subtle sympathy. Miss Raslileigh experienced a sudden access of brilliancy in her own conversation when Ambrose was her companion. He struck a chord in a key in which she found it easy and agreeable to per- form. Florence considered her parents to be perfect in every respect but one ; they cared not a whit for books and all that a love for books implies. Miss Eashleigh was often in want of a congenial volume. This waut Ambrose was ready to supply. He read everything, 96 THE CCEEULEANS chap. told her of all tlie best novels, the most interesting reviews, busied himself in procuring whatever book she had a fancy to read, and was always ready to discuss it with discriminating vivacity. He had brought her Daniel Deronda, when that interesting study in female vagaries first delighted society. ' I don't care a straw for Gwendoline,' he said, as they discussed the story afterwards ; ' she is a common- place, selfish beauty, dressed up in a halo of meta- physics.' ' But,' said Florence, ' I am certain that you would have found her irresistible. Fancy yourself now with a charming creature, dressed with romantic elegance, majestic, miserable, confiding, stretching her beautiful tapering fingers, in fresh, exquisite lavender gloves, towards you, praying for guidance, and hinting at in- teresting confessions, all the while throwing unutterable glances out of her slanting eyes.' ' I should have begun a vehement flirtation on the spot,' said Philip, 'of course. I suppose it was his strength in refusing to do that which gave Deronda his ascendency over her.' 'Yes,' said Florence, 'and his being a Jew. The true genius must always have a strain of Semitic blood VIII AX ENTANGLEMENT • 97 in him, somehow or other. But for my part, I should have snapped my fingers at Deronda. I don't like George Eliot's dreamy young men near ^Yell enough to think of being fascinated by them.' ' And,' said the other, ' when the beautiful Miss Rashleigh has found the world's apple turn to bitter dust, into whose ear will the confidence be poured V ' I shall not, at any rate, choose you for a confessor,' answered his companion ; ' I should suffer in silence. Not that I mean to suffer ; I don't intend my apple to be dust. It is a lovely, rosy pippin, full of delicious juice to the very core. I love it, rind, pips, and every- thing.' ' Dissembler ! ' cried Ambrose, ' I dare say you have some corroding disappointment already of which your heart is aching to disburthen itself. Every woman of sentiment is broken-hearted before twenty.' ' I leave you to pick up the bits of mine,' cried Florence, airily, ' and make what you can of them.' ' Interesting employment !' said Ambrose ; ' but frag- ments will not do for me, I like broken hearts as little as you do. They should be fresh, strong, complete, and without a flaw, like mine.' VOL. L H 98 THE COEEULEAXS chap. How uninteresting!' cried Florence; 'sometimes, Mr. Ambrose, you make me think that I dislike you very much.' ' And I,' answered her companion, ' always find you adorable ; what an unfau^ world we live in.' Young Ambrose was not alone in finding Miss Eashleigh's society an exhilarating relief from the commonplace of existence. Mr. Chichele did all that judicious flattery could do to turn her head. But then, as he observed in flattering her, hers was a character that nothing could spoil. Armed with this comfortable assurance, Mr. Chichele felt no scruple in behaving to her in a manner which would have given good ground for vanity, if Florence had had any material in her com- position which flattery could set aflame. The admiration of so critical, experienced, exacting a connoisseur was, in truth, a great compliment, and it was a compliment which might be safely accepted. ISlo fact could be better established as an article of social faith in Coerulea than that Chichele was not a marrying man. His past was wrapped in mystery, but it was certain that he had burnt his finders in marriao-e, and reoarded the institution with suspicion and dislike as a delusion and a snare — VIII AX EXTAXGLEMENT 99 * He wedded a French dancing girl And had his heart danced over in return, some one had said of his matrimonial misadventure. At any rate he had no thought of repeating the experi- ment in his own person. Marriage was a general necessity for obvious reasons, and might even be pleas- ant for certain people and at certain times of life. But then there are many necessary and pleasant things which it is well to leave to other people to enjoy. Chichele was a cautious talker, but he occasionally let fall observations which were felt to be extremely cynical, and some of his most cynical sayings had been about the happiness of his married friends. He chose, it was obvious, to figure in the world as a person with whom it would be absolutely fatuous to associate the notion of conjugal felicity. Many people, many mothers, had felt inwardly what a pity it was that, as Mr. Chichele was so nice, it should never occur to him to share his uiceuess with some dear, faithful companion for life. But all had recognised the stern fact that he never would entertain such a wish, and had accepted his solitary condition as settled in the immutable decrees of fate. This was a state of things which suited ^liss Eashleiojh exactlv. ]Mr. Chichele was immeasur- 100 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. ably the best company of any one in her circle of acquaintance. He knew the world, he knew political life, he knew society, and he had culled from each a rich crop of shrewd judgments and curious recollections. He had been friends with a great many interesting women — whom Florence only knew of as great ladies of the world. It was not in human nature not to he gratified by finding oneself among the number of women whom he considered interesting. Chichele now made Florence understand with great distinctness his desire to be ' friends ' with her, and she accepted the proffered friendship with unhesitating alacrity. He brought her the very things she wanted, and he brought them in just the way she liked — a way which safe- guarded kindness from awkward complications and robbed intimacy of its possible dangers. It was an immense comfort, Miss Eashleigh told herself, to have a friend whose kindnesses need not be suspected of masking a battery of sentiment, and with whom one might be confidential without the risk of his becoming inconveniently confidential in return. If any one had proposed to her, and she had felt in difficulty, Chichele would, after her parents, have been the first person to whom she would have looked for counsel. VIII AX EXTAXGLEMEXT 101 Chichele accepted the role which she assigned to him with unquestioning cheerfulness, and seasoned his amusing stories with a great deal of excellent advice. It had not hitherto occurred to Florence that she mio-ht ever need to ask his opinion about Philip Ambrose. Xone the less when, some months later, the C cerulean Gazette announced that Mr. Philip Ambrose had ob- tained six months' leave from a date which was start- lingly close at hand, Florence Eashleigh became suddenly conscious of a feeling about the matter that was some- thing different from the absolute indifference with which she regarded the comings and goings of mankind at large. The appearance of such a feeling took her by surprise and challenged inquiry. Why was it that she cared ? Florence asked herself this question, and the in- genious sprites which hover in the inner conscious- ness of each of us — the ready ministrants of self- deception — assured her, at once, that it was but natural to regret even the temporary absence of one whose high spirits, good nature, and vivacity gave a zest to life wherever his presence happened to make itself felt. A little further reflection satisfied Florence, who was honesty itself, even in her self-communings, that she 102 THE CCERULEANS chap. was not, in truth, as serenely indifferent to Philip Ambrose as she had imagined. After all he was in- finitely nicer than nine-tenths of the men whom she came across. He had a natural refinement, and did not, as many men did, on the first approach to famili- arity, betray fatal faults of taste, fatal barriers to any approach to real intimacy. If she and Philip sometimes sparred in conversation, it was because they had enough in common to make it worth while to explore their differences. Anyhow she felt a decided interest in him and his fortunes. He had described to her his adventures in Paris, and had shown her the picture of Camilla, which had greatly taken her fancy. ' That,' he had said, ' is the little girl who wished me good- bye in the station at Paris ; is not she pretty ? ' 'It is a most sweet, touching face,' Florence had said, and, being a vehement matchmaker for every one but her- self, she forthwith had sketched out mentally a romantic project that Ambrose should, some day or other, go home and marry this pretty child-friend. And now Ambrose was to go home forthwith, and Florence admitted to herself that the prospect of his departure, and of his possibly resumed adoration of his child - friend in England, was not altogether without its mixture of VIII AX ENTANGLEMENT lOo melancholy to her. His absence wonld make a blank, which would not easily be filled, in her little world. Ambrose, too, began to grow sentimental as the time approached ; and as soon as he discovered it, encour- aged the growing sentiment in his own mind with fostering care. Florence's quieter and gentler mood struck him as extremely touching. A pang of regret shot through his heart, not an agonising pang, — perhaps even it was slightly pleasurable, but still craving ex- pression. What is one to say to a charming woman whom one is about to leave, and who holds out little distress signals of regret at one's departure ? Philip solved the difficulty by becoming extremely tender ; and tenderness was so natural a mood to him that he never felt more at ease than when he was indulging it. So, somewhat unawares, they had lapsed into a far more serious and affectionate mood than they had ever hitherto contemplated as possible. One morning — it was amongst the last two or three which remained before his departure — Philip had joined Florence and her father in their ride, and the General being deep in business talk with one of his officers, the two had ridden some way homewards tite-a-Ute. Last things, last rides with charming women among 104 THE CCERULEANS chap. the rest, have always a touch of melancholy. Philip felt this with great acuteness as he watclied his beautiful companion and saw that she, too, was feeling it. Her accustomed joyousness was pervaded with the subtle aroma of a pensive mood. The truth was that Florence was rather sad. She had enjoyed many pleasant things in Ambrose's company, and his companionship, she now realised, had formed a large part of their pleasantness. For weeks past he had been exactly in the mood in which she liked him best, — a bright, gentle naturalness, which half-amused, half-touched her by its confidential na'Lvete. She had sometimes pictured him to herself as a Faun, a charming creature, with natural grace and brightness provided, possibly, with perhaps a slightly in- adequate supply of soul. Now the Faun w^as going back to his native woods, and it was natural that he should be pleased to go ; but he w^as leaving his forest companions, the familiar faces of to-day and yesterday, and breaking off the pleasant routine of existence. So the Faun was sad, and made no secret of his sadness. Florence would have scarcely been surprised if he had sat down under one of the huge spreading trees under which they were riding, taken out his pan-pipes, and breathed to the forest deities a strain of half-animal distress. But VIII AX ENTAXGLEMEXT 105 Philip was not Faun enough for that. His emotions were never inarticulate. ' Do you know,' he now said, ' the nearer I get to this journey to England the less I seem to like it. I have more than half a mind to give it up. Yet I want to see my father badly. I have been five years away, and he is lonely without me. He Kves all alone, you know.' 'No wonder you are in a hurry to get to him,' Florence said ; ' India is a cruel country to fathers like yours, is it not ?' ' It is a cruel country to us all,' said Philip, bitterly ; ' it is the land of regrets — the desolate kingdom of sepa- rations — we live in a scramble : one is always being torn from the people one likes the best. It is scarcely worth making friends, is it, only to leave them ?' 'Don't say that,' said his companion; 'we are all sorry to lose you now, and we shall welcome you back. What is to become of my father's whist, meanwhile, it is dreadful to think. We shall have to ask Mr. ]\Iasterly, who is always revoking.' * But will you miss me,' asked Philip, turning round in his saddle, and looking straight at his companion with sudden earnestness. 106 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. ' Excessively/ said Florence ; ' I never play lawn tennis so well as when I have you for my partner. By the way, who will take care of your lawn while you are away ? Shall I watch over it V ' You don't understand me in the least,' said Ambrose ; ' cannot you see that I am really very unhappy ; I thought that women saw everything/ ' I should not have thought that you were so very unhappy,' said his companion ; ' you ought not to be : you will have the great joy of seeing your father again. You will have a charming time in England and enjoy everything immensely. All the same, as I said, we shall be missing you dreadfully here, and it will be only fair if, among all your pleasures, you regret your Indian friends a little.' ' I shall regret leaving you, but not a little,' answered Ambrose ; ' go where I will, I shall never find a more delightful friend. I shall be for ever wishing myself back in Coerulea again with you. To be with you, to see you, to hear your voice, is all I want — all that I care for in the world. No other pleasure is like it, or could be. I have found it out to my cost, now that I am about to lose it — to lose you. That is w^hy I hate this horrid journey to England. Tell me VIII AN ENTANGLEMENT 107 to give it up, and make me the happiest fellow in the world.' Philip thought that Miss Eashleigh had never looked more absolutely enchanting than when, on coming to the close of this avowal, he looked up and met her fine, tender, courageous glance, startled as she was by a sudden shock and confronted by an immediate embar- rassment. Her face had in it a great deal of latent nobility, which only needed occasion to rush to light. She was now, he could see, nerving herself to master a surprise and to face w4th composure a trying ordeal. His outburst had been almost as great a surprise to himself as it was to her. He had frequently, of late, felt prompted to say something extremely affectionate to Miss Eashleigh, but prudence had immediately in- sisted that this something should be as vague as was compatible with the necessary degree of strength. His money troubles, which were a mere inconvenience to a bachelor, would look very different and very much more serious when confronted with the additional embarrass- ment of a wife. IN'or was it probable that they could ever be settled except with the assistance of a wife who should be, not only charming, but opulent. In the abstract Philip was determined not to marry for several 108 THE Ca:RULEANS chap. years to come, and then to marry money ; in tlie concrete he adored Miss Eashleigh. The conflicting impulses had whirled him, a helpless victim, to an unintended result. And now the die was cast. Ambrose's fate, so far as it depended on himself, was sealed. The strong current had caught him : resistance was impossible, nor did he wish to resist. Why resist ? Why not rather revel in it to the full, and taste the full ecstasy of the one supreme moment of existence, let the rest be what it might ? ' At a touch I yield : let the great river bear me to the deep.' Philip's feelings, by this time, were quite beyond the control of sober discretion, and were carrying him rapidly on to the wild tempestuous sea. What his fate would be there he was in no mood for considering. Florence, he could see, was moved. Her gay pre- paredness of speech was gone. Her courage was shaken, her bright composure had given way to a nervous em- barrassment. On such fragile materials love builds its silly hopes. ' Tell me to give it up,' he said ; ' but I have no need to be told. I am determined not to go. Yours or not yours, happy or wretched, I cannot bear to leave you. Whatever your decision, I shall stay.' VIII AN ENTA^XTLEMENT 109 Florence had now had time to collect her scattered senses and decide on the reply which it behoved her to make. ' You must not do that, Mr. Ambrose/ she said, ' or you will forfeit my friendsliip for ever ; and, please now, to say no more on the subject. You are speaking strongly, wildly, on the spur of the moment, I am con- vinced, not of settled design. For my part, I must tell you frankly that your words have been an unwelcome surprise, and that I cannot imagine myself ever feeling for you as you have spoken to me. Till to-day I have never thought of you but as a pleasant friend ; nor, I believe, can you have thought otherwise of me. We will remain as friends, if you please. I like you, as you know. If our friendship is to last, you must promise me never again to talk to me like this.' ' Xever 1 ' cried Philip, ' that's a long word. How can you tell what you may feel hereafter?' ' Well !' said Florence, catching at the first chance to bring matters to a close ; ' never, at any rate, till you return from England. You are going home. Go, free as air. When you come back, we can see how matters stand between us.' ' But I am going for six months,' cried Ambrose. 110 THE CCERULEANS chap, viii *I know/ said Florence; 'for six months, then, silence! and remember you are free. We are both free.' ' Six months or six hundred,' cried Ambrose ; ' I shall never think of you but as the perfection of womankind. Only give me leave to stay.' ' No,' said Florence, by this time again quite mistress of herself and of the situation, ' I tell you to go — and, remember, you are free, and I am free.' CHAPTEE IX A WOUNDED HEART ' Methinks I feel this youth's perfections With an invisible and subtle strength, To creep in at my eyes.' Florence's answer to her lover had been, like herself, honest and courageous. She had told Ambrose the exact truth as to her feelinos about him ; she had not concealed her liking for him or underrated it ; she had warned him that her liking was not love nor likely to become so. On the other hand, she had not bidden him to despair, or forbidden him to renew his request if, after six months in England, he was still of the same mind. In this Miss Eashleigh had shown her courage — a courage, however, that was full of danger to herself, and of hope for any man who really loved her. Such a concession, construed by the insight of true devo- tion, would mean that the battle was more than half- 112 THE CCERULEANS chap. won, and victory already assured. Her rejection of him had lacked the decisiveness of indifference or dislike, still, when Florence came to think over the interview with her lover in cold blood, she was less and less favour- ably impressed with his behaviour. It had been too spasmodic, too abruptly intense, too wanting in self- restraint, too suggestive of a suddenly -kindled and fugitive passion. It had wanted the true ring of real earnest devotion. She told her mother of it with a lio-ht heart, and treated it with an indifference that satisfied Mrs. Eashleigh that no harm had been done, and that no danger was to be feared. She contented herself with saying that Philip had behaved very foolishly, and hinting that his dismissal might well have been more absolute. ' I would have sent him about his business for good and all, dear, and taken good care that nothing of the kind should occur again. That sort of love-making is one form of impertinence.' 'Poor fellow!' Florence said, 'that would have been needlessly cruel. He is so impulsive, you know, mother, and I should have been sorry to hurt him. After all, I rather like him, you know.' ' It would have done him no harm,' her mother IX A WOUNDED HEART 113 said, decisively ; ' he had no business to speak as he did.' Florence knew that this was so. She knew that she had been right to keep herself free ; yet freedom is not always happiness, and Florence was far from happy. Philip's kindly, unconscious mirthfulness, his irrepres- sible good humour, his unstudied, gentle manner had made a deeper impression than she had at first sus- pected ; and the impression grew deeper and deeper every day. In some moods she wondered how she had ever had the heart, the nerve, to let him go, and thought to herself that if he had come within her reach again, she must have kept him at whatever risk of future misfortune. Then common sense would assert its reign, and Florence scorned herself for a foolish fancy, and resolved to be as heart-whole as ever. Philip by this time was halfway across the Indian Ocean on his homeward journey, and was spending long dreamy afternoons in siestas in which Florence's image figured only as one of a host of pleasant recollections of a world which was every day fading faster from his thoughts. Europe, England, home, with all their thou- sand interests and delights, were already in full and VOL. I. I 114 THE COERULEANS CHAP. exclusive possession of his mind. He was free, and freedom seemed fraught with a host of delightful possi- bilities. India and Indian things, even Indian people, seemed merging into the indistinctness which is the prelude of oblivion. His relations towards Miss Eashleigh were con- veniently vague, and his feelings, if still those of affec- tionate remembrance, were obscured by an overgrowth of young and radiant hopes and more immediate claims on his attention. No sort of tie, so a well-disciplined and courteous conscience assured him, bound him to the young lady, who had declined his proffered devotion, and disbelieved his protestations of eternal fidelity. If he was free, whose fault was that? Florence, it was certain, was less tender-hearted than himself; and it might even be a form of judicious self-protection against the melancholy of disappointment if her rejected lover took full advantage of any compensatory alleviation that kind, tender eyes and sympathetic hearts in England might be ready to afford. In plain words, Philip had, before he reached the Mediterranean, determined with himself that, if kind Fortune brought a flirtation in his way he would make the most of her kindness. Now Fortune, though proverbially fickle, is almost invariably IX A WOUNDED HEART 115 kind to good-looking Youth when thus prepared to wel- come her largess. Meanwhile, the seed so carefully sown was growing apace in the fine soil of Florence's heart. It grew and grew until she acknowledged to herself, with a sort of remorseful indignation at her own weakness, that it had become the master -thought, and threw all other influences into the backgi^ound. * Vulnus alit venis et ceeco carpitur igni.' Life somehow had grown darker — pleasure had lost its zest. Everything seemed worse, commoner, less in- teresting. Now that Pliilip was no longer present to remind her of his slightness, it was so easy to forget it, and to remember only that he was mirthful, charming, and devoted. In a man's absence, imagination so soon begins to idealise him, to throw his shortcomings into the shade, to set his attractions in a striking light — to make him what friendship would wish him to be. Les absents ont toujours tort, the proverb says : but the pleasant companion who has left us is the victim of no such injustice. Eather he benefits by an indulgent obliviousness of all about him, for which oblivion is desirable. It is not with material beauties alone that 116 THE CCERULEANS chap. distance lends enchantment to the view. And indeed, without being in love with young Ambrose, one may- admit that Ccerulean society, and especially that fraction of it which formed the atmosphere of Florence's daily life, was the duller for the want of his presence. Miss Eashleigh, at any rate, found it very dull indeed, and cheered herself with hazy visions in the mind's far horizon — a rosy dawn, lovely as Aurora's self, when Apollo would rise again from the orient wave and come to glorify her world again. Alas, when Apollo reappeared — so the cruel fates had willed — it was under circum- stances not calculated to give her the least satisfaction ! Florence's predicament could not for long pass un- observed. The kindly General found the companion of his rides changed ; he could not tell how, but decidedly changed. She was as devoted, as anxious to please him, as prompt to read his wishes and wants, as ready in her sweet, filial solicitude as ever. But her mirthfulness had fled ; the bright, unconscious joy of life was no longer there. Her face, as she rode beside him, wore some other look than that which of yore spoke of high animal spirits and keen natural enjoyment in her gallop. She looked grave ; she looked even sad. The General, in great perturbation, confided IX A WOUNDED HEART 117 his observations to Mrs. Easlileigh, and his alarm increased when Mrs. Eashleigh admitted that she, too, was aware that something was the matter. These two tender hearts, linked in a common love, shrank and shuddered, sensitive to the approach of evil, at the bare thought of sorrow coming near the child they both adored. The situation became critical. All the more affectionate than ever ; no one spoke of it, but each of the three secretly felt, by a subtle instinct, that a secret sorrow had overclouded that bright and happy home. How happy that home had been. The General and his wife belonged to that favoured class of married people who continue lovers to the end. His old age was as chivalrous, as ardent, as devoted as his youth had been, to the dear companion, who had followed his fortunes through good times and bad. They had travelled together for many a year in rough places and smooth ; together they had borne the blows of fate ; they had enjoyed the bright and the dark hours of life in company till the one could scarcely think of pleasure or pain, except as shared by the other. There had been some dark days of disappointment, suspense, and deadly anxiety — what soldier's wife escapes them ? Now the good times had come, and, best of all, the good things — 118 THE CCERULEANS chap. the daughter who, two years before, had arrived from England — with a long-cherished store of affection, to be the crowning joy, the charm and ornament of the closing scene of their Indian career. And the charm had been as sweet in realisation as in Hope's fondest day-dream. Neither of them had known how delightful it would be. Again and again their good fortune would take them by surprise. The General's manly heart would throb, now and again, with a sudden rush of pleasure, as Florence — fresh, joyous, beautiful — went sailing along on her Arab by his side, witching the world with noble horsemanship and charming every eye with the radiance of exulting youth. Mrs. Eash- leigh's eyes would sometimes fill with unbidden tears of love and gratitude as she watched the sweet child of their youth, whom it had sometimes seemed to break her heart to part with, restored to her at last, the crowning blessing of a blest existence. Their common joy had bound these true and faithful hearts closer than ever; and now they were confronted by a common trouble. That Florence was not as happy as she had been — as she ought to be — was an idea which, the General found, put all his stoicism to the rout at once ; and, as he buckled and strapped on his uni- IX A WOUNDED HEART 119 form for the morning's parade, lie inwardly admitted that, put what courageous face upon it he would, a reverse in this direction would mean not only defeat but disaster. Like a good soldier as he was, he deter- mined to do his best to obviate defeat. Florence's outspokenness on the subject to her mother had been unembarrassed, and her assurance that her heart was disengaged so obviously sincere, that the conjecture that she might possibly be mistaken had not suggested itself to Mrs. Eashleigh as a possible explan- ation of her new-found melancholy. The two were on far too good terms for reticence on either side. Florence was anxious to disburthen herself of her trouble, and, one day, her mother with gentle compulsion forced the secret from her. 'Florence, dear,' she said, laying her hand kindly on hers and looking straight at her, ' you have some- thing on your mind.' 'Yes,' Florence answered, 'and something I am heartily ashamed of. I have been weak, mother. I am weak and I am behavins: like a fool. I cannot get that foolish Philip Ambrose out of my thoughts. I don't love him. I don't respect him. I don't wish to marry him ; all the same it hurts me to have lost 120 THE CCERULEANS chap. liiiii ; sometimes I let myself think I really do love him. That is what has been making me miserable. Do you despise me very much ? What will my father think ? I know that I despise myself.' ' There is no need to do that, dear,' said her mother, * only I beg and pray you, dear Florence, not to play with day-dreams. Your decision was assuredly right. We all feel alike about Philip Ambrose. You yourself think him weak and unstable ; he would never make you happy ; you will not go on thinking about him — will you ? Promise.' ' I tell you what, mother,' Florence replied, evading a pledge which she may have doubted her ability to keep, ' I think men are very horrid, and I don't feel at all inclined to have anything to do with any of them. Why can they not let one alone ? How happy we three are together ! As for my foolish fancy I mean to laugh it away and be ten times gayer than ever.' And gayer than ever in society Florence forthwith be- came. The old colonels found her even more affable and more amusing than they had believed. Mr. Chichele made no secret of his admiration, pronounced her the best company in Coerulea, and threw over his friend Mrs. Paragon without the least compunction IX A WOUNDED HEART 121 whenever he got the chance of a chat with Miss Eashleigh. The subalterns, to a boy, burnt incense at a respectful distance; no one who was not in the secret had a suspicion but that Florence was still the gayest, brightest, most whole-hearted of her sex. Mean- while the secret trouble grew none the less troublesome for being recognised by those who had to bear it. The General growled out a hearty execration under his grisly moustache, when j\Irs. Eashleigh explained the nature of their daughter's trouble. ' I always told you,' he said, ' that that fellow was no good ; he has no backbone — he has no principle — he has no strength. It was dishonourable to speak to Florence as he did. I wish to goodness I. had never played whist with him. He is confoundedly pleasant and all that sort of thing, but you will see, Maria, he'll come to awful grief some day and break the heart of the woman who is unlucky enough to marry him.' With this grim vaticination the General was constrained, faute de mieiox, to console himself in a crisis which, he began to fear, did not admit of any consolation. CHAPTEE X MR. MONTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER Lucms — ' His enemies confess The virtues of humanity are Ctesar's,' Cato — ' Curse on his virtues ! They've undone his country ; Such popular humanity is treason. ' Miss Eashleigh was not the only person to whom Philip's departure implied a serious diminution of enjoyment — Mr. Montem was another sufferer. That gentleman's exterior, as exhibited to mankind at large, was of an irritable, unconciliatory, and aggressive order, not unfitly symbolised by the quills upon the fretful porcupine. Deep hidden, however, below — deep as the recesses of the terrestrial globe, at which fortunate explorers ' strike ' gold or petroleum — were smouldering fires of wit, and a copious supply of that agreeable ingredient known to moralists as the milk of human kindness. Both qualities needed only a congenial touch CHAP. X MR. MOXTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER 123 to spring to the surface, and Ambrose, with his usual good luck, appealed effectually to each. ]\Iontem had grown really fond of him; and, whenever he got the chance, would carry him off from the whist-table to a Ute-a-Utc dinner — not, it must be confessed, of the most rechcrcM order, — where, under the mellowing influences of whisky and soda-water, the old Scotchman would blossom into a genial mood, and produce all his treas- ures of wide reading, subtle thought and humorous analysis of character, for the edification of his guest ; and then the two would have a fine time of it. Philip found j\Iontem's racy talk an agreeable change from the frivolous chatter of ball-rooms and band-stands, or the dreary round of military gossip. One may have enough even of pretty young ladies : and, as for the army, Philip used to say, it is as great a puzzle as the Athanasian creed : the only thing that is certain about it is that every man has a grievance which he wants to tell you. Montem's griev- ances were of a less personal and more interesting order ; and they were enforced with a picturesque extravagance — now fun, now pathos, now prejudice, now serious conviction, — but in every case alike, full of character. Philip made an excellent listener, and differed just often enough to stir the acids and alkalis of his instructor's 124 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. talk into continual effervescence. Much good advice had Montem given him on his approaching visit to England. ' Young man/ he said, ' let me give you a hint. When you get home, — as you value peace and quiet and a kindly welcome by your friends, — let nothing tempt you to say a word about India — not one word. Polite people will ask you about it, but that is only to please you. Do not answer them. They cannot bear it. Take my word. You are a revenant, you know; and well-bred and judi- cious revenants say as little as possible about the place they have come from.' ' Especially,' said Philip, ' when it happens to be a hot one; but I thought that India was rather the fashion.' * The India of sentiment and nonsense,' said Montem, 'is, and always will be the fashion — the India that Burke flooded with bombast, and Macaulay with anti- thesis — the India that Stain writes pamphlets about, and Frontinbras sonnets — the India that never was, and never will be, except in foolish heads. The English are a curious race. They hate intellectual exertion, and they like to have their passions roused. Consequently they hate alike the effort which serious thought costs, X MR. MONTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER 125 and the many-sided, hesitating results to which it leads. Hence comes the sensational method, with vivid outline and strongly-marked effects, which involve no thought, and generate plenty of passion. You remember Thucy- dides's dictum about the little trouble that the Athenian oi iroWoL took to find the truth. The English ot ttoWoc like exertion just as little. They ivill not take the trouble to learn, and, in consequence, they are always making colossal blunders ; and the blunders are growing more and more colossal every year. Sometimes, as I sit in my office and watch the wear and tear of things in general, I feel a horrid conviction that the English national character has suffered with the rest, and begins to show signs of dilapidation.' ' Of course,' said Caro, w^ho came in at this moment, and at once took up his accustomed role of capping Montem's cynicisms. ' It ought to be allowed for in the national accounts, if they were properly kept — " depreciation of moral rolHng stock," at so much per cent. Only, what Chancellor of Exchequer would venture to gauge it ? ' ' Look at the nation's behaviour about Egypt,' continued Montem ; ' was it not suggestive of de- crepitude? a want of fixed purpose — an incapacity for 126 THE CGERULEAXS CHAP. sustained effort — a degrading mixture of levity, viol- ence and irresolution ? ' ' That was the fault of their rulers,' said Caro ; * each one trying to catch the nation's whim and set his sails by it. No nation could undergo such a process of petting and escape the natural infirmities of a spoilt cliild.' 'Please listen to this,' said Montem, taking up a Eeview from the table. 'Hear the great apostle of Eadicalism on its agreeable consequences. "Does the excitement of democracy," he asks, "weaken the stability of national character ? By setting up a highly increased molecular activity does it disturb, not merely con- servative respect for institutions, but for coherence and continuity of opinion and sentiment in the character of the individual himself ? Is there a fluidity of character in modern democratic societies which contrasts not altogether favourably with the strong solid types of old ?" Are Englishmen becoming less like Eomans and more like chattering Greeks ? ' ' Yes,' said his companion ; ' and the worst Greeks are those who will chatter about India. But talking of fluid characters and chattering Greeks, Frontinbras is coming presently to call on you, with an introduction X MR. MONTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER 127 from Mr. Chichele ; I shall escape while I can, and leave you to convert him if you can.' ' Convert him !' cried Montem, making a wry face at the impending infliction, ' " Though thou shalt bray a fool in a mortar, yet shall he not depart from his folly." ' * Excellent text,' said Caro. ' That, I suppose, is why I never see Frontinbras without thinking of bray- ing. Farewell, Philosopher, till whist-time this after- noon. I must be off.' ' And I will come with you,' said Ambrose ; ' I have a particular engagement.' ' You have a particular aversion for garrulous block- heads,' said Montem, ' and so have I. If Chichele keeps sending his revolutionary visitors on to me, I intend to resign my appointment, and leave Ccerulean wear and tear to go to the devil as they please.' Presently Frontinbras arrived, keen on interviewing a Ccerulean character, and determined — thanks to Chi- chele's admonitions — to be as little offensive as he could. Montem, on his part, bent himself, in the true spirit of Christian resignation, to receive the Governor's guest with all due politeness. For a while all went on smoothly, till the smoothness of the interview imper- ceptibly threw both parties off their guard. Frontinbras 128 THE CCERULEANS chap. began to air some of the foolish things which he had heard at Sir Theophilus's Court ; and, unluckily, quoted one of Montem's pet aversions in support of them. ' He is a man, you will admit, of great experience,' he said, throwing a tone of assurance into the speech, which ruffled the unnatural calm of Montem's equa- nimity with a sudden gust of displeasure, — ' a man of great and varied experience.' ' He is,' said Montem ; * but then ill-judging experi- ence is the very deuce. The experience of stupid or careless people is merely an intense form of misunder- standing. It means that they have collected a number of misperceived facts in support of a blundering con- clusion. As George Eliot says somewhere, " Experience cackles far oftener than she lays a live egg." Of the two I prefer ignorance as absolute as your own.' ' Do you ? ' said Frontinbras, who by this time was beginning to feel decidedly less amiable than when the interview began ; ' and I suppose you think just as little of Sir Theophilus, to whom I was indebted for the in- troduction. Tell me frankly.' ' I will/ said Montem, ' with pleasure. Prance is the worst of the lot. There is no man in India, as I judge, whose vanity, shallowness, and want of political fore- X MR. MONTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER 129 sight has done more to impede useful work for the present or laid up greater difficulties for the future.' * I have heard that sort of thing before/ said Frontin- bras ; ' I should be glad to learn what it seriously means.' * I will tell you/ said Montem. ' He could not set the Thames on fire at home, so he is trying his hand on the Ganges, Burampootra, and the rest of them/ 'Drop metaphor!' cried Frontinbras, by this time well on towards being in a passion. ' What is it that makes all you Indian conservatives so bitter against him ?' ' Because/ said Montem, who had now forgotten politeness in the necessity of being forcible, — ' because he has seized the most dangerous points in a dangerous position, and used them for self-glorification. India just nowisfull of explosive materials — restlessness, envy, race- jealousy, class -animosity — a vast, half- educated class, with just little knowledge enough to be a dangerous thing and to feel at a loss what to do with its newly-found powers. Prance has appealed to all in behalf of himself and his party ; and, what is worst of all, appealed in a way that has put all his countrymen against him. He VOL. I. K 130 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. postures as the friend of freedom. He is really the apostle of disorder. He has convinced himself, in truth's despite, that white is black and black is white, and he appeals to young India to prove it. The solemn truth remains that they are remarkably unlike, but Sir Theophilus cannot or will not see it. He found the task^ of quiet, rational government in India difficult. He and his admirers are doing their best to make it im- possible.' ' You seem to think us all very dangerous characters,' said Frontinbras. * Not dangerous,' answered Montem, with amusement twinkling in his eye, for he knew that it was Frontin- bras's foible to be considered dangerous, and was re- solved not to indulge it. ' If you were dangerous, the Governor would have to deport you, and, if you objected to deportation, to imprison you.' ' Imprison me ! ' cried Frontinbras, by this time in a white heat of indignation, ' and without a trial ? ' ' Without a trial/ said Montem, with an exasperating composure, ' by a lettre de cachet. We have them here, you know. It is one of the many advantages of a military despotism.' ' It is one of the infamies that we are determined to X MR. MONTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER 131 efface,' cried the other ; ' Englishmen have no business with military despotisms.' ' Except that they happen to own the largest in the world/ said his companion. ' But you do not want it to last for ever, I suppose,' cried Frontinbras. ' It will last none too long,' said the other, with an earnest tone that struck even Frontinbras as impressive; 'and, meanwhile, it has converted the biggest bear- garden the world has ever seen into an orderly and, as things go, fairly prosperous community. Eemove it, and you will have the bear-garden back in a twelve- month, and an invader, pouring once again through the Afghan passes, within a decade.' Frontinbras shook his wild locks, and was trembling with excitement. Had he not that very morning been constructing a forcible stanza comparing India to a crucified slave, with brutal soldiery around, and ribald persecutors gibing at his pangs ? 'Our whole views are antipathetic,' he said. ' Have you no hopes for India, for mankind ?' 'I have,' said the other, * perhaps as high ones as your own, — so high that I think their accomplishment is well worth the toil and patience which several 132 THE CCERULEANS chap. generations of unconspicuous Englislimen have loyally contributed towards tlieir accomplishment, — so high that I resent the levity, the hardihood, the sensa- tionalism that risks all for its gratification. You hasty gentlemen have not leisure to understand the complica- tions of the case. You prescribe before you have diagnosed : you must have sensationalism, and India is full of sensational effects. But you indulge yourselves at a heavy cost. You give form and substance to floating folly ; you instil baseless discontents and vain hopes; you rally the scattered germs of disaffection, and try to bring them to a head ; you would ruin the Government if you could. It is a proof of its strength and of its reliance on the good sense of the community against the feelings to which you appeal that the Govern- ment can afford to let you and your fellow-fanatics go where you will and say what you please.' ' Still,' said Frontinbras, who was well accustomed to having strong things said to him, and rather liked it, * if you had your way, you would deport me ? ' ' 'No' said Montem ; ' I would imprison you.' ' Then I had better be going while I can,' replied his companion ; ' you may have a lettre de cachet about you ; who knows ? ' X MR. MONTEM LOSES HIS TEMPER 133 ' No such luck/ said Montem, good-naturedly ; ' but have a cigar before you go ; you will find this a good one.' That evening a well -assorted circle at Chichele's table listened with sympathising amusement to the narrative of all that poor Montem had been through, in the cause of hospitality on the one hand and truth on the other. ' There is one plain, prosaic question,' Chichele ob- served, * to which no apostle of India's regeneration has ever yet given a satisfactory answer. If India, in order to be regenerated, is to dispense with British rule, who is to guarantee the repayment of the two hundred millions sterling which Englishmen have lent India to make railways and canals with ? It is vulgar per- haps to ask it, but, from a business point of view, it is important.' ' And who, if it comes to that,' said Montem, ' will give back to the English all they have sacrificed for the country — our wasted lives V 'And,' added Caro, emphatically, 'our enfeebled livers :' and as he had just been restricted by a stern committee of doctors to a penitential diet of toast and gruel, and was unable, in consequence, on the present 134 THE CCERULEANS chap, x occasion, to enfeeble liis own any further by rasli ex- periments on Chichele's excellent cuisine, lie was, no doubt, in a position to speak feelingly as to this par- ticular form of contribution to the welfare of his Aryan first cousins. CHAPTEE XI GATHER YOUR ROSES WHILE YE MAY ' "We figure to ourselves The thing we like, and then we build it up, As chance will have it, on the rock or sand ; For Thought is tired of wandering o'er the world, And home-bound Fancy runs her bark ashore.' Five years had passed away since Philip left his home, and, except on rare occasions on which Mr. Ambrose paid a visit at her uncle's, Camilla had heard nothing of the man who had so deeply impressed her. Even when he came, Mr. Ambrose was not particularly communicative as to his son's fortunes. Philip, he said, was a shockingly bad correspondent ; and life in India, it might be supposed, did not supply material for many amusing letters. 'Anyhow, I cannot say that Philip's letters are either numerous or amusing. However, he is all right, and keeping well, which is the great thing; and he is getting on, I suppose, for he has been moved from 136 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. Moldipettiah to MustipoUium, a much grander station; and he is now, he tells me, what they call a "Joint."' This sort of information was, naturally, not at all such as that for which Camilla's ardent imagination craved. A romantic young woman cannot satisfy her flights of fancy by dreaming of her lover as translated from one unknown, unpronounceable place to another, and being described as if he was so much meat. The expression meant, she supposed, that, in some mysteri- ous way or other, Philip formed a humble member of the body corporate of Indian officialdom. But what an arid fact ! What honey is to be sucked by the liveliest fancy from such a flower as that ? Meanwhile Camilla was rapidly growing out of a picturesque girl into a woman of beauty, strength, and character. Her mind was forming ; she had learnt to formulate her girlish instincts with distinct convictions and views. The narrowness of her uncle's world had become an accepted fact, and she bore it more quietly because she understood it better. She recognised it as essentially intolerable, despicable, and to be escaped from at the first oppor- tunity. She knew now, by actual experience, a little of the vast world without, — the great river of human life rushing along; of the realms of science, art, thought. XI GATHEE YOUR EOSES WHILE YE MAY 137 and feeling; the wild dreams — the grand discoveries; the grave doubts that swayed mankind ; the theories with which men's minds were busy, the hopes and fears which stirred them, — for all which topics those around her cared as much as for the social economy of Timbuctoo. In this discouraging and uncongenial surrounding Camilla lived alone. She had always cherished a grand ideal : she took life seriously; regarded it with deep interest, as of a sort of awful significance to every one ; she felt its issues to be supremely im- portant, the difference between its various possibilities so tremendous : on the one hand, such lofty, beautiful eminences, serene and pure, and bathed in heaven's own light ; on the other such abyssmal depths of dul- ness and turpitude : on the one hand such wild, free flights amid celestial pleasures; on the other, such enslavement amid narrow, soul -destroying, enervating vacuity. Between these alternatives she had made her choice with a passionate, eager decisiveness ; she vowed to herself that her life should be something worth living — something pure, good, elevated and refined. These were her vehement cravings as soon as she began to think at all ; and she had never wavered in their pursuit. This sort of self- culture had given her a 138 THE CCERULEANS chap. certain exquisiteness of mind, which bespoke itself in her appearance and manner. It gave her on the one hand, an uncompromising dislike of all that militated against, or even fell short of her standard — a sort of moral daintiness : on the other hand, it invested her with all the strength which comes from a fixed purpose and a will ever bent towards one set of noble objects. Camilla was never distracted, never dissipated, never without an object. She moved onwards towards her end, sometimes, no doubt, with stumbling feet, some- times with halting and uncertain steps — but with her gaze on the goal she had imagined for herself. The Beautiful Mountains were for ever in her horizon, fair with celestial beauty, the object of her pilgrimage. This settled purpose gave her a fine disdain, perhaps too little concealed, for all things petty, mean, unreal, or unrefined ; she cherished a vehement repugnance to every sort of sham. The lightnings of sarcasm played about her finely chiselled lips, and she, not unfrequently, produced the impression of unintentionally withering the object of her disapproval with polished bolts of scornful wit. Her uncle had on various occasions had reason to remark that Camilla's tongue was a great deal too sharp, and that sarcasm was one of the last XI GATHER YOUE ROSES WHILE YE MAY 139 qualities for which a well-educated young lady ought to desire to be remarkable. 'Now Camilla/ Sir Marmaduke confided to his sister, in his sham oracular fashion, *is distinctly sarcastic' Camilla had some excuse for being occasionally sar- castic. Her uncle's conversation produced on her nerves the effect which the Autocrat of the Breakfast TaUe describes so feelingly as wrought upon himself by a dull discourse ; it stirred a hundred mental currents into inconvenient activity. * If,' says that ingenious writer, ' you ever saw a crow with a king-bird after him, you will get an image of a dull speaker and lively listener. The bird in sable plumage flaps heavily along his straightforward course, while the other sails around him, over him, under him, leaves him, comes back again, tweaks out a black feather, shoots away once more, never losing sight of him, and finally reaches the crow's perch at the same time the crow does ; having cut a perfect labyrinth of loops and knots and spirals, while the slow fowl was painfully working from one end of his straight line to another.' This simile describes exactly the action of Sir Marma- duke's conversation on Camilla's nervous system, and the sort of road by which their minds travelled. Sir Marma- 140 THE CCERULEANS chap. duke's journeyed slowly, cautiously, complacently, along a well-beaten road of conventional commonplace ; well pleased with his sagacity in discovering it, with his pro- gress upon it, and perfectly assured as to his destination. It was impossible not to listen to him ; Camilla had often tried that resource ; it was equally impossible to listen without an access of nervous fatigue and exhaustion. While Sir Marmaduke trudged complacently along, scattering commonplaces as he went, Camilla's eager thoughts were stimulated into unnatural restlessness; they touched him every now and then, and rebounded into the empyrean : they returned from the airy void, took a look at the honest pedestrian, and were off again, soaring out of sight. Hodgson, the head keeper, en- deavouring with whip and whistle to inspire sobriety into a couple of young pointers, wild with escape from the durance of the kennel, was not less capable of emulating their movements, or more in the dark as to their delight, than was this worthy banker as to the as- pirations, interests, and pangs of tedium which stirred the bosom of his mercurial niece. She knew his stories, and the exact point at which the joke — that horrid thrice-told joke — would explode. She knew his arguments ; she knew his demonstrations. XI GATHER YOUR ROSES WHILE YE MAY 141 which he ordered out just as he ordered out his carriage whenever wanted. Even her Aunt Augusta flinched sometimes, and gave a little sigh of fatigue as her brother began. To Camilla it was maddening ; she would fly away, lock herself up in her bedroom, and there breathe the awful revelation to the respectable ancestors, who gazed at her from its walls, that her uncle was a bore. There are men, it has been well said, with whom it weakens you more to talk for an hour than would a day's fasting. Camilla had frequently to experience this sense of prostration. Her outbursts were only the flutterings of a spirit in prison, beating against the bars of a too narrow cage, and expectant of the hour of deliverance. In the background of her char- acter, and lighting up her lofty aspirations with a gentle radiance, was a large store of tender romance. This was her true self ; it recoiled, like some sensitive plant, from the rude contact of the outer world. Her uncle's rough, unsympathising touch inspired her with a real terror — the terror which gentle creatures feel at strength which can neither pity nor understand. Thus Camilla fre- quently seemed proud when she was really only fright- ened, and fastidious merely because she tried the things and persons about her by a high standard of refinement. 142 THE CCEKULEANS CHAP. If, as her uncle sometimes reprovingly observed, she thought nothing good enough for her, it was less from a too -exacting critical habit than because the ideal, which she instinctively followed, was something very good indeed. Youthful idealism must rest its tired wing on a concrete ideal, and in Camilla's imagination her sudden friendship with Philip Ambrose lived as something exceptionally charming. The sweet memory of those few happy days in Paris — their mysterious charm — the deep impression they had made upon her; that last scene — that farewell kiss — had been stored up in her thoughts, like some treasure, laid away in a secret drawer under lock and key, and guarded jeal- ously from the general gaze, to which one goes, every now and then, to feast the eye and be assured of its lovehness. Camilla had often repaired to her secret drawer, and had found her treasure safe and sound and delightful as ever. Those days had been different from all other days, that friend from other friends, Each scene, each word almost seemed to live — graced, vivified with some imperishable charm in her recollec- tion. No colour faded from the picture as years went on — the weary years of dulness, commonplace, and XI GATHER YOUE EOSES WHILE YE MAY 143 hollowness. There lay for her the possibility of bliss ; there was the man whom she could fancy herself trusting, loving, idolising. Was it a dream — a half- remembered, half-imagined phantasm ? or would that enchanting vision again shape itself into flesh and blood ? Would Perseus arrive, strike off Andromeda's chains, and carry her off to liberty and love ? The courageous credulity of youth breathed a confident reply. The sombre atmosphere of Camilla's real exist- ence lit up with a great brightness of hope and joy, and the gloomy realities around her died away or glowed into brightness, like some sombre landscape irradiated with the glow of a summer morning. So Camilla lived in a phantom -land of her own creation — a land of noble ideals which she had fashioned for herself. She had had several lovers; one, the young rector of the parish, a cadet of a great county family, whose suit Camilla's aunts — half-terrified at their own audacity — furtively abetted ; and one, a neighbouring squire, who used to be constantly riding- over to see Sir Marmaduke on business, or to walk with him through the home coverts. They were both, as the two Miss Crofts confided regretfully to one another, nice men — gentlemen, good, attractive — in 144 THE CGERULEANS chap. every way eligible. Alas, alas ! Camilla would elect neither. The first thought of it, directly it dawned upon her mind, convinced her of its impossibility. Her aunts' mild persuasions, her uncle's unconcealed displeasure — and Sir Marmaduke had no need to speak in order to make Camilla understand that he was very much displeased with her indeed — produced no effect but to convert indifference into aversion. Pastor Aristseus, as Camilla irreverently described the clergy- man, retired, despairing, to his flock, and consulted the Miss Crofts no more about his Sunday School and evening classes — that Sunday School in which, with artless craft, he had beguiled Camilla into teaching a little smiling row of rustics, and whither he had watched her — wdth what admiring eyes ! — coming in her pony- carriage, on Sunday afternoons, across the park and along the sweet-scented country lane, his heart beating at the thought of a happy moment when he would meet her at the porch, and see her standing — charming apparition to clerical vision ! — among her curtseying and smiling disciples. The youthful squire, too, had received his dismissal and gone his way, and came no more to ask Sir Marmaduke's advice about drainage schemes or kill his pheasants. Both lovers disappeared. XI GATHER YOUR ROSES WHILE YE MAY 145 'This is trifling with life,' Camilla's elder aunt informed her, reproachfully. 'What?' Camilla had cried, with a sudden out- spokenness very unusual to her, ' Trifling with life to decline to marry a man I don't care twopence about ! Come, Aunt Augusta, do you really mean that '? If you do, thank you, I care a great deal too much about my life to trifle with it by doing anything of the sort.' Aunt Augusta, who was at heart extremely senti- mental, was forced to admit the cogency of the reply, and to content herself with reminding her niece, with a sigh, that people, who do not gather their roses while they may, are in danger of not being able to gather them at all. 'Yes, but,' said Camilla, with a pretty blush, 'let me wait till the roses come — the true rose, the rose I really love ; then. Aunt Augusta, you will see me gather it fast enough.' At last it seemed that the real rose was about to make its appearance. Mr. Ambrose came over one day to lunch, and told them that he had received a telegram from Philip, the day before, to say that he had got six months' holiday, and was already on his road to England. Camilla's heart went pit-a-pat, and she VOL. I. L 146 THE CCERULEANS chap. was conscious of a vehement effort to conceal the agitation that the announcement had occasioned. 'You remember my boy, Philip, your old friend/ Mr. Ambrose said to her, ' and the pleasant time we had in Paris ? ' 'To be sure/ said Camilla, trying, with but scant success, to look as if nothing had happened, and with a crimson cheek signalling her consciousness of failure. * What fun we had ; and how M. Got did make us all laugh ! ' M. Got, indeed ! As if the most brilliant perform- ance that ever yet took place at the Comedie Fran^aise weighed for a feather in the balance against the pain- fully interesting drama which was at that moment enacting itself in Camilla's tender heart ; and as if the little hypocrite had not, even then, formed her deep design, and did not, the moment luncheon was over, carry off the unsuspecting Mr. Ambrose to look at her flowers, and from the flowers to walk about with her, in kindly confabulation, in the pleasant, shady terrace under the cedars, for a good half hour, during which Philip's father poured into her sympathetic ear many tender confidences about the much-beloved son, whom he was to have with him again so soon, and many pleasant XI GATHER YOUR ROSES WHILE YE MAY 147 stories of Philip's childhood and youth, such as a loving father might be pardoned for treasuring up in his recollection and imparting to a congenial listener, as Camilla always proved. These two were always sworn friends. She behaved to him with a pretty filial respect, and Mr. Ambrose had, no doubt, often reflected how great a charm a daughter-in-law, such as Camilla, would lend to life. He returned now, all the better for his walk. Camilla, too, came in flushed with hope and joy, such as her aunts had never before seen in her face, usually so calm, often so sombre and unimpassioned. The long, dull, cold winter was over, the golden summer had come. The rose of Camilla's existence — the incom- parable rose — was at last about to bloom ! CHAPTER XII THE TRUE ROSE ' — Thoughts and dreams and sighs — Wishes and tears — poor Fancy's followers. ' The next few weeks proved a trying period to Camilla. She was the prey of a great excitement, which no one around her shared, whose existence no one suspected, or could be allowed to suspect — a great hope, a great fear, — perhaps supreme felicity, possibly a cruel disap- pointment. Camilla did not try to conceal from herself that Philip Ambrose's arrival must mean something of vital importance to her. She had often thought of it, in the far distance, as a turning-point in her existence ; and now the crisis was too near for comfort or tran- quillity. She began to realise of what slender materials her castle in the air was built. It had been a day- dream — vague, charming, unsubstantial, fair with what- ever colours imagination chose to paint it. It had now CHAP. XII THE TRUE ROSE 149 to be reckoned with, face to face, as a solid fact of actual, waking life. The proximity was distressing, and, though Camilla was courageous, alarming. The harsh, hard light of day was beginning to pour on to the fair edifice of moonlight romance. It is one thing to play with an idea in some remote region of might be or might have been. It is another, and a far less agreeable one, to confront it in midway, bring it to exact account, and to be brought to exact account by it. Camilla, the soul of truthfulness, was obliged to admit to her own con- science that she had been romancing. But what is the good of such an admission ? Would it make the im- pending event less eventful? Would it assuage her anxiety ? Would it calm her nerves, which, every day, stood in more need of composure ? Would it save her from agitation, unrest, fear ? Camilla began to feel that the tranquillity of her uncle's house, — the commonplace routine of life, was not, after all, without its advantages. It was dull, uninteresting, uninspiring ; but it was safe ; and there are moments when to be safe becomes a tran- scendent consideration — when, like Falstaff, one feels that one would give all fame for a pot of beer and safety. Camilla had often deplored and despised the tame home-brew of her circumscribed existence. But 150 THE CCERULEANS chap. now it seemed a somewhat ambrosial beverage. In short, she was getting into a regular fright. Then the news came that Philip had actually arrived, and was already with his father, only a dozen miles away ; and Camilla became more frightened than ever. After a few days father and son came over to the Vines to call upon Sir Marmaduke and his sisters. Camilla was speedily relieved of one part of her anxieties. Her childish impressions had not been wrong. Philip was as charming as he had seemed to her at Paris ; he was more charming than ever. His good looks had improved. The years in India had turned his boyish pink and white to a manly bronze. He was stronger and manlier. His active life had given him, Camilla could see, a certain courageous, outspoken, off-hand demeanour, which was very much to her taste. He had an air of success, an air of command, which she felt to be impressive. Philip, his father said, had been representing British rule over a tract as big as an English county. Kuling people for their own good was one of the employments which Camilla felt to be deserving of pursuit, really worthy of the dignity of man — one of the few things in the world which it was really worth while to do.^ It was the work of high natures and an im- XII THE TEUE ROSE 151 perial race. Camilla invested Philip with this imperial glamour. Then Philip was not only very imperial in manner, but he was delightfully kind and courteous. He behaved to Sir Marmaduke with a gracious deference, which had no touch of obsequiousness. He was evidently petting his father to his heart's delight. The two Miss Crofts felt just the same half - terrified, half- pleased amusement at his proceedings that they had experienced in Paris, but could not withstand his ingratiating polite- ness. His behaviour to Camilla made her conscious at once of the admiration she inspired. She knew in- stinctively that to him she was beautiful, transcendent, adorable. He had remembered her all these years and amid all those far-off, mysterious scenes — her, the little girl whom he had half- played with, half- petted for a few days at Paris. He had cherished the recollection of those happy days as she had cherished it. She had never forgotten him ; she had never wavered in her feeling about that recollection. Philip too, she felt, had never wavered ; presently he began to talk about their meeting in Paris, and his recollection was as fresh and vivid as Camilla's own. He had remem- bered his friends, too, in a substantial way, for he had presents for every one — a handsome cane for Sir Mar- 152 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. maduke cut from MuddipoUium forests, with an iron ferule from the MuddipoUium iron-works, and a top of gold that once liad lain buried in MuddipoUium quartz. ' Iron and gold !' cried Sir Marmaduke, greatly flat- tered by this act of attention. ' Yes, sir,' said Philip, cheerfully, ' it is the land of Ophir, you know ; we have gold and iron and virgin forests, and water power enough for the mills of twenty Manchesters. All it wants is development, and that's what we are doing for it — we're developing it.' ' Ah,' said Sir Marmaduke, airing his new possession with great satisfaction, 'development — that's a good business, Philip, and just what a young fellow, like you, should be about.' Camilla, for once, fully concurred with her uncle. And then there were two soft, white shawls for the Miss Crofts, into which the gentle ladies nestled peacefully at once, and declared that they had never known perfect comfort till then. There was, too, a pretty necklace of rough turquoises, strung on a barbaric string, for Camilla, — beautiful, rugged, and full of local colour of its far-off home. Philip gave it to her with such kindly, respectful, affectionate courtesy, that the act and the gift became inscribed in her thoucrhts with the sacredness of chivalrous XII THE TRUE ROSE 153 romance. She carried it off presently to her room, and wept over it some happy tears of pleasurable sentiment, and appeared, wearing it, that evening, — so bright and blushing and radiant, — that the Miss Crofts exchanged furtive glances, and began to guess the cause of Camilla's sudden excitement. The roses, indeed, were blooming thick about her. The fated hour had struck, the long -enchanted sleep of dulness closed, the de- liverer was at hand who should bid her awake to liberty and joy and life. Fortune smiled upon her, for nothing would satisfy Sir Marmaduke but that Philip should pay them a visit at the Vines, and have some partridge shooting. Philip was delighted to come, and enjoyed his holi- day with an intensity of pleasure for which five years' exile in Indian jungles is, no doubt, one of the best of all possible prescriptions. It was exquisite Sep- tember weather, and everything at the Vines seemed to Philip delightfully redolent of the well-ordered peace and plenty of an English harvest time. Sir Marmaduke listened with amused satisfaction to his bursts of un- affected delisjht at all the accustomed sisjhts and sounds of an Ensflish autumn. The truth is that, when vou have been about the world and seen how ninetv-nine- 154 THE CCERULEANS chap. hundredths of mankind are housed, an old English country-house, with its trim gardens and lawns, its immemorial trees and wide -stretching park, with the village nestling at its gates, — the moss-grown church where lord and peasant have worshipped for a thousand years, strikes one as an extraordinary achievement in the w\ay of beauty, magnificence, and comfort. It com- bines so many and such contrasting charms. There is grandeur without parade, profusion without waste, dignity without ostentation. The present seems linked by so many outward and visible signs to the past. There is an air of well-ordered, temperate life — of refined economy — of cultivated and pure enjoyment — of days bound each to each by natural piety — a sort of exquisite propriety everywhere manifest. So, at least, thought Philip, as he drove up to the Vines, and saw its red gables showing faintly through the elms, and compare it with the tumble-down or half-finished palaces, the ruined gardens, the tawdry splendour, the ramshackle finery, the ragged rabble of untidy attendants and pranc- ing liorses of the magnates with whom he had had, of late, to do. Then came some delightful days; mornings with Sir Marmaduke in dewy, fragrant turnip fields, or the new-reaped corn-stubbles, where the barley shocks XII THE TRUE ROSE 155 still stood unearned, and the partridges were lying thick among them. ' These turnips,' he declared, draw- ing a long breath, '' are the best thing I have smelt for an age. We have no good smells in India.' And then, at the right place, there would be lunch, and the ladies would come out and join them; and Sir Marmaduke, having walked enough, and busied with matters at the farm, Philip did not care to go on shooting alone, and would send guns and dogs and keepers away, and sit chatting with his companions in the shade till, soon, the afternoon was old and the evening rays came slanting through the woodland. And then, as the two Miss Crofts could never pass a cottage without going in for a chat, Camilla and Philip would saunter on, homeward, through shady lanes and by cool water-meadows, and so reach the postern gate and the path that led across the park to the terrace of old cedars that skirted the gardens and lawn. 'This avenue,' Camilla said, as they watched the sun's last rays lighting up bough and stem with a golden glory, ' is my pet haunt. It always makes me think of an idea I read somewhere of venerable trees that seem to be pronouncing a benediction, "Grace, mercy, and peace be with you." ' ' I feel as if they were,' said her companion ; ' I shall 156 THE CCERULEANS chap. always remember them as dear and sacred friends, who stood over me and gave me a blessing in some of the happiest moments of my life.' Alas tliat such happy moments should fly so fast ! Autumn was already come, and winter near at hand. Before the spring buds were out Philip would be back again in India, and these golden hours only a recollec- tion ! Some natures, thoudi affectionate and even lovino^, find it difficult to make love. With others, when a charming woman is their companion, the difficulty is not to make it. Philip's difficulty had always been of this last order. The sentiment of delighted homage, which the prevailing deity of the moment inspired, was always strong enough to make anything easier than reticence. It seemed so natural, so pleasant, so inevitable to feel tender and to express one's feelings. Accordingly the various young ladies who had inspired him with this emotion were speedily apprised of its existence, if not in actual language of the tongue, yet by those more subtle, but equally efficacious means of communication with which Nature has provided us. Philip had no taste for solitude. When he admired, he desired that the object of his admiration should know XII THE TRUE ROSE 157 his feelings and should sympathise in them. He was affectionately communicative, and the natural frankness with which his communications were made won him, no doubt, many friends, l^o one, however, of the many charming women who had impressed him, had ever made so strong an impression as Camilla. It was, perhaps, owing to this fact that Philip's wooing proceeded less smoothly than Camilla's friendly attitude and the warmth of his own feelings might have seemed to justify. He was quite sure that he had never known a woman so deserving of homage, so refined, so charming, so exquisite in taste, so noble in mind. But then this exquisite taste might easily be shocked — this nobility had something that rather awed one. Philip was con- scious of being mentally and morally on his very best behaviour when in Camilla's society. How could he have ever dared to kiss her at the Paris station ? Should he ever dare to repeat that agreeable performance? Philip's courage, however, rose with the difficulty of his task, and so did his admiration for its object. For once in his life he experienced the sensation of feeling something more than he dared to express; and this unaccustomed sensation added an intense glow to the fever-heat of his sentiments. He had never felt frisjht- 158 THE CCEliULEANS CHAP. ened at a woman before. Camilla, though sweetness itself to him, made him feel afraid, doubtful of himself, doubtful of his success, doubtful whether he deserved to succeed. So despondency beset him. Then Camilla would come into the room, so radiant with tender beauty ; she moved about the task of the moment with so exquisite a dignity. If she put on a garden- hat, and went for a stroll on the terrace with her uncle, w^as ever a garden-hat worn with such a grace ? Did ever woman walk with a more nymph-like air, or show a prettier foot as she stept across the dewy lawn ? Was there ever so charming a flush of youth, health, and beauty as shone on her face as she came in at the breakfast-room window with her hands full of freshly -gathered flowers ? Then she made tea — with what an ineffable charm did she officiate at that sacred domestic rite ! Philip felt it a sort of pri- vilege to put to his lips the cup which she had filled. He was, in fact, very far gone in love ; and as love has been, ever since the days of Ovid, an affair full of anxious fear, Philip became very much afraid, and being constitutionally unfit to bear any burthen alone, poured the tale of his love and his anxieties into his father's friendly ear. Mr. Ambrose received the XII THE TRUE ROSE 159 communication with more cordial pleasure than Philip had ever known him evince at any previous event in his career — more even than when Philip had won the Newdegate prize poem in his Oxford days. ' My dear fellow/ he said, ' I am delighted to hear of your wish, and I trust with all my heart you may succeed. She is as good and charming a girl as I have ever known. If you could get her, it would be the making of you. But you must take care. What a pity your time is so short.' ' I don't think the time signifies, father ; we know each other very well. My conviction is that she has made up her mind already, but then I can't feel sure which way she has decided.' Had Camilla made up her mind ? So far, at any rate, that she felt a vehement desire that Philip should not bring matters to a crisis between them by an actual declaration, and a distressing apprehension that he would. She liked him very much ; she would have grieved to lose him. His pleasant courtesy, his friend- ship, his devotion were very charming. He brought a great brightness into her life ; he inspired existence with a strong, delightful excitement ; he was very agree- able ; but still the thought would suo-gest itself that he 160 THE CCERULEANS chap. was not the ideal of lier day-dreams. There were feel- ings and beliefs in Camilla's mind which were a great deal to her, to which he seemed to be an utter stranger, unable to make any response. He seemed to take lightly matters which to her seemed very serious — sacred. He passed over with an easy, cynical indif- ference topics which weighed heavily upon her as great problems demanding solution. Her view of the world invested it with a sort of mysterious sanctity — a stage where not to play one's part well and nobly was to miss the very object of existence ; and Camilla's 'well and nobly' meant a great deal — self-sacrifice, self-abnegation, efforts on a grand scale to enrich man- kind and ennoble human life. George Eliot's exquisite profession of faith was to her a sort of daily aspiration, to part with which would be to part with all which made life worth having — ' May I reach That purest Heaven, to be to other souls The cup of strength in some great agony, Enkindle generous ardour, feed pure love. Beget the smiles that have no cruelty, Be the sweet presence of a good diffused, And in diffusion ever more intense, So shall I join the choir invisible, "Whose music is the gladness of the world ! ' XII THE TRUE ROSE 161 This was the kind of aspiration that stirred the inmost depths of Camilla's soul, and made the ordinary lives of the men and women she came across — the dull, frigid, heartless ceremonies of social politeness, the cold, rough struggle of London society, the absurd little pomp of her uncle's house — seem to her an almost intolerable travesty of what life was meant to be. This was her true self to which the true sharer of her heart would make appeal ; these were the vague, blind longings and cravings to which he would give form and substance and definite aim. But nothing in Philip's character tended at all in this direction. She could not by any effort of idealising fancy invest him with those qualities of head or heart with which her sweetest, highest aspirations had affinity. His aims for humanity were circumscribed to the tiny atom of it which circled round himself, his own pleasures, interest, and success ; and especially his own pleasures. The world appeared to be to him merely an ' I writ large,' and the ' I ' was a creature of selfish good nature and aimless self- gratification. He spoke of India as a place where, amid a great many millions of very abject creatures, whose condition — the growth of centuries — it was as impossible to improve as to alter their colour, a man VOL. I. M 162 THE CCERULEANS chap. had to make his way and, if possible, his fortune as speedily as possible. Camilla had been horrified at some pitiable stories, which she had read somewhere, of the tragedies of an Indian famine. Such things, Philip explained glibly to her, were inevitable, quite inevi- table, with a vast agricultural population, living, to begin with, at a level which an English pauper would regard as starvation, with scarcely any railways or roads, and a harvest dependent on a highly variable season. The mortality, vast in numbers — as everything in the East is — was comparatively insignificant — and, anyhow, it was but the effort of Nature to get rid of a redundant population. It was a necessity ; it was even an advan- tage. There was a struggle for existence in which the fittest survived ; the feeble ones, naturally, according to Nature's stern but beneficent law, succumbed. Such explanations struck a chill into Camilla's very soul; she consoled herself as best she could, still shuddering, with the reflection that men's theories were often much harder than their hearts. Still the man, whom one could really love, the ideal lover, would stand in need of no such apologies. On the whole she very much hoped that Philip would not propose, and became, every day, more apprehensive that he would ; and, while ?ai THE TRUE ROSE 163 Camilla was still dealing with it, in her thoughts, as an approaching danger, the crisis came upon her; and Philip was added to the list of Camilla's unsuccessful suitors. Her refusal, however, cost her more than she had anticipated. All the more because she found it ex- tremely difficult to formulate in any language, that did not seem ridiculous and high flown, the reason of her decision. She did not attempt to conceal her Uking for him. Philip must never, never doubt her friendship, her warm friendship, but The reasons why she stopped there were too subtle for expression. They sounded absurd, directly she tried to put them into words. They would seem monstrous to any one who could not understand them. Philip, she felt sure, would never have understood them. What man, ardently in love with a lovely girl, who confessed to, nay, herself professed her friendship, would understand being refused because his aspirations were not high enough, his views about life insufficiently serious, and the political economy of his explanation of Indian famines too coldly scientific? You had only to say it to feel how unnatural it was. Still Camilla felt instinctively certain that she was right, and with 164 THE CCERULEANS chap, xii many tender expressions of regard and wishes for his happiness, and many affectionate heart -searching com- punctions, bound Philip down not to mention the subject again before his departure to India. Then her compunctions became more grievous than ever. Poor Ambrose was dreadfully grieved, but accepted her decision with a touching humility. ' I know,' he said, ' I am not a quarter good enough for you. What fellow could be ? but, for all that, I love you with all my heart. It is a dreadful disappointment — a dreadful grief.' 'It is a grief to me too,' Camilla said, by this time in a very melting mood, and anxious to bear her share in her lover's troubles — ' but it is inevitable, believe me. You must think of me always as your friend.' 'A dear, sweet, cruel, hard-hearted friend,' Philip said, with a sad smile. ' If you would only have had me, with all my shortcomings, I would have tried to deserve you.' He was gone ; and Camilla's day-dream had ended. She was awake ; the rose had faded, ungathered. She was alone again with the stern facts of life ; and very stern and sad they looked. . CHAPTEE XIII CHATEAU QUI PAELE ' She is a woman — therefore to be won.' One of those stern facts was that Camilla would have, in a few days, to meet Philip's father, who was coming over to the Vines on some county business with her uncle. Now Mr. Ambrose touched a very tender spot in Camilla's heart. He was, in one way, her greatest friend. She always found it easy to be confidential with him. He had often talked to her about his books, and the pure and lofty natures with which they had made him familiar. Once, when she had driven over to the Kectory with her uncle, who, as a College visitor, was bound once a year to inspect the church, Mr. Ambrose had taken her into his study and left her there, awhile, happy in a wilderness of books, where every volume and title fiUed Camilla's thirsty soul with rapture. 166 THE CCERULEANS chap. ' What a charming room/ she said, when he returned from the inspection, and found Camilla with a flush of pleasure on her cheek, busy with an open volume ; ' and what delightful companions. I have been reading Marcus Aurelius. Here is a pretty bit 1 ' And then Camilla read aloud — an art in which she, unconsciously, excelled : '"Men seek retirement in country-liouses, at the seaside, on the mountains ; and you have, yourself, as much fondness for such places as another. Still there is no proof of originality in that ; for the privilege is yours of retiring into yourself whensoever you please — into that little farm of your own mind, where a silence so profound may be enjoyed." ' ' Ah,' said Mr. Ambrose, ' that little farm, my dear, is what we all have to guard from profane intrusion. Take care of yours and till it well ; it is a sacred soil. You shall take the volume with you, Camilla, if you like ; and take this one too — St. Bonaventura's Journey of the Sold to God. He too, like Marcus Aurelius, loved " the sacred silence " where none but holy sounds are ever heard. You will find my mark at all my favourite passages. See, here is one which I will give you to think about next time you are alone and in a serious mood : ' ' ' The perfection of recollection is for a man to be so absorbed in God as to forget all else, and himself also, and sweetly to rest in God — every sound of mutable thoughts and affections being hushed."' XIII CHATEAU QUI PARLE 167 Camilla had gone home that afternoon in a happy, peaceful frame of mind. A new window had been opened to her mental vision, with a delightful, serene vista. Henceforward Mr. Ambrose became her guide, friend, and father-confessor. He lent her many a dear volume — his faithful companion from College onward — and Camilla found in them and in him the congenial nutri- ment which fed her natural mood and taste. They met but rarely; but Camilla felt a sort of peaceful con- fidence in his protecting care and thoughtful, sympa- thetic counsels. She had been more open to him than to any one in the world : and now there was a topic on which any confidence between them would be extremely embarrassing. Mr. Ambrose came, sure enough, on the appointed day, and Camilla could see at once that he was greatly distressed. He looked older, grayer, and more careworn. Camilla had always thought him rather pathetic — a gentle, dignified, refined nature, bearing the troubles of life with a patience which scarcely fell short of heroism. These troubles had been many, and now she had added to them, she could see, a more than ordinarily grievous one. He took it, as she had known he would, as a gentleman should meet a reverse. He was politer, 168 THE CCERULEANS chap. gentler, kinder to her than ever, in a way that smote Camilla to the heart. She could not bear the thought that she had grieved him. What a wretch she was so to wound this kind and tender friend ! She felt very- much grieved. She could not, at any rate, let him go away without a word. * I will come with you, Mr. Ambrose, if you will let me,' she said, as he was tak- ing leave of them, ' and walk home across the fields.' Mr. Ambrose was delighted to take her. It was a comfort to be alone with him, yet it was alarming, for, of course, there must be an explanation of what Camilla most shrank from explaining, if indeed it was not really inexplicable. They tried to talk commonplaces; the attempt completely failed. At last in her perturbation she plunged, with the courage of despair, into the dreaded topic. 'I am so very sorry,' she said ; ' you are not angry with me, are you V ' Angry ? my dear Camilla,' Mr. Ambrose said ; * what an idea ! But I am sorry — very, very sorry for Philip's sake, and my own. I own that I should have liked you for a daughter-in-law, dearly. I have always wished and hoped that it might some day come about. I was rejoiced when I found that Philip's wishes and hopes xrii CHATEAU QUI PARLE 169 were the same as mine. Poor fellow — you would have been the saving of him. However ' They had reached the postern gate, and Mr. Ambrose pulled up his horse. Here Camilla was to leave him. She could not speak ; her heart was aching. Mr. Am- brose gave her one of his pathetic smiles. She loved this kind, tender friend, whom she had wounded so badly. She loved Philip, too, after a fashion. Why was she rejecting the gift of these kind, generous hearts ? Her will was wavering. Her heart gave a jump at the thought that she might, by a word, turn all this sad- ness into joy. The two looked at each other, and tears were in the eyes of each. * You are very good to me,' was all that she could say, 'and you may pity me, for I am very unhappy too.' ' Well,' said Mr. Ambrose, with a dismal smile, ' then we are all unhappy together ; for there is Philip breaking his heart about you at the Eectory, and I mind it for him, poor fellow, as much as he does for himself. How I wish you liked him.' ' But I do like him very much indeed,' Camilla said, with vehemence ; ' I told him so. He is a friend — a great friend. Why cannot he be content with that ?' 170 THE CCERULEANS char 'Why?' cried Mr. Ambrose, with more animation than Camilla had ever before known him to exhibit; ' because, my dear, he loves you : wait, Camilla, till you love some one yourself, and then see whether friendship will content you.' Mr. Ambrose sat watching while Camilla let herself through the postern gate and waved him good-bye. As she turned to walk homewards he could see that she was in tears. Then he drove away, somewhat comforted in soul, and reflecting that Philip's chance was not, perhaps, after all, so desperate as he had feared. Camilla had not long to wait before she began to feel that friendship between such friends as Philip and her- self is but a very poor affair. She missed him dread- fully. The house seemed sunk in gloom and silence. The days, with no chance of a visit from him, were appallingly long. The half-pleasurable, half-painful ex- citement was gone, and gone with it, Camilla found to her cost, all that o-ave zest to life. She beoan to doubt the justice of her decision. Was her estimate of Philip a fair one ? Suppose that, after all, her theories of existence were but the fantastic dreams of theorists, mystics, and recluses, and the shock, which Philip's speeches sometimes gave her, only the necessary con- XIII CHATEAU QUI PARLE 171 sequence of contact of the visionary with the real? Might not his way of talking and feeling about things be the natural language of men immersed in practical work, and too busy about it to think about their thoughts and feelings. She had found in Saint Bernard a passage in which the human soul was described as a mirror, in which he, who would see God in it, must keep pure from every speck or stain, and unobscured by any breath of unholiness. But were not such conceptions the morbid dreams of the monastic cell — the hysterical cravings of half- crazy fanatics, scourged, starved, and frightened into a saintly frenzy? Had not human beings — had not active young Englishmen, at any rate, — full of health, strength, and daring, with nerves and muscles of the soundest possible order, something else to do in life than to sit polishing the mirrors of their own self- consciousness, and waiting, like an ecstatic nun, for beatific revelation ? And, as soldiers in the field talk lightly of death, was it not natural that busy men, grappling hourly with practical emergencies, and fami- liar with horrors, should use less dainty phrases, should even think less daintily about them than those whose lives were stirred by no such excitements, no such rude, useful, necessary work? Philip might have spoken 172 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. with an almost brutal levity of an Indian famine, but lie had acted admirably. There had been quoted in the Times a ' Eesolution ' from an Indian Gazette, in which his good deeds were set forth by a grateful Government in no faltering terms. Sir Marmaduke read it out at break- fast. The famine had been in charge of Sir Optimus Maximus, and he had made it historical ; and amongst other topics, which engaged his historic muse, was the admirable zeal and disinterested self-devotion, with which the officials concerned, and Phihp amongst the rest, had busied themselves in camp and hospital and many a far, outlying, squalid hamlet, in combating the dreadful foe. Sir Optimus possessed a rich official paint -pot, and wielded a lavish brush. Each officer received his daub of rose-colour. Mr. Ambrose's hos- pital arrangements were especially commended, as sensible, effectual, humane. 'The warmest thanks of Government are due to this officer for the untiring zeal, wise foresight, and administrative capacity, which he evinced throughout a long succession of difficulties and anxieties, and which rendered his famine camp, despite all its inevitable sadness, a bright spot amid the sur- rounding gloom.' So the Resolution ran on in streams of grateful XIII CHATEAU QUI PARLE 173 panegyric. The fact was that PhiHp Ambrose and a lot of young fellows, finding themselves suddenly trans- formed into almoners-general and poor-law inspectors for a country half the size of England, had set them- selves, with a good will, to meet the emergency as best they might. Philip had ridden his fine Australian horses fifty miles a day on inspection tours, had laid out famine camps, organised food depots, and distributed rice, with the enjoyment that a vigorous lad feels in a piece of important work, and quite unconscious of achieving anything heroic till Sir Optimus's Resolution informed him of the fact. Camilla now read the glowing phrases with a beating heart. This was the man, whose love, so generously proffered, she was rejecting ; and for what reason that was not too fantastic for expression ? Mr. Ambrose, her old and faithful and sympathising friend, who knew Philip better than any one, saw no reason, evidently ; for he urged her to accept him. On the other hand, an obstinate, quiet voice, in Camilla's innermost soul, sounded clear and unmistakable, and counselled refusal. Camilla began to feel desperate, — as if all power of decision were deserting her. Mean- while she was supremely miserable. The days were slipping fast away. In a few weeks PhiHp was to start 174 THE CCERULEANS chap. for India, and then the mistake, if mistake it was, would be irreparable. At last, in her despair, she consulted her Aunt Augusta. Aunt Augusta, under her composed exterior, was a sentimentalist. She had, in her youthful days, had a desperate affair with a penniless curate, in which all her own happiness had been shipwrecked, and of which, even now, she sometimes thought with an aching heart. She had been right on that occasion and her advisers wrong ; for life had been cold and dull and gray to her ever since. She felt about all such subjects with a sort of terror at the pain they may occasion. Camilla found her kind and sympathetic. ' He is a very nice fellow, dear,' she said. * I know that only too well,' said Camilla bitterly, ' but that is not the same thing as marrying him. Do you think I should be happy ? ' ' You are very unhappy now,' said her aunt. ' Yes,' said Camilla ; ' I know that too — as deplorably miserable as any one could be, and I have been getting worse every hour since I refused him.' Aunt Augusta sat looking at her for an instant, awed by a sense of responsibility. Camilla met her look with another of helpless expectancy. Then the die was cast. XIII CHATEAU QUI PAELE 175 'My dear child/ said her aunt, 'sit down here and write to him to come to you at once. You are thoroughly in love with him, but you are frightened.' Camilla burst into tears. ' I believe you are right, Aunt Augusta/ she said ; ' I love him — I know it to my cost — but I am dreadfully frightened.' So Camilla's fate was sealed ; she wrote the letter, there and then, with a trembling hand. Aunt Augusta, greatly impressed with the solemnity of the crisis, and, her match-making propensity mastering all thoughts of prudence, — took charge of it, and, as a precaution against any further wavering, sped it, forthwith, on its way. Camilla stood at the window with a beating heart, and watched the groom go galloping across the park, carrying her fate with him. A dreadful terror seized her, which all Aunt Augusta's exhortations could not allay. She would have recalled the messenger even now, had it been possible. ' Be a little courageous, dear,' said her gentle con- soler ; ' why should you be frightened ? ' ' Frightened ! ' cried Camilla, shivering and pale with excitement, ' I am indeed. Don't you see that I am an arrant coward ? Do all women go through this sort of thing before they are engaged ? ' 176 THE CCERULEANS chap. ' Yes,' said Aunt Augusta, firmly, for she felt that it was no moment to stick at trifles, ' they all do ; you will be as happy as possible when once you have seen him.' And so it proved. Philip, in the course of a few hours, arrived, and speedily put all Camilla's doubts and fears to flight. He played his part as accepted lover with a confident, yet respectful joyousness, which in- fected Camilla with a sudden fit of high spirits. His tenderness was so natural and gay ; his mood was so congenial ; his admiration so heartfelt, that any further hesitation would have seemed a sort of treason. Camilla forgot her coyness, and, in a sudden rush of sentiment, told him all he needed to make him the happiest of mortals. After all, it is delightful to be worshipped, and Philip was an excellent worshipper. Camilla felt remorseful for her doubts, and showed her repentance in a sweet, tender contrition. There was no longer any room for doubt. A happy pair of lovers, they strolled about the garden in a sort of enchantment, and came back to the prosaic realities of life (and dinner at eight o'clock was a solemn reality at the Vines, which nothing short of an earthquake could have disarranged) with the air of favoured beings, to whom the celestial aspect of existence had been suddenly revealed. xni CHATEAU QUI PAELE 177 ' Well ? ' said Aunt Augusta, as Camilla came into her room, radiant and serene, as she had never seemed before. ' It is more than well,' said Camilla, with an air of rapt fervour ; 'he is all that I could wish. Why did I ever hesitate? You were my good genius. Aunt Augusta, when you put these foolish doubts to flight. How can I ever be grateful enough to you ? ' Philip rode home that night in a sort of ecstasy. The silent meadows through which his path lay were enchanted ground. The moonlight seemed a flood of magic radiance. It was no common night — no common world. Life was transformed and glorified. Camilla's sweet, refined nature had inspired him with something higher, purer, more serious than he had ever known before. 'To have loved her,' it was said once of a charming woman, 'is a liberal education.' To love Camilla, to be loved by her, to be the happy master of that noble heart, to read its thoughts, to be admitted to its sacred shrine, was, Philip felt now, a revelation of undreamed-of deliohts — of unimas^ined heisrhts, where privileged spirits move in finer air than that which ordinary mortals breathe. Mr. Ambrose came over the next morning with VOL. I. N 178 THE CCERULEANS chap, xiii Philip, and added to the general rejoicing. Camilla could not have believed that he could look so radiant. ' My dear, dear Camilla/ he said, holding her hand with an air of paternal benediction, 'you have made me very happy.' 'And I too am happy,' Camilla said, giving him a filial kiss — 'and I shall have a very dear father-in- law.' CHAPTEE XIV LAST DAYS IN EXGLAXD ' He kissed my liaud, lie looked into my eyes, And love, love was the end of every phrase ; Love is begun : thus much has come to pass ; The rest is easy. ' Philip's return to India was drawing near, too near to admit of any question as to Camilla's accompanying liim. Even if it could have been delayed, Camilla felt a great disinclination to be hurried from her home and her English life. It was decided in a family conclave that she should follow in the course of the winter, as soon as the business arrangements could be completed and some desirable companions for the journey found. Meanwhile, it was but natural that the young lovers should make the most of the days which still remained before their first separation. These days were very charming, and the charm spread beyond the two people immediately concerned. 180 THE COERULEANS CHAP. Mr. Ambrose had grown quite young again, and lived the days of his courtship once more in his sympathetic appreciation of Philip's good fortune. He had never been gay since the dark hour that closed his own married life ; but now a great happiness had befallen him exactly at the point of his being where feeling was most acute, and his heart was light. Father and son strolled arm in arm about the Eectory garden, descanting on Camilla's character and singing her praises, like a pair of shepherds in an eclogue. Philip learnt now that his father — ascetic as he looked — had once been a lover. He had been in depths of despair at Philip's rejection ; he was now as elated as the young lover himself. Philip had brought him Camilla's portrait, which was to be their part- ing gift, and which, placed on an easel in the study among all the sombre books and faded Oxford prints, seemed to light up all around it with a ray of youth and joy. ' She is beautiful, dear Phil,' his father exclaimed as he stood admiringly before it, ' and it is the best sort of beauty, the fitting shrine of the beautiful soul within ; what sweet eyes, and what a noble brow — ' ' ' Dilated nostril, full of youth, And forehead royal with the truth." ' ' And what courage, father,' said Phil, delighted at XIV LAST DAYS IX ENGLAND 181 his father's congenial mood. 'Eichmond has caught that well, has he not ? — ' ' ' Courage was cast about her like a dress Of solemn comeliness ; A gathered mind and an untroubled face Did give her dangers gi-ace." Camilla has a pretty hand, too, the prettiest I ever saw. I wish it was in the picture.' Mr. Ambrose's thoughts at that moment were busy with other topics than Camilla's hand. He turned to Philip with a sudden gravity; the tears were in his eyes : 'Dear Phil ' he said, ' you have been very fortu- nate. May God help you to deserve your good fortune.' At the Vines Philip's high spirits and joyous love- making spread a sort of brightness over the dull, old house and its commonplace inmates. By a fortunate instinct he did and said exactly the right thing — the nice thing, on each occasion, to each person concerned. The result was that he was a general favourite. Sir Marmaduke's disapproval of the alliance, which at first was pretty emphatic, had been neutralised by Aunt Augusta's judicious diplomacy, and by his own convic- tion — the result of previous experience on similar occa- sions — that Camilla, in such matters, was fanciful, 182 THE CCERULEANS chap. determined, and unamenable to the ordinary influences by which well-regulated young ladies may be supposed to guide their decisions at this critical stage of their career. How it should come about that any woman, out of Bedlam, should prefer a young Indian official, with the certainty of expatriation and the probability of impaired health and great many other drawbacks and discomforts, to a comfortable country gentleman, with a fine park within a dozen miles of her home, or a well- connected clergyman, who had already got a good living, and might, very likely, ultimately become a dean — was one of those mysteries before which Sir Marmaduke's intellect fairly broke down, and which made him think that there must be something radically wrong in the condition of society, when such blunders could be made. On the other hand. Sir Marmaduke rather dreaded an encounter with Camilla's sharp wit, and knew that he was powerless to convince her. 'Are you quite sure that she has made up her mind ? ' he asked his sister. ' I am absolutely positive,' said Miss Augusta — who had now taken the engagement under her special pro- tection, and was committing herself more and more deeply to its success — 'and I trust, Marmaduke, that you will say nothing to distress her.' XIV LAST DAYS IX EXGLAXD 183 ' I shall tell her what I think/ Sir Marmaduke said, decisively ; and so he did, Avith the unpleasing sensa- tion that he might just as well have been addressing one of the marble statues in the hall. Camilla's nerves were brought up to a high pitch ; she was entirely unim- pressed by her uncle's dark picture of the disadvantages of an Indian husband. ' I love him, Uncle ^larmaduke,' she said, * and I love India, beggary, illness, and everything else that loving hmi involves. I would go with him to the end of the world. Pray, say no more.' She held her uncle's hand; the tears stood in her eyes ; her lip trembled with excitement ; she looked the very embodiment of courage and devotion. How oppose such a mood as this with the cowardly suggestions of worldly wisdom ? Sir Marmaduke felt his defeat, and was obliged to content himself with deploring that such a high-spirited girl should be so entirely irrational. ' She looked hke a young martyr,' he told his sister afterwards, * and talked like a fool. She must have her way, I suppose, as her mother did before her.' Sir Marmaduke eased his conscience by resolving to be very firm and exacting in the matter of Camilla's settlement. People were continually asking him to be 184 THE CCERULEANS chap. their trustee, aud he determined that all his experience should be now devoted to safeguarding this wilful young lady's future by every expedient that human ingenuity could devise. One awful morning Philip was summoned to Sir Marmaduke's study, — a dread-inspiring chamber, with a portrait of Sir ]\Iarmaduke's father, as M. H. of the Vine Hunt, on one side, and a statue of Mr. Pitt, turning up his nose at the enemies of his country, on the other ; and here he found the worthy baronet and Mr. Greaves, the family solicitor, drawn up in conclave for the inter- view. Mr. Greaves, a thin, shrewd old gentleman, pro- foundly versed in the affairs of the Croft family, and devoted to its interests, had come down from London for the occasion, and treated it with the solemnity of an affair of State. He congratulated Philip with cere- monious courtesy on the prospective alliance, and was greatly interested in Camilla's fortunes. ' Dear me,' he said, ' I remember drawing her mother's marriage-settle- ment more than twenty years ago. We discussed it in this very room — do you recollect. Sir Marmaduke ? ' ' Perfectly,' said the other, with the air of a man with whom family events were far too important to be for- gotten, and whose standard of what was befitting could XIV LAST DAYS IX ENGLAND 185 not easily be moved ; ' and I am sure I hope this affair may turn out more happily than that did.' ' Well, sir/ said Philip, trying desperately to resist Sir Marmaduke's melancholy tone, ' I am not likely to get killed in battle, am I ? ' ' I am sure I don't know,' said Sir Marmaduke, equally determined to shut out any ray of consolation ; 'in India, I am told, the civilians have frequently to attend military expeditions, and even to lead them ; but let us get to business, Mr. Greaves, if you please.' Philip had been feeling more and more abject ever since the interview began, and was now completely prostrated by having to confess that he had no immediate possessions to settle on his wife. He was entitled to some £10,000 at his father's death, and his father had promised to allow him £300 a year as long as he held his living. Besides this, Philip had a good appointment, and if anything befell him, his widow would have a pension. ' Humph ! ' said Mr. Greaves, and Philip felt his annihilation to be complete. Sir Marmaduke looked stern. The Master of the Hunt seemed to be frowning at him from the middle of the hounds, as if he would like to lay his hunting-whip across his shoulders ; Mr. 186 THE CCERULEANS chap. Pitt's nose was higher in the air than ever. At this stage of the proceedings, however, Sir Marmaduke gave Philip the agreeable information that Camilla was some- thing of an heiress. Her mother's property had been judiciously nursed into a comfortable little fortune. Sir Marmaduke had watched over the investments, in which he had placed his niece's little store, and took a personal satisfaction in its growth. As a banker, he knew of all the good things that were going, and some of them had proved to be very good indeed. Then, one of Camilla's great-aunts had left her a legacy, which had swelled the total of her patrimony, and had grown, with the rest, under Sir Marmaduke's fostering skill. Sir Marmaduke, however, with Mr. Greaves to abet him, now felt it due to the occasion to raise objections and contemplate various remote contingencies and embarrass- ments with an anxiety which appeared to Philip very unnecessary. ' In the event of your predeceasing your wife and leaving a family,' suggested the solicitor with ruthless bluntness, ' and your father (as he may very likely wish to do on account of failing health or fifty other things) resigning his living, what would be Mrs. Ambrose's position ? ' Philip had not contemplated this adverse conjunction XIV LAST DAYS IX EXGLAND 187 of events, and felt completely unable to suggest any proper expedient by which it could be met. ' That is a very unlikely thing to happen,' he feebly remarked. ' My dear young gentleman/ said Mr. Greaves, with a provoking air of superior sagacity, ' when you are as old as I am, you will know that it is just the unlikely things that always happen, and, in any case, the use of a settlement, as Sir Marmaduke well knows, is to pro- vide for the unlikely things. Don't you remember the story of poor Lord O'Eush, who stopped in the middle of making his will to go to lunch, and fell over a step and broke his neck as he was walking- from his studv to the dining-room ? ' ' Good heavens ! ' cried Philip, ' Mr. Greaves, don't tell such fearful stories — you make one quite nervous. I do not intend to break my neck, at any rate, I can tell you.' ' Possibly not,' said the solicitor ; * nor, I presume, did Lord O'Eush. All the same, this is a serious matter, and I don't see how it is to be got over.' It was got over at last by Philip's suggesting that his father's covenant should not be contingent on his retaining his living. Mr. Ambrose, he was positive, would agree to this. ]\Ir, Greaves was constrained to 188 THE CCERULEANS chap. admit, with some reluctance, that if this were so, Camilla's future might be regarded as moderately well safeguarded against absolute destitution. And then Sir Marmaduke announced that he intended to give his niece £2000, to be put into settlement with the rest. At last Philip escaped, with a great sense of reKef, to tlie drawing-room, where Camilla was await- in sj him. 'It is all over, thank goodness,' he said. 'Every- thing is all right, and we are to be as rich as Croesus ; but, Camilla dear, what a dreadful sort of personage a family solicitor is — his mind's eye occupied with all sorts of horrible possibilities. Let us go into the garden and forget him and them amongst the flowers.' ' Poor fellow,' said Camilla, ' you look tired to death. I am tired too. I have had a dreadful morning over my village-hospital accounts — why is it, alas ! that all good deeds involve so much arithmetic ? Come under the cedars, and you shall lie on the grass while I finish Elaine to you.' 'Delightful!' cried Philip ; and so the happy lovers strolled across the lawn, and reached their favourite haunt, and soon forgot their troubles and fatigues in the happy oblivion of propitious love-making. All this XIV LAST DAYS IX ENGLAND 189 part of the business Philip did to perfection ; Camilla could not doubt, at any rate, that, whatever might be his other imperfections, her lover was excessively in love. Philip had not, however, even now arrived at the last of Mr. Greaves's persecutions. That gentleman, it soon became apparent, was far from satisfied, and took a most gloomy view of Camilla's intended alliance. The whole thing, he felt, was rash and inexpedient. His firm were not accustomed to draw settlements in which the prospective husband settled nothing but promises and contingencies, and in which the accidents of life in India had to be taken into account. It was not like Sir Marmaduke's usual good sense to have allowed such an alliance for his ward. Camilla ought to have found a home in one of the county families. He went over to the Eectory and talked about the marriage in terms which Mr. Ambrose, who, in his quiet way, stood im- mensely on his dignity, felt to be covertly disrespectful. Greaves, he found, had been to the India Office and made all sorts of impertinent inquiries about Philip's position, pay, and future pension, as if Mr. Ambrose's word were not enou2;h. When, some weeks later, Mr. Greaves came down to the Vines with the settlement. 190 THE CCERULEANS chap. his dissatisfaction was apparent even to Sir Marmaduke, and excited his alarm. ' What is it you do not like, Greaves ?' he asked, con- fidentially. ' Well, sir,' said the solicitor, ' I go by instinct, and I instinctively doubt young Mr. Ambrose. He looks weak, and is a wretched man of business. He knows nothing about his own affairs, such of them as there are to know. I feel pretty confident that he is in debt, and he will die in debt — men with that sort of expression always do.' Mr. Greaves's warnings, however, came too late. Sir Marmaduke was as much annoyed at an arrangement which he had approved being called in question as Mr. Ambrose had been at the suggested disparagement of his son. ' Suppose now,' Mr. Greaves said, in his cheerful way, ' he dies in some remote spot — Masulipatam, you know, or Chandernagore, or that style of place — with no friends at hand, and with a number of outstanding bills, what a position Mrs. Ambrose and her family might be in! We ought to have provided for it, Sir Marmaduke.' ' Come, come, Greaves,' Sir Marmaduke had answered XIV LAST DAYS IN ENGLAND 191 testily, ' the thing is settled now, and it will do well enough.' All the same he hinted his anxieties to Mr. Ambrose, and Mr. Ambrose to his son. ' What is it that they want ? ' cried Pliilip in a pas- sion. ' I tell you what I will do, father. I will insure my life the moment I get back to India.' ' That is a good notion, Philip,' said his father ; ' I wish you would. I really can do nothing more for you. Go and tell Sir Marmaduke at once what you mean to do.' CHAPTEE XV SINCLAIR ' I have lived As he lives, who through perilous paths must pass, — And lifelong trials, striving to keep down The brute within him — born of too much strength And sloth and vacuous days — by difficult toils, Labours endured, and hard-fought fights with ill ; Now vanquished, now triumphant ; and sometimes, In intervals of too long labour finding His nature grown too strong for him, falls prone — Awhile, a helpless prey — then once again Rises and spurns his chains and fares anew Along the perilous ways. ' An escort was found for Camilla in time to give her the benefit of such approach to cold weather as Coerulea enjoys — in time, too, to initiate her into the horrors of the overcrowded vessels, which, as winter approaches, carry out to India a multitude of officials rejoining their appointments, of wives rejoining their husbands, and of tourists, who in the course of the CHAP. XV SINCLAIR 193 ensuing three months intend to master for themselves, by ocular inspection, the various problems of Indian administration. Camilla was not inspirited by her surroundings. She tried in vain to find them pic- turesque or interesting. A considerable portion of her fellow-passengers bore the stamp of shabbiness ; others were objectionably smart. Several young ladies lost no time in establishing flirtations of a vulgar order ; several married women followed, or, perhaps, set them the example. The Brandons, under whose protection Camilla was travelling, were not much of a resource. Colonel Brandon was a heavy, worn, dull man, whose twenty years as a police ofiicer had left him apparently with few ideas about India, except that it was a supreme misfortune to have to return to it. Mrs. Brandon was gentle and depressed, with occasional flashes of rather dreary amusement at her own misfor- tunes. Her appearance told a tale of hot seasons in the plains, of frequent ill-health and of generally enfeebled powers, on which life was continually making overdrafts in the way of uncongenial effort. Her existence had been too hard, too busy, too hopeless, to allow of any of Camilla's high-flown ideas of self-improvement or em- bellishment. Her heart was aching now for the boys VOL. I. 194 THE CCERULEANS chap. and fjirls, whose school arransjements were an unfailing source of perplexity, and the dearly-beloved youngest born, whom the doctors had said was just too old to confront India in safety, and from whom, for the first time, her mother had been obliged to separate. She shared Camilla's cabin, and soon became confidential. Her revelations were not of an exhilarating order. Life had to her little that was bright. They were dreadfully poor, she told her companion ; her husband's chances of promotion had been, for years, fading away, as one by one the opportunities arrived and passed without result. They were heartsick with disappointment, and had de- termined, with a rather sad stoicism, to hope no more. Their income was barely enough to cover the school bills at home and the current expenses of Indian life. Every month the fall of Exchange was making them sensibly poorer. One of the girls was delicate, and required constant care and every sort of luxury. She ought to have been wintering at Cannes. It was heart- breaking to be obliged to leave her in a shabby comfort- less home, in a chill English suburb. As Charles Lamb said, it is not only the classes known as 'poor' that have to ' drag ' their children up, instead of bringing them up, as richer folk can afford to do. Camilla felt XV SIXCLAIE 195 all this very depressing, dingy, and incompatible with any theory of life which could be regarded as tolerably adequate. Such lives seemed to her merely one long, de- grading struggle with poverty. She was quite relieved to see that Mrs. Brandon cheered up considerably in public, chatted away with vivacity in a daily enlarging circle of acquaintance, did not scorn a valse when occasion offered, and was roused into actual enthusiasm by the private theatricals which some enterprising young travellers extemporised on the quarter-deck. On the whole, she gave Camilla the idea of a rougher, sterner, more work-a-day life, than any with which she had as yet come in contact in the safe, sheltered confines of the Vines — a life whose rough and smooth aspects had alike to be accepted — whose duties, often onerous and unattractive, had, as a matter of course, to be dis- charged, — whose pleasures must be accepted for what they were worth, and made the best of. The idea of any fortunate, brilliant event coming their way, or of life leaving room for any heroic achievement, did not fall within the range of Colonel Brandon's wildest flights of fancy. What a dreary ambition ! What a life, unlit by other hopes than these ! Those flights seldom ranged beyond the chance of acting for a wliile in the 196 THE CCERULEANS chap. appointment of some more fortunate compeer, or the delightful possibility of becoming a head -jailer in England. These good people's story struck Camilla rather sadly. It was like that of some humble member of a theatrical company, not aspiring to, hardly wishing for, a lucrative or conspicuous role, but earning his wages by a conscientious performance of an ungrateful and almost unnoticed part. Camilla began to recognise that life in her uncle's comfortable house was, however dull, a luxurious affair, fenced round from the rude world outside — difterent from the stern, laborious struggle with the prosaic and often ignoble difficulties which beset the existence of ninety- nine hundredths of mankind. She consoled herself with the reflection that the life, at the threshold of which she now stood, was, at any rate, extremely real, and with the hope, which the facts of the case rendered not irrational, that her future husband might be one of the happy few for whom fortune had some especial prize in store. A more solid ground of comfort was that, for better fate or worse, she would now, in a few weeks, be with the man she loved. The Brandons soon found acquaintances on board ; people whom they had known before, or whom they knew XV SINCLAIR 197 about, or with whom similarity of employments, com- mon friends or common anxieties, presently furnished an adequate supply of topics for the sort of conversation that is possible in the hurly-burly of a crowded deck. None of them seemed to Camilla in the faintest degree interesting, with a single exception. One day Mrs. Brandon introduced her to a Major Sinclair, who was on his way to join his regiment at a Coerulean station. ' I am sure I don't know if you will like him,' Mrs. Brandon told Camilla beforehand ; ' I do not like him much myself. He is too intense for my taste, and takes everything too tremendously in earnest. But he is a firstrate soldier, they say, and, moreover, a great reader. He will talk to you about books as much as you please. He will be a comfort to you on this stupid voyage.' And so Camilla found him. He proved an invaluable ingredient in the mild composition of the little temporary world in which, for the next month, she was to live. He had been five years in India and was now returning, not in the best of spirits, Camilla could see, after a year's fur- lough at home. He and Camilla not unfrequently found themselves companions for a portion of those interminable evenings, which the deities who govern that portion of 198 THE CCERULEANS chap. man's destiny have decreed that everybody shall spend in the twilight of a badly -lighted deck. Friendships grow quickly on board ship, and before the voyage was nearly over Camilla found that she had glided into great intimacy with her new-found friend. Sinclair was extremely sympathetic. He looked at the world from much the same standpoint as her own. His theory of life was her own too, only tamed by actual experience — a struggle to ennoble it, to rise above its temptations, to trample down everything that could degrade, to seek high aims. It was impossible to resist so good a claim to her regard. Nor did Camilla feel inclined to resist, for she was very much impressed. Sinclair left on her mind the idea of a more intense character than any she had hitherto met. There was a laboured calmness about him which bespoke an habitual effort at control and compression, and a systematically maintained mastery over feelings, tastes, and passions which were capable of a desperate struggle for mastery. His temper loomed in sight, every now and then, just enough to assert a vigorous existence and to admit accustomed subjection. His opinions were clear, definite, unqualified ; standing, clear, and hard, in the sunshine, with none of the hazy ^v SIXCLAIK 199 atmospliere of indistinctness which gives some minds a convenient intellectual chiaroscuro. His likes and, dislikes, especially the latter, were of the most vehement order. ' Talking to him,' said Mrs. Brandon, * is like being in a gale at sea : his talk exhausts one by its very strength. Other men seem like silver paper to his granite ; but then silver paper is the best for wrapping such smallwares as mine. Major Sinclair is absolutely granitic' Camilla, however, liked the granite, and she found that Sinclair, if he had a giant's strength, had no wish to make a giantlike use of it. He was always delighted to talk to her, and on whatever subject she cliose to start ; he broke off from his books — of which he ap- peared to have an endless supply on hand — with cheerful readiness whenever the chance of doing anything for her, or with her, presented itself He took her out of the crowd for long walks on the upper deck ; he devoted his afternoons to teaching her whist, not the gentle, guileless, and somewhat fatiguing struggle which her aunts and uncle waged through quiet evenings at the Vines, but the profound and exact system of tactics which Cambridize mathematicians have elaborated for a 200 THE CCERULEANS chap. later generation. Camilla soon recognised the dignity of the newly revealed science, and became extremely interested in understanding Sinclair's instructions and applying them. ' They are/ he said, ' the nearest approach, hitherto discovered by mankind, to eternal principles ; anyhow, they are essential to the salvation of whist, if it is to be saved from degenerating into a dull pastime for babies.' ' It is incurring a grave, moral responsibility to play at all,' said Camilla ; * happily I now know my leads, so that I am safe from one set of heresies ; but my con- science is not yet alive to the call for trumps.' It was not into the laws of Cavendish alone that Sinclair found it an interesting employment to initiate his new companion. He was no sooner assured of her fellow-feeling on some points than he seemed possessed by a vehement desire to command her sympathy on all. Camilla found that any difference of opinion between them appeared to give him real concern. He took a great deal of trouble to convince her that they did not really disagree, and was quite uneasy till their agree- ment was clearly made out. Confidence once estab- lished, Camilla found a daily increasing interest in exploring her companion, and in conquering his re- XV SINCLAIR 201 luctance to talk about himself. She discovered in him a vigorous impersonation of the commonplace, but by no means common, creed, in which doing one's duty is the main article of faith and the inspiring sentiment. Fame, success, enjojonent, happiness, all seemed — as she understood Sinclair's modest and unconscious self- deKneation — matters for which he had no ardent as- piration. They were accidents which befell some men, as did wealth, high birth, good health, good looks, or any other piece of good luck ; but they were no objects for serious desire, far less active effort. To perform his appointed task with a scrupulous and conscientious exactness, to get through life without some dreadful shortcoming, to sacrifice whatever was necessary for its performance, to die in the last ditch or on the last bar- ricade — such was Sinclair's ideal of felicity ; no other view of life could render it endurable, or reconcile one to its innumerable vicissitudes. Camilla found his theory of life a graver one than any she had hitherto confronted in real life. That its prizes fell often to un- worthy recipients gave him no pang of envy, no feeling even of annoyance. It was the natural order of things ; and the success of most was too dearly bought to create any feeling but one of surprise that they should think it 202 THE CCERULEANS chap. worth its cost. To a great extent it was a lottery. One lad, loyal, able, brave as a lion, with all the making of a great commander in him, gets knocked over in his first engagement, or dies of sunstroke the day before the battle. Another fellow arrives at the right moment, has the good luck to keep his head clear of the cannon balls, and finds himself a few weeks later figuring in gazettes, and be-praised and be-medalled and be-lettered into fame. ' You know what Othello says of reputation, — "an idle and most false imposition, oft got without merit and lost without deserving." The only sensible thing is not to care two straws whether it comes or goes.' ' But,' said Camilla, ' what about the last infirmity of noble minds V ' That means, or ought to mean,' said Sinclair, ' that it is the last infirmity which a really noble nature ought to have.' 'What!' cried Camilla; 'you would not have men without ambition surely V ' It comes to few of us,' said Sinclair, ' to have a chance of indulging it. Everybody must like the good things on which ambition feeds, but one is much better with- out them. Take public life, for instance, full of delight- XV SINCLAIR 203 ful interest and excitement, of course ; but just look at the sacrifices which it involves — the surrender of leisure, independence, individuality, all that makes life worth having. Look at its struggles, its degradations, its dis- appointments, and, worst of all, its rewards. Fancy working hard at it for twenty years to find oneself a burthen to one's party, politely ignored by one's friends, edged out of a Cabinet, shelved with a convenient sinecure, or banished to a colonial governorship. What a way of spending life ! ' ' Ah,' said Camilla, ' that is for the unsuccessful only ; but then, of course, one is determined to succeed.' ' Yes,' said her companion, by this time warming into his defence of indifferentism ; 'and if you do, is not success, often, the worst misfortune of all ? Has not the function of statesmanship been reduced, as Matthew Arnold says, to " the cult of the jumping cat " ? and is not the most successful statesman he who has the keenest instinct of the way she means to jump, and most encourages her in jumping. Has not the greatest statesman of the day laid it down as a political axiom that the most important duty of a leader is to ascertain the average opinions of his party, and largely to give effect to them ? ' . 204 THE CCERULEANS chap. ' That is from the point of view of self-preservation/ said Camilla, who had learnt from her uncle, at any rate, to be somewhat of a politician. ' A Government has got to keep itself in existence, you know, like any- thing else.' * Yes,' said Sinclair ; ' but from the other points of view, — honour, justice, reason, and the common weal. Are they all to be sacrificed to a degraded opportunism ? Fancy, now, being admired for half a century as the greatest politician of one's day, and ending it all by breaking one's party to pieces in an abortive attempt to dismember one's country, with half your countrymen doubting your sanity, and the other half your recti- tude.' ' That,' said Camilla with a laugh, ' must have hap- pened to some statesman of antiquity, — anyhow, I am for ambition. "A crust of bread and liberty " is all very well ; I have always had an idea that, notwithstanding its perils, the town mouse had the best of it after all.' ]N"or did Sinclair, Camilla found, show a weaker front to the pleasures of life than its ambitions. 'Pleasant things are pleasant of course,' he said; ' but most people make too much fuss about them, exalt them to a philosophy or a religion. I think they are XV SINCLAIR 205 a very poor religion. I suppose it is very prosaic, something wanting in my nature, but that is how they strike me. I see that many things have a charm, a reality, a meaning for other men which they have not for me. Beauty is one of them — in art, in literature, in our mode of life. I cannot worship it. I cannot understand how a man can satisfy himself by making it the end of life, by filling existence with prettinesses, by surrounding himself with elegant trifles, by pro- viding a continuous succession of artistic effects, a series of exquisite sensations. I don't venture to decry such men — very likely they are higher, more refined natures ; but I cannot understand them.' ' But,' said Camilla, ' was not the love of the beau- tiful the chief light of the world till Christianity eclipsed it, or, rather, supplied a new standard of beauty?' ' Yes, and that is why I can least of all understand the sestheticism of people and natures that have drunk the strong drink of Christianity — with its solemn view of man's being, its awful depths, its dreadful menaces, its enrapturing hopes, its saints and martyrs. It seems to me a sort of pitiful falling away — a sinking to a lower level. Existence is to me a grave, rather a grim affair. 206 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. where each one has his load of duty to carry. One can carry it, if one tries, — with more or less success, probably less. One is always making the most hideous mistakes, the most deplorable failures ; the great thing is to try to do one's best. Whether it is pretty or not, seems beside the question. This view is Puritanism, I sup- pose, but the Puritans had a good deal to say for themselves : at any rate I am one myself. The world is too old for the child-play of the Greeks — the broken toys of a Greek nursery, lovely though they be. It can only be done by resolutely shutting one's eyes to the real world around one — its atrocities, its miseries, its dreadful, cruel wrongs — its trampling on the weak — its gross impudent frauds — its rapid passage into the un- pierceable gloom beyond. How can one stand in the midst of such things and be thinking merely of whether one's own little speck is beautiful or no ? It is like the naturalist at Paris who went on arranging butter- flies in his studio all through the reign of terror. I would rather have been out with the fighters on the barricades.' ' Ah,' said Camilla, ' you love excitement ; you have a weak point, you see, like the rest of us.' ' Yes,' said Sinclair, ' I will confess to that common XV SINCLAIR 207 failing of Englishmen. The moments when I have been excited have been the most delightful of my life. But then the excitement must be a strong one, some- thing that really stirs a man's blood.' ' Storming barricades, for instance,' said Camilla ; ' not the discovery of a new butterfly. That is why you chose to be a soldier, I suppose V ^ It is a reason why I have never regretted my choice of a soldier's life, notwithstanding its vexations, its pedantries, its disappointments. You are unlucky, out here, if you do not get a campaign sooner or later, and then all your doubts about your profession disappear. You drink a stronger wine of life than any that can be had elsewhere, and it makes all other drink seem very poor stuff. I was in a charge once, and a half-hour's fight ; it was called a skirmish of cavalry, and history has never deigned even to name it, but I would not have lost that half-hour for a lifetime of quiet existence.' * But after all,' Camilla said, ' that sort of excitement is only a sort of moral dram-drinking.' * Yes,' said Sinclair, ' but it is a dram one gets so seldom that there is no risk of its hurting one, and when you taste it, it is nectar.' CHAPTEE XVI AT SEA * Some unborn sorrow, ripe in fortune's womb, Is coming to me, and my inward soul With nothing trembles . . . I cannot but be sad.' Camilla now came to appreciate the truth that, when once we leave the safeguarded barriers of home behind us, our intimacies and friendships depend on other forces than our own free will. Forcible as circum- stances always are, they are nowhere more irresistible than in the close-packed microcosm of a ship. Camilla had started on the voyage with the desire .and the prospect of a quiet — in one sense a solitary — month. She was longing for solitude. She had passed through a great deal of late, much that was agitating : she had come to a momentous decision, and she wanted to be alone with her own thoughts, and to realise to herself, CHAP. XVI AT SEA 209 in undisturbed reflection, the meaning of what she had done, and what she was about to do. There were many scenes, many conversations, which she desired to recall ; and where could the process of recollection be better conducted than in the enforced idleness and monotony of sea-life and in the solitude of a crowd of strangers ? And all around her were completely strange, as strange as people of another world. The Brandons made no advance to familiarity, nor did Camilla feel inclined to be familiar. Mrs. Brandon, on further acquaintance . revealed nothing that could serve as a common ground for thought or feeling. She was a weary, hopeless woman, scrambling through a fatiguing existence as best she could, with poverty always at her elbow, and the cares of each day more than each day's strength sufficed to meet. Her protests against her lot were not without a touch of somewhat dreary humour ; but her flashes of fun were few and far between. Her thought never travelled beyond the petty interests of a life that was only saved from being ignoble by the sturdy forti- tude with which it was endured. So far as interesting Camilla, or being interested in the things for which Camilla really cared, she was no more than any other of the crowd of unknown beings with whom she was VOL. I. p 210 THE CCERULEANS chap. sharing a month's captivity. With no one else had Camilla even a speaking acquaintance. So, for some days, when she started on her jonrney, she had felt, and was glad to feel, very much alone. Then Sinclair had appeared on the scene, and Camilla, before many days were over, was conscious that she was understood, appreciated, impressed, in a manner which defied in- difference and brought her sense of isolation to a sudden close. Sinclair's strongly marked personality could not be ignored : nor would the current of Camilla's thoughts run on unstirred by the ideas he called to light and the moods which he excited. Camilla had, at first, resented the sort of influence he began to exert upon her, and tried to repel it : but Sinclair, quite unconscious of her efforts, was not to be repelled. Of what use was it to try to conceal from oneself the fact that he had a hundred things to tell her that she cared to hear — feelings to express which stirred a sympathetic pulse — tastes which were common property — convictions which, once uttered, gave the speaker the privileges of a common faith ? Thus, before the Indian Ocean was nearly crossed, Camilla found herself sliding, insensibly, into an intimacy with Sinclair, more real, serious, and far- XVI AT SEA 211 reaching than any she had ever yet formed with any one, except, perhaps, Mr. Ambrose ; and her confidences with him were rather such as are breathed by a disciple into the ear of a spiritual father than the free inter- course of mind with mind. With Philip her intercourse had been too brief, too agitating, too passion-stirred to allow of analysis or even of thorough knowledge. She knew but one aspect of his character — the bright, effusive, mirthful, affectionate, sentimental side. It was a sweet, gentle, lovable aspect. What was the rest of him like ? She had still to find out. But Sinclair, as they sat and chatted through the long evenings, made her feel his whole range of sentiment and belief stamp- ing itself forcibly upon her own mind. He had nothing to conceal, nor would any form of concealment have been compatible with his notion of the rational ends of human intercourse. He bore her alono- with him on the strong current of his own convictions. His theory of life was hard, rugged, even distressing ; yet it had a pathos and a sort of solemnity of its own which sank deep into Camilla's soul. Here, at any rate, was a man who was walking on the heights, unattracted by vulgar aims, unimpeded by vulgar infirmities, stirred, not by enthusiasm — for enthusiastic Sinclair never was — but 212 THE CCERULEANS chap. by a noble instinct and moral chivalry, which was to him a sort of religion. He opened to her an altogether new horizon of thought about the strange country which was to be her future home. ' Read all you can get hold of about Buddhism,' he said ; ' the story of the grandest effort of mankind towards the spiritual, the sublime : it is, to say the least of it, the step-sister, if indeed it is not the mother, of Christianity. That has revolution- ised the western world — has it not ? and given it what- ever of nobility it possesses. Well, Buddhism did the same for India and the East. The story of Sakia-mooni is a foreshadowing, — too close in its resemblance to admit of any explanation but relationship, — to that sacred life which we in Europe venerate as divine. It is a beautiful life, inspired by the same tender compas- sion for the miseries of mankind that has carried Chris- tianity — like a ray of heavenly light — to so many millions of aching hearts. But it is dying as religions do. Perhaps it has reached the stage when, as they say, an expiring creed is like the setting sun ; its rays can no longer give warmth, but only create forms of beauty.' ' Do all religions die then ? ' asked Camilla. 'A great many have died, that is certain,' said her XVI AT SEA 213 companion. ' One may stand in a Buddhist temple — only not ruined, because it is cut in solid rock — and wonder who the men were who prayed and fasted, chanted solemn litanies, or, in the solitude of the monk's cell, tried to come to terms with conscience two thousand years ago. All has gone but the solid rock itself. Do you remember Matthew Arnold's dirge ? — '"The Sea of Faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled. But now I only hear Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, Retreating, to the breath Of the night wind, down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world." ' ' How dreary ! ' said Camilla ; ' but there are sweeter and more inspiring sounds, surely, than that to the ear that is attuned to hear them. There are some tides still, are there not, which run full and strong. Men must have a livinQj creed.' ' Would you like to hear a fine one ? ' said Sinclair, taking up the volume which lay beside him. ' I was reading it when we began to talk. It is as grand as St. Athanasius's, and a great deal easier to understand.' ' Yes,' said Camilla, * let me hear it.' 214 THE CCERULEANS chap. ' It is poetry/ Sinclair said, ' but none the worse for that ; ' and then he began : ' "We stand on a mountain pass, in the midst of whirling snow and blinding mist, through which we get glimpses, now and then, of paths which may be deceptive. If we stand still we shall be frozen to death. If we take the wrong road we shall be dashed to pieces. We do not certainly know whether there is any right one. What must we do ? 'Be strong and very courageous. ' Act for the best, hope for the best, and take what comes. Above all, let us dream no dreams and tell no lies, but go our way, wherever it may lead, with our eyes open and our heads erect. If death ends all, we cannot meet it better. If not, let us enter whatever may be the next scene, like honest men, with no sophistry in our hearts and no masks on our faces." ' ' That is very impressive,' said Camilla ; 'it is like the old Norseman's idea of life being the bird that comes into the bright hall from the stormy night outside, flutters an instant in the light, and disappears again into the darkness. But I object to your description of it as a creed — it is rather the half-desperate courage of a man who has to live without one.' ' At any rate he believes in the mountains, the snow- storm and the precipices,' said her companion, 'and that is something — and more than many men achieve, in the way of belief, nowadays.' ' Well,' said Camilla, ' I am thankful to travel by a lower road and a safer one. A kind hand leads me XVI AT SEA 215 through some peaceful valleys, and I fancy I sometunes catch glimpses of the white presences of the immortals on the mountain side. Life is full of delightful possi- bilities, surely.' ' Yes,' said the other, * but look at its horrid disap- pointments — its dreadful failures, and what they mean in the way of suffering and degradation. Who could be enthusiastic about it?' 'Ah,' said Camilla, 'that is it — you have no enthusiasm, Mr. Sinclair ; you are a pessimist of the worst order.' Sinclair must have been in particularly bad spirits that day. ' Yes,' he said, ' I am a pessimist, so far, that I do not regard life as particularly worth living, or the world and its prospects as brilliant enough to kindle any very ardent hopes. It seems to me a gallery of more or less disastrous mistakes ; and one is so liable to make mistakes, and bad ones, that it is an escape to have done with life before their occurrence. It is like riding a bad horse out hunting in a difficult country — a fall, sooner or later, is inevitable; why should one make the experiment ?' ' Don't frighten me, please,' said Camilla ; ' I am on the brink of one such experiment myself. I am going to be married.' 216 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. 'I know/ said Sinclair, turning pale as he spoke, and with a set look in his face which Camilla had already learnt to interpret as the signal of some unusual effort at self-restraint ; ' pray Heaven it may be one of the successful experiments.' ' Of course/ said Camilla ; 'I intend it to be a splendid success/ 'I hope and trust, indeed, that it will/ said the other. Sinclair's face wore a grave, determined look — the look, Camilla fancied, of a man whose composure is not rest but repression, and whose mental eye is saddened by the prospect of troubles to come. It was a sad look and grave, and brought no ray of encouragement to her anxious soul. She dreaded — she almost hated him, as one hates the prophets of evil. Sinclair said no more, nor, much as she longed for it, did his companion dare to bid him divulge his gloomy thoughts. As the days went by, Camilla became conscious that this reticence weighed increasingly upon her spirits. It was a refusal to be sympathetic exactly where sym- pathy was most needed and could best have been given. It was disappointing to her, and, in her apprehensive XVI AT SEA 217 mood, seemed somewhat ominous that, though their intimacy had reached a very confidential stage, Sinclair never volunteered an observation on her impending marriage — could not, even, be led to do so. She stood greatly in need of reinforcement, such as his sympathis- ing approval would have supplied. She knew, neces- sarily, but little of her future husband — of his character so much only as could be discerned in the commerce of society and the treacherous mirage of a courtship ; of his daily life, work, and habits, as near as possible nothing. It would have been a relief if Sinclair would have said something about him which would ratify her judgment — some expression of friendship or esteem — some story, some act, something upon which her willing fancy might build its edifice of hope. Sinclair knew Philip perfectly, and even had lived in the same house. But, beyond this, he was resolutely silent, and would not take Camilla's hints to be communicative. Eather, her sensitive ear seemed to detect a settled intention to satisfy the requirements of courtesy without saying anything that could gratify her inquisitiveness or throw a ray of light on the common object of their thoughts. Philip, he said, was a great favourite, and had now justified his reputation as the luckiest fellow in the 218 THE CCERULEANS chap, xvi world. He liacl such a pretty drawing-room and sucli lovely old cliina. This was not the sort of thing of which Camilla stood in need, or that it was natural for Sinclair to say on such an occasion, or, indeed, to say at all. Why should the thought of Philip suggest a refer- ence to pretty drawing-rooms and choice pottery ? Why were Sinclair's communications on the subject so ob- viously artificial ? Why did they come to so abrupt a close? Camilla felt it depressing and not a little alarming. She tried to delude herself with the explan- ation that, perhaps, this was the sort of thing that happened when one was married, and that Sinclair would have regarded a compliment to her future husband as an impertinence to herself But no : the explanation, Camilla knew well enough, would not do. It was not a question of compliment. It was a matter of life or death. She wanted to be assured that the man to whom she had given her heart, her happi- ness, her life, was deemed by those who knew him worthy of the trust. This was what she craved for — and on this Sinclair, who seemed generally to read her wishes almost before they were conceived, could not be induced to throw a ray of light. CHAPTEE XVII CAMILLA'S BIRTHDAY ' L'amour fait tout excuser ; mais il faut etre bien sur qu'il y a de l'amour.' Sinclair's silence was not without a cause, tliough not exactly the cause which Camilla's fears suggested. It was not so much his knowledge of Philip's antecedents that made it difficult for him to speak, as his conscious- ness of what was going on within himself. He knew various things about poor Phil which would have gone far to disillusionise his future wife, if she cherished any illusions about him as approaching a lofty ideal of moral perfection. He had in his desk, at that very time, an I.O.U. for sundry thousands of rupees, which Ambrose had given him before his departure for England by way of temporary settlement of an old standing debt. Philip, a year or two before, had been ordered to a station as Sinclair was leaving it, and, 220 THE CCERULEANS chap. with his accustomed magnificence, had offered to take his house, horses, and household belongings off his hands. ' You are not in a hurry about the money, I dare- say V he had added, lightly. ' 'No' Sinclair had said ; 'I am in no hurry ; pay me just when you please.' Philip had taken full advantage of the accorded delay — an advantage which, as the weeks and months rolled by, and the opportunity of paying the debt never presented itself, had often made Philip feel uncomfortable and ashamed. Somehow, whenever he had been on the verge of accomplishing the feat, some untoward accident intervened to stave off accomplishment. ISTow it was a creditor, whose forbearance was less proof against im- patience than Sinclair's, and whose impatience would make itself disagreeably perceptible in ways to which Sinclair would never resort : now it was an alluring investment, in which one might well hope to turn an honest penny by a judicious courage in immediate out- lay : now a run of bad luck at cards or a rash bet : now a new horse, a tempting carriage, a lovely set of engravings, or choice books, happening as bad luck would have it, to be going at the moment for cash, and which Philip could not bring himself to do without, — XVII CAMILLA'S BIETHDAY 221 had swept away the sum with which he had meant to set himself straight with Sinclair. So a year had passed, and when Sinclair had gone to England and had asked for the money, Philip had been constrained, with shame and confusion, to confess his inability to pay, and to give his creditor this wretched I.O.U. by way of assuring future liquidation. What business, Sinclair had asked himself, had Philip to be going holiday-making to Eng- land with such a debt unpaid ? Still more, what busi- ness had he to marry while that and other debts, of which pretty persistent rumours were floating about Coerulean society, were hanging about his neck? It would have been easy enough, however, to ignore all these as well as other indications of Philip's frailty and to give him whatever support, in his future wife's esteem, might be derived from a generous acknowledg- ment of his good points. But the problem that was beginning to force itself on Sinclair's mind was less simple, and its solution was replete with embarrassing struggles and alternatives. That problem was, What is the duty of a punctilious man of honour when he discovers that he is falling, or perhaps has fallen, in love with a woman, whose faith is pledged to another, that other being, from the necessities of the case, absent 222 THE CCERULEANS chap. and unable to protect his own interests? Sinclair's creed, his tastes, his temj)erament, his sturdy habit of self-control, of choosing, when in doubt, the least agree- able course of conduct — all conspired to give a clear, concise reply. He must turn from the idea, conscience said, as from any of the pleasant temptations to mean- ness, self-indulgence, and dishonour with which life abounds. The woman who was his temptation now was as good as married. She was alone ; she was defenceless ; the man, to whom her love was given and whose presence would have been her best protection, was, through no fault of his, absent. She was at that critical stage when doubt and fear must ever be close at hand. Could it be right to play upon such doubts and fears to one's own advantage ? Supposing Camilla was induced to change her mind, would not the act be one which cynics were used to quote as a typical in- stance of woman's frail purpose and varying mood? Supposing the positions to be reversed, and Am- brose to have done to him what he was now tempted to do to Ambrose; what would he have felt? No. Honour, conscience, and chivalry pronounced it im- possible. It is so easy to say impossible ; but when the impos- XVII CAMILLA S BIRTHDAY 223 sible thing happens to be one's heart's desire, the one par- ticular atom of the universe which makes the difference between joy and woe, between life being a dreary void — flat, dull, unprofitable, as Hamlet found it — or a dream of rapture, ablaze with unimagined delights — then one scrutinises the impossibility with more minuteness ; and differences begin to be discernible. A woman's engagement, after all, is no vow, especially her engage- ment to a man who courts her for a few weeks in the course of a holiday run to England. She knows — she can know — next to nothing of him. Is she not entitled to whatever additional knowledge Fortune may bring within her reach before the irretrievable step is taken and her doom finally sealed? If there be cause for doubt, by what law is one bound to conceal it ? nay, rather, is not concealment the cowardly act of an accom- plice ? * Ambrose,' said the inward voice, ' will never make her happy, and you know it. In moral, intel- lectual fibre, in taste and tone, in earnestness of purpose, in purity of character, above all, in delicacy of con- science, she is worlds above him : she will discover her mistake, her fatal mistake, when it is too late. Can it be wrong, is it not rather a sacred duty to undeceive her, while disillusion can bring something besides regret 224 THE CGEEULEANS chap. and misery? Why stand by, like a fool and coward, with folded hands, and see her happiness and your own shipwrecked ? Serious questions indeed, and difficult to answer, except in the way that Sinclair wished with a vehemence that rendered all calm reasoning impos- sible. He could only turn fiercely away from the delightful seduction. He would never be a poacher. The prize was Ambrose's, worthy or not, and Sinclair resolved that his should never be the hand to snatch it enviously away. Camilla had made her choice, and one could, after all, only conjecture as to the causes by which that choice was influenced. She had never given him the least pretext to intrude within that region of her thoughts. What right had he to do so ? His inti- macy, he resolved, should go no farther. So Sinclair resolved ; and having resolved, became forthwith convinced of the futility of his resolution. The very consciousness of it left no room in his mind for any other thought. He went sternly to his cabin and got out a huge treatise on Modern Siege Operations, which he had destined to be the pUce de rdsistance of his voyage, but which, somehow, till now had remained uncut. It was one thing to cut the pages with a deter- mined hand ; another to re-establish the serene passivity XVII CAmLLA S BIRTHDAY 225 of mind, when the intellect will play its part and each function of the brain work harmoniously to the desired result. Where this is not, — when the soul's citadel is in disorder, what dust and ashes do the materials of thought become ; what a mockery the attempt to bid intellect perform its accustomed duties. Sinclair plunged heroic- ally into the law of trajectories, and forced his way from formula to formula, from one dreary exposition to another, and only realised, in doing so, how bootless is the attempt to make the mind work as if it were a mechanical instrument, regardless of its environment of flesh and blood, of nerves and tissues, of hopes that stimulate and passions that consume. A man may fill his eye's retina with engineer's diagrams and the serried millions of the mathematician's art ; but the mind's eye, who shall dictate what it shall see, what visions shall brighten it with rapture or dim it with misery? So Sinclair found now, as he sat through weary hours, furious with his own weakness, and read or seemed to read. In vain he bent himself to his book, and forced his attention to the page, continually growing more and more unmeaning. It was in vain : one face — why lie to oneself any longer about it ? — one dear, sweet face shone through it all — one voice was the only sound that VOL. I. Q 226 THE CGERULEANS chap. Sinclair cared to hear — one look, one word from her, his very soul was longing for it with an intensity which only burnt the hotter for every attempt to ignore it. He shut up his book with a groan ; and as he shut it Mrs. Brandon's voice from overhead summoned hun to come on deck and join her party. ' Pray come and talk to us,' she said, as he joined them, ' and help us through this dreary afternoon.' Camilla looked up from her book with the kindest, brightest smile of welcome. No suspicion of Sinclair's predicament had, it was obvious, crossed her mind. She made no secret of her pleasure at his arrival ; why should she ? ' Yes,' she said, closing her book; 'I have had enough — too much of the Eenaissance for to-day. Mrs. Brandon and I both want badly to be amused; and why have you been deserting us all day?' ' Deserting you ?' said Sinclair, in consternation at the prompt discovery of his intention, ' no, indeed ; but I have been deserting my profession shamefully of late, thanks to too pleasant companions. Look at this por- tentous volume which I have vowed to finish before we reach India — all but the first dozen pages uncut.' ' Well,' said Mrs. Brandon, ' you chose a bad day to xvir CAMILLA S BIRTHDAY 227 begin, for you must know tliat we are keeping high holiday to-day, and want it to be as pleasant as possible.' Camilla was in her brightest, most joyous mood. Sinclair had never seen her looking so serene, so satis- fied and hopeful — so bright with that most ef&cacious of female embellishments, the certainty of being loved. ' Yes,' she said, ' it is my birthday, and I want you to wish me joy. I have had a very happy day — a letter and a beautiful present, and I am in the best of spirits.' And with this Camilla showed a little Indian gem that sparkled at her neck, and told him how it had been in the captain's custody since Aden, and how she had found it on her pillow that morning, on waking, with the letter — a pleasant surprise. ' So, you see,' she said, * I have a right to be in good spirits, have I not ? and that my friends should wish me many happy returns of a day as bright as this one.' ' And I do,' said Sinclair, valiantly rising to the occasion, 'wish you all joy from the bottom of my heart. Well, how are we to celebrate the day as it deserves ? ' * By a rubber,' said Mrs. Brandon, who never lost a chance of her favourite amusement. ' Go and wake 228 THE CCERULEANS CHAP. my lazy Colonel, who is asleep there m the easy chair/ * Yes/ said Camilla, who, fancying that Sinclair was in bad spirits, wanted to be especially kind to him, ' and we will be partners, if you please. Major Sinclair, and retrieve our yesterday's defeat.' Sinclair's resolutions had been heroic, and Fortune, to reward his heroism, decreed that it should be his fate, after dinner, to take Camilla for a walk, and to sit by her side, in a sort of enchantment, through a long evening, on the outskirts of an amateur concert, the charms of which were not lessened by a little distance — a distance sufficient to allow of subdued conversation without discourtesy to the performers. Camilla was joyful, longing for sympathy, and in a more than usually courageous mood. ' I want you to be very nice to me to-night,' she said, ' and to say exactly the sort of things I want to hear — to make the day perfect. Talk to me about my future life.' ' And your future husband,' said Sinclair, determined to go through the business heroically. ' That is what you really mean, is it not ? Well, now let us see. He is one of the best liked men in India, and a general XVII Camilla's birthday 229 favourite. You will find yourself in the midst of friends.' ' That will be nice/ said Camilla ; ' go on in that way, please.' * But I can only tell you what you know,' said her companion. ' He is very bright and clever, of course — you know that.' 'Yes,' said Camilla; * everybody, I believe, thinks him that.' *Yes,' said Sinclair, 'and very charming in society. You are not the first young lady who has thought him adorable.' * I dare say not,' cried Camilla, mentally rejoicing in the plenitude of her own good fortune; 'and now to reward you for being so nice, I will show you something that came this morning in my letter : would you like to see his photograph ? ' ' Immensely,' said Sinclair, only too glad to purchase Camilla's approval at any price. ' Well, he looks rather adorable, I admit. What business has a man to be so picturesque, I should like to know ! But he is a fortun- ate fellow, as I always say.' ' And deserves his good fortune,' cried Camilla, glee- fuUy. 230 THE CCEKULEANS chap, xvn ' No/ said Sinclair, firmly ; ' I will not say that, even to please you. No man, in my opinion, could do that; but it is something to be fortunate — deserve it or no.' * Well,' cried Camilla, in the best of spirits, ' I main- tain that he deserves it ; I ought to know, ought I not ? My letter this morning was a treasure.' Phil's birthday epistle had, in fact, been a very pretty bit of love-making — as bright and natural and full of affectionate nonsense as any young woman could wish to have it. The historic muse shall not desecrate it by revelation to any other eyes than those for which it was intended. Suffice it to say that Camilla had stolen down to her cabin, more than once in the course of that happy day, to reassure herself, by reperusal, of its delightfulness, and had wept some happy tears of joy and gratitude over each loving phrase. It had been indeed a golden day. 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