VIVIAN.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.
Miss Edgeworth’s general views, in these stories, are explained in the preface to the first volume. I cannot, however, omit repeating, that public favour has not yet rendered her so presumptuous as to offer hasty effusions to her readers, but that she takes a longer time to revise what she writes than the severe ancients required for the highest species of moral fiction.
Vivian exposes one of the most common defects of mankind. To be “infirm of purpose” is to be at the mercy of the artful or at the disposal of accident. Look round, and count the numbers who have, within your own knowledge, failed from want of firmness.
An excellent and wise mother gave the following advice with her dying breath: “My son, learn early how to say, No!”—This precept gave the first idea of the story of Vivian.
THE ABSENTEE is not intended as a censure upon those whose duties, and employments, and superior talents, lead them to the capital; but to warn the thoughtless and the unoccupied from seeking distinction by frivolous imitation of fashion and ruinous waste of fortune.
A country gentleman, or even a nobleman, who does not sit in parliament, may be as usefully and as honourably employed in Yorkshire, Mid Lothian, or Ireland, as at a club-house or an assembly in London.
Irish agents are here described as of two different species. That there have been bad and oppressive Irish agents, many great landed English proprietors have felt; that there are well-informed, just, and honourable Irish agents, every-day experience can testify.
MADAME DE FLEURY points out some of the means which may be employed by the rich for the real advantage of the poor. This story shows that sowing gold does not always produce a golden harvest; but that knowledge and virtue, when early implanted in the human breast, seldom fail to make ample returns of prudence and felicity.
EMILIE DE COULANGES exposes a fault into which the good and generous are liable to fall.
Great sacrifices and great benefits cannot frequently be made or conferred by private individuals; but, every day, kindness and attention to the common feelings of others is within the power, and may be the practice, of every age, and sex, and station. Common faults are reproved by all writers on morality; but there are errors and defects that require to be treated in a lighter manner, and that come, with propriety, within the province of essayists and of writers for the stage.
R. L. EDGEWORTH. May, 1812.
CHAPTER I.
“To see the best, and yet the worse pursue.”
“Is it possible,” exclaimed Vivian, “that you, Russell, my friend, my best friend, can tell me that this line is the motto of my character!—’ To see the best, and yet the worse pursue.—Then you must think me either a villain or a madman.”
“No,” replied Russell, calmly; “I think you only weak.”
“Weak—but you must think me an absolute fool.”
“No, not a fool; the weakness of which I accuse you is not a weakness of the understanding. I find no fault either with the logical or the mathematical part of your understanding. It is not erroneous in either of the two great points in which Bacon says that most men’s minds be deficient in—the power of judging of consequences, or in the power of estimating the comparative value of objects.”
“Well,” cried Vivian, impatiently, “but I don’t want to hear just now what Bacon says—but what you think. Tell me all the faults of my character.”
“All!—unconscionable!—after the fatigue of this long day’s journey,” said Russell, laughing.
These two friends were, at this time, travelling from Oxford to Vivian Hall (in ——shire), the superb seat of the Vivian family, to which Vivian was heir. Mr. Russell, though he was but a few years older than Vivian, had been his tutor at college; and by an uncommon transition, had, from his tutor, become his intimate friend.
After a pause, Vivian resumed, “Now I think of it, Russell, you are to blame, if I have any faults. Don’t you say, that every thing is to be done by education? And are not you—though by much too young, and infinitely too handsome, for a philosopher—are not you my guide, philosopher, and friend?”
“But I have had the honour to be your guide, philosopher, and friend, only for these three years,” said Russell. “I believe in the rational, but not in the magical, power of education. How could I do, or undo, in three years, the work of the preceding seventeen?”
“Then, if you won’t let me blame you, I must blame my mother.”
“Your mother!—I had always understood that she had paid particular attention to your early education, and all the world says that Lady Mary Vivian, though a woman of fashion, is remarkably well-informed and domestic; and, judging from those of her letters which you have shown me, I should think that, for once, what all the world says is right.”
“What all the world says is right, and yet I am not wrong:—my mother is a very clever woman, and most affectionate, and she certainly paid particular attention to my early education; but her attention was too particular, her care was too great. You know I was an only son—then I lost my father when I was an infant; and a woman, let her be ever so sensible, cannot well educate an only son, without some manly assistance; the fonder she is of the son the worse, even if her fondness is not foolish fondness—it makes her over-anxious—it makes her do too much. My mother took too much, a great deal too much, care of me; she over-educated, over-instructed, over-dosed me with premature lessons of prudence: she was so afraid that I should ever do a foolish thing, or not say a wise one, that she prompted my every word, and guided my every action. So I grew up, seeing with her eyes, hearing with her ears, and judging with her understanding, till, at length, it was found out that I had not eyes, ears, or understanding of my own. When I was between twelve and thirteen, my mother began to think that I was not sufficiently manly for my age, and that there was something too yielding and undecided in my character. Seized with a panic, my mother, to make a man of me at once, sent me to —— school. There I was, with all convenient expedition, made ashamed of every thing good I had learned at home; and there I learned every thing bad, and nothing good, that could be learned at school. I was inferior in Latin and Greek; and this was a deficiency I could not make up without more labour than I had courage to undertake. I was superior in general literature, but this was of little value amongst my competitors, and therefore I despised it; and, overpowered by numbers and by ridicule, I was, of course, led into all sorts of folly, by mere mauvaise honte. Had I been in the habit of exercising my own judgment, or had my resolution been strengthened by degrees; had I, in short, been prepared for a school, I might, perhaps, have acquired, by a public education, a manly, independent spirit. If I had even been wholly bred up in a public school, I might have been forced, as others were, by early and fair competition, to exercise my own powers, and by my own experience in that microcosm, as it has been called, I might have formed some rules of conduct, some manliness of character, and might have made, at least, a good schoolboy. Half home-bred, and half school-bred, from want of proper preparation, one half of my education totally destroyed the other. From school, of course, I went to college, and at college, of course, I should have become one of the worst species of college lads, and should have had no chance, in my whole future life, of being any thing but a dissipated fool of fashion, one of the Four-in-Hand Club, or the Barouche Club, or the Tandem Club, or the Defiance Club, had not I, by the greatest good fortune, met with such a friend as you, and, by still greater good fortune, found you out for myself; for if my mother had recommended you to me, I should have considered you only as a college tutor; I should never have discovered half your real merit; I doubt whether I should have even seen that you are young and handsome: so prejudiced should I have been with the preconceived notion of a college tutor, that I am not certain whether I should have found out that you are a gentleman as well born and well bred as myself; but, be that as it may, I am positive that I never should have made you my companion and friend; I should never have thrown open my whole soul to you, as I have done; nor could you ever have obtained such wondrous power as you possess over my mind, if you had been recommended to me by my mother.”
“I am sorry,” said Russell, smiling, “that, after so many wise reflections, and so many fine compliments, you end by proving to me that my wondrous power is founded on your wondrous weakness. I am mortified to find that your esteem and friendship for me depended so much upon my not having had the honour of your mother’s recommendation; and have not I reason to fear, that now, when I have a chance of becoming acquainted with Lady Mary Vivian, and, perhaps, a chance of her thinking me a fit companion and friend for her son, I must lose his regard and confidence, because I shall labour under the insuperable objection of an affectionate mother’s approbation?”
“No, no,” said Vivian; “my wilful folly does not go quite so far as that. So that I maintain the privilege of choosing my friends for myself, I shall always be pleased and proud to find my mother approve my choice.”
After a few moments’ pause, Vivian added, “You misunderstand, quite misunderstand me, if you think that I am not fond of my mother. I respect and love her with all my soul:—I should be a most ungrateful wretch if I did not. I did very wrong to speak as I did just now, of any little errors she may have made in my education; but, believe me, I would not have said so much to any one living but yourself, nor to you, but in strict confidence; and, after all, I don’t know whether I ought not to lay the blame of my faults on my masters more than on my poor mother.”
“Lay the blame where we will,” said Russell, “remember, that the punishment will rest on ourselves. We may, with as much philosophic justice as possible, throw the blame of our faults on our parents and preceptors, and on the early mismanagement of our minds; yet, after we have made out our case in the abstract, to the perfect satisfaction of a jury of metaphysicians, when we come to overt actions, all our judges, learned and unlearned, are so awed, by the ancient precedents and practice of society, and by the obsolete law of common sense, that they finish by pronouncing against us the barbarous sentence, that every man must suffer for his own faults.”
“‘I hope I shall be able to bear it, my lord,’ as the English sailor said when the judge——But look out there! Let down that glass on your side of the carriage!” cried Vivian, starting forward. “There’s Vivian Hall!”
“That fine old castle?” said Russell, looking out of the window.
“No; but farther off to the left, don’t you see amongst the trees that house with wings?”
“Ha! quite a new, modern house: I had always fancied that Vivian Hall was an old pile of building.”
“So it was, till my father threw down the old hall, and built this new house.”
“And a very handsome one it is.—Is it as good within as without?”
“Quite, I think; but I’ll leave you to judge for yourself.—Are not those fine old trees in the park?”
From this time till the travellers arrived at Vivian Hall, their conversation turned upon trees, and avenues, and serpentine approaches, and alterations that Vivian intended to make, when he should be of age, and master of this fine place; and he now wanted but a twelvemonth of being at legal years of discretion. When they arrived at the hall, Lady Mary Vivian showed much affectionate joy at the sight of her son, and received Mr. Russell with such easy politeness that he was prepossessed at first in her favour. To this charm of well-bred manners was united the appearance of sincerity and warmth of feeling. In her conversation there was a mixture of excellent sense and general literature with the frivolities of the fashionable world, and the anecdotes of the day in certain high circles, of which she seemed to talk more from habit than taste, and to annex importance more from the compulsion of external circumstances than from choice. But her son,—her son was the great object of all her thoughts, serious or frivolous. She was delighted by the improvements she saw in his understanding and character; by the taste and talents he displayed, both for fine literature and for solid information: this flattered her hope that he would both shine as a polished gentleman and make a figure in public life. To his friend Russell she attributed these happy improvements; and, though he was not a tutor of her own original selection, yet her pride, on this occasion, yielded to gratitude, and she graciously declared, that she could not feel jealous of the pre-eminent power he had obtained over her son, when she saw the admirable use he made of this influence. Vivian, like all candid and generous persons, being peculiarly touched by candour and generosity in others, felt his affection for his mother rapidly increased by this conduct; nor did his enthusiasm for his friend in the least abate, in consequence of the high approbation with which she honoured him, nor even in consequence of her ladyship’s frequent and rather injudicious expressions of her hopes, that her son would always preserve and show himself worthy of such a friend.
He joined in his mother’s entreaties to Russell to prolong his visit; and as her ladyship declared she thought it of essential consequence to her son’s interest and future happiness, that he should, at this turn of his life, have such a companion, Russell consented to remain with him some time longer. All parties were thus pleased with each other, and remained united by one common interest about the same objects, during several weeks of a delightful summer. But, alas! this family harmony, and this accord of reason and will, between the mother and son, were not of longer duration. As usual, there were faults on both sides.
Lady Mary Vivian, whose hopes of her son’s distinguishing himself by his abilities had been much exalted since his last return from Oxford, had indulged herself in pleasing anticipations of the time when he should make his appearance in the fashionable and in the political world. She foresaw the respect that would be paid to her, on his account, both by senators and by matrons; by ministers, who might want to gain a rising orator’s vote, and by mothers, who might wish to make an excellent match for their daughters: not only by all mothers who had daughters to marry, but by all daughters who had hearts or hands to dispose of, Lady Mary felt secure of having her society courted. Now, she had rather extravagant expectations for her son: she expected him to marry, so as to secure domestic happiness, and, at the same time, to have fashion, and beauty, and rank, and high connexions, and every amiable quality in a wife. This vision of a future daughter-in-law continually occupied her ladyship’s imagination. Already, with maternal Alnascharism, she had, in her reveries, thrown back her head with disdain, as she repulsed the family advances of some wealthy but low-born heiress, or as she rejected the alliance of some of the new nobility. Already she had arranged the very words of her answers to these, and determined the degrees and shades of her intimacies with those; already had she settled
“To whom to nod, whom take into her coach, Whom honour with her hand;”
when one morning, as she sat at work, absorbed in one of these reveries, she was so far “rapt into future times,” that, without perceiving that any body was present, she began to speak her thoughts, and said aloud to herself, “As if my son could possibly think of her!”
Her son, who was opposite to her, lying on a sofa, reading, or seeming to read, started up, and putting down his book, exclaimed, in a voice which showed at once that he was conscious of thinking of some particular person, and determined to persist in the thought, “As if your son could possibly think of her!——Of whom, ma’am?”
“What’s the matter, child? Are you mad?”
“Not in the least, ma’am; but you said——”
“What!” cried Lady Mary, looking round; “What did I say, that has occasioned so much disturbance?—I was not conscious of saying any thing. My dear Selina,” continued her ladyship, appealing to a young lady, who sat very intent upon some drawing beside her, “my dear Selina, you must have heard; what did I say?”
The young lady looked embarrassed; and the colour which spread over her face, brought a sudden suspicion into Lady Mary’s mind: her eye darted back upon her son—the suspicion, the fear was confirmed; and she grew instantly pale, silent, and breathless, in the attitude in which she was struck with this panic. The young lady’s blush and embarrassment had a very different effect on Vivian; joy suddenly sparkled in his eyes, and illumined his whole countenance, for this was the first instant he had ever felt any hope of having obtained an interest in her heart. He was too much transported at this moment to think either of prudence or of his mother; and, when he recollected himself, he was too little practised in dissimulation to repair his indiscretion. Something he did attempt to say, and blundered, and laughed at his blunder; and when his mother looked up at him, in serious silence, he only begged pardon for his folly, confessed he believed he was mad, and, turning away abruptly, left the room, exclaiming that he wondered where Russell had been all the morning, and that he must go and look for him. A long silence ensued between Vivian’s mother and the young lady, who were left alone together. Lady Mary first broke the silence, and, in a constrained tone, asked, as she took up the newspaper, “Whether Miss Sidney had found any news?”
“I don’t know, ma’am,” answered Miss Sidney, in a voice scarcely articulate.
“I should have imagined there must be some news from the continent: but you did not find any, I think you say, Miss Sidney;” continued Lady Mary, with haughty, averted eyes. After turning over the pages of the paper, without knowing one word it contained, she laid it down, and rose to leave the room. Miss Sidney rose at the same time.
“Lady Mary, one instant; my dear Lady Mary.”
Lady Mary turned, and saw Selina’s supplicating eyes full of tears; but her ladyship, still retaining her severity of manner, coldly said, “Does Miss Sidney desire that I should stay?—Does Miss Sidney wish to speak to me?”
“I do—as soon as I can,” said Selina in a faltering voice; but, raising her eyes, and perceiving the contemptuous expression of Lady Mary’s countenance, her own instantly changed. With the firm tone of conscious innocence, she repeated, “I do wish to speak to your ladyship, if you will hear me with your usual candour; I do not expect or solicit your usual indulgence.”
“Miss Sidney,” replied Lady Mary, “before you say more, it becomes me to point out to you, that the moment is past for confidence between us two; and that in no moment could I wish to hear from any person, much less from one whom I had considered as my friend, confessions, extorted by circumstances, degrading and unavailing.”
“Your ladyship need not be apprehensive of hearing from me any degrading confessions,” said Miss Sidney; “I have none to make: and since, without any just cause, without any cause for suspicion, but what a blush, perhaps, or a moment’s embarrassment of manner may have created, you think it becomes you to point out to me that the moment for confidence between us is past, I can only lament my mistake in having believed that it ever existed.”
Lady Mary’s countenance and manner totally changed. The pride of rank yielded before the pride of virtue; and perhaps the hope that she had really no cause for suspicion at once restored her affection for her young friend. “Let us understand one another, my dear Selina,” said she; “if I said a hasty or a harsh word, forgive it. You know my affection for you, and my real confidence; in actions, not in words, I have shown it.—In thought, as well as in actions, my confidence in you has been entire; for, upon my word, and you know this is not an asseveration I lightly use, upon my word, till that unfortunate moment, a suspicion of you never crossed my imagination. The proof—if there could need any proof to you of what I assert—the proof is, the delight I take in your society, the urgent manner in which I have so frequently, this summer, begged your company from your mother. You know this would have not only been the height of insincerity, but of folly and madness, if I had not felt a reliance upon you that made me consider it as an absolute impossibility that you could ever disappoint my friendship.”
“I thank your ladyship,” said Selina, softened by the kind tone in which Lady Mary now spoke, yet still retaining some reserve of manner; “I thank your ladyship for all your kindness—it has flattered me much—touched me deeply—commanded my gratitude, and influenced my conduct uniformly—I can and do entirely forgive the injustice of a moment; and I now bid you adieu, my dear Lady Mary, with the conviction that, if we were never to meet again, I should always hold that place in your esteem and affection with which you have honoured me, and which, if it be not too proud an expression, I hope I have deserved——Won’t you bid me farewell?”
The tears gushed from Lady Mary’s eyes. “My dear, charming, and prudent Selina, I understand you perfectly—and I thank you: it grieves me to part with you—but I believe you are right—I believe there is no other safety—no other remedy. How, indeed, could I expect that my son could see and hear you—live in the house with you, and become intimately acquainted with such a character as yours, without danger! I have been very imprudent, unaccountably imprudent, to expose him to such a temptation; but I hope, I trust, that your prudence will repair, in time, the effects of my rashness—and again and again I thank you, my dear young friend—but, perhaps it might be still better that you should not leave us abruptly. Still better than your absence, I think, would be the conviction you might impress on his mind of the impossibility of his hopes: if you were to stay a day or two, and convince him by your indifference that——” “Excuse me, that is what I cannot undertake,” said Selina, blushing, and conscious of blushing. Lady Mary was too polite and too delicate to seem to observe her confusion, but, embracing her, said—“If we must part, then take with you my highest esteem, affection, and gratitude; and this much let me add, that my most sanguine expectations for my son’s happiness would be realized, if amongst the women to whom family interests must restrict his choice, he could meet with one of half your merit, and half your attractions.”
“Amongst the women to whom family interests must restrict his choice,” repeated Selina to herself many times, as she journeyed homewards; and she pondered much upon the meaning of this phrase. Vivian was sole heir to a very large property, without encumbrances of any kind; what, therefore, was the necessity that restricted his choice? The imaginary necessity of ambition, which confined him to a certain circle of fashionable, or highly connected people. Selina Sidney, though she was not rich, was of a very good gentleman’s family; her father had been a colonel in the British army: during his life, Mrs. Sidney had been in the habit of living a great deal in what is called the world, and in the best company; and though, since his death, she had lived in retirement, Miss Sidney had received an education which put her upon a footing with young ladies of the highest accomplishments and refinement in the kingdom. With every solid and amiable quality, she had all those external advantages of appearance and manner which Lady Mary Vivian valued most highly. Selina, who was convinced that Lady Mary appreciated her character, and was peculiarly fond of her company and conversation, could not but feel surprise, mixed with some indignation, perhaps with a little resentment, when she perceived that her ladyship’s prejudices and ambition made her act so completely in contradiction to her better judgment, to her professions, and to her feelings of affection. Whatever Miss Sidney thought upon this subject, however, she determined to continue to avoid seeing Vivian any more—an excellent resolution, in which we leave her, and return to her lover.
A walk with Russell had brought him back in the full determination of avowing his attachment sincerely to his mother, and of speaking to her ladyship in the most respectful manner; but, when he found that Miss Sidney was gone, anger and disappointment made him at once forget his prudence, and his intended respect; he declared, in the most passionate terms, his love for Selina Sidney, and his irrevocable determination to pursue her, to the end of time and space, in spite of all opposition whatsoever from any person whatever. His mother, who was prepared for a scene of this sort, though not for one of this violence, had sufficient command of temper to sustain it properly; her command of temper was, indeed, a little assisted by the hope that this passion would be transitory in proportion to its vehemence, much by the confidence she had in Miss Sidney’s honour, and in her absence: Lady Mary, therefore, calmly disclaimed having had any part in persuading Miss Sidney to that measure which had so much enraged her lover; but her ladyship avowed, that though it had not been necessary for her to suggest the measure, she highly approved of it, and admired now, as she had ever admired, that young lady’s prudent and noble conduct.
Softened by the only thing that could, at this moment, soften him—praise of his mistress—Vivian, in a most affectionate manner, assured his mother that it was her warm eulogiums of Miss Sidney which had first turned his attention to the perfections of her character; and he now inquired what possible objections she could make to his choice. With the generous enthusiasm of his disposition, heightened by all the eloquence of love, he pleaded, that his fortune was surely sufficient to put him above mercenary considerations in the choice of a wife; that in every point, except this one of money, Selina Sidney was, in his own mother’s opinion, superior to every other woman she could name, or wish for, as a daughter-in-law.
“But my tastes are not to blind me to your interests,” said Lady Mary; “you are entitled to look for rank and high connexion. You are the representative of an ancient family, have talents to make a figure in public; and, in short, prejudice or not, I confess it is one of the first wishes of my heart that you should marry into a noble family, or at least into one that shall strengthen your political interest, as well as secure your domestic happiness.”
Vivian, of course, cursed ambition, as all men do whilst they are in love. His arguments and his eloquence in favour of a private station, and of the joys of learned leisure, a competence, and domestic bliss, were worthy of the most renowned of ancient or modern philosophers. Russell was appealed to with much eagerness, both by mother and son, during their debates. He frankly declared to Lady Mary, that he thought her son perfectly right in all he now urged, and especially in his opinion of Miss Sidney; “but at the same time,” added Russell, “I apprehend that he speaks, at this moment, more from passion than from reason; and I fear that, in the course of a few months, he might, perhaps, entirely change his mind: therefore, I think your ladyship is prudent in refusing, during the minority of your son, your consent to a hasty union, of which he might afterwards repent, and thus render both himself and a most amiable woman miserable.”
Russell, after having given his opinion with the utmost freedom, when it was required by Lady Mary, assured her that he should no farther interfere; and he trusted his present sincerity would be the best pledge to her of his future discretion and honour. This equitable judgment and sincerity of Russell’s at first displeased both parties, but in time operated upon the reason of both; not, however, before contests had gone on long and loud between the mother and son—not before a great deal of nonsense had been talked on both sides. People of the best abilities often talk the most nonsense where their passions are concerned, because then the whole of their ingenuity is exercised to find arguments in favour of their folly. They are not, like fools, content to say, This is my will; but they pique themselves on giving reasons for their will; and their reasons are the reasons of madmen, excellent upon false premises. It happened here, as in most family quarrels, that the disputants did not allow sufficiently for the prejudices and errors incident to their different ages. The mother would not allow for the romantic notions of the son, nor could the son endure the worldly views of the mother. The son, who had as yet no experience of the transitory nature of the passion of love, thought his mother unfeeling and barbarous, for opposing him on the point where the whole happiness of his life was concerned; the mother, who had seen the decline and fall of so many everlasting loves, considered him only as a person in a fever; and thought she prevented him, by her calmness, from doing that which he would repent when he should regain his sober senses. Without detailing the daily disputes which now arose, it will be sufficient to mark the result.
Vivian’s love had been silent, tranquil, and not seemingly of any great consequence, till it was opposed; but, from the instant that an obstacle intervened, it gathered strength and force, and it presently rose rapidly, with prodigious uproar, threatening to burst all bounds, and to destroy every thing that stopped its course. Lady Mary was now inclined to try what effect lessening the opposition might produce. To do her justice, she was also moved to this by some nobler motives than fear; or, at least, her fears were not of a selfish kind: she dreaded that her son’s health and permanent happiness might be injured by this violent passion; she was apprehensive of becoming an object of his aversion; of utterly losing his confidence, and all power over his mind; but, chiefly, her generous temper was moved and won by Selina Sidney’s admirable conduct. During the whole time that Vivian used every means to see her, to write to her, and to convince her of the fervour of his love, though he won all her friends over to his interests, though she heard his praises from morning till night from all who surrounded her, and though her own heart, perhaps, pleaded more powerfully than all the rest in his favour; yet she never, for one instant, gave him the slightest encouragement. Lady Mary’s esteem and affection were so much increased by these strong proofs of friendship and honour, that her prejudices yielded; and she at length declared, that if her son continued, till he was of age, to feel the same attachment for this amiable girl, she would give her consent to their union. But this, she added, she promised only on one condition—that her son should abstain from all attempts, in the interval, to see or correspond with Miss Sidney, and that he should set out immediately to travel with Mr. Russell. Transported with love, and joy, and victory, Vivian promised every thing that was required of him, embraced his mother, and set out upon his travels.
“Allow,” said he triumphantly to Russell, as the chaise drove from the door, “allow, my good friend, that you were mistaken, in your fears of the weakness of my character, and of the yielding facility of my temper. You see how firm I have been—you see what battle I have made—you see how I have stood out.”
“I never doubted,” said Russell, “your love of your own free will—I never doubted your fear of being governed, especially by your mother; but you do not expect that I should allow this to be a proof of strength of character.”
“What! do you suppose I act from love of my own free will merely?—Do you call my love for Selina Sidney weakness?—Oh! take care, Russell; for if once I find you pleading my mother’s cause against your conscience——”
“You will never find me pleading any cause against my conscience. I have told your mother, as I have told you, my opinion of Miss Sidney—my firm opinion—that she is peculiarly calculated to make the happiness of your life, provided you continue to love her.”
“Provided!—Oh!” cried Vivian, laughing, “spare your musty provisoes, my dear philosopher! Would not any one think, now, you were an old man of ninety? If this is all you have to fear, I am happy indeed.”
“At present,” said Russell, calmly, “I have no fear, as I have just told your mother, but that you should change your mind before you are of age.”
Vivian grew quite indignant at this suggestion. “You are angry with me,” said Russell, “and so was your mother: she was angry because I said, I feared, instead of I hoped, you would change your mind. Both parties are angry with me for my sincerity.”
“Sincerity!—no; but I am angry with you for your absurd suspicions of my constancy.”
“If they are absurd, you need not be angry,” said Russell; “I shall be well pleased to see their absurdity demonstrated.”
“Then I can demonstrate it this moment.”
“Pardon me; not this moment; you must take time into the account. I make no doubt but that, at this moment, you are heartily in love with Miss Sidney; but the thing to be proved is, that your passion will not decline in force, in proportion as it meets with less resistance. If it does, you will acknowledge that it was more a love of your own free will than a love of your mistress that has actuated you, which was the thing to be proved.”
“Hateful Q.E.D.!” cried Vivian; “you shall see the contrary, and, at least, I will triumph over you.”
If Russell had ever used art in his management of Vivian’s mind, he might have been suspected of using it in favour of Miss Sidney at this instant; for this prophecy of Vivian’s inconstancy was the most likely means to prevent its accomplishment. Frequently, in the course of their tour, when Vivian was in any situation where his constancy was tempted, he recollected Russell’s prediction, and was proud to remind him how much he had been mistaken. In short, the destined time for their return home arrived—Vivian presented himself before his mother, and claimed her promise. She was somewhat surprised, and a little disappointed, by our hero’s constancy; but she could not retract her word; and, since her compliance was now unavoidable, she was determined that it should be gracious. She wrote to Selina, therefore, with great kindness, saying, that whatever views of other connexions she might formerly have had for her son, she had now relinquished them, convinced, by the constancy of her son’s attachment, and by the merit of its object, that his own choice would most effectually ensure his happiness, and that of all his friends. Her ladyship added expressions of her regard and esteem, and of the pleasure she felt in the thoughts of finding in her daughter-in-law a friend and companion, whose society was peculiarly agreeable to her taste and suited to her character. This letter entirely dissipated Selina’s scruples of conscience; Vivian’s love and merit, all his good and all his agreeable qualities, had now full and unreproved power to work upon her tender heart. His generous, open temper, his candour, his warm attachment to his friends, his cultivated understanding, his brilliant talents, his easy, well-bred, agreeable manners, all heightened in their power to please by the charm of love, justified, even in the eyes of the aged and prudent, the passion he inspired. Selina became extremely attached to him; and she loved with the delightful belief that there was not, in the mind of her lover, the seed of a single vice which threatened danger to his virtues or to their mutual happiness. With his usual candour, he had laid open his whole character to her, as far as he knew it himself; and had warned her of that vacillation of temper, that easiness to be led, which Russell had pointed out as a dangerous fault in his disposition. But of this propensity Selina had seen no symptoms; on the contrary, the steadiness of her lover in his attachment to her—the only point on which she had yet seen him tried—decided her to trust to the persuasive voice of love and hope, and to believe that Russell’s friendship had in this instance, been too harsh or too timorous in its forebodings.
Nothing now delayed the marriage of Vivian and Selina but certain legal rites, which were to be performed on his coming of age, and before marriage settlements could be drawn;—and the parties were doomed to wait for the arrival of some trustee who was with his regiment abroad. All these delays Vivian of course cursed: but, upon the whole, they were borne by him with heroic patience, and by Selina with all the tranquillity of confiding love, happy in the present, and not too anxious for the future.
CHAPTER II.
“My dear Russell,” said Vivian, “love shall not make me forget friendship; before I marry, I must see you provided for. Believe me, this was the first—one of the first pleasures I promised myself, in becoming master of a good fortune. Other thoughts, I confess, have put it out of my head; so now let me tell you at once. I hate paltry surprises with my friends: I have, you know—or rather, probably, you do not know, for you are the most disinterested fellow upon earth—I have an excellent living in my gift; it shall be yours; consider it as such from this moment. If I knew a more deserving man, I would give it to him, upon my honour; so you can’t refuse me. The incumbent can’t live long; he is an old, very old, infirm man; you’ll have the living in a year or two, and, in the mean time, stay with me. I ask it as a favour from a friend, and you see how much I want a friend of your firm character; and I hope you see, also, how much I can value, in others, the qualities in which I am myself deficient.”
Russell was much pleased and touched by Vivian’s generous gratitude, and by the delicacy, as well as kindness of the manner in which he made this offer; but Russell could not consistently with his feelings or his principles live in a state of dependent idleness, waiting for a rich living and the death of an old incumbent. He told Vivian that he had too much affection for him, and too much respect for himself, ever to run the hazard of sinking from the rank of an independent friend. After rallying him, without effect, on his pride, Vivian acknowledged that he was forced to admire him the more for his spirit. Lady Mary, too, who was a great and sincere admirer of independence of character, warmly applauded Mr. Russell, and recommended him, in the highest terms, to a nobleman in the neighbourhood, who happened to be in want of a preceptor for his only son. This nobleman was Lord Glistonbury: his lordship was eager to engage a person of Russell’s reputation for talents; so the affair was quickly arranged, and Lady Mary Vivian and her son went to pay a morning visit at Glistonbury Castle, on purpose to accompany Russell on his first introduction to the family. As they approached the castle, Vivian was struck with its venerable Gothic appearance; he had not had a near view of it for some years, and he looked at it with new eyes. Formerly he had seen it only as a picturesque ornament to the country; but now that he was himself possessor of an estate in the vicinity, he considered Glistonbury Castle as a point of comparison which rendered him dissatisfied with his own mansion. As he drove up the avenue, and beheld the towers, turrets, battlements, and massive entrance, his mother, who was a woman of taste, strengthened, by her exclamations on the beauty of Gothic architecture, the wish that was rising in his mind to convert his modern house into an ancient castle: she could not help sighing whilst she reflected that, if her son’s affections had not been engaged, he might perhaps have obtained the heart and hand of one of the fair daughters of this castle. Lady Mary went no farther, even in her inmost thoughts. Incapable of double-dealing, she resolved never even to let her son know what her wishes had been with respect to a connexion with the Glistonbury family. But the very reserve and discretion with which her ladyship spoke—a reserve unusual with her, and unsuited to the natural warmth of her manner and temper—might have betrayed her to an acute and cool observer. Vivian, however, at this instant, was too much intent upon castle-building to admit any other ideas.
When the carriage drove under the great gateway and stopped, Vivian exclaimed, “What a fine old castle! how surprised Selina Sidney would be, how delighted, to see my house metamorphosed into such a castle!”
“It is a magnificent castle, indeed!” said Lady Mary, with a sigh: “I think there are the Lady Lidhursts on the terrace; and here comes my Lord Glistonbury with his son.”
“My pupil?” said Russell; “I hope the youth is such as I can become attached to. Life would be wretched indeed without attachment—of some sort or other. But I must not expect,” added he, “to find a second time a friend in a pupil; and such a friend!”
Sentiment, or the expression of the tenderness he felt for his friends, was so unusual from Russell, that it had double effect; and Vivian was so much struck by it, that he could scarcely collect his thoughts in time to speak to Lord Glistonbury, who came to receive his guests, attended by three hangers on of the family—a chaplain, a captain, and a young lawyer. His lordship was scarcely past the meridian of life; yet, in spite of his gay and debonair manner, he looked old, as if he were paying for the libertinism of his youth by premature decrepitude. His countenance announced pretensions to ability; his easy and affable address, and the facility with which he expressed himself, gained him credit at first for much more understanding than he really possessed. There was a plausibility in all he said; but, if it were examined, there was nothing in it but nonsense. Some of his expressions appeared brilliant; some of his sentiments just; but there was a want of consistency, a want of a pervading mind in his conversation, which to good judges betrayed the truth, that all his opinions were adopted, not formed; all his maxims commonplace; his wit mere repetition; his sense merely tact. After proper thanks and compliments to Lady Mary and Mr. Vivian, for securing for him such a treasure as Mr. Russell, he introduced Lord Lidhurst, a sickly, bashful boy of fourteen, to his new governor, with polite expressions of unbounded confidence, and a rapid enunciation of undefined and contradictory expectations.
“Mr. Russell will, I am perfectly persuaded, make Lidhurst every thing we can desire,” said his lordship; “an honour to his country, an ornament to his family. It is my decided opinion that man is but a bundle of habits; and it’s my maxim, that education is second nature—first, indeed, in many cases. For, except that I am staggered about original genius, I own I conceive with Hartley, that early impressions and associations are all in all: his vibrations and vibratiuncles are quite satisfactory. But what I particularly wish for Lidhurst, sir, is, that he should be trained as soon as possible into a statesman. Mr. Vivian, I presume you mean to follow up public business, and no doubt will make a figure. So I prophesy; and I am used to these things. And from Lidhurst, too, under similar tuition, I may with reason expect miracles—‘hope to hear him thundering in the house of commons in a few years—‘confess ‘am not quite so impatient to have the young dog in the house of incurables; for you know he could not be there without being in my shoes, which I have not done with yet—ha! ha! ha!——Each in his turn, my boy! In the mean time, Lady Mary, shall we join the ladies yonder, on the terrace? Lady Glistonbury walks so slow, that she will be seven hours in coming to us; so we had best go to her ladyship: if the mountain won’t go to Mahomet—you know, of course, what follows.”
On their way to the terrace, Lord Glistonbury, who always heard himself speak with singular complacency, continued to give his ideas on education; sometimes appealing to Mr. Russell, sometimes happy to catch the eye of Lady Mary.
“Now, my idea for Lidhurst is simply this:—that he should know every thing that is in all the best books in the library, but yet that he should be the farthest possible from a book-worm—that he should never, except in a set speech in the house, have the air of having opened a book in his life—mother-wit for me!—in most cases—and that easy style of originality, which shows the true gentleman. As to morals—Lidhurst, walk on, my boy—as to morals, I confess I couldn’t bear to see any thing of the Joseph Surface about him. A youth of spirit must, you know, Mr. Vivian—excuse me, Lady Mary, this is—an aside—be something of a latitudinarian to keep in the fashion: not that I mean to say so exactly to Lidhurst—no, no—on the contrary, Mr. Russell, it is our cue, as well as this reverend gentleman’s,” looking back at the chaplain, who bowed assent before he knew to what, “it is our cue, as well as this reverend gentleman’s, to preach prudence, and temperance, and all the cardinal virtues.”
“Cardinal virtues! very good, faith! my lord,” said the lawyer, looking at the clergyman.
“Temperance!” repeated the chaplain, winking at the officer; “upon my soul, my lord, that’s too bad.”
“Prudence!” repeated the captain; “that’s too clean a cut at poor Wicksted, my lord.”
Before his lordship had time to preach any more prudence, they arrived within bowing distance of the ladies, who had, indeed, advanced at a very slow rate. Vivian was not acquainted with any of the ladies of the Glistonbury family; for they had, till this summer, resided at another of their country seats, in a distant county. His mother had often met them at parties in town.
Lady Glistonbury was a thin, stiffened, flattened figure—she was accompanied by two other female forms, one old, the other young; not each a different grace, but alike all three in angularity, and in a cold haughtiness of mien. After reconnoitring with their glasses the party of gentlemen, these ladies quickened their step; and Lady Glistonbury, making her countenance as affable as it was in its nature to be, exclaimed, “My dear Lady Mary Vivian! have I the pleasure to see your ladyship?—They told me it was only visitors to my lord.”
Mr. Vivian had then the honour of being introduced to her ladyship, to her eldest daughter, Lady Sarah Lidhurst, and to Miss Strictland, the governess. By all of these ladies he was most graciously received; but poor Russell was not so fortunate; nothing could be more cold and repulsive than their reception of him. This did not make Lady Sarah appear very agreeable to Vivian; he thought her, at this first view, one of the least attractive young women he had ever beheld.
“Where is my Julia?” inquired Lord Glistonbury. “Ah! there she goes yonder, all life and spirits.”
Vivian looked as his lordship directed his eye, and saw, at the farthest end of the terrace, a young girl of about fifteen, running very fast, with a hoop, which she was keeping up with great dexterity for the amusement of a little boy who was with her. The governess no sooner saw this than she went in pursuit of her young ladyship, calling after her, in various tones and phrases of reprehension, in French, Italian, and English; and asking whether this was a becoming employment for a young lady of her age and rank. Heedless of these reproaches, Lady Julia still ran on, away from her governess, “to chase the rolling circle’s speed,” down the slope of the terrace; thither Miss Strictland dared not pursue, but contented herself with standing on the brink, reiterating her remonstrances. At length the hoop fell, and the young lady returned, not to her governess, but, running lightly up the slope of the terrace, to her surprise, she came full in view of the company before she was aware that any strangers were there. Her straw hat being at the back of her head, Lady Glistonbury, with an indignant look, pulled it forwards.
“What a beautiful colour! what a sweet countenance Lady Julia has!” whispered Lady Mary Vivian to Lord Glistonbury: at the same time she could not refrain from glancing her eyes towards her son, to see what effect was produced upon him. Vivian’s eyes met hers; and this single look of his mother’s revealed to him all that she had, in her great prudence, resolved to conceal. He smiled at her, and then at Russell, as much as to say, “Surely there can be no comparison between such a child as this and Selina Sidney!”
A few minutes afterwards, in consequence of a sign from Lady Glistonbury, Julia disappeared with her governess; and the moment was unnoticed by Vivian, who was then, as his mother observed, looking up at one of the turrets of the old castle. All its inhabitants were at this time uninteresting to him, except so far as they regarded his friend Russell; but the castle itself absorbed his attention. Lord Glistonbury, charmed to see how he was struck by it, offered to show him over every part of the edifice; an offer which he and Lady Mary gladly accepted. Lady Glistonbury excused herself, professing to be unable to sustain the fatigue: she deputed her eldest daughter to attend Lady Mary in her stead; and this was the only circumstance which diminished the pleasure to Vivian, for he was obliged to show due courtesy to this stiff taciturn damsel at every turn, whilst he was intent upon seeing the architecture of the castle, and the views from the windows of the towers and loop-holes of the galleries; all which Lady Sarah pointed out with a cold, ceremonious civility, and a formal exactness of proceeding, which enraged Vivian’s enthusiastic temper. The visit ended: he railed half the time he was going home against their fair, or, as he called her, their petrified guide; then, full of the Gothic beauties of Glistonbury, he determined, as soon as possible, to turn his own modern house into a castle. The very next morning he had an architect to view it, and to examine its capabilities. It happened that, about this time, several of the noblemen and gentry, in the county in which Vivian resided, had been seized with this rage for turning comfortable houses into uninhabitable castles. And, however perverse or impracticable this retrograde movement in architecture might seem, there were always at hand professional projectors, to convince gentlemen that nothing was so feasible. Provided always that gentlemen approve their estimates as well as their plans, they undertake to carry buildings back, in a trice, two, or three, or half a dozen centuries, as may be required, to make them Gothic or Saracenic, and to “add every grace that time alone can give.” A few days after Vivian had been at Glistonbury Castle, when Lord Glistonbury came to return the visit, Russell, who accompanied his lordship, found his friend encompassed with plans and elevations.
“Surely, my dear Vivian,” said he, seizing the first moment he could speak to him, “you are not going to spoil this excellent house? It is completely finished, in handsome modern architecture, perfectly comfortable and convenient, light, airy, large enough, warm rooms, well distributed, with ample means of getting at each apartment; and if you set about to new-model and transform it into a castle, you must, I see, by your plan, alter the proportions of almost every room, and spoil the comfort of the whole; turn square to round, and round again to square; and, worse than all, turn light to darkness—only for the sake of having what is called a castle, but what has not, in fact, any thing of the grandeur or solid magnificence of a real ancient edifice. These modern baby-house miniatures of castles, which gentlemen ruin themselves to build, are, after all, the most paltry, absurd things imaginable.”
To this Vivian was, after some dispute, forced to agree; but he said, “that his should not be a baby-house; that he would go to any expense to make it really magnificent.”
“As magnificent, I suppose, as Glistonbury Castle?”
“If possible:—that is, I confess, the object of my emulation.”
“Ah!” said Russell, shaking his head, “these are the objects of emulation, for which country gentlemen often ruin themselves; barter their independence and real respectability; reduce themselves to distress and disgrace: these are the objects for which they sell either their estates or their country; become placemen or beggars; and end either in the liberties of the King’s Bench, or the slaveries of St. James’s.”
“Impossible for me! you know my public principles,” said Vivian: “and you know that I think the life of an independent country gentleman the most respectable of all others—you know my principles.”
“I know your facility,” said Russell: “if you begin by sacrificing thus to your taste, do you think you will not end by sacrificing to your interest?”
“Never! never!” cried Vivian.
“Then you imagine that a strong temptation will not act where a weak one has been found irresistible.”
“Of this I am certain,” said Vivian: “I could never be brought to sell my country, or to forfeit my honour.”
“Perhaps not,” said Russell: “you might, in your utmost need, have another alternative; you might forfeit your love; you might give up Selina Sidney, and marry for money—all for the sake of a castle!”
Struck by this speech, Vivian exclaimed, “I would give up a thousand castles rather than run such a hazard!”
“Let us then coolly calculate,” said Russell. “What would the castle cost you?”
The expense, even by the estimates of the architects, which, in the execution, are usually doubled, was enormous, such as Vivian acknowledged was unsuited even to his ample fortune. His fortune, though considerable, was so entailed, that he would, if he exceeded his income, be soon reduced to difficulties for ready money. But then his mother had several thousands in the stocks, which she was ready to lend him to forward this castle-building. It was a project which pleased her taste, and gratified her aristocratic notions.
Vivian assured his friend at parting, that his reason was convinced: that he would not yield to the whims of taste, and that he would prudently give up his folly. So he determined; and he abided by his determination till he heard numbers speak on the other side of the question. With Vivian, those who spoke last frequently seemed to speak best; and, in general, the number of voices overpowered the weight of argument. By the persuasions of his mother, the example of his neighbours, and the urgency of architects and men of taste who got about him soon afterwards, he was convinced that there was no living without a castle, and that the expense would be next to nothing at all. Convinced, we should not say; for he yielded, against his conviction, from mere want of power to resist reiterated solicitations. He had no other motive; for the enthusiasm raised by the view of Glistonbury Castle had passed away: he plainly saw, what Russell had pointed out to him, that he should spoil the inside of his house for the sake of the outside; and, for his own part, he preferred comfort to show. It was not, therefore, to please his own taste that he ran into this imprudent expense, but merely to gratify the taste of others.
Now the bustle of building began, and workmen swarmed round his house; the foundations sank, the scaffolds rose; and many times did Vivian sigh and repent, when he saw how much was to be undone before any thing could be done; when he found his house dismantled, saw the good ceilings and elegant cornices knocked to pieces, saw the light domes and modern sashes give way; all taken out to be replaced, at profuse expense, by a clumsy imitation of Gothic; how often did be sigh and calculate, when he saw the tribes of workmen file off as their dinner bell rang! how often did he bless himself, when he beheld the huge beams of timber dragged into his yards, and the solid masses of stone brought from a quarry at an enormous distance!—Vivian perceived that the expense would be treble the estimate; and said, that if the thing were to be done again, he would never consent to it; but now, as Lady Mary observed, it was too late to repent; and it was, at any rate, best to go on and finish it with spirit—since it was impossible (nobody knew why) to stop. He hurried on the workmen with impatience; for he was anxious to have the roof and some apartments in his castle finished before his marriage. The dilatoriness of the lawyers, and the want of the trustee, who had not yet arrived in England, were no longer complained of so grievously by the lover. Russell, one day, as he saw Vivian overlooking his workmen, and urging them to expedition, smiled, and asked whether the impatience of an architect or of a lover was now predominant in his mind. Vivian, rather offended by the question, replied, that his eagerness to finish this part of his castle arose from his desire to give an agreeable surprise to his bride; and he declared that his passion for Selina was as ardent, at this moment, as it had ever been; but that it was impossible to make lawyers move faster than their accustomed pace; and that Miss Sidney was too secure of his affection, and he too well convinced of hers, to feel that sort of anxiety, which persons who had less confidence in each other might experience in similar circumstances. This was all very true, and very reasonable; but Russell could not help perceiving that Vivian’s language and tone were somewhat altered since the time when he was ready to brave heaven and earth to marry his mistress, without license or consent of friends, without the possibility of waiting a few months till he was of age. In fact, though Vivian would not allow it, this consent of friends, this ceasing of opposition, this security and tranquillity of happiness, had considerably changed the appearance, at least, of his love. Lady Mary perceived it, with a resolution to say nothing, and see how it would end. Selina did not perceive it for some time; for she was of a most unsuspicious temper; and her confidence in Vivian was equal to the fondness of her love. She began to think, indeed, that the lawyers were provokingly slow; and when Vivian did not blame them as much as he used to do, she only thought that he understood business better than she did—besides, the necessary trustee was not come—and, in short, the last thing that occurred to her mind was to blame Vivian.
The trustee at length arrived, and the castle was almost in the wished-for state of forwardness, when a new cause of delay arose—a county election: but how this election was brought on, and how it was conducted, it is necessary to record. It happened that a relation of Vivian’s was appointed to a new seventy-four gun ship, of which he came to take the command at Yarmouth, which was within a few miles of him. Vivian recollected that Russell had often expressed a desire to go on board a man-of-war. Vivian, therefore, after having appointed a day for their going, went to Glistonbury to invite Russell: his pupil, Lord Lidhurst, begged to be permitted to accompany them: and Lady Julia, the moment she heard of this new seventy-four gun ship, was, as her governess expressed it, wild to be of the party. Indeed, any thing that had the name of a party of pleasure, and that promised a transient relief from the tedious monotony in which her days passed; any thing that gave a chance of even a few hours’ release from the bondage in which she was held between the restraints of the most rigid of governesses and the proudest of mothers, appeared delightful to this lively and childish girl. She persecuted her governess with entreaties, till at last she made Miss Strictland go with her petition to Lady Glistonbury; whilst, in the mean time, Lady Julia overwhelmed her father with caresses, till he consented; and with much difficulty, prevailed upon Lady Glistonbury to give her permission for the young ladies to go with their governess, their brother, their father, and Lady Mary Vivian, on this excursion. The invitation was now extended to all the company then at the castle; including the representative of the county, who, being just threatened with a fit of the gout, brought on by hard drinking at the last election, expressed some reluctance to going with this party on the water. But this gentleman was now paying his humble devoirs to the Lady Sarah Lidhurst; and it was represented to him, by all who understood the ground, that he would give mortal offence if he did not go; so it was ruled, that, hot or cold, gout or no gout, he must appear in the Lady Sarah’s train: he submitted to this perilous necessity in the most gallant manner. The day proved tolerably fine—Vivian had an elegant entertainment provided for the company, under a marquee pitched on the shore—they embarked in a pleasure-boat—Lady Sarah was very sick, and her admirer very cold; but Lady Julia was in extasies at every thing she saw and felt—she feared nothing, found nothing inconvenient—was charmed to be drawn so easily from the boat up the high side of the ship—charmed to find herself on deck—charmed to see the sails, the ropes, the rigging, the waves, the sea, the sun, the clouds, the sailors, the cook dressing dinner—all, all indiscriminately charmed her; and, like a school-girl broke loose, she ran about, wild with spirits, asking questions, some sensible, some silly; laughing at her own folly, flying from this side to that, from one end of the ship to the other, down the ladders and up again; whilst Mr. Russell, who was deputed to take care of her, could scarcely keep up with her: Lord Glistonbury stood by, holding his sides and laughing aloud: Miss Strictland, quite disabled by the smell of the ship, was lying on a bed in the state cabin; and Lady Sarah, all the time shaded by an umbrella held by her shivering admirer, sat, as if chained upright in her chair of state, upon deck, scorning her sister’s childish levity, and proving herself, with all due propriety, incapable of being moved to surprise or admiration by any object on land or sea.
Lady Mary Vivian, while she observed with a quick eye all that passed, and read her son’s thoughts, was fully persuaded that neither of the Lady Lidhursts would be likely to suit his taste, even if his affections were disengaged: the one was too childish, the other too stiff. “Yet their birth and connexions, and their consequence in the county,” thought Lady Mary, “would have made their alliance highly desirable.” Every body seemed weary at the close of this day’s entertainment, except Lady Julia, who kept it up with indefatigable gaiety, and could hardly believe that it was time to go home, when the boat was announced to row them to shore: heedless, and absolutely dizzy with talking and laughing, her ladyship, escaping from the assistance of sailors and gentlemen, made a false step in getting into the boat, and, falling over, would have sunk for ever, but for Mr. Russell’s presence of mind. He seized her with a strong grasp, and saved her. The fright sobered her completely; and she sat wrapped in great-coats, as silent, as tractable, and as wet as possible, during the remainder of the way to shore. The screams, the ejaculations, the reprimands from Miss Strictland; the questions, the reflections, to which this incident led, may possibly be conceived, but cannot be enumerated.
This event, however alarming at the moment, had no serious consequence; for Lady Julia caught neither fever nor cold, though Miss Strictland was morally certain her ladyship would have one or the other; indeed she insinuated, that her ladyship deserved to have both. Lady Sarah’s poor shivering knight of the shire, however, did not escape so well. Obliged to row home, in a damp evening, without his great-coat, which he had been forced to offer to Lady Julia, in a pleasure-boat, when he should have been in flannels or in bed, he had “cause to rue the boating of that day.” His usual panacea of the gout did not come as expected, to set him up again. The cold he caught this day killed him. Lady Sarah Lidhurst was precisely as sorry as decorum required. But the bustle of a new election was soon to obliterate the memory of the old member, in the minds of his numerous friends. Lord Glistonbury, and several other voices in the county, called upon Vivian to stand on the independent interest. There was to be a contest: for a government candidate declared himself at the same moment that application was made to Vivian. The expense of a contested election alarmed both Vivian and his mother. Gratified as she was by the honour of this offer, yet she had the prudence to advise her son rather to go into parliament as representative for a borough than to hazard the expense of a contest for the county. Miss Sidney, also, whom he consulted upon this occasion, supported his mother’s prudent advice, in the most earnest manner; and Vivian was inclined to follow this counsel, till Lord Glistonbury came one morning to plead the contrary side of the question: he assured Vivian, that from his experience of the county, he was morally certain they should carry it without trouble, and with no expense worth mentioning. These were only general phrases, to be sure, not arguments; but these, joined to her ambition to see her son member for the county, at length overpowered Lady Mary’s better judgment: her urgent entreaties were now joined to those of Lord Glistonbury, and of many loud-tongued electioneerers, who proved to Vivian, by every thing but calculation, that he must be returned if he would but stand—if he would only declare himself. Russell and his own prudence strongly counselled him to resist these clamorous importunities; the two preceding candidates, whose fortunes had been nearly as good as his, had been ruined by the contests. Vivian was very young, but just of age; and Russell observed, “that it would be better for him to see something more of the world, before he should embark in politics, and plunge into public business.” “True,” said Vivian; “but Mr. Pitt was only three-and-twenty when he was minister of England. I am not ambitious; but I should certainly like to distinguish myself, if I could; and whilst I feel in youth the glow of patriotism, why should I not serve my country?”
“Serve it and welcome,” said Russell: “but don’t begin by ruining yourself by a contested election; or else, whatever glow of patriotism you may feel, it will be out of your power to be an honest member of parliament. If you must go into parliament immediately for the good of your country, go in as member for some borough, which will not ruin you.”
“But the committee of our friends will be so disappointed if I decline; and my mother, who has now set her heart upon it, and Lord Glistonbury, and Mr. C——, and Mr. G——, and Mr. D——, who are such zealous friends, and who urge me so much——”
“Judge for yourself,” said Russell, “and don’t let any persons who happen to be near you persuade you to see with their eyes, and decide with their wishes. Zealous friends, indeed!—because they love to make themselves of consequence, by bawling and scampering about at an election!—And you would let such people draw you on, to ruin yourself.”