Though closely approaching seventy, he was hale and vigorous, his gray eyes quick and full of fire, his voice clear, and his whole air and bearing that of one many years younger. He had been a “beau” in his youth, and there was in the accurately powdered hair, the lace ruffles in which he still appeared at dinner, and the well-fitting silk stocking, an evidence that he had not forgotten the attractions of dress. At the Bar he still maintained the very highest place. His powers of cross-examination were very great; his management of a jury unrivalled. A lifelong acquaintance with Dublin had familiarized him with the tone and temper of every class of its citizens, and had taught him the precise kind of argument, and the exact nature of the appeal to address to each. As he grew older, perhaps he did not observe all his wonted discretion in the use of this subtle power, and somewhat presumed upon his own skill. Nor was he so scrupulous in his deference to the Court,—a feature which had once pre-eminently distinguished him; but, upon the whole, he had kept wonderfully clear of the proverbial irritability of age, and was, without an exception, the favorite amongst his brethren.
The only touch of years observable about his mind was a fondness for recurring to incidents or events in which he himself had borne a part. A case in which he held a brief, the dinner at which he had been brilliant, the epigram he had dashed off in Lady Somebody's drawing-room, were bright spots he could not refrain from adverting to; but, generally speaking, he had skill enough to introduce these without any seeming effort or any straining, and thus strangers, at least, were in wonderment at his endless stores of anecdote and illustration. No man better than he knew how to throw a great name into the course of a conversation, and make an audience for himself, by saying, “I remember one day at the Priory with Curran”—or, “We were dining with poor Grattan at Tinnehinch, when—” “As Flood once remarked to me—” and so on.
The flattery of being addressed by one who had stood in such intimate relation to those illustrious men never failed of success. The most thoughtless and giddy hearers were at once arrested by such an opening, and Repton was sure of listeners in every company.
The man who finds his place in every society is unquestionably a clever man. The aptitude to chime in with the tone of others infers a high order of humor,—of humor in its real sense; meaning, thereby, the faculty of appreciating, and even cultivating, the individual peculiarities of those around him, and deriving from their display a high order of pleasure.
From these scattered traits let my reader conjure up Valentine Repton before him, and imagine the bustling, active, and brisk-looking old gentleman whose fidgetiness nearly drove Martin mad, as they held converse together in the library after breakfast. Now seated, now rising to pace the room, or drawing nigh the window to curse the pelting rain without, Repton seemed the incarnation of uneasiness.
“Very splendid—very grand—very sumptuous—no doubt,” said he, ranging his eyes over the gorgeous decorations of the spacious apartment, “but would kill me in a month; what am I saying?—in a week!”
“What would kill you, Repton?” said Martin, languidly.
“This life of yours, Martin,—this sombre quiet, this unbroken stillness, this grave-like monotony. Why, man, where 's your neighborhood? where are your gentry friends?”
“Cosby Blake, of Swainestown, is abroad,” said Martin, with an indolent drawl. “Randal Burke seldom comes down here now. Rickman, I believe, is in the Fleet. They were the nearest to us!”
“What a country! and you are spending—What did you tell me last night,—was it upwards of ten thousand a year here?”