Kenelm Chillingly — Volume 03 eBook

“And you felt wings that you were unconscious of before, fluttering and beating themselves as against the wires of a cage.  You were true to your instincts then, my dear fellow-man,—­instincts of space and Heaven.  Courage!—­the cage-door will open soon.  And now, practically speaking, I give you this advice in parting:  You have a quick and sensitive mind which you have allowed that strong body of yours to incarcerate and suppress.  Give that mind fair play.  Attend to the business of your calling diligently; the craving for regular work is the healthful appetite of mind:  but in your spare hours cultivate the new ideas which your talk with men who have been accustomed to cultivate the mind more than the body has sown within you.  Belong to a book-club, and interest yourself in books.  A wise man has said, ‘Books widen the present by adding to it the past and the future.’  Seek the company of educated men and educated women too; and when you are angry with another, reason with him:  don’t knock him down; and don’t be knocked down yourself by an enemy much stronger than yourself,—­Drink.  Do all this, and when I see you again you will be—­”

“Stop, sir,—­you will see me again?”

“Yes, if we both live, I promise it.”

“When?”

“You see, Tom, we have both of us something in our old selves which we must work off.  You will work off your something by repose, and I must work off mine, if I can, by moving about.  So I am on my travels.  May we both have new selves better than the old selves, when we again shake hands!  For your part try your best, dear Tom, and Heaven prosper you.”

“And Heaven bless you!” cried Tom, fervently, with tears rolling unheeded from his bold blue eyes.

CHAPTER XIV.

THOUGH Kenelm left Luscombe on Tuesday morning, he did not appear at Neesdale Park till the Wednesday, a little before the dressing-bell for dinner.  His adventures in the interim are not worth repeating.  He had hoped he might fall in again with the minstrel, but he did not.

His portmanteau had arrived, and he heaved a sigh as he cased himself in a gentleman’s evening dress.  “Alas!  I have soon got back again into my own skin.”

There were several other guests in the house, though not a large party,—­they had been asked with an eye to the approaching election,—­consisting of squires and clergy from remoter parts of the county.  Chief among the guests in rank and importance, and rendered by the occasion the central object of interest, was George Belvoir.

Kenelm bore his part in this society with a resignation that partook of repentance.

The first day he spoke very little, and was considered a very dull young man by the lady he took in to dinner.  Mr. Travers in vain tried to draw him out.  He had anticipated much amusement from the eccentricities of his guest, who had talked volubly enough in the fernery, and was sadly disappointed.  “I feel,” he whispered to Mrs. Campion, “like poor Lord Pomfret, who, charmed with Punch’s lively conversation, bought him, and was greatly surprised that, when he had once brought him home, Punch would not talk.”