Particular To those who, standing apart from the rush and flurry of life, look
upon the world with a seeing eye, it is, surely, interesting to
observe on what small and apparently insignificant things great
matters depend. To the student History abounds with examples, and to
the philosopher they are to be met with everywhere.
But how should Barnabas (being neither a student nor a philosopher)
know, or even guess, that all his fine ideas and intentions were to
be frustrated, and his whole future entirely changed by nothing more
nor less than--a pebble, an ordinary, smooth, round pebble, as
innocent-seeming as any of its kind, yet (like young David's)
singled out by destiny to be one of these "smaller things"?
They were sitting on the terrace, the Duchess, Cleone, Barnabas, and
the Captain, and they were very silent,--the Duchess, perhaps,
because she had supped adequately, the Captain because of his long,
clay pipe, Cleone because she happened to be lost in contemplation
of the moon, and Barnabas, because he was utterly absorbed in
contemplation of Cleone.
The night was very warm and very still, and upon the quietude stole
a sound--softer, yet more insistent than the whisper of wind among
leaves,--a soothing, murmurous sound that seemed to make the
pervading quiet but the more complete.
"How cool the brook sounds!" sighed the Duchess at last, "and the
perfume of the roses,--oh dear me, how delicious! Indeed I think the
scent of roses always seems more intoxicating after one has supped
well, for, after all, one must be well-fed to be really romantic,--eh,
Jack?"
"Romantic, mam!" snorted the Captain, "romantic,--I say bosh, mam! I
say--"
"And then--the moon, Jack!"
"Moon? And what of it, mam,--I say--"
"Roses always smell sweeter by moonlight, Jack, and are far more
inclined to--go to the head--"
"Roses!" snorted the Captain, louder than before, "you must be
thinking of rum, mam, rum--"
"Then, Jack, to the perfume of roses, add the trill of a
nightingale--"
"And of all rums, mam, give me real old Jamaica--"
"And to the trill of a nightingale, add again the murmur of an
unseen brook, Jack--"
"Eh, mam, eh? Nightingales, brooks? I say--oh, Gad, mam!" and the
Captain relapsed into tobacco-puffing indignation.
"What more could youth and beauty ask? Ah, Jack, Jack!" sighed the
Duchess, "had you paid more attention to brooks and nightingales,
and stared at the moon in your youth, you might have been a green
young grandfather to-night, instead of a hoary old bachelor in a
shabby coat--sucking consolation from a clay pipe!"