Mr. Bull, though he is not of lucid memory, kept an eye on the owner of
those millions. His bards were awake to his anxiety, and celebrated John
Mattock's doings with a trump and flourish somewhat displeasing to a
quietly-disposed commoner. John's entry into Parliament as a Liberal
was taken for a sign of steersman who knew where the tide ran. But
your Liberals are sometimes Radicals in their youth, and his choice
of parties might not be so much sagacity as an instance of unripe
lightheadedness. A young conservative millionaire is less disturbing.
The very wealthy young peer is never wanton in his politics, which seems
to admonish us that the heir of vast wealth should have it imposed on
him to accept a peerage, and be locked up as it were. A coronet steadies
the brain. You may let out your heels at the social laws, you are
almost expected to do it, but you are to shake that young pate of yours
restively under such a splendid encumbrance. Private reports of John,
however, gave him credit for sound opinions: he was moderate, merely
progressive. When it was added that the man had the habit of taking
counsel with his sister, he was at once considered as fast and safe, not
because of any public knowledge of the character of Jane Mattock. We pay
this homage to the settled common sense of women. Distinctly does
she discountenance leaps in the dark, wild driving, and the freaks of
Radicalism.
John, as it happened, had not so grave a respect for the sex as for the
individual Jane. He thought women capable of acts of foolishness; his
bright-faced sister he could thoroughly trust for prudent conduct. He
gave her a good portion of his heart in confidence, and all of it in
affection. There were matters which he excluded from confidence, even
from intimate communication with himself. These he could not reveal;
nor could she perfectly open her heart to him, for the same reason. They
both had an established ideal of their personal qualities, not far above
the positive, since they were neither of them pretentious, yet it was a
trifle higher and fairer than the working pattern; and albeit they were
sincere enough, quite sincere in their mutual intercourse, they had,
by what each knew at times of the thumping organ within them, cause for
doubting that they were as transparent as the other supposed; and
they were separately aware of an inward smile at one another's partial
deception; which did not thwart their honest power of working up to the
respected ideal. The stroke of the deeper self-knowledge rarely shook
them; they were able to live with full sensations in the animated
picture they were to the eyes best loved by them. This in fact was
their life. Anything beside it was a dream, and we do not speak of
our dreams--not of every dream. Especially do we reserve our speech
concerning the dream in which we had a revelation of the proud frame
deprived of a guiding will, flung rudderless on the waves. Ah that
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account