had thrown off her "misty shroud," or Monta Rosa blushed into light-too sleepy to heed even the legendary murmuring of the gentle lake, or the "blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone;" turned away from every inn within that most dirty and unbeauteous town; and driven by necessity in the shape of two faded and ill-tempered postillions, they at length reached Secheron, and soon found themselves in two of Monsieur de Jeans most clean and comfortable beds; not thinking of the past, and not dreaming of the future. CHAPTER II. "E'en as the tenderness that hour instils, LORD BYRON's Monody on the death of Sheridan. "And is there then no earthly place, Where we may rest in dream Elysian, Without some cursed, round English face MOORE. It was about four o'clock P.M., when Mowbray, from his bedroom windows, espied Saville in deep conference at the end of the garden with the triton of the lake, who was busily unmooring the boat and pointing to the opposite shore. He put on his hat, and soon stood beside him. "My dear fellow," said he, "I suppose you are going over to Lord Byron's house; and as I perceive you are getting up a sensation, I will promise not to interrupt you, only let me go with you.' Saville laughed, and they sprang into the boat together: by mutual consent they seemed to drink in the quiet beauty of the scene, for neither of them spoke till they reached the other side; when, from the confused directions of the boy who had rowed them, it seemed doubtful whether, at the end of their ramble, they should find themselves at Shelley's or Lord Byron's house. However, trusting to their stars, and preceded by Prince, they began ascending the steep narrow lane that leads into the little village; they at length got to the wilderness of vineyards that bursts upon one previous to the turn which leads to the house; that house which seems almost emblematic of the fortunes of its oncegifted tenant-all that relates to its domestic and homeward state, so chill and desolate. The rusty iron gates, the grass-grown court, the dried-up fountain, the two leafless trees, and the long-echoing and melancholysounding bell; this is the homeside of the house only seen by the few! The very air feels chill and looks dark, while the side next the lake is imbosomed in fertile terraces; the house itself standing upon an eminence, as if marked out as a focus for the gaze of the wide world of beauty it looks down upon, while an eternal sunlight seems to throw a halo and gild into brightness everything in and around it. The present owner, an English gentleman of the name of Willis, though at home, very obligingly permitted the friends to go over it. On the left-hand side of the hall is a little study opening on a terrace, where the poet used to write, and from which Lake Leman looks its best; farther on is a large and comfortable drawing-room, which has two different views of the lake; outside this room, in the centre of the hall, is a staircase which leads to the bedrooms, which are divided by a little gallery, lined with pictures, or, rather, old portraits, some of them curious enough. On the right of this gallery is the room Lord Byron used to sleep in, with its little tent-bed, and its one window, looking out upon the vineyards and the lake: in one corner of this room stands an old walnut-tree escritoire, on two of the drawers of which, written on white paper, in his own hand, are the following labels-" BILLS"-" LADY BYRON'S LETTERS.” 66 Now, really," said Mowbray, "though one is apt to laugh at people who run miles to look on those who have seen Sir Walter's head, Lord Byron's hat,' and all that sort of thing, yet I confess that I cannot look round this little room, and upon these spots of ink, which I dare say he dashed impatiently out of his pen as he put the letters' into the drawer, without a weakness that brings my heart into my eyes; for one feels a part of one's own being annihilated when one thinks that a mighty spirit has passed from the earth for ever, while such frail memorials of it as these remain long after to remind us of it!" "This from you, Mowbray, of all people in the world! Why, I did not know you were such an enthusiastic admirer of Lord Byron's." "Of the man, perhaps not; but of the genius, yes; though I am not sure he was worse than his peers in that respect. I have long had a pet theory concerning authors; I doubt very much if the outside of a beautiful face is more different from the bone and arteries that compose it within, than are books from their authors indeed, so strongly am I imbued with this idea, that ĺ sometimes fancy Dr. Johnson must have been in reality an atheist, and Tom Paine a fanatic!" Just at this moment Prince, who was sitting in the middle of the room with his ears erect, blinking his eyes at a sunbeam, crouched his head for a moment, and then lifting up his face, gave three of those shrill, melancholy howls, with which dogs sometimes startle the superstitious. What could it be? Was it the shade of Byron, like that of Theseus on Marathon, which had passed and "smote without a blow?" The poor animal seemed evidently uncomfortable, and walking to the door, scratched and listened at it till his master let him out. They cast "one long, lingering look" at the little deserted chamber, and descended once more into the grass-grown court. They had scarcely drawn the rusty iron gate after them, albeit in no merry mood, when, lo! puffing and panting up the lane, one of those ubiquitous rubicund Anglo visions burst upon them, which let no wayworn traveller in a foreign land hope to escape. It was no less a personage than one of their outlawed compatriots, Major Nonplus, taking his appetitenal walk before dinner, and looking, in his red Belcher cravat, Flamingo face, and scarlet waistcoat, for all the world like an ambulating carbuncle trying to extinguish the setting sun. Major Nonplus was one of those clever, managing mortals, who, with little money or credit, always contrived to keep more carriages, horses, and houses than any one else; he was also one of those innumerable "best-natured creatures in the world," always bent upon making everybody comfortable, and therefore succeeding in making everybody miserable. Had a dowager manœuvred so as her daughter should sit next a duke's elder son, or a snobbish "millionaire" of a county member at dinner, Major Nonplus instantly started up and divided them on the gallant and facetious plea, that he could not possibly sit next to Mrs. Nonplus (to whose tender mercies he had been purposely consigned). Was he admitted to a morning visit by some Johnny Raw of a footman (for in all houses where he had appeared twice, a preventive porter was stationed, who knew him to be contraband), and saw two friends confidentially conversing, he invariably out-stayed the first comer, thinking that the host or hostess would enjoy an agreeable "tête-à-tête" with him "when the coast was clear!" Did he encounter two lovers in a shady walk, he instantly joined them, "fearing the young people might be dull." Did the mother of five "pelican daughters" (all unmarried) happen to observe with a sigh, that she had never been at Clifton but once, when her youngest darling Jemima had the scarlet fever, the major instantly observed, with that chronological memory so dreadfully prevalent among common people, 66 Ah, I perfectly remember it was there I first had the pleasure of meeting you: let me see-that was in the autumn of ninety-eight, and Miss Jemima was then a little urchin of four or five years old, and a remarkably clever, forward little thing she was too; any one would have taken her for seven or eight. True, I assure you -I never flatter!" Did he encounter an acquaintance in a packet, whose wife some three years before might have eloped from him, the major would instantly, before the assembled audience on the quarter-deck, grasp his hand, and calling him by his name, assure him, though he had never written to him since poor Mrs. So-and-So's mishap, that he most sincerely pitied him! Did he venture to bet on a rubber, when congratulated upon his good luck in winning by the person he had betted upon, he would reply with an amiable candour that baffles all description: "My dear fellow, I owe it all to you; I saw you revoke when your adversary's queen was out, and then I knew the game must be yours, and so I betted upon you." The major, though no logician, was rich in proverbs, which he called to his assistance upon all occasions; and one he practically illustrated in his costume, viz., that "familiarity breeds contempt;" for which reason there was always a species of Scotch divorce subsisting between his waistcoat and trousers, and between the latter and his Wellington boots; though, to be sure, as "coming events cast their shadows before" in the shape of great rotundity of form, these garments had not altogether the merit of prescience in the respectful distance they kept from each other. There was one very remarkable circumstance attending Major Nonplus, which was, that no one ever yet met him, that he had not either just come into a legacy of £70,000, or just been defrauded out of a similar sum: the former solved the enigma of a house in Park-lane and a stud at Melton, while the latter as satisfactorily accounted for a cottage in the Tyrol. But whether the aforesaid £70,000 was among the fashionable arrivals or departures in the major's fate, it made little difference in his hospitality, which, however, was always in the future tense; and though sure of an invitation to his house, at whichever side of the channel the invited found himself, yet he could only hail it, as the witches hailed Macbeth on his Thane of Cawdorship, "that is to be." Among his other delightful attributes, he seemed to have realized Sir Boyle Roach's idea of a bird, and possess the power of being “in two places at once;" for no sooner had A left him, "taking tea and toast upon the wall of China," than B would write word he had encountered him " 'Mid the blacks of Carolina." This ambulating lottery-office now advanced, looking as blank as the loss of £70,000 could make him; but extending two stumpy fingers of each hand to Saville and Mowbray, exclaimed, "Bless me! delighted to see you. Heard how that rascal Price Hatton has behaved to me? By George! sir, done me out of £70,000! Obliged to cut and run; left poor Mrs. Nonplus buried alive in the Tyrol (where, by-the-by, you must come and see us in the spring; not now, for it's damp, misty, and disagreeable), and I've just come to Geneva to see what's going on. Things have come to a pretty pass, when a man goes to Geneva for news; but when one goes upon tick, can't come to a better place, eh? ha! ha! ha! Ah! been to see Lord Byron's house, I suppose? Nothing very tasty |