"Oh, such a many!"
"So many, dearest love, you mean to say."
"Well, so I do, thank you; and then the mamma asked me, as she had never
seen me before, if I had not been much abroad; and I said, never at all
till I married; and then she said, 'What! had I been to Paris since?'
and I find she meant foreign parts by abroad. And she told me that we
ought to go to London soon; that the season was advanced, and that the
Pasta would come out soon this spring. What is the Pasta--a plant?"
"A plant! no, love. Pasta is a singer's name, you could not be expected
to know that; but I hope you didn't say any thing to show them your
ignorance?"
"Oh, no; you told me, whenever I was completely puzzled, that silence
was best; so I said nothing. Pasta's the name of a singer, then! Oh,
that accounts, for a moment after she the mamma said, that her daughter
Arabella sang delightfully, and asked me if I would sing with her; so I
said no, I'd much rather listen. That was right, warn't it? You see I
knew you'd ask me all about it, so I recollected it for you. Arabella
then asked me if I would accompany her? so I said, Wherever she
liked,--where did she want to go? But, I suppose, she altered her mind,
for she sat down to the grand instrument you had brought here for me to
begin my lessons upon; and then she sang such an extraordinary song--all
coming from her throat. And the sister asked me if I understood German?
and I answered, No, nor French neither."
"That was an unnecessary addition, my love."
"Well, so it was. Then the youngest sister explained to me, that it was
a song a Swiss peasant girl sang whilst she was milking her cow; and I
said that must be very difficult, to sing while milking a cow. And then
the mamma asked how I knew; and I said I had _tried_ very _often_."
"How could you, dear Lucy, volunteer such an avowal?"
"I thought you would be afraid of that; but it all did very well, for
the mother said I was so amusing, had so much natural wit, and they all
tried to persuade me I had said something clever."
"Well, go on--and what then?"
"And then the lady took me aside, and began saying so much in praise of
you; and when she once got me on that subject, I was ready and glib
enough, I warrant you. But somehow, though I then found it so much
easier to speak, I find it more difficult to recollect exactly what I
said. Is not that strange? And then she said that my happiness would
excite so much envy in the great world; that you had been admired,
courted, nay, even loved by rich, noble, clever ladies. Why was all
this? and how could you ever think to leave all these, to seek out from
her quiet home your poor little Lucy?"
"Oh, that's a story of by-gone days. These were follies of my youth,
which I thought I had lived to repent.
"'Nor knew, till seated by thy side,
My heart in all save hope the same.'"
"Why, save hope, my dear Lord? What may you not only hope, but trust,
from my constant devotion?"
"I did not mean to tie myself precisely to every word I uttered. It was
only a quotation."
"And what is a quotation?"
"A quotation is the vehicle in which imagination posts forward, when she
only hires her Pegasus from memory. Or sometimes it is only a quit-rent,
which the intellectual cultivator, who farms an idea, pays to the
original proprietor; or rather,"--(seeing that he was not making the
matter more intelligible by his explanation,)--"or rather, it is when we
convey our own thoughts by the means of the more perfect expressions of
some favourite author."
"But then, surely _you_ need not be driven to borrow, whose own words
always sound to me like a book. As for poor me, I wish I could talk in
quotations for ever; then I need not fear to make these mistakes, which,
as it is, I am afraid I am always like to do."
(A scene at _the Opera_ is richer still: the performance _Semiramide_:)
"Lady Gayland took the opportunity of inquiring of Lady Castleton, 'how
the opera had amused her?' There was that unmistakable air of real
interest in Lady Gayland's manner, whenever she addressed Lucy, which
made her always reply in a tone of confidence, different from that which
she felt towards any other member of the society in which she moved.
"Why, to tell the honest truth," said she, leaning forwards towards her
questioner, "I can't say that I could the least understand what it all
meant. It's not likely that people should sing when they're in such
sorrow; and then I can't guess why that young man should kill the queen
that was so kind to him all along."
"I don't wonder that that should surprise you, my dear; but he was not
aware of what he was doing. It was in the dark."
"In the dark! But I could see very well who it was, though I did not
know her so well as he did, and was so much farther off."
"I am afraid you are in the dark, too, a little as yet," said Lady
Gayland, (tapping her gently with her fan.) "But, tell me, did you not
admire the singing, though you could not understand the story."
"Why, I should, perhaps, if I had known the language; but even then they
seemed to me more like birds, than men and women singing words. I like a
song that I can make out every word that's said."
"The curtain then rose for the ballet; at first, Lucy was delighted with
the scenery and pageantry, for the spectacle was grand and imposing. But
at length the resounding plaudits announced the _entrée_ of the perfect
Taglioni. Lucy was a little astonished at her costume upon her first
appearance. She was attired as a goddess, and goddesses' gowns are
somewhat of the shortest, and their legs rather _au naturel_; but when
she came to elicit universal admiration by pointing her toe, and
revolving in the slow _pirouette_, Lucy, from the situation in which she
sat was overpowered with shame at the effect; and whilst Lady Gayland,
with her _longnette_ fixed on the stage, ejaculated, 'Beautiful!
inimitable!' the unpractised Lucy could not help exclaiming, 'O that is
too bad! I cannot stay to see that!' and she turned her head away
blushing deeply."
"Is your ladyship ill?" exclaimed Lord Stayinmore. "Castleton, I am
afraid Lady Castleton feels herself indisposed."
"Would you like to go?" kindly inquired Castleton.
"O so much!" she answered.
"Are you ill, my dear?" asked Lady Gayland.
"Oh, no!" she said.
"Then you had better stay, it is so beautiful."
"Thank you, Lord Castleton is kind enough to let me go."
(They get into the carriage.)
"And how do you find yourself now, my dear Lucy?" tenderly inquired
Castleton, as the carriage drove off.
"Oh, I am quite well, thank you."
"Quite well! are you? What was it, then, that was the matter with you?"
"There was nothing the matter with me, it was that woman."
"What woman? what can you mean? Did you not say that you were ill; and
was not that the reason that we hurried away?"
"No! YOU said I was ill; and I did not contradict you, because you tell
me that in the world, as you call it, it is not always right to give the
real reason for what we do; and therefore I thought, perhaps, that
though of course you wished me to come away, you liked to put it upon my
being ill."
"Of course I wished you to come away! I was never more unwilling to move
in all my life; and nothing but consideration for your health would have
induced me to stir. Why should I have wished you to come away?"
"Why, the naked woman," stammered Lucy.
"What can you mean?"
"You couldn't surely wish me to sit by the side of those people, to see
such a thing as that?"
"As to being by the side of those people, I must remind you, that it was
Lady Gayland's box in which you were; and that whatever she, with her
acknowledged taste and refinement, sanctions with her presence, can only
be objected to by ignorance or prejudice. You have still a great deal to
learn, my dear Lucy," added he, more kindly; "and nothing can be so
fatal to your progress in that respect, as your attempting to lead, or
to find fault, with what you do not understand."
"But surely I can understand that it is not right to do what I saw that
woman do," interrupted Lucy, presuming a little more doggedly than she
usually ventured to do on any subject with her husband; for this time
she had been really shocked by what she had seen.
"Wrong it certainly is not, if you mean moral wrong. As to such an
exhibition being becoming or not in point of manners, that depends
entirely upon custom. Many things at your father's might strike me as
coarseness, which made no impression upon you from habit, though much
worse in my opinion than this presumed indecorum. Those things probably
arose from ignorance on your parts, which might be corrected. This, on
the other hand, from conventional indifference, consequent on custom,
which it is not in you to correct. Depend upon it you will only get
yourself laughed at, and me too, if you preach about dancers'
petticoats."
"I don't want to preach to any body; and you know how much it fashes me
to contend with you."
"Don't say FASHES, say distresses, or annoys, not _fashes_, for heaven's
sake, my dear Lucy."
"Oh, dear, it was very stupid of me to forget it. That was one of the
first things you taught me, and it is a many days since I said it last;
but it is so strange to me to venture to differ with you, that I get
confused, and don't say any thing as right as I could do. Even now I
should like to ask, if modesty is a merit, whether nakedness ought to be
a show; but I'll say no more, for I dare say you won't make me go there
again."
"No, that will be the best way to settle it."
The plot of the Contrast is not, as the reader may perceive, one of
fashionable life: it has more of the romance of nature in its
composition: the characters are not the drawling bores that we find in
fashionable novels, though their affected freaks are occasionally
introduced to contrast with unsophisticated humility, and thus exhibit
the deformities of high life. The whole work is, however, light as
gossamer: we had almost said that a fly might read it through the
meshes, without endangering his patience or liberty.
* * * * *