“We shall cross-question our host after dinner,” answered Tracey; “meanwhile let me conduct you to the dining-room. A pretty place this, in its way, is it not?”
“Very,” said I, with enthusiasm. “Could you not live as happily here as in your own brilliant villa?”
“No, not quite, but still happily.”
“Why not quite?”
“First, because there is nothing within or without the house which one could attempt to improve, unless by destroying the whole character of what is so good in its way; secondly, where could I put my Claudes and Turners? where my statues? where, oh where, my books? where, in short, the furniture of Man’s mind?”
I made no answer, for the dinner-bell rang loud, and we went down at once into the dining-room—a quaint room, scarcely touched since the date of William III. A high and heavy dado of dark oak, the rest of the walls in Dutch stamped leather, still bright and fresh; a high mantelpiece, also of oak, with a very indifferent picture of still life let into the upper panel; arched recesses on either side, receptacles for china and tall drinking-glasses; heavy chairs, with crests inlaid on their ponderous backs, and faded needlework on their ample seats;—all, however, speaking of comfort and home, and solid though unassuming prosperity. Gray had changed his rude morning dress, and introduced me to his wife with an evident husbandlike pride. Mrs Gray was still very pretty; in her youth she must have been prettier even than Clara Thornhill, and though very plainly dressed, still it was the dress of a gentlewoman. There was intelligence, but soft timid intelligence, in her dark hazel eyes and broad candid forehead. I soon saw, however, that she was painfully shy, and not at all willing to take her share in the expense of conversation. But with Tracey she was more at her ease than with a stranger, and I thanked him inwardly for coming to my relief, as I was vainly endeavouring to extract from her lips more than a murmured monosyllable.
The dinner, however, passed off very pleasantly. Simple old English fare—plenty of it—excellent of its kind. Tracey was the chief talker, and made himself so entertaining, that at last even Mrs Gray’s shyness wore away, and I discovered that she had a well-informed graceful mind, constitutionally cheerful, as was evidenced by the blithe music of her low but happy laugh.
The dinner over, we adjourned, as Percival had proposed, to the summer-house. There we found the table spread with fruits and wine, of which last the port was superb; no better could be dragged from the bins of a college, or blush on the board of a prelate. Mrs Gray, however, deserted us, but we now and then caught sight of her in the garden without, playing gaily with her children—two fine little boys, and Lucy, who seemed to have her own way with them all, as she ought—the youngest child, the only girl—justifiably papa’s pet, for she was the one most like her mother.
“Gray,” said Tracey, “my friend and I have had some philosophical disputes, which we cannot decide to our own satisfaction, on the reasons why some men do so much more in life than other men, without having any apparent intellectual advantage over those who are contented to be obscure. We have both hit on a clue to the cause, in what we call motive power. But what this motive power really is, and why it should fail in some men and be so strong in others, is matter of perplexity, at least to me, and I fancy my friend himself is not much more enlightened therein than I am. So we have both come here to hear what you have to say—you, who certainly had motive enough for ambitious purposes when you swept away so many academical prizes—when you rushed into speech and into print, and cast your bold eye on St Stephen’s. And now, what has become of that motive power? Is it all put into prizes for root-crops and sheep?”
“As to myself,” answered Gray, passing the wine, “I can give very clear explanations. I am of a gentleman’s family, but the son of a very poor curate. Luckily for me, we lived close by an excellent grammar-school, at which I obtained a free admission. From the first day I entered, I knew that my poor father, bent on making me a scholar, counted on my exertions not only for my own livelihood, but for a provision for my mother should she survive him. Here was motive enough to supply motive power. I succeeded in competition with rivals at school, and success added to the strength of the motive power. Our county member, on whose estate I was born, took a kindly interest in me, and gave me leave, when I quitted school, as head boy, to come daily to his house and share the studies of his son, who was being prepared for the university by a private tutor, eminent as a scholar and admirable as a teacher. Thus I went up to college not only full of hope (in itself a motive power, though, of itself, an unsafe one), but of a hope so sustained that it became resolution, by the knowledge that to maintain me at the university my parents were almost literally starving themselves. This suffices to explain whatever energy and application I devoted to my academical career. At last I obtained my fellowship; the income of that I shared with my parents; but if I died before them the income would die also—a fresh motive power towards a struggle for fortune in the Great World. I took up politics, I confess it very frankly, as a profession rather than a creed; it was the shortest road to fame, and, with prudence, perhaps to pecuniary competence. If I succeeded in Parliament I might obtain a living for my father, or some public situation for myself not dependent on the fluctuations of party. A very high political ambition was denied me by the penury of circumstance. A man must have good means of his own who aspires to rank among party chiefs. I knew I was but a political adventurer, that I could only be so considered; and had it not been for my private motive power, I should have been ashamed of my public one. As it was, my scholarly pride was secretly chafed at the thought that I was carrying into the affairs of state the greed of trade. Suddenly, most unexpectedly, this estate was bequeathed to me. You large proprietors will smile when I say that we had always regarded the Grays of Oakden Hall with venerating pride; they were the head of our branch of the clan. My father had seen this place in his boyhood; the remembrance of it dwelt on his mind as the unequivocal witness of his dignity as a gentleman born. He came from the same stock as the Grays of Oakden, who had lived on the land for more than three centuries, entitled to call themselves squires. The relationship was very distant, still it existed. But a dream that so great a place as Oakden Hall, with its 1000 acres, should ever pass to his son—no, my father thought it much more likely that his son might be prime minister! John Gray of Oakden had never taken the least notice of us, except that, when I won the Pitt scholarship, he sent me a fine turkey, labelled ‘From John Gray, Esq. of Oakden.’ This present I acknowledged, but John Gray never answered my letter. Just at that time, however, as appears by the date, he re-made his will, and placed me as remainder-man in case of the deaths, without issue, of two nearer relations, both nephews. These young men died unmarried—the one of rheumatic fever, a few months before old Gray’s decease; the other, two weeks after it; poor fellow, he was thrown from his horse and killed on the spot. So, unexpectedly, I came into this property. Soon afterwards I married. The possession of land is a great tranquilliser to a restless spirit, and a happy marriage is as sedative as potent. Poverty is a spur to action. Great wealth, on the other hand, not unnaturally tends to the desire of display, and in free countries often to the rivalry for political power. The golden mean is proverbially the condition most favourable to content, and content is the antidote to ambition. Mine was the golden mean! Other influences of pride and affection contributed to keep me still. Of pride; for was I not really a greater man here, upon my ancestral acres and my few yearly hundreds, than as a political aspirant, who must commence his career by being a political dependant? How rich I felt here! how poor I should be in London! How inevitably, in the daily expenses of a metropolitan life, and in the costs of elections (should I rise beyond being a mere nominee), I must become needy and involved! So much for the influence of pride. Now for the influence of affection; my dear wife had never been out of these rural shades among which she was born. She is of a nature singularly timid, sensitive, and retiring. The idea of that society to which a political career would have led me terrified her. I loved her the better for desiring no companionship but mine. In fine, my desires halted at once on these turfs; the Attraction of the Earth, of which I had a share, prevailed; the motive power stopped here.”