LARGE families are--as my experience goes--of two sorts. We have the
families whose members all admire each other. And we have the families
whose members all detest each other. For myself, I prefer the second
sort. Their quarrels are their own affair; and they have a merit which
the first sort are never known to possess--the merit of being sometimes
able to see the good qualities of persons who do not possess the
advantage of being related to them by blood. The families whose members
all admire each other, are families saturated with insufferable conceit.
You happen to speak of Shakespeare, among these people, as a type of
supreme intellectual capacity. A female member of the family will not
fail to convey to you that you would have illustrated your meaning far
more completely if you had referred her to "dear Papa." You are out
walking with a male member of the household; and you say of a woman who
passes, "What a charming creature!" Your companion smiles at your
simplicity, and wonders whether you have ever seen his sister when she is
dressed for a ball. These are the families who cannot be separated
without corresponding with each other every day. They read you extracts
from their letters, and say, "Where is the writer by profession who can
equal this?" They talk of their private affairs, in your presence--and
appear to think that you ought to be interested too. They enjoy their own
jokes across you at table--and wonder how it is that you are not amused.
In domestic circles of this sort the sisters sit habitually on the
brothers' knees; and the husbands inquire into the wives' ailments, in
public, as unconcernedly as if they were closeted in their own room. When
we arrive at a more advanced stage of civilization, the State will supply
cages for these intolerable people; and notices will be posted at the
corners of streets, "Beware of Number Twelve: a family in a state of
mutual admiration is hung up there!"
I gathered from Lucilla that the Finches were of the second order of
large families, as mentioned above. Hardly one of the members of this
domestic group was on speaking terms with the other. And some of them had
been separated for years, without once troubling Her Majesty's Post
Office to convey even the slightest expression of sentiment from one to
the other.
The first wife of Reverend Finch was a Miss Batchford. The members of her
family (limited at the time of the marriage to her brother and her
sister) strongly disapproved of her choice of a husband. The rank of a
Finch (I laugh at these contemptible distinctions!) was decided, in this
case, to be not equal to the rank of a Batchford. Nevertheless, Miss
married. Her brother and sister declined to be present at the ceremony.
First quarrel.
Lucilla was born. Reverend Finch's elder brother (on speaking terms with
no other member of the family) interfered with a Christian
proposal--namely--to shake hands across the baby's cradle. Adopted by the
magnanimous Batchfords. First reconciliation.
Time passed. Reverend Finch--then officiating in a poor curacy near a
great manufacturing town--felt a want (the want of money); and took a
liberty (the liberty of attempting to borrow of his brother-in-law). Mr.
Batchford, being a rich man, regarded this overture, it is needless to
say, in the light of an insult. Miss Batchford sided with her brother.
Second quarrel.
Time passed, as before. Mrs. Finch the first died. Reverend Finch's elder
brother (still at daggers drawn with the other members of the family)
made a second Christian proposal--namely--to shake hands across the
wife's grave. Adopted once more by the bereaved Batchfords. Second
reconciliation.
Another lapse of time. Reverend Finch, left a widower with one daughter,
became personally acquainted with an inhabitant of the great city near
which he ministered, who was also a widower with one daughter. The status
of the parent, in this case--social-political-religious--was
Shoemaker-Radical-Baptist. Reverend Finch, still wanting money, swallowed
it all; and married the daughter, with a dowry of three thousand pounds.
This proceeding alienated from him for ever, not the Batchfords only, but
the peacemaking elder brother as well. That excellent Christian ceased to
be on speaking terms now with his brother the clergyman, as well as with
all the rest of the family. The complete isolation of Reverend Finch
followed. Regularly every year did the second Mrs. Finch afford
opportunities of shaking hands, not only over one cradle, but sometimes
over two. Vain and meritorious fertility! Nothing came of it, but a kind
of compromise. Lucilla, quite overlooked among the rector's
rapidly-increasing second family, was allowed to visit her maternal uncle
and aunt at stated periods in every year. Born, to all appearance with
the full possession of her sight, the poor child had become incurably
blind before she was a year old. In all other respects, she presented a
striking resemblance to her mother. Bachelor uncle Batchford, and his old
maiden sister, both conceived the strongest affection for the child. "Our
niece Lucilla," they said, "has justified our fondest hopes--she is a
Batchford, not a Finch!" Lucilla's father (promoted, by this time, to the
rectory of Dimchurch) let them talk. "Wait a bit, and money will come of
it," was all he said. Truly money was wanted!--with fruitful Mrs. Finch
multiplying cradles, year after year, till the doctor himself (employed
on contract) got tired of it, and said one day, "It is not true that
there is an end to everything: there is no end to the multiplying
capacity of Mrs. Finch."
Lucilla grew up from childhood to womanhood. She was twenty years old,
before her father's expectations were realized, and the money came of it
at last.
Uncle Batchford died a single man. He divided his fortune between his
maiden sister, and his niece. When she came of age, Lucilla was to have
an income of fifteen hundred pounds a year--on certain conditions, which
the will set forth at great length. The effect of these conditions was
(first) to render it absolutely impossible for Reverend Finch, under any
circumstances whatever, to legally inherit a single farthing of the
money--and (secondly), to detach Lucilla from her father's household, and
to place her under the care of her maiden aunt, so long as she remained
unmarried, for a period of three months in every year.
The will avowed the object of this last condition in the plainest words.
"I die as I have lived" (wrote uncle Batchford), "a High Churchman and a
Tory. My legacy to my niece shall only take effect on these
terms--namely--that she shall be removed at certain stated periods from
the Dissenting and Radical influences to which she is subjected under her
father's roof, and shall be placed under the care of an English
gentlewoman who unites to the advantages of birth and breeding the
possession of high and honorable principles"--etcetera, etcetera. Can you
conceive Reverend Finch's feelings, sitting, with his daughter by his
side, among the company, while the will was read, and hearing this? He
got up, like a true Englishman, and made them a speech. "Ladies and
gentlemen," he said, "I admit that I am a Liberal in politics, and that
my wife's family are Dissenters. As an example of the principles thus
engendered in my household, I beg to inform you that my daughter accepts
this legacy with my full permission, and that I forgive Mr. Batchford."
With that, he walked out, with his daughter on his arm. He had heard
enough, please to observe, to satisfy him that Lucilla (while she lived
unmarried) could do what she liked with her income. Before they had got
back to Dimchurch, Reverend Finch had completed a domestic arrangement
which permitted his daughter to occupy a perfectly independent position
in the rectory, and which placed in her father's pockets--as Miss Finch's
contribution to the housekeeping--five hundred a year.
(Do you know what I felt when I heard this? I felt the deepest regret
that Finch of the liberal principles had not made a third with my poor
Pratolungo and me in Central America. With him to advise us, we should
have saved the sacred cause of Freedom without spending a single farthing
on it!)
The old side of the rectory, hitherto uninhabited, was put in order and
furnished--of course at Lucilla's expense. On her twenty-first birthday,
the repairs were completed; the first installment of the housekeeping
money was paid; and the daughter was established, as an independent
lodger, in her own father's house!
In order to thoroughly appreciate Finch's ingenuity, it is necessary to
add here that Lucilla had shown, as she grew up, an increasing dislike of
living at home. In her blind state, the endless turmoil of the children
distracted her. She and her step-mother did not possess a single sympathy
in common. Her relations with her father were in much the same condition.
She could compassionate his poverty, and she could treat him with the
forbearance and respect due to him from his child. As to really
venerating and loving him--the less said about that the better. Her
happiest days had been the days she spent with her uncle and aunt; her
visits to the Batchfords had grown to be longer and longer visits with
every succeeding year. If the father, in appealing to the daughter's
sympathies, had not dexterously contrived to unite the preservation of
her independence with the continuance of her residence under his roof,
she would, on coming of age, either have lived altogether with her aunt,
or have set up an establishment of her own. As it was, the rector had
secured his five hundred a year, on terms acceptable to both sides--and,
more than that, he had got her safe under his own eye. For, remark, there
was one terrible possibility threatening him in the future--the
possibility of Lucilla's marriage!
Such was the strange domestic position of this interesting creature, at
the time when I entered the house.
You will now understand how completely puzzled I was when I recalled what
had happened on the evening of my arrival, and when I asked myself--in
the matter of the mysterious stranger--what course I was to take next. I
had found Lucilla a solitary being--helplessly dependent in her blindness
on others--and, in that sad condition, without a mother, without a
sister, without a friend even in whose sympathies she could take refuge,
in whose advice she could trust. I had produced a first favorable
impression on her; I had won her liking at once, as she had won mine. I
had accompanied her on an evening walk, innocent of all suspicion of what
was going on in her mind. I had by pure accident enabled a stranger to
intensify the imaginary interest which she felt in him, by provoking him
to speak in her hearing for the first time. In a moment of hysterical
agitation--and in sheer despair of knowing who else to confide in--the
poor, foolish, blind, lonely girl had opened her heart to me. What was I
to do?
If the case had been an ordinary one, the whole affair would have been
simply ridiculous.
But the case of Lucilla was not the case of girls in general.
The minds of the blind are, by cruel necessity, forced inward on
themselves. They live apart from us--ah, how hopelessly far apart!--in
their own dark sphere, of which we know nothing. What relief could come
to Lucilla from the world outside? None! It was part of her desolate
liberty to be free to dwell unremittingly on the ideal creature of her
own dream. Within the narrow limit of the one impression that it had been
possible for her to derive of this man--the impression of the beauty of
his voice--her fancy was left to work unrestrained in the changeless
darkness of her life. What a picture! I shudder as I draw it. Oh, yes, it
is easy, I know, to look at it the other way--to laugh at the folly of a
girl, who first excites her imagination about a total stranger; and then,
when she hears him speak, falls in love with his voice! But add that the
girl is blind; that the girl lives habitually in the world of her own
imagination; that the girl has nobody at home who can exercise a
wholesome influence over her. Is there nothing pitiable in such a state
of things as this? For myself, though I come of a light-hearted nation
that laughs at everything--I saw my own face looking horribly grave and
old, as I sat before the glass that night, brushing my hair.
I looked at my bed. Bah! what was the use of going to bed? She was her
own mistress. She was perfectly free to take her next walk to Browndown
alone! and to place herself, for all I knew to the contrary, at the mercy
of a dishonorable and designing man. What was I? Only her companion. I
had no right to interfere--and yet, if anything happened, I should be
blamed. It is so easy to say, "You ought to have done something." Whom
could I consult? The worthy old nurse only held the position of servant.
Could I address myself to the lymphatic lady with the baby in one hand,
and the novel in the other? Absurd! her stepmother was not to be thought
of. Her father? Judging by hearsay, I had not derived a favorable
impression of the capacity of Reverend Finch for interfering successfully
in a matter of this sort. However, he was her father; and I could feel my
way cautiously with him at first. Hearing Zillah moving about the
corridor, I went out to her. In the course of a little gossip, I
introduced the name of the master of the house. How was it I had not seen
him yet? For an excellent reason. He had gone to visit a friend at
Brighton. It was then Tuesday. He was expected back on "sermon-day"--that
is to say on Saturday in the same week.
I returned to my room, a little out of temper. In this state my mind
works with wonderful freedom. I had another of my inspirations. Mr.
Dubourg had taken the liberty of speaking to me that evening. Good. I
determined to go alone to Browndown the next morning, and take the
liberty of speaking to Mr. Dubourg.
Was this resolution solely inspired by my interest in Lucilla? Or had my
own curiosity been all the time working under the surface, and
influencing the course of my reflections unknown to myself? I went to bed
without inquiring. I recommend you to go to bed without inquiring too.