_A Dangerous Guide_
SUCH able and congenial spirits as Mrs. Dallington Vere and Sir Lucius
Grafton prosecuted their plans with the success which they had a
right to anticipate. Lady Aphrodite, who was proud of her previous
acquaintance, however slight, with the most distinguished girl
in London, and eager to improve it, unconsciously assisted their
operations. Society is so constituted that it requires no little
talent and no slight energy to repel the intimacy even of those whose
acquaintance is evidently not desirable; and there are many people in
this world mixing, apparently, with great spirit and self-esteem in
its concerns, who really owe their constant appearance and occasional
influence in circles of consideration to no other qualities than their
own callous impudence, and the indolence and the irresolution of their
victims. They, who at the same time have no delicacy and no shame, count
fearful odds; and, much as is murmured about the false estimation of
riches, there is little doubt that the parvenus as often owe their
advancement in society to their perseverance as to their pelf.
When, therefore, your intimacy is courted by those whose intimacy is
an honour, and that, too, with an art, which conceals its purpose, you
often find that you have, and are a devoted friend, really before you
have felt sufficient gratitude for the opera-box which has been so often
lent, the carriage which has been ever at hand, the brother who has
received such civilities, or the father who has been requested to accept
some of the unattainable tokay which he has charmed you by admiring at
your own table.
The manoeuvres and tactics of society are infinitely more numerous and
infinitely finer than those of strategy. Woe betide the rash knight
who dashes into the thick of the polished melée without some slight
experience of his barb and his lance! Let him look to his arms! He will
do well not to appear before his helm be plumed with some reputation,
however slight. He may be very rich, or even very poor. We have seen
that answer with a Belisarius-like air; and more than one hero without
an obolus has stumbled upon a fortune merely from his contempt of
riches. If to fight, or write, or dress be above you, why, then, you can
ride, or dance, or even skate; but do not think, as many young gentlemen
are apt to believe, that _talking_ will serve your purpose. That is the
quicksand of your young beginners. All can talk in a public assembly;
that is to say, all can give us exhortations which do not move, and
arguments which do not convince; but to converse in a private assembly
is a different affair, and rare are the characters who can be endured if
they exceed a whisper to their neighbours. But though mild and silent,
be ever ready with the rapier of repartee, and be ever armed with the
breastplate of good temper. You will infallibly gather laurels if you
add to these the spear of sarcasm and the shield of nonchalance.
The high style of conversation where eloquence and philosophy emulate
each other, where principles are profoundly expounded and felicitously
illustrated, all this has ceased. It ceased in this country with Johnson
and Burke, and it requires a Johnson and a Burke for its maintenance.
There is no mediocrity in such discourse, no intermediate character
between the sage and the bore. The second style, where men, not things,
are the staple, but where wit, and refinement, and sensibility invest
even personal details with intellectual interest, does flourish at
present, as it always must in a highly civilised society. S. is, or
rather was, a fine specimen of this school, and M. and L. are his worthy
rivals. This style is indeed, for the moment, very interesting. Then
comes your conversation man, who, we confess, is our aversion. His talk
is a thing apart, got up before he enters the company from whose conduct
it should grow out. He sits in the middle of a large table, and, with a
brazen voice, bawls out his anecdotes about Sir Thomas or Sir Humphry,
Lord Blank, or my Lady Blue. He is incessant, yet not interesting; ever
varying, yet always monotonous. Even if we were amused, we are no more
grateful for the entertainment than we are to the lamp over the table
for the light which it universally sheds, and to yield which it was
obtained on purpose. We are more gratified by the slight conversation
of one who is often silent, but who speaks from his momentary feelings,
than by all this hullaballoo. Yet this machine is generally a favourite
piece of furniture with the hostess. You may catch her eye as he
recounts some adventure of the morning, which proves that he not only
belongs to every club, but goes to them, light up with approbation;
and then, when the ladies withdraw, and the female senate deliver their
criticism upon the late actors, she will observe, with a gratified
smile, to her confidante, that the dinner went off well, and that Mr.
Bellow was very strong to-day.
All this is horrid, and the whole affair is a delusion. A variety of
people are brought together, who all come as late as possible, and
retire as soon, merely to show they have other engagements. A dinner is
prepared for them, which is hurried over, in order that a certain number
of dishes should be, not tasted, but seen: and provided that there is
no moment that an absolute silence reigns; provided that, besides the
bustling of the servants, the clattering of the plates and knives,
a stray anecdote is told, which, if good, has been heard before, and
which, if new, is generally flat; provided a certain number of certain
names of people of consideration are introduced, by which some stranger,
for whom the party is often secretly given, may learn the scale of
civilisation of which he this moment forms a part; provided the senators
do not steal out too soon to the House, and their wives to another
party, the hostess is congratulated on the success of her entertainment.
And this glare, and heat, and noise, these _congeries_ of individuals
without sympathy and dishes without flavour; this is society! What an
effect without a cause! A man must be green indeed to stand this for two
seasons. One cannot help thinking that one consequence of the increased
intelligence of the present day will be a great change in the habits of
our intercourse.
To our tale; we linger. Few who did not know too much of Sir Lucius
Grafton could refrain from yielding him their regard when he chose to
challenge it, and with the Dacres he was soon an acknowledged favourite.
As a new M.P., and hitherto doubtful supporter of the Catholic cause,
it was grateful to Mr. Dacre’s feelings to find in him an ally, and
flattering to Mr. Dacre’s judgment when that ally ventured to consult
him on his friendly operations. With Miss Dacre he was a mild, amiable
man, who knew the world; thoroughly good, but void of cant, and owner of
a virtue not less to be depended on because his passions had once been
strong, and he had once indulged them. His experience of life made him
value domestic felicity; because he knew that there was no other source
of happiness which was at once so pure and so permanent. But he was not
one of those men who consider marriage as an extinguisher of all those
feelings and accomplishments which throw a lustre on existence; and he
did not consider himself bound, because he had plighted his faith to
a beautiful woman, immediately to terminate the very conduct which had
induced her to join him in the sacred and eternal pledge. His gaiety
still sparkled, his wit still flashed; still he hastened to be foremost
among the courteous; and still his high and ready gallantry indicated
that he was not prepared to yield the fitting ornament of his still
blooming youth. A thousand unobtrusive and delicate attentions which
the innocent now received from him without a thought, save of Lady
Aphrodite’s good fortune; a thousand gay and sentimental axioms, which
proved not only how agreeable he was, but how enchanting he must have
been; a thousand little deeds which struggled to shun the light, and
which palpably demonstrated that the gaiety of his wit, the splendour of
his accomplishments, and the tenderness of his soul were only equalled
by his unbounded generosity and unparalleled good temper; all these
combined had made Sir Lucius Grafton, to many, always a delightful,
often a dangerous, and sometimes a fatal, companion. He was one of those
whose candour is deadly. It was when he least endeavoured to conceal his
character that its hideousness least appeared. He confessed sometimes
so much, that you yielded that pity which, ere the shrived culprit could
receive, by some fatal alchemy was changed into passion. His smile was a
lure, his speech was a spell; but it was when he was silent, and almost
gloomy, when you caught his serious eye, charged, as it were, with
emotion, gazing on yours, that if you had a guardian sylph you should
have invoked its aid; and we pray, if ever you meet the man of whom we
write, your invocation may not be forgotten, or be, what is more likely,
too late.
The Dacres, this season, were the subject of general conversation. She
was the distinguished beauty, and the dandies all agreed that his
dinner was worthy of his daughter. Lady Fitz-pompey was not behind the
welcoming crowd. She was too politic a leader not to feel anxious to
enlist under her colours a recruit who was so calculated to maintain the
reputation of her forces. Fitz-pompey House must not lose its character
for assembling the most distinguished, the most agreeable, and the most
refined, and May Dacre was a divinity who would summon many a crowd to
her niche in this Pantheon of fashion.
If any difficulty were for a moment anticipated in bringing about this
arrangement, a fortunate circumstance seemed sufficient to remove it.
Lord St. Maurice and Arundel Dacre had been acquainted at Vienna, and,
though the intimacy was slight, it was sweet. St. Maurice had received
many favours from the _attaché_, and, as he was a man of family and
reputation, had been happy to greet him on his arrival in London. Before
the Dacres made their appearance in town for the season Arundel had been
initiated in the mysteries of Fitz-pompey House, and therefore a desire
from that mansion to cultivate the good graces of his Yorkshire relation
seemed not only not forced, but natural. So, the families met, and, to
the surprise of each other, became even intimate, for May Dacre and Lady
Caroline soon evinced a mutual regard for each other. Female friendships
are of rapid growth, and in the present instance, when there was nothing
on either side which was not lovable, it was quite miraculous, and the
friendship, particularly on the part of Lady Caroline, shot up in one
night, like a blooming aloe.
Perhaps there is nothing more lovely than the love of two beautiful
women, who are not envious of each other’s charms. How delightfully they
impart to each other the pattern of a cap, or flounce, or frill! how
charmingly they entrust some slight, slender secret about tinting a
flower or netting a purse! Now one leans over the other, and guides her
inexperienced hand, as it moves in the mysteries of some novel work,
and then the other looks up with an eye beaming with devotion; and
then again the first leans down a little lower, and gently presses her
aromatic lips upon her friend’s polished forehead.
These are sights which we quiet men, who, like ‘little Jack Horner,’
know where to take up a safe position, occasionally enjoy, but which
your noisy fellows, who think that women never want to be alone--a sad
mistake--and consequently must be always breaking or stringing a guitar,
or cutting a pencil, or splitting a crowquill, or overturning the gold
ink, or scribbling over a pattern, or doing any other of the thousand
acts of mischief, are debarred from.
Not that these bright flowers often bloomed alone; a blossom not less
brilliant generally shared with them the same parterre. Mrs. Dallington
completed the bouquet, and Arundel Dacre was the butterfly, who, she was
glad to perceive, was seldom absent when her presence added beauty to
the beautiful. Indeed, she had good reason to feel confidence in her
attractions. Independently of her charms, which assuredly were great,
her fortune, which was even greater, possessed, she was well aware,
no slight allurement to one who ever trembled when he thought of his
dependence, and often glowed when he mused over his ambition. His
slight but increasing notice was duly estimated by one who was
perfectly acquainted with his peculiar temper, and daily perceived how
disregardful he was of all others, except her and his cousin. But a
cousin! She felt confidence in the theory of Sir Lucius Grafton.
And the young Duke; have we forgotten him? Sooth to say, he was seldom
with our heroine or heroines. He had called on Mr. Dacre, and had
greeted him with marked cordiality, and he had sometimes met him and his
daughter in society. But although invited, he had hitherto avoided being
their visitor; and the comparatively secluded life which he now led
prevented him from seeing them often at other houses. Mr. Dacre, who
was unaware of what had passed between him and his daughter, thought his
conduct inexplicable; but his former guardian remembered that it was not
the first time that his behaviour had been unusual, and it was never the
disposition of Mr. Dacre to promote explanations.
Our hero felt annoyed at his own weakness. It would have been infinitely
more worthy of so celebrated, so unrivalled a personage as the Duke of
St. James not to have given the woman who had rejected him this evidence
of her power. According to etiquette, he should have called there daily
and have dined there weekly, and yet never have given the former object
of his adoration the slightest idea that he cared a breath for her
presence. According to etiquette, he should never have addressed her but
in a vein of persiflage, and with a smile which indicated his perfect
heartease and her bad taste. According to etiquette, he should have
flirted with every woman in her company, rode with her in the Park,
walked with her in the Gardens, chatted with her at the opera, and drunk
wine with her at a water party; and finally, to prove how sincere he
was in his former estimation of her judgment, have consulted her on the
presents which he should make to some intimate friend of hers, whom he
announces as his future bride. This is the way to manage a woman; and
the result may be conceived. She stares, she starts, she sighs, she
weeps; feels highly offended at her friend daring to accept him; writes
a letter of rejection herself to the affianced damsel, which she makes
him sign, and then presents him with the hand which she always meant to
be his.
But this was above our hero. The truth is, whenever he thought of May
Dacre his spirit sank. She had cowed him; and her arrival in London had
made him as dissatisfied with his present mode of life as he had been
with his former career. They had met again, and under circumstances
apparently, to him, the most unfavourable. Although he was hopeless, yet
he dreaded to think what she might hear of him. Her contempt was bitter;
her dislike would even be worse. Yet it seemed impossible to retrieve.
He was plunged deeper than he imagined. Embarrassed, entangled,
involved, he flew to Lady Afy, half in pique and half in misery. Passion
had ceased to throw a glittering veil around this idol; but she was
kind, and pure, and gentle, and devoted. It was consoling to be loved to
one who was so wretched. It seemed to him that life must ever be a blank
without the woman who, a few months ago, he had left an encumbrance. The
recollection of past happiness was balm to one who was so forlorn. He
shuddered at the thought of losing his only precious possession, and he
was never more attached to his mistress than when the soul of friendship
rose from the body of expired love.