DEDICATION.

TO MISS M. L. BOYLE.

My dear Miss Boyle,

I dedicate to you a work, the greater part of which was written many years ago, and long before I had the slightest intention of submitting anything I wrote to public criticism. It was intended originally for the amusement of some of my personal friends; but many of the papers got beyond that limited circle, and some I published myself anonymously in various periodicals[1]. Those which were so published, received from persons whom I believed to be competent judges, so much praise that I determined to attempt a longer and more laboured composition, and to strive without concealment for the approbation of the public. Many of my friends attempted to dissuade me from so doing; and, while they assured me that they doubted not my capability of acquitting myself well, endeavoured to make me look upon literary efforts in a light in which such ennobling pursuits could never appear to my eyes.

Suspecting, notwithstanding their praises, that their view was, to save me from a disappointment which they saw that my own want of abilities would inevitably call upon me, I induced a friend to lay the first volume of a romance I had begun, before one to whose judgment I might well look with full reliance. The opinion which was pronounced upon that volume led me to proceed at once, without hesitation; but still I had many a voice raised, amongst my friends, against my purposes. The dread of criticism was endeavoured to be instilled into me, the difficulty of calling public attention was displayed to deter me, the slight foundation for my hopes of fame, the anxiety of suspense, and the bitterness of disappointment. But still, supported by the opinion of a few in whom I had greater confidence, I persevered; and never have regretted that I did so.

You, my dear young friend, are about to try the same adventure; and I cannot do better than dedicate to you these pages, from the success of which my first literary hopes were derived. At the same time I cannot help feeling in regard to your forthcoming romance, a considerable share of responsibility, as it is upon my opinion, given after having read it through, and thought of it in every point of view, that you are about to send it forth to seek the favour of the world. The feeling of that responsibility has of course been increased by hearing persons for whom we both entertain a high esteem, address to you the same dissuasions which were employed towards myself at the outset of my literary career, and by having been asked whether, with the deep and sincere regard which my wife and myself feel towards you and all the members of your immediate family circle, I can judge impartially of your book. I feel the responsibility however without apprehension, for I know that I am impartial: and the sincerity of my regard for you

and yours, instead of taking from my impartiality, has only rendered it more stern and severe. I say to you now, as I said when first I read the work, "Go on and fear not." I will stake any small literary reputation I may possess upon your success. Whether the work may have the vogue of some romances written upon the fashionable coteries of the day, I do not know; but I think it may have more; and I do not scruple to assert that every one who can estimate genius guided by high principles, and the poetry of the heart inspired by noble feelings and guided by pure taste, will read that work (especially the second volume) with delight and approbation. This is the best success which can attend any work: those who are worthy of loving what is good, and capable of appreciating what is beautiful, will admire and approve; and a long line of illustrious ancestors, may—if such things be permitted—look down on you with applause, as you send into the world a book which contains so much of which you may be justly proud. I say again, go on to success; and I may add, in the words of Francis

the First, "Ma lance contre un écu d'Espagne, vous gagnerez la partie."

To you then I dedicate the following pages, not because I think them at all worthy of your acceptance, but because they contain those things from which I first obtained an augury of future success. May my auguries in your favour be verified even more fully than in my own case; but that they will be verified to the full extent of your expectations, is the strongest conviction of,

My dear Miss Boyle,

Yours most truly,

G. P. R. JAMES.

The Cottage, Great Marlow, 26th September, 1836.

THE

DESULTORY MAN.

Ven dulce soledad, y al alma mia Libra del mar horrisono agitado Del mundo corrompido Y benign la paz y la alegria Vuelve al dolcente corazon.—Melendez.

I sit alone, with time sufficient before me to put down a record of the last year of my existence, and with the desire, if be possible, to gather together into one view, all the thoughts and feelings, and incidents and anecdotes, which have filled up one of the most painful periods of my existence. Of the many acts which went before that epoch I must speak, though briefly, in order that others may comprehend how I am what I am; but I will not dwell thereon, for the detail might be tedious to others, and in some degree would be painful to myself, although, in looking back upon the occurrences of those earlier years, I already begin to experience that sort of interest which clings in general to the past. Time acts upon events as upon fine pictures, softening every harshness, mellowing every tint, and blending all into richness and harmony. It is true that sometimes he takes away the brighter colours, and leaves but the darker shades, and in the end is sure to obliterate all entirely: but even to the last, there is a pleasure in tracing the faint remains of things once bright, as we

gaze upon an old painting, and seek out, amidst the wreck of beauties, those that the waves of time have not yet swept away.

The very mention of those days calls up again to view the events they brought with them, almost as vividly as at the time. In solitude and silence the images of a thousand things, gone for ever, come back upon my mind. The past alone is ours; it is our grand possession in the wilderness of time; it is all that we call our own. Memory fixes her eyes ever upon it, like a miser watching his treasure, and culls out the brightest recollections, to place them at the top of her store. Fancy seeks there for many of the materials for the gay fabrics of imagination; and wisdom, too, borrows from the past to provide against the future. Pilgrims as we are, wandering on towards a distant shrine, over a rough and painful road, let us pluck the wild blossoms that grow by the road to deck our pillow, ere we lay down to rest; and though perhaps we can neither give to our own tale, or to that of others, the same interest with which we have felt or have listened, still let us gather up, ere it fades into forgetfulness, all that the old reaper Time lets fall upon our path.

I know not well whether I write for myself or others: whether these pages will alone serve to recall to my own mind, in after years, events and tales that are now vivid, but may then be partly effaced from the tablet of memory; or whether they will afford some amusement and some instruction to persons who neither know the writer nor are acquainted with his history. Lest the latter should be the case, I write the following sketch of my early years:

My name, then, is James Young, and I was born the second son of an officer in the navy, who had fought in the battle which destroyed the fleet of Llangara, and in that which immortalized the name of Rodney, who gained honour and glory, but little worldly wealth; and died in battle when I had reached the age of eight years, leaving an income of about twelve hundred per annum for the support of his widow and two children. I remember well, even at this moment, the people telling me that my father was dead, and endeavouring to explain to me what death is. But though I could understand that I should never see my parent again, and wept bitterly to think that it was so, yet I could not get my mind to grasp the meaning of being dead, till an accidental occurrence, which took place a few weeks after the news of my father's death had reached England, gave me the first tangible idea of death, and filled me with awe and horror. I had gone out with my brother, who was five or six years older than myself, and was walking on with him

rapidly towards Hyde Park, when at the corner of Grosvenor Square we saw a crowd gathered round the step of a door, which I think at that time belonged to the house of Admiral Berkeley. With boyish curiosity we pressed near, and I heard some one say as we approached, "Oh! the man is dead, quite dead, you had better get a shutter, and carry the body to the workhouse."

The idea of death had never ceased to occupy my mind and excite my curiosity since I had been told that my father was dead; and I instantly cried out, "Is he dead? Oh, let me look at him—let me look at him!" The sound of my childish voice uttering such an exclamation caught the attention of those around, and whether they believed that I might be related to the dead person, or were actuated merely by a sudden impulse, I cannot tell, but they made way instantly, and letting me into the circle, stood round with a part of their attention now withdrawn from the former object of their contemplations to myself, as I stood habited in deep mourning, gazing upon the body, with all the simplicity, but more than the feelings, of childhood. The dead man was dressed like a respectable tradesman, and had, I suppose, fallen down in a fit of apoplexy; but there he lay with his jaw dropping upon his throat, his glassy eyes wide open, and his limbs stretched out in all the rigidity of death. People may say what they please on the similarity of sleep and death, but, even to a child, the

awful difference of the two was so conspicuous, that it seemed to freeze the blood in my young heart, and I never asked what death is again.

My brother was destined for the navy, and my father had fancied that his family interest was sufficiently good to obtain for me the post of attaché to some embassy, by which means he hoped that I might be enabled to make my way in the diplomatic world. Four hundred a-year, three on my reaching one-and-twenty, and one hundred in reversion, after my mother's death, he had calculated would be sufficient to procure me the proper education for that mode of life to which I was destined, and to support me during the toils and privations of the probationary state of unpaid attachéship. The rest of his fortune, sooner or later, was willed to my brother; and, joined to my mother in our guardianship and the execution of his will, was his banker and old friend, Mr. Somers, of whom I shall have to speak much more hereafter. Within a year after my father's death my brother went to sea, and I was sent to school, in order to gain so much Latin and Greek as are needful to an attaché, but with especial injunctions to my master to bestow far more attention upon the living than upon the dead

languages. I was at this time a gay and lively boy, full of fun, daring, and impudence, but with what neither I nor any one else suspected, namely, a wild and ungovernable imagination, which was constantly leading me into scrapes during my youth, and which has been, by turns, my bane and my consolation since I reached the days of manhood. The French master at the school was an emigrant and a gentleman, both by birth and habits; and as the instructions which he had to bestow upon me were more extended than those which he was called on to give the rest of the boys, it very naturally happened, that a closer intimacy and regard took place between us than existed between himself and the others. I liked his language, too, and his manners; and soon finding out that my imagination was of a very irritable nature, he kindly, but perhaps injudiciously, supplied it with plenty of food, either by telling me tales of the wars of La Vendée, or by lending me books which he received from a circulating library to which he subscribed. Although French notions of delicacy

and morality are very different from our own, it is but fair to say, that in every other respect but that of furnishing excitement to a fancy already too excitable, he showed much care and prudence in the books which he selected for me. Poetry he gave me abundantly, both French and English, but it was of the best kind, and with books of travels he also supplied me, which sometimes certainly raised my curiosity on points that might as well have been left to elucidate themselves, but which had no tendency to weaken my mind or corrupt my morals. I was idle enough, certainly, but I was tolerably quick in intellect, and consequently contrived to please all the different masters in a certain degree, though those I liked best were certain both to command more of my attention and respect than the others.

At the end of six months I returned home for the holidays, and, on the very first interrogation in reference to my progress at school, established, to my mother's full satisfaction, the fact of my being a miracle of genius and application. Mr. Somers, the banker, had come down himself to bring me home in his carriage, and after leaving me some hours with my mother he returned to dine, bringing with him his little daughter as a playfellow for me. He was a kind good-hearted man; and, after asking we several questions, to satisfy himself that I had not misused my time, he also declared himself perfectly satisfied. I remarked, that both he himself, his servants, and his daughter, who was then about six years old, were all in mourning, and I afterwards found that he had lost his wife some months before.

I need dwell no further on my life at school, though the mixed character of the studies which I there pursued, and the nature of the books with which the good-natured Frenchman supplied me, gave that desultory character to my mind which it has never lost. I had a great greediness for information, without much regularity of arrangement or steadiness of pursuit; and when I left that school, which was at the end of two years and a half, I knew a great many things that other boys did not know, and a great deal less of many things than they did know.

What was the occasion of my quitting the school remains to be told. About half a year before I did quit it, my mother became Mrs. Somers, and my brother, whose ship was at Deal, was present, as well as myself, at the wedding, which was to give us a new father and a new home. Mr. Somers was very kind, and looked very happy; my mother was serious, but her vanity was flattered in various respects, and she easily found means to persuade herself that she was doing what was quite right and expedient. My brother, as smart as a naval uniform could make him, was as gay as a lark, and in robust health; and little Emily Somers, who was now a sweet girl of about eight years old, looked all delight, and was only too sure that she should love her new mamma most dearly. Strange enough to say, I was the only person who did not fully participate in the gaiety of the occasion. I had been, I am afraid, a spoilt child; my mother had seemed to love me better than any thing on earth; and certain it is that, even at that early age, I felt a degree of jealousy when I thought of any one else except my

brother sharing in her affection. My poor brother was soon destined to leave me alone in her love. He returned to his ship as soon as the wedding breakfast was over, and shortly after sailed for the coast of Spain. One epistle, dated Gibraltar, informed us that he was well and happy, but the next ship-letter my mother received was written in the hand of the captain—an old comrade of my father—and its purport was to inform her, that her eldest son had fallen a victim to one of the severe fevers which occasionally visit the Peninsula.

My worldly prospects were of course greatly changed by this event. I was far too young myself—even if at any time of life I could have known such feelings—to derive the smallest portion of consolation for the loss of my brother from the acquisition of fortune which thus befell me: but my mother and Mr. Somers saw the affair both in an affectionate and in a worldly light. They both grieved sincerely, I am sure, for my brother, who was, as Mr. Somers declared, a very good lad indeed; but they both agreed also, that there was a considerable difference between four hundred and twelve hundred per annum; and my mother was delighted to believe, and Mr. Somers well pleased to suggest, that a private tutor might now very well be kept for me at home, instead of putting Mrs. Somers to the pain of having me always at a distance from her maternal eye. Thus I at once received the news of my brother's death and a summons to return to Portland Place, which was destined to be my home till I set out in the world for myself.

On my arrival I found my mother installed mistress of a splendid mansion, furnished newly from the garrets to the cellars, with a very kind and affectionate husband, and a lovely little girl for her companion in the person of his daughter. Her affection for myself, however, seemed to have increased rather than diminished, and it was easy to perceive that my will was to be her law. Two years before, such a perception would have ruined my disposition for ever, but I had already been some time at a school with, a great many boys older than myself. I had been drilled into some kind of discipline by the masters, and beaten into some knowledge of myself by my elders in the school. I had learned also a habit of scrutinizing my own thoughts and feelings, as well as those of other people, very unusual at that period of life, which has never left me, though I acknowledge that I have but too often been wrong in my conclusions, not only in regard to others, but even respecting myself. If our fellows in society can, for purposes of their own, throw a veil over their actions which we can

seldom penetrate, surely vanity, passion, interest, and every other modification of selfishness, can, with art a thousand-fold more specious, still conceal from us the springs and motives of what is passing in our own bosom. It is only long-confirmed habit, dear-bought experience, and strong determination, which can tear away the mask successfully in either case. However, I had a strong sense of what is just and right also, and I was not long in perceiving that my mother not only loved me a great deal better than little Emily Somers—which I should not have objected to, because it seemed natural—but she also contrived to show that partiality in a manner which was not fair towards Emily. What Emily did was seldom right—what Emily said was always nonsense with her stepmother—and many and many a time have I had to fight Emily's battles, and defend Emily's cause, and petition in Emily's behalf, when the dear little creature neither did, nor said, nor desired, any thing but what was right. Emily felt the change, and as yet remembered her own mother

sufficiently to weep over that change; but she was of a gay and happy disposition, bearing no malice, forgetting injuries, retentive of kindness, frank, true, and gentle; yet, withal, with a firmness of determination on points where some internal principle of rectitude told her that she should be firm, which contrasted strangely enough with the general mildness and placidity of her character. I could, were I so inclined, write down a thousand examples of this peculiar trait in her character; but as I intend merely to give a sketch of those years, it will be unnecessary. Suffice it, that when Emily had positively pledged herself to do or not to do any particular thing, no one attempted to turn her from it, for we all learned to know that it would be in vain.