Читать книгу Raymond - Lang John - Страница 5

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Despite Gibbon's assertion to the contrary, there is much truth in the commonplace remark, that our school-days are the happiest of our lives. At no other period is the capacity of enjoyment so much on the alert within us, or its materials drawn from so many sources. With manhood comes a consciousness of responsibility, deepening as years steal on us, regulating our feelings by the square and rule of discretion, and qualifying the pleasure of to-day by the thought of to-morrow. But in boyhood there is no such drawback on happiness. Impulse prompts us to unleavened enjoyment. We have no past to regret, no future to distrust. The present is all-in-all with us; and if we ever venture to look beyond, it is with the eye of hope, who spreads before us a prospect steeped in the hues of Paradise. Then the friendships which we form at this sunny, unreflecting season! how disinterested their character—how enthusiastic the spirit that suggests them! They seem entwined with our very heart-strings; but, alas! they are mere impulses, generous but short-lived, that fade and become extinct as experience dawns on the mind. Engaged in after years too much with ourselves to bestow a thought on others, our attention is solely occupied in bustling through the crowd that every where checks our progress. Though we see the friend of our youth pressed and trodden down beneath our feet, we gaze with indifference at the sight. Perhaps at that moment a recollection of past times dims our eyes. But the crowd thickens—the trouble and hazard of interference increase; so we just cast a cautious glance about us, sigh out "poor fellow," and then pass on, leaving the object of our early love to perish or escape, as may happen. Such is human nature! The affections of the heart, like streams flowing on towards the sea, roll awhile in different channels, but are all at last centred and swallowed up in self.

This, however, was a stern truth which Raymond had yet to experience. At present he knew and felt nothing but that he was about to bid adieu to a place where he had spent many happy years, which had, in fact, been a sort of home to him; for his father—a cold, reserved London merchant, whose every thought and feeling were monopolized by business—had, since his mother's death, shown him but little active kindness.

It was in the October term that Henry quitted Belford for Cambridge, and entered himself of Peterhouse. His conduct, for the first six or eight weeks, was as orderly as could be desired. He was punctual in his attendance at chapel, hall, and lectures, and in his leisure hours assiduously cultivated the Belles Lettres. But his natural vivacity of temperament soon caused him to tire of this regular mode of life. His daily attendance at college lectures, in particular, went sadly against the grain; for he had an absolute hatred of the exact sciences and though he managed to crawl far as the "ass's bridge" in Euclid, yet he stuck fast there, like Bunyan's Pilgrim in the Slough of Despond. Being thus shut out from all chance of acquiring high academical distinction—for in those days the system pursued at Cambridge was by no means so liberal as it is now—he abandoned all idea of hard, continuous study, and determined to enlist among the oi polloi, or non-reading men of the university. In this determination he was strengthened by his old friend and school-fellow, Jenkins—a silly, good-natured young man, with a rosy expanse of countenance, always on the grin—who arrived at Cambridge at the end of the Christmas vacation, and soon began to influence Raymond's actions by his animal spirits, his unassuming temper, and his ardent love of a frolic.

"Harry," said this ingenious and enlightened freshman, as the two friends encountered each other one cold winter morning in the pease-market, "you must come and wine with me to-day; you must indeed. I'll take no excuse. There will be some capital fellows to meet you—Potts of Trinity—Lloyd of Jesus—fine fellow Lloyd; such a voice! sings like a nightingale; you may hear him half down Trumpington Street—Thompson of Christ's; I'm sure you'll like Thompson; he's a charming boxer, and so fond of a row! Then, too, he's got such a beautiful collection—quite a museum—of knockers, bell-handles, street-lamps, and wooden highlanders, all carried off by himself. I declare he's quite a credit to the university, and I think myself most fortunate in knowing him."

"I've no doubt Thompson is all you say, but I shall not be able to meet him."

"Why not?"

"Because," added Raymond gravely, "I've promised to get the whole of Simpson's Euclid by heart, and repeat it, word for word, at lecture to-morrow. I'm sure, Jinks, you're too much of a man of honour to wish me to break my promise."

"O Lord! O Lord, how good! That's so like you! Just the same fellow you were at Belford. But, joking apart, you really must come, and we'll make a night of it; and to-morrow, if the frost holds, we'll have our long-talked of skate to Ely. Thompson tells me the Cathedral's well worth looking at; and we can get a capital dinner at the George, for it's the inn where all the parsons put up."

"Well, for this once," replied Henry, slyly, "I don't much mind sacrificing duty to inclination. But remember, I won't have it drawn into a precedent; for it's highly indecorous to be tossing off heel-taps among a set of hardened reprobates, when one should be seated alone in one's study, erecting an isosceles triangle on a given straight line. I can hardly reconcile it to my conscience, I assure you."

"Hah! hah! I wish Thompson was by to hear you. He does so relish a bit of fun."

"What time do you commence operations?"

"Early, say four o'clock, for we shall have a good deal of business to get through. I've just laid in a fresh stock of Timmins's best port; but I must not stay chatting here, for I've an appointment at twelve with Potts at Chesterton, and it's now past eleven; so, adieu till four, Harry, and be sure you don't forget to-morrow."

Punctual to the hour, Raymond made his appearance at Jenkins's rooms, where he found a snug party of eight assembled; and among them the illustrious Thompson, a jolly, rough-hewn, stout-built fellow, bearing no slight resemblance to the figure-head of a Newcastle collier. This remarkable biped was famous for his practical jokes, and had recently achieved an undying celebrity for the skill with which he had contrived to tie two tutors of Trinity together by the coat-tails, while they were standing side by side in Trumpington Street, staring up at a comet which was then nightly visible in the heavens. This difficult, and—in less scientific hands—impracticable achievement, he of course looked on as his chef-d'æuvre; and when Raymond was made acquainted with it, he felt, with a blush of conscious inferiority, that he had yet much to learn ere he could hope to become a Thompson!

After the bottle had made about a dozen rounds of the table, its effects soon manifested themselves; and by the time some thirteen or fourteen corks had been drawn, the experienced Thompson was the only one of the party who had not utterly disqualified himself for passing muster at a temperance society. One mercurial young freshman threw up the window, despite the intense cold, and amused himself by taking aim at the people below him with nuts and apples; another, who was rather sparingly endowed with brains, kept telling the same story four or five times over; a third, while endeavouring to show himself particularly sober, disappeared under the table, where he fell fast asleep, and was accommodated with a pair of cork mustaches, the coal-scuttle for a pillow, and a fragment of Jenkins's silk gown for a nightcap; and a fourth, snatching up the tongs, rushed out of the room in a perfect paroxysm of pugnacity! This effervescing gownsman was immediately followed by the rest of the party, and an energetic street row commenced, like that which has been described with such graphic skill in Reginald Dalton. It was soon, however, put a stop to by the timely apparition of the proctor and his bull-dogs; and the belligerents proceeded in a body towards Castle-end, where, at Thompson's suggestion, they tore off a placard of "Seminary for Young Ladies," from a girls' school near the turnpike, and affixed it on the great gates of Trinity!

When Jenkins called next morning on Raymond, he found him looking exceedingly dismal. His hand shook, his head ached, and his cheeks were as yellow as a daffodil. "Well, Harry," said the former, "what do you think of Thompson?"

"Oh! a decent fellow enough."

"Yes, and what astonishing abilities! Do you know what he did after you left us last night? Kissed old T——, the tutor, by mistake! Seeing him come waddling along in his black gown, he mistook him for a clergyman's widow, and insisted on a chaste salute, if only, as he said, to show his respect for the cloth. The old fellow roared 'murder,' just as if he were having his throat cut; upon which we all took to our heels, and knocked up a friend at Barnwell, who gave us some devilled kidneys and a bottle of Madeira, which soon set us all to rights."

"Yet you look a little out of sorts, Jinks, for all that."

"Who, I? Never was better in my life, with the exception of a slight headache, which I attribute to early rising;" and so saying, Jenkins made a vigorous attack on the broiled fowls, tongue, ham, &c., which the gyp had just placed on the table; and which, with the addition of a strong cup of green tea, with about a thimbleful of brandy in it, soon completed his and Raymond's restoration. After breakfast the friends sallied down to the fields near Sapsford's boat-house, and thence started on their novel skating expedition. The day was bright, but intensely cold; the clouds floated high in heaven; the dew hung unmelted on the thistle's beard; and the frosted grass in the meadows that stretch along the river's southern bank, gave out a sharp, crackling sound as the ploughman crushed it beneath his tread. Swiftly and cheerily the two Cantabs flew along the smooth, leaden surface of the Cam, which here bears the closest possible resemblance to a Dutch canal, and is about as alert and lively in its movements; experiencing the highest sense of animal enjoyment as a fresh, north-east wind blew right against them.

When they had accomplished nearly a-third of their journey, they came to a small village, on whose outskirts stood a pretty cottage in the centre of a flower-garden, about two hundred yards or so from the river. Just as Raymond passed it—his companion was some distance in advance—two ladies appeared at the garden-gate, where they stood for a few minutes as if considering what direction they should take for a walk. On catching sight of these fair strangers, Henry moderated his pace, and cast a scrutinizing glance towards them; but the distance at which they stood prevented him from distinguishing more than that one stooped considerably and wore spectacles, and that the other was tall, slender, and graceful in figure, whence he sagely inferred that they were mother and daughter, and felt strongly disposed to believe, also, that the latter was a remarkably pretty girl. Impressed with this agreeable notion, he could not resist the temptation—oh! the exquisite self-conceit of youth!—of showing off; and accordingly, instead of pursuing his course, he began cutting a variety of figures on the ice, now rolling on the inside edge, and whirling semicircularly on the spread-eagle, with an ease and elegance that he felt persuaded were irresistible.

Thus was he occupied, when suddenly, just as he was advancing with a long graceful sweep towards the bank, nearly opposite the gate where the ladies were standing, a large stone—those infernal stones are always in the way on delicate occasions like this!—tripped him up, and down he came with a dismal crash on the ice, his hat flying off in his descent. Infinite were his shame and confusion at this unexpected and inelegant catastrophe. The pain of his fall he thought nothing of; but how humiliating to be made the object of a pretty girl's laughter, at the very moment when he fancied her rapt in admiration of the grace and dignity of his attitudes! Scrambling up again as quickly as he could, and afraid to look behind him, lest his glowing scarlet face might betray his anguished sensibilities, he shot forward like lightning to rejoin Jenkins; and when he came up with him, took care to preserve a discreet silence on the subject of his inglorious mishap.

No other incident worthy of notice occurred till the friends reached Ely, a small, old-fashioned city, remarkable only for its supernatural dulness and ugliness. The very aspect of this Bæotian spot is provocative of slumber. There is no bustle, no variety of any sort to break its drowsy still-life. The tradesmen seem to be without business, and half the dingy private houses without tenants; the women you meet in the streets are, for the most part, elderly, and have thick ankles; and as for the men, they are generally plump, apoplectic, and of singular breadth in the stern; dressed in rusty black, with a cotton umbrella poking out under their left arm, and the last number of the Quarterly Review sticking out of their coat-pocket; and when they stop to converse, or rather to drone like cockchafers, they have a horrid trick of catching each other by the buttonhole!

Yet dull as it is, to a degree bordering on the miraculous, Ely is not without its attraction. It has a magnificent cathedral, scarcely even surpassed by that at York; and hither, while the dinner, which they had ordered at the head hotel, was getting ready, Raymond and Jenkins repaired. Having ascended to the summit of one of the towers, they were greatly struck, not only with the extensive prospect that lay stretched out beneath them, but also with its very peculiar character. In whatever direction they cast their eyes, the country—a dead cheerless flat—appeared to be but one large sheet of frozen water, with here and there a lean hedge, a half-starved elm which looked like a quiz upon vegetation, a damp, rheumatic cottage, or a forlorn spire peeping out in the midst of it. Northward, in the far distance, might be seen the summits of Peterborough cathedral; and eastward, that noble sheet of water, Whittlesea Mere, which is surrounded by a broad fringe of bullrushes, the unshaved growth of ages; and is so full of fish of the most gigantic size, that if an angler happens to hook a pike, it is a moot point whether he pulls the monster out, or it pulls him into, the water!

Having sufficiently admired this paradisaical landscape, Henry and his companion, who were by this time as ravenous as one of the pikes of which I have just made honourable mention, returned to dinner to their hotel, where they took up their quarters for the night, and at an early hour next day set out again for Cambridge.