Part 11 (1/2)

”Pray what do you think, Mr. Bunting? Why do you hesitate?”

”'Fraid of offence--but I do think that Master Aram--your honour understands--howsomever Squire's daughter too great a match for such as he!”

Walter did not answer; and the garrulous old soldier, who had been the young man's playmate and companion since Walter was a boy; and was therefore accustomed to the familiarity with which he now spoke, continued, mingling with his abrupt prolixity an occasional shrewdness of observation, which shewed that he was no inattentive commentator on the little and quiet world around him.

”Free to confess, Squire Walter, that I don't quite like this larned man, as much as the rest of 'em--something queer about him--can't see to the bottom of him--don't think he's quite so meek and lamb-like as he seems:--once saw a calm dead pool in foren parts--peered down into it--by little and little, my eye got used to it--saw something dark at the bottom--stared and stared--by Jupiter--a great big alligator!--walked off immediately--never liked quiet pools since--augh, no!”

”An argument against quiet pools, perhaps, Bunting; but scarcely against quiet people.”

”Don't know as to that, your honour--much of a muchness. I have seen Master Aram, demure as he looks, start, and bite his lip, and change colour, and frown--he has an ugly frown, I can tell ye--when he thought no one nigh. A man who gets in a pa.s.sion with himself may be soon out of temper with others. Free to confess, I should not like to see him married to that stately beautiful young lady--but they do gossip about it in the village. If it is not true, better put the Squire on his guard--false rumours often beget truths--beg pardon, your honour--no business of mine--baugh! But I'm a lone man, who have seen the world, and I thinks on the things around me, and I turns over the quid--now on this side, now on the other--'tis my way, Sir--and--but I offend your honour.”

”Not at all; I know you are an honest man, Bunting, and well affected to our family; at the same time it is neither prudent nor charitable to speak harshly of our neighbours without sufficient cause. And really you seem to me to be a little hasty in your judgment of a man so inoffensive in his habits and so justly and generally esteemed as Mr. Aram.”

”May be, Sir--may be,--very right what you say. But I thinks what I thinks all the same; and indeed, it is a thing that puzzles me, how that strange-looking vagabond, as frighted the ladies so, and who, Miss Nelly told me, for she saw them in his pocket, carried pistols about him, as if he had been among cannibals and hottentots, instead of the peaceablest county that man ever set foot in, should boast of his friends.h.i.+p with this larned schollard, and pa.s.s a whole night in his house. Birds of a feather flock together--augh!--Sir!”

”A man cannot surely be answerable for the respectability of all his acquaintances, even though he feel obliged to offer them the accommodation of a night's shelter.”

”Baugh!” grunted the Corporal. ”Seen the world, Sir--seen the world--young gentlemen are always so good-natured; 'tis a pity, that the more one sees the more suspicious one grows. One does not have gumption till one has been properly cheated--one must be made a fool very often in order not to be fooled at last!”

”Well, Corporal, I shall now have opportunities enough of profiting by experience. I am going to leave Gra.s.sdale in a few days, and learn suspicion and wisdom in the great world.”

”Augh! baugh!--what?” cried the Corporal, starting from the contemplative air which he had hitherto a.s.sumed. ”The great world?--how?--when?--going away;--who goes with your honour?”

”My honour's self; I have no companion, unless you like to attend me;”

said Walter, jestingly--but the Corporal affected, with his natural shrewdness, to take the proposition in earnest.

”I! your honour's too good; and indeed, though I say it, Sir, you might do worse; not but what I should be sorry to leave nice snug home here, and this stream, though the trout have been shy lately,--ah! that was a mistake of yours, Sir, recommending the minnow; and neighbour Dealtry, though his ale's not so good at 'twas last year; and--and--but, in short, I always loved your honour--dandled you on my knees;--You recollect the broadsword exercise?--one, two, three--augh! baugh!--and if your honour really is going, why rather than you should want a proper person who knows the world, to brush your coat, polish your shoes, give you good advice--on the faith of a man, I'll go with you myself!”

This alacrity on the part of the Corporal was far from displeasing to Walter. The proposal he had at first made unthinkingly, he now seriously thought advisable; and at length it was settled that the Corporal should call the next morning at the manor-house, and receive instructions as to the time and method of their departure. Not forgetting, as the sagacious Bunting delicately insinuated, ”the wee settlements as to wages, and board wages, more a matter of form, like, than any thing else--augh!”

CHAPTER X.

THE LOVERS.--THE ENCOUNTER AND QUARREL OF THE RIVALS.

Two such I saw, what time the laboured ox In his loose traces from the furrow came.

--Comus.

Pedro. Now do me n.o.ble right.

Rod. I'll satisfy you; But not by the sword.

--Beaumont and Fletcher.--The Pilgrim.

While Walter and the Corporal enjoyed the above conversation, Madeline and Aram, whom Lester soon left to themselves, were pursuing their walk along the solitary fields. Their love had pa.s.sed from the eye to the lip, and now found expression in words.

”Observe,” said he, as the light touch of one who he felt loved him entirely rested on his arm,--”Observe, as the later summer now begins to breathe a more various and mellow glory into the landscape, how singularly pure and lucid the atmosphere becomes. When, two months ago, in the full flush of June, I walked through these fields, a grey mist hid yon distant hills and the far forest from my view. Now, with what a transparent stillness the whole expanse of scenery spreads itself before us. And such, Madeline, is the change that has come over myself since that time. Then, if I looked beyond the limited present, all was dim and indistinct. Now, the mist had faded away--the broad future extends before me, calm and bright with the hope which is borrowed from your love!”

We will not tax the patience of the reader, who seldom enters with keen interest into the mere dialogue of love, with the blus.h.i.+ng Madeline's reply, or with all the soft vows and tender confessions which the rich poetry of Aram's mind made yet more delicious to the ear of his dreaming and devoted mistress.