LADY MASON AND HER SON.
I trust that it is already perceived by all persistent novel readers
that very much of the interest of this tale will be centred in the
person of Lady Mason. Such educated persons, however, will probably
be aware that she is not intended to be the heroine. The heroine, so
called, must by a certain fixed law be young and marriageable. Some
such heroine in some future number shall be forthcoming, with as
much of the heroic about her as may be found convenient; but for the
present let it be understood that the person and character of Lady
Mason is as important to us as can be those of any young lady, let
her be ever so gracious or ever so beautiful.
In giving the details of her history, I do not know that I need go
back beyond her grandfather and grandmother, who were thoroughly
respectable people in the hardware line; I speak of those relatives
by the father's side. Her own parents had risen in the world,--had
risen from retail to wholesale, and considered themselves for a
long period of years to be good representatives of the commercial
energy and prosperity of Great Britain. But a fall had come upon
them,--as a fall does come very often to our excellent commercial
representatives--and Mr. Johnson was in the "Gazette." It would be
long to tell how old Sir Joseph Mason was concerned in these affairs,
how he acted as the principal assignee, and how ultimately he took
to his bosom as his portion of the assets of the estate, young Mary
Johnson, and made her his wife and mistress of Orley Farm. Of the
family of the Johnsons there were but three others, the father, the
mother, and a brother. The father did not survive the disgrace of his
bankruptcy, and the mother in process of time settled herself with
her son in one of the Lancashire manufacturing towns, where John
Johnson raised his head in business to some moderate altitude, Sir
Joseph having afforded much valuable assistance. There for the
present we will leave them.
I do not think that Sir Joseph ever repented of the perilous deed he
did in marrying that young wife. His home for many years had been
desolate and solitary; his children had gone from him, and did not
come to visit him very frequently in his poor home at the farm. They
had become grander people than him, had been gifted with aspiring
minds, and in every turn and twist which they took, looked to do
something towards washing themselves clean from the dirt of the
counting-house. This was specially the case with Sir Joseph's son, to
whom the father had made over lands and money sufficient to enable
him to come before the world as a country gentleman with a coat of
arms on his coach-panel. It would be inconvenient for us to run off
to Groby Park at the present moment, and I will therefore say no more
just now as to Joseph junior, but will explain that Joseph senior was
not made angry by this neglect. He was a grave, quiet, rational man,
not however devoid of some folly; as indeed what rational man is so
devoid? He was burdened with an ambition to establish a family as the
result of his success in life; and having put forth his son into the
world with these views, was content that that son should act upon
them persistently. Joseph Mason, Esq., of Groby Park, in Yorkshire,
was now a county magistrate, and had made some way towards a footing
in the county society around him. With these hopes, and ambition such
as this, it was probably not expedient that he should spend much of
his time at Orley Farm. The three daughters were circumstanced much
in the same way: they had all married gentlemen, and were bent on
rising in the world; moreover, the steadfast resolution of purpose
which characterised their father was known by them all,--and by
their husbands: they had received their fortunes, with some settled
contingencies to be forthcoming on their father's demise; why, then,
trouble the old gentleman at Orley Farm?
Under such circumstances the old gentleman married his young
wife,--to the great disgust of his four children. They of course
declared to each other, corresponding among themselves by letter,
that the old gentleman had positively disgraced himself. It was
impossible that they should make any visits whatever to Orley Farm
while such a mistress of the house was there;--and the daughters did
make no such visits. Joseph, the son, whose monetary connection with
his father was as yet by no means fixed and settled in its nature,
did make one such visit, and then received his father's assurance--so
at least he afterwards said and swore--that this marriage should by
no means interfere with the expected inheritance of the Orley Farm
acres. But at that time no young son had been born,--nor, probably,
was any such young son expected.
The farm-house became a much brighter abode for the old man, for the
few years which were left to him, after he had brought his young
wife home. She was quiet, sensible, clever, and unremitting in her
attention. She burthened him with no requests for gay society, and
took his home as she found it, making the best of it for herself, and
making it for him much better than he had ever hitherto known it. His
own children had always looked down upon him, regarding him merely
as a coffer from whence money might be had; and he, though he had
never resented this contempt, had in a certain measure been aware of
it. But there was no such feeling shown by his wife. She took the
benefits which he gave her graciously and thankfully, and gave back
to him in return, certainly her care and time, and apparently her
love. For herself, in the way of wealth and money, she never asked
for anything.
And then the baby had come, young Lucius Mason, and there was of
course great joy at Orley Farm. The old father felt that the world
had begun again for him, very delightfully, and was more than ever
satisfied with his wisdom in regard to that marriage. But the very
genteel progeny of his early youth were more than ever dissatisfied,
and in their letters among themselves dealt forth harder and still
harder words upon poor Sir Joseph. What terrible things might he not
be expected to do now that his dotage was coming on? Those three
married ladies had no selfish fears--so at least they declared, but
they united in imploring their brother to look after his interests at
Orley Farm. How dreadfully would the young heir of Groby be curtailed
in his dignities and seignories if it should be found at the last day
that Orley Farm was not to be written in his rent-roll!
And then, while they were yet bethinking themselves how they might
best bestir themselves, news arrived that Sir Joseph had suddenly
died. Sir Joseph was dead, and the will when read contained a codicil
by which that young brat was made the heir to the Orley Farm estate.
I have said that Lady Mason during her married life had never asked
of her husband anything for herself; but in the law proceedings which
were consequent upon Sir Joseph's death, it became abundantly evident
that she had asked him for much for her son,--and that she had been
specific in her requests, urging him to make a second heir, and to
settle Orley Farm upon her own boy, Lucius. She herself stated that
she had never done this except in the presence of a third person. She
had often done so in the presence of Mr. Usbech the attorney,--as to
which Mr. Usbech was not alive to testify; and she had also done so
more than once in the presence of Mr. Furnival, a barrister,--as to
which Mr. Furnival, being alive, did testify--very strongly.
As to that contest nothing further need now be said. It resulted in
the favour of young Lucius Mason, and therefore, also, in the favour
of the widow;--in the favour moreover of Miriam Usbech, and thus
ultimately in the favour of Mr. Samuel Dockwrath, who is now showing
himself to be so signally ungrateful. Joseph Mason, however, retired
from the battle nothing convinced. His father, he said, had been
an old fool, an ass, an idiot, a vulgar, ignorant fool; but he was
not a man to break his word. That signature to the codicil might be
his or might not. If his, it had been obtained by fraud. What could
be easier than to cheat an old doting fool? Many men agreed with
Joseph Mason, thinking that Usbech the attorney had perpetrated this
villainy on behalf of his daughter; but Joseph Mason would believe,
or say that he believed--a belief in which none but his sisters
joined him,--that Lady Mason herself had been the villain. He was
minded to press the case on to a Court of Appeal, up even to the
House of Lords; but he was advised that in doing so he would spend
more money than Orley Farm was worth, and that he would, almost to a
certainty, spend it in vain. Under this advice he cursed the laws of
his country, and withdrew to Groby Park.
Lady Mason had earned the respect of all those around her by the way
in which she bore herself in the painful days of the trial, and also
in those of her success,--especially also by the manner in which she
gave her evidence. And thus, though she had not been much noticed
by her neighbours during the short period of her married life, she
was visited as a widow by many of the more respectable people round
Hamworth. In all this she showed no feeling of triumph; she never
abused her husband's relatives, or spoke much of the harsh manner
in which she had been used. Indeed, she was not given to talk about
her own personal affairs; and although, as I have said, many of her
neighbours visited her, she did not lay herself out for society. She
accepted and returned their attention, but for the most part seemed
to be willing that the matter should so rest. The people around by
degrees came to know her ways, they spoke to her when they met her,
and occasionally went through the ceremony of a morning call; but did
not ask her to their tea-parties, and did not expect to see her at
picnic and archery meetings.
Among those who took her by the hand in the time of her great trouble
was Sir Peregrine Orme of The Cleeve,--for such was the name which
had belonged time out of mind to his old mansion and park. Sir
Peregrine was a gentleman now over seventy years of age, whose family
consisted of the widow of his only son, and the only son of that
widow, who was of course the heir to his estate and title. Sir
Peregrine was an excellent old man, as I trust may hereafter be
acknowledged; but his regard for Lady Mason was perhaps in the first
instance fostered by his extreme dislike to her stepson, Joseph Mason
of Groby. Mr. Joseph Mason of Groby was quite as rich a man as Sir
Peregrine, and owned an estate which was nearly as large as The
Cleeve property; but Sir Peregrine would not allow that he was a
gentleman, or that he could by any possible transformation become
one. He had not probably ever said so in direct words to any of the
Mason family, but his opinion on the matter had in some way worked
its way down to Yorkshire, and therefore there was no love to spare
between these two county magistrates. There had been a slight
acquaintance between Sir Peregrine and Sir Joseph; but the ladies of
the two families had never met till after the death of the latter.
Then, while that trial was still pending, Mrs. Orme had come forward
at the instigation of her father-in-law, and by degrees there had
grown up an intimacy between the two widows. When the first offers
of assistance were made and accepted, Sir Peregrine no doubt did
not at all dream of any such result as this. His family pride, and
especially the pride which he took in his widowed daughter-in-law,
would probably have been shocked by such a surmise; but,
nevertheless, he had seen the friendship grow and increase without
alarm. He himself had become attached to Lady Mason, and had
gradually learned to excuse in her that want of gentle blood and
early breeding which as a rule he regarded as necessary to a
gentleman, and from which alone, as he thought, could spring many of
those excellences which go to form the character of a lady.
It may therefore be asserted that Lady Mason's widowed life was
successful. That it was prudent and well conducted no one could
doubt. Her neighbours of course did say of her that she would not
drink tea with Mrs. Arkwright of Mount Pleasant villa because she was
allowed the privilege of entering Sir Peregrine's drawing-room; but
such little scandal as this was a matter of course. Let one live
according to any possible or impossible rule, yet some offence will
be given in some quarter. Those who knew anything of Lady Mason's
private life were aware that she did not encroach on Sir Peregrine's
hospitality. She was not at The Cleeve as much as circumstances would
have justified, and at one time by no means so much as Mrs. Orme
would have desired.
In person she was tall and comely. When Sir Joseph had brought her
to his house she had been very fair,--tall, slight, fair, and very
quiet,--not possessing that loveliness which is generally most
attractive to men, because the beauty of which she might boast
depended on form rather than on the brightness of her eye, or the
softness of her cheek and lips. Her face too, even at that age,
seldom betrayed emotion, and never showed signs either of anger or of
joy. Her forehead was high, and though somewhat narrow, nevertheless
gave evidence of considerable mental faculties; nor was the evidence
false, for those who came to know Lady Mason well, were always ready
to acknowledge that she was a woman of no ordinary power. Her eyes
were large and well formed, but somewhat cold. Her nose was long and
regular. Her mouth also was very regular, and her teeth perfectly
beautiful; but her lips were straight and thin. It would sometimes
seem that she was all teeth, and yet it is certain that she never
made an effort to show them. The great fault of her face was in
her chin, which was too small and sharp, thus giving on occasions
something of meanness to her countenance. She was now forty-seven
years of age, and had a son who had reached man's estate; and yet
perhaps she had more of woman's beauty at this present time than
when she stood at the altar with Sir Joseph Mason. The quietness and
repose of her manner suited her years and her position; age had given
fulness to her tall form; and the habitual sadness of her countenance
was in fair accordance with her condition and character. And yet
she was not really sad,--at least so said those who knew her. The
melancholy was in her face rather than in her character, which was
full of energy,--if energy may be quiet as well as assured and
constant.
Of course she had been accused a dozen times of matrimonial
prospects. What handsome widow is not so accused? The world of
Hamworth had been very certain at one time that she was intent on
marrying Sir Peregrine Orme. But she had not married, and I think I
may say on her behalf that she had never thought of marrying. Indeed,
one cannot see how such a woman could make any effort in that line.
It was impossible to conceive that a lady so staid in her manner
should be guilty of flirting; nor was there any man within ten miles
of Hamworth who would have dared to make the attempt. Women for the
most part are prone to love-making--as nature has intended that they
should be; but there are women from whom all such follies seem to be
as distant as skittles and beer are distant from the dignity of the
Lord Chancellor. Such a woman was Lady Mason.
At this time--the time which is about to exist for us as the period
at which our narrative will begin--Lucius Mason was over twenty-two
years old, and was living at the farm. He had spent the last three or
four years of his life in Germany, where his mother had visited him
every year, and had now come home intending to be the master of his
own destiny. His mother's care for him during his boyhood, and up to
the time at which he became of age, had been almost elaborate in its
thoughtfulness. She had consulted Sir Peregrine as to his school, and
Sir Peregrine, looking to the fact of the lad's own property, and
also to the fact, known by him, of Lady Mason's means for such a
purpose, had recommended Harrow. But the mother had hesitated, had
gently discussed the matter, and had at last persuaded the baronet
that such a step would be injudicious. The boy was sent to a private
school of a high character, and Sir Peregrine was sure that he had
been so sent at his own advice. "Looking at the peculiar position of
his mother," said Sir Peregrine to his young daughter-in-law, "at her
very peculiar position, and that of his relatives, I think it will be
better that he should not appear to assume anything early in life;
nothing can be better conducted than Mr. Crabfield's establishment,
and after much consideration I have had no hesitation in recommending
her to send her son to him." And thus Lucius Mason had been sent to
Mr. Crabfield, but I do not think that the idea originated with Sir
Peregrine.
"And perhaps it will be as well," added the baronet, "that he and
Perry should not be together at school, though I have no objection to
their meeting in the holidays. Mr. Crabfield's vacations are always
timed to suit the Harrow holidays." The Perry here mentioned was the
grandson of Sir Peregrine--the young Peregrine who in coming days was
to be the future lord of The Cleeve. When Lucius Mason was modestly
sent to Mr. Crabfield's establishment at Great Marlow, young
Peregrine Orme, with his prouder hopes, commenced his career at the
public school.
Mr. Crabfield did his duty by Lucius Mason, and sent him home at
seventeen a handsome, well-mannered lad, tall and comely to the
eye, with soft brown whiskers sprouting on his cheek, well grounded
in Greek, Latin, and Euclid, grounded also in French and Italian,
and possessing many more acquirements than he would have learned
at Harrow. But added to these, or rather consequent on them, was
a conceit which public-school education would not have created.
When their mothers compared them in the holidays, not openly with
outspoken words, but silently in their hearts, Lucius Mason was found
by each to be the superior both in manners and knowledge; but each
acknowledged also that there was more of ingenuous boyhood about
Peregrine Orme.
Peregrine Orme was a year the younger, and therefore his comparative
deficiencies were not the cause of any intense sorrow at The Cleeve;
but his grandfather would probably have been better satisfied--and
perhaps also so would his mother--had he been less addicted to the
catching of rats, and better inclined towards Miss Edgeworth's novels
and Shakespeare's plays, which were earnestly recommended to him by
the lady and the gentleman. But boys generally are fond of rats, and
very frequently are not fond of reading; and therefore, all this
having been duly considered, there was not much deep sorrow in those
days at The Cleeve as to the boyhood of the heir.
But there was great pride at Orley Farm, although that pride was
shown openly to no one. Lady Mason in her visits at The Cleeve said
but little as to her son's present excellences. As to his future
career in life she did say much both to Sir Peregrine and to Mrs.
Orme, asking the council of the one and expressing her fears to the
other; and then, Sir Peregrine having given his consent, she sent the
lad to Germany.
He was allowed to come of age without any special signs of manhood,
or aught of the glory of property; although, in his case, that coming
of age did put him into absolute possession of his inheritance. On
that day, had he been so minded, he could have turned his mother out
of the farm-house, and taken exclusive possession of the estate; but
he did in fact remain in Germany for a year beyond this period, and
returned to Orley Farm only in time to be present at the celebration
of the twenty-first birthday of his friend Peregrine Orme. This
ceremony, as may be surmised, was by no means slurred over without
due rejoicing. The heir at the time was at Christchurch; but at such
a period a slight interruption to his studies was not to be lamented.
There had been Sir Peregrine Ormes in those parts ever since the days
of James I; and indeed in days long antecedent to those there had
been knights bearing that name, some of whom had been honourably
beheaded for treason, others imprisoned for heresy; and one made
away with on account of a supposed royal amour,--to the great
glorification of all his descendants. Looking to the antecedents of
the family, it was only proper that the coming of age of the heir
should be duly celebrated; but Lucius Mason had had no antecedents;
no great-great-grandfather of his had knelt at the feet of an
improper princess; and therefore Lady Mason, though she had been at
The Cleeve, had not mentioned the fact that on that very day her son
had become a man. But when Peregrine Orme became a man--though still
in his manhood too much devoted to rats--she gloried greatly in her
quiet way, and whispered a hope into the baronet's ear that the young
heir would not imitate the ambition of his ancestor. "No, by Jove! it
would not do now at all," said Sir Peregrine, by no means displeased
at the allusion.
And then that question as to the future life of Lucius Mason became
one of great importance, and it was necessary to consult, not only
Sir Peregrine Orme, but the young man himself. His mother had
suggested to him first the law: the great Mr. Furnival, formerly of
the home circuit, but now practising only in London, was her very
special friend, and would give her and her son all possible aid in
this direction. And what living man could give better aid than the
great Mr. Furnival? But Lucius Mason would have none of the law. This
resolve he pronounced very clearly while yet in Germany, whither his
mother visited him, bearing with her a long letter written by the
great Mr. Furnival himself. But nevertheless young Mason would have
none of the law. "I have an idea," he said, "that lawyers are all
liars." Whereupon his mother rebuked him for his conceited ignorance
and want of charity; but she did not gain her point.
She had, however, another string to her bow. As he objected to be a
lawyer, he might become a civil engineer. Circumstances had made Sir
Peregrine Orme very intimate with the great Mr. Brown. Indeed, Mr.
Brown was under great obligations to Sir Peregrine, and Sir Peregrine
had promised to use his influence. But Lucius Mason said that civil
engineers were only tradesmen of an upper class, tradesmen with
intellects; and he, he said, wished to use his intellect, but he did
not choose to be a tradesman. His mother rebuked him again, as well
he deserved that she should,--and then asked him of what profession
he himself had thought. "Philology," said he; "or as a profession,
perhaps literature. I shall devote myself to philology and the races
of man. Nothing considerable has been done with them as a combined
pursuit." And with these views he returned home--while Peregrine Orme
at Oxford was still addicted to the hunting of rats.
But with philology and the races of man he consented to combine the
pursuit of agriculture. When his mother found that he wished to take
up his abode in his own house, she by no means opposed him, and
suggested that, as such was his intention, he himself should farm his
own land. He was very ready to do this, and had she not represented
that such a step was in every way impolitic, he would willingly have
requested Mr. Greenwood of the Old Farm to look elsewhere, and have
spread himself and his energies over the whole domain. As it was he
contented himself with desiring that Mr. Dockwrath would vacate his
small holding, and as he was imperative as to that his mother gave
way without making it the cause of a battle. She would willingly have
left Mr. Dockwrath in possession, and did say a word or two as to the
milk necessary for those sixteen children. But Lucius Mason was ducal
in his ideas, and intimated an opinion that he had a right to do what
he liked with his own. Had not Mr. Dockwrath been told, when the
fields were surrendered to him as a favour, that he would only have
them in possession till the heir should come of age? Mr. Dockwrath
had been so told; but tellings such as these are easily forgotten by
men with sixteen children. And thus Mr. Mason became an agriculturist
with special scientific views as to chemistry, and a philologist
with the object of making that pursuit bear upon his studies with
reference to the races of man. He was convinced that by certain
admixtures of ammonia and earths he could produce cereal results
hitherto unknown to the farming world, and that by tracing out the
roots of words he could trace also the wanderings of man since the
expulsion of Adam from the garden. As to the latter question his
mother was not inclined to contradict him. Seeing that he would sit
at the feet neither of Mr. Furnival nor of Mr. Brown, she had no
objection to the races of man. She could endure to be talked to about
the Oceanic Mongolidae and the Iapetidae of the Indo-Germanic class,
and had perhaps her own ideas that such matters, though somewhat
foggy, were better than rats. But when he came to the other subject,
and informed her that the properly plentiful feeding of the world
was only kept waiting for the chemists, she certainly did have her
fears. Chemical agriculture is expensive; and though the results may
possibly be remunerative, still, while we are thus kept waiting by
the backwardness of the chemists, there must be much risk in making
any serious expenditure with such views.
"Mother," he said, when he had now been at home about three months,
and when the fiat for the expulsion of Samuel Dockwrath had already
gone forth, "I shall go to Liverpool to-morrow."
"To Liverpool, Lucius?"
"Yes. That guano which I got from Walker is adulterated. I have
analyzed it, and find that it does not contain above thirty-two and a
half hundredths of--of that which it ought to hold in a proportion of
seventy-five per cent. of the whole."
"Does it not?"
"No; and it is impossible to obtain results while one is working with
such fictitious materials. Look at that bit of grass at the bottom of
Greenwood's Hill."
"The fifteen-acre field? Why, Lucius, we always had the heaviest
crops of hay in the parish off that meadow."
"That's all very well, mother; but you have never tried,--nobody
about here ever has tried, what the land can really produce. I will
throw that and the three fields beyond it into one; I will get
Greenwood to let me have that bit of the hill-side, giving him
compensation of course--"
"And then Dockwrath would want compensation."
"Dockwrath is an impertinent rascal, and I shall take an opportunity
of telling him so. But as I was saying, I will throw those seventy
acres together, and then I will try what will be the relative effects
of guano and the patent blood, But I must have real guano, and so I
shall go to Liverpool."
"I think I would wait a little, Lucius. It is almost too late for any
change of that kind this year."
"Wait! Yes, and what has come of waiting? We don't wait at all in
doubling our population every thirty-three years; but when we come
to the feeding of them we are always for waiting. It is that waiting
which has reduced the intellectual development of one half of the
human race to its present terribly low state--or rather prevented its
rising in a degree proportionate to the increase of the population.
No more waiting for me, mother, if I can help it."
"But, Lucius, should not such new attempts as that be made by men
with large capital?" said the mother.
"Capital is a bugbear," said the son, speaking on this matter quite
_ex cathedrâ_, as no doubt he was entitled to do by his extensive
reading at a German university--"capital is a bugbear. The capital
that is really wanting is thought, mind, combination, knowledge."
"But, Lucius--"
"Yes, I know what you are going to say, mother. I don't boast that
I possess all these things; but I do say that I will endeavour to
obtain them."
"I have no doubt you will; but should not that come first?"
"That is waiting again. We all know as much as this, that good manure
will give good crops if the sun be allowed full play upon the land,
and nothing but the crop be allowed to grow. That is what I shall
attempt at first, and there can be no great danger in that." And so
he went to Liverpool.
Lady Mason during his absence began to regret that she had not left
him in the undisturbed and inexpensive possession of the Mongolidae
and the Iapetidae. His rent from the estate, including that which she
would have paid him as tenant of the smaller farm, would have enabled
him to live with all comfort; and, if such had been his taste, he
might have become a philosophical student, and lived respectably
without adding anything to his income by the sweat of his brow. But
now the matter was likely to become serious enough. For a gentleman
farmer determined to wait no longer for the chemists, whatever might
be the results, an immediate profitable return per acre could not be
expected as one of them. Any rent from that smaller farm would now
be out of the question, and it would be well if the payments made
so punctually by old Mr. Greenwood were not also swallowed up in
the search after unadulterated guano. Who could tell whether in
the pursuit of science he might not insist on chartering a vessel,
himself, for the Peruvian coast?