The Antiquary — Complete, Walter Scott [best novels for beginners .TXT] 📗

“I am sensible of your kindness,” answered the youth; “but the wound that is of recent infliction must always smart severely, and I should be little comforted under my present calamity—forgive me for saying so—by the conviction that life had nothing in reserve for me but a train of successive sorrows. And permit me to add, you, Mr. Oldbuck, have least reason of many men to take so gloomy a view of life. You have a competent and easy fortune—are generally respected—may, in your own phrase, vacare musis, indulge yourself in the researches to which your taste addicts you; you may form your own society without doors—and within you have the affectionate and sedulous attention of the nearest relatives.”

“Why, yes—the womankind, for womankind, are, thanks to my training, very civil and tractable—do not disturb me in my morning studies—creep across the floor with the stealthy pace of a cat, when it suits me to take a nap in my easy-chair after dinner or tea. All this is very well; but I want something to exchange ideas with—something to talk to.”

“Then why do you not invite your nephew, Captain M’Intyre, who is mentioned by every one as a fine spirited young fellow, to become a member of your family?”

“Who?” exclaimed Monkbarns, “my nephew Hector?—the Hotspur of the North? Why, Heaven love you, I would as soon invite a firebrand into my stackyard. He’s an Almanzor, a Chamont—has a Highland pedigree as long as his claymore, and a claymore as long as the High Street of Fairport, which he unsheathed upon the surgeon the last time he was at Fairport. I expect him here one of these days; but I will keep him at staff’s end, I promise you. He an inmate of my house! to make my very chairs and tables tremble at his brawls. No, no—I’ll none of Hector M’Intyre. But hark ye, Lovel;—you are a quiet, gentle-tempered lad; had not you better set up your staff at Monkbarns for a month or two, since I conclude you do not immediately intend to leave this country?—I will have a door opened out to the garden—it will cost but a trifle—there is the space for an old one which was condemned long ago—by which said door you may pass and repass into the Green Chamber at pleasure, so you will not interfere with the old man, nor he with you. As for your fare, Mrs. Hadoway tells me you are, as she terms it, very moderate of your mouth, so you will not quarrel with my humble table. Your washing”—

“Hold, my dear Mr. Oldbuck,” interposed Lovel, unable to repress a smile; “and before your hospitality settles all my accommodations, let me thank you most sincerely for so kind an offer—it is not at present in my power to accept of it; but very likely, before I bid adieu to Scotland, I shall find an opportunity to pay you a visit of some length.”

Mr. Oldbuck’s countenance fell. “Why, I thought I had hit on the very arrangement that would suit us both,—and who knows what might happen in the long run, and whether we might ever part? Why, I am master of my acres, man—there is the advantage of being descended from a man of more sense than pride—they cannot oblige me to transmit my goods chattels, and heritages, any way but as I please. No string of substitute heirs of entail, as empty and unsubstantial as the morsels of paper strung to the train of a boy’s kite, to cumber my flights of inclination, and my humours of predilection. Well,—I see you won’t be tempted at present—but Caledonia goes on I hope?”

“O certainly,” said Lovel; “I cannot think of relinquishing a plan so hopeful.”

“It is indeed,” said the Antiquary, looking gravely upward,—for, though shrewd and acute enough in estimating the variety of plans formed by others, he had a very natural, though rather disproportioned good opinion of the importance of those which originated with himself—“it is indeed one of those undertakings which, if achieved with spirit equal to that which dictates its conception, may redeem from the charge of frivolity the literature of the present generation.”

Here he was interrupted by a knock at the room door, which introduced a letter for Mr. Lovel. The servant waited, Mrs. Hadoway said, for an answer. “You are concerned in this matter, Mr. Oldbuck,” said Lovel, after glancing over the billet, and handing it to the Antiquary as he spoke.

It was a letter from Sir Arthur Wardour, couched in extremely civil language, regetting that a fit of the gout had prevented his hitherto showing Mr. Lovel the attentions to which his conduct during a late perilous occasion had so well entitled him—apologizing for not paying his respects in person, but hoping Mr. Lovel would dispense with that ceremony, and be a member of a small party which proposed to visit the ruins of Saint Ruth’s priory on the following day, and afterwards to dine and spend the evening at Knockwinnock Castle. Sir Arthur concluded with saying, that he had sent to request the Monkbarns family to join the party of pleasure which he thus proposed. The place of rendezvous was fixed at a turnpike-gate, which was about an equal distance from all the points from which the company were to assemble.

“What shall we do?” said Lovel, looking at the Antiquary, but pretty certain of the part he would take.

“Go, man—we’ll go, by all means. Let me see—it will cost a post-chaise though, which will hold you and me, and Mary M’Intyre, very well—and the other womankind may go to the manse—and you can come out in the chaise to Monkbarns, as I will take it for the day.”

“Why, I rather think I had better ride.”

“True, true, I forgot your Bucephalus. You are a foolish lad, by the by, for purchasing the brute outright; you should stick to eighteenpence a side, if you will trust any creature’s legs in preference to your own.”

“Why, as the horse’s have the advantage of moving considerably faster, and are, besides, two pair to one, I own I incline”—

“Enough said—enough said—do as you please. Well then, I’ll bring either Grizel or the minister, for I love to have my full pennyworth out of post-horses—and we meet at Tirlingen turnpike on Friday, at twelve o’clock precisely. “—And with this ageement the friends separated.