Page:Once a Week Jul - Dec 1859.pdf/43

32 and must not take aught to weaken his powers. Now, if the ‘soupe au vin’ had been known in Troy, it is clear that in declining ‘vinum merum’ upon that score, he would have added in the next hexameter, ‘But a “soupe au vin,” madam, I will degust, and gratefully.’ Not only would this have been but common civility—a virtue no perfect commander is wanting in—but not to have done it would have proved him a shallow and improvident person, quite unfit to be trusted with the conduct of a war; for men going into battle need sustenance and all possible support, as is proved by this—that foolish generals, bringing hungry soldiers to battle with full ones, have been defeated, in all ages, by inferior numbers. The Romans lost a great battle in the north of Italy to Hannibal the Carthaginian, by this neglect alone. Now, this divine elixir gives in one moment force to the limbs and ardour to the spirits; and taken into Hector’s body at the nick of time, would, by the aid of Phœbus, Venus, and the blessed saints, have most likely procured the Greeks a defeat. For, note how faint and weary and heart-sick I was a minute ago; well, I suck this celestial cordial, and now behold me brave as Achilles and strong as an eagle.”

“Oh father! now, an eagle!”

“Girl, I defy thee and all the world. Ready, I say, like a foaming charger, to devour the space between this and Rotterdam, and strong to combat the ills of life, even poverty and old age, which last philosophers have called the ‘summum malum.’ Negatur; unless the man’s life has been ill-spent—which, by the bye, it generally has. Now for the moderns.”

“Father! dear father!”

“Fear me not, girl, I will be brief, beyond measure brief. The ‘soupe au vin’ occurs not in modern science; but this is only one proof more, if proof were needed, that for the last few hundred years physicians have all been idiots, with their chicken broth and their decoction of gold, whereby they attribute the highest qualities to that meat which has the least juice of any meat, and to that metal which has less chemical qualities than all the metals. Mountebanks! dunces! homicides! Since, then, from these no light is to be gathered, we must go to the chroniclers; and first we find that Duguesclin, a French knight, being about to join battle with the English—masters, at that time, of half France, and sturdy strikers by sea and land—drank, not one, but three, ‘soupes au vin,’ in honour of the Blessed Trinity. This done, he charged the islanders; and as might have been expected, killed a multitude of them, and drove the rest into the sea. But he was only the first of a long list of holy and hard-hitting ones who have, by this divine restorative, been sustentated, fortified, corroborated, and consoled.”

“Dear father, prithee add thyself to that list before the soup cools.” And Margaret held the hat imploringly in both hands till he inserted the straw once more.

This spared them the “modern instances,” and gave Gerard an opportunity of telling Margaret how proud his mother would be her soup had profited a man of learning.

“Ay! but,” said Margaret, “it would like her ill to see her son give all and take none himself. Why brought you but two straws?”

“Fair mistress, I hoped you would let me put my lips to your straw, there being but two.”

Margaret smiled, and blushed. “Never beg that you may command,” said she. “The straw is not mine—’tis yours: you cut it in yonder field.”

“I cut it, and that made it mine; but, after that, your lip touched it, and that made it yours.”

“Did it? Then I will lend it you. There—now it is yours again: your lip has touched it.”

“No, it belongs to us both now. Let us divide it.”

“By all means; you have a knife.”

“No, I will not cut it—that would be unlucky. I’ll bite it. There. I shall keep my half: you will burn yours the moment you get home, I doubt.”

“You know me not. I waste nothing. It is odds but I make a hair-pin of it, or something.”

This answer dashed the novice Gerard instead of provoking him to fresh efforts, and he was silent. And now, the bread and soup being disposed of, the old scholar prepared to continue his journey. Then came a little difficulty: Gerard the adroit could not tie his ribbon again as Catherine had tied it. Margaret, after slily eyeing his efforts for some time, offered to help him; for at her age girls love to be coy and tender, saucy and gentle, by turns, and she saw she had put him out of countenance but now. Then a fair head, with its stately crown of auburn hair, glossy and glowing through silver, bowed sweetly towards him; and, while it ravished his eye, two white supple hands played delicately upon the stubborn ribbon, and moulded it with soft and airy touches. Then a heavenly thrill ran through the innocent young man, and vague glimpses of a new world of feeling and sentiment opened on him. And these new and exquisite sensations Margaret unwittingly prolonged: it is not natural to her sex to hurry aught that pertains to the sacred toilet. Nay, when the taper fingers had at last subjugated the ends of the knot, her mind was not quite easy, till, by a manœuvre peculiar to the female hand, she had made her palm convex, and so applied it with a gentle pressure to the centre of the knot—a sweet little coaxing hand-kiss, as much as to say, “Now be a good knot, and stay as you are.” The palm-kiss was bestowed on the ribbon, but the wearer’s heart leaped to meet it.

“There, that is how it was,” said Margaret, and drew back to take one last keen survey of her work; then, looking up for simple approval of her skill, received full in her eyes a longing gaze of such ardent adoration, as made her lower them quickly and colour all over. An indescribable tremor seized her, and she retreated with downcast lashes and tell-tale cheeks, and took her father’s arm on the opposite side. Gerard, blushing at having scared her with his eyes, took the other arm; and so the two young things went downcast and conscious, and propped the eagle along in silence.