Charles Tyrrell; or, The Bitter Blood. Volumes I and II

by G. P. R. James

CHAPTER IV.

The scenery amid which we are born and brought up, if we remain long enough therein to have passed that early period of existence on which memory seems to have no hold, sinks, as it were, into the spirit of man; twines itself intimately with every thought, and becomes a part of his being. He can never cast it off, any more than he can cast off the body in which his spirit acts. Almost every chain of his after thoughts is linked at some point to the magical circle which bounds his youth's ideas; and even when latent, and in no degree known, it is still present, affecting every feeling and every fancy, and giving a bent of its own to all our words and our deeds.

I have heard a story of a girl who was captive to some Eastern prince, and wore upon her ancles a light golden ring. She learned to love her master devotedly, and was as happy as she could be in his love. Adored, adorned, and cherished, she sat beside him one day in all the pomp of Eastern state, when suddenly her eye fell upon the golden ring round her ancle, which custom had rendered so light that she had forgotten it altogether. The tears instantly rose in her eyes as she looked upon it, and her lover divining all at once, asked, with a look of reproach, "Would you be free?" She cast herself upon his bosom and answered, "Never!"

Thus, often the links that bind us to early scenes and places, in which we have passed happy or unhappy hours, are unobserved and forgotten, till some casual circumstance turns our eyes thitherward. But if any one should ask us whether we would sever that chain, there is scarcely one fine mind that would not also answer, Never! The passing of our days may be painful, the early years may be checkered with grief and care, unkindness and frowns may wither the smiles of boyhood, and tears bedew the path of youth; yet, nevertheless, when we stand and look back, in later life, letting Memory hover over the past, prepared to light where she will, there is no period in all the space laid out before her over which her wings flutter so joyfully, or on which she would so much wish to pause, as the times of our youth. The evils of other days are forgotten; the scenes in which those days passed are remembered, detached from the sorrows that checkered them, and the bright misty light of life's first sunrise still gilds the whole with a glory not its own. It is not alone, however, after long years have passed away, and crushed out the gall from sorrows endured, that fine and enchanting feelings are awakened by the scenes in which our early days have gone by, and that the thrill of association is felt in all its joyfulness, acting as an antidote to the poisonous sorrows which often mingle with our cup.

It was so, at least, with Charles Tyrrell as he returned towards the home of his fathers. The sun rose upon his journey when he was about twenty miles from home, but still in scenes of which every rood was familiar to him; and while the first red and blushing hues upon the eastern sky were changing into the bright and golden splendour that surrounds the half-risen sun, the road wound out upon the side of a hill, showing him a wide extent of country to the right, scattered with many a mound and many a tumulus, each, in general, planted with a small clump of dark fir-trees, which waved above the conical hillocks like plumes from the casques of the warriors who now slept beneath.

Beyond that extent again might be beheld long lines of hill and woodland, broken, before the eye reached the faintest line in the distance, by a tall, curiously-shaped hill, known by the name of Harbury Hill, or, as some called it, Harbury Fort, though, to say sooth, scarcely a vestige of a fort existed there, except the broken vallum of a Roman camp, on the short sweet grass of which now grazed some innocent sheep and peaceful cows.

Looking forth, as well as he could, from the window, the eyes of Charles Tyrrell instantly sought out Harbury Hill, which was, it may be remembered, within a very short distance of his paternal mansion. They lighted on it at once; and, notwithstanding all that he had suffered there, and felt he was still to suffer, a thrill of satisfaction passed through his bosom, again to behold the well-known scenes of his early years; the hill, the valley, the wood, the plain, all glowing in the early light of the morning, which imaged not amiss the light of youth pouring its lustre through all that surrounds it. He gazed and enjoyed; and, with an economy of pleasure, which the harsh lessons of the world had taught him to practise even then, he enjoyed, perhaps, the more, because he felt that that first glow of joy was the only pleasure which was likely to be his during his sojourn there.

All the passengers in the coach were still sound asleep; and after a glance, which gave him no satisfaction, at the sharp, astute countenance of Mr. Driesen, he turned away from the fat, unmeaning faces of the rest, heated with travelling and dirty with a journey, and continued to gaze at every well-remembered object till the coach stopped, the horses were unharnessed, and four staid and heavy animals, but very little like the light blood tits that now gallop over the ground with the Highflyer behind them, were brought out, and with somewhat slow and clumsy hands attached to the heavy Blue. The stopping of the coach roused almost all the inside passengers, and amid many expressions of wonder at the sun having risen while they were all asleep, Mr. Driesen put forth his head from the coach window, commented on the beauty of the morning, and assured Charles Tyrrell that, though he had been absent but a few months, he would find very great improvements in the neighbourhood of Harbury Park.

"Indeed," said Charles; "I have not heard of any, either in progress or contemplation."

"It is nevertheless true," replied Mr. Driesen, "and I may say that I have had some share therein, for I suggested several of the plans to your father; and I hear that he is not only executing them, but greatly improving upon them: I am even now on my way to spend a week or two at the Park, and see what progress has been made."