And when a young, affectionate girl is wailing for a parent, the voice of sorrow cannot be hushed, nor the tears dried, till grief has had its course, and time has cured the wounds now so excruciating, which ere long shall be healed over and forgotten. “Cousin Charlie,” boy-like, was more easily consoled; and although at intervals his kind aunt’s voice would seem to sound in his ears, and the sight of her work, her writing, or any other familiar object associated with herself would bring on a fresh accession of grief, yet in the society of Frank Hardingstone, and the anticipation of Uncle Baldwin’s arrival, he found objects to divert his thoughts, and direct them to that brilliant inheritance of the young, the golden future, which never shall arrive. He was, besides, a lad of a sanguine, imaginative disposition, and these are the spirits over which sorrow has least power. The more elastic the spring, the more easily it regains its position; and a sensitive organisation, after the first recoil, will rise uninjured from a shock that prostrates more material souls to the very dust.
Over the rest of the household came the reaction that invariably follows the first sensations of awe inspired by sudden death. There was an excitement not altogether unpleasing in the total derangement of plans, the uncertainty as to the future created amongst the domestics by the departure of their mistress. The butler knew he should have to account for his plate, and was busied with his spoons and his inventory; the footman speculated on the next place he should get, with “a family that spent nine months of the year in London”; the very “boy in buttons” thought more of his promotion than of the kind mistress who had housed, clothed, and fed him when a parish orphan. Gingham herself, that tender damsel, was occupied and excited about Miss Blanche’s mourning, and her own “breadths” of black and “depths” of crape usurped the place of unavailing regrets in a mind not calculated to contain many ideas at a time. Besides, the pleasure of “shopping,” inexplicable as it may appear to man’s perverted taste, is one which ravishes the female mind with an intense delight; and what with tradesmen’s condolences, the interminable fund of gossip created thereby, the comparing of patterns, the injunctions on all sides “not to give way,” and the visits to linen-drapers’ shops, we cannot but confess that Gingham’s spirits were surprisingly buoyant, considering the circumstance under which she swept those costly wares from their tempting counters. Tom Blacke, too, lost no time in assuring her of his sympathy.
“O, Miss Gingham,” said wily Tom, as he insisted on carrying a huge brown-paper parcel home for her, and led the way by a circuitous route along the beach, “O, Miss Gingham, what a shock for your affectionate natur’ and kindly ’eart! Yet sorrow becomes some people,” added Tom, reflectively, and glancing his dark eyes into Gingham’s muddy-looking face, as he offered her an arm.
“Go along with you, Mr. Blacke,” replied the sorrowing damsel, forgetful of her despondency for the moment, which emboldened him to proceed.
“You ought to have a home, Miss Gingham—you ought to have some one to attach yourself to—you that attaches everybody” (he ventured a squeeze, and the maiden did not withdraw the brown thread glove which rested on his arm; so Tom mixed it a little stronger)—“a ’onest man to depend on, and a family and such like.”
Tom flourished his arm along a line of imaginary olive branches, and Gingham represented that “she couldn’t think of such a thing.”
“Service isn’t for the likes of you, miss,” proceeded the tempter; “hindependence is fittest for beauty” (Tom peeped under the bonnet, and “found it,” as he expressed himself, “all serene”); “a cottage and content, and a ’eart that is ’umble may ’ope for it ’ere;” with which concluding words Mr. Blacke, who was an admirer of poetry, and believed with Moore that would be given to song “which gold could never buy,” imprinted a vigorous kiss on those not very tempting lips, and felt that the day was his own.
Ladies of mature charms are less easily taken aback by such advances than their inexperienced juniors. The position, even if new in practice, is by no means so in theory, and having often anticipated the attack, they are the more prepared to receive it when it arrives. Ere our lovers reached No. 9 he had called her by her Christian name, and “Rachel” had promised to think of it. As she closed the “area-gate” Gingham had given her heart away to a scamp. True, she was oldish, uglyish, wore brown thread gloves, and had a yellow skin; yet for all this she had a woman’s heart, and, like a very woman, gave it away to Tom Blacke without a return.
In good time General Bounce arrived, and took the command from Frank Hardingstone, with many gracious acknowledgments of his kindness. The General was a man of far too great importance to be introduced at the conclusion of a chapter. It is sufficient to say, that with military promptitude and decision (which generally means a disagreeable and abrupt method of doing a simple thing) he set the household in order, arranged the sad ceremony, over which he presided with proper gravity, packed Cousin Charlie off to his private tutor’s, paid the servants their wages, and settled the departure of himself and niece for his own residence.
Do we think ourselves of account in this our world?—do we think we shall be so missed and so regretted? Drop a stone into a pool, there is a momentary splash, a bubble on the surface, and circle after circle spreads, and widens and weakens, till all is still and smooth as though the water had never been disturbed; so it is with death. There is a funeral and crape and weeping, and “callings to inquire,” then the intelligence gets abroad amongst mere acquaintances and utter strangers, a line in the Times proclaims our decease to the world. Ere it has reached the colonies we are well-nigh forgotten at home.
Mrs. Kettering was at rest in her grave; the General was full of his arrangements and his responsibilities; Charlie was back amongst his mathematics and his cricket and his Greek and Latin; the servants were looking out for fresh places; and the life that had disappeared from the surface was forgotten by all. By all save one; for still Blanche was gazing on the waters and mourning for her mother.
NEWTON-HOLLOWS AND ITS GROUNDS—BACHELORS’ BILLETS—THE HEIRESS AND HER COMPANION—GENERAL BOUNCE—A GENTLEMAN FARMER—THE LADIES’ CLUB—A WOMAN’S IDEAL
In an unpretending corner of the “Guyville Guide and Midland Counties’ Directory” a few lines are devoted to inform the tourist that “Newton-Hollows, post-town Guyville, in the Hundred of Cow-capers, is the seat of Major-General Bounce, etc., etc., etc. The lover of the picturesque obtains, from the neighbourhood of this mansion, a magnificent view, comprising no less than seventeen churches, a vast expanse of wood and meadow-land, the distant spires of Bubbleton, and the imposing outline of the famous Castle Guy.” Doubtless all these beauties might have been conspicuous had the adventurous tourist chosen to climb one of the lofty elms with which the house was surrounded; but from the altitude of his own stature he was obliged to content himself with a far less extensive landscape, seeing that the country was closely wooded, and as flat as his hand. But Newton-Hollows was one of those sweet little places, self-contained and compact, that require no distant views, no shaggy scenery, no “rough heath and rugged wood,” to enhance their charm. Magnificent old timber, “the oak and the ash, and the bonny ivy tree,” to say nothing of elms and chestnuts, dotted the meadows and pastures in which the mansion was snugly ensconced. People driving up, or rather along, the level approach, were at a loss to make out where the farms ended and the park began. Well-kept lawns, that looked as if they were fresh mown every morning, swept up to the drawing-room windows, opening to the ground; not a leaf was strewn on sward or gravel; not a weed, nor even a daisy, permitted to show its modest head above the surface; and as for a rake, roller, or a gardener’s hat being left in a place where such instruments have no business, why, the General would have made the unfortunate delinquent eat it—rake, roller, or “wide-a-awake”—and discharged him besides on the spot. No wonder the flower-garden adjoining the conservatory, which again opened into the drawing-room, looked so trim and well-kept: “Master’s” hobby was a garden, and, though utterly ignorant of the names, natures, and treatment of plants, he liked to see every variety in his possession, and spared no expense on their cultivation; and so a head gardener and five subalterns carried off all the prizes at the Bubbleton and Guyville horticulturals; and the General complained that he could never get a nosegay for his table, nor a bit of fruit for his dessert fit to eat. Yet were there worse “billets” in this working world than Newton-Hollows. The Bubbleton “swells” and county dignitaries found it often “suit their hunting arrangements” to go, over-night, and dine with “old Bounce.” He would always “put up a hack for you,” than which no effort of hospitality makes a man more deservedly popular in a hunting country; and his dinners, his Indian dishes, his hot pickles, his dry champagne, his wonderful claret (“not a headache in a hogshead, sir,” the General would say, with a frown of defiance), were all in keeping with the snug, comfortable appearance of his dwelling, and the luxurious style which men who have served long in the army, and often been obliged to “rough it,” know so well how to enjoy. Then there was no pretension about the thing whatever. The house, though it ranged over a considerable extent of ground, particularly towards the offices, was only two storeys high—“a mere cottage,” its owner called it; but a cottage in which the apartments were all roomy and well-proportioned, in which enough “married couples could be put up” to furnish a very good-sized dinner-table, and the bachelors (we like to put in a word for our fellow-sufferers) were as comfortably accommodated as their more fortunate associates, who travelled with wives, imperials, cap-boxes, and ladies’-maids.
It is a bad plan to accustom unmarried gentlemen to think they can do without their comforts; it makes them hardy and independent, and altogether averse to the coddling and care and confinement with which they expect to find matrimony abound. As we go through the world, in our desolate celibacy, we see the net spread in sight of many a bird, and we generally remark, that the meshes which most surely entangle the game are those of self-indulgence and self-applause. You must gild the wires, and pop a lump of sugar between them too, if you would have the captive flutter willingly into the cage. When young Cœlebs comes home from hunting or shooting, and has to divest himself of his clammy leathers or dirt-encumbered gaiters in a room without a fire and with a cracked pane in the window, he takes no pleasure in his adornment, but hurries over his toilet, or perhaps begins to smoke. This should be avoided: we have known a quiet cigar do away with the whole effect of a bran-new pink bonnet. But if, on the contrary, he finds a warm, luxurious room, plenty of hot water, wax candles on the dressing-table, and a becoming looking-glass, the quarry lingers over the tie of its neckcloth with a pleasing conviction that that is not half a bad-looking fellow grinning opposite, and moreover that there is a “deuced lovable girl” down-stairs, who seems to be of the same opinion. So the thing works: vows are exchanged, trousseaux got ready, settlements drawn out, the lawyers thrive, and fools are multiplied. Had Newton-Hollows belonged to a designing matron, instead of an unmarried general officer, it might have become a perfect mart for the exchanges of beauty and valour. Hunting men are pretty usually a marrying race; whether it be from daily habits of recklessness, a bold disregard of the adage which advises “to look before you leap,” or a general thick-headedness and want of circumspection, the red-coated Nimrod falls an easy prey to any fair enslaver who may think him worth the trouble of subjection; and for one alliance that has been negotiated in the stifling atmosphere of a London ball-room, twenty owe their existence to the fresh breezes, the haphazard events, and surrounding excitement of the hunting-field.
General Bounce’s guests, as was natural in the country where he resided, were mostly men like mad Tom,
nor, like him, would they have objected to place gloves in their caps or carry any other favours which might demonstrate their own powers of fascination, and their rank in the good graces of the heiress. Yes, there was an heiress now at Newton-Hollows. Popular as had always been the General’s hospitality, he was now besieged with hints, and advances, and innuendoes, having for their object an invitation to his house. What a choice of scamps might he have had, all ready and willing to marry his niece—all anxious, if possible, to obtain even a peep “of that little Miss Kettering, not yet out of the school-room, who is to have ever so many hundred thousand pounds, and over whom old Bounce keeps watch and ward like a fiery dragon.”
But the passing years have little altered Blanche’s sweet and simple character, though they have rounded her figure and added to her beauty. She is to “come out” next spring, and already the world is talking of her charms and her expectations. A pretty picture is so much prettier in a gilt frame, and she will probably begin life with the ball at her foot; yet is there the same soft, artless expression in her countenance that it wore at St. Swithin’s ere her mother’s death—the same essence of beauty, independent of colouring and features, which may be traced in really charming people from the cradle to the grave, which made Blanche a willing child, is now enhancing the loveliness of her womanhood, and will probably leave her a very pleasant-looking old lady.
“And Charlie comes home to-morrow,” says Blanche, tripping along the gravel walk that winds through those well-kept shrubberies. “I wonder if he’s at all the sort of person you fancy, and whether you will think him as perfect as I do?”
“Probably not, my dear,” replied her companion, whose stately gait contrasted amusingly with Blanche’s light and playful gestures. “People seldom come up to one’s ideas of them; and I am sure it is not your fault if I do not expect to meet a perfect hero of romance in your cousin.” We ought to know those low thrilling tones; we ought to recognise the majestic figure—the dark sweeping dress—the braided hair and classical features of that pale, serious face. Mary Delaval is still the handsome governess; and Blanche would rather part with her beauty or her bullfinch, or any of her most prized earthly possessions, than that dear duenna, who, having finished her education, is now residing with her in the dubious capacity of part chaperon, part teacher, and part friend.
“Well, dear, he is a hero,” replied Blanche, who always warmed on that subject. “Let me see which of my heroes he’s most like: Prince Rupert—only he’s younger and better-looking” (Blanche, though a staunch little cavalier, could not help associating mature age and gravity with the flowing wigs in which most of her favourites of that period were depicted); “Claverhouse, only not so cruel,—he is like Claverhouse in the face, I think, Mrs. Delaval; or ‘bonnie Prince Charlie’; or Ivanhoe,—yes, Ivanhoe, that’s the one; he’s as brave and as gentle; and Mr. Hardingstone, whose life he saved, you know, says he rides most beautifully, and will make a capital officer.”
“And which of the heroes is Mr. Hardingstone, Blanche?” said her friend, in her usual measured tones. Blanche blushed.
“Oh, I can’t understand Mr. Hardingstone,” said she; “I think he’s odd-ish, and quite unlike other people; then he looks through one so. Mrs. Delaval, I think it’s quite rude to stare at people as if you thought they were not telling the truth. But he’s good-looking, too,” added the young lady, reflectively; “only not to be compared with Charlie.”
“Of course not,” rejoined her friend; “but it is fortunate that we are to enjoy the society of this Paladin till he joins his regiment—Lancers, are they not? Well, we must hope, Blanche, to use the language of your favourites of the middle ages, that he may prove a lamb among ladies, as he is doubtless a lion among lancers.”
“Dear Charlie! how he will enjoy his winter. He is so fond of hunting; and he is to have Hyacinth, and Haphazard, and Mayfly to ride for his own—so kind of Uncle Baldwin; but I must be off to put some flowers in his room,” quoth Blanche, skipping along the walk as young ladies will, when unobserved by masculine eyes; “he may arrive at any moment, he’s such an uncertain boy.”
“Zounds! you’ve broke it, you fiddle-headed brute!” exclaimed a choleric voice from the further side of a thick laurel hedge, startling the ladies most unceremoniously, and preparing them for the spectacle of a sturdy black cob trotting rebelliously down the farm road, with a fragment of his bridle dangling from his head, the remaining portion being firmly secured to a gate-post, at which the self-willed animal had been tied up in vain. Another instant brought the owner of the voice and late master of the cob into the presence of Mrs. Delaval and his niece. It was no less a person than General Bounce.
“Uncle Baldwin, Uncle Baldwin,” exclaimed Blanche, who turned him round her finger as she did the rest of the establishment, “where have you been all day? You promised to drive me out—you know you did, you wicked, hard-hearted man.”
“Been, my dear?” replied the General, in a tone of softness contrasting strangely with the flushed and vehement bearing of his outward man; “at that—(no, I will not swear)—at that doubly accursed farm. Would you believe the infernal stupidity of the people—(excuse me, Mrs. Delaval)—men with heads on their shoulders, and hair, and front teeth like other people—and they’ve sent the black bull to Bubbleton without winkers—without winkers, as I live by bread; but I won’t be answerable for the consequences,—no, I won’t make good any damages originating in such carelessness; no, not if there’s law in England or justice under heaven! But, my sweet Blanche,” added the General, in a tone of amiable piano, the more remarkable for the forte of his previous observations, “I’ll go and get ready this instant, my darling; you shan’t be disappointed; I’ll order the pony-carriage forthwith. Holloa! you, sir; only let me catch you—only let me catch you, that’s all; I’ll trounce you as sure as my name’s Bounce!” and the General, without waiting for any further explanation, darted off in pursuit of an idle village boy, whom he espied in the very act, flagrante delicto, of trespassing on a pathway which the lord of the manor had been several years vainly endeavouring to shut up.
General Bounce was such a medley as can only be produced by the action of a tropical sun on a vigorous, sanguine Anglo-Saxon temperament. Specimens are becoming scarcer every day. They are seldom to be met with in our conventional and well-behaved country, though here and there, flitting about a certain club celebrated for its curries, they may be discovered even in the heart of the metropolis. On board transports, men-of-war, mail-steamers, and such-like government conveyances, they are more at home; in former days they were occasionally visible inside our long coaches, where they invariably made a difficulty about the window; but in the colonies they are to be seen in their highest state of cultivation; as a general rule, the hotter the climate, the more perfect the specimen.
Our friend the General was a very phœnix of his kind. In person he was short, stout, square, and active, with black twinkling eyes and a round, clean-shaved face—small-featured and good-humoured-looking, but choleric withal. His naturally florid complexion had been baked into a deep red-brown by his Indian campaigns. If Pythagoras was right in his doctrine concerning the transmigration of souls, the General’s must have previously inhabited the person of a sturdy, snappish black-and-tan terrier. In manner he was alternately marvellously winning and startlingly abrupt, the transition being instantaneous; whilst in character he was decided, energetic, and impracticable, though both rash and obstinate, with an irritable temper and an affectionate heart. He had seen service in India, and by his own account had not only experienced sundry hair-breadth ’scapes bordering on the romantic, but likewise witnessed such strange sights and vagaries as fall to the lot of few, save those whose bodily vision is assisted by that imaginative faculty denominated “the mind’s eye.”
The General was a great disciplinarian, and piqued himself much upon the order in which he kept the females of his establishment, Blanche especially, whose lightest word, by the way, was his law. Indeed, like many old bachelors, he entertained a reverence almost superstitious for the opposite sex, and a few tears shed at the right moment would always bear the delinquent harmless, whatever the misdemeanour for which she was taken to task. The men, indeed, found him more troublesome to deal with, and the newly-arrived were somewhat alarmed at his violent language and impetuous demeanour; but the older servants always “took the bull by the horns” fearlessly and at once, nor in the end did they ever fail to get their own way with a master who, to use their peculiar language, “was easily upset, though he soon came round again.” What made the General an infinitely less disagreeable man in society than he otherwise would have been, was the fact of his having a farm, which farm served him as a safety-valve to carry off all the irritation that could not but accumulate in an easy, uneventful life, destitute of real grievances as of the stirring, active scenes to which he had been accustomed in his earlier days. If a gentleman finds it indispensable to his health that he should be continually in hot water—that he should always have something to grumble at, something to disappoint him, let him take to farming—his own land or another’s, it is immaterial which; but let him “occupy,” as it is called, a certain number of acres—and we will warrant him as much “worry” and “annoyance” as the most “tonic”-craving disposition can desire. Let us accompany our retired warrior to his farm-yard, whither, after an ineffectual chase, he at length followed his black pony, forgetful of Blanche and the drive, on which, in the now shortening daylight, it was already too late to embark.
In the first place, the bull was come back—he had been to Bubbleton minus his winkers, but no one in that salubrious town caring to purchase a bull, he had returned to his indigenous pastures and his disgusted owner—therefore must the bailiff hazard an excuse and a consolation, in which the words “poor,” and “stock,” and the “fair on the fifteenth,” are but oil to the flame.
“Fair! he’ll be as thin as a whipping-post in a week—if anybody bids five shillings for him at the fair, I’ll eat him, horns and all! What weight are those sheep?” adds the General, abruptly turning to another subject, and somewhat confusing his deliberate overseer by the suddenness of the inquiry. “Now those turnips are not fit for sheep! I tell you they ought to be three times the size. Zounds, man, will you grow larger turnips? And have I not countermanded those infernal iron hurdles a hundred times? a thousand times!! a hundred thousand times!!! Give me the pail, you lop-eared buffoon—do you call that the way to feed a pig?” and the General, seizing the bucket from an astonished chaw-bacon, who stood aghast, as if he thought his master was mad, managed to spill the greater part of the contents over his own person and gaiters, rendering a return home absolutely indispensable. He stumped off accordingly, giving a parting direction to some of his myrmidons to catch the black cob, in as mild a tone and with as good-humoured a countenance as if he had been in this heavenly frame of mind the whole afternoon.
Now the General, when he first began to live alone, and to miss the constant interchange of ideas which a military life encourages, had acquired a habit of discoursing to himself on such subjects as were most interesting to him at the time; so as he toddled merrily along, much relieved by the bucolic blow-up, and admired his sturdy legs and swung his short arms, all the way up the long gravel-walk towards the house, his thoughts framed themselves into a string of disjointed sentences, now muttered scarcely above a whisper, now spoken boldly out in an audible tone, which would have led a stranger to suppose he was carrying on a conversation with some one on the other side of the screening Portugal laurels. “Thick-headed fellows, these bumpkins,” soliloquised the General, “not like my old friends at Fool-a-pore—could make them skip about to some purpose: there’s nothing like a big stick for a nigger—never mind. I’m young enough to begin again—man of iron—what an arm! what a leg! might have married a dozen peeresses, and beauties by hundreds—didn’t though. Now, there’s Blanche; I shall have fifty fellows all after her before Christmas—sharp dogs if they think they can weather old Bounce—Rummagee Bang couldn’t. By the by, I haven’t told Mrs. Delaval that story yet—clever woman, and good judgment—admires my character, I’ll bet a million—an officer’s daughter, too, and what a magnificent figure she has—Bounce, you’re an old fool! As for Charlie, he shall stay here all the winter; there’s mettle in that lad, and if I can’t lick him into shape I’m a Dutchman. He’ll show ’em the way with the hounds, and I’ll put him up to a thing or two, the young scamp. Snaffles! Snaffles!!” roared the General, as he concluded his monologue, and passed the stables on his way to the house, “don’t take any of the horses out to-morrow till you get your orders. Do you hear me? man alive!” And by this time, having reached home, he stumped off to dress for dinner, keeping up a running fire along the passages, as he discovered here a hearth-broom, and there a coal-scuttle, ready for him to break his shins over, and observed the usual plate and tea-cup standing sentry at each of the ladies’ doors.
We may be sure that not the least comfortable of the rooms at Newton-Hollows was especially appropriated as Blanche’s own, and that young lady was now sitting opposite a glass that reflected a smiling face, enduring with patience and resignation the ceremony of having “her hair done.” A French maid, named “Rosine,” a very pretty substitute for bilious-looking Gingham, was working away at the ivory-handled brushes, and occasionally letting fall a thick glossy ringlet athwart the snow-white cape in which the process of adornment was submitted to, whilst Mary Delaval, buried in an arm-chair drawn close to the blazing fire, and enveloped in a dressing-gown, with an open book in her hand, was quietly listening to Blanche’s remarks on things in general, and her own self and prospects in particular.
That hour before dinner is the period chosen by women for their most confidential intercourse, and the enjoyment of what they call “a cozy chat.” When Damon, in the small hours, smokes a cigar with Pythias, more especially if such an indulgence be treason against the rules of the house, he opens his heart to his fellow-trespasser, in a manner of which, next morning, he has but a faint recollection. He confides to him his differences with “the governor,” his financial embarrassments, the unsoundness of his horses and his heart, the latter possession much damaged by certain blue eyes in the neighbourhood; he details to him the general scandal with which he is conversant, and binding him by promises of eternal secrecy, proceeds deliberately to demolish the fair fame of maid and matron who enjoy the advantage of his acquaintance; finally, he throws his cigar-end beneath the grate and betakes him “to perch,” as he calls it, with an infatuated persuasion that the confidences which he has broken, will be respected by his listener, and that his debts, his difficulties, his peccadilloes, and the lameness of his bay mare, will not form the subject of conversation to-morrow night, when he, Damon, has gone back to London, and Pythias takes out his case to smoke a cigar with Dionysius. But the ladies by this time are fast asleep, dreaming, bless them, as it shall please Queen Mab—they must not wither their roses by sitting up too late, and though tolerant of smoking sometimes, they do not practise that abomination themselves, so tea-time is their hour of gossip, and heartily they enjoy the refreshment, both of mind and body, ere they come down demure and charming, in low evening dresses, with little or no appetite for dinner.
“Never mind Rosine,” said Blanche, as that attendant concluded an elaborate plait by the insertion of an enormous hair-pin; “she can’t speak a word of English. I agree with you that it is very charming to be an heiress, and I shall enjoy ‘coming out,’ and doing what I like; but I wish, too, sometimes, that I were a man; I feel so restrained, so useless, so incapable of doing any good. Mrs. Delaval, I think women are shamefully kept back; why shouldn’t we have professions and employments? not that I should like to be a soldier or a sailor, because I am not brave, but I do feel as if I was fit for something greater than tying up flowers or puzzling through worsted work.”
“There was a time when I, too, thought the same,” replied Mary, “but depend upon it, my dear, that you may do an infinity of good in the station which is assigned you. I used to fancy it would be so noble to be a man, and to do something grand, and heroic, and disinterested; but look at half the men we see, Blanche, and tell me if you would like to change places with one of them. Caring only for their dress, their horses, and their dinners, they will tell you themselves, and think they are philosophers for saying so, ‘that they are easy, good-tempered fellows, and if they can only get enough to eat, and lots of good hunting and good claret, they are perfectly satisfied.’ Indeed, my dear, I think we have the best of it; we are more resigned, more patient, more contented; we have more to bear, and we bear it better—more to detach us from this world, and to wean us from being entirely devoted to ourselves. No, I had rather be a woman, with all her imperfections, than one of those lords of the creation, such as we generally find them.”
“But still there are great men, Mrs. Delaval, even in these days. Do you think they are all selfish and egotistical, and care only for indulgences?”
“Heaven forbid, my dear; I only argue from the generality. My idea of man,” said Mary, kindling as she went on in her description, “is that he should be brave, generous, and unselfish; stored with learning, which he uses not for display, but for a purpose; careless of vanity and frivolous distinction; reliant on himself and his own high motives; deep and penetrating in his mental powers, with a lofty view of the objects of existence, and the purposes for which we are here. What does it signify whether such a one is good-looking in person or taking in manner? But as I am describing a hero, I will say his frame should be robust and his habits simple, to harmonise with the vigour of his intellect and the singleness of his character.”
“You have described Mr. Hardingstone exactly,” exclaimed Blanche, with rising colour, and a feeling not quite of pleasure at her heart. Yet what signified it to her that Mary Delaval’s Quixotic idea of a pattern man should typify so precisely her old friend Frank? Mary had never seen him; and even if she had, what was that to Blanche? Yet somehow she had taught herself from childhood to consider him her own property; probably because he was such a friend of Charlie; and she was a thorough woman—though she fancied she ought to have been born a hero—and consequently very jealous of her rights, real or imaginary. Silly Blanche! there was a sort of excitement, too, in talking about him, so she went on—“He is all that you have said, and people call him very good-looking besides, though I don’t think him so;” and Blanche coloured as she spoke, and told Rosine not to pull her hair so hard.
“Well, my dear,” said Mary, “then I should like to know him. But never mind the gentlemen, Blanche; there will be half-a-dozen here to dinner to-day. To return to yourself—you have a bright career before you, but never think it is traced out only for your own enjoyment. As a girl, you may in your position be an example to your equals, and a blessing to your dependents—think what a deal of good you can do even about a place like this; and then, should you marry, your influence may be the means of leading your husband and family into the right way. I have had a good deal of trouble, as you know, but I have always tried to remember, that to bear it patiently, and to do the best I could in my own path without repining, was to fulfil my destiny as nobly as if I had been a dethroned queen, or a world-famous heroine. No, my dear, this world is not a place only for dancing, and driving, and flirting, and dressing.—Good gracious! there’s the dinner-bell! and my hair not ‘done’ yet.” And away Mary rushed in the midst of her lecture, to complete those arrangements which brought her out, some ten minutes afterwards, the handsomest woman within fifty miles of Guyville.
Notwithstanding the lofty aspirations of these ladies, their contempt for the approbation of the other sex, and the short time they allowed themselves for adornment, two more tasteful and perfectly-finished toilettes have been seldom accomplished than those which at the well-lighted dinner-table enhanced the attractions of the pretty heiress and her handsome governess.
THE GRUB BECOMES A BUTTERFLY—FAREWELL AND HOW D’YE DO—NOT WHAT WAS EXPECTED—THE GENERAL’S HOBBY—BLANCHE’S BIRTHDAY—FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS—“GIVE YOU JOY”—A COUNTRY DINNER-PARTY—TURNING THE TABLES—“THE COQUETTE”
Meanwhile the eventful Friday has arrived which has promoted “Cousin Charlie” to the rank of manhood. The Gazette of that day has announced the appointment of “Charles Kettering, Gentleman, to be Cornet in the 20th Lancers, vice Slack, who retires,” and the young one, who has been cultivating the down on his upper lip for months, in anticipation of this triumph, turns up those ends, of which there is scarcely enough to take hold, and revels in the consciousness that he is a boy no longer, but an officer, a cavalry officer, and a gentleman. Old Nobottle, whom the pupil has attached to himself as an imaginative boy often does a sober old gentleman, is of the same mind, and has confided to Mr. Hardingstone his opinion of Charlie, and the bright deeds he expects from him. “The lad has all the makings of a soldier, sir,” said the clergyman; “the cheerful spirits, the gallant bearing, the love of action, and the chivalrous vanity—half courageous, half coxcombical—which form the military character; and if he has a chance, he will distinguish himself. If he has a chance, do I say? he’ll make himself a chance, sir; the boy is cut out for a recruit, and he’ll learn his drill and know his men, and keep his troop-accounts smarter than any of ’em.” Nobottle was waxing enthusiastic, as the old recollections stole over him, and he saw, in fancy, a certain young artillery officer, gay amongst the gayest, and brave amongst the bravest, consulted by his seniors for his science and professional knowledge, and thanked in general orders for “his distinguished gallantry” in more than one decisive action. How different from the slouching, slovenly old man, in yesterday’s white neckcloth, who may now be seen budding his roses, poking about his parish, and stuffing stupid young gentlemen with as much learning as shall enable them to pass their dreaded examinations. Poor old Nobottle, you would marry for love, you would sacrifice your profession and your commission, your prospects and your all, for the red-nosed lady, then, to do her justice, a very pretty girl, who now occupies the top of your table. Like Antony, you were “all for love and the world well lost,” and, after a time, you found that the exchange was against you: what you took for gold turned out to be dross,—that which was honey in the mouth became bitter as gall in the digestion; in short, you discovered Mrs. N. was a failure, and that you did not care two pins for each other. Then came poverty and recrimination and the gnawing remorse of chances thrown away, that could not possibly recur again. Fortunately for you, a classical education and Church interest enabled you to take orders and get a living, so you work on, contentedly enough, now that your sensations are deadened and yourself half torpid; and although, when your better feelings obtain the mastery, you cannot but acknowledge the superiority of the present warfare in which you are engaged over that in which you spent your gaudy youth, yet, ever and anon, that foolish old heart still pines for the marshalling of men and the tramp of steeds, “the plumed troop and the big wars, that make ambition virtue.”
Hardingstone breakfasted at the rectory on the morning of Charlie’s departure; he was to drive him to the station, and our young friend must indubitably have been late for the train, had he not been rescued, by a man of decision, from the prolonged farewells of the inconsolables he left behind. Binks, the butler, was overwhelmed by sorrow and strong beer; Tim, the tea-boy, who had never before seen a half-sovereign, sobbed aloud; the maids, on whom Charlie’s good looks had made an impression proportionable to the softness of each damsel’s heart, laughed and wept by turns; whilst Mrs. Nobottle, generally a lady of austere and inflexible disposition, weakened the very tea which she was pouring out for breakfast with her tears, and, finally, embraced Charlie with hysterical affection, and a nose redder than ever. The good rector took him aside into his study, and blessed him as a father blesses a son. “You have never given me a moment’s uneasiness, my dear boy, since you came here,” said the old man, with a trembling voice; “you have been a credit to me as a pupil, and a comfort as a friend; and now, perhaps, I shall never see you again. But you won’t forget your old pedagogue, and if ever you are in difficulties, if ever you are in distress, remember there is a home here to which you may always apply for advice and assistance. God be with you, my boy, in the temptations of a barrack, as, if it should be your lot, in the perilous excitement of a battle. Do your duty wherever you are, and think, sometimes, of old Nobottle.”
Why was it Charlie’s cigar would not light, as he was borne away on the wheels of Frank Hardingstone’s dog-cart? The tinder was quite wet, though there was not a drop of rain in the sky, and he turned away his head from his companion, and bent sedulously over the refractory tobacco. Could it be that Charlie was crying? ’Tis not improbable. Despite his recently-acquired manhood, he had a soft, affectionate heart, and if it now gave way, and came unbidden to his eyes, Frank liked him all the better for it.
And as he was whirled along on the London and North-Western, how the young soldier’s thoughts ran riot in the future. Would he have changed places with any dignitary in the world, monarch, prince, or peer, or even with the heretofore much-admired Frank Hardingstone? Not he. None of these held a commission in the 20th Lancers; and were to be pitied, if not despised, accordingly. What a lot was his! Two months’ leave at least, and at his time of life two months is an age, to be spent in the gaieties of Newton-Hollows, and the attenuation of Haphazard, Hyacinth, and Mayfly, the mettle of which very excellent steeds Master Charlie had fully resolved to prove. All the delights of Bubbleton and the county gaieties, with the companionship of Blanche, that more than sister, without whom, from his earliest boyhood, no enjoyment could be half enjoyed. And then the flattering pride she would feel in her officer-cousin (Charlie felt for his moustaches so perseveringly, that a short-sighted fellow-traveller thought he had a sore lip), and the request he should be in amongst the young ladies of the neighbourhood, with a romantic conviction that love was not for him, that “the sword was the soldier’s bride,” etc. Then the dreamer looked forward into the vistas of the future; the parade, the bivouac, and the charge; night-watches in a savage country—for the 20th were even then in Kaffirland—the trumpet alarum, the pawing troop-horses, the death-shock and the glittering blade; a certain cornet hurraing in the van, the admiration of brother officers, and the veteran colonel’s applause; a Gazette promotion and honourable mention in dispatches; Uncle Baldwin’s uproarious glee at home; and Blanche’s quiet smile. Who would not be a boy again? Yet not with the stipulation we hear so often urged, of knowing as much as we do now. That knowledge would destroy it all. No, let us have boyhood once more, with its vigorous credulity and its impossible romance, with that glorious ignorance which turns everything to gold, that sanguine temperament which sheds its rosy hues even over the bleak landscape of future old age. “Poor lad! how green he is,” says worldly experience, with a sneer of affected pity at those raptures it would give its very existence to feel again. “Happy fellow; he’s a boy still!” says good-natured philosophy with a smile, half saddened at the thoughts of the coming clouds, which shall too surely darken that sunny horizon. But each has been through the crucible, each recognises that sparkle of the virgin gold which shall never again appear on the dead surface of the metal, beaten and stamped and fabricated into a mere conventional coin. The train whizzes on, the early evening sets in, tired post-horses grope their way up the dark avenue, wheels are heard grinding round the gravel sweep before the house, and the expected guest arrives at Newton-Hallows.
“Goodness! Charlie, how you have been smoking,” exclaims Blanche, after their first affectionate greeting, while she shrinks a little from the cousinly embrace somewhat redolent of tobacco; “and how you’re grown, dear—I suppose you don’t like to be told you are grown now—and moustaches, I declare,” she adds, bursting out laughing, as she catches Charlie’s budding honours en profil; “’pon my word they’re a great improvement.” Charlie winced a little. There is always a degree of awkwardness even amongst the nearest and dearest, when people meet after a long absence, and the less artificial the character, the more it betrays itself; but Blanche was in great spirits and rattled on, till the General made his appearance, bustling in perfectly radiant with hospitality.
“Glad to see ye, my lad—glad to see ye; have been expecting ye this half-hour—trains always late—and always will be till they hang a director—I’ve hanged many a man for less, myself, ‘up the country.’ Fact, Blanche, I assure you. You’ll have lots of time to dress,” he observed, glancing at the clock’s white face shining in the fire-light—and adding, with a playful dig of his fingers into Charlie’s lean ribs, “We dine in half-an-hour, temps militaire, you dog! We must teach you that punctuality and good commissariat are the two first essentials for a soldier.” So the General rang a peal for hand candles that might have brought a house down.
And Charlie was well acquainted with all the inmates of Newton-Hollows save Mrs. Delaval. Of her he had often heard Blanche speak as the most delightful of companions, and indulgent of governesses, but he had never set eyes on her in person; so as he effected his tie before the glass, and drew his fingers over those precious moustaches to discover if change of air had already influenced their growth, he began to speculate on the character and appearance of the lady who was to complete their family party. “A middle-aged woman,” thought Charlie—for Blanche, on whom some ten years of seniority made a great impression, had always described her as such—“forty, or thereabouts—stout, jolly-looking and good-humoured, I’ll be bound—I know I shall like her—wears a cap, I’ve no doubt, and a front, too, most probably—sits very upright, and talks like a book, till one knows her well—spectacles, I shouldn’t wonder (it’s no use making much of a tie for her)—pats Blanche on the shoulder when she gives her precedence, and keeps her hands in black lace mittens, I’ll bet a hundred!” With which mental wager Master Charlie blew his candles out, and swaggered down-stairs, feeling in his light evening costume, as indeed he looked, well-made, well-dressed, and extremely like a gentleman.
Mischievous Blanche was enchanted at the obvious start of astonishment with which her introduction was received by her cousin—“Mr. Kettering, Mrs. Delaval.” Charlie looked positively dismayed. Was this the comfortable, round-about, good-humoured body he had expected to see?—was that tall, stately figure, dressed in the most perfect taste, with an air of more than high-breeding, almost of command, such as duchesses may be much admired without possessing—was that the dowdy middle-aged governess?—were those long, deep-set eyes, the orbs that should have glared at him through spectacles, and would black lace mittens have been an improvement on those white taper hands, beautiful in their perfect symmetry without a single ornament? Charlie bowed low to conceal the blush that overspread his countenance. The boy was completely taken aback, and, when he led her in to dinner, and heard those thrilling tones murmuring in his ear, the spell, we may be sure, lost none of its power. “She is beautiful,” thought Charlie, “and nearly as tall as I am;” and he was pleased to recollect that Blanche had thought him grown. Ladies, we opine, are not so impressionable as men—at least they do not allow themselves to appear so. Either they are more cautious in their judgments, which we have heard denied by those who plume themselves on knowledge of the sex, or their hypocrisy is more perfect; certainly a young lady’s education is based upon principles of the most frigid reserve, and her decorous bearing, we believe, is never laid aside, even in tea-rooms, conservatories, shaded walks, and other such resorts, fatal to the equanimity of masculine understanding; therefore Mary Delaval did by no means lose her presence of mind on being introduced to the young gentleman, of whose deeds and sentiments she had heard so much. Woman as she was, she could not but be gratified at the evident admiration her appearance created in this new acquaintance, and truth to speak, “Cousin Charlie” was a youth whose allegiance few female hearts would have entirely scorned to possess; yet there was no occasion to tell the young gentleman as much to his face.
A very good-looking face it was too, with its wide, intellectual brow, round which the brown silky hair waved in such becoming clusters—its perfect oval and delicate high-bred features, if they had a fault, too girlish in their soft, winning expression—in fact, he was as like Blanche as possible; and had his moustaches been shaved, could he indeed have submitted to the sacrifice, his stature lowered, and a bonnet and shawl put on, he might well have passed for his pretty cousin. There was nothing effeminate though about Charlie, save his countenance and his smile. That slender, graceful figure was lithe and wiry as the panther’s—those symmetrical limbs could toil, those little feet could walk and run, after a Hercules would have been blown and overpowered; and when standing up to his wicket, rousing a horse, or putting him at a fence, there was a game sparkle in his eye that, to use Frank Hardingstone’s expression, “meant mischief.” Some of these good-looking young gentlemen are “ugly customers” enough when their blood is up, and Cousin Charlie, like the rest, had quite as much “devil” in his composition as was good for him. The “pretty page” only wanted a few years over his head, a little more beard upon his lip, to be a perfect Paladin.
But the spell went on working the whole of dinner-time; in vain the General told his most wondrous anecdotes, scolded his servants at intervals, and pressed his good cheer on the little party—Charlie could not get over his astonishment. Mrs. Delaval sat by him, looking like a queen, and talked in her own peculiarly winning voice and impressive manner, just enough to make him wish for more. She was one of those women who, speaking but little, seem always to mean more than they say, and on whom conscious mental superiority, and the calm subdued air worn by those who have known affliction, confer a certain mysterious charm, which makes fearful havoc in a young gentleman’s heart. There is nothing enslaves a boy so completely as a spice of romance. An elderly Strephon will go on his knees to a romping schoolgirl, and the more hoydenish and unsophisticated the object, the more will the old reprobate adore her; but beardless youth loves to own superiority where it worships, loves to invest its idol with the fabulous attributes that compose its own ideal; and of all the liaisons, honourable and otherwise, that have bound their votaries in silken fetters, those have been the most fatal, and the most invincible, which have dated their existence from an earnest boyish heart’s first devotion to a woman some years his senior, of whom the good-natured world says, “To be sure she is handsome, but Lor’! she’s old enough to be his mother!”
Not that Charlie was as far gone as this: on the contrary, his was an imaginative poetical disposition, easily scorched enough, but almost incapable of being thoroughly done brown. Of such men, ladies, we would warn you to beware; the very temperament that clothes you in all the winning attributes of its own ideal can the most easily transfer those fancied attractions to a rival, inasmuch as the charm is not so much yours as his, exists not in your sweet face, but in his heated and inconstant brain. No, the real prize, depend upon it, is a sensible, phlegmatic, matter-of-fact gentleman, anything but “wax to receive,” yet if you can succeed in making an impression, most assuredly “marble to retain.” Such a captive clings to his affections as to his prejudices, and is properly subjected into a tame and willing Benedict in half the time it takes to guess at the intentions of the faithless rover, offering on a dozen shrines an adoration that, however brilliant, is