Waverley; Or, 'Tis Sixty Years Since. Walter Scott
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to the inspection of the unworthy editor of this memorable history. If they afford the reader no higher amusement, they will serve, at least, better than narrative of any kind, to acquaint him with the wild and irregular spirit of our hero:—
Late when the Autumn evening fell
On Mirkwood-Mere's romantic dell,
The lake returned, in chastened gleam,
The purple cloud, the golden beam:
Reflected in the crystal pool,
Headand and bank lay fair and cool;
The weather-tinted rock and tower,
Each drooping tree, each fairy flower,
So true, so soft, the mirror gave,
As if there lay beneath the wave,
Secure from trouble, toil, and care,
A world than earthly world more fair.
But distant winds began to wake,
And roused the Genius of the Lake!
He heard the groaning of the oak,
And donned at once his sable cloak,
As warrior, at the battle-cry,
Invests him with his panoply:
Then as the whirlwind nearer pressed,
He 'gan to shake his foamy crest
O'er furrowed brow and blackened cheek,
And bade his surge in thunder speak.
In wild and broken eddies whirled,
Flitted that fond ideal world,
And, to the shore in tumult tost,
The realms of fairy bliss were lost.
Yet, with a stern delight and strange,
I saw the spirit-stirring change,
As warred the wind with wave and wood.
Upon the ruined tower I stood,
And felt my heart more strongly bound,
Responsive to the lofty sound,
While, joying in the mighty roar,
I mourned that tranquil scene no more.
So, on the idle dreams of youth,
Breaks the loud trumpet-call of truth,
Bids each fair vision pass away,
Like landscape on the lake that lay,
As fair, as flitting, and as frail,
As that which fled the Autumn gale.—
For ever dead to fancy's eye
Be each gay form that glided by,
While dreams of love and lady's charms
Give place to honour and to arms!
In sober prose, as perhaps these verses intimate less decidedly, the transient idea of Miss Cecilia Stubbs passed from Captain Waverley's heart amid the turmoil which his new destinies excited. She appeared, indeed, in full splendour in her father's pew upon the Sunday when he attended service for the last time at the old parish church, upon which occasion, at the request of his uncle and Aunt Rachel, he was induced (nothing loth, if the truth must be told) to present himself in full uniform.
There is no better antidote against entertaining too high an opinion of others, than having an excellent one of ourselves at the very same time. Miss Stubbs had indeed summoned up every assistance which art could afford to beauty; but, alas! hoop, patches, frizzled locks, and a new mantua of genuine French silk, were lost upon a young officer of dragoons, who wore, for the first time, his gold-laced hat, jack-boots, and broadsword. I know not whether, like the champion of an old ballad,
His heart was all on honour bent,
He could not stoop to love;
No lady in the land had power
His frozen heart to move;
or whether the deep and flaming bars of embroidered gold, which now fenced his breast, defied the artillery of Cecilia's eyes; but every arrow was launched at him in vain.
Yet did I mark where Cupid's shaft did light;
It lighted not on little western flower,
But on bold yeoman, flower of all the west,
Hight Jonas Culbertfield, the steward's son.
Craving pardon for my heroics (which I am unable in certain cases to resist giving way to), it is a melancholy fact, that my history must here take leave of the fair Cecilia, who, like many a daughter of Eve, after the departure of Edward, and the dissipation of certain idle visions which she had adopted, quietly contented herself with a PIS-ALLER, and gave her hand, at the distance of six months, to the aforesaid Jonas, son of the Baronet's steward, and heir (no unfertile prospect) to a steward's fortune; besides the snug probability of succeeding to his father's office. All these advantages moved Squire Stubbs, as much as the ruddy brow and manly form of the suitor influenced his daughter, to abate somewhat in the article of their gentry; and so the match was concluded. None seemed more gratified than Aunt Rachel, who had hitherto looked rather askance upon the presumptuous damsel (as much so, peradventure, as her nature would permit), but who, on the first appearance of the new-married pair at church, honoured the bride with a smile and a profound curtsy, in presence of the rector, the curate, the clerk, and the whole congregation of the united parishes of Waverley CUM Beverley.
I beg pardon, once and for all, of those readers who take up novels merely for amusement, for plaguing them so long with old-fashioned politics, and Whig and Tory, and Hanoverians and Jacobites, The truth is, I cannot promise them that this story shall be intelligible, not to say probable, without it. My plan requires that I should explain the motives on which its action proceeded; and these motives necessarily arose from the feelings, prejudices, and parties of the times. I do not invite my fair readers, whose sex and impatience give them the greatest right to complain of these circumstances, into a flying chariot drawn by hippogriffs, or moved by enchantment. Mine is a humble English post-chaise, drawn upon four wheels, and keeping his Majesty's highway. Such as dislike the vehicle may leave it at the next halt, and wait for the conveyance of Prince Hussein's tapestry, or Malek the Weaver's flying sentry-box. Those who are contented to remain with me will be occasionally exposed to the dullness inseparable from heavy roads, steep hills, sloughs, and other terrestrial retardations; but, with tolerable horses and a civil driver (as the advertisements have it), I engage to get as soon as possible into a more picturesque and romantic country, if my passengers incline to have some patience with me during my first stages. [These Introductory Chapters have been a good deal censured as tedious and unnecessary. Yet there are circumstances recorded in them which the author has not been able to persuade himself to retract or cancel.]
CHAPTER VI
THE ADIEUS OF WAVERLEY
It was upon the evening of this memorable Sunday that Sir Everard entered the library, where he narrowly missed surprising our young hero as he went through the guards of the broadsword with the ancient weapon of old Sir Hildebrand, which, being preserved as an heirloom, usually hung over the chimney in the library, beneath a picture of the knight and his horse, where the features were almost entirely hidden by the knight's profusion of curled hair, and the Bucephalus which he bestrode concealed by the voluminous robes of the Bath with which he was decorated. Sir Everard entered, and after a glance at the picture and another at his nephew, began a little speech, which, however, soon dropped into the natural simplicity of his common manner, agitated