CHAPTER XIII.
At this time, and in this very village, there lived a gentleman, in the truest sense of the term, by the name of Edward Lang. He was a man of high family, of aristocratic notions, and thought literature the chief object worthy of pursuit. At the time I saw him, he bore the ills of poverty, the burden of a broken heart, and disappointed hopes. He possessed a well-stored mind, unwearied benevolence, and a Tremaine-like refinement. He had, in the early part of his life, encumbered a large fortune with debts of extravagance, idleness, and folly; and at a subsequent period, lost the remainder in scheming; for he thought that his prëeminence in literature gave him prëeminence in every thing.
Every body applauded his plans; they were upon a large scale; they redounded to the good of the place, and ruined him.
Bred a lawyer, the unfairness of country practice, the low and degraded crowd it brought him in contact with, caused him to throw up his profession. He took to farming; but he only tried experiments, to the advantage of other people, and his own loss. He got up all sorts of useful societies, which cost him his time, and paid him nothing. He bought all the new works for other people to read; subscribed liberally to reading-rooms and schools. He fatted cattle for the agricultural society, at six times their worth in corn and care. Every body in the village improved their own stock by his; but then all this took money from his pocket.
He did not know the state of his affairs, because he hated settlements. He could not bring himself down to the drudgery of life, but did his farming scientifically, in his study, and left the work to hired hands. He failed, and nobody pitied him. He began to be called a 'poor good-for-nothing fellow,' whose chimeras had brought him down. All his neighbors sued him, and he suffered all who owed him to go undunned. He gave up all for lost; sat himself down in wretchedness, disgusted with the world, and tired of himself.
I was quite intimate with this gentleman. Being much my senior, for he was about fifty, and a bachelor, he took it upon himself to give me a word of advice. He had been in love himself, and that desperately; though unfortunate in his love affairs, as well as all others. The father of the lady objected to him, on the score of his being unfit to make money. He possessed hordes of wealth, himself, and could have made two hearts happy. But no; this would not do. His ideas of excellence consisted in the faculty of making money and keeping it. 'As for literature and refinement, he did not care for them. He was not a literary man,' he said, 'and yet he was rich, and respected; a president of a bank; had been an unsuccessful candidate for congress, which was some honor, and had it in his power to fill any office in the town he would accept. No; he preferred a man of business for a son-in-law.'
He found one; a coarse, rough, unlettered country-merchant, whose ideas were bounded by the length and breadth of his counter; whose whole soul was given to traffic. A sloven, except on Sundays and courting-days, and then only clean on the outside. This fair, delicate, daughter of wealth, possessed of a mind and education much beyond her family's comprehension, was wedded to this 'respectable' man. Her heart was broken by this savage act of parental authority. She died during the first year of her wedlock, and Edward Lang was for two years deranged, and woke from this sleep of reason, to find himself without hope, without motive, without sympathy.
He took to his books; he shut out the world, and dwelt upon the beautiful and good in theory; lived in a love for the generous, the exalted, and happy scenes of his imagination. When forced abroad by his friends, he seemed lost and unhappy; he was disturbed from this resting which an unfortunate mind derives from picturing for others what he knows can never be for him.
By the world at large he was said to nourish false views of things, because he had a higher standard than the world generally live by. By these means he unfitted himself for society, and was voted dull, eccentric, and love-sick. Time, however, softened his regrets, and he came out in the scheming life I have referred to, in which, by acting by principle and science, even in the work of agriculture, he lost his all.
When I was introduced to him, he was living with an old aunt, upon his paternal estate. Though poor, they had about them those marks of refinement, which well-educated people will contrive to weave out of common materials. Whether on the farm, in the garden, at his table, in church, or in the street, no one could see Mr. Lang, and not say with certainty that he was a gentleman. The aunt belonged to the old school of ladies, rather prim and stiff; and yet her benevolent face, her self-possession, and quiet dignity, gave her great influence in society. Her reading and good sense, her piety and patience, were proverbial. Every body called her 'madam,' and treated her with marked respect. I was on the most familiar terms at their house; for I believe they felt that I appreciated them. It was the sympathy of people educated in the same way.
This gentleman was of great service to me. From the examination of his own feelings, he had learned much of the nature of passion; from severe suffering, he had become acquainted with misfortune. I used to confide to him all my sorrows, and I told him my struggles. He saw my remorse, and pitied my irresolution.
Alice, too, had confidence in him. They often rode together; and his age and purity of life, and the nice delicacy of his feelings, induced her to open her heart to him. He felt flattered, as well he might, by the trust this noble girl reposed in him. But, beside, he had read so much of love, thought so much of it, and suffered so much for it, that he engaged in the contemplation of our affairs with the goût of an epicure over a favorite dish. He lived over again hours of past endearment of his own. He felt young and ardent, as he listened to the recital of conversations and difficulties which I, with the greenness of a boy, always told him.
Things had arrived at a pass dangerous for both of us; and as yet her parents knew nothing. One of our conversations happened to be heard by the lady's mamma, and papa was informed of all. He was surprised, but affected to treat the matter quite coldly; told me I was too young, too unsettled, to think of matrimony, and very politely forbade me his house; 'as,' he said, 'the sooner we forgot each other the better.'
I ought to confess, here, that my habits had got to be quite irregular. I attended horse-races, tavern-suppers, balls, and sometimes drinking-parties, when the society was by no means the most select; and to drown the mortification, and get to the level of my companions, I ran into excesses that shattered my nerves, and made me unfit, for days, for any calm reflection.
I have always felt the consequences of this mode of life. Even the best minds will become tainted by contact with vulgarity and coarseness. The purest taste will get degraded, in a measure, by constant intercourse with low persons, such as young men who have nothing to do usually meet about taverns, stage-houses, and strolling theatres. We even acquire habits of speaking and pronunciation, and of cant terms, which are beneath a gentleman.
When low-bred men engage in pleasure, 'plenty of stuff to drink' is deemed the first essential. We are getting rid, to be sure, of the character of 'a nation of drunkards;' but when I was a boy, liquors were set out upon all occasions; at weddings, at funerals, dinners, calls, paying money, or dunning-visits. People in the country, of respectability, used to drink at eleven o'clock in the forenoon, and at four in the afternoon. That was genteel. The class who drank before breakfast then, now drink only at eleven; and those who drank only at eleven, drink not at all.
It was the custom, too, to drink before meals for an appetite; for appetite was considered a mark of health, however produced. Among very good sort of people, this was a common notion, that a man could work in proportion to the food he took into his stomach; so workmen were swilled with drams for an appetite.
It is certainly true, that temperance societies cannot hope for any permanent results in their exertions, unless there is a corresponding movement in other societies. Education societies, peace societies, temperance societies, and religious societies, they all have a common object and common cause, to ameliorate the state of man. They point to a common centre. People will not become temperate, and remain irreligious, and quarrelsome, and ignorant. I have often thought it would be well to turn all our efforts to educating mankind; and I believe all other objects would be protected by the course of events. But it is very questionable whether any benefit can result from taking down names to pledges not to drink spirits, in places where schools are not supported, nor the house of God attended.
In this village, every body drank at times, at parties and balls; and to be a little boosy, was by no means disreputable. Judges, members of congress, lawyers, doctors, mingled in these frolics, for popularity's sake; and the people at large thought, of course, they might go, upon the strength of such examples, to any extent.
If I had, by retirement, escaped the contamination of what are called 'glossed vices' in the city, in the country I contracted habits of a grosser nature. I do not mean to be understood as being a drunkard; but I had frequent 'scrapes;' my selection of associates was less nice; my delicacy less; my sense of honor less accurately defined. I lost, in refinement of feeling, immeasurably.
Taking all these things into view, it is no wonder that my intended father-in-law looked upon me with suspicious eyes. He was a man who had seen the ruin of many a likely young farmer and mechanic, from the same beginnings; and he was by no means pleased with my prospects. So I was forbidden to think of his daughter. She was sent out of town, I could not tell where, and I immediately left the village of N—— for a wider sphere of dissipation.
I returned to the city, coarse in my manners, rough in my appearance—thanks to the country tailor!—with large whiskers, and a swaggering bar-room air. I found, upon comparing myself with city appearances, that I was at least ten years behind the age. I blushed, looked ashamed, and avoided former acquaintances, who would greet me with, 'Well, Conworth, where the devil have you been?' or, 'Where the devil did you get those whiskers?' Mind, reader, I had been sentimental for a year, and when I was with gentlemen, was as stiff as country gentlemen usually are. Think, then, how my feelings must have been shocked at such familiarity, when I was looking as grave as an owl, dressed up in my long-tailed coat, large pantaloons, nicely polished thick boots, and long-napped, broad-brimmed hat, with whiskers covering the sides of my face, and my complexion the color of a coal-heaver.
Tailors and time work wonders; and in a short time my country friends would hardly have known me. I soon settled down into courses of dissolute life. I had no restraints. I imagined myself a martyr to love, and was, indeed, unhappy; persuaded myself that I had no hope, and particularly when about half drunk, I sighed like a furnace.
I spent one year, one precious year, of my youth in this manner. I was desperate; lived away from home, and only visited my friends when I was in want of money.
Sometimes, when my stomach was deranged, and my brain flighty, I meditated self-destruction. I was only at ease when rioting in excitement. I kept all sorts of company, and indulged in all sorts of vices. I cannot imagine a more dissolute young man than I was in conduct, who keeps himself this side of penal crime; though it is worthy of remark, that I never recollect having indulged in any vice, unless under artificial stimulus.
I believe my father thought himself a little in the wrong, by suffering such desertion as I met with from all my friends. He pitied me, and in the most affectionate manner persuaded me to return to his house. A word of kindness was to me like manna in the wilderness. I eagerly acceded to his proposal. He paid me every attention, and actually left his business, and travelled with me for two months, and endeavoured to bring my mind back to pleasant reflections; for I was indeed almost a maniac. This was the balm in Gilead to my sick mind. I came to myself, and with my father's permission I went to spend the remainder of my clerkship at the celebrated law-school at L——.
I have always had the strongest inducements to do well. After all my errors, before I left home, the friends of our family vied in showing me kindness. I was in a constant round of the most refined society. To be sure, I had the éclat of having been disappointed in love with the finest girl in the country; and any thing about love is interesting; and to be crazy or drunk for love, is not so bad as to be so for any other cause.
I was grateful for these favors and attentions; and when I left home for the law lectures, I really believe all my friends were firmly persuaded that I was an instance of wonderful reformation. So credulous and forgiving are our friends for the sake of what they know we can and ought to be!