CHAPTER XII.
"But you have found the mountain's top--there sit
On the calm flourishing head of it;
And whilst with wearied steps we upward go,
See us and clouds below."--COWLEY.
It was true that Sidney was happy in his new home, and thither we must
now trace him.
On reaching the town where the travellers in the barouche had been
requested to leave Sidney, "The King's Arms" was precisely the inn
eschewed by Mr. Spencer. While the horses were being changed, he
summoned the surgeon of the town to examine the child, who had already
much recovered; and by stripping his clothes, wrapping him in warm
blankets, and administering cordials, he was permitted to reach another
stage, so as to baffle pursuit that night; and in three days Mr. Spencer
had placed his new charge with his maiden sisters, a hundred and fifty
miles from the spot where he had been found. He would not take him to
his own home yet. He feared the claims of Arthur Beaufort. He artfully
wrote to that gentleman, stating that he had abandoned the chase of
Sidney in despair, and desiring to know if he had discovered him; and a
bribe of L300. to Mr. Sharp with a candid exposition of his reasons for
secreting Sidney--reasons in which the worthy officer professed to
sympathise--secured the discretion of his ally. But he would not deny
himself the pleasure of being in the same house with Sidney, and was
therefore for some months the guest of his sisters. At length he heard
that young Beaufort had been ordered abroad for his health, and he then
deemed it safe to transfer his new idol to his _Lares_ by the lakes.
During this interval the current of the younger Morton's life had indeed
flowed through flowers. At his age the cares of females were almost a
want as well as a luxury, and the sisters spoiled and petted him as much
as any elderly nymphs in Cytherea ever petted Cupid. They were good,
excellent, high-nosed, flat-bosomed spinsters, sentimentally fond of
their brother, whom they called "the poet," and dotingly attached to
children. The cleanness, the quiet, the good cheer of their neat abode,
all tended to revive and invigorate the spirits of their young guest, and
every one there seemed to vie which should love him the most. Still his
especial favourite was Mr. Spencer: for Spencer never went out without
bringing back cakes and toys; and Spencer gave him his pony; and Spencer
rode a little crop-eared nag by his side; and Spencer, in short, was
associated with his every comfort and caprice. He told them his little
history; and when he said how Philip had left him alone for long hours
together, and how Philip had forced him to his last and nearly fatal
journey, the old maids groaned, and the old bachelor sighed, and they all
cried in a breath, that "Philip was a very wicked boy." It was not only
their obvious policy to detach him from his brother, but it was their
sincere conviction that they did right to do so. Sidney began, it is
true, by taking Philip's part; but his mind was ductile, and he still
looked back with a shudder to the hardships he had gone through: and so
by little and little he learned to forget all the endearing and fostering
love Philip had evinced to him; to connect his name with dark and
mysterious fears; to repeat thanksgivings to Providence that he was saved
from him; and to hope that they might never meet again. In fact, when
Mr. Spencer learned from Sharp that it was through Captain Smith, the
swindler, that application had been made by Philip for news of his
brother, and having also learned before, from the same person, that
Philip had been implicated in the sale of a horse, swindled, if not
stolen, he saw every additional reason to widen the stream that flowed
between the wolf and the lamb. The older Sidney grew, the better he
comprehended and appreciated the motives of his protector--for he was
brought up in a formal school of propriety and ethics, and his mind
naturally revolted from all images of violence or fraud. Mr. Spencer
changed both the Christian and the surname of his protege, in order to
elude the search whether of Philip, the Mortons, or the Beauforts, and
Sidney passed for his nephew by a younger brother who had died in India.
So there, by the calm banks of the placid lake, amidst the fairest
landscapes of the Island Garden, the youngest born of Catherine passed
his tranquil days. The monotony of the retreat did not fatigue a spirit
which, as he grew up, found occupation in books, music, poetry, and the
elegances of the cultivated, if quiet, life within his reach. To the
rough past he looked back as to an evil dream, in which the image of
Philip stood dark and threatening. His brother's name as he grew older
he rarely mentioned; and if he did volunteer it to Mr. Spencer, the bloom
on his cheek grew paler. The sweetness of his manners, his fair face and
winning smile, still continued to secure him love, and to screen from the
common eye whatever of selfishness yet lurked in his nature. And,
indeed, that fault in so serene a career, and with friends so attached,
was seldom called into action. So thus was he severed from both the
protectors, Arthur and Philip, to whom poor Catherine had bequeathed him.
By a perverse and strange mystery, they, to whom the charge was most
intrusted were the very persons who were forbidden to redeem it. On our
death-beds when we think we have provided for those we leave behind--
should we lose the last smile that gilds the solemn agony, if we could
look one year into the Future?
Arthur Beaufort, after an ineffectual search for Sidney, heard, on
returning to his home, no unexaggerated narrative of Philip's visit, and
listened, with deep resentment, to his mother's distorted account of the
language addressed to her. It is not to be surprised that, with all his
romantic generosity, he felt sickened and revolted at violence that
seemed to him without excuse. Though not a revengeful character, he had
not that meekness which never resents. He looked upon Philip Morton as
upon one rendered incorrigible by bad passions and evil company. Still
Catherine's last request, and Philip's note to him, the Unknown
Comforter, often recurred to him, and he would have willingly yet aided
him had Philip been thrown in his way. But as it was, when he looked
around, and saw the examples of that charity that begins at home, in
which the world abounds, he felt as if he had done his duty; and
prosperity having, though it could not harden his heart, still sapped the
habits of perseverance, so by little and little the image of the dying
Catherine, and the thought of her sons, faded from his remembrance. And
for this there was the more excuse after the receipt of an anonymous
letter, which relieved all his apprehensions on behalf of Sidney. The
letter was short, and stated simply that Sidney Morton had found a friend
who would protect him throughout life; but who would not scruple to apply
to Beaufort if ever he needed his assistance. So one son, and that the
youngest and the best loved, was safe. And the other, had he not chosen
his own career? Alas, poor Catherine! when you fancied that Philip was
the one sure to force his way into fortune, and Sidney the one most
helpless, how ill did you judge of the human heart! It was that very
strength of Philip's nature which tempted the winds that scattered the
blossoms, and shook the stem to its roots; while the lighter and frailer
nature bent to the gale, and bore transplanting to a happier soil. If a
parent read these pages, let him pause and think well on the characters
of his children; let him at once fear and hope the most for the one whose
passions and whose temper lead to a struggle with the world. That same
world is a tough wrestler, and has a bear's gripe.
Meanwhile, Arthur Beaufort's own complaints, which grew serious and
menaced consumption, recalled his thoughts more and more every day to
himself. He was compelled to abandon his career at the University, and
to seek for health in the softer breezes of the South. His parents
accompanied him to Nice; and when, at the end of a few months, he was
restored to health, the desire of travel seized the mind and attracted
the fancy of the young heir. His father and mother, satisfied with his
recovery, and not unwilling that he should acquire the polish of
Continental intercourse, returned to England; and young Beaufort, with
gay companions and munificent income, already courted, spoiled, and
flattered, commenced his tour with the fair climes of Italy.
So, O dark mystery of the Moral World!--so, unlike the order of the
External Universe, glide together, side by side, the shadowy steeds of
NIGHT AND MORNING. Examine life in its own world; confound not that
world, the inner one, the practical one, with the more visible, yet
airier and less substantial system, doing homage to the sun, to whose
throne, afar in the infinite space, the human heart has no wings to flee.
In life, the mind and the circumstance give the true seasons, and
regulate the darkness and the light. Of two men standing on the same
foot of earth, the one revels in the joyous noon, the other shudders in
the solitude of night. For Hope and Fortune, the day-star is ever
shining. For Care and Penury, Night changes not with the ticking of the
clock, nor with the shadow on the dial. Morning for the heir, night for
the houseless, and God's eye over both.
