  Quicquid agit Rufus, nihil est, nisi Naevia Rufo, Si gaudet, si flet, si tacet, hanc loquitur; Coenat, propinat, poscit, negat, annuit, una est Naevia; si non sit Naevia, mutus erit. Scriberet hesterna patri cum luce salutem Naevia lux, inquit, Naevia numen, ave.—MART. [“Whatever Rufus does is nothing, except Naevia be at his elbow. Be he joyful or sorrowful, be he even silent, he is still harping upon her. He eats, he drinks, he talks, he denies, he assents; Naevia is his sole theme: no Naevia, and he’s dumb. Yesterday at daybreak, he would fain write a letter of salutation to his father: ‘Hail, Naevia, light of my eyes,’ quoth he; ‘hail, Naevia, my divine one.’”] “The last time,” said Clarence to himself, “that I travelled this road, on exactly the same errand that I travel now, I do remember that I was honoured by the company of one in all respects the opposite to mine honest host; for, whereas in the latter there is a luxuriant and wild eccentricity, an open and blunt simplicity, and a shrewd sense, which looks not after pence, but peace; so, in the mind of the friend of the late Lady Waddilove there was a flat and hedged-in primness and narrowness of thought; an enclosure of bargains and profits of all species,—mustard-pots, rings, monkeys, chains, jars, and plum-coloured velvet inexpressibles; his ideas, with the true alchemy of trade, turned them all into gold: yet was he also as shrewd and acute as he with whose character he contrasts,—equally with him seeking comfort and gladness, and an asylum for his old age. Strange that all tempers should have a common object, and never a common road to it! But since I have begun the contrast, let me hope that it may be extended in its omen unto me; let me hope that as my encountering with the mercantile Brown brought me ill-luck in my enterprise, thereby signifying the crosses and vexations of those who labour in the cheateries and overreachings which constitute the vocation of the world; so my meeting with the philosophical Cole, who has, both in vagrancy and rest, found cause to boast of happiness, authorities from his studies to favour his inclination to each, and reason to despise what he, with Sir Kenelm Digby, would wisely call— ‘The fading blossoms of the earth;’ so my meeting with him may prove a token of good speed to mine errand, and thereby denote prosperity to one who seeks not riches, nor honour, nor the conquest of knaves, nor the good word of fools, but happy love, and the bourne of its quiet home.” Thus, half meditating, half moralizing, and drawing, like a true lover, an omen of fear or hope from occurrences in which plain reason could have perceived neither type nor token, Clarence continued and concluded his day’s journey. He put up at the same little inn he had visited three years ago, and watched his opportunity of seeing Lady Flora alone. More fortunate in that respect than he had been before, such opportunity the very next day presented to him. |
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