The Virginians

CHAPTER LVII. In which Mr. Harry's Nose continues to be put out of joint

Madame de Bernstein was scarcely less pleased than her Virginian nephews at the result of Harry's final interview with Lady Maria. George informed the Baroness of what had passed, in a billet which he sent to her the same evening; and shortly afterwards her nephew Castlewood, whose visits to his aunt were very rare, came to pay his respects to her, and frankly spoke about the circumstances which had taken place; for no man knew better than my Lord Castlewood how to be frank upon occasion, and now that the business between Maria and Harry was ended what need was there of reticence or hypocrisy? The game had been played, and was over: he had no objection now to speak of its various moves, stratagems, finesses. “She is my own sister,” said my lord, affectionately; “she won't have many more chances—many more such chances of marrying and establishing herself. I might not approve of the match in all respects, and I might pity your ladyship's young Virginian favourite: but of course such a piece of good fortune was not to be thrown away, and I was bound to stand by my own flesh and blood.”

“Your candour does your lordship honour,” says Madame de Bernstein, “and your love for your sister is quite edifying!”

“Nay, we have lost the game, and I am speaking sans rancune. It is not for you, who have won, to bear malice,” says my lord, with a bow.

Madame de Bernstein protested she was never in her life in better humour. “Confess, now, Eugene, that visit of Maria to Harry at the spunging-house—that touching giving up of all his presents to her, was a stroke of thy invention?”

“Pity for the young man, and a sense of what was due from Maria to her friend—her affianced lover—in misfortune, sure these were motives sufficient to make her act as she did,” replies Lord Castlewood, demurely.

“But 'twas you advised her, my good nephew?”

Castlewood, with a shrug of his shoulders, owned that he did advise his sister to see Mr. Henry Warrington. “But we should have won, in spite of your ladyship,” he continued, “had not the elder brother made his appearance. And I have been trying to console my poor Maria by showing her what a piece of good fortune it is after all, that we lost.”

“Suppose she had married Harry, and then cousin George had made his appearance?” remarks the Baroness.

“Effectivement,” cries Eugene, taking snuff. “As the grave was to give up its dead, let us be thankful to the grave for disgorging in time! I am bound to say, that Mr. George Warrington seems to be a man of sense, and not more selfish than other elder sons and men of the world. My poor Molly fancied that he might be a—what shall I say?—a greenhorn perhaps is the term—like his younger brother. She fondly hoped that he might be inclined to go share and share alike with Twin junior; in which case, so infatuated was she about the young fellow, that I believe she would have taken him. 'Harry Warrington, with half a loaf, might do very well,' says I, 'but Harry Warrington with no bread, my dear!'”

“How no bread?” asks the Baroness.

“Well, no bread except at his brother's side-table. The elder said as much.”

“What a hard-hearted wretch!” cries Madame de Bernstein.

“Ah, bah! I play with you, aunt, cartes sur table! Mr. George only did what everybody else would do; and we have no right to be angry with him, really we haven't. Molly herself acknowledged as much, after her first burst of grief was over, and I brought her to listen to reason. The silly old creature! to be so wild about a young lad at her time of life!”

“'Twas a real passion, I almost do believe,” said Madame de Bernstein.

“You should have heard her take leave of him. C'etait touchant, ma parole d'honneur! I cried. Before George, I could not help myself. The young fellow with muddy stockings, and his hair about his eyes, flings himself amongst us when we were at dinner; makes his offer to Molly in a very frank and noble manner, and in good language too; and she replies. Begad, it put me in mind of Mrs. Woffington in the new Scotch play, that Lord Bute's man has wrote—Douglas—what d'ye call it? She clings round the lad: she bids him adieu in heartrending accents. She steps out of the room in a stately despair—no more chocolate, thank you. If she had made a mauvais pas no one could retire from it with more dignity. 'Twas a masterly retreat after a defeat. We were starved out of our position, but we retired with all the honours of war.”

“Molly won't die of the disappointment!” said my lord's aunt, sipping her cup.

My lord snarled a grin, and showed his yellow teeth. “He, he!” he said, “she hath once or twice before had the malady very severely, and recovered perfectly. It don't kill, as your ladyship knows, at Molly's age.”

How should her ladyship know? She did not marry Doctor Tusher until she was advanced in life. She did not become Madame de Bernstein until still later. Old Dido, a poet remarks, was not ignorant of misfortune, and hence learned to have compassion on the wretched.

People in the little world, as I have been told, quarrel and fight, and go on abusing each other, and are not reconciled for ever so long. But people in the great world are surely wiser in their generation. They have differences; they cease seeing each other. They make it up and come together again, and no questions are asked. A stray prodigal, or a stray puppy-dog, is thus brought in under the benefit of an amnesty, though you know he has been away in ugly company. For six months past, ever since the Castlewoods and Madame de Bernstein had been battling for possession of poor Harry Warrington, these two branches of the Esmond family had remained apart. Now, the question being settled, they were free to meet again, as though no difference ever had separated them: and Madame de Bernstein drove in her great coach to Lady Castlewood's rout, and the Esmond ladies appeared smiling at Madame de Bernstein's drums, and loved each other just as much as they previously had done.

“So, sir, I hear you have acted like a hard-hearted monster about your poor brother Harry!” says the Baroness, delighted, and menacing George with her stick.

“I acted but upon your ladyship's hint, and desired to see whether it was for himself or his reputed money that his kinsfolk wanted to have him,” replies George, turning rather red.

“Nay, Maria could not marry a poor fellow who was utterly penniless, and whose elder brother said he would give him nothing!”

“I did it for the best, madam,” says George, still blushing.

“And so thou didst, O thou hypocrite!” cries the old lady.

“Hypocrite, madam! and why?” asks Mr. Warrington, drawing himself up in much state.

“I know all, my infant!” says the Baroness in French. “Thou art very like thy grandfather. Come, that I embrace thee! Harry has told me all, and that thou hast divided thy little patrimony with him!”

“It was but natural, madam. We have had common hearts and purses since we were born. I but feigned hard-heartedness in order to try those people yonder,” says George, with filling eyes.

“And thou wilt divide Virginia with him too?” asks the Bernstein.

“I don't say so. It were not just,” replied Mr. Warrington. “The land must go to the eldest born, and Harry would not have it otherwise: and it may be I shall die, or my mother outlive the pair of us. But half of what is mine is his: and he, it must be remembered, only was extravagant because he was mistaken as to his position.”

“But it is a knight of old, it is a Bayard, it is the grandfather come to life!” cried Madame de Bernstein to her attendant, as she was retiring for the night. And that evening, when the lads left her, it was to poor Harry she gave the two fingers, and to George the rouged cheek, who blushed, for his part, almost as deep as that often-dyed rose, at such a mark of his old kinswoman's favour.

Although Harry Warrington was the least envious of men, and did honour to his brother as in all respects his chief, guide, and superior, yet no wonder a certain feeling of humiliation and disappointment oppressed the young man after his deposition from his eminence as Fortunate Youth and heir to boundless Virginian territories. Our friends at Kensington might promise and vow that they would love him all the better after his fall; Harry made a low bow and professed himself very thankful; but he could not help perceiving, when he went with his brother to the state entertainment with which my Lord Castlewood regaled his new-found kinsman, that George was all in all to his cousins: had all the talk, compliments, and petits soins for himself, whilst of Harry no one took any notice save poor Maria, who followed him with wistful looks, pursued him with eyes conveying dismal reproaches, and, as it were, blamed him because she had left him. “Ah!” the eyes seemed to say, “'tis mighty well of you, Harry, to have accepted the freedom which I gave you; but I had no intention, sir, that you should be so pleased at being let off.” She gave him up, but yet she did not quite forgive him for taking her at her word. She would not have him, and yet she would. Oh, my young friends, how delightful is the beginning of a love-business, and how undignified, sometimes, the end! What a romantic vista is before young Damon and young Phillis (or middle-aged ditto ditto) when, their artless loves made known to each other, they twine their arms round each other's waists and survey that charming pays du tendre which lies at their feet! Into that country, so linked together, they will wander from now until extreme old age. There may be rocks and roaring rivers, but will not Damon's strong true love enable him to carry Sweetheart over them? There may be dragons and dangers in the path, but shall not his courageous sword cut them down? Then at eve, how they will rest cuddled together, like two pretty babes in the wood, the moss their couch, the stars their canopy, their arms their mutual pillows! This is the wise plan young folks make when they set out on the love journey; and—O me!—they have not got a mile when they come to a great wall and find they must walk back again. They are squabbling with the post-boy at Barnet (the first stage on the Gretna Road, I mean), and, behold, perhaps Strephon has not got any money, or here is papa with a whacking horsewhip, who takes Miss back again, and locks her up crying in the schoolroom. The parting is heart-breaking; but, when she has married the banker and had eight children, and he has become, it may be, a prosperous barrister,—it may be, a seedy raff who has gone twice or thrice into the Gazette; when, I say, in after years Strephon and Delia meet again, is not the meeting ridiculous? Nevertheless, I hope no young man will fall in love, having any doubt in his mind as to the eternity of his passion. 'Tis when a man has had a second or third amorous attack that he begins to grow doubtful; but some women are romantic to the end, and from eighteen to eight-and-fifty (for what I know) are always expecting their hearts to break. In fine, when you have been in love and are so no more, when the King of France, with twenty thousand men, with colours flying, music playing, and all the pomp of war, having marched up the hill, then proceeds to march down again, he and you are in an absurd position.

This is what Harry Warrington, no doubt, felt when he went to Kensington and encountered the melancholy, reproachful eyes of his cousin. Yes! it is a foolish position to be in; but it is also melancholy to look into a house you have once lived in, and see black casements and emptiness where once shone the fires of welcome. Melancholy? Yes; but, ha! how bitter, how melancholy, how absurd to look up as you pass sentimentally by No. 13, and see somebody else grinning out of window, and evidently on the best terms with the landlady. I always feel hurt, even at an inn which I frequent, if I see other folks' trunks and boots at the doors of the rooms which were once mine. Have those boots lolled on the sofa which once I reclined on? I kick you from before me, you muddy, vulgar highlows!

So considering that his period of occupation was over, and Maria's rooms, if not given up to a new tenant, were, at any rate, to let, Harry did not feel very easy in his cousin's company, nor she possibly in his. He found either that he had nothing to say to her, or that what she had to say to him was rather dull and commonplace, and that the red lip of a white-necked pipe of Virginia was decidedly more agreeable to him now than Maria's softest accents and most melancholy moue. When George went to Kensington, then, Harry did not care much about going, and pleaded other engagements.

At his uncle's house in Hill Street the poor lad was no better amused, and, indeed, was treated by the virtuous people there with scarce any attention at all. The ladies did not scruple to deny themselves when he came; he could scarce have believed in such insincerity after their caresses, their welcome, their repeated vows of affection; but happening to sit with the Lamberts for an hour after he had called upon his aunt, he saw her ladyship's chairmen arrive with an empty chair, and his aunt step out and enter the vehicle, and not even blush when he made her a bow from the opposite window. To be denied by his own relations—to have that door which had opened to him so kindly, slammed in his face! He would not have believed such a thing possible, poor simple Harry said. Perhaps he thought the door-knocker had a tender heart, and was not made of brass; not more changed than the head of that knocker was my Lady Warrington's virtuous face when she passed her nephew.

“My father's own brother's wife! What have I done to offend her? Oh, Aunt Lambert, Aunt Lambert, did you ever see such cold-heartedness?” cries out Harry, with his usual impetuosity.

“Do we make any difference to you, my dear Harry?” says Aunt Lambert, with a side look at her youngest daughter. “The world may look coldly at you, but we don't belong to it: so you may come to us in safety.”

“In this house you are different from other people,” replies Harry. “I don't know how, but I always feel quiet and happy somehow when I come to you.”

calls out General Lambert. “Do you know where I got these verses, Mr. Gownsman?” and he addresses his son from college, who is come to pass an Easter holiday with his parents. “You got them out of Catullus, sir,” says the scholar.

“I got them out of no such thing, sir. I got them out of my favourite Democritus Junior—out of old Burton, who has provided many indifferent scholars with learning;” and who and Montaigne, were favourite authors with the good General.

CHAPTER LVIII. Where we do what Cats may do

We have said how our Virginians, with a wisdom not uncommon in youth, had chosen to adopt strong Jacobite opinions, and to profess a prodigious affection for the exiled royal family. The banished prince had recognised Madam Esmond's father as Marquis of Esmond, and she did not choose to be very angry with an unfortunate race, that, after all, was so willing to acknowledge the merits of her family. As for any little scandal about her sister, Madame de Bernstein, and the Old Chevalier, she tossed away from her with scorn the recollection of that odious circumstance, asserting, with perfect truth, that the two first monarchs of the House of Hanover were quite as bad as any Stuarts in regard to their domestic morality. But the king de facto was the king, as well as his Majesty de jure. De Facto had been solemnly crowned and anointed at church, and had likewise utterly discomfited De Jure, when they came to battle for the kingdom together. Madam's clear opinion was, then, that her sons owed it to themselves as well as the sovereign to appear at his royal court. And if his Majesty should have been minded to confer a lucrative post, or a blue or red ribbon upon either of them, she, for her part, would not have been in the least surprised. She made no doubt but that the King knew the Virginian Esmonds as well as any other members of his nobility. The lads were specially commanded, then, to present themselves at court, and, I dare say, their mother would have been very angry had she known that George took Harry's laced coat on the day when he went to make his bow at Kensington.

A hundred years ago the King's drawing-room was open almost every day to his nobility and gentry; and loyalty—especially since the war had begun—could gratify itself a score of times in a month with the august sight of the sovereign. A wise avoidance of the enemy's ships of war, a gracious acknowledgment of the inestimable loss the British Isles would suffer by the seizure of the royal person at sea, caused the monarch to forgo those visits to his native Hanover which were so dear to his royal heart, and compelled him to remain, it must be owned, unwillingly amongst his loving Britons. A Hanoverian lady, however, whose virtues had endeared her to the prince, strove to console him for his enforced absence from Herrenhausen. And from the lips of the Countess of Walmoden (on whom the imperial beneficence had gracefully conferred a high title of British honour) the revered Defender of the Faith could hear the accents of his native home.

To this beloved Sovereign, Mr. Warrington requested his uncle, an assiduous courtier, to present him; and as Mr. Lambert had to go to court likewise, and thank his Majesty for his promotion, the two gentlemen made the journey to Kensington together, engaging a hackney-coach for the purpose, as my Lord Wrotham's carriage was now wanted by its rightful owner, who had returned to his house in town. They alighted at Kensington Palace Gate, where the sentries on duty knew and saluted the good General, and hence modestly made their way on foot to the summer residence of the sovereign. Walking under the portico of the Palace, they entered the gallery which leads to the great black marble staircase (which hath been so richly decorated and painted by Mr. Kent), and then passed through several rooms, richly hung with tapestry and adorned with pictures and bustos, until they came to the King's great drawing-room, where that famous “Venus” by Titian is, and, amongst other masterpieces, the picture of “St. Francis adoring the infant Saviour,” performed by Sir Peter Paul Rubens; and here, with the rest of the visitors to the court, the gentlemen waited until his Majesty issued from his private apartments, where he was in conference with certain personages who were called in the newspaper language of that day his M-j-ty's M-n-st-rs.

George Warrington, who had never been in a palace before, had leisure to admire the place, and regard the people round him. He saw fine pictures for the first time too, and I dare say delighted in that charming piece of Sir Athony Vandyck, representing King Charles the First, his Queen and Family, and the noble picture of “Esther before Ahasuerus,” painted by Tintoret, and in which all the figures are dressed in the magnificent Venetian habit. With the contemplation of these works he was so enraptured, that he scarce heard all the remarks of his good friend the General, who was whispering into his young companion's almost heedless ear the names of some of the personages round about them.

“Yonder,” says Mr. Lambert, “are two of my Lords of the Admiralty, Mr. Gilbert Elliot and Admiral Boscawen: your Boscawen, whose fleet fired the first gun in your waters two years ago. That stout gentleman all belated with gold is Mr. Fox, that was Minister, and is now content to be Paymaster with a great salary.

“He carries the auri fames on his person. Why, his waistcoat is a perfect Potosi!” says George.

“Aliena appetens—how goes the text? He loves to get money and to spend it,” continues General Lambert. “Yon is my Lord Chief Justice Willes, talking to my Lord of Salisbury, Doctor Headley, who, if he serve his God as he serves his King, will be translated to some very high promotion in Heaven. He belongs to your grandfather's time, and was loved by Dick Steele and hated by the Dean. With them is my Lord of London, the learned Doctor Sherlock. My lords of the lawn sleeves have lost half their honours now. I remember when I was a boy in my mother's hand, she made me go down on my knees to the Bishop of Rochester; him who went over the water, and became Minister to somebody who shall be nameless—Perkin's Bishop. That handsome fair man is Admiral Smith. He was president of poor Byng's court-martial, and strove in vain to get him off his penalty; Tom of Ten Thousand they call him in the fleet. The French Ambassador had him broke, when he was a lieutenant, for making a French man-of-war lower topsails to him, and the King made Tom a captain the next day. That tall, haughty-looking man is my Lord George Sackville, who, now I am a Major-General myself, will treat me somewhat better than a footman. I wish my stout old Blakeney were here; he is the soldier's darling, and as kind and brave as yonder poker of a nobleman is brave and—I am your lordship's very humble servant. This is a young gentleman who is just from America, and was in Braddock's sad business two years ago.”

“Oh, indeed!” says the poker of a nobleman. “I have the honour of speaking to Mr.——?”

“To Major-General Lambert, at your lordship's service, and who was in his Majesty's some time before you entered it. That, Mr. Warrington, is the first commoner in England, Mr. Speaker Onslow. Where is your uncle? I shall have to present you myself to his Majesty if Sir Miles delays much longer.” As he spoke, the worthy General addressed himself entirely to his young friend, making no sort of account of his colleague, who stalked away with a scared look as if amazed at the other's audacity. A hundred years ago, a nobleman was a nobleman, and expected to be admired as such.

Sir Miles's red waistcoat appeared in sight presently, and many cordial greetings passed between him, his nephew, and General Lambert: for we have described how Sir Miles was the most affectionate of men. So the General had quitted my Lord Wrotham's house? It was time, as his lordship himself wished to occupy it? Very good; but consider what a loss for the neighbours!

“We miss you, we positively miss you, my dear General,” cries Sir Miles. “My daughters were in love with those lovely young ladies—upon my word, they were; and my Lady Warrington and my girls were debating over and over again how they should find an opportunity of making the acquaintance of your charming family. We feel as if we were old friends already; indeed we do, General, if you will permit me the liberty of saying so; and we love you, if I may be allowed to speak frankly, on account of your friendship and kindness to our dear nephews: though we were a little jealous, I own a little jealous of them, because they went so often to see you. Often and often have I said to my Lady Warrington, 'My dear, why don't we make acquaintance with the General? Why don't we ask him and his ladies to come over in a family way and dine with some other plain country gentlefolks?' Carry my most sincere respects to Mrs. Lambert, I pray, sir; and thank her for her goodness to these young gentlemen. My own flesh and blood, sir; my dear, dear brother's boys!” He passed his hand across his manly eyes: he was choking almost with generous and affectionate emotion.

Whilst they were discoursing—George Warrington the while restraining his laughter with admirable gravity—the door of the King's apartments opened, and the pages entered, preceding his Majesty. He was followed by his burly son, his Royal Highness the Duke, a very corpulent Prince, with a coat and face of blazing scarlet: behind them came various gentlemen and officers of state; among whom George at once recognised the famous Mr. Secretary Pitt, by his tall stature, his eagle eye and beak, his grave and majestic presence. As I see that solemn figure passing, even a hundred years off, I protest I feel a present awe, and a desire to take my hat off. I am not frightened at George the Second; nor are my eyes dazzled by the portentous appearance of his Royal Highness the Duke of Culloden and Fontenoy; but the Great Commoner, the terrible Cornet of Horse! His figure bestrides our narrow isle of a century back like a Colossus; and I hush as he passes in his gouty shoes, his thunderbolt hand wrapped in flannel. Perhaps as we see him now, issuing with dark looks from the royal closet, angry scenes have been passing between him and his august master. He has been boring that old monarch for hours with prodigious long speeches, full of eloquence, voluble with the noblest phrases upon the commonest topics; but, it must be confessed, utterly repulsive to the little shrewd old gentleman, “at whose feet he lays himself,” as the phrase is, and who has the most thorough dislike for fine boedry and for fine brose too! The sublime Minister passes solemnly through the crowd; the company ranges itself respectfully round the wall; and his Majesty walks round the circle, his royal son lagging a little behind, and engaging select individuals in conversation for his own part.

The monarch is a little, keen, fresh-coloured old man, with very protruding eyes, attired in plain, old-fashioned, snuff-coloured clothes and brown stockings, his only ornament the blue ribbon of his Order of the Garter. He speaks in a German accent, but with ease, shrewdness, and simplicity, addressing those individuals whom he has a mind to notice, or passing on with a bow. He knew Mr. Lambert well, who had served under his Majesty at Dettingen, and with his royal son in Scotland, and he congratulated him good-humouredly on his promotion.

“It is not always,” his Majesty was pleased to say, “that we can do as we like; but I was glad when, for once, I could give myself that pleasure in your case, General; for my army contains no better officer as you.”

The veteran blushed and bowed, deeply gratified at this speech. Meanwhile, the Best of Monarchs was looking at Sir Miles Warrington (whom his Majesty knew perfectly, as the eager recipient of all favours from all Ministers), and at the young gentleman by his side.

“Who is this?” the Defender of the Faith condescended to ask, pointing towards George Warrington, who stood before his sovereign in a respectful attitude, clad in poor Harry's best embroidered suit.

With the deepest reverence Sir Miles informed his King, that the young gentleman was his nephew, Mr. George Warrington, of Virginia, who asked leave to pay his humble duty.

“This, then, is the other brother?” the Venerated Prince deigned to observe. “He came in time, else the other brother would have spent all the money. My Lord Bishop of Salisbury, why do you come out in this bitter weather? You had much better stay at home!” and with this, the revered wielder of Britannia's sceptre passed on to other lords and gentlemen of his court. Sir Miles Warrington was deeply affected at the royal condescension. He clapped his nephew's hands. “God bless you, my boy,” he cried; “I told you that you would see the greatest monarch and the finest gentleman in the world. Is he not so, my Lord Bishop?”

“That, that he is!” cried his lordship, clasping his ruffled hands, and turning his fine eyes up to the sky, “the best of princes and of men.”

“That is Master Louis, my Lady Yarmouth's favourite nephew,” says Lambert, pointing to a young gentleman who stood with a crowd round him; and presently the stout Duke of Cumberland came up to our little group.

His Royal Highness held out his hand to his old companion-in-arms. “Congratulate you on your promotion, Lambert,” he said good-naturedly. Sir Miles Warrington's eyes were ready to burst out of his head with rapture.

“I owe it, sir, to your Royal Highness's good offices,” said the grateful General.

“Not at all; not at all: ought to have had it a long time before. Always been a good officer; perhaps there'll be some employment for you soon. This is the gentleman whom James Wolfe introduced to me?”

“His brother, sir.”

“Oh, the real Fortunate Youth! You were with poor Ned Braddock in America—a prisoner, and lucky enough to escape. Come and see me, sir, in Pall Mall. Bring him to my levee, Lambert.” And the broad back of the Royal Prince was turned to our friends.

“It is raining! You came on foot, General Lambert? You and George must come home in my coach. You must and shall come home with me, I say. By George, you must! I'll have no denial,” cried the enthusiastic Baronet; and he drove George and the General back to Hill Street, and presented the latter to my Lady Warrington and his darlings, Flora and Dora, and insisted upon their partaking of a collation, as they must be hungry after their ride. “What, there is only cold mutton? Well, an old soldier can eat cold mutton. And a good glass of my Lady Warrington's own cordial, prepared with her own hands, will keep the cold wind out. Delicious cordial! Capital mutton! Our own, my dear General,” says the hospitable Baronet, “our own from the country, six years old if a day. We keep a plain table; but all the Warringtons since the Conqueror have been remarkable for their love of mutton; and our meal may look a little scanty, and is, for we are plain people, and I am obliged to keep my rascals of servants on board-wages. Can't give them seven-year-old mutton, you know.”

Sir Miles, in his nephew's presence and hearing, described to his wife and daughters George's reception at court in such flattering terms that George hardly knew himself, or the scene at which he had been present, or how to look his uncle in the face, or how to contradict him before his family in the midst of the astonishing narrative he was relating. Lambert sat by for a while with open eyes. He, too, had been at Kensington. He had seen none of the wonders which Sir Miles described.

“We are proud of you, dear George. We love you, my dear nephew—we all love you, we are all proud of you—”

“Yes; but I like Harry best,” says a little voice.

“—not because you are wealthy! Screwby, take Master Miles to his governor. Go, dear child. Not because you are blest with great estates and an ancient name; but because, George, you have put to good use the talents with which Heaven has adorned you; because you have fought and bled in your country's cause, in your monarch's cause, and as such are indeed worthy of the favour of the best of sovereigns. General Lambert, you have kindly condescended to look in on a country family, and partake of our unpretending meal. I hope we may see you some day when our hospitality is a little less homely. Yes, by George, General, you must and shall name a day when you and Mrs. Lambert, and your dear girls, will dine with us. I'll take no refusal now, by George I won't,” bawls the knight.

“You will accompany us, I trust, to my drawing-room?” says my lady, rising.

Mr. Lambert pleaded to be excused; but the ladies on no account would let dear George go away. No, positively, he should not go. They wanted to make acquaintance with their cousin. They must hear about that dreadful battle and escape from the Indians. Tom Claypool came in and heard some of the story. Flora was listening to it with her handkerchief to her eyes, and little Miles had just said—

“Why do you take your handkerchief, Flora? You're not crying a bit.”

Being a man of great humour, Martin Lambert, when he went home, could not help entertaining his wife with an account of the new family with which he had made acquaintance. A certain cant word called humbug had lately come into vogue. Will it be believed that the General used it to designate the family of this virtuous country gentleman? He described the eager hospitalities of the father, the pompous flatteries of the mother, and the daughters' looks of admiration; the toughness and security of the mutton, and the abominable taste and odour of the cordial; and we may be sure Mrs. Lambert contrasted Lady Warrington's recent behaviour to poor Harry with her present conduct to George.

“Is this Miss Warrington really handsome?” asks Mrs Lambent.

“Yes; she is very handsome indeed, and the most astounding flirt I have ever set eyes on,” replies the General.

“The hypocrite! I have no patience with such people!” cries the lady.

To which the General, strange to say, only replied by the monosyllable “Bo!”

“Why do you say 'Bo!' Martin?” asks the lady.

“I say 'Bo!' to a goose, my dear,” answers the General.

And his wife vows she does not know what he means, or of what he is thinking, and the General says—

“Of course not.”

CHAPTER LIX. In which we are treated to a Play

The real business of life, I fancy, can form but little portion of the novelist's budget. When he is speaking of the profession of arms, in which men can show courage or the reverse, and in treating of which the writer naturally has to deal with interesting circumstances, actions, and characters, introducing recitals of danger, devotedness, heroic deaths, and the like, the novelist may perhaps venture to deal with actual affairs of life: but otherwise, they scarcely can enter into our stories. The main part of Ficulnus's life, for instance, is spent in selling sugar, spices and cheese; of Causidicus's in poring over musty volumes of black-letter law; of Sartorius's in sitting, cross-legged, on a board after measuring gentlemen for coats and breeches. What can a story-teller say about the professional existence of these men? Would a real rustical history of hobnails and eighteenpence a day be endurable? In the days whereof we are writing, the poets of the time chose to represent a shepherd in pink breeches and a chintz waistcoat, dancing before his flocks, and playing a flageolet tied up with a blue satin ribbon. I say, in reply to some objections which have been urged by potent and friendly critics, that of the actual affairs of life the novelist cannot be expected to treat—with the almost single exception of war before named. But law, stockbroking, polemical theology, linen-drapery, apothecary-business, and the like, how can writers manage fully to develop these in their stories? All authors can do, is to depict men out of their business—in their passions, loves, laughters, amusements, hatreds, and what not—and describe these as well as they can, taking the business part for granted, and leaving it as it were for subaudition.

Thus, in talking of the present or the past world, I know I am only dangling about the theatre-lobbies, coffee-houses, ridottos, pleasure-haunts, fair-booths, and feasting- and fiddling-rooms of life; that, meanwhile, the great serious past or present world is plodding in its chambers, toiling at its humdrum looms, or jogging on its accustomed labours, and we are only seeing our characters away from their work. Corydon has to cart the litter and thresh the barley, as well as to make love to Phillis; Ancillula has to dress and wash the nursery, to wait at breakfast and on her misses, to take the children out, etc., before she can have her brief sweet interview through the area-railings with Boopis, the policeman. All day long have his heels to beat the stale pavement before he has the opportunity to snatch the hasty kiss or the furtive cold pie. It is only at moments, and away from these labours, that we can light upon one character or the other; and hence, though most of the persons of whom we are writing have doubtless their grave employments and avocations, it is only when they are disengaged and away from their work, that we can bring them and the equally disengaged reader together.

The macaronis and fine gentlemen at White's and Arthur's continued to show poor Harry Warrington such a very cold shoulder, that he sought their society less and less, and the Ring and the Mall and the gaming-table knew him no more. Madame de Bernstein was for her nephew's braving the indifference of the world, and vowed that it would be conquered, if he would but have courage to face it; but the young man was too honest to wear a smiling face when he was discontented; to disguise mortification or anger; to parry slights by adroit flatteries or cunning impudence; as many gentlemen and gentlewomen must and do who wish to succeed in society.

“You pull a long face, Harry, and complain of the world's treatment of you,” the old lady said. “Fiddlededee, sir! Everybody has to put up with impertinences: and if you get a box on the ear now you are poor and cast down, you must say nothing about it, bear it with a smile, and if you can, revenge it ten years after. Moi qui vous parle, sir!—do you suppose I have had no humble-pie to eat? All of us in our turn are called upon to swallow it: and, now you are no longer the Fortunate Youth, be the Clever Youth, and win back the place you have lost by your ill luck. Go about more than ever. Go to all the routs and parties to which you are asked, and to more still. Be civil to everybody—to all women especially. Only of course take care to show your spirit, of which you have plenty. With economy, and by your brother's, I must say, admirable generosity, you can still make a genteel figure. With your handsome person, sir, you can't fail to get a rich heiress. Tenez! You should go amongst the merchants in the City, and look out there. They won't know that you are out of fashion at the Court end of the town. With a little management, there is not the least reason, sir, why you should not make a good position for yourself still. When did you go to see my Lady Yarmouth, pray? Why did you not improve that connexion? She took a great fancy to you. I desire you will be constant at her ladyship's evenings, and lose no opportunity of paying court to her.”

Thus the old woman who had loved Harry so on his first appearance in England, who had been so eager for his company, and pleased with his artless conversation, was taking the side of the world, and turning against him. Instead of the smiles and kisses with which the fickle old creature used once to greet him, she received him with coldness; she became peevish and patronising; she cast gibes and scorn at him before her guests, making his honest face flush with humiliation, and awaking the keenest pangs of grief and amazement in his gentle, manly heart. Madame de Bernstein's servants, who used to treat him with such eager respect, scarcely paid him now any attention. My lady was often indisposed or engaged when he called on her; her people did not press him to wait; did not volunteer to ask whether he would stay and dine, as they used in the days when he was the Fortunate Youth and companion of the wealthy and great. Harry carried his woes to Mrs. Lambert. In a passion of sorrow he told her of his aunt's cruel behaviour to him. He was stricken down and dismayed by the fickleness and heartlessness of the world in its treatment of him. While the good lady and her daughters would move to and fro, and busy themselves with the cares of the house, our poor lad would sit glum in a window-seat, heart-sick and silent.

“I know you are the best people alive,” he would say to the ladies, “and the kindest, and that I must be the dullest company in the world—yes, that I am.”

“Well, you are not very lively, Harry,” says Miss Hetty, who began to command him, and perhaps to ask herself, “What? Is this the gentleman whom I took to be such a hero?”

“If he is unhappy, why should he be lively?” asks Theo, gently. “He has a good heart, and is pained at his friends' desertion of him. Sure there is no harm in that?”

“I would have too much spirit to show I was hurt, though,” cries Hetty, clenching her little fists. “And I would smile, though that horrible old painted woman boxed my ears. She is horrible, mamma. You think so yourself, Theo! Own, now, you think so yourself! You said so last night, and acted her coming in on her crutch, and grinning round to the company.”

“I mayn't like her,” said Theo, turning very red. “But there is no reason why I should call Harry's aunt names before Harry's face.”

“You provoking thing; you are always right!” cries Hetty, “and that's what makes me so angry. Indeed, Harry, it was very wrong of me to make rude remarks about any of your relations.”

“I don't care about the others, Hetty; but it seems hard that this one should turn upon me. I had got to be very fond of her; and you see, it makes me mad, somehow, when people I'm very fond of turn away from me, or act unkind to me.”

“Suppose George were to do so?” asks Hetty. You see, it was George and Hetty, and Theo and Harry, amongst them now.

“You are very clever and very lively, and you may suppose a number of things; but not that, Hetty, if you please,” cried Harry, standing up and looking very resolute and angry. “You don't know my brother as I know him—or you wouldn't take—such a—liberty as to suppose—my brother George could do anything unkind or unworthy!” Mr. Harry was quite in a flush as he spoke.

Hetty turned very white. Then she looked up at Harry, and then she did not say a single word.

Then Harry said, in his simple way, before taking leave, “I'm very sorry, and I beg your pardon, Hetty, if I said anything rough, or that seemed unkind; but I always fight up if anybody says anything against George.”

Hetty did not answer a word out of her pale lips, but gave him her hand, and dropped a prim little curtsey.

When she and Theo were together at night, making curl-paper confidences, “Oh!” said Hetty, “I thought it would be so happy to see him every day, and was so glad when papa said we were to stay in London! And now I do see him, you see, I go on offending him. I can't help offending him; and I know he is not clever, Theo. But oh! isn't he good, and kind, and brave? Didn't he look handsome when he was angry?”

“You silly little thing, you are always trying to make him look handsome,” Theo replied.

It was Theo and Hetty, and Harry and George, among these young people, then; and I dare say the reason why General Lambert chose to apply the monosyllable “Bo” to the mother of his daughters, was as a rebuke to that good woman for the inveterate love of sentiment and propensity to match-making which belonged to her (and every other woman in the world whose heart is worth a fig); and as a hint that Madam Lambert was a goose if she fancied the two Virginian lads were going to fall in love with the young women of the Lambert house. Little Het might have her fancy; little girls will; but they get it over: “and you know, Molly” (which dear, soft-hearted Mrs. Lambert could not deny), “you fancied somebody else before you fancied me,” says the General; but Harry had evidently not been smitten by Hetty; and now he was superseded, as it were, by having an elder brother over him, and could not even call the coat upon his back his own, Master Harry was no great catch.

“Oh yes: now he is poor we will show him the door, as all the rest of the world does, I suppose,” says Mrs. Lambert.

“That is what I always do, isn't it, Molly? turn my back on my friends in distress?” asks the General.

“No, my dear! I am a goose, now, and that I own, Martin!” says the wife, having recourse to the usual pocket-handkerchief.

“Let the poor boy come to us and welcome: ours is almost the only house in this selfish place where so much can be said for him. He is unhappy, and to be with us puts him at ease; in God's name let him be with us!” says the kind-hearted officer. Accordingly, whenever poor crestfallen Hal wanted a dinner, or an evening's entertainment, Mr. Lambert's table had a corner for him. So was George welcome, too. He went among the Lamberts, not at first with the cordiality which Harry felt for these people, and inspired among them: for George was colder in his manner, and more mistrustful of himself and others than his twin-brother: but there was a goodness and friendliness about the family which touched almost all people who came into frequent contact with them; and George soon learned to love them for their own sake, as well as for their constant regard and kindness to his brother. He could not but see and own how sad Harry was, and pity his brother's depression. In his sarcastic way, George would often take himself to task before his brother for coming to life again, and say, “Dear Harry, I am George the Unlucky, though you have ceased to be Harry the Fortunate. Florac would have done much better not to pass his sword through that Indian's body, and to have left my scalp as an ornament for the fellow's belt. I say he would, sir! At White's the people would have respected you. Our mother would have wept over me, as a defunct angel, instead of being angry with me for again supplanting her favourite—you are her favourite, you deserve to be her favourite: everybody's favourite: only, if I had not come back, your favourite, Maria, would have insisted on marrying you; and that is how the gods would have revenged themselves upon you for your prosperity.”

“I never know whether you are laughing at me or yourself, George” says the brother. I never know whether you are serious or jesting.

“Precisely my own case, Harry, my dear!” says George.

“But this I know, that there never was a better brother in the world; and never better people than the Lamberts.”

“Never was truer word said!” cries George, taking his brother's hand.

“And if I'm unhappy, 'tis not your fault—nor their fault—nor perhaps mine, George,” continues the younger. “'Tis fate, you see, 'tis the having nothing to do. I must work; and how, George? that is the question.”

“We will see what our mother says. We must wait till we hear from her,” says George.

“I say, George! Do you know, I don't think I should much like going back to Virginia?” says Harry, in a low, alarmed voice.

“What! in love with one of the lasses here?”

“Love 'em like sisters—with all my heart, of course, dearest, best girls! but, having come out of that business, thanks to you, I don't want to go back, you know. No! no! It is not for that I fancy staying in Europe better than going home. But, you see, I don't fancy hunting, duck-shooting, tobacco-planting, whist-playing, and going to sermon, over and over and over again, for all my life, George. And what else is there to do at home? What on earth is there for me to do at all, I say? That's what makes me miserable. It would not matter for you to be a younger son you are so clever you would make your way anywhere; but, for a poor fellow like me, what chance is there? Until I do something, George, I shall be miserable, that's what I shall!”

“Have I not always said so? Art thou not coming round to my opinion?”

“What opinion, George? You know pretty much whatever you think, I think, George!” says the dutiful junior.

“That Florac had best have left the Indian to take my scalp, my dear!”

At which Harry bursts away with an angry exclamation; and they continue to puff their pipes in friendly union.

They lived together, each going his own gait; and not much intercourse, save that of affection, was carried on between them. Harry never would venture to meddle with George's books, and would sit as dumb as a mouse at the lodgings whilst his brother was studying. They removed presently from the Court end of the town, Madame de Bernstein pishing and pshaing at their change of residence. But George took a great fancy to frequenting Sir Hans Sloane's new reading-room and museum, just set up in Montagu House, and he took cheerful lodgings in Southampton Row, Bloomsbury, looking over the delightful fields towards Hampstead, at the back of the Duke of Bedford's gardens. And Lord Wrotham's family coming to Mayfair, and Mr. Lambert having business which detained him in London, had to change his house, too, and engaged furnished apartments in Soho, not very far off from the dwelling of our young men; and it was, as we have said, with the Lamberts that Harry, night after night, took refuge.

George was with them often, too; and, as the acquaintance ripened, he frequented their house with increasing assiduity, finding their company more to his taste than that of Aunt Bernstein's polite circle of gamblers, than Sir Miles Warrington's port and mutton, or the daily noise and clatter of the coffee-houses. And as he and the Lambert ladies were alike strangers in London, they partook of its pleasures together, and, no doubt, went to Vauxhall and Ranelagh, to Marybone Gardens, and the play, and the Tower, and wherever else there was honest amusement to be had in those days. Martin Lambert loved that his children should have all the innocent pleasure which he could procure for them, and Mr. George, who was of a most generous, open-handed disposition, liked to treat his friends likewise, especially those who had been so admirably kind to his brother.

With all the passion of his heart Mr. Warrington loved a play. He had never enjoyed this amusement in Virginia, and only once or twice at Quebec, when he visited Canada; and when he came to London, where the two houses were in their full glory, I believe he thought he never could have enough of the delightful entertainment. Anything he liked himself, he naturally wished to share amongst his companions. No wonder that he was eager to take his friends to the theatre, and we may be sure our young countryfolks were not unwilling. Shall it be Drury Lane or Covent Garden, ladies? There was Garrick and Shakspeare at Drury Lane. Well, will it be believed, the ladies wanted to hear the famous new author whose piece was being played at Covent Garden?

At this time a star of genius had arisen, and was blazing with quite a dazzling brilliancy. The great Mr. John Home, of Scotland, had produced a tragedy, than which, since the days of the ancients, there had been nothing more classic and elegant. What had Mr. Garrick meant by refusing such a masterpiece for his theatre? Say what you will about Shakspeare; in the works of that undoubted great poet (who had begun to grow vastly more popular in England since Monsieur Voltaire attacked him) there were many barbarisms that could not but shock a polite auditory; whereas, Mr. Home, the modern author, knew how to be refined in the very midst of grief and passion; to represent death, not merely as awful, but graceful and pathetic; and never condescended to degrade the majesty of the Tragic Muse by the ludicrous apposition of buffoonery and familiar punning, such as the elder playwright certainly had resort to. Besides, Mr. Home's performance had been admired in quarters so high, and by personages whose taste was known to be as elevated as their rank, that all Britons could not but join in the plaudits for which august hands had given the signal. Such, it was said, was the opinion of the very best company, in the coffee-houses, and amongst the wits about town. Why, the famous Mr. Gray, of Cambridge, said there had not been for a hundred years any dramatic dialogue of such a true style; and as for the poet's native capital of Edinburgh, where the piece was first brought out, it was even said that the triumphant Scots called out from the pit (in their dialect), “Where's Wully Shakspeare noo?”

“I should like to see the man who could beat Willy Shakspeare?” says the General, laughing.

“Mere national prejudice,” says Mr. Warrington.

“Beat Shakspeare, indeed!” cries Mrs. Lambert.

“Pooh, pooh! you have cried more over Mr. Sam Richardson than ever you did over Mr. Shakspeare, Molly!” remarks the General. “I think few women love to read Shakspeare: they say they love it, but they don't.”

“Oh, papa!” cry three ladies, throwing up three pair of hands.

“Well, then, why do you all three prefer Douglas? And you, boys, who are such Tories, will you go see a play which is wrote by a Whig Scotchman, who was actually made prisoner at Falkirk?”

“Relicta non bene parmula,” says Mr. Jack the scholar.

“Nay; it was relicta bene parmula,” cried the General. “It was the Highlanders who flung their targes down, and made fierce work among us redcoats. If they had fought all their fields as well as that, and young Perkin had not turned back from Derby——”

“I know which side would be rebels, and who would be called the Young Pretender,” interposed George.

“Hush! you must please to remember my cloth, Mr. Warrington,” said the General, with some gravity; “and that the cockade I wear is a black, not a white one! Well, if you will not love Mr. Home for his politics, there is, I think, another reason, George, why you should like him.”

“I may have Tory fancies, Mr. Lambert, but I think I know how to love and honour a good Whig,” said George, with a bow to the General: “but why should I like this Mr. Home, sir?”

“Because, being a Presbyterian clergyman, he has committed the heinous crime of writing a play, and his brother-parsons have barked out an excommunication at him. They took the poor fellow's means of livelihood away from him for his performance; and he would have starved, but that the young Pretender on our side of the water has given him a pension.”

“If he has been persecuted by the parsons, there is hope for him,” said George, smiling. “And henceforth I declare myself ready to hear his sermons.”

“Mrs. Woffington is divine in it, though not generally famous in tragedy. Barry is drawing tears from all eyes; and Garrick is wild at having refused the piece. Girls, you must bring each half a dozen handkerchiefs! As for mamma, I cannot trust her; and she positively must be left at home.”

But mamma persisted she would go; and, if need were to weep, she would sit and cry her eyes out in a corner. They all went to Covent Garden, then; the most of the party duly prepared to see one of the masterpieces of the age and drama. Could they not all speak long pages of Congreve; had they not wept and kindled over Otway and Rowe? O ye past literary glories, that were to be eternal, how long have you been dead? Who knows much more now than where your graves are? Poor, neglected Muse of the bygone theatre! She pipes for us, and we will not dance; she tears her hair, and we will not weep. And the Immortals of our time, how soon shall they be dead and buried, think you? How many will survive? How long shall it be ere Nox et Domus Plutonia shall overtake them?

So away went the pleased party to Covent Garden to see the tragedy of the immortal John Home. The ladies and the General were conveyed in a glass coach, and found the young men in waiting to receive them at the theatre door. Hence they elbowed their way through a crowd of torch-boys, and a whole regiment of footmen. Little Hetty fell to Harry's arm in this expedition, and the blushing Miss Theo was handed to the box by Mr. George. Gumbo had kept the places until his masters arrived, when he retired, with many bows, to take his own seat in the footman's gallery. They had good places in a front box, and there was luckily a pillar behind which mamma could weep in comfort. And opposite them they had the honour to see the august hope of the empire, his Royal Highness George Prince of Wales, with the Princess Dowager his mother, whom the people greeted with loyal, but not very enthusiastic, plaudits. That handsome man standing behind his Royal Highness was my Lord Bute, the Prince's Groom of the Stole, the patron of the poet whose performance they had come to see, and over whose work the Royal party had already wept more than once.

How can we help it, if during the course of the performance, Mr. Lambert would make his jokes and mar the solemnity of the scene? At first, as the reader of the tragedy well knows, the characters are occupied in making a number of explanations. Lady Randolph explains how it is that she is so melancholy. Married to Lord Randolph somewhat late in life, she owns, and his lordship perceives, that a dead lover yet occupies all her heart; and her husband is fain to put up with this dismal, second-hand regard, which is all that my lady can bestow. Hence, an invasion of Scotland by the Danes is rather a cause of excitement than disgust to my lord, who rushes to meet the foe, and forgets the dreariness of his domestic circumstances. Welcome, Vikings and Norsemen! Blow, northern blasts, the invaders' keels to Scotland's shore! Randolph and other heroes will be on the beach to give the foemen a welcome! His lordship has no sooner disappeared behind the trees of the forest, but Lady Randolph begins to explain to her confidante the circumstances of her early life. The fact was, she had made a private marriage, and what would the confidante say, if, in early youth, she, Lady Randolph, had lost a husband? In the cold bosom of the earth was lodged the husband of her youth, and in some cavern of the ocean lies her child and his!

Up to this the General behaved with as great gravity as any of his young companions to the play; but when Lady Randolph proceeded to say, “Alas! Hereditary evil was the cause of my misfortunes,” he nudged George Warrington, and looked so droll, that the young man burst out laughing.

The magic of the scene was destroyed after that. These two gentlemen went on cracking jokes during the whole of the subsequent performance, to their own amusement, but the indignation of their company, and perhaps of the people in the adjacent boxes. Young Douglas, in those days, used to wear a white satin “shape” slashed at the legs and body, and when Mr. Barry appeared in this droll costume, the General vowed it was the exact dress of the Highlanders in the late war. The Chevalier's Guard, he declared, had all white satin slashed breeches, and red boots—“only they left them at home, my dear,” adds this wag. Not one pennyworth of sublimity would he or George allow henceforth to Mr. Home's performance. As for Harry, he sate in very deep meditation over the scene; and when Mrs. Lambert offered him a penny for his thoughts, he said, “That he thought, Young Norval, Douglas, What-d'ye-call-'em, the fellow in white satin—who looked as old as his mother—was very lucky to be able to distinguish himself so soon. I wish I could get a chance, Aunt Lambert,” says he, drumming on his hat; on which mamma sighed, and Theo, smiling, said, “We must wait, and perhaps the Danes will land.”

“How do you mean?” asks simple Harry.

“Oh, the Danes always land, pour qui scait attendre!” says kind Theo, who had hold of her sister's little hand, and, I dare say, felt its pressure.

She did not behave unkindly—that was not in Miss Theo's nature—but somewhat coldly to Mr. George, on whom she turned her back, addressing remarks, from time to time, to Harry. In spite of the gentlemen's scorn, the women chose to be affected. A mother and son, meeting in love and parting in tears, will always awaken emotion in female hearts.

“Look, papa! there is an answer to all your jokes!” says Theo, pointing towards the stage.

At a part of the dialogue between Lady Randolph and her son, one of the grenadiers on guard on each side of the stage, as the custom of those days was, could not restrain his tears, and was visibly weeping before the side-box.

“You are right, my dear,” says papa.

“Didn't I tell you she always is?” interposes Hetty.

“Yonder sentry is a better critic than we are, and a touch of nature masters us all.”

“Tamen usque recurrit!” cries the young student from college.

George felt abashed somehow, and interested too. He had been sneering, and Theo sympathising. Her kindness was better—nay, wiser—than his scepticism, perhaps. Nevertheless, when, at the beginning of the fifth act of the play, young Douglas, drawing his sword and looking up at the gallery, bawled out—