He seemed to expect that I would show some curiosity regarding the future, but my thoughts were all too busy with the present. They were all turned to that home I was about to leave, to the fond mother I was to part from, to honest Joseph himself,—my guide, my friend, and my companion; and for what? An unknown sea, upon which I was to adventure without enterprise or enthusiasm.
The Count continued to talk of Paris and his various friends there, with whom he assured me I should be a favorite. He pictured the life of the great city in all its brightest colors. He mentioned the names of many who had entered it as unknown and friendless as myself, and yet, in a few years, had won their way up to high distinction. There was a vagueness in all this which did not satisfy me; but I was too deeply occupied with other thoughts to question or cavil at what he said.
When we went back to supper, Raper was there to pay his respects to the Count. De Gabriac received his respectful compliments coldly and haughtily; he even interrupted the little address poor Joseph had so carefully studied and committed to memory, by asking if he still continued to bewilder his faculties with Greek particles and obsolete dialects; and then, without waiting for his reply, he seated himself at the table, and arranged his napkin.
“Master Joseph,” said he, half sarcastically, “the world has been pleased to outlive these follies; they have come to the wise resolve that, when languages are dead, they ought to be buried; and they have little sympathy with those who wish to resuscitate and disinter them.”
“It is but an abuse of terms to call them dead, Count,” replied Joseph. “Truth, in whatever tongue it be syllabled, does not die. Fidelity to nature in our age will be acknowledged as correct in centuries after.”
“Our own time gives us as good models, and with less trouble to look for them,” said the Count, flippantly. “Your dreamy bookworm is too prone to delve in the earth, and not to coin the ore that he has discovered. Take Jasper there: you have taught him diligently and patiently; I 'll be sworn you have neglected him in nothing, so far as your own knowledge went; and yet, before he shall have been three months in Paris, he will look upon you, his master, as an infant. The interval between you will be wide as the broad Atlantic; and the obstacles and crosses, to overcome which will be with him the work of a second, would be to you difficulties insurmountable.”
“To Paris! Jasper go to Paris!” exclaimed my mother, as she grew deadly pale.
“Jasper leave us!” cried Raper, in a tone of terror.
“And why not?” replied the Count. “Is it here you would have him waste the best years of youth? Is it in the wild barbarism of this dreary valley that he will catch glimpses of the prizes for which men struggle and contend? The boy himself has higher and nobler instincts; he feels that this is but the sluggish existence of a mere peasant, and that yonder is the tournament where knights are jousting.”
“And you wish to leave us, Jasper?” cried my mother, with a quivering lip, and a terrible expression of anxiety in her features.