Harper's New Monthly Magazine: No. XVI.—September, 1851—Vol. III.Various
History
Harper's New Monthly Magazine: No. XVI.—September, 1851—Vol. III.
Various
American literature -- Periodicals; Civilization -- Periodicals; Culture -- Periodicals
Having thus, as he thought, safely provided for his two charges, Helen
and Leonard, the doctor then gave himself up to his final preparations
for departure. He left a short note for Leonard with Mr. Prickett,
containing some brief advice, some kind cheering; a postscript to the
effect that he had not communicated to Mrs. Avenel the information
Leonard had acquired, and that it were best to leave her in that
ignorance; and six small powders to be dissolved in water, and a tea
spoonful every fourth hour--"Sovereign against rage and sombre
thoughts," wrote the doctor.
By the evening of the next day Dr. Morgan, accompanied by his pet
patient with the chronic tic, whom he had talked into exile, was on the
steamboat on his way to Ostend.
Leonard resumed his life at Mr. Prickett's; but the change in him did
not escape the bookseller. All his ingenuous simplicity had deserted
him. He was very distant, and very taciturn; he seemed to have grown
much older. I shall not attempt to analyze metaphysically this change.
By the help of such words as Leonard may himself occasionally let fall,
the reader will dive into the boy's heart, and see how there the change
had worked, and is working still. The happy, dreamy peasant-genius,
gazing on Glory with inebriate, undazzled eyes, is no more. It is a man,
suddenly cut off from the old household holy ties--conscious of great
powers, and confronted on all sides by barriers of iron--alone with hard
Reality, and scornful London; and if he catches a glimpse of the lost
Helicon, he sees, where he saw the Muse, a pale, melancholy spirit,
vailing its face in shame--the ghost of the mournful mother, whose child
has no name, not even the humblest, among the family of men.
On the second evening after Dr. Morgan's departure, as Leonard was just
about to leave the shop, a customer stepped in with a book in his hand,
which he had snatched from the shop-boy, who was removing the volumes
for the night from the booth without.
"Mr. Prickett, Mr. Prickett!" said the customer, "I am ashamed of you.
You presume to put upon this work, in two volumes, the sum of eight
shillings."
Mr. Prickett stepped forth from the Cimmerian gloom of some recess, and
cried, "What! Mr. Burley, is that you? But for your voice, I should not
have known you."
"Man is like a book, Mr. Prickett; the commonalty only look to his
binding. I am better bound, it is very true."
Leonard glanced toward the speaker, who now stood under the gas-lamp,
and thought he recognized his face. He looked again. Yes; it was the
perch-fisher whom he had met on the banks of the Brent, and who had
warned him of the lost fish and the broken line.
MR. BURLEY (continuing).--"But the 'Art of Thinking!'--you charge eight
shillings for the 'Art of Thinking.'"
MR. PRICKETT.--"Cheap enough, Mr. Burley. A very clean copy."
MR. BURLEY.--"Usurer! I sold it to you for three shillings. It is more
than 150 per cent you propose to gain from my 'Art of Thinking.'"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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