Thus having spoke, with generous ardour press’d, In arms terrific their huge limbs they dress’d. A two-edged falchion Thrasymed the brave, And ample buckler, to Tydides gave: Then in a leathern helm he cased his head, Short of its crest, and with no plume o’erspread: (Such as by youths unused to arms are worn:) No spoils enrich it, and no studs adorn. Next him Ulysses took a shining sword, A bow and quiver, with bright arrows stored: A well-proved casque, with leather braces bound, (Thy gift, Meriones,) his temples crown’d; Soft wool within; without, in order spread,[217] A boar’s white teeth grinn’d horrid o’er his head. This from Amyntor, rich Ormenus’ son, Autolycus by fraudful rapine won, And gave Amphidamas; from him the prize Molus received, the pledge of social ties; The helmet next by Merion was possess’d, And now Ulysses’ thoughtful temples press’d. Thus sheathed in arms, the council they forsake, And dark through paths oblique their progress take. Just then, in sign she favour’d their intent, A long-wing’d heron great Minerva sent: This, though surrounding shades obscured their view, By the shrill clang and whistling wings they knew. As from the right she soar’d, Ulysses pray’d, Hail’d the glad omen, and address’d the maid:
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“What o’clock is it, Victor?” asked Dorian Gray drowsily.
I threw myself into the carriage that was to convey me away, hardly knowing whither I was going, and careless of what was passing around. I remembered only, and it was with a bitter anguish that I reflected on it, to order that my chemical instruments should be packed to go with me. Filled with dreary imaginations, I passed through many beautiful and majestic scenes, but my eyes were fixed and unobserving. I could only think of the bourne of my travels and the work which was to occupy me whilst they endured.
“It fits thee not, before these chiefs of fame, (Replied the sage,) to praise me, or to blame: Praise from a friend, or censure from a foe, Are lost on hearers that our merits know. But let us haste—Night rolls the hours away, The reddening orient shows the coming day, The stars shine fainter on the ethereal plains, And of night’s empire but a third remains.”
“I am cool now,” said Monsieur the Marquis, “and may go to bed.”
“Sir William’s interruption has made me forget what we were talking of.”
It was in the latter end of September that I again quitted my native country. My journey had been my own suggestion, and Elizabeth therefore acquiesced, but she was filled with disquiet at the idea of my suffering, away from her, the inroads of misery and grief. It had been her care which provided me a companion in Clerval—and yet a man is blind to a thousand minute circumstances which call forth a woman’s sedulous attention. She longed to bid me hasten my return; a thousand conflicting emotions rendered her mute as she bade me a tearful, silent farewell.
“Monsieur has well slept this morning,” he said, smiling.
“Please, sir, who is the Lord Warden?”
“Then thus (the godlike Diomed rejoin’d) My choice declares the impulse of my mind. How can I doubt, while great Ulysses stands To lend his counsels and assist our hands? A chief, whose safety is Minerva’s care; So famed, so dreadful, in the works of war: Bless’d in his conduct, I no aid require; Wisdom like his might pass through flames of fire.”
The latter part of this address was scarcely heard by Darcy; but Sir William’s allusion to his friend seemed to strike him forcibly, and his eyes were directed, with a very serious expression, towards Bingley and Jane, who were dancing together. Recovering himself, however, shortly, he turned to his partner, and said,--
He moved from end to end of his voluptuous bedroom, looking again at the scraps of the day’s journey that came unbidden into his mind; the slow toil up the hill at sunset, the setting sun, the descent, the mill, the prison on the crag, the little village in the hollow, the peasants at the fountain, and the mender of roads with his blue cap pointing out the chain under the carriage. That fountain suggested the Paris fountain, the little bundle lying on the step, the women bending over it, and the tall man with his arms up, crying, “Dead!”
I now made arrangements for my journey, but one feeling haunted me which filled me with fear and agitation. During my absence I should leave my friends unconscious of the existence of their enemy and unprotected from his attacks, exasperated as he might be by my departure. But he had promised to follow me wherever I might go, and would he not accompany me to England? This imagination was dreadful in itself, but soothing inasmuch as it supposed the safety of my friends. I was agonised with the idea of the possibility that the reverse of this might happen. But through the whole period during which I was the slave of my creature I allowed myself to be governed by the impulses of the moment; and my present sensations strongly intimated that the fiend would follow me and exempt my family from the danger of his machinations.
Madame Defarge received it as a compliment, and looked at her husband. Defarge, who had been uneasily biting his thumb-nail and looking at her, collected his face into a sterner expression.
Now when these poor sun-burnt mariners, bare-footed, and with their trowsers rolled high up on their eely legs, had wearily hauled their fat fish high and dry, promising themselves a good £150 from the precious oil and bone; and in fantasy sipping rare tea with their wives, and good ale with their cronies, upon the strength of their respective shares; up steps a very learned and most Christian and charitable gentleman, with a copy of Blackstone under his arm; and laying it upon the whale’s head, he says—“Hands off! this fish, my masters, is a Fast-Fish. I seize it as the Lord Warden’s.” Upon this the poor mariners in their respectful consternation—so truly English—knowing not what to say, fall to vigorously scratching their heads all round; meanwhile ruefully glancing from the whale to the stranger. But that did in nowise mend the matter, or at all soften the hard heart of the learned gentleman with the copy of Blackstone. At length one of them, after long scratching about for his ideas, made bold to speak,
It seems that some honest mariners of Dover, or Sandwich, or some one of the Cinque Ports, had after a hard chase succeeded in killing and beaching a fine whale which they had originally descried afar off from the shore. Now the Cinque Ports are partially or somehow under the jurisdiction of a sort of policeman or beadle, called a Lord Warden. Holding the office directly from the crown, I believe, all the royal emoluments incident to the Cinque Port territories become by assignment his. By some writers this office is called a sinecure. But not so. Because the Lord Warden is busily employed at times in fobbing his perquisites; which are his chiefly by virtue of that same fobbing of them.
“I heard of Ithaca,” said he, “when I was in Crete beyond the seas, and now it seems I have reached it with all these treasures. I have left as much more behind me for my children, but am flying because I killed Orsilochus son of Idomeneus, the fleetest runner in Crete. I killed him because he wanted to rob me of the spoils I had got from Troy with so much trouble and danger both on the field of battle and by the waves of the weary sea; he said I had not served his father loyally at Troy as vassal, but had set myself up as an independent ruler, so I lay in wait for him with one of my followers by the road side, and speared him as he was coming into town from the country. It was a very dark night and nobody saw us; it was not known, therefore, that I had killed him, but as soon as I had done so I went to a ship and besought the owners, who were Phoenicians, to take me on board and set me in Pylos or in Elis where the Epeans rule, giving them as much spoil as satisfied them. They meant no guile, but the wind drove them off their course, and we sailed on till we came hither by night. It was all we could do to get inside the harbour, and none of us said a word about supper though we wanted it badly, but we all went on shore and lay down just as we were. I was very tired and fell asleep directly, so they took my goods out of the ship, and placed them beside me where I was lying upon the sand. Then they sailed away to Sidonia, and I was left here in great distress of mind.”
“For my sake, then, be merciful to my husband. For my child’s sake! She will put her hands together and pray you to be merciful. We are more afraid of you than of these others.”
Contending leaders at the word arose; Each generous breast with emulation glows; So brave a task each Ajax strove to share, Bold Merion strove, and Nestor’s valiant heir; The Spartan wish’d the second place to gain, And great Ulysses wish’d, nor wish’d in vain. Then thus the king of men the contest ends: “Thou first of warriors, and thou best of friends, Undaunted Diomed! what chief to join In this great enterprise, is only thine. Just be thy choice, without affection made; To birth, or office, no respect be paid; Let worth determine here.” The monarch spake, And inly trembled for his brother’s sake.
The valet come and gone, Monsieur the Marquis walked to and fro in his loose chamber-robe, to prepare himself gently for sleep, that hot still night. Rustling about the room, his softly-slippered feet making no noise on the floor, he moved like a refined tiger:--looked like some enchanted marquis of the impenitently wicked sort, in story, whose periodical change into tiger form was either just going off, or just coming on.