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He was a papermaker, and the son of a papermaker; he was never exactly affluent nor exactly needy; he was apparently a Quaker by education and a freethinker by choice; and between 1781 and 1796, obliged by this reason or that to stain the paper which he made, he produced six novels: Mount Henneth, Barham Downs, The Fair Syrian, James Wallace, Man as he is, and Hermsprong.
It had come to him, as it were, in his dreams a vision of himself rocking in a hammock in his uncle's garden on a wonderful summer afternoon, eating apples and reading Hermsprong, the book discovered, he knew not by what chance, in the dusty depths of his uncle's library. He would like to read it again.
One does not quite know why Scott, who included in the Ballantyne Novels three of Bage's, Mount Henneth , Barham Downs , and James Wallace , did not also include, if not The Fair Syrian , two others, Man as He is and the still later Hermsprong, or Man as He is Not . This last has sometimes been regarded as Bage's masterpiece: but it does not seem so to the present writer.
Hermsprong! the very scent of the skin of the apple, the blue-necked tapestry of light between the high boughs came back to him. He was a boy again.... He was brought up sharply by meeting the little red-rimmed eyes of Miss Milton. Red-rimmed to-day, surely, with recent weeping. She sat humped up on her chair, glaring out into the room. "It's all right, Miss Milton," he said, smiling at her.
In my pride and my honour. Stains, wounds that I can never forget!" It was so exactly as though Miss Milton had just been reading Hermsprong and was quoting from it that Ronder looked about him, almost expecting to see the dusty volume. "Well, Miss Milton, perhaps I can put a little work in your way." "You're very kind, sir," she said.
He was not at all in the mood for lamentations from Miss Milton. Ah! there was Barham Downs. Hermsprong could not be far away. Then suddenly there came to him quite unmistakably a sob, then another, then two more, finally something that horribly resembled hysterics. He came down from his ladder and crossed the room. "My dear Miss Milton!" he exclaimed. "Is there anything I can do?"
The first, second, and fourth of these were admitted by Scott to the "Ballantyne Novels," the others, though Hermsprong is admittedly Bage's best work, were not. It is impossible to say that there is genius in Bage; yet he is a very remarkable writer, and there is noticeable in him that singular fin de siècle tendency which has reasserted itself a century later.
He was an amiable and benevolent man, and highly esteemed. Hermsprong; or, Man as He is Not is considered the best of his novels, of which it was the last. The names of the others are Mount Kenneth , Barham Downs , The Fair Syrian , James Wallace , and Man as He is .
He had had a sudden desire the night before to read an old story by Bage that he had not seen since he was a boy the violent and melancholy Hermsprong.
You won't make your case better by talking scandal, you know. I have your address. If I can help you I will. Good afternoon." Forgetting Hermsprong, having now more important things to consider, he found his way down the steps and out into the air. On every side now it seemed that the Archdeacon was making some blunder.
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