For the rest,John was decidedly like the "David"whose name I still gave him now and then--"a goodly person;"tall,well-built,and strong."The glory of a young man is his strength;"and so I used often to think,when I looked at him.He always dressed with extreme simplicity;generally in grey,he was fond of grey;and in something of our Quaker fashion.On this day,I remember,I noticed an especial carefulness of attire,at his age neither unnatural nor unbecoming.His well-fitting coat and long-flapped vest,garnished with the snowiest of lawn frills and ruffles;his knee-breeches,black silk hose,and shoes adorned with the largest and brightest of steel buckles,made up a costume,which,quaint as it would now appear,still is,to my mind,the most suitable and graceful that a young man can wear.I never see any young men now who come at all near the picture which still remains in my mind's eye of John Halifax as he looked that day.
Once,with the natural sensitiveness of youth,especially of youth that has struggled up through so many opposing circumstances as his had done,he noticed my glance.
"Anything amiss about me,Phineas?You see I am not much used to holidays and holiday clothes.""I have nothing to say against either you or your clothes,"replied I,smiling.
"That's all right;I beg to state,it is entirely in honour of you and of Enderley that I have slipped off my tan-yard husk,and put on the gentleman.""You couldn't do that,John.You couldn't put on what you were born with."He laughed--but I think he was pleased.
We had now come into a hilly region.John leaped out and gained the top of the steep road long before the post-chaise did.I watched him standing,balancing in his hands the riding-whip which had replaced the everlasting rose-switch,or willow-wand,of his boyhood.His figure was outlined sharply against the sky,his head thrown backward a little,as he gazed,evidently with the keenest zest,on the breezy flat before him.His hair--a little darker than it used to be,but of the true Saxon colour still,and curly as ever--was blown about by the wind,under his broad hat.His whole appearance was full of life,health,energy,and enjoyment.
I thought any father might have been proud of such a son,any sister of such a brother,any young girl of such a lover.Ay,that last tie,the only one of the three that was possible to him--I wondered how long it would be before times changed,and I ceased to be the only one who was proud of him.
We drove on a little further,and came to the chief landmark of the high moorland--a quaint hostelry,called the "Bear."Bruin swung aloft pole in hand,brown and fierce,on an old-fashioned sign,as he and his progenitors had probably swung for two centuries or more.
"Is this Enderley?"I asked.
"Not quite,but near it.You never saw the sea?Well,from this point I can show you something very like it.Do you see that gleaming bit in the landscape far away?That's water--that's our very own Severn,swelled to an estuary.But you must imagine the estuary--you can only get that tiny peep of water,glittering like a great diamond that some young Titaness has flung out of her necklace down among the hills.""David,you are actually growing poetical."
"Am I?Well,I do feel rather strange to-day--crazy like;a high wind always sends me half crazy with delight.Did you ever feel such a breeze?And there's something so gloriously free in this high level common--as flat as if my Titaness had found a little Mont Blanc,and amused herself with patting it down like a dough-cake.""A very culinary goddess."
"Yes!but a goddess after all.And her dough-cake,her mushroom,her flattened Mont Blanc,is very fine.What a broad green sweep--nothing but sky and common,common and sky.This is Enderley Flat.