What was she driving at?
"I assure you, Miss Pimpernell," I said with all the earnestness which
the circumstances really warranted, "that I have not behaved in any way,
to my knowledge, of which you might be ashamed for my sake. I came in
this evening to ask your sympathy; and, here, you accuse me like this,
without waiting to hear a word I have to say! Miss Pimpernell, you are
unjust to me. I will go."
And I made as if to leave the room in a huff.
"Stop, Frank," said the dear little old lady, rising to her feet, and
speaking to me again with something of her old cordial manner--"You
speak candidly; and I've always known you to tell the truth, so I won't
doubt you now. Perhaps things have only got into a muddle after all.
Let me see if I cannot get to the bottom of it, and set them straight
for you! You will not deny, I suppose, Frank, that up to a short time
since you've been in the habit of paying a good deal of attention to
Minnie Clyde?"
"Miss Clyde is nothing to me now!" I said grandly: I did not deceive
her, however, nor turn her from her purpose.
"Wait a minute, my boy, and hear me out. You won't deny that you have
been what you call `spoony,' in your abominable slang, eh, Frank?" she
repeated, with a knowing glance from her beady black eyes.
"Pay her attention, Miss Pimpernell," I said impetuously. "Good
heavens! Why, at one time I would have died for her, and let my body be
cut into little pieces, if it would only have done her any good!"
"Softly, Frank," responded the old lady. "I don't think that _would_
have done her any good, or you either, for that matter! But, why have
you changed towards her, Frank? I never thought you so false and
fickle, my boy. She came in here to see me to-day, looking very excited
and unhappy; and when she had sat down--there, in that very chair you
are now sitting in," continued Miss Pimpernell, emphasising her words by
pointing to the corner I occupied, "and I asked her soothingly what
distressed her, she burst into tears, and sobbed as if her little heart
would break. I declare, my boy," said the warm-hearted little body,
with a husky cough, "I almost cried myself in company. However, I got
it all out of her afterwards. It seems to me, Frank, that you have
behaved very unkindly to her. She thought she had offended you in some
way of which she declared that she was perfectly ignorant: she had asked
you, she said, but you would not tell her--treating her as if she were a
perfect stranger. She's a sensitive girl, Frank, and you have hurt her
feelings to the quick! Now, what is the reason of this--do you care for
her still?"
"Care for her! Miss Pimpernell," I said. "Why I love her--although I
did not intend telling you yet."
"As if I didn't know all about that already," said the old lady,
laughing cheerily. "Oh, you lovers, you lovers! You are just for all
the world like a herd of wild ostriches, that stick their heads in the
bush, and fancy that they are completely concealed from observation!
All of you imagine, that, because you do not take people into your
confidence, they are as blind as you are! Can't they see all that is
going on well enough; don't your very looks, much less your actions,
betray you? Why, Frank, I knew all about your case weeks ago, my boy!--
without any information from you or anybody else! Besides, you know, I
_ought_ to have some _little_ experience in such matters by this time;
for, every boy and girl in the parish has made me their confidante for
years and years past!" and she laughed again.
Miss Pimpernell was once more her cheery old self, quite restored to her
normal condition of good humour.
No one, I believe, ever saw her "put out" for more than five minutes
consecutively at the outside; and very seldom for so long, at that.
"Ah!" I ejaculated with a deep sigh, "I wish I had told you before.
Now, it is too late!"
"Too late!" she rejoined, briskly. "Too late! Nonsense; it's `never
too late to mend.'"
"It is in some cases," I said, as mournfully as Lady Dasher could have
spoken; "and this is one of them!"
It was all over, I thought, so, why talk about it any more? What was
done couldn't be helped!
"Rubbish!" replied Miss Pimpernell; "you've had a tiff with her, and
think you have parted for ever! You see, I know all about it without
your telling me. You lovers are ever quarrelling and making up again;
though, how you manage it, I can't think. But, Frank, there must always
be two to make a quarrel, and Minnie Clyde does not seem to have been
one to yours. Tell me why you have altered so towards her; and, let us
see whether old Sally cannot mend matters for you."
She looked at me so kindly that I made a clean breast of all my
troubles.
"Well, Frank!" she exclaimed, when I had got to the end of my story,
"you are a big stupid, in spite of all your cleverness! You are not a
bit sharper than the rest of your sex:--a woman has twice the insight of
any of you lords of creation! Did I not tell you, not to believe that
absurd story about Mr Mawley long ago--that it was only a silly tale of
Shuffler's, and not worth a moment's credence? But, you wouldn't
believe me; and, here you have been knocking your head against a wall
just on account of that cock-and-a-bull-story, and nothing else! Ah,
you lovers will never learn common sense! If it wasn't for us old
ladies, you would get into such fine scrapes that you would never get
out of them, I can tell you!"
"And you are sure it is not true, Miss Pimpernell?" I asked,
imploringly.
"Certainly, Frank. Where are your eyes? You are as blind as a mole, my
boy."
"O, Miss Pimpernell!" I exclaimed, in remorse at my hasty conduct,
"what shall I do to make my peace once more with her? She will never
speak to me again, I know, unless you intercede for me, and tell her how
the misunderstanding arose."
"You have been very foolish, Frank," said my kind old friend; "but I
will try what I can do for you. You ought to have known that she did
not care for Mr Mawley--not in the way you mean; and, as for marrying
him, why, the curate himself does not dream of such a thing. I cannot
imagine how you could have been so blind!"
"But you _will_ help me, Miss Pimpernell, won't you?" I entreated.
"Well, my boy, I will tell Minnie what you have just told me about your
delusion, and say that you are very sorry for having treated her so
badly."
"And tell her," I interposed, "that she's dearer to me than ever."
"I will do nothing of the sort," hastily replied the old lady. "I am
not going to give Miss Spight another chance of calling me `a wretched
old match-maker,' as she did once! No, Master Frank, you must do all
your love-making yourself, my boy. I did not tell you that Minnie cares
for you, you know; and, I can't say whether she does, or no. She's only
very unhappy at your considering her no longer in the light of a friend,
and has said nothing to lead me to imagine anything more than that. She
would not have spoken to me at all about it, I'm confident, if she had
not happened to have seen you only a moment before, and had her
sensitive little heart wounded by your coldness! Why don't you tell her
yourself, Frank, what you wish me to say for you?"
"So I would, Miss Pimpernell, at once," I replied, "if I only had an
opportunity; but I never get a chance of seeing her alone."
"Why don't you make one, Frank?" said she. "For a young fellow of the
day, you are wonderfully bashful and shy, not to be able to tell the
girl of your heart that you love her! I declare, if I had only done
what they wanted me, I would have proposed for half of the wives of the
present married men of my acquaintance! When I was a girl, gentlemen
seemed to have twice the ardour about them that they have now! You are
all, now-a-days, like a pack of boarding-school misses, and have to be
as tenderly coaxed on into proposing, as if _you_ were the wooed and not
the wooers. You don't understand what ladies like," continued the old
lady, who, like most elderly maidens, had a strong spice of the romantic
in her composition; "they prefer having their affections taken by
assault instead of all this shilly-shallying and faint-heartedness. If
I had had my choice, when I thought, as girls will think, of such
things, I would have liked my lover to carry me off like those gallant
knights did in the good old days that we read of!"
"And had him prosecuted for abduction," said I, laughing at her
enthusiasm.
"Well, well, Frank," she said, laughing too, "I don't mean to advise you
to go to that extent; yet, you might easily find an opportunity to speak
to Minnie Clyde, if you only set your wits to work. There's the school
treat on Thursday, won't that do for you?"
"Really," I replied, "I never thought of that, Miss Pimpernell; indeed I
had made up my mind not to go; and--"
"Why shouldn't you?" said the energetic little old lady, interrupting
me. "What better chance could you have, I should like to know--a nice
long day in the country, a picnic excursion, a pleasant party, with lots
of openings for private conversation? Dear me, Frank, you are not half
a lover! If I were a handsome young fellow like you, I would soon cut
you out, my boy! Only be bold and speak out to her. Girls like
boldness. I wouldn't have given twopence for a bashful man when I was
young."
"So I will, Miss Pimpernell," said I, carried away by her energy and
enthusiasm; "I will go to the school treat--that is, if you will only
kindly see _Miss Clyde_ for me"--I was rather diffident of letting Miss
Pimpernell know of the friendly footing we had been on, regarding
Christian nomenclature--"beforehand, and get her to forgive me. You
will, won't you, dear Miss Pimpernell?"
"None of your soft-sawder, Master Frank," replied the old lady; "I will
do what I can to make your peace, as I promised; but, as to anything
further, you must be a man, and speak up for yourself."
"I will, you may rely," I said, determined to bring matters to an issue
ere the week should close.
Before Thursday came, however, I knew that Miss Pimpernell had kept her
word in interceding for me, and that Min had quite forgiven me.
She was "friends with me once more," I was assured; for, when I passed
her window the next evening, in fear and trembling lest she should still
be hostile and not recognise me, she bowed and smiled to me in her own
old sweet way, as she used to do before my fit of jealousy and our
consequent estrangement.
Oh! how ardently I looked forwards to the approaching school treat. I
was then resolved to learn whether she loved me or no. "Faint heart
never won fair lady," as Miss Pimpernell had told me; I would deserve
her reproach no longer.
Thursday arrived at length, and with it the school treat.
This summer "outing" had been an institution of annual celebration by
our vicar long before it became a habit of London clergymen to send
columns of appeals to the benevolent in the daily papers to assist the
poor children of their respective congregations towards having "a day's
pleasuring in the country."
Our vicar, however, was not one of those who thus "passed round the hat"
to strange laity! No, he made _his_ institution entirely a self-
supporting one; and his school-children had the additional pleasure of
knowing, that, they assisted in paying for their treat themselves,
earning it in advance, with no thanks to "charity," or strangers, all
the same.
For some two months beforehand, the little ones used to deposit a weekly
penny for this special purpose; and, when their contributions were
thought to nearly amount to a shilling each, the fund was held
sufficient to carry out the long-looked-for treat--although, of course,
the vicar and other kindly-disposed persons would largely help to make
the affair go off with the eclat and dignity suited to the occasion, all
of which resulted in its being turned into a general picnic for the
parish.
The anniversary of the fete this year, was celebrated with even grander
effect than any former ones had been, imposing and satisfactory though
they were held at the time to be. Richmond Park was the scene of our
festivities; and, not only had the vicar caused to be provided a couple
of roomy four-horse omnibuses, the leading one of which sported a band,
to accommodate the rank and file of the juveniles under the escort of
such of their mothers as could spare the time to accompany them; but,
those children who had particularly distinguished themselves during the
year for good conduct, were permitted to go in the gondola, in which we
oldsters proceeded, to the same destination by water. It was arranged
that the "'buses" should meet us at Richmond, where both descriptions of
conveyances were to disgorge their motley contents; and, the several and
hitherto-severed parties, joining issue, would set about making as
pleasant a day of it as could be effected under the circumstances.
A "gondola" seems at first sight an anachronism on the Thames; still, on
mature reflection, there does not appear to be any reason why we should
not indulge in this respect equally as well as the inhabitants of much-
idealised dirty Venice.
Whether you agree with me or not, however, I can tell you that there
_are_ gondolas to be seen on our great watery highway--heavy barges,
with bluff bows and fictitious awnings and problematical cushions, that
may be had on hire for the asking, at most of the principal boating
places along the banks from Chelsea to Chiswick.
On first starting, one missed the many romantic associations with which
the name of our floating vehicle was generally connected; yet,
suggestive fancy could readily supply their place with kindred ideas
culled from our more prosaic surroundings. We had, it is true, no
crimson-sashed, ragged, ballet-costumed gondolier to "ply the measured
oar;" because, in the first instance, we did not row up at all. We were
a trifle too wise in our generation to pull up the river in a lumbering
barge under a broiling sun, and fancy we were amusing ourselves! No, we
had a horse and a tow-rope; and, went on our way gaily without exertion!
Just you volunteer, for once, to row an excursion party up to
Richmond:--you'll enjoy it, I promise you! It is regular treadmill
work; see, if you won't afterwards think our plan the best, and adopt
it, too, or I'm no prophet, that's all!
Our gondolier "was not;" but the mounted jockey who bestrode our towing
horse _was_; and, in lieu of waking the echoes with choice extracts from
Tasso in the liquid Venesian or harsh, gritty Tuscan dialect, _he_
occasionally beguiled his monotonous jog-trot with a plaintive ballad,
in which he rehearsed the charms of a certain "Pretty little Sarah;" or
else, "made the welkin ring"--though what a "welkin" is, I have never
yet been able to discover--with repeated injunctions to his somewhat
lazy steed to "gee whup" and "gee wo!"
We had no "Bridge of Sighs," to pursue the parallel, where the roving
eye might detect "a palace and a prison on either hand;" but, in its
stead, we could gaze at the festooned chains of Hammersmith Suspension
Bridge in all its simple beauty, and see the Soapworks and the Mall on
the hither and further shore. Our course led, not through serpentine
canals and past Doges' palaces, gaudy with the lavish adornments of
tricky Byzantine architecture; nor could we expect to see "lions" as
historical as those which ornament the facade of Saint Mark's. However,
as we glided up against the tide, in slow but steady progress, by
willowy banks and osiered eyots, our boat yawning in and out and
requiring a stiff weather helm to keep her course, we often caught
glimpses of ivy-wreathed churches, charming villa residences and gothic
summer-houses, peeping out from amidst the river-lining trees--with a
verdant meadow here and there to break the view, its smoothly-mown
surface sweeping down to the water's edge; while, we knew, also, that
the stream which bore us on its bosom flowed over stakes and hurdles
that our indigo-dyed ancestors, the ancient Britons, had planted in its
bed, long before Caesar's conquering legions crossed the channel, or
Venice possessed "a local habitation and a name."
You may say, probably, that all this is a regular rigmarole of nonsense;
but, what else would you have?
It was a nice, beautiful, hot summer day, as our gondola glided on
Richmondwards.
We were a merry party, all in all, passing the time with genial and
general conversation--and, occasionally, graver talk--as the mood suited
us. The cheerful voices of the children, who were packed as tightly as
herrings in a barrel in the bows of our craft, and their happy laughter,
chimed in with the wash of the tide as it swept by the sides of our
gallant barque, hurrying down to meet the flood at Gravesend. The larks
were singing madly in the blue sky overhead. Each and all completed the
harmony of the scene, affording us enjoyment in turn.
Disgusted apparently with our merriment and frivolity, Miss Spight,
shortly after we started, introduced a polemical discussion.
"My dear sir," said she to the vicar, our captain and coxswain in chief,
who stately sat in the sternsheets of the gondola, "don't you think
Romanism is getting very rife in the parish? They are building a new
nunnery, I hear, in the main road; and they are going to set about a
chapel, too, I'm told."
"That won't hurt us," said the vicar, sententiously. He disliked
sectarian disputes excessively, and always avoided them if he could.
"But, don't you think," persisted Miss Spight, "that we ought to prevent
this in some way?"
"I was going to speak to you on the very point to-day, sir," said Mr
Mawley, before the vicar could answer. "Had we not better have a course
of controversial lectures, each giving one in turn?"
"No, Mawley," replied the vicar, "since I have had the living, I have
never yet permitted sectarian disputations to have a place in my pulpit;
and, never will I do so as long as I live! We were instructed to preach
the Gospel by our Saviour, not to wage war against this or that creed;
and the Gospel is one of peace and love. Don't you remember how Saint
John, when he was upwards of fourscore years, continually taught this by
his constant text, `Little children, love one another?' Let us allow
men to judge us by our works. The labour of Protestantism will not be
accomplished by the pharisaical mode of priding ourselves on our faith,
and damning that of every one else! Our mission is to preach the Gospel
pure and simple. Too much time, too much money, too much of true
religion is wasted, in our common custom of trying to proselytise
others! We should look at home first, Mawley."
"Still, sir," said the curate, "it is surely our mission to convert the
heathen?"
"I do not argue against that," said the vicar. "God forbid that I
should! But what I say is, that we are too apt, in seeking for foreign
fields, to neglect the duty that lies nearer to us at home."
"It is a noble work, converting the heathen, though," said Miss Spight.
"That's just what I mean," responded our pastor. "All young minds are
impressed with this romantic view of religion. It appears much nobler
to go abroad as a missionary to the burning deserts of Africa, and to
run the risk of being eaten up by cannibals, to working in this
benighted land of ours, which needs conversion just as much as the
negroes and Hindoos! But, there's no romance about visiting dirty
alleys in London!"
"There are the Scripture readers and district visitors, are there not?"
said Mr Mawley.
"True," replied the vicar, "and I would be the last to disparage their
earnest efforts. What I meant was, that, while we give hundreds of
pounds to foreign missions, pence are grudged for home work! There's
the Society for the Conversion of the Jews, for instance, to which I
have sometimes to give up my pulpit. Now, I dare say, it is a very
meritorious society, but how many Jews does it gain over really to
Christianity in return for the large sums that its travelling
secretaries collect every year?"
"These travelling secretaries," said I, "are what the _Saturday Review_
would call `spiritual bagmen,' or `commercial travellers in the
missionary line.'"
"And not very far out, either," said the vicar, smiling. "They are paid
a salary, at all events, if they do not get a commission, to beg as much
money as they can for the society to which they belong; and they do
their work well, too! They succeed in carrying off an amount of money
from poor parishes, which if laid out in the places where it is
garnered, instead of being devoted to alien expenditure, would do far
more good, and better advance the work of the Gospel than the conversion
of a few renegade Jews, whose reclamation is, in the majority of cases,
but a farce!"
"But, my dear sir!"--exclaimed Mr Mawley, completely shocked at this
overturning of all his prejudices.
"Hear me out," continued the vicar; "you must not misunderstand me. I'm
not opposed to the principles of missions; but, to their being promoted
to the disregard of all other considerations. Saint Paul says that we
should do good to all, and especially to such as are `of the household
of faith.' Our missionary societies never seem to consider this. The
endless number of charity sermons that we have to preach for their aid,
not only extracts too much of what should be spent for the benefit of
our own special communities, but militates against our getting
contributions to other works of greater utility. Our congregations
become so deadened by _these_ repeated onslaughts on their benevolence,
that they button up their pockets and respond in only a half-hearted way
when we claim their assistance for _our own_ poor and parish. Let us, I
say, look at home first, and reclaim the lost, the fallen, the destitute
in our streets; let us convert our own `heathen,'--our murderers, our
drunkards, our wife-beaters, our thieves, our adulterers; and, _then_,
let us talk of converting Hindoos and regenerating the Jews! Our duty,
Mawley, as I hold my commission, is to preach Christ's gospel in all its
truth and simplicity and love. We do not want to run down this or that
creed, however reprehensible we may think it. Let us be judged by our
deeds, and acts, and words. Let us show forth _our_ way of salvation,
as we have learnt it: another authority, greater than us, will tell the
world in his own good time which is _the_ faith!"
A short pause ensued, after the vicar had thus spoken; none of us cared,
for the moment, to pass on to the empty nothings of every-day talk.
Seraphine Dasher was the first to break the silence.
Seeing that Miss Spight had turned to address Monsieur Parole d'Honneur,
who sat by her side, the good-natured Frenchman having accompanied us,
to "assist at the fete" of his friend, "the good vicaire," as he said,
the wicked little seraph created a diversion.
"Gracious, Miss Spight," she exclaimed, "how you are flirting!"
The indignation of the austere virgin, and the warmth with which she
repelled this accusation, caused us all so much amusement, that in
another moment or two we were in the full swing again of our ordinary
chatter.
As we passed under Barnes railway bridge, where the tide was rushing
through the arches with all the pent-up waters of the reach beyond, Min,
who had been hitherto apparently distrait, like myself, not having
spoken, observed, that, the sight of a river flowing along always made
her feel reflective and sad.
"It recalls to my mind," said she, "those lines of Longfellow's, from
the _Coplas de Manrique_.
"`Our lives are rivers, gliding free,
To that unfathom'd boundless sea,
The silent grave!
Thither all earthly pomp and boast
Roll, to be swallowed up and lost
In one dark wave.'"
"I prefer," said I, "Tennyson's _Brook_. Our laureate's description of
a moving river is not so sombre as that of the American poet; and,
besides, has more life and action about it."
"How many different poets have sung the praises of the Thames," said
Miss Pimpernell. "I suppose more poetry,--good, bad, and indifferent--
has been written about it, than for all the other rivers of the world
combined."
"You are right, my dear," said the vicar; "more, by a good deal! The
Jordan has been distinguished in Holy Writ especially; Horner has
celebrated the Xanthus and Simois, and Horace the tawny Tiber; the
rivers of Spain have been painted by Calderon, Lope de Vega and Aldana;
the Rhine and its legends sang of by Uhland and Goethe and Schiller--not
to speak of the fabled Nile, as it was in the days of Sesostris, when
Herodotus wrote of it; and the Danube, the Po, and the Arno,--all rivers
of the old world, that have been described by a thousand poets. But,
above all these, the Thames has furnished a more frequent theme, and for
great poets, too! Every aspirant for the immortal bays has tried his
'prentice hand on it, from Chaucer, in excelsis, down to the poet Close
at the foot of the Parnassian ladder!
"We were talking of the Thames," continued the vicar, pouring out a
flood of archaeological reminiscences--"The great reason why it is so
suggestive, beyond the great practical fact that it is the silent
highway of the fleets of nations, is, that it is also indissolubly bound
up, as well, with by-gone memories of people that have lived and died,
to the glory and disgrace of history--of places whose bare names we
cherish and love! Every step, almost, along its banks is sacred to some
noble name. `Stat magno nominis umbra' should be its motto. Strawberry
Hill reminds you of witty, keen-sighted Horace Walpole, and his
gossiping chit-chat concerning wrangling princes, feeble-minded
ministers, and all the other imbecilities of the last century.
Twickenham brings back to one, bitter-tongued Pope, his distorted body
and waspish mind. Richmond Hill recalls the Earl of Chatham in his
enforced retirement, his gout, and the memorable theatrical speech he
made on the floor of the House of Lords, at the time of our greatest
national triumph and exertion, that closed his public life. Further up
the stream, we come to old Windsor Castle, to be reminded of bluff
Bluebeard, bigamous, wicked, king Hal; higher still, we are at Oxford,
the nursery of our Church, the `alma mater' of our learning. Lower
down, at Whitehall stairs, we are face to face again with Roundheads,
and regicides, and gunpowder plots; lower still, and we are at the
Tower, with its cruel tyrannies and beheadings of traitors and patriots;
and then, we find ourselves amidst a sea of masts which bear the English
flag to the uttermost parts of the earth. No wonder our river has been
so poetical:--it has deserved it! But, really, if all the poems that
have been written in its honour could be collected in one volume, what a
prodigious tome it would be!--what a medley of versification it would
present!"
"Sure you've forgotten the Shannon entirely," observed Lady Dasher in
her plaintive way.
She was certainly waking up from her normal melancholic condition; for,
before this, she had been seen to smile--a phenomenon never noticed in
her before by her oldest acquaintance.
"You have quite forgotten the Shannon! My poor dear papa, when he was
alive, used to say that it was the finest river in the world. I
remember he had a favourite song about it--I don't know if I quite
recollect it now, but, I'll try."
"Do, Lady Dasher, do," said Mr Mawley, who, having been paying great
attention to Bessie the while, wished, I suppose, to ingratiate himself
with her mother.
"I must put on the brogue, you know," said she, looking round with an
affectation of shyness, which was most incongruous on her melancholy
visage; it was just like a death's head trying to grin, I thought to
myself;--and then, she commenced, in a thin, quavering voice, the lay of
the departed earl, her "poor dear papa."
"`O! Limerick is be-yewtifool, as iveryba-ady knows,
And round about the city walls the reever Shannon flows;
But 'tis not the reever, nor the feesh, that preys upon my mind,
Nor, with the town of Limerick have I any fault to find!'"
"Ah! Very nice indeed! Thank you, Lady Dasher, thank you!" said the
vicar, when she had got thus far, and succeeded in arresting the
progress of her ladyship's melody; otherwise, she might have gone on the
live-long summer day with the halting ditty, for it consisted, as she
subsequently told us, of no less than five-and-forty verses, all in the
same pleasant strain!
"I don't think," said I, to change the conversation, "that poetry is
nearly as highly regarded in the present day, as it was some forty years
back or so--if one may judge by the biographies of literary men of that
time."
"But, it sells more readily," said Mr Mawley; "not only do fresh
debutantes appear, but new editions of the old poets come out daily."
"That may be," said I. "But they are not nearly so highly appreciated.
I suppose it is because poetry is not so much a rarity now. We have so
many mediocre poets, that our taste is more exigent. I dare say, if a
very bright, particular star should arise, we would honour him; but we
have no bright particular star; and, thus, we learn to read poetry
without reflection. Forty years ago, people used to talk over the last
production of the muse, and canvas its merits in coffee-rooms all over
the town; now, we only dash through it, as we would take up the last new
novel, or the evening paper, thinking no more about it!"
"When I was younger," said Miss Spight--she didn't say when she was
"young," mark you--"no young gentlewoman's education would have been
thought complete without a course of the best poets, such as Milton's
_Paradise Lost_."
"Which nine out of ten of the people who speak about it now, never
read," said I--and, Miss Spight did not reply.
"What queer people poets are, generally speaking," said Mr Mawley.
"Do you think so?" said I.
"Yes, I do," he replied. "I would divide poets into three great
classes, which I would call respectively the enthusiastic school, the
water-cart school, and the horse-going-round-in-the-mill school."
"O-oh, Mr Mawley!" exclaimed Bessie Dasher, in the unmeaning manner
common to young ladies, in lieu of saying anything, when they have got
nothing to say: the exclamation expressing either astonishment, horror,
alarm, or rebuke, as the case may require.
"Instance, instance! Name, name!" said I, keeping the curate up to the
mark.
"Well, I will give you Horner, and Dante, Goethe, Byron, and, perhaps,
Tennyson, from which to take your choice amongst those whom I call the
enthusiastic school; Mrs Hemans, and others of her tearful race, in the
second; and, in the third order, the majority of those who have spoilt
good ink and paper, from Dryden down to Martin F Tupper."
"What, no exceptions; not even my favourite Longfellow?" asked Min.
"No," said Mr Mawley, "not one--although Longfellow belongs more by
rights to the water-cart line. The fact is," continued he, fairly
started on his hobby, "that Pegasus, the charger of Mount Parnassus, is
a most eccentric animal, who can be made to metamorphose himself so
completely according to the skill and ability or weakness of his rider,
that even Apollo would not recognise him sometimes! When backed by an
intrepid spirit, like the grand heroic poets, Pegasus is the stately
war-horse eager for the fray, and sniffing the battle from afar; or
else, controlled by the nervous reins of genius like that of Shelley and
Coleridge, he appears as the high-mettled racer, pure-blooded and
finely-trained, who may win some great race, but is unfit for any
ordinary work; or, again, when ridden by a Wordsworth, he plods along
wearily, with lack-lustre eyes, dragging a heavy load, such as _The
Excursion_, behind him!"
What the curate might have said further was lost to his hearers. Just
at this moment, on turning a bend of the river, the pretty little low-
arched bridge that spans it in front of Richmond came in sight; seeing
which, the children raised such a shout of joy in the bows of the
gondola, that our conversation shunted into a fresh channel, while our
teamster, urging his horse by a multitude of "gee wo's," into a brisk
trot, tightened our tow-rope and led us up in fine style to our goal.
A short distance from the landing-place under the bridge, we found the
detachments that had gone by road, awaiting us. Joining company, we
proceeded together to the park, and set about our picnic in the usual
harum-scarum fashion, chasing truant children, losing one another,
finding one another, making merry over the most dire mishaps, and
enjoying the whole thing hugely--elders, juveniles, and all--from
beginning to end.
The vicar made a perfect boy of himself. With a charming gleefulness,
he did the most outrageous things--at which Master Adolphus, aetat
twelve, would have turned up his nose, as being much beneath his years
and dignity. He said he did it only to amuse the children; but, he took
such an active part in the games he instituted, that we declared that he
joined in them for his own personal gratification.
Monsieur Parole d'Honneur, too, who was the gayest of the gay, specially
distinguished himself for his vaulting powers in a sport which he
entitled in his broken English manner "ze leap of ze frog;" and, as for
grave Doctor Batson, whom we all thought so formal and dignified in his
professional tether, why, the way in which he "stuck in his twopenny,"
as the boys said, and "gave a `back,'" was a caution to the lookers-on!
Then we had a substantial "soldier's tea" in and around a little cottage
conveniently-situated close to the park:--there, we boiled our kettles,
and brewed great jorums of straw-coloured water, at the sight of which a
Chinaman would have been filled with horror, impregnated as it was with
the taste of new tin and the flavour of moist brown sugar and milk. The
children enjoyed it, however, in conjunction with clothes baskets full
of sliced bread-and-butter, and buns and cake galore:-- so, our main
consideration was satisfied.
The whole thing passed off well, the only mishap, throughout the day,
arising from Horner having filled Miss Spight's galoshes with hot tea;
but, as she did not happen to be wearing them at the time, the accident
was not of much consequence, although she soundly rated the young
gentleman for his awkwardness.
Everybody, too, was satisfied--the vicar and Miss Pimpernell, at the
success of the treat and the pleasure of the school-children; the
churchwardens, that the expenses did not come out of their pockets; Lady
Dasher, at Mr Mawley's attentions to her daughter, which she really
thought "quite marked;" and the rest of us, more youthful members of the
parish gathering, at the general delightfulness of the day's outing--the
excursion by water, the picnic in the park, the gipsying, the fresh
breeze, the bright sun, the everything!
I was happy, too, although I had not yet had a chance of speaking to Min
privately--in the boat there were more listeners near than I cared for,
and on shore she was too busy entertaining a small crowd of toddlekins,
for whose delectation she told deeply-involved fairy stories, and wove
unlimited daisy-chains of intricate patterns and simple workmanship.
Still, I knew that before night closed, I should have the wished-for
opportunity of telling my tale; and, in the meantime, I was quite
contented to sit near her, and hear her sweet voice, and be certain that
she did not care for Mr Mawley after all!
The day could not pass, however, without the curate and I having our
customary spar; and it happened in this wise.
On our way down to the gondola, after packing up the omnibus contingent
of juveniles safely, in company with their mothers and a hecatomb of
emptied baskets, and seeing the party off with a parting cheer from both
sides, Miss Spight amiably suggested that she thought it was going to
rain; at which, of course, there arose a general outcry.
"Dear me," said Miss Pimpernell, "I believe you are right, for, there
are the midges dancing, too! I hope none of you girls will get your new
bonnets spoilt! But, you needn't be alarmed, my dears," she added to
reassure us, "it is certain not to come down before morning, if you will
take an old woman's word for it."
"You may believe Sally, and set your minds at ease," said the vicar.
"She's a rare judge of the weather, and as good as a farmer or sailor in
that respect."
"Are the midges a sign of rain?" asked Min; "I never heard that before."
"Yes, my dear," said Miss Pimpernell, seating herself in the gondola,
which we had now reached. "They always dance about twelve hours or so
before it rains."
"Are there not some other signs given by animals, also, when there is
going to be a change in the weather?" asked Bessie Dasher.
"Yes," said Mr Mawley, anxious, as usual, to show off his erudition,
"cows low, swallows fly near the ground, sheep bleat, and--"
"Asses bray," said I, with emphasis.
"So I hear," said he quickly. The curate was getting sharper than ever.
"Ah," said I, "_that_ is only a `tu quoque!'"
"What is that?" asked Bessie Dasher, thinking I was making use of some
term of virulent abuse, I verily believe.
"Oh!" said Mr Mawley, who was in high feather at having retorted my cut
so brilliantly, "it is only a polite way of saying `you're another,' an
expression which I dare say you have often heard vulgar little boys in
the street make use of. I say, Lorton," he added, addressing me, "I
think that's one to me, eh?"
"All right," said I, "score it up, if you like."
And, we started down the stream homeward bound.