“Ungentlemanly,”—what a word it is with most men, especially in the military profession. Gentlemanly,—the root and apex of all honour. Ungentlemanly,—the lowest term of degradation. Such is our code of morals in the army; and, more or less, probably everywhere.
An officer I knew, who, for all I ever heard or noticed, was himself as true a gentleman as ever breathed; polished, kindly, manly, and brave, gave me once, in an argument on duelling, his definition of the word. “A gentleman—one who never does anything he is ashamed of, or that would compromise his honour.”
Worldly honour, this colonel must have meant, for he considered it would have been compromised by a man's refusing to accept a challenge. That “honour” surely was a little lower thing than virtue; a little less pure than the Christianity which all of us profess, and so few believe. Yet there was something at once touching and heroic about it, and in the way this man of the world upheld it. The best of our British chivalry—as chivalry goes—is made up of materials such as these.
But is there not a higher morality—a diviner honour? And if so, who is he that can find it?
CHAPTER IV. HER STORY.
'Tis over—the weary dinner-party. I can lock myself in here, take off my dress, pull down my hair, clasp my two bare arms one on each shoulder—such a comfortable attitude!—and stare into the fire.
There is something peculiar about our fires. Most likely the quantity of fire-wood we use for this region gives them that curious aromatic smell. How, I love fir-trees of any sort in any season of the year! How I used to delight myself in our pine-woods, strolling in and out among the boles of the trees so straight, strong, and unchangeable—grave in summer, and green in winter! How I have stood listening to the wind in their tops, and looking for the fir-cones, wonderful treasures! which they had dropped on the soft dry mossy ground. What glorious fun it was to fill my pinafore—or in more dignified days my black silk apron—with fir-cones; to heap a surreptitious store of them in a corner of the school-room, and burn them, one by one, on the top of the fire. How they did blaze!
I think I should almost like to go hunting for fir-cones now. It would be a great deal more amusing than dinner-parties.