The Broken Font: A Story of the Civil War, Vol. 1 (of 2)

by Moyle Sherer

George Juxon had instantly seized Sir Charles with an iron grasp. Sir Oliver was troubled, and scarce knew how to act; while Sir Philip Arundel, the most self-possessed of the party, desired the attendants to send swiftly to Warwick for a surgeon, and suggested to Sir Oliver that the aggressor should be committed to his charge, and that he would take him to his own home, and be responsible for his appearance to answer for the crime which he had just committed, when the charge should be preferred against him in due order. But George Juxon required that he should remain in custody at Milverton until it was ascertained whether the stab inflicted on Cuthbert might not prove fatal.

The ladies of Milverton, who were absent, walking in the grounds, were happily spared this painful scene. To the exclamations of wonder, regret, and even condolence, with which Sir Charles was addressed by some others of the party, he answered nothing, but stood with lips closely compressed in sullen scorn and in a dogged silence.

Juxon unhanded him, after Sir Philip promised that he should for the present be kept close guarded, and gave all his attention to Cuthbert, who was borne slowly and carefully up into his chamber, and his wound there bound up with a temporary dressing by Juxon himself, till proper assistance should arrive. This done, he left him for a while in the care of the servants, while he went down to aid in composing Sir Oliver and the ladies of the family.

This young clergyman, who was a distant connection of the good bishop of the same name, the treasurer at that time of the King, was a good specimen of a particular class of richly beneficed clergy, not uncommon in his day. He was a ripe scholar, a kind, orthodox churchman, and a manly country gentleman. His habits were those of his time: they grew out of the circumstances of that period and the state of society in all country places; and he had seen his own pious and dignified relative hunt his own pack of beagles, without a thought that he was doing any thing more than taking a vigorous exercise, beneficial alike to the health of his body and his mind.

Juxon was among, but above, sportsmen. He had a wealthy rectory, and lived hospitably with his equals, and charitably towards the poor. In the discharge of his parochial duties, he was sensible and serious: he valued books, and he had a due appreciation of genius.

He had been of the hunting party this morning, and was thus a guest at Milverton, where he had long occasionally visited, and where, upon a former day, he had chanced to have rather a long and free conversation with Cuthbert, and, albeit widely different in their habits, had found common ground of interest in the subjects on which they talked, and they had parted well pleased with each other. Had they touched on politics, indeed, they would have differed; for Juxon was a most stanch supporter of the court party: through evil report and good report he stuck close to the crown; he wrote for it, spoke for it, and was ready to lay down his life in the defence of it; but he was of too large a mind to wonder at the opinions of those opposed to the government of the King; nor was he blind either to those abuses of the prerogative which had first awakened a spirit of resistance in men of undoubted worth and patriotism, nor to the grievous folly of those deplorable counsels, whereby the King had been induced or encouraged to force upon the proud and resolute Scots the discipline of a church to which they disclaimed allegiance.

Again, he was of a generous spirit, detested persecution in any thing, especially in religion and matters of conscience, and had felt, with the Lord Falkland, in all the earlier stages of the present quarrel. Nevertheless, a decided and sincere attachment to the monarchy, an unshaken respect for the personal qualities of the King, and a devotion to the forms and to the spirit of that church in which he was baptized, suckled, and educated,—a devotion quite distinct from, and independent of, any feeling of self-interest, as an incumbent,—caused him to resolve upon his own course in the coming troubles with a cheerful firmness.

These sentiments, if the conversation in the hall had not been so suddenly put an end to, would there have been elicited. He had not approved the outbreak and burst of indignation with which the sensitive and excited Cuthbert had so energetically appropriated the indirect, but mischievous, speech with which Sir Charles Lambert had sought to sow a suspicion of his tutor’s integrity in the bosom of Sir Oliver; but he with his whole soul detested and abhorred the cowardly and bloody ferocity with which the haughty and maddened barbarian had resented the contemptuous expression of Cuthbert. There sprung up in his heart at that moment a warmth of interest for the youth, which never afterwards, in fortunes the most dark and divided, entirely died away. But to return to the actual present. He saw the ladies, who had but just returned from a walk to the vineyard, in company with Sir Oliver, in a remote corner of the garden, and immediately joined them.

They were, as might be expected, very greatly troubled at the cruel occurrence, and pale with natural anxiety. Indeed there was an expression of concern upon the countenance of Mistress Katharine, so very deep, so profoundly sad, that even amid the sorrowful perplexities of the moment it glanced across the mind of Juxon, that, in one or other of the parties in this business, her own heart was most closely interested, and he thought that he had never before seen human beauty with such a divine aspect. At the readily adopted suggestion of Katharine, her aunt Alice would have proceeded instantly to the chamber of the sufferer, to render him any service in her power; but Juxon requested of her not to do so, and recommended that the ladies should keep themselves quiet and apart until the surgeon arrived, and the gentlemen now in the mansion should have departed. Observing, too, the extreme perplexity of Sir Oliver, who had been and still was exceedingly agitated by this strange event, he entreated him to remain with them, and to keep himself calm and quiet for the present; assuring him that every thing which he could suppose him to wish in the present distress should be properly done, and that he would certainly not leave Milverton himself while he could hope to render the slightest service to Sir Oliver in this difficulty. There was an earnestness of manner about Juxon, and at the same time such a quiet tone of internal confidence in the resources of his own judgment, that they all submitted to his guidance; and Sir Oliver was greatly comforted and strengthened by the thought that so wise and judicious a friend was near him in his necessity.