"That have I," answered the Count. "I have seldom passed a more troublous night, and yet I was weary, too, when I went to rest."
"Were they good or evil visions, my lord," asked the young man. "Mine were all bright."
"Would that mine had been so!" answered the Count. "But they were wild and whirling things, and 'tis no matter--and yet these undigested thoughts," he continued, after a short pause, "these fanciful nothings of the dreaming brain, trouble us as much at the time as fierce realities--nay, perhaps more. I have suffered more bitterly, at times, in some dark vision of the night--yes, even in my corporeal frame,--than even choking death itself could inflict. I cannot but think that there is a land to which the spirits of the sleeping travel for a time, and undergo a strange and wayward fate, till they are called back again. I've often fancied there must be such a place: a kingdom of dreams, as it were, to which all the strange actions and thoughts of the world are sent as soon as done, as a sort of commodity or merchandise, and there are mingled up by some fantastic power with the productions of the land itself. There go the images of the dead, the voices that are lost upon the earth, the passionate loves and follies of our youth, the thirsty ambition of our manhood, the crimes and the temptations of all years, even the very thoughts of infancy, and there we find them all, when the spirit is summoned from the slumbering body to visit that strange country. Else, how is it, that when we lie with darkness all around us, no sight, no sound, no scent, to wake up memory, things long forgotten, faces that no effort of the waking mind could call before the eye of fancy, voices that have long ceased to ring in the deafened ear of forgetfulness, come upon us, all strong and vivid as reality; ay, even the feelings also no longer suited to our state of being, totally dissonant to the condition of our corporeal frame or to our mental age:--such as the joys and pastimes of our early boyhood, and the prattled pleasures of our baby days? Yet there they all are--bright as if in life, though strangely mixed with other wilder things, and cast into mad impossible array. Last night it seemed as if every action of my life, charmed by some frantic Orpheus, danced around me in wild and grotesque forms--never pausing till I had leisure to taste one joy, or power to resist one pang. Would to Heaven! I could be a boy again, and, with the knowledge of each act's results, live over life anew--It would be a very different one!"
Ferdinand had let him proceed without observation or question; indeed he was too much surprised to answer, for he had never before heard the Count speak thus to any one. It seemed, in truth, more as if he were talking to himself than to his companion; as if the weight of thought overpowered him, and he cast down the burden where he could. But the young man's surprise was not less excited by the matter of the confidence, than by the confidence itself. He knew the Count was learned far beyond most of the nobles of his day. He knew that he was thoughtful; but he had ever seemed in disposition, worldly, grasping, avaricious; evil qualities, as he thought, perfectly incompatible with fancy. In his inexperience of the world, he was not aware how frequently habits of thought and of desire often produced in us by the operation of a long train of ruling circumstances--overbear the natural bent of the mind, and lead us to a course of life, and to innumerable actions, utterly inharmonious with the original tone of the character. It is so; and there is scarcely any man who is not thus walled in by circumstances in his course; scarcely any tree that, however upright its original shoot, is not bent by the prevailing wind. Nevertheless, when the mind is left free for a moment from the habitual influences,--when the passions that have been indulged are not called into play,--when the desires that have usurped a sway over us, are for a time without either object or opposition, the original character of the mind is suffered to indulge itself for a brief space, like a prisoner allowed a few moments of free air. So was it with the Count of Ehrenstein. Busy with the thoughts which had succeeded to his dreams, he forgot not only his motives for sending for the young man at his side, but also his habitual reserve; and led from one feeling to another, as he discoursed imaginatively of the visions of the night, he was hurried on to admit those sensations of regret which, sooner or later, visit every one of Adam's race, but which the pride that entered in us at the Fall forbids us to acknowledge.
Ferdinand had walked on by his side, thoughtful and interested, with his eyes, too, bent down upon the pavement of the rampart, and eager to hear more. But soon after the Count paused, the young man brought the confession, if it may be so called, to a conclusion, by asking a question which would naturally rise in any simple and straightforward heart, saying,--"Is it not very easy to repair, my lord, that which has been done amiss?"
"No, no, youth," answered the Count, turning upon him, and speaking almost bitterly, "that is a foolish error. It is never possible to repair aught that has been done amiss. Each act, once performed, is irrevocable. It is more,--it is a foundation-stone upon which, under the lash of the stern taskmaster, Fate, we must, whether we will or not, build up a part of the fabric of our life. Now do not go, silly boy! and from what I have said raise up in your fanciful brain a belief that I have committed great crimes, and bitterly repent them. It is with me as with all men who have power to think, and who try from the past to extract guidance for the future. I see small errors producing greater evils; I see pitiful mistakes, which were thought nothing at first, swelling with bitter consequences,--but nothing more. Every man, Ferdinand," and he laid his hand upon his shoulder with a sort of monitory gesture, "every man who has passed through a great part of life, is like one who has climbed a mountain and is destined to descend on the other side. If he turns round to look at the country he has travelled, he sees it spread forth beneath him, with all its roads and passes, rivers and valleys, laid out as in a map, and he will ever find he has often lost his way; that there were paths which would have led him to his object shorter than those he has taken; that the objects on which he has fixed his eyes to guide him on, were often wide of the right course; and, in a word, that he has not accomplished, in, the summer day of life, one-half he might have done, with less labour, and by easier means. And now let us speak of other things. You would not say last night what you had seen in the old hall; now tell me what befell you there. We were then in the hour of fanciful conceits, when the imagination wanders and easily receives false impressions. We are now in the broad light of the real day, and you can better tell, and I can better understand whatever you may have witnessed there."
"I did not wish to speak last night, my lord," replied Ferdinand, in a clam and easy tone, "because all the people about us have filled themselves with fears which would be quite as well away; and all I had to say would only have made them more afraid. I went straight to the hall as you directed--I do not mean to say that I would not rather have had a light--but neither flesh nor spirit shall turn me from doing what I have undertaken to perform. I found the door fastened, however, and after having lifted the latch, I shook it hard, but it did not give way. For a minute, I thought of coming back to tell you; but then I fancied that you and the rest might doubt me, and I tried again. Just then I think I heard a heavy grating sound, but, however, the door opened, and I went in. At first I could hardly see--"
"Why, the moon shone, and must have given plenty of light through the windows," replied the Count.
"There was too much light, my good lord," answered Ferdinand. "I came out of the dark vestibule, and when I entered the hall, it was all in a blaze of light. The suits of old armour that stand against the wall had, each one, a gauntleted hand extended, and in it was a torch. It seemed, indeed, that there were more suits than usual, but I did not stay to count them, for as soon as I could see, I hurried on, passing the table where they were seated--"
"Who?" exclaimed the Count, "who were seated?"