CHAPTER XXXVIII. Threads and Patches.

CHIPPINGE BOROUGH

I

THE DISSOLUTION

Boom!

It was April 22, 1831, and a young man was walking down Whitehall in

the direction of Parliament Street. He wore shepherd’s plaid trousers

and the swallow-tail coat of the day, with a figured muslin cravat

wound about his wide-spread collar. He halted opposite the Privy

Gardens, and, with his face turned skywards, listened until the sound

of the Tower guns smote again on the ear and dispelled his doubts. To

the experienced, his outward man, neat and modestly prosperous, denoted

a young barrister of promise or a Treasury clerk. His figure was good,

he was above the middle height, and he carried himself with an easy

independence. He seemed to be one who both held a fair opinion of

himself and knew how to impress that opinion on his fellows; yet was

not incapable of deference where deference was plainly due. He was

neither ugly nor handsome, neither slovenly nor a _petit-maître_;

indeed, it was doubtful if he had ever seen the inside of Almack’s. But

his features were strong and intellectual, and the keen grey eyes which

looked so boldly on the world could express both humour and good

humour. In a word, this young man was one upon whom women, even great

ladies, were likely to look with pleasure, and one woman—but he had not

yet met her—with tenderness.

Boom!

He was only one among a dozen, who within the space of a few yards had

been brought to a stand by the sound; who knew what the salute meant,

and in their various ways were moved by it. The rumour which had flown

through the town in the morning that the King was about to dissolve his

six-months-old Parliament was true, then! so true that already in the

clubs, from Boodle’s to Brooks’s, men were sending off despatches,

while the long arms of the semaphore were carrying the news to the

Continent. Persons began to run by Vaughan—the young man’s name was

Arthur Vaughan; and behind him the street was filling with a multitude

hastening to see the sight, or so much of it as the vulgar might see.

Some ran towards Westminster without disguise. Some, of a higher

station, walked as fast as dignity and their strapped trousers

permitted; while others again, who thought themselves wiser than their

neighbours, made quickly for Downing Street and the different openings

which led into St. James’s Park, in the hope of catching a glimpse of

the procession before the crowd about the Houses engulfed it.

Nine out of ten, as they ran or walked—nay, it might be said more

truly, ninety-nine out of a hundred—evinced a joy quite out of the

common, and such as no political event of these days produces. One

cried, “Hip! Hip! Hip!”; one flung up his cap; one swore gaily.

Strangers told one another that it was a good thing, bravely done! And

while the whole of that part of the town seemed to be moving towards

the Houses, the guns boomed on, proclaiming to all the world that the

unexpected had happened; that the Parliament which had passed the

People’s Bill by one—a miserable one in the largest House which had

ever voted—and having done that, had shelved it by some shift, some

subterfuge, was meeting the fate which it deserved.

No man, be it noted, called the measure the Reform Bill, or anything

but the Bill, or, affectionately, the People’s Bill. But they called it

that repeatedly, and in their enthusiasm, exulted in the fall of its

enemies as in a personal gain. And though here and there amid the

general turmoil a man of mature age stood aside and scowled on the

crowd as it swept vociferating by him, such men were but as straws in a

backwater of the stream—powerless to arrest the current, and liable at

any moment to be swept within its influence.

That generation had seen many a coach start laurel-clad from St.

Martin’s and listened many a time to the salvoes that told of victories

in France or Flanders. But it was no exaggeration to say that even

Waterloo had not flung abroad more general joy, nor sown the dingy

streets with brighter faces, than this civil gain. For now—now,

surely—the People’s Bill would pass, and the people be truly

represented in Parliament! Now, for certain, the Bill’s ill-wishers

would get a fall! And if every man—about which some doubts were

whispered even in the public-houses—did not get a vote which he could

sell for a handful of gold, as his betters had sold their votes time

out of mind, at least there would be beef and beer for all! Or, if not

that, something indefinite, but vastly pleasant. Few, indeed, knew

precisely what they wished and what they were going to gain, but

_Hurrah for Mr. Brougham!_

_Hurrah for Gaffer Grey!_

_Hurrah for Lord John!_

Hurrah, in a word, for the Ministry, hurrah for the Whigs! And above

all, three cheers for the King, who had stood by Lord Grey and

dissolved this niggling, hypocritical Parliament of landowners.

Meanwhile the young man who has been described resumed his course; but

slowly, and without betraying by any marked sign that he shared the

general feeling. Still, he walked with his head a little higher than

before; he seemed to sniff the battle; and there was a light in his

eyes as if he saw a wider arena before him. “It is true, then,” he

muttered. “And for to-day I shall have my errand for my pains. He will

have other fish to fry, and will not see me. But what of that! Another

day will do as well.”

At this moment a ragamuffin in an old jockey-cap attached himself to

him, and, running beside him, urged him to hasten.

“Run, your honour,” he croaked in gin-laden accents, “and you’ll ’ave a

good place! And I’ll drink your honour’s health, and Billy the King’s!

Sure he’s the father of his country, and seven besides. Come on, your

honour, or they’ll be jostling you!”

Vaughan glanced down and shook his head. He waved the man away.

But the lout looked only to his market, and was not easily repulsed.

“He’s there, I tell you,” he persisted. “And for threepence I’ll get

you to see him. Come on, your honour! It’s many a Westminster election

I’ve seen, and beer running, from Mr. Fox, that was the gentleman had

always a word for the poor man, till now, when maybe it’s your honour’s

going to stand! Anyway, it’s, Down with the mongers!”

A man who was clinging to the wall at the corner of Downing Street

waved his broken hat round his head. “Ay, down with the

borough-mongers!” he cried. “Down with Peel! Down with the Dook! Down

with ’em all! Down with everybody!”

“And long live the Bill!” cried a man of more respectable appearance as

he hurried by. “And long live the King, God bless him!”

“They’ll know what it is to balk the people now,” chimed in a fourth.

“Let ’em go back and get elected if they can. Ay, let ’em!”

“Ay, let ’em! Mr. Brougham’ll see to that!” shouted the other. “Hurrah

for Mr. Brougham!”

The cry was taken up by the crowd, and three cheers were given for the

Chancellor, who was so well known to the mob by the style under which

he had been triumphantly elected for Yorkshire that his peerage was

ignored.

Vaughan, however, heard but the echo of these cheers. Like most young

men of his time, he leant to the popular side. But he had no taste for

the populace in the mass; and the sight of the crowd, which was fast

occupying the whole of the space before Palace Yard and even surging

back into Parliament Street, determined him to turn aside. He shook off

his attendant and, crossing into Whitehall Place, walked up and down,

immersed in his reflections.

He was honestly ambitious, and his thoughts turned naturally on the

influence which this Bill—which must create a new England, and for many

a new world—was likely to have on his own fortunes. The owner of a

small estate in South Wales, come early to his inheritance, he had

sickened of the idle life of an officer in peacetime; and after three

years of service, believing himself fit for something higher, he had

sold his commission and turned his mind to intellectual pursuits. He

hoped that he had a bent that way; and the glory of the immortal three,

who thirty years before had founded the “Edinburgh Review,” and, by so

doing, made this day possible, attracted him. Why should not he, as

well as another, be the man who, in the Commons, the cockpit of the

nation, stood spurred to meet all comers—in an uproar which could

almost be heard where he walked? Or the man who, in the lists of

Themis, upheld the right of the widow and the poor man’s cause, and to

whom judges listened with reluctant admiration? Or best of all, highest

of all, might he not vie with that abnormal and remarkable man who wore

at once the three crowns, and whether as Edinburgh Reviewer, as knight

of the shire for York, or as Chancellor of England, played his part

with equal ease? To be brief, it was prizes such as these, distant but

luminous, that held his eyes, incited him to effort, made him live

laborious days. He believed that he had ability, and though he came

late to the strife, he brought his experience. If men living from hand

to mouth and distracted by household cares could achieve so much, why

should not he who had his independence and his place in the world? Had

not Erskine been such another? He, too, had sickened of barrack life.

And Brougham and the two Scotts, Eldon and Stowell. To say nothing of

this young Macaulay, whose name was beginning to run through every

mouth; and of a dozen others who had risen to fame from a lower and

less advantageous station.

The goal was distant, but it was glorious. Nor had the eighteen months

which he had given to the study of the law, to attendance at the

Academic and at a less ambitious debating society, and to the output of

some scientific feelers, shaken his faith in himself. He had not yet

thought of a seat at St. Stephen’s; for no nomination had fallen to

him, nor, save from one quarter, was likely to fall. And his income,

some six hundred a year, though it was ample for a bachelor, would not

stretch to the price of a seat at five thousand for the Parliament, or

fifteen hundred for the Session—the quotations which had ruled of late.

A seat some time, however, he must have; it was a necessary

stepping-stone to the heights he would gain. And the subject in his

mind as he paced Whitehall Place was the abolition of the close

boroughs and the effect which the transfer of electoral power to the

middle-class would have on his chances.

A small thing—no more than a quantity of straw laid thickly before one

of the houses—brought his thoughts down to the present. By a natural

impulse he raised his eyes to the house; by a coincidence, less

natural, a hand, even as he looked, showed itself behind one of the

panes of a window on the first floor, and drew down the blind. Vaughan

stood after that, fascinated, and watched the lowering of blind after

blind. And the solemn contrast between his busy thoughts and that which

had even then happened in the house—between that which lay behind the

darkened windows and the bright April sunshine about him, the

twittering of the sparrows in the green, and the tumult of distant

cheering—went home to him.

He thought of the lines, so old and so applicable:

_Omnes eodem cogimur, omnium_

_Versatur urna, serius, ocius_,

_Sors exitura, et nos in æternum_

_Exilium impositura cymbæ_.

He was still rolling the words on his tongue with that love of the

classical rhythm which was a mark of his day—and returns no more than

the taste for the prize-ring which was coeval with it—when the door of

the house opened and a man came clumsily and heavily out, closed the

door behind him, and, with his head bent low and the ungainly movements

of an automaton, made off down the street.

The man was very stout as well as tall, his dress slovenly and

disordered. His hat was pulled awry over his eyes, and his hands were

plunged deep in his breeches pockets. Vaughan saw so much. Then the

door opened again, and a face, unmistakably that of a butler, looked

out.

The servant’s eyes met his, and though the man neither spoke nor

beckoned, his eyes spoke for him. Vaughan crossed the way to him. “What

is it?” he asked.

The man was blubbering. “Oh, Lord; oh, Lord!” he said. “My lady’s gone

not five minutes, and he’ll not be let nor hindered! He’s to the House,

and if the crowd set upon him he’ll be murdered. For God’s sake, follow

him, sir! He’s Sir Charles Wetherell, and a better master never walked,

let them say what they like. If there’s anybody with him, maybe they’ll

not touch him.”

“I will follow him,” Vaughan answered. And he hastened after the stout

man, who had by this time reached the corner of the street.

Vaughan was surprised that he had not recognised Wetherell. For in

every bookseller’s window caricatures of the “Last of the

Boroughbridges,” as the wits called him, after the pocket borough for

which he sat, were plentiful as blackberries. Not only was he the

highest of Tories, but he was a martyr in their cause; for,

Attorney-General in the last Government, he had been dismissed for

resisting the Catholic Claims. Since then he had proved himself, of all

the opponents of the Bill, the most violent, the most witty, and, with

the exception of Croker perhaps, the most rancorous. At this date he

passed for the best hated man in England; and representative to the

public mind of all that was old-fashioned and illiberal and exclusive.

Vaughan knew, therefore, that the servant’s fears were not unfounded,

and with a heart full of pity—for he remembered the darkened house—he

made after him.

By this time Sir Charles was some way ahead and already involved in the

crowd. Fortunately the throng was densest opposite Old Palace Yard,

whence the King was in the act of departing; and the space before the

Hall and before St. Stephen’s Court—the buildings about which abutted

on the river—though occupied by a loosely moving multitude, and

presenting a scene of the utmost animation, was not impassable. Sir

Charles was in the heart of the crowd before he was recognised; and

then his stolid unconsciousness and the general good-humour, born of

victory, served him well. He was too familiar a figure to pass

altogether unknown; and here and there a man hissed him. One group

turned and hooted after him. But he was within a dozen yards of the

entrance of St. Stephen’s Court, with Vaughan on his heels, before any

violence was offered. There a man whom he happened to jostle recognised

him and, bawling abuse, pushed him rudely; and the act might well have

been the beginning of worse things. But Vaughan touched the man on the

shoulder and looked him in the face. “I shall know you,” he said

quietly. “Have a care!” And the fellow, intimidated by his words and

his six feet of height, shrank into himself and stood back.

Wetherell had barely noticed the rudeness. But he noted the

intervention by a backward glance. “Much obliged,” he grunted. “Know

you, too, again, young gentleman.” And he went heavily on and passed

out of the crowd into the court, followed by a few scattered hisses.

Behind the officers of the House who guarded the entrance a group of

excited talkers were gathered. They were chiefly members who had just

left the House and had been brought to a stand by the sight of the

crowd. On seeing Wetherell, surprise altered their looks. “Good G—d!”

cried one, stepping forward. “You’ve come down, Wetherell?”

“Ay,” the stricken man answered without lifting his eyes or giving the

least sign of animation. “Is it too late?”

“By an hour. There’s nothing to be done. Grey and Bruffam have got the

King body and soul. He was so determined to dissolve, he swore that

he’d come down in a hackney-coach rather than not come. So they say!”

“Ay!”

“But I hope,” a second struck in, in a tone of solicitude, “that as you

are here, Lady Wetherell has rallied.”

“She died a quarter of an hour ago,” he muttered. “I could do no more.

I came here. But as I am too late, I’ll go back.”

Yet he stood awhile, as if he had no longer anything to draw him one

way more than another; with his double chin and pendulous cheeks

resting on his breast and his leaden eyes sunk to the level of the

pavement. And the others stood round him with shocked faces, from which

his words and manner had driven the flush of the combat. Presently two

members, arguing loudly, came up, and were silenced by a glance and a

muttered word. The ungainly attitude, the ill-fitting clothes, did but

accentuate the tragedy of the central figure. They knew—none better—how

fiercely, how keenly, how doggedly he had struggled against death,

against the Bill.

And yet, had they thought of it, the vulgar caricatures that had hurt

her, the abuse that had passed him by to lodge in her bosom, would hurt

her no more!

Meanwhile, Vaughan, as soon as he had seen Sir Charles within the

entrance reserved for members, had betaken himself to the main door of

the Hall, a few paces to the westward. He had no hope that he would now

be able to perform the errand on which he had set forth; for the

Chancellor, for certain, would have other fish to fry and other people

to see. But he thought that he would leave a card with the usher, so

that Lord Brougham might know that he had not failed to come, and might

make a fresh appointment if he still wished to see him.

Of the vast congeries of buildings which then encased St. Stephen’s

Chapel and its beautiful but degraded cloisters, little more than the

Hall is left to us. The Hall we have, and in the main in the condition

in which the men of that generation viewed it; as Canning viewed it,

when with death in his face he paced its length on Peel’s arm, and

suspecting, perhaps, that they two would meet no more, proved to all

men the good-will he bore his rival. Those among us whose memories go

back a quarter of a century, and who can recall its aspect in

term-time, with three score barristers parading its length, and thrice

as many suitors and attorneys darting over its pavement—all under the

lofty roof which has no rival in Europe—will be able to picture it as

Vaughan saw it when he entered. To the bustle attending the courts of

law was added on this occasion the supreme excitement of the day. In

every corner, on the steps of every court, eager groups wrangled and

debated; while above the hubbub of argument and the trampling of feet,

the voices of ushers rose monotonously, calling a witness or enjoining

order.

Vaughan paused beside the cake-stall at the door and surveyed the

scene. As he stood, one of two men who were pacing near saw him, and

with a whispered word left his companion and came towards him.

“Mr. Vaughan,” he said, extending his hand with bland courtesy, “I hope

you are well. Can I do anything for you? We are dissolved, but a frank

is a frank for all that—to-day.”

“No, I thank you,” Vaughan answered. “The truth is, I had an

appointment with the Chancellor for this afternoon. But I suppose he

will not see me now.”

The other’s eyebrows met, with the result that his face looked less

bland. He was a small man, with keen dark eyes and bushy grey whiskers,

and an air of hawk-like energy which sixty years had not tamed. He wore

the laced coat of a sergeant at law, powdered on the shoulders, as if

he had but lately and hurriedly cast off his wig. “Good G—d!” he said.

“With the Chancellor!” And then, pulling himself up, “But I

congratulate you. A student at the Bar, as I believe you are, Mr.

Vaughan, who has appointments with the Chancellor, has fortune indeed

within his grasp.”

Vaughan laughed. “I fear not,” he said. “There are appointments and

appointments, Sergeant Wathen. Mine is not of a professional nature.”

Still the sergeant’s face, do what he would, looked grim. He had his

reasons for disliking what he heard. “Indeed!” he said drily. “Indeed!

But I must not detain you. Your time,” with a faint note of sarcasm,

“is valuable.” And with a civil salutation the two parted.

Wathen went back to his companion. “Talk of the Old One!” he said. “Do

you know who that is?”

“No,” the other answered. They had been discussing the coming election.

“Who is it?”

“One of my constituents.”

His friend laughed. “Oh, come,” he said. “I thought you had but one,

sergeant—old Vermuyden.”

“Only one,” Wathen answered, his eyes travelling from group to group,

“who counts; or rather, who did count. But thirteen who poll. And

that’s one of them.” He glanced frowning in the direction which Vaughan

had taken. “And what do you think his business is here, confound him?”

“What?”

“An appointment with old Wicked Shifts.”

“With the Chancellor? Pheugh!”

“Ay,” the sergeant answered morosely, “you may whistle. There’s some

black business on foot, you may depend upon it. And ten to one it’s

about my seat. He’s a broom,” he continued, tugging at the whiskers

which the late King had stamped with the imprimatur of fashion, “that

will make a clean sweep of us if we don’t take care. Whatever he does,

there’s something behind it. Some bedchamber plot, or some intrigue to

get A. out and put B. in. If it was a charwoman’s place he wanted, he’d

not ask for it and get it. That wouldn’t please him. But he’d tunnel

and tunnel and tunnel—and so he’d get it.”

“Still,” the other replied, with secret amusement—for he had no seat,

and the woes of our friends, especially our better-placed friends, have

their comic side—“I thought that you had a safe thing, Wathen? That old

Vermuyden’s nomination at Chippinge was as good as an order on the Bank

of England?”

“It was,” Wathen answered drily. “But with the country wild for the

Bill, there’s no saying what may happen anywhere. Safe!” he continued,

with a snarl. “Was there ever a safer seat than Westbury? Or a man who

had a place in better order than old Lopes, who owned it, and died last

month; taken from the evil to come, Jekyll said, for he never could

have existed in a world without rotten boroughs! It’s not far from

Chippinge, so I know—know it well. And I tell you his system was

beautiful—beautiful! Yet when Peel was there—after he had rattled on

the Catholic Claims and been thrown out at Oxford, Lopes made way for

him, you remember?—he would not have got in, no, by G—d, he wouldn’t

have got in if there had been a man against him. And the state in which

the country was then, though there was a bit of a Protestant cry, too,

wasn’t to compare with what it will be now. That man”—he shook his fist

stealthily in the direction of the Chancellor’s Court—“has lighted a

fire in England that will never be put out till it has consumed King,

Lords, and Commons—ay, every stick and stone of the old Constitution.

You take my word for it. And to think—to think,” he added still more

savagely, “that it is the Whigs have done this. The Whigs! who own more

than half the land in the country; who are prouder and stiffer than old

George the Third himself; who wouldn’t let you nor me into their

Cabinet to save our lives. By the Lord,” he concluded with gusto,

“they’ll soon learn the difference!”

“In the meantime—there’ll be dead cats and bad eggs flying, you think?”

Wathen groaned. “If that were the end of it,” he said, “I’d not mind.”

“Still, with it all, you are pretty safe, I suppose?”

“With that fellow closeted with the Chancellor? No, no!”

“Who is the young spark!” the other asked carelessly. “He looked a

decentish kind of fellow. A little of the prig, perhaps.”

“He’s that!” Wathen answered. “A d——d prig. What’s more, a cousin of

old Vermuyden’s. And what’s worse, his heir. That’s why they put him in

the corporation and made him one of the thirteen. Thought the vote safe

in the family, you see? And cheaper?” He winked. “But there’s no love

lost between him and old Sir Robert. A bed for a night once a year, and

one day in the season among the turnips, and glad to see your back, my

lad! That’s about the position. Now I wonder if Brougham is going to

try—but Lord! there’s no guessing what is in that man’s head! He’s

fuller of mischief than an egg of meat!”

The other was about to answer when one of the courts, in which a case

of some difficulty had caused a late sitting, discharged its noisy,

wrangling, perspiring crowd. The two stepped aside to avoid the

evasion, and did not resume their talk. Wathen’s friend made his way

out by the main door near which they had been standing; while the

sergeant, with looks which mirrored the gloom that a hundred Tory faces

wore on that day, betook himself to the robing-room. There he happened

upon another unfortunate. They fell to talking, and their talk ran

naturally upon the Chancellor, upon old Grey’s folly in letting himself

be led by the nose by such a rogue; finally, upon the mistakes of their

own party. They differed on the last topic, and in that natural and

customary state we may leave them.

II

THE SPIRIT OF THE STORM

The Court of Chancery, the preserve for nearly a quarter of a century

of Eldon and Delay, was the farthest from the entrance on the

right-hand side of the Hall—a situation which enabled the Chancellor to

pass easily to that other seat of his labours, the Woolsack. Two steps

raised the Tribunals of the Common Law above the level of the Hall. But

as if to indicate that this court was not the seat of anything so

common as law, but was the shrine of that more august conception,

Patronage, and the altar to which countless divines of the Church of

England looked with unwinking devotion, a flight of six or eight steps

led up to the door.

The privacy thus secured had been much to the taste of Lord Eldon.

Doubt and delay flourish best in a close and dusty atmosphere; and if

ever there was a man to whom that which was was right, it was “Old

Bags.” Nor had Lord Lyndhurst, his immediate successor, quarrelled with

an arrangement which left him at liberty to devote his time to society

and his beautiful wife. But the man who now sat in the marble chair was

of another kind from either of these. His worst enemy could not lay

dulness to his charge; nor could he who lectured the Whitbreads on

brewing, who explained their art to opticians, who vied with Talleyrand

in the knowledge of French literature, who wrote eighty articles for

the first twenty numbers of the “Edinburgh Review,” be called a

sluggard. Confident of his powers, Brougham loved to display them; and

the wider the arena the better he was pleased. His first sitting had

been graced by the presence of three royal dukes, a whole Cabinet, and

a score of peers in full dress. Having begun thus auspiciously, he was

not the man to vegetate in the gloom of a dry-as-dust court, or to be

content with an audience of suitors, whom equity, blessed word, had

long stripped of their votes.

Again and again during the last six months, by brilliant declamations

or by astounding statement, he had filled his court to the last inch.

The lions in the Tower, the tombs in the Abbey, the New Police—all were

deserted; and countryfolk flocked to Westminster, not to hear the

judgments of the highest legal authority in the land, but to see with

their own eyes the fugleman of reform—the great orator, whose voice,

raised at the Yorkshire election, had found an echo that still

thundered in the ears and the hearts of England.

“I am for Reform!” he had said in the castle yard of York; and the

people of England had answered: “So are we; and we will have it, or——”

The lacuna they had filled, not with words, but with facts stronger

than words—with the flames of Kentish farmhouses and Wiltshire

factories; with political unions counting their numbers by scores of

thousands; with midnight drillings and vague and sullen murmurings;

above all, with the mysterious terror of some great change which was to

come—a terror that shook the most thoughtless and affected even the

Duke, as men called the Duke of Wellington in that day. For was not

every crown on the Continent toppling?

Vaughan did not suppose that, in view of the startling event of the

day, he would be admitted. But the usher, who occupied a high stool

outside the great man’s door, no sooner read his card than he slid to

the ground. “I think his lordship will see you, sir,” he murmured

blandly; and he disappeared.

He was back on the instant, and, beckoning to Vaughan to follow him, he

proceeded some paces along a murky corridor, which the venerable form

of Eldon seemed still to haunt. Opening a door, he stood aside.

The room which Vaughan saw before him was stately and spacious, and

furnished with quiet richness. A deep silence, intensified by the fact

that the room had no windows, but was lighted from above, reigned in

it—and a smell of law-calf. Here and there on a bookcase or a pedestal

stood a marble bust of Bacon, of Selden, of Blackstone. And for a

moment Vaughan fancied that these were its only occupants. On advancing

further, however, he discovered two persons, who were writing busily at

separate side-tables; and one of them looked up and spoke.

“Your pardon, Mr. Vaughan!” he said. “One moment, if you please!”

He was almost as good as his word, for less than a minute later he

threw down the pen, and rose—a gaunt figure in a black frockcoat, and

with a black stock about his scraggy neck—and came to meet his visitor.

“I fear that I have come at an untimely moment, my lord,” Vaughan said,

a little awed in spite of himself by what he knew of the man.

But the other’s frank address put him at once at his ease. “Politics

pass, Mr. Vaughan,” the Chancellor answered lightly, “but science

remains.” He did not explain, as he pointed to a seat, that he loved,

above all things, to produce startling effects; to dazzle by the ease

with which he flung off one part and assumed another.

Henry Brougham—so, for some time after his elevation to the peerage, he

persisted in signing himself—was at this time at the zenith of his

life, as of his fame. Tall, but lean and ungainly, with a long neck and

sloping shoulders, he had one of the strangest faces which genius has

ever worn. His clownish features, his high cheek-bones, and queer

bulbous nose are familiar to us; for, something exaggerated by the

caricaturist, they form week by week the trailing mask which mars the

cover of “Punch.” Yet was the face, with all its ugliness, singularly

mobile; and the eyes, the windows of that restless and insatiable soul,

shone, sparkled, laughed, wept, with incredible brilliance. That which

he did not know, that which his mind could not perform—save sit still

and be discreet—no man had ever discovered. And it was the knowledge of

this, the sense of the strange and almost uncanny versatility of the

man, which for a moment overpowered Vaughan.

The Chancellor seated himself opposite his visitor, and placed a hand

on each of his wide-spread knees. He smiled.

“My friend,” he said, “I envy you.”

Vaughan coloured shyly. “Your lordship has little cause,” he answered.

“Great cause,” was the reply, “great cause! For as you are I was—and,”

he chuckled, as he rocked himself to and fro, “I have not found life

very empty or very unpleasant. But it was not to tell you this that I

asked you to wait on me, Mr. Vaughan, as you may suppose. Light! It is

a singular thing that you at the outset of your career—even as I thirty

years ago at the same point of mine—should take up such a parergon, and

alight upon the same discovery.”

“I do not think I understand.”

“In your article on the possibility of the permanence of reflection—to

which I referred in my letter, I think?”

“Yes, my lord, you did.”

“You have restated a fact which I maintained for the first time more

than thirty years ago! In my paper on colours, read before the Royal

Society in—I think it was ’96.”

Vaughan stared. His colour rose slowly. “Indeed?” he said, in a tone

from which he vainly strove to banish incredulity.

“You have perhaps read the paper?”

“Yes, I have.”

The Chancellor chuckled. “And found nothing of the kind in it?” he

said.

Vaughan coloured still more deeply. He felt that the position was

unpleasant. “Frankly, my lord, if you ask me, no.”

“And you think yourself,” with a grin, “the first discoverer?”

“I did.”

Brougham sprang like a boy to his feet, and whisked his long, lank body

to a distant bookshelf. Thence he took down a much-rubbed manuscript

book. As he returned he opened this at a place already marked, and,

laying it on the table, beckoned to the young man to approach. “Read

that,” he said waggishly, “and confess, young sir, that there were

chiefs before Agamemnon.”

Vaughan stooped over the book, and having read looked up in perplexity.

“But this passage,” he said, “was not in the paper read before the

Royal Society in ’96?”

“In the paper read? No. Nor yet in the paper printed? There, too, you

are right. And why? Because a sapient dunder-head who was in authority

requested me to omit this passage. He did not believe that light

passing through a small hole in the window-shutter of a darkened room

impresses a view of external objects on white paper; nor that, as I

suggested, the view might be made permanent if cast instead on ivory

rubbed with nitrate of silver!”

Vaughan was dumbfounded, and perhaps a little chagrined. “It is most

singular!” he said.

“Do you wonder now that I could not refrain from sending for you?”

“I do not, indeed.”

The Chancellor patted him kindly on the shoulder, and by a gesture made

him resume his seat. “No, I could not refrain,” he continued; “the

coincidence was too remarkable. If you come to sit where I sit, the

chance will be still more singular.”

Vaughan coloured with pleasure. “Alas!” he said, smiling, “one swallow,

my lord, does not made a summer.”

“Ah, my friend,” with a benevolent look. “But I know more of you than

you think. You were in the service, I hear, and left it. _Cedant arma

togæ_, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I, too, after a fashion. Thirty years ago I served a gun with

Professor Playfair in the Volunteer Artillery of Edinburgh. God knows,”

he continued complacently, “if I had gone on with it, where I should

have landed! Where the Duke is, perhaps! More surprising things have

happened.”

Vaughan did not know whether to take this, which was gravely and even

sentimentally spoken, for jest or earnest. He did not speak. And

Brougham, seated in his favourite posture, with a hand on either knee,

his lean body upright, and the skirts of his black coat falling to the

floor on either side of him, resumed. “I hear, too, that you have done

well at the Academic,” he said, “and on the right side, Mr. Vaughan.

Light? Ay, always light, my friend, always light! Let that be our

motto. For myself,” he continued earnestly, “I have taken it in hand

that this poor country shall never lack light again; and by God’s help

and Johnny Russell’s Bill I’ll bring it about! And not the

phosphorescent light of rotten boroughs and corrupt corporations, Mr.

Vaughan. No, nor the blaze of burning stacks, kindled by wretched,

starving, ignorant—ay, above all, Mr. Vaughan, ignorant men! But the

light of education, the light of a free Press, the light of good

government and honest representation; so that, whatever they lack,

henceforth they shall have voices and means and ways to make their

wants known. You agree with me? But I know you do, for I hear how well

you have spoken on that side. Mr. Cornelius,” turning and addressing

the gentleman who still continued to write at his table, “who was it

told us of Mr. Vaughan’s speech at the Academic?”

“I don’t know,” Mr. Cornelius answered gruffly.

“No?” the Chancellor said, not a whit put out. “He never knows

anything!” And then, throwing one knee over the other, he regarded

Vaughan with closer attention. “Mr. Vaughan,” he said, “have you ever

thought of entering Parliament?”

Vaughan’s heart bounded, and his face betrayed his emotions. Good

heavens, was the Chancellor about to offer him a Government seat? He

scarcely knew what to expect or what to say. The prospect, suddenly

opened, blinded him. He muttered that he had not as yet thought of it.

“You have no connection,” Brougham continued, “who could help you to a

seat? For if so, now is the time. Presently there will be a Reformed

Parliament and a crowd of new men, and the road will be blocked by the

throng of aspirants. You are not too young. Palmerston was not so old

when Perceval offered him a seat in the Cabinet.”

The words, the tone, the assumption that such things were for him—that

he had but to hold out his hand and they would fall into it—dropped

like balm into the young man’s soul. Yet he was not sure that the other

was serious, and he made a tremendous effort to hide the emotion he

felt. “I am afraid,” he said, with a forced smile, “that I, my lord, am

not Lord Palmerston.”

“No?” Brougham answered with a faint sneer. “But not much the worse for

that, perhaps. So that if you have any connection who commands a seat,

now is the time.”

Vaughan shook his head. “I have none,” he said, “except my cousin, Sir

Robert Vermuyden.”

“Vermuyden of Chippinge?” the Chancellor exclaimed, in a voice of

surprise.

“The same, my lord.”

“Good G—d!” Brougham cried. It was not a mealy-mouthed age. And he

leant back and stared at the young man. “You don’t mean to say that he

is your cousin?”

“Yes.”

The Chancellor laughed grimly. “Oh, dear, dear!” he said. “I am afraid

that he won’t help us much. I remember him in the House—an old high and

dry Tory. I am afraid that, with your opinions, you’ve not much to

expect of him. Still—Mr. Cornelius,” to the gentleman at the table,

“oblige me with Oldfield’s ‘House of Commons,’ the Wiltshire volume,

and the private Borough List. Thank you. Let me see—ah, here it is!”

He proceeded to read in a low tone, skipping from heading to heading:

“Chippinge, in the county of Wilts, has returned two members since the

twenty-third of Edward III. Right of election in the Alderman and the

twelve capital burgesses, who hold their places for life. Number of

voters, thirteen. Patron, Sir Robert Vermuyden, Bart., of Stapylton

House.

“Umph, as I thought,” he continued, laying down the book. “Now what

does the list say?” And, taking it in turn from his knee, he read:

“In Schedule A for total disfranchisement, the population under 2000.

Present members, Sergeant Wathen and Mr. Cooke, on nomination of Sir

Robert Vermuyden; the former to oblige Lord Eldon, the latter by

purchase. Both opponents of Bill; nothing to be hoped from them. The

Bowood interest divides the corporation in the proportion of four to

nine, but has not succeeded in returning a member since the election of

1741—on petition. The heir to the Vermuyden interest is——” He broke off

sharply, but continued to study the page. Presently he looked over it.

“Are you the Mr. Vaughan who inherits?” he asked gravely.

“The greater part of the estates—yes.”

Brougham laid down the book and rubbed his chin. “Under those

circumstances,” he said, after musing a while, “don’t you think that

your cousin could be persuaded to return you as an independent member?”

Vaughan shook his head with decision.

“The matter is important,” the Chancellor continued slowly, and as if

he weighed his words. “I cannot precisely make a promise, Mr. Vaughan;

but if your cousin could see the question of the Bill in another light,

I have little doubt that any object in reason could be secured for him.

If, for instance, it should be necessary in passing the Bill through

the Upper House to create new—eh?”

He paused, looking at Vaughan, who laughed outright. “Sir Robert would

not cross the park to save my life, my lord,” he said. “And I am sure

he would rather hang outside the White Lion in Chippinge marketplace

than resign his opinions or his borough!”

“He’ll lose the latter, whether or no,” Brougham answered, with a touch

of irritation. “Was there not some trouble about his wife? I think I

remember something.”

“They were separated many years ago.”

“She is alive, is she not?”

“Yes.”

Brougham saw, perhaps, that the subject was not palatable, and he

abandoned it. With an abrupt change of manner he flung the books from

him with the recklessness of a boy, and raised his sombre figure to its

height. “Well, well,” he said, “I hoped for better things; but I fear,

as Tommy Moore sings—

“_He’s pledged himself, though sore bereft_

_Of ways and means of ruling ill_,

_To make the most of what are left_

_And stick to all that’s rotten still!_

And by the Lord, I don’t say that I don’t respect him. I respect every

man who votes honestly as he thinks.” And grandly, with appropriate

gestures, he spouted:

“_Who spurns the expedient for the right_

_Scorns money’s all-attractive charms,_

_And through mean crowds that clogged his flight_

_Has nobly cleared his conquering arms_.

That’s the Attorney-General’s. He turns old Horace well, doesn’t he?”

Vaughan coloured. Young and candid, he could not bear the thought of

taking credit where he did not deserve it. “I fear,” he said awkwardly,

“that would bear rather hardly on me if we had a contest at Chippinge,

my lord. Fortunately it is unlikely.”

“How would it bear hardly on you?” Brougham asked, with interest.

“I have a vote.”

“You are one of the twelve burgesses?” in a tone of surprise.

“Yes, by favour of Sir Robert.”

The Chancellor, smiling gaily, shook his head. “No,” he said, “no; I do

not believe you. You do yourself an injustice. Leave that sort of thing

to older men, to Lyndhurst, if you will, d——d Jacobin as he is,

preening himself in Tory feathers, and determined whoever’s in he’ll

not be out; or to Peel. Leave it! And believe me you’ll not repent it.

I,” he continued loftily, “have seen fifty years of life, Mr. Vaughan,

and lived every year of them and every day of them, and I tell you that

the thing is too dearly bought at that price.”

Vaughan felt himself rebuked; but he made a fight. “And yet,” he said,

“are there no circumstances, my lord, in which such a vote may be

justified?”

“A vote against your conscience—to oblige someone?”

“Well, yes.”

“A Jesuit might justify it. There is nothing which a Jesuit could not

justify, I suppose. But though no man was stronger for the Catholic

Claims than I was, I do not hold a Jesuit to be a man of honour. And

that is where the difference lies. There! But,” he continued, with an

abrupt change from the lofty to the confidential, “let me tell you a

fact, Mr. Vaughan. In ’29—was it in April or May of ’29, Mr.

Cornelius?”

“I don’t know to what you refer,” Mr. Cornelius grunted.

“To be sure you don’t,” the Chancellor replied, without any loss of

good-humour; “but in April or May of ’29, Mr. Vaughan, the Duke offered

me the Rolls, which is £7000 a year clear for life, and compatible with

a seat in the Commons. It would have suited me better in every way than

the Seals and the House of Lords. It was the prize, to be frank with

you, at which I was aiming; and as at that time the Duke was making his

right-about-face on the Catholic question, and was being supported by

our side, I might have accepted it with an appearance of honour and

consistency. But I did not accept it. I did not, though my refusal

injured myself, and did no one any good. But there, I am chattering.”

He broke off, with a smile, and held out his hand. “However,

“_Est et fideli tuta silentio

Merces!_

You won’t forget that, I am certain. And you may be sure I shall

remember you. I am pleased to have made your acquaintance, Mr. Vaughan.

Decide on the direction, politics or the law, in which you mean to

push, and some day let me know. In the meantime follow the light!

Light, more light! Don’t let them lure you back into old Giant

Despair’s cave, or choke you with all the dead bones and rottenness and

foulness they keep there, and that, by God’s help, I’ll sweep out of

the world before it’s a year older!”

And still talking, he saw Vaughan, who was murmuring his

acknowledgments, to the door.

When that had closed on the young man Brougham came back, and, throwing

wide his arms, yawned prodigiously. “Now,” he said, “if Lansdowne

doesn’t effect something in that borough, I am mistaken.”

“Why,” Cornelius muttered curtly, “do you trouble about the borough?

Why don’t you leave those things to the managers?”

“Why? Why, first because the Duke did that last year, and you see the

result—he’s out and we’re in. Secondly, Corny, because I am like the

elephant’s trunk, that can tear down a tree or pick up a pin.”

“But in picking up a pin,” the other grunted, “it picks up a deal of

something else.”

“Of what?”

“Dirt!”

“Old Pharisee!” the Chancellor cried.

Mr. Cornelius threw down his pen, and, turning in his seat, opened fire

on his companion. “Dirt!” he reiterated sternly. “And for what? What

will be the end of it when you have done all for them, clean and dirty?

They’ll not keep you. They use you now, but you’re a new man. What,

you—_you_ think to deal on equal terms with the Devonshires and the

Hollands, the Lansdownes and the Russells! Who used Burke, and when

they had squeezed him tossed him aside? Who used Tierney till they wore

him and his fortune out? Who would have used Canning, but he did not

trust them, and so they worried him—though they were all dumb dogs

before him—to his death. Ay, and presently, when you have served their

turn, they will cast you aside.”

“They will not dare!” Brougham cried.

“Pshaw! You are Samson, but you are shorn of your strength. They have

been too clever for you. While you were in the Commons they did not

dare. Harry Brougham was their master. So they lured you, poor fool,

into the trap, into the Lords, where you may spout, and spout, and

spout, and it will have as much effect as the beating of a bird’s wings

against the bars of its cage!”

“They will not dare!” Brougham reiterated.

“You will see. They will throw you aside.”

Brougham walked up and down the room, his eyes glittering, his quaint,

misshapen features working passionately.

“They will throw you aside,” Mr. Cornelius repeated, watching him

keenly. “You are a man of the people. You are in earnest. You are

honestly in favour of retrenchment, of education, of reform. But to

these Whigs—save and except to Althorp, who is that _lusus naturæ_, an

honest man, and to Johnny Russell, who is a fanatic—these are but

catchwords, stalking-horses, the means by which, after the dull old

fashion of their fathers and their grandfathers and their

great-grandfathers, they think to creep into power. Reform, if reform

means the representation of the people by the people, the rule of the

people by the people, or by any but the old landed families—why, the

very thought would make them sick!”

Brougham stopped in his pacing to and fro. “You are right,” he said

sombrely.

“You acknowledge it?”

“I have known it—here!” And, drawing himself to his full height, he

clapped his hand to his breast. “I have known it here for months. Ay,

and though I have sworn to myself that they would not dare to treat me

as they treated Burke, and Sheridan, and Tierney, and as they would

have treated Canning, I knew it was a lie, my lad; I knew they would.

My mother—ay, my old mother, sitting by the chimneyside, out of the

world there, knew it, and warned me.”

“Then why did you go into the Lords?” Cornelius asked. “Why be lured

into the gilded cage, where you are helpless?”

“Because, mark you,” Brougham replied sternly, “if I had not, they had

not brought in this Bill. And we had waited, and the people had waited,

another twenty years, maybe!”

“And so you went into the prison-house shorn of your strength?”

Brougham looked at him with a gleam of ferocity in his brilliant eyes.

“Ay,” he said, “I did. And by that act,” he continued, stretching his

long arms to their farthest extent, “mark you, mark you, never forget

it, I avenged all—not only all I may suffer at their hands, but all

that every slave who ever ground in their mill has suffered, the

slights, the grudged meticulous office, the one finger lent to

shake—all, all! I went into the prison-house, but when I did so I laid

my hands upon the pillars. And their house falls, falls. I hear it—I

hear it falling even now about their ears. They may throw me aside. But

the house is falling, and the great Whig families—pouf!—they are not in

the heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water that is

under the earth. You call Reform their stalking-horse? Ay, but it is

into their own Troy that they have dragged it; and the clatter of

strife which you hear is the death-knell of their power. They have let

in the waves of the sea, and dream fondly that they can say where they

shall stop and what they shall not touch. They may as well speak to the

tide when it flows; they may as well command the North Sea in its rage;

they may as well bid Hume be silent, or Wetherell be sane. You say I am

spent, Cornelius; and so I am, it may be. I know not. But this I know.

Never again will the families say ‘Go!’ and he goeth, and ‘Do!’ and he

doeth, as in the old world that is passing—passing even at this minute,

passing with the Bill. No,” he continued, flinging out his arms with

passion; “for when they thought to fool me, and to shut me dumb among

dumb things behind the gilded wires, I knew—I knew that I was dragging

down their house upon their heads.”

Mr. Cornelius stared at him. “By G—d!” he said, “I believe you are

right. I believe that you are a cleverer man than I thought you were.”

III

TWO LETTERS

The Hall was empty when Vaughan came forth; and as the young man strode

down its echoing length there was nothing save his own footsteps on the

pavement to distract his mind from the scene in which he had taken

part. He was excited and a little uplifted, as was natural. The

promises made, if they were to be counted as promises, were of the

vague and indefinite character which it is as easy to evade as to

fulfil. But the Chancellor had spoken to him as to an equal and treated

him as one who had but to choose a career to succeed in it, and to win

the highest prizes which it could bestow. This was flattering; nor was

it to a young man who had little experience of the world, less

flattering to be deemed the owner of a stake in the country, and a

person through whom offers of the most confidential and important

character might be properly made.

He walked to his rooms in Bury Street with a pleasant warmth at his

heart. And at the Academic that evening, where owing to the events of

the day there was a fuller house than had ever been known, and a

fiercer debate, he championed the Government and upheld the dissolution

in a speech which not only excelled his previous efforts, but was a

surprise to those who knew him best. Afterwards he recognised that his

peroration had been only a paraphrase of Brougham’s impassioned “Light!

More Light!” and that the whole owed more than he cared to remember to

the same source. But, after all, why not? It was not to be expected

that he could at once rise to the heights of the greatest of living

orators. And it was much that he had made a hit; that as he left the

room he was followed by all eyes.

Nor did a qualm worthy of the name trouble him until the morning of the

27th, five days later—a Wednesday. Then he found beside his breakfast

plate two letters bearing the postmark of Chippinge.

“What’s afoot?” he muttered. But he had a prevision before he broke the

seal of the first. And the contents bore out his fears. The letter ran

thus:

“Stapylton, Chippinge.

“Dear Sir—I make no apology for troubling you in a matter in which your

interest is second only to mine and which is also of a character to

make apology beside the mark. It has not been necessary to require your

presence at Chippinge upon the occasion of former elections. But the

unwholesome ferment into which the public mind has been cast by the

monstrous proposals of Ministers has nowhere been more strongly

exemplified than here, by the fact that, for the first time in half a

century, the right of our family to nominate the members for the

Borough is challenged. Since the year 1783 no serious attempt has been

made to disturb the Vermuyden interest. And I have yet to learn

that—short of this anarchical Bill, which will sweep away all the

privileges attaching to property—such an attempt can be made with any

chance of success.

“I am informed nevertheless that Lord Lansdowne, presuming on a small

connection in the Corporation, intends to send at least one candidate

to the poll. Our superiority is so great that I should not, even so,

trouble you to be present, were it not an object to discourage these

attempts by the exhibition of our full strength, and were it not still

more important to do so at a time when the existence of the Borough

itself is at stake.

“Isaac White will apprise you of the arrangements to be made and will

keep you informed of all matters which you should know. Be good enough

to let Mapp learn the day and hour of your arrival, and he will see

that the carriage and servants meet the coach at Chippenham. Probably

you will come by the York House. It is the most convenient.

“I have the honour to be

“Your sincere kinsman,

“Robert Vermuyden.

“To Arthur Vermuyden Vaughan, Esquire,

“17 Bury Street, St. James’s.”

Vaughan’s face grew long, and his fork hung suspended above his plate,

as he perused the old gentleman’s epistle. When all was read he laid it

down, and whistled. “Here’s a fix!” he muttered. And he thought of his

speech at the Academic; and for the first time he was sorry that he had

made it. “Here’s a fix!” he repeated. “What’s to be done?”

He was too much disturbed to go on with his breakfast, and he tore open

the other letter. It was from Isaac White, his cousin’s attorney and

agent. It ran thus:

“High Street, Chippinge,

“April 25, 1831.

“_Chippinge Parliamentary Election_.

“Sir.—I have the honour to inform you, as upon former occasions, that

the writ in the above is expected and that Tuesday the 3rd day of May

will be appointed for the nomination. It has not been needful to

trouble you heretofore, but on this occasion I have reason to believe

that Sir Robert Vermuyden’s candidates will be opposed by nominees in

the Bowood Interest, and I have therefore, honoured Sir, to intimate

that your attendance will oblige.

“The Vermuyden dinner will take place at the White Lion on Monday the

2nd, when the voters and their friends will sit down at 5 P. M. The

Alderman will preside, and Sir Robert hopes that you will be present.

The procession to the Hustings will leave the White Lion at ten on

Tuesday the 3d, and a poll, if demanded, will be taken after the usual

proceedings.

“Any change in the order of the arrangements will be punctually

communicated to you.

“I have the honour to be, Sir,

“Your humble obedient servant,

“Isaac White.

“Arthur V. Vaughan, Esq.,

(late H.M.’s 14th Dragoons),

“17 Bury Street, London.”

Vaughan flung the letter down and resumed his breakfast moodily. It was

a piece of shocking ill-fortune, that was all there was to be said.

Not that he really regretted his speech! It had committed him a little

more deeply, but morally he had been committed before. It is a poor

conscience that is not scrupulous in youth; and he was convinced, or

almost convinced, that if he had never seen the Chancellor he would

still have found it impossible to support Sir Robert’s candidates.

For he was sincere in his support of the Bill; a little because it

flattered his intellect to show himself above the prejudices of the

class to which he belonged; more, because he was of an age to view with

resentment the abuses which the Bill promised to sweep away. A

Government truly representative of the people, such as this Bill must

create, would not tolerate the severities which still disgraced the

criminal law. It would not suffer the heartless delays which made the

name of Chancery synonymous with ruin. Under it spring-guns and

man-traps would no longer scare the owner from his own coverts. The

poor would be taught, the slave would be freed. Above all, whole

classes of the well-to-do would no longer be deprived of a voice in the

State. No longer would the rights of one small class override the

rights of all other classes.

He was at an age, in a word, when hope invites to change; and he was

for the Bill. “Ay, by Jove, I am!” he muttered, casting the die in

fancy, “and I’ll not be set down! It will be awkward! It will be

odious! But I must go through with it!”

Still, he was sorry. He sprang from the class which had profited by the

old system—that system under which some eight-score men returned a

majority of the House of Commons. He had himself the prospect of

returning two members. He could, therefore enter, to a degree—at times

to a greater degree than he liked,—into the feelings with which the

old-fashioned and the interested, the prudent and the timid, viewed a

change so great and so radical. But his main objection was personal. He

hated the necessity which forced him to cross the wishes and to trample

on the prejudices of an old man whom he regarded with respect, and even

with reverence: a solitary old man, the head of his family, to whom he

owed the very vote he must withhold; and who would hardly, even by the

logic of facts, be brought to believe that one of his race and breeding

could turn against him.

Still it must be done; the die was cast. The sooner, therefore, it was

done, the better. He would go down to Stapylton at once, while his

courage was high; and he would tell Sir Robert. Then, whatever came of

it, he would have nothing with which to reproach himself. In the heat

of resolve he felt very brave and very virtuous; and the moment he rose

from breakfast he went to the coach office, and finding that the York

House, the fashionable Bath, coach was full for the following day, he

booked an outside seat on the Bristol White Lion Coach, which also

passed through Chippenham. From Chippenham, Chippinge is distant a

short nine miles.

That evening proved to be memorable; for the greater part of London was

illuminated by the Reformers in honour of the Dissolution; not without

rioting and drunkenness, violence on the part of the mob, and rage on

the side of the minority. When Vaughan passed through the streets

before six next morning, on his way to the White Horse Cellars, traces

of the night’s work still remained; and where the early sun fell on

them showed ugly and grisly and menacing enough. A moderate reformer

might well have blenched at the sight, and questioned—as many did

question—whither this was tending. But Vaughan was late; the coach, one

out of three which were waiting to start, was horsed. He had only eyes,

as he came hurriedly up, for the seat he had reserved behind the

coachman.

It was empty, and so far his fears were vain. But it annoyed him to

find that his next-door neighbour was a young lady travelling alone.

She had the seat on the near side.

He climbed up quickly, and to reach his place had to pass before her.

The space between the seat and the coachman’s box was narrow, and as

she rose to allow him to pass she glanced up. Their eyes met; Vaughan

raised his hat in mute apology, and took his seat. He said no word. But

a miracle had happened, as miracles do happen, when the world is young.

In his mind, as he sat down, he was not repeating, “What a nuisance!”

but was saying, “What eyes! What a face! And, oh, heaven, what beauty!

What blush-rose cheeks! What a lovely mouth!”

_For ’twas from eyes of liquid blue_

_A host of quivered Cupids flew_,

_And now his heart all bleeding lies_

_Beneath the army of the eyes_.

He gazed gravely at the group of watermen and night-birds who stood in

the roadway below waiting to see the coach start. And apparently he was

unmoved. Apparently he was the same Arthur Vermuyden Vaughan who had

passed round the boot of the coach to reach the ladder and his place.

But he was not the same. His thoughts were no longer querulous, full of

the haste he had made, and the breakfast he had to make; but of a pair

of gentle eyes which had looked for one instant into his, of a modest

face, sweet and shy, of a Quaker-like bonnet that ravished as no other

bonnet had ever ravished the most susceptible!

He was still gazing at the group of loiterers, without seeing them,

when he became aware that an elderly woman plainly but respectably

dressed, who was standing by the forewheel of the coach, was looking up

at him, and trying to attract his attention. Seeing that she had caught

his eye she spoke:

“Gentleman! Gentleman!” she said—but in a restrained voice, as if she

did not wish to be generally heard. “The young lady’s address! Please

say that she’s not left it! For the laundress!”

He turned and made sure that there was only one of the sex on the

coach. Then—to be honest, not without a tiny flutter at his heart—he

addressed his neighbour. “Pardon me,” he said “but there is someone

below who wants your address.”

She turned her eyes on him and his heart gave a perceptible jump. “My

address?” she echoed in a voice as sweet as her face. “I think that

there must be some mistake.” And then for a moment she looked at him as

if she doubted his intentions.

The doubt was intolerable. “It’s for the laundress,” he said. “See,

there she is!”

The girl rose to look over the side of the coach and perforce leant

across him. He saw that she had the slenderest waist and the prettiest

figure—he had every opportunity of seeing. Then the coach started with

a jerk, and if she had not steadied herself by laying her hand on his

shoulder, she must have relapsed on his knees. As it was she fell back

safely into her seat. She blushed.

“I beg your pardon,” she said.

But he was looking back. He had his eye on the woman, who remained in

the roadway, pointing after the coach and apparently asking a bystander

some question respecting it—perhaps where it stopped. “There she is!”

he exclaimed. “The woman with the umbrella! She is pointing after us.”

His neighbour looked back but made nothing of it. “I know no one in

London,” she said a little primly—but with sweet primness—“except the

lady at whose house I stayed last night. And she is not able to leave

the house. It must be a mistake.” And with a gentle reserve which had

in it nothing of coquetry, she turned her face from him.

Tantivy! Tantivy! Tantivy! They were away, bowling down the slope of

broad empty Piccadilly with the four nags trotting merrily, and the

April sun gilding the roofs of the houses, and falling aslant on the

verdure of the Green Park. Then merrily up the rise to Hyde Park

Corner, where the new Grecian Gates looked across at the equally new

arch on Constitution Hill; and where Apsley House, the residence of

“the Duke,” hiding with its new coat of Bath stone the old brick walls,

peeped through the trees at the statue of Achilles, erected ten years

back in the Duke’s honour.

But, alas! what was this? Wherefore the crowd that even at this early

hour was large enough to fill the roadway and engage the attention of

the New Police? Vaughan looked and saw that every blind in Apsley House

was lowered, and that more than half of the windows were shattered. And

the little French gentleman who, to the coachman’s disgust, had taken

the box-seat, saw it too; nay, had seen it before, for he had come that

way to the coach office. He pointed to the silent, frowning mansion,

and snapped his fingers.

“That is your reward for your Vellington!” he cried, turning in his

excitement to the two behind him. “And his lady, I am told, she lie

dead behind the broken vindows! They did that last night, your

_canaille!_ But he vill not forget! And when the refolution come—bah—he

vill have the iron hand! He vill be the Emperor and he vill repay!”

No one answered; they treated him with silent British scorn. But they

one and all stared back at the scene, at the grim blind house in the

early sunshine, and the gaping crowd—as long as it remained in sight.

And some, no doubt, pondered the sight. But who, with a pretty face

beside him and a long day’s drive before him, a drive by mead and

shining river, over hill and down, under the walls of grey churches and

by many a marketplace and cheery inn-yard—who would long dwell on

changes past or to come? Or fret because in the womb of time might lie

that “refolution” of which the little Frenchman spoke?

IV

TANTIVY! TANTIVY! TANTIVY!

The White Lion coach was a light coach carrying only five passengers

outside, and merrily it swept by Kensington Church, whence the

travellers had a peep of Holland House—home of the Whigs—on their

right. And then in a twinkling they were swinging through Hammersmith,

where the ale-houses were opening and lusty girls were beginning to

deliver the milk. They passed through Turnham, through Brentford,

awakening everywhere the lazy with the music of their horn. They saw

Sion House on their left, and on their right had a glimpse of the

distant lawns of Osterley—the seat of Lady Jersey, queen of Almack’s,

and the Holland’s rival. Thence they travelled over Hounslow Heath, and

by an endless succession of mansions and lawns and orchards rich at

this season with apple blossom, and framing here and there a view of

the sparkling Thames.

Vaughan breathed the air of spring and let his eyes dwell on scene

after scene; and he felt that it was good to be young and to sit behind

fast horses. He stole a glance at his neighbour and judged by the

brightness of her eyes, her parted lips and rapt expression, that she

felt with him. And he would have said something to her, but he could

think of nothing worthy of her. At last:

“It’s a beautiful morning,” he ventured, and cursed his vapidity.

But she did not seem to find bathos in the words. “It is, indeed!” she

answered with an enthusiasm which showed that she had forgotten her

doubts of him. “And,” she added simply, “I have not been on a coach

since I was a child!”

“Not on a coach?” he cried in astonishment.

“No. Except on the Clapham Stage. And that is not a coach like this!”

“No, perhaps it is not,” he said. And he thought of her, and—oh,

Lord!—of Clapham! And yet after all there was something about her,

about her grey, dove-like dress and her gentleness, which smacked of

Clapham. He wondered who she was and what she was; and he was still

wondering when she turned her eyes on him, and, herself serenely

unconscious, sent a tiny shock through him.

“I enjoy it the more,” she said, “because I—I am not usually free in

the morning.”

“Oh, yes!”

He could say no more; not another word. It was the stupidest thing in

the world, but he was tongue-tied. Seeing, however, that she had turned

from him and was absorbed in the view of Windsor rising stately amid

its trees, he had the cleverness to steal a glance at the neat little

basket which nestled at her feet. Surreptitiously he read the name on

the label.

Mary Smith

Miss Sibson’s

Queen’s Square, Bristol.

Mary Smith! Just Mary Smith! For the moment—it is not to be denied—he

was sobered by the name. It was not a romantic name. It was anything

but high-sounding. The author of “Tremayne” or “De Vere,” nay, the

author of “Vivian Grey”—to complete the trio of novels which were in

fashion at the time—would have turned up his nose at it. But what did

it matter? He desired no more than to make himself agreeable for the

few hours which he and this beautiful creature must pass together—in

sunshine and with the fair English landscape gliding by them. And that

being so, what need he reck what she called herself or whence she came.

It was enough that under her modest bonnet her ears were shells and her

eyes pure cornflowers, and that a few pleasant words, a little April

dalliance—if only that Frenchman would cease to peep behind him and

grin—would harm neither the one nor the other.

But opportunities let slip do not always recur. As he turned to address

her they rose the ascent of Maidenhead Bridge, had on either hand a

glimpse of the river framed in pale green willows, and halted with

sweating horses before the King’s Arms. The boots advanced, amid a

group of gazers, and reared a ladder against the coach. “Half an hour

for breakfast, gentlemen!” he cried briskly. And through the windows of

the inn the travellers had a view of a long table whereat the

passengers on the up night-coach were already feasting.

Our friends hastened to descend, but not so fast that Vaughan failed to

note the girl’s look of uncertainty, almost of distress. He guessed

that she was not at ease in a scene so bustling and so new to her. And

the thought gave him the courage that he needed.

“Will you allow me to find you a place at the table?” he said. “I know

this inn and they know me. Guard, the ladder here!” And he took her

hand—oh, such a little, little hand!—and aided her in her descent.

“Will you follow me?” he said. And he made way for her through the knot

of starers who cumbered the doorway. But once in the coffee-room he

had, cunning fellow, an inspiration. “Find this lady a seat!” he

commanded one of the attendant damsels. And when he had seen her seated

and the coffee set before her, he took himself deliberately to the

other end of the room. But whether he did so out of pure respect for

her feelings, or because he thought—and hugged himself on the

thought—that he would be missed, he did not himself know. Nor was he so

much a captive, though he counted how many rolls she ate, and looked a

dozen times to see if she looked at him, as to be unable to make an

excellent breakfast.

The cheery, noisy throng at the tables, the brisk coming and going of

the servants, the smell of hot coffee, the open windows, and the

sunshine outside—where the fresh team of the up night-coach were

already tossing their heads impatiently—he wondered how it all struck

her, new to such scenes and to this side of life. And then while he

wondered he saw that she had risen from the table and was going out

with one of the waiting-maids. To reach the door she had to pass near

him; and, oh bliss, her eyes found him—and she blushed. She blushed, ye

heavens! He saw it clearly, and he sat thinking about it until, though

the coach was not due to start for another five minutes and he might

count on the guard summoning him, he was taken with fear lest some one

should steal his seat. And he hurried out.

She was alone on the top of the coach, and a youthful waterman, one of

the crowd of loiterers below, was making eyes at her to the delight of

his companions. When Vaughan came forth, “I’d like to be him,” the wag

said, winking with vulgar gusto. And the bystanders grinned at the

good-looking young man who stood in the doorway buttoning up his

box-coat. The position might soon have become embarrassing to her if

not to him; but in the nick of time the eye of an inside passenger, who

had followed him through the doorway, alighted on a huge placard which

hung behind the coach.

“Take that down!” the stranger cried loudly and pompously. And in a

moment all eyes were upon him. He prodded with his umbrella at the

offending bill. “Do you hear me? Take it down, sir,” he repeated,

turning to the guard. He was a portly man, reddish about the gills.

“Take it down, sir, or I will! It is disgraceful! I shall report this

conduct to your employers.”

The guard hesitated. “It don’t harm you, sir,” he pleaded, anxious, it

was clear, to propitiate a man who would presently be good for half a

crown.

“Don’t harm me?” the choleric gentleman retorted. “Don’t harm me?

What’s that to do with it? What right—what right have you, man, to put

party filth like that on a public vehicle in which I pay to ride? ‘The

Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill!’ D—n the Bill, sir!”

with violence. “Take it down! Take it down at once!” he repeated, as if

his order closed the matter.

The guard frowned at the placard, which bore, largely printed, the

legend which the gentleman found so little to his taste. He rubbed his

head. “Well, I don’t know, sir,” he said. And then—the crowd about the

coach was growing—he looked at the driver. “What do you say, Sammy?” he

asked.

“Don’t touch it,” growled the driver, without deigning to turn his

head.

“You see, sir, it is this way,” the guard ventured civilly. “Mr. Palmer

has a Whig meeting at Reading to-day and the town will be full. And if

we don’t want rotten eggs and broken windows—we’ll carry that!”

“I’ll not travel with it!” the stout gentleman answered positively. “Do

you hear me, man? If you don’t take it down I will!”

“Best not!” cried a voice from the little crowd about the coach. And

when the angry gentleman turned to see who spoke, “Best not!” cried

another behind him. And he wheeled about again, so quickly that the

crowd laughed. This raised his wrath to a white heat.

He grew purple. “I shall have it taken down!” he said. “Guard, remove

it!”

“Don’t touch it,” growled the driver—one of a class noted in that day

for independence and surly manners. “If the gent don’t choose to travel

with it, let him stop here and be d—d!”

“Do you know,” the insulted passenger cried, “that I am a Member of

Parliament?”

“I’m hanged if you are!” coachee retorted. “Nor won’t be again!”

The crowd roared at this repartee. The guard was in despair. “Anyway,

we must go on, sir,” he said. And he seized his horn. “Take your seats,

gents! Take your seats!” he cried. “All for Reading! I’m sorry, sir,

but I’ve to think of the coach.”

“And the horses!” grumbled the driver. “Where’s the gent’s sense?”

They all scrambled to their seats except the ex-member. He stood,

bursting with rage and chagrin. But at the last moment, when he saw

that the coach would really go without him, he swallowed his pride,

plucked open the coach-door, and amid the loud jeers of the crowd,

climbed in. The driver, with a chuckle, bade the helpers let go, and

the coach swung cheerily away through the streets of Maidenhead, the

merry notes of the horn and the rattle of the pole-chains drowning the

cries of the gutter-boys.

The little Frenchman turned round. “You vill have a refolution,” he

said solemnly. “And the gentleman inside he vill lose his head.”

The coachman, who had hitherto looked askance at Froggy, as if he

disdained his neighbourhood, now squinted at him as if he could not

quite make him out. “Think so?” he said gruffly. “Why, Mounseer?”

“I have no doubt,” the Frenchman answered glibly. “The people vill

have, and the nobles vill not give! Or they vill give a leetle—a

leetle! And that is the worst of all. I have seen two refolutions!” he

continued with energy. “The first when I was a child—it is forty years!

My bonne held me up and I saw heads fall into the basket—heads as young

and as lofly as the young Mees there! And why? Because the people would

have, and the King, he give that which is the worst of all—a leetle!

And the trouble began. And then the refolution of last year—it was

worth to me all that I had! The people would have, and the Polignac,

our Minister—who is the friend of your Vellington—he would not give at

all! And the trouble began.”

The driver squinted at him anew. “D’you mean to say,” he asked, “that

you’ve seen heads cut off?”

“I have seen the white necks, as white and as small as the Mees there;

I have seen the blood spout from them; bah! like what you call pump!

Ah, it was ogly, it was very ogly!”

The coachman turned his head slowly and with difficulty, until he

commanded a full view of Vaughan’s pretty neighbour; at whom he gazed

for some seconds as if fascinated. Then he turned to his horses and

relieved his feelings by hitting one of the wheelers below the trace;

while Vaughan, willing to hear what the Frenchman had to say, took up

the talk.

“Perhaps here,” he said, “those who have will give, and give enough,

and all will go well.”

“Nefer! Nefer!” the Frenchman answered positively. “By example, the

Duke whose château we pass—what you call it—Jerusalem House?”

“Sion House,” Vaughan answered, smiling. “The Duke of Northumberland.”

“By example he return four members to your Commons House. Is it not so?

And they do what he tell them. He have this for his nefew, and that for

his niece, and the other thing for his _maître d’hôtel!_ And it is he

and the others like him who rule the country! Gives he up all that? To

the _bourgeoisie?_ Nefer! Nefer!” he continued with emphasis. “He will

be the Polignac! They will all be the Polignacs! And you will have a

refolution. And by-and-by, when the _bourgeoisie_ is frightened of the

_canaille_ and tired of the blood-letting, your Vellington he will be

the Emperor. It is as plain as the two eyes in the face! So plain for

me, I shall not take off my clothes the nights!”

“Well, King Billy for me!” said the driver. “But if he’s willing,

Mounseer, why shouldn’t the people manage their own affairs?”

“The people! The people! They cannot! Your horses, will they govern

themselves? Will you throw down the reins and leave it to them, up

hill, down hill? The people govern themselves Bah!” And to express his

extreme disgust at the proposition, the Frenchman, who had lost his all

with Polignac, bent over the side and spat into the road. “It is no

government at all!”

The driver looked darkly at his horses as if he would like to see them

try it on. “I am afraid,” said Vaughan, “that you think we are in

trouble either way then, whether the Tories give or withhold?”

“Eizer way! Eizer way!” the Frenchman answered _con amore_. “It is

fate! You are on the edge of the what you call it—_chute!_ And you must

go over! We have gone over. We have bumped once, twice! We shall bump

once, twice more, _et voilà_—Anarchy! Now it is your turn, sir. The

government has to be—shifted—from the one class to the other!”

“But it may be peacefully shifted?”

The little Frenchman shrugged his shoulders impatiently. “I have nefer

seen the government shifted without all that that I have told you.

There will be the guillotine, or the barricades. For me, I shall not

take off my clothes the nights!”

He spoke with a sincerity so real and a persuasion so clear that even

Vaughan was a little shaken, and wondered if those who watched the game

from the outside saw more than the players. As for the coachman:

“Dang me,” he said that evening to his cronies in the tap of the White

Lion at Bristol, “if I feel so sure about this here Reform! We want

none of that nasty neck-cutting here! And if I thought Froggy was right

I’m blest if I wouldn’t turn Tory!”

And for certain the Frenchman voiced what a large section of the timid

and the well-to-do were thinking. For something like a hundred and

fifty years a small class, the nobility and the greater gentry, turning

to advantage the growing defects in the representation—the rotten

boroughs and the close corporations—had ruled the country through the

House of Commons. Was it to be expected that the basis of power could

be shifted in a moment? Or that all these boroughs and corporations, in

which the governing class were so deeply interested, could be swept

away without a convulsion; without opening the floodgates of change,

and admitting forces which no man could measure? Or, on the other side,

was it likely that, these defects once seen and the appetite of the

middle class for power once whetted, their claims could be refused

without a struggle from which the boldest must flinch? No man could say

for certain, and hence these fears in the air. The very winds carried

them. They were being discussed in that month of April not only on the

White Lion coach, not on the Bath road only, but on a hundred coaches,

and a hundred roads over the length and breadth of England. Wherever

the sway of Macadam and Telford extended, wherever the gigs of “riders”

met, or farmers’ carts stayed to parley, at fair and market, sessions

and church, men shook their heads or raised their voices in high

debate; and the word _Reform_ rolled down the wind!

Vaughan soon overcame his qualms; for his opinions were fixed. But he

thought that the subject might serve him with his neighbour, and he

addressed her.

“You must not let them alarm you,” he said. “We are still a long way, I

fancy, from guillotines or barricades.”

“I hope so,” she answered. “In any case I am not afraid.”

“Why, if I may ask?”

She glanced at him with a gleam of humour in her eyes. “Little shrubs

feel little wind,” she murmured.

“But also little sun, I fear,” he replied.

“That does not follow,” she said, without raising her eyes again.

“Though it is true that I—I am so seldom free in a morning that a

journey such as this, with the sunshine, is like heaven to me.”

“The morning is a delightful time,” he said.

“Oh!” she cried, as if she now knew that he felt with her. “That is it!

The afternoon is different.”

“Well, fortunately, you and I have—much of the morning left.”

She made no reply to that, and he wondered in silence what was the

employment which filled her mornings and fitted her to enjoy with so

keen a zest this early ride. The Gloucester up-coach was coming to meet

them, the guard tootling merrily on his horn, and a blue and yellow

flag—the Whig colours—flying on the roof of the coach, which was

crowded with smiling passengers. Vaughan saw the girl’s eyes sparkle as

the two coaches passed one another amid a volley of badinage; and

demure as she was, he was sure that she had a store of fun within. He

wished that she would remove her cheap thread gloves that he might see

if her hands were as white as they were small. She was no common

person, he was sure of that; her speech was correct, though formal, and

her manner was quiet and refined. And her eyes—he must make her look at

him again!

“You are going to Bristol?” he said. “To stay there?”

Perhaps he threw too much feeling into his voice. At any rate the tone

of her answer was colder. “Yes,” she said, “I am.”

“I am going as far as Chippenham,” he volunteered.

“Indeed!”

There! He had lost all the ground he had gained. She thought him a

possible libertine, who aimed at putting himself on a footing of

intimacy with her. And that was the last thing—confound it, he meant

that to do her harm was the last thing he had in his mind.

It annoyed him that she should think anything of that kind. And he

cudgelled his brain for a subject at once safe and sympathetic, without

finding one. But either she was not so deeply offended as he fancied,

or she thought him sufficiently punished. For presently she addressed

him; and he saw that she was ever so little embarrassed.

“Would you please to tell me,” she said, in a low voice, “how much I

ought to give the coachman?”

Oh. bless her! She did not think him a horrid libertine. “You?” he said

audaciously. “Why nothing, of course.”

“But—but I thought it was usual?”

“Not on this road,” he answered, lying resolutely. “Gentlemen are

expected to give half a crown, others a shilling. Ladies nothing at

all. Sam,” he continued, rising to giddy heights of invention, “would

give it back to you, if you offered it.”

“Indeed!” He fancied a note of relief in her tone, and judged that

shillings were not very plentiful. Then, “Thank you,” she added. “You

must think me very ignorant. But I have never travelled.”

“You must not say that,” he returned. “Remember the Clapham Stage!”

She laughed at the jest, small as it was; and her laugh gave him the

most delicious feeling—a sort of lightness within, half exhilaration,

half excitement. And of a sudden, emboldened by it, he was grown so

foolhardy that there is no knowing what he would not have said, if the

streets of Reading had not begun to open before them and display a

roadway abnormally thronged.

For Mr. Palmer’s procession, with its carriages, riders, and flags, was

entering ahead of them; and the train of tipsy rabble which accompanied

it blocked King Street, and presently brought the coach to a stand. The

candidate, lifting his cocked hat from time to time, was a hundred

paces before them and barely visible through a forest of flags and

banners. But a troop of mounted gentry in dusty black, and smiling

dames in carriages—who hardly masked the disgust with which they viewed

the forest of grimy hands extended to them to shake—were under the

travellers’ eyes, and showed in the sunlight both tawdry and false. Our

party, however, were not long at ease to enjoy the spectacle. The crowd

surrounded the coach, leapt on the steps, and hung on to the boot. And

presently the noise scared the horses, which at the entrance to the

marketplace began to plunge.

“The Bill! The Bill!” cried the rabble. And with truculence called on

the passengers to assent. “You lubbers,” they bawled, “shout for the

Bill! Or we’ll have you over!”

“All right! All right!” replied Sammy, controlling his horses as well

as he could. “We’re all for the Bill here! Hurrah!”

“Hurrah! Palmer for ever, Tories in the river!” cried the mob.

“Hurrah!”

“Hurrah!” echoed the guard, willing to echo anything. “The Bill for

ever! But let us pass, lads! Let us pass! We’re for the Bear, and we’ve

no votes.”

“Britons never will be slaves!” shrieked a drunken butcher as the

marketplace opened before them. The space was alive with flags and gay

with cockades, and thronged by a multitude, through which the

candidate’s procession clove its way slowly. “We’ll have votes now!

Three cheers for Lord John!”

“Hurrah! Hurrah!”

“And down with Orange Peel!” squeaked a small tailor in a high

falsetto.

The roar of laughter which greeted the sally startled the horses

afresh. But the guard had dropped down by this time and fought his way

to the head of one of the leaders; and two or three good-humoured

fellows seconded his efforts. Between them the coach was piloted slowly

but safely through the press; which, to do it justice, meant only to

exercise the privileges which the Election season brought with it.

V

ROSY-FINGERED DAWN

“_Beaucoup de bruit, pas de mal!_” Vaughan muttered in his neighbour’s

ear; and saw with as much surprise as pleasure that she understood.

And all would have gone well but for the imprudence of the inside

passenger who had distinguished himself by his protest against the

placard. The coach was within a dozen paces of the Bear, the crowd was

falling back from it, the peril, if it had been real, seemed past, the

most timid was breathing again, when he thrust out his foolish head,

and flung a taunt—which those on the roof could not hear—at the rabble.

Whatever the words, their effect was disastrous. A bystander caught

them up and repeated them, and in a trice half-a-dozen louts flung

themselves on the door and strove to drag it open, and get at the man;

while others, leaning over their shoulders, aimed missiles at the

inside passengers.

The guard saw that more than the glass of his windows was at stake; but

he could do nothing. He was at the leaders’ heads. And the passengers

on the roof, who had risen to their feet to see the fray, were as

helpless. Luckily the coachman kept his head and his reins. “Turn ’em

into the yard!” he yelled. “Turn ’em in!”

The guard did so, almost too quickly. The frightened horses wheeled

round, and, faster than was prudent, dashed under the low arch,

dragging the swaying coach after them.

There was a cry of “Heads! Heads!” and then, more imperatively, “Heads!

Stoop! Stoop!”

The warning was needed. The outsides were on their feet engrossed in

the struggle at the coach door. And so quickly did the coach turn

that—though a score of spectators in the street and on the balcony of

the inn saw the peril—it was only at the last moment that Vaughan and

the two passengers at the back, men well used to the road, caught the

warning, and dropped down. And it was only at the very last moment that

Vaughan felt rather than saw that the girl was still standing. He had

just time, by a desperate effort, and amid a cry of horror—for to the

spectators she seemed to be already jammed between the arch and the

seat—to drag her down. Instinctively, as he did so, he shielded her

face with his arm; but the horror was so near that, as they swept under

the low brow, he was not sure that she was safe.

He was as white as she was, when they emerged into the light again. But

he saw that she was safe, though her bonnet was dragged from her head;

and he cried unconsciously, “Thank God! Thank God!” Then, with that

hatred of a scene which is part of the English character, he put her

quickly back into her seat again, and rose to his feet, as if he wished

to separate himself from her.

But a score of eyes had seen the act; and however much he might wish to

spare her feelings, concealment was impossible.

“Christ!” cried the coachman, whose copper cheeks were perceptibly

paler. “If your head’s on your shoulders, Miss, it is to that young

gentleman you owe it. Don’t you ever go to sleep on the roof of a coach

again! Never! Never!”

“Here, get a drop of brandy!” cried the landlady, who, from one of the

doors flanking the archway, had seen all. “Do you stay where you are,

Miss,” she continued, “and I’ll send it up to you.”

Then amid a babel of exclamations and a chorus of blame and praise, the

ladder was brought, and Vaughan made haste to descend. A waiter tripped

out with the brown brandy and water on a tray; and the young lady, who

had not spoken, but had remained, sitting white and still, where

Vaughan had placed her, sipped it obediently. Unfortunately the

landlady’s eyes were sharp; and as Vaughan passed her to go into the

house—for the coach must be driven up the yard and turned before they

could set off again—she let fall a cry.

“Lord, sir!” she said, “your hand is torn dreadful! You’ve grazed every

bit of skin off it!”

He tried to silence her; and failing, hurried into the house. She

fussed after him to attend to him; and Sammy, who was not a man of the

most delicate perceptions, seized the opportunity to drive home his

former lesson. “There, Miss,” he said solemnly, “I hope that’ll teach

you to look out another time! But better his hand than your head. You’d

ha’ been surely scalped!”

The girl, a shade whiter than before, did not answer. And he thought

her, for so pretty a wench, “a right unfeelin’ un!”

Not so the Frenchman. “I count him a very locky man!” he said

obscurely. “A very locky man.”

“Well,” the coachman answered with a grunt, “if you call that lucky——”

“_Vraiment! Vraiment!_ But I—alas!” the Frenchman answered with an

eloquent gesture, “I have lost my all, and the good fortunes are no

longer for me!”

“Fortunes!” the coachman muttered, looking askance at him. “A fine

fortune, to have your hand flayed! But where’s”—recollecting

himself—“where’s that there fool that caused the trouble! D—n me, if he

shall go any further on my coach. I’d like to double-thong him, and

it’d serve him right!”

So when the ex-M.P. presently appeared, Sammy let go his tongue to such

purpose that the political gentleman; finding himself in a minority of

one, retired into the house and, with many threats of what he would do

when he saw the management, declined to go on.

“And a good riddance of a d—d Tory!” the coachman muttered. “Think all

the world’s made for them! Fifteen minutes he’s cost us already! Take

your seats, gents, take your seats! I’m off!”

Vaughan, with his hand hastily bandaged, was the last to come out. He

climbed as quickly as he could to his place, and, without looking at

his neighbour, he said some common-place word. She did not reply, and

they swept under the arch. For a moment the sight of the thronged

marketplace diverted him. Then he looked at her, and he saw that she

was trembling.

If he was not quite so wise as the Frenchman, having had no _bonnes

fortunes_ to speak of, he had, nevertheless, keen perceptions. And he

guessed that the girl, between her maiden shyness and her womanly

gratitude, was painfully placed. It could not be otherwise. A girl who

had spent her years, since childhood, within the walls of a school at

Clapham, first as genteel apprentice, and then as assistant; who had

been taught to consider young men as roaring lions with whom her own

life could have nothing in common, and from whom it was her duty to

guard the more giddy of her flock; who had to struggle at once with the

shyness of youth, the modesty of her sex, and her inexperience—above

all, perhaps with that dread of insult which becomes the instinct of

lowly beauty—how was she to carry herself in circumstances so different

from any which she had ever imagined? How was she to express a tithe of

the feelings with which her heart was bursting, and which overwhelmed

her as often as she thought of the hideous death from which he had

snatched her?

She could not; and with inborn good taste she refrained from the

commonplace word, the bald acknowledgment, in which a shallow nature

might have taken refuge. On his side, he guessed some part of this, and

discerned that if he would relieve her he must himself speak.

Accordingly, when they had left the streets behind them and were

swinging merrily along the Newbury Road, he leant towards her.

“May I beg,” he said in a low voice, “that you won’t think of what has

happened? The coachman would have done as much, and scolded you! I

happened to be next you. That was all.”

In a strangled voice, “But your hand,” she faltered. “I fear—I——” She

shuddered, unable to go on.

“It is nothing!” he protested. “Nothing! In three days it will be

well!”

She turned her eves on him, eyes which possessed an eloquence of which

their owner was unconscious. “I will pray for you,” she murmured. “I

can do no more.”

The pathos of her simple gratitude was such that Vaughan could not

laugh it off. “Thank you,” he said quietly. “We shall then be more than

quits.” And having given her a few moments in which to recover herself,

“We are nearly at Speenhamland,” he resumed cheerfully. “There is the

George and Pelican! It’s a great baiting-house for coaches. I am afraid

to say how much corn and hay they give out in a day. They have a man

who does nothing else but weigh it out.” And so he chattered on, doing

his utmost to talk of indifferent matters in an indifferent tone.

She could not repulse him after what had passed. And now and then, by a

timid word, she gave him leave to talk. Presently he began to speak of

things other than those under their eyes, and when he thought that he

had put her at her ease, “You understand French?” he said looking at

her suddenly.

“I spoke it as a child,” she answered. “I was born abroad. I did not

come to England until I was nine.”

“To Clapham?”

“Yes. I have been employed in a school there.”

Prudently he hastened to bring the talk back to the road again. And she

took courage to steal a look at him when his eyes were elsewhere. He

seemed so strong and gentle and courteous; this unknown creature which

she had been taught to fear. And he was so thoughtful of her! He could

throw so tender a note into his voice. Beside d’Orsay or Alvanley—but

she had never heard of them—he might have passed muster but tolerably;

but to her he seemed a very fine gentleman. She had a woman’s eye for

the fineness of his linen, and the smartness of his waistcoat—had not

Sir James Graham, with his chest of Palermo stuffs, set the seal of

Cabinet approval on fancy waistcoats? Nor was she blind to the easy

carriage of his head, and his air of command.

And there she caught herself up: reflecting with a blush that it was by

the easy path of thoughts such as these that the precipice was

approached; that so it was the poor and pretty let themselves be led

from the right road. Whither was she travelling? In what was this to

end? She trembled. And if they had not at that moment swung out of

Savernake Forest and sighted the red roofs of Marlborough, lying warm

and sung at the foot of the steep London Hill, she did not know what

she should have done, since she could not repulse him.

They rattled in merry style through the town, the leaders cantering,

the bars swinging, the guard tootling, the sun shining; past a score of

inn signs before which the heavy stages were baiting; past the two

churches, while all the brisk pleasantness of this new, this living

world, appealed to her to go its way. Ta-ra-ra! Ta-ra-ra! Swerving to

the right they pulled up bravely, with steaming horses, before the door

of the far-famed Castle Inn. Ta-ra-ra! Ta-ra-ra! “Half an hour for

dinner, gentlemen!”

“Now,” said Vaughan, thinking that all was well, or rather declining to

think of anything but her shy glances and the delightful present. “You

must cut my meat for me!”

She did not reply, and he saw that her eyes went to the basket at her

feet. He guessed that she wished to avoid the expense of dining. “Or,

perhaps, you are not coming in?” he said.

“I did not intend to do so,” she replied. “I suppose,” she continued

timidly, “that I may stay here?”

“Certainly. You have something with you?”

“Yes.”

He nodded pleasantly and left her; and she remained in her seat. As she

ate, the target for many a sly glance of admiration, she was divided

between gratitude and self-reproach; now thinking of him with a

quickened heart, now taking herself to task for her weakness. The

result was that when he strode out, confident and at ease, and looked

up at her with laughing eyes, she blushed furiously—to her own

unspeakable mortification.

Vaughan was no Lothario, and for a moment the telltale colour took him

aback. Then he told himself that at Chippenham, less than twenty miles

down the road, he was leaving her. It was absurd to suppose that, in

the short space which remained, either could be harmed. And he mounted

gaily, and masking his knowledge of her emotion with a skill which

surprised himself, he chatted pleasantly, unaware that with every word

he was stamping the impression of her face, her long eyelashes, her

graceful head, her trick of this and that, more deeply upon his memory.

While she, reassured by the same thought that they would part in an

hour—and in an hour what harm could happen?—closed her eyes and drank

the sweet draught—the sweeter for its novelty, and for the bitter which

lurked at the bottom of the cup. Meantime Sammy winked sagely at his

horses, and the Frenchman cast envious glances over his shoulders, and

Silbury Hill, Fyfield, and the soft folds of the downs swept by, and on

warm commons and southern slopes the early bees hummed above the gorse.

Here was Chippenham at last; and the end was come. He must descend. A

hasty touch, a murmured word, a pang half-felt; she veiled her eyes. If

her colour fluttered and she trembled, why not? She had cause to be

grateful to him. And if he felt as his foot touched the ground that the

world was cold, and the prospect cheerless, why not, when he had to

face Sir Robert, and when his political embarrassments, forgotten for a

time, rose nearer and larger?

It had often fallen to him to alight before the Angel at Chippenhan.

From boyhood he had known the wide street, in which the fairs were

held, the red Georgian houses, and the stone bridge of many arches over

the Avon. But he had never seen these things, he had never alighted

there, with less satisfaction than on this day.

Still this was the end. He raised his hat, saluted silently, and turned

to speak to the guard. In the act he jostled a person who was

approaching to accost him. Vaughan stared. “Hallo, White!” he said. “I

was coming to see you.”

White’s hat was in his hand. “Your servant, sir,” he said. “Your

servant, sir. I am glad to be here to meet you, Mr. Vaughan.”

“But you didn’t expect me?”

“No, sir, no; I came to meet Mr. Cooke, who was to arrive by this

coach. But I do not see him.”

A light broke in upon Vaughan. “Gad! he must be the man we left behind

at Reading,” he said. “Is he a peppery chap?”

“He might be so called, sir,” the agent answered with a smile. “I

fancied that you knew him.”

“No. Sergeant Wathen I know; not Mr. Cooke. Any way, he’s not come,

White.”

“All the better, sir, if I can get a message to him by the up-coach.

For he’s not needed. I am glad to say that the trouble is at an end. My

Lord Lansdowne has given up the idea of contesting the borough, and I

came over to tell Mr. Cooke, thinking that he might prefer to go on to

Bristol. He has a house at Bristol.”

“Do you mean,” Vaughan said, “that there will be no contest?”

“No, sir, no. Not now. And a good thing, too. Upset the town for

nothing! My lord has no chance, and Pybus, who is his lordship’s man

here, he told me himself——”

He paused with his mouth open, and his eyes on a tall lady wearing a

veil, who, after standing a couple of minutes on the further side of

the street, was approaching the coach. To enter it she had to pass by

him, and he stared, as if he saw a ghost. “By Gosh!” he muttered under

his breath. And when, with the aid of the guard, she had taken her seat

inside, “By Gosh!” he muttered again, “if that’s not my lady—though

I’ve not seen her for ten years—I’ve the horrors!”

He turned to Vaughan to see if he had noticed anything. But Vaughan,

without waiting for the end of his sentence, had stepped aside to tell

a helper to replace his valise on the coach. In the bustle he had noted

neither White’s emotion nor the lady.

At this moment he returned. “I shall go on to Bristol for the night,

White,” he said. “Sir Robert is quite well?”

“Quite well, sir, and I shall be happy to tell him of your promptness

in coming.”

“Don’t tell him anything,” the young man said, with a flash of

peremptoriness. “I don’t want to be kept here. Do you understand,

White? I shall probably return to town to-morrow. Anyway, say nothing.”

“Very good, sir,” White answered. “But I am sure Sir Robert would be

pleased to know that you had come down so promptly.”

“Ah, well, you can let him know later. Good-bye, White.”

The agent, with one eye on the young squire and one on the lady, whose

figure was visible through the small coach-window, seemed to be about

to refer to her. But he checked himself. “Good-bye, sir,” he said. “And

a pleasant journey! I’m glad to have been of service, Mr. Vaughan.”

“Thank you, White, thank you,” the young man answered. And he swung

himself up, as the coach moved. A good-natured nod, and—Tantivy!

Tantivy! Tantivy! The helpers sprang aside, and away they went down the

hill, and over the long stone bridge, and so along the Bristol road;

but now with the shades of evening beginning to spread on the pastures

about them, and the cawing rooks, that had been abroad all day on the

uplands, streaming across the pale sky to the elms beside the river.

But _varium et mutabile femina_. When he turned, eager to take up the

fallen thread, Clotho could not have been more cold than his neighbour,

nor Atropos with her shears more decisive. “I’ve had good news,” he

said, as he settled his coat about him. “I came down with a very

unpleasant task before me. And it is lifted from me.”

“Indeed!”

“So I am going on to Bristol instead of staying at Chippenham.”

No answer.

“It is a great relief to me,” he continued cheerfully.

“Indeed!” She spoke in the most distant of voices.

He raised his brows in perplexity. What had happened to her? She had

been so grateful, so much moved, a few minutes before. The colour had

fluttered in her cheek, the tear had been visible in her eye, she had

left her hand the fifth of a second in his. And now!

Now she was determined that she would blush and smile and be kind no

more. She was grateful—God knew she was grateful, let him think what he

would. But there were limits. Her weakness, as long as she believed

that Chippenham must part them, had been pardonable. But if he had it

in his mind to attend her to Bristol, to follow her or haunt her—as she

had known foolish young cits at Clapham to haunt the more giddy of her

flock—then her mistake was clear; and his conduct, now merely

suspicious, would appear in its black reality. She hoped that he was

innocent. She hoped that his change of plan at Chippenham had been no

subterfuge; that he was not a roaring lion. But appearances were

deceitful and her own course was plain.

It was the plainer, as she had not been blind to the respect with which

all at the Angel had greeted her companion; even White, a man of

substance, with a gold chain and seals hanging from his fob, had stood

bareheaded while he talked to him. It was plain that he was a fine

gentleman; one of those whom young persons in her rank of life must

shun.

So he drew scarcely five words out of her in as many miles. At last,

thrice rebuffed, “I am afraid you are tired,” he said. Was it for this

that he had chosen to go on to Bristol?

“Yes,” she answered. “I am rather tired. If you please I would prefer

not to talk.”

He was a little huffed then, and let her be; nor did he guess, though

he was full of conjectures about her, how she hated her seeming

ingratitude. But there was nought else for it; better seem thankless

now than be worse hereafter. For she was growing frightened. She was

beginning to have more than an inkling of the road by which young

things were led to be foolish. Her ear retained the sound of his voice

though he was silent. The fashion in which he had stooped to her—though

he was looking another way now—clung to her memory. His laugh, though

he was grave now, rang for her, full of glee and good-fellowship. She

could have burst into tears.

They stayed at Marshfield to take on the last team. And she tried to

divert her mind by watching a woman in a veil who walked up and down

beside the coach, and seemed to return her curiosity. But she tried to

little purpose, for she felt strained and weary, and more than ever

inclined to cry. Doubtless the peril through which she had passed had

shaken her.

So that she was thankful when, after descending perilous Tog Hill, they

saw from Kingswood heights the lights of Bristol shining through the

dusk; and she knew that she was at her journey’s end. To arrive in a

strange place on the edge of night is trying to anyone. But to alight

friendless and alone, amid the bustle of a city, and to know that new

relations must be created and a new life built up—this may well raise

in the most humble and contented bosom a feeling of loneliness and

depression. And doubtless that was why Mary Smith, after evading

Vaughan with a success beyond her hopes, felt as she followed her

modest trunk through the streets that—but she bent her head to hide the

unaccustomed tears.

VI

THE PATRON OF CHIPPINGE

Much about the time that the “Spectator” was painting in Sir Roger the

most lovable picture of an old English squire which our gallery

contains, Cornelius Vermuyden, of a younger branch of the Vermuydens

who drained the fens, was making a fortune in the Jamaica trade. Having

made it in a dark office at Bristol, and being, like all Dutchmen, of a

sedentary turn, he proceeded to found a family, purchase a borough,

and, by steady support of Whig principles and the Protestant

succession, to earn a baronetcy in the neighbouring county of Wilts.

Doubtless the first Vermuyden had things to contend with, and at assize

ball and sessions got but two fingers from the De Coverleys and their

long-descended dames. But he went his way stolidly, married his son

into a family of like origin—the Beckfords—and, having seen little

George II. firmly on the throne, made way for his son.

This second Sir Cornelius rebuilt Stapylton, the house which his father

had bought from the decayed family of that name, and after living for

some ten years into the reign of Farmer George, vanished in his turn,

leaving Cornelius Robert to succeed him, Cornelius George, the elder

son, having died in his father’s lifetime.

Sir Cornelius Robert was something after the pattern of the famous Mr.

Onslow—

_What can Tommy Onslow do?

He can drive a chaise and two.

What can Tommy Onslow more?

He can drive a chaise and four._

Yet he fitted the time, and, improving his father’s pack of

trencher-fed hounds by a strain of Mr. Warde’s blood, he hunted the

country so conscientiously that at his death a Dutch bottle might have

been set upon his table without giving rise to the slightest

reflection. He came to an end, much lamented, with the century, and Sir

Robert, fourth and present baronet, took over the estates.

By that time, rid of the foreign prenomen, well allied by three good

marriages, and since the American war of true blue Tory leanings, and

thorough Church and King principles, the family was able to hold up its

head among the best in the south of England. There might be some who

still remembered that—

_Saltash was a borough town

When Plymouth was a breezy down_.

But the property was good, the borough safe, and any time these twenty

years their owner might have franked his letters “Chippinge” had he

willed it. As it was, he passed, almost as much as Mr. Western in the

east or Sir Thomas Acland in the west, for the type of a country

gentleman. The most powerful Minister gave him his whole hand; and at

county meetings, at Salisbury or Devizes, no voice was held more

powerful, nor any man’s hint more quickly taken than Sir Robert

Vermuyden’s.

He was a tall and very thin man, of almost noble aspect, with a nose

after the fashion of the Duke’s, and a slight stoop. In early days he

had been something of a beau, though never of the Prince’s following,

and he still dressed finely and with taste. With a smaller sense of

personal dignity, or with wider sympathies, he might have been a

happier man. But he had married too late—at forty-five; and the four

years which followed, and their sequel, had darkened the rest of his

life, drawn crow’s-feet about his eyes and peevish lines about his

mouth. Henceforth he had lived alone, nursing his pride; and the

solitude of this life—which was not without its dignity, since no word

of scandal touched it—had left him narrow and vindictive, a man just

but not over-generous, and pompous without complacency.