The Trial [187]
of Archbishop Usher, which had been the Duke of Lauderdale's study after he was taken at Worcester. He has made a note in the fly-leaf, "I began this book at Windsor, and finished it during my imprisonment here;" and below are mottoes in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. I can't construe the Hebrew. The Greek is oisteon kai elpisteon (one must bear and hope), the Latin is durate. Will you accept your predecessor's legacy?' 'I think I read about him in an account of the island,' said Leonard, with a moment's awakened intelligence; 'was he not the L. of the Cabal, the persecutor in "Old Mortality?"' 'I am afraid you are right. Prosperity must have been worse for him than adversity.' 'Endure' repeated Leonard, gravely. 'I will think of that, and what he would mean by hope now.' The Doctor came home much distressed; he had been unable to penetrate the dreary, resolute self-command that covered so much anguish; he had failed in probing or in healing, and feared that the apathy he had witnessed was a sign that the sustaining spring of vigour was failing in the monotonous life. The strong endurance had been a strain that the additional grief was rendering beyond his power; and the crushed resignation, and air of extinguished hope, together with the indications of failing health, filled the Doctor with misgivings. 'It will not last much longer,' he said. 'I do not mean that he is ill; but to hold up in this way takes it out of a man, especially at his age. The first thing that lays hold of him, he will have no strength nor will to resist, and then-- Well, I did hope to live to see God show the right.'
CHAPTER XXIV
We twa hae wandered o'er the braes, And pu'ed the gowans fine; I've wandered many a weary foot Sin auld lang syne.
These years had passed quietly at Stoneborough, with little change since Mary's marriage. She was the happy excellent wife that she was made to be; and perhaps it was better for Ethel that the first severance had been so decisive that Mary's attentions to her old home were received as favours, instead of as the mere scanty relics of her former attachment. Mr. Cheviot, as the family shook down together, became less afraid of Ethel, and did not think it so needful to snub her either by his dignity or jocularity; though she still knew that she was only on terms of sufferance, and had been, more than once, made to repent of unguarded observations. He was admirable; and the school was so rapidly improving that Norman had put his father into ecstasies by proposing to send home little Dickie to begin his education there. Moreover, the one element wanting, to accomplish the town improvements, had been supplied by a head-master on the side of progress, and Dr. Spencer's victory had been won at last. There was a chance that Stoneborough might yet be clean, thanks to his reiteration of plans for purification, apropos to everything. Baths and wash-houses were adroitly carried as a monument to Prince Albert; and on the Prince of Wales's marriage, his perseverance actually induced the committee to finish up the drains with all the contributions that were neither eaten up nor fired away! Never had he been more happy and triumphant; and Dr. May used to accuse him of perambulating the lower streets snuffing the deodorized air. One autumn evening, contrary to his wont, he allowed himself to be drawn into the May drawing-room, and there fell into one of the bright bantering talks in which the two old friends delighted, quizzing each other, and bringing up stories of their life; while Ethel and Gertrude listened to and laughed at the traditions of a sunnier, gayer, and more reckless age than their own; and Ethel thought how insufficient are those pictures of life that close with the fever-dream of youthful passion, and leave untold those years of the real burthen of manhood, and still more the tranquil brightness when toil has been overlived, and the setting sun gilds the clouds that are drifting away. Ethel's first knowledge of outer life the next morning was the sound of voices in her father's adjoining
CHAPTER XXIV
We twa hae wandered o'er the braes, And pu'ed the gowans fine; I've wandered many a weary foot Sin auld lang syne.
These years had passed quietly at Stoneborough, with little change since Mary's marriage. She was the happy excellent wife that she was made to be; and perhaps it was better for Ethel that the first severance had been so decisive that Mary's attentions to her old home were received as favours, instead of as the mere scanty relics of her former attachment. Mr. Cheviot, as the family shook down together, became less afraid of Ethel, and did not think it so needful to snub her either by his dignity or jocularity; though she still knew that she was only on terms of sufferance, and had been, more than once, made to repent of unguarded observations. He was admirable; and the school was so rapidly improving that Norman had put his father into ecstasies by proposing to send home little Dickie to begin his education there. Moreover, the one element wanting, to accomplish the town improvements, had been supplied by a head-master on the side of progress, and Dr. Spencer's victory had been won at last. There was a chance that Stoneborough might yet be clean, thanks to his reiteration of plans for purification, apropos to everything. Baths and wash-houses were adroitly carried as a monument to Prince Albert; and on the Prince of Wales's marriage, his perseverance actually induced the committee to finish up the drains with all the contributions that were neither eaten up nor fired away! Never had he been more happy and triumphant; and Dr. May used to accuse him of perambulating the lower streets snuffing the deodorized air. One autumn evening, contrary to his wont, he allowed himself to be drawn into the May drawing-room, and there fell into one of the bright bantering talks in which the two old friends delighted, quizzing each other, and bringing up stories of their life; while Ethel and Gertrude listened to and laughed at the traditions of a sunnier, gayer, and more reckless age than their own; and Ethel thought how insufficient are those pictures of life that close with the fever-dream of youthful passion, and leave untold those years of the real burthen of manhood, and still more the tranquil brightness when toil has been overlived, and the setting sun gilds the clouds that are drifting away. Ethel's first knowledge of outer life the next morning was the sound of voices in her father's adjoining