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DREAM-CHILDREN; A Reverie
CHILDREN love to listen to stories about
their elders, when they were children; to stretch their imagination
to the conception of a traditionary great-uncle, or grandame,
whom they never saw. It was in this spirit that my little ones
crept about, me the other evening to hear about their great-grandmother
Field, who lived in a great house in Norfolk (a hundred times
bigger than that in which they and papa lived) which had been
the scene -- so at least it was generally believed in that part
of the country -- of the tragic incidents which they had lately
become familiar with from the ballad of the Children in the Wood.
Certain it is that the whole story of the children and their cruel
uncle was to be seen fairly carved out in wood upon the chimney-piece
of the great hall, the whole story down to the Robin Redbreasts,
till a foolish rich Person pulled it down to set up a marble one
of modern invention in its stead, with no story upon it. Here
Alice put out one of her dear mother's looks, too tender to be
called upbraiding. Then I went on to say, how religious and how
good their great. grandmother Field was, how beloved and respected
by every body, though she was not indeed the mistress of this
great house, but had only the charge of it (and yet in some respects
she might be said to be the mistress of it too) committed to her
by the owner, who preferred living in a newer and more fashionable
mansion which he had purchased somewhere in the adjoining county;
but still she lived in it in a manner as if it had been her own,
and kept up the dignity of the great house in a sort while she
lived, which afterwards came to decay, and was nearly pulled down,
and all its old ornaments stripped and carried away to the owner's
other house, where they were set up, and looked as awkward as
if some one were to carry away the old tombs they had seen lately
at the Abbey, and stick them up in Lady C.'s tawdry gilt drawing-room.
Here John smiled, as much as to say, "that would be foolish
indeed." And then I told how, when she came to die, her funeral
was attended by a concourse of all the poor, and some of the gentry
too, of the neighbourhood for many miles round, to show their
respect for her memory, because she had been such a good and religious
woman; so good indeed that she knew all the Psaltery by heart,
ay, and a great part of the Testament besides. Here little Alice
spread her hands. Then I told what a tall, upright, graceful person
their great-grandmother Field once was; and how in her youth she
was esteemed the best dancer -- here Alice's little right foot
played an involuntary movement, till, upon my looking grave, it
desisted -- the best dancer, I was saying, in the county, till
a cruel disease, called a cancer, came, and bowed her down with
pain; but it could never bend her good spirits, or make them stoop,
but they were still upright, because she was so good and religious.
Then I told how she was used to sleep by herself in a lone chamber
of the great lone house; and how she believed that an apparition
of two infants was to be seen at midnight gliding up and down
the great staircase near where she slept, but she said "those
innocents would do her no harm;" and how frightened I used
to be, though in those days I had my maid to sleep with me, because
I was never half so good or religious as she -- and yet I never
saw the infants. Here John expanded all his eye-brows and tried
to look courageous. Then I told how good she was to all her grand-children,
having us to the great-house in the holydays, where I in particular
used to spend many hours by myself, in gazing upon the old busts
of the Twelve Caesars, that had been Emperors of Rome, till the
old marble heads would seem to live again, or I to be turned into
marble with them; how I never could be tired with roaming about
that huge mansion, with its vast empty rooms, with their worn-out
hangings, fluttering tapestry, and carved oaken pannels, with
the gilding almost rubbed out -- sometimes in the spacious old-fashioned
gardens, which I had almost to myself, unless when now and then
a solitary gardening man would cross me -- and how the nectarines
and peaches hung upon the walls, without my ever offering to pluck
them, because they were forbidden fruit, unless now and then,
-- and because I had more pleasure in strolling about among the
old melancholy-looking yew trees, or the firs, and picking up
the red berries, and the fir apples, which were good for nothing
but to look at -- or in lying a out upon the fresh grass, with
all the fine garden smells around me -- or basking in the orangery,
till I could almost fancy myself ripening too along with the oranges
and the limes in that grateful warmth -- or in watching the dace
that darted to and fro in the fish-pond, at the bottom of the
garden, with here and there a great sulky pike hanging midway
down the water in silent state, as if it mocked at their impertinent
friskings, -- I had more pleasure in these busy-idle diversions
than in all the sweet flavours of peaches, nectarines, oranges,
and such like common baits of children. Here John slyly deposited
back upon the plate a bunch of grapes, which, not unobserved by
Alice, he had meditated dividing with her, and both seemed willing
to relinquish them for the present as irrelevant. Then in somewhat
a more heightened tone, I told how, though their great-grandmother
Field loved all her grand-children, yet in an especial manner
she might be said to love their uncle, John L----, because he
was so handsome and spirited a youth, and a king to the rest of
us; and, instead of moping about in solitary corners, like some
of us, he would mount the most mettlesome horse he could get,
when but an imp no bigger than themselves, and make it carry him
half over the county in a morning, and join the hunters when there
were any out -- and yet he loved the old great house and gardens
too, but had too much spirit to be always pent up within their
boundaries -- and how their uncle grew up to man's estate as brave
as he was handsome, to the admiration of every body, but of their
great-grandmother Field most especially; and how he used to carry
me upon his back when I was a lame- footed boy -- for he was a
good bit older than me -- many a mile when I could not walk pain;
-- and how in after life he became lame-footed too, and I did
not always (I fear) make allowances enough for him when he was
impatient, and in pain, nor remember sufficiently how considerate
he had been to me when I was lame- footed; and how when he died,
though he had not been dead an hour, it seemed as if he had died
a great while ago, such a distance there is betwixt life and death;
and how I bore his death as I thought pretty well at first, but
afterwards it haunted and haunted me; and though I did not cry
or take it to heart as some do, and as I think he would have done
if I had died, yet I missed him all day long, and knew not till
then how much I had loved him. I missed his kindness, and I missed
his crossness, and wished him to be alive again, to be quarrelling
with him (for we quarreled sometimes), rather than not have him
again, and was as uneasy without him, as he their poor uncle must
have been when the doctor took off his limb. Here the children
fell a crying, and asked if their little mourning which they had
on was not for uncle John, and they looked up, and prayed me not
to go on about their uncle, but to tell them, some stories about
their pretty dead mother. Then I told how for seven long years,
in hope sometimes, sometimes in despair, yet persisting ever,
I courted the fair Alice W---n; and, as much as children could
understand, I explained to them what coyness, and difficulty,
and denial meant in maidens -- when suddenly, turning to Alice,
the soul of the first Alice looked out at her eyes with such a
reality of re-presentment, that I became in doubt which of them
stood there before me, or whose that bright hair was; and while
I stood gazing, both the children gradually grew fainter to my
view, receding, and still receding till nothing at last but two
mournful features were seen in the uttermost distance, which,
without speech, strangely impressed upon me the effects of speech;
"We are not of Alice, nor of thee, nor are we children at
all. The children of Alice called Bartrum father. We are nothing;
less than nothing, and dreams. We are only what might have been,
and must wait upon the tedious shores of Lethe millions of ages
before we have existence, and a name" ------ and immediately
awaking, I found myself quietly seated in my bachelor arm-chair,
where I had fallen asleep, with the faithful Bridget unchanged
by my side -- but John L. (or James Elia) was gone for ever.
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