The meeting of parliament caused also the return of Waldershare to
England, and brought life and enjoyment to our friends in Warwick
Street. Waldershare had not taken his seat in the autumn session. After
the general election, he had gone abroad with Lord Beaumaris, the young
nobleman who had taken them to the Derby, and they had seen and
done many strange things. During all their peregrinations, however,
Waldershare maintained a constant correspondence with Imogene,
occasionally sending her a choice volume, which she was not only to
read, but to prove her perusal of it by forwarding to him a criticism of
its contents.
Endymion was too much pleased to meet Waldershare again, and told him of
the kind of intimacy he had formed with Colonel Albert and all about
the baron. Waldershare was much interested in these details, and it was
arranged that an opportunity should be taken to make the colonel and
Waldershare acquainted.
This, however, was not an easy result to bring about, for Waldershare
insisted on its not occurring formally, and as the colonel maintained
the utmost reserve with the household, and Endymion had no room of
reception, weeks passed over without Waldershare knowing more of Colonel
Albert personally than sometimes occasionally seeing him mount his
horse.
In the meantime life in Warwick Street, so far as the Rodney family were
concerned, appeared to have re-assumed its pleasant, and what perhaps
we are authorised in styling its normal condition. They went to the
play two or three times a week, and there Waldershare or Lord Beaumaris,
frequently both, always joined them; and then they came home to supper,
and then they smoked; and sometimes there was a little singing, and
sometimes a little whist. Occasionally there was only conversation, that
is to say, Waldershare held forth, dilating on some wondrous theme,
full of historical anecdote, and dazzling paradox, and happy phrase. All
listened with interest, even those who did not understand him. Much of
his talk was addressed really to Beaumaris, whose mind he was forming,
as well as that of Imogene. Beaumaris was an hereditary Whig, but had
not personally committed himself, and the ambition of Waldershare was
to transform him not only into a Tory, but one of the old rock, a
real Jacobite. “Is not the Tory party,” Waldershare would exclaim, “a
succession of heroic spirits, ‘beautiful and swift,’ ever in the van,
and foremost of their age?--Hobbes and Bolingbroke, Hume and Adam Smith,
Wyndham and Cobham, Pitt and Grenville, Canning and Huskisson?--Are not
the principles of Toryism those popular rights which men like Shippen
and Hynde Cotton flung in the face of an alien monarch and his mushroom
aristocracy?--Place bills, triennial bills, opposition to standing
armies, to peerage bills?--Are not the traditions of the Tory party the
noblest pedigree in the world? Are not its illustrations that glorious
martyrology, that opens with the name of Falkland and closes with the
name of Canning?”
“I believe it is all true,” whispered Lord Beaumaris to Sylvia, who had
really never heard of any of these gentlemen before, but looked most
sweet and sympathetic.
“He is a wonderful man--Mr. Waldershare,” said Mr. Vigo to Rodney, “but
I fear not practical.”
One day, not very long after his return from his travels, Waldershare
went to breakfast with his uncle, Mr. Sidney Wilton, now a
cabinet minister, still unmarried, and living in Grosvenor Square.
Notwithstanding the difference of their politics, an affectionate
intimacy subsisted between them; indeed Waldershare was a favourite of
his uncle, who enjoyed the freshness of his mind, and quite appreciated
his brilliancy of thought and speech, his quaint reading and
effervescent imagination.
“And so you think we are in for life, George,” said Mr. Wilson, taking a
piece of toast. “I do not.”
“Well, I go upon this,” said Waldershare. “It is quite clear that Peel
has nothing to offer the country, and the country will not rally round a
negation. When he failed in ‘34 they said there had not been sufficient
time for the reaction to work. Well, now, since then, it has had nearly
three years, during which you fellows have done everything to outrage
every prejudice of the constituency, and yet they have given you a
majority.”
“Yes, that is all very well,” replied Mr. Wilton, “but we are the
Liberal shop, and we have no Liberal goods on hand; we are the party
of movement, and must perforce stand still. The fact is, all the great
questions are settled. No one will burn his fingers with the Irish
Church again, in this generation certainly not, probably in no other;
you could not get ten men together in any part of the country to
consider the corn laws; I must confess I regret it. I still retain my
opinion that a moderate fixed duty would be a wise arrangement, but
I quite despair in my time of any such advance of opinion; as for
the ballot, it is hardly tolerated in debating societies. The present
government, my dear George, will expire from inanition. I always told
the cabinet they were going on too fast. They should have kept back
municipal reform. It would have carried us on for five years. It was our
only _piece de resistance_.”
“I look upon the House of Commons as a mere vestry,” said Waldershare.
“I believe it to be completely used up. Reform has dished it. There are
no men, and naturally, because the constituencies elect themselves, and
the constituencies are the most mediocre of the nation. The House of
Commons now is like a spendthrift living on his capital. The business
is done and the speeches are made by men formed in the old school.
The influence of the House of Commons is mainly kept up by old social
traditions. I believe if the eldest sons of peers now members would
all accept the Chiltern hundreds, and the House thus cease to be
fashionable, before a year was past, it would be as odious and as
contemptible as the Rump Parliament.”
“Well, you are now the eldest son of a peer,” said Sidney Wilton,
smiling. “Why do you not set an example, instead of spending your
father’s substance and your own in fighting a corrupt borough?”
“I am _vox clamantis_,” said Waldershare. “I do not despair of its being
done. But what I want is some big guns to do it. Let the eldest son of
a Tory duke and the eldest son of a Whig duke do the same thing on
the same day, and give the reason why. If Saxmundham, for example, and
Harlaxton would do it, the game would be up.”
“On the contrary,” said Mr. Wilton, “Saxmundham, I can tell you, will be
the new cabinet minister.”
“Degenerate land!” exclaimed Waldershare. “Ah! in the eighteenth
century there was always a cause to sustain the political genius of the
country,--the cause of the rightful dynasty.”
“Well, thank God, we have got rid of all those troubles,” said Mr.
Wilton.
“Rid of them! I do not know that. I saw a great deal of the Duke of
Modena this year, and tried as well as I could to open his mind to the
situation.”
“You traitor!” exclaimed Mr. Wilton. “If I were Secretary of State, I
would order the butler to arrest you immediately, and send you to the
Tower in a hack cab; but as I am only a President of a Board and your
uncle, you will escape.”
“Well, I should think all sensible men,” said Waldershare, “of all
parties will agree, that before we try a republic, it would be better to
give a chance to the rightful heir.”
“Well, I am not a republican,” said Mr. Wilton, “and I think Queen
Victoria, particularly if she make a wise and happy marriage, need not
much fear the Duke of Modena.”
“He is our sovereign lord, all the same,” said Waldershare. “I wish he
were more aware of it himself. Instead of looking to a restoration to
his throne, I found him always harping on the fear of French invasion. I
could not make him understand that France was his natural ally, and that
without her help, Charlie was not likely to have his own again.”
“Well, as you admire pretenders, George, I wish you were in my shoes
this morning, for I have got one of the most disagreeable interviews on
hand which ever fell to my lot.”
“How so, my dear uncle?” said Waldershare, in a tone of sympathy, for he
saw that the countenance of Mr. Wilton was disturbed.
“My unhappy ward,” said Mr. Wilton; “you know, of course, something
about him.”
“Well, I was at school and college,” said Waldershare, “when it all
happened. But I have just heard that you had relations with him.”
“The most intimate; and there is the bitterness. There existed between
his mother Queen Agrippina and myself ties of entire friendship. In her
last years and in her greatest adversity she appealed to me to be the
guardian of her son. He inherited all her beauty and apparently all her
sweetness of disposition. I took the greatest pains with him. He was at
Eton, and did well there. He was very popular; I never was so deceived
in a boy in my life. I though him the most docile of human beings, and
that I had gained over him an entire influence. I am sure it would have
been exercised for his benefit. In short, I may say it now, I looked
upon him as a son, and he certainly would have been my heir; and yet
all this time, from his seventeenth year, he was immersed in political
intrigue, and carrying on plots against the sovereign of his country,
even under my own roof.”
“How very interesting!” said Waldershare.
“It may be interesting to you; I know what it cost me. The greatest
anxiety and sorrow, and even nearly compromised my honour. Had I not
a large-hearted chief and a true man of the world to deal with, I must
have retired from the government.”
“How could he manage it?” said Waldershare.
“You have no conception of the devices and resources of the secret
societies of Europe,” said Mr. Wilton. “His drawing-master, his
fencing-master, his dancing-master, all his professors of languages, who
delighted me by their testimony to his accomplishments and their praises
of his quickness and assiduity, were active confederates in bringing
about events which might have occasioned an European war. He left me
avowedly to pay a visit in the country, and I even received letters from
him with the postmark of the neighbouring town; letters all prepared
beforehand. My first authentic information as to his movements was to
learn, that he had headed an invading force, landed on the shores which
he claimed as his own, was defeated and a prisoner.”
“I remember it,” said Waldershare. “I had just then gone up to St.
John’s, and I remember reading it with the greatest excitement.”
“All this was bad enough,” said Mr. Wilton, “but this is not my sorrow.
I saved him from death, or at least a dreadful imprisonment. He was
permitted to sail to America on his parole that he would never return
to Europe, and I was required, and on his solemn appeal I consented, to
give my personal engagement that the compact should be sacred. Before
two years had elapsed, supported all this time, too, by my bounty, there
was an attempt, almost successful, to assassinate the king, and my ward
was discovered and seized in the capital. This time he was immured, and
for life, in the strongest fortress of the country; but secret societies
laugh at governments, and though he endured a considerable imprisonment,
the world has recently been astounded by hearing that he had escaped.
Yes; he is in London and has been here, though in studied obscurity,
for some little time. He has never appealed to me until within these
few days, and now only on the ground that there are some family affairs
which cannot be arranged without my approval. I had great doubts
whether I should receive him. I feel I ought not to have done so. But I
hesitated, and I know not what may be the truth about women, but of this
I am quite sure, the man who hesitates is lost.”
“How I should like to present at the interview, my dear uncle!” said
Waldershare.
“And I should not be sorry to have a witness,” said Mr. Wilton, “but it
is impossible. I am ashamed to say how unhinged I feel; no person, and
no memories, ought to exercise such an influence over one. To tell you
the truth, I encouraged your pleasant gossip at breakfast by way of
distraction at this moment, and now”----
At this moment, the groom of the chambers entered and announced “His
royal highness, Prince Florestan.”
Mr. Wilton, who was too agitated to speak, waved his hand to Waldershare
to retire, and his nephew vanished. As Waldershare was descending the
staircase, he drew back on a landing-place to permit the prince to
advance undisturbed. The prince apparently did not observe him, but when
Waldershare caught the countenance of the visitor, he started.