Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXV, No. 1, July 1849

by Various

The consequence of this was simply that he found himself a youth of seventeen, surrounded by all the means and appliances of luxury, with servants, horses, hounds, and falcons at his command, the leading personage, beyond all comparison, of the neighborhood, highly born, handsome, well bred and accomplished. All this, by the way, was entirely uncorrected by any memory of past sufferings or sorrows, either on his own part or on that of his family, or by any knowledge of the privations and exertions on the part of Sir Miles, by which this present affluence had been purchased; and he became, naturally enough, somewhat over confident in his own qualities, somewhat over-bearing in his manner, and not a little intolerant and inconsiderate as to the opinions and feelings of others. He then presented, in a word, the not unusual picture of an arrogant, self-sufficient, proud and fiery youth, with many generous and noble points, and many high qualities, which, duly cultivated, might have rendered him a good, a happy, and perhaps even a great man; but which, untrained as they were, and suffered to run up into a rank and unpruned overgrowth, were but too likely to degenerate themselves into vices, and to render him at some future day a tormentor of himself, and an oppressor of others.

Now, however, he was a general favorite, for largely endowed with animal spirits, indulged in every wish that his fancy could form, never crossed in the least particular, it was rarely that his violent temper would display itself, or his innate selfishness rise conspicuous above the superficial face of good-nature and somewhat careless affability, which he presented to the general observer.

It was, perhaps, unfortunate for Jasper, no less than for those who were in after days connected with him, whether for good or evil, that, at this critical period of his adolescence, when the character of the man is developed from the accidents of boyhood, in proportion as his increasing years and altered habits and pursuits led him to be more abroad, and cast him in some degree into the world, the advancing years and growing infirmities of his father kept him closer to the library and the hall.

So that at the very time when his expanding mind and nascent passions most needed sage advice and moderate coercion, or at least wary guidance, he was abandoned almost entirely to his own direction. The first outbreaks, therefore, of evil principles, the germs of a masterful will, the seeds of fierce and fiery passions, and, above all, the growing recklessness with regard to the feelings and the rights of others, which could scarcely have escaped the notice of the shrewd old man had he accompanied his son abroad, and which, if noticed, would surely have been repressed, were allowed to increase hourly by self-indulgence and the want of restraint, unknown and unsuspected to the youth himself, for whom one day they were to be the cause of so many and so bitter trials.

But it is now time that, turning from this brief retrospect of previous events, and this short analysis of the early constitution of the mind of him whose singular career is to form the subject of this narrative, we should introduce our reader to the scene of action, and to the person whose adventures in after life will perhaps excuse the space which has necessarily been allotted to the antecedents of the first marked event which befel him, and from which all the rest took their rise in a train of connection, which, although difficult to trace by a casual observer, was in reality close and perfect.

The manor-house of Widecomb, such as it has been slightly sketched above, stood on a broad flat terrace, paved with slabs of red freestone, and adorned with a massive balustrade of the same material, interspersed with grotesque images at the points where it was reached from the esplanade below, by three or four flights of broad and easy steps.

The mansion itself was large, and singularly picturesque, but the beauties of the building were as nothing to those of the scenery which it overlooked.

It was built on the last and lowest slope of one of those romantic spurs which trend southerly from the wild and heathery heights of Dartmoor. And although the broad and beautifully kept lawn was embosomed in a very woody and sylvan chase, full of deep glens and tangled dingles, which was in turn framed on three sides by the deep oak-woods, which covered all the rounded hills in the rear of the estate and to the right and left hand, yet as the land continued to fall toward the south for many and many a mile, the sight could range from the oriel windows of the great hall, and of the fine old library, situated on either hand of the entrance and armory, over a wide expanse of richly cultivated country, with more than one navigable river winding among the woods and corn-fields, and many a village steeple glittering among the hedgerows, until in the far distance it was bounded by a blue hazy line, which seemed to melt into the sky, but which was in truth, though not to be distinguished as such unless by a practiced eye, the British Channel.

The Hall itself and even the southern verge of the chase, which bounded the estate in that direction, lay, however, at a very considerable distance from the cultivated country, and was divided from it by a vast broken chasm, with banks so precipitous and rocky that no road had ever been carried through it, while its great width had deterred men from the idea of bridging it. Through this strange and terrific gorge there rushed an impetuous and powerful torrent, broken by many falls and rapids, with many a deep and limpid pool between them, favorite haunts of the large salmon and sea trout which abounded in its waters. This brook, for it scarcely can be called a river, although after the rains of autumn or the melting snows of spring it sent down an immense volume of dark, rust colored water, with a roar that could be heard for miles, to the distant Tamar, swept down the hills in a series of cascades from the right hand side of the park, until it reached the brink of the chasm we have described, lying at right angles to its former course, down which it plunged in an impetuous shoot of nearly three hundred feet, and rushed thence easterly away, walled on each side by the precipitous rock, until some five miles thence it was crossed at a deep and somewhat dangerous ford, by the only great road which traversed that district, and by which alone strangers could reach the Hall and its beautiful demesnes.

To the westward or right hand side of the chase the country was entirely wild and savage, covered with thick woods, interspersed with lonely heaths, and intersected by hundreds of clear brawling rills. To the eastward, however, although much broken by forest ground, there was a wide range of rich pasture fields and meadows, divided by great overgrown hawthorn hedges, each hedge almost a thicket, and penetrated by numerous lanes and horse-roads buried between deep banks, and overcanopied by foliage, that, even at noonday, was almost impenetrable to the sunshine.