Part 40 (1/2)
”By telling me that I am expected to be vastly entertaining, since every word I utter can only serve to dispel the illusion, and prove that I am gifted with no such miraculous power.”
”I don't think it requires any miraculous power, either to entertain or be entertained. For my part, I flatter myself I can entertain any man, woman, or child in the kingdom, when I choose; and as for being entertained, that is still an easier matter. I seldom meet with anybody who is not entertaining, either from their folly, or their affectation, or their stupidity, or their vanity; or, in short, something of the ridiculous, that renders them not merely supportable, but positively amusing.”
”How extremely happy you must be,” said Lord Lindore.
”Happy! No--I don't know that my feelings precisely amount to happiness neither; for at the very time I'm most diverted I'm sometimes disgusted too, and often provoked. My spirit gets chafed, and---”
”You long to box the ears of all your acquaintances,” said her brother, laughing. ”Well, no matter--there is nothing so enviable as a facility of being amused, and even the excitement of anger is perhaps preferable to the stagnation of indifference.”
”Oh, thank heaven! I know nothing about indifference; I leave that to Adelaide.”
Lord Lindore turned his eyes with more animation than he had yet evinced towards his cousin, who sat reading, apparently paying no attention to what was going on. He regarded her for a considerable time with an expression of admiration; but Adelaide, though she was conscious of his gaze, calmly pursued her studies. ”Come, you positively must do something to signalise yourself. I a.s.sure you it is expected of you that you should be the soul of the company. Here is Adelaide waltzes like an angel, when she can get a partner to her liking.”
”But I waltz like a mere mortal,” said Lord Lindore, seating himself at a table, and turning over the leaves of a book.
”And I am engaged to play billiards with my uncle,” said Adelaide, rising with a blush of indignation.
”Shall we have some music, then? Can you bear to listen to our croakings after the warbling of your Italian nightingales?” asked Lady Emily.
”I should like very much to hear you sing,” answered her brother, with an air of the most perfect indifference.
”Come then, Mary, do you be the one to 'untwist the chains that tie the hidden soul of harmony.' Give us your Scotch Exile, pray? It is tolerably appropriate to the occasion, though an English one would have been still more so; but, as you say, there is nothing in this country to make a song about.”
Mary would rather have declined, but she saw a refusal would displease her cousin; and she was not accustomed to consult her own inclination in such frivolous matters. She therefore seated herself at the harp, and sang the following verses;--
THE EXILE.
The weary wanderer may roam To seek for bliss in change of scene; Yet still the loved idea of home, And of the days he there has seen,
Pursue him with a fond regret, Like rays from suns that long have set.
”Tis not the sculptor's magic art, ”Tis not th' heroic deeds of yore, That fill and gratify the heart.
No! 'tis affection's tender lore-- The thought of friends, and love's first sigh, When youth, and hope, and health were nigh.
What though on cla.s.sic ground we tread, What though we breathe a genial air-- Can these restore the bliss that's fled?
Is not remembrance ever there?
Can any soil protect from grief, Or any air breathe soft relief?
No! the sick soul, that wounded flies From all its early thoughts held dear, Will more some gleam of memory prize, That draws the long-lost treasure near; And warmly presses to its breast The very thought that mars its rest.
Some mossy stone, some torrent rude, Some moor unknown to worldly ken, Some weeping birches, fragrant wood, Or some wild roebuck's fern-clad glen;-- Yes! these his aching heart delight, These bring his country to his sight.
Ere the song was ended Lord Lindore had sauntered away to the billiard-room, singing, ”Oh! Jiove Omnipotente!” and seemingly quite unconscious that any attentions were due from him in return. But there, even Adelaide's charms failed to attract, in spite of the variety of graceful movements practised before him--the beauty of the extended arm, the majestic step, and the exclamations of the enchanting voice Lord Lindore kept his station by the fire, in a musing att.i.tude, from which he was only roused occasionally by the caresses of his dog. At supper it was still worse. He placed himself by Mary, and when he spoke, it was only of Scotland.
”Well--what do you think of Lindore?” demanded Lady Emily of her aunt and cousins, as they were about to separate for the night. ”Is he not divine?”
”Perfectly so!” replied Lady Juliana, with all the self-importance of a fool. ”I a.s.sure you I think very highly of him. He is a vastly charming, clever young man-perfectly beautiful, and excessively amiable; and his attention to his dog is quite delightful--it is so uncommon to see men at all kind to their dogs. I a.s.sure you I have known many who were absolutely cruel to them--beat them, and starved them, and did a thousand shocking things; and----”