Pierre; or The Ambiguities. Герман Мелвилл

my fine fellow, bring me three bowls of milk."

      "One bowl, sir, you mean," said Dates, gravely and imperturbably.

      As the servitor left the room, Mrs. Glendinning spoke. "My dear Pierre, how often have I begged you never to permit your hilariousness to betray you into overstepping the exact line of propriety in your intercourse with servants. Dates' look was a respectful reproof to you just now. You must not call Dates, My fine fellow. He is a fine fellow, a very fine fellow, indeed; but there is no need of telling him so at my table. It is very easy to be entirely kind and pleasant to servants, without the least touch of any shade of transient good-fellowship with them."

      "Well, sister, no doubt you are altogether right; after this I shall drop the fine, and call Dates nothing but fellow;—Fellow, come here!—how will that answer?"

      "Not at all, Pierre—but you are a Romeo, you know, and so for the present I pass over your nonsense."

      "Romeo! oh, no. I am far from being Romeo—" sighed Pierre. "I laugh, but he cried; poor Romeo! alas Romeo! woe is me, Romeo! he came to a very deplorable end, did Romeo, sister Mary."

      "It was his own fault though."

      "Poor Romeo!"

      "He was disobedient to his parents."

      "Alas Romeo!"

      "He married against their particular wishes."

      "Woe is me, Romeo!"

      "But you, Pierre, are going to be married before long, I trust, not to a Capulet, but to one of our own Montagues; and so Romeo's evil fortune will hardly be yours. You will be happy."

      "The more miserable Romeo!"

      "Don't be so ridiculous, brother Pierre; so you are going to take Lucy that long ride among the hills this morning? She is a sweet girl; a most lovely girl."

      "Yes, that is rather my opinion, sister Mary.—By heavens, mother, the five zones hold not such another! She is—yes—though I say it—Dates!—he's a precious long time getting that milk!"

      "Let him stay.—Don't be a milk-sop, Pierre!"

      "Ha! my sister is a little satirical this morning. I comprehend."

      "Never rave, Pierre; and never rant. Your father never did either; nor is it written of Socrates; and both were very wise men. Your father was profoundly in love—that I know to my certain knowledge—but I never heard him rant about it. He was always exceedingly gentlemanly: and gentlemen never rant. Milk-sops and Muggletonians rant, but gentlemen never."

      "Thank you, sister.—There, put it down, Dates; are the horses ready?"

      "Just driving round, sir, I believe."

      "Why, Pierre," said his mother, glancing out at the window, "are you going to Santa Fe De Bogota with that enormous old phaeton;—what do you take that Juggernaut out for?"

      "Humor, sister, humor; I like it because it's old-fashioned, and because the seat is such a wide sofa of a seat, and finally because a young lady by the name of Lucy Tartan cherishes a high regard for it. She vows she would like to be married in it."

      "Well, Pierre, all I have to say, is, be sure that Christopher puts the coach-hammer and nails, and plenty of cords and screws into the box. And you had better let him follow you in one of the farm wagons, with a spare axle and some boards."

      "No fear, sister; no fear;—I shall take the best of care of the old phaeton. The quaint old arms on the panel, always remind me who it was that first rode in it."

      "I am glad you have that memory, brother Pierre."

      "And who it was that next rode in it."

      "Bless you!—God bless you, my dear son!—always think of him and you can never err; yes, always think of your dear perfect father, Pierre."

      "Well, kiss me now, dear sister, for I must go."

      "There; this is my cheek, and the other is Lucy's; though now that I look at them both, I think that hers is getting to be the most blooming; sweeter dews fall on that one, I suppose."

      Pierre laughed, and ran out of the room, for old Christopher was getting impatient. His mother went to the window and stood there.

      "A noble boy, and docile"—she murmured—"he has all the frolicsomeness of youth, with little of its giddiness. And he does not grow vain-glorious in sophomorean wisdom. I thank heaven I sent him not to college. A noble boy, and docile. A fine, proud, loving, docile, vigorous boy. Pray God, he never becomes otherwise to me. His little wife, that is to be, will not estrange him from me; for she too is docile—beautiful, and reverential, and most docile. Seldom yet have I known such blue eyes as hers, that were not docile, and would not follow a bold black one, as two meek blue-ribboned ewes, follow their martial leader. How glad am I that Pierre loves her so, and not some dark-eyed haughtiness, with whom I could never live in peace; but who would be ever setting her young married state before my elderly widowed one, and claiming all the homage of my dear boy—the fine, proud, loving, docile, vigorous boy!—the lofty-minded, well-born, noble boy; and with such sweet docilities! See his hair! He does in truth illustrate that fine saying of his father's, that as the noblest colts, in three points—abundant hair, swelling chest, and sweet docility—should resemble a fine woman, so should a noble youth. Well, good-bye, Pierre, and a merry morning to ye!"

      So saying she crossed the room, and—resting in a corner—her glad proud eye met the old General's baton, which the day before in one of his frolic moods Pierre had taken from its accustomed place in the pictured-bannered hall. She lifted it, and musingly swayed it to and fro; then paused, and staff-wise rested with it in her hand. Her stately beauty had ever somewhat martial in it; and now she looked the daughter of a General, as she was; for Pierre's was a double revolutionary descent. On both sides he sprang from heroes.

      "This is his inheritance—this symbol of command! and I swell out to think it. Yet but just now I fondled the conceit that Pierre was so sweetly docile! Here sure is a most strange inconsistency! For is sweet docility a general's badge? and is this baton but a distaff then?—Here's something widely wrong. Now I almost wish him otherwise than sweet and docile to me, seeing that it must be hard for man to be an uncompromising hero and a commander among his race, and yet never ruffle any domestic brow. Pray heaven he show his heroicness in some smooth way of favoring fortune, not be called out to be a hero of some dark hope forlorn;—of some dark hope forlorn, whose cruelness makes a savage of a man. Give him, O God, regardful gales! Fan him with unwavering prosperities! So shall he remain all docility to me, and yet prove a haughty hero to the world!"

BOOK II.

       LOVE, DELIGHT, AND ALARM.

       Table of Contents

      I.

      ON the previous evening, Pierre had arranged with Lucy the plan of a long winding ride, among the hills which stretched around to the southward from the wide plains of Saddle-Meadows.

      Though the vehicle was a sexagenarian, the animals that drew it, were but six-year colts. The old phaeton had outlasted several generations of its drawers.

      Pierre rolled beneath the village elms in billowy style, and soon drew up before the white cottage door. Flinging his reins upon the ground he entered the house.

      The two colts were his particular and confidential friends; born on the same land with him, and fed with the same corn, which, in the form of Indian-cakes, Pierre himself was often wont to eat for breakfast. The same fountain that by one branch supplied the stables with water, by another supplied Pierre's pitcher. They were a sort of family cousins to Pierre, those horses; and they were splendid young cousins; very showy in their redundant manes and mighty paces, but not at all vain or arrogant. They acknowledged Pierre as the undoubted head of