“I am making a little excursion from the Engadine, my dearest of all
dear friends. Two charming fellow-travelers take care of me; and we may
perhaps get as far as the Lake of Como.
“My sister (already much improved in health) remains at St. Moritz with
the old governess. The moment I know what exact course we are going to
take, I shall write to Julia to forward any letters which arrive in my
absence. My life, in this earthly paradise, will be only complete when I
hear from my darling Emily.
“In the meantime, we are staying for the night at some interesting
place, the name of which I have unaccountably forgotten; and here I am
in my room, writing to you at last--dying to know if Sir Jervis has yet
thrown himself at your feet, and offered to make you Lady Redwood with
magnificent settlements.
“But you are waiting to hear who my new friends are. My dear, one of
them is, next to yourself, the most delightful creature in existence.
Society knows her as Lady Janeaway. I love her already, by her Christian
name; she is my friend Doris. And she reciprocates my sentiments.
“You will now understand that union of sympathies made us acquainted
with each other.
“If there is anything in me to be proud of, I think it must be my
admirable appetite. And, if I have a passion, the name of it is Pastry.
Here again, Lady Doris reciprocates my sentiments. We sit next to each
other at the _table d’hote_.
“Good heavens, I have forgotten her husband! They have been married
rather more than a month. Did I tell you that she is just two years
older than I am?
“I declare I am forgetting him again! He is Lord Janeaway. Such a quiet
modest man, and so easily amused. He carries with him everywhere a dirty
little tin case, with air holes in the cover. He goes softly poking
about among bushes and brambles, and under rocks, and behind old wooden
houses. When he has caught some hideous insect that makes one shudder,
he blushes with pleasure, and looks at his wife and me, and says, with
the prettiest lisp: ‘This is what I call enjoying the day.’ To see the
manner in which he obeys Her is, between ourselves, to feel proud of
being a woman.
“Where was I? Oh, at the _table d’hote_.
“Never, Emily--I say it with a solemn sense of the claims of
truth--never have I eaten such an infamous, abominable, maddeningly bad
dinner, as the dinner they gave us on our first day at the hotel. I ask
you if I am not patient; I appeal to your own recollection of occasions
when I have exhibited extraordinary self-control. My dear, I held out
until they brought the pastry round. I took one bite, and committed
the most shocking offense against good manners at table that you can
imagine. My handkerchief, my poor innocent handkerchief, received the
horrid--please suppose the rest. My hair stands on end, when I think of
it. Our neighbors at the table saw me. The coarse men laughed. The sweet
young bride, sincerely feeling for me, said, ‘Will you allow me to shake
hands? I did exactly what you have done the day before yesterday.’ Such
was the beginning of my friendship with Lady Doris Janeaway.
“We are two resolute women--I mean that _she_ is resolute, and that
I follow her--and we have asserted our right of dining to our own
satisfaction, by means of an interview with the chief cook.
“This interesting person is an ex-Zouave in the French army. Instead of
making excuses, he confessed that the barbarous tastes of the English
and American visitors had so discouraged him, that he had lost all pride
and pleasure in the exercise of his art. As an example of what he meant,
he mentioned his experience of two young Englishmen who could speak
no foreign language. The waiters reported that they objected to their
breakfasts, and especially to the eggs. Thereupon (to translate the
Frenchman’s own way of putting it) he exhausted himself in exquisite
preparations of eggs. _Eggs a la tripe, au gratin, a l’Aurore, a
la Dauphine, a la Poulette, a la Tartare, a la Venitienne, a la
Bordelaise_, and so on, and so on. Still the two young gentlemen
were not satisfied. The ex-Zouave, infuriated; wounded in his honor,
disgraced as a professor, insisted on an explanation. What, in heaven’s
name, _did_ they want for breakfast? They wanted boiled eggs; and a fish
which they called a _Bloaterre_. It was impossible, he said, to express
his contempt for the English idea of a breakfast, in the presence
of ladies. You know how a cat expresses herself in the presence of a
dog--and you will understand the allusion. Oh, Emily, what dinners we
have had, in our own room, since we spoke to that noble cook!
“Have I any more news to send you? Are you interested, my dear, in
eloquent young clergymen?
“On our first appearance at the public table we noticed a remarkable air
of depression among the ladies. Had some adventurous gentleman tried to
climb a mountain, and failed? Had disastrous political news arrived from
England; a defeat of the Conservatives, for instance? Had a revolution
in the fashions broken out in Paris, and had all our best dresses become
of no earthly value to us? I applied for information to the only lady
present who shone on the company with a cheerful face--my friend Doris,
of course. “‘What day was yesterday?’ she asked.
“‘Sunday,’ I answered.
“‘Of all melancholy Sundays,’ she continued, the most melancholy in
the calendar. Mr. Miles Mirabel preached his farewell sermon, in our
temporary chapel upstairs.’
“‘And you have not recovered it yet?’
“‘We are all heart-broken, Miss Wyvil.’
“This naturally interested me. I asked what sort of sermons Mr. Mirabel
preached. Lady Janeaway said: ‘Come up to our room after dinner. The
subject is too distressing to be discussed in public.’
“She began by making me personally acquainted with the reverend
gentleman--that is to say, she showed me the photographic portraits of
him. They were two in number. One only presented his face. The other
exhibited him at full length, adorned in his surplice. Every lady in the
congregation had received the two photographs as a farewell present. ‘My
portraits,’ Lady Doris remarked, ‘are the only complete specimens. The
others have been irretrievably ruined by tears.’
“You will now expect a personal description of this fascinating man.
What the photographs failed to tell me, my friend was so kind as to
complete from the resources of her own experience. Here is the result
presented to the best of my ability.
“He is young--not yet thirty years of age. His complexion is fair; his
features are delicate, his eyes are clear blue. He has pretty hands, and
rings prettier still. And such a voice, and such manners! You will say
there are plenty of pet parsons who answer to this description. Wait a
little--I have kept his chief distinction till the last. His beautiful
light hair flows in profusion over his shoulders; and his glossy beard
waves, at apostolic length, down to the lower buttons of his waistcoat.
“What do you think of the Reverend Miles Mirabel now?
“The life and adventures of our charming young clergyman, bear eloquent
testimony to the saintly patience of his disposition, under trials which
would have overwhelmed an ordinary man. (Lady Doris, please notice,
quotes in this place the language of his admirers; and I report Lady
Doris.)
“He has been clerk in a lawyer’s office--unjustly dismissed. He has
given readings from Shakespeare--infamously neglected. He has been
secretary to a promenade concert company--deceived by a penniless
manager. He has been employed in negotiations for making foreign
railways--repudiated by an unprincipled Government. He has been
translator to a publishing house--declared incapable by envious
newspapers and reviews. He has taken refuge in dramatic
criticism--dismissed by a corrupt editor. Through all these means of
purification for the priestly career, he passed at last into the one
sphere that was worthy of him: he entered the Church, under the
protection of influential friends. Oh, happy change! From that moment
his labors have been blessed. Twice already he has been presented with
silver tea-pots filled with sovereigns. Go where he may, precious
sympathies environ him; and domestic affection places his knife and
fork at innumerable family tables. After a continental career, which
will leave undying recollections, he is now recalled to England--at the
suggestion of a person of distinction in the Church, who prefers a mild
climate. It will now be his valued privilege to represent an absent
rector in a country living; remote from cities, secluded in pastoral
solitude, among simple breeders of sheep. May the shepherd prove worthy
of the flock!
“Here again, my dear, I must give the merit where the merit is due.
This memoir of Mr. Mirabel is not of my writing. It formed part of his
farewell sermon, preserved in the memory of Lady Doris--and it shows
(once more in the language of his admirers) that the truest humility may
be found in the character of the most gifted man.
“Let me only add, that you will have opportunities of seeing and
hearing this popular preacher, when circumstances permit him to address
congregations in the large towns. I am at the end of my news; and I
begin to feel--after this long, long letter--that it is time to go to
bed. Need I say that I have often spoken of you to Doris, and that she
entreats you to be her friend as well as mine, when we meet again in
England?
“Good-by, darling, for the present. With fondest love,
“Your CECILIA.”
“P.S.--I have formed a new habit. In case of feeling hungry in the
night, I keep a box of chocolate under the pillow. You have no idea what
a comfort it is. If I ever meet with the man who fulfills my ideal, I
shall make it a condition of the marriage settlement, that I am to have
chocolate under the pillow.”