CHAPTER I.

Waikato Times, Volume XIX, Issue 1598, 30 September 1882, Page 1

CHAPTER I.

" Here then, at last, I may rest, and, putting away from me with a resolute hand the memories of a broken life, find in this out-of-the-way corner of the Great South Land such degree of peace as may fall to the lot of a man whose ties are severed, whose ambition is dead, and whose heart, if not dead also, has yet in great measure lost the two grand qualities which make existence a reality ; the power to enjoy — the capacity to suffer!" The.se, or something like theso, were the thoughts that passed through my mind as, upon a sweltering January evening, I sat by the great swamp of Kojonga, and saw, through the quivering air, the far-away bush fires glow fiercer upon the eastern horizon, as tho smokereddened sun sank behind the western mountains. How much I was deceived — how far I erred in thinking that, because I had cut my- . self adrift from the older civilization, and the more crowded communities, I had at the same time severed myself from the associations of my past life — let these pages tell ! Igßefore I can proceed with my story, I must look back to the period when, a young fellow of twenty-five, I camo home to live with my father at Monkton-Edgett. My mother had been dead for many years, and as I was the only child, tho attachment between my father and myself was of a deeper and warmer character than is usual where the family circle is a more extended one. And, indeed, he was worthy of anyone's affection and respect, with his kind, gentle disposition, relieved here and there by an old-fashioned prejudice ; his high sens>e of honor, and simple, unworldly ways. Monkton-Edgett had been tho property of a titled spendthrift, who had died abroad, and the place had been bought by my father shortly after his marriage. Its quiet retirement was well adapted to the pursuit of the abstruse studies which even then engrossed much of his time, while tho quaint old-world aspect of the place pleased his artistic fancies and accorded well with tho somewhat prim and formal notions in which his young wife had been educated. Not long was that wife fated to live there, however ; she died too soon after my birth for me to have any recollection of her, and so I grew up to ramble about the great gloomy house and quaint old garden. I had a governess, it is true, and a nurse, but the moment I could escape from them, I preferred to bo alone. The mysterious spirit of the place seemed to have infected me, and I would spend hours by the ancient sun-dial in the centie of the garden, interweaving with the ordinary fancies of childhood the weird imaginings suggested by the diabolic carvings with which the morbid taste of some longdead sculptor had ornamented its pedestal. But as I grew older my father took my education in hand, and under his loving instruction I made rapid progress. So rapid, indeed, that his pride and satisfaction at my aptitude gradually gave way to a fear that my physical health might suffer from undue stimulation of tho mind, and gradually diminishing, therefore, my mental work, he instructed Tim Began, Jus old and faithful factotum, to have me duly initiated in the mysteries of riding and shooting, while he himself did violence to his sedentary inclinations for the purpose of imparting to me tho arts of boating and swimming, in both of which, during his college days, lie had been an adept. As Tim, like mo&t people from his native county — Galway — was an enthuiastic sportsman, it was a labour of love to him to instruct me in the various matters without a knowledge of which, as he put it, " a gintleman was no gintleman at all !" and thus it was that under his able tuition I began to develop into a fair specimen of the strength and stature for which we Eaymonds had long been noted. Perhaps, indeed, matters were carried a little too far in that direction, for when in due course I went to Cambridge I distinguished myself more with the oar and the cricket bat than in classics or mathematics, and when, as I have mentioned, I came finally home from the university, I could detect a shade of dissatisfaction in my father's manner towards me. This soon wore away, however, but there still remained a look on the old man's face which was strange to me— a peculiarly worn and pained expression about the eyes — and a fear came upon me that he might be ill ; nor was this dread removed by the half-playful manner in which he evaded my anxious inquiries upon the point. I was soon to learn the truth. One day, about a fortnight after my return, I was out with Tim after wild-duck, and at mid-day we sat down on the river bank to -eat what wo had brought with us. While thus engaged, my retriever sat gazing up into my face, and something about his beautiful eyes suddenly recalled to my mind the expression I had noticed in my father's. Tim, I thought, might happen to know something about it, for though I did not of course expect that my father would have confided further in him than in me, I knew that the old fellow kept his eyes andears open to everything that went on around him. I would ask him, at anyrate. A thrill of fear shot through me at the 100k — half startled, hah* pitying — with which Tim received my question. " Och ! then, it's myself that would be tho last to tell ye, masther Harry, but it's bette r for ye to know the truth." " What is it, Tim ? Speak out, for Heaven's sakel Is my fatherjill?" • " That's just what he is, then. It may be .wrong for me to mintion it, as he hasn't tould ye himself, but sure his own son ought to know it.^He has somethin' tho matther wid ;Jii^ heart I DocthorListon was here three or |> seeliini f av^d the .last time, he ; v VjSp^iea to me an' «ays he, • YelL have tp be of thelmastherVfTim, "an^see^ f^^iMh'^^W?! to .w;oriy, or excite ( 'huas

the disazc ; an — anny — somethin'." "Was it aneurism?" "That's it! But oh! Masther Harry, it can't be so bad as the docthor makes out, an* tho masther hearty enough to look at 1" I shook my head in silent grief, as Tim went on — "Sure the half o' thim docthors is only ommllumns, afther all, wid their long faces an 1 big words ! It's meself that won't care to live afther the masther, anyhow. It's more of the frind than the masther he's been to me," and Tim's voice quavered, as a tear made its appearance on his hard brown cheek. I grasped the hone&t old fellow's hand, but the next moment his face brightened up again. " Sure it's meself that's the divil's own blockhead!" he cried, "to forgit tho only word of comfort the docthor gey me. He said that wid care an' quietness the masther might live for years yit. Come, Masther Harry, cheer up ! We'll take such out-an'-out care of your father between us that he'll see ould Tim undher the sod yit 1" I felt relieved as I remembered that persons affected as my father was sometimes survived for a long time, and I made an inward resolution that everything which care and affection could suggObt should bo done to prolong a life so dear to me. I had no need to cast about for the reason why my father had concealed his ailment from mo, in whom he placed so absolute a confidence ; I knew well that it was to spare me usleoS grief that he kept the fatal secret, and I determined by every means in my power to prevent him from &uspccting that I knew the true state of affairs. But, as time went on and he did not grow externally worse, tho improasion made upon me by the news grew gradually weaker, until I came almost to forget the shadow of death which hovered above us from day to day. Sometimes I would reproach myself for what I called my callousness, but I know now that tho change in me was in accordance with an inevitable law, and that even those afflicted with heart-disease, themselves, come gradually to look upon tho possibility of sudden death with comparative indifference.