AN OVATION.
CLEVE had no dinner; he had supped full of horrors. He got on his coat
and hat, and appeared nowhere that evening, but took an immense walk
instead, in the hope I dare say of tiring out his agony--perhaps simply
because quietude and uninterrupted thought were unendurable.
Next day hope began a little to revive. An inventive mind is
inexhaustible; and are not the resources of delay always considerable?
Who could have been acting upon his uncle's mind in this matter? The
spring of Lord Verney's action was seldom quite within himself. All at
once he recollected that he had come suddenly upon what seemed an
unusually secret conference between his uncle and Mr. Larkin about ten
days since; it was in the library. He was sure the conversation had some
reference to him. His uncle looked both annoyed and embarrassed when he
came into the room; even the practised countenance of Mr. Larkin
betrayed some faint signs of confusion.
Larkin he knew had been down in the neighbourhood of Ware, and probably
in Cardyllian. Had anything reached him about the Malory romance? Mr.
Larkin was a man who would not stick at trifles in hunting up evidence,
and all that concerned _him_ would now interest Mr. Larkin, and Cleve
had too high an opinion of that gentleman's sagacity not to assume that
if he had obtained the clue to his mystery he would make capital of the
secret with Lord Verney. _Viscera magnorum domuum_--nothing like secret
relations--confidences,--and what might not come of this? Of course, the
first result would be a peremptory order on which Lord Verney had spoken
last night. The only safety for the young man, it will be concluded, is
to marry him suitably forthwith.
And--by Jove!--a flash of light! He had it! The whole thing was clear
now. Yes; _he_ was to be married to Caroline Oldys, because Mr. Larkin
was the professional right hand of that family, and so the attorney
would glide ultimately into the absolute command of the House of Verney!
To think of that indescribably vulgar rogue's actually shaping the
fortunes and meting out the tortures of Cleve Verney.
How much of our miseries result from the folly of those who would serve
us! Here was Viscount Verney with, as respected Cleve, the issues of
life very much in his fingers, dropping through sheer imbecility into
the coarse hands of that odious attorney!
Cleve trembled with rage as he thought of the degradation to which that
pompous fool, Lord Verney, was consigning him, yet what was to be done?
Cleve was absolutely at the disposal of the peer, and the peer was
unconsciously placing himself in the hands of Mr. Larkin, to be worked
like a puppet, and spoken for by the Pharisaical attorney.
Cleve's theory hung together plausibly. It would have been gross folly
to betray his jealousy of the attorney, whose opportunities with his
uncle he had no means of limiting or interrupting, and against whom he
had as yet no case.
He was gifted with a pretty talent for dissimulation; Mr. Larkin
congratulated himself in secret upon Cleve's growing esteem and
confidence. The young gentleman's manner was gracious and even friendly
to a degree that was quite marked, and the unconscious attorney would
have been startled had he learned on a sudden how much he hated him.
Ware--that great house which all across the estuary in which its
princely front was reflected, made quite a feature in the landscape
sketched by so many tourists, from the pier on the shingle of Cardyllian
on bright summer days, was about to be re-habilitated, and very splendid
doings were to follow.
In the mean time, before the architects and contractors, the plumbers,
and painters, and carpenters, and carvers, and gilders had taken
possession, and before those wonderful artists in stucco who were to
encrust and overspread the ceilings with noble designs, rich and
graceful and light, of fruit and flowers and cupids, and from memory,
not having read the guide-book of Cardyllian and its vicinity for more
than a year, I should be afraid to say what arabesques, and imagery
beside, had entered with their cements and their scaffolding; and before
the three brother artists had got their passports for England who were
to paint on the panels of the doors such festive pieces as Watteau
loved. In short, before the chaos and confusion that attend the throes
of that sort of creation had set in, Lord Verney was to make a visit of
a few days to Ware, and was to visit Cardyllian and to receive a
congratulatory address from the corporation of that ancient town, and to
inspect the gas-works (which I am glad to say are hid away in a little
hollow), and the two fountains which supply the town--constructed, as
the inscription tells, at the expense of "the Right Honourable Kiffyn
Fulke, Nineteenth Viscount Verney, and Twenty-ninth Baron Penruthyn, of
Malory." What else his lordship was to see, and to do, and to say on the
day of his visit the county and other newspapers round about printed
when the spectacle was actually over, and the great doings matter of
history.
There were arches of evergreens and artificial flowers of paper, among
which were very tolerable hollyhocks, though the roses were startling.
Under these, Lord Viscount Verney and the "distinguished party" who
accompanied him passed up Castle Street to the town-hall, where he was
received by the mayor and town-councillors, accompanied and fortified by
the town-clerk and other functionaries, all smiling except the mayor, on
whom weighed the solemn responsibility of having to read the address, a
composition, and no mean one, of the Rev. Dr. Splayfoot, who attended
with parental anxiety "to see the little matter through," as he phrased
it, and was so awfully engaged that Mrs. Splayfoot, who was on his arm,
and asked him twice, in a whisper, whether the tall lady in purple silk
was Lady Wimbledon, without receiving the slightest intimation that she
was so much as heard, remarked testily that she hoped he would not
write many more addresses, inasmuch as it made him ill-bred to that
degree that if the town-hall had fallen during the reading, he never
would have perceived it till he had shaken his ears in kingdom-come.
Lord Verney read his answer, which there was much anxiety and pressure
to hear.
"Now it really _was_ be-autiful--_wasn't_ it?" our friend Mrs. Jones,
the draper, whispered, in particular reference to that part of it, in
which the viscount invoked the blessing of the Almighty upon himself and
his doings, gracefully admitting that in contravention of the Divine
will and the decrees of heaven, even he could not be expected to
accomplish much, though with the best intentions. And Captain Shrapnell,
who felt that the sentiment was religious, and was anxious to be
conspicuous, standing with his hat in his hand, with a sublime
expression of countenance, said in an audible voice--"_Amen_."
All this over, and the building inspected, the distinguished party were
conducted by the mayor, the militia band accompanying their
march--[air--"The Meeting of the Waters"]--to the "Fountains" in
Gunner's Lane, to which I have already alluded.
Here they were greeted by a detachment of the Llanwthyn Temperance
Union, headed by short, fat Thomas Pritchard, the interesting apostle
of total abstinence, who used to preach on the subject alternately in
Welsh and English in all the towns who would hear his gospel, in most of
which he was remembered as having been repeatedly fined for public
intoxication, and known by the familiar pet-name of "Swipey Tom," before
his remarkable conversion.
Mr. Pritchard now led the choir of the Lanwthyn Temperance Union,
consisting of seven members, of various sizes, dressed in their Sunday
costume, and standing in a row in front of fountain No. 1--each with his
hat in his left hand and a tumbler of fair water in his right.
Good Mrs. Jones, who had a vague sense of fun, and remembered anecdotes
of the principal figure in this imposing spectacle, did laugh a little
modestly into her handkerchief, and answered the admonitory jog of her
husband's elbow by pleading--"_Poor_ fellows! Well, you know it _is_
odd--there's no denying _that_ you _know_;" and from the background were
heard some jeers from the excursionists who visited Cardyllian for that
gala, which kept Hughes, the Cardyllian policeman, and Evans, the other
"horney," who had been drafted from Llwynan, to help to overawe the
turbulent, very hot and active during that part of the ceremony.
Particularly unruly was John Swillers, who, having failed as a publican
in Liverpool, in consequence of his practice of drinking the greater
part of his own stock in trade, had migrated to "The Golden Posts" in
Church Street, Cardyllian, where he ceased to roll his barrel, set up
his tressels, and had tabernacled for the present, drinking his usual
proportion of his own liquors, and expecting the hour of a new
migration.
Over the heads of the spectators and the admiring natives of Cardyllian
were heard such exhortations as "Go it, Swipey." "There's gin in that,"
"Five shillin's for his vorship, Swipey," "I say, Swipey Tom, pay your
score at the Golden Posts, will ye?" "Will ye go a bit on the stretcher,
Swipey?" "Here's two horneys as 'll take ye home arter that."
And these interruptions, I am sorry to say, continued, notwithstanding
the remonstrances which Mr. Hughes addressed almost pathetically to John
Swillers of the Golden Posts, as a respectable citizen of Cardyllian,
one from whose position the police were led to expect assistance and the
populace an example. There was something in these expostulations which
struck John Swillers, for he would look with a tipsy solemnity in
Hughes's face while he delivered them, and once took his hand, rather
affectionately, and said, "That's your sort." But invariably these
unpleasant interpolations were resumed, and did not cease until this
moral exhibition had ended with the last verse of the temperance song,
chanted by the deputation with great vigour, in unison, and which, as
the reader will perceive, had in it a Bacchanalian character, which
struck even the gravest listeners as a hollow mockery:--
Refreshing more than sinful swipes,
The weary man
Who quaffs a can,
That sparkling foams through leaden pipes.
CHORUS.
Let every man
Then, fill his can,
And fill the glass
Of every lass
In brimming bumpers sparkling clear,
To pledge the health of Verney's Peer!
And then came a chill and ghastly "hip-hip, hurrah," and with some
gracious inquiries on Lord Verney's part, as to the numbers, progress,
and finances of "their interesting association," and a subscription of
ten pounds, which Mr. John Swillers took leave to remark, "wouldn't be
laid out on water, by _no_ means," the viscount, with grand and radiant
Mr. Larkin at his elbow, and frequently murmuring in his ear--to the
infinite disgust of my friend, Wynne Williams, the Cardyllian attorney,
thus out-strutted and out-crowed on his own rustic elevation--was
winning golden opinions from all sorts of men.
The party went on, after the wonders of the town had been exhausted, to
look at Malory, and thence returned to a collation, at which toasts were
toasted and speeches spoken, and Captain Shrapnell spoke, by
arrangement, for the ladies of Cardyllian in his usual graceful and
facetious manner, with all the puns and happy allusions which a month's
private diligence, and, I am sorry to say, some shameless plagiarisms
from three old numbers of poor Tom Hood's "Comic Annual," could get
together, and the gallant captain concluded by observing that the noble
lord whom they had that day the honour and happiness to congratulate,
intended, he understood, everything that was splendid and liberal and
handsome, and that the town of Cardyllian, in the full radiance of the
meridian sunshine, whose golden splendour proceeded from the
_south_--"The cardinal point at which the great house of Ware is visible
from the Green of Cardyllian"--(hear, hear, and laughter)--"there
remained but one grievance to be redressed, and that set to rights,
every ground of complaint would slumber for ever, he might say, in the
great bed of Ware"--(loud cheers and laughter)--"and what was that
complaint? He was instructed by his fair, lovely, and beautiful
clients--the ladies of Cardyllian--some of whom he saw in the gallery,
and some still more happily situated at the festive board"--(a laugh).
"Well, he was, he repeated, instructed by them to say that there was one
obvious duty which the noble lord owed to his ancient name--to the fame
of his public position--to the coronet, whose golden band encircled his
distinguished brow--and above all, to the ancient feudal dependency of
Cardyllian"--(hear, hear)--"and that was to select from his county's
beauty, fascination, and accomplishment, and he might say loveliness, a
partner worthy to share the ermine and the coronet and the name and
the--ermine" (hear, hear) "of the ancient house of Verney" (loud
cheers); "and need he add that when the selection was made, it was hoped
and trusted and aspired after, that the selection would not be made a
hundred miles away from the ivied turrets, the feudal ruins, the gushing
fountains, and the spacious town-hall of Cardyllian" (loud and
long-continued cheering, amid which the gallant captain, very hot, and
red, and smiling furiously, sat down with a sort of lurch, and drank off
a glass of champagne, and laughed and giggled a little in his chair,
while the "cheering and laughter" continued).
And Lord Verney rose, not at all hurt by this liberty, very much amused
on the contrary, and in high good humour his lordship said,--
"Allow me to say--I am sure you will"--(hear, hear, and cries of "We
will")--"I say, I am sure you will permit me to say that the ladies of
Cardyllian, a-a-about it, seem to me to have chosen a very eloquent
spokesman in the gallant, and I have no doubt, distinguished officer who
has just addressed the house. We have all been entertained by the
eloquence of Captain Scollop"--[here the mayor deferentially whispered
something to the noble orator]--"I beg pardon--Captain Grapnell--who
sits at the table, with his glass of wine, about it--and very good wine
it is--his glass, I say, where it should be, in his hand"--(hear, hear,
and laughter, and "You got it there, captain"). "And I assure the
gallant captain I did not mean to be severe--only we were all
joking--and I do say that he has his hand--my gallant friend, Captain
Grabblet, has it--where every gallant officer's ought to be, about it,
and that is, upon his weapon"--(hear, hear, laughter, and cries of "His
lordship's too strong for you, captain"). "I don't mean to hurt him,
though, about it," (renewed cries of hear, and laughter, during which
the captain shook his ears a little, smiling into his glass rather
foolishly, as a man who was getting the worst of it, and knew it, but
took it pleasantly). "No, it would not be fair to the ladies about it,"
(renewed laughter and cheering), "and all I _will_ say is this, about
it--there are parts of Captain Scraplet's speech, which I shan't
undertake to answer at this moment. I feel that I am trespassing, about
it, for a much longer time than I had intended," (loud cries of "No, no,
go on, go on," and cheering, during which the mayor whispered something
to the noble lord, who, having heard it twice or thrice repeated, nodded
to the mayor in evident apprehension, and when silence was restored,
proceeded to say), "I have just heard, without meaning to say anything
unfair of the gallant captain, Captain Scalpel, that he is hardly
himself qualified to give me the excellent advice, about it, which I
received from him; for they tell me that he has rather run away, about
it, from his colours, on that occasion." (Great laughter and cheering).
"I should be sorry to wound Captain Shat--Scat--Scrap, the gallant
captain, to wound him, I say, even in front." (Laughter, cheering, and a
voice from the gallery "Hit him hard, and he won't swell," "Order.")
"But I think I was bound to make that observation in the interest of the
ladies of Cardyllian, about it;" (renewed laughter); "and, for my part,
I promise my gallant friend--my--captain--about it--that although I may
take some time, like himself" (loud laughter); "although I cannot let
fall, about it, any observation that may commit me, yet I do promise to
meditate on the excellent advice he has been so good as to give me,
about it." And the noble lord resumed his seat amid uproarious cheering
and general laughter, wondering what had happened to put him in the
vein, and regretting that some of the people at Downing Street had not
been present to hear it, and witness its effect.