 | Pierre, or, The ambiguities |  |
20. BOOK XX.
CHARLIE MILLTHORPE.
I.
Pierre had been induced to take chambers at the Apostles',
by one of the Apostles themselves, an old acquaintance of his,
and a native of Saddle Meadows.
Millthorpe was the son of a very respectable farmer—now
dead—of more than common intelligence, and whose bowed
shoulders and homely garb had still been surmounted by a
head fit for a Greek philosopher, and features so fine and regular
that they would have well graced an opulent gentleman.
The political and social levelings and confoundings of all manner
of human elements in America, produce many striking individual
anomalies unknown in other lands. Pierre well remembered
old farmer Millthorpe:—the handsome, melancholy,
calm-tempered, mute, old man; in whose countenance—refinedly
ennobled by nature, and yet coarsely tanned and attenuated
by many a prolonged day's work in the harvest—
rusticity and classicalness were strangely united. The delicate
profile of his face, bespoke the loftiest aristocracy; his knobbed
and bony hands resembled a beggar's.
Though for several generations the Millthorpes had lived on
the Glendinning lands, they loosely and unostentatiously traced
their origin to an emigrating English Knight, who had crossed
the sea in the time of the elder Charles. But that indigence
for the howling wilderness, was the only remaining hereditament
left to his bedwindled descendants in the fourth and
fifth remove. At the time that Pierre first recollected this interesting
man, he had, a year or two previous, abandoned an
ample farm on account of absolute inability to meet the manorial
rent, and was become the occupant of a very poor and
contracted little place, on which was a small and half-ruinous
house. There, he then harbored with his wife,—a very gentle
and retiring person,—his three little daughters, and his only
son, a lad of Pierre's own age. The hereditary beauty and
youthful bloom of this boy; his sweetness of temper, and
something of natural refinement as contrasted with the unrelieved
rudeness, and oftentimes sordidness, of his neighbors;
these things had early attracted the sympathetic, spontaneous
friendliness of Pierre. They were often wont to take their
boyish rambles together; and even the severely critical Mrs.
Glendinning, always fastidiously cautious as to the companions
of Pierre, had never objected to his intimacy with so prepossessing
and handsome a rustic as Charles.
Boys are often very swiftly acute in forming a judgment on
character. The lads had not long companioned, ere Pierre
concluded, that however fine his face, and sweet his temper,
young Millthorpe was but little vigorous in mind; besides
possessing a certain constitutional, sophomorean presumption
and egotism; which, however, having nothing to feed on but
his father's meal and potatoes, and his own essentially timid
and humane disposition, merely presented an amusing and
harmless, though incurable, anomolous feature in his character,
not at all impairing the good-will and companionableness of
Pierre; for even in his boyhood, Pierre possessed a sterling
charity, which could cheerfully overlook all minor blemishes in
his inferiors, whether in fortune or mind; content and glad
to embrace the good whenever presented, or with whatever
peculiar principles, which in conscious and verbalized maxims
shall systematically regulate our maturer lives;—a fact, which
forcibly illustrates the necessitarian dependence of our lives,
and their subordination, not to ourselves, but to Fate.
If the grown man of taste, possess not only some eye to
detect the pieturesque in the natural landscape, so also, has he
as keen a perception of what may not unfitly be here styled,
the povertiresque in the social landscape. To such an one,
not more picturesquely conspicuous is the dismantled thatch
in a painted cottage of Gainsborough, than the time-tangled
and want-thinned locks of a beggar, povertiresquely diversifying
those snug little cabinet-pictures of the world, which, exquisitely
varnished and framed, are hung up in the drawing-room
minds of humane men of taste, and amiable philosophers
of either the “Compensation,” or “Optimist” school. They
deny that any misery is in the world, except for the purpose
of throwing the fine povertiresque element into its general picture.
Go to! God hath deposited cash in the Bank subject
to our gentlemanly order; he hath bounteously blessed the
world with a summer carpet of green. Begone, Haraclitus!
The lamentations of the rain are but to make us our rainbows!
Not that in equivocal reference to the povertiresque old farmer
Millthorpe, Pierre is here intended to be hinted at. Still,
man can not wholly escape his surroundings. Unconsciously
Mrs. Glendinning had always been one of these curious Optimists;
and in his boyish life Pierre had not wholly escaped
the maternal contagion. Yet often, in calling at the old farmer's
for Charles of some early winter mornings, and meeting
the painfully embarrassed, thin, feeble features of Mrs. Millthorpe,
and the sadly inquisitive and hopelessly half-envious
glances of the three little girls; and standing on the threshold,
Pierre would catch low, aged, life-weary groans from a recess
inklings of something else than the pure povertiresque in
poverty: some inklings of what it might be, to be old, and
poor, and worn, and rheumatic, with shivering death drawing
nigh, and present life itself but a dull and a chill! some inklings
of what it might be, for him who in youth had vivaciously
leaped from his bed, impatient to meet the earliest sun, and
lose no sweet drop of his life, now hating the beams he once so
dearly loved; turning round in his bed to the wall to avoid
them; and still postponing the foot which should bring him
back to the dismal day; when the sun is not gold, but copper;
and the sky is not blue, but gray; and the blood, like Rhenish
wine, too long unquaffed by Death, grows thin and sour in the
veins.
Pierre had not forgotten that the augmented penury of the
Millthorpe's was, at the time we now retrospectively treat of,
gravely imputed by the gossiping frequenters of the Black
Swan Inn, to certain insinuated moral direlictions of the farmer.
“The old man tipped his elbow too often,” once said in Pierre's
hearing an old bottle-necked fellow, performing the identical
same act with a half-emptied glass in his hand. But though
the form of old Millthorpe was broken, his countenance, however
sad and thin, betrayed no slightest sign of the sot, either
past or present. He never was publicly known to frequent the
inn, and seldom quitted the few acres he cultivated with his
son. And though, alas, indigent enough, yet was he most
punctually honest in paying his little debts of shillings and
pence for his groceries. And though, heaven knows, he had
plenty of occasion for all the money he could possibly earn, yet
Pierre remembered, that when, one autumn, a hog was bought
of him for the servants' hall at the Mansion, the old man never
called for his money till the midwinter following; and then, as
with trembling fingers he eagerly clutched the silver, he unsteadily
said, “I have no use for it now; it might just as well
Mrs. Glendinning had looked at the old man, with a kindly
and benignantly interested eye to the povertiresque; and murmured,
“Ah! the old English Knight is not yet out of his
blood. Bravo, old man!”
One day, in Pierre's sight, nine silent figures emerged from
the door of old Millthorpe; a coffin was put into a neighbor's
farm-wagon; and a procession, some thirty feet long, including
the elongated pole and box of the wagon, wound along Saddle
Meadows to a hill, where, at last, old Millthorpe was laid down
in a bed, where the rising sun should affront him no more.
Oh, softest and daintiest of Holland linen is the motherly earth!
There, beneath the sublime tester of the infinite sky, like emperors
and kings, sleep, in grand state, the beggars and paupers
of earth! I joy that Death is this Democrat; and hopeless of
all other real and permanent democracies, still hug the thought,
that though in life some heads are crowned with gold, and
some bound round with thorns, yet chisel them how they will,
head-stones are all alike.
This somewhat particular account of the father of young
Millthorpe, will better set forth the less immature condition and
character of the son, on whom had now descended the maintenance
of his mother and sisters. But, though the son of a
farmer, Charles was peculiarly averse to hard labor. It was
not impossible that by resolute hard labor he might eventually
have succeeded in placing his family in a far more comfortable
situation than he had ever remembered them. But it was not
so fated; the benevolent State had in its great wisdom decreed
otherwise.
In the village of Saddle Meadows there was an institution,
half common-school and half academy, but mainly supported
by a general ordinance and financial provision of the government.
Here, not only were the rudiments of an English education
taught, but likewise some touch of belles lettres, and
On the high-raised, stage platform of the Saddle Meadows
Academy, the sons of the most indigent day-laborers were
wont to drawl out the fiery revolutionary rhetoric of Patrick
Henry, or gesticulate impetuously through the soft cadences of
Drake's “Culprit Fay.” What wonder, then, that of Saturdays,
when there was no elocution and poesy, these boys should
grow melancholy and disdainful over the heavy, plodding handles
of dung-forks and hoes?
At the age of fifteen, the ambition of Charles Millthrope was
to be either an orator, or a poet; at any rate, a great genius of
one sort or other. He recalled the ancestral Knight, and indignantly
spurned the plow. Detecting in him the first germ
of this inclination, old Millthorpe had very seriously reasoned
with his son; warning him against the evils of his vagrant ambition.
Ambition of that sort was either for undoubted genius,
rich boys, or poor boys, standing entirely alone in the world,
with no one relying upon them. Charles had better consider
the case; his father was old and infirm; he could not last very
long; he had nothing to leave behind him but his plow and
his hoe; his mother was sickly; his sisters pale and delicate;
and finally, life was a fact, and the winters in that part of the
country exceedingly bitter and long. Seven months out of the
twelve the pastures bore nothing, and all cattle must be fed in
the barns. But Charles was a boy; advice often seems the
most wantonly wasted of all human breath; man will not take
wisdom on trust; may be, it is well; for such wisdom is worthless;
we must find the true gem for ourselves; and so we go
groping and groping for many and many a day.
Yet was Charles Millthorpe as affectionate and dutiful a boy
as ever boasted of his brain, and knew not that he possessed a
far more excellent and angelical thing in the possession of a
generous heart. His father died; to his family he resolved to
be a second father, and a careful provider now. But not by
Already he had read many books—history, poetry, romance,
essays, and all. The manorial book-shelves had often been
honored by his visits, and Pierre had kindly been his librarian.
Not to lengthen the tale, at the age of seventeen, Charles sold
the horse, the cow, the pig, the plow, the hoe, and almost
every movable thing on the premises; and, converting all into
cash, departed with his mother and sisters for the city; chiefly
basing his expectations of success on some vague representations
of an apothecary relative there resident. How he and his mother
and sisters battled it out; how they pined and half-starved
for a while; how they took in sewing; and Charles took in
copying; and all but scantily sufficed for a livelihood; all this
may be easily imagined. But some mysterious latent goodwill
of Fate toward him, had not only thus far kept Charles
from the Poor-House, but had really advanced his fortunes in a
degree. At any rate, that certain harmless presumption and
innocent egotism which have been previously adverted to as
sharing in his general character, these had by no means retarded
him; for it is often to be observed of the shallower men, that
they are the very last to despond. It is the glory of the bladder
that nothing can sink it; it is the reproach of a box of treasure,
that once overboard it must down.
II.
When arrived in the city, and discovering the heartless neglect
of Glen, Pierre,—looking about him for whom to apply
to in this strait,—bethought him of his old boy-companion
Charlie, and went out to seek him, and found him at last; he
saw before him, a tall, well-grown, but rather thin and pale
vet strikingly handsome young man of two-and-twenty; occupying
building of the Apostles; assuming to be doing a very large,
and hourly increasing business among empty pigeon-holes, and
directly under the eye of an unopened bottle of ink; his mother
and sisters dwelling in a chamber overhead; and himself, not
only following the law for a corporeal living, but likewise interlinked
with the peculiar secret, theologico-politico-social schemes
of the masonic order of the seedy-coated Apostles; and pursuing
some crude, transcendental Philosophy, for both a contributory
means of support, as well as for his complete intellectual
aliment.
Pierre was at first somewhat startled by his exceedingly
frank and familiar manner; all old manorial deference for
Pierre was clean gone and departed; though at the first shock
of their encounter, Charlie could not possibly have known that
Pierre was cast off.
“Ha, Pierre! glad to see you, my boy! Hark ye, next
month I am to deliver an address before the Omega order of
the Apostles. The Grand Master, Plinlimmon, will be there.
I have heard on the best authority that he once said of me—
`That youth has the Primitive Categories in him; he is destined
to astonish the world.' Why, lad, I have received propositions
from the Editors of the Spinozaist to contribute a weekly
column to their paper, and you know how very few can understand
the Spinozaist; nothing is admitted there but the Ultimate
Transcendentals. Hark now, in your ear; I think of
throwing off the Apostolic disguise and coming boldly out;
Pierre! I think of stumping the State, and preaching our philosophy
to the masses.—When did you arrive in town?”
Spite of all his tribulations, Pierre could not restrain a smile
at this highly diverting reception; but well knowing the youth,
he did not conclude from this audacious burst of enthusiastic
egotism that his heart had at all corroded; for egotism is one
thing, and selfishness another. No sooner did Pierre intimate
and practical kindness; recommended the Apostles as the best
possible lodgment for him,—cheap, snug, and convenient to
most public places; he offered to procure a cart and see himself
to the transport of Pierre's luggage; but finally thought it
best to mount the stairs and show him the vacant rooms. But
when these at last were decided upon; and Charlie, all cheerfulness
and alacrity, started with Pierre for the hotel, to assist
him in the removal; grasping his arm the moment they
emerged from the great arched door under the tower of the
Apostles; he instantly launched into his amusing heroics, and
continued the strain till the trunks were fairly in sight.
“Lord! my law-business overwhelms me! I must drive
away some of my clients; I must have my exercise, and this
ever-growing business denies it to me. Besides, I owe something
to the sublime cause of the general humanity; I must
displace some of my briefs for my metaphysical treatises. I can
not waste all my oil over bonds and mortgages.—You said you
were married, I think?”
But without stopping for any reply, he rattled on. “Well,
I suppose it is wise after all. It settles, centralizes, and confirms
a man, I have heard.—No, I didn't; it is a random
thought of my own, that!—Yes, it makes the world definite to
him; it removes his morbid subjectiveness, and makes all
things objective; nine small children, for instance, may be considered
objective. Marriage, hey!—A fine thing, no doubt, no
doubt:—domestic—pretty—nice, all round. But I owe something
to the world, my boy! By marriage, I might contribute
to the population of men, but not to the census of mind. The
great men are all bachelors, you know. Their family is the
universe: I should say the planet Saturn was their elder son;
and Plato their uncle.—So you are married?”
But again, reckless of answers, Charlie went on. “Pierre, a
thought, my boy;—a thought for you! You do not say it,
Stump the State on the Kantian Philosophy! A dollar a
head, my boy! Pass round your beaver, and you'll get it. I
have every confidence in the penetration and magnanimousness
of the people! Pierre, hark in your ear;—it's my opinion
the world is all wrong. Hist, I say—an entire mistake. Society
demands an Avatar,—a Curtius, my boy! to leap into
the fiery gulf, and by perishing himself, save the whole empire
of men! Pierre, I have long renounced the allurements of
life and fashion. Look at my coat, and see how I spurn
them! Pierre! but, stop, have you ever a shilling? let's take
a cold cut here—it's a cheap place; I go here sometimes.
Come, let's in.”
| Pierre, or, The ambiguities | |