Vivian Grey

“By no means. Southey is a political writer, a writer for a particular purpose. All his works, from those in three volumes quarto to those in one duodecimo, are alike political pamphlets.”

“We certainly want a master-spirit to set us right, Grey. We want Byron.”

“There was the man! And that such a man should be lost to us at the very moment that he had begun to discover why it had pleased the Omnipotent to have endowed him with such powers!”

“If one thing were more characteristic of Byron’s mind than another, it was his strong, shrewd, common sense; his pure, unalloyed sagacity.”

“You knew him, I think, Cleveland?”

“Well, I was slightly acquainted with him when in England; slightly, however, for I was then very young. But many years afterwards I met him in Italy. It was at Pisa, just before he left that place for Genoa. I was then very much struck at the alteration in his appearance.”

“Indeed.”

“Yes; his face was swollen, and he was getting fat. His hair was grey, and his countenance had lost that spiritual expression which it once eminently possessed. His teeth were decaying; and he said that if ever he came to England it would be to consult Wayte about them. I certainly was very much struck at his alteration for the worse. Besides, he was dressed in the most extraordinary manner.”

“Slovenly?”

“Oh, no, no, no! in the most dandified style that you can conceive; but not that of an English dandy either. He had on a magnificent foreign foraging cap, which he wore in the room, but his grey curls were quite perceptible; and a frogged surtout; and he had a large gold chain round his neck, and pushed into his waistcoat pocket. I imagined, of course, that a glass was attached to it; but I afterwards found that it bore nothing but a quantity of trinkets. He had also another gold chain tight round his neck, like a collar.”

“How odd! And did you converse much with him?”

“I was not long at Pisa, but we never parted, and there was only one subject of conversation, England, England, England. I never met a man in whom the maladie du pays was so strong. Byron was certainly at this time restless and discontented. He was tired of his dragoon captains and pensioned poetasters, and he dared not come back to England with what he considered a tarnished reputation. His only thought was of some desperate exertion to clear himself: it was for this he went to Greece. When I was with him he was in correspondence with some friends in England about the purchase of a large tract of land in Colombia. He affected a great admiration of Bolivar.”

“Who, by-the-bye, is a great man.”

“Assuredly.”

“Your acquaintance with Byron must have been one of the gratifying incidents of your life, Cleveland?”

“Certainly; I may say with Friar Martin, in Goetz of Berlichingen, ‘The sight of him touched my heart. It is a pleasure to have seen a great man.’”

“Hobhouse was a faithful friend to him?”

“His conduct has been beautiful; and Byron had a thorough affection for him, in spite of a few squibs and a few drunken speeches, which damned good-natured friends have always been careful to repeat.”

“The loss of Byron can never be retrieved. He was indeed a real man; and when I say this, I award him the most splendid character which human nature need aspire to. At least, I, for my part, have no ambition to be considered either a divinity or an angel; and truly, when I look round upon the creatures alike effeminate in mind and body of which the world is, in general, composed, I fear that even my ambition is too exalted. Byron’s mind was like his own ocean, sublime in its yesty madness, beautiful in its glittering summer brightness, mighty in the lone magnificence of its waste of waters, gazed upon from the magic of its own nature, yet capable of representing, but as in a glass darkly, the natures of all others.”

“Hyde Park is greatly changed since I was a dandy, Vivian. Pray, do the Misses Otranto still live in that house?”

“Yes; blooming as ever.”

“It is the fashion to abuse Horace Walpole, but I really think him the most delightful writer that ever existed. I wonder who is to be the Horace Walpole of the present century? some one, perhaps, we least suspect.”

“Vivida Vis, think you?”

“More than probable. I will tell you who ought to be writing Memoirs; Lord Dropmore. Does my Lord Manfred keep his mansion there, next to the Misses Otranto?”

“I believe so, and lives there.”

“I knew him in Germany; a singular man, and not understood. Perhaps he does not understand himself. I see our horses.”

“I will join you in an instant, Cleveland. I just want to speak one word to Osborne, whom I see coming down here. Well, Osborne, I must come and knock you up one of these mornings. I have got a commission for you from Lady Julia Knighton, to which you must pay particular attention.”

“Well, Mr. Grey, how does Lady Julia like the bay mare?”

“Very much, indeed; but she wants to know what you have done about the chestnut.”

“Oh! put it off, sir, in the prettiest style, on young Mr. Feoffment, who has just married, and taken a house in Gower Street. He wanted a bit of blood; hopes he likes it!”

“Hopes he does, Jack. There is a particular favour which you can do for me, Osborne, and which I am sure you will. Ernest Clay; you know Ernest Clay; a most excellent fellow is Ernest Clay, you know, and a great friend of yours, Osborne; I wish you would just step down to Connaught Place, and look at those bays he bought of Harry Mounteney. He is in a little trouble, and we must do what we can for him; you know he is an excellent fellow, and a great friend of yours. Thank you, I knew you would. Good morning; remember Lady Julia. So you really fitted young Feoffment with the chestnut; well, that was admirable! Good morning.”

“I do not know whether you care for these things at all, Cleveland, but Premium, a famous millionaire, has gone this morning, for I know not how much! Half the new world will be ruined; and in this old one a most excellent fellow, my friend Ernest Clay. He was engaged to Premium’s daughter, his last resource, and now, of course, it is all up with him.”

“I was at College with his brother, Augustus Clay. He is a nephew of Lord Mounteney’s, is he not?”

“The very same. Poor fellow! I do not know what we must do for him. I think I shall advise him to change his name to Clayville; and if the world ask him the reason of the euphonious augmentation, why, he can swear it was to distinguish himself from his brothers. Too many roués of the same name will never do. And now spurs to our steeds! for we are going at least three miles out of our way, and I must collect my senses and arrange my curls before dinner, for I have to flirt with at least three fair ones.”

CHAPTER II

These conversations play the very deuce with one’s story. We had intended to have commenced this book with something quite terrific, a murder or a marriage; and all our great ideas have ended in a lounge. After all, it is, perhaps, the most natural termination. In life, surely man is not always as monstrously busy as he appears to be in novels and romances. We are not always in action, not always making speeches or making money, or making war, or making love. Occasionally we talk, about the weather generally; sometimes about, ourselves; oftener about our friends; as often about our enemies, at least, those who have any; which, in my opinion, is the vulgarest of all possessions.

But we must get on.

Mr. Cleveland and Mrs. Felix Lorraine again met, and the gentleman scarcely appeared to be aware that this meeting was not their first. The lady sighed and remonstrated. She reproached Mr. Cleveland with passages of letters. He stared, and deigned not a reply to an artifice which he considered equally audacious and shallow. There was a scene. Vivian was forced to interfere; but as he deprecated all explanation, his interference was of little avail; and, as it was ineffectual for one party and uncalled for by the other, it was, of course, not encouraged. The presence of Mrs. Cleveland did not tend to assist Mrs. Felix in that self-control which, with all her wildness, she could appositely practise. In the presence of the Clevelands she was fitful, capricious, perplexing; sometimes impertinent, sometimes humble; but always ill at ease, and never charming.

Peculiar, however, as was her conduct in this particular relation, it was in all others, at this moment, most exemplary. Her whole soul seemed concentrated in the success of the approaching struggle. No office was too mechanical for her attention, or too elaborate for her enthusiastic assiduity. Her attentions were not confined merely to Vivian and the Marquess, but were lavished with equal generosity on their colleagues. She copied letters for Sir Berdmore, and composed letters for Lord Courtown, and construed letters to Lord Beaconsfield; they, in return, echoed her praises to her delighted relative, who was daily congratulated on the possession of “such a fascinating sister in law.”

“Well, Vivian,” said Mrs. Lorraine, to that young gentleman, the day previous to his departure from Buckhurst Lodge, “you are going to leave me behind you.”

“Indeed!”

“Yes! I hope you will not want me. I am very annoyed at not being able to go to town with you, but Lady Courtown is so pressing! and I have really promised so often to stay a week with her, that I thought it was better to make out my promise at once than in six months hence.”

“Well! I am exceedingly sorry, for you really are so useful! and the interest you take in everything is so encouraging, that I very much fear we shall not be able to get on without you. The important hour draws nigh.”

“It does, indeed, Vivian; and I assure you that there is no person awaiting it with intenser interest than myself. I little thought,” she added, in a low but distinct voice, “I little thought, when I first reached England, that I should ever again be interested in anything in this world.”

Vivian was silent, for he had nothing to say.

“Vivian!” very briskly resumed Mrs. Lorraine, “I shall get you to frank all my letters for me. I shall never trouble the Marquess again. Do you know, it strikes me you will make a very good speaker!”

“You flatter me exceedingly; suppose you give me a few lessons.”

“But you must leave off some of your wicked tricks, Vivian! You must not improvise parliamentary papers!”

“Improvise papers, Mrs. Lorraine! What can you mean?”

“Oh! nothing. I never mean anything.”