chapter 7.
at castle dacre
the moment that was to dissolve the spell which had combined and enchanted so many thousands of human beings arrived. nobles and nobodies, beauties and blacklegs, dispersed in all directions. the duke of burlington carried off the french princes and the protocolis, the bloomerlys and the vaticans, to his paradise of marringworth. the fitz-pompeys cantered off with the shropshires; omen of felicity to the enamoured st. maurice and the enamouring sophy. annesley and squib returned to their patés. sir lucius and lady aphrodite, neither of them with tempers like summer skies, betook their way to cambridgeshire, like adam and eve from the glorious garden. the duke of st. james, after a hurried visit to london, found himself, at the beginning of october, on his way to dacre.
as his carriage rolled on he revelled in delicious fancies. the young duke built castles not only at hauteville, but in less substantial regions. reverie, in the flush of our warm youth, generally indulges in the future. we are always anticipating the next adventure and clothe the coming heroine with a rosy tint. when we advance a little on our limited journey, and an act or two of the comedy, the gayest in all probability, are over, the wizard memory dethrones the witch imagination, and ’tis the past on which the mind feeds in its musings. ’tis then we ponder on each great result which has stolen on us without the labour of reflection; ’tis then we analyse emotions which, at the time, we could not comprehend, and probe the action which passion inspired, and which prejudice has hitherto defended. alas! who can strike these occasional balances in life’s great ledger without a sigh! alas! how little do they promise in favour of the great account! what whisperings of final bankruptcy! what a damnable consciousness of present insolvency! my friends! what a blunder is youth! ah! why does truth light her torch but to illume the ruined temple of our existence! ah! why do we know we are men only to be conscious of our exhausted energies!
and yet there is a pleasure in a deal of judgment which your judicious man alone can understand. it is agreeable to see some younkers falling into the same traps which have broken our own shins; and, shipwrecked on the island of our hopes, one likes to mark a vessel go down full in sight. ’tis demonstration that we are not branded as cains among the favoured race of man. then giving advice: that is delicious, and perhaps repays one all. it is a privilege your grey-haired signors solely can enjoy; but young men now-a-days may make some claims to it. and, after all, experience is a thing that all men praise. bards sing its glories, and proud philosophy has long elected it her favourite child. ’tis the ‘rò kaxàv’, in spite of all its ugliness, and the elixir vit?, though we generally gain it with a shattered pulse.
no more! no more! it is a bitter cheat, the consolation of blunderers, the last refuge of expiring hopes, the forlorn battalion that is to capture the citadel of happiness; yet, yet impregnable! oh! what is wisdom, and what is virtue, without youth! talk not to me of knowledge of mankind; give, give me back the sunshine of the breast which they o’erclouded! talk not to me of proud morality; oh! give me innocence!
amid the ruins of eternal rome i scribble pages lighter than the wind, and feed with fancies volumes which will be forgotten ere i can hear that they are even published. yet am i not one insensible to the magic of my memorable abode, and i could pour my passion o’er the land; but i repress my thoughts, and beat their tide back to their hollow caves!
the ocean of my mind is calm, but dim, and ominous of storms that may arise. a cloud hangs heavy o’er the horizon’s verge, and veils the future. even now a star appears, steals into light, and now again ’tis gone! i hear the proud swell of the growing waters; i hear the whispering of the wakening winds; but reason lays her trident on the cresting waves, and all again is hushed.
for i am one, though young, yet old enough to know ambition is a demon; and i fly from what i fear. and fame has eagle wings, and yet she mounts not so high as man’s desires. when all is gained, how little then is won! and yet to gain that little how much is lost! let us once aspire and madness follows. could we but drag the purple from the hero’s heart; could we but tear the laurel from the poet’s throbbing brain, and read their doubts, their dangers, their despair, we might learn a greater lesson than we shall ever acquire by musing over their exploits or their inspiration. think of unrecognised caesar, with his wasting youth, weeping over the macedonian’s young career! could pharsalia compensate for those withering pangs? view the obscure napoleon starving in the streets of paris! what was st. helena to the bitterness of such existence? the visions of past glory might illumine even that dark-imprisonment; but to be conscious that his supernatural energies might die away without creating their miracles: can the wheel or the rack rival the torture of such a suspicion? lo! byron bending o’er his shattered lyre, with inspiration in his very rage. and the pert taunt could sting even this child of light! to doubt of the truth of the creed in which you have been nurtured is not so terrific as to doubt respecting the intellectual vigour on whose strength you have staked your happiness. yet these were mighty ones; perhaps the records of the world will not yield us threescore to be their mates! then tremble, ye whose cheek glows too warmly at their names! who would be more than man should fear lest he be less.
yet there is hope, there should be happiness, for them, for all. kind nature, ever mild, extends her fond arms to her truant children, and breathes her words of solace. as we weep on her indulgent and maternal breast, the exhausted passions, one by one, expire like gladiators in yon huge pile that has made barbarity sublime. yes! there is hope and joy; and it is here!
where the breeze wanders through a perfumed sky, and where the beautiful sun illumines beauty.
on the poet’s farm and on the conqueror’s arch thy beam is lingering! it lingers on the shattered porticoes that once shrouded from thy o’erpowering glory the lords of earth; it lingers upon the ruined temples that even in their desolation are yet sacred! ’tis gone, as if in sorrow! yet the woody lake still blushes with thy warm kiss; and still thy rosy light tinges the pine that breaks the farthest heaven!
a heaven all light, all beauty, and all love! what marvel men should worship in these climes? and lo! a small and single cloud is sailing in the immaculate ether, burnished with twilight, like an olympian chariot from above, with the fair vision of some graceful god!
it is the hour that poets love; but i crush thoughts that rise from out my mind, like nymphs from out their caves, when sets the sun. yes, ’tis a blessing here to breathe and muse. and cold his clay, indeed, who does not yield to thy ausonian beauty! clime where the heart softens and the mind expands! region of mellowed bliss! o most enchanting land!
but we are at the park gates.
they whirled along through a park which would have contained half a hundred of those patagonian paddocks of modern times which have usurped the name. at length the young duke was roused from his reverie by carlstein, proud of his previous knowledge, leaning over and announcing —
‘chateau de dacre, your grace!’
the duke looked up. the sun, which had already set, had tinged with a dying crimson the eastern sky, against which rose a princely edifice. castle dacre was the erection of vanbrugh, an imaginative artist, whose critics we wish no bitterer fate than not to live in his splendid creations. a spacious centre, richly ornamented, though broken, perhaps, into rather too much detail, was joined to wings of a corresponding magnificence by fanciful colonnades. a terrace, extending the whole front, was covered with orange trees, and many a statue, and many an obelisk, and many a temple, and many a fountain, were tinted with the warm twilight. the duke did not view the forgotten scene of youth without emotion. it was a palace worthy of the heroine on whom he had been musing. the carriage gained the lofty portal. luigi and spiridion, who had preceded their master, were ready to receive the duke, who was immediately ushered to the rooms prepared for his reception. he was later than he had intended, and no time was to be unnecessarily lost in his preparation for his appearance.
his grace’s toilet was already prepared: the magical dressing-box had been unpacked, and the shrine for his devotions was covered with richly-cut bottles of all sizes, arranged in all the elegant combinations which the picturesque fancy of his valet could devise, adroitly intermixed with the golden instruments, the china vases, and the ivory and rosewood brushes, which were worthy even of delcroix’s exquisite inventions.
the duke of st. james was master of the art of dress, and consequently consummated that paramount operation with the decisive rapidity of one whose principles are settled. he was cognisant of all effects, could calculate in a second all consequences, and obtained his result with that promptitude and precision which stamp the great artist. for a moment he was plunged in profound abstraction, and at the same time stretched his legs after his drive. he then gave his orders with the decision of wellington on the arrival of the prussians, and the battle began.
his grace had a taste for magnificence in costume; but he was handsome, young, and a duke. pardon him. yet today he was, on the whole, simple. confident in a complexion whose pellucid lustre had not yielded to a season of dissipation, his grace did not dread the want of relief which a white face, a white cravat, and a white waistcoat would seem to imply.
a hair chain set in diamonds, worn in memory of the absent aphrodite, and to pique the present dacre, is annexed to a glass, which reposes in the waistcoat pocket. this was the only weight that the duke of st. james ever carried. it was a bore, but it was indispensable.
it is done. he stops one moment before the long pier-glass, and shoots a glance which would have read the mind of talleyrand. it will do. he assumes the look, the air that befit the occasion: cordial, but dignified; sublime, but sweet. he descends like a deity from olympus to a banquet of illustrious mortals.