The work found its way at length into fame, and the fame sent its voices loud to the poet’s home. But the applause of the world had not a sound so sweet to his ear, as, when, in doubt, humiliation, and sadness, the lips of his Helen had whispered “Hope! and believe!”
Side by side with this picture of Woman the Consoler, let me place the companion sketch. Harley L’Estrange, shortly after his marriage with Violante, had been induced, whether at his bride’s persuasions, or to dissipate the shadow with which Egerton’s death still clouded his wedded felicity, to accept a temporary mission, half military, half civil, to one of our colonies. On this mission he had evinced so much ability and achieved so signal a success, that on his return to England he was raised to the peerage, while his father yet lived to rejoice that the son who would succeed to his honours had achieved the nobler dignity of honours not inherited, but won. High expectations were formed of Harley’s parliamentary success; but he saw that such success, to be durable, must found itself on the knowledge of wearisome details, and the study of that practical business which jarred on his tastes, though it suited his talents. Harley had been indolent for so many years,—and there is so much to make indolence captivating to a man whose rank is secured, who has nothing to ask from fortune, and who finds at his home no cares from which he seeks a distraction; so he laughed at ambition in the whim of his delightful humours, and the expectations formed from his diplomatic triumph died away. But then came one of those political crises, in which men ordinarily indifferent to politics rouse themselves to the recollection that the experiment of legislation is not made upon dead matter, but on the living form of a noble country; and in both Houses of Parliament the strength of party is put forth.
It is a lovely day in spring, and Harley is seated by the window of his old room at Knightsbridge,—now glancing to the lively green of the budding trees; now idling with Nero, who, though in canine old age, enjoys the sun like his master; now repeating to himself, as he turns over the leaves of his favourite Horace, some of those lines that make the shortness of life the excuse for seizing its pleasures and eluding its fatigues, which formed the staple morality of the polished epicurean; and Violante (into what glorious beauty her maiden bloom has matured!) comes softly into the room, seats herself on a low stool beside him, leaning her face on her hands, and looking up at him through her dark, clear, spiritual eyes; and as she continues to speak, gradually a change comes over Harley’s aspect, gradually the brow grows thoughtful, and the lips lose their playful smile. There is no hateful assumption of the would-be “superior woman,” no formal remonstrance, no lecture, no homily which grates upon masculine pride; but the high theme and the eloquent words elevate unconsciously of themselves, and the Horace is laid aside,—a Parliamentary Blue Book has been, by some marvel or other, conjured there in its stead; and Violante now moves away as softly as she entered. Harley’s hand detains her.
“Not so. Share the task, or I quit it. Here is an extract I condemn you to copy. Do you think I would go through this labour if you were not to halve the success?—halve the labour as well!”
And Violante, overjoyed, kisses away the implied rebuke, and sits down to work, so demure and so proud, by his side. I do not know if Harley made much way in the Blue Book that morning; but a little time after he spoke in the Lords, and surpassed all that the most sanguine had hoped from his talents. The sweetness of fame and the consciousness of utility once fully tasted, Harley’s consummation of his proper destinies was secure. A year later, and his voice was one of the influences of England. His boyish love of glory revived,—no longer vague and dreamy, but ennobled into patriotism, and strengthened into purpose. One night, after a signal triumph, he returned home, with his father, who had witnessed it, and Violante—who all lovely, all brilliant, though she was, never went forth in her lord’s absence, to lower among fops and flatterers the dignity of the name she so aspired to raise—sprang to meet him. Harley’s eldest son—a boy yet in the nursery—had been kept up later than usual; perhaps Violante had anticipated her husband’s triumph, and wished the son to share it. The old earl beckoned the child to him, and laying his hand on the infant’s curly locks, said with unusual seriousness,
“My boy, you may see troubled times in England before these hairs are as gray as mine; and your stake in England’s honour and peace will be great. Heed this hint from an old man who had no talents to make a noise in the world, but who yet has been of some use in his generation. Neither sounding titles, nor wide lands, nor fine abilities, will give you real joy, unless you hold yourself responsible for all to your God and to your country; and when you are tempted to believe that the gifts you may inherit from both entail no duties, or that duties are at war with true pleasure, remember how I placed you in your father’s arms, and said, ‘Let him be as proud of you some day as I at this hour am of him.’”
The boy clung to his father’s breast, and said manfully, “I will try!” Harley bent his fair smooth brow over the young earnest face, and said softly, “Your mother speaks in you!”
Then the old countess, who had remained silent and listening on her elbow-chair, rose and kissed the earl’s hand reverently. Perhaps in that kiss there was the repentant consciousness how far the active goodness she had often secretly undervalued had exceeded, in its fruits, her own cold unproductive powers of will and mind. Then passing on to Harley, her brow grew elate, and the pride returned to her eye.
“At last,” she said, laying on his shoulder that light firm hand, from which he no longer shrunk,—“at last, O my noble son, you have fulfilled all the promise of your youth!”
“If so,” answered Harley, “it is because I have found what I then sought in vain.” He drew his arm around Violante, and added, with half tender, half solemn smile, “Blessed is the woman who exalts!”