Egremont

“ The face of nature was newly washed, the trees were putting on their new green liveries for the festal time of spring. The sun shone out with a generous and penetrating ardor that warmed the whole earth and all the people on it. The gray old castle basked in the noonday light. Roger Egremont wandered over it and, standing on the ancient parapet under the deep blue sky, saw all the beauty around him—and could enjoy none of it, because Michelle was not there. ”

“ And Roger Egremont, this honorable gentleman, whose creed was gentleness to women, who had gone to sleep a penitent man, resolving to do right even if it required the crucifixion of the soul, fell into the most unseemly passion imaginable. The devil in a man dies hard, and even after he is conquered he can give much trouble. Roger Egremont, this strong, weather-beaten man, was unnerved and unstrung by the strain of furious emotions from which he had suffered the whole night, and these words of Marianne’s seemed altogether unbearable to him. ”

“ Grail, I have a mind to try if I can't work on that idea.'
Gilbert was stirred. This interchange of words had strengthened his personal liking for Egremont, and his own idealism took fire from that of the other. He regarded the young man with admiration and with noble envy. To be able to devise such things and straightway say 'It shall be done!' How blest beyond all utterance was the man to whom fortune had given such power! He reverenced Egremont profoundly. It was the man's nature to worship, to bend with singleness of heart before whatsoever seemed to him high and beautiful. ”

“ Charles Egremont mused, as he wandered among the ruins of the ancient abbey. "Why were these hard times for the poor?" Brooding over these questions, he observed two men hard by in the old cloister garden, one of lofty stature, nearer forty than fifty years of age, the other younger and shorter, with a pale face redeemed from ugliness by its intellectual brow. Egremont joined the strangers, and talked.
"Our queen reigns over two nations, between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy--the rich and the poor," said the younger stranger. ”

“ Be sure that Roger Egremont was in the meadow long before the procession of hay-makers started from the old palace, and walked the length of the terrace to the low-lying fields. It was a glorious midsummer day, and never were the prospects of King James better in the way of haying. The hay-makers, bearing the proudest names of England, Scotland, Ireland, and France, were dressed as peasants, but their costumes were made of silken stuffs such as no peasant ever wore. ”

“ He is very intimate with the family and lives in the same county.”
“But his wife,” said Lady Firebrace; “that’s the point: he never could get his wife there before.”
“He has none,” said Egremont very quietly.
“Then we may regain him,” said Lady St Julians with energy. “You shall make a little dinner to Greenwich, Mr Egremont, and I will sit next to him.”
“Fortunate Trenchard!” said Egremont. “But do you know I fear he is hardly worthy of his lot. He has a horror of fine ladies; and there is nothing in the world he more avoids than what you call society. ”

“ In the spring of 1694, more fighting; in the summer, more fighting still,—in Flanders, in Italy, on the Rhine, on the coasts of France,—everywhere arms resounded. In the winter all was peace, and the gallants fled to Paris. This year of 1694, Roger Egremont, conscious that he was growing to be a mere campaigner, that books and women, to whom every gentleman should be devoted, had lost their charm for him, determined to go to St. Germains for a while. He longed to see Dicky. ”

“ No dog marked for hanging ever had a more shame-faced look than Roger Egremont at these words. Had he been the damnablest of villains, he could not have appeared more of a poltroon. In truth had he been a villain, he would have shown a brazen assurance. Instead of which, he turned very red, shuffled his feet on the floor, looked wildly and foolishly about him, and in short, made the poorest possible figure that a man of sense could. ”

“ And looking in that direction, on the left hand of Lady Mowbray, Egremont beheld a gentleman in the last year of his youth, if youth according to the scale of Hippocrates cease at thirty-five. He was distinguished by that beauty of the noble English blood, of which in these days few types remain; the Norman tempered by the Saxon; the fire of conquest softened by integrity; and a serene, though inflexible habit of mind. The chains of convention, an external life grown out of all proportion with that of the heart and mind, have destroyed this dignified beauty. ”

“ The church of St Mary is a modern reconstruction embodying some of the Norman features of the old church. Iron ore and limestone are raised in the neighbourhood.
It seems impossible to find any history for Egremont until after the Norman Conquest, when Henry I. gave the barony of Coupland to William de Meschines, who erected a castle at Egremont around which the town grew into importance. The barony afterwards passed by marriage to the families of Lucy and Multon, and finally came to the Percys, earls of Northumberland, from whom are descended the present lords of the manor of Egremont. ”

“ Egremont stared with irrepressible astonishment at the excited being, who unconsciously pressed his companion’s arm, as he drew this rapid sketch of the glories so unconstitutionally withheld from him.
“A magnificent spectacle!” said Egremont.
“Evidently the body destined to save this country,” eagerly continued Sir Vavasour. “Blending all sympathies: the crown of which they are the peculiar champions; the nobles of whom they are the popular branch; the people who recognize in them their natural leaders. ”

“ And sweet moments like these must be many before they reached Orlamunde; and after that—well, a campaign was coming; a soldier with his sword could cut his way through a forest of obstacles. So thought Roger.
They were roused from their dream in Paradise by Madame de Beaumanoir’s voice in the distance, cutting the air like a knife. They ran back, like a couple of school children caught playing truant,—the bold Roger Egremont as meek and apologetic as François Delaunay could have been. ”

“ Quit the world and the world forgets you; and Egremont would have soon been a name no longer mentioned in those brilliant saloons which he once adorned, had not occasionally a sensation, produced by an effective speech in the House of Commons, recalled his name to his old associates, who then remembered the pleasant hours passed in his society and wondered why he never went anywhere now. ”

“ So, partly from policy, partly from lassitude and disgust, King William was minded to let bygones be bygones with Roger Egremont—which was better for both than another arrest, another state trial, and another raking up of the popular fury which had attended the trials of the Egremonts.
Roger Egremont settled himself down for a year of preparation for the greatest happiness in the world; he had no reason to doubt that Michelle was doing the same thing. And meanwhile there was happiness in finding himself once more master of Egremont. No man was ever less fitted for exile than Roger Egremont. ”

“ I hear the Egremonts sometimes play the very shirts off their backs, and it makes me ashamed of the Egremont gentlemen. All of the others are not so, however. Cousin Hilary is grown very sober, and is in the corps of gentlemen-at-arms of the K. He and his family have nothing, poor souls, their estates being sequestered, as you know. For myself, I have found friends, and they give me my education. All I can complain of is that they do not give me all the time I want to play the fiddle. ’Tis but an idle amusement, but I love it. Dear Roger, I long to see you. ”

“ Lord Marney looked at Egremont pugnaciously, and then observed, “Grouse is a capital fellow; one is never dull when Grouse is here.”
“Well, for my part,” said Egremont, “I do not much admire that amusement which is dependent on the efforts of hangers-on.”
“Grouse is no more a hanger-on than any one else,” said Lord Marney, rather fiercely. ”

“ Dicky Egremont would have reckoned himself the happiest man on earth could he have exchanged places with any one of those unfortunate gentlemen, and would have gone cheerfully to his death to have spared an agonized wife and weeping children the loss of a husband and father. ”

“ A silence so profound amid these solemn ruins, offered the perfection of solitude; and there was that stirring in the mind of Egremont which rendered him far from indisposed for this loneliness.
The slight words that he had exchanged with the farmer and the hind had left him musing. Why was England not the same land as in the days of his light-hearted youth? Why were these hard times for the poor? He stood among the ruins that, as the farmer had well observed, had seen many changes: changes of creeds, of dynasties, of laws, of manners. ”

“ Roger stood, his eyes cast down, blushing like a girl, while the applause surged about him like a hurricane, men pounding the table and shouting, “Aye—be Glencoe’d—Glencoe’d; how the damned villain will hate that word!” and General Buchan shook Roger’s hand, and Berwick clasped him in his arms crying, “Glencoe’d! What a glorious word!”
Pity Roger Egremont. That one word, and the platter of beans dashed into the usurper’s face were his sole recompense for a great estate filched from him, three years in Newgate gaol, and poverty and exile. ”

“ IN WHICH ROGER EGREMONT MEETS WITH BOTH GOOD AND ILL FORTUNE WHAT is reckoned ill luck at one time is counted the best of good luck at another. Roger Egremont, who had fretted continually in his heart about being tied to the King’s writing-table, now was secretly rejoiced that he had ample duty to do, because of one of his fellow-secretaries falling ill just about the time of Bess Lukens’s arrival at St. Germains. ”

“ She is greedy of knowledge, and, hoping and longing as she does to play a great part, she wants to know all about everything.”
“And when does Mademoiselle d’Orantia return to St. Germains?” Roger Egremont ventured to ask, adding a gruesome joke,—“I hope before we all depart for England.”
“Surely. You need not be packing your portmanteau yet awhile, Mr. Egremont. Well, my niece will come back in time for the hay-making in August, for that is one of the few amusements my lady condescends to,—that, and taking long rides a-horseback with nobody but François for an escort.” ”

“ And at last, when the black sky was turning a ghostly gray, and in the heart of the forest there was a rustling of wings and a chirping, and a small wind stirred the budding twigs, Roger and Dicky went up together to the great, bare attic room, and throwing themselves down on a pallet, slept with Dicky’s arm around Roger’s neck, as they had often slept when they were lads together at Egremont. ”

“ Not many gayer evenings were spent at the inn than the first night there of Roger Egremont. When the bats and owls in the forest of St. Germains were crying aloud in the midnight, the fiddle was again singing, and the rafters trembling with the carolling. There was a song with the fiddling,—a very tender song,—and Dicky was the singer. Some Scotch gentlemen did the manly sword dance very nobly, but one did it better, and that was Dicky. There was play, and a good deal of money changed hands, and poor Dicky lost all he had—about seven livres—and laughed rather ruefully at his own ill luck. ”

“ But I am surprised that old families can be so dead to our national art; so full of our ancestors, their exploits, their mind. Indeed you and I have no excuse for such indifference Mr Egremont.”
“And I do not think I shall ever again be justly accused of it,” replied Egremont, “you plead its cause so effectively. But to tell you the truth, I have been thinking of late about these things; monasteries and so on; the influence of the old church system on the happiness and comfort of the People.”
“And on the tone of the Nobles—do not you think so?” said Lady Maud. ”

“ Lord Egremont was eighty-one the day before yesterday, and is still healthy, with faculties and memory apparently unimpaired. He has reigned here for sixty years with great authority and influence. He is shrewd, eccentric, and benevolent, and has always been munificent and charitable in his own way; he patronises the arts and fosters rising genius. Painters and sculptors find employment and welcome in his house ”

“ Hugo Egremont, still by a great effort, kept a scornful smile on his face; and then every other face grew grave, and the ploughman added,—
“If your honor smiles, sir, at the notion that such a horse is good enough for Master Roger, we all do smile with you. But if you smile because he has no better—well, sir, ’tis because there is no better one in this village.”
Hugo, always master of himself, and better able to see himself as others saw him than many worthier men, knew that his triumph would be to conquer Roger’s ill-will. ”

“ And hark you, Monsieur Egremont, this girl of ours is very prudent where men are concerned. She seems well versed in the art of keeping them at a distance.”
“That is true,” gravely replied Roger. “I know of an English gentleman who once dared an impertinence [171] with her, and she gave him in return a whack with a broom-handle, of which he will bear the scar to his dying day.”
“’Tis a blessed thing for her that she is of that mind,” answered Papa Mazet, “for she will have to keep many at bay as soon as she appears in public.” ”