"Buckland," said Morton, "your nerves are very much weakened and disordered, and particular troubles weigh upon and engross you, as they could not if you were well. What you most need is a good physician."
"'Could he minister to a mind diseased?' Come, sit down here--on this bench. Perhaps you have never felt--I hope you have never had occasion to feel--impelled to relieve some torment pressing on your mind, by telling it to a friend. Genuine friends are rare. When one meets them, he knows them by instinct. I need not fear you; you will not laugh at me to yourself, and tell me, as some others do, that a man of force and energy would fling off an affair like mine, and not suffer it to weigh upon him like a nightmare."
"When you have recovered your health, perhaps I may tell you so; but not till then."
"I am like the Ancient Mariner," continued Buckland, with a faint smile; "when I find the man who must hear my story, I know him the moment I see his face. Your good sense will tell you that I have been a knave and a fool; but your good heart will prevent your showing me that you think so."
Morton looked with deep compassion on his old comrade, and wondered what follies or misfortunes could have sunk his former gallant spirit so far. In his weakened and depressed condition, Buckland seemed to lean for support on his friend's firmer and better governed nature, and to draw strength from the contact.
"After all," he said in a livelier tone, "what right have I to bore you with this story of mine?"
"Any thing that you are willing to tell," answered Morton, "I shall be glad to hear."
On me laisse tout croire; on fait gloire de tout; Et cependant mon coeur est encore assez lâche Pour ne pouvoir briser la chaîne qui l'attache.--_Le Misanthrope_.
"I had an old friend," Buckland began, with some glimmering of his former vivacity,--"De Ruyter,--I don't think you ever knew him. He was the representative of a family great in its day and generation, but broken in fortune, and without means to support its pretensions. This did not at all tend to diminish their pride,--precisely of that kind which goeth before destruction. De Ruyter was a good fellow, however, and, if he had had twenty thousand a year, he would have spent it all. One summer, four years ago, he went with his child--his wife had died the year before--and his two sisters to spend a few weeks at a quiet little watering-place on the Jersey shore, frequented by people of good standing, but not fashionably inclined. De Ruyter praised the sporting in the neighborhood, and persuaded me to go with him.