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Title: Helen

Author: Maria Edgeworth

Release Date: July, 2005 [EBook #8531]
[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on July 20, 2003]

Edition: 10

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HELEN ***




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TALES AND NOVELS

BY

MARIA EDGEWORTH.



IN TEN VOLUMES.

WITH ENGRAVINGS ON STEEL.



VOL. X.

HELEN.

1857.




HELEN.



CHAPTER I.


"There is Helen in the lime-walk," said Mrs. Collingwood to her husband, as
she looked out of the window. The slight figure of a young person in deep
mourning appeared between the trees,--"How slowly she walks! She looks very
unhappy!"

"Yes," said Mr. Collingwood, with a sigh, "she is young to know sorrow, and
to struggle with difficulties to which she is quite unsuited both by nature
and by education, difficulties which no one could ever have foreseen. How
changed are all her prospects!"

"Changed indeed!" said Mrs. Collingwood, "pretty young creature!--Do you
recollect how gay she was when first we came to Cecilhurst? and even last
year, when she had hopes of her uncle's recovery, and when he talked of
taking her to London, how she enjoyed the thoughts of going there! The
world was bright before her then. How cruel of that uncle, with all his
fondness for her, never to think what was to become of her the moment he
was dead: to breed her up as an heiress, and leave her a beggar!"

"But what is to be done, my dear?" said her husband.

"I am sure I do not know; I can only feel for her, you must think for her."

"Then I think I must tell her directly of the state in which her uncle's
affairs are left, and that there is no provision for her."

"Not yet, my dear," said Mrs, Collingwood: "I don't mean about there being
no provision for herself, that would not strike her, but her uncle's
debts,--there is the point: she would feel dreadfully the disgrace to his
memory--she loved him so tenderly!"

"Yet it must be told," said Mr. Collingwood, resolutely "and perhaps it
will be better now; she will feel it less, while her mind is absorbed by
grief for him."

Helen was the only daughter of colonel and Lady Anne Stanley; her parents
had both died when she was too young to know her loss, nor had she ever
felt till now that she was an orphan, for she had been adopted and brought
up with the greatest tenderness by her uncle, Dean Stanley, a man of
genius, learning, and sincere piety, with the most affectionate heart, and
a highly cultivated understanding. But on one subject he really had
not common sense; in money matters he was inconceivably imprudent and
extravagant; extravagant from charity, from taste, from habit. He possessed
rich benefices in the church, and an ample private fortune, and it was
expected that his niece would be a great heiress--he had often said so
himself, and his fondness for her confirmed every one in this belief.
But the dean's taste warred against his affection: his too hospitable,
magnificent establishment had exceeded his income; he had too much indulged
his passion for all the fine arts, of which he was a liberal patron: he had
collected a magnificent library, and had lavished immense sums of money on
architectural embellishments. Cursed with too fine a taste, and with too
soft a heart--a heart too well knowing how to yield, never could he deny
himself, much less any other human being, any gratification which money
could command; and soon the necessary consequence was, that he had no money
to command, his affairs fell into embarrassment--his estate was sold; but,
as he continued to live with his accustomed hospitality and splendour, the
world believed him to be as rich as ever.

Some rise superior from the pressure of pecuniary difficulties, but that
was not the case with Dean Stanley, not from want of elasticity of mind;
but perhaps because his ingenuity continually suggested resources, and his
sanguine character led him to plunge into speculations--they failed, and in
the anxiety and agitation which his embarrassments occasioned him, he fell
into bad health, his physicians ordered him to Italy. Helen, his devoted
nurse, the object upon which all his affections centered, accompanied him
to Florence. There his health and spirits seemed at first, by the change
of climate, to be renovated; but in Italy he found fresh temptations to
extravagance, his learning and his fancy combined to lead him on from day
to day to new expense, and he satisfied his conscience by saying to himself
that all the purchases which he now made were only so much capital, which
would, when sold in England, bring more than their original price, and
would, he flattered himself, increase the fortune he intended for his
niece. But one day, while he was actually bargaining for an antique, he was
seized with a fit of apoplexy. From this fit he recovered, and was able to
return to England with his niece. Here he found his debts and difficulties
had been increasing; he was harassed with doubts as to the monied value of
his last-chosen chef-d'oeuvres; his mind preyed upon his weakened frame, he
was seized with another fit, lost his speech, and, after struggles the most
melancholy for Helen to see, conscious as she was that she could do nothing
for him--he expired--his eyes fixed on her face, and his powerless hand
held between both hers.

All was desolation and dismay at the deanery; Helen was removed to the
vicarage by the kindness of the good vicar and his wife, Mr. and Mrs.
Collingwood.

It was found that the dean, instead of leaving a large fortune, had nothing
to leave. All he had laid out at the deanery was sunk and gone; his real
property all sold; his imaginary wealth, his pictures, statues--his whole
collection, even his books, his immense library, shrunk so much in value
when estimated after his death, that the demands of the creditors could not
be nearly answered: as to any provision for Miss Stanley, that was out of
the question.

These were the circumstances which Mrs. Collingwood feared to reveal, and
which Mr. Collingwood thought should be told immediately to Helen; but
hitherto she had been so much absorbed in sorrow for the uncle she had
loved, that no one had ventured on the task.

Though Mr. and Mrs. Collingwood had not known her long (for they had but
lately come to the neighbourhood), they had the greatest sympathy for her
orphan state; and they had seen enough of her during her uncle's illness to
make them warmly attached to her. Every body loved her that knew her, rich
or poor, for in her young prosperity, from her earliest childhood, she had
been always sweet-tempered and kind-hearted; for though she had been bred
up in the greatest luxury, educated as heiress to a large fortune, taught
every accomplishment, used to every fashionable refinement, she was not
spoiled--she was not in the least selfish. Indeed, her uncle's indulgence,
excessive though it was, had been always joined with so much affection,
that it had early touched her heart, and filled her whole soul with ardent
gratitude.

It is said, that the ill men do, lives after them--the good is oft interred
with their bones. It was not so with Dean Stanley: the good he had intended
for Helen, his large fortune, was lost and gone; but the real good he had
done for his niece remained in full force, and to the honour of his memory:
the excellent education he had given her--it was excellent not merely in
the worldly meaning of the word, as regards accomplishments and elegance
of manners, but excellent in having given her a firm sense of duty, as the
great principle of action, and as the guide of her naturally warm generous
affections.

And now, when Helen returned from her walk, Mr. Collingwood, in the
gentlest and kindest manner he was able, informed her of the confusion in
her uncle's affairs, the debts, the impossibility of paying the creditors,
the total loss of all fortune for herself.

Mrs. Collingwood had well foreseen the effect this intelligence would have
on Helen. At first, with fixed incredulous eyes, she could not believe that
her uncle could have been in any way to blame. Twice she asked--"Are you
sure--are you certain--is there no mistake?" And when the conviction was
forced upon her, still her mind did not take in any part of the facts, as
they regarded herself. Astonished and, shocked, she could feel nothing but
the disgrace that would fall upon the memory of her beloved uncle.

Then she exclaimed--"One part of it is not true, I am certain:" and hastily
leaving the room, she returned immediately with a letter in her hand,
which, without speaking, she laid before Mr. Collingwood, who wiped his
spectacles quickly, and read.

It was addressed to the poor dean, and was from an old friend of his,
Colonel Munro, stating that he had been suddenly ordered to India, and
was obliged to return a sum of money which the dean had many years before
placed in his hands, to secure a provision for his niece, Miss Stanley.

This letter had arrived when the dean was extremely ill. Helen had been
afraid to give it to him, and yet thought it right to do so. The moment
her uncle had read the letter, which he was still able to do, and to
comprehend, though he was unable to speak, he wrote on the back with
difficulty, in a sadly trembling hand, yet quite distinctly, these
words:--"That money is yours, Helen Stanley: no one has any claim upon it.
When I am gone consult Mr. Collingwood; consider him as your guardian."

Mr. Collingwood perceived that this provision had been made by the dean for
his niece before he had contracted his present debts--many years before,
when he had sold his paternal estate, and that knowing his own disposition
to extravagance, he had put this sum out of his own power.

"Right--all right, my dear Miss Stanley," said the vicar; "I am very
glad--it is all justly yours."

"No," said Helen, "I shall never touch it: take it, my dear Mr.
Collingwood, take it, and pay all the debts before any one can complain."

Mr. Collingwood pressed her to him without speaking; but after a moment's
recollection he replied:--"No, no, my dear child, I cannot let you do this:
as your guardian, I cannot allow such a young creature as you are, in a
moment of feeling, thus to give away your whole earthly fortune--it must
not be."

"It must, indeed it must, my dear sir. Oh, pay everybody at
once--directly."

"No, not directly, at all events," said Mr. Collingwood--certainly not
directly: the law allows a year."

"But if the money is ready," said Helen, "I cannot understand why the
debt should not be paid at once. Is there any law against paying people
immediately?"

Mr. Collingwood half smiled, and on the strength of that half smile Helen
concluded that he wholly yielded. "Yes, do," cried she, "send this money
this instant to Mr. James, the solicitor: he knows all about it, you say,
and he will see everybody paid."

"Stay, my dear Miss Stanley," said the vicar, "I cannot consent to this,
and you should be thankful that I am steady. If I were at this minute to
consent, and to do what you desire--pay away your whole fortune, you would
repent, and reproach me with my folly before the end of the year--before
six months were over."

"Never, never," said Helen.

Mrs. Collingwood strongly took her husband's side of the question. Helen
could have no idea, she said, how necessary money would be to her. It was
quite absurd to think of living upon air; could Miss Stanley think she was
to go on in this world without money?

Helen said she was not so absurd; she reminded Mrs. Collingwood that she
should still have what had been her mother's fortune. Before Helen had well
got out the words, Mrs. Collingwood replied,

"That will never do, you will never be able to live upon that; the interest
of Lady Anne Stanley's fortune, I know what it was, would just do for
pocket-money for you in the style of life for which you have been educated.
Some of your uncle's great friends will of course invite you presently, and
then you will find what is requisite with that set of people."

"Some of my uncle's friends perhaps will," said Helen; "but I am not
obliged to go to great or fine people, and if I cannot afford it I will
not, for I can live independently on what I have, be it ever so little."

Mrs. Collingwood allowed that if Helen were to live always in the country
in retirement, she might do upon her mother's fortune.

"Wherever I live--whatever becomes of me, the debts must be paid--I will do
it myself;" and she took up a pen as she spoke--"I will write to Mr. James
by this day's post."

Surprised at her decision of manner and the firmness of one in general so
gentle, yielding, and retired, and feeling that he had no legal power to
resist, Mr. Collingwood at last gave way, so far as to agree that he would
in due time use this money in satisfying her uncle's creditors; _provided
she lived for the next six months within her income_.

Helen smiled, as if that were a needless proviso.

"I warn you," continued Mr. Collingwood, "that you will most probably find
before six months are over, that you will want some of this money to pay
debts of your own."

"No, no, no," cried she; "of that there is not the slightest chance."

"And now, my dear child," said Mrs. Collingwood, "now that Mr. Collingwood
has promised to do what you wish, will you do what we wish? Will you
promise to remain with us? to live here with us, for the present at least;
we will resign you whenever better friends may claim you, but for the
present will you try us?"

"Try!" in a transport of gratitude and affection she could only repeat
the words "Try! oh, my dear friends, how happy I am, an orphan, without a
relation, to have such a home."

But though Mr. and Mrs. Collingwood, childless as they were, felt real
happiness in having such a companion--such an adopted daughter, yet they
were sure that some of Dean Stanley's great friends and acquaintance in
high life would ask his niece to spend the spring in town, or the summer in
the country with them; and post after post came letters of condolence to
Miss Stanley from all these personages of high degree, professing the
greatest regard for their dear amiable friend's memory, and for Miss
Stanley, his and their dear Helen; and these polite and kind expressions
were probably sincere at the moment, but none of these dear friends seemed
to think of taking any trouble on her account, or to be in the least
disturbed by the idea of never seeing their dear Helen again in the course
of their lives.

Helen, quite touched by what was said of her uncle, thought only of him;
but when she showed the letters to Mr. and Mrs. Collingwood, they marked
the oversight, and looked significantly as they read, folded the letters up
and returned them to Helen in silence. Afterwards between themselves, they
indulged in certain comments.

"Lady C---- does not invite her, for she has too many daughters, and they
are too ugly, and Helen is too beautiful," said Mrs. Collingwood.

"Lady L---- has too many sons," said Mr. Collingwood, "and they are too
poor, and Helen is not an heiress now."

"But old Lady Margaret Dawe, who has neither sons nor daughters, what
stands in the way there? Oh! her delicate health--delicate health is a
blessing to some people--excuses them always from doing anything for
anybody."

Then came many, who hoped, in general, to see Miss Stanley as soon as
possible; and some who were "very anxious indeed" to have their dear Helen
with them; but when or where never specified--and a general invitation, as
every body knows, means nothing but "Good morning to you."

Mrs. Coldstream ends with, "I forbear to say more at present," without
giving any reason.

"And here is the dean's dear duchess, always in the greatest haste, with
'You know my heart,' in a parenthesis, 'ever and ever most sincerely and
affec'--yours.'"

"And the Davenants," continued Mrs. Collingwood, "who were such near
neighbours, and who were so kind to the dean at Florence; they have not
even written!"

"But they are at Florence still," said Mr. Collingwood, "they can hardly
have heard of the poor dean's death."

The Davenants were the great people of this part of the country; their
place, Cecilhurst, was close to the deanery and to the vicarage, but they
were not known to the Collingwoods, who had come to Cecilhurst during the
dean's absence abroad.

"And here is Mrs. Wilmot too," continued Mrs. Collingwood, "wondering as
usual, at everybody else, wondering that Lady Barker has not invited Miss
Stanley to Castleport; and it never enters into Mrs. Wilmot's head that she
might invite her to Wilmot's fort. And this is friendship, as the world
goes!"

"And as it has been ever since the beginning of the world and will be
to the end," replied Mr. Collingwood. "Only I thought in Dean Stanley's
case--however, I am glad his niece does not see it as we do."

No--with all Helen's natural quickness of sensibility, she suspected
nothing, saw nothing in each excuse but what was perfectly reasonable and
kind; she was sure that her uncle's friends could not mean to neglect her.
In short, she had an undoubting belief in those she loved, and she loved
all those who she thought had loved her uncle, or who had ever shown her
kindness. Helen had never yet experienced neglect or detected insincerity,
and nothing in her own true and warm heart could suggest the possibility
of double-dealing, or even of coldness in friendship. She had yet to learn
that--

  "No after-friendship e'er can raze
  Th' endearments of our early days,
  And ne'er the heart such fondness prove,
  As when it first began to love;
  Ere lovely nature is expelled,
  And friendship is romantic held.
  But prudence comes with hundred eyes,
  The veil is rent, the vision flies,
  The dear illusions will not last,
  The era of enchantment's past:
  The wild romance of life is done,
  The real history begun!"




CHAPTER II.


Some time after this, Mr. Collingwood, rising from the breakfast-table,
threw down the day's paper, saying there was nothing in it; Mrs.
Collingwood glancing her eye over it exclaimed--

"Do you call this nothing? Helen, hear this!

"Marriage in high life--At the ambassador's chapel, Paris, on the 16th
instant, General Clarendon to Lady Cecilia Davenant, only daughter of Earl
and Countess Davenant."

"Married! absolutely married!" exclaimed Helen: "I knew it was to be, but
so soon I did not expect. Ambassador's chapel--where did you say?--Paris?
No, that must be a mistake, they are all at Florence--settled there, I
thought their letters said."

Mrs. Collingwood pointed to the paragraph, and Helen saw it was certainly
Paris--there could be no mistake. Here was a full account of the marriage,
and a list of all "the fashionables who attended the fair bride to the
hymeneal altar. Her father gave her away."

"Then certainly it is so," said Helen; and she came to the joyful
conclusion that they must all be on their way home:--"Dear Lady Davenant
coming to Cecilhurst again!"

Lady Cecilia, "the fair bride," had been Helen's most intimate friend;
they had been when children much together, for the deanery was so close to
Cecilhurst, that the shrubbery opened into the park. "But is it not rather
extraordinary, my dear. Helen," said Mrs. Collingwood, "that you should
see this account of your dear Lady Cecilia's marriage in the public papers
only, without having heard of it from any of your friends themselves--not
one letter, not one line from any of them?"

A cloud came over Helen's face, but it passed quickly, and she was sure
they had written--something had delayed their letters. She was certain Lady
Davenant or Lady Cecilia had written; or, if they had not, it was because
they could not possibly, in such a hurry, such agitation as they must have
been in. At all events, whether they had written or not, she was certain
they could not mean anything unkind; she could not change her opinion of
her friend for a letter more or less. "Indeed!" said Mrs. Collingwood, "how
long is it since you have seen them?"

"About two years; just two years it is since I parted from them at
Florence."

"And you have corresponded with Lady Cecilia constantly ever since?" asked
Mrs. Collingwood.

"Not constantly."

"Not constantly--oh!" said Mrs. Collingwood, in a prolonged and somewhat
sarcastic tone.

"Not constantly--so much the better," said her husband: "a constant
correspondence is always a great burthen, and moreover, sometimes a great
evil, between young ladies especially--I hate the sight of ladies' long
cross-barred letters."

Helen said that Lady Cecilia's letters were never cross-barred, always
short and far between.

"You seem wonderfully fond of Lady Cecilia," said Mrs. Collingwood.

"Not wonderfully," replied Helen, "but very fond, and no wonder, we were
bred up together. And"--continued she, after a little pause, "and if Lady
Cecilia had not been so generous as she is, she might have been--she must
have been, jealous of the partiality, the fondness, which her mother always
showed me."

"But was not Lady Davenant's heart large enough to hold two?" asked Mrs.
Collingwood. "Was not she fond of her daughter?"

"Yes, as far as she knew her, but she did not know Lady Cecilia." "Not
know her own daughter!" Mr. and Mrs. Collingwood both at once exclaimed,
"How could that possibly be?"

"Very easily," Helen said, "because she saw so little of her."

"Was not Lady Cecilia educated at home?"

"Yes, but still Lady Cecilia, when a child, was all day long with her
governess, and at Cecilhurst the governess's apartments were quite out of
the way, in one of the wings at the end of a long corridor, with a separate
staircase; she might as well have been in another house."

"Bad arrangement," said Mr. Collingwood, speaking to himself as he stood on
the hearth. "Bad arrangement which separates mother and daughter."

"At that time," continued Helen, "there was always a great deal of company
at Cecilhurst. Lord Davenant was one of the ministers then. I believe--I
know he saw a great many political people, and Lady Davenant was forced to
be always with them talking."

"Talking! yes, yes!" said Mr. Collingwood, "I understand it all--Lady
Davenant is a great politician, and female politicians, with their heads
full of the affairs of Europe, cannot have time to think of the affairs of
their families."

"What is the matter, my dear Helen?" said Mrs. Collingwood, taking her
hand. Helen had tears in her eyes and looked unhappy.

"I have done very wrong," said she; "I have said something that has given
you a bad, a false opinion of one for whom I have the greatest admiration
and love--of Lady Davenant. I am excessively sorry; I have done very
wrong."

"Not the least, my dear child; you told us nothing but what everybody
knows--that she is a great politician; you told us no more."

"But I should have told you more, and what nobody knows better than I do,"
cried Helen, "that Lady Davenant is a great deal more, and a great deal
better than a politician. I was too young to judge, you may think, hut
young as I was, I could see and feel, and children can and do often see a
great deal into character, and I assure you Lady Davenant's is a sort of
deep, high character, that you would admire."

Mrs. Collingwood observed with surprise, that Helen spoke of her with even
more enthusiasm than of her dear Lady Cecilia. "Yes, because she is a
person more likely to excite enthusiasm."

"You did not feel afraid of her, then?"

"I do not say that," replied Helen; "yet it was not fear exactly, it was
more a sort of awe, but still I liked it. It is so delightful to have
something to look up to. I love Lady Davenant all the better, even for that
awe I felt of her."

"And I like you all the better for everything you feel, think, and say
about your friends," cried Mrs. Collingwood; "but let us see what they will
do; when I see whether they can write, and what they write to you, I will
tell you more of my mind--if any letters come."

"If!--" Helen repeated, but would say no more--and there it rested, or
at least stopped. By common consent the subject was not recurred to
for several days. Every morning at post-time Helen's colour rose with
expectation, and then faded with disappointment; still, with the same
confiding look, she said, "I am sure it is not their fault."

"Time will show," said Mrs. Collingwood.

At length, one morning when she came down to breakfast, "Triumph, my dear
Helen!" cried Mrs. Collingwood, holding up two large letters, all scribbled
over with "Try this place and try that, mis-sent to Cross-keys--Over moor,
and heaven knows where--and--no matter."

Helen seized the packets and tore them open; one was from Paris, written
immediately after the news of Dean Stanley's death; it contained two
letters, one from Lady Davenant, the other from Lady Cecilia--"written,
only think!" cried she, "how kind!--the very day before her marriage;
signed 'Cecilia Davenant, for the last time,'--and Lady Davenant, too--to
think of me in all their happiness."

She opened the other letters, written since their arrival in England, she
read eagerly on,--then stopped, and her looks changed.

"Lady Davenant is not coming to Cecilhurst. Lord Davenant is to be sent
ambassador to Petersburgh, and Lady Davenant will go along with him!--Oh!
there is an end of everything, I shall never see her again!--Stay--she is
to be first with Lady Cecilia at Clarendon Park, wherever that is, for some
time--she does not know how long--she hopes to see me there--oh! how
kind, how delightful!" Helen put Lady Davenant's letter proudly into Mrs.
Collingwood's hand, and eagerly opened Lady Cecilia's.

"So like herself! so like Cecilia," cried she. Mrs. Collingwood read and
acknowledged that nothing could be kinder, for here was an invitation, not
vague or general, but particular, and pressing as heart could wish or heart
could make it. "We shall be at Clarendon Park on Thursday, and shall expect
you, dearest Helen, on Monday, just time, the general says, for an answer;
so write and say where horses shall meet you," &c. &c.

"Upon my word, this is being in earnest, when it comes to horses meeting,"
cried Mr. Collingwood. "Of course you will go directly?"

Helen was in great agitation.

"Write--write--my dear, directly," said Mrs. Collingwood, "for the
post-boy waits."

And before she had written many lines the Cross-post boy sent up word that
he could wait no longer.

Helen wrote she scarcely knew what, but in short an acceptance, signed,
sealed, delivered, and then she took breath. Off cantered the boy with the
letters bagged, and scarcely was he out of sight, when Helen saw under the
table the cover of the packet, in which were some lines that had not yet
been read. They were in Lady Cecilia's handwriting--a postscript.

"I forgot, dear Helen, the thing that is most essential, (you remember
our friend Dumont's definition of _une betise: c'est d'oublier la chose
essentielle;_) I forgot to tell you that the general declares he will not
hear of a mere _visit_ from you. He bids me tell you that it must be 'till
death or marriage.' So, my dear friend, you must make up your mind in short
to live with us till you find a General Clarendon of your own. To this
postscript no reply--silence gives consent."

"If I had seen this!" said Helen, as she laid it before Mr. and Mrs.
Collingwood, "I ought to have answered, but, indeed, I never saw it;"
she sprang forward instantly to ring the bell, exclaiming, "It is time
yet--stop the boy--'silence gives consent.' I must write. I cannot leave
you, my dear friends, in this way. I did not see that postscript, believe
me I did not."

They believed her, they thanked her, but they would not let her ring the
bell; they said she had better not bind herself in any way either to
themselves or to Lady Cecilia. Accept of the present invitation she
must--she must go to see her friend on her marriage; she must take leave of
her dear Lady Davenant before her departure.

"They are older friends than we are," said Mr. Collingwood, "they have the
first claim upon you; but let us think of it as only a visit now. As to a
residence for life, that you can best judge of for yourself after you have
been some time at Clarendon Park; if you do not like to remain there, you
know how gladly we shall welcome you here again, my child; or, if you
decide to live with those you have known so long and loved so much, we
cannot be offended at your choice,"

This generous kindness, this freedom from jealous susceptibility, touched
Helen's heart, and increased her agitation. She could not bear the thoughts
of either the reality or appearance of neglecting these kind good people,
the moment she had other prospects, and frequently in all the hurry of her
preparations, she repeated, "It will only be a visit at Clarendon Park. I
will return to you, I shall write to you, my dear Mrs. Collingwood, at all
events, constantly."

When Mr. Collingwood gave her his parting blessing he reminded her of his
warning about her fortune. Mrs. Collingwood reminded her of her promise
to write. The carriage drove from the door. Helen's heart was full of
the friends she was leaving, but by degrees the agitation of the parting
subsided, her tears ceased, her heart grew lighter, and the hopes of seeing
her friends at Clarendon Park arose bright in her mind, and her thoughts
all turned upon Cecilia, and Lady Davenant.




CHAPTER III.


Helen looked eagerly out of the carriage-window for the first view of
Clarendon Park. It satisfied--it surpassed her expectations. It was a fine,
aristocratic place:--ancestral trees, and a vast expanse of park; herds of
deer, yellow and dark, or spotted, their heads appearing in the distance
just above the fern, or grazing near, startled as the carriage passed.
Through the long approach, she caught various views of the house, partly
gothic, partly of modern architecture; it seemed of great extent and
magnificence.

All delightful so far; but now for her own reception. Her breath grew quick
and quicker as she came near and nearer to the house. Some one was standing
on the steps. Was it General Clarendon? No; only a servant. The
carriage stopped, more servants appeared, and as Helen got out, a very
sublime-looking personage informed her, that "Lady Cecilia and the General
were out riding--only in the park--would be in immediately."

And as she crossed the great hall, the same sublime person informed her
that there would be still an hour before dinner-time, and inquired whether
she would be pleased to be shown to her own apartment, or to the library?
Helen felt chilled and disappointed, because this was not exactly the way
she had expected things would be upon her arrival. She had pictured to
herself Cecilia running to meet her in the hall.

Without answering the groom of the chambers, she asked, "Is Lady Davenant
out too?"

"No; her ladyship is in the library."

"To the library then."

And through the antechamber she passed rapidly, impatient of a momentary
stop of her conductor to open the folding-doors, while a man, with a
letter-box in hand, equally impatient, begged that Lady Davenant might be
told, "The General's express was waiting."

Lady Davenant was sealing letters in great haste for this express, but when
the door opened, and she saw Helen, she threw wax and letter from her, and
pushing aside the sofa-table, came forward to receive her with open arms.

All was in an instant happy in Helen's heart; but there was the man of the
letter-box; he must be attended to. "Beg your pardon, Helen, my dear--one
moment. Letters of consequence--must not be delayed."

By the time the letters were finished, before they were gone, Lady Cecilia
came in. The same as ever, with affectionate delight in her eyes--her
beautiful eyes. The same, yes, the same Cecilia as ever; yet different:
less of a girl, less lively, but more happy. The moment she had embraced
her, Lady Cecilia turned quick to present General Clarendon, thinking he
had followed, but he had stopped in the hall.

"Send off the letters," were the first words of his which Helen heard. The
tone commanding, the voice remarkably gentlemanlike. An instant afterwards
he came in. A fine figure, a handsome man; in the prime of life; with a
high-born, high-bred military air. English decidedly--proudly English.
Something of the old school--composed self-possession, with voluntary
deference to others--rather distant. Helen felt that his manner of
welcoming her to Clarendon Park was perfectly polite, yet she would have
liked it better had it been less polite--more cordial. Lady Cecilia, whose
eyes were anxiously upon her, drew her arm within hers, and hurried her out
of the room. She stopped at the foot of the stairs, gathered up the folds
of her riding-dress, and turning suddenly to Helen, said,--

"Helen, my dear, you must not think _that_"----

"Think what?" said Helen.

"Think _that_--for which you are now blushing. Oh, you know what I mean!
Helen, your thoughts are just as legible in your face, as they always were
to me. His manner is reserved--cold, may be--but not his heart. Understand
this, pray--once for all. Do you? will you, dearest Helen?"

"I do, I will," cried Helen; and every minute she felt that she better
understood and was more perfectly pleased with her friend. Lady Cecilia
showed her through the apartment destined for her, which she had taken
the greatest pleasure in arranging; everything there was not only most
comfortable, but particularly to her taste; and some little delicate proofs
of affection, recollections of childhood, were there;--keepsakes, early
drawings, nonsensical things, not worth preserving, but still preserved.

"Look how near we are together," said Cecilia, opening a door into her own
dressing-room. "You may shut this up whenever you please, but I hope you
will never please to do so. You see how I leave you your own free will, as
friends usually do, with a proviso, a hope at least, that you are never to
use it on any account--like the child's half guinea pocket-money, never to
be changed." Her playful tone relieved, as she intended it should, Helen's
too keen emotion; and this too was felt with the quickness with which every
touch of kindness ever was felt by her. Helen pressed her friend's hand,
and smiled without speaking.

They were to be some time alone before the commencement of bridal visits,
and an expected succession of troops of friends. This was a time of
peculiar enjoyment to Helen: she had leisure to grow happy in the feeling
of reviving hopes from old associations.

She did not forget her promise to write to Mrs. Collingwood; nor afterwards
(to her credit be it here marked)--even when the house was full of company,
and when, by amusement or by feeling, she was most pressed for time--did
she ever omit to write to those excellent friends. Those who best know the
difficulty will best appreciate this proof of the reality of her gratitude.

As Lady Cecilia was a great deal with her husband riding or walking, Helen
had opportunities of being much alone with Lady Davenant, who now gave her
a privilege that she had enjoyed in former times at Cecilhurst, that of
entering her apartment in the morning at all hours without fear of being
considered an intruder.

The first morning, however, on seeing her ladyship immersed in papers with
a brow of care, deeply intent, Helen paused on the threshold, "I am afraid
I interrupt--I am afraid I disturb you."

"Come in, Helen, come in," cried Lady Davenant, looking up, and the face of
care was cleared, and there was a radiance of pleasure--"Interrupt--yes:
disturb--no. Often in your little life, Helen, you have interrupted--never
disturbed me. From the time you were a child till this moment, never did I
see you come into my room without pleasure."

Then sweeping away heaps of papers, she made room for Helen on the sofa
beside her.

"Now tell me how things are with you--somewhat I have heard reported of my
friend the dean's affairs--tell me all."

Helen told all as briefly as possible; she hurried on through her uncle's
affairs with a tremulous voice, and before she could come to a conclusion
Lady Davenant exclaimed,

"I foresaw it long since: with all my friend's virtues, all his
talents--but we will not go back upon the painful past. You, my dear Helen,
have done just what I should have expected from you,--right;--right, too,
the condition Mr. Collingwood has made--very right. And now to the next
point:--where are you to live, Helen? or rather with whom?"

Helen was not quite sure yet, she said she had not quite determined.

"Am I to understand that your doubt lies between the Collingwoods and my
daughter?"

"Yes; Cecilia most kindly invited me, but I do not know General Clarendon
yet, and he does not know me yet. Cecilia might wish most sincerely that I
should live with her, and I am convinced she does; but her husband must be
considered."

"True," said Lady Davenant--"true; a husband is certainly a thing _to be
cared for_--in Scottish phrase, and General Clarendon is no doubt a person
to be considered,--but it seems that I am not a person to be considered in
your arrangements."

Even the altered, dry, and almost acrid tone in which Lady Davenant spoke,
and the expression of disappointment in her countenance--were, as marks of
strong affection, deeply gratifying to Helen. Lady Davenant went on.

"Was not Cecilhurst always a home to you, Helen Stanley?"

"Yes, yes,--always a most happy home!"

"Then why is not Cecilhurst to be your home?"

"My dear Lady Davenant! how kind!--how very, very kind of you to wish
it--but I never thought of----"

"And why did you not think of it, Helen?'"

"I mean--I thought you were going to Russia."

"And have you settled, my dear Helen," said Lady Davenant, smiling, "have
you settled that I am never to come back from Russia? Do not you know
that you are--that you ever were--you ever will be to me a daughter?" and
drawing Helen fondly towards her, she added, "as my own very dear--I must
not say dearest child,--must not, because as I well remember once--little
creature as you were then---you whispered to me, 'Never call me
dearest,'--generous-hearted child!" And tears started into her eyes as she
spoke; but at that moment came a knock at the door. "A packet from Lord
Davenant, by Mr. Mapletofft, my lady." Helen rose to leave the room, but
Lady Davenant laid a detaining hand upon her, saying, "You will not be in
my way in the least;" and she opened her packet, adding, that while she
read, Helen might amuse herself "with arranging the books on that table, or
in looking over the letters in that portfolio."

Helen had hitherto seen Lady Davenant only with the eyes of very early
youth; but now, after an absence of two years--a great space in her
existence, it seemed as if she looked upon her with new eyes, and every
hour made fresh discoveries in her character. Contrary to what too often
happens when we again see and judge of those whom we have early known, Lady
Davenant's character and abilities, instead of sinking and diminishing,
appeared to rise and enlarge, to expand and be ennobled to Helen's view.
Strong lights and shades there were, but these only excited and fixed her
attention. Even her defects--those inequalities of temper of which she had
already had some example, were interesting as evidences of the power and
warmth of her affections.

The books on the table were those which Lady Davenant had had in her
travelling carriage. They gave Helen an idea of the range and variety of
the reader's mind. Some of them were presentation copies, as they are
called, from several of the first authors of our own, and foreign
countries; some with dedications to Lady Davenant; others with inscriptions
expressing respect or propitiating favour, or anxious for judgment.

The portfolio contained letters whose very signatures would have driven the
first of modern autograph collectors distracted with joy--whose meanest
scrap would make a scrap-book the envy of the world.

But among the letters in this portfolio, there were none of those nauseous
notes of compliment, none of those epistles adulatory, degrading to those
who write, and equally degrading to those to whom they are written: letters
which are, however cleverly turned, inexpressibly wearisome to all but the
parties concerned.

After opening and looking at the signature of several of these letters,
Helen sat in a delightful _embarras de richesse_. To read them all--all at
once, was impossible; with which to begin, she could not determine. One
after another was laid aside as too good to be read first, and after
glancing at the contents of each, she began to deal them round
alphabetically till she was struck by a passage in one of them--she looked
to the signature, it was unknown to fame--she read the whole, it was
striking and interesting. There were several letters in the same hand, and
Helen was surprised to find them arranged according to their dates, in Lady
Davenant's own writing--preserved with those of persons of illustrious
reputation! These she read on without further hesitation. There was no sort
of affectation in them--quite easy and natural, "real feeling, and genius,"
certainly genius, she thought!--and there seemed something romantic and
uncommon in the character of the writer. They were signed Granville
Beauclerc!

Who could he be, this Granville Beauclerc? She read on till Lady Davenant,
having finished her packet, rang a silver handbell, as was her custom, to
summon her page. At the first tingle of the bell Helen started, and Lady
Davenant asked, "Whose letter, my dear, has so completely abstracted you?"

Carlos, the page, came in at this instant, and after a quick glance at the
handwriting of the letters, Lady Davenant gave her orders in Portuguese to
Carlos, and then returning to Helen, took no further notice of the letters,
but went on just where she had left off. "Helen, I remember when you were
about nine years old, timid as you usually were, your coming forward,
bold as a little lion, to attack me in Cecilia's defence; I forget the
particulars, but I recollect that you said I was unjust, and that I did not
know Cecilia, and there you were right; so, to reward you, you shall see
that now I do her perfect justice, and that I am as fond of her as your
heart can wish. I really never did know Cecilia till I saw her heartily in
love; I had imagined her incapable of real love; I thought the desire of
pleasing universally had been her ruling passion--the ruling passion that,
of a little mind and a cold heart; but I did her wrong. In another more
material point, too, I was mistaken."

Lady Davenant paused and looked earnestly at Helen, whose eyes said, "I am
glad," and yet she was not quite certain she knew to what she alluded.

"Cecilia righted herself, and won my good opinion, by the openness with
which she treated me from the very commencement of her attachment to
General Clarendon." Lady Davenant again paused to reflect, and played for
some moments with the tablets in her hand.

"Some one says that we are apt to flatter ourselves that we leave our
faults when our faults leave us, from change of situation, age, and so
forth; and perhaps it does not signify much which it is, if the faults are
fairly gone, and if there be no danger of their returning: all our former
misunderstandings arose on Cecilia's part from cowardice of character; on
mine from--no matter what--no matter which of us was most wrong."

"True, true," cried Helen eagerly; and anxious to prevent recurrence to
painful recollections, she went on to ask rapidly several questions about
Cecilia's marriage.

Lady Davenant smiled, and promised that she should have the whole history
of the marriage in true gossip detail.

"When I wrote to you, I gave you some general ideas on the subject, but
there are little things which could not well be written, even to so safe a
young friend as you are, for what is written remains, and often for those
by whom it was never intended to be seen; the _dessoux_des_cartes_ can
seldom be either safely or satisfactorily shown on paper, so give me my
embroidery-frame, I never can tell well without having something to do with
my hands."

And as Helen set the embroidery-frame, Lady Davenant searched for some
skeins of silk and silk winders.

"Take these, my dear, and wind this silk for me, for I must have my hearer
comfortably established, not like the agonised listener in the '_World_'
leaning against a table, with the corner running into him all the time."




CHAPTER IV.


"I must go back," continued Lady Davenant, "quite to the dark ages, the
time when I knew nothing of my daughter's character but by the accidental
lights which you afforded me. I will take up my story before the
reformation, in the middle ages, when you and your dear uncle left us
at Florence; about two years ago, when Cecilia was in the height of her
conquests, about the time when a certain Colonel D'Aubiguy flourished, you
remember him?"

Helen answered "Yes," in rather a constrained voice, which caused Lady
Davenant to look up, and on seeing that look of inquiry, Helen coloured,
though she would have given the world not to be so foolish. The affair was
Cecilia's, and Helen only wished not to have it recurred to, and yet
she had now, by colouring, done the very thing to fix Lady Davenant's
attention, and as the look was prolonged, she coloured more and more.

"I see I was wrong," said Lady Davenant; "I had thought Colonel D'Aubigny's
ecstasy about that miniature of you was only a feint; but I see he really
was an admirer of yours, Helen?"

"Of mine! oh no, never!" Still from her fear of saying something that
should implicate Cecilia, her tone, though she spoke exactly the truth,
was not to Lady Davenant's discriminative ear quite natural--Helen seeing
doubt, added,

"Impossible, my dear Lady Davenant! you know I was then so young, quite a
child!"

"No, no, not quite; two from eighteen and sixteen remain, I think, and in
our days sixteen is not absolutely a child."

Helen made no answer; her thoughts had gone back to the time when Colonel
D'Aubigny was first introduced to her, which was just before her uncle's
illness, and when her mind had been so engrossed by him, that she had but a
confused recollection of all the rest.

"Now you are right, my dear," said Lady Davenant; "right to be absolutely
silent. In difficult cases say nothing; but still you are wrong in sitting
so uneasily under it, for that seems as if there _was_ something."

"Nothing upon earth!" cried Helen, "if you would not look at me _so_, my
clear Lady Davenant."

"Then, my dear Helen, do not break my embroidery silk; that jerk was
imprudent, and trust me, my dear, the screw of that silk winder is not so
much to blame as you would have me think; take patience with yourself and
with me. There is no great harm done, no unbearable imputation, you are not
accused of loving or liking, only of having been admired." "Never!" cried
Helen.

"Well, well! it does not signify in the least now; the man is either dying
or dead."

"I am glad of it," cried Helen.

"How barbarous!" said Lady Davenant, "but let it pass, I am neither glad
nor sorry; contempt is more dignified and safer than hatred, my dear.

"Now to return to Cecilia; soon after, I will not say the D'Aubigny era,
but soon after you left us, I fell sick, Cecilia was excessively kind to
me. In kindness her affectionate heart never failed, and I felt this
the more, from a consciousness that I had been a little harsh to her. I
recovered but slowly; I could not bear to have her confined so long in a
sick room, and yet I did not much like either of the chaperons with
whom she went out, though they were both of rank, and of unimpeachable
character--the one English, one of the best women in the world, but the
most stupid; the other a foreigner, one of the most agreeable women in the
world, but the most false. I prevailed on Cecilia to break off that--I do
not know what to call it, friendship it was not, and my daughter and I drew
nearer together. Better times began to dawn, but still there was little
sympathy between us; my mind was intent on Lord Davenant's interests, hers
on amusement and admiration. Her conquests were numerous, and she gloried
in their number, for, between you and me, Cecilia was, before the
reformation, not a little of a coquette. You will not allow it, you did not
see it, you did not go out with her, and being three or four years younger,
you could not be a very good critic of Cecilia's conduct; and depend upon
it I am right, she was not a little of a coquette. She did not know, and I
am sure I did not know, that she had a heart, till she became acquainted
with General Clarendon.

"The first time we met him,"--observing a quickening of attention in
Helen's eyes, Lady Davenant smiled, and said, "Young ladies always like
to hear of 'the first time we saw him.'--The first time we saw General
Clarendon was--forgive me the day of the month--in the gallery at Florence.
I forget how it happened that he had not been presented to me--to Lord
Davenant he must have been. But so it was and it was new to Cecilia to see
a man of his appearance who had not on his first arrival shown himself
ambitious to be made known to her. He was admiring a beautiful Magdalene,
and he was standing with his back towards us. I recollect that his
appearance when I saw him as a stranger--the time when one can best judge
of appearance--struck me as that of a distinguished person; but little
did I think that there stood Cecilia's husband! so little did my maternal
instinct guide me.

"As we approached, he turned and gave one look at Cecilia; she gave one
look at him. He passed on, she stopped me to examine the picture which he
had been admiring.

"Every English mother at Florence, except myself, had their eyes fixed upon
General Clarendon from the moment of his arrival. But whatever I may have
been, or may have been supposed to be, on the great squares of politics, I
believe I never have been accused or even suspected of being a manoeuvrer
on the small domestic scale.

"My reputation for imbecility in these matters was perhaps advantageous. He
did not shun me as he did the tribe of knowing ones; a hundred reports flew
about concerning him, settling in one, that he was resolved never to marry.
Yet he was a passionate admirer of beauty and grace, and it was said that
he had never been unsuccessful where he had wished to please. The secret of
his resolution against marriage was accounted for by the gossiping public
in many ways variously absurd. The fact was, that in his own family, and in
that of a particular friend, there had been about this time two or three
scandalous intrigues, followed by 'the public brand of shameful life.' One
of these 'sad affairs,' as they are styled, was marked with premeditated
treachery and turpitude. The lady had been, or had seemed to be, for years
a pattern wife, the mother of several children; yet she had long betrayed,
and at last abandoned, a most amiable and confiding husband, and went
off with a man who did not love her, who cared for nought but himself, a
disgusting monster of selfishness, vanity, and vice! This woman was said to
have been once good, but to have been corrupted and depraved by residence
abroad--by the contagion of foreign profligacy. In the other instance, the
seduced wife had been originally most amiable, pure-minded, uncommonly
beautiful, loved to idolatry by her husband, Clarendon's particular friend,
a man high in public estimation. The husband shot himself. The seducer was,
it's said, the lady's first love. That these circumstances should have made
a deep impression on Clarendon, is natural; the more feeling--the stronger
the mind, the more deep and lasting it was likely to be. Besides his
resolution against marriage in general, we heard that he had specially
resolved against marrying any travelled lady, and most especially against
any woman with whom there was danger of a first love. How this danger was
to be avoided or ascertained, mothers and daughters looked at one another,
and did not ask, or at least did not answer.

"Cecilia, apparently unconcerned, heard and laughed at these high resolves,
after her gay fashion with her young companions, and marvelled how long
the resolution would be kept. General Clarendon of course could not but be
introduced to us, could not but attend our assemblies, nor could he avoid
meeting us in all the good English and foreign society at Florence; but
whenever he met us, he always kept at a safe distance: this caution marked
his sense of danger. To avoid its being so construed, perhaps, he made
approaches to me, politely cold; we talked very wisely on the state of the
Continent and the affairs of Europe; I did not, however, confine myself or
him to politics, I gave him many unconscious opportunities of showing in
conversation, not his abilities, for they are nothing extraordinary; but
his character, which is first-rate. Gleams came out, of a character born to
subjugate, to captivate, to attach for life. It worked first on Cecilia's
curiosity; she thought she was only curious, and she listened at first,
humming an opera air between times, with the least concerned look
conceivable. But, her imagination was caught, and it thenceforward through
every thing that every body else might be saying, and through all she said
herself, she heard every word that fell from our general, and even all that
was repeated of his saying at second or third hand. So she learned in due
season that he had seen women as handsome, handsomer than Lady Cecilia
Davenant; but that there was something in her manner peculiarly suited to
his taste--his fastidious taste! so free from coquetry, he said she was.
And true, perfectly true, from the time he became acquainted with her; no
hypocrisy on her part, no mistake on his; at the first touch of a real
love, there was an end of vanity and coquetry. Then her deference--her
affection for her mother, was so charming, he thought; such perfect
confidence--such quick intelligence between us. No deceit here either,
only a little self-deception on Cecilia's part. She had really grown
suddenly fonder of me; what had become of her fear, she did not know. But
I knew full well my new charm and my real merit; I was a good and safe
conductor of the electric shock.

"It chanced one day, when I was listening only as one listens to a man who
is talking at another through oneself, I did not immediately catch the
meaning, or I believe hear what the general said. Cecilia, unawares,
answered for me, and showed that she perfectly understood:--he bowed--she
blushed.

"Man is usually quicksighted to woman's blushes. But our general was not
vain, only proud; the blush he did not set down to his own account, but
very much to hers. It was a proof, he thought, of so much simplicity of
heart, so unspoiled by the world, so unlike--in short, so like the very
woman he had painted in his fancy, before he knew too much----. Lady
Cecilia was now a perfect angel. Not one word of all this did he say, but
it was understood quite as well as if it had been spoken: his lips were
firm compressed, and the whole outer man composed--frigidly cold;--yet
through all this Cecilia saw--such is woman's penetration in certain
cases--Cecilia saw what must sooner or later happen. He, still proud of his
prudence, refrained from word, look, or sigh, resolved to be impassive
till his judgment should be perfectly satisfied. At last this judgment was
perfectly satisfied; that is, he was passionately in love--fairly 'caught,'
my dear, 'in the strong toils of grace,' and he threw himself at Cecilia's
feet. She was not quite so much surprised as he expected, but more pleased
than he had ventured to hope. There was that, however, in his proud
humility, which told Cecilia there must be no trifling.

  'He either fears his fate too much,
  Or his deserts are small,
  Who fears to put it to the touch,
  To win or lose it all.'

"He put it to the test, and won it all. General Clarendon, indeed, is a
man likely to win and keep the love of woman, for this, among other good
reasons, that love and honour being with him inseparable, the idol he
adores must keep herself at the height to which he has raised her, or cease
to receive his adoration. She must be no common vulgar idol for every
passing worshipper." As Lady Davenant paused, Helen looked up, hesitated,
and said: "I hope that General Clarendon is not disposed to jealousy."

"No: he's too proud to be jealous," replied Lady Davenant.

Are proud men never jealous? thought Helen.

"I mean," continued Lady Davenant, "that General Clarendon is too proud to
be jealous of his wife. For aught I know, he might have felt jealousy of
Cecilia before she was his, for then she was but a woman, like another; but
once HIS--once having set his judgment on the cast, both the virtues and
the defects of his character join in security for his perfect confidence in
the wife 'his choice and passion both approve.' From temper and principle
he is unchangeable. I acknowledge that I think the general is a little
inclined perhaps to obstinacy; but, as Burke says, though obstinacy is
certainly a vice, it happens that the whole line of the great and masculine
virtues, constancy, fidelity, fortitude, magnanimity, are closely allied to
this disagreeable quality, of which we have so just an abhorrence.

"It is most peculiarly happy for Cecilia that she has a husband of this
firm character, one on whom she can rely--one to whom she may, she must,
look up, if not always, yet upon all important occasions where decision is
necessary, or integrity required. It is between her and her general as it
should be in marriage, each has the compensating qualities to those which
the other possesses: General Clarendon is inferior to Cecilia in wit, but
superior in judgment; inferior in literature, superior in knowledge of the
world; inferior to my daughter altogether in abilities, in what is called
genius, but far superior in that ruling power, _strength of mind_. Strength
of mind is an attaching as well as a ruling power: all human creatures,
women especially, become attached to those who have power over their
minds. Yes, Helen, I am satisfied with their marriage, and with your
congratulations: yours are the sort I like. Vulgar people--by vulgar people
I mean all who think vulgarly--very great vulgar people have congratulated
me upon this establishment of my daughter's fortune and future rank (a
dukedom in view), all that could be wished in worldly estimation. But I
rejoice in it as the security for my daughter's character and happiness.
Thank you again, my dear young friend, for your sympathy; you can
understand me, you can feel with me."

Sympathy, intelligent, quick, warm, unwearied, unweariable, such as
Helen's, is really a charming accomplishment in a friend; the only
obligation a proud person, is never too proud to receive; and it was most
gratifying to Helen to be allowed to sympathise with Lady Davenant--one
who, in general, never spoke of herself, or unveiled her private feelings,
even to those who lived with her on terms of intimacy. Helen felt
responsible for the confidence granted to her thus upon credit, and a
strong ambition was excited in her mind to justify the high opinion her
superior friend had formed of her. She determined to become all that she
was believed to be; as the flame of a taper suddenly rises towards what is
held over it, her spirit mounted to the point to which her friend pointed.




CHAPTER V.

Helen's perfect happiness at Clarendon Park was not of long duration.
People who have not been by nature blessed or cursed with nice feelings, or
who have well rubbed off their delicacy in roughing through the world, can
be quite happy, or at least happy enough without ascertaining whether they
are really esteemed or liked by those with whom they live. Many, and some
of high degree, when well sheltered and fed, and provided with all
the necessaries, and surrounded by all the luxuries of life, and with
appearances tolerably well kept up by outward manner, care little or nought
about the inside sentiments.

But Helen was neither of the case-hardened philosophic, or the naturally
obtuse-feeling class; she belonged to the over-anxious. Surrounded at
Clarendon Park with all the splendour of life, and with the immediate
expectation of seeing and being seen by the first society in England; with
the certainty also of being tenderly loved and highly esteemed by two of
the persons she was living with, yet a doubt about the third began to make
her miserable. Whether General Clarendon really liked her or not, was a
question that hung upon her mind sometimes as a dead weight--then vibrating
backwards and forwards, she often called to mind, and endeavoured to
believe, what Cecilia the first day told her, that this reserved manner
was natural to him with strangers, and would wear off. But to her the icy
coldness did not thaw. So she felt, or so she fancied, and which it was
she could not decide. She had never before lived with any one about whose
liking for her she could doubt, therefore, as she said to herself, "I know
I am a bad judge." She feared to open her mind to Cecilia. Lady Davenant
would be the safest person to consult; yet Helen, with all her young
delicacy fresh about her, scrupled, and could not screw her courage to
the sticking-place. Every morning going to Lady Davenant's room, she half
resolved and yet came away without speaking. At last, one morning, she
began:--

You said something the other day, my dear Lady Davenant, about a visit
from Miss Clarendon. Perhaps--I am afraid--in short I think,--I fear,
the general does not like my being here; and I thought, perhaps, he was
displeased at his sister's not being here,--that he thought Cecilia's
having asked me prevented his sister's coming; but then you told me he was
not of a jealous temper, did not you?"

"_Distinguez_," said Lady Davenant; "_distinguons_, as the old French
metaphysicians used to say, _distinguons_, there be various kinds of
jealousy, as of love. The old romancers make a distinction between
_amour_ and _amour par amours_. Whatever that mean, I beg leave to take a
distinction full as intelligible, I trust, between _jalousie par amour_ and
_jalousie par amitie_. Now, to apply; when I told you that our general was
not subject to jealousy, I should have distinguished, and said, _jalousie
par amour_--jealousy in love, but I will not ensure him against _jalousie
par amitie_--jealousy in friendship--of friends and relations, I mean.
Me-thinks I have seen symptoms of this in the general, he does not like my
influence over Cecilia, nor yours, my dear."

"I understand it all," exclaimed Helen, "and I was right from the very
first; I saw he disliked me, and he ever will and must dislike and detest
me--I see it in every look, hear it in every word, in every tone." "Now,
my dear Helen, if you are riding off on your imagination, I wish you a
pleasant ride, and till you come back again I will write my letter," said
Lady Davenant, taking up a pen.

Helen begged pardon, and protested she was not going to ride off upon any
imagination,--she had no imagination now--she entreated Lady Davenant to
go on, for she was very anxious to know the whole truth, whatever it might
be. Lady Davenant laid down her pen, and told her all she knew. In the
first place, that Cecilia did not like Miss Clarendon, who, though a very
estimable person, had a sort of uncompromising sincerity, joined with a
_brusquerie_ of manner which Cecilia could not endure. How her daughter had
managed matters to refuse the sister without offending the brother, Lady
Davenant said she did not know; that was Cecilia's secret, and probably it
lay in her own charming manner of doing things, aided by the whole affair
having occurred a few days before marriage, when nothing could be taken
ill of the bride elect. "The general, as Cecilia told me, desired that she
would write to invite you, Helen; she did so, and I am very glad of it.
This is all I know of this mighty matter."

But Helen could not endure the idea of being there, contrary to the
general's wishes, in the place of the sister he loved. Oh, how very,
very unfortunate she was to have all her hopes blighted, destroyed--and
Cecilia's kindness all in vain. Dear, dear Cecilia!--but for the whole
world Helen would not be so selfish--she would not run the hazard of making
mischief. She would never use her influence over Cecilia in opposition to
the general. Oh, how little he knew of her character, if he thought it
possible.

Helen had now come to tears. Then the keen sense of injustice turned to
indignation; and the tears wiped away, and pride prevailing, colouring she
exclaimed, "That she knew what she ought to do, she knew what she would
do--she would not stay where the master of the house did not wish for her.
Orphan though she was, she could not accept of protection or obligation
from any human being who neither liked or esteemed her. She would
shorten her visit at Clarendon Park--make it as short as his heart could
desire,--she would never be the cause of any disagreement--poor, dear, kind
Cecilia! She would write directly to Mrs. Collingwood." At the close of
these last incoherent sentences, Helen was awe-struck by the absolute
composed immovability and silence of Lady Davenant. Helen stood rebuked
before her.

"Instead of writing to Mrs. Collingwood, had not you better go at once?"
said her ladyship, speaking in a voice so calm, and in a tone so slightly
ironical, that it might have passed for earnest on any but an acutely
feeling ear--"Shall I ring, and order your carriage?" putting her hand on
the bell as she spoke, and resting it there, she continued--"It would be so
spirited to be off instantly; so wise, so polite, so considerate towards
_dear_ Cecilia--so dignified towards the general, and so kind towards me,
who am going to a far country, Helen, and may perhaps not see you ever
again."

"Forgive me!" cried Helen; "I never could go while you were here."

"I did not know what you might think proper when you seemed to have lost
your senses."

"I have recovered them," said Helen; "I will do whatever you
please--whatever you think best."

"It must not be what I please, my dear child, nor what I think best, but
what you judge for yourself to be best; else what will become of you when
I am in Russia? It must be some higher and more stable principle of action
that must govern you. It must not be the mere wish to please this or that
friend;--the defect of your character, Helen, remember I tell you,
is this--inordinate desire to be loved, this impatience of not being
loved--that which but a moment ago made you ready to abandon two of the
best friends you have upon earth, because you imagine, or you suspect, or
you fear, that a third person, almost a stranger, does not like before he
has had time to know you."

"I was very foolish," said Helen; "but now I will be wise, I will do
whatever is--right. Surely you would not have me live here if I were
convinced that the master of the house did not wish it?"

"Certainly not--certainly not," repeated Lady Davenant; "but let us see our
way before us; never gallop, my dear, much less leap; never move, till you
see your way;--once it is ascertained that General Clarendon does not wish
you to be here, nor approve of you for the chosen companion of his wife, I,
as your best friend, would say, begone, and speed you on your way; then
as much pride, as much spirit as you will; but those who are conscious of
possessing real spirit, should never be--seldom are--in a hurry to show it;
that kind of ostentatious haste is undignified in man, and ungraceful in
woman."

Helen promised that she would be patience itself: "But tell me exactly,"
said she, "what you would have me do."

"Nothing," said Lady Davenant.

"Nothing! that is easy at least," said Helen, smiling.

"No, not so easy as you imagine; it requires sometimes no small share of
strength of mind."

"Strength of mind!" said Helen, "I am afraid I have not any."

"Acquire it then, my dear," said her friend.

"But can I?"

"Certainly; strength of mind, like strength of body, is improved by
exercise."

"If I had any to begin with--" said Helen.

"You have some, Helen, a great deal in one particular, else why should
I have any more regard for you, or more hope of you, than of any other
well-dressed, well-taught beauty, any of the tribe of young ladies who pass
before me without ever fixing my mind's eye for one moment?"

"But in what particular, my dear Lady Davenant, do you mean?" said Helen,
anxiously; "I am afraid you are mistaken; in what do you think I ever
showed strength of mind? Tell me, and I will tell you the truth."

"That you will, and there is the point that I mean. Ever since I have known
you, you have always, as at this moment, coward as you are, been brave
enough to speak the truth; and truth I believe to be the only real lasting
foundation for friendship; in all but truth there is a principle of decay
and dissolution. Now good bye, my dear;--stay, one word more--there is a
line in some classic poet, which says 'the suspicion of ill-will never
fails to produce it'--Remember this in your intercourse with General
Clarendon; show no suspicion of his bearing you ill-will, and to show none,
you must feel none. Put absolutely out of your head all that you may have
heard or imagined about Miss Clarendon, or her brother's prejudices on her
account."

"I will--I will indeed," said Helen, and so they parted. A few words have
sometimes a material influence on events in human life. Perhaps even
among those who hold in general that advice never does good, there is no
individual who cannot recollect some few words--some conversation which has
altered the future colour of their lives.

Helen's over-anxiety concerning General Clarendon's opinion of her, being
now balanced by the higher interest Lady Davenant had excited, she met him
with new-born courage; and Lady Cecilia, not that she suspected it was
necessary, but merely by way of prevention, threw in little douceurs of
flattery, on the general's part, repeated sundry pretty compliments, and
really kind things which he had said to her of Helen. These always pleased
Helen at the moment, but she could never make what she was told he said of
her quite agree with what he said to her: indeed, he said so very little,
that no absolute discrepancy could be detected between the words spoken and
the words reported to have been said; but still the looks did not agree
with the opinions, or the cordiality implied.

One morning Lady Cecilia told her that the general wished that she would
ride out with them, "and you must come, indeed you must, and try his pretty
Zelica; he wishes it of all things, he told me so last night."

The general chancing to come in as she spoke, Lady Cecilia appealed to him
with a look that almost called upon him to enforce her request; but he only
said that if Miss Stanley would do him the honour, he should certainly be
happy, if Zelica would not be too much for her; but he could not take it
upon him to advise. Then looking for some paper of which he came in search,
and passing her with the most polite and deferential manner possible, he
left the room.

Half vexed, half smiling, Helen looked at Cecilia, and asked whether all
she had told her was not a little--"_plus belle que la verite._"

Lady Cecilia, blushing slightly, poured out rapid protestations that
all she had ever repeated to Helen of the general's sayings was perfect
truth--"I will not swear to the words--because in the first place it is
not pretty to swear, and next, because I can never recollect anybody's
words, or my own, five minutes after they have been said."

Partly by playfulness, and partly by protestations, Lady Cecilia half
convinced Helen; but from this time she refrained from repeating
compliments which, true or false, did no good, and things went on better;
observing this, she left them to their natural course, upon all such
occasions the best way.

And now visitors began to appear, and some officers of the general's staff
arrived. Clarendon Park happened to be in the district which General
Clarendon commanded, so that he was able usually to reside there. It was in
what is called a good neighbourhood, and there was much visiting, and many
entertainments.

One day at dinner, Helen was seated between the general and a fine young
guardsman, who, as far as his deep sense of his own merit, and his
fashionable indifference to young ladies would permit, had made some
demonstrations of a desire to attract her notice. He was piqued when,
in the midst of something he had wonderfully exerted himself to say, he
observed that her attention was distracted by a gentleman opposite, who
had just returned from the Continent, and who, among other pieces of news,
marriages and deaths of English abroad, mentioned that "poor D'Aubigny" was
at last dead.

Helen looked first at Cecilia, who, as she saw, heard what was said with
perfect composure; and then at Lady Davenant, who had meantime glanced
imperceptibly at her daughter, and then upon Helen, whose eyes she
met--and Helen coloured merely from association, because she had coloured
before-provoking! yet impossible to help it. All passed in less time than
it can be told, and Helen had left the guardsman in the midst of his
sentence, discomfited, and his eyes were now upon her; and in confusion she
turned from him, and there were the general's eyes but he was only inviting
her to taste some particular wine, which he thought she would like, and
which she willingly accepted, and praised, though she assuredly did not
know in the least what manner of taste it had. The general now exerted
himself to occupy the guardsman in a conversation about promotion, and drew
all observation from Helen. Yet not the slightest indication of having
seen, heard, or understood, appeared in his countenance, not the least
curiosity or interest about Colonel D'Aubigny. Of one point Helen was
however intuitively certain, that he had noticed that confusion which he
had so ably, so coolly covered. One ingenuous look from her thanked him,
and his look in return was most gratifying; she could not tell how it was,
but it appeared more as if he understood and liked her than any look she
had ever seen from him before. They were both more at their ease. Next day,
he certainly justified all Cecilia's former assurances, by the urgency with
which he desired to have her of the riding party. He put her on horseback
himself, bade the aide-de-camp ride on with Lady Cecilia--three several
times set the bridle right in Miss Stanley's hand, assuring her that she
need not be afraid, that Zelica was the gentlest creature possible, and he
kept his fiery horse, Fleetfoot, to a pace that suited her during the whole
time they were out. Helen took courage, and her ride did her a vast deal of
good.

The rides were repeated, the general evidently became more and more
interested about Miss Stanley; he appealed continually to her taste, and
marked that he considered her as part of his family; but, as Helen told
Lady Davenant, it was difficult, with a person of his high-bred manners
and reserved temper, to ascertain what was to be attributed to general
deference to her sex, what to particular regard for the individual, how
much to hospitality to his guest, or attention to his wife's friend,
and what might be considered as proof of his own desire to share that
friendship, and of a real wish that she should continue to live with them.

While she was in this uncertainty, Lord Davenant arrived from London; he
had always been fond of Helen, and now the first sight of her youthful
figure in deep mourning, the recollection of the great changes that had
taken place since they had last met, touched him to the heart--he folded
her in his arms, and was unable to speak. He! a great bulky man, with a
face of constitutional joy--but so it was; he had a tender heart, deep
feelings of all kinds under an appearance of _insouciance_ which deceived
the world. He was distinguished as a political leader--but, as he said of
himself, he had been three times inoculated with ambition--once by his
mother, once by his brother, and once by his wife; but it had never taken
well; the last the best, however,--it had shown at least sufficiently to
satisfy his friends, and he was happy to be no more tormented. With talents
of the first order, and integrity unblenching, his character was not of
that stern stuff--no, not of that corrupt stuff--of which modern ambition
should be made.

He had now something to tell Helen, which he would say even before he
opened his London budget of news. He told her, with a congratulatory smile,
that he had had an opportunity of showing his sense of Mr. Collingwood's
merits; and as he spoke he put a letter into her hand.

The letter was from her good friend Mr. Collingwood, accepting a bishopric
in the West Indies, which had been offered to him by Lord Davenant. It
enclosed a letter for Helen, desiring in the most kind manner that she
would let him know immediately and decidedly where and with whom she
intended to live; and there was a postscript from Mrs. Collingwood full of
affection, and doubts, and hopes, and fears.

The moment Helen had finished this letter, without seeming to regard the
inquiring looks of all present, and without once looking towards any one
else, she walked deliberately up to General Clarendon, and begged to speak
to him alone. Never was general more surprised, but of course he was too
much of a general to let that appear. Without a word, he offered his arm,
and led her to his study; he drew a chair towards her--

"No misfortune, I hope, Miss Stanley? If I can in any way be of
service----"

"The only service, General Clarendon," said Helen, her manner becoming
composed, and her voice steadying as she went on--"the only service you
can do me now is to tell me the plain truth, and this will prevent what
would certainly be a misfortune to me--perhaps to all of us. Will you read
this letter?"

He received it with an air of great interest, and again moved the chair to
her. Before she sat down, she added,--

"I am unused to the world, you see, General Clarendon. I have been
accustomed to live with one who always told me his mind sincerely, so that
I could judge always what I ought to do. Will you do so now? It is the
greatest service, as well as favour, you can do me."

"Depend upon it, I will," said General Clarendon.

"I should not ask you to tell me in words--that might be painful to your
politeness; only let me see it," said Helen, and she sat down.

The general read on without speaking, till he came to the mention of
Helen's original promise of living with the Collingwoods. He did not
comprehend that passage, he said, showing it to her. He had always, on the
contrary, understood that it had been a long _settled_ thing, a promise
between Miss Stanley and Lady Cecilia, that Helen should live with Lady
Cecilia when she married.

"No such thing!" Helen said. "No such agreement had ever been made."

So the general now perceived; but this was a mistake of his which he
hoped would make no difference in her arrangements, he said: "Why should
it?--unless Miss Stanley felt unhappy at Clarendon Park?"

He paused, and Helen was silent: then, taking desperate resolution, she
answered,--

"I should be perfectly happy here, if I were sure of your wishes, your
feelings about me--about it."

"Is it possible that there has been any thing in my manner," said he, "that
could give Miss Stanley pain? What could have put a doubt into her mind?"

"There might be some other person nearer, and naturally dearer to you,"
said Helen, looking up in his face ingenuously--"one whom you might have
desired to have in my place:--your sister, Miss Clarendon, in short."

"Did Cecilia tell you of this?"

"No, Lady Davenant did; and since I heard it I never could be happy--I
never can be happy till I know your feeling."

His manner instantly changed.

"You shall know my feelings, then," said he. "Till I knew you, Helen, my
wish was, that my sister should live with my wife; now I know you, my wish
is, that you should live with us. You will suit Cecilia better than my
sister could--will suit us both better, having the same truth of character,
and more gentleness of manner. I have answered you with frankness equal to
your own. And now," said he, taking her hand, "you know Cecilia has always
considered you as her sister--allow me to do the same: consider me as a
brother--such you shall find me. Thank you. This is settled for life,"
added he, drawing her arm through his, and taking up her letters, he led
her back towards the library.

But her emotion, the stronger for being suppressed, was too great for
re-appearing in company: she withdrew her arm from his when they were
passing through the hall, and turning her face away, she had just voice
enough to beg he would show her letters to----

He understood. She ran up-stairs to her own room, glad to be alone; a flood
of joy came over her.

"A brother in Cecilia's husband!--a brother!"

The word had a magical charm, and she could not help repeating it
aloud--she wept like a child. Lady Cecilia soon came flying in, all
delight and affection, reproaches and wonder alternately, in the quickest
conceivable succession. "Delighted, it is settled and for ever! my dear,
dear Helen! But how could you ever think of leaving us, you wicked Helen!
Well! now you see what Clarendon really is! But, my dear, I was so
terrified when I heard it all. You are, and ever were, the oddest mixture
of cowardice and courage. I--do you know I, brave _I_--never should have
advised--never should have ventured as you have? But he is delighted at it
all, and so am I now it has all ended so charmingly, now I have you safe. I
will write to the Collingwoods; you shall not have a moment's pain; I will
settle it all, and invite them here before they leave England; Clarendon
desired I would--oh, he is!--now you will believe me! The Collingwoods,
too, will be glad to be asked here to take leave of you, and all will be
right; I love, as you do, dear Helen, that everybody should be pleased when
I am happy."

When Lady Davenant heard all that had passed, she did not express that
prompt unmixed delight which Helen expected; a cloud came over her brow,
something painful regarding her daughter seemed to strike her, for her
eyes fixed on Cecilia, and her emotion was visible in her countenance; but
pleasure unmixed appealed as she turned to Helen, and to her she gave, what
was unusual, unqualified approbation.

"My dear Helen, I admire your plain straightforward truth; I am satisfied
with this first essay of your strength of mind and courage."

"Courage!" said Helen, smiling.

"Not such as is required to take a lion by the beard, or a bull by the
horns," replied Lady Davenant; "but there are many persons in this world
who, brave though they be, would rather beard a lion, sooner seize a bull
by the horns, than, when they get into a dilemma, dare to ask a direct
question, and tell plainly what passes in their own minds. Moral courage
is, believe me, uncommon in both sexes, and yet in going through the
world it is equally necessary to the virtue of both men and women."

"But do you really think," said Helen, "that strength of mind, or what you
call moral courage, is as necessary to women as it is to men?"

"Certainly, show me a virtue, male or female--if virtues admit of
grammatical distinctions, if virtues acknowledge the more worthy gender and
the less worthy of the grammar, show me a virtue male or female that _can_
long exist without truth. Even that emphatically termed the virtue of our
sex, Helen, on which social happiness rests, society depends, on what is it
based? is it not on that single-hearted virtue truth?--and truth on what?
on courage of the mind. They who dare to speak the truth, will not ever
dare to go irretrievably wrong. Then what is falsehood but cowardice?--and
a false woman!--does not that say all in one word?"

"But whence arose all this? you wonder, perhaps," said Lady Davenant;
"and I have not inclination to explain. Here comes Lord Davenant. Now for
politics--farewell morality, a long farewell. Now for the London budget,
and 'what news from Constantinople? Grand vizier certainly strangled, or
not?'"




_CHAPTER VI._

The London budget of news was now opened, and gone through by Lord
Davenant, including quarrels in the cabinet and all that with fear of
change perplexes politicians. But the fears and hopes of different ages are
attached to such different subjects, that Helen heard all this as though
she heard it not, and went on with her drawing, touching, and retouching
it, without ever looking up, till her attention was wakened by the name of
Granville Beauclerc; this was the name of the person who had written those
interesting letters which she had met with in Lady Davenant's portfolio.
"What is he doing in town?" asked the general.

"Amusing himself, I suppose," replied Lord Davenant.

"I believe he forgets that I am his guardian," said the general.

"I am sure he cannot forget that you are his friend," said Lady Cecilia;
"for he has the best heart in the world."

"And the worst head for any thing useful," said the general.

"He is a man of genius," said Lady Davenant.

"Did you speak to him, my lord," pursued the general, "about standing for
the county?"

"Yes."

"And he said what?"

"That he would have nothing to do with it."

"Why?"

"Something about not being tied to party, and somewhat he said about
patriotism," replied Lord Davenant.

"Nonsense!" said the general, "he is a fool."

"Only young," said Lady Davenant,

"Men are not so very young in these days at two-and-twenty," said the
general.

"In some," said Lady Davenant, "the classical touch, the romance of
political virtue, lasts for months, if not years, after they leave college;
even those who, like Granville, go into high life in London, do not
sometimes, for a season or two, lose their first enthusiasm of patriotism."

The general's lips became compressed. Lord Davenant, throwing himself back
in his easy chair, repeated, "Patriotism! yes, every young man of talent is
apt to begin with a fit of that sort."

"My dear lord," cried Lady Davenant, "you, of all men, to speak of
patriotism as a disease!"

"And a disease that can be had but once in life, I am afraid," replied her
lord laughing; "and yet," as if believing in that at which he laughed, "it
evaporates in most men in words, written or spoken, lasts till the first
pamphlet is published, or till the maiden-speech in parliament is fairly
made, and fairly paid for--in all honour--all honourable men."

Lady Davenant passed over these satirical observations, and somewhat
abruptly asked Lord Davenant if he recollected the late Mr. Windham.

"Certainly he was not a man to be easily forgotten: but what in
particular?" "The scales of his mind were too fine," said Lady Davenant,
"too nicely adjusted for common purposes; diamond scales will not do for
weighing wool. Very refined, very ingenious, very philosophical minds, such
as Windham, Burke, Bacon, were all too scrupulous weighers; their scales
turned with the millionth of a grain, and all from the same cause, subject
to the same defect, indecision. They saw too well how much can be said on
both sides of the question. There is a sort of philosophical doubt, arising
from enlargement of understanding, quite different from that irresolution
of character which is caused by infirmity of will; and I have observed,"
continued Lady Davenant, "in some of these over scrupulous weighers, that
when once they come to a balance, that instant they become most wilful; so
it will be, you will see, with Beauclerc. After excessive indecision, you
will see him start perhaps at once to rash action."

"Rash of wrong, resolute of right," said Lord Davenant.

"He is constitutionally wilful, and metaphysically vacillating," said Lady
Davenant.

The general waited till the metaphysics were over, and then said to Lord
Davenant that he suspected there was something more than mere want of
ambition in Beauclerc's refusal to go into parliament. Some words were here
inaudible to Helen, and the general began to walk up and down the room with
so strong a tread, that at every step the china shook on the table near
which Helen sat, so that she lost most part of what followed, and yet it
seemed interesting, about some Lord Beltravers, and a Comtesse de Saint
---- something, or a Lady Blanche ---- somebody.

Lady Davenant looked anxious, the general's steps became more deliberately,
more ominously firm; till lady Cecilia came up to him, and playfully
linking her arm in his, the steps were moderated, and when a soothing hand
came upon his shoulder, the compressed lips were relaxed--she spoke in a
low voice--he answered aloud.

"By all means! write to him yourself, my love; get him down here and he
will be safe; he cannot refuse you."

"Tuesday, then?" she would name the earliest day if the general approved.

He approved of every thing she said; "Tuesday let it be." Following him to
the door, Lady Cecilia added something which seemed to fill the measure of
his contentment. "Always good and kind," said he; "so let it be.

"Then shall I write to your sister, or will you?"

"You," said the general, "let the kindness come from you, as it always
does."

Lady Cecilia, in a moment at the writing-table, ran off, as fast as pen
could go, two notes, which she put into her mother's hand, who gave an
approving nod; and, leaving them with her to seal and have franked, Cecilia
darted out on the terrace, carrying Helen along with her, to see some
Italian garden she was projecting.

And as she went, and as she stood directing the workmen, at every close of
her directions she spoke to Helen. She said she was very glad that she had
settled that Beauclerc was to come to them immediately. He was a great
favourite of hers.

"Not for any of those grandissimo qualities which my mother sees in him,
and which I am not quite clear exist; but just because he is the most
agreeable person in nature; and really natural; though he is a man of the
world, yet not the least affected. Quite fashionable, of course, but with
true feeling. Oh! he is delightful, just--" then she interrupted herself to
give directions to the workmen about her Italian garden----

"Oleander in the middle of that bed; vases nearer to the balustrade-----"

"Beauclerc has a very good taste, and a beautiful place he has, Thorndale.
He will be very rich. Few very rich young men are agreeable now, women
spoil them so.--['Border that bed with something pretty.']--Still he is,
and I long to know what you will think of him; I know what I think he will
think, but, however, I will say no more; people are always sure to get into
scrapes in this world, when they say what they think.--['That fountain
looks beautiful.']--I forgot to tell you he is very handsome. The general
is very fond of him, and he of the general, except when he considers him
as his guardian, for Granville Beauclerc does not particularly like to be
controlled--who does? It is a curious story.--['Unpack those vases, and by
the time that is done I will be back.']--Take a turn with me, Helen, this
way. It is a curious story: Granville Beauclerc's father--but I don't know
it perfectly, I only know that he was a very odd man, and left the general,
though he was so much younger than himself, guardian to Granville, and
settled that he was not to be of age, I mean not to come into possession
of his large estates, till he is five-and-twenty: shockingly hard on poor
Granville, and enough to make him hate Clarendon, but he does not, and that
is charming, that is one reason I like him! So amazingly respectful to his
guardian always, considering how impetuous he is, amazingly respectful,
though I cannot say I think he is what the gardening books call _patient of
the knife_, I don't think he likes his fancies to be lopped; but then he is
so clever. Much more what you would call a reading man than the general,
distinguished at college, and all that which usually makes a young man
conceited, but Beauclerc is only a little headstrong--all the more
agreeable, it keeps one in agitation; one never knows how it will end, but
I am sure it will all go on well now. It is curious, too, that mamma knew
him also when he was at Eton, I believe--I don't know how, but long before
we ever heard of Clarendon, and she corresponded with him, but I never knew
him till he came to Florence, just after it was all settled with me and the
general; and he was with us there and at Paris, and travelled home with us,
and I like him. Now you know all, except what I do not choose to tell you,
so come back to the workmen--'That vase will not do there, move it in
front of these evergreens; that will do.'"

Then returning to Helen--"After all, I did so right, and I am so glad
I thought in time of inviting Esther, now Mr. Beauclerc is coming--the
general's sister--half sister. Oh, so unlike him! you would never guess
that Miss Clarendon was his sister, except from her pride. But she is so
different from other people; she knows nothing, and wishes to know nothing
of the world. She lives always at an old castle in Wales, Llan ----
something, which she inherited from her mother, and she has always been her
own mistress, living with her aunt in melancholy grandeur there, till her
brother brought her to Florence, where--oh, how she was out of her element!
Come this way and I will tell you more. The fact is, I do not not much like
Miss Clarendon, and I will tell you why--I will describe her to you."

"No, no, do not," said Helen; "do not, my dear Cecilia, and I will tell you
why."

"Why--why?" cried Cecilia. "Do you recollect the story my uncle told us
about the young bride and her old friend, and the bit of advice?"

No, Cecilia did not recollect any thing of it. She should be very glad to
hear the anecdote, but as to the advice, she hated advice.

"Still, if you knew who gave it--it was given by a very great man."

"A very great man! now you make me curious. Well, what is it?" said Lady
Cecilia.

"That for one year after her marriage, she would not tell to her friends
the opinion she had formed, if unfavourable, of any of her husband's
relations, as it was probable she might change that opinion on knowing
them better, and would afterwards be sorry for having told her first hasty
judgment. Long afterwards the lady told her friend that she owed to this
advice a great part of the happiness of her life, for she really had, in
the course of the year, completely changed her first notions of some of her
husband's family, and would have had sorely to repent, if she had told her
first thoughts!"

Cecilia listened, and said it was all "Vastly well! excellent! But I
had nothing in the world to say of Miss Clarendon, but that she was too
good--too sincere for the world we live in. For instance, at Paris, one day
a charming Frenchwoman was telling some anecdote of the day in the most
amusing manner. Esther Clarendon all the while stood by, grave and black
as night, and at last turning upon our charmer at the end of the story,
pronounced, 'There is not one word of truth in all you have been
saying!' Conceive it, in full salon! The French were in such amazement.
'Inconceivable!' as they might well say to me, as she walked off with her
tragedy-queen air; _'Inconcevable--mais, vraiment inconcevable;'_ and
_'Bien Anglaise,'_ they would have added, no doubt, if I had not been by."

"But there must surely have been some particular reason," said Helen.

"None in the world, only the story was not true, I believe. And then
another time, when she was with her cousin, the Duchess of Lisle, at
Lisle-Royal, and was to have gone out the next season in London with the
Duchess, she came down one morning, just before they were to set off for
town, and declared that she bad heard such a quantity of scandal since she
had been there, and such shocking things of London society, that she had
resolved not to go out with the Duchess, and not to go to town at all? So
absurd--so prudish!"

Helen felt some sympathy in this, and was going to have said so, but
Cecilia went on with--

"And then to expect that Granville Beauclerc--should--"

Here Cecilia paused, and Helen felt curious, and ashamed of her curiosity;
she turned away, to raise the branches of some shrub, which were drooping
from the weight of their flowers.

"I know something _has_ been thought of," said Cecilia. "A match has been
in contemplation--do you comprehend me, Helen?"

"You mean that Mr. Beauclerc is to marry Miss Clarendon," said Helen,
compelled to speak.

"I only say it has been thought of," replied Lady Cecilia; "that is, as
every thing in this way is thought of about every couple not within the
prohibited degrees, one's grandmother inclusive. And the plainer the woman,
the more sure she is to contemplate such things for herself, lest no one
else should think of them for her. But, my dear Helen, if you mean to
ask--"

"Oh, I don't mean to ask any thing," cried Helen.

"But, whether you ask or not, I must tell you that the general is too proud
to own, even to himself, that he could; ever think of any man for his
sister who had not first proposed for her."

There was a pause for some minutes.

"But," resumed Lady Cecilia, "I could not do less than ask her here for
Clarendon's sake, when I know it pleases him; and she is very--estimable,
and so I wish to make her love me if I could! But I do not think she will
be nearer her point with Mr. Beauclerc, if it is her point, by coming here
just now. Granville has eyes as well as ears, and contrasts will strike.
I know who I wish should strike him, as she strikes me--and I think--I
hope--"

Helen looked distressed.

"I am as innocent as a dove," pursued Lady Cecilia; "but I suppose even
doves may have their own private little thoughts and wishes."

Helen was sure Cecilia had meant all this most kindly, but she was sorry
that some things had been said. She was conscious of having been interested
by those letters of Mr. Beauclerc's; but a particular thought had now been
put into her mind, and she could never more say, never more feel, that such
a thought had not come into her head. She was very sorry; it seemed as if
somewhat of the freshness, the innocence, of her mind was gone from her.
She was sorry, too, that she had heard all that Cecilia had said about
Miss Clarendon; it appeared as if she was actually doomed to get into some
difficulty with the general about his sister; she felt as if thrown back
into a sea of doubts, and she was not clear that she could, even by
opposing, end them.

On the appointed Tuesday, late, Miss Clarendon arrived; a fine figure,
but ungraceful, as Helen observed, from the first moment when she
turned sharply away from Lady Cecilia's embrace to a great dog of her
brother's--"Ah, old Neptune! I'm glad you're here still."

And when Lady Cecilia would have put down his paws--Let him alone, let him
alone, dear, honest, old fellow."

"But the dear, honest, old fellow's paws are wet, and will ruin your pretty
new pelisse."

"It may be new, but you know it is not pretty," said Miss Clarendon,
continuing to pat Neptune's head as he jumped up with his paws on her
shoulders.

"O my dear Esther, how can you hear him? he is so rough in his love!"

"I like rough better than smooth." The rough paw caught in her lace frill,
and it was torn to pieces before "down! down!" and the united efforts of
Lady Cecilia and Helen could extricate it.--"Don't distress yourselves
about it, pray; it does not signify in the least. Poor Neptune, how really
sorry he looks--there, there, wag your tail again--no one shall come
between us two old friends."

Her brother came in, and, starting up, her arms were thrown round his neck,
and her bonnet falling back, Helen who had thought her quite plain before,
was surprised to see that, now her colour was raised, and there was life in
her eyes, she was really handsome.

Gone again that expression, when Cecilia spoke to her: whatever she said,
Miss Clarendon differed from; if it was a matter of taste, she was always
of the contrary opinion; if narrative or assertion, she questioned,
doubted, seemed as if she could not believe. Her conversation, if
conversation it could be called, was a perpetual rebating and regrating,
especially with her sister-in-law; if Lady Cecilia did but say there were
three instead of four, it was taken up as "quite a mistake," and marked not
only as a mistake, but as "not true." Every, the slightest error, became a
crime against majesty, and the first day ended with Helen's thinking her
really the most disagreeable, intolerable person she had ever seen.

And the second day went on a little worse. Helen thought Cecilia took too
much pains to please, and said it would be better to let her quite alone.
Helen did so completely, but Miss Clarendon did not let Helen alone; but
watched her with penetrating eyes continually, listened to every word she
said, and seeming to weigh every syllable,--"Oh, my words are not worth
your weighing," said Helen, laughing.

"Yes they are, to settle my mind."

The first thing that seemed at all to settle it was Helen's not agreeing
with Cecilia about the colour of two ribands which Helen said she could
not flatter her were good matches. The next was about a drawing of Miss
Clarendon's, of Llansillan, her place in Wales; a beautiful drawing indeed,
which she had brought for her brother, but one of the towers certainly was
out of the perpendicular. Helen was appealed to, and could not say it was
upright; Miss Clarendon instantly took up a knife, cut the paper at the
back of the frame, and, taking out the drawing, set the tower to rights.

"There's the use of telling the truth."

"Of listening to it," said Helen.

"We shall get on, I see, Miss Stanley, if you can get over the first
bitter outside of me;--a hard outside, difficult to crack--stains delicate
fingers, may be," she continued, as she replaced her drawing in its
frame--"stains delicate fingers, may be, in the opening, but a good walnut
you will find it, taken with a grain of salt."

Many a grain seemed necessary, and very strong nut-crackers in very strong
hands. Lady Cecilia's evidently were not strong enough, though she strained
hard. Helen did not feel inclined to try.

Cecilia invited Miss Clarendon to walk out and see some of the alterations
her brother had made. As they passed the new Italian garden, Miss Clarendon
asked, "What's all this?--don't like this--how I regret the Old English
garden, and the high beech hedges. Every thing is to be changed here, I
suppose,--pray do not ask my opinion about any of the alterations."

"I do not wonder," said Cecilia, "that you should prefer the old garden,
with all your early associations; warm-hearted, amiable people must always
be so fond of what they have loved in childhood."

"I never was here when I was a child, and I am not one of your amiable
people."

"Very true, indeed," thought Helen.

"Miss Stanley looks at me as if I had seven heads," said Miss Clarendon,
laughing; and, a minute after, overtaking Helen as she walked on, she
looked full in her face, and added, "Do acknowledge that you think me a
savage." Helen did not deny it, and from that moment Miss Clarendon looked
less savagely upon her: she laughed and said, "I am not quite such a bear
as I seem, you'll find; at least I never hug people to death. My growl is
worse than my bite, unless some one should flatter my classical, bearish
passion, and offer to feed me with honey, and when I find it all comb and
no honey, who would not growl then?"

Lady Cecilia now came up, and pointed out views to which the general had
opened. "Yes, it's well, he has done very well, but pray don't stand on
ceremony with me. I can walk alone, you may leave me to my own cogitations,
as I like best."

"Surely, as you like best," said Lady Cecilia; "pray consider yourself, as
you know you are, at home here."

"No, I never shall be at home here," said Esther.

"Oh! don't say that, let me hope--let me hope--" and she withdrew. Helen
just stayed to unlock a gate for Miss Clarendon's 'rambles further,' and,
as she unlocked it, she heard Miss Clarendon sigh as she repeated the word,
"Hope! I do not like to hope, hope has so often deceived me."

"You will never be deceived in Cecilia," said Helen.

"Take care--stay till you try."

"I have tried," said Helen, "I know her."

"How long?"

"From childhood!"

"You're scarcely out of childhood yet."

"I am not so very young. I have had trials of my friends--of Cecilia
particularly, much more than you could ever have had."

"Well, this is the best thing I ever heard of her, and from good authority
too; her friends abroad were all false," said Miss Clarendon.

"It is very extraordinary," said Helen, "to hear such a young person as you
are talk so--

"So--how?"

"Of false friends--you must have been very unfortunate."

"Pardon me--very fortunate--to find them out in time." She looked at the
prospect, and liked all that her brother was doing, and disliked all that
she even guessed Lady Cecilia had done. Helen showed her that she guessed
wrong here and there, and smiled at her prejudices; and Miss Clarendon
smiled again, and admitted that she was prejudiced, "but every body is;
only some show and tell, and others smile and fib. I wish that word fib was
banished from English language, and white lie drummed out after it. Things
by their right names and we should all do much better. Truth must be told,
whether agreeable or not."

"But whoever makes truth disagreeable commits high treason against virtue,"
said Helen.

"Is that yours?" cried Miss Clarendon, stopping short.

"No," said Helen. "It is excellent whoever said it."

"It was from my uncle Stanley I heard it," said Helen.

"Superior man that uncle must have been."

"I will leave you now," said Helen.

"Do, I see we shall like one another in time, Miss Stanley; in time,--I
hate sudden friendships."

That evening Miss Clarendon questioned Helen more about her friendship with
Cecilia, and how it was she came to hive with her. Helen plainly told her.

"Then it was not an original promise between you?"

"Not at all," said Helen.

"Lady Cecilia told me it was. Just like her,--I knew all the time it was a
lie."

Shocked and startled at the word, and at the idea, Helen exclaimed, "Oh!
Miss Clarendon, how can you say so? anybody may he mistaken. Cecilia
mistook--" Lady Cecilia joined them at this moment. Miss Clarendon's face
was flushed. "This room is insufferably hot. What can be the use of a fire
at this time of year?"

Cecilia said it was for her mother, who was apt to be chilly in the
evenings; and as she spoke, she put a screen between the flushed cheek and
the fire. Miss Clarendon pushed it away, saying, "I can't talk, I can't
hear, I can't understand with a screen before me. What did you say,
Lady Cecilia, to Lady Davenant, as we came out from dinner, about Mr.
Beauclerc?"

"That we expect him to-morrow."

"You did not tell me so when you wrote!"

"No, my dear."

"Why pray?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know, Lady Cecilia! why should people say they do not know, when
they do know perfectly well?"

"If I had thought it was of any consequence to you, Esther," said Cecilia,
with an arch look----

"Now you expect me to answer that it was not of the least consequence to
me--that is the answer you would make; but my answer is, that it was of
consequence to me, and you knew it was."

"And if I did?"

"If you did, why say 'If I had thought it of any consequence to you?'--why
say so? answer me truly."

"Answer me truly!" repeated Lady Cecilia, laughing. "Oh, my dear Esther, we
are not in a court of justice."

"Nor in a court of honour," pursued Miss Clarendon.

"Well, well! let it be a court of love at least," said Lady Cecilia. "What
a pretty proverb that was, Helen, that we met with the other day in that
book of old English proverbs--'Love rules his kingdom without a sword.'"

"Very likely; but to the point," said Miss Clarendon, "when do you expect
Mr. Beauclerc?"

"To-morrow."

"Then I shall go to-morrow!"

"My dear Esther, why?"

"You know why; you know what reports have been spread; it suits neither my
character nor my brother's to give any foundation for such reports. Let me
ring the bell and I will give my own orders."

"My dear Esther, but your brother will be so vexed--so surprised."

"My brother is the best judge of his own conduct, he will do what he
pleases, or what you please. I am the judge of mine, and certainly shall do
what I think right."

She rang accordingly, and ordered that her carriage should be at the door
at six o'clock in the morning.

"Nay, my dear Esther," persisted Cecilia, "I wish you would not decide so
suddenly; we were so glad to have you come to us--"

"Glad! why you know--"

"I know," interrupted Lady Cecilia, colouring, and she began as fast
as possible to urge every argument she could think of to persuade Miss
Clarendon; but no arguments, no entreaties of hers or the general's,
public or private, were of any avail,--go she would, and go she did at six
o'clock.

"I suppose," said Helen to Lady Davenant, "that Miss Clarendon is very
estimable, and she seems to be very clever: but I wonder that with all her
abilities she does not learn to make her manners more agreeable."

"My dear," said Lady Davenant, "we must take people as they are; you may
graft a rose upon an oak, but those who have tried the experiment tell
us the graft will last but a short time, and the operation ends in the
destruction of both; where the stocks have no common nature, there is ever
a want of conformity which sooner or later proves fatal to both."

But Beauclerc, what was become of him?--that day passed, and no Beauclerc;
another and another came, and on the third day, only a letter from him,
which ought to have come on Tuesday.--But "_too late_," the shameful brand
of procrastination was upon it--and it contained only a few lines blotted
in the folding, to say that he could not possibly be at Clarendon Park on
Tuesday, but would on Wednesday or Thursday if possible.

Good-natured Lord Davenant observed, "When a young man in London, writing
to his friends in the country, names two days for leaving town, and adds an
'_if possible_' his friends should never expect him till the last of the
two named."

The last of the two days arrived--Thursday. The aide-de-camp asked if Mr.
Beauclerc was expected to-day. "Yes, I expect to see him to-day," the
general answered.

"I hope, but do not expect," said Lady Davenant, "for, as learned authority
tells me, 'to expect is to hope with some degree of certainty'--"

The general left the room repeating, "I expect him to-day, Cecilia."

The day passed, however, and he came not--the night came. The general
ordered that the gate should be kept open, and that a servant should sit
up. The servant sat up all night, cursing Mr. Beauclerc. And in the morning
he replied with malicious alacrity to the first question his master asked,
"No, Sir, Mr. Beauclerc is not come."

At breakfast, the general, after buttering his bread in silence for some
minutes, confessed that he loved punctuality. It might be a military
prejudice;--it might be too professional, martinet perhaps,--but still he
owned he did love punctuality. He considered it as a part of politeness, a
proper attention to the convenience and feelings of others; indispensable
between strangers it is usually felt to be, and he did not know why
intimate friends should deem themselves privileged to dispense with it.

His eyes met Helen's as he finished these words, and smiling, he
complimented her upon her constant punctuality. It was a voluntary grace in
a lady, but an imperative duty in a man--and a young man.

"You are fond of this young man, I see general," said Lord Davenant.

"But not of his fault."

Lady Cecilia said something about forgiving a first fault.

"Never!" said Lady Davenant. "Lord Collingwood's rule was--never forgive a
first fault, and you will not have a second. You love Beauclerc, I see, as
Lord Davenant says."

"Love him!" resumed the general; "with all his faults and follies, I love
him as if he were my brother."

At which words Lady Cecilia, with a scarcely perceptible smile, cast a
furtive glance at Helen.

The general called for his horses, and, followed by his aide-de-camp,
departed, saying that he should be back at luncheon-time, when he hoped to
find Beauclerc. In the same hope, Lady Davenant ordered her pony-phaeton
earlier than usual; Lady Cecilia further hoped most earnestly that
Beauclerc would come this day, for the next the house would be full of
company, and she really wished to have him one day at least to themselves,
and she gave a most significant glance at Helen.

"The first move often secures the game against the best players," said she.

Helen blushed, because she could not help understanding; she was ashamed,
vexed with Cecilia, yet pleased by her kindness, and half amused by her
arch look and tone.

They were neither of them aware that Lady Davenant had heard the words
that passed, or seen the looks; but immediately afterwards, when they were
leaving the breakfast-room, Lady Davenant came between the two friends,
laid her hand upon her daughter's arm, and said,

"Before you make any move in a dangerous game, listen to the voice of old
experience."

Lady Cecilia startled, looked up, but as if she did not comprehend.

"Cupid's bow, my dear," continued her mother, "is, as the Asiatics tell us,
strung with bees, which are apt to sting--sometimes fatally--those who
meddle with it."

Lady Cecilia still looked with an innocent air, and still as if she could
not comprehend.

"To speak more plainly, then, Cecilia," said her mother, "build
no matrimonial castles in the air; standing or falling they do
mischief--mischief either to the builder, or to those for whom they may be
built."

"Certainly if they fall they disappoint one," said Lady Cecilia, "but if
they stand?"

Seeing that she made no impression on her daughter, Lady Davenant turned to
Helen, and gravely said,--

"My dear Helen, do not let my daughter inspire you with false, and perhaps
vain imaginations, certainly premature, therefore unbecoming."

Helen shrunk back, yet instantly looked up, and her look was ingenuously
grateful.

"But, mamma," said Lady Cecilia, "I declare I do not understand what all
this is about."

"About Mr. Granville Beauclerc," said her mother.

"How can you, dear mamma, pronounce his name so _tout an long?_" "Pardon my
indelicacy, my dear; delicacy is a good thing, but truth a better. I have
seen the happiness of many young women sacrificed by such false delicacy,
and by the fear of giving a moment's present pain, which it is sometimes
the duty of a true friend to give."

"Certainly, certainly, mamma, only not necessary now; and I am so sorry you
have said all this to poor dear Helen."

"If you have said nothing to her, Cecilia, I acknowledge I have said too
much."

"I said--I did nothing," cried Lady Cecilia; "I built no castles--never
built a regular castle in my life; never had a regular plan in my
existence; never mentioned his name, except about another person--"

An appealing look to Helen was however _protested_.

"To the best of my recollection, at least," Lady Cecilia immediately added.

"Helen seems to be blushing for your want of recollection, Cecilia."

"I am sure I do not know why you blush, Helen. I am certain I never did say
a word distinctly."

"Not _distinctly_ certainly," said Helen in a low voice. "It was my fault
if I understood----"

"Always true, you are," said Lady Davenant.

"I protest I said nothing but the truth," cried Lady Cecilia hastily.

"But not the whole truth, Cecilia," said her mother.

"I did, upon my word, mamma," persisted Lady Cecilia, repeating "upon my
word."

"Upon your word, Cecilia! that is either a vulgar expletive or a most
serious asseveration."

She spoke with a grave tone, and with her severe look, and Helen dared not
raise her eyes; Lady Cecilia now coloured deeply.

"Shame! Nature's hasty conscience," said Lady Davenant. "Heaven preserve
it!"

"Oh, mother!" cried Lady Cecilia, laying her hand on her mother's, "surely
you do not think seriously--surely you are not angry--I cannot bear to see
you displeased," said she, looking up imploringly in her mother's face, and
softly, urgently pressing her hand. No pressure was returned; that hand was
slowly and with austere composure withdrawn, and her mother walked away
down the corridor to her own room. Lady Cecilia stood still, and the tears
came into her eyes.

"My dear friend, I am exceedingly sorry," said Helen. She could not believe
that Cecilia meant to say what was not true, yet she felt that she had been
to blame in not telling all, and her mother in saying too much.

Lady Cecilia, her tears dispersed, stood looking at the impression which
her mother's signet-ring had left in the palm of her hand. It was at that
moment a disagreeable recollection that the motto of that ring was "Truth."
Rubbing the impress from her hand, she said, half speaking to herself, and
half to Helen--"I am sure I did not mean anything wrong; and I am sure
nothing can be more true than that I never formed a regular plan in my
life. After all, I am sure that so much has been said about nothing, that
I do not understand anything: I never do, when mamma goes on in that way,
making mountains of molehills, which she always does with me, and did ever
since I was a child; but she really forgets that I am not a child. Now, it
is well the general was not by; he would never have borne to see his
wife so treated. But I would not, for the world, be the cause of any
disagreement. Oh! Helen, my mother does not know how I love her, let her be
ever so severe to me! But she never loved me; she cannot help it. I believe
she does her best to love me--my poor, dear mother!"

Helen seized this opportunity to repeat the warm expressions she had heard
so lately from Lady Davenant, and melting they sunk into Cecilia's heart.
She kissed Helen again and again, for a dear, good peacemaker, as she
always was--and "I'm resolved"--but in the midst of her good resolves
she caught a glimpse through the glass door opening on the park, of the
general, and a fine horse they were ringing, and she hurried out: all light
of heart she went, as though

  "Or shake the downy _blowball_ from her stalk."




CHAPTER VII


Since Lord Davenant's arrival, Lady Davenant's time was so much taken up
with him, that Helen could not have many opportunities of conversing
with her, and she was the more anxious to seize every one that occurred.
She always watched for the time when Lady Davenant went out in her pony
phaeton, for then she had her delightfully to herself, the carriage
holding only two.

It was at the door, and Lady Davenant was crossing the hall followed by
Helen, when Cecilia came in with a look, unusual in her, of being much
discomfited.

"Another put off from Mr. Beauclerc! He will not he here to-day. I give
him up."

Lady Davenant stopped short, and asked whether Cecilia had told him that
probably she should soon be gone?

"To be sure I did, mamma."

"And what reason does he give for his delay?"

"None, mamma, none--not the least apology. He says, very cavalierly
indeed, that he is the worst man in the world at making excuses--shall
attempt none."

"There he is right" said Lady Davenant. "Those who are good at excuses,
as Franklin justly observed, are apt to be good for nothing else."

The general came up the steps at this moment, rolling a note between his
fingers, and looking displeased. Lady Davenant inquired if he could tell
her the cause of Mr. Beauclerc's delay. He could not.

Lady Cecilia exclaimed--"Very extraordinary! Provoking! Insufferable!
Intolerable!"

"It is Mr. Beauclerc's own affair," said Lady Davenant, wrapping her
shawl round her; and, taking the general's arm, she walked on to her
carriage. Seating herself, and gathering up the reins, she repeated--
"Mr. Beauclerc's own affair, completely."

The lash of her whip was caught somewhere, and, while the groom was
disentangling it, she reiterated--"That will do: let the horses go:"--
and with half-suppressed impatience thanked Helen, who was endeavouring
to arrange some ill-disposed cloak--"Thank you, thank you, my dear: it's
all very well. Sit down, Helen."

She drove off rapidly, through the beautiful park scenery But the
ancient oaks, standing alone, casting vast shadows, the distant massive
woods of magnificent extent and of soft and varied foliage; the secluded
glades, all were lost upon her. Looking straight between her horses'
ears, she drove on in absolute silence.

Helen's idea of Mr. Beauclerc's importance increased wonderfully. What
must he be whose coming or not coming could so move all the world, or
those who were all the world to her? And, left to her own cogitations,
she was picturing to herself what manner of man he might be, when
suddenly Lady Davenant turned, and asked what she was thinking of?

"I beg your pardon for startling you so, my dear; I am aware that it is
a dreadfully imprudent, impertinent question--one which, indeed, I
seldom ask. Few interest me sufficiently to make me care of what they
think: from fewer still could I expect to hear the truth. Nay--nothing
upon compulsion, Helen. Only say plainly, if you would rather not tell
me. That answer I should prefer to the ingenious formula of evasion, the
solecism in metaphysics, which Cecilia used the other day, when
unwittingly I asked her of what she was thinking--'Of a great many
different things, mamma.'"

Helen, still more alarmed by Lady Davenant's speech than by her
question, and aware of the conclusions which might be drawn from her
answer, nevertheless bravely replied that she had been thinking of Mr.
Beauclerc, of what he might be whose coming or not coming was of such
consequence. As she spoke the expression of Lady Davenant's countenance
changed.

"Thank you, my dear child, you are truth itself, and truly do I love you
therefore. It's well that you did not ask me of what I was thinking, for
I am not sure that I could have answered so directly."

"But I could never have presumed to ask such a question of you," said
Helen, "there is such a difference."

"Yes," replied Lady Davenant; "there is such a difference as age and
authority require to be made, but nevertheless, such as is not quite
consistent with the equal rights of friendship. You have told me the
subject of your day-dream, my love, and if you please, I will tell you
the subject of mine. I was rapt into times long past: I was living over
again some early scenes--some which are connected, and which connect me,
in a curious manner, with this young man, Mr. Granville Beauclerc."

She seemed to speak with some difficulty, and yet to be resolved to go
on. "Helen, I have a mind," continued she, "to tell you what, in the
language of affected autobiographers, I might call 'some passages of my
life.'"

Helen's eyes brightened, as she eagerly thanked her: but hearing a half-
suppressed sigh, she added--"Not if it is painful to you though, my dear
Lady Davenant."

"Painful it must be," she replied, "but it may be useful to you; and a
weak friend is that who can do only what is pleasurable. You have often
trusted me with those little inmost feelings of the heart, which,
however innocent, we shrink from exposing to any but the friends we most
love; it is unjust and absurd of those advancing in years to expect of
the young that confidence should come all and only on their side: the
human heart, at whatever age, opens only to the heart that opens in
return."

Lady Davenant paused again, and then said,--" It is a general opinion,
that nobody is the better for advice."

"I am sure I do not think so," said Helen.

"I am glad you do not; nor do I. Much depends upon the way in which it
is offered. General maxims, drawn from experience, are, to the young at
least, but as remarks--moral sentences--mere dead letter, and take no
hold of the mind. 'I have felt' must come before 'I think,' especially
in speaking to a young friend, and, though I am accused of being so fond
of generalising that I never come to particulars, I can and will:
therefore, my dear, I will tell you some particulars of my life, in
which, take notice, there are no adventures. Mine has been a life of
passion--of feeling, at least,--not of incidents: nothing, my dear, to
excite or to gratify curiosity."

"But, independent of all curiosity about events," said Helen, "there is
such an interest in knowing what has been really felt and thought in
their former lives by those we know and love."

"I shall sink in your esteem," said Lady Davenant--"so be it."

"I need not begin, as most people do, with 'I was born'--" but,
interrupting herself, she said, "this heat is too much for me."

They turned into a long shady drive through the woods. Lady Davenant
drew up the reins, and her ponies walked slowly on the grassy road;
then, turning to Helen, she said:--

"It would have been well for me if any friend had, when I was of your
age, put me on my guard against my own heart: but my too indulgent, too
sanguine mother, led me into the very danger against which she should
have warned me--she misled me, though without being aware of it. Our
minds, our very natures differed strangely.

"She was a castle-builder--yes, now you know, my dear, why I spoke so
strongly, and, as you thought, so severely this morning. My mother was a
castle-builder of the ordinary sort: a worldly plan of a castle was
hers, and little care had she about the knight within; yet she had
sufficient tact to know that it must be the idea of the _preux
chevalier_ that would lure her daughter into the castle. Prudent for
herself, imprudent for me, and yet she loved me--all she did was for
love of me. She managed with so much address, that I had no suspicion of
my being the subject of any speculation--otherwise, probably, my
imagination might have revolted, my self-will have struggled, my pride
have interfered, or my delicacy might have been alarmed, but nothing of
all that happened; I was only too ready, too glad to believe all that I
was told, all that appeared in that spring-time of hope and love. I was
very romantic, not in the modern fashionable young-lady sense of the
word, with the mixed ideas of a shepherdess's hat and the paraphernalia
of a peeress--love in a cottage, and a fashionable house in town. No;
mine was honest, pure, real romantic love--absurd if you will; it was
love nursed by imagination more than by hope. I had early, in my secret
soul, as perhaps you have at this instant in yours, a pattern of
perfection--something chivalrous, noble, something that is no longer to
be seen now-a-days--the more delightful to imagine, the moral sublime
and beautiful; more than human, yet with the extreme of human
tenderness. Mine was to be a demigod whom I could worship, a husband to
whom I could always look up, with whom I could always sympathise, and to
whom I could devote myself with all a woman's self-devotion. I had then
a vast idea--as I think you have now, Helen--of self-devotion; you would
devote yourself to your friends, but I could not shape any of my friends
into a fit object. So after my own imagination I made one, dwelt upon
it, doated on it, and at last threw this bright image of my own fancy
full upon the being to whom I thought I was most happily destined--
destined by duty, chosen by affection. The words 'I love you' once
pronounced, I gave my whole heart in return, gave it, sanctified, as I
felt, by religion. I had high religious sentiments; a vow once passed
the lips, a look, a single look of appeal to Heaven, was as much for me
as if pronounced at the altar, and before thousands to witness. Some
time was to elapse before the celebration of our marriage. Protracted
engagements are unwise, yet I should not say so; this gave me time to
open my eyes--my bewitched eyes: still, some months I passed in a trance
of beatification, with visions of duties all performed--benevolence
universal, and gratitude, and high success, and crowns of laurel, for my
hero, for he was military; it all joined well in my fancy. All the
pictured tales of vast heroic deeds were to be his. Living, I was to
live in the radiance of his honour; or dying, to die with him, and then
to be most blessed.

"It is all to me now as a dream, long passed, and never told; no, never,
except to him who had a right to know it--my husband, and now to you,
Helen. From my dream I was awakened by a rude shock--I saw, I thank
Heaven I first, and I alone, saw that his heart was gone from me--that
his heart had never been mine--that it was unworthy of me. No, I will
not say that; I will not think so. Still I trust he had deceived
himself, though not so much as he deceived me. I am willing to believe
he did not know that what he professed for me was not love, till he was
seized by that passion for another, a younger, fairer----Oh! how much
fairer. Beauty is a great gift of Heaven--not for the purposes of female
vanity; but a great gift for one who loves, and wishes to be loved. But
beauty I had not."

"Had not!" interrupted Helen, "I always heard----"

"_He_ did not think so, my dear; no matter what others thought, at least
so I felt at that time. My identity is so much changed that I can look
back upon this now, and tell it all to you calmly.

"It was at a rehearsal of ancient music; I went there accidentally one
morning without my mother, with a certain old duchess and her daughters;
the dowager full of some Indian screen which she was going to buy; the
daughters, intent, one of them, on a quarrel between two of the singers;
the other upon loves and hates of her own. I was the only one of the
party who had any real taste for music. I was then particularly fond of
it.

"Well, my dear, I must come to the point," her voice changing as she
spoke.--"After such a lapse of time, during which my mind, my whole self
has so changed, I could not have believed before I began to speak on
this subject, that these reminiscences could have so moved me; but it is
merely this sudden wakening of ideas long dormant, for years not called
up, never put into words.

"I was sitting, wrapt in a silent ecstasy of pleasure, leaning back
behind the whispering party, when I saw him come in, and, thinking only
of his sharing my delight, I made an effort to catch his attention, but
he did not see me--his eye was fixed on another; I followed that eye,
and saw that most beautiful creature on which it fixed; I saw him seat
himself beside her--one look was enough--it was conviction. A pang went
through me; I grew cold, but made no sound nor motion; I gasped for
breath, I believe, but I did not faint. None cared for me; I was
unnoticed--saved from the abasement of pity. I struggled to retain my
self-command, and was enabled to complete the purpose on which I then--
even _then_, resolved. That resolve gave me force.

"In any great emotion we can speak better to those who do not care for
us than to those who feel for us. More calmly than I now speak to you, I
turned to the person who then sat beside me, to the dowager whose heart
was in the Indian screen, and begged that I might not longer detain her,
as I wished that she would carry me home--she readily complied: I had
presence of mind enough to move when we could do so without attracting
attention. It was well that woman talked as she did all the way home;
she never saw, never suspected, the agony of her to whom she spoke. I
ran up to my own room, bolted the door, and threw myself into a chair;
that is the last thing I remember, till I found myself lying on the
floor, wakening from a state of insensibility. I know not what time had
elapsed; so as soon as I could I rang for my maid; she had knocked at my
door, and, supposing I slept, had not disturbed me--my mother, I found,
had not yet returned.

"I dressed for dinner: HE was to dine with us. It was my custom to see
him for a few minutes before the rest of the company arrived. No time
ever appeared to me so dreadfully long as the interval between my being
dressed that day and his arrival.

"I heard him coming up stairs: my heart heat so violently that I feared
I should not be able to speak with dignity and composure, but the motive
was sufficient.

"What I said I know not; I am certain only that it was without one word
of reproach. What I had at one glance foreboded was true--he
acknowledged it. I released him from all engagement to me. I saw he was
evidently relieved by the determined tone of my refusal--at what expense
to my heart lie was set free, he saw not--never knew--never suspected.
But after that first involuntary expression of the pleasure of relief, I
saw in his countenance surprise, a sort of mortified astonishment at my
self-possession. I own my woman's pride enjoyed this; it was something
better than pride--the sense of the preservation of my dignity. I felt
that in this shipwreck of my happiness I made no cowardly exposure of my
feelings, but he did not understand me. Our minds, as I now found, moved
in different orbits. We could not comprehend each other. Instead of
feeling, as the instinct of generosity would have taught him to feel,
that I was sacrificing my happiness to his, he told me that he now
believed I had never loved him. My eyes were opened--I saw him at once
as he really was. The ungenerous look upon self-devotion as madness,
folly, or art: he could not think me a fool, he did not think me mad,
artful I believe he did suspect me to be; he concluded that I made the
discovery of his inconstancy an excuse for my own; he thought me,
perhaps, worse than capricious, interested--for, our engagement being
unknown, a lover of higher rank had, in the interval, presented himself.
My perception of this base suspicion was useful to me at the moment, as
it roused my spirit, and I went through the better, and without relapse
of tenderness, with that which I had undertaken. One condition only I
made; I insisted that this explanation should rest between us two; that,
in fact, and in manner, the breaking off the match should be left
entirely to me. And to this part of the business I now look back with
satisfaction, and I have honest pride in telling you, who will feel the
same for me, that I practised in the whole conduct of the affair no
deceit of any kind, not one falsehood was told. The world knew nothing;
there my mother had been prudent. She was the only person to whom I was
bound to explain--to speak, I mean, for I did not feel myself bound to
explain. Perfect confidence only can command perfect confidence in
whatever relation of life. I told her all that she had a right to know.
I announced to her that the intended marriage could never be--that I
objected to it; that both our minds were changed; that we were both
satisfied in having released each other from our mutual engagement. I
had, as I foresaw, to endure my mother's anger, her entreaties, her
endless surprise, her bitter disappointment; but she exhausted all
these, and her mind turned sooner than I had expected to that hope of
higher establishment which amused her during the rest of the season in
London. Two months of it were still to be passed--to me the two most
painful months of my existence. The daily, nightly, effort of appearing
in public, while I was thus wretched, in the full gala of life in the
midst of the young, the gay, the happy--broken-hearted as I felt--it was
an effort beyond my strength. That summer was, I remember, intolerably
hot. Whenever my mother observed that I looked pale, and that my spirits
were not so good as formerly, I exerted myself more and more; accepted
every invitation because I dared not refuse; I danced at this ball, and
the next, and the next; urged on, I finished to the dregs the
dissipation of the season.

"My mother certainly made me do dreadfully too much. But I blame others,
as we usually do when we are ourselves the most to blame--I had
attempted that which could not be done. By suppressing all outward sign
of suffering, allowing no vent for sorrow in words or tears--by actual
force of compression--I thought at once to extinguish my feelings.
Little did I know of the human heart when I thought this! The weak are
wise in yielding to the first shock. They cannot be struck to the earth
who sink prostrate; sorrow has little power where there is no
resistance.--'The flesh will follow where the pincers tear.' Mine was a
presumptuous--it had nearly been a fatal struggle. That London season at
last over, we got into the country; I expected rest, but found none. The
pressing necessity for exertion over, the stimulus ceasing, I sunk--sunk
into a state of apathy. Time enough had elapsed between the breaking
off of my marriage and the appearance of this illness, to prevent any
ideas on my mother's part of cause and effect, ideas indeed which were
never much looked for, or well joined in her mind. The world knew
nothing of the matter. My illness went under the convenient head
'nervous.' I heard all the opinions pronounced on my case, and knew they
were all mistaken, but I swallowed whatever they pleased. No physician,
I repeated to myself, can 'minister to a mind diseased.'

"I tried to call religion to my aid; but my religious sentiments were,
at that time, tinctured with the enthusiasm of my early character. Had I
been a Catholic, I should have escaped from my friends and thrown myself
into a cloister; as it was, I had formed a strong wish to retire from
that world which was no longer anything to me: the spring of passion,
which I then thought the spring of life, being broken, I meditated my
resolution secretly and perpetually as I lay on my bed. They used to
read to me, and, among other things, some papers of 'The Rambler,' which
I liked not at all; its tripod sentences tired my ear, but I let them go
on--as well one sound as another.

"It chanced that one night, as I was going to sleep, an eastern story in
'The Rambler,' was read to me, about some man, a-weary of the world, who
took to the peaceful hermitage. There was a regular moral tagged to the
end of it, a thing I hate, the words were, 'No life pleasing to God that
is not useful to man.' When I wakened in the middle of that night, this
sentence was before my eyes, and the words seemed to repeat themselves
over and over again to my ears when I was sinking to sleep. The
impression remained in my mind, and though I never voluntarily recurred
to it, came out long afterwards, perfectly fresh, and became a motive of
action.

"Strange, mysterious connection between mind and body; in mere animal
nature we see the same. The bird wakened from his sleep to be taught a
tune sung to him in the dark, and left to sleep again,--the impression
rests buried within him, and weeks afterward he comes out with the tune
perfect. But these are only phenomena of memory--mine was more
extraordinary. I am not sure that I can explain it to you. In my weak
state, my understanding enfeebled as much as my body--my reason weaker
than my memory, I could not help allowing myself to think that the
constant repetition of that sentence was a warning sent to me from
above. As I grew stronger, the superstition died away, but the sense of
the thing still remained with me. It led me to examine and reflect. It
did more than all my mother's entreaties could effect. I had refused to
see any human creature, but I now consented to admit a few. The charm
was broken. I gave up my longing for solitude, my plan of retreat from
the world; suffered myself to be carried where they pleased--to Brighton
it was--to my mother's satisfaction. I was ready to appear in the ranks
of fashion at the opening of the next London campaign. Automatically I
'ran my female exercises o'er' with as good grace as ever. I had
followers and proposals; but my mother was again thrown into despair by
what she called the short work I made with my admirers, scarcely
allowing decent time for their turning into lovers before I warned them
not to think of me. I have heard that women who have suffered from man's
inconstancy are disposed afterwards to revenge themselves by inflicting
pain such as they have themselves endured, and delight in all the
cruelty of coquetry. It was not so with me. Mine was too deep a wound--
skinned over--not callous, and all danger of its opening again I
dreaded. I had lovers the more, perhaps, because I cared not for them;
till amongst them there came one who, as I saw, appreciated my
character, and, as I perceived, was becoming seriously attached. To
prevent danger to his happiness, as he would take no other warning, I
revealed to him the state of my mind. However humiliating the
confession, I thought it due to him. I told him that I had no heart to
give--that I had received none in return for that with which I had
parted, and that love was over with me.

"'As a passion, it may be so, not as an affection,' was his reply.

"The words opened to me a view of his character. I saw, too, by his love
increasing with his esteem, the solidity of his understanding, and the
nobleness of his nature. He went deeper and deeper into my mind, till he
came to a spring of gratitude, which rose and overflowed, vivifying and
fertilising the seemingly barren waste. I believe it to be true that,
after the first great misfortune, persons never return to be the same
that they were before, but this I know--and this it is important you
should be convinced of, my dear Helen--that the mind, though sorely
smitten, can recover its powers. A mind, I mean, sustained by good
principles, and by them made capable of persevering efforts for its own
recovery. It may be sure of regaining, in time--observe, I say in time--
its healthful tone.

"Time was given to me by that kind, that noble being, who devoted
himself to me with a passion which I could not return--but, with such
affection as I could give, and which he assured me would make his
happiness, I determined to devote to him the whole of my future
existence. Happiness for me, I thought, was gone, except in so far as I
could make him happy.

"I married Lord Davenant--much against my mother's wish, for he was then
the younger of three brothers, and with a younger brother's very small
portion. Had it been a more splendid match, I do not think I could have
been prevailed on to give my consent. I could not have been sure of my
own motives, or rather my pride would not have been clear as to the
opinion which others might form. This was a weakness, for in acting we
ought to depend upon ourselves, and not to look for the praise or blame
of others; but I let you see me as I am, or as I was: I do not insist,
like Queen Elizabeth, in having my portrait without shade."




CHAPTER VIII.


"I am proud to tell you, that at the time I married we were so poor,
that I was obliged to give up many of those luxuries to which I was
entitled, and to which I had been so accustomed, that the doing without
them had till then hardly come within my idea of possibility. Our whole
establishment was on the most humble scale.

"I look back to this period of my life with the greatest satisfaction. I
had exquisite pleasure, like all young people of sanguine temperament
and generous disposition, in the consciousness of the capability of
making sacrifices. This notion was my idol, the idol of the inmost
sanctuary of my mind, and I worshipped it with all the energies of body
and soul.

"In the course of a few years, my husband's two elder brothers died. If
you have any curiosity to know how, I will tell you, though indeed it is
as little to the purpose as half the things people tell in their
histories. The eldest, a homebred lordling, who, from the moment he
slipped his mother's apron-strings, had fallen into folly, and then, to
show himself manly, run into vice, lost his life in a duel about some
lady's crooked thumb, or more crooked mind.

"The second brother distinguished himself in the navy; he died the death
of honour; he fell gloriously, and was by his country honoured--by his
country mourned.

"After the death of this young man, the inheritance came to my husband.
Fortune soon after poured in upon us a tide of wealth, swelled by
collateral streams.

"You will wish to know what effect this change of circumstances produced
upon my mind, and you shall, as far as I know it myself. I fancied that
it would have made none, because I had been before accustomed to all the
trappings of wealth; yet it did make a greater change in my feelings
than you could have imagined, or I could have conceived. The possibility
of producing a great effect in society, of playing a distinguished part,
and attaining an eminence which pleased my fancy, had never till now
been within my reach. The incense of fame had been wafted near me, but
not to me--near my husband I mean, yet not to him; I had heard his
brother's name from the trumpet of fame, I longed to hear his own. I
knew, what to the world was then unknown, his great talents for civil
business, which, if urged into action, might make him distinguished as a
statesman even beyond his hero brother, but I knew that in him ambition,
if it ever awoke, must be awakened by love. Conscious of my influence, I
determined to use it to the utmost.

"Lord Davenant had not at that time taken any part in politics, but from
his connections he could ask and obtain; and there was one in the world
for whom I desired to obtain a favour of importance. It chanced that he,
whom I have mentioned to you as my inconstant lover, now married to my
lovely rival, was at this time in some difficulty about a command
abroad. His connections, though of very high rank were not now in
power. He had failed in some military exploit which had formerly been
intrusted to him. He was anxious to retrieve his character; his credit,
his whole fate in life, depended on his obtaining this appointment,
which, at my request, was secured to him by Lord Davenant. The day it
was obtained was, I think, the proudest of my life. I was proud of
returning good for evil; that was a Christian pride, if pride can be
Christian. I was proud of showing that in me there was none of the fury
of a woman scorned--no sense of the injury of charms despised.

"But it was not yet the fulness of success; it had pained me in the
midst of my internal triumph, that my husband had been obliged to use
intermediate powers to obtain that which I should have desired should
have been obtained by his own. Why should not he be in that first place
of rule? He could hold the balance with a hand as firm, an eye as just.
That he should be in the House of Peers was little satisfaction to me,
unless distinguished among his peers. It was this distinction that I
burned to see obtained by Lord Davenant; I urged him forward then by all
the motives which make ambition virtue. He was averse from public life,
partly from indolence of temper, partly from sound philosophy: power was
low in the scale in his estimate of human happiness; he saw how little
can be effected of real good in public by any individual; he felt it
scarcely worth his while to stir from his easy chair of domestic
happiness. However, love urged him on, and inspired him, if not with
ambition, at least with what looked like it in public. He entered the
lists, and in the political tournament tilted successfully. Many were
astonished, for, till they came against him in the joust, they had no
notion of his weight, or of his skill in arms; and many seriously
inclined to believe that Lord Davenant was only Lady Davenant in
disguise, and all he said, wrote, and did, was attributed to me. Envy
gratifies herself continually by thus shifting the merit from one person
to another; in hopes that the actual quantity may be diminished, she
tries to make out that it is never the real person, but somebody else
who does that which is good. This silly, base propensity might have cost
me dear, would have cost me my husband's affections, had he not been a
man, as there are few, above all jealousy of female influence or female
talent; in short, he knew his own superiority, and needed not to measure
himself to prove his height. He is quite content, rather glad, that
every body should set him down as a common-place character. Far from
being jealous of his wife's ruling him, he was amused by the notion: it
flattered his pride, and it was convenient to his indolence; it fell in,
too, with his peculiar humour. The more I retired, the more I was put
forward, he, laughing behind me, prompted and forbade me to look back.

"Now, Helen, I am come to a point where ambition ceased to be virtue.
But why should I tell you all this? no one is ever the better for the
experience of another."

"Oh! I cannot believe that," cried Helen; "pray, pray go on."

"Ambition first rose in my mind from the ashes of another passion. Fresh
materials, of heterogeneous kinds, altered the colour, and changed the
nature of the flame: I should have told you, but narrative is not my
forte--I never can remember to tell things in their right order. I
forgot to tell you, that when Madame de Stael's book, 'Sur la Revolution
Francaise,' came out, it made an extraordinary impression upon me. I
turned, in the first place, as every body did, eagerly to the chapter on
England, but, though my national feelings were gratified, my female
pride was dreadfully mortified by what she says of the ladies of
England; in fact, she could not judge of them. They were afraid of her.
They would not come out of their shells. What she called timidity, and
what I am sure she longed to call stupidity, was the silence of overawed
admiration, or mixed curiosity and discretion. Those who did venture,
had not full possession of their powers, or in a hurry showed them in a
wrong direction. She saw none of them in their natural state. She
asserts that, though there may be women distinguished as writers in
England, there are no ladies who have any great conversational and
political influence in society, of that kind which, during _l'ancien
regime_, was obtained in France by what they would call their _femmes
marquantes_, such as Madame de Tencin, Madame du Deffand, Mademoiselle
de l'Espinasse. This remark stung me to the quick, for my country and
for myself, and raised in me a foolish, vain-glorious emulation, an
ambition false in its objects, and unsuited to the manners, domestic
habits, and public virtue of our country. I ought to have been gratified
by her observing, that a lady is never to be met with in England, as
formerly in France, at the Bureau du Ministre; and that in England there
has never been any example of a woman's having known in public affairs,
or at least told, what ought to have been kept secret. Between
ourselves, I suspect she was a little mistaken in some of these
assertions; but, be that as it may, I determined to prove that she was
mistaken; I was conscious that I had more within me than I had yet
brought out; I did not doubt that I had eloquence, if I had but courage
to produce it. It is really astonishing what a mischievous effect those
few passages produced on my mind. In London, one book drives out
another, one impression, however deep, is effaced by the next shaking of
the sand; but I was then in the country, for, unluckily for me, Lord
Davenant had been sent away on some special embassy. Left alone with my
nonsense, I set about, as soon as I was able, to assemble an audience
round me, to exhibit myself in the character of a female politician, and
I believe I had a notion at the same time of being the English Corinne.
Rochefoucault, the dexterous anatomist of self-love, says that we
confess our small faults, to persuade the world that we have no large
ones. But, for my part, I feel that there are some small faults more
difficult to me to confess than any large ones. Affectation, for
instance; it is something so little, so paltry, it is more than a crime,
it is a ridicule: I believe I did make myself completely ridiculous; I
am glad Lord Davenant was not by, it lasted but a short time. Our dear
good friend Dumont (you knew Dumont at Florence?) could not bear to see
it; his regard for Lord Davenant urged him the more to disenchant me,
and bring me back, before his return, to my natural form. The
disenchantment was rather rude.

"One evening, after I had been snuffing up incense till I was quite
intoxicated, when my votaries had departed, and we were alone together,
I said to him, 'Allow that this is what would be called at Paris, _un
grand succes_.'

"Dumont made no reply, but stood opposite to me playing in his peculiar
manner with his great snuff-box, slowly swaying the snuff from side to
side. Knowing this to be a sign that he was in some great dilemma, I
asked of what he was thinking. 'Of you,' said he. 'And what of me?' In
his French accent he repeated those two provoking lines--

  'New wit, like wine, intoxicates the brain,
   Too strong for feeble women to sustain.'

"'To my face?' said I, smiling, for I tried to command my temper.

"'Better than behind your back, as others do,' said he.

"'Behind my back!' said I; 'impossible.'

"'Perfectly possible,' said he, 'as I could prove if you were strong
enough to bear it.'

"'Quite strong enough,' I said, and bade him speak on.

"'Suppose you were offered,' said he, 'the fairy-ring that rendered the
possessor invisible, and enabled him to hear every thing that was said,
and all that was thought of him, would you throw it away, or put it on
your finger?'

"'Put it on my finger,' I replied; 'and this instant, for a true friend
is better than a magic ring, I put it on.'

"'You are very brave,' said he, 'then you shall hear the lines I heard
in a rival salon, repeated by him who last wafted the censer to you
to-night.' He repeated a kind of doggrel pasquinade, beginning with--

  'Tell me, gentles, have you seen,
  The prating she, the mock Corinne?'

"Dumont, who had the courage for my good to inflict the blow, could not
stay to see its effect, and this time I was left alone, not with my
nonsense, but with my reason. It was quite sufficient. I was cured. My only
consolation in my disgrace was, that I honourably kept Dumont's counsel.
The friend who composed the lampoon, from that day to this never knew that
I had heard it; though I must own I often longed to tell him, when he was
offering his incense again, that I wished he would reverse his practice,
and let us have the satire in my presence, and keep the flattery for my
absence. The graft of affectation, which was but a poor weak thing, fell
off at once, but the root of the evil had not yet been reached. My friend
Dumont had not cut deep enough, or perhaps feared to cut away too much that
was sound and essential to life: my political ambition remained, and on
Lord Davenant's return sprang up in full vigour.

"Now it is all over, I can analyse and understand my own motives: when I
first began my political course, I really and truly had no love for
power; full of other feelings, I was averse from it; it was absolutely
disagreeable to me; but as people acquire a taste for drams after making
faces at first swallowing, so I, from experience of the excitation,
acquired the habit, the love, of this mental dram-drinking; besides, I had
such delightful excuses for myself: I didn't love power for its own sake,
it was never used for myself, always for others; ever with my old principle
of sacrifice in full play: this flattering unction I laid to my soul, and
it long hid from me its weakness, its gradual corruption.

"The first instance in which I used my influence, and by my husband's
intervention obtained a favour of some importance, the thing done, though
actually obtained by private favour, was in a public point of view well
done and fit to be done; but when in time Lord Davenant had reached that
eminence which had been the summit of my ambition, and when once it was
known that I had influence (and in making it known between jest and earnest
Lord Davenant was certainly to blame), numbers of course were eager to
avail themselves of the discovery, swarms born in the noontide ray, or such
as salute the rising morn, buzzed round me. I was good-natured and glad to
do the service, and proud to show that I could do it. I thought I had some
right to share with Lord Davenant, at least, the honour and pleasures of
patronage, and so he willingly allowed it to be, as long as my objects were
well chosen, though he said to me once with a serious smile, 'The patronage
of Europe would not satisfy you; you would want India, and if you had
India, you would sigh for the New World.' I only laughed, and said 'The
same thought as Lord Chesterfield's, only more neatly put.' 'If all Ireland
were given to such a one for his patrimony, he'd ask for the Isle of Man
for his cabbage-garden.' Lord Davenant did not smile. I felt a little
alarmed, and a feeling of estrangement began between us.

"I recollect one day his seeing a note on my table from one of my
_proteges_, thanking me outrageously, and extolling my very obliging
disposition. He read, and threw it down, and with one of his dry-humour
smiles repeated, half to himself,

  And so obliging that she ne'er obliged.'

"I thought these lines were in the Characters of Women, and I hunted all
through them in vain; at last I found them in the character of a man,
which could not suit me, and I was pacified, and, what is extraordinary,
my conscience quite put at ease.

"The week afterwards I went to make some request for a friend: my little
boy--for I had a dear little boy then--had come in along with mamma.
Lord Davenant complied with my request, but unwillingly I saw, and as if
he felt it a weakness; and, putting his hand upon the curly-pated little
fellow's head, he said, 'This boy rules Greece, I see.' The child was
sent for the Grecian history, his father took him on his knee, while he
read the anecdote, and as he ended he whispered in the child's ear,
'Tell mamma this must not be; papa should be ruled only by justice.' He
really had public virtue, I only talked of it.

"After this you will wonder that I could go on, but I did.

"I had at that time a friend, who talked always most romantically, and
acted most selfishly, and for some time I never noticed the
inconsistency between her words and actions. In fact she had two
currents in her mind, two selves, one romantic from books, the other
selfish from worldly education and love of fashion, and of the goods of
this world. She had charming manners, which I thought went for nothing
with me, but which I found stood for every thing. In short, she was as
caressing, as graceful, in her little ways, and as selfish as a cat. She
had claws too, but at first I only felt the velvet.

"It was for this woman that I hazarded my highest happiness--my
husband's esteem, and for the most paltry object imaginable. She wanted
some petty place for some man who was to marry her favourite maid. When
I first mentioned it to him, Lord Davenant coldly said, 'It can't be
done,' and his pen went on very quickly with the letter he was writing.
Vexed and ashamed, and the more vexed because ashamed, I persisted.
'Cannot be done for _me_?' said I. 'Not for anybody,' said he--'by me,
at least.'--I thought--Helen, I am ashamed to tell you what I thought;
but I will tell it you, because it will show you how a mind may be
debased by the love of power, or rather by the consequence which its
possession bestows. I thought he meant to point out to me that, although
he would not do it, I might _get it done_. And, speaking as if to
myself, I said, 'Then I'll go to such a person; then I'll use such and
such ways and means.'

"Looking up from his writing at me, with a look such as I had never seen
from him before, he replied, in the words of a celebrated minister,
_'C'est facile de se servir de pareils moyens, c'est difficile de s'y
resoudre.'_

"I admired him, despised myself, left the room, and went and told my
friend decidedly it could not be done. That instant, she became my
enemy, and I felt her claws. I was proud of the wounds, and showed them
to my husband. Now, Helen, you think I am cured for ever, and safe.
Alas! no, my dear, it is not so easy to cure habit. I have, however,
some excuse--let me put it forward; the person for whom I again
transgressed was my mother, and for her I was proud of doing the utmost,
because she had, as I could not forget, been ready to sacrifice my
happiness to her speculations. She had left off building castles in the
air, but she had outbuilt herself on earth. She had often recourse to me
in her difficulties, and I supplied funds, as well I might, for I had a
most liberal allowance from my most liberal lord; but schemes of my own,
very patriotic but not overwise, had in process of time drained my
purse. I had a school at Cecilhurst, and a lace manufactory; and to
teach my little girls I must needs bring over lace-makers from Flanders,
and Lisle thread, at an enormous expense: I shut my lace-makers up in a
room (for secrecy was necessary), where, like spiders, they quarrelled
with each other and fought, and the whole failed.

"Another scheme, very patriotic too, cost me an immensity: trying to
make Indian cachemires in England, very beautiful they were, but they
left not the tenth part of a penny in my private purse, and then my
mother wanted some thousands for a new dairy; dairies were then the
fashion, and hers was to be floored with the finest Dutch tiles,
furnished with Sevre china, with plate glass windows, and a porch hung
with French mirrors; so she set me to represent to Lord Davenant her
very distressed situation, and to present a petition from her for a
pension. The first time I urged my mother's request, Lord Davenant said,
'I am sure, Anne, that you do not know what you are asking.' I
desisted. I did not indeed well understand the business, nor at all
comprehend that I was assisting a fraudulent attempt to obtain public
money for a private purpose, but I wished to have the triumph of
success, I wished to feel my own influence.

"Had it been foretold to me that I could so forget myself in the
intoxication of political power, how I should have disdained the
prophecy--'Lord, is thy servant a dog, that he should do this thing?'
There is a fine sermon of Blair's on this subject; it had early made a
great impression upon me; but what are good impressions, good feelings,
good impulses, good intentions, good any thing, without principle?

"My mother wondered how I could so easily take a refusal; she piqued my
pride by observing that she was sorry my influence had declined; her
pity, so near contempt, wounded me, and I unadvisedly exclaimed that my
influence had in no way declined. Scarcely had I uttered the words, when
I saw the inference to which they laid me open, that I had not used my
influence to the utmost for her. My mother had quite sense and just
feeling enough to refrain from marking this in words. She noted it only
by an observing look, followed by a sigh. She confessed that I had
always been so kind, so much kinder than she could have expected, that
she would say no more. This was more to the purpose with me than if she
had talked for hours. I heard fresh sighs, and saw tears begin to flow--
a mother's sighs and tears it is difficult, and I felt it was shameful,
to bear. I was partly melted, much confused, and hurried, too, by
visitors coming in, and I hastily promised that I would try once more
what I could do. The moment I had time for reflection I repented of what
I had promised. But the words were past recall. It was so disagreeable
to me to speak about the affair to my husband, that I wanted to get it
off my mind as soon as possible, but the day passed without my being
able to find a moment when I could speak to Lord Davenant in private.
Company stayed till late, my mother the latest. At parting, as she
kissed me, calling me her dearest Anne, she said she was convinced I
could do whatever I pleased with Lord Davenant, and as she was going
down stairs, added, she was sure the first words she should hear from me
in the morning would be 'Victory, victory!'

"I hated myself for admitting the thought, and yet there it was; I let
it in, and could not get it out. From what an indescribable mixture of
weak motives or impulses, and often without one reasonable principle, do
we act in the most important moments of life. Even as I opened the door
of his room I hesitated, my heart beat forebodingly, but I thought I
could not retreat, and I went in.

"He was standing on the hearth looking weary, but a reviving smile
came on seeing me, and he held out his hand--'My comfort always,' said
he.

"I took his hand, and, hesitating, was again my better self; but I would
not go back, nor could I begin with any preface.--Thank Heaven that was
impossible. I began:--

"'Davenant, I am come to ask you a favour, and you must do it for me.'

"'I hope it is in my power, my dear,' said he; 'I am sure you would not
ask--' and there he stopped.

"I told him it was in his power, and that I would not ask it for any
creature living, but--' He put his hand upon my lips, told me he knew
what I was going to say, and begged me not to say it; but I, hoping to
carry it off playfully, kissed his hand, and putting it aside said, 'I
must ask, and you must grant this to my mother.' He replied, 'It cannot
be, Anne, consistently with public justice, and with my public duty. I--'

"'Nonsense, nonsense,' I said, 'such words are only to mask a refusal.'
_Mask_, I remember, was the word that hurt him. Of all I could have
used, it was the worst: I knew it the instant I had said it. Lord
Davenant stepped back, and with such a look! You, Helen, who have seen
only his benign countenance, his smiling eyes, cannot conceive it. I am
sure he must have seen how much it alarmed me, for suddenly it changed,
and I saw all the melting softness of love.

"Oh fool! vain wicked fool that I was! I thought of 'victory,' and
pursued it. My utmost power of persuasion--words--smiles--and tears I
tried--and tried in vain; and then I could not bear to feel that I had
in vain made this trial of power and love. Shame and pride and anger
seized me by turns, and raised such a storm within me--such confusion--
that I knew not what I did or said. And he was so calm! looked so at
least, though I am sure he was not. His self-possession piqued and
provoked me past all bearing. I cannot tell you exactly how it was--it
was so dreadfully interesting to me that I am unable to recall the exact
words; but I remember at last hearing him say, in a voice I had never
before heard, 'Lady Davenant!'--He had never called me so before; he had
always called me 'Anne:' it seemed as if he had dismissed me from his
heart.

"'Call me Anne! O call me Anne!'

"And he yielded instantly, he called me Anne, and caressing me, 'his
Anne.' 'O Helen! never do as I did.' I whispered, 'Then, my love, you
will do this for me--for me, your own Anne?'

"He put me gently away, and leaned against the chimney-piece in silence.
Then turning to me, in a low suppressed voice, he said,--

"'I have loved you--love you as much as man can love woman, there is
nothing I would not sacrifice for you except--'

"'No exceptions!' cried I, in an affected tone of gaiety.

"'Except honour,' he repeated firmly.--Helen, my dear, you are of a
generous nature, so am I, but the demon of pride was within me, it made
me long to try the extent of my power. Disappointed, I sunk to meanness;
never, never, however tempted, however provoked, never do as I did,
never reproach a friend with any sacrifice you have made for them; this
is a meanness which your friend may forgive, but which you can never
forgive yourself.

"I reproached him with the sacrifice of my feelings, which I had made in
marrying him! His answer was, 'I feel that what you say is true, I am
now convinced you are incapable of loving me; and since I cannot make
you happy, we had better--part.'

"These were the last words I heard. The blow was wholly unexpected.

"Whether I sunk down, or threw myself at his feet, I know not; but when
I came to myself he was standing beside me. There were other faces, but
my eyes saw only his: I felt his hand holding mine, I pressed it, and
said, 'Forget.' He stooped down and whispered, 'It is forgotten.'

"I believe there is nothing can touch a generous mind so much as the
being treated with perfect generosity--nothing makes us so deeply feel
our own fault."

Lady Davenant was here so much moved that she could say no more. By an
involuntary motion, she checked the reins, and the horses stopped, and
she continued quite silent for a few minutes: at length two or three
deeply drawn sighs seemed to relieve her; she looked up, and her
attention seemed to be caught by a bird that was singing sweetly on a
branch over their heads. She asked what bird it was? Helen showed it to
her where it sat: she looked up and smiled, touched the horses with her
whip, and went on where she had left off.--"The next thing was the
meeting my mother in the morning; I prepared myself for it, and thought
I was now armed so strong in honesty that I could go through with it
well: my morality, however, was a little nervous, was fluttered by the
knock at the door, and, when I heard her voice as she came towards my
room, asking eagerly if I was alone, I felt a sickness at the certainty
that I must at once crush her hopes. But I stood resolved; my eyes fixed
on the door through which she was to enter. She came in, to my
astonishment, with a face radiant with joy, and hastening to me she
embraced me with the warmest expression of fondness and gratitude.--I
stood petrified as I heard her talk of my kindness--my generosity. I
asked what she could mean, said there must be some mistake. But holding
before my eyes a note, 'Can there be any mistake in this?' said she.
That note, for I can never forget it, I will repeat to you.

"'What you wish can be done in a better manner than you proposed. The
public must have no concern with it; Lady Davenant must have the
pleasure of doing it her own way; an annuity to the amount required
shall be punctually paid to your banker. The first instalment will be in
his hands by the time you receive this.--DAVENANT.'

"When I had been formerly disenchanted from my trance of love, the
rudeness of the shock had benumbed all my faculties, and left me
scarcely power to think; but now, when thus recovered from the delirium
of power, I was immediately in perfect possession of my understanding,
and when I was made to comprehend the despicable use I would have made
of my influence, or the influence my husband possessed, I was so
shocked, that I have ever since, I am conscious, in speaking of any
political corruption, rather exaggerated my natural abhorrence of it.
Not from the mean and weak idea of convincing the world how foreign all
such wrong was to my soul, but because it really is foreign to it,
because I know how it can debase the most honourable characters; I feel
so much shocked at the criminal as at the crime, because I saw it once
in all its hideousness so near myself.

"A change in the ministry took place this year, Lord Davenant's
resignation was sent in and accepted, and in retirement I had not only
leisure to be good, but also leisure to cultivate my mind. Of course I
had read all such reading as ladies read, but this was very different
from the kind of study that would enable me to keep pace with Lord
Davenant and his highly informed friends. Many of these, more men of
thought than of show, visited us from time to time in the country.
Though I had passed very well in London society, blue, red, and green,
literary, fashionable, and political, and had been extolled as both
witty and wise, especially when my husband was in place; yet when I came
into close contact with minds of a higher order, I felt my own
deficiencies. Lord Davenant's superiority I particularly perceived in
the solidity of the ground he uniformly took and held in reasoning. And
when I, too confident, used to venture rashly, and often found myself
surrounded, and in imminent danger in argument, he used to bring me off
and ably cover my retreat, and looked so pleased, so proud, when I made
a happy hit, or jumped to a right conclusion.

"But what I most liked, most admired, in him was, that he never
triumphed or took unfair advantages on the strength of his learning, of
his acquirements, or of what I may call his logical training.

"I mention these seeming trifles because it is not always in the great
occasions of life that a generous disposition shows itself in the way
which we most feel. Little instances of generosity shown in this way,
unperceived by others, have gone most deeply into my mind; and have most
raised my opinion of his character. The sense that I was over rather
than under valued, made me the more ready to acknowledge and feel my own
deficiencies. I felt the truth of an aphorism of Lord Verulam's, which
is now come down to the copy-books; that 'knowledge is power.' Having
made this notable discovery, I set about with all my might to acquire
knowledge. You may smile, and think that this was only in a new form the
passion for power; no, it was something better. Not to do myself
injustice, I now felt the pure desire of knowledge, and enjoyed the pure
pleasure of obtaining it; assisted, supported, and delighted, by the
sympathy of a superior mind.

"As to intellectual happiness, this was the happiest time of my life. As
if my eyes had been rubbed by your favourite dervise in the Arabian
tales, with this charmed ointment, which opened at once to view all the
treasures of the earth, I saw and craved the boundless treasures opened
to my view. I now wanted to read all that Lord Davenant was reading,
that I might be up to his ideas, but this was not to be done in an
instant. There was a Frenchwoman who complained that she never could
learn any thing, because she could not find anybody to teach her all she
wanted to know in two words. I was not quite so _exigeante_ as this
lady; but, after having skated on easily and rapidly, far on the
superficies of knowledge, it was difficult and rather mortifying to have
to go back and begin at the beginning. Yet, when I wanted to go a little
deeper, and really to understand what I was about, this was essentially
necessary. I could not have got through without the assistance of one
who showed me what I might safely leave unlearned, and who pointed out
what fruit was worth climbing for, what would only turn to ashes.

"This happy time of my life too quickly passed away. It was interrupted,
however, not by any fault or folly of my own, but by an infliction from
the hand of Providence, to which I trust I submitted with resignation--
we lost our dear little boy; my second boy was born dead, and my
confinement was followed by long and severe illness. I was ordered to
try the air of Devonshire.

"One night--now, my dear, I have kept for the last the only romantic
incident in my life--one night, a vessel was wrecked upon our coast; one
of the passengers, a lady, an invalid, was brought to our house; I
hastened to her assistance--it was my beautiful rival!

"She was in a deep decline, and had been at Lisbon for some time, but
she was now sent home by the physicians, as they send people from one
country to another to die. The captain of the ship in which she was
mistook the lights upon the coast, and ran the ship ashore near to our
house.

"Of course we did for her all we could, but she was dying: she knew
nothing of my history, and I trust I soothed her last moments--she died
in my arms.

"She had one child, a son, then at Eton: we sent for him; he arrived too
late; the feeling he showed interested us deeply; we kept him with us
some time; he was grateful; and afterwards as he grew up he often wrote
to me. His letters you have read."

"Mr. Beauclerc!" said Helen.

"Mr. Beauclerc.--I had not seen him for some time, when General
Clarendon presented him to me as his ward at Florence, where I had
opportunities of essentially serving him. You may now understand, my
dear, why I had expected that Mr. Granville Beauclerc might have
preferred coming to Clarendon Park this last month of my stay in England
to the pleasures of London. I was angry, I own, but after five minutes'
grace I cooled, saw that I must be mistaken, and came to the just
conclusion of the old poet, that no one sinks at once to the depth of
ill, and ingratitude I consider as the depth of ill. I opine, therefore,
that some stronger feeling than friendship now operates to detain
Granville Beauclerc. In that case I forgive him, but, for his own sake,
and with such a young man I should say for the sake of society--of the
public good--for he will end in public life, I hope the present object
is worthy of him, whoever she may be.

"Have I anything more to tell you? Yes, I should say that, when by
changes in the political world Lord Davenant was again in power, I had
learned, if not to be less ambitious, at least to show it less. D----,
who knew always how to put sense into my mind, so that I found it there,
and thought it completely my own, had once said that 'every public man
who has a cultivated and high-minded wife, has in fact two selves, each
holding watch and ward for the other.' The notion pleased me--pleased
both my fancy and my reason; I acted on it, and Lord Davenant assures me
that I have been this second self to him, and I am willing to believe
it, first because he is a man of strict truth, and secondly, because
every woman is willing to believe what she wishes."

Lady Davenant paused, and after some minutes of reflection said, "I
confess, however, that I have not reason to be quite satisfied with
myself as a mother; I did not attend sufficiently to Cecilia's early
education: engrossed with politics, I left her too much to governesses,
at one period to a very bad one. I have done what I can to remedy this,
and you have done more perhaps; but I much fear that the early neglect
can never be completely repaired; she is, however, married to a man of
sense, and when I go to Russia I shall think with satisfaction that I
leave you with her."

After expressing how deeply she had been interested in all that she had
heard, and how grateful she felt for the confidence reposed in her,
Helen said she could not help wishing that Cecilia knew all that had
been just told her of Lady Davenant's history. If Cecilia could but know
all the tenderness of her mother's heart, how much less would she fear,
how much more would she love her!

"It would answer no purpose," replied Lady Davenant; "there are persons
with intrinsic differences of character, who, explain as you will, can
never understand one another beyond a certain point. Nature and art
forbid--no spectacles you can furnish will remedy certain defects of
vision. Cecilia sees as much as she can ever see of my character, and I
see, in the best light, the whole of hers. So Helen, my dear, take the
advice of a Scotch proverb--proverbs are vulgar, because they usually
contain common sense--'Let well alone.'"

"You are really a very good little friend," added she, "but keep my
personal narrative for your own use."




CHAPTER IX.


It was late before they reached home, and Helen dressed as fast as
possible, for the general's punctual habits required that all should
assemble in the drawing-room five minutes at least before dinner. She
was coming down the private turret staircase, which led from the family
apartments to the great hall, when, just at the turn, and in the most
awkward way possible, she met a gentleman, a stranger, where never
stranger had been seen by her before, running up full speed, so that
they had but barely space and time to clear out of each other's way.
Pardons were begged of course. The manner and voice of the stranger were
particularly gentlemanlike. A servant followed with his portmanteau,
inquiring into which room Mr. Beauclerc was to go?

"Mr. Beauclerc!"--When Helen got to the drawing-room, and found that not
even the general was there, she thought she could have time to run up
the great staircase to Lady Davenant's room, and tell her that Mr.
Beauclerc was come.

"My dear Lady Davenant, Mr. Beauclerc!"--He was there! and she made her
retreat as quickly as possible. The quantity that had been said about
him, and the awkward way in which they had thus accidentally met, made
her feel much embarrassed when they were regularly introduced.

At the beginning of dinner, Helen fancied that there was unusual silence
and constraint; perhaps this might be so, or perhaps people were really
hungry, or perhaps Mr. Beauclerc had not yet satisfied the general and
Lady Davenant: however, towards the end of dinner, and at the dessert,
he was certainly entertaining; and Lady Cecilia appeared particularly
amused by an account which he was giving of a little French piece he had
seen just before he left London, called "Les Premieres Amours," and
Helen might have been amused too, but that Lady Cecilia called upon her
to listen, and, Mr. Beauclerc turning his eyes upon her, she saw, or
fancied that he was put out in his story, and though he went on with
perfect good breeding, yet it was evidently with diminished spirit. As
soon as politeness permitted, at the close of the story, she, to relieve
him and herself, turned to the aide-de-camp on her other side, and
devoted, or seemed to devote, to him her exclusive attention. He was
always tiresome to her, but now more than ever; he went on, when once
set a-going, about his horses and his dogs, while she had the
mortification of hearing almost immediately after her seceding, that Mr.
Beauclerc recovered the life and spirit of his tone, and was in full and
delightful enjoyment of conversation with Lady Cecilia. Something very
entertaining caught her ear every now and then; but, with her eyes fixed
in the necessary direction, it was impossible to make it out, through
the aid-de-camp's never-ending tediousness. She thought the sitting
after dinner never would terminate, though it was in fact rather shorter
than usual.

As soon as they reached the drawing-room, Lady Cecilia asked her mother
what was the cause of Granville's delay in town, and why he had come
to-day, after he had written it was impossible?

Lady Davenant answered, that he had 'trampled,' as Lord Chatham did, 'on
impossibilities.' "It was not a physical impossibility, it seems."

"I'm sure--I hope," continued Cecilia, "that none of the Beltravers' set
had any thing to do with his delay, yet from a word or two the general
let fall, I'm almost sure that they have--Lady Blanche, I'm afraid--."
There she stopped. "If it were only a money difficulty with Lord
Beltravers," resumed she, "that might be easily settled, for Beauclerc
is rich enough."

"Yes," said Lady Davenant, "but rashly generous; an uncommon fault in
these days, when young men are in general selfishly prudent or selfishly
extravagant."

"I hope," said Cecilia,--"I hope Lady Blanche Forrester will not--"
there she paused, and consulted her mother's countenance; her mother
answered that Beauclerc had not spoken to her of Lady Blanche. After
putting her hopes and fears, questions and conjectures, into every
possible form and direction, Lady Cecilia was satisfied that her mother
knew no more than herself, and this was a great comfort.

When Mr. Beauclerc reappeared, Helen was glad that she was settled at an
embroidery frame, at the furthest end of the room, as there, apart from
the world, she felt safe from all cause for embarrassment, and there she
continued happy till some one came to raise the light of the lamp over
her head. It was Mr. Beauclerc, and, as she looked up, she gave a
foolish little start of surprise, and then all her confusion returning,
with thanks scarce audible, her eyes were instantly fixed on the vine
leaf she was embroidering. He asked how she could by lamplight
distinguish blue from green? a simple and not very alarming question,
but she did not hear the words rightly, and thinking he asked whether
she wished for a screen, she answered "No, thank you."

Lady Cecilia laughed, and covering Helen's want of hearing by
Beauclerc's want of sight, explained--"Do not you see, Granville, the
silk-cards are written upon, 'blue' and 'green;' there can be no
mistake."

Mr. Beauclerc made a few more laudable attempts at conversation with
Miss Stanley, but she, still imagining that this was forced, could not
in return say anything but what seemed forced and unnatural, and as
unlike her usual self as possible. Lady Cecilia tried to relieve her;
she would have done better to have let it alone, for Beauclerc was not
of the French wit's opinion that, _La modestie n'est bonne qu'a quinze
ans_, and to him it appeared only a graceful timidity. Helen retired
earlier than any one else, and, when she thought over her foolish
awkwardness, felt as much ashamed as if Mr. Beauclerc had actually heard
all that Lady Cecilia had said about him--had seen all her thoughts, and
understood the reason of her confusion. At last, when Lady Cecilia came
into her room before she went to bed, she began with--"I am sure you are
going to scold me, and I deserve it, I am so provoked with myself, and
the worst of it is, that I do not think I shall ever get over it--I am
afraid I shall be just as foolish again tomorrow."

"I could find it in my heart to scold you to death," said Lady Cecilia,
"but that I am vexed myself."

Then hesitating, and studying Helen's countenance, she seemed doubtful
how to proceed. Either she was playing with Helen's curiosity, or she
was really herself perplexed. She made two or three beginnings, each a
little inconsistent with the other.

"Mamma is always right; with her--'coming events' really and truly 'cast
their shadows before.' I do believe she has the fatal gift, the coming
ill to know!"

"Ill!" said Helen; "what ill is coming?"

"After all, however, it may not be an ill," said Lady Cecilia; "it may
be all for the best; yet I am shockingly disappointed, though I declare
I never formed any--"

"Oh, my dear Cecilia, do tell me at once what it is you mean."

"I mean, that Granville Beauclerc, like all men of genius, has acted
like the greatest fool."

"What has he done?"

"He is absolutely--you must look upon him in future--as a married man."

Helen was delighted. Cecilia could form no farther schemes on her
account, and she felt relieved from all her awkwardness.

"Dearest Helen, this is well at all events," cried Cecilia, seeing her
cleared countenance. "This comforts me; you are at ease; and, if I have
caused you one uncomfortable evening, I am sure you are consoled for it
by the reflection that my mother was right, and I, as usual, wrong. But,
Helen," continued she earnestly, "remember that this is not to be known;
remember you must not breathe the least hint of what I have told you to
mamma or the general."

Something more than astonishment appeared in Helen's countenance. "And
is it possible that Mr. Beauclerc does not tell them,--does not trust
his guardian and such a friend as your mother?" said Helen.

"He will tell them, he will tell them--but not yet; perhaps not till--he
is not to see his fiancee--they have for some reason agreed to be
separated for some time--I do not know exactly, but surely every body
may choose their own opportunity for telling their own secrets. In fact,
Helen, the lady, I understand, made it a point with him that nothing
should be said of it yet--to any one."

"But he told it to you?"

"No, indeed, he did not tell it; I found it out, and he could not deny
it; but he charged me to keep it secret, and I would not have told it to
any body living but yourself; and to you, after all I said about him, I
felt it was necessary--thought I was bound--in short, I thought it would
set things to rights, and put you at your ease at once."

And then, with more earnestness, she again pressed upon Helen a promise
of secrecy, especially towards Lady Davenant. Helen submitted. Cecilia
embraced her affectionately, and left the room. Quite tired, and quite
happy, Helen was in bed and asleep in a few minutes.

Not the slightest suspicion crossed her mind that all her friend had
been telling her was not perfectly true. To a more practised, a less
confiding, person the perplexity of Lady Cecilia's prefaces, and some
contradictions or inconsistencies, might have suggested doubts; hut
Helen's general confidence in her friend's truth had never yet been
seriously shaken. Lady Davenant she had always thought prejudiced on
this point, and too severe. If there had been in early childhood a bad
habit of inaccuracy in Cecilia, Helen thought it long since cured; and
so perhaps it was, till she formed a friendship abroad with one who had
no respect for truth.

But of this Helen knew nothing; and, in fact, till now Lady Cecilia's
aberrations had been always trifling, almost imperceptible, errors, such
as only her mother's strictness or Miss Clarendon's scrupulosity could
detect. Nor would Cecilia have ventured upon a decided, an important,
false assertion, except for a kind purpose. Never in her life had she
told a falsehood to injure any human creature, or one that she could
foresee might, by any possibility do harm to any living being. But here
was a friend, a very dear friend, in an awkward embarrassment, and
brought into it by her means; and by a little innocent stretching of the
truth she could at once, she fancied, set all to rights. The moment the
idea came into her head, upon the spur of the occasion, she resolved to
execute it directly. It was settled between the drawing-room door and
her dressing-room. And when thus executed successfully, with happy
sophistry she justified it to herself. "After all," said she to herself,
"though it was not absolutely true, it was _ben trovato_, it was as near
the truth, perhaps, as possible. Beauclerc's best friends really feared
that he was falling in love with the lady in question. It was very
likely, and too likely, it might end in his marrying this Lady Blanche
Forrester. And, on every account, and every way, it was for the best
that Helen should consider him as a married man. This would restore
Helen by one magical stroke to herself, and release her from that
wretched state in which she could neither please nor be pleased." And as
far as this good effect upon Helen was concerned, Lady Cecilia's plan
was judicious; it succeeded admirably.

Wonderful! how a few words spoken, a single idea taken, out of or put
into the mind, can make such a difference, not only in the mental
feelings, but in the whole bodily appearance, and in the actual powers
of perception and use of our senses.

When Helen entered the breakfast-room the next morning, she looked, and
moved, and felt, quite a different creature from what she had been the
preceding day. She had recovered the use of her understanding, and she
could hear and see quite distinctly; and the first thing she saw was,
that nobody was thinking particularly about her; and now she for the
first time actually saw Mr. Beauclerc. She had before looked at him
without seeing him, and really did not know what sort of looking person
he was, except that he was like a gentleman; of that she had a sort of
intuitive perception;--as Cuvier could tell from the first sight of a
single bone what the animal was, what were its habits, and to what class
it belonged, so any person early used to good company can, by the first
gesture, the first general manner of being, passive or active, tell
whether a stranger, even scarcely seen, is or is not a gentleman.

At the beginning of breakfast, Mr. Beauclerc had all the perfect English
quiet of look and manners, with somewhat of a high-bred air of
indifference to all sublunary things, yet saying and doing whatever was
proper for the present company; yet it was done and said like one in a
dream, performed like a somnambulist, correctly from habit, but all
unconsciously. He awakened from his reverie the moment General Clarendon
came in, and he asked eagerly,--

"General! how far is it to Old Forest?" These were the first words which
he pronounced like one wide awake. "I must ride there this morning; it's
absolutely necessary."

The general replied that he did not see the necessity.

"But when I do, sir," cried Beauclerc; the natural vivacity of the young
man breaking through the conventional manner. Next moment, with a humble
look, he hoped that the general would accompany him, and the look of
proud humility vanished from his countenance the next instant, because
the general demurred, and Beauclerc added, "Will not you oblige me so
far? Then I must go by myself."

The general, seeming to go on with his own thoughts, and not to be moved
by his ward's impatience, talked of a review that was to be put off, and
at length found that he could accompany him. Beauclerc then, delighted,
thanked him warmly.

"What is the object of this essential visit to Old Forest, may I ask?"
said Lady Davenant.

"To see a dilapidated house," said the general.

"To save a whole family from ruin," cried Beauclerc; "to restore a man
of first-rate talents to his place in society."

"Pshaw!" said the general.

"Why that contemptuous exclamation, my dear general?" said Beauclerc.

"I have told you, and again I tell you, the thing is impossible!" said
the general.

"So I hear you say, sir," replied his ward; "but till I am convinced, I
hold to my project."

"And what is your project, Granville?" said Lady Davenant.

"I will explain it to you when we are alone," said Beauclerc.

"I beg your pardon, I was not aware that there was any mystery," said
Lady Davenant. "No mystery," said Beauclerc, "only about lending some
money to a friend."

"To which I will not consent," said the general.

"Why not, sir?" said Beauclerc, throwing back his head with an air of
defiance in his countenance; there was as he looked at his guardian a
quick, mutable succession of feelings, in striking contrast with the
fixity of the general's appearance.

"I have given you my reasons, Beauclerc," said the general, "It is
unnecessary to repeat what I have said, you will do no good."

"No good, general? When I tell you that if I lend Beltravers the money,
to put his place in repair, to put it in such a state that his sisters
could live in it, he would no longer be a banished man, a useless
absentee, a wanderer abroad, but he would come and settle at Old Forest,
re-establish the fortune and respectability of his family, and above
all, save his own character and happiness. Oh, my dear general!"

General Clarendon, evidently moved by his ward's benevolent enthusiasm,
paused and said that there were many recollections which made it rather
painful to him to revisit Old Forest. Still he would do it for
Beauclerc, since nothing but seeing the place would convince him of the
impracticability of his scheme. "I have not been at Old Forest,"
continued the general, "since I was a boy--since it was deserted by the
owners, and sadly changed I shall find it.

"In former times these Forresters were a respectable, good old English
family, till the second wife, pretty and silly, took a fancy for
figuring in London, where of course she was nobody. Then, to make
herself somebody, she forced her husband to stand for the county. A
contested election--bribery--a petition--another election--ruinous
expense. Then that Beltravers title coming to them: and they were to
live up to it,--and beyond their income. The old story--over head and
shoulders in debt. Then the new story,--that they must go abroad for
economy!"

"Economy! The cant of all those who have not courage to retrench at
home," said Lady Davenant.

"They must," they said, "live abroad, it is so cheap," continued the
general. "So cheap to leave their house to go to ruin! Cheap education
too! and so good--and what does it come to?"

"A cheap provision it is for a family in many cases," said Lord
Davenant. "Wife, son, and daughter, Satan, are thy own."

"Not in this case," cried Beauclerc; "you cannot mean I hope."

"I can answer for one, the daughter at least," said Lady Davenant; "that
Mad. de St. Cimon, whom we saw abroad, at Florence, you know, Cecilia,
with whom I would not let you form an acquaintance."

"Your ladyship was quite right," said the general.

Beauclerc could not say, "Quite wrong,"--and he looked--suffering.

"I know nothing of the son," pursued Lady Davenant.

"I do," said Beauclerc, "he is my friend."

"I thought he had been a very distressed man, that young Beltravers,"
said the aid-de-camp.

"And if he were, that would not prevent my being his friend, sir," said
Beauclerc.

"Of course," said the aid-de-camp, "I only asked."

"He is a man of genius and feeling," continued Beauclerc, turning to
Lady Davenant.

"But I never heard you mention Lord Beltravers before. How long has he
been your friend?" said Lady Davenant.

Beauclerc hesitated. The general without hesitation answered, "Three
weeks and one day."

"I do not count my friendship by days or weeks," said Beauclerc.

"No, my dear Beauclerc," said the general: "well would it be for you if
you would condescend to any such common-sense measure." He rose from the
breakfast-table as he spoke, and rang the bell to order the horses.

"You are prejudiced against Beltravers, general; but you will think
better of him, I am sure, when you know him."

"You will think worse of him when you know him, I suspect," replied the
general.

"Suspect! But since you only _suspect_," said Beauclerc, "we English do
not condemn on suspicion, unheard, unseen."

"Not unheard," said the general, "I have heard enough of him." "From the
reports of his enemies," said Beauclerc.

"I do not usually form my judgment," replied the general, "from reports
either of friends or enemies; I have not the honour of knowing any of
Lord Beltravers' enemies."

"Enemies of Lord Beltravers!" exclaimed Lady Davenant. "What right as he
to enemies as if he were a great man?--a person of whom nobody ever
heard, setting up to have enemies! But now-a-days, these candidates for
fame, these would-be celebrated, set up their enemies as they would
their equipages, on credit--then, by an easy process of logic, make out
the syllogism thus:--Every great man has enemies, therefore, every man
who has enemies must be great--hey, Beauclerc?"

Beauclerc vouchsafed only a faint, absent smile, and, turning to his
guardian, asked--"Since Lord Beltravers was not to be allowed the
honours of enemies, or the benefit of pleading prejudice, on what _did_
the general form his judgment?"

"From his own words."

"Stay judgment, my dear general," cried Beauclerc; "words repeated! by
whom?"

"Repeated by no one--heard from himself, by myself."

"Yourself! I was not aware you had ever met;--when? where?" Beauclerc
started forward on his chair, and listened eagerly for the answer.

"Pity!" said Lady Davenant, speaking to herself,--"pity! that 'with such
quick affections kindling into flame,' they should burn to waste."

"When, where?" repeated Beauclerc, with his eyes fixed on his guardian,
and his soul in his eyes.

Soberly and slowly his guardian answered, and categorically,--"When did
I meet Lord Beltravers? A short time before his father's death.--Where?
At Lady Grace Bland's."

"At Lady Grace Bland's!--where he could not possibly appear to
advantage! Well, go on, sir."

"One moment--pardon me, Beauclerc; I have curiosity as well as yourself.
May I ask why Lord Beltravers could not possibly have appeared to
advantage at Lady Grace Bland's?"

"Because I know he cannot endure her; I have heard him, speaking of her,
quote what Johnson or somebody says of Clariss--'a prating, preaching,
frail creature.'"

"Good!" said the general, "he said this of his own aunt!" "Aunt! You
cannot mean that Lady Grace is his aunt?" cried Beauclerc.

"She is his mother's sister," replied the general, "and therefore is, I
conceive, his aunt."

"Be it so," cried Beauclerc; "people must tell the truth sometimes, even
of their own relations; they must know it best, and therefore I conclude
that what Beltravers said of Lady Grace is true."

"Bravo! well jumped to a conclusion, Granville, as usual," said Lady
Davenant, "But go on, general, tell us what you have heard from this
precious lord; can you have better than what Beauclerc, his own witness,
gives in evidence?"

"Better I think, and in the same line," said the general: "his lordship
has the merit of consistency. At table, servants of course present, and
myself a stranger, I heard Lord Beltravers begin by cursing England and
all that inhabit it. 'But your country!' remonstrated his aunt. He
abjured England; he had no country, he said, no liberal man ever has; he
had no relations--what nature gave him without his consent he had a
right to disclaim, I think he argued. But I can swear to these words,
with which he concluded--'My father is an idiot, my mother a brute, and
my sister may go to the devil her own way.'"

"Such bad taste!" said the aid-de-camp.

Lady Davenant smiled at the unspeakable astonishment in Helen's face.
"When you have lived one season in the world, my dear child, this power
of surprise will be worn out."

"But even to those who have seen the world," said the aide-de-camp, who
had seen the world, "as it strikes me, really it is such extraordinary
bad taste!"

"Such ordinary bad taste! as it strikes me," said Lady Davenant; "base
imitation, and imitation is always a confession of poverty, a want of
original genius. But then there are degrees among the race of imitators.
Some choose their originals well, some come near them tolerably; but
here, all seems equally bad, clumsy, Birmingham counterfeit; don't you
think so, Beauclerc? a counterfeit that falls and makes no noise. There
is the worst of it for your protege, whose great ambition I am sure it
is to make a noise in the world. However, I may spare my remonstrances,
for I am quite aware that you would never let drop a friend." "Never,
never!" cried Beauclerc.

"Then, my dear Granville, do not take up this man, this Lord Beltravers,
for, depend upon it, he will never do. If he had made a bold stroke for
a reputation, like a great original, and sported some deed without a
name, to work upon the wonder-loving imagination of the credulous
English public, one might have thought something of him. But this
cowardly, negative sin, _not_ honouring his father and mother! so
commonplace, too, neutral tint--no effect. Quite a failure, one cannot
even stare, and you know, Granville, the object of all these strange
speeches is merely to make fools stare. To be the wonder of the London
world for a single day, is the great ambition of these ephemeral fame-
hunters 'insects that shine, buzz, and fly-blow in the setting sun.'"

Beauclerc pushed away his tea-cup half across the table, exclaiming,
"How unjust! to class him among a tribe he detests and despises as much
as you can, Lady Davenant. And all for that one unfortunate speech--Not
quite fair, general, not quite philosophical, Lady Davenant, to decide
on a man's character from the specimen of a single speech: this is like
judging of a house from the sample of a single brick. All this time I
know how Beltravers came to make that speech--I know how it was, as well
as if I had been present--better!"

"Better!" cried Lady Cecilia.

"Ladies and gentlemen may laugh," resumed Beauclerc, "but I seriously
maintain--better!"

"How better than the general, who was present, and heard and saw the
whole?" said Lady Cecilia.

"Yes, better, for he saw only effects, and I know causes; and I appeal
to Lady Davenant,--from Lady Davenant sarcastic to Lady Davenant
philosophic I appeal--may not the man who discovers causes, say he knows
more than he who merely sees effects?"

"He may say he knows more, at all events," replied Lady Davenant; "but
now for the discovery of causes, metaphysical sir."

"I have done," cried the general, turning to leave the breakfast-room;
"when Beauclerc goes to metaphysics I give it up."

"No, no, do not give it up, my dear general," cried Lady Cecilia; "do
not stir till we have heard what will come next, for I am sure it will
be something delightfully absurd."

Beauclerc bowed, and feared he should not justify her ladyship's good
opinion, for he had nothing delightfully absurd to say, adding that the
cause of his friend's appearing like a brute was, that he feared to be a
hypocrite among hypocrites.

"Lord Beltravers was in company with a set who were striving, with all
their might of dissimulation, to appear better than they are, and he, as
he always does, strove to make himself appear worse than he really is."

"Unnecessary, I should think," said Lady Davenant.

"Impossible, I should think," said the general.

"Impossible I know it is to change your opinion, general, of any one,"
said Beauclerc.

"For my own part, I am glad of that," said Lady Cecilia, rising; "and I
advise you, Granville, to rest content with the general's opinion of
yourself, and say no more."

"But," said Beauclerc; "one cannot be content to think only of one's-
self always."

"Say no more, say no more," repeated Lady Cecilia, smiling as she looked
back from the door, where she had stopped the general. "For my sake say
no more, I entreat, I do dislike to hear so much said about anything or
anybody. What sort of a road is it to Old Forest?" continued she; "why
should not we ladies go with you, my dear Clarendon, to enliven the
way."

Clarendon's countenance brightened at this proposal. The road was
certainly beautiful, he said, by the banks of the Thames. Lady Cecilia
and the general left the room, but Beauclerc remained sitting at the
breakfast-table, apparently intently occupied in forming a tripod of
three tea-spoons; Lady Davenant opposite to him, looking at him
earnestly, "Granville!" said she. He started, "Granville! set my mind at
ease by one word, tell me the _mot d'enigme_ of this sudden friendship."

"Not what you suppose," said he steadily, yet colouring deeply. "The
fact is, that Beltravers and I were school-fellows; a generous little
fellow he was as ever was born; he got me out of a sad scrape once at
his own expense, and I can never forget it. We had never met since we
left Eton, till about three weeks ago in town, when I found him in great
difficulties, persecuted too, by a party--I could not turn my back on
him--I would rather be shot!"

"No immediate necessity for being shot, my dear Granville, I hope," said
Lady Davenant. "But if this be indeed _all_, I will never say another
word against your Lord Beltravers; I will leave it to you to find out
his character, or to time to show it. I shall be quite satisfied that
you throw away your money, if it be only money that is in the question;
be this Lord Beltravers what he may. Let him say, 'or let them do, it is
all one to me,' provided that he does not marry you to his sister."

"He has not a thought of it," cried Beauclerc; "and if he had, do you
conceive, Lady Davenant, that any man on earth could dispose of me in
marriage, at his pleasure?"

"I hope not," said Lady Davenant.

"Be assured not; my own will, my own heart alone, must decide that
matter."

"The horses are at the door!" cried Cecilia, as she entered; but
"where's Helen?"

Helen had made her escape out of the room when Lady Davenant had
pronounced the words, "Set my mind at rest, Granville," as she felt it
must then be embarrassing to him to speak, and to herself to hear. Her
retreat, had not, however, been effected with considerable loss, she had
been compelled to leave a large piece of the crape-trimming of her gown
under the foot of Lady Davenant's inexorable chair.

"Here is something that belongs to Miss Stanley, if I mistake not," said
the general, who first spied the fragment. The aid-de-camp stooped for
it--Lady Cecilia pitied it--Lady Davenant pronounced it to be Helen's
own fault--Beauclerc understood how it happened, and said nothing.

"But, Helen," cried Lady Cecilia, as she re-appeared,--"but, Helen, are
you not coming with us?"

Helen had intended to have gone in the pony-carriage with Lady Davenant,
but her ladyship now declared that she had business to do at home; it
was settled therefore that Helen was to be of the riding party, and that
party consisted of Lady Cecilia and the general, Beauclerc and herself.




CHAPTER X.


It was a delightful day, sun shining, not too hot, air balmy, birds
singing, all nature gay; and the happy influence was quickly felt by the
riding party. Unpleasant thoughts of the past or future, if any such had
been, were now lost in present enjoyment. The general, twice a man on
horseback, as he always felt himself, managed his own and Helen's horse
to admiration, and Cecilia, riding on with Beauclerc, was well pleased
to hear his first observation, that he had been quite wrong last night,
in not acknowledging that Miss Stanley was beautiful. "People look so
different by daylight and by candlelight," said he; "and so different
when one does not know them at all, and when one begins to know
something of them."

"But what can you know yet of Helen?"

"One forms some idea of character from trifles light as air. How
delightful this day is!"

"And now you really allow she may be called beautiful?"

"Yes, that is, with some expression of mind, heart, soul, which is what
I look for in general," said Beauclerc.

"In general, what can you mean by in general?"

"Not in particular; in particular cases I might think--I--I might feel--
otherwise."

"In particular, then, do you like fools that have no mind, heart, or
soul, Granville?--Answer me."

"Take care," said he, "that horse is too spirited for a lady."

"Not for me," said Lady Cecilia; "but do not think you shall get off so;
what did you mean?"

"My meaning lies too deep for the present occasion."

"For the present company--eh?"

Beauclerc half smiled and answered--"You know you used to tell me that
you hated long discussions on words and nice distinctions."

"Well, well, but let me have the nice distinction now."

"Between love and friendship, then, there is a vast difference in what
one wishes for in a woman's face; there are, 'faces which pale passion
loves.'" "To the right, turn," the general's voice far behind was heard
to say.

To the right they turned, into a glade of the park, which opened to a
favourite view of the general's, to which Cecilia knew that all
attention must be paid. He came up, and they proceeded through a wood
which had been planted by his father, and which seemed destined to stand
for ever secure from sacrilegious axe. The road led them next into a
village, one of the prettiest of that sort of scattered English
villages, where each habitation seems to have been suited to the fancy
as well as to the convenience of each proprietor; giving an idea at once
of comfort and liberty, such as can be seen only in England. Happy
England, how blest, would she but know her bliss!

This village was inhabited by the general's tenants. His countenance
brightened and expanded, as did theirs, whenever he came amongst them;
he saw them happy, and they knew that they owed their happiness in just
proportion to their landlord and themselves; therefore there was a
comfortable mixture in their feelings of gratitude and self-respect.
Some old people who were sitting on the stone benches, sunning
themselves at their doors, rose as he passed, cap in hand, with cordial
greeting. The oldest man, the father of the village, forgot his crutch
as he came forward to see his landlord's bride, and to give him joy. At
every house where they stopped, out came husband, wife, and children,
even "wee toddling things;" one of these, while the general was speaking
to its mother, made its way frightfully close to his horse's heels:
Helen saw it, and called to the mother. The general, turning and leaning
back on his horse, said to the bold little urchin as the mother snatched
him up, "My boy, as long as you live never again go behind a horse's
heels."

"And remember, it was general Clarendon gave you this advice," added
Beauclerc, and turning to Lady Cecilia--"'_Et souvenez vous que c'est
Marechal Turenne qui vous l'a dit_.'"

While the general searched for that English memento, six-pence, Lady
Cecilia repeated, "Marshal Turenne! I do not understand."

"Yes, if you recollect," said Helen, "you do."

"I dare say I know, but I don't remember," said Cecilia. "It was only,"
said Helen, "that the same thing had happened to Marshal Turenne, that
he gave the same advice to a little child."

Lady Cecilia said she owed Beauclerc an acknowledgment down to her
saddle-bow, for the compliment to her general, and a bow at least as low
to Ellen, for making her comprehend it; and, having paid both debts with
graceful promptitude, she observed, in an aside to Beauclerc, that she
quite agreed with him, that "In friendship it was good not to have to do
with fools."

He smiled.

"It is always permitted," continued Cecilia, "to woman to use her
intellects so far as to comprehend what man says; her knowledge, of
whatever sort, never comes amiss when it serves only to illustrate what
is said by one of the lords of the creation. Let us note this, my dear
Ellen, as a general maxim, for future use, and pray, since you have so
good a memory, remember to tell mamma, who says I never generalise, that
this morning I have actually made and established a philosophical maxim,
one that may be of some use too, which cannot be said of all
reflections, general or particular."

They rode on through a lane bright and fragrant with primroses and
violets; gradually winding, this lane opened at last upon the beautiful
banks of the Thames, whose "silver bosom" appeared at once before them
in the bright sunshine, silent, flowing on, seeming, as Beauclerc said,
as if it would for ever flow on unaltered in full, broad, placid
dignity. "Here," he exclaimed, as they paused to contemplate the view,
"the throng of commerce, the ponderous barge, the black steam-boat, the
hum and din of business, never have violated the mighty current. No
lofty bridge insultingly over-arches it, no stone-built wharf confines
it; nothing but its own banks, coeval with itself and like itself,
uncontaminated by the petty uses of mankind!--they spread into large
parks, or are hung with thick woods, as nature wills. No citizen's box,
no chimera villa destroys the idea of repose; but nature, uninterrupted,
carries on her own operations in field, and flood, and tree."

The general, less poetically inclined, would name to Helen all the fine
places within view--"Residences," as he practically remarked, "such as
cannot be seen in any country in the world but England; and not only
fine places such as these, but from the cottage to the palace--'the
homes of Old England' are the best homes upon earth."

"The most candid and sensible of all modern French travellers," said
Beauclerc, "was particularly struck with the superiority of our English
country residences, and the comfort of our homes."

"You mean M. de Stael?" said the general; "true English sense in that
book, I allow."

When the general and Beauclerc did agree in opinion about a book, which
was not a circumstance of frequent occurrence, they were mutually
delighted; one always feeling the value of the other's practical sense,
and the other then acknowledging that literature is good for something.
Beauclerc in the fulness of his heart, and abundance of his words, began
to expatiate on M. de Stael's merits, in having better than any
foreigner understood the actual workings and balances of the British
constitution, that constitution so much talked of abroad, and so little
understood.

"So little understood any where," said the general.

Reasonably as Beauclerc now spoke, Helen formed a new idea of his
capacity, and began to think more respectfully even of his common sense,
than when she had heard him in the Beltravers cause. He spoke of the
causes of England's prosperity, the means by which she maintains her
superiority among nations--her equal laws and their just administration.
He observed, that the hope which every man born in England, even in the
lowest station, may have of rising by his own merits to the highest
eminence, forms the great spring of industry and talent. He agreed with
the intelligent foreigner's observation, that the aristocracy of talent
is superior in England to the aristocracy of birth.

The general seemed to demur at the word superior, drew himself up, but
said nothing in contradiction.

"Industry, and wealth, and education, and fashion, all emulous, act in
England beneficially on each other," continued Beauclerc.

The general sat at ease again.

"And above all," pursued Beauclerc,--"above all, education and the
diffusion of knowledge----"

"Knowledge--yes, but take care of what kind," said his guardian. "All
kinds are good," said Beauclerc.

"No, only such as are safe," said the general. The march of intellect
was not a favourite march with him, unless the step were perfectly kept,
and all in good time.

But now, on passing a projecting bend in the wood, they came within
sight of a place in melancholy contrast to all they had just admired. A
park of considerable extent, absolutely bereft of trees, except a few
ragged firs on each side of a large dilapidated mansion, on the summit
of a bleak hill: it seemed as if a great wood had once been there.

"Old Forest!" exclaimed the general; "Old Forest, now no more! Many a
happy hour, when I was a boy, have I spent shooting in those woods," and
he pointed to where innumerable stumps of trees, far as the eye could
reach, marked where the forest had once stood: some of the white circles
on the ground showed the magnificent size of those newly felled.
Beauclerc was quite silent.

The general led the way on to the great gate of entrance: the porter's
lodge was in ruins.

A huge rusty padlock hung upon one of the gates, which had been dragged
half open, but, the hinge having sunk, there it stuck--the gate could
not be opened further. The other could not be stirred without imminent
hazard of bringing down the pier on which it hung, and which was so
crazy, the groom said, "he was afraid, if he shook it never so little,
all would come down together."

"Let it alone," said the general, in the tone of one resolved to be
patient; "there is room enough for us to get in one by one--Miss
Stanley, do not be in a hurry, if you please; follow me quietly."

In they filed. The avenue, overgrown with grass, would have been
difficult to find, but for deep old cart-ruts which still marked the
way. But soon, fallen trees, and lopped branches, dragged many a rood
and then left there, made it difficult to pass. And there lay exposed
the white bodies of many a noble tree, some wholly, some half, stripped
of their bark, some green in decay, left to the weather--and every here
and there little smoking pyramids of burning charcoal.

As they approached the house--"How changed," said the general, "from
that once cheerful hospitable mansion!"--It was a melancholy example of
a deserted home: the plaster dropping off, the cut stone green, the
windows broken, the shutters half shut, the way to the hall-door steps
blocked up. They were forced to go round through the yards. Coach-houses
and stables, grand ranges, now all dilapidated. Only one yelping cur in
the great kennel. The back-door being ajar, the general pushed it open,
and they went in, and on to the great kitchen, where they found in the
midst of wood smoke one little old woman, whom they nearly scared out of
her remaining senses. She stood and stared. Beauclerc stepped towards
her to explain; but she was deaf: he raised his voice--in vain. She was
made to comprehend by the general, whose voice, known in former times,
reached her heart--"that they only came to see the place."

"See the place! ah! a sad sight to see." Her eyes reverted to Beauclerc,
and, conceiving that he was the young lord himself, she waxed pale, and
her head shook fearfully; but, when relieved from this mistake, she went
forward to show them over the house.

As they proceeded up the great staircase, she confided to her friend,
the general, that she was glad it was not the young lord, for she was
told he was a fiery man, and she dreaded his coming unawares.

Lady Cecilia asked if she did not know him?

No, she had never seen him since he was a little fellow: "he has been
always roaming about, like the rest, in foreign parts, and has never set
foot in the place since he came to man's estate."

As the general passed a window on the landing-place, he looked out.--
"You are missing the great elm, Sir. Ah! I remember you here, a boy; you
was always good. It was the young lord ordered specially the cutting of
that, which I could not stomach; the last of the real old trees! Well,
well! I'm old and foolish--I'm old and foolish, and I should not talk."

But still she talked on, and as this seemed her only comfort, they would
not check her garrulity. In the hope that they were come to take the
house, she now bustled as well as she could, to show all to the best
advantage, but bad was the best now, as she sorrowfully said. She was
very unwilling that the gentlemen should go up to inspect the roof. They
went, however; and the general saw and estimated, and Beauclerc saw and
hoped.

The general, recollecting the geography of the house, observed that she
had not shown them what used to be the picture-gallery, which looked out
on the terrace; he desired to see it. She reluctantly obeyed; and, after
trying sundry impossible keys, repeating all the while that her heart
was broke, that she wished it had pleased God never to give her a heart,
unlock the door she could not in her trepidation. Beauclerc gently took
the keys from her, and looked so compassionately upon her, that she God-
blessed him, and thought it a pity her young lord was not like him; and
while he dealt with the lock, Lady Cecilia, saying they would trouble
her no further, slipped into her hand what she thought would be some
comfort. The poor old creature thanked her ladyship, but said gold could
be of no use to her now in life; she should soon let the parish bury
her, and be no cost to the young lord. She could forgive many things,
she said, but she could never forgive him for parting with the old
pictures. She turned away as the gallery-door opened.

One only old daub of a grandmother was there; all the rest had been
sold, and their vacant places remained discoloured on the walls. There
were two or three dismembered old chairs, the richly dight windows
broken, the floor rat-eaten. The general stood and looked, and did not
sigh, but absolutely groaned. They went to the shattered glass door,
which looked out upon the terrace--that terrace which had cost thousands
of pounds to raise, and he called Cecilia to show her the place where
the youngsters used to play, and to point out some of his favourite
haunts.

"It is most melancholy to see a family-place so gone to ruin," said
Beauclerc; "if it strikes us so much, what must it be to the son of this
family, to come back to the house of his ancestors, and find it thus
desolate! Poor Beltravers!"

The expression of the general's eye changed.

"I am sure you must pity him, my dear general," continued Beauclerc.

"I might, had he done any thing to prevent, or had he done less to
hasten, this ruin."

"How? he should not have cut down the trees, do you mean?--but it was to
pay his father's debts----" "And his own," said the general.

"He told me his father's, sir."

"And I tell you his own."

"Even so," said Beauclerc, "debts are not crimes for which we ought to
shut the gates of mercy on our fellow-creatures--and so young a man as
Beltravers, left to himself, without a home, his family abroad, no
parent, no friend--no guardian friend."

"But what is it you would do, Beauclerc?" said the general.

"What you must wish to be done," said Beauclerc. "Repair this ruin,
restore this once hospitable mansion, and put it in the power of the son
to be what his ancestors have been."

"But how--my dear Beauclerc? Tell me plainly--how?"

"Plainly, I would lend him money enough to make this house fit to live
in."

"And he would never repay you, and would never live in it."

"He would, sir--he promised me he would."

"Promised you!"

"And I promised him that I would lend him the money."

"Promised! Beauclerc? Without your guardian's knowledge? Pray, how much--"

"Confound me, if I remember the words. The sense was, what would do the
business; what would make the house fit for him and his sisters to live
in."

"Ten thousand!--fifteen thousand would not do."

"Well, sir. You know what will be necessary better than I do. A few
thousands more or less, what signifies, provided a friend be well
served. The superfluous money accumulated during my long minority cannot
be better employed."

"All that I have been saving for you with such care from the time your
father died!"

"My dear guardian, my dear friend, do not think me ungrateful; but the
fact is,--in short, my happiness does not depend, never can depend, upon
money; as my friend, therefore, I beseech you to consider my moneyed
interest less, and my happiness more."

"Beauclerc, you do not know what your happiness is. One hour you tell me
it is one thing, the next another. What is become of the plan for the
new house you wanted to build for yourself? I must have common sense for
you, Beauclerc, as you have none for yourself. I shall not give you this
money for Lord Beltravers."

"You forget sir, that I told you I had promised."

"You forget, Beauclerc, that I told you that such a promise, vague and
absurd in itself, made without your guardian's concurrence or consent,
is absolutely null and void."

"Null and void in law, perhaps it may be," cried Beauclerc; "but for
that very reason, in honour, the stronger the more binding, and I am
speaking to a man of honour."

"To one who can take care of his own honour," said the general.

"And of mine, I trust."

"You do well to trust it, as your father did, to me: it shall not he
implicated--"

"When once I am of age," interrupted Beauclerc.

"You will do as you please," said the general. "In the mean time I shall
do my duty."

"But, sir, I only ask you to let me _lend_ this money."

"Lend--nonsense! lend to a man who cannot give any security."

"Security!" said Beauclerc, with a look of unutterable contempt. "When a
friend is in distress, to talk to him like an attorney, of security! Do,
pray, sir, spare me that. I would rather give the money at once."

"I make no doubt of it; then at once I say No, sir."

"No, sir! and why do you say no?"

"Because I think it my duty, and nothing I have heard has at all shaken
my opinion."

"Opinion! and so I am to be put down by opinion, without any reason!"
cried Beauclerc. Then trying to command his temper, "But tell me, my
dear general, why I cannot have this cursed money?"

"Because, my dear Beauclerc, I am your guardian, and can say _no_, and
can adhere to a refusal as firmly as any man living, when it is
necessary."

"Yes, and when it is unnecessary. General Clarendon, according to your
own estimate, fifteen thousand pounds is the utmost sum requisite to put
this house in a habitable state--by that sum I abide!" "Abide!"

"Yes, I require it, to keep my promise to Beltraver's, and have it I
MUST."

"Not from me."

"From some one else then, for have it I WILL.

"Dearest Clarendon," whispered Lady Cecilia, "let him have it, since he
has promised----"

Without seeming to hear her whisper, without a muscle of his countenance
altering, General Clarendon repeated, "Not from me."

"From some one else then--I can."

"Not while I have power to prevent."

"Power! power! power! Yes, that is what you love, above all things and
all persons, and I tell you plainly, General Clarendon," pursued
Beauclerc, too angry to heed or see Lady Cecilia's remonstrating looks,
"at once I tell you that you have not the power. You had it. It is past
and gone. The power of affection you had, if not of reason; but force,
General Clarendon, despotism, can never govern me. I submit to no man's
mere will, much less to any man's sheer obstinacy."

At the word obstinacy, the general's face, which was before rigid, grew
hard as iron. Beauclerc walked up and down the room with great strides,
and as he strode he went on talking to himself.

"To be kept from the use of my own money, treated like a child--an
idiot--at my time of life! Not considered at years of discretion, when
other men of the meanest capacity, by the law of the land, can do what
they please with their own property! By heavens!--that will of my
father's----"

"Should be respected, my dear Granville, since it was your father's
will," said Lady Cecilia, joining him as he walked. "And respect----" He
stopped short.

"My dear Lady Cecilia, for your sake----" he tried to restrain himself.

"Till this moment never did I say one disrespectful word to General
Clarendon. I always considered him as the representative of my father;
and when most galled I have borne the chains in which it was my father's
pleasure to leave me. Few men of my age would have so submitted to a
guardian not many years older than himself." "Yes, and indeed that
should be considered," said Lady Cecilia, turning to the general.

"I have always considered General Clarendon more as my friend than my
guardian."

"And have found him so, I had hoped," said the general, relaxing in tone
hut not in looks.

"I have never treated you, sir, as some wards treat their guardians. I
have dealt openly, as man of honour to man of honour, gentleman to
gentleman, friend to friend."

"Acknowledged, and felt by me, Beauclerc."

"Then now, my dear Clarendon, grant the only request of any consequence
I ever made you--say yes." Beauclerc trembled with impatience.

"No," said the general, "I have said it--No."

The gallery rung with the sound.

"No!" repeated Beauclerc.

Each walked separately up and down the room, speaking without listening
to what the other said. Helen heard an offer from Beauclerc, to which
she extremely wished that the general had listened. But he was deaf with
determination not to yield to any thing Beauclerc could say further: the
noise of passion in their ears was too great for either of them to hear
the other.

Suddenly turning, Beauclerc exclaimed,--

"Borne with me, do you say? 'Tis I that have to bear--and by heavens!"
cried he, "more than I can--than I will--bear. Before to-morrow's sun
goes down I will have the money."

"From whom?"

"From any money-lending Jew--usurer--extortioner--cheat--rascal--
whatever he be. You drive me to it--you--you my friend--you, with whom I
have dealt so openly; and to the last it shall be open. To no vile
indirections will I stoop. I tell you, my guardian, that if you deny me
my own, I will have what I want from the Jews."

"Easily," said his guardian. "But first, recollect that a clause in your
father's will, in such case, sends his estates to your cousin Venables."

"To my cousin Venables let them go--all--all; if such be your pleasure,
sir, be it so. The lowest man on earth that has feeling keeps his
promise. The slave has a right to his word! Ruin me if you will, and as
soon as you please; disgrace me you cannot; bend my spirit you cannot;
ruin in any shape I will meet, rather than submit to such a guardian,
such a----"

Tyrant he was on the point of saying, but Lady Cecilia stopped that word
by suddenly seizing upon his arm: forcibly she carried him off, saying
"Come out with me on the terrace, Granville, and recover your senses."

"My senses! I have never lost them; never was cooler in my life," said
he, kicking open the glass door upon its first resistance, and
shattering its remaining panes to fragments. Unnoticing, not hearing the
crash, the general stood leaning his elbow on the mantel-piece, and
covering his eyes with his hand. Helen remained near him, scarce
breathing loud enough to be heard; he did not know she was there, and he
repeated aloud, in an accent of deep feeling, "Tyrant! from Beauclerc!"

A sigh from Helen made him aware of her presence, and, as he removed his
hand from his eyes, she saw his look was more in sorrow than in anger:
she said softly, "Mr. Beauclerc was wrong, very wrong, but he was in a
passion, he did not know what he meant."

There was silence for a few moments. "You are right, I believe," said
the general, "it was heat of anger----"

"To which the best are subject," said Helen, "and the best and kindest
most easily forgive."

"But Beauclerc said some things which were----"

"Unpardonable--only forget them; let all be forgotten."

"Yes," said the general, "all but my determination; that, observe, is
fixed. My mind, Miss Stanley, is made up, and, once made up, it is not
to be changed."

"I am certain of that," said Helen, "but I am not clear that your mind
is made up."

The general looked at her with astonishment.

"Your refusal is not irrevocable."

"You do not know me, Miss Stanley."

"I think I do."

"Better than I know myself."

"Yes, better, if you do yourself the injustice to think that you would
not yield, if it were right to do so. At this very instant," pursued
Helen, disregarding his increasing astonishment, "you would yield if
you could reasonably, honourably--would not you? If you could without
injury to your ward's fortune or character, would you not? Surely it is
for his good only that you are so resolute?"

"Certainly!" He waited with eyes fixed, bending forward, but with
intensity of purpose in his calmness of attention.

"There was something which I heard Mr. Beauclerc say, which, I think,
escaped your attention," said Helen. "When you spoke of the new house he
intended to build for himself, which was to cost so much, he offered to
give that up."

"I never heard that offer."

"I heard him," said Helen, "I assure you: it was when you were both
walking up and down the room."

"This may be so, I was angry _then_," said the general.

"But you are not angry now," said Helen.

He smiled, and in truth he desired nothing more than an honourable
loophole--a safe way of coming off without injury to his ward--without
hurting his own pride, or derogating from the dignity of guardian. Helen
saw this, and, thanking him for his condescension, his kindness, in
listening to her, she hastened as quickly as possible, lest the
relenting moment might not be seized; and running out on the terrace,
she saw Beauclerc, his head down upon his arms, leaning upon an old
broken stone lion, and Lady Cecilia standing beside him, commiserating;
and as she approached, she beard her persuading him to go to the
general, and speak to him again, and say _so_--only say so.

Whatever it was, Helen did not stay to inquire, but told Cecilia, in as
few words as she could, all that she had to say; and ended with "Was I
right?"

"Quite right, was not she, Granville?"

Beauclerc looked up--a gleam of hope and joy came across his face, and,
with one grateful look to Helen, he darted forward. They followed, but
could not keep pace with him; and when they reached the gallery, they
found him appealing, as to a father, for pardon.

"Can you forgive, and will you?"

"Forgive my not hearing you, not listening to you, as your father would?
My dear Beauclerc, you were too hot, and I was too cold; and there is an
end of it." This reconciliation was as quick, as war, as the quarrel had
been. And then explanations were made, as satisfactorily as they are
when the parties are of good understanding, and depend on each other's
truth, past, present, and future.

Beauclerc, whose promise all relied on, and for reasons good, none more
implicitly than the general, promised that he would ask for no more than
just what would do to put this Old Forest house in habitable trim; he
said he would give up the new house for himself, till as many thousands
as he now lent, spent, or wasted--take which word you will--should be
again accumulated from his income. It was merely a sacrifice of his own
vanity, and perhaps a little of his own comfort, he said, to save a
friend, a human being, from destruction.

"Well, well, let it rest so."

It was all settled, witness present--"two angels to witness," as
Beauclerc quoted from some old play.

And now in high good-humour, up again to nonsense pitch, they all felt
that delightful relief of spirits, of which friends, after perilous
quarrel, are sensible in perfect reconciliation. They left this
melancholy mansion now, with Beauclerc the happiest of the happy, in the
generous hope that he should be the restorer of its ancient glories and
comfort. The poor old woman was not forgotten as they passed, she
courtesying, hoping, and fearing: Lady Cecilia whispered, and the deaf
ear heard.

"The roof will not fall--all will be well: and there is the man that
will do it all."

"Well, well, my heart inclined to him from the first--at least from the
minute I knew him not to be my young lord."

They were to go home by water. The boat was in readiness, and, as
Beauclerc carefully handed Helen into it, the general said:--"Yes, you
are right to take care of Miss Stanley, Beauclerc; she is a good friend
in need, at least, as I have found this morning," added he, as he seated
himself beside her.

Lady Cecilia was charming, and every thing was delightful, especially
the cold chicken.




CHAPTER XI.


No two people could be more unlike in their habits of mind than this
guardian and ward. General Clarendon referred in all cases to old
experience, and dreaded innovation; Beauclerc took for his motto, "My
mind leadeth me to new things." General Clarendon was what is commonly
called a practical man; Granville Beauclerc was the flower of theorists.
The general, fit for action, prompt and decided in all his judgments,
was usually right and just in his conclusions--but if wrong, there was
no setting him right; for he not only would not, but could not go back
over the ground--he could not give in words any explanation of his
process of reasoning--it was enough for him that it was right, and that
it was _his_; while Beauclerc, who cared not for any man's opinion, was
always so ingeniously wrong, and could show all the steps of his
reasoning so plausibly, that it was a pity he should be quite out of the
right road at last. The general hated metaphysics, because he considered
them as taking a flight beyond the reach of discipline, as well as of
common sense: he continually asked, of what use are they?--While Lady
Davenant answered,--

"To invigorate and embellish the understanding. 'This turning the soul
inward on itself concentrates its forces, and fits it for the strongest
and boldest flights; and in such pursuits, whether we take or whether we
lose the game, the chase is certainly of service.'"

Possibly, the general said; he would not dispute the point with Lady
Davenant, but a losing chase, however invigorating, was one in which he
never wished to engage: as to the rest, he altogether hated discussions,
doubts, and questionings. He had "made up his fagot of opinions," and
would not let one be drawn out for examination, lest he should loosen
the bundle.

Beauclerc, on the contrary, had his dragged out and scattered about
every day, and each particular stick was tried, and bent, and twisted,
this way and that, and peeled, and cut, and hacked; and unless they
proved sound to the very core, not a twig of them should ever go back
into his bundle, which was to be the bundle of bundles, the best that
ever was seen, when once tied so that it would hold together--of which
there seemed little likelihood, as every knot slipped, and all fell to
pieces at each pull.

While he was engaged in this analysis, he was, as his guardian thought,
in great moral peril, for not a principle had he left to bless himself
with; and, in any emergency, if any temptation should occur, what was to
become of him? The general, who was very fond of him, but also strongly
attached to his own undeviating rule of right, was upon one occasion
about peremptorily to interpose, not only with remonstrances as a
friend, but with authority as a guardian.

This occurred when Beauclerc was with them at Florence, and when the
general's love for Lady Cecilia, and intimacy with her mother,
commenced. Lady Davenant being much interested for young Beauclerc,
begged that the patient might be left to her, and that his guardian
would refrain from interference. This was agreed to the more readily by
the general, as his thoughts and feelings were then more agreeably
engrossed, and Beauclerc found in Lady Davenant the very friend he
wanted and wished for most ardently--one whose mind would not blench at
any moral danger, would never shrink from truth in any shape, but, calm
and self-possessed, would examine whether it were indeed truth, or only
a phantom assuming her form. Besides, there was in Lady Davenant towards
Beauclerc a sort of maternal solicitude and kindness, of which the
effect was heightened by her dignified manner and pride of character.
She, in the first place, listened to him patiently; she, who could talk,
would listen: this was, as she said, her first merit in his estimation.
To her he poured forth all those doubts, of which she was wise enough
not to make crimes: she was sure of his honourable intentions, certain
that there was no underhand motive, no bad passion, no concealed vice,
or disposition to vice, beneath his boasted freedom from prejudice, to
be justified or to be indulged by getting rid of the restraints of
principle. Had there been any danger of this sort, which with young men
who profess themselves _ultra-liberal_ is usually the case, she would
have joined in his guardian's apprehensions; but in fact Beauclerc,
instead of being "le philosophe sans le savoir," was "le bon enfant sans
le savoir;" for, while he questioned the rule of right in all his
principles, and while they were held in abeyance, his good habits, and
good natural disposition held fast and stood him in stead; while Lady
Davenant, by slow degrees, brought him to define his terms, and
presently to see that he had been merely saying old things in new words,
and that the systems which had dazzled him as novelties were old to
older eyes; in short, that he was merely a resurrectionist of obsolete
heresies, which had been gone over and over again at various long-past
periods, and over and over again abandoned by the common sense of
mankind: so that, after puzzling and wandering a weary way in the dark
labyrinth he had most ingeniously made for himself, he saw light,
followed it, and at length, making his way out, was surprised, and sorry
perhaps to perceive that it was the common light of day.

It is of great consequence to young enthusiastic tyros, like Beauclerc,
to have safe friends to whom they can talk of their opinions privately,
otherwise they will talk their ingenious nonsense publicly, and so they
bind themselves, or are bound, to the stake, and live or die martyrs to
their own follies.

From these and all such dangers Lady Davenant protected him, and she
took care that nobody hurt him in his defenceless state, before his
shell was well formed and hardened. She was further of peculiar service
in keeping all safe and smooth between the ward and guardian. All
Beauclerc's romance the general would have called by the German word
"_Schwaermerey_,"--not fudge--not humbug--literally "sky-rocketing"--
visionary enthusiasm; and when it came to arguments, they might have
turned to quarrels, but for Lady Davenant's superior influence, while
Lady Cecilia's gentleness and gaiety usually succeeded in putting all
serious dangerous thoughts to flight.

Nature never having intended Lady Cecilia for a manoeuvrer, she was now
perpetually on the point of betraying herself; and one day, when she was
alone with Helen, she exclaimed, "Never was any thing better managed
than I managed this, my dear Helen! I am so glad I told you----"
Recollecting herself just in time, she ended with, "so glad I told you
the truth."

"Oh yes! thank you," said Helen. "My uncle used to say no one could be a
good friend who does not tell the whole truth." "That I deny," thought
Cecilia. The twinge of conscience was felt but very slightly; not
visible in any change of countenance, except by a quick twinkling motion
of the eyelashes, not noticed by unsuspicious Helen.

Every thing now went on as happily as Cecilia could have desired; every
morning they rode or booted to Old Forest to see what was doing. The
roof was rather hastily taken off; Lady Cecilia hurried forward that
measure, aware that it would prevent the possibility of any of the
ladies of the family coming there for some time. Delay was all she
wanted, and she would now, as she promised herself, leave the rest to
time. She would never interfere further in word or look, especially when
her mother might be by. One half of this promise she kept faithfully,
the other she broke continually.

There were plans to be made of all the alterations and improvements at
Old Forest. Beauclerc applied to Lady Cecilia for her advice and
assistance. Her advice she gave, but her assistance she ingeniously
contrived to leave to Helen; for whenever Beauclerc brought to her a
sketch or a plan of what was to be done, Lady Cecilia immediately gave
it to Helen, repeating, "Never drew a regular plan in my life, you know,
my dear, you must do this;" so that Helen's pencil and her patience were
in constant requisition. Then came apologies from Beauclerc, and regrets
at taking up her time, all which led to an intimacy that Lady Cecilia
took care to keep up by frequent visits to Old Forest, so that Helen was
necessarily joined in all his present pursuits.

During one of these visits, they were looking over some old furniture
which Lord Beltravers had commissioned Beauclerc to have disposed of at
some neighbouring auction. There was one curiously carved oak arm-chair,
belonging to "the old old gentleman of all" which the old woman
particularly regretted should go. She had sewn it up in a carpet, and
when it came out, Helen was struck with its likeness to a favourite
chair of her uncle's; many painful recollections occurred to her, and
tears came into her eyes. Ashamed of what appeared so like affectation,
she turned away, that her tears might not be seen, and when Cecilia,
following her, insisted on knowing what was the matter, she left Helen
immediately to the old woman, and took the opportunity of telling
Beauclerc all about Dean Stanley, and how Helen was an heiress and no
heiress, and her having determined to give up all her fortune to pay her
uncle's debts. There was a guardian, too, in the case, who would not
consent; and, in short, a parallelism of circumstances, a similarity of
generous temper, and all this she thought must interest Beauclerc--and
so it did. But yet its being told to him would have gone against his
nice notions of delicacy, and Helen would have been ruined in his
opinion had he conceived that it had been revealed to him with her
consent or connivance. She came back before Lady Cecilia had quite
finished, and a few words which she heard, made her aware of the whole.
The blush of astonishment--the glance of indignation--which she gave at
Lady Cecilia, settled Beauclerc's opinion; and Cecilia was satisfied
that she had done her friend good service against her will; and as to
the means thought she--what signifies going back to consider when they
succeed.

The Collingwoods gladly availed themselves of Lady Cecilia Clarendon's
kind invitation, as they were both most anxious to take leave of Helen
Stanley before their departure. They were to sail very soon, so that
their visit was but short; a few days of painful pleasure to Helen--a
happy meeting, but enjoyed with the mournful sense that they were so
soon to separate, and for so long a time; perhaps, for ever.

Mr. Collingwood told Helen that if she still agreed to his conditions,
he would arrange with Mr. James, the solicitor, that all the money left
to her by her uncle should be appropriated to the payment of his debts.
"But," continued he, "pause and consider well, whether you can do
without this money, which is still yours; you are, you know, not bound
by any promise, and it is not yet too late to say you have altered your
decision."

Helen smiled and said, "You cannot be serious in saying this, I am
sure?"

Mr. Collingwood assured her that he was. Helen simply said that her
determination was unalterable. He looked pleased yet his last words in
taking leave of her were, "Remember, my dear, that when you have given
away your fortune, you cannot live as if you had it."

The Collingwoods departed; and, after a decent time had elapsed, or what
she deemed a decent time, Lady Cecilia was anxious to ascertain what
progress had been made; how relatively to each other, Lady Blanche
Forrester and Helen stood in Beauclerc's opinion, or rather in his
imagination. But this was not quite so easy a matter to determine as she
had conceived it would be, judging from the frankness of Beauclerc's
temper, and from the terms of familiarity on which they had lived while
abroad. His confidence was not to be won, surprised, or forced. He was
not only jealous of his free will, as most human beings are in love
affairs, but, like all men of true feeling, he desired in these matters
perfect mental privacy.

When Pysche is awakened, it should be by Cupid alone. Beauclerc did not
yet wish that she should be awakened. He admired, he enjoyed that
repose; he was charmed by the perfect confiding simplicity of Helen's
mind, so unlike what he had seen in others--so real. The hope of that
pure friendship which dawned upon him he wished to prolong, and dreaded
lest, by any doubt raised, all might be clouded and changed. Lady
Cecilia was, however, convinced that, without knowing it, he was falling
comfortably in love through friendship; a very easy convenient way.

And Helen, had she too set out upon that easy convenient road of
friendship? She did not think about the road, but she felt that it was
very agreeable, and thought it was quite safe, as she went on so
smoothly and easily. She could not consider Mr. Beauclerc as a new
acquaintance, because she had heard so much about him. He was completely
one of the family, so that she, as part of that family, could not treat
him as a stranger. Her happiness, she was sensible, had much increased
since his arrival; but so had everybody's. He gave a new spring, a new
interest, to everything; added so much to the life of life; his sense
and his nonsense were each of them good in their kind; and they were of
various kinds, from the high sublime of metaphysics to the droll
realities of life. But everybody blaming, praising, scolding, laughing
_at_, or _with_ him, he was necessary to all and with all, for some
reason or other, a favourite.

But the general was always as impatient as Lady Cecilia herself both of
his hypercriticism and of his never-ending fancies, each of which
Beauclerc purused with an eagerness and abandoned with a facility which
sorely tried the general's equanimity. One day, after having ridden to
Old Forest, General Clarendon returned chafed. He entered the library,
talking to Cecilia, as Helen thought, about his horse.

"No managing him! Curb him ever so little, and he is on his hind-legs
directly. Give him his head, put the bridle on his neck, and he stands
still; does not know which way he would go, or what he would do. The
strangest fellow for a rational creature."

Now it was clear it was of Beauclerc that he spoke. "So rash and yet so
resolute," continued the general.

"How is that?" said Lady Davenant.

"I do not know how, but so it is," said the general. "As you know,"
appealing to Helen and to Lady Cecilia, "he was ready to run me through
till he had his own way about that confounded old house; and now there
are all the workmen at a stand, because Mr. Beauclerc cannot decide what
he will have done or undone."

"Oh, it is my fault!" cried Helen, with the guilty recollection of the
last alteration not having been made yesterday in drawing the working
plan, and she hastened to look for it directly; but when she found it,
she saw to her dismay that Beauclerc had scribbled it all over with
literary notes; it was in no state to meet the general's eye; she set
about copying it as fast as possible.

"Yes," pursued the general; "forty alterations--shuffling about
continually. Cannot a man be decided?"

"Always with poor Beauclerc," said Lady Cecilia, "le mieux est l'ennemi
du bien."

"No, my dear Cecilia, it is all his indolence; there he sat with a book
in his hand all yesterday! with all his impetuosity, too indolent to
stir in his own business," said the general.

"His mind is too active sometimes to allow his body to stir," said Lady
Davenant; "and because he cannot move the universe, he will not stir his
little finger."

"He is very fond of paradoxes, and your ladyship is very fond of him,"
said the general; "but indolent he is; and as to activity of mind, it is
only in pursuit of his own fancies."

"And your fancies and his differ," said Lady Davenant.

"Because he never fancies any thing useful," said the general. "C'est
selon! c'est selon!" cried Lady Cecilia gaily; "he thinks his fancies
useful, and especially all he is doing at Old Forest; but I confess he
tends most to the agreeable. Certainly he is a most agreeable creature."

"Agreeable! satisfied to be called an agreeable man!" cried the general
indignantly; "yes, he has no ambition."

"There I differ from you, general," said Lady Davenant; "he has too
much: have patience with him; he is long-sighted in his visions of
glory."

"Visions indeed!" said the general.

"Those who are really ambitious," continued Lady Davenant, "must think
before they act. 'What shall I do to be for ever known?' is a question
which deserves at least a little more thought than those which most
young men ask themselves, which commonly are, 'What shall I do to be
known to-morrow--on the Turf or at Brook's--or in Doctors' Commons--or
at some exclusive party at charming Lady Nobody's?'"

"What will you do for the plan for these workmen in the mean time, my
dear Clarendon?" said Lady Cecilia, afraid that some long discussion
would ensue.

"Here it is!" said Helen, who had managed to get it ready while they
were talking. She gave it to the general, who thanked her, and was off
directly. Cecilia then came to divert herself with looking at
Beauclerc's scribbled plan, and she read the notes aloud for her
mother's amusement. It was a sketch of a dramatical, metaphysical,
entertainment, of which half a dozen proposed titles had been scratched
out, and there was finally left 'Tarquin the Optimist, or the Temple of
Destiny.' It was from an old story begun by Laurentius Valla, and
continued by Leibnitz;--she read,

_"Act I. Scene 1. Sextus Tarquin goes to consult the Oracle, who
foretells the crime he is to commit.'_

"And then," cried Lady Cecilia, "come measures of old and new front of
Old Forest house, wings included."--Now he goes on with his play.

_"'Tarquin's complaint to Jupiter of the Oracle--Modern Predestination
compared to Ancient Destiny.'_

"And here," continued Cecilia, "come prices of Norway deal and a great
blot, and then we have _'Jupiter's answer that Sextus may avoid his doom
if he pleases, by staying away from Rome; but he does not please to do
so, because he must then_ _renounce the crown. Good speech here on
vanity, and inconsistency of human wishes.'_

"'Kitchen 23 ft. by 21. Query with hobs?'

"I cannot conceive, my dear Helen," continued Lady Cecilia, "how you
could make the drawing out through all this," and she continued to read.

_"'Scene 3rd._

_"'High Priest of Delphi asks Jupiter why he did not give Sextus a
better WILL?--why not MAKE him choose to give up the crown, rather than
commit the crime? Jupiter refuses to answer, and sends the High Priest
to consult Minerva at Athens.'_

"'N.B. Old woman at Old Forest, promised her an oven,'--'_Leibnitz
gives_----'

"Oh! if he goes to Leibnitz," said Lady Cecilia, "he will be too grand
for me, but it will do for you, mamma.

_"'Leibnitz gives in his Temple of the Destinies a representation of
every possible universe from the worst to the best--This could not be
done on the stage.'_

"Very true indeed," said Lady Cecilia; 'but, Helen, listen, Granville
has really found an ingenious resource.

_"'By Ombres Chinoises, suppose; or a gauze curtain, as in Zemire et
Azore, the audience might be made to understand the main point, that
GOOD resulted from Tarquin's BAD choice. Brutus, Liberty, Rome's
grandeur, and the Optimist right at last. Q.E.D.'_

"Well, well," continued Lady Cecilia, "I don't understand it; but I
understand this,--'Bricks wanting.'"

Lady Davenant smiled at this curious specimen of Beauclerc's
versatility, but said, "I fear he will fritter away his powers on a
hundred different petty objects, and do nothing at last worthy of his
abilities. He will scatter and divide the light of his genius, and show
us every change of the prismatic colours--curious and beautiful to
behold, but dispersing, wasting the light he should concentrate on some
one, some noble object."

"But if he has light enough for little objects and great too?" said Lady
Cecilia, "I allow, 'qu'il faudrait plus d'un coeur pour aimer tant de
choses a la fois;' but as I really think Granville has more heart than
is necessary, he can well afford to waste some of it, even on the old
woman at Old Forest."




CHAPTER XII.


One evening, Helen was looking over a beautiful scrap-book of Lady
Cecilia's. Beauclerc, who had stood by for some time, eyeing it in
rather scornful silence, at length asked whether Miss Stanley was a
lover of albums and autographs?

Helen had no album of her own, she said, but she was curious always to
see the autographs of celebrated people.

"Why?" said Beauclerc.

"I don't know. It seems to bring one nearer to them. It gives more
reality to our imagination of them perhaps," said Helen.

"The imagination is probably in most cases better than the reality,"
replied he.

Lady Davenant stooped over Helen's shoulder to look at the handwriting
of the Earl of Essex--the writing of the gallant Earl of Essex, at sight
of which, as she observed, the hearts of queens have beat high. "What a
crowd of associated ideas rise at the sight of that autograph! who can
look at it without some emotion?"

Helen could not. Beauclerc in a tone of raillery said he was sure, from
the eager interest Miss Stanley took in these autographs, that she would
in time become a collector herself; and he did not doubt that he should
see her with a valuable museum, in which should be preserved the old
pens of great men, that of Cardinal Chigi, for instance, who boasted
that he wrote with the same pen for fifty years.

"And by that boast you know," said Lady Davenant, "convinced the
Cardinal de Retz that he was not a great, but a very little man. We will
not have that pen in Helen's museum."

"Why not?" Beauclerc asked, "it was full as well worth having as many of
the relics to be found in most young ladies' and even old gentlemen's
museums. It was quite sufficient whether a man had been great or little
that he had been talked of,--that he had been something of a _lion_--to
make any thing belonging to him valuable to collectors, who preserve and
worship even 'the parings of lions' claws.'"

That class of indiscriminate collectors Helen gave up to his ridicule;
still he was not satisfied. He went on to the whole class of 'lion-
hunters,' as he called them, condemning indiscriminately all those who
were anxious to see celebrated people; he hoped Miss Stanley was not one
of that class.

"No, not a lion-hunter," said Helen; she hoped she never should be one
of that set, but she confessed she had a great desire to see and to know
distinguished persons, and she hoped that this sort of curiosity, or as
she would rather call it enthusiasm, was not ridiculous, and did not
deserve to be confounded with the mere trifling vulgar taste for sight-
seeing and lion-hunting.

Beauclerc half smiled, but, not answering immediately, Lady Davenant
said, that for her part she did not consider such enthusiasm as
ridiculous; on the contrary, she liked it, especially in young people.
"I consider the warm admiration of talent and virtue in youth as a
promise of future excellence in maturer age."

"And yet," said Beauclerc, "the maxim 'not to admire,' is, I believe,
the most approved in philosophy, and in practice is the great secret of
happiness in this world."

"In the _fine_ world, it is a fine air, I know," said Lady Davenant.
"Among a set of fashionable young somnambulists it is doubtless the only
art they know to make men happy or to keep them so; but this has nothing
to do with philosophy, Beauclerc, though it has to do with conceit or
affectation."

Mr. Beauclerc, now piqued, with a look and voice of repressed feeling,
said, that he hoped her ladyship did not include him among that set of
fashionable somnambulists.

"I hope you will not include yourself in it," answered Lady Davenant:
"it is contrary to your nature, and if you join the _nil admirari_
coxcombs, it can be only for fashion's sake--mere affectation."

Beauclerc made no reply, and Lady Davenant, turning to Helen, told her
that several celebrated people were soon to come to Clarendon Park, and
congratulated her upon the pleasure she would have in seeing them.
"Besides being a great pleasure, it is a real advantage," continued she,
"to see and be acquainted early in life with superior people. It enables
one to form a standard of excellence, and raises that standard high and
bright. In men, the enthusiasm becomes glorious ambition to excel in
arts or arms; in women, it refines and elevates the taste, and is so far
a preventive against frivolous, vulgar company, and all their train of
follies and vices. I can speak from my own recollection, of the great
happiness it was to me, when I early in life became acquainted with some
of the illustrious of my day."

"And may I ask," said Beauclerc, "if any of them equalled the
expectations you had formed of them?"

"Some far exceeded them," said Lady Davenant.

"You were fortunate. Every body cannot expect to be so happy," said
Beauclerc. "I believe, in general it is found that few great men of any
times stand the test of near acquaintance. No man----"

"Spare me!" cried Lady Davenant, interrupting him, for she imagined she
knew what he was going to say; "Oh! spare me that old sentence, 'No man
is a hero to his valet de chambre.' I cannot endure to hear that for the
thousandth time; I heartily wish it had never been said at all."

"So do I," replied Beauclerc; but Lady Davenant had turned away, and he
now spoke in so low a voice, that only Helen heard him. "So do I detest
that quotation, not only for being hackneyed, but for having been these
hundred years the comfort both of lean-jawed envy and fat mediocrity."

He took up one of Helen's pencils and began to cut it--he looked vexed,
and low to her observed, "Lady Davenant did not do me the honour to let
me finish my sentence."

"Then," said Helen, "if Lady Davenant misunderstood you, why do not you
explain?"

"No, no it is not worth while, if she could so mistake me."

"But any body may be mistaken; do explain."

"No, no," said he, very diligently cutting the pencil to pieces; "she is
engaged, you see, with somebody--something else."

"But now she has done listening."

"No, no, not now; there are too many people, and it's of no
consequence."

By this time the company were all eagerly talking of every remarkable
person they had seen, or that they regretted not having seen. Lady
Cecilia now called upon each to name the man among the celebrated of
modern days, whom they should most liked to have seen. By acclamation
they all named Sir Walter Scott, 'The Ariosto of the North!'

All but Beauclerc; he did not join the general voice; he said low to
Helen with an air of disgust--"How tired I am of hearing him called 'The
Ariosto of the North!'"

"But by whatever name," said Helen, "surely you join in that general
wish to have seen him?"

"Yes, yes, I am sure of your vote," cried Lady Cecilia, coming up to
them, "You, Granville, would rather have seen Sir Walter Scott than any
author since Shakespeare--would not you?"

"Pardon me, on the contrary, I am glad that I have never seen him."

"Glad not to have seen him!--_not_?"

The word _not_ was repeated with astonished incredulous emphasis by all
voices. "Glad not to have seen Sir Walter Scott! How extraordinary! What
can Mr. Beauclerc mean?"

"To make us all stare," said Lady Davenant, "so do not gratify him. Do
not wonder at him; we cannot believe what is impossible, you know, only
because it is impossible. But," continued she, laughing, "I know how it
is. The spirit of contradiction--the spirit of singularity--two of your
familiars, Granville, have got possession of you again, and we must have
patience while the fit is on."

"But I have not, and will not have patience," said Lord Davenant, whose
good-nature seldom failed, but who was now quite indignant.

"I wonder you are surprised, my dear Lord," said Lady Davenant, "for Mr.
Beauclerc likes so much better to go wrong by himself than to go right
with all the world, that you could not expect that he would join the
loud voice of universal praise."

"I hear the loud voice of universal execration," said Beauclerc; "you
have all abused me, but whom have I abused? What have I said?"

"Nothing." replied Lady Cecilia; "that is what we complain of. I could
have better borne any abuse than indifference to Sir Walter Scott."

"Indifference!" exclaimed Beauclerc--"what did I say Lady Cecilia, from
which you could infer that I felt indifference? Indifferent to him
whose name I cannot pronounce without emotion! I alone, of all the
world, indifferent to that genius, pre-eminent and unrivalled, who has
so long commanded the attention of the whole reading public, arrested at
will the instant order of the day by tales of other times, and in this
commonplace, this every-day existence of ours, created a holiday world,
where, undisturbed by vulgar cares, we may revel in a fancy region of
felicity, peopled with men of other times--shades of the historic dead,
more illustrious and brighter than in life!"

"Yes, the great Enchanter," cried Cecilia.

"Great and good Enchanter," continued Beauclerc, "for in his magic there
is no dealing with unlawful means. To work his ends, there is never aid
from any one of the bad passions of our nature. In his writings there is
no private scandal--no personal satire--no bribe to human frailty--no
libel upon human nature. And among the lonely, the sad, and the
suffering, how has he medicined to repose the disturbed mind, or
elevated the dejected spirit!--perhaps fanned to a flame the unquenched
spark, in souls not wholly lost to virtue. His morality is not in purple
patches, ostentatiously obtrusive, but woven in through the very texture
of the stuff. He paints man as he is, with all his faults, but with his
redeeming virtues--the world as it goes, with all its compensating good
and evil, yet making each man better contented with his lot. Without our
well knowing how, the whole tone of our minds is raised--for, thinking
nobly of our kind, he makes us think more nobly of ourselves!"

Helen, who had sympathised with Beauclerc in every word he had said,
felt how true it is that

"----Next to genius, is the power Of feeling where true genius lies."

"Yet after all this, Granville," said Lady Cecilia, "you would make us
believe you never wished to have seen this great man?"

Beauclerc made no answer.

"Oh! how I wish I had seen him!" said Helen to Lady Davenant, the only
person present who had had that happiness.

"If you have seen Raeburn's admirable pictures, or Chantrey's speaking
bust," replied Lady Davenant, "you have as complete an idea of Sir Walter
Scott as painting or sculpture can give. The first impression of his
appearance and manner was surprising to me, I recollect, from its quiet,
unpretending good nature; but scarcely had that impression been made before
I was struck with something of the chivalrous courtesy of other times. In
his conversation you would have found all that is most delightful in all
his works--the combined talent and knowledge of the historian, novelist,
antiquary, and poet. He recited poetry admirably, his whole face and figure
kindling as he spoke: but whether talking, reading, or reciting, he never
tired me, even with admiring; and it is curious that, in conversing with
him, I frequently found myself forgetting that I was speaking to Sir Walter
Scott; and, what is even more extraordinary, forgetting that Sir Walter
Scott was speaking to me, till I was awakened to the conviction by his
saying something which no one else could have said. Altogether he was
certainly the most perfectly agreeable and perfectly amiable great man I
ever knew."

"And now, mamma," said Lady Cecilia, "do make Granville confess honestly he
would give the world to have seen him."

"Do, Lady Davenant," said Helen, who saw, or thought she saw, a singular
emotion in Beauclerc's countenance, and fancied he was upon the point of
yielding; but Lady Davenant, without looking at him, replied,--"No, my
dear, I will not ask him--I will not encourage him in _affectation_."

At that word dark grew the brow of Beauclerc, and he drew back, as it were,
into his shell, and out of it came no more that night, nor the next morning
at breakfast. But, as far as could be guessed, he suffered internally, and
no effort made to relieve did him any good, so every one seemed to agree
that it was much better to let him alone, or let him be moody in peace,
hoping that in time the mood would change; but it changed not till the
middle of that day, when, as Helen was sitting working in Lady Davenant's
room, while she was writing, two quick knocks were heard at the door.

"Come in!" said Lady Davenant.

Mr. Beauclerc stood pausing on the threshold----

"Do not go, Miss Stanley," said he, looking very miserable and ashamed, and
proud, and then ashamed again.

"What is the matter, Granville?" said Lady Davenant.

"I am come to have a thorn taken out of my mind," said he--"two thorns
which have sunk deep, kept me awake half the night. Perhaps, I ought to
he ashamed to own I have felt pain from such little things. But so it
is; though, after all, I am afraid they will be invisible to you, Lady
Davenant."

"I will try with a magnifying-glass," said she; "lend me that of your
imagination, Granville--a high power, and do not look so very miserable, or
Miss Stanley will laugh at you."

"Miss Stanley is too good to laugh."

"That is being too good indeed," said Lady Davenant. "Well, now to the
point."

"You were very unjust to me, Lady Davenant, yesterday, and unkind."

"Unkind is a woman's word; but go on."

"Surely man may mark 'unkindness' altered eye' as well as woman," said
Beauclerc; "and from a woman and a friend he may and must feel it, or he is
more or less than man."

"Now what can you have to say, Granville, that will not be anticlimax to
this exordium?"

"I will say no more if you talk of exordiums and anti-climaxes," cried
he. "You accused me yesterday of affectation--twice, when I was no more
affected than you are."

"Oh! is that my crime? Is that, what has hurt you so dreadfully? Here is
the thorn that has gone in so deep! I am afraid that, as is usual, the
accusation hurt the more because it was----"

"Do not say 'true,'" interrupted Beauclerc, "for you really cannot believe
it, Lady Davenant. You know me, and all my faults, and I have plenty; but
you need not accuse me of one that I have not, and which from the bottom of
my soul I despise. Whatever are my faults, they are at least real, and my
own."

"You may allow him that," said Helen.

"Well I will--I do," said Lady Davenant; "to appease you, poor injured
innocence; though anyone in the world might think you affected at this
moment. Yet I, who know you, know that it is pure real folly. Yes, yes, I
acquit you of affectation."

Beauclerc's face instantly cleared up.

"But you said two thorns had gone into your mind--one is out, now for the
other."

"I do not feel that other, now," said Beauclerc, "it was only a mistake.
When I began with 'No man,' I was not going to say, 'No man is a hero to
his valet de chambre.' If I had been allowed to finish my sentence, it
would have saved a great deal of trouble, I was going to say that no man
admires excellence more fervently than I do, and that my very reason for
wishing not to see celebrated people is, lest the illusion should be
dispelled.

"No description ever gives us an exact idea of any person, so that when any
one has been much described and talked of, before we see them we form in
our mind's eye some image, some notion of our own, which always proves to
be unlike the reality; and when we do afterwards see it, even if it be
fairer or better than our imagination, still at first there is a sort
of disappointment, from the non-agreement with our previously formed
conception. Every body is disappointed the first time they see Hamlet, or
Falstaff, as I think Dugald Stewart observes."

"True; and I remember," said Lady Davenant, "Madame de la Rochejaquelin
once said to me, 'I hate that people should come to see me. I know it
destroys the illusion.'"

"Yes," cried Beauclerc; "how much I dread to destroy any of those blessed
illusions, which make the real happiness of life. Let me preserve the
objects of my idolatry; I would not approach too near the shrine; I fear
too much light. I would not know that they were false!"

"Would you then be deceived?" said Lady Davenant.

"Yes," cried he; "sooner would I believe in all the fables of the Talmud
than be without the ecstasy of veneration. It is the curse of age to be
thus miserably disenchanted; to outlive all our illusions, all our hopes.
That may be my doom in age, but, in youth, the high spring-time of
existence, I will not be cursed with such a premature ossification of the
heart. Oh! rather, ten thousand times rather, would I die this instant!"

"Well! but there is not the least occasion for your dying," said Lady
Davenant, "and I am seriously surprised that you should suffer so much
from such slight causes; how will you ever get through the world if you
stop thus to weigh every light word?"

"The words of most people," replied he, "pass by me like the idle wind; but
I do weigh every word from the very few whom I esteem, admire, and love;
with my friends, perhaps, I am too susceptible, I love them so deeply."

This is an excuse for susceptibility of temper which flatters friends too
much to be easily rejected. Even Lady Davenant admitted it, and Helen
thought it was all natural.




CHAPTER XIII.


Lady Cecilia was now impatient to have the house filled with company. She
gave Helen a _catalogue raisonne_ of all who were expected at Clarendon
Park, some for a fashionable three days' visit; some for a week; some for a
fortnight or three weeks, be the same more or less. "I have but one fixed
principle," said she, "but I _have_ one,--never to have tiresome people
when it can possibly be avoided. Impossible, you know, it is sometimes.
One's own and one's husband's relations one must have; but, as for the
rest, it's one's own fault if one fails in the first and last maxim of
hospitality--to welcome the coming and speed the parting guest."

The first party who arrived were of Lady Davenant's particular friends, to
whom Cecilia had kindly given the precedence, if not the preference, that
her mother might have the pleasure of seeing them, and that they might have
the honour of taking leave of her, before her departure from England.

They were political, fashionable, and literary; some of ascendency
in society, some of parliamentary promise, and some of ministerial
eminence--the aristocracy of birth and talents well mixed.

The aristocracy of birth and the aristocracy of talents are words now used
more as a commonplace antithesis, than as denoting a real difference or
contrast. In many instances, among those now living, both are united in a
manner happy for themselves and glorious for their country. England may
boast of having among her young nobility

  "The first in birth, the first in fame."

men distinguished in literature and science, in senatorial eloquence and
statesmanlike abilities.

But in this party at Clarendon Park there were more of the literary and
celebrated than without the presence of Lady Davenant could perhaps have
been assembled, or perhaps would have been desired by the general and Lady
Cecilia. Cecilia's beauty and grace were of all societies, and the general
was glad for Lady Davenant's sake and proud for his own part, to receive
these distinguished persons at his house.

Helen had seen some of them before at Cecilhurst and at the Deanery. By her
uncle's friends she was kindly recognised, by others of course politely
noticed; but miserably would she have been disappointed and mortified, if
she had expected to fix general attention, or excite general admiration.
Past and gone for ever are the days, if ever they were, when a young lady,
on her entrance into life, captivated by a glance, overthrew by the first
word, and led in triumph her train of admirers. These things are not to be
done now-a-days.

Yet even when unnoticed Helen was perfectly happy. Her expectations were
more than gratified in seeing and in hearing these distinguished people,
and she sat listening to their conversation in delightful enjoyment,
without even wanting to have it seen how well she understood.

There is a precious moment for young people, if taken at the prime, when
first introduced into society, yet not expected, not called upon to take a
part in it, they, as standers by, may see not only all the play, but the
characters of the players, and may learn more of life and of human nature
in a few months, than afterwards in years, when they are themselves actors
upon the stage of life, and become engrossed by their own parts. There is
a time, before the passions are awakened, when the understanding, with all
the life of nature, fresh from all that education can do to develop and
cultivate, is at once eager to observe and able to judge, for a brief space
blessed with the double advantages of youth and age. This time once gone
is lost irreparably; and how often it is lost--in premature vanity, or
premature dissipation!

Helen had been chiefly educated by a man, and a very sensible man, as Dean
Stanley certainly was in all but money matters. Under his masculine care,
while her mind had been brought forward on some points, it had been kept
back on others, and while her understanding had been cultivated, it had
been done without the aid of emulation or competition; not by touching the
springs of pride, but by opening sources of pure pleasure; and this pure
pleasure she now enjoyed, grateful to that dear uncle. For the single
inimitable grace of simplicity which she possessed, how many mothers,
governesses, and young ladies themselves, willingly, when they see how
much it charms, would too late exchange half the accomplishments, all the
acquirements, so laboriously achieved!

Beauclerc, who had seen something of the London female world, was, both
from his natural taste and from contrast, pleased with Helen's fresh and
genuine character, and he sympathised with all her silent delight. He never
interrupted her in her enthusiastic contemplation of the great stars, but
he would now and then seize an interval of rest to compare her observations
with his own; anxious to know whether she estimated their relative
magnitude and distances as he did. These snatched moments of comparison and
proof of agreement in their observations, or the pleasure of examining
the causes of their difference of opinion, enhanced the enjoyment of this
brilliant fortnight; and not a cloud obscured the deep serene.

Notwithstanding all the ultra-refined nonsense Beauclerc had talked about
his wish not to see remarkable persons, no one could enjoy it more, as
Helen now perceived; and she saw also that he was considered as a man of
promise among all these men of performance. But there were some, perhaps
very slight things, which raised him still more in her mind, because they
showed superiority of character. She observed his manner towards the
general in this company, where he had himself the 'vantage ground--so
different now from what it had been in the Old-Forest battle, when only man
to man, ward to guardian. Before these distinguished persons there was a
look--a tone of deference at once most affectionate and polite.

"It is so generous," said Lady Cecilia to Helen; "is not it?" and Helen
agreed.

This brilliant fortnight ended too soon, as Helen thought, but Lady Cecilia
had had quite enough of it. "They are all to go to-morrow morning, and I
am not sorry for it," said she at night, as she threw herself into an
arm-chair, in Helen's room; and, after having indulged in a refreshing
yawn, she exclaimed, "Very delightful, very delightful! as you say, Helen,
it has all been; but I am not sure that I should not be very much tired
if I had much more of it. Oh! yes, I admired them all amazingly, but then
admiring all day long is excessively wearisome. The very attitude of
looking up fatigues both body and mind. Mamma is never tired, because she
never has to look up; she can always look down, and that's so grand and so
easy. She has no idea how the neck of my poor mind aches this minute; and
my poor eyes! blasted with excess of light. How yours have stood it so
well, Helen, I cannot imagine! how much stronger they must be than mine. I
must confess, that, without the relief of music now and then, and ecarte,
and that quadrille, bad as it was, I should never have got through it
to-night alive or awake. But," cried she, starting up in her chair, "do you
know Horace Churchill stays to-morrow. Such a compliment from him to stay
a day longer than he intended! And do you know what he says of your eyes,
Helen?--that they are the best listeners he ever spoke to. I should warn
you though, my dear, that he is something, and not a little, I believe, of
a male coquette. Though he is not very young, but he well understands all
the advantages of a careful toilette. He has, like that George Herbert in
Queen Elizabeth's time, 'a genteel humour for dress.' He is handsome still,
and his fine figure, and his fine feelings, and his fine fortune, have
broken two or three hearts; nevertheless I am delighted that he stays,
especially that he stays on your account."

"Upon my account!" exclaimed Helen. "Did not you see that, from the first
day when Mr. Churchill had the misfortune to be placed beside me at dinner,
he utterly despised me: he began to talk to me, indeed, but left his
sentence unfinished, his good story untold, the instant he caught the eye
of a grander auditor."

Lady Cecilia had seen this, and marvelled at a well-bred man so far
forgetting himself in vanity; but this, she observed, was only the first
day; he had afterwards changed his manner towards Helen completely.

"Yes, when he saw Lady Davenant thought me worth speaking to. But, after
all, it was quite natural that he should not know well what to say to me. I
am only a young lady. I acquit him of all peculiar rudeness to me, for I am
sure Mr. Churchill really could not talk for only one insignificant hearer,
could not bring out his good things, unless he felt secure of possessing
the attention of the whole dinner-table, so I quite forgive him."

"After this curse of forgiveness, my dear Helen, I will wish you a good
night," said Lady Cecilia, laughing; and she retired with a fear that there
would not be jealousy enough between the gentlemen, or that Helen would not
know how to play them one against another.

There is a pleasure in seeing a large party disperse; in staying behind
when others go:--there is advantage as well as pleasure, which is felt by
the timid, because they do not leave their characters behind them; and
rejoiced in by the satirical, because the characters of the departed and
departing are left behind, fair game for them. Of this advantage no one
could be more sensible, no one availed himself of it with more promptitude
and skill, than Mr. Churchill: for well he knew that though wit may fail,
humour may not take--though even flattery may pall upon the sense, scandal,
satire, and sarcasm, are resources never failing for the lowest capacities,
and sometimes for the highest.

This morning, in the library at Clarendon Park, he looked out of the window
at the departing guests, and, as each drove off, he gave to each his _coup
de patte_. To Helen, to whom it was new, it was wonderful to see how each,
even of those next in turn to go, enjoyed the demolition of those who were
just gone; how, blind to fate, they laughed, applauded, and licked the hand
just raised to strike themselves. Of the first who went--"Most respectable
people," said Lady Cecilia; "a _bonne mere de famille_."

"Most respectable people!" repeated Horace--"most respectable people, old
coach and all." And then, as another party drove off--"No fear of any thing
truly respectable here."

"Now, Horace, how can you say so?--she is so amiable and so clever."

"So clever? only, perhaps, a thought too fond of English liberty and French
dress. _Poissarde lien corfee."

"_Poissarde!_ of one of the best born, best bred women in England!" cried
Lady Cecilia; "bien coiffee, I allow."

"Lady Cecilia is _si coiffee de sa belle amie_, that I see I must not say
a word against her, till--the fashion changes. But, hark! I hear a voice I
never wish to hear."

"Yet nobody is better worth hearing----"

"Oh! yes, the queen of the Blues--the Blue Devils!"

"Hush!" cried the aide-de-camp, "she is coming in to take leave." Then, as
the queen of the Blue Devils entered, Mr, Churchill, in the most humbly
respectful manner, begged--"My respects--I trust your grace will do me
the favour--the justice to remember me to all your party who--do me the
honour to bear me in mind--" then, as she left the room, he turned about
and laughed.

"Oh! you sad, false man!" cried the lady next in turn to go. "I declare,
Mr. Churchill, though I laugh, I am quite afraid to go off before you."

"Afraid! what could malice or envy itself find to say of your ladyship,
_intacte_ as you are?--_Intacte!_" repeated he, as she drove off,
"_intacte!_--a well chosen epithet, I flatter myself!"

"Yes, _intacte_--untouched--above the breath of slander," cried Lady
Cecilia.

"I know it: so I say," replied Churchill: "fidelity that has stood all
temptations--to which it has ever been exposed; and her husband is----"

"A near relation of mine," said Lady Cecilia. "I am not prudish as to
scandal in general," continued she, laughing; "'a chicken, too, might do me
good,' hut then the fox must not prey at home. No one ought to stand by and
hear their own relations abused."

"A thousand pardons! I depended too much on the general maxim--that the
nearer the bone the sweeter the slander."

"Nonsense!" said Lady Cecilia.

"I meant to say, the nearer the heart the dearer the blame. A cut against
a first cousin may go wrong--but a bosom friend--oh! how I have succeeded
against best friends; scolded all the while, of course, and called a
monster. But there is Sir Stephen bowing to you." Then, as Lady Cecilia
kissed her hand to him from the window, Churchill went on: "By the
by, without any scandal, seriously I heard something--I was quite
concerned--that he had been of late less in his study and more in the
boudoir of ------. Surely it cannot be true!"

"Positively false," said Lady Cecilia.

"At every breath a reputation dies," said Beauclerc.

"'Pon my soul, that's true!" said the aide-de-camp. "Positively, hit or
miss, Horace has been going on, firing away with his wit, pop, pop, pop!
till he has bagged--how many brace?"

Horace turned away from him contemptuously, and looked to see whereabouts
Lady Davenant might be all this time.




CHAPTER XIV.


Lady Davenant was at the far end of the room engrossed, Churchill feared,
by the newspaper; as he approached she laid it down, and said,--

"How scandalous some of these papers have become, but it is the fault of
the taste of the age. 'Those who live to please, must please to live.'"

Horace was not sure whether he was cut or not, but he had the presence of
mind not to look hurt. He drew nearer to Lady Davenant, seated himself,
and taking up a book as if he was tired of folly, to which he had merely
condescended, he sat and read, and then sat and thought, the book hanging
from his hand.

The result of these profound thoughts he gave to the public, not to the
aide-de-camp; no more of the little pop-gun pellets of wits--but now was
brought out reason and philosophy. In a higher tone he now reviewed the
literary, philosophical, and political world, with touches of La Bruyere
and Rochefoucault in the characters he drew and in the reflections he made;
with an air, too, of sentimental contrition for his own penetration and
fine moral sense, which compelled him to see and to be annoyed by the
faults of such superior men.

The analysis he made of every mind was really perfect--in one respect, not
a grain of bad but was separated from the good, and held up clean and clear
to public view. And as an anatomist he showed such knowledge both of the
brain and of the heart, such an admirable acquaintance with all their
diseases and handled the probe and the scalpel so well, with such a
practised hand!

"Well, really this is comfortable," said Lord Davenant, throwing himself
back in his arm-chair--"True English comfort, to sit at ease and see all
one's friends so well dissected! Happy to feel that it is our duty to
our neighbour to see him well cut up--ably anatomised for the good of
society; and when I depart--when my time comes--as come it must, nobody
is to touch me but Professor Churchill. It will be a satisfaction to know
that I shall be carved as a dish fit for gods, not hewed as a carcase for
hounds. So now remember, Cecilia, I call on you to witness--I hereby,
being of sound mind and body, leave and bequeath my character, with all
my defects and deficiencies whatsoever, and all and any singular curious
diseases of the mind, of which I may die possessed, wishing the same many
for his sake,--to my good friend Doctor Horace Churchill, professor of
moral, philosophic, and scandalous anatomy, to be by him dissected at his
good pleasure for the benefit of society."

"Many thanks, my good lord; and I accept your legacy for the honour--not
the value of the gift, which every body must be sensible is nothing," said
Churchill, with a polite bow--"absolutely nothing. I shall never he able
to make anything of it."

"Try--try, my dear friend," answered Lord Davenant. "Try, don't be
modest."

"That would be difficult when so distinguished," said Beauclerc, with an
admirable look of proud humility.

"Distinguished Mr. Horace Churchill assuredly is," said Lady Davenant,
looking at him from behind her newspaper. "Distinguished above all his many
competitors in this age of scandal; he has really raised the art to the
dignity of a science. Satire, scandal, and gossip, now hand-in-hand--the
three new graces: all on the same elevated rank--three, formerly considered
as so different, and the last left to our inferior sex, but now, surely, to
be a male gossip is no reproach."

"O, Lady Davenant!--male gossip--what an expression!"

"What a reality!"

"Male gossip!--'_Tombe sur moi le ciel!_'" cried Churchill.

"'_Pourvu que je me venge_,' always understood," pursued Lady Davenant;
"but why be so afraid of the imputation of gossiping, Mr. Churchill? It
is quite fashionable, and if so, quite respectable, you know, and in your
style quite grand.

  "And gossiping wonders at being so fine--

"Malice, to be hated, needs but to be seen, but now when it is elegantly
dressed we look upon it without shame or consciousness of evil; we grow
to doat upon it--so entertaining, so graceful, so refined. When vice loses
half its grossness, it loses all its deformity. Humanity used to be
talked of when our friends were torn to pieces, but now there is such
a philosophical perfume thrown over the whole operation, that we are
irresistibly attracted. How much we owe to such men as Mr. Churchill, who
make us feel detraction virtue!"

He bowed low as Lady Davenant, summoned by her lord, left the room, and
there he stood as one condemned but not penitent.

"If I have not been well sentenced," said he, as the door closed, "and made
'_to feel detraction virtue_!'--But since Lady Cecilia cannot help smiling
at that, I am acquitted, and encouraged to sin again the first opportunity.
But Lady Davenant shall not be by, nor Lord Davenant either."

Lady Cecilia sat down to write a note, and Mr. Churchill walked round the
room in a course of critical observation on the pictures, of which, as of
every thing else, he was a supreme judge. At last he put his eye and his
glass down to something which singularly attracted his attention on one of
the marble tables.

"Pretty!" said Lady Cecilia, "pretty are not they?--though one's so tired
of them every where now--those doves!"

"Doves!" said Churchill, "what I am admiring are gloves, are not they, Miss
Stanley?" said he, pointing to an old pair of gloves, which, much wrinkled
and squeezed together, lay on the beautiful marble in rather an unsightly
lump.

"Poor Doctor V------," cried Helen to Cecilia; "that poor Doctor V-------is
as absent as ever! he is gone, and has forgotten his gloves!"

"Absent! oh, as ever!" said Lady Cecilia, going on with her note, "the most
absent man alive."

"Too much of that sort of thing I think there is in Doctor V-------,"
pursued Churchill: "a touch of absence of mind, giving the idea of high
abstraction, becomes a learned man well enough; but then it should only
be slight, as a _soupcon_ of rouge, which may become a pretty woman; all
depends on the measure, the taste, with which these things are managed--
put on."

"There is nothing managed, nothing _put on_ in Doctor V------," cried
Helen, eagerly, her colour rising; "it is all perfectly sincere, true in
him, whatever it be."

Beauclerc put down his hook.

"All perfectly true! You really think so, Miss Stanley?" said Churchill,
smiling, and looking superior down.

"I do, indeed," cried Helen.

"Charming--so young! How I do love that freshness of mind!"

"Impertinent fellow! I could knock him down, felt Beauclerc.

"And you think all Doctor V------'s humility true?" said Churchill. "Yes,
perfectly!" said Helen; "but I do not wonder you are surprised at it, Mr.
Churchill."

She meant no _malice_, though for a moment he thought she did; and he
winced under Beauclerc's smile.

"I do not wonder that any one who does not know Doctor V------should he
surprised by his great humility," added Helen.

"You are sure that it is not pride that apes humility?" asked Churchill.

"Yes, quite sure!"

"Yet--" said Churchill (putting his malicious finger through a great hole
in the thumb of the doctor's glove) "I should have fancied that I saw
vanity through the holes in these gloves, as through the philosopher's
cloak of old."

"Horace is a famous fellow for picking holes and making much of them, Miss
Stanley, you see," said the aide-de-camp.

"Vanity! Doctor V----has no vanity!" said Helen, "if you knew him."

"No vanity! Whom does Miss Stanley mean?" cried the aide-de-camp. "No
vanity? that's good. Who? Horace?"

"_Mauvais plaisant_!" Horace put him by, and, happily not easily put out of
countenance, he continued to Helen,--

"You give the good doctor credit, too, for all his _naivete_?" said
Churchill.

"He does not want credit for it," said Helen, "he really has it."

"I wish I could see things as you do, Miss Stanley."

"Show him that, Helen," cried Lady Cecilia, looking at a table beside them,
on which lay one of those dioramic prints which appear all a confusion
of lines till you look at them in their right point of view. "Show him
that--it all depends, and so does seeing characters, on getting the right
point of view."

"Ingenious!" said Churchill, trying to catch the right position; "but I
can't, I own--" then abruptly resuming, "Naviete charms me at fifteen," and
his eye glanced at Helen, then was retracted, then returning to his point
of view, "at eighteen perhaps may do," and his eyes again turned to Helen,
"at eighteen--it captivates me quite," and his eye dwelt. "But naivete at
past fifty, verging to sixty, is quite another thing, really rather too
much for me. I like all things in season, and above all, simplicity will
not bear long keeping. I have the greatest respect possible for our learned
and excellent friend, but I wish this could be any way suggested to him,
and that he would lay aside this out-of-season simplicity."

"He cannot lay aside his nature," said Helen, "and I am glad of it, it is
such a good nature."

"Kind-hearted creature he is, I never heard him say a severe word of any
one," said Lady Cecilia.

"What a sweet man he must he!" said Horace, making a face at which none
present, not even Helen, could forbear to smile. "His heart, I am sure, is
in the right place always. I only wish one could say the same of his wig.
And would it be amiss if he sometimes (I would not be too hard upon him,
Miss Stanley), once a fortnight, suppose--brushed, or caused to be brushed,
that coat of his?"

"You have dusted his jacket for him famously, Horace, I think," said the
aide-de-camp.

At this instant the door opened, and in came the doctor himself.

Lady Cecilia's hand was outstretched with her note, thinking, as the door
opened, that she should see the servant come in, for whom she had rung.

"What surprises you all so, my good friends," said the doctor, stopping and
looking round in all his native simplicity.

"My dear doctor" said Lady Cecilia, "only we all thought you were
gone--that's all."

"And I am not gone, that's all. I stayed to write a letter, and am come
here to look for--but I cannot find-my--"

"Your gloves, perhaps, doctor, you are looking for," said Churchill, going
forward, and with an air of the greatest respect and consideration, both
for the gloves and for their owner, he presented them; then shook the
doctor by the hand, with a cordiality which the good soul thought truly
English, and, bowing him out, added, "How proud he had been to make his
acquaintance,--_au revoir_, he hoped, in Park Lane."

"Oh you treacherous--!" cried Lady Cecilia, turning to Horace, as soon as
the unsuspecting philosopher was fairly gone. "Too bad really! If he were
not the most simple-minded creature extant, he must have seen, suspected,
something from your look; and what would have become of you if the doctor
had come in one moment sooner, and had heard you--I was really frightened."

"Frightened! so was I, almost out of my wits," said Churchill. "_Les
revenans_ always frighten one; and they never hear any good of themselves,
for which reason I make it a principle, when once I have left a room, full
of friends especially, never--never to go back. My gloves, my hat, my coat,
I'd leave, sooner than lose my friends. Once I heard it said, by one who
knew the world and human nature better than any of us--once I heard it said
in jest, but in sober earnest I say, that I would not for more than I am
worth be placed, without his knowing it, within earshot of my best friend."

"What sort of a best friend can yours he?" cried Beauclerc.

"Much like other people's, I suppose," replied Horace, speaking with
perfect nonchalance--"much like other people's best friends. Whosoever
expects to find better, I guess, will find worse, if he live in the world
we live in."

"May I go out of the world before I believe or suspect any such thing?"
cried Beauclerc. "Rather than have the Roman curse light upon me, 'May you
survive all your friends and relations!' may I die a thousand times!"

"Who talks of dying, in a voice so sweet--a voice so loud?" said provoking
Horace, in his calm, well-bred tone; "for my part, I who have the honour of
speaking to you, can boast, that never since I was of years of discretion
(counting new style, beginning at thirteen, of course)--never have I lost a
friend, a sincere friend--never, for this irrefragable reason--since that
nonage, never was I such a neophyte as to fancy I had found that _lusus
natures_, a friend perfectly sincere."

"How I pity you!" cried Beauclerc, "if you are in earnest; but in earnest
you can't be."

"Pardon me, I can, and I am. And in earnest you will oblige me, Mr.
Beauclerc, if you will spare me your pity: for, all things in this world
considered," said Horace Churchill, drawing himself up, "I do not conceive
that I am much an object of pity." Then, turning upon his heel, he walked
away, conscious, however, half an instant afterwards, that he had drawn
himself up too high, and that for a moment his temper had spoiled his tone,
and betrayed him into a look and manner too boastful, bordering on the
ridiculous. He was in haste to repair the error.

Not Garrick, in the height of his celebrity and of his susceptibility, was
ever more anxious than Horace Churchill to avert the stroke of ridicule--to
guard against the dreaded smile. As he walked away, he felt behind his back
that those he left were smiling in silence.

Lady Cecilia had thrown herself on a sofa, resting, after the labour of
_l'eloquence de billet_. He stopped, and, leaning over the back of the
sofa on which she reclined, repeated an Italian line in which was the word
"_pavoneggiarsi_."

"My dear Lady Cecilia, you, who understand and feel Italian so well, how
expressive are some of their words! _Pavoneggiarsi!_--untranslatable. One
cannot say well in English, to peacock oneself. To make oneself like unto a
peacock is flat; but _pavoneggiarsi_--action, passion, picture, all in one!
To plume oneself comes nearest to it; but the word cannot be given, even by
equivalents, in English; nor can it be naturalised, because, in fact, we
have not the feeling. An Englishman is too proud to boast--too bashful to
strut; if ever he _peacocks himself_, it is in a moment of anger, not in
display. The language of every country," continued he, raising his voice,
in order to reach Lady Davenant, who just then returned to the room, as he
did not wish to waste a philosophical observation on Lady Cecilia,--"the
language of every country is, to a certain degree, evidence, record,
history of its character and manners." Then, lowering his voice almost to a
whisper, but very distinct, turning while he spoke so as to make sure that
Miss Stanley heard--"Your young friend this morning quite captivated me by
her nature--nature, the thing that now is most uncommon, a real natural
woman; and when in a beauty, how charming! How delicious when one meets
with _effusion de coeur_: a young lady, too, who speaks pure English, not
a leash of languages at once; and cultivated, too, your friend is, for one
does not like ignorance, if one could have knowledge without pretension--so
hard to find the golden mean!--and if one could find it, one might not be
nearer to----"

Lady Cecilia listened for the finishing word, but none came. It all ended
in a sigh, to be interpreted as she pleased. A look towards the ottoman,
where Beauclerc had now taken his seat beside Miss Stanley, seemed to point
the meaning out: but Lady Cecilia knew her man too well to understand him.

Beauclerc, seated on the ottoman, was showing to Helen some passages in the
book he was reading; she read with attention, and from time to time looked
up with a smile of intelligence and approbation. What either said Horace
could not hear, and he was the more curious, and when the book was put
down, after carelessly opening others he took it up. Very much surprised
was he to find it neither novel nor poem: many passages were marked
with pencil notes of approbation, he took it for granted these were
Bleauclerc's; there he was mistaken, they were Lady Davenant's. She was at
her work-table. Horace, book in hand, approached; the book was not in his
line, it was more scientific than literary--it was for posterity more
than for the day; he had only turned it over as literary men turn over
scientific books, to seize what may serve for a new simile or a good
allusion; besides, among his philosophical friends, the book being talked
of, it was well to know enough of it to have something to say, and he had
said well, very _judiciously_ he had praised it among the elect; but now it
was his fancy to depreciate it with all his might; not that he disliked
the author or the work now more than he had done before, but he was in the
humour to take the opposite side from Beauclerc, so he threw the book from
him contemptuously "Rather a slight hasty thing, in my opinion," said he.
Beauclerc's eyes took fire as he exclaimed, "Slight! hasty! this most
noble, most solid work!"

"Solid in your opinion," said Churchill, with a smile deferential, slightly
sneering.

"Our own opinion is all that either of us can give," said Beauclerc; "in my
opinion it is the finest view of the progress of natural philosophy, the
most enlarged, the most just in its judgments of the past, and in its
prescience of the future; in the richness of experimental knowledge, in its
theoretic invention, the greatest work by any one individual since the time
of Bacon."

"And Bacon is under your protection, too?"

"Protection! my protection?" said Beauclerc.

"Pardon me, I simply meant to ask if you are one of those who swear by Lord
Verulam."

"I swear by no man, I do not swear at all, not on philosophical subjects
especially; swearing adds nothing to faith," said Beauclerc.

"I stand corrected," said Churchill, "and I would go further, and add that
in argument enthusiasm adds nothing to reason--much as I admire, as we
all admire," glancing at Miss Stanley, "that enthusiasm with which this
favoured work has been advocated!"

"I could not help speaking warmly," cried Beauclerc; "it is a book to
inspire enthusiasm; there is such a noble spirit all through it, so pure
from petty passions, from all vulgar jealousies, all low concerns! Judge of
a book, somebody says, by the impression it leaves on your mind when you
lay it down; this book stands that test, at least with me, I lay it down
with such a wish to follow--with steps ever so unequal still to follow,
where it points the way."

"Bravo! bravissimo! hear him, hear him! print him, print him! hot-press
from the author to the author, hot-press!" cried Churchill, and he laughed.

Like one suddenly awakened from the trance of enthusiasm by the cold touch
of ridicule, stood Beauclerc, brought down from heaven to earth, and by
that horrid little laugh, not the heart's laugh.

"But my being ridiculous does not make my cause so, and that is a comfort."
"And another comfort you may have, my dear Granville," said Lady Davenant,
"that ridicule is not the test of truth; truth should be the test of
ridicule."

"But where is the book?" continued Beauclerc.

Helen gave it to him.

"Now, Mr. Churchill," said Beauclerc; "I am really anxious, I know you are
such a good critic, will you show me these faults? blame as well as praise
must always he valuable from those who themselves excel."

"You are too good," said Churchill.

"Will you then be good enough to point out the errors for me?"

"Oh, by no means," cried Churchill, "don't note me, do not quote me, I am
nobody, and I cannot give up my authorities."

"But the truth is all I want to get at," said Beauclerc.

"Let her rest, my dear sir, at the bottom of her well; there she is,
and there she will be for ever and ever, and depend upon it none of our
windlassing will ever bring her up."

"Such an author as this," continued Beauclerc, "would have been so glad to
have corrected any error."

"So every author tells you, but I never saw one of them who did not look
blank at a list of errata--if you knew how little one is thanked for them!"

"But you would be thanked now," said Beauclerc:--"the faults in style, at
least."

"Nay, I am no critic," said Churchill, confident in his habits of literary
detection; "but if you ask me," said he, as he disdainfully flirted the
leaves back and forward with a "There now!" and a "Here now!" "We should
not call that good writing--you could not think this correct? I may be
wrong, but I should not use this phrase. Hardly English that--colloquial, I
think; and this awkward ablative absolute--never admitted now."

"Thank you," said Beauclerc, "these faults are easily mended."

"Easily mended, say you? I say, better make a new one."

"WHO COULD?" said Beauclerc.

"How many faults you see," said Helen, "which I should never have perceived
unless you had pointed them out, and I am sorry to know them now." Smiling
at Helen's look of sincere mortification, in contrast at this moment with
Mr. Churchill's air of satisfied critical pride, Lady Davenant said,--

"Why sorry, my dear Helen? No human work can be perfect; Mr. Churchill may
be proud of that strength of eye which in such a powerful light can count
the spots. But whether it be the best use to make of his eyes, or the best
use that can be made of the light, remains to be considered."




CHAPTER XV.


Beyond measure was Churchill provoked to find Lady Davenant against him and
on the same side as Granville Beauclerc--all unused to contradiction in
his own society, where he had long been supreme, he felt a difference of
opinion so sturdily maintained as a personal insult.

For so young a man as Beauclerc, yet unknown to fame, not only to challenge
the combat but to obtain the victory, was intolerable; and the more so,
because his young opponent appeared no ways elated or surprised, but seemed
satisfied to attribute his success to the goodness of his cause.

Churchill had hitherto always managed wisely his great stakes and
pretensions in both the fashionable and literary world. He had never
actually published any thing except a clever article or two in a review, or
an epigram, attributed to him but not acknowledged. Having avoided giving
his measure, it was believed he was above all who had been publicly
tried--it was always said--"If Horace Churchill would but publish, he would
surpass every other author of our times."

Churchill accordingly dreaded and hated all who might by possibility
approach the throne of fashion, or interfere with his dictatorship in a
certain literary set in London, and from this moment he began cordially to
detest Beauclerc--he viewed him with a scornful, yet with jealous eyes; but
his was the jealousy of vanity, not of love; it regarded Lady Davenant and
his fashionable reputation in the first place--Helen only in the second.

Lady Davenant observed all this, and was anxious to know how much or how
little Helen had seen, and what degree of interest it excited in her mind.
One morning, when they were alone together, looking over a cabinet of
cameos, Lady Davenant pointed to one which she thought like Mr. Beauclerc.
Helen did not see the likeness.

"People see likenesses very differently," said Lady Davenant. "But you and
I, Helen, usually see characters, if not faces, with the same eyes. I
have been thinking of these two gentlemen, Mr. Churchill and Mr.
Beauclerc--which do you think the most agreeable?"

"Mr. Churchill is amusing certainly," said Helen, "but I think Mr.
Beauclerc's conversation much more interesting--though Mr. Churchill is
agreeable, sometimes--when--"

"When he flatters you," said Lady Davenant.

"When he is not satirical--I was going to say," said Helen.

"There is a continual petty brilliancy, a petty effort too," continued Lady
Davenant, "in Mr. Churchill, that tires me--sparks struck perpetually, but
then you hear the striking of the flints, the clink of the tinder-box."

Helen, though she admitted the tinder-box, thought it too low a comparison.
She thought Churchill's were not mere sparks.

"Well, fireworks, if you will," said Lady Davenant, "that rise, blaze,
burst, fall, and leave you in darkness, and with a disagreeable smell too;
and it's all _feu d'artifice_ after all. Now in Beauclerc there is too
little art and too ardent nature. Some French friends of mine who knew
both, said of Mr. Churchill, '_De l'esprit on ne peut pas plus meme a
Paris_,' the highest compliment a Parisian can pay, but they allowed that
Beauclerc had '_beaucoup plus d'ame_.'"

"Yes," said Helen; "how far superior!"

"It has been said," continued Lady Davenant, "that it is safer to judge of
men by their actions than by their words, but there are few actions and
many words in life; and if women would avail themselves of their daily,
hourly, opportunities of judging people by their words, they would get at
the natural characters, or, what is of just as much consequence, they would
penetrate through the acquired habits; and here Helen, you have two good
studies before you."

Preoccupied as Helen was with the certainty of Beauclerc being an engaged,
almost a married man, and looking, as she did, on Churchill as one who must
consider her as utterly beneath his notice, she listened to Lady Davenant's
remarks as she would have done to observations about two characters in a
novel or on the stage.

As Churchill could not immediately manifest his hatred of Beauclerc, it
worked inwardly the more. He did not sleep well this night, and when he
got up in the morning, there was something the matter with him. Nervous,
bilious--cross it could not be;--_journalier_ (a French word settles
everything)--_journalier_ he allowed he was; he rather gloried in it,
because his being permitted to be so proved his power,--his prerogative of
fortune and talent combined.

In the vast competition of the London world, it is not permitted to every
man to be in his humour or out of his humour at pleasure; but, by an
uncommon combination of circumstances, Churchill had established his
privilege of caprice; he was allowed to have his bad and his good days, and
the highest people and the finest smiled, and submitted to his "_cachet de
faveur et de disgrace_;" and when he was sulky, rude, or snappish, called
it only Horace Churchill's way. They even prided themselves on his
preferences and his aversions. "Horace is always charming when he is with
us."--"With me you have no idea how delightful he is."--"Indeed I must do
him the justice to say, that I never found him otherwise."--While the less
favoured permitted him to be as rude as he pleased, and only petted him,
and told of his odd ways to those who sighed in vain to have him at their
parties. But Lady Davenant was not a person to pet or spoil a child of any
age, and to the general, Mr. Churchill was not particularly agreeable--not
his sort; while to Lady Cecilia, secure in grace, beauty, and fashion, his
humours were only matter of amusement, and she bore with him pleasantly and
laughingly.

"Such weather!" cried he in a querulous tone; "how can a man have any sense
in such weather? Some foreigner says, that the odious climate of England is
an over-balance for her good constitution. The sun of the south is in truth
well worth the liberty of the north. It is a sad thing," said he, with a
very sentimental air, "that a free-born Briton should be servile to these
skyey influences;" and, grumbling on, he looked out of the window as cross
as he pleased, and nobody minded him. The aide-de-camp civilly agreed with
him that it was horrid weather, and likely to rain, and it did rain; and
every one knows how men, like children, are in certain circumstances
affected miserably by a rainy day. There was no going out; horses at the
door, and obliged to be dismissed. Well, since there could be no riding,
the next best thing the aide-de-camp thought, was to talk of horses, and
the officers all grew eager, and Churchill had a mind to exert himself so
far as to show them that he knew more of the matter than they did; that he
was no mere book-man; but on this unlucky day, all went wrong. It happened
that Horace fell into some grievous error concerning the genealogy of a
famous race-horse, and, disconcerted more than he would have been at being
convicted of any degree of moral turpitude, vexed and ashamed, he talked no
more of Newmarket or of Doncaster, left the race-ground to those who prided
themselves on the excellences of their four-footed betters, and lounged
into the billiard-room.

He found Lady Cecilia playing with Beauclerc; Miss Stanley was looking on.
Churchill was a famous billiard-player, and took his turn to show how much
better than Beauclerc he performed, but this day his hand was out, his eye
not good; he committed blunders of which a novice might have been ashamed.
And there was Miss Stanley and there was Beauclerc by to see! and Beauclerc
pitied him!

  O line extreme of human misery!

He retreated to the book-room, but there the intellectual Horace, with all
the sages, poets, and novelists of every age within his reach, reached them
not; but, with his hands in his pockets, like any squire or schoolboy
under the load of ignorance or penalties of idleness, stood before the
chimney-piece, eyeing the pendule, and verily believing that this morning
the hands went backward. Dressing-time at last came, and dinner-time,
bringing relief how often to man and child ill-tempered; but, this day to
Churchill dinner brought only discomfiture worse discomfited.

Some of the neighbouring families were to dine at Clarendon Park. Mr.
Churchill abhorred country neighbours and country gentlemen. Among these,
however, were some not unworthy to be perceived by him; and besides these,
there were some foreign officers; one in particular, from Spain, of high
rank and birth, of the _sangre azul_, the _blue blood_, who have the
privilege of the silken cord if they should come to be hanged. This
Spaniard was a man of distinguished talent, and for him Horace might have
been expected to shine out; it was his pleasure, however, this day to
disappoint expectations, and to do "the dishonours of his country." He
would talk only of eating, of which he was privileged not only to speak but
to judge, and pronounce upon _en dernier ressort_, though this was only an
air, for he was not really a gourmand; but after ogling through his glass
the distant dishes, when they with a wish came nigh, he, after a cursory
glance or a close inspection, made them with a nod retire.

At last he thought an opportunity offered for bringing in a well-prepared
anecdote which he had about Cambaceres, and a hot blackbird and white feet,
but unluckily a country gentleman would tell some history of a battle
between poachers and gamekeepers, which fixed the attention of the company
till the moment for the anecdote was past.

Horace left his tale untold, and spoke word never more till a subject was
started on which he thought he could come out unrivalled. General Clarendon
had some remarkably good wines. Churchill was referred to as a judge, and
he allowed them to be all good, but he prided himself on possessing a
certain Spanish wine, esteemed above all price, because not to be had for
money--_amontillado_ is its name. Horace appealed to the Spanish officer,
who confirmed all he said of this vinous phenomenon. "No cultivator can be
certain of producing it. It has puzzled, almost to death, all the _growers_
of Xeres:--it is a variety of sherry, almost as difficult to judge of as to
procure."

But Mr. Churchill boasted he had some, undoubtedly genuine; he added, "that
Spanish judges had assured him his taste was so accurate he might venture
to pronounce upon the difficult question of amontillado or not!"

While he yet spoke, General Clarendon, unawares, placed before him some of
this very fine wine, which, as he finished speaking, Churchill swallowed
without knowing it from some other sherry which he had been drinking. He
would have questioned that it was genuine, but the Spaniard, as far as he
could pretend to judge, thought it unquestionable.

Churchill's countenance fell in a manner that quite surprised Helen, and
exceedingly amused Lady Cecilia. He was more mortified and vexed by this
failure than by all the rest, for the whole table smiled.

The evening of this day of misfortune was not brighter than the morning,
everything was wrong--even at night--at night when at last the dinner
company, the country visitors, relieved him from their presence, and when
some comfort might be had, he thought, stretched in a good easy-chair--Lord
Davenant had set him the example. But something had happened to all the
chairs,--there was a variety of fashionable kinds; he tried them by turns,
but none of them this night would suit him. Yet Lady Cecilia maintained
(for the general had chosen them) that they were each and all of them
in their way comfortable, in the full English spirit of the word, and
according to the French explanation of _comfortable_, given to us by
the Duchess d'Abrantes, _convenablement bon_; but in compassion to Mr.
Churchill's fastidious restlessness, she would now show him a perfection of
a chair which she had just had made for her own boudoir. She ordered that
it should be brought, and in it rolled, and it was looked at in every
direction and sat in, and no fault could be found with it, even by the
great faultfinder; but what was it called? It was neither a lounger, nor
a dormeuse, nor a Cooper, nor a Nelson, nor a kangaroo: a chair without a
name would never do; in all things fashionable the name is more than half.
Such a happy name as kangaroo Lady Cecilia despaired of finding for her new
favourite, but she begged some one would give it a good one; whoever gave
her the best name should be invited to the honours and pleasures of the
sitting in this chair for the rest of the night.

Her eyes, and all eyes, turned upon Mr. Churchill, but whether the occasion
was too great, or that his desire to satisfy the raised expectation of the
public was too high strained, or that the time was out of joint, or that he
was out of sorts, the fact was, he could find no name.

Beauclerc, who had not yet tried the chair, sank into its luxurious depth,
and leaning back, asked if it might not be appropriately called the
"Sleepy-hollow."

"Sleepy-hollow!" repeated Lady Cecilia, "excellent!" and by acclammation
"Sleepy-hollow" was approved; but when Beauclerc was invited to the honours
of the sitting, he declined, declaring that the name was not his invention,
only his recollection; it had been given by a friend of his to some such
easy chair.

This magnanimity was too much for Horace; he looked at his watch, found it
was bed-time, pushed the chair out of his way, and departed; Beauclerc, the
first and last idea in this his day of mortifications.

Seeing a man subject to these petty irritations lowers him in the eyes of
woman. For that susceptibility of temper arising from the jealousy of love,
even when excited by trifles, woman makes all reasonable, all natural
allowance; but for the jealousy of self-love she has no pity. Unsuited to
the manly character!--so Helen thought, and so every woman thinks.




CHAPTER XVI.


It was expected by all who had witnessed his discomfiture and his
parting push to the chair, that Mr. Churchill would be off early in
the morning--such was his wont when he was disturbed in vanity: but he
reappeared at breakfast.

This day was a good day with Horace; he determined it should be so, and
though it was again a wet day, he now showed that he could rule the weather
of his own humour, when intensity of will was wakened by rivalry. He
made himself most agreeable, and the man of yesterday was forgotten or
remembered only as a foil to the man of to-day. The words he so much loved
to hear, and to which he had so often surreptitiously listened, were now
repeated, 'No one can be so agreeable as Horace Churchill is on his good
days!'

Bright he shone out, all gaiety and graciousness; the _cachet de faveur_
was for all, but its finest impression was for Helen. He tried flattery,
and wit, each playing on the other with reflected and reflecting lustre,
for a woman naturally says to herself, "When this man has so much wit, his
flattery even must be worth something."

And another day came, and another, and another party of friends filled the
house, and still Mr. Churchill remained, and was now the delight of all. As
far as concerned his successes in society, no one was more ready to join in
applause than Beauclerc; but when Helen was in question he was different,
though he had reasoned himself into the belief that he could not yet love
Miss Stanley, therefore he could not be jealous. But he had been glad to
observe that she had from the first seemed to see what sort of a person Mr.
Churchill was. She was now only amused, as everybody must be, but she would
never be interested by such a man as Horace Churchill, a wit without a
soul. If she were--why he could never feel any further interest about
her--that was all!

So it went on; and now Lady Cecilia was as much amused as she expected
by these daily jealousies, conflicts, and comparisons, the feelings
perpetually tricking themselves out, and strutting about, calling
themselves judgments, like the servants in Gil Blas in their masters'
clothes, going about as counts dukes, and grandees.

"Well, really," said Lady Cecilia to Helen, one day, as she was standing
near her tambour frame, "you are an industrious creature, and the only very
industrious person I ever could bear. I have myself a natural aversion to
a needle, but that tambour needle I can better endure than a common one,
because, in the first place, it makes a little noise in the world; one not
only sees but hears it getting on; one finds, that without dragging it
draws at every link a lengthened chain."

"It is called chainstitch, is it not?" said the aide-de-camp; "and Miss
Stanley is working on so famously fast at it she will have us all in her
chains by and by."

"Bow, Miss Stanley," said Lady Cecilia; "that pretty compliment deserves at
least a bow, if not a look-up."

"I should prefer a look-down, if I were to choose," said Churchill.

"Beggars must not be choosers," said the aide-de-camp.

"But the very reason I can bear to look at you working, Helen," continued
Lady Cecilia, "is, because you do look up so often--so refreshingly. The
professed _Notables_ I detest--those who never raise their eyes from their
everlasting work; whatever is said, read, thought, or felt, is with them of
secondary importance to that bit of muslin in which they are making holes,
or that bit of canvass on which they are perpetrating such figures or
flowers as nature scorns to look upon. I did not mean anything against you
mamma, I assure you," continued Cecilia, turning to her mother, who was
also at her embroidering frame, "because, though you do work, or have work
before you, to do you justice, you never attend to it in the least."

"Thank you! my dear Cecilia," said Lady Davenant, smiling; "I am, indeed, a
sad bungler, but still I shall always maintain a great respect for work and
workers, and I have good reasons for it."

"And so have I," said Lord Davenant. "I only wish that men who do not know
what to do with their hands, were not ashamed to sew. If custom had but
allowed us this resource, how many valuable lives might have been saved,
how many rich ennuyes would not have hung themselves, even in November!
What years of war, what overthrow of empires, might have been avoided, if
princes and sultans, instead of throwing handkerchiefs, had but hemmed
them!"

"No, no," said Lady Davenant, "recollect that the race of Spanish kings has
somewhat deteriorated since they exchanged the sword for the tambour-frame.
We had better have things as they are: leave us the privilege of the
needle, and what a valuable resource it is; sovereign against the root of
all evil--an antidote both to love in idleness and hate in idleness--which
is most to be dreaded, let those who have felt both decide. I think we
ladies must be allowed to keep the privilege of the needle to ourselves,
humble though it be, for we must allow it is a good one."

"Good at need," said Churchill. "There is an excellent print, by Bouck, I
believe, of an old woman beating the devil with a distaff; distaffs have
been out of fashion with spinsters ever since, I fancy."

"But as she was old, Churchill," said Lord Davenant, "might not your lady
have defied his black majesty, without her distaff?"

"His _black_ majesty! I admire your distinction, my lord," said Churchill,
"but give it more emphasis; for all kings are not black in the eyes of the
fair, it is said, you know." And here he began an anecdote of regal scandal
in which Lady Cecilia stopped him----

"Now, Horace, I protest against your beginning with scandal so early in the
morning. None of your _on dits_, for decency's sake, before luncheon; wait
till evening."

Churchill coughed, and shrugged, and sighed, and declared he would be
temperate; he would not touch a character, upon his honour; he would
only indulge in a few little personalities; it could not hurt any lady's
feelings that he should criticise or praise absent beauties. So he just
made a review of all he could recollect, in answer to a question one of the
officers, Captain Warmsley, had asked him, and which, in an absent fit,
he had had the ill-manners yesterday, as now he recollected, not to
answer--Whom he considered as altogether the handsomest woman of his
acquaintance? Beauclerc was now in the room, and Horace was proud to
display, before him in particular, his infinite knowledge of all the fair
and fashionable, and all that might be admitted fashionable without being
fair--all that have the _je ne sais quoi_, which is than beauty dearer.
As one conscious of his power to consecrate or desecrate, by one look
of disdain or one word of praise, he stood; and beginning at the lowest
conceivable point, his uttermost notion of want of beauty--his _laid
ideal_, naming one whose image, no doubt, every charitable imagination will
here supply, Horace next fixed upon another for his mediocrity point--what
he should call "just well enough"--_assez bien, assez_--just up to the
Bellasis motto, "_Bonne et belle assez_." Then, in the ascending scale, he
rose to those who, in common parlance, may be called charming, fascinating;
and still for each he had his fastidious look and depreciating word. Just
keeping within the verge, Horace, without exposing himself to the ridicule
of coxcombry, ended by sighing for that being 'made of every creature's
best'--perfect, yet free from the curse of perfection. Then, suddenly
turning to Beauclerc, and tapping him on the shoulder--"Do, give us your
notions--to what sort of a body or mind, now, would you willingly bend the
knee?"

Beauclerc could not or would not tell--"I only know that whenever I bend
the knee," said he, "it will be because I cannot help it!"

Beauclerc could not be drawn out either by Churchill's persiflage or
flattery, and he tried both, to talk of his tastes or opinions of women.
He felt too much perhaps about love to talk much about it. This all agreed
well in Helen's imagination with what Lady Cecilia had told her of his
secret engagement. She was sure he was thinking of Lady Blanche, and that
he could not venture to describe her, lest he should betray himself and his
secret. Then, leaving Churchill and the talkers, he walked up and down the
room alone, at the further side, seeming as if he were recollecting some
lines which he repeated to himself, and then stopping before Lady Cecilia,
repeated to her, in a very low voice, the following:--

  "I saw her upon nearer view,
  A spirit, yet a woman too!
  Her household motions light and free,
  And steps of virgin liberty;
  A countenance in which did meet
  Sweet records, promises as sweet;
  A creature not too bright or good
  For human nature's daily food;
  For transient sorrows, simple wiles,
  Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles."

Helen thought Lady Blanche must be a charming creature if she was like this
picture; but somehow, as she afterwards told Lady Cecilia, she had formed a
different idea of Lady Blanche Forrester--Cecilia smiled and asked, "How?
different how?"

Helen did not exactly know, but altogether she had imagined that she must
be more of a heroine, or perhaps more of a woman of rank and fashion.
She had not formed any exact idea--but different altogether from this
description. Lady Cecilia again smiled, and said, "Very natural; and after
all not very certain that the Lady Blanche is like this picture, which was
not drawn for her or from her assuredly--a resemblance found only in the
imagination, to which we are, all of us, more or less, dupes; and _tant
mieux_ say I--_tant pis_ says mamma--and all mothers."

"There is one thing I like better in Mr. Beauclerc's manners than in Mr.
Churchill," said Helen.

"There are a hundred I like better," said Lady Cecilia, "but what is your
one thing?"

"That he always speaks of women in general with respect--as if he had more
confidence in them, and more dependence upon them for his happiness. Now
Mr. Churchill, with all the adoration he professes, seems to look upon them
as idols that he can set up or pull down, bend the knee to or break to
pieces, at pleasure--I could not like a man for a friend who had a bad, or
even a contemptuous, opinion of women--could you, Cecilia?"

"Certainly not," Lady Cecilia said; "the general had always, naturally, the
greatest respect for women. Whatever prejudices he had taken up had been
only caught from others, and lasted only till he had got rid of the
impression of certain 'untoward circumstances.'" Even a grave, serious
dislike, both Lady Cecilia and Helen agreed that they could bear better
than that persiflage which seemed to mock even while it most professed to
admire.

Horace presently discovered the mistakes he had made in his attempts, and
repaired them as fast as he could by his infinite versatility. The changes
shaded off with a skill which made them run easily into each other. He
perceived that Mr. Beauclerc's respectful air and tone were preferred, and
he now laid himself out in the respectful line, adding, as he flattered
himself, something of a finer point, more polish in whatever he said, and
with more weight of authority.

But he was mortified to find that it did not produce the expected effect,
and, after having done the respectful one morning, as he fancied, in the
happiest manner, he was vexed to perceive that he not only could not raise
Helen's eyes from her work, but that even Lady Davenant did not attend to
him: and that, as he was rounding one of his best periods, her looks were
directed to the other side of the room, where Beauclerc sat apart; and
presently she called to him, and begged to know what it was he was reading.
She said she quite envied him the power he possessed of being rapt into
future times or past, completely at his author's bidding, to be transported
how and where he pleased.

Beauclerc brought the book to her, and put it into her hand. As she took it
she said, "As we advance in life, it becomes more and more difficult to
find in any book the sort of enchanting, entrancing interest which we
enjoyed when life, and, books, and we ourselves were new. It were vain to
try and settle whether the fault is most in modern books, or in our ancient
selves; probably not in either: the fact is, that not only does the
imagination cool and weaken as we grow older, but we become, as we live on
in this world, too much engrossed by the real business and cares of life,
to have feeling or time for factitious, imaginary interests. But why do I
say factitious? while they last, the imaginative interests are as real
as any others."

"Thank you," said Beauclerc, "for doing justice to poor imagination, whose
pleasures are surely, after all, the highest, the most real, that we
have, unwarrantably as they have been decried both by metaphysicians and
physicians."

The book which had so fixed Beauclerc's attention, was Segur's History of
Napoleon's Russian Campaign. He was at the page where the burning of Moscow
is described--the picture of Buonaparte's despair, when he met resolution
greater than his own, when he felt himself vanquished by the human mind, by
patriotism, by virtue--virtue in which he could not believe, the existence
of which, with all his imagination, he could not conceive: the power which
his indomitable will could not conquer.

Beauclerc pointed to the account of that famous inscription on the iron
gate of a church which the French found still standing, the words written
by Rostopchin after the burning of his "delightful home."

"_Frenchmen, I have been eight years in embellishing this residence; I have
lived in it happily in the bosom of my family. The inhabitants of this
estate (amounting to seventeen hundred and twenty) have quitted it at your
approach; and I have, with my own hands, set fire to my own house, to
prevent it from being polluted by your presence._"

"See what one, even one, magnanimous individual can do for his country,"
exclaimed Beauclerc. "How little did this sacrifice cost him! Sacrifice do
I say? it was a pride--a pleasure."

Churchill did not at all like the expression of Helen's countenance, for he
perceived she sympathised with Beauclerc's enthusiasm. He saw that romantic
enthusiasm had more charm for her than wit or fashion; and now he meditated
another change of style. He would try a noble style. He resolved that the
first convenient opportunity he would be a little romantic, and perhaps,
even take a touch at chivalry, a burst like Beauclerc, but in a way of his
own, at the degeneracy of modern times. He tried it--but it was quite a
failure; Lady Cecilia, as he overheard, whispered to Helen what was once
so happily said--"_Ah! le pauvre homme! comme il se batte les flancs d'un
enthousiasme de commande._"

Horace was too clever a man to persist in a wrong line, or one in which his
test of right _success_ did not crown his endeavours. If this did not do,
something else would--should, It was impossible that with all his spirit of
resource he should ultimately fail. To please, and to make an impression on
Helen, a greater impression than Beauclerc--to annoy Beauclerc, in short,
was still, independently of all serious thoughts, the utmost object of
Churchill's endeavours.


END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.






VOLUME THE SECOND.


CHAPTER I.


About this time a circumstance occurred, which seemed to have nothing to
do with Churchill, or Beauclerc, but which eventually brought both their
characters into action and passion.

Lord Davenant had purchased, at the sale of Dean Stanley's pictures,
several of those which had been the dean's favourites, and which,
independently of their positive merit, were peculiarly dear to Helen. He
had ordered that they should be sent down to Clarendon Park; at first, he
only begged house-room for them from the general while he and Lady Davenant
were in Russia; then he said that in case he should never return he wished
the pictures should be divided between his two dear children, Cecilia and
Helen; and that, to prevent disputes, he would make the distribution of
them himself now, and in the kindest and most playful manner he allotted
them to each, always finding some excellent reason for giving to Helen
those which he knew she liked best; and then there was to be a _hanging
committee_, for hanging the pictures, which occasioned a great deal of
talking, Beauclerc always thinking most of Helen, or of what was really
best for the paintings; Horace most of himself and his amateurship.

Among these pictures were some fine Wouvermans, and other hunting and
hawking pieces, and one in particular of the duchess and her ladies, from
Don Quixote. Beauclerc, who had gone round examining and admiring, stood
fixed when he came to this picture, in which he fancied he discovered in
one of the figures some likeness to Helen; the lady had a hawk upon her
wrist. Churchill came up eagerly to the examination, with glass at eye. He
could not discern the slightest resemblance to Miss Stanley; but he was in
haste to, bring out an excellent observation of his own, which he had made
his own from a Quarterly Review, illustrating the advantage it would be to
painters to possess knowledge, even of kinds seemingly most distant from
the line of their profession.

"For instance, now _a priori_, one should not insist upon a great painter's
being a good ornithologist, and yet, for want of being something of a
bird-fancier, look here what he has done--quite absurd, a sort of hawk
introduced, such as never was or could be at any hawking affair in nature:
would not sit upon lady's wrist or answer to her call--would never fly at a
bird. Now you see this is a ridiculous blunder."

While Churchill plumed himself on this critical remark Captain Warmsley
told of who still kept hawks in England, and of the hawking parties he had
seen and heard of--"even this year, that famous hawking in Wiltshire, and
that other in Norfolk."

Churchill asked Warmsley if he had been at Lord Berner's when Landseer was
there studying the subject of his famous hawking scene. "Have you seen
it, Lady Cecilia?" continued he; "it is beautiful; the birds seem to be
absolutely coming out of the picture;" and he was going on with some of
his connoisseurship, and telling of his mortification in having missed the
purchase of that picture; but Warmsley got back to the hawking he had seen,
and he became absolutely eloquent in describing the sport.

Churchill, though eager to speak, listened with tolerably polite patience
till Warmsley came to what he had forgot to mention,--to the label with
the date of place and year that is put upon the heron's leg; to the heron
brought from Denmark, where it had been caught, with the label of having
been let fly from Lord Berner's; "for," continued he, "the heron is always
to be saved if possible, so, when it is down, and the hawk over it, the
falconer has some raw beef ready minced, and lays it on the heron's back,
or a pigeon, just killed, is sometimes used; the hawk devours it, and the
heron, quite safe, as soon as it recovers from its fright, mounts slowly
upward and returns to its heronry."

Helen listened eagerly, and so did Lady Cecilia, who said, "You know,
Helen, our favourite Washington Irving quotes that in days of yore, 'a lady
of rank did not think herself completely equipped in riding forth, unless
she had her tassel-gentel held by jesses on her delicate hand.'"

Before her words were well finished, Beauclerc had decided what he would
do, and the business was half done that is well begun. He was at the
library table, writing as fast as pen could go, to give carte blanche to a
friend, to secure for him immediately a whole hawking establishment which
Warmsley had mentioned, and which was now upon public sale, or privately to
be parted with by the present possessor.

At the very moment when Beauclerc was signing and sealing at one end of the
room, at the other Horace Churchill, to whom something of the same plan
had occurred, was charming Lady Cecilia Clarendon, by hinting to her his
scheme--anticipating the honour of seeing one of his hawks borne upon her
delicate wrist.

Beauclerc, after despatching his letter, came up just in time to catch the
sound and the sense, and took Horace aside to tell him what he had done.
Horace looked vexed, and haughtily observed, that he conceived his place
at Erlesmede was better calculated for a hawking party than most places in
England; and he had already announced his intentions to the ladies. The way
was open to him--but Beauclerc did not see why he should recede; the same
post might carry both their letters--both their orders!"

"How far did your order go, may I ask?" said Churchill.

"Carte blanche."

Churchill owned, with a sarcastic smile, that he was not prepared to go
quite so far. He was not quite so young as Granville; he, unfortunately,
had arrived at years of discretion--he said unfortunately; without ironical
reservation, he protested from the bottom of his heart he considered it as
a misfortune to have become that slow circumspect sort of creature which
looks before it leaps. Even though this might save him from the fate of the
man who was in Sicily, still he considered it as unfortunate to have lost
so much of his natural enthusiasm.

"Natural enthusiasm!" Beauclerc could not help repeating to himself, and he
went on his own way. It must be confessed, as even Beauclerc's best friends
allowed, counting among them Lady Davenant and his guardian, that never
was man of sense more subject to that kind of temporary derangement of the
reasoning powers which results from being what is called bit by a fancy;
he would then run on straight forward, without looking to the right or the
left, in pursuit of his object, great or small. That hawking establishment
now in view, completely shut out, for the moment, all other objects; "of
tercels and of lures he talks;" and before his imagination were hawking
scenes, and Helen with a hawk on her wrist, looking most graceful--a hawk
of his own training it should be. Then, how to train a hawk became the
question. While he was waiting for the answer to his carte blanche, nothing
better, or so good, could be done, as to make himself master of the whole
business, and for this purpose he found it essential to consult every book
on falconry that could be found in the library, and a great plague he
became to everybody in the course of this book-hunt.

"What a bore!" Warmsley might be excused for muttering deep and low between
the teeth. General Clarendon sighed and groaned. Lady Davenant bore and
forebore philosophically--it was for Beauclerc; and to her great philosophy
she gave all the credit of her indulgent partiality. Lady Cecilia,
half-annoyed yet ever good-natured, carried her complaisance so far as to
consult the catalogue and book-shelves sundry times in one hour; but
she was not famous for patience, and she soon resigned him to a better
friend--Helen, the most indefatigable of book-hunters. She had been well
trained to it by her uncle; had been used to it all her life; and really
took pleasure in the tiresome business. She assured Beauclerc it was not
the least trouble, and he thought she looked beautiful when she said so.
Whosoever of the male kind, young, and of ardent, not to say impatient,
spirit, has ever been aided and abetted in a sudden whim, assisted,
forwarded, above all, sympathised with, through all the changes and chances
of a reigning fancy, may possibly conceive how charming, and more charming
every hour, perhaps minute, Helen became in Beauclerc's eyes. But, all in
the way of friendship observe. Perfectly so--on her part, for she could not
have another idea, and it was for this reason she was so much at her ease.
He so understood it, and, thoroughly a gentleman, free from coxcombry, as
he was, and interpreting the language and manners of women with instinctive
delicacy, they went on delightfully. Churchill was on the watch, but he was
not alarmed; all was so undisguised and frank, that now he began to feel
assured that love on her side not only was, but ever would be, quite out of
the question.

Beauclerc was, indeed, in the present instance, really and truly intent
upon what he was about; and he pursued the History of Falconry, with all
its episodes, from the olden time of the Boke of St. Alban's down to the
last number of the Sporting Magazine, including Colonel Thornton's latest
flight, with the adventures of his red falcons, Miss M'Ghee and Lord
Townsend, and his red tercels, Messrs. Croc Franc and Craignon;--not
forgetting that never-to-be forgotten hawking of the Emperor
Arambombamboberus with Trebizonian eagles, on the authority of a manuscript
in the Grand Signior's library.

Beauclerc had such extraordinary dependence upon the sympathy of his
friends, that, when he was reading any thing that interested him, no matter
what they might be doing, he must have their admiration for what charmed
him. He brought his book to Lord Davenant, who was writing a letter."
Listen, oh listen! to this pathetic lament of the falconer,--'Hawks,
heretofore the pride of royalty, the insignia of nobility, the ambassador's
present, the priest's indulgence, companion of the knight, and nursling of
the gentle mistress, are now uncalled-for and neglected.'"

"Ha! very well that," said good-natured Lord Davenant, stopping his pen,
dipping again, dotting, and going on.

Then Beauclerc passaged to Lady Davenant, and, interrupting her in Scott's
Lives of the Novelists, on which she was deeply intent, "Allow me, my dear
Lady Davenant, though you say you are no great topographer, to show you
this, it is so curious; this royal falconer's proclamation--Henry the
Eighth's--to preserve his partridges, pheasants, and herons, from his
palace at Westminster to St. Giles's _in the Fields_, and from thence to
Islington, Hampstead, and Highgate, under penalty for every bird killed of
imprisonment, or whatever other punishment to his highness may seem meet."

Lady Davenant vouchsafed some suitable remark, consonant to expectation, on
the changes of times and places, and men and manners, and then motioned the
quarto away with which motion the quarto reluctantly complied; and then
following Lady Cecilia from window to window, as she _tended_ her flowers,
he would insist upon her hearing the table of precedence for hawks. She,
who never cared for any table of precedence in her life, even where the
higher animals were concerned, would only undertake to remember that the
merlin was a lady's hawk, and this only upon condition, that she should
have one to sit upon her wrist like the fair ladies in Wouvermans'
pictures. But further, as to Peregrine, Gerfalcon, or Gerkin, she would
hear nought of them, nor could she listen, though Granville earnestly
exhorted, to the several good reasons which make a falcon dislike her
master--

1st. If he speak rudely to her. 2nd. If he feed her carelessly.

Before he could get thirdly out, Lady Cecilia stopped him, declaring that
in all her life she never could listen to any thing that began with _first_
and _secondly_--reasons especially.

Horace, meanwhile, looked superior down, and thought with ineffable
contempt of Beauclerc's little skill in the arts of conversation, thus upon
unwilling ears to squander anecdotes which would have done him credit at
some London dinner.

"What I could have made of them! and may make of them yet," thought he;
"but some there are, who never can contrive, as other some cleverly do, to
ride their hobby-horses to good purpose and good effect;--now Beauclerc's
hobbies, I plainly see, will always run away with him headlong, cost him
dear certainly, and, may be, leave him in the mire at last."

What this fancy was to cost him, Beauclerc did not yet know. Two or three
passages in the Sporting Magazine had given some hints of the expense
of this "most delectable of all country contentments," which he had not
thought it necessary to read aloud. And he knew that the late Lord Orford,
an ardent pursuer of this "royal and noble" sport, had expended one hundred
a-year on every hawk he kept, each requiring a separate attendant, and
being moreover indulged in an excursion to the Continent every season
during moulting-time: but Beauclerc said to himself he had no notion of
humouring his hawks to that degree; they should, aristocratic birds though
they be, content themselves in England, and not pretend to "damn the
climate like a lord." And he flattered himself that he should be able to
pursue his fancy more cheaply than any of his predecessors; but as he had
promised his guardian that, after the indulgence granted him in the
Beltravers' cause, he would not call upon him for any more extraordinary
supplies, he resolved, in case the expense exceeded his ways and means, to
sell his hunters, and so indulge in a new love at the expense of an old
one.

The expected pleasure of the first day's hawking was now bright in his
imagination; the day was named, the weather promised well, and the German
cadgers and trainers who had been engaged, and who, along with the whole
establishment, were handed over to Beauclerc, were to come down to
Clarendon Park, and Beauclerc was very happy teaching the merlins to sit on
Lady Cecilia's and on Miss Stanley's wrist. Helen's voice was found to be
peculiarly agreeable to the hawk, who, as Beauclerc observed, loved, like
Lear, that excellent thing in woman, a voice ever soft, gentle, and low.

The ladies were to wear some pretty dresses for the occasion, and all was
gaiety and expectation; and Churchill was mortified when he saw how well
the thing was likely to take, that he was not to be the giver of the fete,
especially as he observed that Helen was particularly pleased--when, to his
inexpressible surprise, Granville Beauclerc came to him, a few days before
that appointed for the hawking-party, and said that he had changed his
mind, that he wished to get rid of the whole concern--that he should be
really obliged to Churchill if he would take his engagement off his hands.
The only reason he gave was, that the establishment would altogether be
more than he could afford, he found he had other calls for money, which
were incompatible with his fancy, and therefore he would give it up.

Churchill obliged him most willingly by taking the whole upon himself,
and he managed so to do in a very ingenious way, without incurring any
preposterous expense. He was acquainted with a set of rich, fashionable
young men, who had taken a sporting lodge in a neighbouring county, who
desired no better than to accede to the terms proposed, and to distinguish
themselves by giving a fete out of the common line, while Churchill, who
understood, like a true man of the world, the worldly art of bargaining,
contrived, with off-hand gentleman-like jockeying, to have every point
settled to his own convenience, and he was to be the giver of the
entertainment to the ladies at Clarendon Park. When this change in affairs
was announced, Lady Cecilia, the general, Lady Davenant, and Helen, were
all, in various degrees, surprised, and each tried to guess what could have
been the cause of Beauclerc's sudden relinquishment of his purpose. He
was--very extraordinary for him--impenetrable: he adhered to the words
"I found I could not afford it." His guardian could not believe in this
wonderful prudence, and was almost certain "there must be some imprudence
at the bottom of it all."

Granville neither admitted nor repelled that accusation. Lady Cecilia
worked away with perpetual little strokes, hoping to strike out the truth,
but, as she said, you might as well have worked at an old flint. Nothing
was elicited from him, even by Lady Davenant; nor did the collision of all
their opinions throw any light upon the matter.

Meanwhile the day for the hawking-party arrived. Churchill gave the fete,
and Beauclerc, as one of the guests, attended and enjoyed it without
the least appearance even of disappointment; and, so far from envying
Churchill, he assisted in remedying any little defects, and did all he
could to make the whole go off well.

The party assembled on a rising ground; a flag was displayed to give notice
of the intended sport; the falconers appeared, picturesque figures in their
green jackets and their long gloves, and their caps plumed with herons'
feathers--some with the birds on their wrists--one with the frame over his
shoulder upon which to set the hawk. _Set_, did we say?--no: "_cast_ your
hawk on the perch" is, Beauclerc observed, the correct term; for, as Horace
sarcastically remarked, Mr. Beauclerc might be detected as a novice in the
art by his over-exactness; his too correct, too attic, pronunciation of the
hawking language. But Granville readily and gaily bore all this ridicule
and raillery, sure that it would neither stick nor stain, enjoying with all
his heart the amusement of the scene--the assembled ladies, the attendant
cavaliers; the hood-winked hawks, the ringing of their brass bells; the
falconers anxiously watching the clouds for the first appearance of the
bird; their skill in loosening the hoods, as, having but one hand at
liberty, they used their teeth to untie the string:----And now the hoods
are off, and the hawks let fly.

They were to fly many castes of hawks this day; the first flight was after
a curlew; and the riding was so hard, so dangerous, from the broken nature
of the ground, that the ladies gave it up, and were contented to view the
sport from the eminence where they remained.

And now there was a question to be decided among the sportsmen as to
the comparative rate of riding at a fox chase, and in "the short, but
terrifically hard gallop, with the eyes raised to the clouds, which is
necessary for the full enjoyment of hawking;" and then the gentlemen,
returning, gathered round the ladies, and the settling the point, watches
in hand, and bets depending, added to the interest of flight the first, and
Churchill, master of the revels, was in the highest spirits.

But presently the sky was overcast, the morning lowered, the wind rose, and
changed was Churchill's brow; there is no such thing as hawking against the
wind--that capricious wind!

"Curse the wind!" cried Churchill; "and confusion seize the fellow who says
there is to be no more hawking to-day!"

The chief falconer, however, was a phlegmatic German, and proper-behaved,
as good falconers should be, who, as "Old Tristram's booke" has it, even
if a bird should be lost, he should never swear, and only say, "_Dieu soit
loue_," and "remember that the mother of hawks is not dead."

But Horace, in the face of reason and in defiance of his German
counsellors, insisted upon letting fly the hawks in this high wind; and it
so fell out that, in the first place, all the terms he used in his haste
and spleen were wrong; and in the next, that the quarry taking down the
wind, the horsemen could not keep up with the hawks: the falconers in great
alarm, called to them by the names they gave them--"Miss Didlington," "Lord
Berners." "Ha! Miss Didlington's off;--off with Blucher, and Lady Kirby,
and Lord Berners, and all of 'em after her." Miss Didlington flew fast
and far, and further still, till she and all the rest were fairly out of
sight--lost, lost, lost!

"And as fine a caste of hawks they were as ever came from Germany!"--the
falconers were in despair, and Churchill saw that the fault was his; and
it looked so like cockney sportsmanship! If Horace had been in a towering
rage, it would have been well enough; but he only grew pettish, snappish,
waspish: now none of those words ending in _ish_ become a gentleman; ladies
always think so, and Lady Cecilia now thought so, and Helen thought so too,
and Churchill saw it, and he grew pale instead of red, and that looks ugly
in an angry man.

But Beauclerc excused him when he was out of hearing; and when others said
he had been cross, and crosser than became the giver of a gala, Beauclerc
pleaded well for him, that falconry has ever been known to be "an extreme
stirrer-up of the passions, being subject to mischances infinite."

However, a cold and hot collation under the trees for some, and under a
tent for others, set all to rights for the present. Champagne sparkled, and
Horace pledged and was pledged, and all were gay; even the Germans at their
own table, after their own fashion, with their Rhenish and their foaming
ale, contrived to drown the recollection of the sad adventure of the truant
hawks.

And when all were refreshed and renewed in mind and body, to the hawking
they went again. For now that

  "The wind was laid, and all their fears asleep,"

there was to be a battle between heron and hawk, one of the finest sights
that can be in all falconry.

"Look! look! Miss Stanley," cried Granville; "look! follow that high-flown
hawk--that black speck in the clouds. Now! now! right over the heron; and
now she will _canceleer_--turn on her wing, Miss Stanley, as she comes
down, whirl round, and balance herself--_chanceler_. Now! now look!
cancelleering gloriously!"

But Helen at this instant recollected what Captain Warmsley had said of the
fresh-killed pigeon, which the falconer in the nick of time is to lay upon
the heron's back; and now, even as the cancelleering was going on--three
times most beautifully, Helen saw only the dove, the white dove, which that
black-hearted German held, his great hand round the throat, just raised to
wring it. "Oh, Beauclerc, save it, save it!" cried Lady Cecilia and Helen
at once.

Beauclerc sprang forward, and, had it been a tiger instead of a dove, would
have done the same no doubt at that moment; the dove was saved, and the
heron killed. If Helen was pleased, so was not the chief falconer, nor any
of the falconers, the whole German council in combustion! and Horace
Churchill deeming it "Rather extraordinary that any gentleman should so
interfere with other gentlemen's hawks."

Lady Cecilia stepped between, and never stepped in vain. She drew a ring
from her finger--a seal; it was the seal of peace--no great value--but
a well-cut bird--a bird for the chief falconer--a guinea-hen, with its
appropriate cry, its polite motto, "Come back, come back;" and she gave it
as a pledge that the ladies would come back another day, and see another
hawking; and the gentlemen were pleased, and the aggrieved attendant
falconers pacified by a promise of another heron from the heronry at
Clarendon Park; and the clouded faces brightened, and "she smoothed the
raven down of darkness till it smiled," whatever that may mean; but, as
Milton said it, it must be sense as well as sound.

At all events, in plain prose, be it understood that every body was
satisfied, even Mr. Churchill; for Beauclerc had repaired for him, just in
time, an error which would have been a blot on his gallantry of the day. He
had forgotten to have some of the pretty grey hairs plucked from the heron,
to give to the ladies to ornament their bonnets, but Beauclerc had secured
them for him, and also two or three of those much-valued, smooth, black
feathers, from the head of the bird, which are so much prized that a plume
of them is often set with pearls and diamonds. Horace presented these most
gracefully to Lady Cecilia and Helen, and was charmed with Lady Cecilia's
parting compliments, which finished with the words "Quite chivalrous."

And so, after all the changes and chances of weather, wind, and humour, all
ended well, and no one rued the hawking of this day.




CHAPTER II.


"But all this time," said Lady Davenant, "you have not told me whether you
have any of you found out what changed Granville's mind about this falconry
scheme--why he so suddenly gave up the whole to Mr. Churchill. Such a
point-blank weathercock turn of fancy in most young men would no more
surprise me than the changes of those clouds in the sky, now shaped and now
unshaped by the driving wind; but in Granville Beauclerc there is always
some reason for apparent caprice, and the reason is often so ingeniously
wrong that it amuses me to hear it; and even as a study in human nature, I
am curious to know the simple fact."

But no one could tell the simple fact, no one could guess his reason, and
from him it never would have been known--never could have been found out,
but from a mistake--from a letter of thanks coming to a wrong person.

One morning, when Helen was sitting in Lady Davenant's room with her, Lord
Davenant came in, reading a letter, like one walking in his sleep.

"What is all this, my dear? Can you explain it to me? Some good action of
yours, I suppose, for which I am to be thanked."

Lady Davenant looked at the letter. She had nothing to do with the
matter, she said; but, on second thoughts, exclaimed, "This is Granville
Beauclerc's doing, I am clear!"

The letter was from Count Polianski, one of the poor banished Poles; now
poor, but who had been formerly master of a property estimated at about one
hundred and sixty-five thousand _available individuals_. In attempting
to increase the happiness and secure the liberty of these available
individuals, the count had lost every thing, and had been banished from his
country--a man of high feeling as well as talents, and who had done all he
could for that unhappy country, torn to pieces by demagogues from within
and tyrants from without.

Lady Davenant now recollected that Beauclerc had learned from her all this,
and had heard her regretting that the circumstances in which Lord Davenant
was placed at this moment, prevented the possibility of his affording this
poor count assistance for numbers of his suffering fellow-countrymen who
had been banished along with him, and who were now in London in the utmost
distress. Lady Davenant remembered that she had been speaking to Granville
on this subject the very day that he had abandoned his falconry project.
"Now I understand it all," said she; "and it is like all I know and all
I have hoped of him. These hundreds a-year which he has settled on these
wretched exiles, are rather better disposed of in a noble national cause,
than in pampering one set of birds that they may fly at another set."

"And yet this is done," said Lord Davenant, "by one of the much reviled,
high-bred English gentlemen--among whom, let the much reviling, low-bred
English democrats say what they will, we find every day instances of
subscription for public purposes from private benevolence, in a spirit of
princely charity to be found only in our own dear England--England with all
her faults.'"

"But this was a less ordinary sort of generosity of Granville's," said Lady
Davenant,--"the giving up a new pleasure, a new whim with all its gloss
fresh upon it, full and bright in his eye."

"True," said Lord Davenant; "I never saw a strong-pulling fancy better
thrown upon its haunches."

The white dove, whose life Helen had saved, was brought home by Beauclerc,
and was offered to her and accepted. Whether she had done a good or a bad
action, by thus saving the life of a pigeon at the expense of a heron, may
be doubted, and will be decided according to the several tastes of ladies
and gentlemen for herons or doves. As Lady Davenant remarked, Helen's
humanity (or dove-anity, as Churchill called it,) was of that equivocal
sort which is ready to destroy one creature to save another which may
happen to be a greater favourite.

Be this as it may, the favourite had a friend upon the present occasion,
and no less a friend than General Clarendon, who presented it with a marble
basin, such as doves should drink out of, by right of long prescription.

The general feared, he said, "that this vase might be a little too
deep--dangerously perhaps----."

But Helen thought nothing could be altogether more perfect in taste and in
kindness--approving Beauclerc's kindness too--a remembrance of a day most
agreeably spent. Churchill, to whom she looked, as she said the last words,
with all becoming politeness, bowed and accepted the compliment, but with
a reserve of jealousy on the brow; and as he looked again at the dove,
caressing and caressed, and then at the classic vase--he stood vexed, and
to himself he said,--

"So this is the end of all my pains--hawking and all 'quite chivalrous!'
Beauclerc carries off the honours and pleasures of the day, and his present
and his dove are to be all in all. Yet still," continued he to himself in
more consolatory thought--"she is so open in her very love for the bird,
that it is plain she has not yet any love for the man. She would
be somewhat more afraid to show it, delicate as she is. It is only
friendship--honest friendship, on her side; and if her affections be not
engaged somewhere else--she may be mine: if--if I please--if--I can bring
myself fairly to propose--we shall see--I shall think of it."

And now he began to think of it seriously.--Miss Stanley's indifference to
him, and the unusual difficulty which he found in making any impression,
stimulated him in an extraordinary degree. Helen now appeared to him even
more beautiful than he had at first thought her--"Those eyes that fix so
softly," thought he, "those dark eyelashes--that blush coming and going so
beautifully--and there is a timid grace in all her motions, with that
fine figure too--and that high-bred turn of the neck!--altogether she is
charming! and she will be thought so!--she must be mine!"

She would do credit to his taste; he thought she would, when she had a
little more _usage du monde_, do the honours of his house well; and it
would be delightful to train her!--If he could but engage her affections,
before she had seen more of the world, she might really love him for his
own sake--and Churchill wished to be really loved, if possible, for his own
sake; but of the reality of modern love he justly doubted, especially for
a man of his fortune and his age; yet, with Helen's youth and innocence
he began to think he had some chance of disinterested attachment, and he
determined to bring out for her the higher powers of his mind--the better
parts of his character.

One day Lady Davenant had been speaking of London conversation. "So
brilliant," said she, "so short-lived, as my friend Lady Emmeline K----
once said, 'London wit is like gas, which lights at a touch, and at a touch
can be extinguished;'" and Lady Davenant concluded with a compliment to
him who was known to have this "_touch and go_" of good conversation to
perfection.

Mr. Churchill bowed to the compliment, but afterwards sighed, and it seemed
an honest sigh, from the bottom of his heart. Only Lady Davenant and Helen
were in the room, and turning to Lady Davenant he said,

"If I have it, I have paid dearly for it, more than it is worth, much
too dearly, by the sacrifice of higher powers; I might have been a very
different person from what I am."

Helen's attention was instantly fixed; but Lady Davenant suspected he was
now only talking for effect. He saw what she thought--it was partly true,
but not quite. He felt what he said at the moment; and besides, there is
always a sincere pleasure in speaking of one's self when one can do it
without exposing one's self to ridicule, and with a chance of obtaining
real sympathy.

"It was my misfortune," he said, "to be spoiled, even in childhood, by my
mother."

As he pronounced the word "mother," either his own heart or Helen's eyes
made him pause with a look of respectful tenderness. It was cruel of a son
to blame the fond indulgence of a mother; but the fact was, she brought
him too forward early as a clever child, fed him too much with that sweet
dangerous fostering dew of praise. The child--the man--must suffer for it
afterwards.

"True, very true," said Lady Davenant; "I quite agree with you."

"I could do nothing without flattery," continued he, pursuing the line of
confession which he saw had fixed Lady Davenant's attention favourably.
"Unluckily, I came too early into possession of a large fortune, and into
the London world, and I lapped the stream of prosperity as I ran, and it
was sweet with flattery, intoxicating, and I knew it, and yet could
not forbear it. Then in a London life every thing is too
stimulating--over-exciting. If there are great advantages to men of science
and literature in museums and public libraries, the more than _Avicenna_
advantages of having books come at will, and ministering spirits in waiting
on all your pursuits--there is too much of every thing except time, and too
little of that. The treasures are within our reach, but we cannot clutch;
we have, but we cannot hold. We have neither leisure to be good, nor to be
great: who can think of living for posterity, when he can scarcely live for
the day? and sufficient for the day are never the hours thereof. From want
of time, and from the immense quantity that nevertheless must be known,
comes the necessity, the unavoidable necessity of being superficial."

"Why should it be unavoidable necessity?" asked Lady Davenant.

"Because _should_ waits upon _must_, in London always, if not elsewhere,"
said Churchill.

"A conversation answer," replied Lady Davenant.

"Yes, I allow it; it is even so, just so, and to such tricks, such playing
upon words, do the bad habits of London conversation lead;" and Lady
Davenant wondered at the courage of his candour, as he went on to speak of
the petty jealousies, the paltry envy, the miserable selfish susceptibility
generated by the daily competition of London society. Such dissensions,
such squabbles--an ignoble but appropriate word--such deplorable, such
scandalous squabbles among literary, and even among scientific men.
"And who," continued he, "who can hope to escape in such a tainted
atmosphere--an atmosphere overloaded with life, peopled with myriads of
little buzzing stinging vanities! It really requires the strength of
Hercules, mind and body, to go through our labours, fashionable, political,
_bel esprit_, altogether too much for mortal. In parliament, in politics,
in the tug of war you see how the strongest minds fail, come to
untimely----"

"Do not touch upon that subject," cried Lady Davenant, suddenly agitated.
Then, commanding herself, she calmly added--"As you are not now, I think,
in parliament, it cannot affect you. What were you saying?--your health of
mind and body, I think you said, you were sensible had been hurt by----"

"These straining, incessant competitions have hurt me. My health suffered
first, then my temper. It was originally good, now, as you have seen, I
am afraid"--glancing at Helen, who quickly looked down, "I am afraid I am
irritable."

There was an awkward silence. Helen thought it was for Lady Davenant to
speak; but Lady Davenant did not contradict Mr. Churchill. Now, the not
contradicting a person who is abusing himself, is one of the most heinous
offences to self-love that can be committed; and it often provokes false
candour to pull off the mask and throw it in your face; but either Mr.
Horace Churchill's candour was true, or it was so well guarded at the
moment that no such catastrophe occurred.

"Worse than this bad effect on my temper!" continued he, "I feel that my
whole mind has been deteriorated--my ambition dwindled to the shortest
span--my thoughts contracted to the narrow view of mere effect; what would
please at the dinner-table or at the clubs--what will be thought of me
by this literary coterie, or in that fashionable boudoir. And for this
_reputation de salon_ I have sacrificed all hope of other reputation,
all power of obtaining it, all hope of "----(here he added a few words,
murmured down to Lady Davenant's embroidery frame, yet still in such a tone
that Helen could not help thinking he meant she should hear)--"If I had a
heart such as--" he paused, and, as if struck with some agonising thought,
he sighed deeply, and then added--"but I have not a heart worth such
acceptance, or I would make the offer."

Helen was not sure what these words meant, but she now pitied him, and she
admired his candour, which she thought was so far above the petty sort
of character he had at first done himself the injustice to seem, and she
seized the first opportunity to tell Beauclerc all Mr. Churchill had said
to Lady Davenant and to her, and of the impression it had made upon them
both. Beauclerc had often discussed Mr. Churchill's character with her,
but she was disappointed when she saw that what she told made no agreeable
impression on Beauclerc: at first he stood quite silent, and when she asked
what he thought, he said--"It's all very fine, very clever."

"But it is all true," said Helen, "And I admire Mr. Churchill's knowing the
truth so well and telling it so candidly."

"Every thing Mr. Churchill has said may be true--and yet I think the truth
is not in him."

"You are not usually so suspicious," said Helen. "If you had heard Mr.
Churchill's voice and emphasis, and seen his look and manner at the time, I
think you could not have doubted him."

The more eager she grew, the colder Mr. Beauclerc became. "Look and manner,
and voice and emphasis," said he, "make a great impression, I know, on
ladies."

"But what is your reason, Mr. Beauclerc, for disbelief? I have as yet only
heard that you believe every thing that Mr. Churchill said was true,
and yet that you do not believe in his truth," said Helen, in a tone of
raillery.

And many a time before had Beauclerc been the first to laugh when one
of his own paradoxes stared him in the face; but now he was more out of
countenance than amused, and he looked seriously about for reasons to
reconcile his seeming self-contradiction.

"In the first place, all those allusions and those metaphorical
expressions, which you have so wonderfully well remembered, and which no
doubt were worth remembering, all those do not give me the idea of a man
who was really feeling in earnest, and speaking the plain truth about
faults, for which, if he felt at all, he must be too much ashamed to talk
in such a grand style; and to talk of them at all, except to most intimate
friends, seems so unnatural, and quite out of character in a man who had
expressed such horror of egotists, and who is so excessively circumspect in
general."

"Yes, but Mr. Churchill's forgetting all his little habits of
circumspection, and all fear of ridicule, is the best proof of his being
quite in earnest--that all he said was from his heart."

"I doubt whether he has any heart," said Beauclerc.

"Poor man, he said----" Helen began, and then recollecting the words, 'or
I would make the offer,' she stopped short, afraid of the construction they
might bear, and then, ashamed of her fear, she coloured deeply.

"Poor man, he said----" repeated Beauclerc, fixing his eyes upon her,
"What did he say, may I ask?"

"No,--" said Helen, "I am not sure that I distinctly heard or understood
Mr. Churchill."

"Oh, if there was any mystery!" Beauclerc begged pardon.

And he went away very quickly. He did not touch upon the subject again, but
Helen saw that he never forgot it; and, by few words which she heard him
say to Lady Davenant about his dislike to half-confidences, she knew he
was displeased, and she thought he was wrong. She began to fear that his
mistrust of Churchill arose from envy at his superior success in society;
and, though she was anxious to preserve her newly-acquired good opinion of
Churchill's candour, she did not like to lose her esteem for Beauclerc's
generosity. Was it possible that he could be seriously hurt at the
readiness with which Mr. Churchill availed himself of any idea which
Beauclerc threw out, and which he dressed up, and passed as his own?
Perhaps this might be what he meant by "the truth is not in him." She
remembered one day when she sat between him and Beauclerc, and when he did
not seem to pay the least attention to what Mr. Beauclerc was saying to
her, yet fully occupied as he had apparently been in talking for the
company in general, he had through all heard Granville telling the Chinese
fable of the "Man in the Moon, whose business it is to knit together
with an invisible silken cord those who are predestined for each other."
Presently, before the dessert was over, Helen found the "Chinese Man in the
Moon," whom she thought she had all to herself, figuring at the other end
of the table, and received with great applause. And was it possible that
Beauclerc, with his abundant springs of genius, could grudge a drop
thus stolen from him? but without any envy in the case, he was right in
considering such theft, however petty, as a theft, and right in despising
the meanness of the thief. Such meanness was strangely incompatible with
Mr. Churchill's frank confession of his own faults. Could that confession
be only for effect?

Her admiration had been sometimes excited by a particular happiness of
thought, beauty of expression, or melody of language in Mr. Churchill's
conversation. Once Beauclerc had been speaking with enthusiasm of modern
Greece, and his hopes that she might recover her ancient character; and
Mr. Churchill, as if admiring the enthusiasm, yet tempering it with better
judgment, smiled, paused, and answered.

"But Greece is a dangerous field for a political speculator; the
imagination produces an illusion resembling the beautiful appearances which
are sometimes exhibited in the Sicilian straits; the reflected images of
ancient Grecian glory pass in a rapid succession before the mental eye;
and, delighted with the captivating forms of greatness and splendour, we
forget for a moment that the scene is in reality a naked waste."

Some people say they can distinguish between a written and a spoken style,
but this depends a good deal on the art of the speaker. Churchill could
give a colloquial tone to a ready-written sentence, and could speak it
with an off-hand grace, a carelessness which defied all suspicion of
preparation; and the look, and pause, and precipitation--each and all came
in aid of the actor's power of perfecting the illusion. If you had heard
and seen him, you would have believed that, in speaking this passage, the
thought of the _Fata Morgana_ rose in his mind at the instant, and that,
seeing it pleased you, and pleased with it himself, encouraged by your
look of intelligence, and borne along by your sympathy, the eloquent
man followed his own idea with a happiness more than care, admirable in
conversation. A few days afterwards, Helen was very much surprised to find
her admired sentence word for word in a book, from which Churchill's card
fell as she opened it.

Persons without a name Horace treated as barbarians who did not know the
value of their gold; and he seemed to think that, if they chanced to
possess rings and jewels, they might be plucked from them without remorse,
and converted to better use by some lucky civilised adventurer. Yet in his
most successful piracies he was always haunted by the fear of discovery,
and he especially dreaded the acute perception of Lady Davenant; he thought
she suspected his arts of appropriation, and he took the first convenient
opportunity of sounding her opinion on this point.

"How I enjoy," said he to Lady Cecilia "telling a good story to you, for
you never ask if it is a fact. Now, in a good story, no one sticks to
absolute fact; there must be some little embellishment. No one would send
his own or his friend's story into the world without 'putting a hat on its
head, and a stick into its hand,'" Churchill triumphantly quoted; this time
he did not steal.

"But," said Lady Davenant, "I find that even the pleasure I have in mere
characteristic or humorous narration is heightened by my dependence on the
truth--the character for truth--of the narrator."

Not only Horace Churchill, but almost every body present, except Helen,
confessed that they could not agree with her. The character for truth
of the story-teller had nothing to do with his story, unless it was
_historique_, or that he was to swear to it.

"And even if it were _historique_," cried Horace, buoyed up at the moment
by the tide in his favour, and floating out farther than was prudent--"and
even if it were _historique_, how much pleasanter is graceful fiction than
grim, rigid truth; and how much more amusing in my humble opinion!"

"Now," said Lady Davenant, "for instance, this book I am reading--(it was
Dumont's 'Memoires de Mirabeau')--this book which I am reading, gives
me infinitely increased pleasure, from my certain knowledge, my perfect
conviction of the truth of the author. The self-evident nature of some of
the facts would support themselves, you may say, in some instances; but my
perceiving the scrupulous care he takes to say no more than what he knows
to be true, my perfect reliance on the relater's private character for
integrity, gives a zest to every anecdote he tells--a specific weight to
every word of conversation which he repeats--appropriate value to every
trait of wit or humour characteristic of the person he describes. Without
such belief, the characters would not have to me, as they now have, all
the power, and charm, and life, of nature and reality. They are all now
valuable as records of individual varieties that have positively so
existed. While the most brilliant writer could, by fiction, have produced
an effect, valuable only as representing the general average of human
nature, but adding nothing to our positive knowledge, to the data from
which we can reason in future."

Churchill understood Lady Davenant too well to stand quite unembarrassed as
he listened; and when she went on to say how differently she should have
felt in reading these memoirs if they had been written by Mirabeau himself;
with all his brilliancy, all his talents, how inferior would have been her
enjoyment as well as instruction! his shrinking conscience told him how
this might all be applied to himself; yet, strange to say, though somewhat
abashed, he was nevertheless flattered by the idea of a parallel between
himself and Mirabeau. To _Mirabeauder_ was no easy task; it was a certain
road to notoriety, if not to honest fame.

But even in the better parts of his character, his liberality in money
matters, his good-natured patronage of rising genius, the meanness of his
mind broke out. There was a certain young poetess whom he had encouraged;
she happened to be sister to Mr. Mapletofft, Lord Davenant's secretary, and
she had spoken with enthusiastic gratitude of Mr. Churchill's kindness. She
was going to publish a volume of Sonnets under Mr. Churchill's patronage,
and, as she happened to be now at some country town in the neighbourhood,
he requested Lady Cecilia to allow him to introduce this young authoress to
her. She was invited for a few days to Clarendon Park, and Mr. Churchill
was zealous to procure subscriptions for her, and eager to lend the aid of
his fashion and his literary reputation to bring forward the merits of her
book. "Indeed," he whispered, "he had given her some little help in the
composition," and all went well till, in an evil hour, Helen praised one
of the sonnets rather too much--more, he thought, than she had praised
another, which was his own. His jealousy wakened--he began to criticise his
protegee's poetry. Helen defended her admiration, and reminded him that he
had himself recommended these lines to her notice.

"Well!--yes--I did say the best I could for the whole thing, and for her it
is surprising--that is, I am anxious the publication should take. But if we
come to compare--you know this cannot stand certain comparisons that might
be made. Miss Stanley's own taste and judgment must perceive--when we talk
of genius--that is quite out of the question, you know."

Horace was so perplexed between his philanthropy and his jealousy, his
desire to show the one and his incapability of concealing the other, that
he became unintelligible; and Helen laughed, and told him that she could
not now understand what his opinion really was. She was quite ready to
agree with him, she said, if he would but agree with himself: this made him
disagree still more with himself and unluckily with his better self, his
benevolence quite gave way before his jealousy and ill-humour, and he
vented it upon the book; and, instead of prophecies of its success, he
now groaned over "sad careless lines,"--"passages that lead to
nothing,"--"similes that will not hold when you come to examine them."

Helen pointed out in the dedication a pretty, a happy thought.

Horace smiled, and confessed that was his own.

What! in the dedication to himself?--and in the blindness of his vanity he
did not immediately see the absurdity.

The more he felt himself in the wrong, of course the more angry he grew,
and it finished by his renouncing the dedication altogether, declaring he
would have none of it. The book and the lady might find a better patron.
There are things which no man of real generosity could say or do, or think,
put him in ever so great a passion. He would not be harsh to an inferior--a
woman--a protegee on whom he had conferred obligations; but Mr. Churchill
was harsh--he showed neither generosity nor feeling; and Helen's good
opinion of him sank to rise no more.

Of this, however, he had not enough of the sympathy or penetration of
feeling to be aware.




CHAPTER III.


The party now at Clarendon Park consisted chiefly of young people. Among
them were two cousins of Lady Cecilia's, whom Helen had known at Cecilhurst
before they went abroad, while she was still almost a child. Lady Katrine
Hawksby, the elder, was several years older than Cecilia. When Helen last
saw her, she was tolerably well-looking, very fashionable, and remarkable
for high spirits, with a love for _quizzing_, and for all that is vulgarly
called _fun_, and a talent for ridicule, which she indulged at everybody's
expense. She had always amused Cecilia, who thought her more diverting than
really ill-natured; but Helen thought her more ill-natured than diverting,
never liked her, and had her own private reasons for thinking that she was
no good friend to Cecilia: but now, in consequence either of the wear and
tear of London life, or of a disappointment in love or matrimony, she had
lost the fresh plumpness of youth; and gone too was that spirit of mirth,
if not of good humour, which used to enliven her countenance. Thin and
sallow, the sharp features remained, and the sarcastic without the arch
expression; still she had a very fashionable air. Her pretensions to youth,
as her dress showed, were not gone; and her hope of matrimony, though
declining, not set. Her many-years-younger sister, Louisa, now Lady
Castlefort, was beautiful. As a girl, she had been the most sentimental,
refined, delicate creature conceivable; always talking poetry--and so
romantic--with such a soft, sweet, die-away voice--lips apart--and such
fine eyes, that could so ecstatically turn up to heaven, or be so cast
down, charmingly fixed in contemplation:--and now she is married, just the
same. There she is, established in the library at Clarendon Park, with the
most sentimental fashionable novel of the day, beautifully bound, on the
little rose-wood table beside her, and a manuscript poem, a great secret,
"Love's Last Sigh," in her bag with her smelling-bottle and embroidered
handkerchief; and on that beautiful arm she leaned so gracefully, with her
soft languishing expression; so perfectly dressed too--handsomer than ever.

Helen was curious to know what sort of man Lady Louisa had married, for she
recollected that no hero of any novel that ever was read, or talked of,
came up to her idea of what a hero ought to be, of what a man must be, whom
she could ever think of loving. Cecilia told Helen that she had seen Lord
Castlefort, but that he was not Lord Castlefort, or likely to be Lord
Castlefort, at that time; and she bade her guess, among all she could
recollect having ever seen at Cecilhurst, who the man of Louisa's choice
could be. Lady Katrine, with infinite forbearance, smiled, and gave no
hint, while Helen guessed and guessed in vain. She was astonished when she
saw him come into the room. He was a little deformed man, for whom Lady
Louisa had always expressed to her companions a peculiar abhorrence. He had
that look of conceit which unfortunately sometimes accompanies personal
deformity, and which disgusts even Pity's self. Lord Castlefort was said
to have declared himself made for love and fighting! Helen remembered
that kind-hearted Cecilia had often remonstrated for humanity's sake, and
stopped the quizzing which used to go on in their private coteries, when
the satirical elder sister would have it that _le petit bossu_ was in love
with Louisa.

But what _could_ make her marry him? Was there anything within to make
amends for the exterior? Nothing--nothing that could "rid him of the lump
behind." But superior to the metamorphoses of love, or of fairy tale,
are the metamorphoses of fortune. Fortune had suddenly advanced him to
uncounted thousands and a title, and no longer _le petit bossu_, Lord
Castlefort obtained the fair hand--the very fair hand of Lady Louisa
Hawksby, _plus belle que fee!_

Still Helen could not believe that Louisa had married him voluntarily; but
Lady Cecilia assured her that it was voluntarily, quite voluntarily. "You
could not have so doubted had you seen the _trousseau_ and the _corbeille_,
for you know, '_Le present fait oublier le futur_.'"

Helen could scarcely smile.

"But Louisa had feeling--really some," continued Lady Cecilia; "but she
could not afford to follow it. She had got into such debt, I really do not
know what she would have done if Lord Castlefort had not proposed; but she
has some little heart, and I could tell you a secret; but no, I will leave
you the pleasure of finding it out."

"It will be no pleasure to me," said Helen.

"I never saw anybody so out of spirits," cried Lady Cecilia, laughing,
"at another's unfortunate marriage, which all the time she thinks very
fortunate. She is quite happy, and even Katrine does not laugh at him any
longer, it is to be supposed; it is no laughing matter now."

"No indeed," said Helen.

"Nor a crying matter either," said Cecilia. "Do not look shocked at me, my
dear, I did not do it; but so many do, and I have seen it so often, that
I cannot wonder with such a foolish face of blame--I do believe, my dear
Helen, that you are envious because Louisa is married before you! for
shame, my love! Envy is a naughty passion, you know our Madame Bonne used
to say; but here's mamma, now talk to her about Louisa Castlefort, pray."

Lady Davenant took the matter with great coolness, was neither shocked nor
surprised at this match, she had known so many worse; Lord Castlefort, as
well as she recollected, was easy enough to live with. "And after all,"
said she, "it is better than what we see every day, the fairest of the
fair knowingly, willingly giving themselves to the most profligate of the
profligate, In short, the market is so overstocked with accomplished young
ladies on the one hand, and on the other, men find wives and establishments
so expensive, clubs so cheap and so much more luxurious than any home,
liberty not only so sweet but so fashionable, that their policy, their
maxim is, 'Marry not at all, or if marriage be ultimately necessary to pay
debts and leave heirs to good names, marry as late as possible;' and thus
the two parties with their opposite interests stand at bay, or try to
outwit or outbargain each other. And if you wish for the moral of the whole
affair, here it is from the vulgar nursery-maids, with their broad sense
and bad English, and the good or bad French of the governess, to the
elegant inuendo of the drawing-room, all is working to the same effect:
dancing-masters, music-masters, and all the tribe, what is it all for, but
to prepare young ladies for the grand event; and to raise in them, besides
the natural, a factitious, an abstract idea of good in being married!
Every girl in these days is early impressed with the idea that she must be
married, that she cannot be happy unmarried. Here is an example of what I
meant the other day by strength of mind; it requires some strength of mind
to be superior to such a foolish, vain, and vulgar belief."

"It will require no great strength of mind in me," said Helen, "for I
really never have formed such notions. They never were early put into my
head; my uncle always said a woman might be very happy unmarried. I do not
think I shall ever be seized with a terror of dying an old maid."

"You are not come to the time yet, my dear," said Lady Davenant smiling.
"Look at Lady Katrine; strength of mind on this one subject would have
saved her from being a prey to envy, and jealousy, and all the vulture
passions of the mind.

"In the old French _regime_," continued Lady Davenant, "the young women
were at least married safely out of their convents; but our young ladies,
with their heads full of high-flown poetry and sentimental novels, are
taken out into the world before marriage, expected to see and not to
choose, shown the most agreeable, and expected, doomed to marry the most
odious. But, in all these marriages for establishment, the wives who have
least feeling are not only likely to be the happiest, but also most likely
to conduct themselves well. In the first place they do not begin with
falsehood. If they have no hearts, they cannot pretend to give any to
the husband, and that is better than having given them to somebody else.
Husband and wife, in this case, clearly understand the terms of agreement,
expect, imagine no more than they have, and jog-trot they go on together to
the end of life very comfortably."

"Comfortably!" exclaimed Helen, "it must be most miserable."

"Not most miserable, Helen," said Lady Davenant, "keep your pity for
others; keep your sighs for those who need them--for the heart which no
longer dares to utter a sigh for itself, the faint heart that dares to
love, but dares not abide by its choice. Such infatuated creatures, with
the roots of feeling left aching within them, must take what opiates they
can find; and in after-life, through all their married existence, their
prayer must be for indifference, and thankful may they be if that prayer is
granted."

These words recurred to Helen that evening, when Lady Castlefort sang some
tender and passionate airs; played on the harp with a true Saint Cecilia
air and attitude; and at last, with charming voice and touching expression,
sung her favourite--"Too late for redress."

Both Mr. Churchill and Beauclerc were among the group of gentlemen;
neither was a stranger to her. Mr. Churchill admired and applauded as a
connoisseur. Beauclerc listened in silence. Mr. Churchill entreated for
more--more--and named several of his favourite Italian airs. Her ladyship
really could not. But the slightest indication of a wish from Beauclerc,
was, without turning towards him, heard and attended to, as her sister
failed not to remark and to make others remark.

Seizing a convenient pause while Mr. Churchill was searching for some
master-piece, Lady Katrine congratulated her sister on having recovered her
voice, and declared that she had never heard her play or sing since she was
married till tonight.

"You may consider it as a very particular compliment, I assure you,"
continued she, addressing herself so particularly to Mr. Beauclerc that he
could not help being a little out of countenance,--"I have so begged and
prayed, but she was never in voice or humour, or heart, or something.
Yesterday, even Castlefort was almost on his knees for a song,--were not
you, Lord Castlefort?"

Lord Castlefort pinched his pointed chin, and casting up an angry look,
replied in a dissonant voice,--"I do not remember!"

"_Tout voir, tout entendre, tout oublier_," whispered Lady Katrine to
Mr. Churchill, as she stooped to assist him in the search for a
music-book--"_Tout voir, tout entendre, tout oublier_, should be the motto
adopted by all married people."

Lady Castlefort seemed distressed, and turned over the leaves in such a
flutter that she could not find anything, and she rose, in spite of all
entreaties, leaving the place to her sister, who was, she said, "so much
better a musician and not so foolishly nervous." Lady Castlefort said her
"voice always went away when she was at all--"

There it ended as far as words went; but she sighed, and retired so
gracefully, that all the gentlemen pitied her.

There is one moment in which ill-nature sincerely repents--the moment when
it sees pity felt for its victim.

Horace followed Lady Castlefort to the ottoman, on which she sank.
Beauclerc remained leaning on the back of Lady Katrine's chair, but without
seeming to hear what she said or sung. After some time Mr. Churchill, not
finding his attentions well received, or weary of paying them, quitted Lady
Castlefort but sat down by Helen; and in a voice to be heard by her, but by
no one else, he said--

"What a relief!--I thought I should never get away!" Then, favoured by a
loud bravura of Lady Katrine's, he went on--"That beauty, between you
and me, is something of a bore--she--I don't mean the lady who is now
screaming--she should always sing. Heaven blessed her with song, not
sense--but here one is made so fastidious!"

He sighed, and for some moments seemed to be given up to the duet which
Lady Katrine and an officer were performing; and then exclaimed, but so
that Helen only could hear,--"Merciful Heaven! how often one wishes one had
no ears: that Captain Jones must be the son of Stentor, and that lady!--if
angels sometimes saw themselves in a looking-glass when singing--there
would be peace upon earth."

Helen, not liking to be the secret receiver of his contraband good things,
was rising to change her place, when softly detaining her, he said, "Do not
be afraid, no danger--trust me, for I have studied under Talma."

"What can you mean?"

"I mean," continued he, "that Talma taught me the secret of his dying
scenes--how every syllable of his dying words might be heard to the
furthest part of the audience; and I--give me credit for my ingenuity--know
how, by reversing the art, to be perfectly inaudible at ten paces'
distance, and yet, I trust, perfectly intelligible, always, to you."

Helen now rose decidedly, and retreated to a table at the other side of the
room, and turned over some books that lay there--she took up a volume of
the novel Lady Castlefort had been reading--"Love unquestionable." She was
surprised to find it instantly, gently, but decidedly drawn from her hand:
she looked up--it was Beauclerc.

"I beg your pardon, Miss Stanley, but----"

"Thank you! thank you!" said Helen; "you need not beg my pardon."

This was the first time Beauclerc had spoken in his friendly, cordial,
natural manner, to her, since their incomprehensible misunderstanding. She
was heartily glad it was over, and that he was come to himself again. And
now they conversed very happily together for some time; though what they
said might not be particularly worth recording. Lady Katrine was at Helen's
elbow before she perceived her "looking for her sac;" and Lady Castlefort
came for her third volume, and gliding off, wished to all--"_Felice,
felicissima notte_."

Neither of these sisters had ever liked Helen; she was too true for the
one, and too good-natured for the other. Lady Katrine had always, even when
she was quite a child, been jealous of Lady Cecilia's affection for Helen;
and now her indignation and disappointment were great at finding her
established at Clarendon Park--to live with the Clarendons, to _go out_
with Lady Cecilia. Now, it had been the plan of both sisters, that Lady
Katrine's present visit should be eternal. How they would ever have managed
to fasten her ladyship upon the General, even if Helen had been out of the
question, need not now be considered. Their disappointment and dislike to
Helen were as great as if she had been the only obstacle to the fulfilment
of their scheme.

These two sisters had never agreed--

  --"Doom'd by Fate
  To live in all the elegance of hate;"

and since Lady Castlefort's marriage, the younger, the beautiful being now
the successful lady of the ascendant, the elder writhed in all the combined
miseries of jealousy and dependance, and an everyday lessening chance of
bettering her condition. Lord Castlefort, too, for good reasons of his own,
well remembered, detested Lady Katrine, and longed to shake her off. In
this wish, at least, husband and wife united; but Lady Castlefort had no
decent excuse for her ardent impatience to get rid of her sister. She had
magnificent houses in town and country, ample room everywhere--but in her
heart. She had the smallest heart conceivable, and the coldest; but had it
been ever so large, or ever so warm, Lady Katrine was surely not the person
to get into it, or into any heart, male or female: there was the despair.
"If Katrine was but married--Mr. Churchill, suppose?"

Faint was the _suppose_ in Lady Castlefort's imagination. Not so the
hope which rose in Lady Katrine's mind the moment she saw him here. "How
fortunate!" Her ladyship had now come to that no particular age, when a
remarkable metaphysical phenomenon occurs; on one particular subject hope
increases as all probability of success decreases. This aberration of
intellect is usually observed to be greatest in very clever women; while
Mr. Churchill, the flattered object of her present hope, knew how to manage
with great innocence and modesty, and draw her on to overt acts of what is
called flirtation.

Rousseau says that a man is always awkward and miserable when placed
between two women to whom he is making love. But Rousseau had never
seen Mr. Churchill, and had but an imperfect idea of the dexterity,
the ambiguity, that in our days can be successfully practised by an
accomplished male coquette. Absolutely to blind female jealousy may be
beyond his utmost skill; but it is easy, as every day's practice shows, to
keep female vanity pleasantly perplexed by ocular deception--to make her
believe that what she really sees she does not see, and that what is unreal
is reality: to make her, to the amusement of the spectators, continually
stretch out her hand to snatch the visionary good that for ever eludes her
grasp, or changes, on near approach, to grinning mockery.

This delightful game was now commenced with Lady Katrine, and if Helen
could be brought to take a snatch, it would infinitely increase the
interest and amusement of the lookers on. Of this, however, there seemed
little chance; but the evil eye of envy was set upon her, and the demon of
jealousy was longing to work her woe.

Lady Castlefort saw with scornful astonishment that Mr. Beauclerc's eyes,
sometimes when she was speaking, or when she was singing, would stray
to that part of the room where Miss Stanley might be; and when she was
speaking to him, he was wonderfully absent. Her ladyship rallied him, while
Lady Katrine, looking on, cleared her throat in her horrid way, and longed
for an opportunity to discomfit Helen, which supreme pleasure her ladyship
promised herself upon the first convenient occasion,--convenient meaning
when Lady Davenant was out of the room; for Lady Katrine, though urged
by prompting jealousy, dared not attack her when under cover of that
protection. From long habit, even her sarcastic nature stood in awe of a
certain power of moral indignation, which had at times flashed upon
her, and of which she had a sort of superstitious dread, as of an
incomprehensible, incalculable power.

But temper will get the better of all prudence. Piqued by some little
preference which Lady Cecilia had shown to Helen's taste in the choice of
the colour of a dress, an occasion offered of signalising her revenge,
which could not be resisted. It was a question to be publicly decided,
whether blue, green, or white should be adopted for the ladies' uniform
at an approaching _fete_. She was deputed to collect the votes. All the
company were assembled; Lady Davenant, out of the circle, as it was a
matter that concerned her not, was talking to the gentlemen apart.

Lady Katrine went round canvassing. "Blue, green, or white? say blue,
_pray_." But when she came to Helen, she made a full stop, asked no
question--preferred no prayer, but after fixing attention by her pause,
said, "I need not ask Miss Stanley's vote or opinion, as I know my
cousin's, and with Miss Stanley it is always 'I say ditto to Lady Cecilia;'
therefore, to save trouble, I always count two for Cecilia--one for herself
and one for her _double_."

"Right, Lady Katrine Hawksby," cried a voice from afar, which made her
start; "you are quite right to consider Helen Stanley as my daughter's
double, for my daughter loves and esteems her as her second self--her
better self. In this sense Helen is Lady Cecilia's double, but if you
mean----"

"Bless me! I don't know what I meant, I declare. I could not have conceived
that Lady Davenant----Miss Stanley, I beg a thousand million of pardons."

Helen, with anxious good-nature, pardoned before she was asked, and
hastened to pass on to the business of the day, but Lady Davenant would not
so let it pass; her eye still fixed she pursued the quailing enemy--"One
word more. In justice to my daughter, I must say her love has not been won
by flattery, as none knows better than the Lady Katrine Hawksby."

The unkindest cut of all, and on the tenderest part. Lady Katrine could not
stand it. Conscious and trembling, she broke through the circle, fled into
the conservatory, and, closing the doors behind her, would not be followed
by Helen, Cecilia, or any body.

Lady Castlefort sighed, and first breaking the silence that ensued, said,
"'Tis such a pity that Katrine will always so let her wit run away with
her--it brings her so continually into----for my part, in all humility I
must confess, I can't help thinking that, what with its being unfeminine
and altogether so incompatible with what in general is thought amiable
--I cannot but consider wit in a woman as a real misfortune. What say the
gentlemen? they must decide, gentlemen being always the best judges."

With an appealing tone of interrogation she gracefully looked up to the
gentlemen; and after a glance towards Granville Beauclerc, unluckily
unnoticed or unanswered, her eyes expected reply from Horace Churchill. He,
well feeling the predicament in which he stood, between a fool and a _femme
d'esprit_, answered, with his ambiguous smile, "that no doubt it was a
great misfortune to have '_plus d'esprit qu'on ne sait mener.'"

"This is a misfortune," said Lady Davenant, "that may be deplored for a
great genius once in an age, but is really rather of uncommon occurrence.
People complain of wit where, nine times in ten, poor wit is quite
innocent; but such is the consequence of having kept bad company. Wit and
ill-nature having been too often found together, when we see one we expect
the other; and such an inseparable false association has been formed, that
half the world take it for granted that there is wit if they do but see
ill-nature."

At this moment Mr. Mapletofft, the secretary, entered with his face full
of care, and his hands full of papers. Lady Katrine needed not to feign or
feel any further apprehensions of Lady Davenant; for, an hour afterwards,
it was announced that Lord and Lady Davenant were obliged to set off for
town immediately. In the midst of her hurried preparations Lady Davenant
found a moment to comfort Helen with the assurance that, whatever happened,
she would see her again. It might end in Lord Davenant's embassy being
given up. At all events she would see her again--she hoped in a few
weeks, perhaps in a few days. "So no leave-takings, my dear child, and no
tears--it is best as it is. On my return let me find----"

"Lord Davenant's waiting, my lady," and she hurried away.




CHAPTER IV.


Absent or present, the guardian influence of a superior friend is one of
the greatest blessings on earth, and after Lady Davenant's departure Helen
was so full of all she had said to her, and of all that she would approve
or disapprove, that every action, almost every thought, was under the
influence of her friend's mind. Continually she questioned her motives as
well as examined her actions, and she could not but condemn some of her
conduct, or if not her conduct, her manner, towards Horace Churchill; she
had been flattered by his admiration, and had permitted his attentions
more than she ought, when her own mind was perfectly made up as to his
character. Ever since the affair of the poetess, she had been convinced
that she could never make the happiness or redeem the character of one so
mean.

According to the ladies' code, a woman is never to understand that a
gentleman's attentions mean anything more than common civility; she is
supposed never to see his mind, however he may make it visible, till he
declares it in words. But, as Helen could not help understanding his
manner, she thought it was but fair to make him understand her by her
manner. She was certain that if he were once completely convinced, not
only that he had not made any impression, but that he never could make any
impression, on her heart, his pursuit would cease. His vanity, mortified,
might revenge itself upon her, perhaps; but this was a danger which she
thought she ought to brave; and now she resolved to be quite sincere, as
she said to herself, at whatever hazard (probably meaning at the hazard of
displeasing Cecilia) she would make her own sentiments clear, and put an
end to Mr. Churchill's ambiguous conduct: and this should be done on the
very first opportunity.

An opportunity soon occurred--Horace had a beautiful little topaz ring
with which Lady Katrine Hawksby fell into raptures; such a charming
device!--Cupid and Momus making the world their plaything.

It was evident that Lady Katrine expected that the seal should be presented
to her. Besides being extravagantly fond of baubles, she desired to have
this homage from Horace. To her surprise and mortification, however, he was
only quite flattered by her approving of his taste:--it was his favourite
seal, and so "he kept the topaz, and the rogue was bit."

Lady Katrine was the more mortified by this failure, because it was
witnessed by many of the company, among whom, when she looked round,
she detected smiles of provoking intelligence. Soon afterwards the
dressing-bell rang and she quitted the room; one after another every one
dropped off, except Helen, who was finishing a letter, and Horace, who
stood on the hearth playing with his seal. When she came to sealing-time,
he approached and besought her to honour him by the acceptance of this
little seal. "If he could obliterate Momus--if he could leave only Cupid,
it would be more appropriate. But it was a device invented for him by a
French friend, and he hoped she would pardon his folly, and think only of
his love!"

This was said so that it might pass either for mere jest or for earnest;
his look expressed very sentimental love, and Helen seized the moment to
explain herself decidedly.

It was a surprise--a great surprise to Mr. Churchill, a severe
disappointment, not only to his vanity but to his heart, for he had one. It
was some comfort, however, that he had not quite committed himself, and he
recovered--even in the moment of disappointment he recovered himself time
enough dexterously to turn the tables upon Helen.

He thanked her for her candour--for her great care of his happiness, in
anticipating a danger which might have been so fatal to him; but he really
was not aware that he had said anything which required so serious an
answer.

Afterwards he amused himself with Lady Katrine at Miss Stanley's
expense, representing himself as in the most pitiable case of Rejected
Addresses--rejected before he had offered. He had only been guilty of
Folly, and he was brought in guilty of Love.

Poor Helen had to endure not only this persiflage, which was soon made to
reach her ear, but also the reproaches of Lady Cecilia, who said, "I should
have warned you, Helen, not to irritate that man's relentless vanity; now
you see the consequences."

"But, after all, what harm can he do me?" thought Helen. "It is very
disagreeable to be laughed at, but still my conscience is satisfied, and
that is a happiness that will last; all the rest will soon be over. I am
sure I did the thing awkwardly, but I am glad it is done."

Mr. Churchill soon afterwards received an invitation--a command to join a
royal party now at some watering-place; an illustrious person could not
live another day without Horace _le desire_. He showed the note, and acted
despair at being compelled to go, and then he departed. To the splendid
party he went, and drowned all recollections of whatever love he had felt
in the fresh intoxication of vanity--a diurnal stimulus which, however
degrading, and he did feel it degrading, was now become necessary to his
existence.

His departure from Clarendon Park was openly regretted by Lady Cecilia,
while Lady Katrine secretly mourned over the downfall of her projects, and
Beauclerc attempted not to disguise his satisfaction.

He was all life and love, and would then certainly have declared his
passion, but for an extraordinary change which now appeared in Helen's
manner towards him. It seemed unaccountable; it could not be absolute
caprice, she did not even treat him as a friend, and she evidently avoided
explanation. He thought, and thought, and came as near the truth without
touching it as possible. He concluded that she had understood his joy at
Churchill's departure; that she now clearly perceived his attachment;
and was determined against him. Not having the slightest idea that she
considered him as a married man, he could not even guess the nature of her
feelings. And all the time Helen did not well understand herself; she
began to be extremely alarmed at her own feelings--to dread that there
was something not quite right. This dread, which had come and gone by
fits,--this doubt as to her own sentiments,--was first excited by the
death of her dove--Beauclerc's gift. The poor dove was found one morning
drowned in the marble vase in which it went to drink. Helen was very
sorry--that was surely natural; but she was wonderfully concerned. Lady
Katrine scoffingly said; and before everybody, before Beauclerc, worse than
all, her ladyship represented to the best of her ability the attitude in
which she had found Helen mourning over her misfortune, the dove in her
hand pressed close to her bosom--"And in tears--absolutely." She would
swear to the tears.

Helen blushed, tried to laugh, and acknowledged it was very foolish. Well,
that passed off as only foolish, and she did not at first feel that it was
a thing much to be ashamed of in any other way. But she was sorry that
Beauclere was by when Lady Katrine mimicked her; most sorry that he should
think her foolish. But then did he? His looks expressed tenderness. He was
very tender-hearted. Really manly men always are so; and so she observed to
Lady Cecilia. Lady Katrine heard the observation, and smiled--her odious
smile--implying more than words could say. Helen was not quite clear,
however, what it meant to say.

Some days afterwards Lady Katrine took up a book, in which Helen's name was
written in Beauclerc's hand. "_Gage d'amitie?_" said her ladyship; and
she walked up and down the room, humming the air of an old French song;
interrupting herself now and then to ask her sister if she could recollect
the words. "The _refrain_, if I remember right, is something like this--

  Sous le nom d'amitie--sous le nom d'amitie,
  La moitie du monde trompe l'autre moitie,
  Sous le nom, sous le nom, sous le nom d'amitie.

And it ends with

  Sous le nom d'amitie, Damon, je vous adore,
  Sous le nom, sous le nom d'amitie.

Miss Stanley, do you know that song?" concluded her malicious ladyship.
No--Miss Stanley had never heard it before; but the marked emphasis with
which Lady Katrine sung and looked, made Helen clear that she meant to
apply the words tauntingly to her and Beauclerc,--but which of them her
ladyship suspected was cheating, or cheated--"_sous le nom d'amitie_,"
she did not know. All was confusion in her mind. After a moment's cooler
reflection, however, she was certain it could not be Beauclerc who was to
blame--it must be herself, and she now very much wished that every body,
and Lady Katrine in particular, should know that Mr. Beauclerc was engaged
--almost married; if this were but known, it would put an end to all such
imputations.

The first time she could speak to Cecilia on the subject, she begged to
know how soon Mr. Beauclerc's engagement would be declared. Lady Cecilia
slightly answered she could not tell--and when Helen pressed the question
she asked,--

"Why are you so anxious, Helen?"

Helen honestly told her, and Lady Cecilia only laughed at her for minding
what Lady Katrine said,--"When you know yourself, Helen, how it is, what
can it signify what mistakes others may make?"

But Helen grew more and more uneasy, for she was not clear that she did
know how it was, with herself at least. Her conscience faltered, and she
was not sure whether she was alarmed with or without reason. She began to
compare feelings that she had read of, and feelings that she had seen in
others, and feelings that were new to herself, and in this maze and mist
nothing was distinct--much was magnified--all alarming.

One day Beauclerc was within view of the windows on horseback, on a very
spirited horse, which he managed admirably; but a shot fired suddenly in an
adjoining preserve so startled the horse that it----oh! what it did Helen
did not see, she was so terrified: and why was she so much terrified? She
excused herself by saying it was natural to be frightened for any human
creature. But, on the other hand, Tom Isdall was a human creature, and she
had seen him last week actually thrown from his horse, and had not felt
much concern. But then he was not a friend; and he fell into a soft ditch:
and there was something ridiculous in it which prevented people from caring
about it. With such nice casuistry she went on pretty well; and besides,
she was so innocent--so ignorant, that it was easy for her to be deceived.
She went on, telling herself that she loved Beauclerc as a brother--as she
loved the general. But when she came to comparisons, she could not but
perceive a difference. Her heart never bounded on the general's appearance,
let him appear ever so suddenly, as it did one day when Beauclerc returned
unexpectedly from Old Forest. Her whole existence seemed so altered by his
approach, his presence, or his absence. Why was this? Was there any thing
wrong in it? She had nobody whose judgment she could consult--nobody to
whom she could venture to describe her feelings, or lay open her doubts
and scruples. Lady Cecilia would only laugh; and she could not quite trust
either her judgment or her sincerity, though she knew her affection.
Besides, after what Cecilia had said of her being safe; after all she had
told her of Beauclerc's engagement, how astonished and shocked Cecilia
would be!

Then Helen resolved that she would keep a strict watch over herself, and
repress all emotion, and be severe with her own mind to the utmost: and it
was upon this resolution that she had changed her manner, without knowing
how much, towards Beauclerc; she was certain he meant nothing but
friendship. It was her fault if she felt too much pleasure in his company;
the same things were, as she wisely argued, right or wrong according to the
intention with which they were said, done, looked, or felt. Rigidly she
inflicted on herself the penance of avoiding his delightful society, and to
make sure that she did not try to attract, she repelled him with all
her power--thought she never could make herself cold, and stiff, and
disagreeable enough to satisfy her conscience.

Then she grew frightened at Beauclerc's looks of astonishment--feared he
would ask explanation--avoided him more and more. Then, on the other hand,
she feared he might guess and interpret _wrong_, or rather _right_, this
change; and back she changed, tried in vain to keep the just medium--she
had lost the power of measuring--altogether she was very unhappy, and so
was Beauclerc; he found her incomprehensible, and thought her capricious.
His own mind was fluttered with love, so that he could not see or judge
distinctly, else he might have seen the truth; and sometimes, though free
from conceit, he did hope it might be all love. But why then so determined
to discourage him? he had advanced sufficiently to mark his intentions,
she could not doubt his sincerity. He would see farther before he ventured
farther. He thought a man was a fool who proposed before he had tolerable
reason to believe he should not be refused.

Lord Beltravers and his sisters were now expected at Old Forest
immediately, and Beauclerc went thither early every morning, to press
forward the preparations for the arrival of the family, and he seldom
returned till dinner-time; and every evening Lady Castlefort contrived to
take possession of him. It appeared to be indeed as much against his will
as it could be between a well-bred man and a high-bred belle; but to do her
bidding, seemed if not a moral, at least a polite necessity. She had been
spoiled, she owned, by foreign attentions, not French, for that is all gone
now at Paris, but Italian manners, which she so much preferred. She did not
know how she could live out of Italy, and she must convince Lord Castlefort
that the climate was necessary for her health. Meanwhile she adopted, she
acted, what she conceived to be foreign manners, and with an exaggeration
common with those who have very little sense and a vast desire to be
fashionable with a certain set. Those who knew her best (all but her sister
Katrine, who shook her head,) were convinced that there was really no harm
in Lady Castlefort, "only vanity and folly." How frequently folly leads
farther than fools ever, or wise people often foresee, we need not here
stop to record. On the present occasion, all at Clarendon Park, even those
most inclined to scandal, persons who, by the by, may be always known by
their invariable preface of, "I hate all scandal," agreed that "no one _so
far_ could behave better than Granville Beauclerc--so far,"--"as yet."
But all the elderly who had any experience of this world, all the young
who had any intuitive prescience in these matters, could not but fear that
things could not long go on as they were now going. It was sadly to be
feared that so young a man, and so very handsome a man, and such an admirer
of beauty, and grace, and music, and of such an enthusiastic temper, must
be in danger of being drawn on farther than he was aware, and before he
knew what he was about.

The general heard and saw all that went on without seeming to take heed,
only once he asked Cecilia how long she thought her cousins would stay. She
did not know, but she said "she saw he wished them to be what they were
not--cousins once removed--and quite agreed with him." He smiled, for a man
is always well pleased to find his wife agree with him in disliking her
cousins.

One night--one fine moonlight night--Lady Castlefort, standing at the
conservatory door with Beauclerc, after talking an inconceivable quantity
of nonsense about her passion for the moon, and her notions about the
stars, and congenial souls born under the same planet, proposed to him a
moonlight walk.

The general was at the time playing at chess with Helen, and had the best
of the game, but at that moment he made a false move, was check-mated, rose
hastily, threw the men together on the board, and forgot to regret his
shameful defeat, or to compliment Helen upon her victory. Lady Castlefort,
having just discovered that the fatality nonsense about the stars would
not quite do for Beauclerc, had been the next instant seized with a sudden
passion for astronomy; she must see those charming rings of Saturn, which
she had heard so much of, which the general was showing Miss Stanley the
other night; she must beg him to lend his telescope; she came up with her
sweetest smile to trouble the general for his glass. Lord Castlefort,
following, objected strenuously to her going out at night; she had been
complaining of a bad cold when he wanted her to walk in the daytime, she
would only make it worse by going out in the night air. If she wanted to
see Saturn and his rings, the general, he was sure, would fix a telescope
at the window for her.

But that would not do, she must have a moonlight walk; she threw open the
conservatory door, beckoned to Mr. Beauclerc, and how it ended Helen did
not stay to see. She thought that she ought not even to think on the
subject, and she went away as fast as she could. It was late, and she went
to bed wishing to be up early, to go on with a drawing she was to finish
for Mrs. Collingwood--a view by the river side, that view which had struck
her fancy as so beautiful the day she went first to Old Forest. Early the
next morning--and a delightful morning it was--she was up and out, and
reached the spot from which her sketch was taken. She was surprised to find
her little camp-stool, which she had looked for in vain in the hall, in its
usual place, set here ready for her, and on it a pencil nicely cut.

Beauclerc must have done this. But he was not in general an early riser.
However, she concluded that he had gone over thus early to Old Forest, to
see his friend Lord Beltravers, who was to have arrived the day before,
with his sisters. She saw a boat rowing down the river, and she had no
doubt he was gone. But just as she had settled to her drawing, she heard
the joyful bark of Beauclerc's dog Nelson, who came bounding towards her,
and the next moment his master appeared, coming down the path from the
wood. With quick steps he came till he was nearly close to her, then
slackened his pace.

"Good morning!" said Helen; she tried to speak with composure, but her
heart beat--she could not help feeling surprise at seeing him--but it was
only surprise.

"I thought you were gone to Old Forest?" said she.

"Not yet," said he.

His voice sounded different from usual, and she saw in him some suppressed
agitation. She endeavoured to keep her own manner unembarrassed--she
thanked him for the nicely-cut pencil, and the exactly well-placed seat. He
advanced a step or two nearer, stooped, and looked close at her drawing,
but he did not seem to see or know what he was looking at.

At this moment Nelson, who had been too long unnoticed, put up one paw on
Miss Stanley's arm, unseen by his master, and encouraged by such gentle
reproof as Helen gave, his audacious paw was on the top of her drawing-book
the next moment, and the next was upon the drawing--and the paw was wet
with dew.--"Nelson!" exclaimed his master in an angry tone.

"O do not scold him," cried Helen, "do not punish him; the drawing is not
spoiled--only wet, and it will be as well as ever when it is dry."

Beauclerc ejaculated something about the temper of an angel while she
patted Nelson's penitent head.

"As the drawing must be left to dry," said Beauclerc, "perhaps Miss Stanley
would do me the favour to walk as far as the landing-place, where the boat
is to meet me--to take me--if--if I MUST go to Old Forest!" and he sighed.

She took his offered arm and walked on--surprised--confused;--wondering
what he meant by that sigh and that look--and that strong emphasis on
_must_. "If I _must_ go to Old Forest." Was not it a pleasure?--was it not
his own choice?--what could he mean?--What could be the matter?

A vague agitating idea rose in her mind, but she put it from her, and they
walked on for some minutes, both silent. They entered the wood, and feeling
the silence awkward, and afraid that he should perceive her embarrassment,
and that he should suspect her suspicion, she exerted herself to speak--to
say something, no matter what.

"It is a charming morning!"

After a pause of absence of mind, he answered,

"Charming!--very!"

Then stopping short, he fixed his eyes upon Helen with an expression that
she was afraid to understand. It could hardly bear any interpretation but
one--and yet that was impossible--ought to be impossible--from a man in
Beauclerc's circumstances--engaged--almost a married man, as she had been
told to consider him. She did not know at this moment what to think--still
she thought she must mistake him, and she should be excessively ashamed of
such a mistake, and now more strongly felt the dread that he should see and
misinterpret or interpret too rightly her emotion; she walked on quicker,
and her breath grew short, and her colour heightened. He saw her
agitation--a delightful hope arose in his mind. It was plain she was not
indifferent--he looked at her, but dared not look long enough--feared that
he was mistaken. But the embarrassment seemed to change its character even
as he looked, and now it was more like displeasure--decidedly, she appeared
displeased. And so she was; for she thought now that he must either be
trifling with her, or, if serious, must be acting most dishonourably;--her
good opinion of him must be destroyed for ever, if, as now it seemed, he
wished to make an impression upon her heart--yet still she tried not to
think, not to see it. She was sorry, she was very wrong to let such an idea
into her mind--and still her agitation increased.

Quick as she turned from him these thoughts passed in her mind, alternately
angry and ashamed, and at last, forcing herself to be composed, telling
herself she ought to see farther and at least to be certain before she
condemned him--condemned so kind, so honourable a friend, while the fault
might be all her own; she now, in a softened tone, as if begging pardon
for the pain she had given, and the injustice she had done him, said some
words, insignificant in themselves, but from the voice of kindness charming
to Beauclerc's ear and soul.

"Are not we walking very fast?" said she, breathless. He slackened his pace
instantly, and with a delighted look, while she, in a hurried voice,
added, "But do not let me delay you. There is the boat. You must be in
haste--impatient!"

"In haste! impatient! to leave you, Helen!" She blushed deeper than he had
ever seen her blush before. Beauclerc in general knew--

  Which blush was anger's, which was love's!"

--But now he was so much moved he could not decide at the first glance:
at the second, there was no doubt; it was anger--not love. Her arm was
withdrawn from his. He was afraid he had gone too far. He had called her
Helen! He begged pardon, half humbly, half proudly. "I beg pardon; Miss
Stanley, I should have said. I see I have offended. I fear I have been
presumptuous, but Lady Davenant taught me to trust to Miss Stanley's
sincerity, and I was encouraged by her expressions of confidence and
friendship."

"Friendship! Oh, yes! Mr. Beauclerc," said Helen, in a hurried voice,
eagerly seizing on and repeating the word friendship; "yes, I have always
considered you as a friend. I am sure I shall always find you a sincere,
good friend."

"Friend!" he repeated in a disappointed tone--all his hopes sunk. She took
his arm again, and he was displeased even with that. She was not the being
of real sensibility he had fancied--she was not capable of real love. So
vacillated his heart and his imagination, and so quarrelled he alternately
every instant with her and with himself. He could not understand her,
or decide what he should next do or say himself; and there was the boat
nearing the land, and they were going on, on, towards it in silence. He
sighed.

It was a sigh that could not but be heard and noticed; it was not meant
to be noticed, and yet it was. What could she think of it? She could not
believe that Beauclerc meant to act treacherously. This time she was
determined not to take anything for granted, not to be so foolish as she
had been with Mr. Churchill.

"Is not that your boat that I see, rowing close?"

"Yes, I believe--certainly. Yes," said he.

But now the vacillation of Beauclerc's mind suddenly ceased. Desperate, he
stopped her, as she would have turned down that path to the landing-place
where the boat was mooring. He stood full across the path. "Miss Stanley,
one word--by one word, one look decide. You must decide for me whether I
stay--or go--for ever!"

"I!--Mr. Beauclerc!--"

The look of astonishment--more than astonishment, almost of
indignation--silenced him completely, and he stood dismayed. She pressed
onwards, and he no longer stopped her path. For an instant he submitted in
despair. "Then I must not think of it. I must go--must I, Miss Stanley?
Will not you listen to me, Helen? Advise me; let me open my heart to you as
a friend."

She stopped under the shady tree beneath which they were passing,
and, leaning against it, she repeated, "As a friend--but, no, no, Mr.
Beauclerc--no; I am not the friend you should consult--consult the general,
your guardian."

"I have consulted him, and he approves."

"You have! That is well, that is well at all events," cried she; "if he
approves, then all is right."

There was a ray of satisfaction on her countenance. He looked as if
considering what she exactly meant. He hoped again, and was again resolved
to hazard the decisive words. "If you knew all!" and he pressed her arm
closer to him--"if I might tell you all----?"

Helen withdrew her arm decidedly. "I know all," said she; "all I ought to
know, Mr. Beauclerc."

"You know all!" cried he, astonished at her manner.

"You know the circumstances in which I am placed?"

He alluded to the position in which he stood with Lady Castlefort; she
thought he meant with respect to Lady Blanche, and she answered--"Yes: I
know all!" and her eye turned towards the boat.

"I understand you," said he; "you think I ought to go?" "Certainly," said
she. It never entered into her mind to doubt the truth of what Lady Cecilia
had told her, and she had at first been so much embarrassed by the fear of
betraying what she felt she ought not to feel, and she was now so shocked
by what she thought his dishonourable conduct, that she repeated almost in
a tone of severity--"Certainly, Mr. Beauclerc, you ought to go."

The words, "since you are engaged,"--"you know you are engaged," she was on
the point of adding, but Lady Cecilia's injunctions not to tell him that
she had betrayed his secret stopped her.

He looked at her for an instant, and then abruptly, and in great agitation,
said; "May I ask, Miss Stanley, if your affections are engaged?"

"Is that a question, Mr. Beauclerc, which you have a right to ask me?"

"I have no right--no right, I acknowledge--I am answered."

He turned away from her, and ran down the bank towards the boat, but
returned instantly, and exclaimed, "If you say to me, go! I am gone for
ever!"

"Go!" Helen firmly pronounced. "You never can be more than a friend to me!
Oh never be less!--go!"

"I am gone," said he, "you shall never see me more."

He went, and a few seconds afterwards she heard the splashing of his oars.
He was gone! Oh! how she wished that they had parted sooner--a few minutes
sooner, even before he had so looked--so spoken!

"Oh! that we had parted while I might have still perfectly esteemed him;
but now--!"




CHAPTER V.


When Helen attempted to walk, she trembled so much that she could not move,
and leaning against the tree under which she was standing, she remained
fixed for some time almost without thought. Then she began to recollect
what had been before all this, and as soon as she could walk she went back
for her drawing-book, threw from her the pencil which Beauclerc had cut,
and made her way home as fast as she could, and up to her own room, without
meeting anybody; and as soon as she was there she bolted the door and threw
herself upon her bed. She had by this time a dreadful headache, and she
wanted to try and get rid of it in time for breakfast--that was her first
object; but her thoughts were so confused that they could not fix upon
anything rightly. She tried to compose herself, and to think the whole
affair over again; but she could not. There was something so strange in
what had passed! The sudden--the total change in her opinion--her total
loss of confidence! She tried to put all thoughts and feelings out of her
mind, and just to lie stupified if she could, that she might get rid of the
pain in her head. She had no idea whether it was late or early, and was
going to get up to look at her watch, when she heard the first bell, half
an hour before breakfast, and this was the time when Cecilia usually opened
the door between their rooms. She dreaded the sound, but when she had
expected it some minutes, she became impatient even for that which she
feared; she wanted to have it over, and she raised herself on her elbow,
and listened with acute impatience: at last the door was thrown wide open,
and bright and gay as ever, in came Cecilia, but at the first sight of
Helen on her bed, wan and miserable, she stopped short.

"My dearest Helen! what can be the matter?"

"Mr. Beauclerc--"

"Well! what of him?" cried Cecilia, and she smiled.

"Oh, Cecilia! do not smile; you cannot imagine--"

"Oh, yes! but I can," cried Cecilia. "I see how it is; I understand it all;
and miserable and amazed as you look at this moment, I will set all right
for you in one word. He is not going to be married--not engaged."

Helen started up. "Not engaged!"

"No more than you are, my dear! Oh! I am glad to see your colour come
again!"

"Thank Heaven!" cried Helen, "then he is not--"

"A villain!--not at all. He is all that's right; all that is charming, my
dear. So thank Heaven, and be as happy as you please."

"But I cannot understand it," said Helen, sinking back; "I really cannot
understand how it is, Cecilia." Cecilia gave her a glass of water in great
haste, and was very sorry, and very glad, and begged forgiveness, and all
in a breath: but as yet Helen did not know what she had to forgive, till it
was explained to her in direct words, that Cecilia had told her not only
what was not true, but what she at the time of telling knew to be false.

"For what purpose, oh! my dear Cecilia! All to save me from a little
foolish embarrassment at first, you have made us miserable at last."

"Miserable! my dear Helen; at worst miserable only for half an hour.
Nonsense! lie down again, and rest your poor head. I will go this minute to
Granville. Where is he?"

"Gone! Gone for ever! Those were his last words."

"Impossible! absurd! Only what a man says in a passion. But where is he
gone? Only to Old Forest! Gone for ever--gone till dinner-time! Probably
coming back at this moment in all haste, like a true lover, to beg your
pardon for your having used him abominably ill. Now, smile; do not shake
your head, and look so wretched; but tell me exactly, word for word and
look for look, all that passed between you, and then I shall know what is
best to be done."

Word for word Helen could not answer, for she had been so much confused,
but she told to the best of her recollection; and Cecilia still thought
no great harm was done. She only looked a little serious from the
apprehension, now the real, true apprehension, of what might happen about
Lady Blanche, who, as she believed, was at Old Forest. "Men are so foolish;
men in love, so rash. Beauclerc, in a fit of anger and despair on being so
refused by the woman he loved, might go and throw himself at the feet
of another for whom he did not care in the least, in a strange sort of
revenge. But I know how to settle it all, and I will do it this moment."

But Helen caught hold of her hand, and firmly detaining it, absolutely
objected to her doing anything without telling her exactly and truly what
she was going to do.

Lady Cecilia assured her that she was only going to inquire from the
general whether Lady Blanche was with her sister at Old Forest, or not.
"Listen to me, my dear Helen; what I am going to say can do no mischief.
If Lady Blanche is there, then the best thing to be done is, for me to go
immediately, this very morning, to pay the ladies a visit on their coming
to the country, and I will bring back Granville. A word will bring him
back. I will only tell him there was a little mistake, or if you think
it best, I will tell him the whole truth. Let me go--only let me go and
consult the general before the breakfast-bell rings, for I shall have no
time afterwards."

Helen let her go, for as Beauclerc had told her that he had opened his mind
to the general, she thought it was best that he should hear all that had
happened.

The moment the general saw Lady Cecilia come in, he smiled, and said,
"Well! my dear Cecilia, you have seen Helen this morning, and she has seen
Beauclerc--what is the result? Does he stay, or go?"

"He is gone!" said Cecilia. The general looked surprised and sorry. "He did
not propose for her," continued Cecilia, "he did not declare himself--he
only began to sound her opinion of him, and she--she contrived to
misunderstand--to offend him, and he is gone, but only to Old Forest, and
we can have him back again directly."

"That is not likely," said the general, "because I know that Beauclerc had
determined, that if he went he would not return for some time. Your friend
Helen was to decide. If she gave him any hope, that is, permitted him to
appear as her declared admirer, he could, with propriety, happiness, and
honour, remain here; if not, my dear Cecilia, you must be sensible that he
is right to go."

"Gone for some time!" repeated Cecilia, "you mean as long as Lady
Castlefort is here."

"Yes," said the general.

"I wish she was gone, I am sure, with all my heart," said Cecilia; "but
in the mean time, tell me, my dear Clarendon, do you know whether Lord
Beltravers' sisters are at Old Forest?"

The general did not think that Lady Blanche had arrived; he was not
certain, but he knew that the Comtesse de St. Cymon had arrived yesterday.

"Then," said Cecilia, "it would be but civil to go to see the comtesse. I
will go this morning."

General Clarendon answered instantly, and with decision, that she must not
think of such a thing--that it could not be done. "Madame de St. Cymon is a
woman of doubtful reputation, not a person with whom Lady Cecilia Clarendon
ought to form any acquaintance."

"No, not form an acquaintance--I'm quite aware of that," and eagerly she
pleaded that she had no intention of doing anything; "but just one morning
visit paid and returned, you know, leads to nothing. Probably we shall
neither of us be at home, and never meet; and really it would be such a
marked thing not to pay this visit to the Beltravers family on their return
to the country. Formerly there was such a good understanding between the
Forresters and your father; and really hospitality requires it. Altogether
this one visit really must be paid, it cannot be helped, so I will order
the carriage."

"It must not be done!" the general said; "it is a question of right, not of
expediency."

"Right, but there is nothing really wrong, surely; I believe all that has
been said of her is scandal. Nobody is safe against reports--the public
papers are so scandalous! While a woman lives with her husband, it is but
charitable to suppose all is right. That's the rule. Besides, we should not
throw the first stone." Then Lady Cecilia pleaded, lady this and lady that,
and the whole county, without the least scruple would visit Madame de St.
Cymon.

"Lady this and lady that may do as they please, or as their husbands think
proper or improper, that is no rule for Lady Cecilia Clarendon; and as
to the whole county, or the whole world, what is that to me, when I have
formed my own determination?"

The fact was, that at this very time Madame de St. Cymon was about to be
separated from her husband. A terrible discovery had just been made. Lord
Beltravers had brought his sister to Old Forest to bide her from London
disgrace; there he intended to leave her to rusticate, while he should
follow her husband to Paris immediately, to settle the terms of separation
or divorce.

"Beauclerc, no doubt, will go to Paris with him," said the general.

"To Paris! when will he set out?"

"To-day--directly, if Helen has decidedly rejected him; but you say he did
not declare himself. Pray tell me all at once."

And if she had done so, all might have been well; but she was afraid. Her
husband was as exact about _some things_ as her mother; he would certainly
be displeased at the deception she had practised on Helen; she could not
tell him that, not at this moment, for she had just fooled him to the top
of his bent about this visit; she would find a better time; she so dreaded
the instant change of his smile--the look of disapprobation; she was so
cowardly; in short, the present pain of displeasing--the consequences even
of her own folly, she never could endure, and to avoid it she had always
recourse to some new evasion; and now, when Helen--her dear Helen's
happiness, was at stake, she faltered--she paltered--she would not for the
world do her any wrong; but still she thought she could manage without
telling the whole--she would tell nothing _but_ the truth. So, after a
moment's hesitation, while all these thoughts went through her mind, when
the general repeated his question, and begged to know at once what was
passing in her little head; she smiled in return for that smile which
played on her husband's face while he fondly looked upon her, and she
answered, "I am thinking of poor Helen. She has made a sad mistake--and has
a horrid headache at this moment--in short she has offended Beauclerc past
endurance--past his endurance--and he went off in a passion before she
found out her mistake. In short, we must have him back again; could you go,
my dear love--or write directly?"

"First let me understand," said the general. "Miss Stanley has made a
mistake--what mistake?"

"She thought Beauclerc was engaged to Lady Blanche."

"How could she think so? What reason had she?"

"She had been told so by somebody."

"Somebody!--that eternal scandal-monger Lady Katrine, I suppose."

"No--not Lady Katrine," said Cecilia; "but I am not at liberty to tell you
whom."

"No matter; but Miss Stanley is not a fool; she could not believe somebody
or anybody, contrary to common sense."

"No, but Beauclerc did not come quite to proposing--and you know she
had been blamed for refusing Mr. Churchill before she was asked--and in
short--in love, people do not always know what they are about."

"I do not understand one word of it," said the general; "nor I am sure do
you, my dear Cecilia." "Yes, I really do, but----"

"My dear Cecilia, I assure you it is always best to let people settle their
love affairs their own way."

"Yes, certainly--I would not interfere in the least--only to get Granville
back again--and then let them settle it their own way. Cannot you call at
Old Forest?"

"No."

"Could you not write?"

"No--not unless I know the whole. I will do nothing in the dark. Always
tell your confessor, your lawyer, your physician, your friend, your whole
case, or they are fools or rogues if they act for you; go back and repeat
this to Helen Stanley from me."

"But, my dear, she will think it so unkind."

"Let her show me how I can serve her, and I will do it."

"Only write a line to Beauclerc--say, 'Beauclerc come back,--here has been
a mistake.'" She would have put a pen into his hand, and held paper to him.

"Let me know the whole, and then, and not till then, can I judge whether I
should be doing right for her or not." The difficulty of telling the whole
had increased to Lady Cecilia, even from the hesitation and prevarication
she had now made. "Let me see Helen,--let me speak to her myself, and
learn what this strange nonsensical mystery is." He was getting impatient.
"Cannot I see Miss Stanley?"

"Why no, my dear love, not just now, she has such a headache! She is lying
down. There is the breakfast-bell--after breakfast, if you please. But I
am clear she would rather not speak to you herself on the subject."

"Then come down to breakfast, my dear, and let her settle it her own
way--that is much the best plan. Interference in love matters always does
mischief. Come to breakfast, my dear--I have no time to lose--I must be off
to a court-martial."

He looked at his watch, and Cecilia went half down stairs with him, and
then ran back to keep Helen quiet by the assurance that all would
be settled--all would be right, and that she would send her up some
breakfast--she must not think of coming down; and Cecilia lamented half
breakfast-time--how subject to headaches poor Helen was; and through this
and through all other conversation she settled what she would do for her.
As the last resource, she would tell the whole truth--not to her husband,
she loved him too well to face his displeasure for one moment--hut to
Beauclerc; and writing would be so much easier than speaking--without
being put to the blush she could explain it all to Beauclerc, and turn
it playfully; and he would be so happy that he would be only too glad to
forgive her, and to do anything she asked. She concocted and wrote a very
pretty letter, in which she took all the blame fully on herself--did
perfect justice to Helen; said she wrote without her knowledge, and
depended entirely upon his discretion, so he must come back of his own
accord, and keep her counsel. This letter, however, she could not despatch
so soon as she had expected; she could not send a servant with it till
the general should be off to his court-martial. Now had Cecilia gone the
straight-forward way to work, her husband could in that interval, and
would, have set all to rights; but this to Cecilia was impossible; she
could only wait in an agony of impatience till the general and his officers
were all out of the way, and then she despatched a groom with her letter to
Old Forest, and desired him to return as fast as possible, while she went
to Helen's room, to while away the time of anxious suspense as well as she
could; and she soon succeeded in talking herself into excellent spirits
again. "Now, my dear Helen, if that unlucky mistake had not been made,--if
you had not fancied that Granville was married already,--and if he had
actually proposed for you,--what would you have said?--in short--would you
have accepted him?"

"Oh! Cecilia, I do hope he will understand how it all was; I hope he will
believe that I esteem him as I always did: as to love--"

Helen paused, and Lady Cecilia went on: "As to love, nobody knows
anything about it till it comes--and here it is coming, I do believe!"
continued she, looking out of the window.--No! not Mr. Beauclerc, but
the man she had sent with her letter, galloping towards the house.
Disappointed not to see Beauclerc himself, she could only conclude that
as he had not his horse with him, he was returning in the boat. The
answer to her letter was brought in. At the first glance on the
direction, her countenance changed. "Not Granville's hand!--what can
have happened?" She tore open the note, "He is gone!--gone with Lord
Beltravers--set off!--gone to Paris!" Helen said not one word, and
Cecilia, in despair, repeated, "Gone!--gone!--absolutely gone! Nothing
more can he done. Oh, that I had done nothing about it! All has failed!
Heaven knows what may happen now! Oh! if I could but have let it all
alone! I never, never can forgive myself! My dear Helen, be angry with
me--reproach me: pray--pray reproach me as I deserve!" But Helen could
not blame one who so blamed herself--one who, however foolish and wrong
she had been, had done it all from the kindest motives. In the agony of
her penitence, she now told Helen all that had passed between her and
the general; that, to avoid the shame of confessing to him her first
deception, she had gone on another and another step in these foolish
evasions, contrivances, and mysteries; how, thinking she could manage
it, she had written without his knowledge; and now, to complete her
punishment, not only had every thing which she had attempted failed, but
a consequence which she could never have foreseen had happened.--"Here I
am, with a note actually in my hand from this horrid Madame de St.
Cymon, whom Clarendon absolutely would not hear of my even calling upon!
Look what she writes to me. She just took advantage of this opportunity
to begin a correspondence before an acquaintance: but I will never
answer her. Here is what she says:--

"'The Comtesse de St. Cymon exceedingly regrets that Lady Cecilia
Clarendon's servant did not arrive in time to deliver her ladyship's letter
into Mr. Beauclerc's own hand. Mr. B. left Old Forest with Lord Beltravers
early to-day for Paris. The Comtesse de St. Cymon, understanding that
Lady Cecilia Clarendon is anxious that there should be as little delay as
possible in forwarding her letter, and calculating that if returned by her
ladyship's servant it must be too late for this day's post from Clarendon
Park, has forwarded it immediately with her own letters to Paris, which
cannot fail to meet Mr. Beauclerc directly on his arrival there.'

"Oh!" cried Lady Cecilia, "how angry the general would be if he knew of
this!" She tore the note to the smallest bits as she spoke, and threw them
away; and next she begged that Helen would never say a word about it. There
was no use in telling the general what would only vex him, and what could
not be helped; and what could lead to nothing, for she should never answer
this note, nor have any further communication of any kind with Madame de
St. Cymon.

Helen, nevertheless, thought it would be much better to tell the general of
it, and she wondered how Cecilia could think of doing otherwise, and just
when she had so strongly reproached herself, and repented of these foolish
mysteries; and this was going on another step. "Indeed, Cecilia," said
Helen, "I wish--on my own account I wish you would not conceal anything. It
is hard to let the general suspect me of extreme folly and absurdity, or
of some sort of double dealing in this business, in which I have done my
utmost to do right and to go straightforward." Poor Helen, with her nervous
headache beating worse and worse, remonstrated and entreated, and came to
tears; and Lady Cecilia promised that it should be all done as she desired;
but again she charged and besought Helen to say nothing herself about the
matter to the general: and this acceded to, Lady Cecilia's feelings being
as transient as they were vehement, all her self-reproaches, penitence, and
fears passed away, and, taking her bright view of the whole affair, she
ended with the certainty that Beauclerc, would return the moment he
received her letter; that he would have it in a very few days, and all
would end well, and quite as well as if she had not been a fool.




CHAPTER VI.


THE first tidings of Beauclerc came in a letter from him to the general,
written immediately after his arrival at Paris. But it was plain that it
must have been written before Lady Cecilia's letter, forwarded by Madame de
St. Cymon, could have reached him. It was evident that matters were as yet
unexplained, from his manner of writing about "the death-blow to all his
hopes," and now he was setting off with Lord Beltravers for Naples, to
follow M. de St. Cymon, and settle the business of the sister's divorce.
Lady Cecilia could only hope that her letter would follow him thither,
enclosed in this Madame de St. Cymon's despatches to her brother; and now
they could know nothing more till they could hear from Naples.

Meanwhile, Helen perceived that, though the general continued to be as
attentive and kind to her as usual, yet that there was something more
careful and reserved in his manner than formerly, less of spontaneous
regard, and cordial confidence. It was not that he was displeased by her
having discouraged the addresses of his ward, fond as he was of Beauclerc,
and well as he would have been pleased by the match. This he distinctly
expressed the only time that he touched upon the subject. He said, that
Miss Stanley was the best and the only judge of what would make her happy;
but he could not comprehend the nature of the mistake she had made;
Cecilia's explanations, whatever they were, had not made the matter clear.
There was either some caprice, or some mystery, which he determined not to
inquire into, upon his own principle of leaving people to settle their love
affairs in their own way. Helen's spirits were lowered: naturally of great
sensibility, she depended more for her happiness on her inward feelings
than upon any external circumstances. A great deal of gaiety was now going
on constantly among the young people at Clarendon Park, and this made
her want of spirits more disagreeable to herself, more obvious, and more
observed by others. Lady Katrine rallied her unmercifully. Not suspecting
the truth, her ladyship presumed that Miss Stanley repented of having,
before she was asked, said No instead of Yes, to Mr. Churchill. Ever since
his departure she had evidently worn the willow.

Lady Cecilia was excessively vexed by this ill-natured raillery: conscious
that she had been the cause of all this annoyance to Helen, and of much
more serious evil to her, the zeal and tenderness of her affection now
increased, and was shown upon every little occasion involuntarily, in a
manner that continually irritated her cousin Katrine's jealousy. Helen had
been used to live only with those by whom she was beloved, and she was not
at all prepared for the sort of warfare which Lady Katrine carried on; her
perpetual sneers, innuendoes, and bitter sarcasms, Helen did not resent,
but she felt them. The arrows, ill-aimed and weak, could not penetrate far;
it was not with their point they wounded, but by their venom--wherever
that touched it worked inward mischief. Often to escape from one false
imputation she exposed herself to another more grievous. One night, when
the young people wished to dance, and the usual music was not to be
had, Helen played quadrilles, and waltzes, for hours with indefatigable
good-nature, and when some of the party returned their cordial thanks, Lady
Katrine whispered, "our musician has been well paid by Lord Estridge's
admiration of her white hands." His lordship had not danced, and had been
standing all the evening beside Helen, much to the discomfiture of Lady
Katrine, who intended to have had him for her own partner. The next night,
Helen did not play, but joined the dance, and with a boy partner, whom
nobody could envy her. The general, who saw wonderfully quickly the by-play
of society, marked all this, and now his eye followed Helen through the
quadrille, and he said to some one standing by, that Miss Stanley danced
charmingly, to his taste, and in such a lady-like manner. He was glad to
see her in good spirits again; her colour was raised, and he observed that
she looked remarkably well. "Yes," Lady Katrine answered, "remarkably well;
and black is so becoming to that sort of complexion, no doubt this is the
reason Miss Stanley wears it so much longer than is customary for an uncle.
Short or long mournings are, to be sure, just according to fashion,
or feeling, as some say. For my part, I hate long mournings--so like
ostentation of sentiment; whatever I did, at any rate I would be
consistent. I never would dance in black. Pope, you know, has such a good
cut at that sort of thing. Do you recollect the lines?"

 "'And bear about the mockery of woe
  To midnight dances and the public show.'"

Lady Castlefort took Miss Stanley aside, after the dance was over, to
whisper to her so good-naturedly, how shockingly severe Katrine had been;
faithfully repeating every word that her sister had said. "And so cruel,
to talk of your bearing about the _mockery_ of woe!--But, my sweet little
lamb, do not let me distress you so." Helen, withdrawing from the false
caresses of Lady Castlefort, assured her that she should not be hurt by
any thing Lady Katrine could say, as she so little understood her real
feelings; and at the moment her spirit rose against the injustice, and felt
as much superior to such petty malice as even Lady Davenant could have
desired. She had resolved to continue in mourning for the longest period
in which it is worn for a parent, because, in truth, her uncle had been a
parent to her; but the morning after Lady Katrine's cruel remarks, Cecilia
begged that Helen would oblige her by laying aside black. "Let it be on my
birthday." Lady Cecilia's birth-day was to be celebrated the ensuing week.
"Well, for that day certainly I will," Helen said; "but only for that day."
This would not satisfy Cecilia. Helen saw that Lady Katrine's observations
had made a serious impression, and, dreading to become the subject of daily
observation, perhaps altercation, she yielded. The mourning was thrown
aside. Then every thing she wore must be new. Lady Cecilia and Mademoiselle
Felicie, her waiting-maid, insisted upon taking the matter into their
own hands. Helen really intended only to let one dress for her friend's
birth-day be bespoken for her; but from one thing she was led on to
another. Lady Cecilia's taste in dress was exquisite. Her first general
principle was admirable--"Whatever you buy, let it be the best of its kind,
which is always the cheapest in the end." Her second maxim was--"Never have
anything but from such and such people, or from such and such places,"
naming those who were at the moment accredited by fashion. "These, of
course, make you pay high for the name of the thing; but that must be. The
name is all," said Lady Cecilia. "Does your hat, your bonnet, whatever it
be, come from the reigning fashionable authority? then it is right, and you
are quite right. You can put down all objections and objectors with the
magic of a name. You need think no more about your dress; you have no
trouble; while the poor creatures who go toiling and rummaging in cheap
shops--what comes of it? but total exhaustion and disgrace! Yesterday, now,
my dear Helen, recollect. When Lady Katrine, after dinner, asked little
Miss Isdall where she bought that pretty hat, the poor girl was quite out
of countenance. 'Really she did not know; she only knew it was very cheap.'
You saw that nobody could endure the hat afterwards; so that, cheap as it
might be, it was money to all intents and purposes absolutely thrown away,
for it did not answer its purpose."

Helen, laughing, observed, that if its purpose had been to look well, and
to make the wearer look well, it had fully succeeded. "Sophistry, my dear
Helen. The purpose was not to look well, but to have a distinguished air.
Dress, and what we call fashion and taste altogether, you know, are mere
matters of opinion, association of ideas, and so forth. When will you learn
to reason, as mamma says? Do not make me despair of you."

Thus, half in jest, half in earnest, with truth and falsehood, sense and
nonsense, prettily blended together, Lady Cecilia prevailed in overpowering
Helen's better judgment, and obtained a hasty submission. In economy, as in
morals, false principles are far more dangerous than any one single error.
One false principle as to laying out money is worse than any bad bargain
that can be made, because it leads to bad bargains innumerable. It was
settled that all Helen wanted should be purchased, not only from those who
sold the best goods, but from certain very expensive houses of fashionably
high name in London. And the next point Lady Cecilia insisted upon was,
that Helen's dress should always be the same as her own. "You know it used
to be so, my dear Helen, when we were children; let it be so now."

"But there is such a difference _now_" said Helen; "and I cannot
afford----"

"Difference! Oh! don't talk of differences--let there be none ever between
us. Not afford!--nonsense, my dear--the expense will be nothing. In
these days you get the materials of dress absolutely for nothing--the
fashion--the making-up is all, us Felicie and I, and everybody who knows
anything of the matter, can tell you. Now all that sort of thing we can
save you--here is my wedding paraphernalia all at your service--patterns
ready cut--and here is Felicie, whose whole French soul is in the
toilette--and there is your own little maid, who has hands, and head, and
heart, all devoted to you--so leave it to us--leave it to us, my dear--take
no thought what you shall put on--and you will put it on all the better."
Felicie was summoned. "Felicie, remember Miss Stanley's dress is always
to be the same as my own. It must be so, my dear. It will be the greatest
pleasure to me," and with her most persuasive caressing manner, she added,
"My own dear Helen, if you love me, let it be so."

This was an appeal which Helen could not resist. She thought that she could
not refuse without vexing Cecilia; and, from a sort of sentimental belief
that she was doing Cecilia "a real kindness,"--that it was what Cecilia
called "a sisterly act," she yielded to what she knew was unsuited to her
circumstances--to what was quite contrary to her better judgment. It often
so happens, that our friends doubly guard one obvious point of weakness,
while another exists undiscovered by them, and unknown to ourselves. Lady
Davenant had warned Helen against the dangers of indecision and coquetry
with her lovers, but this danger of extravagance in dress she had not
foreseen--and into how much expense this one weak compliance would lead
her, Helen could not calculate. She had fancied that, at least, till she
went to town, she should not want anything expensive--this was a great
mistake. Formerly in England, as still in every other country but England,
a marked difference was made in the style of dress in the country and in
town. Formerly, overdressing in the country was reprobated as quite vulgar;
but now, even persons of birth and fashion are guilty of this want of taste
and sense. They display almost as much expensive dress in the country as in
town.

It happened that, among the succession of company at Clarendon Park
this summer, there came, self-invited, from the royal party in the
neighbourhood, a certain wealthy lady, by some called "Golconda," by others
"the Duchess of Baubleshire." She was passionately fond of dress, and she
eclipsed all rivals in magnificence and variety of ornaments. At imminent
peril of being robbed, she brought to the country, and carried about
everywhere with her, an amazing number of jewels, wearing two or three
different sets at different times of the day--displaying them on the most
absurdly improper occasions--at a fete champetre, or a boat race.

Once, after a riding-party, at a pic-nic under the trees, when it had been
resolved unanimously that nobody should change their dress at dinner-time,
Golconda appeared in a splendid necklace, displayed over her riding-dress,
and when she was reproached with having broken through the general
agreement not to dress she replied, that, "Really she had put the thing on
in the greatest hurry, without knowing well what it was, just to oblige her
little page who had brought three sets of jewels for her choice--she had
chosen the _most undressed_ of the three, merely because she could not
disappoint the poor little fellow."

Every one saw the affectation and folly, and above all, the vulgarity of
this display, and those who were most envious were most eager to comfort
themselves by ridicule. Never was the "Golconda" out of hearing, but Lady
Katrine was ready with some instance of her "absurd vanity." "If fortune
had but blessed her with such jewels," Lady Katrine said, "she trusted she
should have worn them with better grace;" but it did not appear that the
taste for baubles was diminished by the ridicule thrown upon them--quite
the contrary, it was plain that the laughers were only envious, and envious
because they could not be envied.

Lady Cecilia, who had no envy in her nature--who was really
generous--entered not into this vain competition; on the contrary, she
refrained from wearing any of her jewels, because Helen had none; besides,
simplicity was really the best taste, the general said so--this was well
thought and well done for some time, but there was a little lurking love
of ornaments in Cecilia's mind, nor was Helen entirely without sympathy in
that taste. Her uncle had early excited it in her mind by frequent fond
presents of the prettiest trinkets imaginable; the taste had been matured
along with her love for one for whom she had such strong affection, and it
had seemed to die with its origin. Before she left Cecilhurst, Helen had
given away every ornament she possessed; she thought she could never want
them again, and she left them as remembrances with those who had loved her
and her uncle.

Cecilia on her birthday brought her a set of forget-me-nots to match those
which she intended to wear herself, and which had been long ago given to
Lady Cecilia by the dear good dean himself. This was irresistible to Helen,
and they were accepted. But this was only the prelude to presents of more
value, which Helen scrupled to receive; yet--

  "Oft to refuse and never once offend"

was not so easily done as said, especially with Lady Cecilia; she was so
urgent, so caressing, and had so many plausible reasons, suitable to all
occasions. On the general's birthday, Lady Cecilia naturally wished to wear
his first gift to her--a pair of beautiful pearl bracelets, but then Helen
must have the same. Helen thought that Roman pearl would do quite as well
for her. She had seen some such excellent imitations that no eye could
detect the difference. "No eye! very likely; but still your own conscience,
my dear!" replied Lady Cecilia. "And if people ask whether they are real,
what could you say? You know there are everywhere impertinent people;
malicious Lady Katrines, who will ask questions. Oh! positively I cannot
bear to think of your being detected in passing off counterfeits. In all
ornaments, it should be genuine or none--none or genuine."

"None, then, let it be for me this time, dear Cecilia."

Cecilia seemed to submit, and Helen thought she had well settled it. But
on the day of the general's _fete_, the pearl bracelets were on her
dressing-table. They were from the general, and could not be refused.
Cecilia declared she had nothing to do with the matter.

"Oh, Cecilia!"

"Upon my word!" cried Lady Cecilia; "and if you doubt me, the general shall
have the honour of presenting, and you the agony of refusing or accepting
them in full salon."

Helen sighed, hesitated, and submitted. The general, on her appearing with
the bracelets, bowed, smiled, and thanked her with his kindest look; and
she was glad to see him look kindly upon her again.

Having gained her point so pleasantly this time, Lady Cecilia did not stop
there; and Helen found there was no resource but to bespeak beforehand for
herself whatever she apprehended would be pressed upon her acceptance.

Fresh occasions for display, and new necessities for expense, continually
occurred. Reviews, and races, and race-balls, and archery meetings, and
archery balls, had been, and a regatta was to be. At some of these the
ladies had appeared in certain uniforms, new, of course, for the day; and
now preparations for the regatta had commenced, and were going on. It was
to last several days: and after the boat-races in the morning, there were
to be balls at night. The first of these was to be at Clarendon Park, and
Mademoiselle Felicie considered her lady's dress upon this occasion as one
of the objects of first importance in the universe. She had often sighed
over the long unopened jewel-box. Her lady might as well be nobody.
Mademoiselle Felicie could no ways understand a lady well born not wearing
that which distinguished her above the common; and if she was ever to
wear jewels, the ball-room was surely the proper place. And the sapphire
necklace would look _a ravir_ with her lady's dress, which, indeed, without
it, would have no effect; would be quite _mesquine_ and _manquee_.

Now Lady Cecilia had a great inclination to wear that sapphire necklace,
which probably Felicie saw when she commenced her remonstrances, for it is
part of the business of the well-trained waiting-woman, to give utterance
to those thoughts which her lady wishes should be divined and pressed into
accomplishment. Cecilia considered whether it would not be possible to
divide the double rows of her sapphires, to make out a set for Helen as
well as for herself; she hesitated only because they had been given to her
by her mother, and she did not like to run the hazard of spoiling the set;
but still she could manage it, and she would do it. Mademoiselle Felicie
protested the attempt would be something very like sacrilege; to prevent
which, she gave a hint to Helen of what was in contemplation.

Helen knew that with Cecilia, when once she had set her heart upon a
generous feat of this kind, remonstrance would be in vain; she dreaded
that she would, if prevented from the meditated division of the sapphires,
purchase for her a new set: she had not the least idea what the expense
was, but, at the moment, she thought anything would be better than letting
Cecilia spoil her mother's present, or put her under fresh obligations of
this sort. She knew that the sapphires had been got from the jewellers with
whom her uncle had dealt, and who were no strangers to her name; she wrote,
and bespoke a similar set to Lady Cecilia's.

"_Charmante!_ the very thing," Mademoiselle Felicie foresaw, "a young lady
so well born would determine on doing. And if she might add a little word,
it would be good at the same opportunity to order a ruby brooch, the same
as her lady's, as that would be the next object in question for the second
day's regatta ball, when it would be indispensable for that night's
appearance; _positivement_, she knew her lady would do it for Miss Stanley
if Miss Stanley did not do it of her own head."

Helen did not think that a brooch could be very expensive; there was not
time to consider about it--the post was going--she was afraid that Lady
Cecilia would come in and find her writing, and prevent her sending the
letter. She hastily added an order for the brooch, finished the letter, and
despatched it. And when it was gone she told Cecilia what she had done.
Cecilia looked startled; she was well aware that Helen did not know the
high price of what she had bespoken. But, determining that she would settle
it her own way, she took care not to give any alarm, and shaking her head,
she only reproached Helen playfully with having thus stolen a march upon
her.

"You think you have out-generaled me, but we shall see. Remember, I am the
wife of a general, and not without resources."




CHAPTER VII.


Of the regatta, of the fineness of the weather, the beauty of the
spectacle, and the dresses of the ladies, a full account appeared in the
papers of the day, of which it would be useless here to give a repetition,
and shameful to steal or seem to steal a description. We shall record only
what concerns Helen.

With the freshness of youth and of her naturally happy temper, she was
delighted with the whole, to her a perfectly new spectacle, and every body
was pleased except Lady Katrine, who, in the midst of every amusement,
always found something that annoyed her, something that "should not have
been so." She was upon this occasion more cross than usual, because this
morning's uniform was not becoming to her, and was most particularly so to
Miss Stanley, as all the gentlemen observed.

Just in time before the ladies went to dress for the ball at night, the
precious box arrived, containing the set of sapphires. Cecilia opened it
eagerly, to see that all was right. Helen was not in the room. Lady Katrine
stood by, and when she found that these were for Helen, her envious
indignation broke forth. "The poor daughters of peers cannot indulge
in such things," cried she; "they are fit only for rich heiresses! I
understood," continued she, "that Miss Stanley had given away her fortune
to pay her uncle's debts, but I presume she has thought better of that, as
I always prophesied she would----generosity is charming, but, after all,
sapphires are so becoming!"

Helen came into the room just as this speech was ended. Lady Katrine had
one of the bracelets in her hand. She looked miserably cross, for she
had been disappointed about some ornaments she had expected by the same
conveyance that brought Miss Stanley's. She protested that she had nothing
fit to wear to-night. Helen looked at Cecilia; and though Cecilia's look
gave no encouragement, she begged that Lady Katrine would do her the honour
to wear these sapphires this night, since she had not received what her
ladyship had ordered. Lady Katrine suffered herself to be prevailed on, but
accepted with as ill a grace as possible. The ball went on, and Helen at
least was happier than if she had worn the bracelets. She had no pleasure
in being the object of envy, and now, when she found that Cecilia could be
and was satisfied, though their ornaments were not exactly alike, it
came full upon her mind that she had done foolishly in bespeaking these
sapphires: it was at that moment only a transient self-reproach for
extravagance, but before she went to rest this night it became more
serious.

Lady Davenant had been expected all day, but she did not arrive till late
in the midst of the ball, and she just looked in at the dancers for a few
minutes before she retired to her own apartment. Helen would have followed
her, but that was not allowed. After the dancing was over, however, as she
was going to her room, she heard Lady Davenant's voice, calling to her as
she passed by; and, opening the door softly, she found her still awake, and
desiring to see her for a few minutes, if she was not too much tired.

"Oh no, not in the least tired; quite the contrary," said Helen.

After affectionately embracing her, Lady Davenant held her at arms' length,
and looked at her as the light of the lamp shone full upon her face and
figure. Pleased with her whole appearance, Lady Davenant smiled, and said,
as she looked at her--"You seem, Helen, to have shared the grateful old
fairy's gift to Lady Georgiana B. of the never-fading rose in the cheek.
But what particularly pleases me, Helen, is the perfect simplicity of your
dress. In the few minutes that I was in the ball-room to-night, I was
struck with that over-dressed duchess: her figure has been before my eyes
ever since, hung round with jewellery, and with that _aureole_ a foot and
a-half high on her head: like the Russian bride's headgear, which Heber
so well called 'the most costly deformity he ever beheld.' Really, this
passion for baubles," continued Lady Davenant, "is the universal passion of
our sex. I will give you an instance to what extravagance it goes. I know a
lady of high rank, who hires a certain pair of emerald earrings at fifteen
hundred pounds per annum. She rents them in this way from some German
countess in whose family they are an heir-loom, and cannot be sold." Helen
expressed her astonishment. "This is only one instance, my dear; I could
give you hundreds. Over the whole world, women of all ages, all ranks, all
conditions, have been seized with this bauble insanity--from the counter to
the throne. Think of Marie Antoinette and the story of her necklace; and
Josephine and her Cisalpine pearls, and all the falsehoods she told about
them to the emperor she reverenced, the husband she loved--and all for
what?--a string of beads! But I forget," cried Lady Davenant, interrupting
herself, "I must not forget how late it is: and I am keeping you up, and
you have been dancing: forgive me! When once my mind is moved, I forget all
hours. Good night--or good morning, my dear child; go, and rest." But just
as Helen was withdrawing her hand, Lady Davenant's eye fixed on her pearl
bracelets--"Roman pearls, or real? Real, I see, and very valuable!--given
to you, I suppose, by your poor dear extravagant uncle?"

Helen cleared her uncle's memory from this imputation, and explained that
the bracelets were a present from General Clarendon. She did not know they
were so "very valuable," but she hoped she had not done wrong to accept of
them in the circumstances; and she told how she had been induced to take
them.

Lady Davenant said she had done quite right. The general was no
present-maker, and this exception in his favour could I not lead to any
future inconvenience. "But Cecilia," continued she, "is too much addicted
to trinket giving, which ends often disagreeably even between friends, or
at all events fosters a foolish taste, and moreover associates it with
feelings of affection in a way particularly deceitful and dangerous to such
a little, tender-hearted person as I am speaking to, whose common sense
would too easily give way to the pleasure of pleasing or fear of offending
a friend. Kiss me, and don't contradict me, for your conscience tells you
that what I say is true."

The sapphires, the ruby brooch, and all her unsettled accounts, came across
Helen's mind; and if the light had shone upon her face at that moment, her
embarrassment must have been seen; but Lady Davenant, as she finished the
last words, laid her head upon the pillow, and she turned and settled
herself comfortably to go to sleep. Helen retired with a disordered
conscience; and the first thing she did in the morning was to look in the
red case in which the sapphires came, to see if there was any note of their
price; she recollected having seen some little bit of card--it was found
on the dressing-table. When she beheld the price, fear took away her
breath--it was nearly half her whole year's income; still she _could_ pay
it. But the ruby brooch that had not yet arrived--what would that cost? She
hurried to her accounts; she had let them run on for months unlooked at,
but she thought she must know the principal articles of expense in dress by
her actual possessions. There was a heap of little crumpled bills which,
with Felicie's griffonage, Helen had thrown into her table-drawer. In vain
did she attempt to decipher the figures, like apothecaries' marks, linked
to quarters and three-quarters, and yards, of gauzes, silks, and muslins,
altogether inextricably puzzling. They might have been at any other moment
laughable, but now they were quite terrible to Helen; the only thing she
could make clearly out was the total; she was astonished when she saw to
how much little nothings can amount, an astonishment felt often by the
most experienced--how much more by Helen, all unused to the arithmetic of
economy! At this instant her maid came in smiling with a packet, as if sure
of being the bearer of the very thing her young lady most wished for; it
was the brooch--the very last thing in the world she desired to see. With
a trembling hand she opened the parcel, looked at the note of the price,
and sank upon her chair half stupified, with her eyes fixed upon the sum.
She sat she knew not how long, till, roused by the opening of Cecilia's
door, she hastened to put away the papers. "Let me see them, my dear, don't
put away those papers," cried Cecilia; "Felicie tells me that you have been
at these horrid accounts these two hours, and--you look--my dear Helen, you
must let me see how much it is!" She drew the total from beneath Helen's
hand. It was astounding even to Cecilia, as appeared by her first unguarded
look of surprise. But, recovering herself immediately, she in a playfully
scolding tone told Helen that all this evil came upon her in consequence of
her secret machinations. "You set about to counteract me, wrote for things
that I might not get them for you, you see what has come of it! As to these
bills, they are all from tradespeople who cannot be in a hurry to be paid;
and as to the things Felicie has got for you, she can wait, is not she a
waiting-woman by profession? Now, where is the ruby-brooch? Have you never
looked at it?--I hope it is pretty--I am sure it is handsome," cried she as
she opened the case. "Yes; I like it prodigiously, I will take it off your
hands, my dear; will that do?"

"No, Cecilia, I cannot let you do that, for you have one the same, I know,
and you cannot want another--no, no."

"You speak like an angel, my dear, but you do not look like one," said
Cecilia. "So woe-begone, so pale a creature, never did I see! do look at
yourself in the glass; but you are too wretched to plague. Seriously, I
want this brooch, and mine it must be--it is mine: I have a use for it, I
assure you."

"Well, if you have a use for it, really," said Helen, "I should indeed be
very glad----"

"Be glad then, it is mine," said Cecilia; "and now it is yours, my dear
Helen, now, not a word! pray, if you love me!"

Helen could not accept of it; she thanked Cecilia with all her heart, she
felt her kindness--her generosity, but even the hitherto irresistible
words, "If you love me," were urged in vain. If she had not been in actual
need of money, she might have been over-persuaded, but now her spirit of
independence strengthened her resolution, and she persisted in her refusal.
Lady Davenant's bell rang, and Helen, slowly rising, took up the miserable
accounts, and said, "Now I must go----"

"Where!" said Cecilia; "you look as if you had heard a knell that summoned
you--what are you going to do?" "To tell all my follies to Lady Davenant."

"Tell your follies to nobody but me," cried Lady Cecilia. "I have enough of
my own to sympathise with you, but do not go and tell them to my mother, of
all people; she, who has none of her own, how can you expect any mercy?"

"I do not; I am content to bear all the blame I so richly deserve, but I
know that after she has heard me, she will tell me what I ought to do, she
will find out some way of settling it all rightly, and if that can but be,
I do not care how much I suffer. So the sooner I go to her the better,"
said Helen.

"But you need not be in such a hurry; do not be like the man who said,
'Je veux etre l'enfant prodigue, je veux etre l'enfant perdu.' L'enfant
prodigue, well and good, but why l'enfant perdu?"

"My dear Cecilia, do not play with me now--do not stop me," said Helen
anxiously. "It is serious with me now, and it is as much as I can do----"

Cecilia let her go, but trembled for her, as she looked after her, and saw
her stop at her mother's door.

Helen's first knock was too low, it was unheard, she was obliged to wait;
another, louder, was answered by, "Come in." And in the presence she stood,
and into the middle of things she rushed at once; the accounts, the total,
lay before Lady Davenant. There it was: and the culprit, having made her
confession, stood waiting for the sentence.

The first astonished change of look, was certainly difficult to sustain.
"I ought to have foreseen this," said Lady Davenant; "my affection has
deceived my judgment. Helen, I am sorry for your sake, and for my own."

"Oh do not speak in that dreadful calm voice, as if--do not give me up at
once," cried Helen.

"What can I do for you? what can be done for one who has no strength of
mind?" I have some, thought Helen, or I should not be here at this moment.
"Of what avail, Helen, is your good heart--your good intentions, without
the power to abide by them? When you can be drawn aside from the right by
the first paltry temptation--by that most contemptible of passions--the
passion for baubles! You tell me it was not that, what then? a few words of
persuasion from any one who can smile, and fondle, and tell you that they
love you;--the fear of offending Cecilia! how absurd! Is this what you both
call friendship? But weaker still, Helen, I perceive that you have been led
blindfold in extravagance by a prating French waiting-maid--to the brink of
ruin, the very verge of dishonesty."

"Dishonesty! how?"

"Ask yourself, Helen: is a person honest, who orders and takes from the
owner that for which he cannot pay? Answer me, honest or dishonest."

"Dishonest! if I had intended not to pay. But I did intend to pay, and I
will."

"You will! The weak have no will--never dare to say I will. Tell me how you
will pay that which you owe. You have no means--no choice, except to take
from the fund you have already willed to another purpose. See what good
intentions, come to, Helen, when you cannot abide by them!"

"But I can," cried Helen; "whatever else I do, I will not touch that fund,
destined for my dear uncle--I have not touched it. I could pay it in two
years, and I will--I will give up my whole allowance."

"And what will you live upon in the mean time?"

"I should not have said my whole allowance, but I can do with very little,
I will buy nothing new."

"Buy nothing--live upon nothing!" repeated Lady Davenant; "how often have
I heard these words said by the most improvident, in the moment of
repentance, even then as blind and uncalculating as ever! And you, Helen,
talk to me of your powers of forbearance,--you, who, with the strongest
motive your heart could feel, have not been able for a few short months to
resist the most foolish--the most useless fancies."

Helen burst into tears. But Lady Davenant, unmoved, at least to all outward
appearance, coldly said, "It is not feeling that you want, or that I
require from you; I am not to be satisfied by words or tears."

"I deserve it all," said Helen; "and I know you are not cruel. In the midst
of all this, I know you are my best friend."

Lady Davenant was now obliged to be silent, lest her voice should betray
more tenderness than her countenance chose to show.

"Only tell me what I can do now," continued Helen; "what can I do?"

"What you CAN do, I will tell you, Helen. Who was the man you were dancing
with last night?" "I danced with several; which do you mean?"

"Your partner in the quadrille you were dancing when I came in."

"Lord Estridge: but you know him--he has been often here."

"Is he rich?" said Lady Davenant.

"Oh yes, very rich, and very self-sufficient: he is the man Cecilia used to
call '_Le prince de mon merite._'"

"Did she? I do not remember. He made no impression on me, nor on you, I
dare say."

"Not the least, indeed."

"No matter, he will do as well as another, since he is rich. You can marry
him, and pay your present debts, and contract new, for thousands instead of
hundreds:--this is what you CAN do, Helen."

"Do you think I can?" said Helen.

"You can, I suppose, as well as others. You know that young ladies often
marry to pay their debts?"

"So I once heard," said Helen, "but is it possible?"

"Quite. You might have been told more--that they enter into regular
partnerships, joint-stock companies with dress-makers and jewellers, who
make their ventures and bargains on the more or less reputation of the
young ladies for beauty or for fashion, supply them with finery, speculate
on their probabilities of matrimonial success, and trust to being repaid
after marriage. Why not pursue this plan next season in town? You must come
to it like others, whose example you follow--why not begin it immediately?"

There is nothing so reassuring to the conscience as to hear, in the midst
of blame that we do deserve, suppositions of faults, imputations which we
know to be unmerited--impossible. Instead of being hurt or alarmed by what
Lady Davenant had said, the whole idea appeared to Helen so utterly beneath
her notice, that the words made scarcely any impression on her mind, and
her thoughts went earnestly back to the pressing main question--"What can
I do, honestly to pay this money that I owe?" She abruptly asked Lady
Davenant if she thought the jeweller could be prevailed upon to take back
the sapphires and the brooch?

"Certainly not, without a considerable loss to you," replied Lady Davenant;
but with an obvious change for the better in her countenance, she added,
"Still the determination to give up the bauble is good; the means, at
whatever loss, we will contrive for you, if you are determined."

"Determined!--oh yes." She ran for the bracelets and brooch, and eagerly
put them into Lady Davenant's hand. And now another bright idea came into
her mind: she had a carriage of her own--a very handsome carriage, almost
new; she could part with it--yes, she would, though it was a present from
her dear uncle--his last gift; and he had taken such pleasure in having it
made perfect for her. She was very, very fond of it, but she would part
with it; she saw no other means of abiding by her promise, and paying his
debts and her own. This passed rapidly through her mind; and when she had
expressed her determination, Lady Davenant's manner instantly returned to
all its usual kindness, and she exclaimed as she embraced her, drew her
to her, and kissed her again and again--"You are my own Helen! These are
deeds, Helen, not words: I am satisfied--I may be satisfied with you now!

"And about that carriage, my dear, it shall not go to a stranger, it shall
be mine. I want a travelling chaise--I will purchase it from you: I shall
value it for my poor friend's sake, and for yours, Helen. So now it is
settled, and you are clear in the world again. I will never spoil you,
but I will always serve you, and a greater pleasure I cannot have in this
world."

After this happy termination of the dreaded confession, how much did Helen
rejoice that she had had the courage to tell all to her friend. The pain
was transient--the confidence permanent.

As Helen was going into her own room, she saw Cecilia flying up stairs
towards her, with an open letter in her hand, her face radiant with joy. "I
always knew it would all end well! Churchill might well say that all the
sand in my hour-glass was diamond sand. There, my dear Helen--there," cried
Cecilia, embracing her as she put the letter into her hand. It was from
Beauclerc, his answer to Lady Cecilia's letter, which had followed him to
Naples. It was written the very instant he had read her explanation, and,
warm from his heart, he poured out all the joy he felt on hearing the
truth, and, in his transport of delight, he declared that he quite forgave
Lady Cecilia, and would forget, as she desired, all the misery she had made
him feel. Some confounded quarantine he feared might detain him, but he
would certainly be at Clarendon Park in as short a time as possible.
Helen's first smile, he said, would console him for all he had suffered,
and make him forget everything.

Helen's first smile he did not see, nor the blush which spread and rose as
she read. Cecilia was delighted. "Generous, affectionate Cecilia!" thought
Helen; "if she has faults, and she really has but one, who could help
loving her?" Not Helen, certainly, or she would have been the most
ungrateful of human beings. Besides her sympathy in Helen's happiness,
Cecilia was especially rejoiced at this letter, coming, as it did, the very
day after her mother's return; for though she had written to Lady Davenant
on Beauclerc's departure, and told her that he was gone only on Lord
Beltravers' account, yet she dreaded that, when it came to speaking, her
mother's penetration would discover that something extraordinary had
happened. Now all was easy. Beauclerc was coming back: he had finished his
friend's business, and, before he returned to Clarendon Park he wished
to know if he might appear there as the acknowledged admirer of Miss
Stanley--if he might with any chance of success pay his addresses to her.
Secure that her mother would never ask to see the letter, considering it
either as a private communication to his guardian, or as a love letter
to Helen, Cecilia gave this version of it to Lady Davenant; and how she
settled it with the general, Helen never knew, but it seemed all smooth and
right.

And now, the regatta being at an end, the archery meetings over, and no
hope of further gaiety for this season at Clarendon Park, the Castleforts
and Lady Katrine departed. Lady Katrine's last satisfaction was the hard
haughty look with which she took leave of Miss Stanley--a look expressing,
as well as the bitter smile and cold form of good breeding could express
it, unconquered, unconquerable hate.




CHAPTER VIII


There is no better test of the strength of affection than the ready turning
of the mind to the little concerns of a friend, when preoccupied with
important interests of our own. This was a proof of friendship, which Lady
Davenant had lately given to Helen, for, at the time when she had entered
with so much readiness and zeal into Helen's little difficulties and debts,
great political affairs and important interests of Lord Davenant's were in
suspense, and pressed heavily upon her mind. What might be the nature of
these political embarrassments had not been explained. Lady Davenant had
only hinted at them. She said, "she knew from the terror exhibited by
the inferior creatures in office that some change in administration
was expected, as beasts are said to howl and tremble before storm, or
earthquake, or any great convulsion of nature takes place."

Since Lady Davenant's return from town, where Lord Davenant still remained,
nothing had been said of the embassy to Russia but that it was delayed.
Lady Cecilia, who was quick, and, where she was not herself concerned,
usually right, in interpreting the signs of her mother's discomfiture,
guessed that Lord Davenant had been circumvented by some diplomatist of
inferior talents, and she said to Helen, "When an ass kicks you never tell
it, is a maxim which mamma heard from some friend, and she always acts
upon it; but a kick, whether given by ass or not, leaves a bruise, which
sometimes tells in spite of ourselves, and my mother should remember
another maxim of that friend's, that the faults and follies of the great
are the delight and comfort of the little. Now, my mother, though she is
so well suited, from her superior abilities and strength of mind, and all
that, to be the wife of a great political leader, yet in some respects she
is the most unfit person upon earth for _the situation_; for, though she
feels the necessity of conciliating, she cannot unbend with her inferiors,
that is, with half the world. As Catalani said of singing, it is much more
difficult to descend than to ascend well. Shockingly mamma shows in her
manner sometimes how tired she is of the stupid, and how she despises the
mean; and all the underlings think she can undo them with papa, for it has
gone abroad that she _governs_, while in fact, though papa asks her advice,
to be sure, because she is so wise, she never does interfere in the least;
but, now it has once got into the world's obstinate head that she does, it
cannot be put out again, and mamma is the last person upon earth to take
her own part, or condescend to explain and set things right. She is always
thinking of papa's glory and the good of the public, but the public will
never thank him and much less her; so there she is a martyr, without her
crown; now, if I were to make a martyr of myself, which, Heaven forbid! I
would at least take right good care to secure my crown, and to have my full
glory round my head, and set on becomingly. But seriously, my dear Helen,"
continued Lady Cecilia, "I am unhappy about papa and mamma, I assure you.
I have seen little clouds of discontent long gathering, lowering, and
blackening, and I know they will burst over their heads in some tremendous
storm at last."

Helen hoped not, but looked frightened.

"Oh, you may hope not, my dear, but I know it will be--we may not hear the
thunder, but we shall see the lightning all the more dangerous. We shall be
struck down, unless--" she paused.

"Unless what?" said Helen.

"Unless the storm be dispersed in time."

"And how?"

"The lightning drawn off by some good conductor--such as myself; I am quite
serious, and though you were angry with me for laughing just now, as if I
was not the best of daughters, even though I laugh, I can tell you I am
meditating an act of self-devotion for my mother's sake--a grand _coup
d'etat_." "_Coup d'etat_? you, Cecilia! my dear--"

"I, Helen, little as you think of me."

"Of your political talents you don't expect me to think much, do you?"

"My political talents! you shall see what they are. I am capable of a
grand _coup d'etat_. I will have next week a three days' congress,
anti-political, at Clarendon Park, where not a word of politics shall be
heard, nor any thing but nonsense if I can help it, and the result shall
be, as you shall see, goodwill between all men and all women--women?
yes, there's the grand point. Mamma has so affronted two ladies, very
influential as they call it, each--Lady Masham, a favourite at court, and
Lady Bearcroft, risen from the ranks, on her husband's shoulders; he, 'a
man of law,' Sir Benjamin Bearcroft, and very clever she is I hear, but
loud and coarse; absolutely inadmissible she was thought till lately, and
now, only tolerated for her husband's sake, but still have her here I
must."

"I think you had better not," remonstrated Helen; "if she is so very
vulgar, Lady Davenant and the general will never endure her." "Oh, he will!
the general will bear a great deal for mamma's sake, and more for papa's. I
must have her, my dear, for the husband is of consequence and, though he is
ashamed of her, for that very reason he cannot bear that any body should
neglect her, and terribly mamma has neglected her! Now, my dear Helen, do
not say a word more against it." Very few words had Helen said. "I must
ponder well," continued Cecilia, "and make out my list of worthies, my
concordatum party."

Helen much advised the consulting Lady Davenant first; but Lady Cecilia
feared her mother might be too proud to consent to any advance on her own
part. Helen still feared that the bringing together such discordant people
would never succeed, but Lady Cecilia, always happy in paying herself with
words answerable to her wishes, replied, "that discords well managed often
produced the finest harmony." The only point she feared was, that she
should not gain the first step, that she should not be able to prevail upon
the general to let her give the invitations. In truth, it required all her
persuasive words, and more persuasive looks to accomplish this preliminary,
and to bring General Clarendon to invite, or permit to be invited, to
Clarendon Park, persons whom he knew but little, and liked not at all. But
as Lady Cecilia pleaded and urged that it would soon be over, "the whole
will be over in three days--only a three days' visit; and for mamma!--I am
sure, Clarendon--you will do anything for her, and for papa, and your
own Cecilia? "--the general smiled, and the notes were written, and the
invitations were accepted, and when once General Clarendon had consented,
he was resolutely polite in his reception of these to him unwelcome guests.
His manner was not false; it was only properly polite, not tending to
deceive any one who understood the tokens of conventional good breeding.
It however required considerable power over himself to keep the line of
demarcation correctly, with one person in particular to whom he had a
strong political aversion: Mr. Harley.--His very name was abhorrent
to General Clarendon, who usually designated him as "That Genius,
Cecilia--that favourite of your mother's! "--while to Lady Davenant
Mr. Harley was the only person from whose presence she anticipated any
pleasure, or who could make the rest of the party to her endurable. Helen,
though apprehensive of what might be the ultimate result of this congress,
yet could not help rejoicing that she should now have an opportunity of
seeing some of those who are usually considered "high as human veneration
can look." It is easy, after one knows who is who, to determine that we
should have found out the characteristic qualities and talents in each
countenance. Lady Cecilia, however, would not tell Helen the names of the
celebrated unknown who were assembled when they went into the drawing-room
before dinner, and she endeavoured to guess from their conversation the
different characters of the speakers; but only a few sentences were
uttered, signifying nothing; snuff-boxes were presented, pinches taken
and inclinations made with becoming reciprocity, but the physiognomy of
a snuff-box Helen could not interpret, though Lavater asserts that every
thing in nature, even a cup of tea, has a physiognomy.

Dinner was announced, and the company paired off, seemingly not standing
on the order of their going; yet all, especially as some were strangers,
secretly mindful of their honours, and they moved on in precedence just,
and found themselves in places due at the dinner-table.

But Helen did not seem likely to obtain more insight into the characters
of these great personages in the dining-room than she had done in the
drawing-room. For it often happens that, when the most celebrated, and
even the most intellectual persons are brought together expressly for the
purpose of conversation, then it does not flow, but sinks to silence, and
ends at last in the stagnation of utter stupidity. Each seems oppressed
with the weight of his own reputation, and, in the pride of high celebrity,
and the shyness, real or affected, of high rank, each fears to commit
himself by a single word. People of opposite parties, when thrown together,
cannot at once change the whole habit of their minds, nor without some
effort refrain from that abuse of their opposites in which they are
accustomed to indulge when they have it all to themselves. Now every
subject seems laboured--for in the pedantry of party spirit no partisan
will speak but in the slang or cant of his own craft. Knowledge is not only
at one entrance, but at every entrance quite shut out, and even literature
itself grows perilous, so that to be safe they must all be dumb.

Lady Cecilia Clarendon was little aware of what she undertook when she
called together this heterogeneous assembly of uncongenials and dissimilars
round her dinner-table. After she had in vain made what efforts she could,
and, well skilled in throwing the ball of conversation, had thrown it again
and again without rebound from either side, she felt that all was flat, and
that the silence and the stupidity were absolutely invincible. Helen could
scarcely believe, when she tried afterwards to recollect, that she had
literally this day, during the whole of the first course, heard only the
following sentences, which came out at long intervals between each couple
of questions and answers--or observations and acquiescences:--"We had a
shower."--"Yes, I think so." "But very fine weather we have had."--"Only
too hot."--"Quite." "The new buildings at Marblemore--are they getting on,
my Lord?"--"Do not know; did not come that way." "Whom have they now at
Dunstanbury?" was the next question. Then in reply came slowly a list of
fashionable names. "Sir John died worth a million, they say."--"Yes, a
martyr to the gout." "Has Lady Rachel done any thing for her eyes?"--"Gone
to Brighton, I believe." "Has any thing been heard of the North Pole
expedition?"--"Not a word." "Crockly has got a capital cook, and English
too."--"English! eh?"--"English--yes." Lord Davenant hoped this English
cook would, with the assistance of several of his brother _artistes_ of
the present day, redeem our country from one-half of the Abbe Gregoire's
reproach. The abbe has said that England would be the finest country in the
world, but that it wants too essentials, _sunshine_ and _cooks_. "Good!
Good! Very!" voices from different sides of the table pronounced; and there
was silence again.

At the dessert, however, after the servants had withdrawn, most people
began to talk a little to their next neighbours; but by this Helen profited
not, for each pair spoke low, and those who were beside her on either hand,
were not disposed to talk; she was seated between Sir Benjamin Bearcroft
and Mr. Harley--Sir Benjamin the man of law, and Mr. Harley the man of
genius, each eminent in his kind; but he of law seemed to have nothing in
him but law, of which he was very full. In Sir Benjamin's economy of human
life it was a wholesome rule, which he practised invariably, to let his
understanding sleep in company, that it might waken in the courts, and for
his repose he needed not what some great men have professed so much to
like--"the pillow of a woman's mind." Helen did not much regret the silence
of this great legal authority, but she was very sorry that the man of
genius did not talk; she did not expect him to speak to her, but she wished
to hear him converse with others. But something was the matter with him;
from the moment he sat down to dinner Helen saw he seemed discomfited. He
first put his hand across his eyes, then pressed his forehead: she feared
he had a bad headache. The hand went next to his ear, with a shrinking,
excruciating gesture; it must be the earache thought Helen. Presently his
jaws were pinched together; toothache perhaps. At last she detected the
disturbing cause. Opposite to Mr. Harley, and beside Lady Davenant, sat a
person whom he could not endure; one,