Squire Arden; volume 2 of 3

by Mrs. Oliphant

It was not, however, Edgar Arden’s intention to preach any crusade. On the contrary, the first impulse of his friendly and neighbour-loving soul was to find out some reason for the existence which seemed so strange to him. He tried to approach, in a great many different ways, and evoke out of it, as it were, or surprise out of it, its secrets. It could not exist, he said to himself, without a meaning. Edgar was not very profound in his philosophy, but still he had a way of thinking of what he saw, and his amused interest in everything led him into a world of questions. Besides, he was not merely conversant with Harry Thornleigh and his class, but also with various other divisions of society. He saw a good deal of Lord Newmarch, for instance, who was entirely a different kind of man; and he renewed his acquaintance with some men whom he had met abroad in his earlier days, one of whom was a great cricketer, and another who was of the Alpine Club, and whose soul dwelt habitually in the sacred recesses of the Matterhorn or Jungfrau. Except Lord Newmarch and his set, these men were all utterly disinterested, pursuing their favourite amusements, not for any purpose to be gained, but for the mere sake of the pursuit itself. The Alpine Club man had no curiosity about the view from the mountain-head, and cared nothing for the formation of the glaciers, or any other subject connected with his mountains: all his object was to get to the top; and he did get to a great many tops, and distinguished himself, and acquired various bits of practical knowledge, which, having no connection of purpose or interest in his mind, were of little use to himself, and none to others. And so likewise the men who devoted themselves to society did not expect to be amused, or instructed, or to meet people they liked, or to find in it any of those solaces which theorists pretend. They went because everybody went—because it was the right thing to do—just for the sake of going, and no other reason. This disinterestedness was the great thing that struck Edgar. He himself was aware that he did not at all possess it. He was continually desiring some result—pleasure or advantage of some description, which, when you come to think of it (he reflected), is a mean way of treating existence after all. Whereas, society was grand in its indifference to any issue. It lived, it assembled, it talked, it went to and fro, and gave itself a great deal of trouble; and from all this exertion it expected nothing to come. This was the first discovery Edgar made, or thought he made; and it staggered him much in the contempt for society which he had been settling into. Was not this in reality a higher principle than his own? It bewildered him, and he could not make it out; and Lord Newmarch, though he was a social philosopher of much greater experience than Edgar, did not seem capable of giving him any aid.

“I don’t know what you mean by disinterestedness,” Lord Newmarch said. “There is nobody who is disinterested. We have some selfish object in whatever we do. I think, for my own part, that I desire sincerely the good of the country, and make it the grand object of my life; but I know that I want the country to be benefited in my way, not in any one else’s. We are all like that. There is my brother Everard, do you see, making himself very agreeable to that great fat woman. He hates fat women, and that one in particular, I know; but he is being so very civil to her because he wants her to ask him to her garden party, which is coming off next week. He is going to call her carriage for her, like a humbug as he is—but all with the most selfish and interested motives.”

“I allow that,” said Edgar. “I allow that anybody will do anything for an invitation; but why should he wish to go to her garden party? That is what I want to know.”

“My dear fellow,” said Lord Newmarch, shrugging his shoulders, “why, even I am going! everybody will be there.”

“Does he want to meet everybody?” said Edgar. “He does continually, and he is sick of them. Does he want to see any one in particular? Does he think he will enjoy himself? Is it for the pleasure of it he is going? When he has got his invitation he will say, what a confounded bore! He knows exactly beforehand what it will be like. Well, then, I say he is utterly disinterested. He is going for the sake of going. It is not to make him happier, or amuse him, or benefit him. And everybody is going just for the same reason. Surely something might be made of this wonderful disinterestedness! It cannot be meant to be wasted upon garden parties and Lady Bodmiller’s ball.”

“My dear Arden, you mistake completely,” said Lord Newmarch, with even a little irritation. “Disinterestedness! nonsense! Don’t you see they want it to be known they have been there; everybody will be there. And out of the list, if one name was wanting, don’t you see that the owner of it would lose a certain position. He would feel himself left out. Of course, you have a card. You are one of the most eligible young men of the season. There is no telling what fears and hopes you are exciting in some gentle breasts. Disinterested! That shows how little you know.”

And even Lord Newmarch laughed—a refined little laugh—not much like him. He was drawn out of his usual rôle for the moment by the exceeding simplicity of his friend—a thing he could not help laughing at. “Why, there is no saying how many fair huntresses will go there in search of you,” he said. “These are the happy hunting-grounds where every woman is permitted to shoot, and none of the men dare run away.”

“I was not speaking of women,” said Edgar, sharply, for he had a kindness for women. “I was talking of your brother and the rest. These are not happy hunting-grounds for them. There is nothing there for them except the mere fact that they are there. They go for the sake of going. The other is poor enough, but still it is a motive if it exists. The question is, which is finest, my stupid search for a motive, or your brother’s grand disinterestedness. There is something splendid, don’t you think, in seeing a man throw away his life like this?”

“What do you mean by throwing away a man’s life?” cried the social philosopher. “You have become dreadfully highflown. An hour or two in an afternoon, in a pretty garden, with well-dressed people about, and a band, and all that—I don’t understand what you mean.”

To this Edgar made no reply. His antagonist had the best of it; and yet he was right, and his theory was just. As for the poor ladies who went to those happy hunting-grounds—if there was any truth in it—that was a branch of the subject more melancholy and more intricate still. Edgar preferred not to enter into it. He thought of Helena Thornleigh and her visions, poor girl—visions which, perhaps, were only evidences of a spasmodic state of conflict against the happy hunting-grounds. Fancy Clare going out with her bow and her spear like the other young Dianas! Edgar thought to himself. But then Clare was rich: she had no need to become a huntress. She, like himself, would be the pursued and not the pursuer. This thought made the young man faint and sick. What a ghastly light it threw upon all these pretty parties and assemblies of pleasure! Even the men who sought nothing were better than this.