In short, though she often fell into fits of musing, she seldom lost an opportunity of giving my mind improvement. If I fixed upon a wild flower, she told me its nature and its qualities; if I watched a passing cloud, she explained to me how sweet and beneficial to the earth's surface are the light vapours that float gently over it, descending in light rain to render everything fertile and productive; and she would explain to me, as well as she could, what were the beneficial effects produced by winds and storms that seemed to my imagination tremendous, pointing still to the all-powerful hand of Providence, shaping still the events of this world with never-erring wisdom directing never-failing might.
From her conversation, from her train of thought, my mind took the peculiar turn which it ever after retained; and even to the present day, after scenes of peril, and danger, and activity; after having gained, by sad experience, knowledge of the world, and become hackneyed and keen in the wisdom of the earth, many of the words that she spoke to me, many of the counsels that she gave, come back upon my ear in all the fresh sweetness of the tones in which it was originally spoken, and I feel myself better, happier, more contented, when thus dwell with her for a moment in the wide tracts of memory, than I do when fulfilling any of the ordinary duties of my state and station.
What she herself could not do to improve my mind the good priest did; he applied himself to teach me sciences; to read other languages than my own, both dead and living; to argue by rule; to write my native language with accuracy; to calculate arithmetically; and to do all, in short, that he himself could do, which was more, perhaps, than my after fate required. It was some years, of course, ere I gained much facility in everything, but ere four years had passed after my cousin's marriage I had become quite a different being. The formidable obstacles that await us at the entrance of every science had given way, and during the following year, which was the fourteenth of my age, I made greater progress than I had done in any other. I had now acquired a taste for the poetry which had descended to us from other days; and from that high and ennobling source I drank long, deep draughts of pure and unmingled delight. I found, too, that there were works of infinite value, full of fancy and of wit, full of instruction and amusement, in other languages besides either French, or Greek, or Latin; and, almost unaided--for my good preceptor knew little of that tongue himself--I made myself a tolerable master of the Italian language, and felt like one who has suddenly discovered a treasure when the works of Dante and Boccaccio, and the newer poems of Tasso, fell into my hands.
Nevertheless, I did not in any degree neglect the usual exercises of which I had formerly been fond. There were always a number of old military retainers about the house, who were willing and eager to teach me everything that could be taught in the profession to which they had devoted themselves. I did not, it is true, follow any study with great regularity, but I followed all and each with eagerness, and zeal, and devotion.
When the baroness could give me up any of her time, she was always the first I sought, and then the good minister La Tour. But he had many duties to perform, and, during the rest of the day, every sport of the field that was going on I followed with eagerness; every instruction I could get in military exercises I sought continually, and listened with deep and profound attention to all that the old officers or soldiers could tell me of discipline and of tactics, or to their tales of terrible sieges, well-fought fields, and marvellous escapes. I was one of the best of listeners; and, flattered by the attention that I paid them, they were always willing to amuse or to instruct me. The courtyard of the castle became the mimic field of battle, the walls the sisterus, the stables the fortifications of a besieged city; and everything that was at hand was pressed into our service, either as the animate or inanimate materials of war. All the tales that they told me were delightful to me, but more especially so were those in which my father's name was introduced, and when I heard deep regrets expressed for his early death, and praises of the promise that he had displayed as a soldier and a commander.
In the mean while, the greater part of the servants and retainers of the household treated me completely as the poor dependant; the little services I required were neglected; any direction that I gave was heard in silence, or replied to with contemptuous lightness; and, in order as far as possible to keep myself from the irritation of petty insolence, I was obliged to avoid all communication with the domestics of the chateau.
In the presence of their mistress, indeed, the servants dared not behave in such a manner, and when her eye was on them they showed me every sort of reverence and respect; once also I remember her rebuking one of the grooms for neglecting my horse, speaking to him in a manner so severe, as to work a permanent change in his conduct, and in some degree to affect his companions.
These slight inconveniences, however, did not in the least depress my spirit or keep down my gayety. Youth's buoyant and happy blood beat in every limb, my heart was light, my cheerfulness unchecked; and, though I learned when any one neglected me to punish by a cutting word, yet it was always done with light and happy gayety, and forgotten almost as soon as it was spoken, at least by myself.
Thus years rolled on, and during the frequent and long-continued absence of my cousin, his children learned to love me with a strong affection; and, taking a model from the domestic circle of a neighbouring family, my imagination pictured for me a future fate like that of a person whom I frequently beheld situated in very similar circumstances. He was at this time a man well advanced in life, and, like me, the cousin of the lord of the castle. But he had gained considerable renown in arms. The father of the family, who was now withheld from active service by the effects of severe wounds, confided to him the leading of his retainers; the children clung to him with reverence and affection; and the two eldest were, even at that very time, trying their first arms under the sword of their veteran cousin. He possessed no property, he sought none; but he lived with people who reverenced and loved him: he had his own honoured seat by the hall fire; his tales were listened to and sought for with delight by all, and his counsel or assistance was asked by the father when any matter of real danger or difficulty arose, by the elder sons in the mysteries of the chase or the mew, and by the younger children in any of the small sorrows or difficulties which were to them as important as wars or sieges.
I fancied myself, I say, like him; winning renown in arms, gaining a station by my own deeds, and seeing the young beings that I loved so tenderly as babes, grow up round me as round an elder brother.
But oh, how vainly, how youthfully did I calculate! My cousin, when he returned to the castle after any of his long absences, had now become harsh and stern. Me he treated with utter neglect and coldness; he saw me dine at his table without addressing a word to me; he met me without any kind gratulation: he heard me wish him joy of his return with scarcely an answering word. When he looked at me it was coldly; and I could not but feel that I was a burden to him.
When I was about fifteen years of age, he one morning took the pains to ask what progress I had made in my studies. The question was addressed to Monsieur la Tour, but in my presence. The clergyman replied with high praise; higher, I believe, than I deserved; and the baron's reply was, "Don't you think you can contrive to make a priest of him, La Tour?"
My blood boiled, I confess, but my cousin turned away without waiting for any reply, having satisfied himself that, by the question he had asked and the suggestion he had made, he quite fulfilled his duty towards me, at least for the time.
I thought, however, of the days when I had sat upon his knee, and when he had said that he would make a little hero of me: that I should be a Bayard or a Du Guesclin.
He was absent after that visit for more than two years; and there were tales reached the chateau of some fair dame in the capital who withheld the baron