L'homme qui rit. English

  CHAPTER IV.

  THE OLD CHAMBER.

  The whole ceremony of the investiture of Gwynplaine, from his entryunder the King's Gate to his taking the test under the nave window, wasenacted in a sort of twilight.

  Lord William Cowper had not permitted that he, as Lord Chancellor ofEngland, should receive too many details of circumstances connected withthe disfigurement of the young Lord Fermain Clancharlie, considering itbelow his dignity to know that a peer was not handsome; and feeling thathis dignity would suffer if an inferior should venture to intrude on himinformation of such a nature. We know that a common fellow will takepleasure in saying, "That prince is humpbacked;" therefore, it isabusive to say that a lord is deformed. To the few words dropped on thesubject by the queen the Lord Chancellor had contented himself withreplying, "The face of a peer is in his peerage!"

  Ultimately, however, the affidavits he had read and certifiedenlightened him. Hence the precautions which he took. The face of thenew lord, on his entrance into the House, might cause some sensation.This it was necessary to prevent; and the Lord Chancellor took hismeasures for the purpose. It is a fixed idea, and a rule of conduct ingrave personages, to allow as little disturbance as possible. Dislike ofincident is a part of their gravity. He felt the necessity of soordering matters that the admission of Gwynplaine should take placewithout any hitch, and like that of any other successor to the peerage.

  It was for this reason that the Lord Chancellor directed that thereception of Lord Fermain Clancharlie should take place at the eveningsitting. The Chancellor being the doorkeeper--"_Quodammodo ostiarus_,"says the Norman charter; "_Januarum cancellorumque_," saysTertullian--he can officiate outside the room on the threshold; and LordWilliam Cowper had used his right by carrying out under the nave theformalities of the investiture of Lord Fermain Clancharlie. Moreover, hehad brought forward the hour for the ceremonies; so that the new peeractually made his entrance into the House before the House hadassembled.

  For the investiture of a peer on the threshold, and not in the chamberitself, there were precedents. The first hereditary baron, John deBeauchamp, of Holt Castle, created by patent by Richard II., in 1387,Baron Kidderminster, was thus installed. In renewing this precedent theLord Chancellor was creating for himself a future cause forembarrassment, of which he felt the inconvenience less than two yearsafterwards on the entrance of Viscount Newhaven into the House of Lords.

  Short-sighted as we have already stated him to be, Lord William Cowperscarcely perceived the deformity of Gwynplaine; while the two sponsors,being old and nearly blind, did not perceive it at all.

  The Lord Chancellor had chosen them for that very reason.

  More than this, the Lord Chancellor, having only seen the presence andstature of Gwynplaine, thought him a fine-looking man. When thedoor-keeper opened the folding doors to Gwynplaine there were but fewpeers in the house; and these few were nearly all old men. In assembliesthe old members are the most punctual, just as towards women they arethe most assiduous.

  On the dukes' benches there were but two, one white-headed, the othergray--Thomas Osborne, Duke of Leeds, and Schomberg, son of thatSchomberg, German by birth, French by his marshal's baton, and Englishby his peerage, who was banished by the edict of Nantes, and who, havingfought against England as a Frenchman, fought against France as anEnglishman. On the benches of the lords spiritual there sat only theArchbishopof Canterbury, Primate of England, above; and below, Dr. SimonPatrick, Bishop of Ely, in conversation with Evelyn Pierrepoint, Marquisof Dorchester, who was explaining to him the difference between a gabionconsidered singly and when used in the parapet of a field work, andbetween palisades and fraises; the former being a row of posts driveninfo the ground in front of the tents, for the purpose of protecting thecamp; the latter sharp-pointed stakes set up under the wall of afortress, to prevent the escalade of the besiegers and the desertion ofthe besieged; and the marquis was explaining further the method ofplacing fraises in the ditches of redoubts, half of each stake beingburied and half exposed. Thomas Thynne, Viscount Weymouth, havingapproached the light of a chandelier, was examining a plan of hisarchitect's for laying out his gardens at Longleat, in Wiltshire, in theItalian style--as a lawn, broken up into plots, with squares of turfalternating with squares of red and yellow sand, of river shells, and offine coal dust. On the viscounts' benches was a group of old peers,Essex, Ossulstone, Peregrine, Osborne, William Zulestein, Earl ofRochford, and amongst them, a few more youthful ones, of the factionwhich did not wear wigs, gathered round Prince Devereux, ViscountHereford, and discussing the question whether an infusion of apalacaholly was tea. "Very nearly," said Osborne. "Quite," said Essex. Thisdiscussion was attentively listened to by Paulet St. John, a cousin ofBolingbroke, of whom Voltaire was, later on, in some degree the pupil;for Voltaire's education, commenced by Pere Poree, was finished byBolingbroke. On the marquises' benches, Thomas de Grey, Marquis of Kent,Lord Chamberlain to the Queen, was informing Robert Bertie, Marquis ofLindsay, Lord Chamberlain of England, that the first prize in the greatEnglish lottery of 1694 had been won by two French refugees, Monsieur LeCoq, formerly councillor in the parliament of Paris, and MonsieurRavenel, a gentleman of Brittany. The Earl of Wemyss was reading a book,entitled "Pratique Curieuse des Oracles des Sybilles." John Campbell,Earl of Greenwich, famous for his long chin, his gaiety, and hiseighty-seven years, was writing to his mistress. Lord Chandos wastrimming his nails.

  The sitting which was about to take place, being a royal one, where thecrown was to be represented by commissioners, two assistant door-keeperswere placing in front of the throne a bench covered with purple velvet.On the second woolsack sat the Master of the Rolls, _sacrorum scriniorummagister_, who had then for his residence the house formerly belongingto the converted Jews. Two under-clerks were kneeling, and turning overthe leaves of the registers which lay on the fourth woolsack. In themeantime the Lord Chancellor took his place on the first woolsack. Themembers of the chamber took theirs, some sitting, others standing; whenthe Archbishop of Canterbury rose and read the prayer, and the sittingof the house began.

  Gwynplaine had already been there for some time without attracting anynotice. The second bench of barons, on which was his place, was close tothe bar, so that he had had to take but a few steps to reach it. The twopeers, his sponsors, sat, one on his right, the other on his left, thusalmost concealing the presence of the new-comer.

  No one having been furnished with any previous information, the Clerk ofthe Parliament had read in a low voice, and as it were, mumbled throughthe different documents concerning the new peer, and the Lord Chancellorhad proclaimed his admission in the midst of what is called, in thereports, "general inattention." Every one was talking. There buzzedthrough the House that cheerful hum of voices during which assembliespass things which will not bear the light, and at which they wonder whenthey find out what they have done, too late.

  Gwynplaine was seated in silence, with his head uncovered, between thetwo old peers, Lord Fitzwalter and Lord Arundel. On entering, accordingto the instructions of the King-at-Arms--afterwards renewed by hissponsors--he had bowed to the throne.

  Thus all was over. He was a peer. That pinnacle, under the glory ofwhich he had, all his life, seen his master, Ursus, bow himself down infear--that prodigious pinnacle was under his feet. He was in that place,so dark and yet so dazzling in England. Old peak of the feudal mountain,looked up to for six centuries by Europe and by history! Terriblenimbus of a world of shadow! He had entered into the brightness of itsglory, and his entrance was irrevocable.

  He was there in his own sphere, seated on his throne, like the king onhis. He was there and nothing in the future could obliterate the fact.The royal crown, which he saw under the dais, was brother to hiscoronet. He was a peer of that throne. In the face of majesty he waspeerage; less, but like. Yesterday, what was he? A player. To-day, whatwas he? A prince.

  Yesterday, nothing; to-day, everything.

  It was a sudden confrontation of misery and power, m
eeting face to face,and resolving themselves at once into the two halves of a conscience.Two spectres, Adversity and Prosperity, were taking possession of thesame soul, and each drawing that soul towards itself.

  Oh, pathetic division of an intellect, of a will, of a brain, betweentwo brothers who are enemies! the Phantom of Poverty and the Phantom ofWealth! Abel and Cain in the same man!