“Well,” thought he, “is my hour coming, or have I yet the ordinary term of mortal nature to expect? It is true, I have lately suffered these strange revulsions of the frame with somewhat of an alarming frequency; perhaps this medicine, which healed the anguish of one infirmity, has produced another more immediately deadly. Yet why should I think this? My sleep is sound and calm, my habits temperate, my mind active and clear as in its best days. In my youth I never played the traitor with my constitution; why should it desert me at the very threshold of my age? Nay, nay, these are but passing twitches, chills of the blood that begins to wax thin. Shall I learn to be less rigorous in my diet? Perhaps wine may reward my abstinence in avoiding it for my luxuries, by becoming a cordial to my necessities! Ay, I will consult,—I will consult, I must not die yet. I have—let me see, three—four grades to gain before the ladder is scaled. And, above all, I must regain my child! Lucy married to Mauleverer, myself a peer, my son wedded to-whom? Pray God he be not married already! My nephews and my children nobles! the house of Brandon restored, my power high in the upward gaze of men, my fame set on a more lasting basis than a skill in the quirks of law,—these are yet to come; these I will not die till I have enjoyed! Men die not till their destinies are fulfilled. The spirit that swells and soars within me says that the destiny of William Brandon is but half begun!”
With this conclusion, Brandon sought his pillow. What were the reflections of the prisoner whom he was to judge? Need we ask? Let us picture to ourselves his shattered health, the languor of sickness heightening the gloom which makes the very air of a jail; his certainty of the doom to be passed against him; his knowledge that the uncle of Lucy Brandon was to be his judge, that Mauleverer was to be his accuser, and that in all human probability the only woman he had ever loved must sooner or later learn the criminality of his life and the ignominy of his death; let us but glance at the above blackness of circumstances that surrounded him, and it would seem that there is but little doubt as to the complexion of his thoughts! Perhaps, indeed, even in that terrible and desolate hour one sweet face shone on him, “and dashed the darkness all away.” Perhaps, too, whatever might be the stings of his conscience, one thought, one remembrance of a temptation mastered and a sin escaped, brought to his eyes tears that were sweet and healing in their source. But the heart of a man in Clifford's awful situation is dark and inscrutable; and often when the wildest and gloomiest external circumstances surround us, their reflection sleeps like a shadow, calm and still upon the mind.
The next morning, the whole town of (a town in which, we regret to say, an accident once detained ourself for three wretched days, and which we can, speaking therefore from profound experience, assert to be in ordinary times the most melancholy and peopleless-looking congregation of houses that a sober imagination can conceive) exhibited a scene of such bustle, animation, and jovial anxiety as the trial for life or death to a fellow-creature can alone excite in the phlegmatic breasts of the English. Around the court the crowd thickened with every moment, until the whole marketplace in which the townhall was situated became one living mass. The windows of the houses were filled with women, some of whom had taken that opportunity to make parties to breakfast; and little round tables, with tea and toast on them, caught the eyes of the grinning mobists as they gaped impatiently upwards.
“Ben,” said a stout yeoman, tossing up a halfpenny, and catching the said coin in his right hand, which he immediately covered with the left,—“Ben, heads or tails that Lovett is hanged; heads hanged, tails not, for a crown.”
“Petticoats, to be sure,” quoth Ben, eating an apple; and it was heads!
“Damme, you've lost!” cried the yeoman, rubbing his rough hands with glee.
It would have been a fine sight for Asmodeus, could he have perched on one of the house tops of the market-place of ————, and looked on the murmuring and heaving sea of mortality below. Oh! the sight of a crowd round a court of law or a gibbet ought to make the devil split himself with laughter.
While the mob was fretting, and pushing, and swearing, and grinning, and betting, and picking pockets, and trampling feet, and tearing gowns, and scrambling nearer and nearer to the doors and windows of the court, Brandon was slowly concluding his abstemious repast, preparatory to attendance on his judicial duties. His footman entered with a letter. Sir William glanced rapidly over the seal (one of those immense sacrifices of wax used at that day), adorned with a huge coat-of-arms, surmounted with an earl's coronet, and decorated on either side with those supporters so dear to heraldic taste. He then tore open the letter, and read as follows:—
MY DEAR SIR WILLIAM,—You know that in the last conversation I had
the Honour to hold with you I alluded, though perhaps somewhat
distantly, to the esteem which his Majesty had personally expressed
for your principles and talents, and his wish to testify it at the
earliest opportunity. There will be, as you are doubtless aware, an
immediate creation of four peerages. Your name stands second on the
list. The choice of title his Majesty graciously leaves to you; but
he has hinted that the respectable antiquity of your family would
make him best pleased were you to select the name of your own
family-seat, which, if I mistake not, is Warlock. You will instruct
me at your leisure as to the manner in which the patent should be
made out, touching the succession, etc. Perhaps (excuse the license
of an old friend) this event may induce you to forsake your long-
cherished celibacy. I need not add that this accession of rank will
be accompanied by professional elevation. You will see by the
papers that the death of ————leaves vacant the dignity of Chief
Baron; and I am at length empowered to offer you a station
proportioned to your character and talents.
With great consideration, believe me, my dear Sir, Very truly yours,
Private and Confidential.
Brandon's dark eye glanced quickly from the signature of the premier, affixed to this communication, towards the mirror opposite him. He strode to it, and examined his own countenance with a long and wistful gaze. Never, we think, did youthful gallant about to repair to the trysting-spot, in which fair looks make the greatest of earthly advantages, gaze more anxiously on the impartial glass than now did the ascetic and scornful judge; and never, we ween, did the eye of the said gallant retire with a more satisfied and triumphant expression.