Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth

by Maria Edgeworth

“You are sure that it is not pride that apes humility?” asked Churchill.

  “Yes, quite sure!”

  “Yet—” said Churchill (putting his malicious finger through a great hole in the thumb of the doctor’s glove) “I should have fancied that I saw vanity through the holes in these gloves, as through the philosopher’s cloak of old.”

  “Horace is a famous fellow for picking holes and making much of them, Miss Stanley, you see,” said the aide-de-camp.

  “Vanity! Doctor V —— has no vanity!” said Helen, “if you knew him.”

  “No vanity! Whom does Miss Stanley mean?” cried the aide-de-camp. “No vanity? that’s good. Who? Horace?”

  “Mauvais plaisant!” Horace put him by, and, happily not easily put out of countenance, he continued to Helen, —

  “You give the good doctor credit, too, for all his naïveté?” said Churchill.

  “He does not want credit for it,” said Helen, “he really has it.”

  “I wish I could see things as you do, Miss Stanley.”

  “Show him that, Helen,” cried Lady Cecilia, looking at a table beside them, on which lay one of those dioramic prints which appear all a confusion of lines till you look at them in their right point of view. “Show him that — it all depends, and so does seeing characters, on getting the right point of view.”

  “Ingenious!” said Churchill, trying to catch the right position; “but I can’t, I own—” then abruptly resuming, “Navïeté charms me at fifteen,” and his eye glanced at Helen, then was retracted, then returning to his point of view, “at eighteen perhaps may do,” and his eyes again turned to Helen, “at eighteen — it captivates me quite,” and his eye dwelt. “But naïveté at past fifty, verging to sixty, is quite another thing, really rather too much for me. I like all things in season, and above all, simplicity will not bear long keeping. I have the greatest respect possible for our learned and excellent friend, but I wish this could be any way suggested to him, and that he would lay aside this out-of-season simplicity.”

  “He cannot lay aside his nature,” said Helen, “and I am glad of it, it is such a good nature.”

  “Kind-hearted creature he is, I never heard him say a severe word of any one,” said Lady Cecilia.

  “What a sweet man he must he!” said Horace, making a face at which none present, not even Helen, could forbear to smile. “His heart, I am sure, is in the right place always. I only wish one could say the same of his wig. And would it be amiss if he sometimes (I would not be too hard upon him, Miss Stanley), once a fortnight, suppose — brushed, or caused to be brushed, that coat of his?”

  “You have dusted his jacket for him famously, Horace, I think,” said the aide-de-camp.

  At this instant the door opened, and in came the doctor himself.

  Lady Cecilia’s hand was outstretched with her note, thinking, as the door opened, that she should see the servant come in, for whom she had rung.

  “What surprises you all so, my good friends,” said the doctor, stopping and looking round in all his native simplicity.

  “My dear doctor” said Lady Cecilia, “only we all thought you were gone — that’s all.”

  “And I am not gone, that’s all. I stayed to write a letter, and am come here to look for — but I cannot find-my—”

  “Your gloves, perhaps, doctor, you are looking for,” said Churchill, going forward, and with an air of the greatest respect and consideration, both for the gloves and for their owner, he presented them; then shook the doctor by the hand, with a cordiality which the good soul thought truly English, and, bowing him out, added, “How proud he had been to make his acquaintance, — au revoir, he hoped, in Park Lane.”

  “Oh you treacherous — !” cried Lady Cecilia, turning to Horace, as soon as the unsuspecting philosopher was fairly gone. “Too bad really! If he were not the most simple-minded creature extant, he must have seen, suspected, something from your look; and what would have become of you if the doctor had come in one moment sooner, and had heard you — I was really frightened.”

  “Frightened! so was I, almost out of my wits,” said Churchill. “Les revenans always frighten one; and they never hear any good of themselves, for which reason I make it a principle, when once I have left a room, full of friends especially, never — never to go back. My gloves, my hat, my coat, I’d leave, sooner than lose my friends. Once I heard it said, by one who knew the world and human nature better than any of us — once I heard it said in jest, but in sober earnest I say, that I would not for more than I am worth be placed, without his knowing it, within earshot of my best friend.”

  “What sort of a best friend can yours he?” cried Beauclerc.

  “Much like other people’s, I suppose,” replied Horace, speaking with perfect nonchalance—”much like other people’s best friends. Whosoever expects to find better, I guess, will find worse, if he live in the world we live in.”

  “May I go out of the world before I believe or suspect any such thing?” cried Beauclerc. “Rather than have the Roman curse light upon me, ‘May you survive all your friends and relations!’ may I die a thousand times!”

  “Who talks of dying, in a voice so sweet — a voice so loud?” said provoking Horace, in his calm, well-bred tone; “for my part, I who have the honour of speaking to you, can boast, that never since I was of years of discretion (counting new style, beginning at thirteen, of course) — never have I lost a friend, a sincere friend — never, for this irrefragable reason — since that nonage, never was I such a neophyte as to fancy I had found that lusus natures, a friend perfectly sincere.”

  “How I pity you!” cried Beauclerc, “if you are in earnest; but in earnest you can’t be.”

  “Pardon me, I can, and I am. And in earnest you will oblige me, Mr. Beauclerc, if you will spare me your pity: for, all things in this world considered,” said Horace Churchill, drawing himself up, “I do not conceive that I am much an object of pity.” Then, turning upon his heel, he walked away, conscious, however, half an instant afterwards, that he had drawn himself up too high, and that for a moment his temper had spoiled his tone, and betrayed him into a look and manner too boastful, bordering on the ridiculous. He was in haste to repair the error.

  Not Garrick, in the height of his celebrity and of his susceptibility, was ever more anxious than Horace Churchill to avert the stroke of ridicule — to guard against the dreaded smile. As he walked away, he felt behind his back that those he left were smiling in silence.

  Lady Cecilia had thrown herself on a sofa, resting, after the labour of l’éloquence de billet. He stopped, and, leaning over the back of the sofa on which she reclined, repeated an Italian line in which was the word “pavoneggiarsi.”

  “My dear Lady Cecilia, you, who understand and feel Italian so well, how expressive are some of their words! Pavoneggiarsi! — untranslatable. One cannot say well in English, to peacock oneself. To make oneself like unto a peacock is flat; but pavoneggiarsi — action, passion, picture, all in one! To plume oneself comes nearest to it; but the word cannot be given, even by equivalents, in English; nor can it be naturalised, because, in fact, we have not the feeling. An Englishman is too proud to boast — too bashful to strut; if ever he peacocks himself, it is in a moment of anger, not in display. The language of every country,” continued he, raising his voice, in order to reach Lady Davenant, who just then returned to the room, as he did not wish to waste a philosophical observation on Lady Cecilia,—”the language of every country is, to a certain degree, evidence, record, history of its character and manners.” Then, lowering his voice almost to a whisper, but very distinct, turning while he spoke so as to make sure that Miss Stanley heard—”Your young friend this morning quite captivated me by her nature — nature, the thing that now is most uncommon, a real natural woman; and when in a beauty, how charming! How delicious when one meets with effusion de coeur: a young lady, too, who speaks pure English, not a leash of languages at once; and cultivated, too, your friend is, for one does not like
ignorance, if one could have knowledge without pretension — so hard to find the golden mean! — and if one could find it, one might not be nearer to — —”

  Lady Cecilia listened for the finishing word, but none came. It all ended in a sigh, to be interpreted as she pleased. A look towards the ottoman, where Beauclerc had now taken his seat beside Miss Stanley, seemed to point the meaning out: but Lady Cecilia knew her man too well to understand him.

  Beauclerc, seated on the ottoman, was showing to Helen some passages in the book he was reading; she read with attention, and from time to time looked up with a smile of intelligence and approbation. What either said Horace could not hear, and he was the more curious, and when the book was put down, after carelessly opening others he took it up. Very much surprised was he to find it neither novel nor poem: many passages were marked with pencil notes of approbation, he took it for granted these were Bleauclerc’s; there he was mistaken, they were Lady Davenant’s. She was at her work-table. Horace, book in hand, approached; the book was not in his line, it was more scientific than literary — it was for posterity more than for the day; he had only turned it over as literary men turn over scientific books, to seize what may serve for a new simile or a good allusion; besides, among his philosophical friends, the book being talked of, it was well to know enough of it to have something to say, and he had said well, very judiciously he had praised it among the elect; but now it was his fancy to depreciate it with all his might; not that he disliked the author or the work now more than he had done before, but he was in the humour to take the opposite side from Beauclerc, so he threw the book from him contemptuously “Rather a slight hasty thing, in my opinion,” said he. Beauclerc’s eyes took fire as he exclaimed, “Slight! hasty! this most noble, most solid work!”

  “Solid in your opinion,” said Churchill, with a smile deferential, slightly sneering.

  “Our own opinion is all that either of us can give,” said Beauclerc; “in my opinion it is the finest view of the progress of natural philosophy, the most enlarged, the most just in its judgments of the past, and in its prescience of the future; in the richness of experimental knowledge, in its theoretic invention, the greatest work by any one individual since the time of Bacon.”

  “And Bacon is under your protection, too?”

  “Protection! my protection?” said Beauclerc.

  “Pardon me, I simply meant to ask if you are one of those who swear by Lord Verulam.”

  “I swear by no man, I do not swear at all, not on philosophical subjects especially; swearing adds nothing to faith,” said Beauclerc.

  “I stand corrected,” said Churchill, “and I would go further, and add that in argument enthusiasm adds nothing to reason — much as I admire, as we all admire,” glancing at Miss Stanley, “that enthusiasm with which this favoured work has been advocated!”

  “I could not help speaking warmly,” cried Beauclerc; “it is a book to inspire enthusiasm; there is such a noble spirit all through it, so pure from petty passions, from all vulgar jealousies, all low concerns! Judge of a book, somebody says, by the impression it leaves on your mind when you lay it down; this book stands that test, at least with me, I lay it down with such a wish to follow — with steps ever so unequal still to follow, where it points the way.”

  “Bravo! bravissimo! hear him, hear him! print him, print him! hot-press from the author to the author, hot-press!” cried Churchill, and he laughed.

  Like one suddenly awakened from the trance of enthusiasm by the cold touch of ridicule, stood Beauclerc, brought down from heaven to earth, and by that horrid little laugh, not the heart’s laugh.

  “But my being ridiculous does not make my cause so, and that is a comfort.”

  “And another comfort you may have, my dear Granville,” said Lady Davenant, “that ridicule is not the test of truth; truth should be the test of ridicule.”

  “But where is the book?” continued Beauclerc.

  Helen gave it to him.

  “Now, Mr. Churchill,” said Beauclerc; “I am really anxious, I know you are such a good critic, will you show me these faults? blame as well as praise must always be valuable from those who themselves excel.”

  “You are too good,” said Churchill.

  “Will you then be good enough to point out the errors for me?”

  “Oh, by no means,” cried Churchill, “don’t note me, do not quote me, I am nobody, and I cannot give up my authorities.”

  “But the truth is all I want to get at,” said Beauclerc.

  “Let her rest, my dear sir, at the bottom of her well; there she is, and there she will be for ever and ever, and depend upon it none of our windlassing will ever bring her up.”

  “Such an author as this,” continued Beauclerc, “would have been so glad to have corrected any error.”

  “So every author tells you, but I never saw one of them who did not look blank at a list of errata — if you knew how little one is thanked for them!”

  “But you would be thanked now,” said Beauclerc:—”the faults in style, at least.”

  “Nay, I am no critic,” said Churchill, confident in his habits of literary detection; “but if you ask me,” said he, as he disdainfully flirted the leaves back and forward with a “There now!” and a “Here now!” “We should not call that good writing — you could not think this correct? I may be wrong, but I should not use this phrase. Hardly English that — colloquial, I think; and this awkward ablative absolute — never admitted now.”

  “Thank you,” said Beauclerc, “these faults are easily mended.”

  “Easily mended, say you? I say, better make a new one.”

  “WHO COULD?” said Beauclerc.

  “How many faults you see,” said Helen, “which I should never have perceived unless you had pointed them out, and I am sorry to know them now.” Smiling at Helen’s look of sincere mortification, in contrast at this moment with Mr. Churchill’s air of satisfied critical pride, Lady Davenant said, —

  “Why sorry, my dear Helen? No human work can be perfect; Mr. Churchill may be proud of that strength of eye which in such a powerful light can count the spots. But whether it be the best use to make of his eyes, or the best use that can be made of the light, remains to be considered.”

  CHAPTER XV.

  Beyond measure was Churchill provoked to find Lady Davenant against him and on the same side as Granville Beauclerc — all unused to contradiction in his own society, where he had long been supreme, he felt a difference of opinion so sturdily maintained as a personal insult.

  For so young a man as Beauclerc, yet unknown to fame, not only to challenge the combat but to obtain the victory, was intolerable; and the more so, because his young opponent appeared no ways elated or surprised, but seemed satisfied to attribute his success to the goodness of his cause.

  Churchill had hitherto always managed wisely his great stakes and pretensions in both the fashionable and literary world. He had never actually published any thing except a clever article or two in a review, or an epigram, attributed to him but not acknowledged. Having avoided giving his measure, it was believed he was above all who had been publicly tried — it was always said—”If Horace Churchill would but publish, he would surpass every other author of our times.”

  Churchill accordingly dreaded and hated all who might by possibility approach the throne of fashion, or interfere with his dictatorship in a certain literary set in London, and from this moment he began cordially to detest Beauclerc — he viewed him with a scornful, yet with jealous eyes; but his was the jealousy of vanity, not of love; it regarded Lady Davenant and his fashionable reputation in the first place — Helen only in the second.

  Lady Davenant observed all this, and was anxious to know how much or how little Helen had seen, and what degree of interest it excited in her mind. One morning, when they were alone together, looking over a cabinet of cameos, Lady Davenant pointed to one which she thought like Mr. Beauclerc. Helen did not see the likeness.

  “Peopl
e see likenesses very differently,” said Lady Davenant. “But you and I, Helen, usually see characters, if not faces, with the same eyes. I have been thinking of these two gentlemen, Mr. Churchill and Mr. Beauclerc — which do you think the most agreeable?”

  “Mr. Churchill is amusing certainly,” said Helen, “but I think Mr. Beauclerc’s conversation much more interesting — though Mr. Churchill is agreeable, sometimes — when—”

  “When he flatters you,” said Lady Davenant.

  “When he is not satirical — I was going to say,” said Helen.

  “There is a continual petty brilliancy, a petty effort too,” continued Lady Davenant, “in Mr. Churchill, that tires me — sparks struck perpetually, but then you hear the striking of the flints, the clink of the tinder-box.”

  Helen, though she admitted the tinder-box, thought it too low a comparison. She thought Churchill’s were not mere sparks.

  “Well, fireworks, if you will,” said Lady Davenant, “that rise, blaze, burst, fall, and leave you in darkness, and with a disagreeable smell too; and it’s all feu d’artifice after all. Now in Beauclerc there is too little art and too ardent nature. Some French friends of mine who knew both, said of Mr. Churchill, ‘De l’esprit on ne peut pas plus même à Paris,’ the highest compliment a Parisian can pay, but they allowed that Beauclerc had ‘beaucoup plus d’ame.’”

  “Yes,” said Helen; “how far superior!”

  “It has been said,” continued Lady Davenant, “that it is safer to judge of men by their actions than by their words, but there are few actions and many words in life; and if women would avail themselves of their daily, hourly, opportunities of judging people by their words, they would get at the natural characters, or, what is of just as much consequence, they would penetrate through the acquired habits; and here Helen, you have two good studies before you.”

  Preoccupied as Helen was with the certainty of Beauclerc being an engaged, almost a married man, and looking, as she did, on Churchill as one who must consider her as utterly beneath his notice, she listened to Lady Davenant’s remarks as she would have done to observations about two characters in a novel or on the stage.