Raleigh entered his library, an apartment now slightly in
disarray, and therefore, perhaps, not uncongenial with his present mood.
After strolling round the place, Mr. Raleigh paused at the window an
instant, the window overhung with clematis, and commanding the long
stretch of water between him and the Bawn, which last was, however, too
distant for any movement to be discerned there. Soon Mr. Raleigh turned
his back upon the scene that lay pictured in such beauty below, and,
throwing himself into a deep armchair, remained motionless and plunged
in thought for many moments. Rising at last, he took from the table a
package of letters from India that had arrived in his absence. Glancing
absently at the superscriptions, breaking the seal of one, he replaced
them: it would take too long to read them now; they must wait. Then
Mr. Raleigh had recourse to a universal panacea, and walked to and fro
across the room, with measured, unvarying steps, till the striking clock
warned him that time was passing. Mr. Raleigh drew near his desk again,
took up the pen, and hesitated; then recalling his gaze that had seemed
to search his own inmost soul, he drew the paper nearer and wrote.
What he wrote, the very words, may not signify; with the theme one is
sufficiently acquainted. Perhaps he poured out there all that had so
often trembled on his lips without finding utterance; perhaps, if ever
passionate heart flashed its own fire into its implements, this pen and
paper quivered beneath the current throbbing through them.
Pages:
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145