Part 8 (2/2)
Alphen is a straggling line of houses by a ca.n.a.l. They are all well sized, and even with some pretension to gentility, with long gardens sloping to the water, and shady coverts of trees. Master Wishart's stood in the extreme end, apart from the rest, low-built, with a doorway with stuccoed pilasters. It was a place very pleasant to look upon, and save for its flatness, I could have found it in my heart to choose it for a habitation. But I am hill-bred, and must have rough, craggy land near me, else I weary of the finest dwelling. Master Wishart dwelt here, since he had ever a pa.s.sion for the growing of rare flowers, and could indulge it better here than in the town of Leyden. He was used to drive in every second day in his great coach, for he lectured but three times a week.
A serving-man took my horse from me, and, along with Nicol, led them to the stable, having directed me where, in the garden, I should find my host. I opened a gate in a quickset hedge, and entered upon the most beautiful pleasure-ground that I had ever beheld. A wide, well-ordered lawn stretched straitly down to the very brink of the ca.n.a.l, and though, as was natural at that season of the year, the gra.s.s had not come to its proper greenness, yet it gave promise of great smoothness and verdure.
To the side of this, again, there ran a belt of low wood, between which and the house was a green all laid out into flower beds, bright even at that early time with hyacinths and jonquils. Below this the low wood began again, and continued to the borders of the garden, full of the most delightsome alleys and shady walks. From one of these I heard voices, and going in that direction, I came of a sudden to a handsome arbour, at the side of which flowered the winter-jasmine, and around the door of which, so mild was the day, some half-dozen men were sitting.
My host, Master Wishart, was a short, spare man, with a long face adorned with a well-trimmed beard. He had the most monstrous heavy brows that I have ever seen, greater even than those of our Master Sandeman, of whom the students were wont to say that his eyebrows were heather-besoms. His eyes twinkled merrily when he spoke, and but for his great forehead no one might have guessed that he stood in the presence of one of the most noted of our schoolmen.
He rose and greeted me heartily, bidding me all welcome to Alphen, saying that he loved to see the sight of a Scots face, for was he not an exile here like the Jews by the waters of Babylon? ”This is Master John Burnet of Barns,” said he, presenting me to a very grave and comely man some ten years my senior, ”who has come all the way from Tweedside to drink at our Pierian Spring.” The other greeted me, looked kindly at me for a second, and then asked me some question of my family; and finding that a second cousin of his own on his mother's side had once married one of my race, immediately became very gracious, and condescended to tell me his opinions of the land, which were none so good. He was, as I did not know till later, Sir William Crichtoun of Bourhope; that Sir William who in after times was slain in the rout at Cromdale when the forces of Buchan and Cannon were caught unawares on the hillside.
I had leisure now to look around me at the others, and a motley group they were. There was Quentin Markelboch, the famous physician of Leyden, who had been pointed out to me in the street some days before, a little, round-bellied man with an eye of wondrous shrewdness. There was likewise Master Jardinius, who had lectured on philosophy at one time in the college, but had now grown too old for aught save sitting in the sun and drinking Schiedam-which, as some said, was no great pity. But the one I most marked was a little, fiery-eyed, nervous man, Pieter van Mieris by name, own cousin to the painter, and one who lived for nothing else than to fight abstruse metaphysical quarrels in defence of religion, which he believed to be in great peril from men of learning, and, but for his exertions on its behalf, to be unable to exist. It was he who first addressed me.
”I have heard that the true religion is wondrous pure in your land, Master Burnet, and that men yet wors.h.i.+p G.o.d in simple fas.h.i.+on, and believe in Him without subtleties. Is that so, may I beg of you to tell me?”
”Ay,” I answered, ”doubtless they do, when they wors.h.i.+p Him at all.”
”Then the most pernicious heresy of the pervert Arminius has not yet penetrated to your sh.o.r.es, I trust, nor Pelagianism, which, of old, was the devil's wile for simple souls?”
”I have never heard of their names,” I answered bluntly. ”We folk in Scotland keep to our own ways, and like little to import aught foreign, be it heresy or strong ale.”
”Then,” said my inquisitor triumphantly, ”you are not yet tainted with that most vile and pernicious heresy of all, with which one Baruch Spinoza, of accursed memory, has tainted this land?”
I roused myself at the name, for this was one I had heard often within the past few weeks, and I had a great desire to find out for myself the truth of his philosophy.
”I am ashamed to confess,” I said, ”that I have read none of his writings, that I scarcely know his name. But I would be enlightened in the matter.”
”Far be it from me,” said the little man earnestly, ”to corrupt the heart of any man with so pernicious a doctrine. Rather close thy cars, young man, when you hear anyone speak his name, and pray to G.o.d to keep you from danger. 'Tis the falsest admixture of the Jewish heresy with the sc.u.m of ancient philosophy, the vain imaginings of man stirred up by the Evil One. The man who made it is dead, and gone to his account, but I would that the worthy magistrates had seen fit to gibbet him for a warning to all the fickle and light-minded. Faugh, I cannot bear to pollute my mouth with his name.”
And here a new voice spoke.
”The man of whom you speak was so great that little minds are unable to comprehend him. He is dead, and has doubtless long since learned the truth which he sought so earnestly in life. I am a stranger, and I little thought to hear any Hollander speak ill of Baruch Spinoza, for though G.o.d, in his mercy, has given many good gifts to this land, He has never given a greater than him. I am no follower of his, as they who know me will bear witness, but I firmly believe that when men have grown wiser and see more clearly, his name will s.h.i.+ne as one of the lights of our time, brighter, may be, even than the great Cartesius.”
The speaker was but newly come, and had been talking with my host when he heard the declamation of Master van Mieris. I turned to look at him and found a tall, comely man, delicately featured, but with a chin as grim as a marshal's. He stood amid the crowd of us with such an easy carriage of dignity and breeding that one and all looked at him in admiration. His broad, high brow was marked with many lines, as if he had schemed and meditated much. He was dressed in the pink of the fas.h.i.+on, and in his gestures and tones I fancied I discerned something courtier-like, as of a man who had travelled and seen much of courts and kings.h.i.+ps. He spoke so modestly, and withal so wisely, that the unhappy Pieter looked wofully crestfallen, and would not utter another word.
A minute later, finding Master Wishart at hand, I plucked him by the sleeve.
”Tell me, who is that man there, the one who spoke?”
”Ah,” said he, ”you do not know him, perhaps you do not know his name; but be sure that when you are old you will look back upon this day with pleasure, and thank Providence for bringing you within sight of such a man. That is the great Gottfried Leibnitz, who has been dwelling for a short s.p.a.ce in London, and now goes to Hanover as Duke Frederick's councillor.”
But just at this moment all thoughts of philosophy and philosophers were banished from my mind by the sudden arrival of a new guest. This was no other than the worthy professor of Greek, Master Quellinus, who came in arrayed in the coa.r.s.est clothes, with a gigantic basket suspended over his shoulders by a strap, and a rod like a weaver's beam in his hand. In truth the little man presented a curious sight. For the great rod would not stay balanced on his shoulders, but must ever slip upward and seriously endanger the equipoise of its owner. His boots were very wide and splashed with mud, and round the broad-brimmed hat which he wore I discerned many lengths of horsehair. My heart warmed to the man, for I perceived he was a fellow-fisherman, and, in that strange place, it was the next best thing to being a fellow Scot.
He greeted us with great joviality. ”A good day to you, my masters,” he cried; ”and G.o.d send you the ease which you love. Here have I been bearing the heat and burden of the day, all in order that lazy folk should have carp to eat when they wish it. Gad, I am tired and wet and dirty, this last beyond expression. For Heaven's sake, Master Wishart, take me where I may clean myself.”
The host led the fisherman away, and soon he returned, spruce and smiling once more. He sat down heavily on a seat beside me. ”Now, Master Burnet,” says he, ”you must not think it unworthy of a learned Grecian to follow the sport of the angle, for did not the most famous of their writers praise it, not to speak of the example of the Apostles?”
I tried hard to think if this were true.
”Homer, at any rate,” I urged, ”had no great opinion of fish and their catchers, though that was the worse for Homer, for I am an angler myself, and can understand your likings.”
<script>