Something there is more needful than expense,
And something previous even to taste--'tis sense.
POPE.
Dum vitant stulti vitia, in contraria currunt[2].
HORACE.
[Footnote 2: When fools would avoid one extreme, they run into the
other.]
The family at Webberly House was the only one in the neighbourhood of
Deane, which lived in a style of ostentatious expense; its members
vainly endeavouring to purchase respect by extravagance, and to transfer
the ideas and hours of the _beau monde_ to a place totally unfit for
their reception. The only families within a distance often miles of
their residence were--Sir Henry Seymour's, at Deane Hall--Squire
Thornbull's, at Hunting Field, and Mr. Temple's, at the parsonage of
Deane; all of whom lived in the most quiet manner. Beyond this distance,
however, the country was more thickly inhabited, and the town of York,
in the race and assize week, presented sufficient attractions to make a
drive of thirty miles no impediment to the Webberlys visiting it at
those times, though its allurements were not great enough to tempt their
immediate neighbours from their homes. Mrs. Sullivan had purchased
Webberly House, two years previous to the commencement of this
narration, on the faith of an advertisement nearly as deceptious as the
famous one of a celebrated auctioneer, that procured the sale of an
estate on the strength of a "hanging-wood," which proved to be a gibbet
on an adjoining common.
Webberly House--formerly called Simson's Folly--had been purposely
tricked up for sale by a prodigal heir, when obliged to dispose of his
paternal estate to discharge the debts his extravagance had incurred.
As a second dupe was not easily to be found, Mrs. Sullivan now vainly
endeavoured to part with it, as neither she nor her children could
reconcile themselves to living in so retired a part of the country.
Mrs. Sullivan was the only child of an extremely rich hosier in
Cheapside, who perhaps had saved more money than he had made, and fully
instructed his daughter in all the arts of frugality, limiting her
knowledge of all other arts and sciences to considerable manual
dexterity in making "a pudding and a shirt," which he considered the
ultimatum of female education. When Miss Leatherly was thus, according
to long established opinion, qualified for matrimony, her large fortune
brought her in reward a West Indian planter as a husband, from whom she
acquired those habits of ostentatious arrogance, which, united to her
early imbibed parsimony, formed the principal traits of her character.
By this marriage Mrs. Sullivan had one son and two daughters; and,
fifteen years after the birth of the former, became a widow, with a
large jointure, as well as all her father's riches, at her own disposal.
She received the addresses of many fortune hunters, but finally gave the
preference to a handsome, good natured, dissipated Irishman, whose name
she now bore. Mr. Sullivan at the period of his marriage was past the
prime of life; he had long served in the Austrian armies, (for being a
Catholic he was incapacitated from holding any high rank in those of his
native sovereign, and therefore preferred following another standard),
but his military career procuring him little except scars and honours,
he gladly availed himself of the wealthy widow's evident partiality, and
at first thought himself most fortunate in becoming the possessor of so
large a fortune; yet soon found he had dearly purchased the affluence
which inflicted on him, not only the disgusting illiberal vulgarity of
his wife, but the petulant rudeness and self-sufficiency of her
children. His only consolation was a daughter Mrs. Sullivan had
presented him with, in the first year of their marriage, and his
happiness as a father, made him in some degree forget his miseries as a
husband. His heart was completely wrapped up in the charming little
Caroline, and bitterly did he repent on her account, that his former
prodigality had obliged him to yield to his elder brother's desire of
cutting off the entail of the family estate; which must otherwise have
descended to her, being settled on the females, as well as males of
their ancient house. Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan associated but little
together; as she was never happy except when she accompanied her elder
daughters to the most fashionable watering places; whilst he, remaining
at home, devoted most of his time to the little Caroline. But here,
unfortunately, in the attempt to banish the uneasy feelings of his
mind, he by degrees formed a habit of indulging in the pleasures of the
bottle, in a greater degree than strict propriety permits. About three
months before his death, the little domestic comfort he had enjoyed was
exchanged for the most complete disquietude, as at that time the
jealousy of his wife was roused by his introducing Miss Wildenheim into
his family as his ward.--Notwithstanding his most solemn assurances,
that this young lady was the daughter of a German baron, who had not
only long been his commanding officer but his most zealous friend, Mrs.
Sullivan constantly asserted she was his natural child. Such a paternity
was in her eyes an almost unpardonable crime; for, considering her
inferiority of rank and sex, she was still more unreasonable than Henry
the Eighth, who made it high treason for those he sought as partners to
his throne not to confess all the errors they had been guilty of in a
state of celibacy. Perhaps nothing but the stipend received for
Adelaide's maintenance could have reconciled Mrs. Sullivan to her
residence at Webberly House, for she was too avaricious not to submit to
a great deal for three hundred a year.
When Miss Wildenheim first appeared in Mr. Sullivan's family she was in
the deepest mourning for a parent, who his wife felt convinced was her
mother. It must be confessed, the affection Mr. Sullivan showed
Adelaide, and his distracted state of mind from the period of her
arrival, gave a very plausible colour to his wife's suspicions. He
avoided the society of his family, and giving himself up to his habit of
drinking, it in a short time proved fatal; for returning late one night
from squire Thornbull's in a state of intoxication, he was killed at his
own gate by falling off his horse. Miss Wildenheim's consequent
affliction, and dangerous illness, left no doubt in Mrs. Sullivan's
mind, as to the justice of her surmises. Enraged by this apparent
confirmation of her imagined wrongs, and urged by the envious hatred the
Miss Webberlys showed of Adelaide's superior charms, she determined no
longer to retain under her roof an object on these accounts so
obnoxious; and, as a flattering unction to her soul, persuaded herself,
that a girl with ten thousand pounds fortune could never be at any great
loss for a home. But at length her darling passion, covetousness,
prevailed over her resentment; as she recollected, that should the
brother of her late husband ever hear of her treating in such a manner a
girl Mr. Sullivan had left under her protection, and in whose fate (from
whatever motive) he had shown so deep an interest, her unkindness might
be construed into disrespect to his memory, and as such be resented with
the warmth of family pride and affection, so natural to the Irish
character; and perhaps prompt the offended brother to revenge the
affront, by leaving his estate to a distant cousin, who had been dreaded
by her husband as a rival to Caroline. These and other pecuniary
considerations finally induced Mrs. Sullivan to accept the guardianship
of Miss Wildenheim in conjunction with a Mr. Austin, who was trustee to
her fortune, and was said to be an old and faithful friend of her
father.
However Mrs. Sullivan had failed in the character of a wife, she had
always been weakly indulgent as a mother, and was easily led by her
children into every expensive folly. Her son's command of money had made
him, on his first entrance into life, a very desirable acquaintance to
some needy young men of fashion, who, in return for the pecuniary
accommodation he afforded them, did him the favour to turn his head and
corrupt his morals. As he became daily more ambitious to emulate his new
associates in all their extravagance, he persuaded his mother to change
her style of living, in order to imitate as closely as possible that of
the relatives of his _professed_ friends. At this critical period, he
had unfortunately found Mr. Sullivan no less solicitous of joining those
secondary circles of fashion, to which alone they could expect
admittance, from his having long been accustomed to lead as a bachelor a
life of gaiety and dissipation; and the Miss Webberlys still more
zealously promoted his wishes, being equally solicitous to reach the
threshold of fashion, which had long been the unattained object of their
highest hope. This was perhaps the only point in the chapter of
possibilities, on which the whole family could agree.
Mrs. Sullivan reversed the order of nature, and followed the path her
children traced for her, supposing them to be better instructed in such
things than herself; for she knew they had received a superabundance of
the _means_, and, poor woman! she had not sense to perceive they had
missed the _ends_ of education. In encouraging her children in the
pursuit of fashionable follies, Mrs. Sullivan but followed the general
example of wealthy parents, whom we so frequently behold acting like the
worshippers of Moloch in elder days, making their sons and their
daughters pass through the fires of dissipation, in the chance of
drawing them forth from the ordeal with greater external brightness; but
the scorching flames too often wither to the root the shoots of honour,
benevolence, and truth.
In nothing was Mrs. Sullivan's lamentable imitation of her children's
follies more perceptible, than in her conversation, which was a mixture
of Cheapside vulgarisms and Newmarket cant, with here and there a stray
ornament from her daughters' vocabularies of sentimental and
scientifical jargon; the whole misapplied and mispronounced, in a manner
that would have done honour to Mrs. Malaprop herself!
Miss Webberly's person was much in the predicament Solomon laments in
his song for his sister; but she had in compensation an addendum which
the Jewish fair had not, in the shape of a protuberance on the left
shoulder, which however she always endeavoured to balance by applying to
the right the judicious stuffing of Madame Huber's stays; and her
deformity was only perceptible by some slight traces in her countenance,
in which there was nothing else remarkable, except a pair of little
black eyes, rather pert than sparkling. Conscious that she could not
shine as a beauty, she resolved on being a "_bel esprit_," for which she
was nearly as ill qualified by nature; and, reversing the fable of
Achilles habiting himself in female attire, she put on an armour she
could not carry, and grasped at weapons she was unable to wield. And as
she sought knowledge "with all her seeking," not to promote her own
happiness, but to subtract from that of others, by mortifying their
self-love, in the anticipated triumphs of her own, her preposterous
vanity led her to deform her mind as much by art with misplaced and
uncouth excrescences of pedantry, as her person was by the unlucky
addition it had received from nature: but while she sought to conceal
the one with the most anxious care, she laboured as incessantly to
display the other; thus resembling the infatuated being, who first held
up for the worship of his fellow mortal a disgusting reptile, or a
worthless weed.
Miss Cecilia Webberly was in face and figure entitled to the appellation
of a fine bouncing girl, if for that a mass of flesh and blood
exquisitely coloured could suffice; but though to lilies and roses of
the most perfect hues were superadded fine blue eyes and beautiful
flaxen hair, her countenance was neither good-natured nor gay, but
indicative of the most supercilious self-conceit. She had enjoyed what
are usually termed the _advantages_ of a London boarding school, and
through their influence had acquired sufficient French to read the tales
of Marmontel, by a strange misnomer called "_Contes moraux_," and to
which, for the benefit of the rising generation, we would humbly advise
prefixing a syllable in any future edition. From these tales she learned
to be sentimental, and fancied herself in turn the heroine of "_Le mari
Sylph_," "_L'heureux Divorce_," &c.
Moreover, the fair Cecilia had here been taught to move her ponderous
fingers with considerable swiftness over the keys of a piano forte, and
to exercise her powerful lungs in Vauxhall songs.
In this seminary she was unfortunately inoculated with a virus, that
totally diseased a heart nature had intended for better
purposes--namely, an aching desire after fashionable life, which led her
to caricature those airs of _ton_ which she had not _tact_ to imitate.
The eye that is always turned upwards must be blinded by the brightness
of a sphere it is not fashioned to; and Cecilia Webberly was so dazzled
by the accounts she read in the daily prints, and La Belle AssemblÈe, of
"great lords and ladies dressed out on gay days," that she looked on the
inhabitants of Bloomsbury Square with sovereign contempt, her mother and
sister inclusive, who notwithstanding encouraged and emulated her
flights, flattering themselves that her eccentricities would carry her,
and them as her attendants, into regions of splendour, though in truth
they were only thus brought forth to the "garish eye of day," to be
exposed to the contempt and ridicule her folly excited.
A few days after the expedition of Mrs. Martin and her friends to
Webberly House, as she was standing one fine morning at her parlour
window, Mrs. Sullivan's dashing equipage drove past, and her involuntary
exclamation at the sudden, and to her unpractised eyes, terrifying stop
of the four horses, which were a second before at their utmost speed,
was changed into an expression of pleasure, when she saw Miss Wildenheim
alone alight at Mr. Slater's shop, and the showy carriage from which she
descended drive away ere the door was well closed; for Mrs. Sullivan and
her daughters never condescended to enter _the shop_, as it was in token
of pre-eminence called in the village of Deane. The great Frederick has
wisely remarked, that "_custom_ guides fools in place of _reason_;" and
they had sapiently agreed amongst themselves, that "no lady of fashion
was ever seen in a shop out of Bond Street;" but as for many reasons
they were always anxious to prevail on Miss Wildenheim to execute their
commissions, they took care not to inform her of the solecism in
etiquette they had thus discovered, lest her timid and scrupulous
attention to propriety should overcome her good nature, and deprive
them of the benefit of her taste and judgment. The place of sale these
ladies thus contemned, was a rustic pantheon-physitechnicon, where were
to be had--food for the mind, at least for those who were content to
"prey on garbage," and countless articles for the ladies' use. Part of
the counter was covered with stationery of all descriptions, school
books, last speeches, and ballads, besides a few miscellaneous articles
in the reading way, such as Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, the Seven
Champions of Christendom, and the Methodistical Magazine, relating how
Mr. Goodman "put on by faith," not "the armour of the Lord," but a pair
of "leathern conveniences," vulgarly called _breeches_. The remainder of
the counter showed, through glass panes, plated and pinchbeck _tiaras_
for farmers' daughters, and every species of low-priced disfigurement
for the person, in the shape of necklace or ear-ring, with a variety of
other articles of equal utility. The drawers, on one side of the
counter, contained groceries of all kinds; those on the other, a no less
various assortment of haberdashery and millinery, the latter, when
unsaleable, being altered from year to year to "the newest London
fashion." The shop also displayed a considerable store of hardware and
crockery, from the unglazed brown pan to the gold edged tea cup and
painted sailor's pig--lastly, boasting of a delectable circulating
library, which presented volumes that, like the highly prized works of
classic fame, had a most oleaginous odour.
The contents of the shop were scarcely less various than the occupations
of its master and his family. In part of the second floor, Miss Slater
held her "Academy for young ladies." In the other her sister performed
the office of mantua and corset maker. Their father was upholsterer,
undertaker, and _barber_, and by consequence _politician_ to the parish.
His gratuitous office of quidnunc had perhaps gained him more wealth
and patronage than all his others collectively, as in it he had never
made any direct attack on the purses of his neighbours, but by reading
the newspapers and gazette every market day free of cost, he assembled
all the farmers of the vicinity in his shop, who generally discovered
something amongst its various contents they felt an imperious necessity
to purchase, thus successfully following the plan of the ingenious
advertiser of----_A pair of globes for nothing!!!_----with an atlas,
price five guineas.
On the above mentioned occasions Mr. Slater was furiously loyal, in a
flaming red waistcoat, which scarcely rivalled his rubicund face.--When
he first became the village orator, he had endeavoured, from motives of
interest, to persuade others he felt more than he really did; and, as is
commonly the case with those who _exaggerate_ but are not
_hypocritical_, he ended in feeling more than he got credit for.--In
the proceedings of the English government he now really thought, that
"whatever is is right."--And perhaps it is to be regretted, that in his
class this belief is not more general.--Illiterate politicians are
scarcely less dangerous than self-constituted physicians--It requires
men of skill to medicate for the body physical or political.--Quacks in
either injure in proportion to their ignorance and consequent audacity;
it may often be better to let a disease alone, in the constitution of
the state or individual, than to run the risk of aggravating it by the
nostrums of the venders of concealed poisons.
Mr. Slater's window was always adorned with a bulletin of the news of
the day, of his own writing! and this singular composition set at
defiance all rules of grammar and orthography; but he had none of the
pride of authorship, and unfeignedly thanked the village schoolmaster
for his emendations, though perhaps it might sometimes be said, that
the _correction_ was the worst of the two.
The good man also amused himself with what he called "mapping" and
"drawing." The few unoccupied spaces in his shop walls were stuck over
with representations of the Thalaba of modern history in a variety of
woful plights; and he had made more changes in the face of Europe than
that archconjurer himself--for, to elucidate the Duke of Wellington's
campaigns, he exhibited a map with Portugal at the wrong side of
Spain[3]! not failing to take similar liberties in his representations
of _actions_ of various kinds.
[Footnote 3: Matter of fact.]
It may be supposed, that a shop so filled, and a master thus
accomplished, would be unremittingly attended.--In truth, "The Shop" was
seldom empty; and what with haranguing, bargaining, and the ceaseless
creaking of the pack-thread on its ever revolving roller, with
interludes of breaking sugar, and chopping ham, the noise on market days
was so deafening, that the tower of Babel might serve as an emblem, but
that there only one faculty was confounded, whilst here three of the
five senses were assailed at once.
At the moment of Miss Wildenheim's entrance, however, a comparative
"silence reigned within the walls,"--as in the shop were only Mrs.
Temple (wife of the rector) and her youngest son and daughter, the one
teazing her for a Robinson Crusoe, the other coaxing for a doll; but at
the sight of their "dear dote Miss Wildenheim" the little petitioners
forgot their requests, and throwing their arms about her neck, to the no
small damage of the muslin frill, that contrasted its snowy whiteness
with the sable hue of her other garments, made her cheek glow with their
kisses, whilst their friendly mother not less cordially shook her hand.
After a little social chat, Miss Wildenheim proceeded to fulfil the
object of her visit to the shop, namely, to choose a novel for Miss
Cecilia Webberly.--"What are you looking for there, my dear, with so
much perseverance? any thing will do for her," said Mrs.
Temple.--"Here's the Delicate Distress--The Innocent Seduction."--"I
fear, from their titles, they would serve to aid her in her search after
romance; don't you think that would be a pity?--I was looking for
Patronage, or Almeria."--The peculiar tone, half foreign, half pathetic,
in which Adelaide said the word _pity_, joined to the ludicrous but just
parallel she had in sober sadness unconsciously drawn for Cecilia
Webberly, struck with so comic an effect on Mrs. Temple's risible
nerves, that she burst out into an uncontrollable fit of laughter.
Adelaide opened her eye-lids to their utmost expansion, and cast the
beautiful orbs they had concealed on Mrs. Temple's face, with a look of
mingled surprise and inquiry.--"I only thought, my dear girl, (laying
her hand on Miss Wildenheim's arm), it was a sin you should waste your
morality and your _pit-tie_ in so useless a manner: believe me, Miss
Edgeworth's wit and sense would be lost on a girl too stupid to
comprehend the one, and too silly to profit by the other: if Miss
Cecilia Webberly were only a _fool_, I might encourage your laudable
endeavours, but----" "Hush, hush, my dear Mrs. Temple, here are
strangers;" and turning round Mrs. Temple discovered Sir Henry Seymour's
carriage at the door. It was a vehicle as old fashioned as the owner,
"the good Sir Henry," and formed a striking contrast to the showy
_cortËge_ of the Webberly family. It was drawn in a steady quiet trot,
by four heavy steeds as gray as their driver, who, seated on a
hammer-cloth adorned with fringes as numerous as those on the petticoat
of a modern belle, carefully avoided the sharp turns and charioteering
skill of the Four-in-hand Club. Sir Henry Seymour's carriage contained
only his sister-in-law, Mrs. Galton, who was addressed by Mrs. Temple
with all the intimacy of friendship, and answered a variety of inquiries
concerning Miss Seymour, which were made with real interest.
After giving Mrs. Temple an invitation to join a dinner party at the
hall on the following Thursday, Mrs. Galton whispered, "I suspect; that
elegant girl in mourning is the interesting foreigner whose unexpected
appearance at Webberly House last November excited so much
gossip."--"Yes, she is."--"Then pray introduce me; we have never met,
though I called on her the last time I visited Mrs. Sullivan." This
request was soon complied with; and the ceremony being over, Mrs. Galton
politely appealed to Adelaide's taste, regarding the colours of some
silks she was choosing to work a trimming for her niece's first gown,
which, on her ensuing birth-day, was to mark her approach to womanhood;
for in Sir Henry Seymour's family the difference in dress between
sixteen and forty-five was preserved: Selina had not yet laid aside her
white frock, nor was Mrs. Galton in her own person anxious to antedate
the period of second childhood. Mrs. Martin and Lucy, accompanied by
Mrs. Lucas, now walked in to pay their compliments to the ladies they
had seen enter, and were as usual received by Mrs. Galton with the
utmost civility; and as she knew that a visit to Deane Hall was an event
and a distinction in the annals of village history, she included them in
her invitation for Thursday, which was delightfully accepted by them.
Mrs. Sullivan's carriage having now returned for Miss Wildenheim, she
took her leave. And Mr. Mordaunt, having executed some business the
worthy baronet had intrusted him with, entered the shop, and reminded
Mrs. Galton, that if they did not hasten home, Sir Henry would be kept
waiting dinner, and, what was to him of much more interest, Selina
Seymour would be disappointed of her evening ride.