The Duke Makes a Speech
THE return of morning had in some degree dissipated the gloom that had settled on the young Duke during the night. Sound and light made him feel less forlorn, and for a moment his soul again responded to his high purpose. But now he was to seek necessary repose. In vain. His heated frame and anxious mind were alike restless. He turned, he tossed in his bed, but he could not banish from his ear the whirling sound of his late conveyance, the snore of Mr. Macmorrogh, and the voice of Tom Rawlins. He kept dwelling on every petty incident of his journey, and repeating in his mind every petty saying. His determination to slumber made him even less sleepy. Conscious that repose was absolutely necessary to the performance of his task, and dreading that the boon was now unattainable, he became each moment more feverish and more nervous; a crowd of half-formed ideas and images flitted over his heated brain. Failure, misery, May Dacre, Tom Rawlins, boiled beef, Mrs. Burnet, the aristocracy, mountains and the marine, and the tower of St. Alban’s cathedral, hurried along in infinite confusion. But there is nothing like experience. In a state of distraction, he remembered the hopeless but refreshing sleep he had gained after his fatal adventure at Brighton. He jumped out of bed, and threw himself on the floor, and in a few minutes, from the same cause, his excited senses subsided into slumber.
He awoke; the sun was shining through his rough shutter. It was noon. He jumped up, rang the bell, and asked for a bath. The chambermaid did not seem exactly to comprehend his meaning, but said she would speak to the waiter. He was the first gentleman who ever had asked for a bath at the Dragon with Two Tails. The waiter informed him that he might get a bath, he believed, at the Hum-mums. The Duke dressed, and to the Hummums he then took his way. As he was leaving the yard, he was followed by an ostler, who, in a voice musically hoarse, thus addressed him:
‘Have you seen missis, sir?’
‘Do you mean me? No, I have not seen your missis;’ and the Duke proceeded.
‘Sir, sir,’ said the ostler, running after him, ‘I think you said you had not seen missis?’
‘You think right,’ said the Duke, astonished; and again he walked on.
‘Sir, sir,’ said the pursuing ostler, ‘I don’t think you have got any luggage?’
‘Oh! I beg your pardon,’ said the Duke; ‘I see it. I am in your debt; but I meant to return.’
‘No doubt on’t, sir; but when gemmen don’t have no luggage, they sees missis before they go, sir.’
‘Well, what am I in your debt? I can pay you here.’
‘Five shillings, sir.’
‘Here!’ said the Duke; ‘and tell me when a coach leaves this place to-morrow for Yorkshire.’
‘Half-past six o’clock in the morning precisely,’ said the ostler.
‘Well, my good fellow, I depend upon your securing me a place; and that is for yourself,’ added his Grace, throwing him a sovereign. ‘Now, mind; I depend upon you.’
The man stared as if he had been suddenly taken into partnership with missis; at length he found his tongue.
‘Your honour may depend upon me. Where would you like to sit? In or out? Back to your horses, or the front? Get you the box if you like. Where’s your great coat, sir? I’ll brush it for you.’
The bath and the breakfast brought our hero round a good deal, and at half-past two he stole to a solitary part of St. James’s Park, to stretch his legs and collect his senses. We must now let our readers into a secret, which perhaps they have already unravelled. The Duke had hurried to London with the determination, not only of attending the debate, but of participating in it. His Grace was no politician; but the question at issue was one simple in its nature and so domestic in its spirit, that few men could have arrived at his period of life without having heard its merits, both too often and too amply discussed. He was master of all the points of interest, and he had sufficient confidence in himself to believe that he could do them justice. He walked up and down, conning over in his mind not only the remarks which he intended to make, but the very language in which he meant to offer them. As he formed sentences, almost for the first time, his courage and his fancy alike warmed: his sanguine spirit sympathised with the nobility of the imaginary scene, and inspirited the intonations of his modulated voice.
About four o’clock he repaired to the House. Walking up one of the passages his progress was stopped by the back of an individual bowing with great civility to a patronising peer, and my-lording him with painful repetition. The nobleman was Lord Fitz-pompey; the bowing gentleman, Mr. Duncan Macmorrogh, the anti-aristocrat, and father of the first man of the day.
‘George! is it possible!’ exclaimed Lord Fitz-pompey. ‘I will speak to you in the House,’ said the Duke, passing on, and bowing to Mr. Duncan Macmorrogh.
He recalled his proxy from the Duke of Burlington, and accounted for his presence to many astonished friends by being on his way to the Continent; and, passing through London, thought he might as well be present, particularly as he was about to reside for some time in Catholic countries. It was the last compliment that he could pay his future host. ‘Give me a pinch of snuff.’
The debate began. Don’t be alarmed. I shall not describe it. Five or six peers had spoken, and one of the ministers had just sat down when the Duke of St. James rose. He was extremely nervous, but he repeated to himself the name of May Dacre for the hundredth time, and proceeded. He was nearly commencing ‘May Dacre’ instead of ‘My Lords,’ but he escaped this blunder. For the first five or ten minutes he spoke in almost as cold and lifeless a style as when he echoed the King’s speech; but he was young and seldom troubled them, and was listened to therefore with indulgence. The Duke warmed, and a courteous ‘hear, hear,’ frequently sounded; the Duke became totally free from embarrassment, and spoke with eloquence and energy. A cheer, a stranger in the House of Lords, rewarded and encouraged him. As an Irish landlord, his sincerity could not be disbelieved when he expressed his conviction of the safety of emancipation; but it was as an English proprietor and British noble that it was evident that his Grace felt most keenly upon this important measure. He described with power the peculiar injustice of the situation of the English Catholics. He professed to feel keenly upon this subject, because his native county had made him well acquainted with the temper of this class; he painted in glowing terms the loyalty, the wealth, the influence, the noble virtues of his Catholic neighbours; and he closed a speech of an hour’s duration, in which he had shown that a worn subject was susceptible of novel treatment, and novel interest, amid loud and general cheers. The Lords gathered round him, and many personally congratulated him upon his distinguished success. The debate took its course. At three o’clock the pro-Catholics found themselves in a minority, but a minority in which the prescient might have well discovered the herald of future justice. The speech of the Duke of St. James was the speech of the night.
The Duke walked into White’s. It was crowded. The first man who welcomed him was Annesley. He congratulated the Duke with a warmth for which the world did not give him credit.
‘I assure you, my dear St. James, that I am one of the few people whom this display has not surprised. I have long observed that you were formed for something better than mere frivolity. And between ourselves I am sick of it. Don’t be surprised if you hear that I go to Algiers. Depend upon it that I am on the point of doing something dreadful.’ ‘Sup with me, St. James,’ said Lord Squib; ‘I will ask O’Connell to meet you.’
Lord Fitz-pompey and Lord Darrell were profuse in congratulations; but he broke away from them to welcome the man who now advanced. He was one of whom he never thought without a shudder, but whom, for all that, he greatly liked.
‘My dear Duke of St. James,’ said Arundel Dacre, ‘how ashamed I am that this is the first time I have personally thanked you for all your goodness!’
‘My dear Dacre, I have to thank you for proving for the first time to the world that I was not without discrimination.’
‘No, no,’ said Dacre, gaily and easily; ‘all the congratulations and all the compliments to-night shall be for you. Believe me, my dear friend, I share your triumph.’
They shook hands with earnestness.
‘May will read your speech with exultation,’ said Arundel. ‘I think we must thank her for making you an orator.’
The Duke faintly smiled and shook his head.
‘And how are all our Yorkshire friends?’ continued Arundel. ‘I am disappointed again in getting down to them; but I hope in the course of the month to pay them a visit.’
‘I shall see them in a day or two,’ said the Duke. ‘I pay Mr. Dacre one more visit before my departure form England.’
‘Are you then indeed going?’ asked Arundel, in a kind voice.
‘For ever.’
‘Nay, nay,everis a strong word.’
‘It becomes, then, my feelings. However, we will not talk of this. Can I bear any letter for you?’
‘I have just written,’ replied Arundel, in a gloomy voice, and with a changing countenance, ‘and therefore will not trouble you. And yet——’
‘What!’
‘And yet the letter is an important letter: to me. The post, to be sure, never does miss; but if it were not troubling your Grace too much, I almost would ask you to be its bearer.’
‘It will be there as soon,’ said the Duke, ‘for I shall be off in an hour.’
‘I will take it out of the box then,’ said Arundel; and he fetched it. ‘Here is the letter,’ said he on his return: ‘pardon me if I impress upon you its importance. Excuse this emotion, but, indeed, this letter decides my fate. My happiness for life is dependent on its reception!’
He spoke with an air and voice of agitation.
The Duke received the letter in a manner scarcely less disturbed; and with a hope that they might meet before his departure, faintly murmured by one party, and scarcely responded to by the other, they parted.
‘Well, now,’ said the Duke, ‘the farce is complete; and I have come to London to be the bearer of his offered heart! I like this, now. Is there a more contemptible, a more ludicrous, absolutely ludicrous ass than myself? Fear not for its delivery, most religiously shall it be consigned to the hand of its owner. The fellow has paid a compliment to my honour or my simplicity: I fear the last, and really I feel rather proud. But away with these feelings! Have I not seen her in his arms? Pah! Thank God! I spoke. At least, I die in a blaze. Even Annesley does not think me quite a fool. O, May Dacre, May Dacre! if you were but mine, I should be the happiest fellow that ever breathed!’
He breakfasted, and then took his way to the Dragon with Two Tails. The morning was bright, and fresh, and beautiful, even in London. Joy came upon his heart, in spite of all his loneliness, and he was glad and sanguine. He arrived just in time. The coach was about to start. The faithful ostler was there with his great-coat, and the Duke found that he had three fellow-passengers. They were lawyers, and talked for the first two hours of nothing but the case respecting which they were going down into the country. At Woburn, a despatch arrived with the newspapers. All purchased one, and the Duke among the rest. He was well reported, and could now sympathise with, instead of smile at, the anxiety of Lord Darrell.
‘The young Duke of St. James seems to have distinguished himself very much,’ said the first lawyer.
‘So I observe,’ said the second one. ‘The leading article calls our attention to his speech as the most brilliant delivered.’
‘I am surprised,’ said the third. ‘I thought he was quite a different sort of person.’
‘By no means,’ said the first: ‘I have always had a high opinion of him. I am not one of those who think the worse of a young man because he is a little wild.’
‘Nor I,’ said the second. ‘Young blood, you know, is young blood.’
‘A very intimate friend of mine, who knows the Duke of St. James well, once told me,’ rejoined the first, ‘that I was quite mistaken about him; that he was a person of no common talents; well read, quite a man of the world, and a good deal of wit, too; and let me tell you that in these days wit is no common thing.’
‘Certainly not,’ said the third. ‘We have no wit now.’
‘And a kind-hearted, generous fellow,’ continued the first, ‘andveryunaffected.’
‘I can’t bear an affected man,’ said the second, without looking off his paper. ‘He seems to have made a very fine speech indeed.’
‘I should not wonder at his turning out something great,’ said the third.
‘I have no doubt of it,’ said the second.
‘Many of these wild fellows do.’
‘He is not so wild as we think,’ said the first.
‘But he is done up,’ said the second.
‘Is he indeed?’ said the third. ‘Perhaps by making a speech he wants a place?’
‘People don’t make speeches for nothing,’ said the third.
‘I shouldn’t wonder if he is after a place in the Household,’ said the second.
‘Depend upon it, he looks to something more active,’ said the first.
‘Perhaps he would like to be head of the Admiralty?’ said the second.
‘Or the Treasury?’ said the third.
‘That is impossible!’ said the first. ‘He is too young.’
‘He is as old as Pitt,’ said the third.
‘I hope he will resemble him in nothing but his age, then,’ said the first.
‘I look upon Pitt as the first man that ever lived,’ said the third.
‘What!’ said the first. ‘The man who worked up the national debt to nearly eight hundred millions!’
‘What of that?’ said the third. ‘I look upon the national debt as the source of all our prosperity.’
‘The source of all our taxes, you mean.’
‘What is the harm of taxes?’
‘The harm is, that you will soon have no trade; and when you have no trade, you will have no duties; and when you have no duties, you will have no dividends; and when you have no dividends, you will have no law; and then, where is your source of prosperity?’ said the first.
But here the coach stopped, and the Duke got out for an hour.
By midnight they had reached a town not more than thirty miles from Dacre. The Duke was quite exhausted, and determined to stop. In half an hour he enjoyed that deep, dreamless slumber, with which no luxury can compete. One must have passed restless nights for years, to be able to appreciate the value of sound sleep.
A Last Appeal
HE ROSE early, and managed to reach Dacre at the breakfast hour of the family. He discharged his chaise at the Park gate, and entered the house unseen. He took his way along a corridor lined with plants, which led to the small and favourite room in which the morning meetings of May and himself always took place when they were alone. As he lightly stepped along, he heard a voice that he could not mistake, as it were in animated converse. Agitated by sounds which ever created in him emotion, for a moment he paused. He starts, his eye sparkles with strange delight, a flush comes over his panting features, half of modesty, half of triumph. He listens to his own speech from the lips of the woman he loves. She is reading to her father with melodious energy the passage in which he describes the high qualities of his Catholic neighbours. The intonations of the voice indicate the deep sympathy of the reader. She ceases. He hears the admiring exclamation of his host. He rallies his strength, he advances, he stands before them. She utters almost a shriek of delightful surprise as she welcomes him.
How much there was to say! how much to ask! how much to answer! Even Mr. Dacre poured forth questions like a boy. But May: she could not speak, but leant forward in her chair with an eager ear, and a look of congratulation, that rewarded him for all his exertion. Everything was to be told. How he went; whether he slept in the mail; where he went; what he did; whom he saw; what they said; what they thought; all must be answered. Then fresh exclamations of wonder, delight, and triumph. The Duke forgot everything but his love, and for three hours felt the happiest of men.
At length Mr. Dacre rose and looked at his watch with a shaking head. ‘I have a most important appointment,’ said he, ‘and I must gallop to keep it. God bless you, my dear St. James! I could stay talking with you for ever; but you must be utterly wearied. Now, my dear boy, go to bed.’
‘To bed!’ exclaimed the Duke. ‘Why, Tom Rawlins would laugh at you!’
‘And who is Tom Rawlins?’
‘Ah! I cannot tell you everything; but assuredly I am not going to bed.’
‘Well, May, I leave him to your care; but do not let him talk any more.’
‘Oh! sir,’ said the Duke, ‘I really had forgotten. I am the bearer to you, sir, of a letter from Mr. Arundel Dacre.’ He gave it him.
As Mr. Dacre read the communication, his countenance changed, and the smile which before was on his face, vanished. But whether he were displeased, or only serious, it was impossible to ascertain, although the Duke watched him narrowly. At length he said, ‘May! here is a letter from Arundel, in which you are much interested.’
‘Give it me, then, papa!’
‘No, my love; we must speak of this together. But I am pressed for time. When I come home. Remember.’ He quitted the room.
They were alone: the Duke began again talking, and Miss Dacre put her finger to her mouth, with a smile.
‘I assure you,’ said he, ‘I am not wearied. I slept at——y, and the only thing I now want is a good walk. Let me be your companion this morning!’
‘I was thinking of paying nurse a visit. What say you?’
‘Oh! I am ready; anywhere.’
She ran for her bonnet, and he kissed her handkerchief, which she left behind, and, I believe, everything else in the room which bore the slightest relation to her. And then the recollection of Arundel’s letter came over him, and his joy fled. When she returned, he was standing before the fire, gloomy and dull.
‘I fear you are tired,’ she said.
‘Not in the least.’
‘I shall never forgive myself if all this exertion make you ill.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because, although I will not tell papa, I am sure my nonsense is the cause of your having gone to London.’
‘It is probable; for you are the cause of all that does not disgrace me.’ He advanced, and was about to seize her hand; but the accursed miniature occurred to him, and he repressed his feelings, almost with a groan. She, too, had turned away her head, and was busily engaged in tending a flower.
‘Because she has explicitly declared her feelings to me, and, sincere in that declaration, honours me by a friendship of which alone I am unworthy, am I to persecute her with my dishonoured overtures—the twice rejected? No, no!’
They took their way through the park, and he soon succeeded in re-assuming the tone that befitted their situation. Traits of the debate, and the debaters, which newspapers cannot convey, and which he had not yet recounted; anecdotes of Annesley and their friends, and other gossip, were offered for her amusement. But if she were amused, she was not lively, but singularly, unusually silent. There was only one point on which she seemed interested, and that was his speech. When he was cheered, and who particularly cheered; who gathered round him, and what they said after the debate: on all these points she was most inquisitive.
They rambled on: nurse was quite forgotten; and at length they found themselves in the beautiful valley, rendered more lovely by the ruins of the abbey. It was a place that the Duke could never forget, and which he ever avoided. He had never renewed his visit since he first gave vent, among its reverend ruins, to his overcharged and most tumultuous heart.
They stood in silence before the holy pile with its vaulting arches and crumbling walls, mellowed by the mild lustre of the declining sun. Not two years had fled since here he first staggered after the breaking glimpses of self-knowledge, and struggled to call order from out the chaos of his mind. Not two years, and yet what a change had come over his existence! How diametrically opposite now were all his thoughts, and views, and feelings, to those which then controlled his fatal soul! How capable, as he firmly believed, was he now of discharging his duty to his Creator and his fellow-men! and yet the boon that ought to have been the reward for all this self-contest, the sweet seal that ought to have ratified this new contract of existence, was wanting.
‘Ah!’ he exclaimed aloud, and in a voice of anguish, ‘ah! if I ne’er had left the walls of Dacre, how different might have been my lot!’
A gentle but involuntary pressure reminded him of the companion whom, for once in his life, he had for a moment forgotten.
‘I feel it is madness; I feel it is worse than madness; but must I yield without a struggle, and see my dark fate cover me without an effort? Oh! yes, here, even here, where I have wept over your contempt, even here, although I subject myself to renewed rejection, let—let me tell you, before we part, how I adore you!’
She was silent; a strange courage came over his spirit; and, with a reckless boldness, and rapid voice, a misty sight, and total unconsciousness of all other existence, he resumed the words which had broken out, as if by inspiration.
‘I am not worthy of you. Who is? I was worthless. I did not know it. Have not I struggled to be pure? have not I sighed on my nightly pillow for your blessing? Oh! could you read my heart (and sometimes, I think, you can read it, for indeed, with all its faults, it is without guile) I dare to hope that you would pity me. Since we first met, your image has not quitted my conscience for a second. When you thought me least worthy; when you thought me vile, or mad, oh! by all that is sacred, I was the most miserable wretch that ever breathed, and flew to dissipation only for distraction!
‘Not—not for a moment have I ceased to think you the best, the most beautiful, the most enchanting and endearing creature that ever graced our earth. Even when I first dared to whisper my insolent affection, believe me, even then, your presence controlled my spirit as no other woman had. I bent to you then in pride and power. The station that I could then offer you was not utterly unworthy of your perfection. I am now a beggar, or, worse, an insolvent noble, and dare I—dare I to ask you to share the fortunes that are broken, and the existence that is obscure?’
She turned; her arm fell over his shoulder; she buried her head in his breast.
‘Love is Like a Dizziness.‘
MR. DACRE returned home with an excellent appetite, and almost as keen a desire to renew his conversation with his guest; but dinner and the Duke were neither to be commanded. Miss Dacre also could not be found. No information could be obtained of them from any quarter. It was nearly seven o’clock, the hour of dinner. That meal, somewhat to Mr. Dacre’s regret, was postponed for half an hour, servants were sent out, and the bell was rung, but no tidings. Mr. Dacre was a little annoyed and more alarmed; he was also hungry, and at half-past seven he sat down to a solitary meal.
About a quarter-past eight a figure rapped at the dining-room window: it was the young Duke. The fat butler seemed astonished, not to say shocked, at this violation of etiquette; nevertheless, he slowly opened the window.
‘Anything the matter, George? Where is May?’
‘Nothing. We lost our way. That is all. May—Miss Dacre desired me to say, that she would not join us at dinner.’
‘I am sure, something has happened.’
‘I assure you, my dear sir, nothing, nothing at all the least unpleasant, but we took the wrong turning. All my fault.’
‘Shall I send for the soup?’
‘No. I am not hungry, I will take some wine.’ So saying, his Grace poured out a tumbler of claret.
‘Shall I take your Grace’s hat?’ asked the fat butler.
‘Dear me! have I my hat on?’
This was not the only evidence afforded by our hero’s conduct that his presence of mind had slightly deserted him. He was soon buried in a deep reverie, and sat with a full plate, but idle knife and fork before him, a perfect puzzle to the fat butler, who had hitherto considered his Grace the very pink of propriety.
‘George, you have eaten no dinner,’ said Mr. Dacre.
‘Thank you, a very good one indeed, a remarkably good dinner. Give me some red wine, if you please.’
At length they were left alone.
‘I have some good news for you, George.’
‘Indeed.’
‘I think I have let Rosemount.’
‘So!’
‘And exactly to the kind of person that you wanted, a man who will take a pride, although merely a tenant, in not permitting his poor neighbours to feel thewantof a landlord. You will never guess: Lord Mildmay!’
‘What did you say of Lord Mildmay, sir?’
‘My dear fellow, your wits are wool-gathering; I say I think I have let Rosemount.’
‘Oh! I have changed my mind about letting Rosemount.’
‘My dear Duke, there is no trouble which I will grudge, to further your interests; but really I must beg, in future, that you will, at least, apprise me when you change your mind. There is nothing, as we have both agreed, more desirable than to find an eligible tenant for Rosemount. You never can expect to have a more beneficial one than Lord Mildmay; and really, unless you have positively promised the place to another person (which, excuse me for saying, you were not authorised to do) I must insist, after what has passed, upon his having the preference.’
‘My dear sir, I only changed my mind this afternoon: I couldn’t tell you before. I have promised it to no one; but I think of living there myself.’
‘Yourself! Oh! if that be the case, I shall be quite reconciled to the disappointment of Lord Mildmay. But what in the name of goodness, my dear fellow, has produced this wonderful revolution in all your plans in the course of a few hours? I thought you were going to mope away life on the Lake of Geneva, or dawdle it away in Florence or Rome.’
‘It is very odd, sir. I can hardly believe it myself: and yet it must be true. I hear her voice even at this moment. Oh! my dear Mr. Dacre, I am the happiest fellow that ever breathed!’
‘What is all this?’
‘Is it possible, my dear sir, that you have not long before detected the feelings I ventured to entertain for your daughter? In a word, she requires only your sanction to my being the most fortunate of men.’
‘My dear friend, my dear, dear boy!’ cried Mr. Dacre, rising from his chair and embracing him, ‘it is out of the power of man to impart to me any event which could afford me such exquisite pleasure! Indeed, indeed, it is to me most surprising! for I had been induced to suspect, George, that some explanation had passed between you and May, which, while it accounted for your mutual esteem, gave little hope of a stronger sentiment.’
‘I believe, sir,’ said the young Duke, with a smile, ‘I was obstinate.’
‘Well, this changes all our plans. I have intended, for this fortnight past, to speak to you finally on your affairs. No better time than the present; and, in the first place——’
But, really, this interview is confidential.
‘Perfection in a Petticoat.‘
THEY come not: it is late. He is already telling all! She relapses into her sweet reverie. Her thought fixes on no subject; her mind is intent on no idea; her soul is melted into dreamy delight; her only consciousness is perfect bliss! Sweet sounds still echo in her ear, and still her pure pulse beats, from the first embrace of passion.
The door opens, and her father enters, leaning upon the arm of her beloved. Yes, he has told all! Mr. Dacre approached, and, bending down, pressed the lips of his child. It was the seal to their plighted faith, and told, without speech, that the blessing of a parent mingled with the vows of a lover! No other intimation was at present necessary;’ but she, the daughter, thought now only of her father, that friend of her long life, whose love had ne’er been wanting: was she about to leave him? She arose, she threw her arms around his neck and wept.
The young Duke walked away, that his presence might not control the full expression of her hallowed soul. ‘This jewel is mine,’ was his thought; ‘what, what have I done to be so blessed?’
In a few minutes he again joined them, and was seated by her side; and Mr. Dacre considerately remembered that he wished to see his steward, and they were left alone. Their eyes meet, and their soft looks tell that they were thinking of each other. His arm steals round the back of her chair, and with his other hand he gently captures hers.
First love, first love! how many a glowing bard has sung thy beauties! How many a poor devil of a prosing novelist, like myself, has echoed all our superiors, the poets, teach us! No doubt, thou rosy god of young Desire, thou art a most bewitching little demon; and yet, for my part, give me last love.
Ask a man which turned out best, the first horse he bought, or the one he now canters on? Ask—but in short there is nothing in which knowledge is more important and experience more valuable than in love. When we first love, we are enamoured of our own imaginations. Our thoughts are high, our feelings rise from out the deepest caves of the tumultuous tide of our full life. We look around for one to share our exquisite existence, and sanctify the beauties of our being.
But those beauties are only in our thoughts. We feel like heroes, when we are but boys. Yet our mistress must bear a relation, not to ourselves, but to our imagination. She must be a real heroine, while our perfection is but ideal. And the quick and dangerous fancy of our race will, at first, rise to the pitch. She is all we can conceive. Mild and pure as youthful priests, we bow down before our altar. But the idol to which we breathe our warm and gushing vows, and bend our eager knees, all its power, does it not exist only in our idea; all its beauty, is it not the creation of our excited fancy? And then the sweetest of superstitions ends. The long delusion bursts, and we are left like men upon a heath when fairies vanish; cold and dreary, gloomy, bitter, harsh, existence seems a blunder.
But just when we are most miserable, and curse the poet’s cunning and our own conceits, there lights upon our path, just like a ray fresh from the sun, some sparkling child of light, that makes us think we are premature, at least, in our resolves. Yet we are determined not to be taken in, and try her well in all the points in which the others failed. One by one, her charms steal on our warming soul, as, one by one, those of the other beauty sadly stole away, and then we bless our stars, and feel quite sure that we have found perfection in a petticoat.
But our Duke—where are we? He had read woman thoroughly, and consequently knew how to value the virgin pages on which his thoughts now fixed. He and May Dacre wandered in the woods, and nature seemed to them more beautiful from their beautiful loves. They gazed upon the sky; a brighter light fell o’er the luminous earth. Sweeter to them the fragrance of the sweetest flowers, and a more balmy breath brought on the universal promise of the opening year.
They wandered in the woods, and there they breathed their mutual adoration. She to him was all in all, and he to her was like a new divinity. She poured forth all that she long had felt, and scarcely could suppress. From the moment he tore her from the insulter’s arms, his image fixed in her heart, and the struggle which she experienced to repel his renewed vows was great indeed. When she heard of his misfortunes, she had wept; but it was the strange delight she experienced when his letter arrived to her father that first convinced her how irrevocably her mind was his.
And now she does not cease to blame herself for all her past obduracy; now she will not for a moment yield that he could have been ever anything but all that was pure, and beautiful, and good.
Another Betrothal
BUT although we are in love, business must not be utterly neglected, and Mr. Dacre insisted that the young Duke should for one morning cease to wander in his park, and listen to the result of his exertions during the last three months. His Grace listened. Rents had not risen, but it was hoped that they had seen their worst; the railroad had been successfully opposed; and coals had improved. The London mansion and the Alhambra had both been disposed of, and well: the first to the new French Ambassador, and the second to a grey-headed stock-jobber, very rich, who, having no society, determined to make solitude amusing. The proceeds of these sales, together with sundry sums obtained by converting into cash the stud, the furniture, and thebijouterie,produced a most respectable fund, which nearly paid off the annoying miscellaneous debts. For the rest, Mr. Dacre, while he agreed that it was on the whole advisable that the buildings should be completed, determined that none of the estates should be sold, or even mortgaged. His plan was to procrastinate the termination of these undertakings, and to allow each year itself to afford the necessary supplies. By annually setting aside one hundred thousand pounds, in seven or eight years he hoped to find everything completed and all debts cleared. He did not think that the extravagance of the Duke could justify any diminution in the sum which had hitherto been apportioned for the maintenance of the Irish establishments; but he was of opinion that the decreased portion which they, as well as the western estates, now afforded to the total income, was a sufficient reason. Fourteen thousand a-year were consequently allotted to Ireland, and seven to Pen Bronnock. There remained to the Duke about thirty thousand per annum; but then Hauteville was to be kept up with this. Mr. Dacre proposed that the young people should reside at Rosemount, and that consequently they might form their establishment from the Castle, without reducing their Yorkshire appointments, and avail themselves, without any obligation, or even the opportunity, of great expenses, of all the advantages afforded by the necessary expenditure. Finally, Mr. Dacre presented his son with his town mansion and furniture; and as the young Duke insisted that the settlements upon her Grace should be prepared in full reference to his inherited and future income, this generous father at once made over to him the great bulk of his personal property amounting to upwards of a hundred thousand pounds, a little ready money, of which he knew the value.
The Duke of St. James had duly informed his uncle, the Earl of Fitz-pompey, of the intended change in his condition, and in answer received the following letter:—
‘Fitz-pompey Hall, May, 18—.
‘My dear George,—Your letter did not give us so much surprise as you expected; but I assure you it gave us as much pleasure. You have shown your wisdom and your taste in your choice; and I am free to confess that I am acquainted with no one more worthy of the station which the Duchess of St. James must always fill in society, and more calculated to maintain the dignity of your family, than the lady whom you are about to introduce to us as our niece. Believe me, my dear George, that the notification of this agreeable event has occasioned even additional gratification both to your aunt and to myself, from the reflection that you are about to ally yourself with a family in whose welfare we must ever take an especial interest, and whom we may in a manner look upon as our own relatives. For, my dear George, in answer to your flattering and most pleasing communication, it is my truly agreeable duty to inform you (and, believe me, you are the first person out of our immediate family to whom this intelligence is made known) that our Caroline, in whose happiness we are well assured you take a lively interest, is about to be united to one who may now be described as your near relative, namely, Mr. Arundel Dacre.
‘It has been a long attachment, though for a considerable time, I confess, unknown to us; and indeed at first sight, with Caroline’s rank and other advantages, it may not appear, in a mere worldly point of view, so desirable a connection as some perhaps might expect. And to be quite confidential, both your aunt and myself were at first a little disinclined (great as our esteem and regard have ever been for him), a little disinclined, I say, to the union. But Dacre is certainly the most rising man of the day. In point of family, he is second to none; and his uncle has indeed behaved in the most truly liberal manner. I assure you, he considers him as a son; and even if there were no other inducement, the mere fact of your connection with the family would alone not only reconcile, but, so to say, make us perfectly satisfied with the arrangement. It is unnecessary to speak to you of the antiquity of the Dacres. Arundel will ultimately be one of the richest Commoners, and I think it is not too bold to anticipate, taking into consideration the family into which he marries, and above all, his connection with you, that we may finally succeed in having him called up to us. You are of course aware that there was once a barony in the family.
‘Everybody talks of your speech. I assure you, although I ever gave you credit for uncommon talents, I was astonished. So you are to have the vacant ribbon! Why did you not tell me? I learnt it to-day, from Lord Bobbleshim. But we must not quarrel with men in love for not communicating.
‘You ask me for news of all your old friends. You of course saw the death of old Annesley. The new Lord took his seat yesterday; he was introduced by Lord Bloomerly. I was not surprised to hear in the evening that he was about to be married to Lady Charlotte, though the world affect to be astonished.
I should not forget to say that Lord Annesley asked most particularly after you. For him, quite warm, I assure you.
‘The oddest thing has happened to your friend, Lord Squib. Old Colonel Carlisle is dead, and has left his whole fortune, some say half a million, to the oddest person, merely because she had the reputation of being his daughter. Quite an odd person, you understand me: Mrs. Montfort. St. Maurice says you know her; but we must not talk of these things now. Well, Squib is going to be married to her. He says that he knows all his old friends will cut him when they are married, and so he is determined to give them an excuse. I understand she is a fine woman. He talks of living at Rome and Florence for a year or two.
‘Lord Darrell is about to marry Harriet Wrekin; and between ourselves (but don’t let this go any further at present) I have very little doubt that young Pococurante will shortly be united to Isabel. Connected as we are with the Shropshires, these excellent alliances are gratifying.
‘I see very little of Lucius Grafton. He seems ill.
I understand, for certain, that her Ladyship opposes the divorce.On dit, she has got hold of some letters, through the treachery of her soubrette, whom he supposed quite his creature, and that your friend is rather taken in. But I should not think this true. People talk very loosely. There was a gay party at Mrs. Dallington’s the other night, who asked very kindly after you.
‘I think I have now written you a very long letter. I once more congratulate you on your admirable selection, and with the united remembrance of our circle, particularly Caroline, who will write perhaps by this post to Miss Dacre, believe me, dear George, your truly affectionate uncle,
‘FITZ-POMPEY.
‘P.S.—Lord Marylebone is very unpopular, quite a brute. We all miss you.’
It is not to be supposed that this letter conveyed the first intimation to the Duke of St. James of the most interesting event of which it spoke. On the contrary, he had long been aware of the whole affair; but we have been too much engaged with his own conduct to find time to let the reader into the secret, which, like all secrets, it is to be hoped was no secret. Next to gaining the affections of May Dacre, it was impossible for any event to occur more delightful to our hero than the present. His heart had often misgiven him when he had thought of Caroline. Now she was happy, and not only happy, but connected with him for life, just as he wished. Arundel Dacre, too, of all men he most wished to like, and indeed most liked. One feeling alone had prevented them from being bosom friends, and that feeling had long triumphantly vanished.
May had been almost from the beginning theconfidanteof her cousin. In vain, however, had she beseeched him to entrust all to her father. Although he now repented his past feelings he could not be induced to change; and not till he had entered Parliament and succeeded and gained a name, which would reflect honour on the family with which he wished to identify himself, would he impart to his uncle the secret of his heart, and gain that support without which his great object could never have been achieved. The Duke of St. James, by returning him to Parliament, had been the unconscious cause of all his happiness, and ardently did he pray that his generous friend might succeed in what he was well aware was his secret aspiration, and that his beloved cousin might yield her hand to the only man whom Arundel Dacre considered worthy of her.