第153章

'When I was eight years of age my uncle the baronet,who was also my godfather,sent me a pair of Norway hawks,with directions for managing them;he was a great fowler.Oh,how rejoiced was I with the present which had been made me,my joy lasted for at least five minutes;I would let them breed,I would have a house of hawks;yes,that I would-but-and here came the unpleasant idea-suppose they were to flyaway,how very annoying!Ah,but,said hope,there's little fear of that;feed them well and they will never fly away,or if they do they will come back,my uncle says so;so sunshine triumphed for a little time.Then the strangest of all doubts came into my head;I doubted the legality of my tenure of these hawks;how did I come by them?why,my uncle gave them to me,but how did they come into his possession?what right had he to them?after all,they might not be his to give.I passed a sleepless night.The next morning I found that the man who brought the hawks had not departed."How came my uncle by these hawks?"I anxiously inquired."They were sent to him from Norway,master,with another pair.""And who sent them?""That I don't know,master,but I suppose his honour can tell you."I was even thinking of scrawling a letter to my uncle to make inquiry on this point,but shame restrained me,and I likewise reflected that it would be impossible for him to give my mind entire satisfaction;it is true he could tell who sent him the hawks,but how was he to know how the hawks came into the possession of those who sent them to him,and by what right they possessed them or the parents of the hawks?In a word,I wanted a clear valid title,as lawyers would say,to my hawks,and I believe no title would have satisfied me that did not extend up to the time of the first hawk,that is,prior to Adam;and,could I have obtained such a title,I make no doubt that,young as I was,I should have suspected that it was full of flaws.

'I was now disgusted with the hawks,and no wonder,seeing all the disquietude they had caused me;I soon totally neglected the poor birds,and they would have starved had not some of the servants taken compassion upon them and fed them.My uncle,soon hearing of my neglect,was angry,and took the birds away;he was a very good-natured man,however,and soon sent me a fine pony;at first I was charmed with the pony,soon,however,the same kind of thoughts arose which had disgusted me on a former occasion.How did my uncle become possessed of the pony?This question I asked him the first time I saw him.Oh,he had bought it of a gypsy,that I might learn to ride upon it.A gypsy;I had heard that gypsies were great thieves,and I instantly began to fear that the gypsy had stolen the pony,and it is probable that for this apprehension I had better grounds than for many others.I instantly ceased to set any value upon the pony,but for that reason,perhaps,I turned it to some account;I mounted it and rode it about,which I don't think I should have done had I looked upon it as a secure possession.Had I looked upon my title as secure,I should have prized it so much,that I should scarcely have mounted it for fear of injuring the animal;but now,caring not a straw for it,I rode it most unmercifully,and soon became a capital rider.This was very selfish in me,and I tell the fact with shame.I was punished,however,as I deserved;the pony had a spirit of its own,and,moreover,it had belonged to gypsies;once,as I was riding it furiously over the lawn,applying both whip and spur,it suddenly lifted up its heels,and flung me at least five yards over its head.I received some desperate contusions,and was taken up for dead;it was many months before I perfectly recovered.

'But it is time for me to come to the touching part of my story.

There was one thing that I loved better than the choicest gift which could be bestowed upon me,better than life itself-my mother;-at length she became unwell,and the thought that I might possibly lose her now rushed into my mind for the first time;it was terrible,and caused me unspeakable misery,I may say horror.