Then dress, then dinner, then awakes the world!
Then glare the lamps, then whirl the wheels, then roar
Through street and square fast flashing chariots hurl’d
Like harnessed meteors; then along the floor
Chalk mimics painting; then festoons are twirled;
Then roll the brazen thunders of the door,
Which opens to a thousand happy few,
An earthly paradise of “Or Molu.”
BYRON.
Lord Castleton changed his mind very often as to the best preparatory
introduction for Lucy to a few select friends. He was convinced that
before she was launched into the great world, he ought to provide
her with some female companion, under whose auspices she might then
make her appearance. For though it might look merely loving and
interesting for a bride to appear leaning on her husband’s arm,
in that society to which they had both been previously known; yet
where she was a stranger, like needlessly backing a bill, it might
excite a suspicion as to her being able to stand alone, without his
name being thus attached, or his hand thus put to insure her not
being discredited. His first intention was to have invited a small
party to dinner at his own house. But though this would have insured
him the absolute selection of all the individuals to whom Lucy
was, in the first instance, to have been introduced; on the other
hand, the active duties of a hostess, perhaps in her idea so much
more active than he would have thought necessary, were more than he
wished to entail upon her in her probationary trial. Then, as to
the lady to whom he was to apply as a sort of _chaperon_ for his
inexperienced bride, his thoughts first turned to Lady Gayland; a
direction in which, as I am afraid it must be acknowledged, they did
turn oftener than he would have chosen to admit. Yet he had a great
disinclination to exposing at once to her acute perception any little
foibles or deficiencies on Lucy’s part, though he knew that the mere
circumstance of any one requiring her assistance, would have disposed
her to view them in the most favourable light. Yet there were many
little traits of ignorance on Lucy’s part which he was labouring
hard to correct, and which he hoped might yet be completely removed,
without Lady Gayland’s ever being conscious of them. There were also
circumstances of misconception, if not of misunderstanding, connected
with his last parting with that lady at Naples, which prevented his
feeling authorized in abruptly asking of her a favour.
The difficulties, both with respect to when the introductory dinner
was to be given, and the person by whom Lucy was to be _chaperoned_,
were removed at the same time, by his accidentally meeting a cousin
of his, Mrs. Tudor, who at once occurred to him as admirably suited
to both purposes. She was indeed an excellent woman--Mrs. Tudor.
Every one admitted it, no one could deny it. Faultless as she was
herself, faultless was her society--faultless were her dinners.
Now why is it, that in this wicked world every one of my readers have
associated an idea of insipidity with the description I have just
given? There were no words used which seemed at all to make such
an interpretation necessary, yet in this particular instance it is
certainly the right one. Every thing connected with Mrs. Tudor was
essentially insipid. Perhaps when an excellent woman is married to a
good kind of man, and such was Tudor, it is too much. It gives one
the fidgets at once. But excellent women, particularly if they happen
to have house and fortune in proportion to their good qualities, are
very apt to have very extensive and very eligible acquaintance; and
Castleton could not possibly have made a happier choice of the person
who was to smooth the first entrance of Lucy into her new career.
Mrs. Tudor was pleased at the extent of the confidence reposed in
her, which Castleton limited to informing her, that his bride was a
young person who had been educated in retirement, and consequently
was not at all prepared for all the ways of the great world. And
though activity was not any part of Mrs. Tudor’s excellence, yet this
was just the sort of quiet exertion which only made her fancy herself
occupied. She immediately fixed an early day for the Castleton’s
to dine with her. Do not let the reader be alarmed with the idea,
that that day is going to be made the subject of minute description.
Suffice it to say, that good nature had, in this instance, its own
reward, in pleasing those whom it was intended to gratify. Faultless
was the dinner, faultless were the guests invited, and faultless,
with pleasure let us add, was Lucy’s deportment during the whole of
that day. Anxious as she had already become as to the impression
which her conduct in these different circumstances should make
upon Castleton, she was on this occasion re-assured by the kind
consideration with which she was treated by all, and therefore bore
her part without discredit or remark on those ordinary topics from
which the conversation never soared.
From Castleton’s lavish praises of her as they returned home in the
carriage, she felt as if she must have done wonders, and therefore
looked forward without much dread, to the engagement she had made
with Mrs. Tudor, to accompany her the following night to Lady
Delacour’s ball.
That style of beauty which is defined as the beauty of innocence,
is sometimes supposed to be but little improved by dress; but such
was not the opinion portrayed in the gratified expression of Lord
Castleton’s countenance, when he witnessed the successful result of
his wife’s toilet on the succeeding evening: for he thought he never
saw her look one half so well--which judgment she read at once in
his looks, and felt repaid for all she had gone through. The whole
affair had been to her a most painful infliction. She had been in
turns a victim in the hands of the milliner, the hair-dresser, and
her own maid, each of whose successive operations she had at the time
thought to be never ending. She bore the sufferings of a martyr with
the patience of a saint. But as Castleton, having first sent the
landau for the Tudors, that they might go together, in handing her
into it, cast one more approving glance by the hall lamp, and pressed
her hand encouragingly, she felt as if she was utterly indifferent
as to what any one else thought of her. And though her diffidence
so far returned, upon hearing her name shouted from hall to
landing-place, and doorway to doorway, as to make an “O pray don’t”
half pass her lips, addressed in a supplicatory tone to a peculiarly
stentorian callman; yet upon entering the rooms, her admiration at
the brilliancy of a scene so much beyond what she had previously
conceived possible, gave to her countenance a subdued expression of
enjoyment struggling with embarrassment, which to her style of beauty
was peculiarly becoming.
As she proceeded, under Mrs. Tudor’s arm, Castleton soon got
separated from her by the crowd of acquaintances, who at that moment
seemed to have no other object there than to welcome him back to
London. After this had a little subsided, whilst jostled by that most
fidgetting, unquiet, unaccommodating of all mobs, the hat-tugging,
gown-tearing mob of fashion, he was of course subject occasionally to
hear remarks which were not meant to meet his ear, but none as yet,
which were not on the whole rather flattering than not. “Who is that
pretty _new_ girl with Mrs. Tudor?” “Where’s the _new_ beauty--have
you seen her?” “Who is that _new_ woman every body is raving about?”
It is true, in all these encomiums, the emphasis was on the word
_new_, as if that was the great attraction; but at the same time,
this, which seemed to imply most in itself, was always coupled with
some favourable adjuncts.
After a little, when it became more generally known who she was, he
observed that his vicinity often caused some half-vented exclamation
or inquiry to be checked by the nudge of a neighbouring elbow; but
even then this appeared to be more from the opinion being rather free
and familiar in its expression, than unfavourable in its nature.
He thought it as well to avoid as much as possible the running
any more risks of this kind, and therefore, making his way out of
that apartment where the crowd was thickest, he came unexpectedly
in the next upon a select circle of admiring listeners, of which
Lady Gayland was the centre of attraction. Their eyes met at the
same instant; one moment she paused, though in the very agony of
a half-finished _bon mot_. She hesitated one moment more, then
stretched out her hand to him, saying, “How is Lady Castleton? Is she
here?”
Mumbling his reply to this, from her, unexpected question, he passed
on. She renewed her sentence, but somehow omitted its point. Her
hearers were much disappointed thereat, though some who listened
were not aware of the fact. Amongst them was a foreign nobleman, to
whom our old acquaintance, Peter Spencer, much to her annoyance,
was showing off Lady Gayland, as a sort of literary lioness. The
Count Finale was a gentlemanlike, inoffensive man, who had been
much puzzled, upon first coming to this country, which of the two
alternatives, offered to every foreigner, he had better select,--the
could and would speak English line, or not. This is a very awkward
choice to make, and there are so many disadvantages both ways, that
it is really difficult to know which to recommend. All foreigners
now, after a manner, speak English, and few like to do it, but they
must profess both or neither, in the first case they are much more
generally well received, but get much less separate attention. They
have more acquaintance but less society; for it is impossible that
they can for some time make out the clipped, slovenly colloquy, in
which so much the greater part of common conversation passes current.
But the Count Finale had at length taken upon himself the alternative
of assumed knowledge, the consequence of which was, that he was at
the present moment in the most disagreeable situation for a gallant
man, that of appearing to be more amused than he really was with a
beautiful woman; for Lady Gayland’s thoughts flowed in much too rapid
sketches for him to be able to follow them.
“You are not aware, my dear Count,” said Peter Spencer, “that Lady
Gayland is a dweller on Parnassus--that she makes up an even _half
score_ with the _Nine_; indeed, there’s hardly a _muse_ whose
department she might not double with advantage, upon occasion.”
The habitual inattention which she always extended to every saying of
Peter Spencer’s, might account for her taking no notice whatever of
this pretty speech, without its being necessary to suppose that her
thoughts were just then straying after that mental will-o’-the-wisp,
the memory of by-gone visions. But Sir North Saunders, who was
standing by, was determined not to let the conversation drop,
therefore continued--
“Seen Lady Gayland’s last little work--eh! Count?”
“O pray, Sir North, don’t talk of one’s _work_, it sounds so
mechanical--savours much more of the tambour frame than the printing
press. Besides, work was a very appropriate description, when the
brain was distilled by midnight oil in a lonely garret. But now the
stud of letters is as light as the lives of the authors, who first
_amuse_ themselves, as the best way of _amusing_ their readers.
Formerly even _plays_ were _works_, but now any _work_ is but _play_.
Besides, from the days of Byron downwards, if an author has passions
he puts them into poetry--if foibles, he owns them with only the
additional lackering of some imaginary merit, confesses himself
grand but faulty--doubly gratifies his vanity, by being himself his
own theme--puts but a little gilt paper upon the blackest parts of
his character, and, in this May day finery, presents himself to an
admiring world.”
Lord Castleton, who had been hovering near, again approached, time
enough to catch most of the last speech, and said more to the speaker
herself, than those whom she had been addressing,
“Heaven forefend that I should ever take pen in hand; but if I did,
it would be to use myself as a warning, not a model. It would be
from the reverse of my own sentiments I should expect sympathy--from
a contrast to my own conduct I should promise happiness.”
Lady Gayland cast one penetrating glance upon him, as if wishing
to detect whether there was any particular meaning attached to so
extraordinary an avowal; and then saying, “And this from a newly
married man too, _che vergogna_,” she passed on.