Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth

by Maria Edgeworth

  “I did not know Fowler had a daughter, and a daughter grown up.”

  “Nancy Fowler! not know! Oh! yes, quite grown up, fit to be married — only a year younger than I am. And there’s our old apothecary in the country has taken such a fancy to her! But he’s too old and wiggy — but it would make a sort of lady of her, and her mother will have it so — but she sha’n’t — I’ve no notion of compulsion. Nancy shall be my maid, for she is quite out of the common style; can copy verses for one — I’ve no time, you know — and draws patterns in a minute. I declare I don’t know which I love best — Fowler or Nancy — poor old Fowler, I think. Do you know she says I’m so like the print of the Queen of France. It never struck me; but I’ll go and ask Topham.”

  I perceived that Fowler, wiser grown, had learned how much more secure the reign of flattery is, than the reign of terror. She was now, as I found, supreme in the favour of both her young and old lady. The specimen I have given of Lady Anne Mowbray’s conversation, or rather of Lady Anne’s mode of talking, will, I fancy, be amply sufficient to satiate all curiosity concerning her ladyship’s understanding and character. She had, indeed, like most of the young ladies her companions—”no character at all.”

  Female conversation in general was, at this time, very different from what it is in our happier days. A few bright stars had risen, and shone, and been admired; but the useful light had not diffused itself. Miss Talbot’s and Miss Carter’s learning and piety, Mrs. Montague’s genius, Mrs. Vesey’s elegance, and Mrs. Boscawen’s [Footnote: See Bas-Bleu.] “polished ease,” had brought female literature into fashion in certain favoured circles; but it had not, as it has now, become general in almost every rank of life. Young ladies had, it is true, got beyond the Spectator and the Guardian: Richardson’s novels had done much towards opening a larger field of discussion. One of Miss Burney’s excellent novels had appeared, and had made an era in London conversation; but still it was rather venturing out of the safe course for a young lady to talk of books, even of novels; it was not, as it is now, expected that she should know what is going on in the literary world. The Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews, and varieties of literary and scientific journals, had not

  “Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way.”

  Before there was a regular demand and an established market, there were certain hawkers and pedlars of literature, fetchers and carriers of bays, and at every turn copies of impromptus, charades, and lines by the honourable Miss C —— , and the honourable Mrs. D —— , were put into my hands by young ladies, begging for praise, which it was seldom in my power conscientiously to bestow. I early had a foreboding — one of my mother’s presentiments — that I should come to disgrace with Lady Anne Mowbray about some of these cursed scraps of poetry. Her ladyship had one — shall I say? — peculiarity. She could not bear that any one should differ from her in matters of taste; and though she regularly disclaimed being a reading lady, she was most assured of what she was most ignorant. With the assistance of Fowler’s flattery, together with that of all the hangers-on at Brantefield Priory, her temper had been rendered incapable of bearing contradiction. But this defect was not immediately apparent: on the contrary, Lady Anne was generally thought a pleasant, good-humoured creature, and most people wondered that the daughter could be so different from the mother. Lady de Brantefield was universally known to be positive and prejudiced. Her prejudices were all old-fashioned, and ran directly counter to the habits of her acquaintance. Lady Anne’s, on the contrary, were all in favour of the present fashion, whatever it might be, and ran smoothly with the popular stream. The violence of her temper could, therefore, scarcely be suspected, till something opposed the current: a small obstacle would then do the business — would raise the stream suddenly to a surprising height, and would produce a tremendous noise. It was my ill fortune one unlucky day to cross Lady Anne Mowbray’s humour, and to oppose her opinion. It was about a trifle; but trifles, indeed, made, with her, the sum of human things. She came one morning, as it was her custom, to loiter away her time at my mother’s till the proper hour for going out to visit. For five minutes she sat at some fashionable kind of work — wafer work, I think it was called, a work which has been long since consigned to the mice; then her ladyship yawned, and exclaiming, “Oh, those lines of Lord Chesterfield’s, which Colonel Topham gave me; I’ll copy them into my album. Where’s my album? — Mrs. Harrington, I lent it to you. Oh! here it is. Mr. Harrington, you will finish copying this for me.” So I was set down to the album to copy — Advice to a Lady in Autumn.

  “Asses’ milk, half a pint, take at seven, or before.”

  My mother, who saw that I did not relish the asses’ milk, put in a word for me.

  “My dear Lady Anne, it is not worth while to write these lines in your album, for they were in print long ago, in every lady’s old memorandum-book, and in Dodsley’s Collection, I believe.”

  “But still that was quite a different thing,” Lady Anne said, “from having them in her album; so Mr. Harrington must be so very good.” I did not understand the particular use of copying in my illegible hand what could be so much better read in print; but it was all-sufficient that her ladyship chose it. When I had copied the verses I must, Lady Anne said, read the lines, and admire them. But I had read them twenty times before, and I could not say that they were as fresh the twentieth reading as at the first. Lord Mowbray came in, and she ran to her brother:—”Mowbray! can any thing in nature be prettier than these verses of Lord Chesterfield? Mowbray, you, who are a judge, listen to these two lines:

  ‘The dews of the evening moat carefully shun,

  Those tears of the sky for the loss of the sun.’

  Now, here’s your friend, Mr. Harrington, says it’s only a prettiness, and something about Ovid. I’m sure I wish you’d advise some of your friends to leave their classics, as you did, at the musty university. What have we to do with Ovid in London? You, yourself, Mr. Harrington, who set up for such a critic, what fault can you find, pray, with

  ‘Keep all cold from your breast, there’s already too much?’”

  By the lady’s tone of voice, raised complexion, and whole air of the head, I saw the danger was imminent, and to avoid the coming storm, I sheltered myself under the cover of modesty; but Mowbray dragged me out to make sport for himself.

  “Oh! Harrington, that will never do. No critic! No judge! You! with all your college honours fresh about you. Come, come, Harrington, pronounce you must. Is this poetry or not?

  ‘Keep all cold from your breast, there’s already too much.’”

  “Whether prose or poetry, I pronounce it to be very good advice.”

  “Good advice! the thing of all others I have the most detested from my childhood,” cried Lady Anne; “but I insist upon it, it is good poetry, Mr. Harrington.”

  “And equally good grammar, and good English, and good sense,” cried her brother, in an ironical tone. “Come, Harrington, acknowledge it all, man — all equally. Never stop half way, when a young — and such a young lady, summons you to surrender to her your truth, taste, and common sense. Gi’ her a’ the plea, or you’ll get na good of a woman’s hands.”

  “So, sir! — So, my lord, you are against me too, and you are mocking me too, I find. I humbly thank you, gentlemen,” cried Lady Anne, in a high tone of disdain; “from a colonel in the army, and a nobleman who has been on the continent, I might have expected more politeness. From a Cambridge scholar no wonder!”

  My mother laid down her netting in the middle of a row, and came to keep the peace. But it was too late; Lady Anne was deaf and blind with passion. She confessed she could not see of what use either of the universities were in this world, except to make bears and bores of young men.

  Her ladyship, fluent in anger beyond conception, poured, as she turned from her brother to me, and from me to her brother, a flood of nonsense, which, when it had once broken bounds, there was no restraining in its course. Amazed at the torrent, my mother stood aghast
; Mowbray burst into unextinguishable laughter: I preserved my gravity as long as I possibly could; I felt the risible infection seizing me, and that malicious Mowbray, just when he saw me in the struggle — the agony — sent me back such an image of my own length of face, that there was no withstanding it. I, too, breaking all bounds of decorum, gave way to visible and audible laughter; and from which I was first recovered by seeing the lady burst into tears, and by hearing, at the same moment, my mother pronounce in a tone of grave displeasure, “Very ill-bred, Harrington!” My mother’s tone of displeasure affecting me much more than the young lady’s tears, I hastened to beg pardon, and I humbled myself before Lady Anne; but she spurned me, and Mowbray laughed the more. Mowbray, I believe, really wished that I should like his sister; yet he could not refrain from indulging his taste for ridicule, even at her expense. My mother wondered how Lord Mowbray could tease his sister in such a manner; and as for Harrington, she really thought he had known that the first law of good-breeding is never to say or do any thing that can hurt another person’s feelings.

  “Never intentionally to hurt another’s feelings, ma’am,” said I; “I hope you will allow me to plead the innocence of my intentions.”

  “Oh, yes! there was no malicious intent: Not guilty — Not guilty!” cried Mowbray. “Anne, you acquit him there, don’t you, Anne?”

  Anne sobbed, but spoke not.

  “It is little consolation, and no compensation, to the person who is hurt,” said my mother, “that the offender pleads he did not mean to say or do any thing rude: a rude thing is a rude thing — the intention is nothing — all we are to judge of is the fact.”

  “Well, but after all, in fact,” said Mowbray, “there was nothing to make any body seriously angry.”

  “Of that every body’s own feelings must be the best judge,” said my mother, “the best and the sole judge.”

  “Thank Heaven! that is not the law of libel yet, not the law of the land yet,” said Mowbray; “no knowing what we may come to. Would it not be hard, ma’am, to constitute the feelings of one person always sole judge of the intentions of another? though in cases like the present I submit. Let it be a ruled case, that the sensibility of a lady shall be the measure of a gentleman’s guilt.”

  “I don’t judge of these things by rule and measure,” said my mother: “try my smelling-bottle, my dear.” Very few people, especially women of delicate nerves and quick feelings, could, as my mother observed, bear to be laughed at; particularly by those they loved; and especially before other people who did not know them perfectly. My mother was persuaded, she said, that Lord Mowbray had not reflected on all this when he had laughed so inconsiderately.

  Mowbray allowed that he certainly had not reflected when he had laughed inconsiderately. “So come, come. Anne, sister Anne, be friends!” then playfully tapping his sister on the back, the pretty, but sullen back of the neck, he tried to raise the drooping head; but finding the chin resist the upward motion, and retire resentfully from his touch, he turned upon his heel, and addressing himself to me, “Well! Harrington,” said he, “the news of the day, the news of the theatre, which I was bringing you full speed, when I stumbled upon this cursed half-pint of asses’ milk, which Mrs.. Harrington was so angry with me for overturning—”

  “But what’s the news, my lord?” said my mother.

  “News! not for you, ma’am, only for Harrington; news of the Jews.”

  “The Jews!” said my mother.

  “The Jews!” said I, both in the same breath, but in very different tones.

  “Jews, did I say?” replied Mowbray: “Jew, I should have said.”

  “Mr. Montenero?” cried I.

  “Montenero! — Can you think of nothing but Mr. Montenero, whom you’ve never seen, and never will see?”

  “Thank you for that, my lord,” said my mother; “one touch from you is worth a hundred from me.”

  “But of what Jew then are you talking? and what’s your news, my lord?” said I.

  “My news is only — for Heaven’s sake, Harrington, do not look expecting a mountain, for ’tis only a mouse. The news is, that Macklin, the honest Jew of Venice, has got the pound, or whatever number of pounds he wanted to get from the manager’s heart; the quarrel’s made up, and if you keep your senses, you may have a chance to see, next week, this famous Jew of Venice.”

  “I am heartily glad of it!” cried I, with enthusiasm.

  “And is that all?” said my mother, coldly.

  “Mr. Harrington,” said Lady Anne, “is really so enthusiastic about some things, and so cold about others, there is no understanding him; he is very, very odd.”

  Notwithstanding all the pains my mother took to atone for my offence, and notwithstanding that I had humbled myself to the dust to obtain pardon, I was not forgiven.

  Lady de Brantefield, Lady Anne, and some other company, dined with us; and Mowbray, who seemed to be really sorry that he had vexed his sister, and that he had in the heyday of his spirit unveiled to me her defects of temper, did every thing in his power to make up matters between us. At dinner he placed me beside Anne, little sister Anne; but no caressing tone, no diminutive of kindness in English, or soft Italian, could touch her heart, or move the gloomy purpose of her soul. Her sulky ladyship almost turned her back upon me, as she listened only to Colonel Topham, who was on the other side. Mowbray coaxed her to eat, but she refused every thing he offered — would not accept even his compliments — his compliments on her pouf — would not allow him to show her off, as he well knew how to do, to advantage; would not, when he exerted himself to prevent her silence from being remarked, smile at any one of the many entertaining things he said; she would not, in short, even passively permit his attempts to cover her ill-humour, and to make things pass off well.

  In the evening, when the higher powers drew off to cards, and when Lady Anne had her phalanx of young ladies round her; and whilst I stood a defenceless young man at her mercy, she made me feel her vengeance. She talked at me continually, and at every opening gave me sly cuts, which she flattered herself I felt sorely.

  Mowbray turned off the blows as fast as they were aimed, or treated them all as playful traits of lover-like malice, tokens of a lady’s favour.

  “Ha! a good cut, Harrington! — Happy man! — Up to you there, Harrington! High favour, when a lady condescends to remember and retaliate. Paid you for old scores! — Sign you’re in her books now!—’No more to say to you, Mr. Harrington’ — a fair challenge to say a great deal more to her.”

  And all the time her ladyship was aiming to vex, and hoping that I was heartily mortified, as from my silence and melancholy countenance she concluded that I was; in reality I stood deploring that so pretty a creature had so mean a mind. The only vexation I felt was at her having destroyed the possibility of my enjoying that delightful illusion which beauty creates.

  My mother, who had been, as she said, quite nervous all this evening, at last brought Lady Anne to terms, and patched up a peace, by prevailing on Lady de Brantefield, who could not be prevailed on by any one else, to make a party to go to some new play which Lady Anne was dying to see. It was a sentimental comedy, and I did not much like it; however, I was all complaisance for my mother’s sake, and she in return renewed her promise to go with me to patronize Shylock. By the extraordinary anxiety my mother showed, and by the pains she took that there should be peace betwixt Lady Anne and me, I perceived, what had never before struck me, that my mother wished me to be in love with her ladyship.

  Now I could sooner have been in love with Lady de Brantefield. Give her back a decent share of youth and beauty, I think I could sooner have liked the mother than the daughter.

  By the force and plastic power of my imagination, I could have turned and moulded Lady de Brantefield, with all her repulsive haughtiness, into a Clelia, or a Princess de Cleves, or something of the Richardson full-dressed heroine, with hoop and fan, and stand off, man! — and then there would be cruelty and difficulty, and incomp
rehensibility-something to be conquered — something to be wooed and won. But with Lady Anne Mowbray my imagination had nothing to work upon, no point to dwell on, nothing on which a lover’s fancy could feed: there was no doubt, no hope, no fear, no reserve of manner, no dignity of mind.

  My mother, I believe, now saw that it would not do, at least for the present; but she had known many of Cupid’s capricious turns. Lady Anne was extremely pretty, and universally allowed to be so; her ladyship was much taken notice of in public, and my mother knew that young men are vain of having their mistresses and wives admired by our sex. But my mother calculated ill as to my particular character. To the Opera and to Ranelagh, to the Pantheon, and to all the fashionable public places of the day, I had had the honour of attending Lady Anne; and I had had the glory of hearing “Beautiful!” “Who is she?” — and “Who is with her?” My vanity, I own, had been flattered, but no further. My imagination was always too powerful, my passions too sincere and too romantic, to be ruled by the opinions of others, or to become the dupe of personal vanity. My mother had fancied that a month or two in London would have brought my imagination down to be content with the realities of fashionable life. My mother was right as to the fact, but wrong in her conclusion. This did not incline me more towards Lady Anne, but it disinclined me towards marriage.

  My exalted ideas of love were lowered — my morning visions of life fled — I was dispirited.

  Mowbray had rallied me on my pining for Cambridge, and on preferring Israel Lyons, the Jew, to him and all the best company in London.

  He had hurried me about with him to all manner of gaieties, but still I was not happy; my mind — my heart wanted something more.

  In this my London life, I found it irksome that I could never, as at dear Cambridge, pause upon my own reflections. If I stopped awhile, “to plume contemplation’s wings, so ruffled and impaired,” some of the low realities, some of the impertinent necessities of fashionable life, would tread on my heels. The order of the day or night was for ever pressed upon me — and the order of the day was now to go to this new sentimental comedy — my mother’s favourite actor, the silver-toned Barry, was to play the lover of the piece; so she was sure of as many fashionable young ladies as her box could possibly hold. At this period, in England, every fashionable belle declared herself the partisan of some actor or actress; and every fashionable beau aspired to the character of a dramatic critic. Mowbray, of course, was distinguished in that line, and his pretty little sister, Lady Anne, was, at least in face, formed to grace the front box. The hours of the great world were earlier then than they are now, and nothing interfered, indeed nothing would have been suffered to interfere, with the hour for the play. As a veteran wit described it, “There were at this time four estates in the English Constitution, kings, lords, commons, and the theatre.” Statesmen, courtiers, poets, philosophers, crowded pell mell with the white-gloved beaux to the stage box and the pit. It was thought well-bred, it was the thing to be in the boxes before the third act, even before the second, nay, incredible as it may in these times appear, before the first act began. Our fashionable party was seated some minutes before the curtain drew up.