CHAPTER X.

MANNERS:

A NOVEL.

----Dicas hÓc forsitan unde

Ingenium par materiÊ.

JUVENAL.

Je sais qu'un sot trouve toujours un plus sot pour le lire.

FRED. LE GRAND.

IN THREE VOLUMES.

VOL. III.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR BALDWIN, CRADOCK, AND JOY,

PATERNOSTER ROW.

1817.

MANNERS.

CHAPTER I.

----Whose birth beyond all question springs

From great and glorious, though forgotten, kings.

oeCHURCHILL.oe

The lady who did the honours of Mr. O'Sullivan's house to our English

travellers, on the night of their arrival at Ballinamoyle, Miss

Fitzcarril by name, was in person extremely tall; and a carriage of

extraordinary uprightness gave her, with a stiffness, a dignity also of

appearance. Her face, though good natured in expression, was, at that

period, rather plain; but yet sufficient evidence remained to

corroborate her own frequent assertion, that "she had once been a fine

woman;" in making which she flattered herself her auditors would imply,

that she took the same license which the structure of a venerable

language sometimes permits, of understanding, at pleasure, different

tenses by the same word; and that they would from the past infer the

present. In dress and manner she was old fashioned, but stately,

generally wearing garments made of the antique tabinets and satins she

inherited from her grandmother, and which, from the unbending nature of

the material, would have stood alone, nearly in as erect a posture as

that they maintained when encompassing her perpendicular figure; a

double clear starched handkerchief, which Mr. Desmond wickedly called

her transparency, enveloped her neck; and the costume of her person was

completed by a fine muslin apron of curious work, derived from her own,

or her progenitors' industry. Her headdress was the only part of her

attire which was ever varied, and in this she was fantastic in the

extreme, composing it of the most showy materials, and wearing in her

caps and turbans colours only fit for the young and beautiful. Every

acquaintance who visited Galway, Limerick, or Clare, was sure to have a

commission to buy a cap or bonnet for Miss Fitzcarril; and the more

_outrÈ_ in form and colour, the better pleased she was with their

purchase. She was, in mind, the most singular mixture of pride and

parsimony that was perhaps ever compounded; the one she derived from her

highly valued ancestry, the other from her own peculiar fate, and a

mistaken idea of principle; and she reconciled her frugality and her

dignity, by declaring that "the Fitzcarrils and O'Sullivans needn't

trouble their heads about what any one said of them; _every body_ knew

they were come of the kings of Connaught, and had a good right to do as

they pleased." In early life she had lived in extreme poverty, and then

had learned the ideas of management she afterwards laboured to enforce

at Ballinamoyle. Mr. O'Sullivan had been deprived of his wife a few

years before he had also the misfortune to lose his only child; and on

the death of this beloved daughter, he chose Theresa Fitzcarril from

amongst his female relatives, to superintend his establishment, at the

same time settling a comfortable provision on her, in case she should

survive himself; which he considered a mere act of justice, for he

foresaw that the retirement of his residence would condemn her to a life

of solitude and celibacy, the two precise circumstances which least

accorded with her own wishes. Theresa, on her part, actuated by an

excess of pride, resolved she would cancel her pecuniary obligations,

not only to her original benefactor, but to his heir, by saving for the

family a sum more than equivalent to all she should ever receive from

it. She therefore endeavoured (though without much success) to introduce

a system of penury at Ballinamoyle, that, had its owner been aware of

her proceedings, he would not have suffered, as it was diametrically

opposite to his wishes; he seldom however inquired into the _minutiÊ_

of his household; and indifferent to every thing, after the loss of his

daughter, he permitted Theresa to do nearly as she pleased; and when he

did object to any of her practices, she was so obstinate, that he found

he must, to get rid of them, get rid of herself also with them, and this

he never could resolve on; but consoled himself with the usual

reflection of his countrymen, when trouble is necessary to avoid any

thing unpleasant, "It will do well enough, my time won't be long." Miss

Fitzcarril sought to relieve the monotony of her life by indulging in

constant speculation. In every lottery she had a sixteenth share of a

ticket; and to ascertain what she might possess in the _matrimonial

lottery_, had frequent and protracted conferences with all the tribes of

cup-tossers, card-cutters, and deaf and dumb men and women, who infested

the country as fortune-tellers,--"Who blind could every thing

foresee"--"Who dumb could every thing foretell." This pleasure however

Miss Fitzcarril was obliged to indulge in secret, as Mr. O'Sullivan and

the worthy priest, who was his domestic pastor, used their best

endeavours to banish this race of vagabonds from every place they had

influence in; so that when she consulted any of these oracles, she was

obliged to conceal herself and them in some remote cabin; but perhaps

the impediment thus thrown in the way of this favourite indulgence made

her but the more keenly enjoy and still more pertinaciously persist in

the practice, notwithstanding the reiterated penances imposed for this

offence by the good father Dermoody, which, though she ventured to

commit, she did not dare to suppress at confessional. A family of the

name of Stewart wandered about the country, presenting papers signed by

respectable names, setting forth, that "their progenitors had been

shipwrecked on the coast of Ireland, about a century ago--that the whole

race were deaf and dumb--but that Providence, in compensation, had

bestowed on them the gift of second sight." To the predictions of a dumb

woman, who claimed this name, and proved she was deaf, by showing that

nature had left her unprovided with ears[1], Theresa gave the most

implicit credit. This Pythoness had learned to write the printed

character, and to draw rude representations of ships, trees, men, and

animals, which she described on a board with a piece of white chalk; and

of these hieroglyphics those who consulted her made what sense best

pleased them. A sharp boy, who had all his senses in full activity,

never failed to accompany her; apparently to assist in expounding her

text, but, in reality, to collect information, which, by the language of

signs, he certainly conveyed to his fellow conjuror, at the most

_‡-propos_ moment, as no body concealed from him the information she was

supposed to be (humanly speaking) ignorant of;

"Tout cela bien souvent faisoit crier miracle!

Enfin quoique ignorant ‡ vingt et trois carats,

Elle passoit pour un oracle!"

[Footnote 1: This account of the Stewart family is not fictitious,

either as to name or circumstance.]

In their last conference Judy Stewart had given Miss Fitzcarril the

following enigma:--A rose rudely drawn, followed by the words "of

vargins,"--then, a ship in full sail--then, three suns--and lastly, a

man, four times as big as the ship, holding a candle in one hand, and a

ring in the other. The exposition Barny and the curious spinster gave of

this was as follows:--"The flower of virgins," that is, the eldest

daughter of the direct branch of the O'Sullivan family, was coming from

beyond sea, and would arrive at Ballinamoyle, as soon as the sun had

risen three times, bringing in her train a great personage (expressed by

his extraordinary size,) who would, in winter, designated by the candle,

bestow the wedding ring on the fair Theresa Fitzcarril. Judy Stewart's

credit was luckily saved by the horses, which our travellers so

unexpectedly procured at Tuberdonny, fulfilling the first part of the

prediction; and in Mr. Webberly the credulous maiden saw the hero, who

was to accomplish that part which related to herself.

Extremes are popularly said to meet, which, we suppose, may naturally

account for the Connaught sibyls' most zealous friend and powerful enemy

residing at Ballinamoyle. The latter was the reverend father Dermoody,

who filled the office of spiritual guide to its owner. He was well

informed in mind, and gentlemanly in manners; two circumstances but

rarely united in the Irish priests, who are generally taken from a low

order in society, and do not usually carry an appearance impressive of

the respect, to which most of them are entitled by their real worth. Mr.

Dermoody was a relation of the late Mrs. O'Sullivan, and had embraced

the priesthood from the influence of early disappointment, which had

disgusted him with the world, and led him to devote himself to a

religious life for consolation. He pursued his theological studies in

one of the French colleges, and was deliberating on entering into a

monastic order of great austerity, when he received a letter from his

present patron, acquainting him with his marriage, and offering him the

situation of chaplain to his family, which Dermoody's better stars

induced him to accept. For many years he bestowed on the education of

his relative's lovely daughter all of his time and thoughts, which were

not devoted to his sacred functions; and, since her death, he had been

the consolation of her desolate father, and a blessing to the poor of

the vicinity. As he however avoided society in general, he was not

introduced to our travellers on the night of their arrival, but they

then made acquaintance with Miss Fitzcarril's constant and obsequious

attendant, Captain Cormac, so called by common consent, though he had

never risen in the army higher than a lieutenant, the half pay of which

rank was his only subsistence, independent of Mr. O'Sullivan's bounty.

Though of a different religious persuasion, his family had long been

tenants and retainers of that at Ballinamoyle; and this member of it, on

the strength of his red coat, was considered a gentleman, and, as such,

was every day admitted to Mr. O'Sullivan's table, and made up his card

party in the winter's evenings, generally returning at night to the

house of a better sort of steward, living on the demesne, who managed

the Ballinamoyle property, its owner charging himself with the expenses

there incurred by Captain Cormac.

This son of Mars, conscious of the deficiency of his pedigree, very

unknowingly endeavoured to prove his title to the character of a

gentleman, by paying the most anxious and unremitting attention to the

fair sex in general, and to Miss Fitzcarril in particular; for, in

consequence of his living in this sequestered situation, he was totally

unsuspicious of the improvements in modern manners, which lead so many

of our youth to suppose, that a neglect of the ladies they associate

with, not unfrequently amounting almost to rudeness, is an indispensable

requisite in the deportment of every fashionable beau; but perhaps some

of our readers will suggest an excuse for Captain Cormac's ignorant

simplicity, by acknowledging that beau and gentleman are not always

synonymous terms. Mr. O'Sullivan for instance, was certainly no beau,

though perfectly a gentleman. As this word, in our humble opinion,

conveys a character that is almost all "that the eye looks for," or "the

heart desires" in man, we will not weaken its inexpressible worth by

paraphrase, but hope the actions of the person it has here been applied

to will establish his claim to the most noble appellation the English

language boasts of.

CHAPTER II.

O! live--and deeply cherish still

The sweet remembrance of the past;

Rely on Heav'n's unchanging will

For peace at last!

oeMONTGOMERY.oe

On the morning after her arrival at Ballinamoyle, Adelaide was forcibly

struck with the strange coincidence of circumstances that had conducted

her to this place, so remote from the scenes in which she had once

expected to have passed her life. That day two years, she had no

expectation of becoming an inhabitant of the British isles; and one

fortnight had just elapsed since she received Mrs. O'Sullivan's letter,

announcing her intention of undertaking the journey they had

accomplished. Her meeting with Colonel Desmond seemed like seeing an

inhabitant of another world, who could dive into thoughts, and was

acquainted with occurrences unknown to those she was surrounded by.

Though but four years had revolved since they last met, from the

unexpected nature of the events that had marked them, they seemed, to

memory, longer in duration than all those which had smoothly rolled

away, ere their giant days rose on the wheel of fate, robed in the

strongest hues of joy or sorrow. She felt grieved her journey was now at

an end, as she had derived much amusement from it, and knew she should,

in future, associate much less with Colonel Desmond. "I wonder, (thought

she,) what description of being this Mr. O'Sullivan is, we have come so

far to see--Poor little Caroline! I hope he will be more affectionate to

her than her mother and sisters are."

When Adelaide repaired to the breakfast room, and proceeded to open the

door, her hand trembled on the lock, for she heard Caroline's joyous

voice within, followed by an expression of fondness; and recollected,

with bitterness of heart, that in that room was no relative, who would

greet her entrance with a face of gladness.--She could not go in at that

moment, and retreated a few steps. "Why am I so overpowered this

morning? (thought she,) I ought to be more than usually happy, in

reflecting, that dearest Caroline is this day introduced to her father's

family; the happy one will soon arrive, when I shall be restored to

mine, so _co˚te qui co˚te_, I go in." Armed with this magnanimous

resolution, she entered the room, and her eyes were instantly attracted

by one of the most venerable figures she had ever beheld. An old

gentleman, dressed in mourning, was sitting with little Caroline on his

knee; his face, as he bent his gray head to gaze on her infant beauties,

was expressive of every benevolent feeling, whilst his dignified figure

impressed the beholder with an awe, which was tempered, but not entirely

removed, by the benignity of his countenance. In him was seen all that

was reverend in age--in the cherub he caressed all that was blooming in

youth. Her silken hair hung, in waving ringlets, on a cheek that mocked

the rose's hue; her transparent skin showed the blue veins, that

meandered on a brow as spotless as the mountain snow. The dark blue eye,

that threw its melting ray on his, seemed to call forth fires that long

had slept beneath those silver brows; and as her ivory arm hung round

his neck, the youthful softness of her hand was more than usually

apparent from the contrast it formed with the withered cheek it pressed.

"Dearest Caroline! may he prove a fond parent to you!" was the ardent

wish of Adelaide's heart, as she gazed on the happy child, and her

venerable relative. Mr. O'Sullivan, looking up, rose to receive her; and

the little girl, springing gaily forward, took her hand, saying, "This

is my own dear Adele Wildenheim, I told you about, uncle; I love her

better than any body in the world; if you will let me live with you, and

will keep her too, I shall be so happy!" Whilst Caroline looked

inquiringly up in his face to read the success of her proposition; the

old man smiled on the lovely girl thus introduced to him, and holding

out his hand cordially to her, said, "Your name is well known to me,

Miss Wildenheim. Baron Wildenheim was the friend and benefactor of my

deceased brother, and his child is truly welcome to my roof." Adelaide's

cheek glowed with the most vivid blushes as she felt a tear trickle

down; the accents faltered on her lips when she attempted to speak, and

a deep sigh burst from Mr. O'Sullivan's breast as he recollected, that

the daughter he had lost in the bloom of youth was, in his eyes at

least, as lovely as the beautiful girl they now rested on.

At this moment Miss Fitzcarril and Mrs. O'Sullivan entered the room; the

latter acting the amicable, aspired to rest her fat hand on the bony arm

of the stately Theresa, who, with smiles of unconscious exultation at

her own towering height, and with an air of condescension, bent her long

neck over her right shoulder, towards her rotund companion, as if the

words she addressed to her would not otherwise be within hearing

distance. The one stalked forward, sweeping after her a long train of

the thickest tabinet; the other (though certainly not a figure for a

Zephyr) fluttered in gauze, whose transparent texture a Roman would have

compared to "the woven wind," her habiliment being about as long as that

of the sapient dame well known in nursery history, after her unfortunate

rencontre with the mischievous pedler.

When Mrs. O'Sullivan espied her brother-in-law, she bustled up to him

with an appearance of lively pleasure; but an observer, with half the

penetration of Adelaide, might have seen a temporary expression of

disappointment cloud his features, as from his brother he had never

received the slightest hint, that might lead him to form an idea of what

she really was, either in manner or appearance; and the beauty of her

daughter and elegance of her ward had made him expect to find her far

different in both; however, this expression was but transient, and he

received her with his usual hospitality, and told her with much warmth

and sincerity, how much he admired the charming little Caroline. The

Miss Webberlys and their brother made their appearance shortly after

Mrs. O'Sullivan's entrance; and the groupe were all assembled round the

breakfast-table when Father Dermoody came into the room, whom Miss

Fitzcarril and the master of the house rose to receive with the utmost

respect, whilst his manner united the humility he felt as a man with the

dignity he derived from his sacred office. When he approached them, the

motion of his hand, and the raised expression of his countenance, told

Adelaide that he passed that silent benediction she had so often

witnessed abroad. His benevolent looks seemed to extend it to all,

though a slight tinge on his cheek, and a half mournful glance of his

eye, betrayed that he felt it would be scorned by some. A reverential

bend of Adelaide's graceful figure, and the mild seriousness that

chastened her smile of acknowledgement as her eye met his, conveyed to

the venerable priest that she at least understood him, and thankfully

received his pious aspirations. He looked in vain for the sign, that

should have marked their conformity of faith, and sighed deeply, then

muttered half under his breath, "In all else how like!"

The English ladies soon found Miss Fitzcarril's gunpowder tea quite too

potent for their nerves, and diluted it in a manner that astonished her;

for this good lady, in her extensive patronage of vagrants, included

smugglers and pedlers, from whom she procured the finest teas and

brandies, for to these articles her ideas of parsimony did not extend;

and as she kept the latter entirely for her male friends, she thought

the former in their utmost strength the peculiar beverage of the fair

sex, and now wondered where these ladies could have been brought up, not

to understand the merits of gunpowder tea at a guinea a pound!

In the course of the morning Mr. O'Sullivan took his usual promenade in

front of his house; and here he appeared in all his glory. In one

promiscuous groupe were assembled the heads of the families his tenantry

comprised, with every other man, woman, or child, that could leave home

to get a peep at the newly-arrived guests, whose appearance at

Ballinamoyle had been looked for with more curiosity than pleasure. For

Mr. O'Sullivan was universally beloved, and the superstitious ideas of

his tenantry made them regard the arrival of his heiress as an omen of

his own death; besides they very naturally dreaded this property being

given to people unattached to them, and unacquainted with their customs.

As the ladies stood at the open windows in front of the house to gaze at

the strange assemblage, many were the remarks their appearance called

forth. According to custom, every domestic went out in turn to

"collogue," as they call it, with their favourite Judy or Barny; and as

Caroline stood on the window-seat with Adelaide's protecting arm round

her waist, she was repeatedly pointed out to the inquirers. But as the

Irish seldom have patience to listen to more than half a sentence, when

their minds are intent on any new subject, Caroline's companion was by

most of the crowd taken for the object of their search. "She is a

beautiful young lady, and looks loving and kind." "She's about the

height of poor Miss Rose." "Ochone, she was the darling! Sun or moon

will ne'er shine on the likes of her again; and while grass grows and

water runs, she'll ne'er be forgot out of Ballinamoyle!" These and many

similar expressions proceeded from the lips of the elder part of the

assembly, whilst the unconscious object of their remarks entertained

herself in viewing the various groupes it consisted of.

Close after Mr. O'Sullivan walked his steward, hat in hand, to receive

his orders, or answer his questions respecting the numerous petitioners

who from time to time approached him. Whenever he turned towards the

crowd, every man's hat was instantaneously taken off in the most

respectful manner--every woman's petticoat, however short, touched the

ground in her curtsy. Sundry sturdy little urchins were thumped on the

back for being rather tardy in paying his honour proper respect; and a

sulky reverence brought more than one little girl to the ground, as her

mother used no very gentle means to expedite her motions; whilst many a

rosy child had its plump cheek or white head stroked for being

"mannerly." When Mr. O'Sullivan's levee had lasted as long as he wished,

and when he had granted potato ground, and grazing ground, and firing

ground, and had remitted fines for trespasses innumerable, his steward

gave the usual signal, and the crowd dispersed to idle away the rest of

the morning:--an idle evening was a thing of course.

Miss Fitzcarril now proceeded to perform that ceremony always observed

in a country house--of showing it, however unworthy it may be of

exhibition. This old-fashioned edifice had been built by the present

proprietor's grandfather with the materials of an ancient monastery,

which had fallen to ruin on its site, which was made choice of for the

convenience of communicating by a covered passage with the remaining

chapel--a venerable and beautiful structure, that had been preserved in

perfect repair. Over the hall door, at the top of the house, appeared

the family arms cut in stone, and underneath the name of the builder and

the date of the year when it was finished, in order, as Miss Webberly

wittily remarked, "to claim the stolen goods by, should any one take it

up on their backs and run away with it." The rooms were large and well

built, and as uniformly square as a bricklayer's line could make them.

The furniture was substantial, and, like Miss Fitzcarril, had been

handsome in its day; but it survived its contemporaries, and the present

race thought it heavy and sombre. The house had altogether a desolate

appearance, and, like the Canal Inn, could rarely boast of a perfect

bell or lock. In the part of the house which adjoined the chapel, Mrs.

O'Sullivan frequently turned the lock of a door she passed by in

traversing the various passages; and her guide always said with unusual

seriousness, "You can't go in there, madam;" at last the question was

asked "Why?" and was answered, with a deep sigh, "That was _poor Rose's_

apartment; nobody has ever been in it since she died but her father and

poor nurse." "Then what a pity," rejoined Mrs. O'Sullivan, "not to block

up the windows; let me see, three rooms back to the chapel, one, two,

three, four, five, six windows--all that much taxes for nothing!" "Block

up the windows of poor Rose's apartment! Blessed powers defend

me!--Child!" said the angry Theresa turning to Caroline, with a

vehemence of gesture and sternness of aspect that made the trembling

infant, while she looked fearfully up in her face, tightly clasp her

arms round Adelaide, "if you ever own this place, take care that you pay

respect to every relict of your cousin; it would be as much as any

one's life's worth to put an affront upon her memory."

Though Mrs. O'Sullivan could not see this apartment, she was resolved to

inspect every other nook of the house, kitchens and store-rooms

inclusive. In the latter she was surprised to see huge barrels of oaten

meal and dried fish, with numerous casks of whisky. Suspended over head

hung the cured carcases of three cows and five pigs, ready to supply the

place of their fellows in the principal kitchen. As they passed down one

of the back stair-cases, they saw in the court yard a number of men and

boys, waiting for the chance of casual employment about the house. The

men were muffled up in great coats, buttoned about their necks, the

empty sleeves hanging at their sides; some leaning against the walls,

some lying on their stomachs basking in the sun; others asleep in

various postures; the boys dancing, or playing backgammon, which they

managed by squares traced on the ground, whilst one called out the

numbers at random, which answered the purpose of dice; others wrestling,

sometimes throwing each other down on the sleepers, who just raised

their heads to give a volley of oaths, and turned to sleep again. The

unexpected entrance of the ladies into the kitchen put to flight a covey

of char-women, who seemed to think they had all the business of the

world on their hands. As strange servants were in the house, they had

determined to keep up the "dacency of Ballinamoyle," by dressing

themselves in their best; but being now at their work (that is, running

in each other's way, at the same time talking unceasingly) all their

petticoats were pinned up about their middle, except a very short dicky;

their shoes and stockings were--not on their feet and legs, but on the

kitchen tables and hot hearths, and the ears of their mob caps were

pinned over the crowns of their heads to keep them clean and the wearers

cool. There was a constant shouting to the boys in the yard to run

incessant messages. At the moment of Mrs. O'Sullivan's first

appearance, the cook called out of the kitchen window, "Do you hear,

Barny, make aff to Jarge Quin for a slip of parsley:--do you mind, be

back in a crack." No sooner was Barny dispatched than she shouted again:

"Jimmy! Jimmy Maloony I say, rin for your life, and make ould Jarge sind

the fruit for the pies." When the ladies proceeded to the servants'

hall, there was an old piper playing, and three girls dancing, that Miss

Fitzcarril thought were busy spinning and sewing. "Get along, you

incorrigibly idle sluts," said she, and they were off in a trice; but it

was out of Scylla into Charybdis, for two or three of the "cutty sarks,"

who had been muddling in the kitchen, met them in the passage, where

they had been drawn by hearing "the mistress spaking mad angry;" and

each seizing her own daughter, and thumping her well, said, "I'll pay

you for your jigging, indeed my lady!" Close to the servants' hall was a

man cleaning knives; he had taken off his coat and waistcoat, one

shoulder appeared through a great hole in the back of his shirt, the

sleeves of which were rolled up to the elbow, and it was open down to

the waist. He had neither shoes nor stockings on, and thus his legs and

arms, with the greater part of his back and breast, were naked; the skin

that covered them was nearly of a copper colour; his head was crowned

with thick, short, curly, black hair, and his unshaved face presented a

luxuriant crop of the same sable material. "What a number of men

servants you keep! pray what compacity does that one fill?" inquired

Mrs. O'Sullivan. "Madam," replied her _cicerone_ (all her pride

colouring her face) "since the world was a world, no such sarving man as

that ever belonged to the name of O'Sullivan! That's Black Frank, the

fool, who comes in to do odd jobs now and again." Black Frank was an

itinerant "innocent," who scoured knives, cleared out ashes, or did any

job the servants of the houses he frequented were too lazy to perform

themselves. He was capricious in his fancies, and never staid long in

any one place, but blessed all his acquaintance in turn. As Mrs.

O'Sullivan went up stairs, she said to herself, "It will be another

guess matter when Caroline rules the roast; I'll soon pack off all these

here wagabonds and ramscallions about their business; she'd be a sight

the richer if these warlets didn't eat up her uncle's fortin. There's

one comfort, he can't live long; when he dies, I'll make this stately

madam and all take to their heels!"

Mrs. O'Sullivan, however, was aware of but a small part of what she

considered her daughter's wrongs; for her brother-in-law, though he had

renounced all society himself, except that of a few distant relatives,

and his friends the Desmonds, authorized his servants to bring their

kindred and "cronies" to his servants' hall, to eat, drink, and be

merry. From twenty to thirty people sat down to dinner there every day,

and on Saturdays and holydays a great many more. And the song and the

jest went round amongst the careless crew, accompanied by the boisterous

laugh of rustic mirth. The young men and women amused themselves of a

winter's evening dancing jigs, whilst their elders "kept the fire warm,"

telling stories of the days of old, superstitious legends, or recounting

the omens each had observed previous to the death of the ever lamented

Miss Rose.

CHAPTER III.

When wilt thou rise in thy beauty, first of Erin's maids?

Thy sleep is long in the tomb, and the morning distant far.

The Sun shall not come to thy bed and say, "Awake, Darthula!

Awake, thou first of women!"

oeDARTHULA.oe

When the ladies retired to the drawing-room after dinner, Miss

Fitzcarril proposed walking. Mrs. O'Sullivan was anxious that Adelaide

and Caroline should study the good of their health by this exercise, but

pleaded fatigue as an excuse for declining the promenade herself,

wishing to profit by the opportunity their absence would afford, to

interrogate Theresa as to the nature and extent of the Ballinamoyle

property, and a thousand other _et cetera_. Her two elder daughters, to

whom she had before dinner mentioned her distress at having her anxiety

for information on this subject so _long_ unsatisfied, understood her

manoeuvre, and remained to assist in the gratification of their mutual

curiosity. Adelaide and Caroline accordingly set out on their ramble.

Miss Fitzcarril, in her anxious civility, attended them as far as the

hall door; she had scarcely reached it, when a voice accosted her with

"I want to spake a word to you, Miss Teree--za." "Well, nurse!" "Will

you be plased to give me some whisky for Jimmy Maloony--the paltry

fellow! he let the dinner fall bringing it up, and the spalpeen has cut

his leg very bad; but it was God saved the puddin, Miss!" Adelaide's

eyes were attracted towards the speaker, and she saw a fresh coloured

old woman, dressed in a rich flowered silk gown, underneath which

appeared a pair of coarse shoes and worsted stockings. The gown was open

before, and would have trailed on the ground, had it not been turned

back and pinned up behind, just to touch the edge of a striped green

stuff petticoat, which was surmounted in front with a fine linen apron

as white as snow. Her gray hair was rolled back over a cushion, and a

mob cap was pinned under her chin, the head piece ornamented with a

cherry coloured riband put once round her head, the ends turned back

again just to the ears, and a flat bow pinned on in front. It was not

surprising that the silk gown, which nurse wore in honour of the

strangers' arrival, should be old fashioned in make and texture, as she

had received it, according to custom, on the day Mr. O'Sullivan's

daughter had cut her first tooth. Miss Fitzcarril, before she complied

with the old woman's demands, directed Adelaide how best to proceed from

the hall door, to the following effect: "Do you see that walk to the

right? well, then you're not to go down that, only just as far as the

old oak, and then there is another to the left, mind you don't take

that, it leads to the shaking bog, but keep strait forward, and that

will bring you round and round to the back of the house." From which it

appeared that they were neither to turn to the right nor the left, but

to proceed in a strait line, which would conduct them home in a circle

from the front to the back of the house!

When the two young ladies set off, Miss Fitzcarril returned to nurse;

and while she felt for a key, amongst its numerous fellows at the bottom

of a pocket long enough to cover _her_ arm up to the elbow, shaking it

two or three times in a manner that showed what metal she carried; the

ancient dame said to her, "Our young lady that is to be, is the making

of a pretty girl, God bless her! But I'd rather it was her comrade, she

has more of the portly air and jaunteel walk of the O'Sullivans than any

of them. The others are no great shakes of ladies. But it's none of them

all would be a patch upon my sweet Rose if she was alive! Och Rose dear,

why did you lave your ould mammy to go wid a foreigner? Wouldn't his

honour have given ye gould to eat if ye chose it, and weren't you as

merry as a grig the live long day? It's but little you're happier, now

you're a blessed angel in Heaven, for you lament ye for your poor father

and ould nurse; and you're not a whit beautifuller or better than you

were here. Many's the mass we say for your sowl; but ye're fitter to

pray for us poor sinful craturs than we for you. Weary on ye, Limerick,

that ever ye rose on the face of God's earth, for ye lost me my sweet

child." The poor old woman beat her breast as this burst of sorrow

escaped her lips, and the tears rolled down the furrows of her aged

cheeks in torrents. "Nurse! nurse!" said Theresa, sobbing, "don't take

on so; if your master sees or hears you, you'll make him ill again: you

know what trouble he was in this morning, and that he wouldn't have the

first sight of the little girl before mortal breathing, but sent for her

to his own room." "Well, well, I'll soon lay my gray head in under the

sod; it isn't fit a poor cratur like me should mislist his honour." When

Miss Fitzcarril had composed herself, and dispatched nurse with a "drap

of comfort" to the kitchen, she returned to the drawing-room, and then

answered the interrogatories her visitors put to her in such a manner,

as much to strengthen the favourable impression, which the marshalling

of the tenantry had made on their minds in the morning; and, without

giving any one direct answer, managed to exalt her own and her cousin's

consequence considerably in their estimation.

Theresa, keeping ever in mind the fortune-teller's prediction, which she

graciously interpreted in young Webberly's favour, was extremely anxious

to ingratiate herself with his mother and sisters, and therefore had by

this time almost forgiven the former her proposition of blocking up the

windows of the revered apartment, as well as the affronting supposition,

that Black Frank appertained to the regular establishment of

Ballinamoyle; and the wheedling civility Mrs. O'Sullivan showed her,

encouraged her hopes and her efforts; more especially as Jack, in

compliance with his parent's wishes, had been particularly attentive to

her in the course of the day. Mrs. O'Sullivan had that morning convinced

her children it was for their interest, that Caroline should be her

uncle's heiress, as she promised in that case not to leave her any of

her own riches. She had been induced to hold out this bribe to them,

from perceiving the extreme rudeness with which they were inclined to

treat all around them, which she feared would disgust their host, whose

uniform urbanity was not less conspicuous.

With the Miss Webberlys, interest was scarcely a counterpoise to ill

temper, conceit, and _ennui_; and therefore their deportment varied

every half hour, according to the feeling of the moment. But in the

composition of their brother, ill nature had not been added to folly and

presumption; he was therefore constant in his endeavours to please, in

which he was also encouraged by the hopes, that the success of this

scheme might "put the old lady in a good humour, and make her come down

handsomely when he married Miss Wildenheim, which he would as soon as

they returned to England, please the pigs." Of the young lady's being

pleased he had little doubt; "her being so confoundedly shy was all a

sham."

Whilst Miss Fitzcarril and Mrs. O'Sullivan were playing against each

other, in the conversation which took place between them in the

drawing-room, Adelaide and Caroline pursued their ramble. At a little

distance from the house, one of the most beautiful scenes in nature

presented itself to their view.--A lake, of considerable extent, rose

from the bosom of rocky hills, whose bold forms were reflected in its

pellucid waters. It contained several islands, some with fine trees,

some grazed by cattle, and covered with the most brilliant verdure. On

the centre island stood the ruins of an old castle half covered with

ivy. To the south of the lake was a fine champaign country, and behind

the house rose a beautiful hill of great height, covered from the base

to the summit with an indigenous wood. To the right a narrow defile

opened into a wild and romantic country, showing mountains of the most

picturesque forms. The varied lights, which the declining sun threw on

this enchanting scene, gave it every beauty of exquisite colouring. "Oh!

look there, Adele!" said Caroline, "doesn't the lake and its islands

look as if it was let down from Heaven by that beautiful rainbow that

touches it at both sides? Oh, how I should like to walk up it!" "And

then," thought Adelaide, as she looked at the lovely child, "you might

join the company of the sylphs, whilst they 'pleas'd untwist the

sevenfold threads of light.'" Just at this moment an odd looking man

came close up, and taking off an old regimental cap, said, "I see you're

some of the strange quality ladies; you're quite out of the right

track,"--(rather surprising after Miss Fitzcarril's explicit

directions.) "I'll show ye'z round the place, and take ye'z to the

garden, if you're agreeable." "Thank you, my good man, I shall be much

obliged to you: pray may I ask your name?"--"They call me Jarge Quin at

the big house, Miss, because I was so long at the wars, where I lost my

right eye. I'm his honour's gardiner; and a brave kind master he is til

me, the Lord love him!" Jarge proceeded to do the honours; and delighted

by the questions Adelaide asked, became more than usually loquacious.

"Thon mountain that's foreninst ye, Miss, (said he,) is Croagh Patrick;

on the top of it is an altar, where many a good Christian goes to tell

their padereenes, on Patricksmas day. It's the very self same spot where

St. Patrick stood, when he called all the snakes and toads, and varmint

of all sorts, up the one side, and bid them, and their heirs for ever,

go down the t'other intil the sea, and be aff till Inglant; and that's

the rason the folks over the water have been so hard with us, ever since

that blessed day, no blame to you, Miss." "And what's that mountain,

shaped like a sugar loaf, more to the south?" "I don't know what name

the quality give it, Miss; but we semples call it, _Altoir na

Griene_[2], the name they say it had in ould times, afore St. Patrick

stood on the other mountain."

[Footnote 2: "The altar of the sun." Grieneus was one of the names of

Apollo in the Grecian temples.]

"Do you see that ould castle there, over aginst ye, in the lake? That's

where the family used to live, afore the new house was built, seventy

year agone next Hollontide; and now the good people dance in it every

moonlight night." "And, pray, who are the good people?" "The little

people, Miss, the fairies.--Many's the time Judy Maloony sees them

chasing each other, when they slide down the moon beams, to play swing

swang on the stalks of the ivy leaves.--And, she says, they sail across

the lake in butter cups, to the lavender hedge in the garden, when it's

in flower, to make themselves caps and jackets; and she gathers the

thistle's beard, to sarve them for threads, afore the sun sets, and as

sure as you live, there's never a bit of it there in the morning.

"Do you see that big stone, Miss, a little up the mountain there? That

by the side of the stream they call the goulden river; and that's the

place the boys and girls sit, of a summer's evening, to steal unknownst

upon the Loughrie men--ould men, about as big as my hand, looking as

sour as you plase; but if you'll thrape it out to them, ye won't let

them aff when ye catch them--they'll show you a power of gould they've

hid in under the earth."

Adelaide, though highly amused herself, thought she would give audience

to Jarge another time, not thinking his conversation very edifying to

Caroline, who, with "locks thrown back, and lips apart," was eagerly

listening to every word he said; and therefore proposed returning home.

But Jarge, looking much disappointed, said,--"Och! and won't ye be

plased just to step intil the gardin? it's in iligant order for ye'z

just now; I doubt ye'll never see it as nate again." Accordingly they

were ushered into a walled garden, three _Irish_ acres in extent, well

stocked with vegetables; but at least one third of it was planted with

potatoes. It however produced a quantity of fruit, which almost

exhausted Theresa's patience in preserving for herself and her friends

the Desmonds; for he would have been a bold wight, that would have

ventured to suggest to one of the name of O'Sullivan the propriety of

selling fruit. It was much more consonant to their dignity to let, what

they or their friends could not consume, rot under the trees. A great

gate opened on a gravel walk (besides the entrance door) on which Mr.

O'Sullivan's father had driven his coach and four all round the walks.

But these walks, though just then, as Jarge Quin said, in "iligant

order," were not usually remarkable for neatness. In their progress

round the garden, they came to a very beautiful flower bed, and Adelaide

put out her hand to pull a rose that tempted her sight.--Jarge hastily

stopped her, saying, "You're welcome, as the flowers of May, to any

thing, but that, at Ballinamoyle; his honour will have that himself the

morra. Before I went to the wars, I dug the place for Miss Rose to plant

the tree with her own beautiful hands. In the bed we always put the same

sorting of flowers, after the very moral of what she left them; and no

soul ever pulls them but his honour, and nurse Delany, who dresses the

altar, in Miss Rose's room, with them; and lays them about her monument

in the chapel, where she's cut out in white marble more nat'ral than the

life."

Adelaide made many apologies for the sacrilege she had been about to

commit; and as she entered the house felt all the wounds of her heart

bleed afresh, as she thought, "so would my beloved father have mourned

for me."

CHAPTER IV.

And do I live to hear the tale!

And will ambition then prevail,

Can sordid schemes of wealth assail,

A heart so true as his?

oeIL PERDUTO BEN.oe

As Mr. O'Sullivan's guests were rising from the breakfast table the

following morning, a peremptory ringing of the hall door bell announced

the welcome arrival of the gray headed postman, who travelled on foot at

all seasons of the year, visiting in turn the scattered dwellings of the

gentry of this mountainous region. Adelaide, with sparkling eyes and

eager fingers, opened a letter from Mrs. Temple, in answer to hers from

Shrewsbury, which, besides much domestic intelligence, contained the

following paragraph:--

"I know you are much interested for Augustus Mordaunt, and therefore

will be glad to hear that he is just gone abroad, with his uncle, Lord

Osselstone, who, I am convinced, must grow proud, nay fond of him, as he

has, by this means, an opportunity of being acquainted with the fine

qualities of this noble young man. I am afraid my favourite wish, of his

marrying Selina Seymour, is never likely to be gratified. Mr. Temple

writes to me from London, that it is confidently reported she is engaged

to Mr. Elton, Lord Eltondale's son and heir. He says, no young man in

England bears a finer character (though it is impossible we could ever

compare him to Augustus): a gentleman from Paris told Mr. Temple, that,

instead of entering into the dissipation of that gay metropolis, he

lives quite retired, absorbed in study; also that he had been acquainted

with Mr. Elton in Sicily, where he was desperately in love with a lady

of that country, whom he believed he had married: if this be the case,

it is surely very dishonourable of him not to put an immediate stop to

his engagement with Miss Seymour.--Augustus would never be guilty of

such conduct."

* * * * *

Adelaide did indeed take a much deeper interest in Augustus Mordaunt's

fate, than Mrs. Temple imagined; and little did that kind friend suspect

the misery her letter had caused on the perusal. "Gone abroad!"

exclaimed Adelaide, in thought; "perhaps for years."--A deadly paleness

overspread her face, and she precipitately sought the solitude of her

own chamber. Let us not intrude on the privacy she has chosen; but turn

to survey the motley groupes that are now assembling about Mr.

O'Sullivan's door.

This day, being Saturday, Miss Fitzcarril held _her_ levee, which was as

numerously, though not quite so respectably, attended as her host's had

been on the day before. On this day of the week she gave audience, and a

halfpenny apiece, to all the beggars in the country, with many charges

not to spend their money idly. On these occasions she stood at the

breakfast room window; from which spot she inquired into all their

complaints, without scruple; and, with the assistance of nurse,

prescribed for them, and gave medicines, wine, spirits, or black currant

jam, as their wants demanded: this affair being at an end, they all

adjourned to the kitchen door, where each received a pitcher of broth,

and a huge oaten cake, to bake which had been the principal employment

of the women assembled there the day before. An English reader might

suppose, that the amount of Miss Fitzcarril's donation in money had been

limited to a halfpenny to each beggar, from her own inclination to

parsimony; but it was in fact what was customary, a sort of toll, paid

by the gentry to the mendicants, on condition of receiving which, they

forbore to infest their abodes at other times. The country families

generally gave something additional, in the way of provision, according

to their ability; but the inhabitants of towns and villages literally

paid only this new species of poll tax; which, when received from

numbers, amounts to something considerable to each individual. It is a

lamentable truth, that an undue proportion of the Irish population are

beggars, either from necessity or inclination; and the predilection for

this mode of living is encouraged by the extraordinary charity of the

lower order to each other: no suppliant ever leaves the door of the most

miserable cabin, without receiving a handful of oaten meal, or two or

three potatoes, which are put into bags carried for the purpose; nor is

a night's lodging and the use of the turf fire ever denied. The form of

application, and admittance, is as follows:--The beggar stands on the

threshold, and says, "Peace be to this house! Any good Christian

within?"--"What do you want, poor sowl?"--"The blessing of the Lord, and

the holy powers, be about ye; and give a desolate cratur a night's

lodging."--"In the name of the holy Vargin, and the blessed saints,

kindly welcome." After this formula, the beggar, and his or her family,

take up their abode, as long as the neighbourhood affords them

subsistence. In summer, hordes of people travel about the country in

this manner. They plant their potatoes, and sow their oats in spring;

then locking up their houses, repair, like their betters, to the

watering places, where they remain till the season arrives for digging

the one and reaping the other. To the beggars that are acknowledged to

be hale in body and sound in mind must be added those, who draw on the

charity of the working members of the community, as "innocents,"

"crouls," "spey" men or women, those afflicted with fits, dumb people,

and lunatics. Whether it be, that the high premium that is given for any

defect, mental or bodily, induces the fortunate possessor to bring it

forward to publick view, and others, not so distinguished, to

counterfeit infirmity; certain it is, that the eye of a stranger from

England, where such objects are shut up in appropriate asylums, is as

much shocked as surprised at the number of the above mentioned

unfortunate beings, that are seen in the country parts of Ireland.

There are numerous impostors, but still they are the exceptions, whilst

the real sufferers form the rule.

Ere the beggars dispersed, Adelaide returned to the breakfast parlour.

And is this proud and brilliant beauty the gentle, placid Adelaide? A

vivid, perhaps a feverish glow, mantled her cheeks, and gave her eyes a

dazzling lustre, that was almost as repelling as it was beautiful. The

dignity of her carriage approached to majesty. She seemed to walk

triumphantly, as if she led misfortune by the hand, and awed her by

"The strange powers which lie

Within the magic circle of the eye."

But had she thus quickly subdued all the rebel feelings, that so lately

had mocked the calm control of reason? Oh, no! The smile that quivers

round the trembling lip may play but to conceal the throb of agony. Even

the melancholy sepulchre sometimes looks bright in the splendid beam of

the sun; and the admiring spectator thinks not of the darkness and

horror that reign within. At that moment Adelaide's heart was the tomb

of hope. When she entered the breakfast room, Mr. Webberly stared at her

like another Cymon, when Iphigenia first appeared to his wondering view.

After gazing at her for some moments, he drew his breath, which had been

repressed by his admiration, so as to give utterance to a most audible

sigh; at the same time resolving, that, when she was Mrs. Webberly, she

should always wear rouge. "When she has a colour (thought he) there is

not a handsomer woman in all Lunnon.--At this very instant she looks as

grand as Madame Catalani, when she acts that Di--Di--that virago queen,

that burned herself like a fool. What a figure we shall cut when I drive

her round the ring at the Park, in an open landaulet, with four dashing

horses, and two out-riders, in smart liveries! No; I think I'll sit

beside her; the fellows will envy me so! and have two postilions, with

purple velvet caps, and jackets trimmed with gold lace!" Having thus

settled his equipage to his satisfaction, he came up to the intended

mistress of it, saying, with all the tenderness of accent he could

command, "There is no body, Miss Wildenheim, I envy so much as Mrs.

Temple; you used always to be so glad when you saw her; I should be the

happiest man alive, if a letter from me would make you look so gay as

hers has done."

A deeper hue painted Adelaide's cheek, and a still brighter beam

sparkled in her eye. "What strange figure is that?" said she, laughing,

and avoiding any direct reply; "mounted like the farrier of Tamworth,

'on a mare of four shilling?'" The equestrian, that thus attracted her

notice, was one of a most unusual description. A sallow, meagre object

was mounted on one of the rough mountain horses of the country; a straw

rope served as bridle; and, instead of saddle, he sat on a well filled

sack, wearing a coarse blanket, fastened under his chin, not to serve

as a garment, as she unknowingly supposed, but to hide the good

condition of those it concealed. "What's your business, good man?"

inquired Miss Fitzcarril.--"I'm a stranger, and ye have a good name in

the country, lady dear; and I'm just come to seek your charity, in God's

name."--"What's that you've got in the sack?"--"Pratees and meal,

honey."--"And where did you get that horse?"--"Troth, I bought him at

the fair, last Tursday was tree weeks." "I've nothing for you, good man:

many's the time I've heard of setting a beggar on horseback, but I never

saw one till now." The following Saturday this hero returned on the same

errand, but without his horse, still however retaining his blanket. Miss

Fitzcarril's lynx's eye recognized him instantly; indeed such a peculiar

figure could hardly have escaped the notice of the most casual observer.

She inquired where he had left his horse? He very quietly answered, "Ye

were no ways agreeable to him, jewel, the last time I was here, so I

just hitched him up at the gate there below[3]!"

[Footnote 3: _Verbatim._]

In the middle of this assembly of beggars, four gentlemen and a lady

rode up to the door; and Mr. Webberly turned away with an expression of

mortification, when he saw Adelaide kiss her hand to Colonel Desmond,

who jumped off his horse, and, with his niece and Mr. Donolan, quickly

entered the house; whilst his brother, with his characteristic

jocularity, stopped to jest with the women on the outside, his son

standing by in silence to enjoy the fun. When they, in a few minutes'

time, joined their party within, the mendicant dames said one to

another, "God bless his merry honour, but master Harry is a hearty

gentleman[4]!"

[Footnote 4: The lower Irish, to the end of life, continue to call every

body by the appellation they knew them in youth. Many a "Master Billy

and Miss Jenny" are, with all propriety, fathers and mothers of large

families. The wives of the peasantry are always called by their maiden

names amongst their equals; and parents speak of "the boy," or "the

girl," even when past the grand climacteric.]

Mr. Desmond was a very handsome man, tall, stout, and well made; his

face, manner, and words expressive of the greatest _bonhomie_, mirth,

and joviality. He had no pretensions whatsoever, but was one of the few,

who openly dare to appear precisely what they are. He went through the

world finding amusement in every person he met, whether beggar or king;

laughing at himself, and with every body else: he danced, rode, and sung

admirably; and particularly excelled in the composition of

electioneering songs and squibs. His family had, for centuries, lost

their blood and their property, in every rebellion Ireland was agitated

by; but, about sixty years ago, had become protestants and loyalists in

the same day; and, as the Irish are never lukewarm in any thing, Mr.

Desmond now figured as Orange-man, captain of a yeomanry corps,

freemason, and magistrate of the most approved zeal, which, however, his

natural good disposition kept within the pale of humanity. Miss Desmond,

who accompanied her father and uncle in this visit, was mentally and

personally a softened resemblance of the former. She was just then

fifteen, but so extremely tall and womanly in stature, that the

spectator was constantly obliged to refer to her face, to correct the

false calendar expressed by her figure. The _dilettante_, in the true

spirit of hypercriticism, congratulated himself on having discovered,

that she was not symmetrically formed; but though some said, "She would

be a fine woman," and some that "She would be a coarse woman," all were

agreed, that in the mean time she was a very lovely girl. Her features

were not perfect, but her countenance was frank, good natured, and

vivacious: a pair of laughing eyes sent forth from beneath their shading

lashes fairy messengers of mirth, to dimple her blooming cheek, or

pucker up the corners of her eye-lids. In manner, though she was not

impudent, she was not bashful, perhaps from the total absence of

self-conceit, which never led her to suppose she occupied a place in the

thoughts of those who did not love her; and on the partiality of those

who did she relied implicitly. Until her uncle fixed his residence at

her father's house, she was nearly as wild as the heaths that surrounded

it. But the observer of nature is well aware, that in such uncultivated

regions blooms many a flower, whose beauty is more exquisite than that

of those the art of man raises in the brilliant parterre. Some happy

star seemed to rule over Melicent Desmond, that saved her from the very

verge of what was unlovely in woman. She was so tall, she would have

looked masculine, but for the fairest complexion in the world, which

gave her face, neck, and arms a most feminine appearance. The expression

of her countenance was so droll, it would have been satirical, but for

the kindness of heart it beamed with. She was so lively she was almost

boisterous; and any other girl, equally careless of her attire, would

have seemed untidy. But all her looks, words, and actions had a peculiar

charm, that, though none would or could have imitated them, few were so

harsh as to condemn; and, in the very act of censure, the face of the

speaker expressed fondness and admiration, of which nobody could define

to themselves the cause: she seized upon the affections with a sort of

arbitrary power, which defied the remonstrances of reason, when it did

not receive her sanction. This dear girl was the idol of her parents and

her uncle: but the latter, though most anxious to see her all that was

delightful in a female character, was extremely cautious in the line of

conduct he adopted towards her; he rather sought to add, than to change,

and was not a little fearful of "improving for the worse," as his

countrymen emphatically express the effects arising from a spirit of

false refinement:

"Many are spoil'd by that pedantic throng,

Who with great pains teach youth to reason wrong:

Tutors, like virtuosoes, oft inclin'd,

By strange transfusion to improve the mind,

Draw off the sense we have, to pour in new,

Which yet with all their skill they ne'er could do."

He more judiciously confined his endeavours to furnishing her with ideas

and examples, leaving it to her unbiassed judgment to choose amongst

them, and make what she pleased her own. He now wished to give her the

advantage of associating, as much as possible, with Adelaide, noticing

her perfections but generally, and trusting to Melicent's discernment to

analyse each particular charm, unaided, save by the happy benevolence of

disposition, which would make such an exercise of her faculties the

first of all pleasures. He had accordingly lost no time in making his

brother call on the strangers, for the purpose of inviting them to

Bogberry Hall. It was settled, in this visit, that the party from

Ballinamoyle should dine at Mr. Desmond's house early in the ensuing

week, where they should remain till the following day, as the distance

was too great to permit of returning at night.

Mr. O'Sullivan prevailed on the Desmonds to join his family circle at

dinner; and when they prepared to return home in the evening, Colonel

Desmond said to Adelaide, in a low voice, "I hope Melicent has not

shocked you by her brogue; I find it most difficult to cure." "Oh, don't

try to alter her accent, (replied she) she speaks the prettiest Irish!

Any thing that would make her less original, would take from her charms:

she is one of the most captivating creatures I ever saw." His only

answer was a parting pressure of her hand, which conveyed his thanks for

her admiration of his niece, and meant more than he yet ventured to

express in words. "How different she is from Melicent, (thought he), yet

how charming!"

A lover and an uncle could not be supposed to be expert at definition,

otherwise he might have said, that the one amused the fancy, whilst the

other touched the heart.

CHAPTER V.

Be my plan,

To live as merry as I can,

Regardless how the fashions go,

Whether there's reason for't, or no.

Be my employment here on earth,

To give a lib'ral scope to mirth.

oeCHURCHILLoe.

Bogberry Hall was the abode of mirth and glee: there was nothing but

rattling, and ranting, and singing, and dancing, from morning till

night. The family living in it, consisted of nine happy children, with

an indulgent, tender mother, remarkable for nothing, except her good

nature, and careful attention to their wants and pleasures. This house

was never without company staying in it, principally relations; for the

Desmonds had first, second, and third cousins innumerable. The actual

income of the family was not large, in proportion to their numbers; but

the advantage of situation supplied them with almost every thing they

consumed at a low rate; and many rents, that a non-resident would have

found it impossible to get, were compounded for, partly in kind, partly

in labour. When any body condoled with Mr. Desmond on his large family,

he used to say, "The more the merrier; there never was a child sent into

the world, that it did not bring its portion with it; I wish I had

thirty of them." Calming his mind with this idea, he determined to make

them, as long as he was alive, as merry as possible; for, in his

vocabulary, merriment and happiness were synonymous. A very necessary

part of his establishment, for this purpose, were two fiddlers and a

piper. One of the former was then absent on rather a singular

errand.--Miss Sophy Desmond had been put to school at Galway, and he was

sent to board in the same house, that he might play for her to dance

every evening, and "keep her from thinking long after home." The cause

of Sophy's being sent to school was as singular as her strange

accompaniment. One of Melicent's favourite pastimes the year before had

been to get up on the horses that carried fish, poultry, or eggs, in a

sort of open panniers called creels, to her father's house for sale; and

whilst her mother was giving a dram, or buying chickens three to the

couple, away she went "o'er moor and mountain," amusing herself with the

alarm she should cause, and the hunt there would be after her. One day a

horse was brought to Bogberry Hall, carrying two wooden churns, one

containing eggs, the other buttermilk. Melicent scrambled up the side,

and seating herself between them, off she set; but while she was

galloping along much to her satisfaction, in making a leap over a pit in

the bog before her father's gate, the covers of the churns came off, and

she was soused with the milk on one side, and pelted with the eggs on

the other. The horse took fright, and carried her in this condition

miles round the country, without hat or cloak. She was at last met by

some gentlemen, who brought her home, her clothes dripping wet, and her

face and hair stiff with the contents of the egg shells. The conclusion

her friends drew from this adventure was, that as _Melicent_ was quite

spoiled, _Sophy_ must be sent to school directly. Miss Desmond's

coadjutor in all such pranks (which however she had much intermitted

since the above-mentioned unlucky day) was her brother Launcelot, an

arch boy, one year younger than herself, who, to plague his cousin

"Dilly," as he called Mr. Donolan, now pretended to be yet more

unpolished than he really was. These two were standing in the window of

their mother's drawing-room, on the day on which she expected the party

from Ballinamoyle to dinner, when they espied Mrs. O'Sullivan's gaudy

equipage at some distance. "There, Melicent," said Launcelot, "there

comes Tidy-ideldy and Big bow bow," as he had christened the two Miss

Webberlys. "I declare, Lanty," replied his sister, "when I saw that

ugly Miss Webberly at dinner the other day, with half a rose tree on her

head, I could scarcely keep from saying to you, that she was 'the devil

in a bush.'" "Oh fie, Melicent!" said Colonel Desmond, with an

ill-suppressed smile, "such a great girl as you ought not to encourage

that rude boy; it would be much more becoming for you to think of

receiving your guests with politeness, than to employ yourself in

finding names for them." "Don't be angry, uncle dear," said Melicent,

coaxingly, "and I'll call her London Pride; and that dear beautiful Miss

Wildenheim is Venus's looking-glass:--you have no objection to be Flos

Adonis, uncle, I'm sure. Oh! I wish I was like her, and then you'd be

quite pleas'd with me." "My dearest Melicent," said he, fondly, "I don't

wish you to be like any body but yourself; only control your spirits

to-day, that's a good girl."

In another window Mr. Donolan was expatiating on the merits of frogs

stewed in _red_ champaigne, as he had eat them at the _CafÈ de mille

Colonnes_; whilst his auditor, Mr. Desmond, was assiduously drawing up

his mouth into a whistle, his usual preventive of _mal ‡ propos_

laughter. His lady was preparing to receive her guests on their

entrance, which she did with much kindness, and with the ease of a

person well accustomed to the office. The ladies from Ballinamoyle were

escorted only by Captain Cormac, as Mr. Webberly had unfortunately

sprained his ancle that morning too severely to admit of his moving off

a couch, and his host remained at home in order to show him proper

attention, and Father Dermoody never formed one of so large a party.

The company, when assembled, besides the party from Ballinamoyle and the

Desmond family, consisted of the curate of the parish, the physician of

the neighbourhood, a music-master, occasionally resident at Bogberry

Hall, two smart beaux on a visit there from Limerick, and three very

handsome girls of the name of Nevil, whom Mr. Desmond introduced to the

English ladies as "Battle, Murder, and Sudden Death."

Miss Fitzcarril had hoped much from the effects of a rose-coloured

satin gown and orange turban, on the heart of her promised spouse; and

therefore great was her disappointment, and unfeigned were her

expressions of regret, when she lamented the accident, which deprived

the party of his "agreeable society." Miss Webberly, resolving to take

the _dilettante's_ affections by a _coup de main_, had that day employed

herself in a reperusal of the portable CyclopÊdia, and had no less

attended to the embellishment of her person, which she attired _‡ la

Minerve_, to give him a delicate proof of her just appreciation of his

compliments.

But Cecilia Webberly lost no time in commencing a flirtation with him,

for the sole purpose of plaguing her "sweet Meely." In this however she

was disappointed, for he complimented the mind of the one nearly as much

as the person of the other, hoping thus to earn an equal portion of the

"diet of good humour" for himself, which was as necessary to the comfort

of his moral existence, as the daily aliments which were required for

his physical being. For the purpose of receiving and bestowing flattery,

he took a favourable opportunity, afforded by a pause in conversation,

of producing a gold fillagree case, in which a few yards of pink riband

were rolled up, which some milliner of the _Palais Royal_ had persuaded

him to buy, in order to mark them with the dimensions of the celebrated

statues in the _Louvre_; and he had thus indefatigably measured every

wrist, waist, head, and ancle of the collection; and now as

unremittingly solicited every lady of his acquaintance to apply this

test of symmetry to the corresponding parts of her own person. And many

a female heart beat with anxious expectation as she passed the girdle of

various Venuses round Her waist, in hopes some one might prove a fit

cestus for herself.

By a little false play, Felix now proved Cecilia to be the exact

counterpart of the celebrated Amazon of the Hall of the Laocoon, which

considerably raised her in his and her own estimation. Mr. Desmond,

seeing him preparing to roll this new _line of beauty_ up, called him

over, and whispered loud enough for Adelaide, who was sitting close by,

to hear, "The ladies will be affronted if you don't measure them all,

Dilly; it looks as if you didn't think they would be the right

fit:--begin with Miss Wildenheim; I'll be bound the belt of the _Venus

de Medici_ will fit her as 'nate as a Limerick glove.'"

When the _dilettante_, in the most affected manner possible, presented

Adelaide with the portion of the riband he had passed round the waist of

the Medicean Venus, she politely, but gravely declined the honour with a

dignity that repelled the officious fop; and turning to Melicent with a

kind and anxious glance, by a half sentence conveyed to the intelligent

girl her contempt and disapprobation of the erudite trifling. Colonel

Desmond met her eye, and by looks thanked her both for the example and

advice; and then said, "Why, Felix, if you were to measure wrists and

waists by spherical trigonometry; indeed it would afford a laudable

display of your science. I'm sure Miss Wildenheim would not suffer the

dimensions of her arm to be found in any way less sublime." "Yes,

indeed," exclaimed Melicent, "you're no better, Cousin Dilly, than a

common habit-maker with that little yard. Why don't you make a surtout

for the Venus you are so fond of talking about?" Though Mr. Desmond had

set young Donolan on in hopes of seeing a high scene of comic effect

take place between him and the ladies, as he never let pass any

opportunity of quizzing him, in revenge for the contempt he on all

occasions expressed for that country, which was the object of his own

enthusiastic love; he grinned with delight to see him so mortified,

whilst he at the same time felt much obliged to Adelaide for the good

natured hint she had given to Melicent, which he had predetermined to

convey himself, when it came to her turn to make the ridiculous

exhibition. However, this votary of Momus could not consent to lose his

fun entirely, and therefore said to the discontented connoisseur, "Don't

be dash'd, Dilly, if the young ones are too shy, we'll try the old

ladies;" and snapping the fillagree case out of his hand, he began with

his own wife, and with much laughter found her circumference out of all

just proportion. He then proceeded to Mrs. O'Sullivan, saying, "I'm

shocked, madam, at my nephew's want of gallantry in not ascertaining the

proportions of your figure before he took those of lesser beauties."

"You're wastly polite, sir, but I bant so slim as I used to be; that ere

belt wouldn't compress me now, though time was, Mr. Desmond, when I was

the pride of Bagnigge Wells--I could show shapes with any of 'em." "But,

my dear ma'am, if one won't do, two of them put together will, and then

we can safely say, you have double the beauty of the best French Venus

amongst them all. Here's for the honour of Old England," holding up the

riband; and as she passed it round her waist, "I knew that," continued

he, "it's allowed that one English can beat three Frenchmen; and I could

have laid my life, that one full grown British beauty was at least equal

to two of the first in France." Miss Fitzcarril simperingly anticipated

her triumph, when she should give incontestable proof, that her waist

was smaller than that of the finest model of sculptured symmetry. After

making the modest, she consented to give ocular demonstration of the

fact; and then, holding out one long bony fore-finger, put the tip of

the other on its knuckle, saying, with the utmost exultation, "All that

much less:" which circumstance she related with conscious pride to Mr.

Webberly, the first time she saw him afterwards; and it will long afford

an agreeable subject for Captain Cormac's compliments, who, in truth,

had lately been rather at a loss for novelties of this kind.

The _dilettante_, in an agony of tasteful horror, that the silk, which

had encircled the divine form of the Medicean Venus, should have been

contaminated by touching that of the stiffest old maid in _Connaught_,

shuddered as he internally groaned, "Oh! the she Vandal! But what can a

man of taste expect, who ventures to amalgamate in society with these

modern Boeotians! May the genius of sculpture never again display her

_chefs d'oeuvre_ to my enlightened gaze, if I ever make any further

attempt to give these demi-savages a specimen of the _beau idÈal_." He

had scarcely rolled up his riband with undissembled indignation, when

dinner was announced. Had the tables on which it was served been as

animated as Homer's, they would have groaned with the weight of

supernumerary dishes, in all which, however, Mr. Donolan could not, with

the aid of his glass, find any thing he could recommend Miss Cecilia

Webberly to eat. "Not a particle of French cookery," said he,

despairingly shrugging his shoulders, "except, perhaps, that _bashamele

de veau roti_--the piper and the fiddler make such a confounded noise,

no one can be heard. Launcelot! you're next your father, ask him for

some of it." "Anan!" said the youth, pretending to look quite stupid,

"Ask your father to send Miss Cecilia Webberly some of that _bashamele

de veau roti_." "What in the name of the Lord does he mean, Milly?" said

Lanty, turning to his sister; "faith and honour he never spakes legible

now." "Legible, Lanty! indeed I think he speaks copperplate," replied

Melicent; "it's some larded veal he wants."

All this time the piper and the fiddler were playing furiously out of

tune in the hall. Mr. Desmond, addressing Adelaide, said, "I always make

them play up a tune at dinner--it makes it sit light." "What a

satisfaction it must be to you to support those poor blind men!" "Yes,

and their being blind has an advantage you don't think of;--if I have a

potato and herring for my dinner, they don't know but I sport three

courses and a dessert." The noise of the piper and fiddler, of

incessant laughing and talking, the clatter of knives and forks, joined

to the giggling and chattering of the maid servants employed in washing

plates, spoons, forks, and knives, in one common bucket, behind the

half-closed parlour door, with occasional dialogues between them, such

as, "Oh Jasus! I have brok the big dish, and my mistress will be

raving!" "The devil mend you! what cale had you to be peeping in at the

quality, with your face as black as my shoe; and when the master turned

his head, ye made off in such a flusteration, ye let go your load."

"Sarra matter! I'll get Miss Milly to spake a good word for me, and

there'll be nothing about it." All these noises united were too much for

Mr. Donolan, whose "nerves were finer than a spider's web," and he

became quite cross. When Melicent complained of the heat, he said very

gruffly, "It's no wonder you're hot, when you appear in _bear skin_."

She pretended not to understand him:--he retorted--"Really, Melicent, if

you have not _gumption_ enough to understand them, I cannot be

dictionary to my own _bon mots_." "Glossary, rather," thought Adelaide,

"for I'm sure they are barbarous wit."

Whilst Mr. Donolan conveyed to his _inamorata_, who was sitting beside

him, by winks, and shrugs, and contortions of countenance, his knowledge

of the _savoir vivre_, he and she both, as well as the rest of the

company, gave incontestable proof--(at least if there be any truth in

the proverb, which tells us, "That the proof of the pudding is in the

eating")--that Mrs. Desmond's bill of fare, though "gothic to the last

degree"--was very palatable. They even condescended, after demolishing

fish, flesh, fowl, and pastry, to partake of her floating island, served

in a flat cut glass dish, which occupied the place of a modern plateau.

After the ladies had given the dessert "honour due," and the gentlemen

had drank "The king," and "All our true friends, and the devil take the

false ones," and the "Ladies' inclinations," the fair part of the

company retired to the drawing-room. Here Melicent, in great delight,

showed her friends the new grand piano forte her uncle had bought for

her in Dublin. "It was thoroughly well tuned," said she to Adelaide, "by

Mr. Ingham this morning, that we might have the pleasure of hearing you

play. My uncle says you are a perfect musician." Miss Cecilia Webberly

bit her lips, but quickly consoled herself with the recollection, that

he had never heard her sing; and, to turn the conversation, asked Miss

Desmond if she drew; she replied in the negative, but produced a

port-folio of fine drawings of her uncle's. Adelaide had seen most of

them before, and looked at them with the deepest interest, as they

brought past scenes to her memory. Melicent held up one that was quite

new to her;--a lovely female figure, in the freshest bloom of youth, was

depicted holding a scroll, which she was reading with evident pleasure.

The painter had caught one of the softest blushes and most bewitching

smiles, that ever gave to beauty her least resistible charm; whilst the

drapery, which flowed round a form of perfect symmetry, seemed to have

been arranged by the hand of the Graces. This drawing had been executed

by one of the first masters at Vienna, from a sketch of Colonel

Desmond's. On the margin of the drawing were the following verses, the

first few words of which were written on the scroll the fair creature

was supposed to read:

AdÈlaÔde

ParoÓt faite-exprËs pour charmer;

Et mieux que le galant Ovide,

Ses yeux enseignent l'art d'aimer

AdÈlaÔde.

D'AdÈlaÔde

Ah! que l'empire semble doux!

Qu'on me donne un nouvel Alcide,

Je gage qu'il file aux genoux

D'AdÈlaÔde.

D'AdÈlaÔde

Fuyez le dangereux accueil:

Tous les enchantemens d'Armide

Sont moins ‡ craindre qu'un coup d'oeil

D'AdÈlaÔde.

D'AdÈlaÔde

Quand l'Amour eut formÈ les traits,

Ma fois, dit-il, la cour de Gnide

N'a rien de pareil aux attraits

D'AdÈlaÔde.

AdÈlaÔde,

Lui dit-il, ne nous quittons pas:

Je suis aveugle, sois mon guide;

Je suivrai partout pas ‡ pas

AdÈlaÔde.

TRANSLATION.

Adelaide

Was surely form'd all hearts to move,

And more than Ovid we can prove

By speaking eyes, the art of love

In Adelaide.

Than Adelaide

No softer thraldom could we meet:

Alcides' self would think it sweet,

To spin his task out at the feet

Of Adelaide.

From Adelaide

And all her dang'rous beauties fly;--

Armida's charms and witchery

Were far less fatal than the eye

Of Adelaide.

Of Adelaide

When Cupid first the features fram'd,

"In Cnidus' court," he loud proclaim'd,

"Not one for beauty shall be fam'd

Like Adelaide."

"O Adelaide!"

The sightless boy enraptur'd cried,

"Alas, I'm blind! Be thou my guide;

From henceforth I'll ne'er leave the side

Of Adelaide."

Miss Wildenheim quickly recollected, that these lines were written in a

fine edition of Klopstock's works Colonel Desmond had given her, as a

_gage d'amitiÈ_, the last day she had seen him at Vienna; and when Miss

Nevil turned to trace the resemblance she perceived in the drawing--the

blush, the smile, the attitude, the graceful form, struck her so

forcibly, that she exclaimed, "It _is_ yourself, Miss Wildenheim; I

thought it was the image of you, the instant I saw it." Melicent, with

intuitive propriety, sought to relieve Adelaide's embarrassment, and

said, "Here's a far more beautiful figure; this, Miss Webberly, is my

last production--a charming Paul and Virginia, I assure you. Do admire

Paul's leg, it is thicker than the tree he is sitting under:--I wonder

he doesn't kick Virginia, she squints so abominably."

When this singular specimen of the fine arts was first displayed to the

partial eyes of Melicent's parents, it met with no small admiration from

them. A showy frame was bought, in which it was hung up over the

chimney-piece of their usual sitting-room, and the fond mother gazed at

it from morning till night. When Colonel Desmond returned from abroad,

this was the first object, that, after showing her nine healthy,

handsome children, she directed his attention to. He did not then

express all the horror he felt at the contrast it afforded; but in about

six months' negociation with considerable difficulty accomplished its

being safely deposited in his port-folio.

CHAPTER VI.

Qu'AdÈlaÔde

Met d'ame et de gout dans son chant!

Aux accens de sa voix timide

Chacun dit rien n'est si touchant,

Qu'AdÈlaÔde[5]!

oeMARMONTELoe.

[Footnote 5:

Adelaide

Whilst singing steals each list'ner's heart,

'Tis melody's refined part,

None can such melting strains impart,

As Adelaide.

]

As soon as the gentlemen returned to the drawing room, and tea was over,

the mistress of the house proposed music.

The Desmonds, in general, were considerable proficients in this

delightful art; and a trio for the violin, flute, and piano forte, was

charmingly played by Melicent, and her father, and uncle. Though the

former failed so lamentably in drawing, she had a fine genius for music,

which was made the most of by constant practice; it was the only thing

her father had ever studied, and in it he had acquired considerable

knowledge, whilst her uncle had gained, in Germany, a fine style of

playing on the violin; and to their instructions she was more indebted

for her excellence, than to those of Mr. Ingham, who taught her the mere

mechanical part of the science, and even that very imperfectly. As soon

as, according to the rules of etiquette, the young lady of the house had

made a commencement, her guests were in turn requested to display their

talents. Colonel Desmond had whispered about that Adelaide sung

enchantingly; and there was a general impatience expressed to hear her,

which she, in her usual unaffected manner, consented to gratify.

The tones of her voice were exquisitely touching, and they took the

shortest road to the heart, without stopping on the way to tickle the

ear by the tricks of mere execution; each ornament seemed to rise in

its own proper place, by a sort of "happy necessity," and, like the

temple of taste, her singing "always charmed, never surprised." Her

vocal excellences were most called forth in the highest style of Italian

music. In the detached scenes of an opera she was inimitable: her divine

voice painted, as it were, every shade of feeling; and the composer

might have rejoiced to hear the Proserpine or Elfrida, not of his music,

but of his imagination. Still more enchanting than her voice when she

sang was her countenance, which the soul seemed to irradiate with that

immortal light only seen on earth in "the human face divine;" and there

were expressed all those indescribable charms, the offspring of genius

and feeling, which the most melodious sounds are insufficient to convey

to the sense. As she was however too rational, to be sublime out of

place, she did not attempt to introduce the "grand opera" at Bogberry

Hall, but apologizing for her deficiency in English music, which she

feared to disfigure by her peculiar accent, sang a playful foreign

ballad, which perhaps displayed the fascinating graces of her flexible

voice, and polished manner, almost as delightfully as a finer

composition would have done. She was rapturously _encored_, and was

detained singing, till, quite distressed at the idea of excluding every

other lady from the piano forte, she pleaded fatigue, as her excuse for

retiring from the instrument. As the company crowded round her to bestow

their praises, the winning expression with which her soft eyes met the

general gaze, as they seemed imploringly to ask the forgiveness of her

unsought superiority, and which her graceful gestures no less eloquently

entreated, drew from the heart touched by her sweetness and modesty that

exclamation of "charming! charming!" which the lips had opened to apply

to her captivating talents.

During the time Adelaide was singing, Melicent stood beside her uncle in

almost breathless delight, her hand resting on his arm, which she

pressed with earnestness as any note of peculiar beauty met her ear. He

was so completely lost in a reverie, (a most unusual circumstance with

him,) that even after the melody had ceased, he stood in the same spot,

and in the same attitude, as before. Melicent roused him from his

reflections, as she looked up in his face, and said, "How enchanting!

her voice is 'pleasant as the gale of spring, that sighs on the hunter's

ear when he wakens from dreams of joy, and has heard the music of the

spirits of the Hill.'" "I perceive," replied he, almost starting at her

first address, "that you read Ossian as incessantly as ever, Melicent: I

have just been thinking how superior Miss Wildenheim is to her own

acquirements." "I don't exactly understand you, uncle." "If you had ever

mixed in the world, my love, you would without difficulty; you would

there meet with many of both sexes, in whom the painter, or the poet, or

the musician, stand forth so prominently, that the individual character

is lost in the background, indeed, sometimes, with advantage. I'm sure,

when Miss Wildenheim occurs to your mind to-morrow morning, you won't

think _first_ of her singing, though you do admire it so much." "Oh,

no!" replied Melicent, "I shall think of her charming smiles, as she is

endeavouring to persuade Miss Cecilia Webberly to sing the air she

thinks she most excels in.--They are looking for the music; I must go

and assist them." Cecilia now did her utmost to eclipse Adelaide, by

displaying twice the power of voice in songs of greater execution, which

every body confessed she sang _well_, though no one _felt_ she sang

charmingly. After two or three solos, it was proposed, that Mr. Ingham

should join her in a duet. She purposely chose one, which should be a

trial of skill between the performers. It was that style of music, which

Colonel Desmond called the "florid Gothick," from its profuse ornament

and defective taste; it had triplets, volatas, and trills without end.

Poor Mr. Ingham, in more than one sense of the word, _shook_ for his

fame; the merciless Cecilia forgot, that on it depended his bread; she

did not read in his countenance, "He who filches from me my good name,

takes that which not enricheth him, and makes me poor indeed!" But when

they came to the final cadence, impelled by the "glorious fault of

angels and of gods," she aspired higher than fate permitted her to

attain with honour; and in a precipitate fall from D sharp in alt was

hurled on the flat seventh, instead of the perfect third of the key,

which made an unfortunate discord with the note intended to harmonize

with said perfect third in a simultaneous trill; and on this unlucky

seventh she continued to shake without pity or remorse, till the poor

man, in emulation, was nearly black in the face, and was obliged to take

breath twice, in a most audible manner, before she would have done. But

at last she ceased, and the mortified musician's good-natured patron,

seeing his vexation, and being himself shocked at the discord, clapped

him on the back, saying, "Well done, Ingham; both parts famously sung:"

and, with a significant wink, added, "By Heavens! she shook the cat out

of the bag that time; she did you up there, man alive!" Lanty, who had

thought the shake wondrous queer, he did not know why, understanding the

drift of his father's observation, burst into a loud fit of laughter,

which was followed by a peremptory order from his mother to quit the

room. In the mean time the rest of the company were variously occupied:

Mrs. O'Sullivan and Miss Fitzcarril, with the physician and curate,

formed a party at _short whist_, which the former, to assist her claims

to fashion, played at a rate that was much higher than accorded with her

frugal propensities, and which the pride of her companions prevented

from confessing was much beyond what suited their finances. The

physician, who was losing, internally grumbled at this new method of

playing the good old game of whist, by which twice as much may be lost

in the same space of time; and muttered, as he sorted his cards, a

barbarous parody of Shakspeare, "There comes the last scene of

all:--short sight, short gowns, short whist, short every thing!" Leaning

over "John of Gaunt's" chair, (the agnomen Mr. Desmond had been pleased

to bestow on the stupendous Theresa,) stood Captain Cormac, to rejoice

in the goodly row of kings, queens, and aces, which the hand of his

liege sometimes contained, and which was graciously pointed out to him

with an accompanying smile; or to pick up the glove, card, or

handkerchief that fell to the ground, not always undesignedly. Mrs.

Desmond kept herself disengaged to be kind and civil to every body,

sometimes condoling with the losers at whist, sometimes laughing with

the young people, as they played at "consequences," "what's my thought

like?" or "dressing the poor soldier." Miss Webberly was in earnest

conversation with Mr. Donolan, of which Mrs. Desmond's ear, unwilling,

caught one or two sentences. In answer to an observation from Amelia, he

said "A very good match for _him_," with a sort of conceited emphasis on

the word _him_, which insinuated "it would be a very bad match for

_me_." "Scarcely even for _him_," retorted Miss Webberly, "German gentry

are but sma." This quotation was followed by a laugh of affected

vehemence from both; and when Cecilia, exulting in her triumph over Mr.

Ingham, came up to them, the witticism was repeated; and they then, in a

playhouse whisper, extended their strictures to all the company in turn,

only interrupted by fits of laughter. Mrs. Desmond turned away in

disgust, and, looking for Melicent, proudly thought, "My little mountain

girl may want polish, as Edward says, but, with all her wildness, she is

still the lady." The object of her thoughts was, at that moment, in

conversation with her uncle and Adelaide, whom they had joined, when

Cecilia Webberly sat down to the piano forte. When she had finished her

duet, in the manner before mentioned, Miss Desmond said, "What a pity it

is, Miss Wildenheim, that people, in the attempt to astonish, will

insist upon showing what they _cannot_ do." "My dear Melicent,"

interrupted her uncle, "you may take it as a pretty general rule, that

when a lady attempts or even succeeds in _astonishing_, all is not

exactly as it ought to be; am I not right?" continued he, turning to

Adelaide, "Oh, perfectly," replied she; "but, indeed, Miss Webberly

executed her songs extremely well, with the exception of that

unfortunate shake." "I have heard my uncle say," rejoined Melicent,

"that an _execution_ is sometimes a _murder_; in that sense, I allow she

has executed them well; but, surely, music that is not pleasing, can

never be good." As Melicent never spoke _sotto voce_, her uncle was

afraid her observations would be heard, and therefore, to divert her

mind from Miss Webberly's singing, took up a book of poems, which was

lying on the table they were standing near, and addressing Adelaide,

said, "I condemned these verses this morning, as being unnatural:

Melicent, to all my objections, only answered, 'Oh! dear uncle, I

delight in them.' Do be our umpire, and show her, that something more

is necessary to prove her admiration to be well founded, than the bare

assertion that she does admire; when she dislikes, she has reasons

enough at command, but when she approves, it is with an extravagance of

enthusiasm, that admits of no analysis." Adelaide read as follows:--

The sigh of her heart was sincere,

When blushing she whisper'd her love,

A sound of delight in my ear;

Her voice was the voice of a dove.

Ah! who could from Phillida fly?

Yet I sought other nymphs of the vale,

Forgot her sweet blush and her sigh!

Forgot that I told her my tale.

In sorrow I wish'd to return,

And the tale of my passion renew;

Go, Shepherd, she answer'd with scorn,

False Shepherd, for ever adieu!

For thee no more tears will I shed,

From thee to fair Friendship I go;

The bird by a wound that has bled,

Is happy to fly from its foe.

"What can she find so affecting in those lines?" thought Colonel

Desmond, as he marked Adelaide's changing countenance. Memory had

raised the shades of departed joys, which appeared in her eyes not clad

in their original brightness, but wrapped in sorrow's watery veil;

reason quickly bade them be gone, but not ere her attentive observer had

marked their shadowy footsteps as they crossed her brow. When she looked

up, his penetrating glance read her mind, and expressed his own. She

painfully felt her heart was open to his view, that there was now no

retreat, and therefore calmly said to Melicent, "I agree with you, Miss

Desmond, the feelings of Phillida are perfectly natural." "But,"

interrupted Colonel Desmond, in a tone and manner not to be mistaken,

"don't you think, that though she might turn in scorn from the unworthy

object of her first attachment, she might solace her wounded heart by

admitting the love of another?" "Never!" replied Adelaide: "even in

endeavouring to view him with indifference, her mind must have been too

long filled with his idea, not to feel the impossibility of its ever

being possessed by a second choice." Colonel Desmond knew the human

heart better, and flattered himself, not unjustly, that if he had

patience to play the friend, and did not too quickly assume the lover,

he might imperceptibly win her regard in that character. He was not

hurried away by the imprudent warmth of feeling, which would have

deprived a younger man of his self-possession, but determined to destroy

the impression of what the seriousness of his looks and tones had

conveyed to her mind; and therefore with apparent carelessness, asked

her how she liked Ireland. This question a stranger is plagued with in

every company, from the day he lands in that country till the one he

leaves it; which with its twin tormentor, "Do you like England or

Ireland best?" serves to commence that sort of conversation, which

begins in Great Britain with observations on the weather. By the way, it

is strange that no moralist has ever remarked how providential it is,

that the climate of this latter island is so variable, considering the

propensity its inhabitants have to talk of it. It certainly affords a

beautiful illustration of the doctrine of compensation.

But to return to our friend Desmond:--he was too well bred to have asked

such an unfair question, had he not been completely _distrait_. When the

mind is absent without leave, the deputy it leaves behind to secure its

unmolested retreat most resembles that apish faculty, memory, and

mechanically imitates the manners, and repeats the phrases of others.

Adelaide, more embarrassed, though not so _distrait_ as her

interrogator, replied, that she was even more pleased with the country

than she had expected to be from the favourable picture held forth in

some late publications. He agreed to the justice of these

representations; while his brother, happening to hear him, was nettled,

to the quick, and abruptly said, "Not a bit like, Ned; quite too

ridiculous." "But, my dear Harry, there is nothing in the world so

tiresome as direct panegyric; you must allow a little for the malice of

human nature, to make an individual or a national character loved, its

virtues must be relieved by its foibles." "I'll tell you what, Ned, the

devil a good there is in dressing us up in a fool's cap and bells, to

make a set of fat English squires laugh who have eat themselves stupid."

"How can you be so illiberal, brother? That des----"--"By the piper that

danced before Moses," interrupted the elder Desmond; "it's themselves

that's illiberal.--There's the two Webberlys, and that airified nephew

of my wife's, mocking us all, by the Lord! and all the time of tea, and

while Milly was playing on the forte, they were laughing as if their

sides would burst. I'm bothered from the head to the tail with them,

that's the truth of it. But come, Miss Wildenheim, a tune from you would

save any man from being in a passion--give us 'God save the King,' and

that will remind me that I ought to comport myself as becomes a

peaceable subject."

In nothing did Adelaide excel more than in playing an air, in a manner

that seemed to give it beauties that it was not before suspected of

possessing. She called to her aid all the powers of harmony, and united

boldness of execution with tenderness of expression. She now played "God

save the King," in a manner that electrified the company; the card

players had dispersed, and there was such a nodding of heads, and

marching, and whistling, and singing, and drumming on tables, and

rattling watch chains, and beating time, that the performance of a

person who could not have brought forth all the power of the "forte," as

Mr. Desmond called it, would have been lost amongst all these various

noises. The tune was played and replayed, till Adelaide laughingly said

her fingers ached; and then dancing was proposed, and being agreed to,

the company repaired to a large hall for the purpose. Here Mr. Desmond

vented the remnant of his spleen against the Webberlys, by calling to

the piper, "Play up the humours of Ludgate Hill there!" with a

significant wink to the music master, (who, by the by, was more of a

wag than an Orpheus), and though the wink was of no use to the blind

piper and fiddler, the tone of his voice was sufficiently understood by

them to need no second order; and they accordingly struck up their

favourite tune of "Jig Polthogue," to which Mr. Desmond amused himself

by mimicking, in turn, the dancing of all the set; and his imitations,

being general, offended nobody in particular, but in truth he even

satirized with so much good humour, that he hardly ever gave offence. It

seemed always to be the fashions of the times he quizzed, rather than

the people who exhibited them. "What an entertaining, exhilarating

people the Irish are!" said Adelaide to Colonel Desmond. "Yes," replied

he; "but yet, with all their cleverness, how strangely inconsistent is

their conduct! If Melicent Desmond was a sovereign princess, her father

could not have had more pride about her than he has; and yet here she is

associating with her music-master, dancing in the very set with him;

and I never can persuade him there is any impropriety in it." "How well

she does dance!" remarked his fair partner. "And what a capital

caricature Captain Cormac and Miss Fitzcarril would make--he all

flourishes, she as stiff as the genealogical tree that hangs up in the

hall at Ballinamoyle. Do you observe," resumed he, "how much of the

'_incedo regina_' there is in her manner to him occasionally! This good

lady is a singular being, I can assure you. She can be 'proud with

meanness, and be mean with pride.'" "Such a character," rejoined

Adelaide, "reminds me of Homer's princesses, who, from doing the honours

of the palace, proceed to wash the clothes of its inhabitants in the

neighbouring river, to which pleasant employment they drive right

regally." Mr. Desmond now coming up to turn her in the dance, took that

opportunity of saying, "I tried to touch you up, but I couldn't--it's a

shame for you to bear away the _bell_ in every thing:--I never saw any

one in my life _handle their feet_ as you do."

After two or three dances the company adjourned to the supper table, and

here again all was mirth and glee. Colonel and Mr. Desmond sung comical

songs, and told droll stories, till the whole party were in fits of

laughter. Three of the children, younger than Melicent and Launcelot,

were kept up to supper, and they sang catches and glees with their

father and uncle, in a manner that surprised every body who heard their

sweet voices and saw their childish faces. Before they began, a dispute

arose between Mr. Desmond and the music-master, relative to the key

note; the one sounded one, and the other another; when, to settle the

matter, the former called to his second son, "Do you hear, George, take

this note out in your mouth to the forte, strike it, and bring me word

if I'm not right, and be sure you don't drop it by the way." How far

George was an impartial testimony, or how much the note lost or gained

in its ascent or descent, must ever remain in doubt; but, like a dutiful

child, when he returned, he said, "_You_ were right to be sure,

father--listen here;" and sounding the octave above as clear as a bell,

and as sweetly as possible, they all set to, the little performers

keeping time and tune admirably; whilst the mellow base of the

gentlemen, and the enchanting soprano of their sister, contrasted

delightfully with the juvenile strains of these "young-eyed cherubim."

Melicent's fine notes made most of the party express a wish to hear her

in a solo, and she sang the "Exile of Erin," with a pathos that drew

tears from many present. Adelaide seemed particularly to feel it; which

Mr. Desmond perceiving, he said, "Come, Melicent, that's too

dismal--I'll tune you up a lilt;" and he immediately sang, in a most

comical manner, a ballad he had written himself, entitled, "Miss Jenny's

lament for the loss of her petticoat;" in which was ably satirized the

present style of _undress_. Soon after this the party separated with as

much hilarity as they had met.

CHAPTER VII.

Jeunes beautÈs qui venez dans ces lieux,

Fouler d'un pied lÈger l'herbe tendre et fleurie,

Comme vous je connus les plaisirs de la vie,

Vos fÍtes, vos transports, et vos aimables jeux.

L'Amour berÁoit mon coeur de ses douces chimËres,

Et l'Hymen me flattoit du destin le plus beau,

Un instant dÈtruisit ces erreurs mensongËres,

Que me reste-t-il? Le tombeau![6]

oeLEVIZACoe.

[Footnote 6:

Ye fair ones that, with agile bound,

Dance o'er this turf in frolick round,

Whose tender flowers scarce bend their head,

Beneath your footstep's airy tread;

Like you I once, with sportive mien,

Join'd laughing Pleasure's joyous train:

Then life and all its hopes were new,

And love its brightest visions drew:

Those joys are past--the vision's flown:

What now remains?--The tomb alone.

]

When Adelaide returned to Ballinamoyle, she thought of the day she had

spent at Bogberry Hall with the most lively pleasure; the unrefined

good-natured gaiety of its inmates had seized her with so strong a

grasp, that it had dragged her along with the general current of mirth,

and, leading her thoughts out of their ordinary course, had, with no

unwelcome violence, broken the chain of their painful associations. Her

eye had early been accustomed to the animation of foreign countenances

and gestures; and as she had only been acquainted with English manners

in a very retired country place, it is perhaps not surprising, that she

should have felt chilled by their apparent monotony, and abashed by the

half-reproving look she sometimes met with; when, pausing for an instant

to consider what she had done wrong, she found she had, in the

earnestness of conversation, raised her hand and arm full six inches

from her side, where it was arrested in its graceful action, and

remanded by the blushing offender to its former quiescent station. But

censure was not even thus avoided, for in the very effort to please,

she had committed a second error, by moving that beautiful brow, which

expressed every feeling of her heart; and her dismay, at perceiving her

observer still unsatisfied, produced some other involuntary gesture

still more reprehensible than the first.

She now therefore saw the Irishmen change from one leg to another,

flourish their arms, rattle their watch chains, and swing their chairs,

without the horror so elegant a female was bound to experience on

beholding such ungraceful motions, for which no sanctioning precedent

could be produced at St. James's. And she even granted absolution to the

varying expression of the women's countenances, which sometimes bordered

on grimace; and extended it to their voices, running through half the

gamut in the changes of the most decided brogue that ever offended ears

polite.

To speak seriously, she found very great amusement in observing a

national character, so dissimilar to any that had ever before fallen

under her observation, and which presented itself with so many comical

and so many amiable traits. In every individual she had met, there was

something strongly characteristic, from Moll Kelly on the strand at

Dunleary, to the proprietor of Bogberry Hall; and, with the exception of

Mr. Donolan, who was spoiled in an attempt at refinement, warmth of

feeling and good nature seemed to be the portion of each. In order to

become better acquainted with this national character, which so much

interested her, she determined, during her residence at Ballinamoyle, to

visit the cottages in its neighbourhood, and to cultivate the

acquaintance of her friend Jarge Quin, hoping to learn from him the

peculiar customs and superstitions of the country, while to the

venerable Father Dermoody she applied for their explanation and origin.

She did not now feel quite so much at ease in referring for information

to her former _cicerone_, Colonel Desmond, as she had done previous to

their ambiguous conversation in his brother's drawing-room: but his

guarded conduct the remainder of the evening tended much to destroy her

first impression; and she felt the utmost confusion, whenever those few

sentences came across her mind, accusing herself of the most egregious

vanity in annexing a sense to his words that he did not mean to give

them; and asking herself, time after time, whether he could have

perceived her mistake. However, these unpleasant ideas soon wore away,

and Colonel Desmond played the part of friend so well, that she

convinced herself he had not understood her; and in a short time this

circumstance, which made her at first feel so embarrassed in his

presence, was erased from her mind. And indeed he so dexterously availed

himself of all the advantages he possessed to make his society agreeable

to her, that she soon began to feel almost uncomfortable without it. He

would talk to her of the scenes of her infancy; and she would then

gratefully recollect the pains he had taken to teach her the English

language, which she now felt of such essential advantage; and would

sometimes remind him of the good-natured patience he had also shown,

when he first condescended to accompany on the violin her childish

performance of concertos and sonatas, and the remembrance of many an

inveterately ill-timed passage afforded them now considerable diversion.

There was one subject of the deepest interest, that he, and he alone, of

all her associates, was master of the virtues and talents of her father;

and this, in her enthusiastic filial affection, and his regrets and

admiration, was inexhaustible. At first Baron Wildenheim's name was but

slightly glanced at; but by degrees she could bear to hear his

sentiments and his words repeated, and her heart warmly thanked the man,

who had so carefully treasured them in his. Colonel Desmond's humanity

and fine feeling told him exactly where to stop. He would,

"When the soft tear stole silently down from the eye,

Take no note of its course, nor detect the slow sigh;"

and the sympathy he showed in her affliction tended much to restore her

mind to its wonted serenity, by gently drawing forth all those agonizing

reflections and remembrances that had fled to hide themselves from human

knowledge, to the most secret recesses of her heart. Under all these

circumstances a penetrating observer would, perhaps, have pronounced,

that if Colonel Desmond steadily pursued his present plan, it would

ultimately be crowned with success. At least it is contrary to all

experience, that a young woman can long continue to feel _friendship

alone_ for an unmarried man, who is in all things a lover, except in the

declaration of his passion;--nay, if there is no love on either side at

first, it is highly probable there will be on both at no distant period,

whenever a similarity of taste, ideas, and pursuits, induces a desire of

association and intimacy, which circumstances permit to be gratified.

Every inexperienced female should be thoroughly aware of the high

probability which exists of her bestowing her affections on the man

with whom she is so situated.

The second evening after their return from Bogberry Hall, Mr.

O'Sullivan's guests were assembled at tea, when they heard the sound of

music in the open air; and looking out, saw a gay groupe of young men

and women dressed in their best, two fiddlers playing merrily before

them, one of the party carrying a pole, on which were tied small hoops

covered with garlands of flowers, intermixed with finery of various

sorts, and gloves cut out in white and coloured papers; after them

followed the elder members of their families, and, lastly, a crowd of

children. The Miss Webberlys saw, with surprise, that not one of the

females of the assembly had hat or bonnet. All the young women, except

the queen of the garland, wore white round caps, ornamented with some

gay riband; some had open gowns of a brilliant calico, others of white

linen, with a stuff petticoat, blue, yellow, red, or green, according to

the fancy of the wearer; white aprons, handkerchiefs, and stockings,

completed their attire. Their showy dress, rosy complexions, and

animated countenances, had altogether a most lively effect.

The dress of the old women was rather different. It consisted of a white

mob cap, with a black silk handkerchief brought over the crown, crossed

under the chin, and tied behind; a calico gown, with a large and gaudy

pattern; and, in addition to the handkerchief and apron, a white dimity

bed-gown, with short sleeves, and the skirt reaching half way to their

knees; with a bright scarlet cloak hanging on one arm. All the men who

were not dancers wore a great coat, of the peculiar frieze of their

country. In the dress of the young men there was nothing remarkable,

except that each had on a showy waistcoat, or silk handkerchief, to make

him look as smart as his sweetheart in her gay gown and petticoat.

Adelaide was delightedly viewing the joyous scene, when she suddenly

heard Colonel Desmond's voice returning Mrs. O'Sullivan's salutation,

"It's midsummer's eve," said he, addressing her, "and I could not resist

coming to witness your surprise at the curious customs observed here on

this night." "I should think Miss Wildenheim wouldn't be such a fool as

to go trapesing out on the damp grass with such a set of vagabonds,"

said Mr. Webberly, who was himself confined to the sofa. Colonel

Desmond's attention was too much engrossed by the sweet smiles and

tones, with which Adelaide thanked him for his kind recollection of her,

to notice the morose look which accompanied this observation; and he

acknowledged the speaker no otherwise than by a distant bow, as the fair

object of his solicitude left the room to join the rest of the party at

the hall door. The crowd had by this time ranged themselves in a

semicircle, in the centre of which stood the king and queen of the

garland, the former carrying the pole. The rustic queen was the

handsomest young girl of the country--

"Health in her motion, the wild grace

Of Pleasure speaking in her face."

Her head was crowned with a chaplet of flowers, whilst her long hair,

which is highly prized in Ireland as a part of female beauty, flowed in

profusion down her back, and its raven hue contrasted well with her

snow-white linen gown. A sky-blue petticoat appeared under her apron in

front, and from her girdle hung a wreath of flowers, forming a festoon

of varied tints. The temporary king was the best dancer, wrestler, and

cudgel-player, and the "tightest and clanest boy in all Ballinamoyle

town land." On the right stood the fiddlers, playing Plansety

O'Sullivan. When the venerable possessor of this name came forward to

welcome the crowd, the united strength of all their lungs sent forth a

heart-felt wish of "Long life to his honour, and God bless him, hurra!

hurra!" There is perhaps nothing more overcoming than the voice of a

rejoicing multitude. The old man felt the present and the past, as he

thought how his beloved Rose was hailed on such anniversaries; and

whilst he made his bows of acknowledgement, the tear stood on his aged

cheek. When silence was proclaimed, the village schoolmaster stepped

forward, and presented him with a song he had written on his honour, and

which "Brian Murdoch would make bould for to sing." Brian began with an

"Och--" half a second in duration, and then proceeded as follows:--

In Connaught, my deer,

Did you walk far and neer,

At a poor man's requist,

His honour's the best

Of all in the land, of all in the land!

When poverty's near,

He ne'er turns a dafe ear,

But is free wid his store,

Gives kind words galliore,

Wid a bountiful hand, a bountiful hand!

Och!--Wheresomdiver he goes

A blessing there flows,

Like a beam of the sun

Or the soft shining moon,

The joy of our heart, the joy of our heart!

Then long may he rain

Widout sorrow or pane,

And in Heaven be blist,

When he takes his last rist,

Tho' we to the heart rue the day he depart!

The intention of this composition was certainly better than the metre;

but for once a poet did not flatter, for Mr. O'Sullivan exercised all

the benevolence of his kind heart, in making his tenants happy; and they

would in return, to use their own expression, have "gone through fire

and water at the dead hour of the night, to sarve his honour. They had a

good right to lay the hair of their head in under his feet."

Brian's performance was applauded and encored, and when it was over,

there was a little murmur amongst the crowd as if to settle the next

act. "Which is her?" asked the king of the garland. "Why, that beautiful

lady to be sure, talking to the fat madam in the lavender blossom dress,

with the borders all figured out in white," replied an ancient matron,

who had been one of the first assembly at Ballinamoyle. The young man

now walked up to Adelaide, and with a bow down to the ground, begged the

honour of dancing with her; and she, perceiving it was a national

custom, instantly complied; and hearing from Captain Cormac, who handed

her to the spot she was to dance on, that the figure of the jig she was

expected to perform, was that of a minuet danced quick, she went through

it with a spirit and grace, that were unalloyed by any airs of exalted

languor.

What! danced with an Irish peasant, and with spirit to! Look down, ye

German Barons of sixteen quarters, and ye noble British Peers, on your

descendant, and--behold her with pride! for she could be dignified

without haughtiness, and complaisant without familiarity--perfectly

understanding the art of adapting herself to her associates, without

thereby assimilating her manners or ideas to theirs; always preserving

that elegance, which "was around her as light," giving to her

performance of the trifles of every day intercourse a charm peculiarly

her own, and which as invariably adorned her in the humblest cottage, as

it would have done in the most brilliant court, dancing with this king

of a rustic pageant, as with the Autocrat of all the Russias; and had

she been one of those selected for that honour, she would perhaps,

whilst she paid due homage to the rank of the Emperor, have no less

forcibly impressed her august partner with the _dignity of the lady_.

However, the most scrupulous belle need not be much annoyed by the

contamination she would suffer, by dancing with the king of the garland;

for actuated by that respect, which the lower Irish so strongly feel for

their superiors, he never presumes to take her hand, but contents

himself with dancing opposite to her with all his might and main, at

about three feet distance. Thus Adelaide's partner beat the batter on

the ground, sprung, capered, hit the sole of his foot with his hand,

danced the garland, beat the batter again, set, shuffled, and capered

in turn. Every now and then there was clapping of hands, and "Well done,

Lary, keep it up, keep it up!" and a murmur of approbation for Adelaide

went round: "She's a beautiful cratur; and what kindly ways she has with

her," said one. "The Lord love her little canny feet, how they do humour

the music!" remarked another; and so on, till she made her curtsy when

the jig was ended; and then there was a general shout of "Huzza! for the

young lady and Lary for ever." "Arrah, whist wid your noisy tongues,"

said an old woman; "you'll trouble his honour, and mind him of Miss

Rose. This day two and twenty year she danced on this very spot of

ground, and the sarra lady has done the same since from that day till

this. Do you see old Dennis there, Cisly?" continued she to her

daughter: "Well, Miss Rose smiled so sweet, (I mind it as if it was but

yesterday), and said, 'What a wonderful old man Dennis is, to be able to

tire me in a dance, at sixty years of age! I hope he'll live to see

many a midsummer's eve.' They say the prayers of them that's soon going

to their long home is uncommon lucky; so she left these words for a

blessing to ould Dennis, though she was too good to live herself." The

old woman's caution was unnecessary--Mr. O'Sullivan had pleaded the

damps of the evening and retired, but begged of Colonel Desmond to take

his place, and keep the dancers as long as they afforded amusement, as

his room was at so distant a part of the house, his _sleep_ would not be

disturbed. "Alas, no!" thought his friend, "poor man, he will never

cease to grieve for his angelic daughter, till she smiles on him once

more in another world."

Colonel Desmond perceived there was a stop in the proceedings of the

crowd, and recollected that it was customary for the master of the

house, or some one in the place, to dance with the queen of the garland,

and therefore requested Captain Cormac would do the honours the

_etiquette_ of such occasions demanded. At another time he would have

enjoyed doing so himself; but at this moment his head was too full of

Rose and her father, to think of dancing--or even of Adelaide! Captain

Cormac took the garland, as every man was bound to do, and flourished it

about, and out-capered Lary himself; whilst his pretty partner, at

stated times, cast her fine eyes on the ground, and was swung round by

him with averted head, then danced boldly up with one arm akimbo,

alternately took the garland, followed, or was chased by him. Little

Caroline was wild with spirits, when the crowd, finding out their

mistake with regard to Adelaide, raised her on a stout man's shoulders,

and pressed round to shake hands with her in turn, while she received

their greetings with the utmost cordiality; and, when let down again,

she danced and capered about, as Jarge Quin said, "as merry and as

pretty as the little people trip it on the blossoms on May morning."

Mr. Webberly had by this time nearly recovered from the ill humour the

sight of Colonel Desmond had put him into, and had been wheeled in a

large chair to the window, for the double purpose of viewing the festive

scene, and watching the proceedings of Adelaide. He was evidently in

pain either of body or mind, and looked so mournful, so deserted, that

she could not resist the impulse of compassion, and addressed to him,

from time to time, some casual remark on the groupe before them. For

many months she had not voluntarily spoken so much to him; and as

Colonel Desmond observed his satisfaction, some painful reflections

crossed his mind: "He deceives himself," thought he, "and so do I--she

has no love for me either. I ought to tear myself from her; yet a faint

heart never won a fair lady, and I see as little cause to despair as to

hope." But with an inconsistency, that the agitation of his feelings

alone could account for, he whispered to Adelaide, "Be more stern, and

you will be more humane; your heavenly sweetness undoes your victim."

She looked up surprised, and read that in his countenance, which

immediately gave to hers a degree of gravity which he had never before

seen her features wear; and bowing slightly in answer, addressed herself

to Mrs. O'Sullivan. He soon found an opportunity of speaking to her

again: "Adelaide," said he, sorrowfully, "you are offended; are you like

all the rest of the world, capricious and fickle? Do you _reject_ the

friend of your infancy?" "Colonel Desmond," said she calmly, "I must be

frank--infancy does not last forever, '_altri tempi, altre maniere_.'"

In these few words she had spoken volumes. To recover himself, he talked

sentiment and science to the two Miss Webberlys, and in doing so, heard

and made such a display of _esprit_, that it soon deadened his feelings,

and in a few minutes he _appeared_ as much at ease as ever.

In the mean time the merry rustics performed Quaker minuets, which

consist of a mixture of quick and slow movements, a sort of strathspey

called petticoatties, and some well executed handkerchief dances, the

figures of which are of the same kind as the shawl-dances of the opera,

and admit six or eight at pleasure. It is surprising with what a degree

of natural dexterity and vivacity the lower Irish dance: Adelaide

thought, "If Horace had been an Irishman, he would not have described

the dancing of the Nymphs and Graces in the spiritless manner he has

done:--

"Jam Cytherea choros ducit Venus, imminente Lun·,

JunctÊque Nymphis GratiÊ decentes,

Alterno terram quatiunt pede.[7]"

[Footnote 7: Literally nearly thus:

Now beneath the beaming moon, Cytherean Venus leads forth the band. The

decent Graces, joined by the Nymphs, strike the earth with alternate

foot.]

But profiting by Mrs. Temple's hint, she never now said any thing that

might lead to the supposition of her being a "learned lady;" at the same

time, she heartily joined in the praises, which even Mrs. O'Sullivan and

her daughters bestowed on the groupe before them. "It is not all pure

nature, however," said Colonel Desmond; "itinerant dancing-masters go

about the country, and there is no lad or lass so poor, that once in

their lives, at least, can't afford half a crown for the benefit of

their education in this particular. They all gather together in some

waste building, or on the level turf; and the scenes that take place in

these assemblies are ludicrous beyond description. It is said, that one

of our Connaught Vestrises found it necessary, to tie a straw rope about

the right leg of his pupils, calling it suggar, and the other gad; and

that he used to sing this rhyme to a tune that marks the time

inimitably, beating it all the time with his foot: only conceive the

bodily and mental labour of such a task!

"'Out with your suggar, my girl,

Right fal la fal la di dy,

Then the gad you must twirl,

Right fal la, &c.

Shuffle your suggar and gad,

Right fal la, &c.

Then you must set to the lad,

Right fal la, &c.'

"It is not surprising," continued he, "that some such contrivance should

sometimes be necessary on our Irish mountains, when the Scripture

informs us, that a hundred and twenty thousand Ninevese could not

discern between their right hand and their left." Adelaide was much

entertained by this allusion. And here let us advise those, who regret

any accidental coldness that may have arisen with a friend, if they have

drollery enough in their composition, to make him or her laugh by all

means. It is the surest way in the world to restore familiarity of

manner; for we cannot look suddenly cross at the person, who has, in

spite of our best endeavours at sullenness, excited the unwilling smile.

Those who are "too dull for a wit, too grave for a joker," may try the

pathetic; and if they can draw forth sympathetic tears at any horrible

story, it will answer the purpose nearly as well, though our experience

certainly inclines to the former method.

Whilst the smile yet played on Adelaide's countenance, old Dennis

walked up to her, and said, with a look where pleasure and regret strove

for preeminence, "Faith, Miss dear, when I see your teeth as white as

the water-lily, and your eyes dancing like the sunbeams on the lake, ye

mind me of Miss Rose; you're the sauciest lady I've seen since she

parted us, when she was in her fifteenth! The sweetest Rose was she in

all Ireland, and the like will ne'er bloom again in Ballinamoyle."

Adelaide graciously received the old man's compliment; and her eyes

filled with tears, as she said to Colonel Desmond, "How much I feel

interested for this Rose! She must have been most amiable, to be so long

loved and remembered by these grateful people." "She was indeed,"

replied he, "one of those beings, that would lead a fanciful imagination

to suppose, they had nearly arrived at perfection in some pre-existent

state, and had been sent on earth, for a short space, to complete their

probation, and show what a superior nature might be, even clogged with

our corporeal infirmities. Mr. O'Sullivan never breathes his daughter's

name, nor is it ever mentioned before him, except by nurse, whom it is

impossible to restrain. His life has passed away so monotonously, that

it seems but as yesterday since he lost her, and she now rises again

forcibly to the remembrance of the elder inhabitants of this

neighbourhood, from the circumstance of Caroline O'Sullivan being

brought, as it were, to take her place; which, I assure you, they

consider as a sort of sacrilegious usurpation, and feel no small

indignation at her having been born in England. Poor Rose! hers was a

fatal marriage!--But this is not a fit time to sadden you with the

details of her melancholy story."

It was now dark, and some of the dancers came forward to receive the

customary donations, after which they proceeded in a body elsewhere.

They were in the act of setting up their last "hurra!" when, as if by

appointed signal, all the hills were instantly illuminated with

innumerable fires. In the distance blazed the altar of the sun, like a

pyramid of light; the nearer flames were reflected in the still waters

of the lake. Every island was gay with moving figures and bonfires.

Within the spacious walls of the old castle in the centre islet was the

largest of all, which was seen brightly beaming through the arched

windows and dilapidated walls, while round it a groupe of merry boys and

girls were dancing; and a sudden blaze showed here and there similar

circles on every hill. Rejoicing voices rose and fell on the gales of

night, which also conveyed, from time to time, the music of various

instruments. "I never beheld so beautiful a scene," said Adelaide; "what

is the origin of this custom?" "It descends to us from our pagan

ancestry," replied Colonel Desmond, "who on this evening offered

sacrifices to the sun on every hill. A similar custom was observed on

the first of May and on the last of October, on which night we keep up

the same ceremonies, which Burns has so beautifully described in his

'Hallow E'en.' At this moment the whole of this island is gay with

garlands, and dancing, and music; and her numerous population are poured

forth on every hill in their best attire, accompanied by mirth and glee,

leaving all their cares behind them at their cottage doors." "I hope,"

said Caroline, "the fires in the castle won't hurt the little fairies

Jarge Quin told us of, Adele; I dare say they ran in a great hurry up

the walls; or may be the lake is covered with their tiny boats to take

them away. When I live here, I never will let a single cobweb be swept."

"Why, my dear child, have you so suddenly fallen in love with the spider

tribe, as well as the fairies?" "Oh, nurse says they steal in at night

through the keyhole, to take the cobwebs to make sails of them; and,

when the wind blows them off, they stick to the trees and every thing,

and they are twice as good for cuts as those in the house. I have been

gathering a whole heap of them to take to England. Oh, Adele! I wish

you would come and hear the beautiful stories nurse tells about kings,

and queens, and giants. She puts her spectacles on her nose, and reads

all morning out of a book she calls the 'Rabby Night's Intertinmant.' I

run down to her every night before I go to bed, and she takes me on her

knee, and tells it to me, and gives me cakes. Sometimes she cries when I

kiss her, and then she talks to me of my _dear_ papa, what a fine young

gentleman he was before he went to be a soldier. I'll marry a soldier

when I grow big. I think nurse and uncle love me better than any body

but you, Adele." It was in vain that Caroline's best beloved

endeavoured, in a low voice, to assure her of the warmth of her mother's

and sister's affection; she said little in reply, but felt all the pain

of being convinced against her will.

The party, when tired of admiring the admirable night scene the

surrounding country presented, retired to the house; and by this time

the rustic assembly had repaired to an empty barn, where they danced

till sunrise, and then went out to make hay.

CHAPTER VIII.

Whilst summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele,

I'll sweeten thy sad grave.

oeCYMBELINE.oe

The remainder of the month of June and July passed at Ballinamoyle in

various degrees of pleasure or tedium to its unusual inmates. Mrs.

O'Sullivan and her three elder children saw the time originally fixed

for their departure approach, with almost undissembled pleasure.

Notwithstanding the anxious endeavours of their host and his circle, to

show them the utmost respect and kindness, and to procure them every

amusement within their reach, nothing pleased, nothing interested them;

but if they could find little to admire in England beyond Hyde Park

Corner, could they be expected to tolerate Irish barbarism? They

associated much with the Desmond family; but, though this circumstance

saved them many hours of _ennui_, it gave them none of real enjoyment.

The Miss Webberlys saw Melicent's natural graces with too much contempt

to envy them, and for once they associated with a lovely girl without

being tormented by this passion. But her father and uncle they little

short of hated; the one for his successful raillery, the other for his

admiration of Adelaide; which circumstance rendered the latter equally

obnoxious to their brother, who attributed to him the bad success of his

suit to Miss Wildenheim, still more than to his sprained ancle, which

had kept him a close prisoner, and enabled her effectually to shun his

society. At home--Mr. O'Sullivan was dismal, Miss Fitzcarril

insufferably proud; a Catholic priest was of course an object of

illiberal aversion; and of all their associates, young Donolan was the

only individual who found favour in their sight; but he had, by his

heartless gallantries and fulsome flattery, ingratiated himself so much

with both sisters, that he was a source of constant bickering between

them.

They therefore so plagued and prejudiced their weak mother, that she was

as much out of humour as themselves. She and Miss Fitzcarril almost

quarrelled, though the one was nearly as anxious to court the cousin, as

the other to win the son; and the ridiculous pride of ancestry in the

spinster kept pace with the narrow-minded pride of riches in the matron.

Mrs. O'Sullivan and her amiable children vented all their ill humour on

their servants, who, in revenge, quarrelled with the domestics of the

house, and expressed their own and their superiors' contempt of every

person and thing they saw, without reserve. All this Miss Fitzcarril was

mean enough to suffer to be repeated to her with those additional

charges scandal-mongers are certain to lay on their retail goods; and

she came sometimes full primed with rage from the kitchen, ready to

discharge her fire-arms in the parlour, which would not unfrequently

have happened, had not Adelaide dexterously managed to unload the

offensive weapon.

Miss Fitzcarril found the amenity of her manners as invariable as the

benignity of her heart. She would, boiling with passion, confide to her

friendly ear some tale of horror she had been told by nurse, or the

cook, the housemaid, or Black Frank himself; and always heard, in

return, some extenuation of the offence, or expression of sorrow that

purchased its forgiveness.

Mr. O'Sullivan's guests did not venture to treat him with disrespect,

nor Miss Fitzcarril to annoy him with the recital of her various

_brouilleries_; his uniformly dignified deportment preserved him from

both: yet Mr. Webberly and his sisters he disliked for their airs of

affected superiority to others; and had Caroline depended on her

_mother's_ powers of pleasing, to obtain her uncle's estate, her claims

would not have met with much success. An Irish country gentleman,

however unpolished he may be himself, is to an extreme fastidious in

his ideas of female gentility. Every one has a code of his own, which he

thinks it necessary a woman should follow, to be what he calls

"_ladylike_." His punctilios are frequently unreasonable, and

excessively troublesome to the female relatives, who are obliged to

conform to them; but the warm affection, from which they derive so much

happiness, is also the source of that pride they sometimes find so

annoying. A writer of eminence has clearly shown the difference between

_rusticity_ and _vulgarity_. Many an unpolished rustic girl Mr.

O'Sullivan might think _ladylike_: but a vulgar woman, such as his

sister-in-law, was perhaps the object in the world the most disgusting

to him; and it required all his good-nature, and all his hospitality, to

make him conquer his involuntary repugnance sufficiently to treat her

with the kindness due to his brother's widow. Though Maurice O'Sullivan

had been only his step-brother by their father's marriage, very late in

life, and there was twenty years' difference in their ages, he had

always felt for him even more than the usual warmth of fraternal

affection; and had, for a long series of years, been bountiful to him in

a degree that but encouraged his extravagant dissipation; till the elder

brother, at last provoked by his career of folly, finally discharged his

debts, on condition of the entail being cut off, to enable him to bestow

the family estate on some more worthy member of it. But the grave had

now closed on all the faults of Maurice's character, whilst memory

exaggerated all its virtues; and O'Sullivan would frequently contrast

Caroline with her mother, saying in the pride of his heart, "How much of

the _father_ she has in her! She shows good blood runs in her veins."

To Adelaide Mr. O'Sullivan was unconsciously as kind as to Caroline.

Before she had been many days in his house, he had made up his mind that

she was "_quite the lady_," and of course possessed of every good

quality necessarily consequent on that, in his mind, highly valued

character. Besides he was much gratified by her inclination to be

pleased with every thing that was worthy of commendation in his place,

and in his country generally; and with the proper feeling and good

breeding, which restrained her from wounding his pride by those

offensive remarks he constantly heard from his sister-in-law and her

elder children, which however were at least equalled by those of Mr.

Donolan. Adelaide had moreover a strong claim on his gratitude for the

kindness she showed to his niece. Caroline's father had lavished on her

the most unlimited fondness, whilst her mother treated her with

comparative coldness. Had she been left to herself, there is no doubt

she would have felt the same love for her as for her other children; but

she was unfortunately entirely guided by the Miss Webberlys. Cecilia she

loved, and Amelia she also feared; and they contrived to alienate her

affection from Caroline, whom they considered as an intruder, who would

unjustly deprive them of a part of their lawful inheritance. It is not

surprising, therefore, that Adelaide, mourning for the loss of a fond

father, should see in Caroline a fellow-sufferer, and should bestow her

affections on the only object around her that would receive or return

them. The child, repulsed by every body else, flew into her open arms,

and loved her with the most doting fondness. She could not bear now to

lose sight of her, was the first that entered her room in the morning,

and when she was busy, would sit for hours at her side, occupied in any

employment Adelaide charitably provided for her. This little girl had

naturally a fine understanding, which her friend's judicious management

prevented running to waste. It was now with the utmost pain that friend

thought of their approaching separation on her return to England; and

this idea gave an increased tenderness to her looks, when she gazed with

regret on the lovely child, and anticipated the probable blight of the

fair promise, internally adding, "Alas! I may not venture to love any

one; it is my fate to be torn from all my heart has ever cherished!" In

consequence of this reciprocal attachment, every one associated Adelaide

and Caroline in idea together; those who loved the one loved the other,

and their united attractions gained them the good-will of every

individual at Ballinamoyle.

But with none of its inmates was the former a greater favourite than

with the venerable Father Dermoody: her manners to him were expressive

of that deference she had been accustomed to see the Catholic clergy

treated with abroad, and she willingly granted that respect, which the

impressive, though mild sanctity of his deportment extorted from others;

and when he saw once more under Mr. O'Sullivan's roof a young and lovely

female all sweetness and intellect, he thought of his beloved pupil,

Rose, and sometimes looked at Adelaide, till he fancied he traced a

strong resemblance to her who had been the adopted child of his

heart--his only earthly pride! He loved to converse with Adelaide as to

the recent state of countries, he had visited in his youth, and he still

more delightedly answered her inquiries regarding the history or customs

of Ireland, or the antiquities the neighbouring country abounded with,

to visit which, Mr. O'Sullivan had induced his guests to make many

excursions, as one of the best means of amusing their time. To

illustrate these remains, Father Dermoody produced from his patron's

library many a musty manuscript and fabulous legend of ancient fame,

which he read and explained to Adelaide, with an enthusiastic admiration

that was delightful to her to behold; though she was sometimes almost

tempted to smile at the excess of his patriotic credulity; for there is

scarcely any thing on the subject of national glory too extravagant for

ancient Irish manuscripts to assert, or for modern Irish feeling to

believe. Adelaide and her venerable friend went one morning to the

above-mentioned library, in search of a work relative to "Conaro the

turbulent and swift footed," whose tomb at the foot of the altar of the

sun they had lately visited. They long looked for the precious relick in

vain, but at last Mr. Dermoody descried it on the very top shelf; it was

out of his reach, but by the help of a number of boxes piled on one of

the heavy old mahogany chairs, Adelaide possessed herself of the

treasure, and was preparing to descend, when she heard a gentleman's

voice and step in the passage leading to the room. This made her prefer

the quickest method of reaching _terra firma_, and she instantly leaped

into the middle of the floor; and Colonel Desmond entering at the same

instant, exclaimed, "Inimitable, by Jove! Why, Miss Wildenheim, if the

principal _sauteuse_ of the Parisian opera had seen that graceful

flight, she would, through all her rouge, have turned pale with envy. I

should think you must find that preliminary much the pleasantest part of

the proceedings attendant on the studies those loaded tables tell me you

have lately been engaged in." "I hope," said Adelaide, laughing and

blushing at his raillery, "you, as a true Milesian, are not inclined to

slight their contents?" "Except to you, my revered friend," rejoined he,

addressing himself to the priest, "who have charity to forgive even

greater offences, I never dare own what a capacity of unbelief I have on

such subjects; but, Miss Wildenheim," he continued, "I am at this moment

much more anxious to hear what you think of the modern Irish, than to

dive into the best accredited accounts of our ancient history. Come,

confess to this worthy father--did you not expect to find us a set of

demisavages, for whom you could feel little else but disgust?" "I am

more than half affronted," replied Adelaide, "that you could possibly

suppose me to be so illiberal." "And with justice," replied the priest;

"wherever the human form is seen, there, I am sure, you find objects to

love and reverence;--the Supreme has impressed on every being he has

created some marks of his majesty and goodness." "Yes, my dear sir,"

rejoined his youthful auditor; "but the proud heart of man draws a line

of circumvallation round the cities he has erected, within which he

confines every thing that is admirable in the human race. Surely we

should rather imitate the liberality of the ancient poets, who peopled

every hill and dale with superior natures." "You must however

acknowledge," said Colonel Desmond, "that those classic favourites of

yours never imagined any thing half so beautiful as our northern

fairies! I don't know which of those ill-behaved scolds, the goddesses,

it would not be an affront to compare a modern _ÈlÈgante_ to; and pray

what are all the accomplishments of Minerva, the best amongst them, to

those of a girl of fashion, unless indeed she could plume herself on

speaking Greek, in the style of the simpleton who was lost in admiration

at the acquirements of the Gallic ladies, who could all converse in

French with so much fluency? But the pure, elegant Queen of Fairies is

the very prototype of female loveliness! I suffer considerable

uneasiness on your account, Miss Wildenheim," continued he, with much

gravity. "On my account, Colonel Desmond?" "Yes; for I am informed by

those most in her majesty's confidence, that, 'when to the banks of the

dark rolling Danube fair Adela hied,' she was seen by some of the fairy

court; and that very evening, 'late, late in the gloamin, Hillmerry came

hame,' being thought insipid in comparison of the more charming Adela.

And now behold her conducted to the chief seat of the fairy power! But

if she could be tempted to show that a small portion of human malice

lurks in her heart, we might hope to keep her still; therefore I am more

than ever anxious she should answer the question I put regarding the

mortal inhabitants of this island." "I could not presume," replied

Adelaide, colouring as she spoke, "on a casual acquaintance, to suppose

myself qualified to estimate fully the merits or defects of the Irish

nation; perhaps national character is of all subjects the one on which

a woman is least competent to form a correct judgment;--but the Irish

character, as it has presented itself to my view, is one I most

sincerely and warmly love." Colonel Desmond seizing her hand in delight,

shook it almost unconsciously for a second or two, whilst Father

Dermoody, in an emphatic tone, and with a complimentary bow, said--

"La sagesse est sublime, on le dit, mais, hÈlas!

Tous ses admirateurs souvent ne l'aiment guËre;

Et sans vous nous ne saurions pas,

Combien la sagesse peut plaire."[8]

[Footnote 8:

Wisdom's sublime, we still are told it,

Yet few admire, though all uphold it;

And but for thee we ne'er had prov'd,

How much e'en wisdom may be lov'd.

]

Gentle reader, if you are _not_ Irish, you will be perhaps much puzzled

to find out what Adele said on this occasion, so marvellously wise. If

you are an Hibernian, you will say, "The dear creature!" Be that as it

may, Miss Wildenheim pleased her auditors better than if she had

uttered three pages of Socratic sense. Poor Colonel Desmond felt but too

deeply the admiration the priest had expressed; and putting up a prayer,

that she might one day descend from generals to particulars, in the

application of these sentiments, was suddenly most assiduous in the

examination of the contemned manuscripts.

Adelaide, curtsying her thanks for Mr. Dermoody's flattering application

of the lines he had repeated, was alleging some trifling excuse for

retiring, when Mr. O'Sullivan came into the room to make his daily

request, that she would join him and Caroline in a saunter round the

garden, where he went every morning with them to gather the nicest fruit

it contained for his two favourites.

The party had not proceeded many paces from the house, when they were

joined by Mr. Webberly, who was now sufficiently recovered from his

sprain to persecute Adelaide once more with his attentions. Mr.

O'Sullivan, addressing him with much civility, said, "I am happy to

say, Mr. Webberly, that your mother has consented to remain with me till

after the first of September, in order to celebrate my dear little

Caroline's birth-day; and bespeak for her the good wishes of my

tenantry, who will assemble to congratulate us on the occasion." "Dear

uncle, how I love you!" said the little girl, twisting her arms round

him; "only for Adele, I think I should break my heart when I go away

from you." He pressed her fondly in his arms, and said, "What will be

your consolation, Caroline, will be an additional grief to me! My dear

young lady," continued he, turning to Adelaide, "you know not the sorrow

the idea that I may never see you again causes me; your society has

given me more pleasure, than I thought I ever should have felt again.

Your sweet attentive manners have reminded me of one whom even you might

be proud to be compared with!"--He paused--his faltering voice had told

how deeply he was affected, and a general silence prevailed for a few

minutes, which was interrupted Mr. Webberly saying, "I'm sure you'll

have no objection to celebrate Miss Wildenheim's birth-day too,

Sir;--she will be of age on the thirty-first of August; that day

one-and-twenty years, Sir, was a happy day for the world, Miss

Adelaide!" "Happy! Good God!" exclaimed the old man; and dropping

Adele's arm, which he had slipped within his, retreated to the house. "I

had almost forgot--" said Colonel Desmond to the priest, much moved,

"was that the day----" "Yes, the day," interrupted he: "Alas! a father's

heart never forgets."

CHAPTER XIII.

Vous Ítes belle, et votre soeur est belle,

Entre vous deux tout choix seroit bien doux,

L'Amour Ètoit blond, comme vous,

Mais il aimoit une brune, comme elle.[9]

oeBERNIS.oe

[Footnote 9:

Thou art lovely--so is she,

Say, which should my heart prefer?

Cupid sure was fair like thee.

But his love was brown like her.

]

Whilst these scenes passed in Ireland, Lady Eltondale and Miss Seymour

arrived at Cheltenham. At first, Selina's delight at breathing once more

the pure air of the country made her almost wonder at the pleasure she

had so lately found in the feverish amusements of London. Her step was

still more elastic, as she trod the beautiful meadows that lay along

the banks of the Chelt; and when, mounted on her favourite mare, she

extended her rides to the surrounding hills, she seemed to regain a

fresh existence.

The picturesque beauties of Dodswell, the magnificent panorama of

Lackington Hill, the curious remains of Sudeley castle, all were in time

explored and admired by Selina; and often did she prefer a solitary walk

amongst the sheltered lanes of Alstone, to accompanying Lady Eltondale

to the morning mall, where crowds assembled at the Wells ostensibly in

search of health, but really in pursuit of pleasure. In one of these

morning walks, as she rested under the shadow of a gigantic oak, while

the fresh breeze played on her glowing cheek, and the song of earliest

birds alone interrupted the general silence, her thoughts involuntarily

turned to those days which had glided by in similar scenes, when she

used to bound like the fawns she chased through the park at Deane, or

with more measured steps, though not less buoyant spirits, attended her

father, as in his Bath chair he took his morning exercise on the broad

smooth terrace, that stretched along the south front of the venerable

mansion. The whole scene rose to her mind's eye, and she saw, in

imagination, the lawns, the fields, the gardens, in which she had spent

so many happy hours, and which were

"Once the calm scene of many a simple sport,

When nature pleas'd, for life itself was new,

And the heart promis'd what the fancy drew."

She dwelt with a melancholy pleasure on the recollection of all the

beloved companions of her earlier years, and sighed to think, that those

moments of innocent delights would never again return to her. From this

painfully pleasing reverie she was roused by the crying of a child, and

the sound of an angry voice, exclaiming in a harsh key, "Hold your

tongue, you little devil--ban't I going as fast as I can?" It seemed as

if manual correction followed this expostulation, as the infant's cries

were redoubled, and Selina heard its little voice, saying in a plaintive

tone, "Mammy, mammy, me be a-hungry, me be tired." At that moment a turn

in the road presented the speakers to her view, and she beheld a young

woman, in whose pallid cheeks disease and wretchedness struggled for

preeminence. A few coarse black locks strayed from under a cap, which

might once have been white, but now in dirt and yellowness rivalled the

complexion of the wearer, whilst it served to contrast a gaudy riband,

by which it was encircled; a ragged, coloured handkerchief scarcely

concealed her shrivelled bosom; and a cotton gown, which in its

variegated pattern showed all the hues of the parterre, trained in the

dust, and was partly caught up under her arm, below which appeared a

tattered stuff petticoat, that scarcely reached to her knees. Her

countenance was, if possible, more disgusting than her dress: her dark

black eyes and oval forehead showed still some trace of beauty; but an

expression of unblushing vice called forth sensations rather of disgust

than of compassion. The little ragged urchin, that trotted by her side,

endeavoured, on seeing Selina, to hide its head beneath her gown; but

after a moment's deliberation, she dragged him from his concealment, and

pushing him forward, desired him to demand charity. Selina, pitying the

infant, more from the appearance of its associate than even from its own

wretchedness, could not deny its request; and while she gave the poor

child all the silver her purse contained, she inquired if the woman was

its mother. "To be sure I am, my lady," replied she, in a tone of

impertinent carelessness; "else what do you think I'd be troubled with

such a brat as that for?" "It seems a fine boy," returned Selina,

willing to rouse the maternal feelings that seemed so nearly extinct.

"And where do you live?" "Down in that hut yonder, and a pretty penny I

pay for it. Our landlord never comes to these here parts; if he did, he

wouldn't let us be so racked; but he never thinks of us when he is

away, and Mr. Smart, his agent, raises our rents just as he pleases; but

he has our curses for his gains;" so saying, she seized the child

roughly by the arm, and pursued her way, muttering imprecations Selina

shuddered to hear. She also proceeded towards home; but her thoughts now

took a more unpleasant turn. She recollected with sorrow how many poor

cottages on her estate might also, with reason, lament the loss of a

landlord, who had always inquired into their distresses and relieved

their wants. But she, though possessed of such extensive means of being

useful to her fellow-creatures, had hitherto seemed to consider the

possession of fortune only as affording her a more ample opportunity for

selfish gratification. She called to mind the happiness she had formerly

experienced in charitable occupations; and reflected, with remorse, that

since she had plunged into the vortex of dissipation, no tear had been

wiped from the cheek of indigence by her generous aid--no smile of

gratitude had hailed her approach to the couch of misery or pain. Of the

many hours she had wasted in the pursuit of pleasure, not one had been

devoted to the purposes of benevolence; and while she had lavished

uncalculated sums in extravagance and folly, she had never purchased the

inestimable benefit of a poor man's blessing.

This trifling incident served to awaken in Selina's mind feelings and

reflections that had long lain dormant. The whole tenour of Lady

Eltondale's conduct had been calculated to efface all the impressions

formerly made on her, both by the precepts and example of the admirable

Mrs. Galton; and while her Ladyship contrived, by cautious degrees, to

impede, and finally almost destroy the correspondence with her, which

might have served occasionally to recall the first, the latter was

almost totally obliterated from her mind by the entirely new scenes,

into which she had been introduced. As to the habits of charity, to

which both from inclination and instruction she had been early

habituated, but little opportunity for their exercise had occurred since

her residence with the Viscountess; for the very servants at Eltondale

were too polite to admit a vulgar beggar within its gates; and in London

she had been taught to consider all vagrants indiscriminately as

impostors, whom it was almost a crime to relieve.

But are those aware, who are anxious to find plausible excuses for

delaying or omitting the fulfilment of the duties of charity, that the

feelings of the human heart, though inflamed by casual restraint, are

extinguished by a continued suppression? And wo be to that breast, in

which the sentiments of benevolence and compassion are destroyed! The

virtues of humanity, as they are those which most peculiarly belong to

this present state of existence, so is the exercise of them most

necessary to our individual happiness in this world; for he, whose heart

has never melted at the sorrows of others, will assuredly, sooner or

later, know the agony of seeking in vain for one sympathising bosom on

which to repose the burden of his own.

When Selina returned home, she was scarcely less pleased than surprised

to find Mr. Sedley seated at breakfast with Lady Eltondale. They were so

deeply engaged in conversation, that her entrance was unnoticed by

either; and as her astonishment at perceiving so unexpected a guest made

her pause for a moment at the door, she heard Lady Eltondale say,

apparently in continuation of a previous speech, "And have you proof of

this from himself, Mr. Sedley?" "Yes; proofs such as must convince even

your Ladyship; otherwise I would never have made the proposal I have

done." Selina here interrupted him, but her appearance was so sudden,

that it was many minutes before he could collect his thoughts to address

her with any composure. Lady Eltondale, however, showed no

embarrassment; she inquired most kindly what had so long detained

Selina; said that she and Mr. Sedley, whom she had accidentally met at

the well, had walked miles in search of her; and finally joined in her

vivacious raillery against Mr. Sedley for his visible confusion. In

answer to Selina's inquiries when he arrived at Cheltenham, "Only

yesterday," said he; "I was quite disappointed at not meeting you at the

rooms last night. How is the detestable head-ache that Lady Eltondale

told me prevented your accompanying her there?" While Selina hastily

dismissed the subject of her casual indisposition, which, in truth, she

had hardly remembered, a momentary surprise glanced across her mind at

the recollection, that Lady Eltondale had not mentioned to her having

seen Mr. Sedley; but she had not time to dwell on the thought, as the

Viscountess immediately renewed her inquiries as to what could have so

unusually prolonged Selina's walk; and the beggar woman and her boy

recurring to her mind, she forgot all her doubts and past reflections,

in the earnestness with which she entered into the description of all

the wretchedness, which she "was sure the poor infant must suffer from

its unfeeling mother." Lady Eltondale seemed to take uncommon interest

in the relation, which she prolonged by apposite questions and remarks

of "Poor child!--Of course you gave it something.--No wonder you

returned so late.--I suppose you were just come home, just opened this

door, as I perceived you.--Dear infant, I should like to have seen it!"

And thus continued the conversation, while Mr. Sedley took a turn or two

across the room; put into his pocket a letter-case that lay beside his

coffee-cup, and regained all his customary self-possession. With his

usual manners he resumed his place in Selina's estimation; and the hours

flew by unnoticed, as he entertained her with the relation of a thousand

ridiculous adventures, all of which had occurred either to himself or

"his particular friends," during the space of three weeks, which he

called an age, since they parted. And in truth he did not much

exaggerate, when he described his regret at their having been so long

separated. Like the unguarded moth, he had flitted round the flame till

he actually suffered for his folly; for his improved acquaintance with

Selina, during the latter part of their stay in London, had so far

increased his admiration of her, that what was at first merely a

preference chiefly influenced by pecuniary considerations, had now

become a passion almost too powerful to be controlled. He had yet

however sufficient command over his feelings, to avoid any verbal

expression of them; and, while he carefully demonstrated how interesting

to him had been all her observations, by delightedly referring to their

former conversations, and recapitulating even her most trifling remarks,

his present adulation was so delicately conveyed by inferred compliment

alone, that, while Selina was gratified by the flattering attention,

thus obviously paid her, she felt it would have but compromised her own

modesty, had she, by disclaiming praise thus subtilely offered,

appropriated to herself an admiration that was only insinuated. And how

did Lady Eltondale approve of this? In truth she was not aware of the

whole tendency of Mr. Sedley's discourse; a stolen glance or a peculiar

emphasis explained his application of a particular sentence to her, who

alone he meant should understand him; _et au reste_, the Viscountess,

like a skilful navigator, always floated down a stream she found it

impossible to stem.

Selina almost persuaded herself, that every clock and watch in the house

was out of order, when Lady Eltondale asserted, that the hour was come

for Fazani's raffle, which she had particularly patronized; and as,

accompanied by the Viscountess and Sedley, Selina walked under the dark

avenue, that led to that fashionable rendezvous, she could not help

internally observing, "how much Mr. Sedley's vivacity and good-nature

enlivened every society of which he was a member."

CHAPTER X.

_Lady Sneerwell._--You are partial, Snake.

_Snake._--Not in the least; every body will allow, that Lady

Sneerwell can do more with a word or a look, than many others with

the most laboured detail.

oeSCHOOL FOR SCANDAL.oe

When they entered Fazani's, the raffle was only waiting for the arrival

of the Viscountess. The prize was a beautiful work-box, and Fortune, who

at that moment seemed to smile with peculiar benignity on Sedley, chose

him to be the successful adventurer. As soon as he was declared victor,

he immediately brought the treasure towards Lady Eltondale and Selina,

and the latter, with pardonable vanity, flattered herself that he

intended it as a present for her. But in this she was mistaken. He

addressed himself to Lady Eltondale, and in a low tone said, with

peculiar emphasis, "Will your ladyship accept this from me as a _gage

d'amitiÈ_?" "I take it as a flag of truce," replied she in a similar

tone. "Then from henceforward you are my friend," exclaimed Sedley,

seizing her hand with unusual vehemence. "At least not your enemy,"

answered the Viscountess.--"But this is not a proper place to settle our

preliminaries."

This conversation was unintelligible to Selina, yet not uninteresting,

as she felt a vague consciousness, that it in some way related to

herself, and a momentary distrust of both speakers glanced across her

mind. But her attention was quickly attracted by Lady Hammersley, who,

on perceiving Lady Eltondale, had advanced from amongst the crowd to pay

her compliments. The Viscountess was as minute in her inquiries

regarding all that could concern Lady Hammersley, as if she had been

sincere in her professions of being glad to meet her; and though Lady

Hammersley's eyes were fixed on Selina, it was some minutes before she

was sufficiently disengaged to accost her; at length she abruptly

exclaimed, "Miss Seymour has, to all appearance, profited as much by her

residence in London, as I prophesied she would; possibly amongst her

other acquirements she may have learned the art of forgetting old

acquaintances." Selina's colour rose, and the implied rebuke checking at

once the friendly salutation with which she had prepared to address her,

she returned her recognizance with an elegant but frigid compliment,

worthy a pupil of Lady Eltondale. "Admirable!" retorted Lady Hammersley

with a scornful smile: "My penetration is not baffled. I must write to

Mrs. Galton, to notice the improvement _I_ always anticipated." "Why,

does your Ladyship know Mrs. Galton?" inquired Selina anxiously; while

Lady Eltondale, leaning on Mr. Sedley, took the opportunity of escaping

from her "Dear Lady Hammersley." "I do know Mrs. Galton," replied she;

"we were together all last winter at Bath; and she, Miss Seymour, was

so convinced of your perfection, that she never would believe it was

even in Lady Eltondale's power to _improve_ you, as I guessed she would,

and see she has done." "Dear, dear aunt Mary!" exclaimed Selina,

bursting into tears, as she heard this instance of a disinterested

partiality, to which she had lately been unused, even though the recital

had been made with more of acrimony than of benevolence. Lady Hammersley

looked for some moments steadily at Selina, and then continued in her

usual cynical tone, "Pray, Miss Seymour, compose yourself; Lady

Eltondale will be shocked at my having betrayed you into so gross an

impropriety. I had not the slightest idea that the mention of Mrs.

Galton would have roused your feelings, and still less that you could

have been tempted to exhibit them." Selina felt hurt at the undeserved

censure, which both Lady Hammersley's words and manner expressed, and,

with a look of dignity, replied, "I am indeed ashamed of betraying them

where they can be so little understood;" and took leave of her Ladyship

with a proud politeness, which admitted of no reply. Lady Hammersley for

some moments looked after Selina, as she moved to a distant part of the

room, where Lady Eltondale was waiting for her. "That girl is still

worth knowing," thought she; and for once she turned an unprejudiced eye

on the lovely form and heavenly countenance of the innocent girl, who

had hitherto so undeservedly shared in the contempt and hatred, which

her Ladyship had always been accustomed to feel for every thing, that in

the remotest degree appertained to Lady Eltondale.

Meantime Selina joined the Viscountess, while "disdain and scorn rode

sparkling in her eyes." "Has Lady Hammersley been entertaining you with

any sententious aphorisms?" asked Lady Eltondale. "No," replied Selina,

laughing. "For once she has been talking on a subject she does not

understand." The Viscountess was not sufficiently interested in her

Ladyship's harangues to inquire further, and they continued their walk

till it was time to separate for dinner.

The amusement allotted for that evening was a public concert, and Lady

Eltondale and Selina had acceded to Sedley's earnest entreaty of

attending it. He accordingly took post in the outside room, waiting for

their arrival, and anxiously inspecting every passing groupe, as the

different parties entered, in hopes of recognizing them. But his

expectations were disappointed; no Lady Eltondale or Selina made their

appearance: he bewildered himself in conjectures; and at last, in a

moment of pique, attributing their delay to caprice, he left the rooms

before the concert was finished, cursing woman's inconsistency, and his

own folly, in ever having suffered himself to be interested about any.

This sage reflection was however chased long before morning, not only by

the recollection of Selina's manifold charms, but of his own manifold

creditors; and at an early hour he repaired to the well, where he and

Lady Eltondale had agreed to meet, in order to finish a conversation

neither was particularly anxious Selina should witness.

But Lady Eltondale was not to be found; and when the hour for the

general dispersion of the company arrived without his seeing her, he

lost patience, and hastened to her house to inquire the cause of her

protracted absence.

But there, to his utmost consternation, he learned that an express had

arrived, just as the ladies were preparing to go to the rooms the night

before, to inform the Viscountess, that Lord Eltondale had suddenly

expired at Eltondale, after having partaken of a turtle feast with more

enjoyment, and even less restraint, than ordinary. Of course neither

Selina nor Lady Eltondale was visible, and Sedley returned home agitated

by a thousand conjectures and emotions.

It was not to be expected, that Lady Eltondale would deeply lament the

death of a husband, who, notwithstanding his uniform indulgence to her,

had never possessed either her esteem or affection; but nevertheless

Selina could not help being shocked at the total apathy and ingratitude

she displayed; as without even assuming a grief, which it would have

been almost more a virtue to dissemble, than thus openly to contemn, she

only thought of, only lamented, the change of her circumstances the

event would inevitably produce. Selina listened in astonishment to the

calm retrospection of past extravagance, and the despairing anticipation

of future poverty, in which she indulged even in those first moments of

widowhood; and disdaining to offer consolation to the only sorrows she

could hear unmoved, at an early hour retired to her own room.

There far, far different reflections agitated her bosom. There is a

certain sympathy in misfortune, which, touching a chord that has once

jarred, finds an echo in our own breast;

"Each substance of a grief hath twenty shadows,

Which show like grief itself."

Thus the sudden dissolution of Lord Eltondale recalled to Selina's mind

all the circumstances of her father's death; and though neither in her

judgment nor affection they could ever have been compared, yet the last

sad scene of mortality blended her recollections of both, and with

unrestrained tears she gave way to all the poignancy of regret, in the

solitude of her chamber, which the freezing insensibility of Lady

Eltondale would have repressed, in the presence of her who should have

been the greatest mourner.

In the morning her swollen eyes and pallid cheeks bore testimony to her

sleepless night; and as from Lady Eltondale she expected reproof rather

than sympathy, she was not sorry to receive a message, stating that her

Ladyship wished to breakfast alone, as she was engaged in writing

letters.

Selina, lost in reflection, unconsciously prolonged her solitary and

almost untasted meal, till she was roused by the abrupt entrance of Lady

Hammersley, who, profiting by her plea of relationship, had come to

inquire all the particulars of the Viscount's death. Though Selina now

felt a degree of repugnance to Lady Hammersley, which her almost

impertinent remarks had provoked, yet she could not with propriety

refuse the details she demanded; and she accordingly answered her

numerous questions with as much brevity as politeness permitted. But her

auditor seemed to attend more to her countenance than to her words, and

at last abruptly exclaimed, "I certainly did not expect to see so much

real sorrow in this house of mourning; you are a good girl, I believe,

after all; and I like you for having at least _some_ feeling left."

Though Selina was always grateful for advice, and even reproof, dictated

by affection, yet she did not feel, that Lady Hammersley was in any way

authorized to offer her either; and therefore she replied, with an air

of _hauteur_, which the recollection of her observations the day before

increased, "My acquaintance with your Ladyship has been so short, that

neither my feelings nor character can be known to you: have you any

commands, madam, to Lady Eltondale?" and rising as she spoke, she

prepared to quit the room. But Lady Hammersley, taking hold of her hand,

exclaimed, "What, proud too! well, I like you the more for it; come, sit

down, you and I must be better acquainted. For once I am inclined to

think I have been mistaken. When first I saw you at Eltondale,"

continued she, in a tone of unusual kindness, "I was interested by your

personal appearance; but above all, by your simplicity of character: but

as I knew these were the two precise points, which must infallibly be

most changed by your residence with Lady Eltondale, I looked upon you

only as a fine piece of plaster of Paris, which she would probably mould

to external perfection, but leave all hollow within. I should therefore

(forgive my frankness, Miss Seymour), most likely, never have thought of

you again, had I not met Mrs. Galton; who spoke of you in such terms,

that I own I was curious to learn whether my prognostics were verified

or not. Circumstances have accelerated my knowledge of you; and since I

find, at least to all appearance, that Lady Eltondale's arts have not

entirely spoiled your character, I am anxious that her schemes should

not militate against your happiness." "Schemes! Lady Hammersley, I am at

a loss to understand you." "Her favourite scheme," returned her

Ladyship, "is this,--she intends you should marry her step-son Frederick

Elton, now Lord Eltondale; and her visit to Deane Hall, which you may

remember this time twelvemonth, was to procure your father's consent to

the match, in which she succeeded." "My father's consent!" exclaimed the

agitated girl. "But Mr. Elton and I are unacquainted; we have never even

seen each other. You must be mistaken, my dear madam." "No, there is no

mistake; both your late uncle and Mrs. Galton were my authorities." "And

do you say my father gave his consent?" "I do say so: and I also know,

that Frederick is now on his return to England, intending to propose

for you. Come, my dear, do not be so agitated: he is one of the finest

young men of the day: his character amiable, and his manners attractive;

so perhaps you cannot do better than make choice of him, provided your

affections are not otherwise engaged." A pause of some minutes ensued.

Lady Hammersley then continued: "But in telling you Lady Eltondale's

scheme, it is fit I should explain her motive; for be assured, Miss

Seymour, no action of hers can ever be disinterested. The fact is, she

has long known, that the Eltondale estates are as much encumbered as the

entail permits them to be; and in securing your property for Frederick,

she flatters herself she has secured an increased jointure for herself."

Selina shuddered, but could make no reply. And Lady Hammersley rising,

said, "I have now, my dear Miss Seymour, told you all I know: you may

think me an impertinent old woman, but, be assured, I only wished to be

a kind one. God bless you! perhaps we may never meet again; for I

suppose Lady Eltondale will leave this place immediately. But don't

forget the key I have given you to her character; and believe me it is

not a false one." So saying, she affectionately kissed Selina, who took

leave of her with a gratitude and cordiality, she would a few hours

before have believed it scarcely possible she could ever have

experienced for Lady Hammersley.

It may be supposed this conversation made a deep impression on her mind;

and one of the most painful feelings it excited was the insight it gave

her into Lady Eltondale's selfish and dissembling character, confirmed

as it was by her own previous observations. But even these feelings had

not long power to withdraw her attention from that part of Lady

Hammersley's communication which related to Frederick, and which was

also corroborated by her recollection of several remarks and casual

speeches of Lady Eltondale, which, at the time they were made, had

seemed to her accidental and undesigned, but each of which, on

retrospection, appeared "squared and fitted to its use." Nor did the

circumstance of her deceased father having given his consent to the

match serve, as with some romantic ladies it might have done, to

determine her against it; on the contrary, it rather served to prejudice

her in its favour; and a long train of reflections was concluded in her

own mind by Lady Hammersley's observation, "So perhaps you cannot do

better, provided your affections are not otherwise engaged."