_Introduces certain new characters upon the stage, and amongst them
the real heroine of this history. Besides containing a love-story far
superior to the last._
But while the delightful loves of Miss Sower soft and Mr. Palethorpe yet
leave their tender impress on the mind, and predispose the susceptible
soul of my romantic reader for the reception of tales of gallantry and
devoted affection, let me take advantage of the favourable opportunity
thus afforded by the condition of his heart, to make mention of another
delicate matter which, up to this time, has been making some progress
in reality, although not the remotest allusion hitherto has been made to
it.
Notwithstanding the little real or supposed amours in which Colin has
previously been engaged, and the last of which so nearly, in his own
opinion, made shipwreck of his heart, it must have been evident that the
opportunity which promised the most proper and appropriate match for
him had not yet arrived. Towards Fanny, it is true, he had never in this
sense entertained any feelings of love, nor had he ever professed any.
On Fanny herself lay all the pain and bitterness of having secretly
nourished an affection for one who was insensible of it, and on whom, as
it now pretty clearly appeared, her heart had been set in vain. While,
with respect to Miss Wintlebury, not only had she herself declined his
company, and withdrawn from his knowledge, but the advice of his father,
Mr. Lupton, combined most strongly with other circumstances to persuade
him that even had it not been thus, he would but be paying due deference
to his protector in considering more seriously upon the subject before
he ventured to carry his communications with that young woman any
farther. The reflections moreover that arose in his mind touching the
very altered circumstances in which he was placed by Mr. Lupton, as well
as the prospects which now through that gentleman opened upon his future
life, could scarcely fail very materially to influence even him in
his decisions upon this important point. But Miss Wintlebury being
voluntarily withdrawn from him, and Fanny being made aware that he
loved her only as a friend, and reconciled he hoped, too, to that
knowledge,--what considerations of any importance remained to prevent
his forming some such other alliance as might at once prove suitable to
his expected future fortunes and rank as a country gentleman, as well
as agreeable to the wishes and advice of him by whom those fortunes and
rank were to be conferred, and whom, on other accounts, he was bound to
endeavour to please?
While in this state of mental uncertainty, Mr. Lupton had taken an
opportunity of introducing him to the acquaintance of one Mr. Henry
Calvert, a gentleman of comfortable, though not large, fortune, residing
in one of the northern suburbs of London, and in whose family he soon
found,--as his father had secretly desired,--a companion very much after
the heart of any young man of true sense and sensibility. This was in
the person of Jane Calvert, the youngest of two sisters, and a lady
within a year or two of his own age. Well-educated, sensible, and
good-tempered, she was one of those creatures who, as they grow up to
womanhood, and all its nameless witcheries, become unconsciously, as it
were, the life and light of the household;--to whom parents,
brothers, and sisters,--all instinctively and unknown, perhaps, to
themselves,--look up as the soul of the family;--whom all love--none
envy; whose presence, in a manner, makes glad, none know why; as the
spring delights us unthought on, or the flowers by our way-side inspire
pleasure and gratification even when least we know whence our elasticity
of spirit is derived. She was one of those happy beings--the heart,
as it were, of the domestic circle--that would be most missed if taken
away; that would leave the longest empty place in the bosoms of those
who had surrounded her; but who, in many things, was least felt while
present, save in the quiet and gentle sense of unobtrusive happiness
which her presence ever occasioned. Such was the character of the young
lady with whom it may now be said Colin was indeed in love. Below him
in height, she yet was sufficiently tall to give dignity to an elegant
figure; while a light and brilliant complexion, associated, as it
usually is, with hair and eyes of a hue which the pencil of nature
colours in admirable correspondence, but which in words can scarcely be
properly described, gave no fairer a representation exteriorly than the
jewel of a soul within most amply deserved.
On the other hand, Jane, who had seen Colin at her father's house but on
few occasions before, now, for the first time in her existence, became
conscious that, happy as she was, she might be yet happier in a sphere
of which hitherto she had thought nothing, and under circumstances
which, even when alone, she scarcely suffered herself to contemplate. Up
to this time she had never dreamed of love beyond the circle of her own
family: now she felt that loveable and good creatures exist beyond in
the wide world, whom to see is to remember, and to remember is to regret
their absence. She found that the heart is capable of other love than
that of parents, sisters, and brothers: and not capable only, but that
such may become too deeply necessary to its happiness, ever again--after
once making that discovery--to be truly happy without it.
Her father and family lived in that quiet and learned retirement which
neither sought nor invited, as they did not require, the excitement of
continual company, to enable them to get through life without weariness.
A tasteful and elegant, though simple, home afforded to them far higher
pleasures than all the genteel riot and conventional affectations of
happiness which occupy so much of the time and attention of the great
body of that class of society to which they belonged, and in which they
might have shone so gracefully conspicuous. But Mr. Calvert the father
was too much a man of mind to precipitate either himself or his family
into the whirl and eddy of what may be termed fashionable life. At the
risk of being thought dull and spiritless,--of having his daughters
neglected, and his sons regarded as “very unlike what one naturally
expects young men would be,”--he preferred to all other pleasures that
sound moral and mental education of his children,--that social, or
domestic, training of them up, and that quiet and pleasing attention
to the whole economy of his estate, and of all who were on it, which,
whatever its defects in the eyes of the world, never fails to produce
the greatest amount of real happiness to the possessors, as well as
to render them the most capable of becoming the sources of greatest
happiness to others. Hence, his daughters had never been presented
a dozen times, if not ostensibly, at least virtually, like bills for
acceptance, but to be refused. Neither had his two sons--for two he
had--any knowledge of those peculiar vices which, though they might have
added to their character as young men of spirit, could not by any means
have done them credit on any other account.
Besides their own mutual stores of ever fresh mental enjoyment, this
happy and well-judging little family found abundant recreation in a
large and admirable library, which Mr. Calvert had himself selected:
as well as amusement in an old-fashioned garden of extensive dimensions
which enclosed the house on three sides, and overshadowed the roof with
its tall elm trees,--planted there perhaps in the days of Addison; and
which threw a quiet secluded air over the whole scene. Mr. Calvert's
taste, indeed, was so far that of the time to which I have alluded,
that Miss Jenny had been so christened after some favourite in the
_Spectator_; while the eldest son Roger had, in like manner, received
his cognomen though his father's veneration at once for the genius of
Addison and his admiration of the character of Sir Roger de Coverley.
When Jane once jerked her pincushion into the pond, he reminded her of
some tale of a watch being similarly dealt by, as told in his favourite
book; and not unfrequently spoke of that particular age of British
literature as one in which he should have been most happy if it had been
his fortune to live.
With such a man, and in a family with such an attraction in it as the
one I have before described, it is not to be wondered at that Colin soon
found himself happier than ever he could have believed. His own good
looks and love of learning recommended him, while the natural powers of
his mind carried him through, where else, perhaps, his previous want
of habitual intercourse with similar society might have exposed him to
inevitable annoyances.
Happiness, however, and especially in love, seems to have been
considered in the economy of human nature,--like the sun-light in the
world,--as too bright to endure without intervals of darkness and of
shade. Not long had Colin and Jane Calvert been thus acquainted,--they
had just learned to speak confidingly, and to breathe to each other
those thoughts which before had only trembled on the lips and been
stifled in the utterance,--when Colin was astonished and surprised to
find in the behaviour of Mr. Calvert a marked and strong difference from
that which hitherto he had pursued towards him. It was not essentially
less kind than before, but seemed more marked by regret than by offence;
as though the bosom in which it originated felt like that of a friend
who secretly knows that he must part,--not that he would, or wished to
do so. Jane, too, seemed downcast; but her regret spoke in her eyes, not
words: in long painful suspenses of thought, as it seemed,--though in
reality in deep worlds of thought traced out in the brain until they
seemed to have no end. And then sometimes, when her father, or her
mother, or brother, or sister, chanced to catch a momentary glance
of her countenance,--they would find those pretty eyes wet, as if the
little well-spring within _would_ come to the top and overflow in
spite of her. Did they ask her what was the matter, she smiled without
feeling, and replied,--“Nothing!”
But instantly she would leave the room and go alone to her own chamber;
thus telling it was something, though a something not to be told. And
little do I know of human nature if, when there, those tears, denied
innocently by the tongue a moment before, did not fall rapidly as she
clasped her hands over a little bible which lay on a white cushion by
her bedside, and prayed voicelessly that she, and he she loved, might
yet be happy.
These things, it was observed by Colin, first occurred some short time
after Mr. Lup-ton and Mr. Calvert had had an interview of several hours'
duration in a private room; and during which, he now felt little doubt,
the question of the possible future union of the young people had been
seriously discussed.
Still it was not easy for him to imagine the cause of this strange
difference; nor could he for a while arrive at any explanation from
either party at all satisfactory on the subject. All that he knew was,
that nearly the whole family, with the exception principally of Mr.
Roger Calvert, even Jane herself,--and that was worst of all,--conducted
themselves towards him in a manner which left little doubt upon his mind
that some strong cause or other was in operation; which, in their eyes
at least, appeared to render the continuance of his acquaintance with
the young lady in question unadvisable, and a course to be decidedly
avoided. Still there was no harshness,--no decided neglect, no offensive
carriage, from any party. The feeling seemed to be that Jane should
decline his acquaintance as gradually and as kindly as possible,--but
that declined somehow it must be, and forgotten and given up for ever
must be the affection, the deep affection, I may properly say, he had
conceived for that excellent young creature. One day, however, as he was
rambling amongst the shrubberies with Roger Calvert, the most blunt and
open-hearted friend he had in the family, Colin mentioned the subject
to him, and ventured to ask plainly what was the real cause of this
coldness towards him.
“Perhaps,” replied Roger, “I am not doing exactly right by telling you;
though, for my own part, I think you ought to know. But since you have
so plainly required me to name the reason, I will do so. Mark, however,
beforehand, that I do not agree with my father and mother in their
opinion about the matter,--I hold that whatever may be said in the Old
Testament, it is not Christian of us--it is not our duty--nor do I see
how we can justly do it,--to visit the sins of the fathers upon the
children.”
Conviction flashed on Colin's mind like a burst of light. His cheeks
became pale and then red, while he would have burst into tears had not
his pride of heart forbidden him.
“I told you,” continued Roger on observing his emotion, “that I did not
know whether it was right or not to tell you; but as you wanted to know,
and I am no keeper of secrets, it is no blame of mine. Frankly, I tell
you it is all owing to the story of your birth, which your father told
to mine some days ago together with all the rest of what he meant to
do for you, in order that there might be no misunderstanding afterwards
between the families. My father and mother, indeed the whole family,
like you uncommonly well; and as for myself, I think you a regularly
good-hearted fellow, and should have no objection any day to make the
second at your wedding with Jenny; but then their rigid and straitened
notions are not mine, although I have on several occasions told them
just as plainly as I am talking to you now, that they and I are by no
means alike in opinion. I can assure you it is nothing else; for though
in fact such a match would be quite equal to anything Jane could ever
expect, if not greater, as Mr. Lupton volunteered to make a will in
your favour, as well as to give you a handsome fortune down before the
marriage, yet with them, especially with my mother, it is a sort of
matter of conscience which they do not seem at present as if they could
overcome. It is the source of much grief to them, that I can tell you;
and especially as Jane seems to have taken such a liking to you: but
then, you see--however, I can only say this,--and I am her brother,
and would not see a hair of her head touched, nor a lash of her eye wet
unnecessarily,--no, not for the best man in England! but this I promise
you, that if _I_ were in your place and in love with any young person
that I cared anything particular about, I would make up my mind to have
her, and have her I would, let anybody, either man or woman, say or do
whatever they liked! That is my spirit,--though I should not have told
you so if I had not cared something about you.”
In this strange speech Colin saw at once the bitter cause of all his
fear, combined most oddly with something which yet inspired him with
hope. Surely he could not altogether fail, with perseverance, and the
assistance (to begin with) of such a spirited auxiliary as Roger Calvert
had thus proved himself likely to be.
That same night,--as he was upon the eve of his departure for Sherwood
forest, on the doubtful expedition for the liberation of James Woodruff,
Colin desired and obtained an interview with the young lady. It was
after a very early meal--about eight o'clock in the evening--when they
walked out along that portion of the garden which lay immediately in
view of the front of Mr. Calvert's house. It was a soft mellow autumnal
night,--the air was still and warm; the leaves were scattered abundantly
on the paths by some rude by-gone blast, and now lay in drifted heaps
along the edges of the grass-plots and under every sheltered corner;
while an increasing moon, that gave just light enough to keep darkness
out of the sky and total blackness from the earth, seemed to sail, like
a forsaken wreck, amongst the white and billowy clouds that overspread
the sky. Jane leaned more fondly, he thought, upon his arm than ever
before; and during some minutes they paced to and fro, without either of
them venturing to speak to the other those words which at best must have
been as it were but the preface to trouble. This silence lay heavy on
each heart, and yet each feared to break it. The first word would sound
like a parting knell, and neither felt courage to utter it. Still they
walked up and down; until at length that meaning and eloquent silence,
which was at first painful, became insupportable. Suddenly Colin stopped
in his path, laid his hand earnestly upon the arm of his companion, and
bent his face earthward, as he said, “Young lady, there is no farther
occasion for disguise or secrecy on the part of yourself and your
family. I know it all, now. We must part!--that is fixed!--Part once
more, and for ever! For myself, as I know myself, and that whatever
evil may be supposed to attach to others, _I_, at least, have not
individually deserved this,--it is contrary to my nature to endure
unkindness undeserved. I am thought unworthy of you, and am treated as
though I were; but I will not in reality render myself so, by acting
a mean and cowardly part; by pressing my acquaintance where it is not
desired, and persisting in those attentions which even she, to whom they
are offered,--even _she_, thinks proper to reject.”
“Oh, no, do not say so!” exclaimed his companion. “It is not so,
indeed,--it is not, indeed!”
“I speak,” replied Colin, “only from what I have seen and experienced. I
_have_ loved you,--I _do_ love you! And, for the rest, you know that as
well as I.”
“In truth, sir,” answered Miss Calvert, “I know nothing whatever of the
cause of all this. A few days ago only, I thought we were _so_ happy!
And now----”
A flood of tears here told, in the most pitiful of all languages, the
difference between that time and the present.
“You know nothing of it?” demanded Colin.
“Nothing, I assure you,” answered his companion.
“Then, why,” asked he,--“why do worse than even others did, and shun me
without knowing why?”
“Because my father and mother, both,” sobbed the lady, “told me that it
would be better we should not love each other, and that I must try to
forget you!”
“And you will do so?”
“I must try,--I must do so,--for it is my duty.”
“But will you,--can you?”
“Oh, if you love me, do not ask me! I ought not to say it,--perhaps
I may. If it must be so, I hope I may; but I feel,--yes, my--my dear
Colin,--I feel that what they demand of me is impossible. I can never
banish you from my bosom,--never! No, not if they would give me the
world!”
If ever the reader of this history have been in love, he or she must
be perfectly well aware that a climax of feeling of the kind above
described is not arrived at without involving ulterior consequences,
which philosophers and grammarians have agreed to designate by the verb
to kiss. It must therefore be understood, that no sooner had the young
lady expressed the sentiments last recorded, than Colin, with becoming
alacrity, converted that verb into a substantive or noun,--i.e, into
“anything which exists, or of which we have any notion,”--by saluting
her upon the cheek in very becoming and gentlemanly style. This delicate
experiment had never been tried between them before; but, I am happy to
be able to record that it perfectly succeeded. Declarations of eternal
attachment were afterwards repeated on both sides, and vows of love
made, such as the Lady Diana, who was listening from behind a cloud over
their heads, hath seldom heard excelled; but which, as a man of honour,
I feel bound never to reveal to the public at large. Be it sufficient
for the reader to know, that Colin and Jane eventually tore themselves
asunder, with the final understanding that neither would ever love
another so long--(as some wonderful poet writes)--as the sun continued
to shine, the rivers to flow, or the seasons to revolve. This, to be
sure, was promising long enough beforehand, but then, being the usual
language of love, as found in the works of eminent authors, I--an humble
imitator--am in duty bound to make use of it.
The mental excitement produced by this interview, and the reflections
consequent upon it, had the effect of entirely preventing Colin from
taking his accustomed rest on retiring to his chamber. He, therefore,
endeavoured to wile away an hour or two in reading; and for that purpose
straightway established himself in an old-fashioned arm-chair by the
fire-place.
Having nearly sat out his exhausted lamp, Colin retired to an unenticing
couch, and passed the greater part of the night in the most anxious
reflections.