So ran my Innocent Maiden Dream.
So ran my Innocent Maiden Dream.
So ran my Innocent Maiden Dream.
"Yes, why not!" he said passionately. "What is fame,reputation, weighed against love? What is it to be on the World's lips, if the lips we love are to be taken away?"
"How pretty!" she said with simple admiration. "If you will not claim the phrase, I should like to give it to my next heroine."
"Claim it!" he said bitterly. "I do not want any phrases. I want you."
"Do you not see it is impossible? If you could become obscure again, it might be. You say fame is nothing weighed against love. Come now, would you give up your genius, your reputation, just to marry me?"
He was silent.
"Come!" she repeated. "I have been frank with you, have I not!"
"You have," he admitted, with a melancholy grimace.
"Well, be equally frank with me. Would you sacrifice these things to your love for me?"
"I could not if I would."
"But would you, if you could?"
He did not answer.
"Of course you wouldn't," she said. "I know you as I know myself."
"What is the use of thinking of what can never be!" he said impatiently.
"Just so. That is what I say. I can never give you my hand; so give me yours and we'll turn homewards."
He gave her his hand and she jumped lightly to her feet. Then he got up and shook himself, and looked still in a sort of daze, at the gentle face and the dainty figure.
He seized her passionately by the arms.
"And must this be the end?" he cried hoarsely.
"Finis," she said decisively, though the renewed pallor of her face showed what it cost her to complete the idyl.
"An unhappy ending?" he said in hopeless interrogation.
"It is not my style," she said simply, "but, after all, this is only real life."
He burst forth in a torrent of half reproachful regrets—he, Addiper, the chaste, the severe, the self-contained.
"And you the sweet, innocent girl who won the heart I no longer hoped to feel living, you would coldly abandon the love for whose existence you are responsible! You, who were to be so fresh and pure an influence on my work, are content to deprive literature of those masterpieces our union would have called into being! Oh, but you cannot unshackle yourself thus from my life—for good or evil your meeting with me determined my third manner. Hitherto I thought it was for good; now I fear it will be for evil."
"You seem to have forgottenallyour manners," she said, annoyed. "And if our meeting was for evil, at least our parting shall be for good."
John Beveridge and Ellaline Rand spake no more, but walked home in silence through the country lanes on which the sunlight seemed to lie cold. The past was but a dream—not for these two the simple emotions which cross with joy or sorrow the web of common life. At the cottage near the top of the hill, where the sounds and scents of the sea were faintest, they parted. The idyl of Trepolpen was ended.
And John Beveridge went downhill.
MORE ABOUT THE CHERUB.
The trial interview between Lord Silverdale and Ellaline Rand took place in the rooms of the Old Maids' Club in the presence of the President. Lillie, encouraged by the rush of candidates, occupied herself in embroidering another epigrammatic antimacassar—"It is man who is vain of woman's dress." She had deliberately placed herself out of earshot. To Miss Rand, Lord Silverdale was a casual visitor with whom she had drifted into conversation, yet she behaved as prettily as if she knew she was undergoing theviva-voceportion of the examination for entranceship.
There are two classes of flirts—those who love to flirt, and those who flirt to love. There is little to be said against the latter, for they are merely experimenting. They intend to fall in love, but they can hardly compass it without preliminary acquaintance, and by giving themselves a wide and varied selection, are more likely to discover the fitting object of affection. It is easy to confound both classes of flirts together, and heartbroken lovers generally do so, when they do not use a stronger expression. But so far as Lord Silverdale could tell, there was nothing in Miss Rand's behavior to justify him in relegating her to either class, or to make him doubt the genuineness of the anti-hymeneal feelings provoked by her disappointmentin Trepolpen. Her manner was simple and artless—she gushed, indeed, but charmingly, like a daintily sculptured figure on a marble fountain in a fair pleasaunce. You could be as little offended by her gush, as by her candid confessions of her own talents. The Lord had given her a good conceit of herself, and given it her so gracefully, that it was one of her chiefest charms. She spoke with his lordship of Shakespeare and others of her profession, and mentioned that she was about to establish a paper calledThe Cherub, after her popular storyThe Cherub That Sits Up Aloft.
"I want to get into closer touch with my readers," she explained, helping herself charmingly to the chocolate creams. "In a book, you cannot get into directrapportwith your public. Your characters are your rivals and distract attention from the personality of the author. In a journal I shall be able to chat with them freely, open my heart to them and gather them to it. There is a legitimate curiosity to learn all about me—the same curiosity that I feel about other authors. Why should I allow myself to be viewed in the refracting medium of alien ink? Let me sketch myself to my readers, tell them what I eat and drink, and how I write, and when, what clothes I wear and how much I pay for them, what I think of this or that book of mine, of this or that character of my creation, what my friends think of me, and what I think of my friends. All the features of the paper will combine to make my face. I shall occupy all the stories, and every column will have me at the top. In this way I hope, not only to gratify my yearnings for sympathy, but to stimulate the circulation of my books. Nay more, with the eye of my admirers thus encouragingly upon me, I shall work more zealously. You see, Lord Silverdale, we authors are a race apart—without the public hanging upon our words, we are like butterflies in a London fog, or actors playing to an empty auditorium."
"I have noticed that," said Lord Silverdale dryly, "before authors succeed, it takes them a year to write a book, after they succeed it takes them only a month."
"You see I am right," said Ellaline eagerly. "That's what the sun of public sympathy does. It ripens work quickly."
"Yes, and when the sun is very burning, it sometimes takes the authors no time at all."
"Ah, now you are laughing at me. You are speaking of 'ghosts.'"
"Yes. Ghost stories are published all the year round—not merely at Christmas. Don't think I'm finding fault. I look upon an author who keeps his ghost, as I do on a tradesmen who keeps his carriage. It is a sign he has succeeded."
"Oh, but it's very wicked, giving the public underweight like that!" said Ellaline in her sweet, serious way. "How can anybody write as well as yourself? But why I mentioned aboutThe Cherubis because it has just struck me the paper might become the organ of the Old Maids' Club, for I should make a point of speaking freely of my aims and aspirations in joining it. I presume you know all about Miss Dulcimer's scheme?"
"Oh, yes! But I don't think it feasible."
"You don't?" she said, with a little tremor of astonishment in her voice. "And why not?" She looked anxiously into his eyes for the reply.
"The candidates are too charming to remain single," he explained, smiling.
She smiled back a little at him, those sweet gray eyes still looking into his.
"Youare not a literary man?" she said irrelevantly.
"I am afraid I must plead guilty to trying to be," he said. "The evidence is down in black and white."
The smile died away and for an instant Ellaline's browwent into black for it. She accepted an ice from Turple the magnificent, but took her leave shortly afterwards, Lillie promising to write to her.
"Well?" said the President when she was left alone with the Honorary Trier.
That functionary looked dubious. "Up till the very last she seemed single-hearted in her zeal. Then she asked whetherIwas a literary man. You know her story. What do you conclude?"
"I can hardly come to a conclusion. Do you think there is still a danger of her marrying to get someone to advertise her?"
"I think it depends onThe Cherub. IfThe Cherubis born and lives, it will be a more effectual advertising medium than even a husband, and may replace him. A paper of your own can puff you rather better than a husband of your own, it has a larger circulation and more opportunities. An authoress-editress, her worth is far above rubies! Her correspondents praise her in the gates and her staff shall rise up and call her blessed. It may well be that she will arrive at that stage at which a husband is an incubus and marriage a manacle. In that day the honor of the Club will be safe in her hands."
"What do you suggest then?" said Lillie anxiously.
"That you wait till she is delivered ofThe Cherubbefore deciding."
"Very well," she replied resignedly. "Only I hope we shall be able to admit her. Her conception of the use of man is so sublime!"
Lord Silverdale smiled. "Ah, if the truth were known," he said, "I daresay it would be that pretty women regard man merely as a beast of draught and burden, a creature to draw their checks and carry their cloaks."
Lillie answered, "And men look on pretty women either as home pets or as drawing-room decorations."
Silverdale said further, "I do not look on you as either."
To which, Lillie, "Why do you say such obvious things? It is unworthy of you. Have you anything worthy of you in your pocket to-day?"
"Nothing of your hearing. Just a little poem about another Cherub."
AN ANCIENT PASSION.
Mine is no passion of to-day,Upblazing like a rocket,To-morrow doomed to die awayAnd leave you out of pocket.Nor is she one who snared my loveBy just the woman's graces:I loved her when, a sucking dove,She cooed and made grimaces.And when the pretty darling cried,I often stooped and kissed her,Though cold and faint her lips replied,As though she were my sister.I loved her long but loved her stillWhen she discarded long-clothes,Yet here if she had had her willWould this romantic song close.For, though we wandered hand in hand,Companions close and chronic,She always made me understandHermotives were Platonic.She said me "Nay" with merry mien,Not weeping like the cayman,When she was Mab, the Fairy Queen,And I Tom King, highwayman.
Mine is no passion of to-day,Upblazing like a rocket,To-morrow doomed to die awayAnd leave you out of pocket.
Nor is she one who snared my loveBy just the woman's graces:I loved her when, a sucking dove,She cooed and made grimaces.
And when the pretty darling cried,I often stooped and kissed her,Though cold and faint her lips replied,As though she were my sister.
I loved her long but loved her stillWhen she discarded long-clothes,Yet here if she had had her willWould this romantic song close.
For, though we wandered hand in hand,Companions close and chronic,She always made me understandHermotives were Platonic.
She said me "Nay" with merry mien,Not weeping like the cayman,When she was Mab, the Fairy Queen,And I Tom King, highwayman.
'Twas at a Children's Fancy Ball,I got that first rejection,It did not kill my love at allBut heightened its complexion.My love to tell, when she grew up,Necessitates italics.Her hair was like the buttercup(Corolla not the calyx).Her form was slim, her eye was bright,Her mouth a jewel-casket,Her hand it was so soft and whiteI often used to ask it.And so from year to year I wooed,My passion growing fiercer,Though she in modest maiden moodAddressed me as "Mydearsir."At twenty she was still as coy,Her heart was like Diana's.The future held for me no joy,Save smoking choice Havanas.At last my perseverance wokeA sweet responsive passion,And of her love for me she spokeIn woman's wordless fashion.I told her, when her speech was done,The task would be above herTo make a happy man of oneWho long had ceased to love her.
'Twas at a Children's Fancy Ball,I got that first rejection,It did not kill my love at allBut heightened its complexion.
My love to tell, when she grew up,Necessitates italics.Her hair was like the buttercup(Corolla not the calyx).
Her form was slim, her eye was bright,Her mouth a jewel-casket,Her hand it was so soft and whiteI often used to ask it.
And so from year to year I wooed,My passion growing fiercer,Though she in modest maiden moodAddressed me as "Mydearsir."
At twenty she was still as coy,Her heart was like Diana's.The future held for me no joy,Save smoking choice Havanas.
At last my perseverance wokeA sweet responsive passion,And of her love for me she spokeIn woman's wordless fashion.
I told her, when her speech was done,The task would be above herTo make a happy man of oneWho long had ceased to love her.
Lillie put on an innocently analytical frown. "I think you behaved very badly," she exclaimed. "You might have waited a little longer."
"Do you think so? Then I will go and leave you to your labors," said Lord Silverdale with his wonted irrelevancy.
Lillie sat for a long time with pen in hand, thinkingwithout writing. As a change from writing without thinking this was perhaps a relief.
Rejected Addresses.
Rejected Addresses.
Rejected Addresses.
"A penny for your thoughts," said the millionaire, stealing in upon her reflections.
Lillie started.
"I am not Ellaline Rand," she said smiling. "Wait tillThe Cherubcomes out, and you will get hers at that price."
"Was Ellaline the girl who has just gone?"
"Did you see her? I thought you were gardening."
"So I was, but I happened to go into the dining-room for a moment and saw her from the window. I suppose she will be here often."
"I suppose so," said Lillie dubiously.
The millionaire rubbed his hands.
"Miss Eustasia Pallas," announced Turple the magnificent.
"A new candidate, probably," said the President.
"Father, you must go and play in the garden."
The millionaire left the room meekly.
OF WIVES AND THEIR MISTRESSES.
"No, no," said Miss Eustasia Pallas. "You misapprehend me. It is not because it would be necessary to have a husband and a home of one's own, that I object to marriage, but because it would be impossible to do without servants. While a girl lives at home, she can cultivate her soul while her mother attends to theménage. But after marriage, the higher life is impossible. You must have servants. You cannot do your own dirty work—not merely because it is dirty, but because it is the thief of time. You can hardly get literature, music, and religion adequately into your life even with the whole day at your disposal; but if you had to make your own bed, too, I am afraid you wouldn't find time to lie on it."
"Then why object to servants?" inquired Lillie.
"Because servants are the asphyxiators of the soul. But for them I should long since have married."
"I do not quite follow you. Surely if you had servants to relieve you of all the grosser duties, the spiritual could then claim your individual attention."
"Ah, that is a pretty theory. It sounds very plausible. In practice, alas! it does not work. Like the servants. I have kept my eyes open almost from the first day of my life. I have observed my mother's household and other people's—I speak of the great middle-classes, mainly—andmy unalterable conviction is, that every faithful wife who aspires to be housekeeper too, becomes the servant of her servants. They rule not only her but all her thoughts. Her life circles round them. She can talk of nothing else. Whether she visits, or is visited, servants are the staple of her conversation. Their curious habits and customs, their love-affairs, their laches, their impertinences, these gradually become the whole food of thought, ousting every higher aim and idea. I have watched a girl—my bosom-friend at Girton—deteriorate from a maiden to a wife, from a wife to a bondswoman. First she talked Shelley, then Charley, then Mary Ann. Gradually her soul shrank. She lost her character. She became a mere parasite on the servant's kitchen, a slave to the cook's drink and the housemaid's followers. Those who knew my mother before she was married speak of her as a bright, bonny girl, all enthusiasm and energy, interesting herself in all the life of her day and even taking a side in politics. But when I knew her, she was haggard and narrow. She never read, nor sang, nor played, nor went to the Academy. The greatest historical occurrences left her sympathies untouched. She did not even care whether Australia or England conquered at cricket, or whether Browning lived or died. You could not get her to discuss Whistler or the relations of Greek drama to Gaiety Burlesque, or any other subject that interests ordinary human beings. She did not want a vote. She did not want any alteration in the divorce laws. She did not want Russia to be a free country or the Empire to be federated. She did not want darkest England to be supplied with lamps. She did not want the working classes to lead better and nobler lives. She did not want to preserve the Commons or to abolish the House of Lords. She did not want to do good or even to be happy. All she wanted was a cook or a housemaid or a coachman, as the case might be, and she wasperpetually asking all her acquaintance if they knew of a good one, or had heard of the outrageous behavior of the last.
"In her early married days, my father's income was not a twentieth of what it is to-day, and so she was fairly happy, with only one servant to tyrannize over her. But she always had hard mistresses, even in those comparatively easy years. Poor mother! One scene remains vividly stamped upon my mind. We had a girl named Selina who would not get up in the morning. We had nothing to complain of in the time of her going to bed—I think she went about nine—but the earliest she ever rose was eight, and my father always had to catch the eight-twenty train to the City, so you may imagine how much breakfast he got. My mother spoke to Selina about it nearly every day and Selina admitted the indictment. She said she could not help it, she seemed to dream such long dreams and never wake up in the middle. My mother had had such difficulty in getting Selina that she hesitated to send her away and start hunting for a new Selina, but the case seemed hopeless. The winter came on and we took to sending Selina to bed at six o'clock, that my father might be sure of a hot cup of coffee before leaving home in the morning. But she said the mornings were so cold and dark it was impossible to get out of bed, though she tried very hard and did her best. I think she spent only nine hours out of bed on the average. My father gave up the hope of breakfast. He used to leave by an earlier train and get something at a restaurant. This grieved my mother very much—she calculated it cost her a bonnet a month. She became determined to convert Selina from the error of her ways. She told me she was going to appeal to Selina's higher nature. Reprimand had failed, but the soul that cannot be coerced can be touched. That was in the days when my mother still read poetry and wassemi-independent. One bleak bitter dawn my mother rose shivering, dressed herself and went down into the kitchen, to the entire disconcertion of the chronology of the black-beetles. She made the fire and put the kettle on to boil and swept the kitchen. She also swept the breakfast-room and lighted the fire and laid the breakfast. Then she sat down, put on a saintly expression and waited for Selina.
"An hour went by, but Selina did not make her appearance. The first half-hour passed quickly because my mother was busy thinking out the exact phrases in which to touch her higher nature. It required tact—a single clumsy turn of language—and she might offend Selina instead of elevating her. It was really quite a literary effort, the adequate expression of my mother's conception of the dignity and pathos of the situation, in fact it was that most difficult branch of literature, the dramatic, for my mother constructed the entire dialogue, speaking for Selina as well as for herself. Like all leading ladies, especially when they write their own plays, my mother allotted herself the 'tag,' and the last words of the dialogue were:—
"'There! there! my good girl! Dry your eyes. The past shall be forgotten. From to-morrow a new life shall begin. Come, Selina! drink that nice hot cup of tea—don't cry and let it get cold. That's right.
"The second half-hour was rather slower, my mother listening eagerly for Selina's footsteps, and pricking up her ears at every sound. The mice ran about the wainscoting, the kettle sang blithely, the little flames leaped in the grate, the kitchen and the breakfast-room were cheerful and cosy and redolent of the goodly savors of breakfast. A pile of hot toast lay upon a plate. Only Selina was wanting.
"All at once my mother heard the hall-door bang, and running to the window she saw a figure going out into thegray freezing fog. It was my father hurrying to catch his train. In the excitement of the experiment my mother had forgotten to tell him that for this morning at least, breakfast could be had at home. He might have had such beautiful tea and coffee, such lovely toast, such exquisite eggs, and there he was hastening along in the raw air on an empty stomach. My mother rapped on the panes with her knuckles but my father was late and did not hear. Her own soul a little ruffled, my mother sat down again in the kitchen and waited for Selina. Gradually she forgot her chagrin, after all it was the last time my father would ever have to depart breakfastless. She went over the dialogue again, polishing it up and adding little touches.
"I think it was past nine when Selina left her bedroom, unwashed and rubbing her eyes. By that time my mother had thrice resisted the temptation to go up and shake her, and it was coming on a fourth time when she heard Selina's massive footstep on the stair. Instantly my mother's irritation ceased. She reassumed her look of sublime martyrdom. She had spread a nice white cloth on the kitchen table and Selina's breakfast stood appetizingly upon it. Tears came into her eyes as she thought of how Selina would be shaken to her depths by the sight.
"Selina threw open the kitchen door with a peevish push, for she disliked having to get up early in these cold, dark winter mornings and vented her irritation even upon insensitive woodwork. But when she saw the deep red glow of the fire, instead of the dusky chillness of the normal morning kitchen, she uttered a cry of joy, and rushing forwards warmed her hands eagerly at the flame.
"'Oh, thank you, missus,' she said with genuine gratitude.
"Selina did not seem at all surprised. But my motherdid. She became confused and nervous. She forgot her words, as if from an attack of stage-fright. There was no prompter and so for a moment my mother remained speechless.
"Selina, having warmed her hands sufficiently, drew her chair to the table and lifted the cosy from the tea-pot.
"'Why, you've let it get cold,' she said reproachfully, feeling the side of the pot.
"This was more than my mother could stand.
"'It's you that have let it get cold,' she cried hotly.
"Now this was pure impromptu 'gag,' and my mother would have done better to confine herself to the rehearsed dialogue.
"'Oh, missus!' cried Selina. 'How can you say that? Why, this is the first moment I've come down.'
"'Yes,' said my mother, gladly seizing the opportunity of slipping back into the text. 'Somebody had to do the work, Selina. In this world no work can go undone. If those whose duty it is do not do it, it must fall on the shoulders of other people. That is why I got up at seven this morning instead of you and have tidied up the place and made the master's breakfast.'
"'That was real good of you!' exclaimed Selina, with impulsive admiration.
"My mother began to feel that the elaborate set piece was going off in a damp sort of way, but she kept up her courage and her saintly expression and continued,
"'It was freezing when I got out of my warm bed, and before I could get the fire alight here I almost perished with cold. I shouldn't be surprised if I have laid the seeds of consumption.'
"'Ah,' said Selina with satisfaction. 'Now you see what I have had to put up with.' She took another piece of toast.
"Selina's failure to give the cues extremely disconcertedmy mother. Instead of being able to make the high moral remarks she had intended, she was forced to inventrepartéeson the spur of the moment. The ethical quality of these improvisations was distinctly inferior.
"'But you are paid for it, I'm not,' she retorted sharply.
"'I know. That is why I say it is so good of you,' replied Selina, with inextinguishable admiration. 'But you'll reap the benefit of it. Now that I've had my breakfast without any trouble I shall be able to go about my work a deal better. It's such a struggle to get up, I assure you, missus, it tires me out for the day. Might I have another egg?'
"My mother savagely pushed her another egg.
"'I'm thinking it would be a good plan,' said Selina, meditatively opening the egg with her fingers, 'if you would get up instead of me every morning. But perhaps that was what you were thinking of.'
"'Oh, you would like me to, would you?' said my mother.
"'I should be very grateful, I should indeed,' said Selina earnestly. 'And I'm sure the work would be better done. There don't seem to be a speck of dust anywhere,'—she rubbed her dirty thumb admiringly along the dresser—'and I'm sure the tea and toast are lots nicer than any I've ever made.'
"My mother waved her hand deprecatingly, but Selina continued:
"'Oh yes, you know they are. You've often told me I was no use at all in the kitchen. I don't need to be told of my shortcomings, missus. All you say of me is quite true. You would be ever so much more satisfied if you cooked everything yourself. I'm sure you would.'
"'And what wouldyoudo under this beautiful scheme?' inquired my mother with withering sarcasm.
"'I haven't thought of that yet,' said Selina simply.'But no doubt, if I looked around carefully, I should find something to occupy me. I couldn't be long out of work, I feel sure.'
"Well, that was how mother's attempt to elevate Selina by moral means came to be a fiasco. The next time she tried to elevate her, it was by physical means. My mother left the suburb, and moved to a London flat very near the sky. She had given up hopes of improving Selina's matutinal habits, and made the breakfast hour later through my father having now no train to catch, but she thought she would cure her of followers. Selina's flirtations were not confined to our tradespeople and the local constabulary. She would exchange remarks about the weather with the most casual pedestrian in trousers. My mother thought she would remove her from danger by raising her high above all earthly temptations. We made the tradesmen send up their goods by lift and the only person she could flirt with was the old lift attendant. My father grumbled a good deal in the early days because the lift was always at the other extreme when he wanted it, but Selina's moral welfare came before all other considerations.
"By and by they began to renovate the exterior of the adjoining mansion. They put up a scaffolding, which grew higher and higher as the work advanced, and men swarmed upon it. At first my mother contemplated them with equanimity because they were British working-men and we were nearest heaven. But as the months went by, they began to get nearer and nearer. There came a time when Selina's smile was distinctly visible to the man engaged on the section of the scaffolding immediately below. That smile encouraged him. It seemed to say 'Excelsior.' He was a veritable Don Juan, that laborer. At every flat he flirted with the maid in possession. By counting the storeys in our mansion you could calculatethe number of hisamours. With every rise he left a love-passage behind him. He was a typical man—always looking higher, and, when he had raised himself to a more elevated position, spurning yesterday's love from beneath his feet. He seemed to mount on broken hearts. And now he was aspiring to the highest of all—Selina. Oh it is cruel! My mother had secluded Selina like a virgin Princess in an enchanted inaccessible tower and yet here was the Prince calmly scaling the tower, without any possibility of interference. Long before he had reached the top the consumption of Bass in our flat went up by leaps and bounds. Selina, my mother ultimately discovered, used to lower the beer by strings. It appeared, moreover, that she had two strings to her bow, for a swain in a slouch hat had been likewise climbing the height, at an insidious angle which had screened him from my mother's observation hitherto. Neither of these men did much work, but it made them very thirsty.
Lowering the Beer.
Lowering the Beer.
Lowering the Beer.
"That destroyed the last vestige of my mother's faith in Selina's soul. Like all disappointed women, she became crabbed and cynical. When my father's rising fortunes brought her more and more under the dominion of servants, the exposure and out-manœuvring of her taskmasters came to be the only pleasure of her life. She spent a great deal of time in the police-courts—the constant prosecution she suffered from, curtailed the last relics of her leisure. Everybody has heard of the law's delay, but few know how much time prosecutors have to lose, hanging about the Court waiting for their case to be called. When a servant robbed her, my mother rarely got off with less than seven days. The moment she had engaged a servant, she became morbidly suspicious of him or her. Often, when she had dressed for dinner, it would suddenly strike her that if she ransacked a certain cupboard something or other would be discovered, and off she would goto spoil her spotless silks. She had a mania for 'Spring cleanings' once a month, so as to keep the drones busy. Often I would bring a friend home, only to find the dining-room in the hall and the drawing-room on the landing. And yet to the end she retained a certain guileless, girlish simplicity—a fresh fund of hope which was not without a charm and pathos of its own. To the very last she believed that, faultless, flawless servants existed somewhere and she didn't intend to be happy till she got them; so that it was said of her by my sister's intended that she passed her life on the doorstep, either receiving an angel or expelling a fiend. It showed what a fine trustful nature had been turned to gall. She is at rest now, poor mother, her life's long slavery ended by the soft touch of all-merciful Death. Let us hope that she has opened her sorrow-stricken eyes on a brighter land, where earthly distinctions are annulled and the poor heavy-laden mistress may mix on equal terms with the radiant parlor-maid and the buxom cook."
The tears were in Lillie's eyes as Miss Eustasia Pallas concluded her affecting recital.
"But don't you think," said the President, conquering her emotion, "that with such an awful example in your memory, you could never yourself sink into such a serfage, even if you married?"
"I dare not trust myself," said Eustasia. "I have seen the fall of too many other women. Why should I expect immunity from the general fate? I think myself strong—but who can fathom her own weakness. Why, I have actually been talking servants to you all the time. Think how continuous is the temptation, how subtle. Were it not better to possess my soul in peace and to cultivate it nobly and wisely and become a shining light of the higher spinsterhood?"
Eustasia passed the preliminary examination and alsothe viva voce, and Lillie was again in high feather. But before the election was formally confirmed, she was chagrined to receive the following letter.
Drew up the Advertisement.
Drew up the Advertisement.
Drew up the Advertisement.
"My dear Miss Dulcimer."I have good news for you. Knowing your anxiety to find for me a way out of my matrimonial dilemma, I am pleased to be able to inform you that it has been found by my friend and literary adviser, Percy Swinshel Spatt, the well known philosopher and idealist. I met him writing down his thoughts in Bond Street. In the course of a dialogue upon the Beautiful, I put my puzzle to him and he solved it in a moment. 'Whymustyou keep a servant?' he asked, for it is his habit to question every statement he does not make. 'Why not rather keep a mistress? Become a servant yourself and all your difficulties vanish.' It was like a flash of lightning. 'Yes,' I said, when I had recovered from the dazzle, 'but that would mean separation from my husband.' 'Why?' he replied with his usual habit. 'In many houses they prefer to take married couples.' 'Ah, but where should I find a man of like mind, a man to whom leisure for the cultivation of his soul was the one great necessity of life?' 'It is a curious coincidence, Eustasia,' he replied, 'that I was just myself contemplating keeping a master and retiring into a hermitage below stairs, to devote myself to philosophical contemplation. As a butler or a footman in a really aristocratic establishment, my duties would be nominal, and the other servants and my employers would attend to all my wants. Abstract speculation would naturally indue me with the grave silence and dignity which seem to be the chief duties of these superior creatures. It is possible, Eustasia, that I am not the first to perceive the advantages of this way of living and that plush is but the disguise of the philosopher. As for you, Eustasia, you could become a parlor-maid.Thus we should live together peacefully, with no sordid housekeeping cares, no squalid interests in rates or taxes, devoted heart and soul to the higher life.' 'You light up for me perspectives of Paradise,' I cried enthusiastically. 'Then let us get the key of the garden at once,' he replied rapturously, and turning over a new leaf of his philosophical note-book, he set to work then and there to draw up the advertisement: 'Wanted—by a young married couple, etc.' Of course we had to be a little previous, because I could not consent to marry him unless we had a situation to go to. We were only putting what the Greek grammars call a proleptic construction upon the situation.Well, it seems good servants are so scarce we got a place at once—the exact thing we were looking for. We are concealing our real names (lest the profession be overrun by jealous friends from Newnham and Girton and Oxford and Cambridge) so that I was able to give Percy a character and Percy to give me a character. We are going into our place next Monday afternoon, so, to avoid obtaining the situation by false pretences, we shall have to go before the Registrar on the Monday morning. Our honeymoon will be spent in the delightful and unexploited retreat of the back kitchen."Yours, in the higher sisterhood,"Eustasia Pallas."
"My dear Miss Dulcimer.
"I have good news for you. Knowing your anxiety to find for me a way out of my matrimonial dilemma, I am pleased to be able to inform you that it has been found by my friend and literary adviser, Percy Swinshel Spatt, the well known philosopher and idealist. I met him writing down his thoughts in Bond Street. In the course of a dialogue upon the Beautiful, I put my puzzle to him and he solved it in a moment. 'Whymustyou keep a servant?' he asked, for it is his habit to question every statement he does not make. 'Why not rather keep a mistress? Become a servant yourself and all your difficulties vanish.' It was like a flash of lightning. 'Yes,' I said, when I had recovered from the dazzle, 'but that would mean separation from my husband.' 'Why?' he replied with his usual habit. 'In many houses they prefer to take married couples.' 'Ah, but where should I find a man of like mind, a man to whom leisure for the cultivation of his soul was the one great necessity of life?' 'It is a curious coincidence, Eustasia,' he replied, 'that I was just myself contemplating keeping a master and retiring into a hermitage below stairs, to devote myself to philosophical contemplation. As a butler or a footman in a really aristocratic establishment, my duties would be nominal, and the other servants and my employers would attend to all my wants. Abstract speculation would naturally indue me with the grave silence and dignity which seem to be the chief duties of these superior creatures. It is possible, Eustasia, that I am not the first to perceive the advantages of this way of living and that plush is but the disguise of the philosopher. As for you, Eustasia, you could become a parlor-maid.Thus we should live together peacefully, with no sordid housekeeping cares, no squalid interests in rates or taxes, devoted heart and soul to the higher life.' 'You light up for me perspectives of Paradise,' I cried enthusiastically. 'Then let us get the key of the garden at once,' he replied rapturously, and turning over a new leaf of his philosophical note-book, he set to work then and there to draw up the advertisement: 'Wanted—by a young married couple, etc.' Of course we had to be a little previous, because I could not consent to marry him unless we had a situation to go to. We were only putting what the Greek grammars call a proleptic construction upon the situation.Well, it seems good servants are so scarce we got a place at once—the exact thing we were looking for. We are concealing our real names (lest the profession be overrun by jealous friends from Newnham and Girton and Oxford and Cambridge) so that I was able to give Percy a character and Percy to give me a character. We are going into our place next Monday afternoon, so, to avoid obtaining the situation by false pretences, we shall have to go before the Registrar on the Monday morning. Our honeymoon will be spent in the delightful and unexploited retreat of the back kitchen.
"Yours, in the higher sisterhood,
"Eustasia Pallas."
THE GOOD YOUNG MEN WHO LIVED.
"It is, indeed, a happy solution," said Lord Silverdale enviously. "To spend your life in the service of other men, yet to save it for yourself! It reconciles all ideals."
"Well, you can very easily try it," said Lillie. "I have just heard from the Princess of Portman Square—she is reorganizing her household in view of her nuptials. Shall I write you a recommendation?"
"No, but I will read you an Address to an Egyptian Tipcat," replied his lordship, with the irrelevancy which was growing upon him. "You know the recent excavations have shown that the little Egyptians used to play 'pussy-cat' five thousand years ago."
ADDRESS TO AN EGYPTIAN TIP-CAT.
And thou has flown about—how strange a story—Full five and forty centuries ago,Ere Fayoum, fired with military glory,Received from Gurod, with purpureal show,The sea-born captives of the spear and bow;And thou has blacked, perhaps, the very finest eyeThat sparkled in the Twelfth Egyptian Dynasty.The sight of thee brings visions panoramicOf manlier games, asFaro,Pyramids.What hands, now tinct with substances balsamic,Have set thee leaping like the sportive kids,What time the passers-by did close their lids?Did the stern Priesthood strive thy cult to smother,Or wast thou worshipped, like thy purring brother?Where is the youth by whom thou wast createdAnd tipped profusely? Doth he frisk in gleeIn Aahlu, or lives he, transmigrated,The lower life Osiris did decree,Of fowl, or fly, or fish, or fox, or flea?Or, fallen deeper, is he politician,Stumping the land, his country's quack physician?Thou Sphynx in wood, unchanged, serene, immortal,How many States and Temples have decayedAnd generations passed the mystic portalWhilst thou, still young, hast gone on being played?Say, when thy popularity shall fade?And art thou—here's my last, if not my stiffest—As good a bouncer as the hieroglyphist?
And thou has flown about—how strange a story—Full five and forty centuries ago,Ere Fayoum, fired with military glory,Received from Gurod, with purpureal show,The sea-born captives of the spear and bow;And thou has blacked, perhaps, the very finest eyeThat sparkled in the Twelfth Egyptian Dynasty.
The sight of thee brings visions panoramicOf manlier games, asFaro,Pyramids.What hands, now tinct with substances balsamic,Have set thee leaping like the sportive kids,What time the passers-by did close their lids?Did the stern Priesthood strive thy cult to smother,Or wast thou worshipped, like thy purring brother?
Where is the youth by whom thou wast createdAnd tipped profusely? Doth he frisk in gleeIn Aahlu, or lives he, transmigrated,The lower life Osiris did decree,Of fowl, or fly, or fish, or fox, or flea?Or, fallen deeper, is he politician,Stumping the land, his country's quack physician?
Thou Sphynx in wood, unchanged, serene, immortal,How many States and Temples have decayedAnd generations passed the mystic portalWhilst thou, still young, hast gone on being played?Say, when thy popularity shall fade?And art thou—here's my last, if not my stiffest—As good a bouncer as the hieroglyphist?
"Why, did the hieroglyphists use to brag?" asked Lillie.
"Shamefully. You can no more believe in their statements than in epitaphs. There seems something peculiarly mendacious about stone as a recording medium. Only it must be admitted on behalf of the hieroglyphists that it may be the Egyptologists who are the braggers. There never was an ancient inscription which is not capable of being taken in a dozen different ways, like a party-leader's speech. Every word has six possible meanings and half a dozen probable ones. Thesavantsonly pretend to understand the stones."
So saying Lord Silverdale took his departure. On the doorstep he met a young lady carrying a brown paper parcel. She smiled so sweetly at him that he raised his hat and wondered where he had met her.
But it was only another candidate. She faced Turple the magnificent and smiled on, unawed. Turple ended by relaxing his muscles a whit, then ashamed of himself he announced gruffly, "Miss Mary Friscoe."
After the preliminary formalities, and after having duly assured herself that there was no male ear within earshot, Miss Friscoe delivered herself of the following candid confession.
"I am a pretty girl, as you can see. I wear sweet frocksand smiles, and my eyes are of Heaven's own blue. Men are fond of gazing into them. Men are so artistic. They admire the beautiful and tell her so. Women are so different. I have overheard my girl friends call me 'that silly little flirt.'
"I hold that any woman can twist any man round her little finger or his arm round her waist, therefore I consider it no conceit to say I have attracted considerable attention. If I had accepted all the offers I received, my marriages could easily have filled a column ofThe Times. I know there are women who think that men are coarse, unsentimental creatures, given over to slang, tobacco, billiards, betting, brandies and sodas, smoking-room stories, flirtations with barmaids, dress and general depravity. But the women who say or write that are soured creatures, who have never been loved, have never fathomed the depth and purity of men's souls.
"I have been loved. I have been loved much and often, and I speak as one who knows. Man is the most maligned animal in creation. He is the least gross and carnal of creatures, the most exquisitely pure and refined in thought and deed; the most capable of disinterested devotion, self-sacrifice, chivalry, tenderness. Every man is his own Bayard.
"If men had their deserts we women—heartless, frivolous, venal creatures that we are—would go down on our knees to them, and beg them to marry us. I am a woman and again I speak as one who knows. For I am not a bad specimen of my sex. Even my best friends admit I am only silly. I am really a very generous and kind-hearted little thing. I never keep my tailor waiting longer than a year, I have made quite a number of penwipers for the poor, and I have never told an unnecessary lie in my life. I give a great deal of affection to my mother and even a little assistance in the household. I do not smoke scentedcigarettes. I read travels and biographies as well as novels, play the guitar rather well, attend a Drawing Class, rise long before noon, am good-tempered, wear my ball-dresses more than once, turn winter dresses into spring frocks by stripping off the fur and putting on galon, and diversify my gowns by changing the sleeves. In short, I am a superior, thoroughly domesticated girl. And yet I have never met a man who has not had the advantage of me in all the virtues.
"There was George Holly,—I regret I cannot mention my lovers in chronological order, but my memories are so vague, they all seem to fuse into one another. Perhaps it is because there is a lack of distinctiveness about men—a monotonous goodness which has its charm but is extremely confusing. One thing I do remember though, about George—at least, I think it was George. His moustache was rather bristly, and the little curled tips used to tickle one's nose comically. I was very disappointed in George, I had heard such a lot of talk about him; but when I got to really know him I found he was not a bit like it. How I came to really know him was like this. 'Mary,' he said, as we sat on the stairs, high up, so as not to be in the way of the waiters. 'Won't you say "yes" and make me the happiest man alive? Never man loved as I love now. Answer me. Do not torture me with suspense.' I was silent; speechless with happiness to think that I had won this true manly heart. I looked down at my fan. My lips were forming the affirmative monosyllable, when George continued passionately,
"'Ah, Mary, speak! Mary, the only woman I ever loved.'
"I turned pale with emotion. Tears came into my eyes.
"'Is this true?' I articulated. 'Am I really the only woman you ever loved?'
"'By my hopes of a hereafter, yes!' George was a bitslangy in his general conversation. The shallow world never knew the poetry he could rise to. 'This is the first time I have known what it is to love, Mary, my sweet, my own.'
"'No, not your own,' I interrupted coldly, for my heart was like ice within me. 'I belong to myself, and I intend to. Will you give me your arm into the ballroom—Mr. Daythorpe must be looking for me everywhere.'
"It sounds very wicked to say it, I know, but I cannot delay my confession longer. I love, I adore, I doat on wicked men, men who love not wisely but too well. When I learnt history at school I could always answer questions about the reign of Charles II., it was such a deliciously wicked period. I love Burns, Lord Byron, De Musset, Lovelace—all the nice naughty men of history or fiction. I like Ouida's guardsman, whose love is a tornado, and Charlotte Bronte's Rochester, and Byron's Don Juan. I hate, I detest milksops. And a good man always seems to me a milksop. It is a flaw—a terrible flaw in my composition, I know—but I cannot help it. It makes me miserable, but what can I do? Nature will out.
"That was how I came to find George out, to discover he was not the terrible cavalier, the abandoned squire of dames the world said he was. His reputation was purely bogus. The gossips might buzz, but I had it on the highest authority. I was the first woman he had ever loved. What pleasure is there in such a conquest? It grieved me to break his heart, but I had no option.
"Daythorpe was another fellow who taught me the same lesson of the purity and high emotions of his cruelly libelled sex. He, too, when driven into a corner (far from the madding crowd) confessed that I was the only woman he had ever loved. I have tried them all—poets and musicians, barristers and business-men. They all had suffered from the same incapacity for affection till they metme. It was quite pathetic to discover how truly all men were brothers. The only difference was that while some added I was the only woman they ever could love, others insisted that never man had loved before as they did now. The latter lovers always remind me of advertisers offering a superior article to anything in the trade. Nowhere could I meet the man I longed for—the man who had lived and loved. Once I felt stirrings towards a handsome young widower, but he went out of his way to assure me he had never cared for his first wife. After that, of course, he had no chance.