Our Polly is a sad slut, nor heeds what we have taught her,
I wonder any man alive will ever rear a daughter,
For when she's drest with care and cost, all tempting, fine,
and gay,
As men should serve a cucumber, she flings herself away.
Beggar's Opera.
After the death of Mr. Bertram, Mannering had set out upon a short
tour, proposing to return to the neighbourhood of Ellangowan before the
sale of that property should take place. He went, accordingly, to
Edinburgh and elsewhere, and it was in his return towards the
south-western district of Scotland, in which our scene lies, that, at a
post-town about a hundred miles from Kippletringan, to which he had
requested his friend, Mr. Mervyn, to address his letters, he received
one from that gentleman which contained rather unpleasing intelligence.
We have assumed already the privilege of acting a secretis to this
gentleman, and therefore shall present the reader with an extract from
this epistle.
'I beg your pardon, my dearest friend, for the pain I have given you in
forcing you to open wounds so festering as those your letter referred
to. I have always heard, though erroneously perhaps, that the
attentions of Mr. Brown were intended for Miss Mannering. But, however
that were, it could not be supposed that in your situation his boldness
should escape notice and chastisement. Wise men say that we resign to
civil society our natural rights of self-defence only on condition that
the ordinances of law should protect us. Where the price cannot be
paid, the resignation becomes void. For instance, no one supposes that
I am not entitled to defend my purse and person against a highwayman,
as much as if I were a wild Indian, who owns neither law nor
magistracy. The question of resistance or submission must be determined
by my means and situation. But if, armed and equal in force, I submit
to injustice and violence from any man, high or low, I presume it will
hardly be attributed to religious or moral feeling in me, or in any one
but a Quaker. An aggression on my honour seems to me much the same. The
insult, however trifling in itself, is one of much deeper consequence
to all views in life than any wrong which can be inflicted by a
depredator on the highway, and to redress the injured party is much
less in the power of public jurisprudence, or rather it is entirely
beyond its reach. If any man chooses to rob Arthur Mervyn of the
contents of his purse, supposing the said Arthur has not means of
defence, or the skill and courage to use them, the assizes at Lancaster
or Carlisle will do him justice by tucking up the robber; yet who will
say I am bound to wait for this justice, and submit to being plundered
in the first instance, if I have myself the means and spirit to protect
my own property? But if an affront is offered to me, submission under
which is to tarnish my character for ever with men of honour, and for
which the twelve judges of England, with the chancellor to boot, can
afford me no redress, by what rule of law or reason am I to be deterred
from protecting what ought to be, and is, so infinitely dearer to every
man of honour than his whole fortune? Of the religious views of the
matter I shall say nothing, until I find a reverend divine who shall
condemn self-defence in the article of life and property. If its
propriety in that case be generally admitted, I suppose little
distinction can be drawn between defence of person and goods and
protection of reputation. That the latter is liable to be assailed by
persons of a different rank in life, untainted perhaps in morals, and
fair in character, cannot affect my legal right of self-defence. I may
be sorry that circumstances have engaged me in personal strife with
such an individual; but I should feel the same sorrow for a generous
enemy who fell under my sword in a national quarrel. I shall leave the
question with the casuists, however; only observing, that what I have
written will not avail either the professed duellist or him who is the
aggressor in a dispute of honour. I only presume to exculpate him who
is dragged into the field by such an offence as, submitted to in
patience, would forfeit for ever his rank and estimation in society.
'I am sorry you have thoughts of settling in Scotland, and yet glad
that you will still be at no immeasurable distance, and that the
latitude is all in our favour. To move to Westmoreland from Devonshire
might make an East-Indian shudder; but to come to us from Galloway or
Dumfries-shire is a step, though a short one, nearer the sun. Besides,
if, as I suspect, the estate in view be connected with the old haunted
castle in which you played the astrologer in your northern tour some
twenty years since, I have heard you too often describe the scene with
comic unction to hope you will be deterred from making the purchase. I
trust, however, the hospitable gossiping Laird has not run himself upon
the shallows, and that his chaplain, whom you so often made us laugh
at, is still in rerum natura.
'And here, dear Mannering, I wish I could stop, for I have incredible
pain in telling the rest of my story; although I am sure I can warn you
against any intentional impropriety on the part of my temporary ward,
Julia Mannering. But I must still earn my college nickname of Downright
Dunstable. In one word, then, here is the matter.
'Your daughter has much of the romantic turn of your disposition, with
a little of that love of admiration which all pretty women share less
or more. She will besides, apparently, be your heiress; a trifling
circumstance to those who view Julia with my eyes, but a prevailing
bait to the specious, artful, and worthless. You know how I have jested
with her about her soft melancholy, and lonely walks at morning before
any one is up, and in the moonlight when all should be gone to bed, or
set down to cards, which is the same thing. The incident which follows
may not be beyond the bounds of a joke, but I had rather the jest upon
it came from you than me.
'Two or three times during the last fortnight I heard, at a late hour
in the night or very early in the morning, a flageolet play the little
Hindu tune to which your daughter is so partial. I thought for some
time that some tuneful domestic, whose taste for music was laid under
constraint during the day, chose that silent hour to imitate the
strains which he had caught up by the ear during his attendance in the
drawing-room. But last night I sat late in my study, which is
immediately under Miss Mannering's apartment, and to my surprise I not
only heard the flageolet distinctly, but satisfied myself that it came
from the lake under the window. Curious to know who serenaded us at
that unusual hour, I stole softly to the window of my apartment. But
there were other watchers than me. You may remember, Miss Mannering
preferred that apartment on account of a balcony which opened from her
window upon the lake. Well, sir, I heard the sash of her window thrown
up, the shutters opened, and her own voice in conversation with some
person who answered from below. This is not "Much ado about nothing"; I
could not be mistaken in her voice, and such tones, so soft, so
insinuating; and, to say the truth, the accents from below were in
passion's tenderest cadence too,--but of the sense I can say nothing. I
raised the sash of my own window that I might hear something more than
the mere murmur of this Spanish rendezvous; but, though I used every
precaution, the noise alarmed the speakers; down slid the young lady's
casement, and the shutters were barred in an instant. The dash of a
pair of oars in the water announced the retreat of the male person of
the dialogue. Indeed, I saw his boat, which he rowed with great
swiftness and dexterity, fly across the lake like a twelve-oared barge.
Next morning I examined some of my domestics, as if by accident, and I
found the gamekeeper, when making his rounds, had twice seen that boat
beneath the house, with a single person, and had heard the flageolet. I
did not care to press any farther questions, for fear of implicating
Julia in the opinions of those of whom they might be asked. Next
morning, at breakfast, I dropped a casual hint about the serenade of
the evening before, and I promise you Miss Mannering looked red and
pale alternately. I immediately gave the circumstance such a turn as
might lead her to suppose that my observation was merely casual. I have
since caused a watch-light to be burnt in my library, and have left the
shutters open, to deter the approach of our nocturnal guest; and I have
stated the severity of approaching winter, and the rawness of the fogs,
as an objection to solitary walks. Miss Mannering acquiesced with a
passiveness which is no part of her character, and which, to tell you
the plain truth, is a feature about the business which I like least of
all. Julia has too much of her own dear papa's disposition to be curbed
in any of her humours, were there not some little lurking consciousness
that it may be as prudent to avoid debate.
'Now my story is told, and you will judge what you ought to do. I have
not mentioned the matter to my good woman, who, a faithful secretary to
her sex's foibles, would certainly remonstrate against your being made
acquainted with these particulars, and might, instead, take it into her
head to exercise her own eloquence on Miss Mannering; a faculty which,
however powerful when directed against me, its legitimate object,
might, I fear, do more harm than good in the case supposed. Perhaps
even you yourself will find it most prudent to act without
remonstrating, or appearing to be aware of this little anecdote. Julia
is very like a certain friend of mine; she has a quick and lively
imagination, and keen feelings, which are apt to exaggerate both the
good and evil they find in life. She is a charming girl, however, as
generous and spirited as she is lovely. I paid her the kiss you sent
her with all my heart, and she rapped my ringers for my reward with all
hers. Pray return as soon as you can. Meantime rely upon the care of,
yours faithfully, 'ARTHUR MERVYN.
'P.S.--You will naturally wish to know if I have the least guess
concerning the person of the serenader. In truth, I have none. There is
no young gentleman of these parts, who might be in rank or fortune a
match for Miss Julia, that I think at all likely to play such a
character. But on the other side of the lake, nearly opposite to Mervyn
Hall, is a d--d cake-house, the resort of walking gentlemen of all
descriptions--poets, players, painters, musicians--who come to rave,
and recite, and madden about this picturesque land of ours. It is
paying some penalty for its beauties, that they are the means of
drawing this swarm of coxcombs together. But were Julia my daughter, it
is one of those sort of fellows that I should fear on her account. She
is generous and romantic, and writes six sheets a week to a female
correspondent; and it's a sad thing to lack a subject in such a case,
either for exercise of the feelings or of the pen. Adieu, once more.
Were I to treat this matter more seriously than I have done, I should
do injustice to your feelings; were I altogether to overlook it, I
should discredit my own.'
The consequence of this letter was, that, having first despatched the
faithless messenger with the necessary powers to Mr. Mac-Morlan for
purchasing the estate of Ellangowan, Colonel Mannering turned his
horse's head in a more southerly direction, and neither 'stinted nor
staid' until he arrived at the mansion of his friend Mr. Mervyn, upon
the banks of one of the lakes of Westmoreland.