Kabanata Kabanata 7 · 第7章

. A few words may suffice for the greater number of the young people to

whom I have been alluding in the foregoing chapter. Eliza and Maria,

the two elder girls, were neither exactly pretty nor exactly plain, and

were in all respects model young ladies, but Alethea was exceedingly

pretty and of a lively, affectionate disposition, which was in sharp

contrast with those of her brothers and sisters. There was a trace of

her grandfather, not only in her face, but in her love of fun, of which

her father had none, though not without a certain boisterous and rather

coarse quasi-humour which passed for wit with many.

John grew up to be a good-looking, gentlemanly fellow, with features a

trifle too regular and finely chiselled. He dressed himself so nicely,

had such good address, and stuck so steadily to his books that he

became a favourite with his masters; he had, however, an instinct for

diplomacy, and was less popular with the boys. His father, in spite of

the lectures he would at times read him, was in a way proud of him as

he grew older; he saw in him, moreover, one who would probably develop

into a good man of business, and in whose hands the prospects of his

house would not be likely to decline. John knew how to humour his

father, and was at a comparatively early age admitted to as much of his

confidence as it was in his nature to bestow on anyone.

His brother Theobald was no match for him, knew it, and accepted his

fate. He was not so good-looking as his brother, nor was his address so

good; as a child he had been violently passionate; now, however, he was

reserved and shy, and, I should say, indolent in mind and body. He was

less tidy than John, less well able to assert himself, and less skilful

in humouring the caprices of his father. I do not think he could have

loved anyone heartily, but there was no one in his family circle who

did not repress, rather than invite his affection, with the exception

of his sister Alethea, and she was too quick and lively for his

somewhat morose temper. He was always the scapegoat, and I have

sometimes thought he had two fathers to contend against—his father and

his brother John; a third and fourth also might almost be added in his

sisters Eliza and Maria. Perhaps if he had felt his bondage very

acutely he would not have put up with it, but he was constitutionally

timid, and the strong hand of his father knitted him into the closest

outward harmony with his brother and sisters.

The boys were of use to their father in one respect. I mean that he

played them off against each other. He kept them but poorly supplied

with pocket money, and to Theobald would urge that the claims of his

elder brother were naturally paramount, while he insisted to John upon

the fact that he had a numerous family, and would affirm solemnly that

his expenses were so heavy that at his death there would be very little

to divide. He did not care whether they compared notes or no, provided

they did not do so in his presence. Theobald did not complain even

behind his father’s back. I knew him as intimately as anyone was likely

to know him as a child, at school, and again at Cambridge, but he very

rarely mentioned his father’s name even while his father was alive, and

never once in my hearing afterwards. At school he was not actively

disliked as his brother was, but he was too dull and deficient in

animal spirits to be popular.

Before he was well out of his frocks it was settled that he was to be a

clergyman. It was seemly that Mr Pontifex, the well-known publisher of

religious books, should devote at least one of his sons to the Church;

this might tend to bring business, or at any rate to keep it in the

firm; besides, Mr Pontifex had more or less interest with bishops and

Church dignitaries and might hope that some preferment would be offered

to his son through his influence. The boy’s future destiny was kept

well before his eyes from his earliest childhood and was treated as a

matter which he had already virtually settled by his acquiescence.

Nevertheless a certain show of freedom was allowed him. Mr Pontifex

would say it was only right to give a boy his option, and was much too

equitable to grudge his son whatever benefit he could derive from this.

He had the greatest horror, he would exclaim, of driving any young man

into a profession which he did not like. Far be it from him to put

pressure upon a son of his as regards any profession and much less when

so sacred a calling as the ministry was concerned. He would talk in

this way when there were visitors in the house and when his son was in

the room. He spoke so wisely and so well that his listening guests

considered him a paragon of right-mindedness. He spoke, too, with such

emphasis and his rosy gills and bald head looked so benevolent that it

was difficult not to be carried away by his discourse. I believe two or

three heads of families in the neighbourhood gave their sons absolute

liberty of choice in the matter of their professions—and am not sure

that they had not afterwards considerable cause to regret having done

so. The visitors, seeing Theobald look shy and wholly unmoved by the

exhibition of so much consideration for his wishes, would remark to

themselves that the boy seemed hardly likely to be equal to his father

and would set him down as an unenthusiastic youth, who ought to have

more life in him and be more sensible of his advantages than he

appeared to be.

No one believed in the righteousness of the whole transaction more

firmly than the boy himself; a sense of being ill at ease kept him

silent, but it was too profound and too much without break for him to

become fully alive to it, and come to an understanding with himself. He

feared the dark scowl which would come over his father’s face upon the

slightest opposition. His father’s violent threats, or coarse sneers,

would not have been taken _au sérieux_ by a stronger boy, but Theobald

was not a strong boy, and rightly or wrongly, gave his father credit

for being quite ready to carry his threats into execution. Opposition

had never got him anything he wanted yet, nor indeed had yielding, for

the matter of that, unless he happened to want exactly what his father

wanted for him. If he had ever entertained thoughts of resistance, he

had none now, and the power to oppose was so completely lost for want

of exercise that hardly did the wish remain; there was nothing left

save dull acquiescence as of an ass crouched between two burdens. He

may have had an ill-defined sense of ideals that were not his actuals;

he might occasionally dream of himself as a soldier or a sailor far

away in foreign lands, or even as a farmer’s boy upon the wolds, but

there was not enough in him for there to be any chance of his turning

his dreams into realities, and he drifted on with his stream, which was

a slow, and, I am afraid, a muddy one.

I think the Church Catechism has a good deal to do with the unhappy

relations which commonly even now exist between parents and children.

That work was written too exclusively from the parental point of view;

the person who composed it did not get a few children to come in and

help him; he was clearly not young himself, nor should I say it was the

work of one who liked children—in spite of the words “my good child”

which, if I remember rightly, are once put into the mouth of the

catechist and, after all, carry a harsh sound with them. The general

impression it leaves upon the mind of the young is that their

wickedness at birth was but very imperfectly wiped out at baptism, and

that the mere fact of being young at all has something with it that

savours more or less distinctly of the nature of sin.

If a new edition of the work is ever required I should like to

introduce a few words insisting on the duty of seeking all reasonable

pleasure and avoiding all pain that can be honourably avoided. I should

like to see children taught that they should not say they like things

which they do not like, merely because certain other people say they

like them, and how foolish it is to say they believe this or that when

they understand nothing about it. If it be urged that these additions

would make the Catechism too long I would curtail the remarks upon our

duty towards our neighbour and upon the sacraments. In the place of the

paragraph beginning “I desire my Lord God our Heavenly Father” I

would—but perhaps I had better return to Theobald, and leave the

recasting of the Catechism to abler hands.