Beside Still Waters, Arthur Christopher Benson [good books for high schoolers .txt] 📗

The old man liked to have Hugh as the companion of his morning ramble, showed him many curious plants and flowers, and spoke often of the reminiscences of his departed youth with no shadow of desire or regret. At first the grateful coolness of the place revived Hugh; but the soft, moist climate brought with it a fatigue of its own, an indolent dejection, which made him averse to work and even to bodily activity. He took, however, one or two lonely walks among the mountains. In his listless mood, he was vexed and disquieted by the contrast between the utter peace and beauty of the hills, which seemed to uplift themselves, half in majesty and half in appeal, into the still sky, as though they had struggled out of the world, and yet desired a further blessing,--the contrast between their meek and rugged patience, and the noisy, dusty crowd of shameless and indifferent tourists, that circulated among the green valleys, like a poisonous fluid in the veins of the wholesome mountains. They brought a kind of blight upon the place; and yet they were harmless, inquisitive people, tempted thither, most of them by fashion, a few perhaps by a feeble love of beauty, and only desirous to bring their own standard of comforts with them. The world seemed out of joint; the radical ugliness and baseness of man an insult to the purity and sweetness of nature.

Hugh walked back, in a close and heavy afternoon, across the fell, with these thoughts struggling together in his heart. The valley was breathlessly still, and the flies buzzed round him as he disturbed them from the bracken. The whole world looked so sweet and noble, that it was impossible not to think that it was moulded and designed by a Will of unutterable graciousness and beauty. From the top, beside a little crag full of clinging trees, that held on tenaciously to the crevices and ledges, with so perfect an accommodation to their precarious situation, Hugh surveyed the wide valleys, and saw the smoke ascend from hamlets and houses, the lake as still as a mirror, while the shadows lengthened on the hills, which seemed indeed to change their very shapes by delicate gradations. It looked perfectly peaceful and serene. Yet in how many houses were there unquiet and suffering hearts, waiting in vain for respite or release! The pain of the world pressed heavily upon Hugh; it seemed that if he could have breathed out his life there upon the hill-top among the fern, to mingle with the incense of the evening, that would be best; and yet even while he thought it, there seemed to contend with his sadness an immense desire for joy, for life; how many beautiful things there were to see, to hear, to feel, to say; to be loved, to be needed--how Hugh craved for that! While he sate, there alighted on his knee, with much deliberation, a dry, varnished-looking, orange-banded fly, which might have almost been turned out of a manufactory a moment before. It sent out a thin and musical buzzing, as it cleaned its brown, large-eyed head industriously with its long legs. It seemed to wish to sit with Hugh; and again and again, after a short flight, it returned to the same place. What was the meaning of this tiny, definite life, with its short space of sun and shade, made with so curious and elaborate an art, so whimsically adorned and glorified? Here again he was touched close by the impenetrable mystery of things. But presently the cheerful and complacent creature flew off on some secret errand, and Hugh was left alone again.

He descended swiftly into the valley; the road was full of dust. The vehicles, full of chattering, smoking, vacuous persons were speeding home. The hands of many were full of poor fading flowers, torn from lawn and ledge to please a momentary whim. Yet beside the road slid the clear stream over its shingle, passing from brisk cascades into dark and silent pools, fringed with rich water-plants, the trees bowing over the water. How swiftly one passed from disgust and ugliness into unimagined peace! It was all going forwards, all changing, all tending to some unknown goal.

Hugh found his host sitting on the terrace, under a leafy sycamore, a perfect picture of holy age and serenity. He listened to the recital of Hugh's little adventures with a smile, and said that he had often walked over the fell in the old days, but did not suppose he would ever see it again. "I am just waiting for my release," he said, with a little nod of his head; "every time that I sit here, I think it may very likely be the last." Hugh longed to ask him the secret of this contented and passionless peace, but he knew there could be no answer; it was the kindly gift of God.

The sunset died away among the blue hill-ranges, and a soft breeze began to stir among the leaves of the sycamore overhead. A nightjar sent out its liquid, reiterated note from the heather, and a star climbed above the edge of the dark hill. Here was peace enough, if he could but reach it and seize it. Yet it softly eluded his grasp, and seemed only to mock him as unattainable. Should he ever grasp it? There was no answer possible; yet a message seemed to come wistfully and timidly, flying like a night-bird out of the wild woodland, as though it would have settled near him; but it left him with the same inextinguishable hunger of the heart, that seemed to be increased rather than fed by the fragrant incense of the garden, the sight of the cool, glimmering paths, the pale rock rising from the turf, the silent pool.


XXXIX

A Friend--The Gate of Life

Hugh was staying in the country with his mother. It was a bright morning in the late summer, and he had just walked out on to the little gravel-sweep before the house, which commanded a view of a pleasant wooded valley with a stream running through; it was one of those fresh days, with a light breeze rustling in the trees, when it seemed good to be alive; rain had fallen in the night, and had washed the dust of a long drought off the trees; some soft aerial pigment seemed mingled with the air, lending a rich lustre to everything; the small woods on the hillside opposite had a mellow colour, and the pastures between were of radiant and transparent freshness; the little gusts whirled over the woodland, turning the under sides of the leaves up, and brightening the whole with a dash of lighter green.

Just at this moment a telegram was put into Hugh's hand, announcing the sudden death of an elderly lady, who had been a good friend to him for over twenty years. Death seemed to be everywhere about him, and the bright scene suddenly assumed an almost heartless aspect of mirth; but he put the thought from him, and strove rather to feel that life and death rejoiced together.

Later in the day he heard more particulars. His friend was a wealthy woman who had lived a very quiet life for many years in a pleasant country-house. She had often spoken to Hugh of her fear of a long and tedious illness, wearing alike to both the sufferer and those in attendance, when the mind may become fretful, fearful, and impatient in the last scene, just when one most desires that the latest memories of one's life may be cheerful, brave, and serene. Her prayer had been very tenderly answered; she had been ailing of late; but she had been sitting talking in her drawing-room the day before, to a quiet family group, when she had been seized with a sudden faintness, and had died gently, in a few minutes, smiling palely, and probably not even knowing that she was in any sort of danger.

Hugh spent the day mostly in solitude, and retraced in tender thought the stages of their long friendship. His friend had been a woman of strong and marked individuality, who had loved life, and had made many loyal friends. She was intensely, almost morbidly, aware of the suffering of the world, especially of animals; and Hugh remembered how she had once told him that a shooting-party in the neighbouring squire's woods had generally meant for her a sleepless night, at the thought of wounded birds and beasts suffering and bleeding the long hours through, couched in the fern, faint with pain, and wondering patiently what hard thing had befallen them. She had been a woman of strong preferences and prejudices, marked likes and dislikes; intensely critical of others, even of those she loved best. Her talk was lively, epigrammatic, and pungent; she was the daughter of a famous Whig house, and had the strong aristocratical prejudices, coupled with a theoretical belief in popular equality, so often found in old Whig families. But this superiority betrayed itself not in any obvious arrogance or disdain, but in a high and distinguished personal courtesy, that penetrated, as if by a subtle aroma, all that she said or did. Though careless of personal appearance, with no grace of beauty, and wearing habitually the oldest clothes, she was yet indisputably the first person in any society in which she found herself. She was intensely reserved about herself, her family, her possessions, and her past; but Hugh had an inkling that there had been some deep disappointment in the background, which had turned a passionately affectionate nature into a fastidious and critical temperament. She had a wonderful contralto voice, and a real genius for music; she could rarely be persuaded to touch an instrument; but occasionally, with a small and familiar party, she would sing a few old songs with a passion and a depth of melancholy feeling that produced an almost physical thrill in her audience. She was of an indolent temperament, read little, never worked, had few philanthropic or social instincts; she was always ready to talk, but was equally content to spend long afternoons sitting alone before a fire, just shielding her eyes from the blaze, meditating with an intentness that seemed as though she were revolving over and over again some particular memory, some old and sad problem for which she could find no solution. Hugh used to think that she blamed herself for something irreparable.

But her gift of humour, of incisive penetration, of serious enthusiasm, made it always refreshing to be with her; and Hugh found himself reflecting that though it had been in many ways so inarticulate and inactive a life, it yet seemed, by virtue of a certain vivid quality, a certain subdued fire, a life of imperishable worth. She had been both generous and severe in her judgments; but there had never been anything tame, or mild, or weak about her. She had always known her own mind; she yielded freely to impulse without ever expressing regret or repentance. Small as her circle had been, Hugh yet felt that she had somehow affected the world; and yet he could indicate nothing that she had accomplished, except for the fact that she had been a kind of bracing influence in the lives of all who had come near her.

Her last message to him had been an intensely sympathetic letter of outspoken encouragement. She had heard that a severe judgment had been passed upon Hugh's writings by a common