Pollio

“ M.—A sweet thing is moisture to the crops, arbutus to weanling kids, the pliant willow to the breeding herd, as Amyntas alone to me.
D.—Pollio loves our Muse, rustic though she be: maids of Pieria, feed a heifer for your reader.
M.—Pollio himself too makes new songs: feed a bull, soon to strike with his horn and scatter the sand with his feet. ”

“ Pollio cast down his eyes. Mr. Littlefield was an old-fashioned man, who did not use very good grammar; but everybody loved [44] him dearly, and Pollio would rather have been chidden by almost any one else.
“Thee has one of the best mothers that ever lived, my boy. I want thee always to mind thy mother.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And remember this: A child that won’t mind its mother won’t mind its God!”
“Click, clack,” went the horse’s hoofs; and Pollio stood on the fence till horse and rider were far out of sight. ”

“ Pollio knew that these were all masks, or what he called “wigs,” and that they were worn by harmless Rosewood boys, who did it only for fun. Pollio knew this well enough. But you can’t always recollect all you know: you hardly ever can when you are taken by surprise. Before he stopped to think, he screamed; but, after he had screamed, he laughed to think how silly it was.
“Poh, nothing but wigs! Glad Posy isn’t here. ”

“ Pitcher couldn’t help hugging Pollio; for he didn’t seem to mind his own sufferings when he thought of his precious Posy.
“Well, my son, if Jimmy pinched her, that was wrong. I like to see you so ready to protect your sister; but you needn’t fly at anybody like a little savage. I can’t have my darling boy fight!”
Pollio buried his aching nose in his mother’s bosom. He didn’t want to fight again that day, you may be sure. ”

“ He had a fair, sunny face, and kind manner; and children always opened their little hearts to him at once. He took Posy on his knee, and she sat there quietly; [122] blushing, it is true, but more for Pollio’s speeches than for fear of Mr. Lane. It was strange what things that boy would say sometimes. Posy being so very silent, he thought he ought to keep up the conversation: so he leaned his elbow on the minister’s other knee, and asked the first question that came into his little head:—
“Pollio led Posy into the Parlor, and was affectionately drying her Eyes with the Lace Curtain.” ”

“ Pollio was the first Roman author who recited his writings to an audience of his friends, a practice which afterwards became common at Rome. The theory that Pollio was the author of the Bellum africanum, one of the supplements to Caesar's Commentarii, has met with little support. ”

“ Pollio was very sorry for his uncle. It must be hard to grow up and not care for balloons! Nunky would never, never, be a boy again: his good times were over.
“Poor Nunky! He has got to stay old,” thought Pollio as the young man walked into the house with a bounding step. ”

“ Pliny has nearly the same observation, lib. xxxv. cap. 2. He remarks, that the custom was rather modern in his time; and attributes to Asinius Pollio the honour of having introduced it into Rome. "In consecrating a library with the portraits of our illustrious authors, he has formed, if I may so express myself, a republic of the intellectual powers of men." To the richness of book-treasures, Asinius Pollio had associated a new source of pleasure, by placing the statues of their authors amidst them, inspiring the minds of the spectators, even by their eyes. ”

“ It was the first time Pollio had smiled that day; but it was such a funny speech from that mite of a girl! He would as soon have thought of leaning on a good-sized flower, say a honeysuckle.
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“Why, Teddy couldn’t hardly carry me: he isn’t big enough,” said the poor boy, feeling suddenly that he was very heavy.
“Well, papa can carry you, and Nunky can carry you, and Dick.”
“Now, you stop! Do you s’pose I want to go pickapack all the time?” whined unhappy Pollio.
To comfort him, Posy took a glass of lemonade from the table, and raised it to his lips, and of course spilled it on his neck. ”

“ While Pollio, who seems to have been the most accomplished man of his age, and is celebrated as a poet, soldier, orator and historian, was engaged in an expedition against the Parthini, whom he subdued, Virgil addressed to him his Pharmaceutria, one of the most beautiful of all his eclogues, and in imitation of a poem of the same name, by his favorite author, Theocritus. This production is the more valuable, as it has handed down to posterity some of the superstitious rites of the Romans and the heathen notions of enchantment. ”

“ BEPPO TALKING.
Mr. Littlefield came to see Pollio while he was lame, and brought some fine honey which his wife “Liddy” had sent.
“Beppo was hugged half to Death by the Children.”
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“It is hard for thee to learn the lesson of patience so young; but it will do thee good, my boy,” said he, patting Pollio’s head with a smile.
“Is Dr. Field any ’lation to you, Mr. Littlefield?” asked Pollio anxiously; and was very glad to learn he was not. Pollio loved Mr. Littlefield dearly; but he would never love the doctor on account of his dreadful jokes. ”

“ He’s no business with me!” said Pollio, turning a somerset on the back-seat.
“O Hop-clover! mustn’t he get down?”
“Of course he must,” replied Hop-clover, chewing some wheat she had found in a barrel.
“Tell you what it is!” said Pollio, dancing up and down, “if Mr. Littlefield had a boy, my father’d let him play in our carriage as easy as nothing.”
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“Well, Ike wouldn’t,” returned Posy.
“I can’t help it about Ike, and I can’t help it about John: I guess Mr. Littlefield wants to be polite to his company,” said Pollio, cracking the whip. ”

“ Towzer was not as heavy as Beppo. No, Towzer couldn’t break a thill: Mr. Littlefield would know better than that.
“Well, p’rhaps the hens roosted on the thill, and broke it.”
This was such a silly idea, that Pollio shook his head impatiently.
“He don’t hear one word we say,” remarked Posy to Hop-clover, after they had asked him half a dozen questions, and received no answer. “He has felt real bad ever since he laughed in meeting. I ’spect he’s afraid Teddy will hear of it; but I sha’n’t tell.—Look up here, Pollio: don’t you be afraid. I sha’n’t tell Teddy.” ”

“ Nunky—that was uncle Rufus Gilman—sat in the corner, reading; Nanty—that was aunt Ann Pitcher—sat by a little basket-table, sewing; Edith and [16] Dick—the older brother and sister—pretended to study; and mamma—well, mamma spent half her time keeping the three youngest children away from papa’s inkstand.
One evening Pollio got down on all-fours, put up his back, and hissed like a cat. His father only laughed till he hit the table and upset the inkstand, and then he had to be sent out of the room. Posy begged to go too: she always wanted to be punished with Pollio. ”

“ In the scene where she discovers the treachery of Pollio, and discharges upon his guilty head a torrent of withering and indignant reproof, she exhibits a power, bordering on the sublime, which belongs exclusively to her, giving to the character of the insulted priestess a dramatic importance which would be remarkable even if entirely separated from the vocal preeminence with which it is allied. ”

“ Polly.
But now the jam and egg party was joining in the fray. A stout yet still fairly able-bodied gentleman in white and black checks enquired: “What’s the fellow up to? Ain’t there no police here?” and it was evident that once more public opinion was rallying to the support of Mr. Polly.
“Oh, come on then all the lot of you!” cried Uncle Jim, and backing dexterously whirled the eel round in a destructive circle. ”

“ Polly sat beside the fat woman at one of the little green tables at the back of the Potwell Inn, and struggled with the mystery of life. It was one of those evenings, serenely luminous, amply and atmospherically still, when the river bend was at its best. A swan floated against the dark green masses of the further bank, the stream flowed broad and shining to its destiny, with scarce a ripple—except where the reeds came out from the headland—the three poplars rose clear and harmonious against a sky of green and yellow. ”

“ After that they talked in a fragmentary way for some time. The blue eyes surveyed Mr. Polly with kindly curiosity from under a broad, finely modelled brow, much as an exceptionally intelligent cat might survey a new sort of dog. She meant to find out all about him. She asked questions that riddled the honest knight in armour below, and probed ever nearer to the hateful secret of the shop and his normal servitude. ”

“ Polly’s mind was filled with the persuasion that indeed all things whatsoever must needs be satisfying and complete. It was incredible that life has ever done more than seemed to jar, that there could be any shadow in life save such velvet softnesses as made the setting for that silent swan, or any murmur but the ripple of the water as it swirled round the chained and gently swaying punt. ”

“ Polly descended into the world again out of the conflagration he had lit to be his funeral pyre, moist, excited, and tremendously alive, amidst a tempest of applause. As he got lower and lower the crowd howled like a pack of dogs at him. Impatient men unable to wait for him seized and shook his descending boots, and so brought him to earth with a run. ”

“ A careless observer watching him sprint round and round the inn in front of the lumbering and reproachful pursuit of Uncle Jim might have formed an altogether erroneous estimate of the issue of the campaign. Certain compensating qualities of the very greatest military value were appearing in Mr. Polly even as he ran; if Uncle Jim had strength and brute courage and the rich toughening experience a Reformatory Home affords, Mr. Polly was nevertheless sober, more mobile and with a mind now stimulated to an almost incredible nimbleness. ”

“ When Mr. Polly re-entered the house he found three entirely strange young women with pink faces, demonstrative manners and emphatic mourning, engaged in an incoherent conversation with Mrs. Johnson. All three kissed him with great gusto after the ancient English fashion. “These are your cousins Larkins,” said Mrs. Johnson; “that’s Annie (unexpected hug and smack) , that’s Miriam (resolute hug and smack) , and that’s Minnie (prolonged hug and smack) .” ”

“ Polly packed ten years of dreams.
“He don’t seem,” said Johnson, “to take a serious interest in anything. That shop at the corner’s bound to be snapped up if he don’t look out.”
The girl and Mr. Polly did not meet on every one of those ten days; one was Sunday and she could not come, and on the eighth the school reassembled and she made vague excuses. All their meetings amounted to this, that she sat on the wall, more or less in bounds as she expressed it, and let Mr. Polly fall in love with her and try to express it below. ”

“ Polly fell in love, as though the world had given way beneath him and he had dropped through into another, into a world of luminous clouds and of desolate hopeless wildernesses of desiring and of wild valleys of unreasonable ecstasies, a world whose infinite miseries were finer and in some inexplicable way sweeter than the purest gold of the daily life, whose joys—they were indeed but the merest remote glimpses of joy—were brighter than a dying martyr’s vision of heaven. ”

“ He sat on the stile above Fishbourne and cried to the Heavens above him: “Oh! Roo-o-o-tten Be-e-astly Silly Hole!” And he wore a rather shabby black morning coat and vest, and his tie was richly splendid, being from stock, and his golf cap aslant over one eye.
Fifteen years ago, and it might have seemed to you that the queer little flower of Mr. Polly’s imagination must be altogether withered and dead, and with no living seed left in any part of him. But indeed it still lived as an insatiable hunger for bright and delightful experiences, for the gracious aspects of things, for beauty. ”

“ A manly young curate, marking and misunderstanding his preoccupied face and moving lips, came and sat by him and entered into conversation with the idea of making him feel more at home. The conversation was awkward and disconnected for a minute or so, and then suddenly a memory of the Port Burdock Bazaar occurred to Mr. Polly, and with a baffling whisper of “Lill’ dog,” and a reassuring nod, he rose up and escaped, to wander out relieved and observant into the varied London streets. ”

“ When you were engaged, ‘the world’ said that it was a ‘capital thing’ for Polly. Did that mean that you were a good, generous, intelligent, friendly, and patient man, who would be the companion for life she ought to have? You know, as well as I do, and as all the people who said it know, that it meant you were worth a few hundred thousands, that you could build a splendid house, keep horses and chariots, and live in style. You and I are sensible men, Paul, and we take the world as we find it; and know that if a man wants a good dinner he must pay for it. ”

“ She of the dancing blue eyes, pink cheeks, and reckless little sun-bonnet was Pauline, otherwise Polly Oliver. Did you ever know a Polly without some one of these things? Well, my Polly had them all, and, besides, a saucy freckled nose, a crown of fluffy, reddish-yellow hair, and a shower of coaxing little pitfalls called dimples round her pretty mouth. She made you think of a sunbeam, a morning songbird, a dancing butterfly, or an impetuous little crocus just out after the first spring shower. Dislike her? You couldn’t. Approve of her? You wouldn’t always. Love her? ”

“ Polly could hear only the dim fragments of sentences. “Orrible things to you—’orrible things.... Kick yer ugly.... Cut yer—liver out... spread it all about, I will.... Outing doos. See? I don’t care a dead rat one way or the uvver.”
And with a curious twisting gesture of the arm Uncle Jim receded until his face was a still, dim thing that watched, and the black shadows of the hedge seemed to have swallowed up his body altogether. ”