While we leave, for a brief space, the Abbé D'Esmonde to pursue his
road, we turn once more to the peaceful scene wherein we found him.
Mayhap there be in this dalliance something of that fond regret, that
sorrowful lingering with which a traveller halts to look down upon a
view he may never see again! Yes, dear reader, we already feel that
the hour of our separation draws nigh, when we shall no more be
fellow-journeyers, and we would fain loiter on this pleasant spot, to
tarry even a few moments longer in your company.
Passing downwards beneath that graceful bridge, which with a rare
felicity seems to heighten, and not to impair, the effect of the scene,
the river glides along between the rich wooded hills of a handsome
demesne, and where, with the most consummate taste, every tint of
foliage and every character of verdure has been cultivated to heighten
the charm of the landscape. The spray-like larch, the wide-leaved
sycamore, the solemn pine, the silver-trunked birch, all blending
their various hues into one harmonious whole,--the very perfection of a
woodland picture. As if reluctant to leave so fair a scene, the stream
winds and turns in a hundred bendings--now forming little embayments
among the jutting rocks, and now, listlessly loitering, it dallies with
the gnarled trunks of some giant beech that bends into the flood.
Emerging from these embowering woods, the river enters a new and totally
different tract of country,--the hills, bare of trees, are higher,
almost mountainous in character, with outlines fantastic and rugged.
These, it is said, were once wooded too; they present, however, little
remains of forest, save here and there a low oak scrub. The sudden
change from the leafy groves, ringing with many a “wood note wild,” to
the dreary silence of the dark region, is complete as you approach the
foot of a tall mountain, at whose base the river seems arrested, and
is in reality obliged by a sudden bend to seek another channel. This
is Corrig-O'Neal; and here, in a little amphitheatre, surrounded by
mountains of lesser size, stood the ancient manor of which mention has
been more than once made in these pages.
It is but a short time back and there stood there an ancient house,
whose character, half quaint, half noble, might have made it seem a
French château; the tall, high-pitched roof, pierced with many a window;
the richly ornamented chimneys, the long terrace, with its grotesque
statues, and the intricate traceries of the old gate itself, all
evidencing a taste not native to our land. The very stiff and formal
avenue of lime-trees that led direct to the door had reference to a
style of landscape-gardening more consonant with foreign notions, even
without the fountains, which, with various strange groups of allegorical
meaning, threw their tiny jets among the drooping flowers. At the back
of the house lay a large garden, or rather what constituted both garden
and orchard; for although near the windows trim flower-beds and neatly
gravelled walks were seen, with rare and blossoming plants, as you
advanced, the turf usurped the place of the cultivated ground, and the
apple, the pear, and the damson formed a dense, almost impenetrable
shade.
Even on the brightest day in spring, when the light played and danced
upon the shining river, with blossoming cherry-trees, and yellow
crocuses in the grass, and fair soft daffodils along the water's edge,
smiling like timid beauties, when the gay May-fly skimmed the rippling
stream, and the strong trout splashed up to seize him,--even then, with
life and light and motion all around, there was an air of sadness on
this spot,--a dreary gloom, that fell upon the spirits less like sudden
grief than as the memory of some old and almost forgotten sorrow. The
frowning aspect of that stern mountain, which gave its name to the
place, and which, in its rugged front, showed little touch of time or
season, seemed to impress a mournful character on the scene. However it
was, few passed the spot without feeling its influence, nor is it likely
that now, when scarcely a trace of its once inhabited home remains, its
aspect is more cheering.
In a dark wainscoted room of this gloomy abode, and on a raw and dreary
day, our old acquaintance, Lady Hester, sat, vainly endeavoring between
the fire and the screen to keep herself warm, while shawls, muffs, and
mantles were heaped in most picturesque confusion around her. A French
novel and a Blenheim spaniel lay at her feet, a scarce-begun piece of
embroidery stood at one side of her, and an untasted cup of coffee on a
small table at the other. Pale, and perhaps seeming still more so from
the effect of her deep mourning, she lay back in her chair, and, with
half-closed lids and folded arms, appeared as if courting sleep--or at
least unconsciousness.
She had lain thus for above half an hour, when a slight rustling
noise--a sound so slight as to be scarcely audible----caught her
attention, and, without raising her head, she asked in a faint tone,----
“Is there any one there?”
“Yes, my Lady. It is Lisa,” replied her maid, coming stealthily forward,
till she stood close behind her chair. “Put some of that thing----peat,
turf, or whatever it is----on the fire, child. Has the post arrived?”
“No, my Lady; they say that the floods have detained the mails, and that
they will be fully twelve hours late.”
“Of course they will,” sighed she; “and if there should be anything for
_me_, they will be carried away.”
“I hope not, my Lady.”
“What's the use of your hoping about it, child? or, if you must hope,
let it be for something worth while. Hope that we may get away from this
miserable place,----that we may once more visit a land where there
are sunshine and flowers, and live where it repays one for the bore of
life.”
“I 'm sure I do hope it with all my heart, my Lady.”
“Of course you do, child. Even you must feel the barbarism of this
wretched country. Have those things arrived from Dublin yet?”
“Yes, my Lady; but you never could wear them. The bonnet is a great
unwieldy thing, nearly as big and quite as heavy as a Life-Guardsman's
helmet; and the mantle is precisely like a hearth-rug with sleeves to
it. They are specially commended to your Ladyship's notice, as being all
of Irish manufacture.”
“What need to say so?” sighed Lady Hester. “Does not every lock on every
door, every scissors that will not cut, every tongs that will not hold,
every parasol that turns upside down, every carriage that jolts, and
every shoe that pinches you, proclaim its nationality?”
“Dr. Grounsell says, my Lady, that all the fault lies in the wealthier
classes, who prefer everything to native industry.”
“Dr. Grounsell's a fool, Lisa. Nothing shall ever persuade me that
Valenciennes and Brussels are not preferable to that ornament for
fireplaces and fauteuils called Limerick lace, and Genoa velvet a
more becoming wear than the O'Connell frieze. But have done with this
discussion; you have already put me out of temper by the mention of that
odious man's name.”
“I at least saved your Ladyship from seeing him this morning.”
“How so? Has he been here?”
“Twice already, my Lady; and threatens another visit He says that he has
something very important to communicate, and his pockets were stuffed
with papers.”
“Oh, dear me! how I dread him and his parchments! Those terrible details
by which people discover how little is bequeathed to them, and how
securely it is tied up against every possibility of enjoying it. I 'd
rather be a negro slave on a coffee plantation than a widow with what is
called a 'high-principled trustee' over my fortune.”
“There he comes again, my Lady; see how fast he is galloping up the
avenue.”
“Why will that pony never stumble? Amiable and worthy folk break their
necks every day of the week,--fathers of families and unbeneficed
clergymen. Assurance companies should certainly deal lightly with crusty
old bachelors and disagreeable people, for they bear charmed lives.”
“Am I to admit him, my Lady?” asked the maid, moving towards the door.
“Yes--no--I really cannot--but perhaps I must. It is only putting off
the evil day. Yes, Lisa, let him come in; but mind that you tell him I
am very poorly--that I have had a wretched night, and am quite unfit
for any unpleasant news, or, indeed, for anything like what he calls
business. Oh dear! oh dear! the very thought of parchment will make me
hate sheep to the last hour of my life; and I have come to detest the
very sight of my own name, from signing 'Hester Onslow' so often.”
It must be said, there was at least no hypocrisy in her Ladyship's
lamentations; if the cause of them was not all-sufficient, the effects
were to the full what she averred, and she was, or believed herself to
be, the most miserable of women. Sir Stafford's will had bequeathed
to her his Irish property, on the condition of her residing upon it at
least six months every two years, a clause whose cruelty she--with
or without reason we know not--attributed to the suggestion of Dr.
Grounsell. To secure eighteen months of unlimited liberty, she was
undergoing her captivity in what, it must be acknowledged, was a spirit
the reverse of that the testator intended. So far from taking any
interest in the country, its people, or its prospects, she only saw
in it a dreary imprisonment, saddened by bad weather, bad spirits, and
solitude. Nor were her griefs all causeless. Her position was greatly
fallen from the possession of a fortune almost without bounds to the
changeful vicissitudes of an Irish property. Norwood's dreadful death,
wrapped in all the mystery which involved it, shocked her deeply,
although, in reality, the event relieved her from a bondage she had long
felt to be insupportable; and lastly, the Romanism in which she had,
so to say, invested all her “loose capital” of zeal and enthusiasm,
had become a terrible disappointment. The gorgeous splendor of Italian
Popery found a miserable representative in Irish Catholicism. The meanly
built Irish chapel, with its humble congregation, was a sorry exchange
for the architectural grandeur and costly assemblage gathered within the
Duomo of Florence, or beneath the fretted roof of “St. John of Lateran.”
In all the sublimity of pealing music, of full-toned choirs, of incense
floating up into realms of dim distance, there were but the nasal
sing-song of a parish priest, and the discordant twang of a dirty
acolyte! And what an interval separated their vulgar manners of the
village curate from the polished addresses of the Roman cardinal! How
unlike the blended pretension and cringing slavery of the one was to
the high-bred bearing and courtly urbanity of the other. A visit from
“Father John” was an actual infliction. To receive his Eminence was not
only an honor but a sincere pleasure. Who, like him, to discuss every
topic of the world and its fashionable inhabitants, touching every
incident with a suave mellowness of remark that, like the light through
a stained-glass window, warmed, while it softened, that which it fell
upon? Who could throw over the frailties of fashion such a graceful
cloak of meek forgiveness, that it seemed actually worth while to sin
to be pardoned with such affection? All the pomp and circumstance of
Romanism, as seen in its own capital, associated with rank, splendor,
high dignity, and names illustrious in story, form a strong contrast
to its vulgar pretensions in Ireland. It is so essentially allied to
ceremonial and display, that when these degenerate into poverty and
meanness, the effect produced is always bordering on the ludicrous.
Such, at least, became the feeling of Lady Hester as she witnessed those
travesties of grandeur, the originals of which had left her awe-stricken
and amazed.
Shorn of fortune, deprived of all the illusions which her newly adopted
creed had thrown around her, uncheered by that crowd of flatterers which
used to form her circle, is it any wonder if her spirits and her temper
gave way, and that she fancied herself the very type of misery and
desertion? The last solace of such minds is in the pity they bestow upon
themselves; and here she certainly excelled, and upon no occasion more
forcibly than when receiving a visit from Dr. Grounsell.
“Dr. Grounsell, my Lady,” said a servant; and, at the words, that
gentleman entered.
A heavy greatcoat, with numerous capes, a low-crowned glazed hat, and a
pair of old-fashioned “Hessians,” into which his trousers were tucked,
showed that he had not stooped to any artifices of toilet to win favor
with her Ladyship. As she bowed slightly to him, she lifted her glass to
her eye, and then dropped it suddenly with a gentle simper, as though to
say that another glance would have perilled her gravity.
“Winter has set in early, madam,” said he, approaching the fire, “and
with unusual severity. The poor are great sufferers this year.”
“I 'm sure I agree with you,” sighed Lady Hester. “I never endured such
cold before!”
“I spoke of the 'poor,' madam,” retorted he, abruptly.
“Well, sir, has any one a better right to respond in their name than I
have? Look around you, see where I am living, and how, and then answer
me!”
“Madam,” said Grounsell, sternly, and fixing his eyes steadily on her as
he spoke, “I have ridden for two hours of this morning over part of that
tract which is your estate. I have visited more than a dozen--I will not
call them houses, but hovels. There was fever in some, ague in others,
and want, utter want, in all; and yet I never heard one of the sufferers
select himself as the special mark of misfortune, but rather allude to
his misery as part of that common calamity to which flesh is heir. 'God
help the poor!' was the prayer, and they would have felt ashamed to have
invoked the blessing on themselves alone.”
“I must say that if you have been to see people with typhus, and perhaps
small-pox, it shows very little consideration to come and visit _me_
immediately after, sir.”
Grounsell's face grew purple, but with a great effort he repressed the
reply that was on his lips, and was silent.
“Of course, then, these poor creatures can pay nothing, sir?”
“Nothing, madam.”
“Che bella cosa! an Irish property!” cried she, with a scornful laugh;
“and if I mistake not, sir, it was to your kind intervention and
influence that I am indebted for this singular mark of my husband's
affection?”
“Quite true, madam. I had supposed it to be possible----Just
possible--that, by connecting your personal interest with duties, you
might be reclaimed from a life of frivolity and idleness to an existence
of active and happy utility, and this without any flattering estimate of
your qualities, madam.”
“Oh, sir, this is a very needless protest,” said she, bowing and
smiling.
“I repeat, madam, that, without any flattering estimate of your
qualities, I saw quite enough to convince me that kindness and
benevolence were just as easy to you as their opposites.”
“Why, you have become a courtier, sir,” said she, with a smile of sly
malice.
“I 'm sorry for it, madam; I 'd as soon be mistaken for a hairdresser
or a dancing-master. But to return. Whether I was correct or not in my
theory would appear to be of little moment; another, and more pressing
view of the case, usurping all our interests, which is no less, madam,
than your actual right and title to this estate at all.”
Lady Hester leaned forward in her chair as he said this, and in a low
but unshaken voice replied, “Do I understand you aright, sir, that the
title to this property is contested?”
“Not yet, madam; there is no claim set up as yet; but there is every
likelihood that there will be such. Rumors have gradually grown into
open discussions; threatening notices have been sent to me by post, and
stories which at first I had deemed vague and valueless have assumed a
degree of importance from the details by which they were accompanied. In
fact, madam, without any clew to the nature or direct drift of the plot,
I can yet see that a formidable scheme is being contrived, the great
agent of which is to be menace.”
“Oh dear, what a relief it would be to me were I quite certain of all
this!” exclaimed Lady Hester, with a deep sigh.
“What a relief? Did you say what a relief, madam?” cried Grounsell, in
amazement.
“Yes, sir, that was precisely the word I used.”
“Then I must have blundered most confoundedly, madam, in my effort to
explain myself. I was endeavoring to show you that your claim to the
estate might be disputed!”
“Very well, sir, I perfectly understood you.”
“You did, eh? you perceive that you might possibly lose the property,
and you acquiesce calmly--”
“Nay, more, sir; I rejoice sincerely at the very thought of it.”
“Well, then, upon my----eh? May the devil--I beg pardon, madam, but
this is really such a riddle to me that I must confess my inability to
unravel it.”
“Shall I aid you, sir?” said Lady Hester, with an easy smile on her
features. “When bequeathing this estate to me, Sir Stafford expressly
provided, that if from any political convulsion Ireland should be
separated from her union with Great Britain, or if by course of law a
substantial claim was established to the property by another, that I
should be recompensed for the loss by an income of equal amount derived
from the estate of his son, George Onslow, at whose discretion it lay
to allocate any portion of his inheritance he deemed suitable for the
purpose.”
“All true, madam, quite true,” broke in Grounsell; “and the
Solicitor-General's opinion is that the provision is perfectly
nugatory,--not worth sixpence. It has not one single tie of obligation,
and, from its vagueness, is totally inoperative.”
“In law, sir, it may be all that you say,” replied Lady Hester, calmly;
“but I have yet to learn that this is the appeal to which Captain Onslow
would submit it.”
Grounsell stared at her; and for the first time in all his life he
thought her handsome. That his own features revealed the admiration
he felt was also plain enough, and Lady Hester was very far from being
insensible to the tribute.
“So that, madam,” cried he, at length, “You prefer insecurity to
certainty.”
“Say rather, sir, that I have more confidence in the honorable
sentiments of an English gentleman than I have in the solvency of a poor
and wretched peasantry. Up to this very hour I have known nothing except
the claims upon myself. I don't like the climate; and I am certain the
neighbors do not like me,--in fact, I have neither the youth nor the
enterprise suited to a new country.”
“Why, good heavens, madam, it isn't New Zealand we're in!” cried
Grounsell, angrily.
“Perhaps not,” sighed she, languidly; “but it is just as strange to
_me_.”
“I see, madam,” said Grounsell, rising, “my plan was a bad one. A wing
in the Borghese Palace, a spacious apartment of the Corsini, on the
Arno, or even the first floor of the Moncenigo, at Venice, would have
been a happier choice than a gloomy old mansion on the banks of an Irish
river.”
“Oh, do not speak of it, sir!” cried she, enthusiastically. “Do not
remind me of starry skies and the deep blue Adriatic in this land of
cloud and fog, where even the rain is 'dirty water.' Pray make the very
weakest defence of my claim to this inheritance. I only ask to march out
with my baggage, and do not even stipulate for the honors of war. Let me
have George's address.”
“You 'll not need it, madam; he will be here within a few days. He has
been promoted to a majority for his conduct in the field, and returns to
England covered with praise and honors.”
“What delightful news, Dr. Grounsell; you are actually charming this
morning!” The doctor bowed stiffly at the compliment, and she went
on: “I often thought that you could be amiable if you would only let
yourself; but, like the Cardinal Gualterino, you took up the character
of Bear, and 'Bear' you would be at all times and seasons; and then
those horrid coats, that you would persist in wearing,--how you ever got
them of that odious brown, I can't think; they must have dyed the wool
to order,--not but that I think your shoes were worst of all.”
Grounsell understood too well the wordy absurdity with which her
Ladyship, on the least excitement, was accustomed to launch forth,
quite forgetful of all the impertinence into which it betrayed her. He
therefore neither interposed a remark, nor seemed in any way conscious
of her observation; but coldly waiting till she had concluded, he said,
----
“Some other of your Ladyship's friends are also expected in this
neighborhood,--the Daltons!”
“What--my dear Kate?”
“Yes; Miss Kate Dalton, accompanied by her brother and uncle. I have
just been to order apartments for them in the hotel at Kilkenny.”
“But they must come here. I shall insist upon it, doctor. This is a
point on which I will accept no refusal.”
“The occasion which calls them to Ireland, madam, and of which you shall
hear all, hereafter, would totally preclude such an arrangement.”
“More mystery, sir?” exclaimed she.
“Another side of the same one, madam,” rejoined he, dryly.
“What delightful news, to think I shall see my dearest Kate again! I
am dying to know all about Russia, and if the ladies do wear pearls
in morning toilette, and whether turquoises are only seen in fans and
parasol handles. What splendor she must have seen!”
“Humph!” said Grounsell, with a short shrug of the shoulders.
“Oh, I know you despise all these things, and you hate caviare. Then I
want to know about the Prince; why the match was broken off; and from
what cause she refused that great settlement,--some thousand roubles.
How much is a rouble, by the way, doctor?”
“I really cannot tell you, madam,” said he, bluntly, who saw that she
was once more “wide a-field.”
“She'll tell me all herself, and everything about Russia. I want to hear
about the knout, and the malachite, and that queer habit of gambling
before dinner is announced. I 'm sure I should like St Petersburg. And
the brother, what is he like?”
“I only know, madam, that he is a great invalid, not yet recovered from
his wounds!”
“How interesting! He was in the patriot army, was he not?”
“He fought for the Emperor, madam; pray make no mistake in that sense.”
“Oh dear! how difficult it is to remember all these things; and yet I
knew it perfectly when I was at Florence,--all about the Kaiser-Jagers,
and the Crociati, and the Croats, and the rest of them. It was the
Crociati, or the Croats--I forget which--eat little children. It 's
perfectly true; Guardarelli, when he was a prisoner, saw an infant
roasting for Radetzky's own table.”
“I would beg of you, madam, not to mention this fact to the
Field-Marshal, Miss Kate Dalton's uncle.”
“Oh, of course not; and I trust he will not expect that we could provide
him with such delicacies here. Now, doctor, how shall we amuse these
people? what can we do?”
“Remember, first of all, madam, that their visit to Ireland is not an
excursion of pleasure----”
“Oh, I can perfectly conceive _that!_” interrupted she, with a look of
irony.
“I was about to remark that an affair of deep importance was the cause
of their journey--”
“More business!” broke she in again. “After all, then, I suppose I am
not much more miserable than the rest of the world. Everybody would seem
to have what you call 'affairs of importance.'”
“Upon my word, madam, you have made me totally forget _mine_, then,”
said Grounsell, jumping up from his seat, and looking at his watch. “I
came here prepared to make certain explanations, and ask your opinion
on certain points. It is now two o'clock, and I have not even opened the
matter in hand.”
Lady Hester laughed heartily at his distress, and continued to enjoy her
mirth as he packed up his scattered papers, buttoned his greatcoat, and
hurried away, without even the ceremony of a leave-taking.