CHAPTER XXXV.
THE HUNT BALL.
By this time your humble servant, the chronicler of these Gylingdenannals, had taken his leave of magnificent old Brandon, and of itsstrangely interesting young mistress and was carrying away with him, ashe flew along the London rails, the broken imagery of that grand andshivered dream. He was destined, however, before very long, to revisitthese scenes; and in the meantime heard, in rude outline, the tenor ofwhat was happening--the minute incidents and colouring of which wereafterwards faithfully communicated.
I can, therefore, without break or blur, continue my description; and tosay truth, at this distance of time, I have some difficulty--so wellacquainted was I with the actors and the scenery--in determining, withoutconsulting my diary, what portions of the narrative I relate fromhearsay, and what as a spectator. But that I am so far from understandingmyself, I should often be amazed at the sayings and doings of otherpeople. As it is, I behold in myself an abyss, I gaze down and listen,and discover neither light nor harmony, but thunderings and lightnings,and voices and laughter, and a medley that dismays me. There rage theelements which God only can control. Forgive us our trespasses; lead usnot into temptation; deliver us from the Evil One! How helpless andappalled we shut our eyes over that awful chasm.
I have long ceased, then, to wonder why any living soul does anythingthat is incongruous and unanticipated. And therefore I cannot say howMiss Brandon persuaded her handsome Cousin Rachel to go with her party,under the wing of Old Lady Chelford, to the Hunt Ball of Gylingden. Andknowing now all that then hung heavy at the heart of the fair tenant ofRedman's Farm, I should, indeed, wonder inexpressibly, were it not, as Ihave just said, that I have long ceased to wonder at any vagaries ofmyself or my fellow creatures.
The Hunt Ball is the great annual event of Gylingden. The criticalprocess of 'coming out' is here consummated by the young ladies of thattown and vicinage. It is looked back upon for one-half of the year, andforward to for the other. People date by it. The battle of Inkerman wasfought immediately before the Hunt Ball. It was so many weeks after theHunt Ball that the Czar Nicholas died. The Carnival of Venice was nothinglike so grand an event. Its solemn and universal importance in Gylingdenand the country round, gave me, I fancied, some notion of what the feastof unleavened bread must have been to the Hebrews and Jerusalem.
The connubial capabilities of Gylingden are positively wretched. When Iknew it, there were but three single men, according even to the modestmeasure of Gylingden housekeeping, capable of supporting wives, and thesewere difficult to please, set a high price on themselves--looked thecountry round at long ranges, and were only wistfully and meekly glancedafter by the frugal vestals of Gylingden, as they strutted round thecorners, or smoked the pipe of apathy at the reading-room windows.
Old Major Jackson kept the young ladies in practice between whiles, withhis barren gallantries and graces, and was, just so far, better thannothing. But, as it had been for years well ascertained that he eithercould not or would not afford to marry, and that his love passages, likethe passages in Gothic piles that 'lead to nothing,' were not designed toterminate advantageously, he had long ceased to excite, even in thatdesolate region, the smallest interest.
Think, then, what it was, when Mr. Pummice, of Copal and Pummice, thesplendid house-painters at Dollington, arrived with his artists andcharwomen to give the Assembly Room its annual touching-up andbedizenment, preparatory to the Hunt Ball. The Gylingden young ladiesused to peep in, and from the lobby observe the wenches dry-rubbing andwaxing the floor, and the great Mr. Pummice, with his myrmidons, inaprons and paper caps, retouching the gilding.
It was a tremendous crisis for honest Mrs. Page, the confectioner, overthe way, who, in legal phrase, had 'the carriage' of the supper andrefreshments, though largely assisted by Mr. Battersby, of Dollington.During the few days' agony of preparation that immediately preceded thisnotable orgie, the good lady's countenance bespoke the magnitude of hercares. Though the weather was usually cold, I don't think she ever wascool during that period--I am sure she never slept--I don't think sheate--and I am afraid her religious exercises were neglected.
Equally distracting, emaciating, and godless, was the condition to whichthe mere advent of this festival reduced worthy Miss Williams, thedressmaker, who had more white muslin and young ladies on her hands thanshe and her choir of needle-women knew what to do with. During thistremendous period Miss Williams hardly resembled herself--her eyesdilated, her lips were pale, and her brow corrugated with deep andinflexible lines of fear and perplexity. She lived on bad tea--sat up allnight--and every now and then burst into helpless floods of tears. Butsomehow, generally things came pretty right in the end. One way oranother, the gay belles and elderly spinsters, and fat villagechaperones, were invested in suitable costume by the appointed hour, andin a few weeks Miss Williams' mind recovered its wonted tone, and hercountenance its natural expression.
The great night had now arrived. Gylingden was quite in an uproar. Ruralfamilies of eminence came in. Some in old-fashioned coaches; others, thewealthier, more in London style. The stables of the 'Brandon Arms,' ofthe 'George Inn,' of the 'Silver Lion,' even of the 'White House,' thougha good way off, and generally every vacant standing for horses in orabout the town were crowded; and the places of entertainment we havenamed, and minor houses of refection, were vocal with the talk offlunkeys, patrician with powdered heads, and splendent in variegatedliveries.
The front of the Town Hall resounded with the ring of horse-hoofs, thecrack of whips, the bawling of coachmen, the clank of carriage steps andclang of coach doors. A promiscuous mob of the plebs and profanum vulgusof Gylingden beset the door, to see the ladies--the slim and the young inwhite muslins and artificial flowers, and their stout guardian angels, ofmaturer years, in satins and velvets, and jewels--some real, and some,just as good, of paste. In the cloak-room such a fuss, unfurling of fans,and last looks and hurried adjustments.
When the Crutchleighs, of Clay Manor, a good, old, formal family, weremounting the stairs in solemn procession--they were always among theearly arrivals--they heard a piano and a tenor performing in thesupper-room.
Now, old Lady Chelford chose to patronise Mr. Page, the Dollingtonprofessor, and partly, I fancy, to show that she could turn thingstopsy-turvy in this town of Gylingden, had made a point, with the rulersof the feast, that her client should sing half-a-dozen songs in thesupper-room before dancing commenced.
Mrs. Crutchleigh stayed her step upon the stairs abruptly, and turned,with a look of fierce surprise upon her lean, white-headed lord,arresting thereby the upward march of Corfe Crutchleigh, Esq., the hopeof his house, who was pulling on his gloves, with his eldest spinstersister on his lank arm.
'There appears to be a concert going on; we came here to a ball. Had younot better enquire, Mr. Crutchleigh; it would seem we have made amistake?'
Mrs. Crutchleigh was sensitive about the dignity of the family of ClayManor; and her cheeks flushed above the rouge, and her eyes flashedseverely.
'That's singing--particularly _loud singing_. Either we have mistaken thenight, or somebody has taken upon him to upset all the arrangements.You'll be good enough to enquire whether there will be dancing to-night;I and Anastasia will remain in the cloak-room; and we'll all leave if youplease, Mr. Crutchleigh, if this goes on.'
The fact is, Mrs. Crutchleigh had got an inkling of this performance, andhad affected to believe it impossible; and, detesting old Lady Chelfordfor sundry slights and small impertinences, and envying Brandon and itsbelongings, was resolved not to be put down by presumption in thatquarter.
Old Lady Chelford sat in an arm-chair in the supper-room, where aconsiderable audience was collected. She had a splendid shawl or twoabout her, and a certain air of demi-toilette, which gave the Gylingdenpeople to understand that her ladyship did not look on this gala in thelight of a real ball, but only as a sort of rustic imitation--curious,possibly amusing, and, like other rural sports, deserving ofencouragement, for the sa
ke of the people who made innocent holidaythere.
Mr. Page, the performer, was a plump young man, with black whiskers, andhis hair in oily ringlets, such as may be seen in the model wigspresented on smiling, waxen dandies, in Mr. Rose's front window atDollington. He bowed and smiled in the most unexceptionable of whitechokers and the dapperest of dress coats, and drew off the whitestimaginable pair of kid gloves, when he sat down to the piano, subsidingin a sort of bow upon the music-stool, and striking those few, brisk andnoisy chords with which such artists proclaim silence and reassurethemselves.
Stanley Lake, that eminent London swell, had attached himself asgentleman-in-waiting to Lady Chelford's household, and was perpetuallygliding with little messages between her ladyship and the dapper vocalistof Dollington, who varied his programme and submitted to an occasional_encore_ on the private order thus communicated.
'I told you Chelford would be here,' said Miss Brandon to Rachel, in alow tone, glancing at the young peer.
'I thought he had returned to Brighton. I fancied he might be--you knowthe Dulhamptons are at Brighton; and Lady Constance, of course, has aclaim on his time and thoughts.'
Rachel smiled as she spoke, and was adjusting her bouquet, as Dorcas madeanswer--
'Lady Constance, my dear Radie! That, you know, was never more than amere whisper; it was only Lady Chelford and the marchioness who talked itover--they would have liked it very well. But Chelford won't be managedor scolded into anything of the kind; and will choose, I think, forhimself, and I fancy not altogether according to their ideas, when thetime comes. And I assure you, dear Radie, there is not the least truth inthat story about Lady Constance.'
Why should Dorcas be so earnest to convince her handsome cousin thatthere was nothing in this rumour? Rachel made no remark, and there was alittle silence.
'I'm so glad I succeeded in bringing you here,' said Dorcas; 'Chelfordmade such a point of it; and he thinks you are losing your spirits amongthe great trees and shadows of Redman's Dell; and he made it quite alittle cousinly duty that I should succeed.'
At this moment Mr. Page interposed with the energetic prelude of hisconcluding ditty. It was one of Tom Moore's melodies.
Rachel leaned back, and seemed to enjoy it very much. But when it wasover, I think she would have found it difficult to say what the song wasabout.
Mr. Page had now completed his programme, and warned by the disrespectfulviolins from the gallery of the ball-room, whence a considerablecaterwauling was already announcing the approach of the dance, he madehis farewell flourish, and bow and, smiling, withdrew.
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