RALPH NEWTON IS BOWLED AWAY.
A day or two after his engagement, Ralph did write his letter to Sir
Thomas, and found when the moment came that the task was difficult.
But he wrote it. The thing had to be done, and there was nothing to
be gained by postponing it.
---- Club, June 2, 186--.
MY DEAR SIR THOMAS,--
You will, I hope, be glad to hear that I am engaged to be
married to Augusta Eardham, the second daughter of Sir
George Eardham, of Brayboro' Park, in Berkshire. Of course
you will know the name, and I rather think you were in
the House when Sir George sat for Berkshire. Augusta
has got no money, but I have not been placed under the
disagreeable necessity of looking out for a rich wife. I
believe we shall be married about the end of August. As
the ceremony will take place down at Brayboro', I fear
that I cannot expect that you or Patience and Clarissa
should come so far. Pray tell them my news, with my best
love.
Yours, most grateful for all your long kindness,
RALPH NEWTON.
I am very sorry that you should have been troubled by
letters from Mr. Neefit. The matter has been arranged at
last.
The letter when done was very simple, but it took him some time, and
much consideration. Should he or should he not allude to his former
loves? It was certainly much easier to write his letter without any
such allusion, and he did so.
About a week after this Sir Thomas went home to Fulham, and took
the letter with him. "Clary," he said, taking his youngest daughter
affectionately by the waist, when he found himself alone with her.
"I've got a piece of news for you."
"For me, papa?"
"Well, for all of us. Somebody is going to be married. Who do you
think it is?"
"Not Ralph Newton?" said Clarissa, with a little start.
"Yes, Ralph Newton."
"How quick he arranges things!" said Clarissa. There was some little
emotion, just a quiver, and a quick rush of blood into her cheeks,
which, however, left them just as quickly.
"Yes;--he is quick."
"Who is it, papa?"
"A very proper sort of person,--the daughter of a Berkshire baronet."
"But what is her name?"
"Augusta Eardham."
"Augusta Eardham. I hope he'll be happy, papa. We've known him a long
time."
"I think he will be happy;--what people call happy. He is not
gifted,--or cursed, as it may be,--with fine feelings, and is what
perhaps may be called thick-skinned; but he will love his own wife
and children. I don't think he will be a spendthrift now that he has
plenty to spend, and he is not subject to what the world calls vices.
I shouldn't wonder if he becomes a prosperous and most respectable
country gentleman, and quite a model to his neighbours."
"It doesn't seem to matter much;--does it?" said Clarissa, when she
told the story to Mary and Patience.
"What doesn't matter?" asked Mary.
"Whether a man cares for the girl he's going to marry, or doesn't
care at all. Ralph Newton cannot care very much for Miss Eardham."
"I think it matters very much," said Mary.
"Perhaps, after all, he'll be just as fond of his wife, in a way,
as though he had been making love to her,--oh, for years," said
Clarissa. This was nearly all that was said at the villa, though, no
doubt, poor Clary had many thoughts on the matter, in her solitary
rambles along the river. That picture of the youth, as he lay upon
the lawn, looking up into her eyes, and telling her that she was
dear to him, could not easily be effaced from her memory. Sir Thomas
before this had written his congratulations to Ralph. They had been
very short, and in them no allusion had been made to the young ladies
at Popham Villa.
In the meantime Ralph was as happy as the day was long, and delighted
with his lot in life. For some weeks previous to his offer he had
been aware that Lady Eardham had been angling for him as for a fish,
that he had been as a prey to her and to her daughter, and that it
behoved him to amuse himself without really taking the hook between
his gills. He had taken the hook, and now had totally forgotten all
those former notions of his in regard to a prey, and a fish, and a
mercenary old harridan of a mother. He had no sooner been kissed all
round by the women, and paternally blessed by Sir George, than he
thought that he had exercised a sound judgment, and had with true
wisdom arranged to ally himself with just the woman most fit to be
his wife, and the future mistress of Newton Priory. He was proud,
indeed, of his success, when he read the paragraph in the "Morning
Post," announcing as a fact that the alliance had been arranged, and
was again able to walk about among his comrades as one of those who
make circumstances subject to them, rather than become subject to
circumstances. His comrades, no doubt, saw the matter in another
light. "By Jove," said Pretty Poll at his club, "there's Newton been
and got caught by old Eardham after all. The girl has been running
ten years, and been hawked about like a second-class race-horse."
"Yes, poor fellow," said Captain Fooks. "Neefit has done that
for him. Ralph for a while was so knocked off his pins by the
breeches-maker, that he didn't know where to look for shelter."
Whether marriages should be made in heaven or on earth, must be
a matter of doubt to observers;--whether, that is, men and women
are best married by chance, which I take to be the real fashion of
heaven-made marriages; or should be brought into that close link and
loving bondage to each other by thought, selection, and decision.
That the heavenly mode prevails the oftenest there can hardly be a
doubt. It takes years to make a friendship; but a marriage may be
settled in a week,--in an hour. If you desire to go into partnership
with a man in business, it is an essential necessity that you should
know your partner; that he be honest,--or dishonest, if such be your
own tendency,--industrious, instructed in the skill required, and of
habits of life fit for the work to be done. But into partnerships for
life,--of a kind much closer than any business partnership,--men rush
without any preliminary inquiries. Some investigation and anxiety as
to means there may be, though in this respect the ordinary parlance
of the world endows men with more caution, or accuses them of more
greed than they really possess. But in other respects everything is
taken for granted. Let the woman, if possible, be pretty;--or if
not pretty, let her have style. Let the man, if possible, not be a
fool; or if a fool, let him not show his folly too plainly. As for
knowledge of character, none is possessed, and none is wanted. The
young people meet each other in their holiday dresses, on holiday
occasions, amidst holiday pleasures,--and the thing is arranged. Such
matches may be said to be heaven-made.
It is a fair question whether they do not answer better than those
which have less of chance,--or less of heaven,--in their manufacture.
If it be needful that a man and woman take five years to learn
whether they will suit each other as husband and wife, and that then,
at the end of the five years, they find that they will not suit, the
freshness of the flower would be gone before it could be worn in the
button-hole. There are some leaps which you must take in the dark, if
you mean to jump at all. We can all understand well that a wise man
should stand on the brink and hesitate; but we can understand also
that a very wise man should declare to himself that with no possible
amount of hesitation could certainty be achieved. Let him take the
jump or not take it,--but let him not presume to think that he can
so jump as to land himself in certain bliss. It is clearly God's
intention that men and women should live together, and therefore let
the leap in the dark be made.
No doubt there had been very much of heaven in Ralph Newton's last
choice. It may be acknowledged that in lieu of choosing at all, he
had left the matter altogether to heaven. Some attempt he had made at
choosing,--in reference to Mary Bonner; but he had found the attempt
simply to be troublesome and futile. He had spoken soft, loving words
to Clarissa, because she herself had been soft and lovable. Nature
had spoken,--as she does when the birds sing to each other. Then,
again, while suffering under pecuniary distress he had endeavoured
to make himself believe that Polly Neefit was just the wife for him.
Then, amidst the glories of his emancipation from thraldom, he had
seen Mary Bonner,--and had actually, after a fashion, made a choice
for himself. His choice had brought upon him nothing but disgrace
and trouble. Now he had succumbed at the bidding of heaven and Lady
Eardham, and he was about to be provided with a wife exactly suited
for him. It may be said at the same time that Augusta Eardham was
equally lucky. She also had gotten all that she ought to have wanted,
had she known what to want. They were both of them incapable of what
men and women call love when they speak of love as a passion linked
with romance. And in one sense they were cold-hearted. Neither of
them was endowed with the privilege of pining because another person
had perished. But each of them was able to love a mate, when assured
that that mate must continue to be mate, unless separation should
come by domestic earthquake. They had hearts enough for paternal and
maternal duties, and would probably agree in thinking that any geese
which Providence might send them were veritable swans. Bickerings
there might be, but they would be bickerings without effect; and
Ralph Newton, of Newton, would probably so live with this wife of his
bosom, that they, too, might lie at last pleasantly together in the
family vault, with the record of their homely virtues visible to the
survivors of the parish on the same tombstone. The means by which
each of them would have arrived at these blessings would not redound
to the credit of either; but the blessings would be there, and it may
be said of their marriage, as of many such marriages, that it was
made in heaven, and was heavenly.
The marriage was to take place early in September, and the first
week in August was passed by Sir George and Lady Eardham and their
two younger daughters at Newton Priory. On the 14th Ralph was to be
allowed to run down to the moors just for one week, and then he was
to be back, passing between Newton and Brayboro', signing deeds and
settlements, preparing for their wedding tour, and obedient in all
things to Eardham influences. It did occur to him that it would
be proper that he should go down to Fulham to see his old friends
once before his marriage; but he felt that such a visit would be
to himself very unpleasant, and therefore he assured himself, and
moreover made himself believe, that, if he abstained from the visit,
he would abstain because it would be unpleasant to them. He did
abstain. But he did call at the chambers in Southampton Buildings; he
called, however, at an hour in which he knew that Sir Thomas would
not be visible, and made no second pressing request to Stemm for the
privilege of entrance.
He had great pride in showing his house and park and estate to the
Eardhams, and had some delicious rambles with his Augusta through the
shrubberies and down by the little brook. Ralph had an enjoyment in
the prettiness of nature, and Augusta was clever enough to simulate
the feeling. He was a little annoyed, perhaps, when he found that the
beauty of her morning dresses did not admit of her sitting upon the
grass or leaning against gates, and once expressed an opinion that
she need not be so particular about her gloves in this the hour of
their billing and cooing. Augusta altogether declined to remove her
gloves in a place swarming, as she said, with midges, or to undergo
any kind of embrace while adorned with that sweetest of all hats,
which had been purchased for his especial delight. But in other
respects she was good humoured, and tried to please him. She learned
the names of all his horses, and was beginning to remember those
of his tenants. She smiled upon Gregory, and behaved with a pretty
decorum when the young parson showed her his church. Altogether her
behaviour was much better than might have been expected from the
training to which she had been subjected during her seven seasons in
London. Lord Polperrow wronged her greatly when he said that she had
been "running" for ten years.
There was a little embarrassment in Ralph's first interview with
Gregory. He had given his brother notice of his engagement by letter
as soon as he had been accepted, feeling that any annoyance coming to
him, might be lessened in that way. Unfortunately he had spoken to
his brother in what he now felt to have been exaggerated terms of his
passion for Mary Bonner, and he himself was aware that that malady
had been quickly cured. "I suppose the news startled you?" he had
said, with a forced laugh, as soon as he met his brother.
"Well;--yes, a little. I did not know that you were so intimate with
them."
"The truth is, I had thought a deal about the matter, and I had come
to see how essential it was for the interests of us all that I should
marry into our own set. The moment I saw Augusta I felt that she was
exactly the girl to make me happy. She is very handsome. Don't you
think so?"
"Certainly."
"And then she has just the style which, after all, does go so far.
There's nothing dowdy about her. A dowdy woman would have killed me.
She attracted me from the first moment; and, by Jove, old fellow, I
can assure you it was mutual. I am the happiest fellow alive, and
I don't think there is anything I envy anybody." In all this Ralph
believed that he was speaking the simple truth.
"I hope you'll be happy, with all my heart," said Gregory.
"I am sure I shall;--and so will you if you will ask that little puss
once again. I believe in my heart she loves you." Gregory, though he
had been informed of his brother's passion for Mary, had never been
told of that other passion for Clarissa; and Ralph could therefore
speak of ground for hope in that direction without uncomfortable
twinges.
There did occur during this fortnight one or two little matters,
just sufficiently laden with care to ruffle the rose-leaves of our
hero's couch. Lady Eardham thought that both the dining-room and
drawing-room should be re-furnished, that a bow-window should be
thrown out to the breakfast-parlour, and that a raised conservatory
should be constructed into which Augusta's own morning sitting-room
up-stairs might be made to open. Ralph gave way about the furniture
with a good grace, but he thought that the bow-window would disfigure
the house, and suggested that the raised conservatory would
cost money. Augusta thought the bow-window was the very thing
for the house, and Lady Eardham knew as a fact that a similar
conservatory,--the sweetest thing in the world,--which she had seen
at Lord Rosebud's had cost almost absolutely nothing. And if anything
was well-known in gardening it was this, that the erection of such
conservatories was a positive saving in garden expenses. The men
worked under cover during the rainy days, and the hot-water served
for domestic as well as horticultural purposes. There was some debate
and a little heat, and the matter was at last referred to Sir George.
He voted against Ralph on both points, and the orders were given.
Then there was the more important question of the settlements. Of
course there were to be settlements, in the arrangement of which
Ralph was to give everything and to get nothing. With high-handed
magnanimity he had declared that he wanted no money, and therefore
the trifle which would have been adjudged to be due to Gus was
retained to help her as yet less fortunate sisters. In truth
Marmaduke at this time was so expensive that Sir George was obliged
to be a little hard. Why, however, he should have demanded out of
such a property as that of Newton a jointure of £4,000 a year, with
a house to be found either in town or country as the widow might
desire, on behalf of a penniless girl, no one acting in the Newton
interest could understand, unless Sir George might have thought that
the sum to be ultimately obtained might depend in some degree on that
demanded. Had he known Mr. Carey he would probably not have subjected
himself to the rebuke which he received.
Ralph, when the sum was first named to him by Sir George's lawyer,
who came down purposely to Newton, looked very blank, and said
that he had not anticipated any arrangement so destructive to the
property. The lawyer pointed out that there was unfortunately no
dowager's house provided; that the property would not be destroyed
as the dower would only be an annuity; that ladies now were more
liberally treated in this matter than formerly;--and that the
suggestion was quite the usual thing. "You don't suppose I mean my
daughter to be starved?" said Sir George, upon whom gout was then
coming. Ralph plucked up spirit and answered him. "Nor do I intend
that your daughter, sir, should be starved." "Dear Ralph, do be
liberal to the dear girl," said Lady Eardham afterwards, caressing
our hero in the solitude of her bed-room. Mr. Carey, however,
arranged the whole matter very quickly. The dower must be £2,000, out
of which the widow must find her own house. Sir George must be well
aware, said Mr. Carey, that the demand made was preposterous. Sir
George said one or two very nasty things; but the dower as fixed by
Mr. Carey was accepted, and then everything smiled again.
When the Eardhams were leaving Newton the parting between Augusta
and her lover was quite pretty. "Dear Gus," he said, "when next I am
here, you will be my own, own wife," and he kissed her. "Dear Ralph,"
she said, "when next I am here, you will be my own, own husband," and
kissed him; "but we have Como, and Florence, and Rome, and Naples to
do before that;--and won't that be nice?"
"It will be very nice to be anywhere with you," said the lover.
"And mind you have your coat made just as I told you," said Augusta.
So they parted.
Early in September they were married with great éclat at Brayboro',
and Lady Eardham spared nothing on the occasion. It was her first
maternal triumph, and all the country round was made to know of her
success. The Newtons had been at Newton for--she did not know how
many hundred years. In her zeal she declared that the estate had been
in the same hands from long before the Conquest. "There's no title,"
she said to her intimate friend, Lady Wiggham, "but there's that
which is better than a title. We're mushrooms to the Newtons, you
know. We only came into Berkshire in the reign of Henry VIII." As the
Wigghams had only come into Buckinghamshire in the reign of George
IV., Lady Wiggham, had she known the facts, would probably have
reminded her dear friend that the Eardhams had in truth first been
heard of in those parts in the time of Queen Anne,--the original
Eardham having made his money in following Marlborough's army. But
Lady Wiggham had not studied the history of the county gentry. The
wedding went off very well, and the bride and bridegroom were bowled
away to the nearest station with four grey post-horses from Reading
in a manner that was truly delightful to Lady Eardham's motherly
feelings.
And with the same grey horses shall the happy bride and bridegroom
be bowled out of our sight also. The writer of this story feels
that some apology is due to his readers for having endeavoured
to entertain them so long with the adventures of one of whom it
certainly cannot be said that he was fit to be delineated as a hero.
It is thought by many critics that in the pictures of imaginary life
which novelists produce for the amusement, and possibly for the
instruction of their readers, none should be put upon the canvas but
the very good, who by their noble thoughts and deeds may lead others
to nobility, or the very bad, who by their declared wickedness will
make iniquity hideous. How can it be worth one's while, such critics
will say,--the writer here speaks of all critical readers, and not
of professional critics,--how can it be worth our while to waste our
imaginations, our sympathies, and our time upon such a one as Ralph,
the heir of the Newton property? The writer, acknowledging the force
of these objections, and confessing that his young heroes of romance
are but seldom heroic, makes his apology as follows.
The reader of a novel,--who has doubtless taken the volume up simply
for amusement, and who would probably lay it down did he suspect
that instruction, like a snake in the grass, like physic beneath the
sugar, was to be imposed upon him,--requires from his author chiefly
this, that he shall be amused by a narrative in which elevated
sentiment prevails, and gratified by being made to feel that the
elevated sentiments described are exactly his own. When the heroine
is nobly true to her lover, to her friend, or to her duty, through
all persecution, the girl who reads declares to herself that she also
would have been a Jeannie Deans had Fate and Fortune given her an
Effie as a sister. The bald-headed old lawyer,--for bald-headed old
lawyers do read novels,--who interests himself in the high-minded,
self-devoting chivalry of a Colonel Newcombe, believes he would have
acted as did the Colonel had he been so tried. What youth in his
imagination cannot be as brave, and as loving, though as hopeless
in his love, as Harry Esmond? Alas, no one will wish to be as
was Ralph Newton! But for one Harry Esmond, there are fifty Ralph
Newtons,--five hundred and fifty of them; and the very youth whose
bosom glows with admiration as he reads of Harry,--who exults in the
idea that as Harry did, so would he have done,--lives as Ralph lived,
is less noble, less persistent, less of a man even than was Ralph
Newton.
It is the test of a novel writer's art that he conceals his
snake-in-the-grass; but the reader may be sure that it is always
there. No man or woman with a conscience,--no man or woman with
intellect sufficient to produce amusement, can go on from year
to year spinning stories without the desire of teaching; with no
ambition of influencing readers for their good. Gentle readers, the
physic is always beneath the sugar, hidden or unhidden. In writing
novels we novelists preach to you from our pulpits, and are keenly
anxious that our sermons shall not be inefficacious. Inefficacious
they are not, unless they be too badly preached to obtain attention.
Injurious they will be unless the lessons taught be good lessons.
What a world this would be if every man were a Harry Esmond, or every
woman a Jeannie Deans! But then again, what a world if every woman
were a Beckie Sharp and every man a Varney or a Barry Lyndon! Of
Varneys and Harry Esmonds there are very few. Human nature, such as
it is, does not often produce them. The portraits of such virtues
and such vices serve no doubt to emulate and to deter. But are no
other portraits necessary? Should we not be taught to see the men
and women among whom we really live,--men and women such as we are
ourselves,--in order that we should know what are the exact failings
which oppress ourselves, and thus learn to hate, and if possible
to avoid in life the faults of character which in life are hardly
visible, but which in portraiture of life can be made to be so
transparent.
Ralph Newton did nothing, gentle reader, which would have caused
thee greatly to grieve for him, nothing certainly which would have
caused thee to repudiate him, had he been thy brother. And gentlest,
sweetest reader, had he come to thee as thy lover, with sufficient
protest of love, and with all his history written in his hand, would
that have caused thee to reject his suit? Had he been thy neighbour,
thou well-to-do reader, with a house in the country, would he not
have been welcome to thy table? Wouldst thou have avoided him at
his club, thou reader from the West-end? Has he not settled himself
respectably, thou grey-haired, novel-reading paterfamilias, thou
materfamilias, with daughters of thine own to be married? In life
would he have been held to have disgraced himself,--except in the
very moment in which he seemed to be in danger? Nevertheless, the
faults of a Ralph Newton, and not the vices of a Varney or a Barry
Lyndon are the evils against which men should in these days be taught
to guard themselves;--which women also should be made to hate. Such
is the writer's apology for his very indifferent hero, Ralph the
Heir.