A NOBLE LORD RESOLVES TO SACRIFICE HIMSELF.
It chanced that one afternoon Lord Campsie came to the conclusion,
that with regard to Dove, of whom he had evidently become as much
smitten as it was in his languid nature to be, he must do something
to place himself on a solid footing with her.
On that afternoon he had been dangling, as usual, about her in the
drawing-room; but she had been provokingly cold and distant to him;
spoke thrice to Gillian--who resolutely kept his post--for each time
she addressed the visitor, and when pressed to sing something, she
allowed him alone to turn the leaves of her music, and by her mode of
treating Lord Campsie, left nothing undone to show him that Gillian
was her affianced and accepted lover, to whom she felt that the
attention of one whom she conceived to be only amusing himself, must
be eminently distasteful. Matters had come to such a pass, that some
such demonstration as this was necessary; and thus pique brought his
lordship suddenly to a point, that he was, perhaps, not yet quite
prepared for, so as he turned his horse's head eastward to the
barracks he began to reflect.
It was not a common process with him, and usually made him
taciturn---even sulky with his best friends.
He began to fancy himself very much in love, and naturally suspected
Gillian; but the chief infirmity of his character was a suspicion of
motives in every one, a fault created by his mode of education and
the circumstances of his position in society.
Though one of the fastest men in the Prince's Hussars, and in his set
in town, it was an understood thing, that Lord Campsie must, sooner
or later, "commit matrimony," as he would have said, whenever the
eligible female came to hand. His father and mother had said so, and
everybody else except himself. The charms of a little box at St.
John's Wood, with the inevitable outlay, in sealskins, diamonds,
bouquets, and tiny brougham, had been, as yet, quite enough for him,
especially while the tents of the Hussars were pitched at Hounslow,
Aldershot, and other pleasant places within a moderate distance of
the metropolis.
In the supposed bride certain qualities were deemed indispensable:
beauty, grace, dignity, good birth, and unexceptionable position.
Poor Dove had the first of these three requisites, and many more,
that were lovable, estimable, and adorable; yet she had neither good
birth, position, nor anything else in these ways, coming up to the
high standard required by the family of Viscount Kilsythe. But, like
the daughters of Cottonopolis, she had money. That it was not
acquired by honest hard work and genuine industry mattered not.
Campsie knew, or supposed that she would have a handsome dowry; for
when asking advances, had not the lawyer said casually, "I must be
careful of my little girl--I must not leave her less than eighty or a
hundred thousand;" and so now, it seemed high time that he, Campsie,
was married and settled at last.
The heir to an old title, taken from the now ruined castle of
Kilsythe, in Stirlingshire (about which he cared no more than if it
was in Timbuctoo or Dahomey), with already burdened estates in more
than one English county, he could not go down to his grave unwed,
especially with all his debts, so here was this taking little Dove
(though he detested her suave, canting, vulgar father) at hand to
make all comfortable, and to be had--he never doubted it--for the
asking.
Such were the views of my Lord Campsie, as he slowly made up his
noble mind to come to the point and "chuck himself away," whatever
the mess and his "set" might think.
Dove would make a very creditable-looking little wife, and---
"Though from a humble stock, undoubtedly
Was fashioned to much honour."
Her father was a nobody, and her grandfather, no doubt, a myth.
These were bitter pills to swallow; while, after all Campsie had seen
and known of life in London and elsewhere, it did seem rather a grim
joke that he should be proposing at last to the little provincial,
this Scots lawyer's heiress; but, once transplanted elsewhere, and
placed among the upper classes, he had no doubt that, with her
father's ill-gotten gains--he was certain they must be so--she would
pass very well as the future Viscountess Kilsythe.
"Eighty or a hundred thousand, incumbered with such a wife, will be a
very tolerable investment of myself," thought Campsie; "but the
pater--the awful father-in-law, ugh! he will require to be kept
utterly and permanently in the background or on his native heath. I
wonder if the old beggar wouldn't take some of his own money and
emigrate!"
He had once, when under the influence of sundry brandies and sodas,
sounded Martingale to ascertain his views of such an alliance.
"I have lost fearfully, on one or two late events, old fellow, don't
you know; and at the Derby, my trainer tells me that it is even
betting my mare don't start at all; so Martingale, by Jove, I think
I'll marry the little Gainswood."
"The devil you will!" drawled the captain, as he lounged back in an
Indian chair, with a leg over each arm thereof, watching the smoke
from his cigar, as it curled upwards; "why she is only a provincial
attorney's daughter, and you know the adage."
"What is it?"
"Brazen pots and earthen vessels ought not to float down the same
channel."
"Old Gainswood already holds so many of my acceptances, that in one
sense, I am as much in his power as he could wish me to be."
"But old Six-and-eightpence will be certain to see that every penny
his girl may have is settled upon herself--everything, even to the
Maltese terrier and the pony phaeton, and she might request her lord
and master to leave even that, if they quarrelled."
"I would then get a seat in the little one's brougham at St. John's
Wood," said Campsie, grimly.
"Gainswood is bad form--very! and without position in society. Take
time, old fellow, something else may turn up, even here."
And with the recollection of this not very cheering advice fresh in
his mind, Campsie dismounted at the door of Gainswood's office, and
even then paused for a moment, as he tied his reins in a knot. He
was selfish; for any man brought up as he had been could not--like
too many of his class--escape being so, more or less.
"Well," thought his lordship, "hang it--here goes!" and on being
ushered into Mr. Gainswood's business-room, he lost not a moment in
announcing his object.
"My lord--you really take my breath away!" exclaimed Gainswood,
inserting a thumb in each arm-hole of his vest, and regarding with
pretended amazement, but with intense secret delight, the young lord,
who seated himself jauntily on the edge of his writing-table, and
flicked his glazed boots with the lash of his jewelled riding-whip.
He thought that Campsie had come, as usual, for an advance, or loan;
but not to this issue so suddenly.
"I have, indeed, Mr. Gainswood, thought of proposing _au serieux_,
for your dear daughter," he repeated.
"You do her and me a high honour, my lord!"
"I do _her_ none," was the rather pointed response.
"Who ever has the good fortune to marry my girl, will find with her
as much goodness as beauty, and as much money as either."
"A vulgar, purse-proud snob!" thought his intending son-in-law.
"You are the heir to an ancient and honourable Scottish peerage,
though not so rich a title as it might be; and you, my lord, pardon
me, have many incumbrances; but, oh, my lord, what matter earthly
riches; we shall all, I hope, meet one day in Heaven, where no riches
are required, save those of the soul, my lord--save those of the
soul!"
"But while on earth, and in the Prince's Hussars, a man must have
money or credit, or he is safe to go to the dogs and the devil before
his time."
"In this matter you are in earnest."
"As earnest as if it was the Derby day, and I heard the saddling bell
ring!" said Campsie, impatiently.
"Dove will have a most creditable portion in cash--besides"----
"Besides what?" thought Campsie, while the lawyer was eyeing him
acutely out of one eye; and it never seemed necessary to either of
these two men, to say one word concerning love, admiration,
affection, or such emotions as Dove might be supposed to excite.
With the lawyer, whose heart trembled with exultation and ambition,
it was simply a magnificent piece of business; while Campsie was much
cooler than he had often been when chaffering for a nag at
Tattersall's.
"Have I then your permission?" he asked, thinking he had bothered
long enough upon the matter.
"Of course, my dear lord--of course, my dear young friend; but can we
reckon upon that of Viscount Kilsythe?"
"As he never consulted me in his matrimonial affairs, I don't mean to
consult him," was the somewhat flippant response. "The governor may
cut up rusty at first; but he'll learn to like Miss Gainswood in
time. No one could know her, without liking and loving her." (His
lordship thought it was time to say something of this kind now.) "Her
manners are doocid good form--her temper sweet--her loveliness
undeniable; and as to title----"
"It is the last thing she or I would set store on, my lord!"
interrupted Mr. Gainswood, with great fervour.
"Very like a whale!" thought my Lord Campsie.
"My dear daughter," said the lawyer, now deeming it necessary to do a
little pathos, "has had a godly upbringing, as beseemed the child of
an elder of the kirk and a Christian man. She is a religious and
God-fearing young woman, and will be as a pearl above price--yea, as
a crown of glory to her husband. I give her to you, my lord, with
the fondest blessing of a loving and tender parent, and the
heart-felt wishes of an honest man. May God bless you both!"
Then he wrung the hand of Campsie, and seeming to give way to
emotion, covered his eyes with his handkerchief,
"To hide the tears he did not shed."
"Now, that 'the heavy father,' business has been done, I am off like
a bird," said Campsie, who had eyed him somewhat dubiously; "so that
is arranged--ta, ta, old fellow, I'd look you up to-morrow again."
"Good; what thine heart findeth to do, do it with all thy might."
Again his lordship betook him to his saddle, leaving the lawyer in a
very mixed mood of mind, in which exultation, ambition, gratified
vanity, and avarice, mingled with much of craven fear and more of
hate for Gillian now, as he alone stood in the way, adding to the
complications of the situation.
Gainswood had permitted the engagement of Dove and Gillian, and had
openly corresponded with the father of the latter on that important
subject; and now he had accorded to Campsie permission to address his
daughter as a lover! and, as yet, he could not see how the whole
affair was to end.
In his vanity and over-reaching ambition, he had not the courage to
act in a straightforward manner, besides, none knew what might happen.
If Dove accepted Campsie, and threw over her cousin, as he never
doubted she would, then--he seemed to pause even in speculation, and
his fishy, shifty eyes wandered unconsciously to the green charter
box.
Meanwhile, half regretting and half exulting in what he had done,
Campsie rode slowly homeward by the most magnificent terrace in
Europe, and yet saw not a feature of it. "What a poem is Prince's
Street!" says Alexander Smith. "The puppets of the busy,
many-coloured hour crowd about its pavement, while across the ravine,
Time has piled up the Old Town, ridge on ridge, grey as a rocky
coast, washed and worn by the foam of centuries; peaked and jagged by
gable and roof; windowed from basement to cope; the whole surmounted
by St. Giles's airy crown. The New is there looking at the Old. Two
Times are brought face to face, and are yet separated by a thousand
years."
Oblivious alike of the picturesque as of "the stirring memory" of
these thousand years, Lord Campsie rode homeward to his barracks, and
saw nothing of all that glorious scenery which makes the city of the
gallant James's so full of interest, even to strangers--that old, old
city, whose massive mansions of stone, weather-beaten, dark, and
built, some of them, in years beyond even the stormy middle ages,
have teemed with romantic and historical recollections for many
generations of men; many painful, many pitiful memories, some of love
and more of war, duels, and clan battles, of rancorous feud and
foreign invasion, and of loyal hearts that have wasted and well-nigh
broken in their passionate faith to religion and a race of kings that
are no more.
To Campsie, the scenery and the place were all flat, stale, and
unprofitable; and if he had a thought on the subject, as he glanced
towards the rugged and wonderful outline of the Canongate, it was
simply, that "it was d---- old and d---- dirty."
"I did not think I should have to chuck myself away among the women
here, of all places; but needs must, and so, I shall have to make a
sacrifice of myself on the altar of necessity!" he muttered as he
gave his bay the spur.