Tales from "Blackwood," Volume 4

by Various

He was silent for some moments. “Some of her friends,” he said at last, “ought to come down; she must have friends, I know, who would come if they were sent for. I wish Mrs Meredith were returned—she might advise her.”

He spoke rather in a soliloquy than as addressing me, and I did not feel called upon to make any answer. The next moment we arrived at the turn of the street, and, by what seemed a mutual impulse, wished each other good morning.

I went straight down to Smith’s rooms, at ——Hall, to get him to come and dine with me; for I pitied the poor fellow’s forlorn condition, and considered myself in some degree bound to supply Russell’s place towards him. A Bible-clerk’s position in the University is always more or less one of mortification and constraint. It is true that the same academical degree, the same honours—if he can obtain them—the same position in after life—all the solid advantages of a University education, are open to him, as to other men; but, so long as his undergraduateship lasts, he stands in a very different position from other men, and he feels it—feels it, too, through three or four of those years of life when such feelings are most acute, and when that strength of mind which is the only antidote—which can measure men by themselves and not by their accidents—is not as yet matured either in himself or in the society of which he becomes a member. If, indeed, he be a decidedly clever man, and has the opportunity early in his career of showing himself to be such, then there is good sense and good feeling enough—let us say, to the honour of the University, there is sufficient of that true esprit du corps, a real consciousness of the great objects for which men are thus brought together—to insure the acknowledgment from all but the most unworthy of its members, that a scholar is always a gentleman. But if he be a man of only moderate abilities, and known only as a Bible-clerk, then, the more he is of a gentleman by birth and education, the more painful does his position generally become. There are not above two or three in residence in most colleges, and their society is confined almost wholly to themselves. Some old schoolfellow, indeed, or some man who “knows him at home,” holding an independent rank in college, may occasionally venture upon the condescension of asking him to wine—even to meet a friend or two with whom he can take such a liberty; and even then, the gnawing consciousness that he is considered an inferior—though not treated as such—makes it a questionable act of kindness. Among the two or three of his own table, one is the son of a college butler, another has been for years usher at a preparatory school; he treats them with civility, they treat him with deference; but they have no tastes or feelings in common. At an age, therefore, which most of all seeks and requires companionship, he has no companions; and the period of life which should be the most joyous, becomes to him almost a purgatory. Of course the radical and the leveller will say at once, “Ay, this comes of your aristocratic distinctions; they ought not to be allowed in universities at all.” Not so: it comes of human nature; the distinction between a dependent and an independent position will always be felt in all societies, mark it outwardly as little as you will. Humiliation, more or less, is a penalty which poverty must always pay. These humbler offices in the University were founded by a charity as wise as benevolent, which has afforded to hundreds of men of talent, but of humble means, an education equal to that of the highest noble in the land, and, in consequence, a position and usefulness in after life which otherwise they could never have hoped for. And if the somewhat servile tenure by which they are held (which in late years has in most colleges been very much relaxed) were wholly done away with, there is reason to fear the charity of the founders would be liable to continual abuse, by their being bestowed upon many who required no such assistance. As it is, this occurs too often; and it is much to be desired that the same regulations were followed in their distribution throughout the University, which some colleges have long most properly adopted: namely, that the appointment should be bestowed on the successful candidate after examination, strict regard being had to the circumstances of all the parties before they are allowed to offer themselves. It would make their position far more definite and respectable, because all would then be considered honourable to a certain degree, as being the reward of merit; instead of which, too often, they are convenient items of patronage in the hands of the Principal and Fellows, the nomination to them depending on private interest, which, by no means insuring the nominee’s being a gentleman by birth, while it is wholly careless of his being a scholar by education, tends to lower the general standing of the order in the University.

This struck me forcibly in Smith’s case. Poor fellow! with an excellent heart and a great deal of sound common sense, he had neither the breeding nor the talent to make a gentleman of. I doubt if an university education was any real boon to him. It insured him four years of hard work—harder, perhaps, than if he had sat at a desk all the time—without the society of any of his own class and habits, and with the prospect of very little remuneration ultimately. I think he might have been very happy in his own sphere, and I do not see how he could be happy at Oxford. And whether he or the world in general ever profited much by the B.A. which he eventually attached to his name, is a point at least doubtful.

I could not get him to come and dine with me in my own college. He knew his own position, as it seemed, and was not ashamed of it; in fact, in his case, it could not involve any consciousness of degradation; and I am sure his only reason for refusing my invitations of that kind was, that he thought it possible my dignity might be compromised by so open an association with him. He would come over to my rooms in the evening to tea, he said; and he came accordingly. When I told him in the morning that Russell had inquired very kindly after him, he was much affected; but it had evidently been a comfort to him to feel that he was not forgotten, and during the hour or two which we spent together in the evening, he seemed much more cheerful.

“Perhaps they will let me see him to-morrow, if he is better?” he said, with an appealing look to me. I assured him I would mention his wish to Russell, and his countenance at once brightened up, as if he thought only his presence were needed to insure our friend’s recovery.

But the next morning all our hopes were dashed again; delirium had returned, as had been feared, and the feverish symptoms seemed to gain strength rather than abate. Bleeding and other usual remedies had been had recourse to already to a perilous extent, and in Russell’s present reduced state, no further treatment of the kind could be ventured upon. “All we can do now, sir,” said Dr Wilson, “is little more than to let nature take her course. I have known such cases recover.” I did not ask to see Mary Russell that day; for what could I have answered to her fears and inquiries? But I thought of Ormiston’s words; surely she ought to have some friend—some one of her own family, or some known and tried companion of her own sex, would surely come to her at a moment’s notice, did they but know of her trying situation. If—if her brother were to die—she surely would not be left here among strangers, quite alone? Yet I much feared, from what had escaped him at our last interview, that they had both incurred the charge of wilfulness in refusing offers of assistance at the time of their father’s disgrace and flight, and that having, contrary to the advice of their friends, and perhaps imprudently, taken the step they had done in coming to Oxford, Mary Russell, with something of her brother’s spirit, had made up her mind now, however heavy and unforeseen the blow that was to fall, to suffer all in solitude and silence. For Ormiston, too, I felt with an interest and intensity that was hourly increasing. I met him after morning chapel, and though he appeared intentionally to avoid any conversation with me, I knew by his countenance that he had heard the unfavourable news of the morning; and it could be no common emotion that had left its visible trace upon features usually so calm and impassible.

From thoughts of this nature, indulged in the not very appropriate locality of the centre of the quadrangle, I was roused by the good-humoured voice of Mrs Meredith—“our governess,” as we used to call her—who, with the Doctor himself, was just then entering the college, and found me right in the line of her movements towards the door of “the lodgings.” I was not until that moment aware of her return, and altogether was considerably startled as she addressed me with—“Oh! how do you do, Mr Hawthorne? You young gentlemen don’t take care of yourselves, you see, when I am away—I am so sorry to hear this about poor Mr Russell. Is he so very ill? Dr Meredith is just going to see him.”

I coloured up, I dare say, for it was a trick I was given to in those days, and, in the confusion, replied rather to my own thoughts than to Mrs Meredith’s question.