his arm in silence, and with a very perplexed face escorted her into the
principal room. As he led her up to his wife, his countenance gradually
changed from perplexity to something like fright. Albina paid her
compliments to Mrs. Potts, who received her with evident amazement, and
without replying. Mrs. Montague, who sat next to the lady of the
mansion, opened still wider her immense eyes, and then, "to make
assurance doubly sure," applied her opera-glass. Miss Montague first
stared and then laughed.
Albina, much disconcerted, turned to look for a seat, Mr. Potts having
withdrawn his arm. As she retired to the only vacant chair, she heard a
half whisper running along the line of ladies, and though she could not
distinguish the words so as to make any connected sense of them, she
felt that they alluded to her.
"Can I believe my eyes?" said Mrs. Potts.
"The assurance of American girls is astonishing," said Mrs. Montague.
"She was forbidden to come," said Miss Montague to a young lady beside
her. "Mrs. Potts herself forbade her to come."
"She was actually prohibited," resumed Mrs. Montague, leaning over to
Mrs. Jones.
"I sent her myself a note of prohibition," said Mrs. Potts, leaning over
to Mrs. Smith. "I had serious objections to having her here."
"I never saw such downright impudence," pursued Mrs. Montague. "This I
suppose is one of the consequences of the liberty, and freedom and
independence that you Americans are always talking about. I must tell
Mr. Montague, for really this is too good to lose."
And beckoning her husband to come to her--"My dear," said she, "put down
in your memorandum-book, that when American married ladies invite young
ladies to parties, they on second thoughts forbid them to come, and that
the said American young ladies boldly persist in coming in spite of the
forbiddance."
And she then related to him the whole affair, at full length, and with
numerous embellishments, looking all the time at poor Albina.
The story was soon circulated round the room in whispers and murmurs,
and no one had candour or kindness to suggest the possibility of Miss
Marsden's having never received the note.
Albina soon perceived herself to be an object of remark and
animadversion, and she was sadly at a loss to divine the cause. The two
ladies that were nearest to her, rose up and left their seats, while two
others edged their chairs farther off. She knew no one, she was
introduced to no one, but she saw that every one was looking at her as
she sat by herself, alone, conspicuous, and abashed. Tea was waiting for
a lady that came always last, and the whole company seemed to have
leisure to gaze on poor Albina, and to whisper about her.
Her situation now became intolerable. She felt that there was nothing
left for her but to go home. Unluckily she had ordered the carriage at
eleven o'clock. At last she resolved on making a great effort, and on
plea of a violent headache (a plea which by this time was literally
true) to ask Mrs. Potts if she would allow a servant to bring a coach
for her.
After several attempts, she rose for this purpose; but she saw at the
same moment that all eyes were turned upon her. She tremblingly, and
with downcast looks, advanced till she got into the middle of the room,
and then all her courage deserted her at once, when she heard some one
say, "I wonder what she is going to do next."
She stopped suddenly, and stood motionless, and she saw Miss Potts
giggle, and heard her say to a school-girl near her, "I suppose she is
going to speak a speech." She turned very pale, and felt as if she could
gladly sink into the floor, when suddenly some one took her hand, and
the voice of Bromley Cheston said to her, "Albina--Miss Marsden--I will
conduct you wherever you wish to go"--and then, lowering his tone, he
asked her, "Why this agitation--what has happened to distress you?"
Cheston had just arrived from New York, having been detained on the way
by an accident that happened to one of the boats, and finding that Mrs.
Marsden was in town, and had that day sent several messages for him, he
repaired immediately to her lodgings. He had intended declining the
invitation of Mrs. Potts, but when he found that Albina had gone
thither, he hastily changed his dress and went to the party. When he
entered, what was his amazement to see her standing alone in the centre
of the room, and the company whispering and gazing at her.
Albina, on hearing the voice of a friend, the voice of Bromley Cheston,
was completely overcome, and she covered her face and burst into tears.
"Albina," said Cheston, "I will not now ask an explanation; I see that,
whatever may have happened, you had best go home."
"Oh! most gladly, most thankfully," she exclaimed, in a voice almost
inarticulate with sobs.
Cheston drew her arm within his, and bowing to Mrs. Potts, he led Albina
out of the apartment, and conducted her to the staircase, whence she
went to the ladies' room to compose herself a little, and prepare for
her departure.
Cheston then sent one servant for a carriage, and another to tell Mr.
Potts that he desired to speak with him in the hall. Potts came out with
a pale, frightened face, and said--"Indeed, sir--indeed, I had nothing
to do with it; ask the women. It was all them entirely. It was the
women that laughed at Miss Albina, and whispered about her."
"For what?" demanded the lieutenant. "I insist on knowing for what
cause."
"Why, sir," replied Potts, "she came here to my wife's party, after Mrs.
Potts had sent a note desiring her to stay away; which was certainly an
odd thing for a young lady to do."
"There is some mistake," exclaimed Cheston; "I'll stake my life that she
never saw the note. And now, for what reason did Mrs. Potts write such a
note? How did she dare--"
"Oh!" replied Potts, stammering and hesitating, "women will have their
notions; men are not half so particular about their company. Somehow,
after Mrs. Potts had invited Miss Albina, she thought, on farther
consideration, that poor Miss Albina was not quite genteel enough for
her party. You know all the women now make a great point of being
genteel. But, indeed, sir (observing the storm that was gathering on
Cheston's brow), indeed, sir--_I_ was not in the least to blame. It was
altogether the fault of my wife."
The indignation of the lieutenant was so highly excited, that nothing
could have checked it but the recollection that Potts was in his own
house. At this moment, Albina came down stairs, and Cheston took her
hand and said to her: "Albina, did you receive a note from Mrs. Potts
interdicting your presence at the party?"--"Oh! no, indeed!" exclaimed
Albina, amazed at the question. "Surely she did not send me such a
note."--"Yes she did, though," said Potts, quickly.--"Is it, then,
necessary for me to say," said Albina, indignantly, "that, under those
circumstances, nothing could have induced me to enter this house, now or
ever! I saw or heard nothing of this note. And is this the reason that I
have been treated so rudely--so cruelly--"
Upon this, Mr. Potts made his escape, and Cheston, having put Albina
into the carriage, desired the coachman to wait a few moments. He then
returned to the drawing-room and approached Mrs. Potts, who was standing
with half the company collected round her, and explaining with great
volubility the whole history of Albina Marsden. On the appearance of
Cheston, she stopped short, and all her auditors looked foolish.
The young officer advanced into the centre of the circle, and, first
addressing Mrs. Potts, he said to her--"In justice to Miss Marsden, I
have returned, madam, to inform you that your note of interdiction, with
which you have so kindly made all the company acquainted, was till this
moment unknown to that young lady. But, even had she come wilfully, and
in the full knowledge of your prohibition, no circumstances whatever
could justify the rudeness with which I find she has been treated. I
have now only to say that, if any gentleman presumes, either here or
hereafter, to cast a reflection on the conduct of Miss Albina Marsden,
in this or in any other instance, he must answer to me for the
consequences. And if I find that any lady has invidiously misrepresented
this occurrence, I shall insist on an atonement from her husband, her
brother, or her admirer."
He then bowed and departed, and the company looked still more foolish.
"This lesson," thought Cheston, "will have the salutary effect of curing
Albina of her predominant follies. She is a lovely girl, after all, and
when withdrawn from the influence of her mother, will make a charming
woman and an excellent wife."
Before the carriage stopped at the residence of Mrs. Marsden, Cheston
had made Albina an offer of his heart and hand, and the offer was not
refused.
Mrs. Marsden was scarcely surprised at the earliness of Albina's return
from the party, for she had a secret misgiving that all was not right,
that the suppression of the note would not eventuate well, and she
bitterly regretted having done it. When her daughter related to her the
story of the evening, Mrs. Marsden was overwhelmed with compunction;
and, though Cheston was present, she could not refrain from
acknowledging at once her culpability, for it certainly deserved no
softer name. Cheston and Albina were shocked at this disclosure; but, in
compassion to Mrs. Marsden, they forbore to add to her distress by a
single comment. Cheston shortly after took his leave, saying to Albina
as he departed, "I hope you are done for ever with Mrs. Washington
Potts."
Next morning, Cheston seriously but kindly expostulated with Albina and
her mother on the folly and absurdity of sacrificing their comfort,
their time, their money, and, indeed, their self-respect, to the paltry
distinction of being capriciously noticed by a few vain, silly,
heartless people, inferior to themselves in everything but in wealth and
in a slight tincture of soi-disant fashion; and who, after all, only
took them on or threw them off as it suited their own convenience.
"What you say is very true, Bromley," replied Mrs. Marsden. "I begin to
view these things in their proper light, and as Albina remarks, we ought
to profit by this last lesson. To tell the exact truth, I have heard
since I came to town that Mrs. Washington Potts is, after all, by no
means in the first circle, and it is whispered that she and her husband
are both of very low origin."
"No matter for her circle or her origin," said Cheston, "in our country
the only acknowledged distinction should be that which is denoted by
superiority of mind and manners."
Next day Lieutenant Cheston escorted Mrs. Marsden and Albina back to
their own home--and a week afterwards he was sent unexpectedly on a
cruise in the West Indies.
He returned in the spring, and found Mrs. Marsden more rational than he
had ever known her, and Albina highly improved by a judicious course of
reading which he had marked out for her, and still more by her intimacy
with a truly genteel, highly talented, and very amiable family from the
eastward, who had recently bought a house in the village, and in whose
society she often wondered at the infatuation which had led her to fancy
such a woman as Mrs. Washington Potts, with whom, of course, she never
had any farther communication.
A recent and very large bequest to Bromley Cheston from a distant
relation, made it no longer necessary that the young lieutenant should
wait for promotion before he married Albina; and accordingly their union
took place immediately on his return.
Before the Montagues left Philadelphia to prosecute their journey to the
south, there arrived an acquaintance of theirs from England, who
injudiciously "told the secrets of his prison-house," and made known in
whispers "not loud but deep," that Mr. Dudley Montague, of Normancourt
Park, Hants, (alias Mr. John Wilkins, of Lamb's Conduit Street,
Clerkenwell), had long been well-known in London as a reporter for a
newspaper; that he had recently married a widow, the ci-devant governess
of a Somers Town Boarding-school, who had drawn her ideas of fashionable
life from the columns of the Morning Post, and who famished her pupils
so much to her own profit that she had been able to retire on a sort of
fortune. With the assistance of this fund, she and her daughter (the
young lady was in reality the offspring of her mother's first marriage)
had accompanied Mr. Wilkins across the Atlantic: all three assuming the
lordly name of Montague, as one well calculated to strike the
republicans with proper awe. The truth was, that for a suitable
consideration proffered by a tory publisher, the _soi-disant_ Mr.
Montague had undertaken to add another octavo to the numerous volumes of
gross misrepresentation and real ignorance that profess to contain an
impartial account of the United States of America.
MR. SMITH.
Those of my readers who recollect the story of Mrs. Washington Potts,
may not be sorry to learn that in less than two years after the marriage
of Bromley Cheston and Albina, Mrs. Marsden was united to a southern
planter of great wealth and respectability, with whom she had become
acquainted during a summer excursion to Newport. Mrs. Selbourne (that
being her new name) was now, as her letters denoted, completely in her
element, presiding over a large establishment, mistress of twelve
house-servants, and almost continually engaged in doing the honours of a
spacious mansion to a round of company, or in complying with similar
invitations from the leading people of a populous neighbourhood, or in
reciprocating visits with the most fashionable inhabitants of the
nearest city. Her only regret was that Mrs. Washington Potts could not
"be there to see." But then as a set-off, Mrs. Selbourne rejoiced in the
happy reflection, that a distance of several hundred miles placed a
great gulf between herself and Aunt Quimby, from whose Vandal incursions
she now felt a delightful sense of security. She was not, however, like
most of her compatriots, a warm advocate for the universal diffusion of
railroads; neither did she assent very cordially to the common remarks
about this great invention, annihilating both time and space, and
bringing "the north and the south, and the east and the west" into the
same neighbourhood.
Bromley Cheston, having succeeded to a handsome inheritance by the
demise of an opulent relative, in addition to his house in Philadelphia,
purchased as a summer residence that of his mother-in-law on the banks
of the Delaware, greatly enlarging and improving it, and adding to its
little domain some meadow and woodland; also a beautiful piece of
ground which he converted into a green lawn sloping down towards the
river, and bounded on one side by a shady road that led to a convenient
landing-place.
The happiness of Albina and her husband (who in the regular course of
promotion became Captain Cheston) was much increased by the society of
Bromley's sister Myrtilla, a beautiful, sprightly, and intelligent girl,
whom they invited to live with them after the death of her maternal
grandmother, an eastern lady, with whom she had resided since the loss
of her parents, and who had left her a little fortune of thirty thousand
dollars.
Their winters were passed in Philadelphia, where Albina found herself
quite at home in a circle far superior to that of Mrs. Washington Potts,
who was one of the first to visit Mrs. Cheston on her marriage. This
visit was of course received with civility, but returned by merely
leaving a card at the door. No notice whatever was taken of Mrs. Potts's
second call; neither was she ever invited to the house.
When Cheston was not at sea, little was wanting to complete the perfect
felicity of the family. It is true they were not entirely exempt from
the occasional annoyances and petty vexations, inseparable from even the
happiest state of human life; but these were only transient shadows,
that, on passing away, generally served as topics of amusement, and
caused them to wonder how trifles, diverting in the recollection, could
have really so troubled them at the time of occurrence. Such, for
instance, were the frequent visitations of Mrs. Quimby, who told them
(after they had enlarged their villa, and bought a carriage and a
tilbury), "Really, good people, now that things are all so genteel, and
pleasant, and full-handed, I think I shall be apt to favour you with my
company the greatest part of every summer. There's no danger of Billy
Fairfowl and Mary being jealous. They always let me go and come just as
I please; and if I was to stay away ten years, I do not believe they'd
be the least affronted."
As the old lady had intimated, her visits, instead of being "few and far
between," were many and close together. It is said you may get used to
anything, and therefore the Chestons _did not_ sell off their property
and fly the country on account of Aunt Quimby. Luckily she never brought
with her any of the Fairfowl family, her son-in-law having sufficient
tact to avoid on principle all visiting intercourse with people who
were beyond his sphere: for, though certain of being kindly treated by
the Chestons themselves, he apprehended that he and his would probably
be looked down upon by persons whom they might chance to meet there.
Mrs. Quimby, for her part, was totally obtuse to all sense of these
distinctions.
One Monday evening, on his return from town, Captain Cheston brought his
wife and sister invitations to a projected picnic party, among the
managers of which were two of his intimate friends. The company was to
consist chiefly of ladies and gentlemen from the city. Their design was
to assemble on the following Thursday, at some pleasant retreat on the
banks of the Delaware, and to recreate themselves with an unceremonious
_fête champêtre_. "I invited them," continued the captain, "to make use
of my grounds for the purpose. We can find an excellent place for them
in the woods by the river side. Delham and Lonsgrave will be here
to-morrow, to reconnoitre the capabilities of the place."
The ladies were delighted with the prospect of the picnic party; more
especially on finding that most of the company were known to them.
"It will be charming," said Albina, "to have them near us, and to be
able to supply them with many conveniences from our own house. You may
be assured, dear Bromley, that I shall liberally do my part towards
contributing to the picnickery. You know that our culinary preparations
never go wrong now that I have more experience, good servants, and above
all plenty to do with."
"How fortunate," said Myrtilla Cheston, "that Mrs. Quimby left us this
morning. This last visit has been so long that I think she will scarcely
favour us with another in less than two or three weeks. I hope she will
not hear that the picnic is to be on our place."
"There is no danger," replied Cheston; "Aunt Quimby cannot possibly know
any of the persons concerned in it. And besides, I met her to-day in the
street, and she told me that she was going to set out on Wednesday for
Baltimore, to visit Billy Fairfowl's sister, Mrs. Bagnell: 'Also,' said
she, 'it will take me from this time to that to pack my things, as I
never before went so far from home, and I dare say, I shall stay in
Baltimore all the rest of the fall; I don't believe when the Bagnells
once have me with them, they'll let me come away much this side of
winter.'"
"I sincerely hope they will not!" exclaimed Albina; "I am so glad that
Nancy Fairfowl has married a Baltimorean. I trust they will make their
house so pleasant to Aunt Quimby, that she will transfer her favour from
us to them. You know she often tells us that Nancy and herself are as
like as two peas, both in looks and ways; and from her account, Johnny
Bagnell must be a third pea, exactly resembling both of them."
"And yet," observed Cheston, "people whose minds are of the same
calibre, do not always assimilate as well as might be supposed. When
_too_ nearly alike, and too close to each other, they frequently rub
together so as to grate exceedingly."
We will pass over the intervening days by saying, that the preparations
for the picnic party were duly and successfully made: the arrangement of
the ground being undertaken by Captain Cheston, and Lieutenants Delham
and Lonsgrave, and completed with the taste, neatness, and judicious
arrangement, which always distinguishes such things when done by
officers, whether of army or navy.
The appointed Thursday arrived. It was a lovely day, early in September:
the air being of that delightful and exhilarating temperature, that
converts the mere sense of existence into pleasure. The heats of summer
were over, and the sky had assumed its mildest tint of blue. All was
calm and cool, and lovely, and the country seemed sleeping in luxurious
repose. The grass, refreshed by the August rains, looked green as that
of the "emerald isle;" and the forest trees had not yet begun to wear
the brilliant colours of autumn, excepting here and there a maple whose
foliage was already crimsoned. The orchards were loaded with fruit,
glowing in ripeness; and the buckwheat fields, white with blossoms,
perfumed the air with their honeyed fragrance. The rich flowers of the
season were in full bloom. Birds of beautiful plumage still lingered in
the woods, and were warbling their farewell notes previous to their
return to a more southern latitude. The morning sunbeams danced and
glittered on the blue waters of the broad and brimming Delaware, as the
mirrored surface reflected its green and fertile banks with their
flowery meadows, embowering groves, and modestly elegant villas.
The ground allotted to the party was an open space in the woodlands,
which ran along an elevated ridge, looking directly down on the noble
river that from its far-off source in the Catskill mountains, first
dividing Pennsylvania from New York and then from New Jersey, carries
its tributary stream the distance of three hundred miles, till it widens
into the dim and lonely bay whose last waves are blended with the
dark-rolling Atlantic. Old trees of irregular and fantastic forms,
leaning far over the water, grew on the extreme edge of this bank; and
from its steep and crumbling side protruded their wildly twisted roots,
fringed with long fibres that had been washed bare by the tide which
daily overflowed the broad strip of gray sand, that margined the river.
Part of an old fence, that had been broken down and carried away by the
incursions of a spring freshet, still remained, at intervals, along the
verge of the bank; and his ladies had prevailed on Captain Cheston not
to repair it, as in its ruinous state it looked far more picturesque
than if new and in good order. In clearing this part of the forest many
of the largest and finest trees had been left standing, and beneath
their shade seats were now dispersed for the company. In another part of
the opening, a long table had been set under a sort of marquée,
constructed of colours brought from the Navy Yard, and gracefully
suspended to the wide-spreading branches of some noble oaks: the stars
and stripes of the most brilliant flag in the world, blending in
picturesque elegance with the green and clustering foliage. At a little
distance, under a group of trees, whose original forms were hidden
beneath impervious masses of the forest grape-vine, was placed a
side-table for the reception of the provisions, as they were unpacked
from the baskets; and a clear shady brook which wandered near, rippling
over a bed of pebbles on its way down to the river, afforded an
unlimited supply of "water clear as diamond spark," and made an
excellent refrigerator for the wine bottles.