Nature and Art
by
Mrs Inchbald
Part 1 out of 3
This etext was produced by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk,
from the 1886 Cassell & Co. edition.
NATURE AND ART
by Mrs. [Elizabeth] Inchbald
INTRODUCTION
Elizabeth Simpson was born on the 15th of October, 1753, one of the
eight children of a poor farmer, at Standingfield, near Bury St.
Edmunds. Five of the children were girls, who were all gifted with
personal beauty. The family was Roman Catholic. The mother had a
delight in visits to the Bury Theatre, and took, when she could, her
children to the play. One of her sons became an actor, and her
daughter Elizabeth offered herself at eighteen--her father then
being dead--for engagement as an actress at the Norwich Theatre.
She had an impediment of speech, and she was not engaged; but in the
following year, leaving behind an affectionate letter to her mother,
she stole away from Standingfield, and made a bold plunge into the
unknown world of London, where she had friends, upon whose help she
relied. Her friends happened to be in Wales, and she had some
troubles to go through before she found a home in the house of a
sister, who had married a poor tailor. About two months after she
had left Standingfield she married, in London, Mr. Inchbald, an
actor, who had paid his addresses to her when she was at home, and
who was also a Roman Catholic. On the evening of the wedding day
the bride, who had not yet succeeded in obtaining an engagement,
went to the play, and saw the bridegroom play the part of Mr. Oakley
in the "Jealous Wife." Mr. Inchbald was thirty-seven years old, and
had sons by a former marriage. In September, 1772, Mrs. Inchbald
tried her fortune on the stage by playing Cordelia to her husband's
Lear. Beauty alone could not assure success. The impediment in
speech made it impossible for Mrs. Inchbald to succeed greatly as an
actress. She was unable to realise her own conceptions. At times
she and her husband prospered so little that on one day their dinner
was of turnips, pulled and eaten in a field, and sometimes there was
no dinner at all. But better days presently followed; first
acquaintance of Mrs. Inchbald with Mrs. Siddons grew to a strong
friendship, and this extended to the other members of the Kemble
family.
After seven years of happy but childless marriage, Mrs. Inchbald was
left a widow at the age of twenty-six. In after years, when
devoting herself to the baby of one of her landladies, she wrote to
a friend,--"I shall never again have patience with a mother who
complains of anything but the loss of her children; so no complaints
when you see me again. Remember, you have had two children, and I
never had one." After her husband's death, Mrs. Inchbald's beauty
surrounded her with admirers, some of them rich, but she did not
marry again. To one of those who offered marriage, she replied that
her temper was so uncertain that nothing but blind affection in a
husband could bear with it. Yet she was patiently living and
fighting the world on a weekly salary of about thirty shillings, out
of which she helped her poorer sisters. When acting at Edinburgh
she spent on herself only eight shillings a week in board and
lodging. It was after her husband's death that Mrs. Inchbald
finished a little novel, called "A Simple Story," but it was not
until twelve years afterwards that she could get it published. She
came to London again, and wrote farces, which she could not get
accepted; but she obtained an increase of salary to three pounds a
week by unwillingly consenting not only to act in plays, but also to
walk in pantomime. At last, in July, 1784, her first farce, "The
Mogul Tale," was acted. It brought her a hundred guineas. Three
years later her success as a writer had risen so far that she
obtained nine hundred pounds by a little piece called "Such Things
Are." She still lived sparingly, invested savings, and was liberal
only to the poor, and chiefly to her sisters and the poor members of
her family. She finished a sketch of her life in 1786, for which a
publisher, without seeing it, offered a thousand pounds. But there
was more satirical comment in it than she liked, and she resolved to
do at once what she would wish done at the point of death. She
destroyed the record.
In 1791 Mrs. Inchbald published her "Simple Story." Her other tale,
"Nature and Art," followed in 1794, when Mrs. Inchbald's age was
forty-one. She had retired from the stage five years before, with
an income of fifty-eight pounds a year, all she called her own out
of the independence secured by her savings. She lived in cheap
lodgings, and had sometimes to wait altogether on herself; at one
lodging "fetching up her own water three pair of stairs, and
dropping a few tears into the heedless stream, as any other wounded
deer might do." Later in life, she wrote to a friend from a room in
which she cooked, and ate, and also her saucepans were cleaned:-
"Thank God, I can say No. I say No to all the vanities of the
world, and perhaps soon shall have to say that I allow my poor
infirm sister a hundred a year. I have raised my allowance to
eighty; but in the rapid stride of her wants, and my obligation as a
Christian to make no selfish refusal to the poor, a few months, I
foresee, must make the sum a hundred." In 1816, when that sister
died, and Mrs. Inchbald buried the last of her immediate home
relations--though she had still nephews to find money for--she said
it had been a consolation to her when sometimes she cried with cold
to think that her sister, who was less able to bear privation, had
her fire lighted for her before she rose, and her food brought to
her ready cooked.
Even at fifty Mrs. Inchbald's beauty of face inspired admiration.
The beauty of the inner life increased with years. Lively and quick
of temper, impulsive, sensitive, she took into her heart all that
was best in the sentiments associated with the teaching of Rousseau
and the dreams of the French Revolution. Mrs. Inchbald spoke her
mind most fully in this little story, which is told with a dramatic
sense of construction that swiftly carries on the action to its
close. She was no weak sentimentalist, who hung out her feelings to
view as an idle form of self-indulgence. Most unselfishly she
wrought her own life to the pattern in her mind; even the little
faults she could not conquer, she well knew.
Mrs. Inchbald died at the age of sixty-eight, on the 1st of August,
1821, a devout Roman Catholic, her thoughts in her last years
looking habitually through all disguises of convention up to
Nature's God.
H. M.
NATURE AND ART.
CHAPTER I.
At a time when the nobility of Britain were said, by the poet
laureate, to be the admirers and protectors of the arts, and were
acknowledged by the whole nation to be the patrons of music--William
and Henry, youths under twenty years of age, brothers, and the sons
of a country shopkeeper who had lately died insolvent, set out on
foot for London, in the hope of procuring by their industry a scanty
subsistence.
As they walked out of their native town, each with a small bundle at
his back, each observed the other drop several tears: but, upon the
sudden meeting of their eyes, they both smiled with a degree of
disdain at the weakness in which they had been caught.
"I am sure," said William (the elder), "I don't know what makes me
cry."
"Nor I neither," said Henry; "for though we may never see this town
again, yet we leave nothing behind us to give us reason to lament."
"No," replied William, "nor anybody who cares what becomes of us."
"But I was thinking," said Henry, now weeping bitterly, "that, if my
poor father were alive, HE would care what was to become of us: he
would not have suffered us to begin this long journey without a few
more shillings in our pockets."
At the end of this sentence, William, who had with some effort
suppressed his tears while his brother spoke, now uttered, with a
voice almost inarticulate,--"Don't say any more; don't talk any more
about it. My father used to tell us, that when he was gone we must
take care of ourselves: and so we must. I only wish," continued
he, giving way to his grief, "that I had never done anything to
offend him while he was living."
"That is what I wish too," cried Henry. "If I had always been
dutiful to him while he was alive, I would not shed one tear for him
now that he is gone--but I would thank Heaven that he has escaped
from his creditors."
In conversation such as this, wherein their sorrow for their
deceased parent seemed less for his death than because he had not
been so happy when living as they ought to have made him; and
wherein their own outcast fortune was less the subject of their
grief, than the reflection what their father would have endured
could he have beheld them in their present situation;--in
conversation such as this, they pursued their journey till they
arrived at that metropolis, which has received for centuries past,
from the provincial towns, the bold adventurer of every
denomination; has stamped his character with experience and example;
and, while it has bestowed on some coronets and mitres--on some the
lasting fame of genius--to others has dealt beggary, infamy, and
untimely death.
CHAPTER II.
After three weeks passed in London, a year followed, during which
William and Henry never sat down to a dinner, or went into a bed,
without hearts glowing with thankfulness to that Providence who had
bestowed on them such unexpected blessings; for they no longer
presumed to expect (what still they hoped they deserved) a secure
pittance in this world of plenty. Their experience, since they came
to town, had informed them that to obtain a permanent livelihood is
the good fortune but of a part of those who are in want of it: and
the precarious earning of half-a-crown, or a shilling, in the
neighbourhood where they lodged, by an errand, or some such
accidental means, was the sole support which they at present
enjoyed.
They had sought for constant employment of various kinds, and even
for servants' places; but obstacles had always occurred to prevent
their success. If they applied for the situation of a clerk to a
man of extensive concerns, their qualifications were admitted; but
there must be security given for their fidelity;--they had friends,
who would give them a character, but who would give them nothing
else.
If they applied for the place even of a menial servant, they were
too clownish and awkward for the presence of the lady of the house;-
-and once, when William (who had been educated at the free grammar-
school of the town in which he was born, and was an excellent
scholar), hoping to obtain the good opinion of a young clergyman
whom he solicited for the favour of waiting upon him, said
submissively, "that he understood Greek and Latin," he was rejected
by the divine, "because he could not dress hair."
Weary of repeating their mean accomplishments of "honesty, sobriety,
humility," and on the precipice of reprobating such qualities,--
which, however beneficial to the soul, gave no hope of preservation
to the body,--they were prevented from this profanation by the
fortunate remembrance of one qualification, which Henry, the
possessor, in all his distress, had never till then called to his
recollection; but which, as soon as remembered and made known,
changed the whole prospect of wretchedness placed before the two
brothers; and they never knew want more.
Reader--Henry could play upon the fiddle.
CHAPTER III.
No sooner was it publicly known that Henry could play most
enchantingly upon the violin, than he was invited into many
companies where no other accomplishment could have introduced him.
His performance was so much admired, that he had the honour of being
admitted to several tavern feasts, of which he had also the honour
to partake without partaking of the expense. He was soon addressed
by persons of the very first rank and fashion, and was once seen
walking side by side with a peer.
But yet, in the midst of this powerful occasion for rejoicing,
Henry, whose heart was particularly affectionate, had one grief
which eclipsed all the happiness of his new life;--his brother
William could NOT play on the fiddle! consequently, his brother
William, with whom he had shared so much ill, could not share in his
good fortune.
One evening, Henry, coming home from a dinner and concert at the
Crown and Anchor found William, in a very gloomy and peevish humour,
poring over the orations of Cicero. Henry asked him several times
"how he did," and similar questions, marks of his kind disposition
towards his beloved brother: but all his endeavours, he perceived,
could not soothe or soften the sullen mind of William. At length,
taking from his pocket a handful of almonds, and some delicious
fruit (which he had purloined from the plenteous table, where his
brother's wants had never been absent from his thoughts), and laying
them down before him, he exclaimed, with a benevolent smile, "Do,
William, let me teach you to play upon the violin."
William, full of the great orator whom he was then studying, and
still more alive to the impossibility that HIS ear, attuned only to
sense, could ever descend from that elevation, to learn mere sounds-
-William caught up the tempting presents which Henry had ventured
his reputation to obtain for him, and threw them all indignantly at
the donor's head.
Henry felt too powerfully his own superiority of fortune to resent
this ingratitude: he patiently picked up the repast, and laying it
again upon the table, placed by its side a bottle of claret, which
he held fast by the neck, while he assured his brother that,
"although he had taken it while the waiter's back was turned, yet it
might be drank with a safe conscience by them; for he had not
himself tasted one drop at the feast, on purpose that he might enjoy
a glass with his brother at home, and without wronging the company
who had invited him."
The affection Henry expressed as he said this, or the force of a
bumper of wine, which William had not seen since he left his
father's house, had such an effect in calming the displeasure he was
cherishing, that, on his brother offering him the glass, he took it;
and he deigned even to eat of his present.
Henry, to convince him that he had stinted himself to obtain for him
this collation, sat down and partook of it.
After a few glasses, he again ventured to say, "Do, brother William,
let me teach you to play on the violin."
Again his offer was refused, though with less vehemence: at length
they both agreed that the attempt could not prosper.
"Then," said Henry, "William, go down to Oxford or to Cambridge.
There, no doubt, they are as fond of learning as in this gay town
they are of music. You know you have as much talent for the one as
I for the other: do go to one of our universities, and see what
dinners, what suppers, and what friends you will find there."
CHAPTER IV.
William DID go to one of those seats of learning, and would have
starved there, but for the affectionate remittances of Henry, who
shortly became so great a proficient in the art of music, as to have
it in his power not only to live in a very reputable manner himself,
but to send such supplies to his brother, as enabled him to pursue
his studies.
With some, the progress of fortune is rapid. Such is the case when,
either on merit or demerit, great patronage is bestowed. Henry's
violin had often charmed, to a welcome forgetfulness of his
insignificance, an effeminate lord; or warmed with ideas of honour
the head of a duke, whose heart could never be taught to feel its
manly glow. Princes had flown to the arms of their favourite fair
ones with more rapturous delight, softened by the masterly touches
of his art: and these elevated personages, ever grateful to those
from whom they receive benefits, were competitors in the desire of
heaping favours upon him. But he, in all his advantages, never once
lost for a moment the hope of some advantage for his brother
William: and when at any time he was pressed by a patron to demand
a "token of his regard," he would constantly reply--"I have a
brother, a very learned man, if your lordship (your grace, or your
royal highness) would confer some small favour on him!"
His lordship would reply, "He was so teased and harassed in his
youth by learned men, that he had ever since detested the whole
fraternity."
His grace would inquire, "if the learned man could play upon any
instrument."
And his highness would ask "if he could sing."
Rebuffs such as these poor Henry met with in all his applications
for William, till one fortunate evening, at the conclusion of a
concert, a great man shook him by the hand, and promised a living of
five hundred a year (the incumbent of which was upon his death-bed)
to his brother, in return for the entertainment that Henry had just
afforded him.
Henry wrote in haste to William, and began his letter thus: "My
dear brother, I am not sorry you did not learn to play upon the
fiddle."
CHAPTER V.
The incumbent of this living died--William underwent the customary
examinations, obtained successively the orders of deacon and priest;
then as early as possible came to town to take possession of the
gift which his brother's skill had acquired for him.
William had a steady countenance, a stern brow, and a majestic walk;
all of which this new accession, this holy calling to religious
vows, rather increased than diminished. In the early part of his
life, the violin of his brother had rather irritated than soothed
the morose disposition of his nature: and though, since their
departure from their native habitation, it had frequently calmed the
violent ragings of his huger, it had never been successful in
appeasing the disturbed passions of a proud and disdainful mind.
As the painter views with delight and wonder the finished picture,
expressive testimony of his taste and genius; as the physician
beholds with pride and gladness the recovering invalid, whom his art
has snatched from the jaws of death; as the father gazes with
rapture on his first child, the creature to whom he has given life;
so did Henry survey, with transporting glory, his brother, dressed
for the first time in canonicals, to preach at his parish church.
He viewed him from head to foot--smiled--viewed again--pulled one
side of his gown a little this way, one end of his band a little
that way; then stole behind him, pretending to place the curls of
his hair, but in reality to indulge and to conceal tears of
fraternal pride and joy.
William was not without joy, neither was he wanting in love or
gratitude to his brother; but his pride was not completely
satisfied.
"I am the elder," thought he to himself, "and a man of literature,
and yet am I obliged to my younger brother, an illiterate man."
Here he suppressed every thought which could be a reproach to that
brother. But there remained an object of his former contempt, now
become even detestable to him; ungrateful man. The very agent of
his elevation was now so odious to him, that he could not cast his
eyes upon the friendly violin without instant emotions of disgust.
In vain would Henry, at times, endeavour to subdue his haughtiness
by a tune on this wonderful machine. "You know I have no ear,"
William would sternly say, in recompense for one of Henry's best
solos. Yet was William enraged at Henry's answer, when, after
taking him to hear him preach, he asked him, "how he liked his
sermon," and Henry modestly replied (in the technical phrase of his
profession), "You know, brother, I have no ear."
Henry's renown in his profession daily increased; and, with his
fame, his friends. Possessing the virtues of humility and charity
far above William, who was the professed teacher of those virtues,
his reverend brother's disrespect for his vocation never once made
him relax for a moment in his anxiety to gain him advancement in the
Church. In the course of a few years, and in consequence of many
fortuitous circumstances, he had the gratification of procuring for
him the appointment to a deanery; and thus at once placed between
them an insurmountable barrier to all friendship, that was not the
effect of condescension on the part of the dean.
William would now begin seriously to remonstrate with his brother
"upon his useless occupation," and would intimate "the degradation
it was to him to hear his frivolous talent spoken of in all
companies." Henry believed his brother to be much wiser than
himself, and suffered shame that he was not more worthy of such a
relation. To console himself for the familiar friend, whom he now
perceived he had entirely lost, he searched for one of a softer
nature--he married.
CHAPTER VI.
As Henry despaired of receiving his brother's approbation of his
choice, he never mentioned the event to him. But William, being
told of it by a third person, inquired of Henry, who confirmed the
truth of the intelligence, and acknowledged, that, in taking a wife,
his sole view had been to obtain a kind companion and friend, who
would bear with his failings and know how to esteem his few
qualifications; therefore, he had chosen one of his own rank in
life, and who, having a taste for music, and, as well as himself, an
obligation to the art--"
"And is it possible," cried the dean, "that what has been hinted to
me is true? Is it possible that you have married a public singer?"
"She is as good as myself," returned Henry. "I did not wish her to
be better, for fear she should despise me."
"As to despise," answered the dean, "Heaven forbid that we should
despise anyone, that would be acting unlike a Christian; but do you
imagine I can ever introduce her to my intended wife, who is a woman
of family?"
Henry had received in his life many insults from his brother; but,
as he was not a vain man, he generally thought his brother in the
right, and consequently submitted with patience; but, though he had
little self-love, he had for his wife an unbounded affection. On
the present occasion, therefore, he began to raise his voice, and
even (in the coarse expression of clownish anger) to lift his hand;
but the sudden and affecting recollection of what he had done for
the dean--of the pains, the toils, the hopes, and the fears he had
experienced when soliciting his preferment--this recollection
overpowered his speech, weakened his arm, and deprived him of every
active force, but that of flying out of his brother's house (in
which they then were) as swift as lightning, while the dean sat
proudly contemplating "that he had done his duty."
For several days Henry did not call, as was his custom, to see his
brother. William's marriage drew near, and he sent a formal card to
invite him on that day; but not having had the condescension to name
his sister-in-law in the invitation, Henry thought proper not to
accept it, and the joyful event was celebrated without his presence.
But the ardour of the bridegroom was not so vehement as to overcome
every other sensation--he missed his brother. That heartfelt
cheerfulness with which Henry had ever given him joy upon every
happy occasion--even amidst all the politer congratulations of his
other friends--seemed to the dean mournfully wanting. This
derogation from his felicity he was resolved to resent; and for a
whole year these brothers, whom adversity had entwined closely
together, prosperity separated.
Though Henry, on his marriage, paid so much attention to his
brother's prejudices as to take his wife from her public employment,
this had not so entirely removed the scruples of William as to
permit him to think her a worthy companion for Lady Clementina, the
daughter of a poor Scotch earl, whom he had chosen merely that he
might be proud of her family, and, in return, suffer that family to
be ashamed of HIS.
If Henry's wife were not fit company for Lady Clementina, it is to
be hoped that she was company for angels. She died within the first
year of her marriage, a faithful, an affectionate wife, and a
mother.
When William heard of her death, he felt a sudden shock, and a kind
of fleeting thought glanced across his mind, that
"Had he known she had been so near her dissolution, she might have
been introduced to Lady Clementina, and he himself would have called
her sister."
That is (if he had defined his fleeting idea), "They would have had
no objection to have met this poor woman for the LAST TIME, and
would have descended to the familiarity of kindred, in order to have
wished her a good journey to the other world."
Or, is there in death something which so raises the abjectness of
the poor, that, on their approach to its sheltering abode, the
arrogant believer feels the equality he had before denied, and
trembles?
CHAPTER VII.
The wife of Henry had been dead near six weeks before the dean heard
the news. A month then elapsed in thoughts by himself, and
consultations with Lady Clementina, how he should conduct himself on
this occurrence. Her advice was,
"That, as Henry was the younger, and by their stations, in every
sense the dean's inferior, Henry ought first to make overtures of
reconciliation."
The dean answered, "He had no doubt of his brother's good will to
him, but that he had reason to think, from the knowledge of his
temper, he would be more likely to come to him upon an occasion to
bestow comfort, than to receive it. For instance, if I had suffered
the misfortune of losing your ladyship, my brother, I have no doubt,
would have forgotten his resentment, and--"
She was offended that the loss of the vulgar wife of Henry should be
compared to the loss of her--she lamented her indiscretion in
forming an alliance with a family of no rank, and implored the dean
to wait till his brother should make some concession to him, before
he renewed the acquaintance.
Though Lady Clementina had mentioned on this occasion her
INDISCRETION, she was of a prudent age--she was near forty--yet,
possessing rather a handsome face and person, she would not have
impressed the spectator with a supposition that she was near so old
had she not constantly attempted to appear much younger. Her dress
was fantastically fashionable, her manners affected all the various
passions of youth, and her conversation was perpetually embellished
with accusations against her own "heedlessness, thoughtlessness,
carelessness, and childishness."
There is, perhaps in each individual, one parent motive to every
action, good or bad. Be that as it may, it was evident, that with
Lady Clementina, all she said or did, all she thought or looked, had
but one foundation--vanity. If she were nice, or if she were
negligent, vanity was the cause of both; for she would contemplate
with the highest degree of self-complacency, "What such-a-one would
say of her elegant preciseness, or what such-a-one would think of
her interesting neglect."
If she complained she was ill, it was with the certainty that her
languor would be admired: if she boasted she was well, it was that
the spectator might admire her glowing health: if she laughed, it
was because she thought it made her look pretty: if she cried, it
was because she thought it made her look prettier still. If she
scolded her servants, it was from vanity, to show her knowledge
superior to theirs: and she was kind to them from the same motive,
that her benevolence might excite their admiration. Forward and
impertinent in the company of her equals, from the vanity of
supposing herself above them, she was bashful even to shamefacedness
in the presence of her superiors, because her vanity told her she
engrossed all their observation. Through vanity she had no memory,
for she constantly forgot everything she heard others say, from the
minute attention which she paid to everything she said herself.
She had become an old maid from vanity, believing no offer she
received worthy of her deserts; and when her power of farther
conquest began to be doubted, she married from vanity, to repair the
character of her fading charms. In a word, her vanity was of that
magnitude, that she had no conjecture but that she was humble in her
own opinion; and it would have been impossible to have convinced her
that she thought well of herself, because she thought so WELL, as to
be assured that her own thoughts undervalued her.
CHAPTER VIII.
That, which in a weak woman is called vanity, in a man of sense is
termed pride. Make one a degree stranger, or the other a degree
weaker, and the dean and his wife were infected with the self-same
folly. Yet, let not the reader suppose that this failing (however
despicable) had erased from either bosom all traces of humanity.
They are human creatures who are meant to be portrayed in this
little book: and where is the human creature who has not some good
qualities to soften, if not to counterbalance, his bad ones?
The dean, with all his pride, could not wholly forget his brother,
nor eradicate from his remembrance the friend that he had been to
him: he resolved, therefore, in spite of his wife's advice, to make
him some overture, which he had no doubt Henry's good-nature would
instantly accept. The more he became acquainted with all the vain
and selfish propensities of Lady Clementina, the more he felt a
returning affection for his brother: but little did he suspect how
much he loved him, till (after sending to various places to inquire
for him) he learned--that on his wife's decease, unable to support
her loss in the surrounding scene, Henry had taken the child she
brought him in his arms, shaken hands with all his former friends--
passing over his brother in the number--and set sail in a vessel
bound for Africa, with a party of Portuguese and some few English
adventurers, to people there the uninhabited part of an extensive
island.
This was a resolution, in Henry's circumstances, worthy a mind of
singular sensibility: but William had not discerned, till then,
that every act of Henry's was of the same description; and more than
all, his every act towards him. He staggered when he heard the
tidings; at first thought them untrue; but quickly recollected, that
Henry was capable of surprising deeds! He recollected with a force
which gave him torture, the benevolence his brother had ever shown
to him--the favours he had heaped upon him--the insults he had
patiently endured in requital!
In the first emotion, which this intelligence gave the dean, he
forgot the dignity of his walk and gesture: he ran with frantic
enthusiasm to every corner of his deanery where the least vestige of
what belonged to Henry remained--he pressed close to his breast,
with tender agony, a coat of his, which by accident had been left
there--he kissed and wept over a walking-stick which Henry once had
given him--he even took up with delight a music book of his
brother's--nor would his poor violin have then excited anger.
When his grief became more calm, he sat in deep and melancholy
meditation, calling to mind when and where he saw his brother last.
The recollection gave him fresh cause of regret. He remembered they
had parted on his refusing to suffer Lady Clementina to admit the
acquaintance of Henry's wife. Both Henry and his wife he now
contemplated beyond the reach of his pride; and he felt the meanness
of his former and the imbecility of his future haughtiness towards
them.
To add to his self-reproaches, his tormented memory presented to him
the exact countenance of his brother at their last interview, as it
changed, while he censured his marriage, and treated with disrespect
the object of his conjugal affection. He remembered the anger
repressed, the tear bursting forth, and the last glimpse he had of
him, as he left his presence, most likely for ever.
In vain he now wished that he had followed him to the door--that he
had once shaken hands and owned his obligations to him before they
had parted. In vain he wished too, that, in this extreme agony of
his mind, he had such a friend to comfort him, as Henry had ever
proved.
CHAPTER IX.
The avocations of an elevated life erase the deepest impressions.
The dean in a few months recovered from those which his brother's
departure first made upon him: and he would now at times even
condemn, in anger, Henry's having so hastily abandoned him and his
native country, in resentment, as he conceived, of a few misfortunes
which his usual fortitude should have taught him to have borne. Yet
was he still desirous of his return, and wrote two or three letters
expressive of his wish, which he anxiously endeavoured should reach
him. But many years having elapsed without any intelligence from
him, and a report having arrived that he, and all the party with
whom he went, were slain by the savage inhabitants of the island,
William's despair of seeing his brother again caused the desire to
diminish; while attention and affection to a still nearer and dearer
relation than Henry had ever been to him, now chiefly engaged his
mind.
Lady Clementina had brought him a son, on whom from his infancy, he
doated--and the boy, in riper years, possessing a handsome person
and evincing a quickness of parts, gratified the father's darling
passion, pride, as well as the mother's vanity.
The dean had, beside this child, a domestic comfort highly
gratifying to his ambition: the bishop of **** became intimately
acquainted with him soon after his marriage, and from his daily
visits had become, as it were, a part of the family. This was much
honour to the dean, not only as the bishop was his superior in the
Church, but was of that part of the bench whose blood is ennobled by
a race of ancestors, and to which all wisdom on the plebeian side
crouches in humble respect.
Year after year rolled on in pride and grandeur; the bishop and the
dean passing their time in attending levees and in talking politics;
Lady Clementina passing hers in attending routs and in talking of
HERSELF, till the son arrived at the age of thirteen.
Young William passed HIS time, from morning till night, with persons
who taught him to walk, to ride, to talk, to think like a man--a
foolish man, instead of a wise child, as nature designed him to be.
This unfortunate youth was never permitted to have one conception of
his own--all were taught him--he was never once asked, "What he
thought;" but men were paid to tell "how to think." He was taught
to revere such and such persons, however unworthy of his reverence;
to believe such and such things, however unworthy of his credit:
and to act so and so, on such and such occasions, however unworthy
of his feelings.
Such were the lessons of the tutors assigned him by his father--
those masters whom his mother gave him did him less mischief; for
though they distorted his limbs and made his manners effeminate,
they did not interfere beyond the body.
Mr. Norwynne (the family name of his father, and though but a
school-boy, he was called Mister) could talk on history, on
politics, and on religion; surprisingly to all who never listened to
a parrot or magpie--for he merely repeated what had been told to him
without one reflection upon the sense or probability of his report.
He had been praised for his memory; and to continue that praise, he
was so anxious to retain every sentence he had heard, or he had
read, that the poor creature had no time for one native idea, but
could only re-deliver his tutors' lessons to his father, and his
father's to his tutors. But, whatever he said or did, was the
admiration of all who came to the house of the dean, and who knew he
was an only child. Indeed, considering the labour that was taken to
spoil him, he was rather a commendable youth; for, with the pedantic
folly of his teachers, the blind affection of his father and mother,
the obsequiousness of the servants, and flattery of the visitors, it
was some credit to him that he was not an idiot, or a brute--though
when he imitated the manners of a man, he had something of the
latter in his appearance; for he would grin and bow to a lady, catch
her fan in haste when it fell, and hand her to her coach, as
thoroughly void of all the sentiment which gives grace to such
tricks, as a monkey.
CHAPTER X.
One morning in winter, just as the dean, his wife, and darling
child, had finished their breakfast at their house in London, a
servant brought in a letter to his master, and said "the man waited
for an answer."
"Who is the man?" cried the dean, with all that terrifying dignity
with which he never failed to address his inferiors, especially such
as waited on his person.
The servant replied with a servility of tone equal to the haughty
one of his master, "he did not know; but that the man looked like a
sailor, and had a boy with him."
"A begging letter, no doubt," cried Lady Clementina.
"Take it back," said the dean, "and bid him send up word who he is,
and what is his errand."
The servant went; and returning said, "He comes from on board a
ship; his captain sent him, and his errand is, he believes, to leave
a boy he has brought with him."
"A boy!" cried the dean: "what have I to do with a boy? I expect
no boy. What boy? What age?"
"He looks about twelve or thirteen," replied the servant.
"He is mistaken in the house," said the dean. "Let me look at the
letter again."
He did look at it, and saw plainly it was directed to himself. Upon
a second glance, he had so perfect a recollection of the hand, as to
open it instantaneously; and, after ordering the servant to
withdraw, he read the following:-
"ZOCOTORA ISLAND, April 6.
"My Dear Brother William,--It is a long time since we have seen one
another; but I hope not so long, that you have quite forgotten the
many happy days we once passed together.
"I did not take my leave of you when I left England, because it
would have been too much for me. I had met with a great many
sorrows just at that time; one of which was, the misfortune of
losing the use of my right hand by a fall from my horse, which
accident robbed me of most of my friends; for I could no longer
entertain them with my performance as I used to do, and so I was
ashamed to see them or you; and that was the reason I came hither to
try my fortune with some other adventurers.
"You have, I suppose, heard that the savages of the island put our
whole party to death. But it was my chance to escape their cruelty.
I was heart-broken for my comrades; yet upon the whole, I do not
know that the savages were much to blame--we had no business to
invade their territories! and if they had invaded England, we should
have done the same by them. My life was spared, because, having
gained some little strength in my hand during the voyage, I pleased
their king when I arrived there with playing on my violin.
"They spared my child too, in pity to my lamentations, when they
were going to put him to death. Now, dear brother, before I say any
more to you concerning my child, I will first ask your pardon for
any offence I may have ever given you in all the time we lived so
long together. I know you have often found fault with me, and I
dare say I have been very often to blame; but I here solemnly
declare that I never did anything purposely to offend you, but
mostly, all I could to oblige you--and I can safely declare that I
never bore you above a quarter of an hour's resentment for anything
you might say to me which I thought harsh.
"Now, dear William, after being in this island eleven years, the
weakness in my hand has unfortunately returned; and yet there being
no appearance of complaint, the uninformed islanders think it is all
my obstinacy, and that I WILL NOT entertain them with my music,
which makes me say that I CANNOT; and they have imprisoned me, and
threaten to put my son to death if I persist in my stubbornness any
longer.
"The anguish I feel in my mind takes away all hope of the recovery
of strength in my hand; and I have no doubt but that they intend in
a few days to put their horrid threat into execution.
"Therefore, dear brother William, hearing in my prison of a most
uncommon circumstance, which is, that an English vessel is lying at
a small distance from the island, I have entrusted a faithful negro
to take my child to the ship, and deliver him to the captain, with a
request that he may be sent (with this letter) to you on the ship's
arrival in England.
"Now my dear, dear brother William, in case the poor boy should live
to come to you, I have no doubt but you will receive him; yet excuse
a poor, fond father, if I say a word or two which I hope may prove
in his favour.
"Pray, my dear brother, do not think it the child's fault, but mine,
that you will find him so ignorant--he has always shown a quickness
and a willingness to learn, and would, I dare say, if he had been
brought up under your care, have been by this time a good scholar,
but you know I am no scholar myself. Besides, not having any books
here, I have only been able to teach my child by talking to him, and
in all my conversations with him I have never taken much pains to
instruct him in the manners of my own country; thinking, that if
ever he went over, he would learn them soon enough; and if he never
DID go over, that it would be as well he knew nothing about them.
"I have kept him also from the knowledge of everything which I have
thought pernicious in the conduct of the savages, except that I have
now and then pointed out a few of their faults, in order to give him
a true conception and a proper horror of them. At the same time I
have taught him to love, and to do good to his neighbour, whoever
that neighbour may be, and whatever may be his failings. Falsehood
of every kind I included in this precept as forbidden, for no one
can love his neighbour and deceive him.
"I have instructed him too, to hold in contempt all frivolous
vanity, and all those indulgences which he was never likely to
obtain. He has learnt all that I have undertaken to teach him; but
I am afraid you will yet think he has learned too little.
"Your wife, I fear, will be offended at his want of politeness, and
perhaps proper respect for a person of her rank: but indeed he is
very tractable, and can, without severity, be amended of all his
faults; and though you will find he has many, yet, pray, my dear
brother William, call to mind he has been a dutiful and an
affectionate child to me; and that had it pleased Heaven we had
lived together for many years to come, I verily believe I should
never have experienced one mark of his disobedience.
"Farewell for ever, my dear, dear brother William--and if my poor,
kind, affectionate child should live to bring you this letter,
sometimes speak to him of me and let him know, that for twelve years
he was my sole comfort; and that, when I sent him from me, in order
to save his life, I laid down my head upon the floor of the cell in
which I was confined, and prayed that Heaven might end my days
before the morning."
* * *
This was the conclusion of the letter, except four or five lines
which (with his name) were so much blotted, apparently with tears,
that they were illegible.
CHAPTER XI.
While the dean was reading to himself this letter, his countenance
frequently changed, and once or twice the tears streamed from his
eyes. When it was finished, he exclaimed,
"My brother has sent his child to me, and I will be a parent to
him." He was rushing towards the door, when Lady Clementina stopped
him.
"Is it proper, do you think, Mr. Dean, that all the servants in the
house should be witnesses to your meeting with your brother and your
nephew in the state in which they must be at present? Send for them
into a private apartment."
"My brother!" cried the dean; "oh! that it WERE my brother! The man
is merely a person from the ship, who has conducted his child
hither."
The bell was rung, money was sent to the man, and orders given that
the boy should be shown up immediately.
While young Henry was walking up the stairs, the dean's wife was
weighing in her mind in what manner it would most redound to her
honour to receive him; for her vanity taught her to believe that the
whole inquisitive world pried into her conduct, even upon every
family occurrence.
Young William was wondering to himself what kind of an unpolished
monster his beggarly cousin would appear; and was contemplating how
much the poor youth would be surprised, and awed by his superiority.
The dean felt no other sensation than an impatient desire of
beholding the child.
The door opened--and the son of his brother Henry, of his
benefactor, entered.
The habit he had on when he left his father, having been of slight
texture, was worn out by the length of the voyage, and he was in the
dress of a sailor-boy. Though about the same age with his cousin,
he was something taller: and though a strong family resemblance
appeared between the two youths, he was handsomer than William; and
from a simplicity spread over his countenance, a quick impatience in
his eye--which denoted anxious curiosity, and childish surprise at
every new object which presented itself--he appeared younger than
his well-informed and well-bred cousin.
He walked into the room, not with a dictated obeisance, but with a
hurrying step, a half pleased, yet a half frightened look, an
instantaneous survey of every person present; not as demanding "what
they thought of him," but expressing almost as plainly as in direct
words, "what he thought of them." For all alarm in respect to his
safety and reception seemed now wholly forgotten, in the curiosity
which the sudden sight of strangers such as he had never seen in his
life before, excited: and as to HIMSELF, he did not appear to know
there was such a person existing: his whole faculties were absorbed
in OTHERS.
The dean's reception of him did honour to his sensibility and his
gratitude to his brother. After the first affectionate gaze, he ran
to him, took him in his arms, sat down, drew him to him, held him
between his knees, and repeatedly exclaimed, "I will repay to you
all I owe to your father."
The boy, in return, hugged the dean round the neck, kissed him, and
exclaimed,
"Oh! you ARE my father--you have just such eyes, and such a
forehead--indeed you would be almost the same as he, if it were not
for that great white thing which grows upon your head!"
Let the reader understand, that the dean, fondly attached to every
ornament of his dignified function, was never seen (unless caught in
bed) without an enormous wig. With this young Henry was enormously
struck; having never seen so unbecoming a decoration, either in the
savage island from whence he came, or on board the vessel in which
he sailed.
"Do you imagine," cried his uncle, laying his hand gently on the
reverend habiliment, "that this grows?"
"What is on MY head grows," said young Henry, "and so does that
which is upon my father's."
"But now you are come to Europe, Henry, you will see many persons
with such things as these, which they put on and take off."
"Why do you wear such things?"
"As a distinction between us and inferior people: they are worn to
give an importance to the wearer."
"That's just as the savages do; they hang brass nails, wire,
buttons, and entrails of beasts all over them, to give them
importance."
The dean now led his nephew to Lady Clementina, and told him, "She
was his aunt, to whom he must behave with the utmost respect."
"I will, I will," he replied, "for she, I see, is a person of
importance too; she has, very nearly, such a white thing upon her
head as you have!"
His aunt had not yet fixed in what manner it would be advisable to
behave; whether with intimidating grandeur, or with amiable
tenderness. While she was hesitating between both, she felt a kind
of jealous apprehension that her son was not so engaging either in
his person or address as his cousin; and therefore she said,
"I hope, Dean, the arrival of this child will give you a still
higher sense of the happiness we enjoy in our own. What an
instructive contrast between the manners of the one and of the
other!"
"It is not the child's fault," returned the dean, "that he is not so
elegant in his manners as his cousin. Had William been bred in the
same place, he would have been as unpolished as this boy."
"I beg your pardon, sir," said young William with a formal bow and a
sarcastic smile, "I assure you several of my tutors have told me,
that I appear to know many things as it were by instinct."
Young Henry fixed his eyes upon his cousin, while, with steady self-
complacency, he delivered this speech, and no sooner was it
concluded than Henry cried out in a kind of wonder,
"A little man! as I am alive, a little man! I did not know there
were such little men in this country! I never saw one in my life
before!"
"This is a boy," said the dean; "a boy not older than yourself."
He put their hands together, and William gravely shook hands with
his cousin.
"It IS a man," continued young Henry; then stroked his cousin's
chin. "No, no, I do not know whether it is or not."
"I tell you again," said the dean, "he is a boy of your own age; you
and he are cousins, for I am his father."
"How can that be?" said young Henry. "He called you SIR."
"In this country," said the dean, "polite children do not call their
parents FATHER and MOTHER."
"Then don't they sometimes forget to love them as such?" asked
Henry.
His uncle became now impatient to interrogate him in every
particular concerning his father's state. Lady Clementina felt
equal impatience to know where the father was, whether he were
coming to live with them, wanted anything of them, and every
circumstance in which her vanity was interested. Explanations
followed all these questions; but which, exactly agreeing with what
the elder Henry's letter has related, require no recital here.
CHAPTER XII.
That vanity which presided over every thought and deed of Lady
Clementina was the protector of young Henry within her house. It
represented to her how amiable her conduct would appear in the eye
of the world should she condescend to treat this destitute nephew as
her own son; what envy such heroic virtue would excite in the hearts
of her particular friends, and what grief in the bosoms of all those
who did not like her.
The dean was a man of no inconsiderable penetration. He understood
the thoughts which, upon this occasion, passed in the mind of his
wife, and in order to ensure her kind treatment of the boy, instead
of reproaching her for the cold manner in which she had at first
received him, he praised her tender and sympathetic heart for having
shown him so much kindness, and thus stimulated her vanity to be
praised still more.
William, the mother's own son, far from apprehending a rival in this
savage boy, was convinced of his own pre-eminence, and felt an
affection for him--though rather as a foil than as a cousin. He
sported with his ignorance upon all occasions, and even lay in wait
for circumstances that might expose it; while young Henry, strongly
impressed with everything which appeared new to him, expressed,
without reserve, the sensations which those novelties excited,
wholly careless of the construction put on his observations.
He never appeared either offended or abashed when laughed at; but
still pursued his questions, and still discovered his wonder at many
replies made to him, though "simpleton," "poor silly boy," and
"idiot," were vociferated around him from his cousin, his aunt, and
their constant visitor the bishop.
His uncle would frequently undertake to instruct him; so indeed
would the bishop; but Lady Clementina, her son, and the greatest
part of her companions, found something so irresistibly ridiculous
in his remarks, that nothing but immoderate laughter followed; they
thought such folly had even merit in the way of entertainment, and
they wished him no wiser.
Having been told that every morning, on first seeing his uncle, he
was to make a respectful bow; and coming into the dean's dressing-
room just as he was out of bed, his wig lying on the table, Henry
appeared at a loss which of the two he should bow to. At last he
gave the preference to his uncle, but afterwards bowed reverently to
the wig. In this he did what he conceived was proper, from the
introduction which the dean, on his first arrival, had given him to
this venerable stranger; for, in reality, Henry had a contempt for
all finery, and had called even his aunt's jewels, when they were
first shown to him, "trumpery," asking "what they were good for?"
But being corrected in this disrespect, and informed of their high
value, he, like a good convert, gave up his reason to his faith; and
becoming, like all converts, over-zealous, he now believed there was
great worth in all gaudy appearances, and even respected the
earrings of Lady Clementina almost as much as he respected herself.
CHAPTER XIII.
It was to be lamented that when young Henry had been several months
in England, had been taught to read, and had, of course, in the
society in which he lived, seen much of the enlightened world, yet
the natural expectation of his improvement was by no means answered.
Notwithstanding the sensibility, which upon various occasions he
manifested in the most captivating degree, notwithstanding the
seeming gentleness of his nature upon all occasions, there now
appeared, in most of his inquiries and remarks, a something which
demonstrated either a stupid or troublesome disposition; either
dulness of conception, or an obstinacy of perseverance in comments
and in arguments which were glaringly false.
Observing his uncle one day offended with his coachman, and hearing
him say to him in a very angry tone,
"You shall never drive me again" -
The moment the man quitted the room, Henry (with his eyes fixed in
the deepest contemplation) repeated five or six times, in a half
whisper to himself,
"YOU SHALL NEVER DRIVE ME AGAIN."
"YOU SHALL NEVER DRIVE ME AGAIN."
The dean at last called to him. "What do you mean by thus repeating
my words?"
"I am trying to find out what YOU meant," said Henry.
"What don't you know?" cried his enlightened cousin. "Richard is
turned away; he is never to get upon our coach-box again, never to
drive any of us more."
"And was it pleasure to drive us, cousin? I am sure I have often
pitied him. It rained sometimes very hard when he was on the box;
and sometimes Lady Clementina has kept him a whole hour at the door
all in the cold and snow. Was that pleasure?"
"No," replied young William.
"Was it honour, cousin?"
"No," exclaimed his cousin with a contemptuous smile.
"Then why did my uncle say to him, as a punishment, 'he should
never'" -
"Come hither, child," said the dean, "and let me instruct you; your
father's negligence has been inexcusable. There are in society,"
continued the dean, "rich and poor; the poor are born to serve the
rich."
"And what are the rich born for?"
"To be served by the poor."
"But suppose the poor would not serve them?"
"Then they must starve."
"And so poor people are permitted to live only upon condition that
they wait upon the rich?"
"Is that a hard condition; or if it were, they will be rewarded in a
better world than this?"
"Is there a better world than this?"
"Is it possible you do not know there is?"
"I heard my father once say something about a world to come; but he
stopped short, and said I was too young to understand what he
meant."
"The world to come," returned the dean, "is where we shall go after
death; and there no distinction will be made between rich and poor--
all persons there will be equal."
"Aye, now I see what makes it a better world than this. But cannot
this world try to be as good as that?"
"In respect to placing all persons on a level, it is utterly
impossible. God has ordained it otherwise."
"How! has God ordained a distinction to be made, and will not make
any Himself?"
The dean did not proceed in his instructions. He now began to think
his brother in the right, and that the boy was too young, or too
weak, to comprehend the subject.
CHAPTER XIV.
In addition to his ignorant conversation upon many topics, young
Henry had an incorrigible misconception and misapplication of many
WORDS. His father having had but few opportunities of discoursing
with him, upon account of his attendance at the court of the
savages, and not having books in the island, he had consequently
many words to learn of this country's language when he arrived in
England. This task his retentive memory made easy to him; but his
childish inattention to their proper signification still made his
want of education conspicuous.
He would call COMPLIMENTS, LIES; RESERVE, he would call PRIDE;
STATELINESS, AFFECTATION; and for the words WAR and BATTLE, he
constantly substituted the word MASSACRE.
"Sir," said William to his father one morning, as he entered the
room, "do you hear how the cannons are firing, and the bells
ringing?"
"Then I dare say," cried Henry, "there has been another massacre."
The dean called to him in anger, "Will you never learn the right use
of words? You mean to say a battle."
"Then what is a massacre?" cried the frightened, but still curious
Henry.
"A massacre," replied his uncle, "is when a number of people are
slain--"
"I thought," returned Henry, "soldiers had been people!"
"You interrupted me," said the dean, "before I finished my sentence.
Certainly, both soldiers and sailors are people, but they engage to
die by their own free will and consent."
"What! all of them?"
"Most of them."
"But the rest are massacred?"
The dean answered, "The number who go to battle unwillingly, and by
force, are few; and for the others, they have previously sold their
lives to the state."
"For what?"
"For soldiers' and sailors' pay."
"My father used to tell me, we must not take away our own lives; but
he forgot to tell me we might sell them for others to take away."
"William," said the dean to his son, his patience tired with his
nephew's persevering nonsense, "explain to your cousin the
difference between a battle and a massacre."
"A massacre," said William, rising from his seat, and fixing his
eyes alternately upon his father, his mother, and the bishop (all of
whom were present) for their approbation, rather than the person's
to whom his instructions were to be addressed--"a massacre," said
William, "is when human beings are slain, who have it not in their
power to defend themselves."
"Dear cousin William," said Henry, "that must ever be the case with
every one who is killed."
After a short hesitation, William replied: "In massacres people are
put to death for no crime, but merely because they are objects of
suspicion."
"But in battle," said Henry, "the persons put to death are not even
suspected."
The bishop now condescended to end this disputation by saying
emphatically,
"Consider, young savage, that in battle neither the infant, the
aged, the sick, nor infirm are involved, but only those in the full
prime of health and vigour."
As this argument came from so great and reverend a man as the
bishop, Henry was obliged, by a frown from his uncle, to submit, as
one refuted; although he had an answer at the veriest tip of his
tongue, which it was torture to him not to utter. What he wished to
say must ever remain a secret. The church has its terrors as well
as the law; and Henry was awed by the dean's tremendous wig as much
as Paternoster Row is awed by the Attorney-General.
CHAPTER XV.
If the dean had loved his wife but moderately, seeing all her faults
clearly as he did, he must frequently have quarrelled with her: if
he had loved her with tenderness, he must have treated her with a
degree of violence in the hope of amending her failings. But having
neither personal nor mental affection towards her sufficiently
interesting to give himself the trouble to contradict her will in
anything, he passed for one of the best husbands in the world. Lady
Clementina went out when she liked, stayed at home when she liked,
dressed as she liked, and talked as she liked without a word of
disapprobation from her husband, and all--because he cared nothing
about her.
Her vanity attributed this indulgence to inordinate affection; and
observers in general thought her happier in her marriage than the
beloved wife who bathes her pillow with tears by the side of an
angry husband, whose affection is so excessive that he unkindly
upbraids her because she is--less than perfection.
The dean's wife was not so dispassionately considered by some of his
acquaintance as by himself; for they would now and then hint at her
foibles: but this great liberty she also conceived to be the effect
of most violent love, or most violent admiration: and such would
have been her construction had they commended her follies--had they
totally slighted, or had they beaten her.
Amongst those acquaintances, the aforesaid bishop, by far the most
frequent visitor, did not come merely to lounge an idle hour, but he
had a more powerful motive; the desire of fame, and dread of being
thought a man receiving large emolument for unimportant service.
The dean, if he did not procure him the renown he wished, still
preserved him from the apprehended censure.
The elder William was to his negligent or ignorant superiors in the
church such as an apt boy at school is to the rich dunces--William
performed the prelates' tasks for them, and they rewarded him--not
indeed with toys or money, but with their countenance, their
company, their praise. And scarcely was there a sermon preached
from the patrician part of the bench, in which the dean did not
fashion some periods, blot out some uncouth phrases, render some
obscure sentiments intelligible, and was the certain person, when
the work was printed, to correct the press.
This honourable and right reverend bishop delighted in printing and
publishing his works; or rather the entire works of the dean, which
passed for his: and so degradingly did William, the shopkeeper's
son, think of his own homiest extraction, that he was blinded, even
to the loss of honour, by the lustre of this noble acquaintance;
for, though in other respects he was a man of integrity, yet, when
the gratification of his friend was in question, he was a liar; he
not only disowned his giving him aid in any of his publications, but
he never published anything in his own name without declaring to the
world "that he had been obliged for several hints on the subject,
for many of the most judicious corrections, and for those passages
in page so and so (naming the most eloquent parts of the work) to
his noble and learned friend the bishop."
The dean's wife being a fine lady--while her husband and his friend
pored over books or their own manuscripts at home, she ran from
house to house, from public amusement to public amusement; but much
less for the pleasure of SEEING than for that of being seen. Nor
was it material to her enjoyment whether she were observed, or
welcomed, where she went, as she never entertained the smallest
doubt of either; but rested assured that her presence roused
curiosity and dispensed gladness all around.
One morning she went forth to pay her visits, all smiles, such as
she thought captivating: she returned, all tears, such as she
thought no less endearing.
Three ladies accompanied her home, entreating her to be patient
under a misfortune to which even kings are liable: namely,
defamation.
Young Henry, struck with compassion at grief of which he knew not
the cause, begged to know "what was the matter?"
"Inhuman monsters, to treat a woman thus!" cried his aunt in a fury,
casting the corner of her eye into a looking-glass, to see how rage
became her.
"But, comfort yourself," said one of her companions: "few people
will believe you merit the charge."
"But few! if only one believe it, I shall call my reputation lost,
and I will shut myself up in some lonely hut, and for ever renounce
all that is dear to me!"
"What! all your fine clothes?" said Henry, in amazement.
"Of what importance will my best dresses be, when nobody would see
them?"
"You would see them yourself, dear aunt; and I am sure nobody
admires them more."
"Now you speak of that," said she, "I do not think this gown I have
on becoming--I am sure I look--"
The dean, with the bishop (to whom he had been reading a treatise
just going to the press, which was to be published in the name of
the latter, though written by the former), now entered, to inquire
why they had been sent for in such haste.
"Oh, Dean! oh, my Lord Bishop!" she cried, resuming that grief which
the thoughts of her dress had for a time dispelled--"My reputation
is destroyed--a public print has accused me of playing deep at my
own house, and winning all the money."
"The world will never reform," said the bishop: "all our labour, my
friend, is thrown away."
"But is it possible," cried the dean, "that any one has dared to say
this of you?"
"Here it is in print," said she, holding out a newspaper.
The dean read the paragraph, and then exclaimed, "I can forgive a
falsehood SPOKEN--the warmth of conversation may excuse it--but to
WRITE and PRINT an untruth is unpardonable, and I will prosecute
this publisher."
"Still the falsehood will go down to posterity," said Lady
Clementina; "and after ages will think I was a gambler."
"Comfort yourself, dear madam," said young Henry, wishing to console
her: "perhaps after ages may not hear of you; nor even the present
age think much about you."
The bishop now exclaimed, after having taken the paper from the
dean, and read the paragraph, "It is a libel, a rank libel, and the
author must be punished."
"Not only the author, but the publisher," said the dean.
"Not only the publisher, but the printer," continued the bishop.
"And must my name be bandied about by lawyers in a common court of
justice?" cried Lady Clementina. "How shocking to my delicacy!"
"My lord, it is a pity we cannot try them by the ecclesiastical
court," said the dean, with a sigh.
"Or by the India delinquent bill," said the bishop, with vexation.
"So totally innocent as I am!" she vociferated with sobs. "Every
one knows I never touch a card at home, and this libel charges me
with playing at my own house; and though, whenever I do play, I own
I am apt to win, yet it is merely for my amusement."
"Win or not win, play or not play," exclaimed both the churchmen,
"this is a libel--no doubt, no doubt, a libel."
Poor Henry's confined knowledge of his native language tormented him
so much with curiosity upon this occasion, that he went softly up to
his uncle, and asked him in a whisper, "What is the meaning of the
word libel?"
"A libel," replied the dean, in a raised voice, "is that which one
person publishes to the injury of another."
"And what can the injured person do," asked Henry, "if the
accusation should chance to be true?"
"Prosecute," replied the dean.
"But, then, what does he do if the accusation be false?"
"Prosecute likewise," answered the dean.
"How, uncle! is it possible that the innocent behave just like the
guilty?"
"There is no other way to act."
"Why, then, if I were the innocent, I would do nothing at all sooner
than I would act like the guilty. I would not persecute--"
"I said PROSECUTE," cried the dean in anger. "Leave the room; you
have no comprehension."
"Oh, yes, now I understand the difference of the two words; but they
sound so much alike, I did not at first observe the distinction.
You said, 'the innocent prosecute, but the GUILTY PERSECUTE.'" He
bowed (convinced as he thought) and left the room.
After this modern star-chamber, which was left sitting, had agreed
on its mode of vengeance, and the writer of the libel was made
acquainted with his danger, he waited, in all humility, upon Lady
Clementina, and assured her, with every appearance of sincerity,
"That she was not the person alluded to by the paragraph in
question, but that the initials which she had conceived to mark out
her name, were, in fact, meant to point out Lady Catherine Newland."
"But, sir," cried Lady Clementina, "what could induce you to write
such a paragraph upon Lady Catherine? She NEVER plays."
"We know that, madam, or we dared not to have attacked her. Though
we must circulate libels, madam, to gratify our numerous readers,
yet no people are more in fear of prosecutions than authors and
editors; therefore, unless we are deceived in our information, we
always take care to libel the innocent--we apprehend nothing from
them--their own characters support them--but the guilty are very
tenacious; and what they cannot secure by fair means, they will
employ force to accomplish. Dear madam, be assured I have too much
regard for a wife and seven small children, who are maintained by my
industry alone, to have written anything in the nature of a libel
upon your ladyship."
CHAPTER XVI.
About this period the dean had just published a pamphlet in his own
name, and in which that of his friend the bishop was only mentioned
with thanks for hints, observations, and condescending encouragement
to the author.
This pamphlet glowed with the dean's love for his country; and such
a country as he described, it was impossible NOT to love.
"Salubrious air, fertile fields, wood, water, corn, grass, sheep,
oxen, fish, fowl, fruit, and vegetables," were dispersed with the
most prodigal hand; "valiant men, virtuous women; statesmen wise and
just; tradesmen abounding in merchandise and money; husbandmen
possessing peace, ease, plenty; and all ranks liberty." This
brilliant description, while the dean read the work to his family,
so charmed poor Henry, that he repeatedly cried out,
"I am glad I came to this country."
But it so happened that a few days after, Lady Clementina, in order
to render the delicacy of her taste admired, could eat of no one
dish upon the table, but found fault with them all. The dean at
length said to her,
"Indeed, you are too nice; reflect upon the hundreds of poor
creatures who have not a morsel or a drop of anything to subsist
upon, except bread and water; and even of the first a scanty
allowance, but for which they are obliged to toil six days in the
week, from sun to sun."
"Pray, uncle," cried Henry, "in what country do these poor people
live?"
"In this country," replied the dean.
Henry rose from his chair, ran to the chimney-piece, took up his
uncle's pamphlet, and said, "I don't remember your mentioning them
here."
"Perhaps I have not," answered the dean, coolly.
Still Henry turned over each leaf of the book, but he could meet
only with luxurious details of "the fruits of the earth, the beasts
of the field, the birds of the air, and the fishes of the sea."
"Why, here is provision enough for all the people," said Henry; "why
should they want? why do not they go and take some of these things?"
"They must not," said the dean, "unless they were their own."
"What, uncle! does no part of the earth, nor anything which the
earth produces, belong to the poor?"
"Certainly not."
"Why did not you say so, then, in your pamphlet?"
"Because it is what everybody knows."
"Oh, then, what you have said in your pamphlet is only what--nobody
knows."
There appeared to the dean, in the delivery of this sentence, a
satirical acrimony, which his irritability as an author could but
ill forgive.
An author, it is said, has more acute feelings in respect to his
works than any artist in the world besides.
Henry had some cause, on the present occasion, to think this
observation just; for no sooner had he spoken the foregoing words,
than his uncle took him by the hand out of the room, and, leading
him to his study, there he enumerated his various faults; and having
told him "it was for all those, too long permitted with impunity,
and not merely for the PRESENT impertinence, that he meant to punish
him," ordered him to close confinement in his chamber for a week.
In the meantime, the dean's pamphlet (less hurt by Henry's critique
than HE had been) was proceeding to the tenth edition, and the
author acquiring literary reputation beyond what he had ever
conferred on his friend the bishop.
The style, the energy, the eloquence of the work was echoed by every
reader who could afford to buy it--some few enlightened ones
excepted, who chiefly admired the author's INVENTION.
CHAPTER XVII.
The dean, in the good humour which the rapid sale of his book
produced, once more took his nephew to his bosom; and although the
ignorance of young Henry upon the late occasions had offended him
very highly, yet that self-same ignorance, evinced a short time
after upon a different subject, struck his uncle as productive of a
most rare and exalted virtue.
Henry had frequently, in his conversation, betrayed the total want
of all knowledge in respect to religion or futurity, and the dean
for this reason delayed taking him to church, till he had previously
given him instructions WHEREFORE he went.
A leisure morning arrived, on which he took his nephew to his study,
and implanted in his youthful mind the first unconfused idea of the
Creator of the universe!
The dean was eloquent, Henry was all attention; his understanding,
expanded by time to the conception of a God--and not warped by
custom from the sensations which a just notion of that God inspires-
-dwelt with delight and wonder on the information given him--lessons
which, instilled into the head of a senseless infant, too often
produce, throughout his remaining life, an impious indifference to
the truths revealed.
Yet, with all that astonished, that respectful sensibility which
Henry showed on this great occasion, he still expressed his opinion,
and put questions to the dean, with his usual simplicity, till he
felt himself convinced.
"What!" cried he--after being informed of the attributes inseparable
from the Supreme Being, and having received the injunction to offer
prayers to Him night and morning--"What! am I permitted to speak to
Power Divine?"
"At all times," replied the dean.
"How! whenever I like?"
"Whenever you like," returned the dean.
"I durst not," cried Henry, "make so free with the bishop, nor dare
any of his attendants."
"The bishop," said the dean, "is the servant of God, and therefore
must be treated with respect."
"With more respect than his Master?" asked Henry.
The dean not replying immediately to this question, Henry, in the
rapidity of inquiry, ran on to another:-
"But what am I to say when I speak to the Almighty?"
"First, thank Him for the favours He has bestowed on you."
"What favours?"
"You amaze me," cried the dean, "by your question. Do not you live
in ease, in plenty, and happiness?"
"And do the poor and the unhappy thank Him too, uncle?"
"No doubt; every human being glorifies Him, for having been made a
rational creature."
"And does my aunt and all her card-parties glorify Him for that?"
The dean again made no reply, and Henry went on to other questions,
till his uncle had fully instructed him as to the nature and the
form of PRAYER; and now, putting into his hands a book, he pointed
out to him a few short prayers, which he wished him to address to
Heaven in his presence.
Whilst Henry bent his knees, as his uncle had directed, he trembled,
turned pale, and held, for a slight support, on the chair placed
before him.
His uncle went to him, and asked him "What was the matter."
"Oh!" cried Henry, "when I first came to your door with my poor
father's letter, I shook for fear you would not look upon me; and I
cannot help feeling even more now than I did then."
The dean embraced him with warmth--gave him confidence--and retired
to the other side of the study, to observe his whole demeanour on
this new occasion.
As he beheld his features varying between the passions of humble
fear and fervent hope, his face sometimes glowing with the rapture
of thanksgiving, and sometimes with the blushes of contrition, he
thus exclaimed apart:-
"This is the true education on which to found the principles of
religion. The favour conferred by Heaven in granting the freedom of
petitions to its throne, can never be conceived with proper force
but by those whose most tedious moments during their infancy were
NOT passed in prayer. Unthinking governors of childhood! to insult
the Deity with a form of worship in which the mind has no share;
nay, worse, has repugnance, and by the thoughtless habits of youth,
prevent, even in age, devotion."
Henry's attention was so firmly fixed that he forgot there was a
spectator of his fervour; nor did he hear young William enter the
chamber and even speak to his father.
At length closing his book and rising from his knees, he approached
his uncle and cousin, with a sedateness in his air, which gave the
latter a very false opinion of the state of his youthful companion's
mind.
"So, Mr. Henry," cried William, "you have been obliged, at last, to
say your prayers."
The dean informed his son "that to Henry it was no punishment to
pray."
"He is the strangest boy I ever knew!" said William, inadvertently.
"To be sure," said Henry, "I was frightened when I first knelt; but
when I came to the words, FATHER, WHICH ART IN HEAVEN, they gave me
courage; for I know how merciful and kind a FATHER is, beyond any
one else."
The dean again embraced his nephew, let fall a tear to his poor
brother Henry's misfortunes; and admonished the youth to show
himself equally submissive to other instructions, as he had done to
those which inculcate piety.
CHAPTER XVIII.
The interim between youth and manhood was passed by young William
and young Henry in studious application to literature; some casual
mistakes in our customs and manners on the part of Henry; some too
close adherences to them on the side of William.
Their different characters, when boys, were preserved when they
became men: Henry still retained that natural simplicity which his
early destiny had given him; he wondered still at many things he saw
and heard, and at times would venture to give his opinion,
contradict, and even act in opposition to persons whom long
experience and the approbation of the world had placed in situations
which claimed his implicit reverence and submission.
Unchanged in all his boyish graces, young William, now a man, was
never known to infringe upon the statutes of good-breeding; even
though sincerity, his own free will, duty to his neighbour, with
many other plebeian virtues and privileges, were the sacrifice.
William inherited all the pride and ambition of the dean--Henry, all
his father's humility. And yet, so various and extensive is the
acceptation of the word pride, that, on some occasions, Henry was
proud even beyond his cousin. He thought it far beneath his dignity
ever to honour, or contemplate with awe, any human being in whom he
saw numerous failings. Nor would he, to ingratiate himself into the
favour of a man above him, stoop to one servility, such as the
haughty William daily practised.
"I know I am called proud," one day said William to Henry.
"Dear cousin," replied Henry, "it must be only, then, by those who
do not know you; for to me you appear the humblest creature in the
world."
"Do you really think so?"
"I am certain of it; or would you always give up your opinion to
that of persons in a superior state, however inferior in their
understanding? Would else their weak judgment immediately change
yours, though, before, you had been decided on the opposite side?
Now, indeed, cousin, I have more pride than you; for I never will
stoop to act or to speak contrary to my feelings."
"Then you will never be a great man."
"Nor ever desire it, if I must first be a mean one."
There was in the reputation of these two young men another mistake,
which the common retailers of character committed. Henry was said
to be wholly negligent, while William was reputed to be extremely
attentive to the other sex. William, indeed, was gallant, was
amorous, and indulged his inclination to the libertine society of
women; but Henry it was who LOVED them. He admired them at a
reverential distance, and felt so tender an affection for the
virtuous female, that it shocked him to behold, much more to
associate with, the depraved and vicious.
In the advantages of person Henry was still superior to William; and
yet the latter had no common share of those attractions which
captivate weak, thoughtless, or unskilful minds.
CHAPTER XIX.
About the time that Henry and William quitted college, and had
arrived at their twentieth year, the dean purchased a small estate
in a village near to the country residence of Lord and Lady Bendham;
and, in the total want of society, the dean's family were frequently
honoured with invitations from the great house.
Lord Bendham, besides a good estate, possessed the office of a lord
of the bed-chamber to his Majesty. Historians do not ascribe much
importance to the situation, or to the talents of nobles in this
department, nor shall this little history. A lord of the bed-
chamber is a personage well known in courts, and in all capitals
where courts reside; with this advantage to the inquirer, that in
becoming acquainted with one of those noble characters, he becomes
acquainted with all the remainder; not only with those of the same
kingdom, but those of foreign nations; for, in whatever land, in
whatever climate, a lord of the bed-chamber must necessarily be the
self-same creature: one wholly made up of observance, of obedience,
of dependence, and of imitation--a borrowed character--a character
formed by reflection.
The wife of this illustrious peer, as well as himself, took her hue,
like the chameleon, from surrounding objects: her manners were not
governed by her mind but were solely directed by external
circumstances. At court, humble, resigned, patient, attentive: at
balls, masquerades, gaming-tables, and routs, gay, sprightly, and
flippant; at her country seat, reserved, austere, arrogant, and
gloomy.
Though in town her timid eye in presence of certain personages would
scarcely uplift its trembling lid, so much she felt her own
insignificance, yet, in the country, till Lady Clementina arrived,
there was not one being of consequence enough to share in her
acquaintance; and she paid back to her inferiors there all the
humiliating slights, all the mortifications, which in London she
received from those to whom SHE was inferior.
Whether in town or country, it is but justice to acknowledge that in
her own person she was strictly chaste; but in the country she
extended that chastity even to the persons of others; and the young
woman who lost her virtue in the village of Anfield had better have
lost her life. Some few were now and then found hanging or drowned,
while no other cause could be assigned for their despair than an
imputation on the discretion of their character, and dread of the
harsh purity of Lady Bendham. She would remind the parish priest of
the punishment allotted for female dishonour, and by her influence
had caused many an unhappy girl to do public penance in their own or
the neighbouring churches.
But this country rigour in town she could dispense withal; and, like
other ladies of virtue, she there visited and received into her
house the acknowledged mistresses of any man in elevated life. It
was not, therefore, the crime, but the rank which the criminal held
in society, that drew down Lady Bendham's vengeance. She even
carried her distinction of classes in female error to such a very
nice point that the adulterous concubine of an elder brother was her
most intimate acquaintance, whilst the less guilty unmarried
mistress of the younger she would not sully her lips to exchange a
word with.
Lord and Lady Bendham's birth, education, talents, and propensities,
being much on the same scale of eminence, they would have been a
very happy pair, had not one great misfortune intervened--the lady
never bore her lord a child, while every cottage of the village was
crammed with half-starved children, whose father from week to week,
from year to year, exerted his manly youth, and wasted his strength
in vain, to protect them from hunger; whose mother mourned over her
new-born infant as a little wretch, sent into the world to deprive
the rest of what already was too scanty for them; in the castle,
which owned every cottage and all the surrounding land, and where
one single day of feasting would have nourished for a mouth all the
poor inhabitants of the parish, not one child was given to partake
of the plenty. The curse of barrenness was on the family of the
lord of the manor, the curse of fruitfulness upon the famished poor.
This lord and lady, with an ample fortune, both by inheritance and
their sovereign's favour, had never yet the economy to be exempt
from debts; still, over their splendid, their profuse table, they
could contrive and plan excellent schemes "how the poor might live
most comfortably with a little better management."
The wages of a labouring man, with a wife and half a dozen small
children, Lady Bendham thought quite sufficient if they would only
learn a little economy.
"You know, my lord, those people never want to dress--shoes and
stockings, a coat and waistcoat, a gown and a cap, a petticoat and a
handkerchief, are all they want--fire, to be sure, in winter--then
all the rest is merely for provision."
"I'll get a pen and ink," said young Henry, one day, when he had the
honour of being at their table, "and see what the REST amounts to."
"No, no accounts," cried my lord, "no summing up; but if you were to
calculate, you must add to the receipts of the poor my gift at
Christmas--last year, during the frost, no less than a hundred
pounds."
"How benevolent!" exclaimed the dean.
"How prudent!" exclaimed Henry.
"What do you mean by prudent?" asked Lord Bendham. "Explain your
meaning."
"No, my lord," replied the dean, "do not ask for an explanation:
this youth is wholly unacquainted with our customs, and, though a
man in stature, is but a child in intellects. Henry, have I not
often cautioned you--"
"Whatever his thoughts are upon the subject," cried Lord Bendham, "I
desire to know them."
"Why, then, my lord," answered Henry, "I thought it was prudent in
you to give a little, lest the poor, driven to despair, should take
all."
"And if they had, they would have been hanged."
"Hanging, my lord, our history, or some tradition, says, was
formerly adopted as a mild punishment, in place of starving."
"I am sure," cried Lady Bendham (who seldom spoke directly to the
argument before her), "I am sure they ought to think themselves much
obliged to us."
"That is the greatest hardship of all," cried Henry.
"What, sir?" exclaimed the earl.
"I beg your pardon--my uncle looks displeased--I am very ignorant--I
did not receive my first education in this country--and I find I
think so differently from every one else, that I am ashamed to utter
my sentiments."
"Never mind, young man," answered Lord Bendham; "we shall excuse
your ignorance for once. Only inform us what it was you just now
called THE GREATEST HARDSHIP OF ALL."
"It was, my lord, that what the poor receive to keep them from
perishing should pass under the name of GIFTS and BOUNTY. Health,
strength, and the will to earn a moderate subsistence, ought to be
every man's security from obligation."
"I think a hundred pounds a great deal of money," cried Lady
Bendham; "and I hope my lord will never give it again."
"I hope so too," cried Henry; "for if my lord would only be so good
as to speak a few words for the poor as a senator, he might possibly
for the future keep his hundred pounds, and yet they never want it."
Lord Bendham had the good nature only to smile at Henry's
simplicity, whispering to himself, "I had rather keep my--" his last
word was lost in the whisper.
CHAPTER XX.
In the country--where the sensible heart is still more susceptible
of impressions; and where the unfeeling mind, in the want of other
men's wit to invent, forms schemes for its own amusement--our youths
both fell in love: if passions, that were pursued on the most
opposite principles, can receive the same appellation. William,
well versed in all the licentious theory, thought himself in love,
because he perceived a tumultuous impulse cause his heart to beat
while his fancy fixed on a certain object whose presence agitated
yet more his breast.
Henry thought himself not in love, because, while he listened to
William on the subject, he found their sensations did not in the
least agree.
William owned to Henry that he loved Agnes, the daughter of a
cottager in the village, and hoped to make her his mistress.
Henry felt that his tender regard for Rebecca, the daughter of the
curate of the parish, did not inspire him even with the boldness to
acquaint her with his sentiments, much less to meditate one design
that might tend to her dishonour.
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