Chapter Chapter 25 · NEWS FROM ENGLAND

. NEWS FROM ENGLAND

The letters which Waverley had hitherto received from his relations in

England were not such as required any particular notice in this

narrative. His father usually wrote to him with the pompous affectation

of one who was too much oppressed by public affairs to find leisure to

attend to those of his own family. Now and then he mentioned persons of

rank in Scotland to whom he wished his son should pay some attention;

but Waverley, hitherto occupied by the amusements which he had found at

Tully-Veolan and Glennaquoich, dispensed with paying any attention to

hints so coldly thrown out, especially as distance, shortness of leave

of absence, and so forth furnished a ready apology. But latterly the

burden of Mr. Richard Waverley’s paternal epistles consisted in certain

mysterious hints of greatness and influence which he was speedily to

attain, and which would ensure his son’s obtaining the most rapid

promotion, should he remain in the military service. Sir Everard’s

letters were of a different tenor. They were short; for the good

Baronet was none of your illimitable correspondents, whose manuscript

overflows the folds of their large post paper, and leaves no room for

the seal; but they were kind and affectionate, and seldom concluded

without some allusion to our hero’s stud, some question about the state

of his purse, and a special inquiry after such of his recruits as had

preceded him from Waverley-Honour. Aunt Rachel charged him to remember

his principles of religion, to take care of his health, to beware of

Scotch mists, which, she had heard, would wet an Englishman through and

through, never to go out at night without his great-coat, and, above

all, to wear flannel next to his skin.

Mr. Pembroke only wrote to our hero one letter, but it was of the bulk

of six epistles of these degenerate days, containing, in the moderate

compass of ten folio pages, closely written, a precis of a

supplementary quarto manuscript of _addenda, delenda, et corrigenda_ in

reference to the two tracts with which he had presented Waverley. This

he considered as a mere sop in the pan to stay the appetite of Edward’s

curiosity until he should find an opportunity of sending down the

volume itself, which was much too heavy for the post, and which he

proposed to accompany with certain interesting pamphlets, lately

published by his friend in Little Britain, with whom he had kept up a

sort of literary correspondence, in virtue of which the library shelves

of Waverley-Honour were loaded with much trash, and a good round bill,

seldom summed in fewer than three figures, was yearly transmitted, in

which Sir Everard Waverley of Waverley-Honour, Bart., was marked Dr. to

Jonathan Grubbet, bookseller and stationer, Little Britain. Such had

hitherto been the style of the letters which Edward had received from

England; but the packet delivered to him at Glennaquoich was of a

different and more interesting complexion. It would be impossible for

the reader, even were I to insert the letters at full length, to

comprehend the real cause of their being written, without a glance into

the interior of the British cabinet at the period in question.

The ministers of the day happened (no very singular event) to be

divided into two parties; the weakest of which, making up by assiduity

of intrigue their inferiority in real consequence, had of late acquired

some new proselytes, and with them the hope of superseding their rivals

in the favour of their sovereign, and overpowering them in the House of

Commons. Amongst others, they had thought it worth while to practise

upon Richard Waverley. This honest gentleman, by a grave mysterious

demeanour, an attention to the etiquette of business rather more than

to its essence, a facility in making long dull speeches, consisting of

truisms and commonplaces, hashed up with a technical jargon of office,

which prevented the inanity of his orations from being discovered, had

acquired a certain name and credit in public life, and even

established, with many, the character of a profound politician; none of

your shining orators, indeed, whose talents evaporate in tropes of

rhetoric and flashes of wit, but one possessed of steady parts for

business, which would wear well, as the ladies say in choosing their

silks, and ought in all reason to be good for common and every-day use,

since they were confessedly formed of no holiday texture.

This faith had become so general that the insurgent party in the

cabinet, of which we have made mention, after sounding Mr. Richard

Waverley, were so satisfied with his sentiments and abilities as to

propose that, in case of a certain revolution in the ministry, he

should take an ostensible place in the new order of things, not indeed

of the very first rank, but greatly higher, in point both of emolument

and influence, than that which he now enjoyed. There was no resisting

so tempting a proposal, notwithstanding that the Great Man under whose

patronage he had enlisted, and by whose banner he had hitherto stood

firm, was the principal object of the proposed attack by the new

allies. Unfortunately this fair scheme of ambition was blighted in the

very bud by a premature movement. All the official gentlemen concerned

in it who hesitated to take the part of a voluntary resignation were

informed that the king had no further occasion for their services; and

in Richard Waverley’s case, which the minister considered as aggravated

by ingratitude, dismissal was accompanied by something like personal

contempt and contumely. The public, and even the party of whom he

shared the fall, sympathised little in the disappointment of this

selfish and interested statesman; and he retired to the country under

the comfortable reflection that he had lost, at the same time,

character, credit, and,—what he at least equally deplored,—emolument.

Richard Waverley’s letter to his son upon this occasion was a

masterpiece of its kind. Aristides himself could not have made out a

harder case. An unjust monarch and an ungrateful country were the

burden of each rounded paragraph. He spoke of long services and

unrequited sacrifices; though the former had been overpaid by his

salary, and nobody could guess in what the latter consisted, unless it

were in his deserting, not from conviction, but for the lucre of gain,

the Tory principles of his family. In the conclusion, his resentment

was wrought to such an excess by the force of his own oratory, that he

could not repress some threats of vengeance, however vague and

impotent, and finally acquainted his son with his pleasure that he

should testify his sense of the ill-treatment he had sustained by

throwing up his commission as soon as the letter reached him. This, he

said, was also his uncle’s desire, as he would himself intimate in due

course.

Accordingly, the next letter which Edward opened was from Sir Everard.

His brother’s disgrace seemed to have removed from his well-natured

bosom all recollection of their differences, and, remote as he was from

every means of learning that Richard’s disgrace was in reality only the

just as well as natural consequence of his own unsuccessful intrigues,

the good but credulous Baronet at once set it down as a new and

enormous instance of the injustice of the existing government. It was

true, he said, and he must not disguise it even from Edward, that his

father could not have sustained such an insult as was now, for the

first time, offered to one of his house, unless he had subjected

himself to it by accepting of an employment under the present system.

Sir Everard had no doubt that he now both saw and felt the magnitude of

this error, and it should be his (Sir Everard’s) business to take care

that the cause of his regret should not extend itself to pecuniary

consequences. It was enough for a Waverley to have sustained the public

disgrace; the patrimonial injury could easily be obviated by the head

of their family. But it was both the opinion of Mr. Richard Waverley

and his own that Edward, the representative of the family of

Waverley-Honour, should not remain in a situation which subjected him

also to such treatment as that with which his father had been

stigmatised. He requested his nephew therefore to take the fittest, and

at the same time the most speedy, opportunity of transmitting his

resignation to the War Office, and hinted, moreover, that little

ceremony was necessary where so little had been used to his father. He

sent multitudinous greetings to the Baron of Bradwardine.

A letter from Aunt Rachel spoke out even more plainly. She considered

the disgrace of brother Richard as the just reward of his forfeiting

his allegiance to a lawful though exiled sovereign, and taking the

oaths to an alien; a concession which her grandfather, Sir Nigel

Waverley, refused to make, either to the Roundhead Parliament or to

Cromwell, when his life and fortune stood in the utmost extremity. She

hoped her dear Edward would follow the footsteps of his ancestors, and

as speedily as possible get rid of the badge of servitude to the

usurping family, and regard the wrongs sustained by his father as an

admonition from Heaven that every desertion of the line of loyalty

becomes its own punishment. She also concluded with her respects to Mr.

Bradwardine, and begged Waverley would inform her whether his daughter,

Miss Rose, was old enough to wear a pair of very handsome ear-rings,

which she proposed to send as a token of her affection. The good lady

also desired to be informed whether Mr. Bradwardine took as much Scotch

snuff and danced as unweariedly as he did when he was at

Waverley-Honour about thirty years ago.

These letters, as might have been expected, highly excited Waverley’s

indignation. From the desultory style of his studies, he had not any

fixed political opinion to place in opposition to the movements of

indignation which he felt at his father’s supposed wrongs. Of the real

cause of his disgrace Edward was totally ignorant; nor had his habits

at all led him to investigate the politics of the period in which he

lived, or remark the intrigues in which his father had been so actively

engaged. Indeed, any impressions which he had accidentally adopted

concerning the parties of the times were (owing to the society in which

he had lived at Waverley-Honour) of a nature rather unfavourable to the

existing government and dynasty. He entered, therefore, without

hesitation into the resentful feeling of the relations who had the best

title to dictate his conduct, and not perhaps the less willingly when

he remembered the tedium of his quarters, and the inferior figure which

he had made among the officers of his regiment. If he could have had

any doubt upon the subject it would have been decided by the following

letter from his commanding officer, which, as it is very short, shall

be inserted _verbatim._

SIR,—Having carried somewhat beyond the line of my duty an indulgence

which even the lights of nature, and much more those of Christianity,

direct towards errors which may arise from youth and inexperience, and

that altogether without effect, I am reluctantly compelled, at the

present crisis, to use the only remaining remedy which is in my power.

You are, therefore, hereby commanded to repair to—, the headquarters of

the regiment, within three days after the date of this letter. If you

shall fail to do so, I must report you to the War Office as absent

without leave, and also take other steps, which will be disagreeable to

you as well as to,

Sir,

Your obedient Servant,

J. GARDINER,

_Lieut.-Col. Commanding the——Regt. Dragoons._

Edward’s blood boiled within him as he read this letter. He had been

accustomed from his very infancy to possess in a great measure the

disposal of his own time, and thus acquired habits which rendered the

rules of military discipline as unpleasing to him in this as they were

in some other respects. An idea that in his own case they would not be

enforced in a very rigid manner had also obtained full possession of

his mind, and had hitherto been sanctioned by the indulgent conduct of

his lieutenant-colonel. Neither had anything occurred, to his

knowledge, that should have induced his commanding officer, without any

other warning than the hints we noticed at the end of the fourteenth

chapter, so suddenly to assume a harsh and, as Edward deemed it, so

insolent a tone of dictatorial authority. Connecting it with the

letters he had just received from his family, he could not but suppose

that it was designed to make him feel, in his present situation, the

same pressure of authority which had been exercised in his father’s

case, and that the whole was a concerted scheme to depress and degrade

every member of the Waverley family.

Without a pause, therefore, Edward wrote a few cold lines, thanking his

lieutenant-colonel for past civilities, and expressing regret that he

should have chosen to efface the remembrance of them by assuming a

different tone towards him. The strain of his letter, as well as what

he (Edward) conceived to be his duty in the present crisis, called upon

him to lay down his commission; and he therefore inclosed the formal

resignation of a situation which subjected him to so unpleasant a

correspondence, and requested Colonel Gardiner would have the goodness

to forward it to the proper authorities.

Having finished this magnanimous epistle, he felt somewhat uncertain

concerning the terms in which his resignation ought to be expressed,

upon which subject he resolved to consult Fergus Mac-Ivor. It may be

observed in passing that the bold and prompt habits of thinking,

acting, and speaking which distinguished this young Chieftain had given

him a considerable ascendency over the mind of Waverley. Endowed with

at least equal powers of understanding, and with much finer genius,

Edward yet stooped to the bold and decisive activity of an intellect

which was sharpened by the habit of acting on a preconceived and

regular system, as well as by extensive knowledge of the world.

When Edward found his friend, the latter had still in his hand the

newspaper which he had perused, and advanced to meet him with the

embarrassment of one who has unpleasing news to communicate. “Do your

letters, Captain Waverley, confirm the unpleasing information which I

find in this paper?”

He put the paper into his hand, where his father’s disgrace was

registered in the most bitter terms, transferred probably from some

London journal. At the end of the paragraph was this remarkable

innuendo:—

“We understand that “this same _Richard_ who hath done all this” is not

the only example of the _Wavering Honour_ of W-v-r-ly H-n-r. See the

Gazette of this day.”

With hurried and feverish apprehension our hero turned to the place

referred to, and found therein recorded, “Edward Waverley, captain

in——regiment dragoons, superseded for absence without leave”; and in

the list of military promotions, referring to the same regiment, he

discovered this farther article, “Lieut. Julius Butler, to be captain,

_vice_ Edward Waverley, superseded.”

Our hero’s bosom glowed with the resentment which undeserved and

apparently premeditated insult was calculated to excite in the bosom of

one who had aspired after honour, and was thus wantonly held up to

public scorn and disgrace. Upon comparing the date of his colonel’s

letter with that of the article in the Gazette, he perceived that his

threat of making a report upon his absence had been literally

fulfilled, and without inquiry, as it seemed, whether Edward had either

received his summons or was disposed to comply with it. The whole,

therefore, appeared a formed plan to degrade him in the eyes of the

public; and the idea of its having succeeded filled him with such

bitter emotions that, after various attempts to conceal them, he at

length threw himself into Mac-Ivor’s arms, and gave vent to tears of

shame and indignation.

It was none of this Chieftain’s faults to be indifferent to the wrongs

of his friends; and for Edward, independent of certain plans with which

he was connected, he felt a deep and sincere interest. The proceeding

appeared as extraordinary to him as it had done to Edward. He indeed

knew of more motives than Waverley was privy to for the peremptory

order that he should join his regiment. But that, without further

inquiry into the circumstances of a necessary delay, the commanding

officer, in contradiction to his known and established character,

should have proceeded in so harsh and unusual a manner was a mystery

which he could not penetrate. He soothed our hero, however, to the best

of his power, and began to turn his thoughts on revenge for his

insulted honour.

Edward eagerly grasped at the idea. “Will you carry a message for me to

Colonel Gardiner, my dear Fergus, and oblige me for ever?”

Fergus paused. “It is an act of friendship which you should command,

could it be useful, or lead to the righting your honour; but in the

present case I doubt if your commanding officer would give you the

meeting on account of his having taken measures which, however harsh

and exasperating, were still within the strict bounds of his duty.

Besides, Gardiner is a precise Huguenot, and has adopted certain ideas

about the sinfulness of such _rencontres_, from which it would be

impossible to make him depart, especially as his courage is beyond all

suspicion. And besides, I—I, to say the truth—I dare not at this

moment, for some very weighty reasons, go near any of the military

quarters or garrisons belonging to this government.”

“And am I,” said Waverley, “to sit down quiet and contented under the

injury I have received?”

“That will I never advise my friend,” replied Mac-Ivor. “But I would

have vengeance to fall on the head, not on the hand, on the tyrannical

and oppressive government which designed and directed these

premeditated and reiterated insults, not on the tools of office which

they employed in the execution of the injuries they aimed at you.”

“On the government!” said Waverley.

“Yes,” replied the impetuous Highlander, “on the usurping House of

Hanover, whom your grandfather would no more have served than he would

have taken wages of red-hot gold from the great fiend of hell!”

“But since the time of my grandfather two generations of this dynasty

have possessed the throne,” said Edward coolly.

“True,” replied the Chieftain; “and because we have passively given

them so long the means of showing their native character,—because both

you and I myself have lived in quiet submission, have even truckled to

the times so far as to accept commissions under them, and thus have

given them an opportunity of disgracing us publicly by resuming them,

are we not on that account to resent injuries which our fathers only

apprehended, but which we have actually sustained? Or is the cause of

the unfortunate Stuart family become less just, because their title has

devolved upon an heir who is innocent of the charges of misgovernment

brought against his father? Do you remember the lines of your favourite

poet,—

Had Richard unconstrain’d resign’d the throne,

A king can give no more than is his own;

The title stood entail’d had Richard had a son.

You see, my dear Waverley, I can quote poetry as well as Flora and you.

But come, clear your moody brow, and trust to me to show you an

honourable road to a speedy and glorious revenge. Let us seek Flora,

who perhaps has more news to tell us of what has occurred during our

absence. She will rejoice to hear that you are relieved of your

servitude. But first add a postscript to your letter, marking the time

when you received this calvinistical colonel’s first summons, and

express your regret that the hastiness of his proceedings prevented

your anticipating them by sending your resignation. Then let him blush

for his injustice.”

The letter was sealed accordingly, covering a formal resignation of the

commission, and Mac-Ivor despatched it with some letters of his own by

a special messenger, with charge to put them into the nearest

post-office in the Lowlands.