THE AMERICAN MINISTER.
In the second week in October, Mr. Glascock returned to Florence,
intending to remain there till the weather should have become
bearable at Naples. His father was said to be better, but was in
such a condition as hardly to receive much comfort from his son's
presence. His mind was gone, and he knew no one but his nurse; and,
though Mr. Glascock was unwilling to put himself altogether out of
the reach of returning at a day's notice, he did not find himself
obliged to remain in Naples during the heat of the autumn. So Mr.
Glascock returned to the hotel at Florence, accompanied by the tall
man who wore the buttons. The hotel-keeper did not allow such a light
to remain long hidden under a bushel, and it was soon spread far and
wide that the Honourable Charles Glascock and his suite were again in
the beautiful city.
And the fact was soon known to the American Minister and his family.
Mr. Spalding was a man who at home had been very hostile to English
interests. Many American gentlemen are known for such hostility. They
make anti-English speeches about the country, as though they thought
that war with England would produce certain triumph to the States,
certain increase to American trade, and certain downfall to a tyranny
which no Anglo-Saxon nation ought to endure. But such is hardly their
real opinion. There, in the States, as also here in England, you
shall from day to day hear men propounding, in very loud language,
advanced theories of political action, the assertion of which
is supposed to be necessary to the end which they have in view.
Men whom we know to have been as mild as sucking doves in the
political aspiration of their whole lives, suddenly jump up,
and with infuriated gestures declare themselves the enemies
of everything existing. When they have attained their little
purpose,--or have failed to do so,--they revert naturally into their
sucking-dove elements. It is so with Americans as frequently as
with ourselves,--and there is no political subject on which it is
considered more expedient to express pseudo-enthusiasm than on that
of the sins of England. It is understood that we do not resent it.
It is presumed that we regard it as the Irishman regarded his wife's
cuffs. In the States a large party, which consists chiefly of those
who have lately left English rule, and who are keen to prove to
themselves how wise they have been in doing so, is pleased by this
strong language against England; and, therefore, the strong language
is spoken. But the speakers, who are, probably, men knowing something
of the world, mean it not at all; they have no more idea of war with
England than they have of war with all Europe; and their respect for
England and for English opinion is unbounded. In their political
tones of speech and modes of action they strive to be as English as
possible. Mr. Spalding's aspirations were of this nature. He had
uttered speeches against England which would make the hair stand on
end on the head of an uninitiated English reader. He had told his
countrymen that Englishmen hugged their chains, and would do so until
American hammers had knocked those chains from off their wounded
wrists and bleeding ankles. He had declared that, if certain American
claims were not satisfied, there was nothing left for Americans to do
but to cross the ferry with such a sheriff's officer as would be able
to make distraint on the great English household. He had declared
that the sheriff's officer would have very little trouble. He had
spoken of Canada as an outlying American territory, not yet quite
sufficiently redeemed from savage life to be received into the Union
as a State. There is a multiplicity of subjects of this kind ready
to the hand of the American orator. Mr. Spalding had been quite
successful, and was now Minister at Florence; but, perhaps, one of
the greatest pleasures coming to him from his prosperity was the
enjoyment of the society of well-bred Englishmen, in the capital to
which he had been sent. When, therefore, his wife and nieces pointed
out to him the fact that it was manifestly his duty to call upon Mr.
Glascock after what had passed between them on that night under the
Campanile, he did not rebel for an instant against the order given
to him. His mind never reverted for a moment to that opinion which
had gained for him such a round of applause, when expressed on the
platform of the Temperance Hall at Nubbly Creek, State of Illinois,
to the effect that the English aristocrat, thorough-born and
thorough-bred, who inherited acres and titles from his father, could
never be fitting company for a thoughtful Christian American citizen.
He at once had his hat brushed, and took up his best gloves and
umbrella, and went off to Mr. Glascock's hotel. He was strictly
enjoined by the ladies to fix a day on which Mr. Glascock would come
and dine at the American embassy.
"'C. G.' has come back to see you," said Olivia to her elder sister.
They had always called him "C. G." since the initials had been seen
on the travelling bag.
"Probably," said Carry. "There is so very little else to bring people
to Florence, that there can hardly be any other reason for his
coming. They do say it's terribly hot at Naples just now; but that
can have had nothing to do with it."
"We shall see," said Livy. "I'm sure he's in love with you. He looked
to me just like a proper sort of lover for you, when I saw his long
legs creeping up over our heads into the banquette."
"You ought to have been very much obliged to his long legs;--so sick
as you were at the time."
"I like him amazingly," said Livy, "legs and all. I only hope Uncle
Jonas won't bore him, so as to prevent his coming."
"His father is very ill," said Carry, "and I don't suppose we shall
see him at all."
But the American Minister was successful. He found Mr. Glascock
sitting in his dressing-gown, smoking a cigar, and reading a
newspaper. The English aristocrat seemed very glad to see his
visitor, and assumed no airs at all. The American altogether forgot
his speech at Nubbly Creek, and found the aristocrat's society to
be very pleasant. He lit a cigar, and they talked about Naples,
Rome, and Florence. Mr. Spalding, when the marbles of old Rome were
mentioned, was a little too keen in insisting on the merits of Story,
Miss Hosmer, and Hiram Powers, and hardly carried his listener with
him in the parallel which he drew between Greenough and Phidias; and
he was somewhat repressed by the apathetic curtness of Mr. Glascock's
reply, when he suggested that the victory gained by the gunboats at
Vicksburg, on the Mississippi, was vividly brought to his mind by
an account which he had just been reading of the battle of Actium;
but he succeeded in inducing Mr. Glascock to accept an invitation to
dinner for the next day but one, and the two gentlemen parted on the
most amicable terms.
Everybody meets everybody in Florence every day. Carry and Livy
Spalding had met Mr. Glascock twice before the dinner at their
uncle's house, so that they met at dinner quite as intimate friends.
Mrs. Spalding had very large rooms, up three flights of stairs, on
the Lungarno. The height of her abode was attributed by Mrs. Spalding
to her dread of mosquitoes. She had not yet learned that people in
Florence require no excuse for being asked to walk up three flights
of stairs. The rooms, when they were reached, were very lofty,
floored with what seemed to be marble, and were of a nature almost to
warrant Mrs. Spalding in feeling that nature had made her more akin
to an Italian countess than to a matron of Nubbly Creek, State of
Illinois, where Mr. Spalding had found her and made her his own.
There was one other Englishman present, Mr. Harris Hyde Granville
Gore, from the Foreign Office, now serving temporarily at the English
Legation in Florence; and an American, Mr. Jackson Unthank, a man of
wealth and taste, who was resolved on having such a collection of
pictures at his house in Baltimore that no English private collection
should in any way come near to it; and a Tuscan, from the Italian
Foreign Office, to whom nobody could speak except Mr. Harris Hyde
Granville Gore,--who did not indeed seem to enjoy the efforts of
conversation which were expected of him. The Italian, who had a
handle to his name,--he was a Count Buonarosci,--took Mrs. Spalding
in to dinner. Mrs. Spalding had been at great trouble to ascertain
whether this was proper, or whether she should not entrust herself
to Mr. Glascock. There were different points to be considered in
the matter. She did not quite know whether she was in Italy or in
America. She had glimmerings on the subject of her privilege to carry
her own nationality into her own drawing-room. And then she was
called upon to deal between an Italian Count with an elder brother,
and an English Honourable, who had no such incumbrance. Which of the
two was possessed of the higher rank? "I've found it all out, Aunt
Mary," said Livy. "You must take the Count." For Livy wanted to give
her sister every chance. "How have you found it out?" said the aunt.
"You may be sure it is so," said Livy. And the lady in her doubt
yielded the point. Mrs. Spalding, as she walked along the passage on
the Count's arm, determined that she would learn Italian. She would
have given all Nubbly Creek to have been able to speak a word to
Count Buonarosci. To do her justice, it must be admitted that she had
studied a few words. But her courage failed her, and she could not
speak them. She was very careful, however, that Mr. H. H. G. Gore was
placed in the chair next to the Count.
"We are very glad to see you here," said Mr. Spalding, addressing
himself especially to Mr. Glascock, as he stood up at his own seat at
the round table. "In leaving my own country, sir, there is nothing
that I value more than the privilege of becoming acquainted with
those whose historic names and existing positions are of such
inestimable value to the world at large." In saying this, Mr.
Spalding was not in the least insincere, nor did his conscience at
all prick him in reference to that speech at Nubbly Creek. On both
occasions he half thought as he spoke,--or thought that he thought
so. Unless it be on subjects especially endeared to us the thoughts
of but few of us go much beyond this.
Mr. Glascock, who sat between Mrs. Spalding and her niece, was soon
asked by the elder lady whether he had been in the States. No; he
had not been in the States. "Then you must come, Mr. Glascock," said
Mrs. Spalding, "though I will not say, dwelling as we now are in the
metropolis of the world of art, that we in our own homes have as much
of the outer beauty of form to charm the stranger as is to be found
in other lands. Yet I think that the busy lives of men, and the
varied institutions of a free country, must always have an interest
peculiarly their own." Mr. Glascock declared that he quite agreed
with her, and expressed a hope that he might some day find himself in
New York.
"You wouldn't like it at all," said Carry; "because you are an
aristocrat. I don't mean that it would be your fault."
"Why should that prevent my liking it,--even if I were an
aristocrat?"
"One half of the people would run after you, and the other half would
run away from you," said Carry.
"Then I'd take to the people who ran after me, and would not regard
the others."
"That's all very well,--but you wouldn't like it. And then you would
become unfair to what you saw. When some of our speechifying people
talked to you about our institutions through their noses, you would
think that the institutions themselves must be bad. And we have
nothing to show except our institutions."
"What are American institutions?" asked Mr. Glascock.
"Everything is an institution. Having iced water to drink in every
room of the house is an institution. Having hospitals in every town
is an institution. Travelling altogether in one class of railway
cars is an institution. Saying sir, is an institution. Teaching all
the children mathematics is an institution. Plenty of food is an
institution. Getting drunk is an institution in a great many towns.
Lecturing is an institution. There are plenty of them, and some are
very good;--but you wouldn't like it."
"At any rate, I'll go and see," said Mr. Glascock.
"If you do, I hope we may be at home," said Miss Spalding.
Mr. Spalding, in the mean time, with the assistance of his
countryman, the man of taste, was endeavouring to explain a certain
point in American politics to the Count. As, in doing this, they
called upon Mr. Gore to translate every speech they made into
Italian, and as Mr. Gore had never offered his services as an
interpreter, and as the Italian did not quite catch the subtle
meanings of the Americans in Mr. Gore's Tuscan version, and did not
in the least wish to understand the things that were explained to
him, Mr. Gore and the Italian began to think that the two Americans
were bores. "The truth is, Mr. Spalding," said Mr. Gore, "I've got
such a cold in my head, that I don't think I can explain it any
more." Then Livy Spalding laughed aloud, and the two American
gentlemen began to eat their dinner. "It sounds ridiculous, don't
it?" said Mr. Gore, in a whisper.
"I ought not to have laughed, I know," said Livy.
"The very best thing you could have done. I shan't be troubled any
more now. The fact is, I know just nine words of Italian. Now there
is a difficulty in having to explain the whole theory of American
politics to an Italian, who doesn't want to know anything about it,
with so very small a repertory of words at one's command."
"How well you did it!"
"Too well. I felt that. So well that, unless I had stopped it, I
shouldn't have been able to say a word to you all through dinner.
Your laughter clenched it, and Buonarosci and I will be grateful to
you for ever."
After the ladies went there was rather a bad half hour for Mr.
Glascock. He was button-holed by the minister, and found it
oppressive before he was enabled to escape into the drawing-room.
"Mr. Glascock," said the minister, "an English gentleman, sir,
like you, who has the privilege of an hereditary seat in your
parliament,"--Mr. Glascock was not quite sure whether he were being
accused of having an hereditary seat in the House of Commons, but he
would not stop to correct any possible error on that point,--"and who
has been born to all the gifts of fortune, rank, and social eminence,
should never think that his education is complete till he has visited
our great cities in the west." Mr. Glascock hinted that he by no
means conceived his education to be complete; but the minister went
on without attending to this. "Till you have seen, sir, what men
can do who are placed upon the earth with all God's gifts of free
intelligence, free air, and a free soil, but without any of those
other good things which we are accustomed to call the gifts of
fortune, you can never become aware of the infinite ingenuity of
man." There had been much said before, but just at this moment Mr.
Gore and the American left the room, and the Italian followed them
briskly. Mr. Glascock at once made a decided attempt to bolt; but the
minister was on the alert, and was too quick for him. And he was by
no means ashamed of what he was doing. He had got his guest by the
coat, and openly declared his intention of holding him. "Let me keep
you for a few minutes, sir," said he, "while I dilate on this point
in one direction. In the drawing-room female spells are too potent
for us male orators. In going among us, Mr. Glascock, you must not
look for luxury or refinement, for you will find them not. Nor must
you hope to encounter the highest order of erudition. The lofty
summits of acquired knowledge tower in your country with an altitude
we have not reached yet."
"It's very good of you to say so," said Mr. Glascock.
"No, sir. In our new country and in our new cities we still lack the
luxurious perfection of fastidious civilisation. But, sir, regard our
level. That is what I say to every unprejudiced Britisher that comes
among us; look at our level. And when you have looked at our level,
I think that you will confess that we live on the highest table-land
that the world has yet afforded to mankind. You follow my meaning,
Mr. Glascock?" Mr. Glascock was not sure that he did, but the
minister went on to make that meaning clear. "It is the multitude
that with us is educated. Go into their houses, sir, and see how they
thumb their books. Look at the domestic correspondence of our helps
and servants, and see how they write and spell. We haven't got the
mountains, sir, but our table-lands are the highest on which the
bright sun of our Almighty God has as yet shone with its illuminating
splendour in this improving world of ours! It is because we are a
young people, sir,--with nothing as yet near to us of the decrepitude
of age. The weakness of age, sir, is the penalty paid by the folly of
youth. We are not so wise, sir, but what we too shall suffer from its
effects as years roll over our heads." There was a great deal more,
but at last Mr. Glascock did escape into the drawing-room.
"My uncle has been saying a few words to you perhaps," said Carry
Spalding.
"Yes; he has," said Mr. Glascock.
"He usually does," said Carry Spalding.