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

at it, when there is no comfort to cheer and no sentiment to hallow the Home."

"I was reading a work the other day," said Egremont, "that statistically proved that the general condition of the people was much better at this moment than it had been at any known period of history."

"Ah! yes, I know that style of speculation," said Gerard; "your gentleman who reminds you that a working man now has a pair of cotton stockings, and that Harry the Eighth himself was not as well off. At any rate, the condition of classes must be judged of by the age, and by their relation with each other. One need not dwell on that. I deny the premises. I deny that the condition of the main body is better now than at any other period of our history; that it is as good as it has been at several. I say, for instance, the people were better clothed, better lodged, and better fed just before the war of the Roses than they are at this moment. We know how an English peasant lived in those times: he eat flesh every day, he never drank water, was well housed, and clothed in stout woollens. Nor are the Chronicles necessary to tell us this. The acts of Parliament from the Plantagenets to the Tudors teach us alike the price of provisions and the rate of wages; and we see in a moment that the wages of those days brought as much sustenance and comfort as a reasonable man could desire."

"I know how deeply you feel upon this subject," said Egremont turning to Sybil.

"Indeed it is the only subject that ever engages my thought," she replied, "except one."

"And that one?"

"Is to see the people once more kneel before our blessed Lady," replied Sybil.

"Look at the average term of life," said Gerard, coming unintentionally to the relief of Egremont, who was a little embarrassed. "The average term of life in this district among the working classes is seventeen. What think you of that? Of the infants born in Mowbray, more than a moiety die before the age of five."

"And yet," said Egremont, "in old days they had terrible pestilences."

"But they touched all alike," said Gerard. "We have more pestilence now in England than we ever had, but it only reaches the poor. You never hear of it. Why Typhus alone takes every year from the dwellings of the artisan and peasant a population equal to that of the whole county of Westmoreland. This goes on every year, but the representatives of the conquerors are not touched: it is the descendants of the conquered alone who are the victims."

"It sometimes seems to me," said Sybil despondingly, "that nothing short of the descent of angels can save the people of this kingdom."

"I sometimes think I hear a little bird," said Gerard, "who sings that the long frost may yet break up. I have a friend, him of whom I was speaking to you the other day, who has his remedies."

"But Stephen Morley does not believe in angels," said Sybil with a sigh; "and I have no faith in his plan."

"He believes that God will help those who help themselves," said Gerard.

"And I believe," said Sybil, "that those only can help themselves whom God helps."

All this time Egremont was sitting at the table, with the book in his hand, gazing fitfully and occasionally with an air of absence on its title-page, whereon was written the name of its owner. Suddenly he said "Sybil."

"Yes," said the daughter of Gerard, with an air of some astonishment.

"I beg your pardon," said Egremont blushing; "I was reading your name. I thought I was reading it to myself. Sybil Gerard! What a beautiful name is Sybil!"

"My mother's name," said Gerard; "and my grandame's name, and a name I believe that has been about our hearth as long as our race; and that's a very long time indeed," he added smiling, "for we were tall men in King John's reign, as I have heard say."

"Yours is indeed an old family."

"Ay, we have some English blood in our veins, though peasants and the sons of peasants. But there was one of us who drew a bow at Azincourt; and I have heard greater things, but I believe they are old wives' tales."

"At least we have nothing left," said Sybil, "but our old faith; and that we have clung to through good report and evil report."

"And now," said Gerard, "I rise with the lark, good neighbour Franklin; but before you go, Sybil will sing to us a requiem that I love: it stills the spirit before we sink into the slumber which may this night be death, and which one day must be."


Book 3 Chapter 6


A bloom was spread over the morning sky. A soft golden light bathed with its fresh beam the bosom of the valley, except where a delicate haze, rather than a mist, still partially lingered over the river, which yet occasionally gleamed and sparkled in the sunshine. A sort of shadowy lustre suffused the landscape, which, though distinct, was mitigated in all its features--the distant woods, the clumps of tall trees that rose about the old grey bridge, the cottage chimneys that sent their smoke into the blue still air, amid their clustering orchards and garden of flowers and herbs.

Ah! what is there so fresh and joyous as a summer morn! That spring time of the day, when the brain is bright, and the heart is brave; the season of daring and of hope; the renovating hour!

Came forth from his cottage room the brother of Lord Marney, to feel the vigorous bliss of life amid sunshiny gardens and the voices of bees and birds.

"Ah! this is delicious!" he felt. "This is existence! Thank God I am here; that I have quitted for ever that formal and heartless Marney. Were it not for my mother, I would remain Mr Franklin for ever. Would I were indeed a journalist; provided I always had a mission to the vale of Mowbray. Or anything, so that I were ever here. As companions, independent of everything else, they are superior to any that I have been used to. Why do these persons interest me? They feel and they think: two habits that have quite gone out of fashion, if ever they existed, among my friends. And that polish of manners, that studied and factitious refinement, which is to compensate for the heartlessness or the stupidity we are doomed to--is my host of last night deficient in that refinement? If he do want our conventional discipline, he has a native breeding which far excels it. I observe no word or action which is not prompted by that fine feeling which is the sure source of good taste. This Gerard appears to me a real genuine man; full of knowledge worked out by his own head; with large yet wholesome sympathies; and a deuced deal better educated than Lord de Mowbray or my brother--and they do occasionally turn over a book, which is not the habit of our set.

"And his daughter--ay, his daughter! There is something almost sublime about that young girl, yet strangely sweet withal; a tone so lofty combined with such simplicity is very rare. For there is no affectation of enthusiasm about her; nothing exaggerated, nothing rhapsodical. Her dark eyes and lustrous face, and the solemn sweetness of her thrilling voice--they haunt me; they have haunted me from the first moment I encountered her like a spirit amid the ruins of our abbey. And I am one of 'the family of sacrilege.' If she knew that! And I am one of the conquering class she denounces. If also she knew that! Ah! there is much to know! Above all--the future. Away! the tree of knowledge is the tree of death. I will have no thought that is not as bright and lovely as this morn."

He went forth from his little garden, and strolled along the road in the direction of the cottage of Gerard, which was about three quarters of a mile distant. You might see almost as far; the sunshiny road a little winding and rising a very slight ascent. The cottage itself was hid by its trees. While Egremont was still musing of one who lived under that roof, he beheld in the distance Sybil.

She was springing along with a quick and airy step. Her black dress displayed her undulating and elastic figure. Her little foot bounded from the earth with a merry air. A long rosary hung at her side; and her head was partly covered with a hood which descended just over her shoulders. She seemed gay, for Harold kept running before her with a frolicsome air, and then returning to his mistress, danced about her, and almost overpowered her with his gambols.

"I salute thee, holy sister," said Egremont.

"Oh! is not this a merry morn!" she exclaimed with a bright and happy face.

"I feel it as you. And whither do you go?"

"I go to the convent; I pay my first visit to our Superior since I left them."

"Not very long ago," said Egremont, with a smile, and turning with her.

"It seems so," said Sybil.

They walked on together; Sybil glad as the hour; noticing a thousand cheerful sights, speaking to her dog in her ringing voice, as he gambolled before them, or seized her garments in his mouth, and ever and anon bounded away and then returned, looking up in his mistress' face to inquire whether he had been wanted in his absence.

"What a pity it is that your father's way each morning lies up the valley," said Egremont; "he would be your companion to Mowbray."

"Ah! but I am so happy that he has not to work in a town," said Sybil. "He is not made to be cooped up in a hot factory in a smoky street. At least he labours among the woods and waters. And the Traffords are such good people! So kind to him and to all."

"You love your father very much."

She looked at him a little surprised; and then her sweet serious face broke into a smile and she said, "And is that strange?"

"I think not," said Egremont; "I am inclined to love him myself."

"Ah! you win my heart," said Sybil, "when you praise him. I think that is the real reason why I like Stephen; for otherwise he is always saying something with which I cannot agree, which I disapprove; and yet he is so good to my father!"

"You speak of Mr Morley--"

"Oh! we don't call him 'Mr'," said Sybil slightly laughing.

"I mean Stephen Morley," said Egremont recalling his position, "whom I met in Marney Abbey. He is very clever, is he not?"

"He is a great writer and a great student; and what he is he has made himself. I hear too that you follow the same pursuit," said Sybil.

"But I am not a great writer or a great student," said Egremont.

"Whatever you be, I trust," said Sybil, in a more serious tone, "that you will never employ the talents that God has given you against the People."

"I have come here to learn something of their condition," said Egremont. "That is not to be done in a great city like London. We all of us live too much in a circle. You will assist me, I am sure," added Egremont; "your spirit will animate