Lady Cecil began:--
"I have already told you, that though I call Gerard my brother, and he
possesses my sisterly affection, we are only connexions by marriage, and
not the least related in blood. His father married my mother; but Gerard
is the offspring of a former marriage, as I am also. Sir Boyvill's first
wife is the unfortunate lady who is the heroine of my tale.
"Sir Boyvill, then Mr. Neville, for he inherited his baronetcy only a
few years ago, had advanced beyond middle age when he first married. He
was a man of the world, and of pleasure; and being also clever,
handsome, and rich, had great success in the circles of fashion. He was
often involved in liaisons with ladies, whose names were rife among the
last generation for loving notoriety and amusement better than duty and
honour. As he made a considerable figure, he conceived that he had a
right to entertain a high opinion of himself, and not without some
foundation; his good sayings were repeated; his songs were set to music,
and sung with enthusiasm in his own set--he was courted and feared.
Favoured by women, imitated by men, he reached the zenith of a system,
any connexion with which is considered as enviable.
"He was some five-and-forty when he fell in love, and married. Like many
dissipated men, he had a mean idea of female virtue--and especially
disbelieved that any portion of it was to be found in London; so he
married a country girl, without fortune, but with beauty and attractions
sufficient to justify his choice. I never saw his lady; but several of
her early friends have described her to me. She was something like
Gerard--yet how unlike! In the colour of the eyes and hair, and the
formation of the features, they resembled; but the expression was wholly
different. Her clear complexion was tinged by a pure blood, that ebbed
and flowed rapidly in her veins, driven by the pulsations of her soul,
rather than of her body. Her large dark eyes were irresistibly
brilliant; and opened their lids on the spectator with an effect such as
the sun has, when it drops majestically below a heavy cloud, and dazzles
the beholder with its unexpected beams. She was vivacious--nay, wild of
spirit; but though raised far above the dull monotony of common life by
her exuberant joyousness of soul, yet every thought and act was ruled by
a pure unsullied heart. Her impulses were keen and imperative; her
sensibility, true to the touch of nature, was tremblingly alive; but
their more dangerous tendencies were guarded by excellent principles,
and a truth never shadowed by a cloud. Her generous and confiding heart
might be duped--might spring forward too eagerly--and she might be
imprudent; but she was never false. An ingenuous confession of error, if
ever she fell into it, purged away all suspicion that anything
mysterious or forbidden lurked in her most thoughtless acts. Other
women, who, like her, are keenly sensitive, and who are driven by
ungovernable spirits to do what they afterward repent, and are endowed,
as she was, with an aptitude to shame when rebuked, guard their dignity
or their fears by falsehood; and while their conduct is essentially
innocent, immesh themselves in such a web of deceit, as not only renders
them absolutely criminal in the eyes of those who detect them, but in
the end hardens and perverts their better nature. Alithea Neville never
sheltered herself from the consequences of her faults; rather she met
them too eagerly, acknowledged a venial error with too much contrition,
and never rested till she had laid her heart bare to her friend and
judge, and vindicated its every impulse. To this admirable frankness,
soft tenderness, and heart-cheering gayety was added a great store of
common sense. Her fault, if fault it could be called, was a too earnest
craving for the sympathy and affection of those she loved; to obtain
this, she was unwearied, nay, prodigal, in her endeavours to please and
serve. Her generosity was a ready prompter, while her sensibility
enlightened her. She sought love, and not applause; and she obtained
both from all who knew her. To sum up all with the mention of a
defect--though she could feel the dignity which an adherence to the
dictates of duty imparts, yet sometimes going wrong--sometimes wounded
by censure, and always keenly alive to blame, she had a good deal of
timidity in her character. She was so susceptible to pain, that she
feared it too much, too agonizingly; and this terror of meeting anything
harsh or grating in her path rendered her too diffident of herself--too
submissive to authority--too miserable, and too yielding, when anything
disturbed the harmony with which she desired to be surrounded.
"It was these last qualities, probably, that led her to accept Mr.
Neville's offer. Her father wished it, and she obeyed. He was a retired
lieutenant in the navy. Sir Boyvill got him raised to the rank of post
captain; and what naval officer but would feel unbounded gratitude for
such a favour! He was appointed to a ship--sailed--and fell in an
engagement not many months after his daughter's marriage--grateful, even
in his last moments, that he died commanding the deck of a man-of-war.
Meanwhile his daughter bore the effects of his promotion in a less
gratifying way. Yet, at first, she loved and esteemed her husband. He
was not then what he is now. He was handsome; and his good breeding had
the polish of the day. He was popular, through a sort of liveliness
which passes for wit, though it was rather a conventional ease in
conversation than the sparkle of real intellect. Besides, he loved her
to idolatry. Whatever he is now, still vehemence of passion forms his
characteristic; and though the selfishness of his disposition gave an
evil bias even to his love, yet it was there, and for a time it shed its
delusions over his real character. While her artless and sweet caresses
could create smiles--while he played the slave at her feet, or folded
her in his arms with genuine and undisguised transport, even his darker
nature was adorned by the, to him, alien and transitory magic of love.
"But marriage too soon changed Sir Boyvill for the worse. Close intimacy
disclosed the distortions of his character. He was a vain and a selfish
man. Both qualities rendered him exacting in the extreme; and the first
gave birth to the most outrageous jealousy. Alithea was too ingenuous
for him to be able to entertain suspicions; but his jealousy was
nourished by the difference of their age and temper. She was
nineteen--in the first bloom of loveliness--in the freshest spring of
youthful spirits--too innocent to suspect his doubts--too kind in her
most joyous hour to fancy that she could offend. He was a man of the
world--a thousand times had seen men duped and women deceive. He did not
know of the existence of a truth as spotless and uncompromising as
existed in Alithea's bosom. He imagined that he was marked out as the
old husband of a young wife; he feared that she would learn that she
might have married more happily; and, desirous of engrossing her all to
himself, a smile spent on another was treason to the absolute nature of
his rights. At first she was blind to his bad qualities. A thousand
times he frowned when she was gay--a thousand times ill-humour and
cutting reproofs were the results of her appearing charming to others,
before she discovered the selfish and contemptible nature of his
passion, and became aware that, to please him, she must blight and
uproot all her accomplishments, all her fascinations; that she must for
ever curb her wish to spread happiness around; that she, the very soul
of generous, unsuspecting goodness, must become cramped in a sort of bed
of Procrustes, now having one portion lopped off, and then another, till
the maimed and half-alive remnant should resemble the soulless, niggard
tyrant, whose every thought and feeling centred in his Lilliputian self.
That she did at last make this discovery, cannot be doubted; though she
never disclosed her disappointment, nor complained of the tyranny from
which she suffered. She grew heedful not to displease, guarded in her
behaviour to others, and so accommodated her manner to his wishes, as
showed that she feared, but concealed that she no longer esteemed him. A
new reserve sprang up in her character, which, after all, was not
reserve; for it was only the result of her fear to give pain, and of her
unalterable principles. Had she spoken of her husband's faults, it would
have been to himself--but she had no spirit of governing--and
quarrelling and contention were the antipodes of her nature. If, indeed,
this silent yielding to her husband's despotism was contrary to her
original frankness, it was a sacrifice made to what she esteemed her
duty, and never went beyond the silence which best becomes the injured.
"It cannot be doubted that she was alive to her husband's faults.
Generous, she was restrained by his selfishness; enthusiastic, she was
chilled by his worldly wisdom; sympathetic, she was rebuked by a
jealousy that demanded every feeling. She was like a poor bird, that
with untired wing would mount gayly to the skies, when on each side the
wires of the aviary impede its flight. Still it was her principle that
we ought not to endeavour to form a destiny for ourselves, but to act
well our part on the scene where Providence has placed us. She reflected
seriously, and perhaps sadly, for the first time in her life; and she
formed a system for herself, which would give the largest extent to the
exercise of her natural benevolence, and yet obviate the suspicions and
cure the fears of her narrow-minded, self-engrossed husband.
"In pursuance of her scheme, she made it her request that they should
take up their residence entirely at their seat in the north of England;
giving up London society, and transforming herself altogether into a
country lady. In her benevolent schemes, in the good she could there do,
and in the few friends she could gather round her, against whom her
husband could form no possible objection, she felt certain of possessing
a considerable share of rational happiness--exempt from the hurry and
excitement of town, for which her sensitive and ardent mind rendered her
very unfit, under the guidance of a man who at once desired that she
should hold a foremost place, and was yet disturbed by the admiration
which she elicited. Sir Boyvill complied with seeming reluctance, but
real exultation. He possesses a delightful seat in the southern part of
Cumberland. Here, amid a simple-hearted peasantry, and in a
neighbourhood where she could cultivate many social pleasures, she gave
herself up to a life which would have been one of extreme happiness, had
not the exactions, the selfishness, the uncongenial mind of Sir Boyvill
debarred her from the dearest blessings of all--sympathy and friendship
with the partner of her life.
"Still she was contented. Her temper was sweet and yielding. She did not
look on each cross in circumstance as an injury or a misfortune; but
rather as a call on her philosophy, which it was her duty to meet
cheerfully. Her heart was too warm not to shrink with pain from her
husband's ungenerous nature, but she had a resource, to which she gave
herself up with ardour. She turned the full but checked tide of
affections from her husband to her son. Gerard was all in all to
her--her hope, her joy, her idol, and he returned her love with more
than a child's affection. His sensibility developed early, and she
cultivated it perhaps too much. She wished to secure a friend--and the
temptation afforded by the singular affectionateness of his disposition
and his great intelligence was too strong. Mr. Neville strongly objected
to the excess to which she carried her maternal cares, and augured ill
of the boy's devotion to her; but here his interference was vain, the
mother could not alter; and the child, standing at her side, eyed his
father even then with a sort of proud indignation, on his daring to step
in between them.
"To Mrs. Neville, this boy was as an angel sent to comfort her. She
could not bear that any one should attend on him except herself--she was
his playmate and instructress. When he opened his eyes from sleep, his
mother's face was the first he saw; she hushed him to rest at night--did
he hurt himself, she flew to his side in agony--did she utter one word
of tender reproach, it curbed his childish passions on the instant--he
seldom left her side, but she was young enough to share his
pastimes--her heart overflowed with its excess of love, and he, even as
a mere child, regarded her as something to protect, as well as worship.
"Mr. Neville was angry, and often reproved her too great partiality,
though by degrees it won some favour in his eyes. Gerard was his son and
heir, and he might be supposed to have a share in the affection lavished
on him. He respected, also, the absence of frivolous vanity that led her
to be happy with her child--contented away from London--satisfied in
fulfilling the duties of her station, though his eyes only were there to
admire. He persuaded himself that there must exist much latent
attachment towards himself, to reconcile her to this sort of exile; and
her disinterestedness received the reward of his confidence--he who
never before believed or respected woman. He began to yield to her more
than he was wont, and to consider that he ought now and then to show
some approbation of her conduct.
"When Gerard was about six years old, they went abroad on a tour.
Travelling was a mode of passing the time that accorded well with Mr.
Neville's matrimonial view of keeping his wife to himself. In the
travelling carriage, he only was beside her; in seeing sights, he, who
had visited Italy before, and had some taste, could guide and instruct
her; and short as their stay in each town was, there was no possibility
of forming serious attachments or lasting friendships; at the same time,
his vanity was gratified by seeing his wife and son admired by strangers
and natives. While abroad, Mrs. Neville bore another child, a little
girl. This added greatly to her domestic happiness. Her husband grew
extremely fond of his baby daughter; there was too much difference of
age to set her up as a rival to Gerard; she was by contradistinction the
father's darling, it is true; but this rather produced harmony than
discord--for the mother loved both children too well to feel hurt by the
preference; and, softened by having an object he really loved to lavish
his favour on, Sir Boyvill grew much more of a tender father and
indulgent husband than he had hitherto shown himself."