himself with answering once more, “that both the young ladies were highly admirable, but he had never thought of them with the wish to do either injustice, by ranking her lower than her sister – that others would probably decide between them, as they happened to be partial to a grave or a gay disposition, or to a dark or fair complexion; but that he could see no excellent quality in the one that was not balanced by something equally captivating in the other.”
It is possible that even the coolness with which Mordaunt made this explanation might not have satisfied his father concerning the subject of investigation; but Swertha at this moment entered with breakfast, and the youth, notwithstanding his late supper, engaged in that meal with an air which satisfied Mertoun that he held it matter of more grave importance than the conversation which they had just had, and that he had nothing more to say upon the subject explanatory of the answers he had already given. He shaded his brow with his hand, and looked long fixedly upon the young man as he was busied with his morning meal. There was neither abstraction nor a sense of being observed in any of his motions; all was frank, natural, and open.
“He is fancy-free,” muttered Mertoun to himself – “so young, so lively, and so imaginative, so handsome and so attractive in face and person, strange, that at his age, and in his circumstances, he should have avoided the meshes which catch all the world beside!”
When the breakfast was over, the elder Mertoun, instead of proposing, as usual, that his son, who awaited his commands, should betake himself to one branch or other of his studies, assumed his hat and staff, and desired that Mordaunt should accompany him to the top of the cliff, called Sumburgh-head, and from thence look out upon the state of the ocean, agitated as it must still be by the tempest of the preceding day. Mordaunt was at the age when young men willingly exchange sedentary pursuits for active exercise, and started up with alacrity to comply with his father’s desire; and in the course of a few minutes they were mounting together the hill, which, ascending from the land side in a long, steep, and grassy slope, sinks at once from the summit to the sea in an abrupt and tremendous precipice.
The day was delightful; there was just so much motion in the air as to disturb the little fleecy clouds which were scattered on the horizon, and by floating them occasionally over the sun, to chequer the landscape with that variety of light and shade which often gives to a bare and unenclosed scene, for the time at least, a species of charm approaching to the varieties of a cultivated and planted country. A thousand flitting hues of light and shade played over the expanse of wild moor, rocks, and inlets, which, as they climbed higher and higher, spread in wide and wider circuit around them.
The elder Mertoun often paused and looked round upon the scene, and for some time his son supposed that he halted to enjoy its beauties; but as they ascended still higher up the hill, he remarked his shortened breath and his uncertain and toilsome step, and became assured, with some feelings of alarm, that his father’s strength was, for the moment, exhausted, and that he found the ascent more toilsome and fatiguing than usual. To draw close to his side, and offer him in silence the assistance of his arm, was an act of youthful deference to advanced age, as well as of filial reverence; and Mertoun seemed at first so to receive it, for he took in silence the advantage of the aid thus afforded him.
It was but for two or three minutes, however, that the father availed himself of his son’s support. They had not ascended fifty yards farther, ere he pushed Mordaunt suddenly, if not rudely, from him; and, as if stung into exertion by some sudden recollection, began to mount the acclivity with such long and quick steps, that Mordaunt, in his turn, was obliged to exert himself to keep pace with him. He knew his father’s peculiarity of disposition; he was aware from many slight circumstances, that he loved him not even while he took much pains with his education, and while he seemed to be the sole object of his care upon earth. But the conviction had never been more strongly or more powerfully forced upon him than by the hasty churlishness with which Mertoun rejected from a son that assistance, which most elderly men are willing to receive from youths with whom they are but slightly connected, as a tribute which it is alike graceful to yield and pleasing to receive. Mertoun, however, did not seem to perceive the effect which his unkindness had produced upon his son’s feelings. He paused upon a sort of level terrace which they had now attained, and addressed his son with an indifferent tone, which seemed in some degree affected.
“Since you have so few inducements, Mordaunt, to remain in these wild islands, I suppose you sometimes wish to look a little more abroad into the world?”
“By my word, sir,” replied Mordaunt, “I cannot say I ever have a thought on such a subject.”
“And why not, young man?” demanded his father; “it were but natural, I think, at your age. At your age, the fair and varied breadth of Britain could not gratify me, much less the compass of a sea-girdled peat-moss.”
“I have never thought of leaving Zetland, sir,” replied the son. “I am happy here, and have friends. You yourself, sir, would miss me, unless indeed” —
“Why, thou wouldst not persuade me,” said his father, somewhat hastily, “that you stay here, or desire to stay here, for the love of me?”
“Why should I not, sir?” answered Mordaunt, mildly; “it is my duty, and I hope I have hitherto performed it.”
“O ay,” repeated Mertoun, in the same tone – “your duty – your duty. So it is the duty of the dog to follow the groom that feeds him.”
“And does he not do so, sir?” said Mordaunt.
“Ay,” said his father, turning his head aside: “but he fawns only on those who caress him.”
“I hope, sir,” replied Mordaunt, “I have not been found deficient?”
“Say no more on’t – say no more on’t,” said Mertoun, abruptly, “we have both done enough by each other – we must soon part – Let that be our comfort – if our separation should require comfort.”
“I shall be ready to obey your wishes,” said Mordaunt, not altogether displeased at what promised him an opportunity of looking farther abroad into the world. “I presume it will be your pleasure that I commence my travels with a season at the whale-fishing.”
“Whale-fishing!” replied Mertoun; “that were a mode indeed of seeing the world! but thou speakest but as thou hast learned. Enough of this for the present. Tell me where you had shelter from the storm yesterday?”
“At Stourburgh, the house of the new factor from Scotland.”
“A pedantic, fantastic, visionary schemer,” said Mertoun – “and whom saw you there?”
“His sister, sir,” replied Mordaunt, “and old Norna of the Fitful-head.”
“What! the mistress of the potent spell,” answered Mertoun, with a sneer – “she who can change the wind by pulling her curch on one side, as King Erick used to do by turning his cap? The dame journeys far from home – how fares she? Does she get rich by selling favourable winds to those who are port-bound?”25
“I really do not know, sir,” said Mordaunt, whom certain recollections prevented from freely entering into his father’s humour.
“You think the matter too serious to be jested with, or perhaps esteem her merchandise too light to be cared after,” continued Mertoun, in the same sarcastic tone, which was the nearest approach he ever made to cheerfulness; “but consider it more deeply. Every thing in the universe is bought and sold, and why not wind, if the merchant can find purchasers? The earth is rented, from its surface down to its most central mines; – the fire, and the means of feeding it, are currently bought and sold; – the wretches that sweep
Note III.– Sale of Winds.
