Sybil by Benjamin Disraeli (snow like ashes series .txt) 📖

fortunes are not much better than his neighbours," said Sybil, "but his wants are few; and who should sympathise with the poor, but the poor? Alas! none else can. Besides, it is the Superior of our convent that has sent you this meal. What my father can do for you, I have told your husband. 'Tis little; but with the favour of heaven, it may avail. When the people support the people, the divine blessing will not be wanting."

"I am sure the divine blessing will never be wanting to you," said Warner in a voice of great emotion.

There was silence; the querulous spirit of the wife was subdued by the tone of Sybil; she revolved in her mind the present and the past; the children pursued their ungrudged and unusual meal; the daughter of Gerard, that she might not interfere with their occupation, walked to the window and surveyed the chink of troubled sky, which was visible in the court. The wind blew in gusts; the rain beat against the glass. Soon after this, there was another knock at the door. Harold started from his repose, and growled. Warner rose, and saying, "they have come for the rent. Thank God, I am ready," advanced and opened the door. Two men offered with courtesy to enter.

"We are strangers," said he who took the lead, "but would not be such. I speak to Warner?"

"My name."

"And I am your spiritual pastor, if to be the vicar of Mowbray entitles me to that description."

"Mr St Lys."

"The same. One of the most valued of my flock, and the most influential person in this district, has been speaking much of you to me this morning. You are working for him. He did not hear of you on Saturday night; he feared you were ill. Mr Barber spoke to me of your distress, as well as of your good character. I came to express to you my respect and my sympathy, and to offer you my assistance."

"You are most good, sir, and Mr Barber too, and indeed, an hour ago, we were in as great straits--."

"And are now, sir," exclaimed his wife interrupting him. "I have been in this bed a-week, and may never rise from it again; the children have no clothes; they are pawned; everything is pawned; this morning we had neither fuel, nor food. And we thought you had come for the rent which we cannot pay. If it had not been for a dish of tea which was charitably given me this morning by a person almost as poor as ourselves that is to say, they live by labour, though their wages are much higher, as high as two pounds a-week, though how that can be I never shall understand, when my husband is working twelve hours a day, and gaining only a penny an hour--if it had not been for this I should have been a corpse; and yet he says we were in straits, merely because Walter Gerard's daughter, who I willingly grant is an angel from heaven for all the good she has done us, has stepped into our aid. But the poor supporting the poor, as she well says, what good can come from that!"

During this ebullition, Mr St Lys had surveyed the apartment and recognised Sybil.

"Sister," he said when the wife of Warner had ceased, "this is not the first time we have met under the roof of sorrow."

Sybil bent in silence, and moved as if she were about to retire: the wind and rain came dashing against the window. The companion of Mr St Lys, who was clad in a rough great coat, and was shaking the wet off an oilskin hat known by the name of a 'south-wester,' advanced and said to her, "It is but a squall, but a very severe one; I would recommend you to stay for a few minutes."

She received this remark with courtesy but did not reply.

"I think," continued the companion of Mr St Lys, "that this is not the first time also that we have met?"

"I cannot recall our meeting before," said Sybil.

"And yet it was not many days past; though the sky was so very different, that it would almost make one believe it was in another land and another clime."

Sybil looked at him as if for explanation.

"It was at Marney Abbey," said the companion of Mr St Lys.

"I was there; and I remember, when about to rejoin my companions, they were not alone."

"And you disappeared; very suddenly I thought: for I left the ruins almost at the same moment as your friends, yet I never saw any of you again."

"We took our course; a very rugged one; you perhaps pursued a more even way."

"Was it your first visit to Marney?"

"My first and my last. There was no place I more desired to see; no place of which the vision made me so sad."

"The glory has departed," said Egremont mournfully.

"It is not that," said Sybil: "I was prepared for decay, but not for such absolute desecration. The Abbey seems a quarry for materials to repair farm-houses; and the nave a cattle gate. What people they must be--that family of sacrilege who hold these lands!"

"Hem!" said Egremont. "They certainly do not appear to have much feeling for ecclesiastical art."

"And for little else, as we were told," said Sybil. "There was a fire at the Abbey farm the day we were there, and from all that reached us, it would appear the people were as little tendered as the Abbey walls."

"They have some difficulty perhaps in employing their population in those parts."

"You know the country?"

"Not at all: I was travelling in the neighbourhood, and made a diversion for the sake of seeing an abbey of which I had heard so much."

"Yes; it was the greatest of the Northern Houses. But they told me the people were most wretched round the Abbey; nor do I think there is any other cause for their misery, than the hard hearts of the family that have got the lands."

"You feel deeply for the people!" said Egremont looking at her earnestly.

Sybil returned him a glance expressive of some astonishment, and then said, "And do not you? Your presence here assures me of it."

"I humbly follow one who would comfort the unhappy."

"The charity of Mr St Lys is known to all."

"And you--you too are a ministering angel."

"There is no merit in my conduct, for there is no sacrifice. When I remember what this English people once was; the truest, the freest, and the bravest, the best-natured and the best-looking, the happiest and most religious race upon the surface of this globe; and think of them now, with all their crimes and all their slavish sufferings, their soured spirits and their stunted forms; their lives without enjoyment and their deaths without hope; I may well feel for them, even if I were not the daughter of their blood."

And that blood mantled to her cheek as she ceased to speak, and her dark eye gleamed with emotion, and an expression of pride and courage hovered on her brow. Egremont caught her glance and withdrew his own; his heart was troubled.

St Lys. who had been in conference with the weaver, left him and went to the bedside of his wife. Warner advanced to Sybil, and expressed his feelings for her father, his sense of her goodness. She, observing that the squall seemed to have ceased, bade him farewell, and calling Harold, quitted the chamber.


Book 2 Chapter 15


"Where have you been all the morning, Charles?" said Lord Marney coming into his brother's dressing-room a few minutes before dinner; "Arabella had made the nicest little riding party for you and Lady Joan, and you were to be found nowhere. If you go on in this way, there is no use of having affectionate relations, or anything else."

"I have been walking about Mowbray. One should see a factory once in one's life."

"I don't see the necessity," said Lord Marney; "I never saw one, and never intend. Though to be sure, when I hear the rents that Mowbray gets for his land in their neighbourhood, I must say I wish the worsted works had answered at Marney. And if it had not been for our poor dear father, they would."

"Our family have always been against manufactories, railroads--everything," said Egremont.

"Railroads are very good things, with high compensation," said Lord Marney; "and manufactories not so bad, with high rents; but, after all, these are enterprises for the canaille, and I hate them in my heart."

"But they employ the people, George."

"The people do not want employment; it is the greatest mistake in the world; all this employment is a stimulus to population. Never mind that; what I came in for, is to tell you that both Arabella and myself think you talk too much to Lady Maud."

"I like her the best."

"What has that to do with it my dear fellow? Business is business. Old Mowbray will make an elder son out of his elder daughter. The affair is settled; I know it from the best authority. Talking to Lady Maud is insanity. It is all the same for her as if Fitz-Warene had never died. And then that great event, which ought to be the foundation of your fortune, would be perfectly thrown away. Lady Maud, at the best, is nothing more than twenty thousand pounds and a fat living. Besides, she is engaged to that parson fellow, St Lys.

"St Lys told me to-day that nothing would ever induce him to marry. He would practise celibacy, though he would not enjoin it."

"Enjoin fiddle-stick! How came you to be talking to such a sanctified imposter; and, I believe, with all his fine phrases, a complete radical. I tell you what, Charles, you must really make way with Lady Joan. The grandfather has come to-day, the old Duke. Quite a family party. It looks so well. Never was such a golden opportunity. And you must be sharp too. That little Jermyn, with his brown eyes and his white hands, has not come down here, in the month of August, with no sport of any kind, for nothing."

"I shall set Lady Firebrace at him."

"She is quite your friend, and a very sensible woman too, Charles, and an ally not to be despised. Lady Joan has a very high opinion of her. There's the bell. Well, I shall tell Arabella that you mean to put up the steam, and Lady Firebrace shall keep Jermyn off. And perhaps it is as well you did not seem too eager at first. Mowbray Castle, my dear fellow, in spite of its manufactories, is not to be despised. And with a little firmness, you could keep the people out of your park. Mowbray could do it, only he has no pluck. He is afraid people would say he was the son of a footman."

The Duke, who was the father of the Countess de Mowbray, was also lord lieutenant of the county. Although advanced in years, he was still extremely handsome; with the most winning manners; full of amenity and grace. He had been a roue in his youth, but seemed now the perfect representative of a benignant and virtuous old age. He was universally popular; admired by young men, adored by young ladies. Lord de Mowbray paid him the most distinguished consideration. It was genuine.