Gryll Grange

People are not now the fixtures they used to be in their respective localities, finding their amusements within their own limited circle. Half the inhabitants of a country place are here to-day and gone to-morrow. Even of those who are more what they call settled, the greater portion is less, probably, at home than whisking about the world. Then, again, where cards are played at all, whist is more consentaneous to modern solemnity: there is more wiseacre-ism about it: in the same manner that this other sort of quadrille, in which people walk to and from one another with faces of exemplary gravity, has taken the place of the old-fashioned country-dance. 'The merry dance, I dearly love' would never suggest the idea of a quadrille, any more than 'merry England' would call up any image not drawn from ancient ballads and the old English drama.

Mr. Gryll. Well, doctor, I intend to have a ball at Christmas, in which all modes of dancing shall have fair play, but country-dances shall have their full share.

The Rev. Dr. Opimian. I rejoice in the prospect. I shall be glad to see the young dancing as if they were young.

Miss Ilex. The variety of the game called tredrille—the Ombre of Pope's Rape of the Lock—is a pleasant game for three. Pope had many opportunities of seeing it played, yet he has not described it correctly; and I do not know that this has been observed.

The Rev. Dr. Opimian. Indeed, I never observed it. I shall be glad to know how it is so.

Miss Ilex. Quadrille is played with forty cards: tredrille usually with thirty: sometimes, as in Pope's Ombre, with twenty-seven. In forty cards, the number of trumps is eleven in the black suits, twelve in the red:{1} in thirty, nine in all suits alike.{2} In twenty-seven, they cannot be more than nine in one suit, and eight in the other three. In Pope's Ombre spades are trumps, and the number is eleven: the number which they would be if the cards were forty. If you follow his description carefully, you will find it to be so.

Mr. MacBorrowdale. Why, then, we can only say, as a great philosopher said on another occasion: The description is sufficient 'to impose on the degree of attention with which poetry is read.'

Miss Ilex. It is a pity it should be so. Truth to Nature is essential to poetry. Few may perceive an inaccuracy: but to those who do, it causes a great diminution, if not a total destruction, of pleasure in perusal. Shakespeare never makes a flower blossom out of season. Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Southey are true to Nature in this and in all other respects: even in their wildest imaginings.

The Rev. Dr. Opimian. Yet here is a combination by one of our greatest poets, of flowers that never blossom in the same season—

And at the same time he plucks the berries of the myrtle and the ivy.

Miss Ilex. Very beautiful, if not true to English seasons: but Milton might have thought himself justified in making this combination in Arcadia. Generally, he is strictly accurate, to a degree that is in itself a beauty. For instance, in his address to the nightingale—

The song of the nightingale ceases about the time that the grass is mown.

The Rev. Dr. Opimian. The old Greek poetry is always true to Nature, and will bear any degree of critical analysis. I must say I take no pleasure in poetry that will not.

Mr. MacBorrowdale. No poet is truer to Nature than Burns, and no one less so than Moore. His imagery is almost always false. Here is a highly-applauded stanza, and very taking at first sight—

But it will not bear analysis. The dew is the cause of the verdure: but the tear is not the cause of the memory: the memory is the cause of the tear.

The Rev. Dr. Opimian. There are inaccuracies more offensive to me than even false imagery. Here is one, in a song which I have often heard with displeasure. A young man goes up a mountain, and as he goes higher and higher, he repeats Excelsior: but excelsior is only taller in the comparison of things on a common basis, not higher, as a detached object in the air. Jack's bean-stalk was excelsior the higher it grew: but Jack himself was no more celsus at the top than he had been at the bottom.

Mr. MacBorrowdale. I am afraid, doctor, if you look for profound knowledge in popular poetry, you will often be disappointed.

The Rev. Dr. Opimian. I do not look for profound knowledge. But I do expect that poets should understand what they talk of. Burns was not a scholar, but he was always master of his subject. All the scholarship of the world would not have produced Tarn o' Shanter: but in the whole of that poem there is not a false image nor a misused word. What do you suppose these lines represent?

Mr. MacBorrowdale. I should take it to be a description of the Queen of Bambo.

The Rev. Dr, Opimian, Yet thus one of our most popular poets describes Cleopatra: and one of our most popular artists has illustrated the description by a portrait of a hideous grinning Æthiop. Moore led the way to this perversion by demonstrating that the Ægyptian women must have been beautiful, because they were 'the countrywomen of Cleopatra.' {1} 'Here we have a sort of counter-demonstration, that Cleopatra must have been a fright because she was the countrywoman of the Ægyptians. But Cleopatra was a Greek, the daughter of Ptolemy Auletes, and a lady of Pontus. The Ptolemies were Greeks, and whoever will look at their genealogy, their coins, and their medals, will see how carefully they kept their pure Greek blood uncontaminated by African intermixture. Think of this description and this picture applied to one who Dio says —and all antiquity confirms him—was 'the most superlatively beautiful of women, splendid to see, and delightful to hear.'{2} For she was eminently accomplished: she spoke many languages with grace and facility. Her mind was as wonderful as her personal beauty. There is not a shadow of intellectual expression in that horrible portrait.

The conversation at the quadrille-table was carried on with occasional pauses, and intermingled with the technicalities of the game.

Miss Gryll continued to alternate between joining in the quadrille-dances and resuming her seat by the side of the room, where she was the object of great attention from some young gentlemen, who were glad to find her unattended by either Lord Curryfin or Mr. Falconer. Mr. Falconer continued to sit as if he had been fixed to his seat, like Theseus. The more he reflected on his conduct, in disappearing at that critical point of time and staying away so long, the more he felt that he had been guilty of an unjustifiable, and perhaps unpardonable offence. He noticed with extreme discomposure the swarm of moths, as he called them to himself, who were fluttering in the light of her beauty: he would gladly have put them to flight; and this being out of the question, he would have been contented to take his place among them; but he dared not try the experiment.

Nevertheless, he would have been graciously received. The young lady was not cherishing any feeling of resentment against him. She understood, and made generous allowance for, his divided feelings. But his irresolution, if he were left to himself, was likely to be of long duration: and she meditated within herself the means of forcing him to a conclusion one way or the other.

CHAPTER XXIV

PROGRESS OF SYMPATHY—LOVE'S INJUNCTIONS—ORLANDO INNAMORATO

While light, fire, mirth, and music were enlivening the party within the close-drawn curtains, without were moonless night and thickly-falling snow; and the morning opened on one vast expanse of white, mantling alike the lawns and the trees, and weighing down the wide-spreading branches. Lord Curryfin, determined not to be baulked of his skating, sallied forth immediately after breakfast, collected a body of labourers, and swept clear an ample surface of ice, a path to it from the house, and a promenade on the bank. Here he and Miss Niphet amused themselves in the afternoon, in company with a small number of the party, and in the presence of about the usual number of spectators. Mr. Falconer was there, and contented himself with looking on.

Lord Curryfin proposed a reel, Miss Niphet acquiesced, but it was long before they found a third. At length one young gentleman, of the plump and rotund order, volunteered to supply the deficiency, and was soon deposited on the ice, where his partners in the ice-dance would have tumbled over him if they had not anticipated the result, and given him a wide berth. One or two others followed, exhibiting several varieties in the art of falling ungracefully. At last the lord and the lady skated away on as large a circuit as the cleared ice permitted, and as they went he said to her—

'If you were the prize of skating, as Atalanta was of running, I should have good hope to carry you off against all competitors but yourself.'

She answered, 'Do not disturb my thoughts, or I shall slip.'

He said no more, but the words left their impression. They gave him as much encouragement as, under their peculiar circumstances, he could dare to wish for, or she could venture to intimate.

Mr. Falconer admired their 'poetry of motion' as much as all the others had done. It suggested a remark which he would have liked to address to Miss Gryll, but he looked round for her in vain. He returned to the house in the hope that he might find her alone, and take the opportunity of making his peace.

He found her alone, but it seemed that he had no peace to make. She received him with a smile, and held out her hand to him, which he grasped fervently. He fancied that it trembled, but her features were composed. He then sat down at the table, on which the old edition of Bojardo was lying open as before. He said, 'You have not been down to the lake to see that wonderful skating.' She answered, 'I have seen it every day but this. The snow deters me to-day. But it is wonderful. Grace and skill can scarcely go beyond it.'

He wanted to apologise for the mode and duration of his departure and absence, but did not know how to begin. She gave him the occasion. She said, 'You have been longer absent than usual—from our rehearsals. But we are all tolerably perfect in our parts. But your absence was remarked—by some of the party. You seemed to be especially missed by Lord Curryfin. He asked the reverend doctor every morning if he thought you would return that day.'

Algernon. And what said the doctor?

Morgana. He usually said, 'I hope so.' But one morning he said something more specific.

Algernon. What was it?

Morgana. I do not know that I ought to tell you.

Algernon. Oh, pray do.

Morgana. He said, 'The chances are against it.' 'What are the odds?' said Lord Curryfin. 'Seven to one,' said the doctor. 'It ought not to be so,' said Lord Curryfin, 'for here is a whole Greek chorus against seven vestals.' The doctor said, 'I do not estimate the chances by the mere balance of numbers.'

Algernon. He might have said more as to the balance of numbers.

Morgana. He might have said more, that the seven outweighed the one.

Algernon. He could not have said that

Morgana. It would be much for the one to say that the balance was even.

Algernon. But how if the absentee himself had been weighed against another in that one's own balance?

Morgana. One to one promises at least more even weight

Algernon. I would not have it so. Pray, forgive me.

Morgana. Forgive you? For what?

Algernon. I wish to say, and I do not well know how, without seeming to assume what I have no right to assume, and then I must have double cause to ask your forgiveness.

Morgana. Shall I imagine what you wish to say, and say it for you?

Algernon. You would relieve me infinitely, if you imagine justly.

Morgana. You may begin by saying with Achilles,

Algernon. I think I do see it more clearly.

Morgana. You may next say, I live an enchanted life. I have been in danger of breaking the spell; it has once more bound me with sevenfold force; I was in danger of yielding to another attraction; I went a step too far in all but declaring it; I do not know how to make a decent retreat.

Algernon. Oh! no, no; nothing like that.

Morgana. Then there is a third thing you may say; but before I say that for you, you must promise to make no reply, not even a monosyllable; and not to revert to the subject for four times seven days. You hesitate.

Algernon. It seems as if my fate were trembling in the balance.

Morgana, You must give me the promise I have asked for.

Algernon. I do give it.

Morgana. Repeat it then, word for word.

Algernon. To listen to you in silence; not to say a syllable in reply; not to return to the subject for four times seven days.

Morgana. Then you may say, I have fallen in love; very irrationally—(he was about to exclaim, but she placed her finger on her lips)—very irrationally; but I cannot help it. I fear I must yield to my destiny. I will try to free myself from all obstacles; I will, if I can, offer my hand where I have given my heart. And this I will do, if I ever do, at the end of four times seven days: if not then, never.

She placed her finger on her lips again, and immediately left the room, having first pointed to a passage in the open pages of Orlando Innamorato. She was gone before he was aware that she was going; but he turned to the book, and read the indicated passage. It was a part of the continuation of Orlando's adventure in the enchanted garden, when, himself pursued and scourged by La Penitenza, he was pursuing the Fata Morgana over rugged rocks and through briery thickets.

'She must have anticipated my coming,' said the young gentleman to himself. 'She had opened the book at this passage, and has left it to say to me for her—Choose between love and repentance. Four times seven days! That is to ensure calm for the Christmas holidays. The term will pass over Twelfth Night. The lovers of old romance were subjected to a probation of seven years:—

'But here, perhaps, the case is reversed. She may have feared a probation of seven years for herself; and not without reason. And what have I to expect if I let the four times seven days pass by? Why, then, I can read in her looks—and they are interpreted in the verses before me—I am assigned to repentance, without the hope of a third opportunity. She is not without a leaning towards Lord Curryfin.

She thinks he is passing from her, and on the twenty-ninth day, or perhaps in the meantime, she will try to regain him. Of course she will succeed. What rivalry could stand against her? If her power over him is lessened, it is that she has not chosen to exert it She has but to will it, and he is again her slave. Twenty-eight days! twenty-eight days of doubt and distraction.' And starting up, he walked out into the park, not choosing the swept path, but wading knee-deep in snow where it lay thickest in the glades. He was recalled to himself by sinking up to his shoulders in a hollow. He emerged with some difficulty, and retraced his steps to the house, thinking that, even in the midst of love's most dire perplexities, dry clothes and a good fire are better than a hole in the snow.

CHAPTER XXV

HARRY AND DOROTHY

Harry Hedgerow had found means on several occasions of delivering farm and forest produce at the Tower, to introduce his six friends to the sisters, giving all the young men in turn to understand that they must not think of Miss Dorothy; an injunction which, in the ordinary perverse course of events, might have led them all to think of no one else, and produced a complication very disagreeable for their introducer. It was not so, however. 'The beauty of it,' as Harry said to the reverend doctor, was that each had found a distinct favourite among the seven vestals. They had not, however, gone beyond giving pretty intelligible hints. They had not decidedly ventured to declare or propose. They left it to Harry to prosecute his suit to Miss Dorothy, purposing to step in on the rear of his success. They had severally the satisfaction of being assured by various handsome young gipsies, whose hands they had crossed with lucky shillings, that each of them was in love with a fair young woman, who was quite as much in love with him, and whom he would certainly marry before twelve months were over. And they went on their way rejoicing.

Now Harry was indefatigable in his suit, which he had unbounded liberty to plead; for Dorothy always listened to him complacently, though without departing from the answer she had originally given, that she and her sisters would not part with each other and their young master.

The sisters had not attached much importance to Mr. Falconer's absences; for on every occasion of his return the predominant feeling he had seemed to express was that of extreme delight at being once more at home.

One day, while Mr. Falconer was at the Grange, receiving admonition from Orlando Innamorato, Harry, having the pleasure to find Dorothy alone, pressed his suit as usual, was listened to as usual, and seemed likely to terminate without being more advanced than usual, except in so far as they both found a progressive pleasure, she in listening, and he in being listened to. There was to both a growing charm in thus 'dallying with the innocence of love,' and though she always said No with her lips, he began to read Yes in her eyes.

Harry. Well, but, Miss Dorothy, though you and your sisters will not leave your young master, suppose somebody should take him away from you, what would you say then?

Dorothy. What do you mean, Master Harry?

Harry. Why, suppose he should get married, Miss Dorothy?

Dorothy. Married!

Harry. How should you like to see a fine lady in the Tower, looking at you as much as to say, This is mine?

Dorothy. I will tell you very candidly, I should not like it at all. But what makes you think of such a thing?

Harry. You know where he is now?

Dorothy. At Squire Gryll's, rehearsing a play for Christmas.

Harry. And Squire Gryll's niece is a great beauty, and a great fortune.

Dorothy. Squire Gryll's niece was here, and my sisters and myself saw a great deal of her. She is a very nice young lady; but he has seen great beauties and great fortunes before; he has always been indifferent to the beauties, and he does not care about fortune. I am sure he would not like to change his mode of life.

Harry. Ah, Miss Dorothy! you don't know what it is to fall in love. It tears a man up by the roots, like a gale of wind.

Dorothy. Is that your case, Master Harry?

Harry. Indeed it is, Miss Dorothy. If you didn't speak kindly to me, I do not know what would become of me. But you always speak kindly to me, though you won't have me.

Dorothy. I never said won't, Master Harry.

Harry. No, but you always say can't, and that's the same as won't, so long as you don't.

Dorothy. You are a very good young man, Master Harry. Everybody speaks well of you. And I am really pleased to think you are so partial to me. And if my young master and my sisters were married, and I were disposed to follow their example, I will tell you very truly, you are the only person I should think of, Master Harry.

Master Harry attempted to speak, but he felt choked in the attempt at utterance; and in default of words, he threw himself on his knees before his beloved, and clasped his hands together with a look of passionate imploring, which was rewarded by a benevolent smile. And they did not change their attitude till the entrance of one of the sisters startled them from their sympathetic reverie.

Harry having thus made a successful impression on one of the Theban gates, encouraged his six allies to carry on the siege of the others; for which they had ample opportunity, as the absences of the young gentleman became longer, and the rumours of an attachment between him and Miss Gryll obtained more ready belief.

CHAPTER XXVI.

DOUBTS AND QUESTIONS

Mr. Falconer saw no more of Miss Gryll till the party assembled in the drawing-rooms. She necessarily took the arm of Lord Curryfin for dinner, and it fell to the lot of Mr. Falconer to offer his to Miss Niphet, so that they sat at remote ends of the table, each wishing himself in the other's place; but Lord Curryfin paid all possible attention to his fair neighbour. Mr. Falconer could see that Miss Gryll's conversation with Lord Curryfin was very animated and joyous: too merry, perhaps, for love: but cordial to a degree that alarmed him. It was, however, clear by the general mirth at the head of the table, that nothing very confidential or sentimental was passing. Still, a young lady who had placed the destiny of her life on a point of brief suspense ought not to be so merry as Miss Gryll evidently was. He said little to Miss Niphet; and she, with her habit of originating nothing, sat in her normal state of statue-like placidity, listening to the conversation near her. She was on the left hand of Mr. Gryll. Miss Ilex was on his right, and on her right was the Reverend Doctor Opimian. These three kept up an animated dialogue. Mr. MacBorrowdale was in the middle of the table, and amused his two immediate fair neighbours with remarks appertaining to the matter immediately before them, the preparation and arrangement of a good dinner: remarks that would have done honour to Francatelli.

After a while, Mr. Falconer bethought him that he would try to draw out Miss Niphet.'s opinion on the subject nearest his heart. He said to her: 'They are very merry at the head of the table.'

Miss Niphet.. I suppose Lord Curryfin is in the vein for amusing his company, and he generally succeeds in his social purposes.

Mr. Falconer. You lay stress on social, as if you thought him not successful in all his purposes.

Miss Niphet. Not in all his inventions, for example. But in the promotion of social enjoyment he has few equals. Of course, it must be in congenial society. There is a power of being pleased, as well as a power of pleasing. With Miss Gryll and Lord Curryfin, both meet in both. No wonder that they amuse those around them.

Mr. Falconer. In whom there must also be a power of being pleased.

Miss Niphet.. Most of the guests here have it. If they had not they would scarcely be here. I have seen some dismal persons, any one of whom would be a kill-joy to a whole company. There are none such in this party. I have also seen a whole company all willing to be pleased, but all mute from not knowing what to say to each other: not knowing how to begin. Lord Curryfin would be a blessing to such a party. He would be the steel to their flint.

Mr. Falconer. Have you known him long?

Miss Niphet.. Only since I met him here.

Mr. Falconer. Have you heard that he is a suitor to Miss Gryll?

Miss Niphet.. I have heard so.

Mr. Falconer. Should you include the probability of his being accepted in your estimate of his social successes?

Miss Niphet.. Love affairs are under influences too capricious for the calculation of probabilities.

Mr. Falconer. Yet I should be very glad to hear your opinion. You know them both so well.

Miss Niphet. I am disposed to indulge you, because I think it is not mere curiosity that makes you ask the question, Otherwise I should not be inclined to answer it, I do not think he will ever be the affianced lover of Morgana. Perhaps he might have been if he had persevered as he began. But he has been used to smiling audiences. He did not find the exact reciprocity he looked for. He fancied that it was, or would be, for another, I believe he was right.

Mr. Falconer. Yet you think he might have succeeded if he had persevered.

Miss Niphet. I can scarcely think otherwise, seeing how much he has to recommend him.

Mr. Falconer. But he has not withdrawn.

Miss Nipket. No, and will not. But she is too high-minded to hold him to a proposal not followed up as it commenced even if she had not turned her thoughts elsewhere.

Mr. Falconer. Do you not think she could recall him to his first ardour if she exerted all her fascinations for the purpose?

Miss Nipket. It may be so. I do not think she will try. (She added, to herself:) I do not think she would succeed.

Mr. Falconer did not feel sure she would not try: he thought he saw symptoms of her already doing so. In his opinion Morgana was, and must be, irresistible. But as he had thought his fair neighbour somewhat interested in the subject, he wondered at the apparent impassiveness with which she replied to his questions.

In the meantime he found, as he had often done before, that the more his mind was troubled, the more Madeira he could drink without disordering his head.

CHAPTER XXVII

LOVE IN MEMORY

Miss Gryll carefully avoided being alone with Mr. Falconer, in order not to give him an opportunity of speaking on the forbidden subject. She was confident that she had taken the only course which promised to relieve her from a life of intolerable suspense; but she wished to subject her conduct to dispassionate opinion, and she thought she could not submit it to a more calmly-judging person than her old spinster friend, Miss Ilex, who had, moreover, the great advantage of being a woman of the world. She therefore took an early opportunity of telling her what had passed between herself and Mr. Falconer, and asking her judgment on the point.

Miss Ilex. Why, my dear, if I thought there had been the slightest chance of his ever knowing his own mind sufficiently to come to the desired conclusion himself, I should have advised your giving him a little longer time; but as it is clear to me that he never would have done so, and as you are decidedly partial to him, I think you have taken the best course which was open to you. He had all but declared to you more than once before; but this 'all but' would have continued, and you would have sacrificed your life to him for nothing.

Miss Gryll. But do you think you would in my case have done as I did?

Miss Ilex. No, my dear, I certainly should not; for, in a case very similar, I did not. It does not follow that I was right. On the contrary, I think you are right, and I was wrong. You have shown true moral courage where it was most needed.

Miss Gryll. I hope I have not revived any displeasing recollections.

Miss Ilex. No, my dear, no; the recollections are not displeasing. The day-dreams of youth, however fallacious, are a composite of pain and pleasure: for the sake of the latter the former is endured, nay, even cherished in memory.

Miss Gryll. Hearing what I hear you were, seeing what I see you are, observing your invariable cheerfulness, I should not have thought it possible that you could have been crossed in love, as your words seem to imply.

Miss Ilex. I was, my dear, and have been foolish enough to be constant all my life to a single idea; and yet I would not part with this shadow for any attainable reality.

Miss Gryll. If it were not opening the fountain of an ancient sorrow, I could wish to know the story, not from idle curiosity, but from my interest in you.

Miss Ilex. Indeed, my dear Morgana, it is very little of a story: but such as it is, I am willing to tell it you. I had the credit of being handsome and accomplished. I had several lovers; but my inner thoughts distinguished only one; and he, I think, had a decided preference for me, but it was a preference of present impression. If some Genius had commanded him to choose a wife from any company of which I was one, he would, I feel sure, have chosen me; but he was very much of an universal lover, and was always overcome by the smiles of present beauty. He was of a romantic turn of mind: he disliked and avoided the ordinary pursuits of young men: he delighted in the society of accomplished young women, and in that alone. It was the single link between him and the world. He would disappear for weeks at a time, wandering in forests, climbing mountains, and descending into the dingles of mountain-streams, with no other companion than a Newfoundland dog; a large black dog, with a white breast, four white paws, and a white tip to his tail: a beautiful affectionate dog: I often patted him on the head, and fed him with my hand. He knew me as well as Bajardo{1} knew Angelica.