"Our life was changed. Another love
In this lone woof began to twine;
But oh! the golden thread was wove
Between my sister's heart and mine."--WILLIS.
Half an hour later, Uncle Ro and myself were seated at table, eating our
dinners as quietly as if we were in an inn. The footman who had set the
table was an old family servant, one who had performed the same sort of
duty in that very house for a quarter of a century. Of course he was not
an American, no _man_ of American birth ever remained so long a time in
an inferior station, or in any station so low as that of a
house-servant. If he has good qualities enough to render it desirable to
keep him he is almost certain to go up in the world; if not, one does
not care particularly about having him. But Europeans are less elastic
and less ambitious, and it is no uncommon thing to find one of such an
origin remaining a long time in the same service. Such had been the fact
with this man, who had followed my own parents from Europe, when they
returned from their marriage tour, and had been in the house on the
occasion of my birth. From that time he had continued at the Nest, never
marrying, nor ever manifesting the smallest wish for any change. He was
an Englishman by birth; and what is very unusual in a servant of that
country, when transferred to America, the "letting-up," which is certain
to attend such a change from the depression of the original condition to
that in which he is so suddenly placed, had not made him saucy. An
American is seldom what is called impudent, under any circumstances; he
is careless, nay ignorant, of forms; pays little or no purely
conventional respect; does not understand half the social distinctions
which exist among the higher classes of even his own countrymen, and
fancies there are equalities in things about which, in truth, there is
great inequality between himself and others, merely because he has been
taught that all men are equal in rights; but he is so unconscious of any
pressure as seldom to feel a disposition to revenge himself by
impudence.
But, while John was not impudent either, he had a footman's feeling
toward those whom he fancied no better than himself. He had set the
table with his customary neatness and method, and he served the soup
with as much regularity as he would have done had we sat there in our
proper characters, but then he withdrew. He probably remembered that the
landlord, or upper servant of an English hotel, is apt to make his
appearance with the soup, and to disappear as that disappears. So it was
with John; after removing the soup, he put a dumb-waiter near my uncle,
touched a carving-knife or two, as much as to say "help yourselves," and
quitted the room. As a matter of course, our dinner was not a very
elaborate one, it wanting two or three hours to the regular time of
dining, though my grandmother had ordered, in my hearing, one or two
delicacies to be placed on the table that had surprised Patt. Among the
extraordinary things for such guests was wine. The singularity, however,
was a little explained by the quality commanded, which was Rhenish.
My uncle Ro was a little surprised at the disappearance of John; for,
seated in that room, he was so accustomed to his face, that it appeared
as if he were not half at home without him.
"Let the fellow go," he said, withdrawing his hand from the bell-cord,
which he had already touched to order him back again; "we can talk more
freely without him. Well, Hugh, here you are, under your own roof,
eating a charitable dinner, and treated as hospitably as if you did not
own all you can see for a circle of five miles around you. It was a
lucky idea of the old lady's, by the way, to think of ordering this
Rudesheimer, in our character of Dutchmen! How amazingly well she is
looking, boy!"
"Indeed she is; and I am delighted to see it. I do not know why my
grandmother may not live these twenty years; for even that would not
make her near as old as Sus, who, I have often heard her say, was a
middle-aged man when she was born."
"True; she seems like an elder sister to me, rather than as a mother;
and is altogether a most delightful old woman. But, if we had so
charming an old woman to receive us, so are there also some very
charming _young_ women--hey, Hugh?"
"I am quite of your way of thinking, sir; and must say I have not, in
many a day, seen two as charming creatures as I have met with here."
"_Two_!--umph; a body would think _one_ might suffice. Pray, which may
be the two, Master Padishah?"
"Patt and Mary Warren, of course. The other two are well enough, but
these two are excellent."
My uncle Ro looked grum, but he said nothing for some time. Eating is
always an excuse for a broken conversation, and he ate away as if
resolute not to betray his disappointment. But it is a hard matter for a
gentleman to do nothing but eat at table, and so he was obliged to talk.
"Everything looks well here, after all, Hugh," observed my uncle. "These
anti-renters may have done an infinite deal of harm in the way of
abusing principles, but they do not seem to have yet destroyed any
material things."
"It is not their cue, sir. The crops are their own; and as they hope to
own the farms, it would be scarcely wise to injure what, no doubt, they
begin to look on as their own property, too. As for the Nest house,
grounds, farm, etc., I dare say they will be very willing to leave me
them for a while longer, provided they can get everything else away from
me."
"For a time longer, at least; though that is the folly of those who
expect to get along by concessions; as if men were ever satisfied with
the yielding of a part, when they ask that which is wrong in itself,
without sooner or later expecting to get the whole. As well might one
expect the pickpocket who had abstracted a dollar to put back
two-and-sixpence change. But things really look well around the place."
"So much the better for us. Though, to my judgment and taste, Miss Mary
Warren looks better than anything else I have yet seen in America."
Another "umph" expressed my uncle's dissatisfaction--displeasure would
be too strong a word--and he continued eating.
"You have really some good Rhenish in your cellar, Hugh," resumed Uncle
Ro, after tossing off one of the knowing green glasses full--though I
never could understand why any man should wish to drink his wine out of
green, when he might do it out of crystal. "It must have been a purchase
of mine, made when we were last in Germany, and for the use of my
mother."
"As you please, sir; it neither adds nor subtracts from the beauty of
Martha and her friend."
"Since you are disposed to make these boyish allusions, be frank with
me, and say, at once, how you like my wards."
"Meaning, of course, sir, my own sister exclusively. I will be as
sincere as possible, and say that, as to Miss Marston, I have no opinion
at all; and as to Miss Coldbrooke, she is what, in Europe, would be
called a 'fine' woman."
"You can say nothing as to her mind, Hugh, for you have had no
opportunity for forming an opinion."
"Not much of a one, I will own. Nevertheless, I should have liked her
better had she spared the allusion to the 'proper person' who is one day
to forge a chain for my sister, to begin with."
"Poh, poh! that is the mere squeamishness of a boy. I do not think her
in the least pert or forward, and your construction would be _tant soi
peu_ vulgar."
"Put your own construction on it, _mon oncle_; _I_ do not like it."
"I do not wonder young men remain unmarried; they are getting to be so
ultra in their tastes and notions."
A stranger might have retorted on an old bachelor, for such a speech, by
some allusion to his own example; but I well knew that my uncle Ro had
once been engaged, and that he lost the object of his passion by death,
and too much respected his constancy and true sentiments ever to joke on
such subjects. I believe he felt the delicacy of my forbearance rather
more than common, for he immediately manifested a disposition to relent,
and to prove it by changing the subject.
"We can never stay here to-night," he said. "It would be at once to
proclaim our names--our name, I might say--a name that was once so
honored and beloved in this town, and which is now so hated!"
"No, no; not as bad as that. We have done nothing to merit hatred."
"_Raison de plus_ for hating us so much the more heartily. When men are
wronged, who have done nothing to deserve it, the evil-doer seeks to
justify his wickedness to himself by striving all he can to calumniate
the injured party; and the more difficulty he finds in doing that to his
mind, the more profound is his hatred. Rely on it, we are most sincerely
disliked here on the spot where we were once both much beloved. Such is
human nature."
At that moment John returned to the room, to see how we were getting on,
and to count his forks and spoons, for I saw the fellow actually doing
it. My uncle, somewhat indiscreetly, I fancied, but by merely following
the chain of thought then uppermost in his mind, detained him in
conversation.
"Dis broperty," he said, inquiringly, "is de broperty of one Yeneral
Littlepage, I hears say?"
"Not of the General, who was Madam Littlepage's husband, and who has
long been dead, but of his grandson, Mr. Hugh."
"Und vhere might he be, dis Mr. Hugh?--might he be at hand, or might he
not?"
"No; he's in Europe; that is to say, in Hengland." John thought England
covered most of Europe, though he had long gotten over his wish to
return. "Mr. Hugh and Mr. Roger be both habsent from the country, just
now."
"Dat ist unfortunate, for dey dells me dere might be moch troobles
hereabouts, and Injin-acting."
"There is, indeed; and a wicked thing it is, that there should be
anything of the sort."
"Und vhat might be der reason of so moch troobles?--and vhere ist der
blame?"
"Well, that is pretty plain, I fancy," returned John, who in consequence
of being a favored servant at head-quarters, fancied himself a sort of
cabinet minister, and had much pleasure in letting his knowledge be
seen. "The tenants on this estate wants to be landlords; and as they
can't be so, so long as Mr. Hugh lives and won't let 'em, why they just
tries all sorts of schemes and plans to frighten people out of their
property. I never go down to the village but I has a talk with some of
them, and that in a way that might do them some good, if anything can."
"Und vhat dost you say?--and vid whom dost you talk, as might do dem
moch goot?"
"Why, you see, I talks more with one 'Squire Newcome, as they calls him,
though he's no more of a real 'squire than you be--only a sort of an
attorney, like, such as they has in this country. You come from the old
countries, I believe?"
"Ja, ja--dat ist, yes--we comes from Charmany; so you can say vhat you
pleases."
"They has queer 'squires in this part of the world, if truth must be
said. But that's neither here nor there, though I give this Mr. Seneca
Newcome as good as he sends. What is it you wants? I says to him--you
can't all be landlords--somebody must be tenants; and if you didn't want
to be tenants, how come you to be so? Land is plenty in this country,
and cheap, too; and why didn't you buy your land at first, instead of
coming to rent of Mr. Hugh; and now when you _have_ rented, to be
quarrelling about the very thing you did of your own accord?"
"Dere you didst dell 'em a goot t'ing; and vhat might der 'squire say to
dat?"
"Oh! he was quite dumfounded, at first; then he said that in old times,
when people first rented these lands, they didn't _know_ as much as they
do now, or they never would have done it."
"Und you could answer dat; or vast it your durn to be dumfounded?"
"I pitched it into him, as they says; I did. Says I, how's this, says
I--you are forever boasting how much you Americans know--and how the
people knows everything that ought to be done, about politics and
religion--and you proclaim far and near that your yeomen are the salt of
the earth--and yet you don't know how to bargain for your leases! A
pretty sort of wisdom is this, says I! I had him there; for the people
round about here is only too sharp at a trade."
"Did he own that you vast right, and dat he vast wrong, dis Herr 'Squire
Newcome?"
"Not he; he will never own anything that makes against his own doctrine,
unless he does it ignorantly. But I haven't told you half of it. I told
him, says I, how is it you talk of one of the Littlepage family cheating
you, when, as you knows yourselves, you had rather have the word of one
of the family than have each other's bonds, says I. You know, sir, it
must be a poor landlord that a tenant can't and won't take his word: and
this they all know to be true; for a gentleman as has a fine estate is
raised above temptation, like, and has a pride in him to do what is
honorable and fair; and, in my opinion, it is good to have a few such
people in a country, if it be only to keep the wicked one from getting
it altogether in his own keeping."
"Und did you say dat moch to der 'squire?"
"No; that I just say to you two, seeing that we are here, talking
together in a friendly way; but a man needn't be ashamed to say it
anywhere, for it's a religious truth. But I says to him, Newcome, says
I, you, who has been living so long on the property of the Littlepages,
ought to be ashamed to wish to strip them of it; but you're not
satisfied with keeping gentlemen down quite as much out of sight as you
can, by holding all the offices yourselves, and taking all the money of
the public you can lay your hands on for your own use, but you wants to
trample them under your feet, I says, and so take your revenge for being
what you be, says I."
"Vell, my friend," said my uncle, "you vast a bolt man to dell all dis
to der beoples of dis coontry, vhere, I have heard, a man may say just
vhat he hast a mind to say, so dat he dost not speak too moch trut!"
"That's it--that's it; you have been a quick scholar, I find. I told
this Mr. Newcome, says I, you're bold enough in railing at kings and
nobles, for you very well know, says I, that they are three thousand
miles away from you, and can do you no harm; but you would no more dare
get up before your masters, the people, here, and say what you really
think about 'em, and what I have heard you say of them in private, than
you would dare put your head before a cannon, as the gunner touched it
off. Oh! I gave him a lesson, you may be sure!"
Although there was a good deal of the English footman in John's logic
and feeling, there was also a good deal of truth in what he said. The
part where he accused Newcome of holding one set of opinions in private,
concerning _his_ masters, and another in public, is true to the life.
There is not, at this moment, within the wide reach of the American
borders, one demagogue to be found who might not, with justice, be
accused of precisely the same deception. There is not one demagogue in
the whole country, who, if he lived in a monarchy, would not be the
humblest advocate of men in power, ready to kneel at the feet of those
who stood in the sovereign's presence. There is not, at this instant, a
man in power among us, a senator or a legislator, who is now the seeming
advocate of what he wishes to call the rights of the tenants, and who is
for overlooking principles and destroying law and right, in order to
pacify the anti-renters by extraordinary concessions, that would not be
among the foremost, under a monarchial system, to recommend and support
the freest application of the sword and the bayonet to suppress what
would then be viewed, ay, and be termed, "the rapacious longings of the
disaffected to enjoy the property of others without paying for it." All
this is certain; for it depends on a law of morals that is infallible.
Any one who wishes to obtain a clear index to the true characters of the
public men he is required to support, or oppose, has now the
opportunity; for each stands before a mirror that reflects him in his
just proportions, and in which the dullest eye has only to cast a
glance, in order to view him from head to foot.
The entrance of my grandmother put a stop to John's discourse. He was
sent out of the room on a message, and then I learned the object of this
visit. My sister had been let into the secret of our true characters,
and was dying to embrace me. My dear grandmother, rightly enough, had
decided it would be to the last degree unkind to keep her in ignorance
of our presence; and, the fact known, nature had longings which must be
appeased. I had myself been tempted twenty times that morning to snatch
Patt to my heart and kiss her, as I used to do just after my beard began
to grow, and she was so much of a child as to complain. The principal
thing to be arranged, then, was to obtain an interview for me without
awakening suspicion in the observers. My grandmother's plan was
arranged, however, and she now communicated it to us.
There was a neat little dressing-room annexed to Martha's bedroom; in
that the meeting was to take place.
"She and Mary Warren are now there, waiting for your appearance,
Hugh----"
"Mary Warren!--Does she, then, know who I am?"
"Not in the least; she has no other idea than that you are a young
German, of good connections and well educated, who has been driven from
his own country by political troubles, and who is reduced to turn his
musical taste and acquisitions to account, in the way you seem to do,
until he can find some better employment. All this she had told us
before we met you, and you are not to be vain, Hugh, if I add, that your
supposed misfortunes, and great skill with the flute, and good behavior,
have made a friend of one of the best and most true-hearted girls I ever
had the good fortune to know. I say good _behavior_, for little, just
now, can be ascribed to good _looks_."
"I hope I am not in the least revolting in appearance, in this disguise.
For my sister's sake----"
The hearty laugh of my dear old grandmother brought me up, and I said no
more; coloring, I believe, a little, at my own folly. Even Uncle Ro
joined in the mirth, though I could see he wished Mary Warren even
safely translated along with her father, and that the latter was
Archbishop of Canterbury. I must acknowledge that I felt a good deal
ashamed of the weakness I had betrayed.
"You are very well, Hugh, darling," continued my grandmother; "though I
must think you would be more interesting in your own hair, which is
curling, than in that long wig. Still, one can see enough of your face
to recognize it, if one has the clew; and I told Martha, at the first,
that I was struck with a certain expression of the eyes and smile that
reminded me of her brother. But, there they are, Mary and Martha, in the
drawing-room, waiting for your appearance. The first is so fond of
music, and, indeed, is so practised in it, as to have been delighted
with your flute; and she has talked so much of your skill as to justify
us in seeming to wish for a further exhibition of your skill. Henrietta
and Ann, having less taste that way, have gone together to select
bouquets, in the greenhouse, and there is now an excellent opportunity
to gratify your sister. I am to draw Mary out of the room, after a
little while, when you and Martha may say a word to each other in your
proper characters. As for you, Roger, you are to open your box again,
and I will answer for it _that_ will serve to amuse your other wards,
should they return too soon from their visit to the gardener."
Everything being thus explained, and our dinner ended, all parties
proceeded to the execution of the plan, each in his or her designated
mode. When my grandmother and I reached the dressing-room, however,
Martha was not there, though Mary Warren was, her bright but serene eyes
full of happiness and expectation. Martha had retired to the inner room
for a moment, whither my grandmother, suspecting the truth, followed
her. As I afterward ascertained, my sister, fearful of not being able to
suppress her tears on my entrance, had withdrawn, in order to struggle
for self-command without betraying our secret. I was told to commence an
air, without waiting for the absent young lady, as the strain could
easily be heard through the open door.
I might have played ten minutes before my sister and grandmother came
out again. Both had been in tears, though the intense manner in which
Mary Warren was occupied with the harmony of my flute, probably
prevented her from observing it. To me, however, it was plain enough;
and glad was I to find that my sister had succeeded in commanding her
feelings. In a minute or two my grandmother profited by a pause to rise
and carry away with her Mary Warren, though the last left the room with
a reluctance that was very manifest. The pretence was a promise to meet
the divine in the library, on some business connected with the
Sunday-schools.
"You can keep the young man for another air, Martha," observed my
grandmother, "and I will send Jane to you, as I pass her room."
Jane was my sister's own maid, and her room was close at hand, and I
dare say dear grandmother gave her the order, in Mary Warren's presence,
as soon as she quitted the room, else might Mary Warren well be
surprised at the singularity of the whole procedure; but Jane did not
make her appearance, nevertheless. As for myself, I continued to play as
long as I thought any ear was near enough to hear me; then I laid aside
my flute. In the next instant Patt was in my arms, where she lay some
time weeping, but looking inexpressibly happy.
"Oh! Hugh, what a disguise was this to visit your own house in!" she
said, as soon as composed enough to speak.
"Would it have done to come here otherwise? You know the state of the
country, and the precious fruits our boasted tree of liberty is bringing
forth. The owner of the land can only visit his property at the risk of
his life!"
Martha pressed me in her arms in a way to show how conscious she was of
the danger I incurred in even thus visiting her; after which we seated
ourselves, side by side, on a little divan, and began to speak of those
things that were most natural to a brother and sister who so much loved
each other, and who had not met for five years. My grandmother had
managed so well as to prevent all interruption for an hour, if we saw
fit to remain together, while to others it should seem as if Patt had
dismissed me in a few minutes.
"Not one of the other girls suspects, in the least, who you are," said
Martha, smiling, when we had got through with the questions and answers
so natural to our situation. "I am surprised that Henrietta has not, for
_she_ prides herself on her penetration. She is as much in the dark as
the others, however."
"And Miss Mary Warren--the young lady who has just left the room--has
she not some _small_ notion that I am not a common Dutch music-grinder?"
Patt laughed, and that so merrily as to cause the tones of her sweet
voice to fill me with delight, as I remembered what she had been in
childhood and girlhood five years before, and she shook her bright
tresses off her cheeks ere she would answer.
"No, Hugh," she replied, "she fancies you an _uncommon_ Dutch
music-grinder; an _artiste_ that not only grinds, but who dresses up his
harmonies in such a way as to be palatable to the most refined taste.
How came Mary to think you and my uncle two reduced German gentlemen?"
"And does the dear girl believe--that is, does Miss Mary Warren do us so
much honor, as to imagine that?"
"Indeed she does, for she told us as much as soon as she got home; and
Henrietta and Ann have made themselves very merry with their
speculations on the subject of Miss Warren's great incognito. They call
you Herzog von Geige."
"Thank them for that." I am afraid I answered a little too pointedly,
for I saw that Patt seemed surprised. "But your American towns are just
such half-way things as to spoil young women; making them neither
refined and polished as they might be in real capitals, while they are
not left the simplicity and nature of the country."
"Well, Master Hugh, this is being very cross about a very little, and
not particularly complimentary to your own sister. And why not _your_
American towns, as well as _ours_?--are you no longer one of us?"
"Certainly; one of _yours_, always, my dearest Patt, though not one of
every chattering girl who may set up for a _belle_, with her Dukes of
Fiddle! But, enough of this;--you like the Warrens?"
"Very much so; father and daughter. The first is just what a clergyman
should be; of a cultivation and intelligence to fit him to be any man's
companion, and a simplicity like that of a child. Your remember his
predecessor--so dissatisfied, so selfish, so lazy, so censorious, so
unjust to every person and thing around him, and yet so exacting; and,
at the same time, so----"
"What? Thus far you have drawn his character well: I should like to hear
the remainder."
"I have said more than I ought already; for one has an idea that, by
bringing a clergyman into disrepute, it brings religion and the Church
into discredit, too. A priest must be a _very_ bad man to have injurious
things said of him, in this country, Hugh."
"That is, perhaps, true. But you like Mr. Warren better than him who has
left you?"
"A thousand times, and in all things. In addition to having a most pious
and sincere pastor, _we_ have an agreeable and well-bred neighbor, from
whose mouth, in the five years that he has dwelt here, I have not heard
a syllable at the expense of a single fellow-creature. You know how it
is apt to be with the other clergy and ours, in the country--forever at
swords' points; and if not actually quarrelling, keeping up a hollow
peace."
"That is only too true--or used to be true, before I went abroad."
"And it is so now elsewhere, I'll answer for it, though it be so no
longer here. Mr. Warren and Mr. Peck seem to live on perfectly amicable
terms, though as little alike at bottom as fire and water."
"By the way, how do the clergy of the different sects, up and down the
country, behave on the subject of anti-rent?"
"I can answer only from what I hear, with the exception of Mr. Warren's
course. _He_ has preached two or three plain and severe sermons on the
duty of honesty in our worldly transactions, one of which was from the
tenth commandment. Of course he said nothing of the particular trouble,
but everybody must have made the necessary application of the
home-truths he uttered. I question if another voice has been raised, far
and near, on the subject, although I have heard Mr. Warren say the
movement threatens more to demoralize New York than anything that has
happened in his time."
"And the man down at the village?"
"Oh, he goes, of course, with the majority. When was one of that sect
known to oppose his parish, in anything?"
"And Mary is as sound and as high-principled as her father?"
"Quite so; though there has been a good deal said about the necessity of
Mr. Warren's removing, and giving up St. Andrew's, since he preached
against covetousness. All the anti-renters say, I hear, that they know
he meant _them_, and that they won't put up with it."
"I dare say; each one fancying he was almost called out by name; that is
the way, when conscience works."
"I should be very, very sorry to part with Mary; and almost as much so
to part with her father. There is one thing, however, that Mr. Warren
himself thinks we had better have done, Hugh; and that is to take down
the canopy from over our pew. You can have no notion of the noise that
foolish canopy is making up and down the country."
"I shall _not_ take it down. It is my property, and there it shall
remain. As for the canopy, it was a wrong distinction to place in a
church, I am willing to allow; but it never gave offence until it has
been thought that a cry against it would help to rob me of my lands at
half-price, or at no price at all, as it may happen."
"All that may be true; but if improper for a church, why keep it?"
"Because I do not choose to be bullied out of what is my own, even
though I care nothing about it. There might have been a time when the
canopy was unsuited to the house of God, and that was when those who saw
it might fancy it canopied the head of a fellow-creature who had higher
claims than themselves to divine favor; but in times like these, when
men estimate merit by beginning at the other end of the social scale,
there is little danger of any one's falling into the mistake. The canopy
shall stand, little as I care about it; now, I would actually prefer it
should come down, and I can fully see the impropriety of making any
distinctions in the temple; but it shall stand until concessions cease
to be dangerous. It is a right of property, and as such I will maintain
it. If others dislike it, let them put canopies over their pews, too.
The best test, in such a matter, is to see who could bear it. A pretty
figure Seneca Newcome would cut, for instance, seated in a canopied pew!
Even his own set would laugh at him, which, I fancy, is more than they
yet do at me."
Martha was disappointed; but she changed the subject. We next talked of
our own little private affairs, as they were connected with smaller
matters.
"For whom is that beautiful chain intended, Hugh?" asked Patt,
laughingly. "I can now believe the pedler when he says it is reserved
for your future wife. But who is that wife to be? Will her name be
Henrietta or Ann?"
"Why not ask, also, if it will be Mary?--why exclude one of your
companions, while you include the other two?"
Patt started--seemed surprised; her cheeks flushed, and then I saw that
pleasure was the feeling predominant.
"Am I too late to secure that jewel, as a pendant to my chain?" I asked,
half in jest, half seriously.
"Too soon, at least, to attract it by the richness and beauty of the
bawble. A more natural and disinterested girl than Mary Warren does not
exist in the country."
"Be frank with me, Martha, and say at once; has she a favored suitor?"
"Why, this seems really serious!" exclaimed my sister, laughing. "But,
to put you out of your pain, I will answer, I know of but one. One she
has certainly, or female sagacity is at fault."
"But is he one that is favored? You can never know how much depends on
your answer."
"Of that you can judge for yourself. It is 'Squire Seneky Newcome, as he
is called hereabouts--the brother of the charming Opportunity, who still
reserves herself for you."
"And they are as rank anti-renters as any male and female in the
country."
"They are rank Newcomites; and that means that each is for himself.
Would you believe it, but Opportunity really gives herself airs with
Mary Warren!"
"And how does Mary Warren take such an assumption?"
"As a young person should--quietly and without manifesting any feeling.
But there is something quite intolerable in one like Opportunity
Newcome's assuming a superiority over any true lady! Mary is as well
educated and as well connected as any of us, and is quite as much
accustomed to good company; while Opportunity--" here Patt laughed, and
then added, hurriedly, "but you know Opportunity as well as I do."
"Oh! yes; she is _la_ vertue, or _the_ virtue, and _je suis venue
pour_."
The latter allusion Patt understood well enough, having laughed over the
story a dozen times; and she laughed again when I explained the affair
of "_the_ solitude."
Then came a fit of sisterly feeling. Patt insisted on taking off my wig,
and seeing my face in its natural dress. I consented to gratify her,
when the girl really behaved like a simpleton. First she pushed about my
curls until they were arranged to suit the silly creature, when she ran
back several steps, clapped her hands in delight, then rushed into "my
arms and kissed my forehead and eyes, and called me her brother"--her
"only brother"--her "dear, _dear_ Hugh," and by a number of other such
epithets, until she worked herself, and me too, into such an excess of
feeling that we sat down, side by side, and each had a hearty fit of
crying. Perhaps some such burst as this was necessary to relieve our
minds, and we submitted to it wisely.
My sister wept the longest, as a matter of course; but, as soon as she
had dried her eyes, she replaced the wig, and completely restored my
disguise, trembling the whole time lest some one might enter and detect
me.
"You have been very imprudent, Hugh, in coming here at all," she said,
while thus busy. "You can form no notion of the miserable state of the
country, or how far the anti-rent poison has extended, or the malignant
nature of its feeling. The annoyances they have attempted with dear
grandmother are odious; _you_ they would scarcely leave alive."
"The country and the people must have strangely altered, then, in five
years. Our New York population has hitherto had very little of the
assassin-like character. Tar and feathers are the blackguards', and have
been the petty tyrants' weapons, from time immemorial, in this country;
but not the knife."
"And can anything sooner or more effectually alter a people than
longings for the property of others? Is not the 'love of money the root
of all evil?'--and what right have we to suppose our Ravensnest
population is better than another, when that sordid feeling is
thoroughly aroused? You know you have written one yourself, that all the
American can or does live for is money."
"I have written you, dear, that the country, in its present condition,
leaves no other incentive to exertion, and therein it is cursed.
Military fame, military rank, even, are unattainable, under our system;
the arts, letters, and science bring little or no reward; and there
being no political rank that a man of refinement would care for, men
must live for money, or live altogether for another state of being. But
I have told you, at the same time, Martha, that, notwithstanding all
this, I believe the American a less mercenary being, in the ordinary
sense of the word, than the European; that two men might be bought, for
instance, in any European country, for one here. This last I suppose to
be the result of the facility of making a living, and the habits it
produces."
"Never mind causes; Mr. Warren says there is a desperate intention to
rob existing among these people, and that they are dangerous. As yet
they do a little respect women, but how long they will do that one
cannot know."
"It may all be so. It _must_ be so, respecting what I have heard and
read; yet this vale looks as smiling and as sweet, at this very moment,
as if an evil passion never sullied it! But depend on my prudence, which
tells me that we ought now to part. I shall see you again and again
before I quit the estate, and you will, of course, join us somewhere--at
the Springs, perhaps--as soon as we find it necessary or expedient to
decamp."
Martha promised this, of course, and I kissed her, previously to
separating. No one crossed my way as I descended to the piazza, which
was easily done, since I was literally at home. I lounged about on the
lawn a few minutes, and then, showing myself in front of the library
windows, I was summoned to the room, as I had expected.
Uncle Ro had disposed of every article of the fine jewelry that he had
brought home as presents for his wards. The pay was a matter to be
arranged with Mrs. Littlepage, which meant no pay at all; and, as the
donor afterward told me, he liked this mode of distributing the various
ornaments better than presenting them himself, as he was now certain
each girl had consulted her own fancy.
As the hour of the regular dinner was approaching, we took our leave
soon after, not without receiving kind and pressing invitations to visit
the Nest again ere we left the township. Of course we promised all that
was required, intending most faithfully to comply. On quitting the house
we returned toward the farm, though not without pausing on the lawn to
gaze around us on a scene so dear to both, from recollection,
association, and interest. But I forget, this is aristocratical; the
landlord has no right to sentiments of this nature, which are feelings
that the sublimated liberty of the law is beginning to hold in reserve
solely for the benefit of the tenant!