The Essential George Meredith Collection. George Meredith
listlessly dispensing justice in the Great Hall, seven days after the mastery of the Event, lo, Noorna, in air, borne by Gulrevaz, she fair and fresh in the revival of health and beauty, and the light of constant love. Of her entry into the Great Hall, to the embrace of her betrothed, the poet exclaims, picturing her in a rapture:
Her march is music, and my soul obeys Each motion, as a lute to cunning fingers I see the earth throb for her as she sways Wave-like in air, and like a great flower lingers Heavily over all, as loath to leave What loves her so, and for her loss would grieve.
But oh, what other hand than heaven's can paint Her eyes, and that black bow from which their lightning Pierces afar! long lustrous eyes, that faint In languor, or with stormy passion brightening: Within them world in world lights up from sleep, And gives a glimpse of the eternal deep.
Sigh round her, odorous winds; and, envious rose, So vainly envious, with such blushes gifted, Bow to her; die, strangled with jealous throes, O Bulbul! when she sings with brow uplifted; Gather her, happy youth, and for thy gain Thank Him who could such loveliness ordain.
Surely the Master of the Event advanced to her in the glory of a Sultan, and seated her beside him in majesty, and their contract of marriage was read aloud in the Hall, and witnessed, and sealed: joyful was he! Then commenced that festival which lasted forty days, and is termed the Festival of the honours of hospitality to the Sons of Aldis, wherein the head-cook of the palace, Uruish, performed wonders in his science, and menaced the renown of Zrmack, the head-cook of King Shamshureen. Even so the confectioner, Dob, excelled himself in devices and inventions, and his genius urged him to depict in sugars and pastes the entire adventures of Shibli Bagarag in search of the Sword. Honour we Uruish and Do-b! as the poet sayeth:
Divide not this fraternal twain; One are they, and one should for ever remain: As to sweet close in fine music we look, So the Confectioner follows the Cook.
And one of the Sons of Aklis, Zaragal, beholding this masterpiece of Dob, which was served to the guests in the Great Hall on the fortieth evening, was fair to exclaim in extemporaneous verse:
Have I been wafted to a rise Of banquet spread in Paradise, Dower'd with consuming powers divine;-- That I, who have not fail'd to dine, And greatly, Fall thus upon the cater and wine Sedately?
So there was feasting in the Hall, and in the City, and over Earth; great pledging the Sovereign of Barbers, who had mastered an Event, and become the benefactor of his craft and of his kind. 'Tis certain the race of the Bagarags endured for many centuries, and his seed were the rulers of men, and the seal of their empire stamped on mighty wax the Tackle of Barbers.
Now, of the promise made by the Sons of Aklis to visit Shibli Bagarag before their compulsory return to the labour of the Sword, and recount to him the marvel of their antecedent adventures; and of the love and grief nourished in the souls of men by the beauty and sorrowful eyes of Gulrevaz, that was mined the Bleeding Lily, and of her engagement to tell her story, on condition of receiving the first-born of Noorna to nurse for a season in Aklis; and of Shibli Bagarag's restoration of towns and monuments destroyed by his battle with Karaz; and of the constancy of passion of Shibli Bagarag for Noorna, and his esteem for her sweetness, and his reverence for her wisdom; and of the glory of his reign, and of the Songs and Sentences of Noorna, and of his Laws for the protection and upholding of women, in honour of Noorna, concerning which the Sage has said:
Were men once clad in them, we should create A race not following, but commanding, fate:
--of all these records, and of the reign of Baba Mustapha in Oolb, surely the chronicles give them in fulness; and they that have searched say of them, there is matter therein for the amusement of generations.
THE ORDEAL OF RICHARD FEVEREL
By George Meredith
1905
CONTENTS I. THE INMATES OF RAYNHAM ABBEY II. FATES SELECTED THE FOURTEENTH BIRTHDAY TO TRY THE STRENGTH III. THE MAGIAN CONFLICT IV. ARSON V. ADRIAN PLIES HIS HOOK VI. JUVENILE STRATAGEMS VII. DAPHNE'S BOWER VIII. THE BITTER CUP IX. A FINE DISTINCTION X. RICHARD PASSES THROUGH HIS PRELIMINARY ORDEAL XI. THE LAST ACT OF THE BAKEWELL COMEDY IS CLOSED IN A LETTER XII. THE BLOSSOMING SEASON XIII. THE MAGNETIC AGE XIV. AN ATTRACTION XV. FERDINAND AND MIRANDA XVI. UNMASKING OF MASTER RIPTON THOMPSON XVII. GOOD WINE AND GOOD BLOOD XVIII. THE SYSTEM ENCOUNTERS THE WILD OATS SPECIAL PLEA XIX. A DIVERSION PLAYED ON A PENNY WHISTLE XX. CELEBRATES THE TIME-HONOURED TREATMENT OF A DRAGON BY THE HERO XXI. RICHARD IS SUMMONED TO TOWN TO HEAR A SERMON XXII. INDICATES THE APPROACHES OF FEVER XXIII. CRISIS IN THE APPLE-DISEASE XXIV. OF THE SPRING PRIMROSE AND THE AUTUMNAL XXV. IN WHICH THE HERO TAKES A STEP XXVI. RECORDS THE RAPID DEVELOPMENT OF THE HERO XXVII. CONTAINS AN INTERCESSION FOR THE HEROINE XXVIII. PREPARATIONS FOR ACTION WERE CONDUCTED UNDER THE APRIL OF LOVERS XIX. THE LAST ACT OF THE COMEDY TAKES THE PLACE OF THE FIRST XXX. CELEBRATES THE BREAKFAST XXXI. THE PHILOSOPHER APPEARS IN PERSON XXXII. PROCESSION OF THE CAKE XXXIII. NURSING THE DEVIL XXXIV. CONQUEST OF AN EPICURE XXXV. CLARE'S MARRIAGE XXXVI. A DINNER-PARTY AT RICHMOND XXXVII. MRS. BERRY ON MATRIMONY XXXVIII. AN ENCHANTRESS XXXIX. THE LITTLE BIRD AND THE FALCON: A BERRY TO THE RESCUE! XL. CLARE'S DIARY XLI. AUSTIN RETURNS XLII. NATURE SPEAKS XLIII. AGAIN THE MAGIAN CONFLICT XLIV. THE LAST SCENE XLV. LADY BLANDISH TO AUSTIN WENTWORTH
CHAPTER I
Some years ago a book was published under the title of "The Pilgrim's Scrip." It consisted of a selection of original aphorisms by an anonymous gentleman, who in this bashful manner gave a bruised heart to the world.
He made no pretension to novelty. "Our new thoughts have thrilled dead bosoms," he wrote; by which avowal it may be seen that youth had manifestly gone from him, since he had ceased to be jealous of the ancients. There was a half-sigh floating through his pages for those days of intellectual coxcombry, when ideas come to us affecting the embraces of virgins, and swear to us they are ours alone, and no one else have they ever visited: and we believe them.
For an example of his ideas of the sex he said:
"I expect that Woman will be the last thing civilized by Man."
Some excitement was produced in the bosoms of ladies by so monstrous a scorn of them.
One adventurous person betook herself to the Heralds' College, and there ascertained that a Griffin between two Wheatsheaves, which stood on the title-page of the book, formed the crest of Sir Austin Absworthy Bearne Feverel, Baronet, of Raynham Abbey, in a certain Western county folding Thames: a man of wealth and honour, and a somewhat lamentable history.
The outline of the baronet's story was by no means new. He had a wife, and he had a friend. His marriage was for love; his wife was a beauty; his friend was a sort of poet. His wife had his whole heart, and his friend all his confidence. When he selected Denzil Somers from among his college chums, it was not on account of any similarity of disposition between them, but from his intense worship of genius, which made him overlook the absence of principle in his associate for the sake of such brilliant promise. Denzil had a small patrimony to lead off with, and that he dissipated before he left college; thenceforth he was dependent upon his admirer, with whom he lived, filling a nominal post of bailiff to the estates, and launching forth verse of some satiric and sentimental quality; for being inclined to vice, and occasionally, and in a quiet way, practising it, he was of course a sentimentalist and a satirist, entitled to lash the Age and complain of human nature. His earlier poems, published under the pseudonym of Diaper Sandoe, were so pure and bloodless in their love passages, and at the same time so biting in their moral tone, that his reputation was great among the virtuous, who form the larger portion of the English book-buying public. Election-seasons called him to ballad-poetry on behalf of the Tory party. Dialer possessed undoubted fluency, but did tittle, though Sir Austin was ever expecting much of him.
A languishing, inexperienced woman, whose husband in mental and in moral stature is more than the ordinary height above her, and who, now that her first romantic admiration of his lofty bearing has worn off, and her fretful little refinements of taste and sentiment are not instinctively responded to, is thrown into