Collected Works of Frances Trollope

by Frances Milton Trollope

  No human being ever heard him say a silly thing; it is true he did not talk much, carefully avoiding all subjects upon which men divide themselves into parties, so that his opinions were, for the most part, as unknown as his birth, parentage, education, and means of living. Even the yawning gulf which divides the conservative from the destructive, seemed a broad highway for him, for though nobody ever dreamed of accusing him of a change in principle or opinion, each party fancied he belonged to them in turn; and as neither could give any better reason for thinking so, than their own arbitrary interpretation of a quiet smile, or a gentle movement of the hand, each were at liberty to believe so still. One or two very old acquaintances, indeed, who fancied that they knew him better, have been heard to declare that they did not believe Mr. Armondyle would draw off his right glove to prevent a revolution, or his left to insure it. He knew mankind well enough, they said, to be very sure that, let what would happen, there would always be, somewhere or other, a game at something or other, to amuse idle men who had nothing particular to do; and with this assurance he would be well contented to go on shuffling and cutting to his dying day, without troubling himself to ascertain who was the better player, and who the worse, in the great game of politics in which he had never been invited to take a hand. It was sometimes gossiped in the clubs that Armondyle had lost immensely, or that Armondyle had won immensely; but neither the one report nor the other appeared to have the slightest effect on his manière d’être. He was ever the same neat, placid, polite person, whom nothing had occurred to disarrange, and whom it would be extremely difficult to discompose.

  This gentleman made the dinner-party at Mr. O’Donagough’s amount to eight; and as of these four were gentlemen and four ladies, Miss Louisa Perkins was led to observe that she had never seen any dinner-table so perfectly well arranged.

  Of the entertainment it is unnecessary to speak at large; Mrs. O’Donagough had done her very best. Mr. Wright furnished the wines, which Mr. Foxcroft took upon himself to declare were excellent, and yet the gentleman repaired to the drawing-room the very moment Mrs. O’Donagough sent to say that the coffee was ready; a good old custom which Mr. O’Donagough declared it was his intention invariably to observe, unless some very young men happened to dine with him, and then he should certainly relax a little, he said, as it was never fair to “come the old codger over boys, and if they liked to be a little tipsy, he should always let them be so.”

  Sir Henry Seymour, however, did not appear to be classed under this category. He produced no alteration in the ordinary arrangement, and if it was even intended, by way of experiment, that he too should get a little tipsy before the card-playing began, this first visit was not considered as a fitting time for it.

  Though Patty was seated at table next to her “darling Jack,’ she was the one to whom the entertainment seemed the longest and the least agreeable; for the young man, though good-humoured, and even kind in his manner of addressing her, made no nearer approximation to love-making in his manner than if she had been sixty, and he fourscore. Her father perceived this, as well as herself, and it was immediately determined in the little committee on ways and means which sat for ever in his brain, that the young man should pay for the obduracy of his heart at the card-table. Not indeed on the present occasion; that would be contrary to all the rules and regulations made and provided in such cases; but steadfastly purposed was Mr. O’Donagough that if it should finally be proved that Sir Henry Seymour was not in love with his daughter, he should pay sharp damages for his indifference. Miss Louisa Perkins, untroubled by any passion, tender or otherwise, smiled, and ate, and smiled again. Mr. Armondyle endeavoured to make himself comfortable, which was indeed now, as at every other moment of his existence, his primary object; while Mrs. O’Donagough, who had conceived a sort of mystical idea that he was a person of consequence, poured out civilities upon him with a copious profusion which no sang froid, less perfect than that of Mr. Armondyle could have stood unmoved — his most animated reply, however, was but a very slight inclination of the head. But, as of course might have been anticipated, the most animated group in the party consisted of Miss Matilda Perkins, Mr. Foxcroft, and the blushing troop of little loves and graces which were playing between them.

  It was, in truth, a labour of love, the toilet of Miss Matilda, on that auspicious day! and equally captious and curious were it to inquire with a critical spirit either into the time consumed, or the effect produced by it. Suffice it to say, that her sister, in the short moment that was left for review before stepping into their hackney-coach, pronounced that she looked “very nice, indeed.”

  The result was all that the gentle Matilda’s heart required; for, from the manner, and indeed, from the words of Mr. Foxcroft, it appeared incontestable that he thought she looked very nice too. Obedient to the hint of his patron, this gentleman made the very best use of every moment that preceded his being called, bon gré, mal gré, to take his place at the card table. Never, to be sure, did the most exemplary saint invoke maledictions on the fifty-two offending elements which combine to form the hateful abomination called a pack of cards, with more heartfelt zeal than did the dejected Matilda, as she sat forsaken and forlorn on a couch which commanded the fullest possible view of the form and countenance she loved! Poor lady! Surely no female heart under similar circumstances can fail to feel for her. More moving accidents may assuredly be found to employ the historian’s pen, — sorrows, which on the face of them bear marks of deeper tragedy, may be recounted, and a reader’s sympathy be claimed for sufferings more fatal — but for pure, perfect, unmitigated vexation of spirit, it could hardly be surpassed. A lover (within a quarter of an inch a declared lover) to be sitting in the same room with a young lady of thirty-six, and yet absolutely-precluded from the possibility of uttering a single word to her! Even the pleasure of looking unremittingly in his face was not long allowed her, for Mr. O’Donagough, who naturally felt that the payment of his dinner was not to be risked by the presence of any ladies, old, young, or middle-aged, no sooner, by the course of cutting, lost Mr. Armondyle as a partner, than he unceremoniously requested the female part of the company to establish themselves in the other drawing-room; a piece of tyranny against which there was no appeal, but which made the four ladies rehearse in chorus that well-known sentiment of the fair, namely, “that there is no spectacle which the eye can rest upon, throughout the whole surface of the globe called earth, one-thousandth part so detestable as seeing the only four men in company sit down to whist.”

  The banished ladies (poor things!) naturally fell into two têtes-à-tête; in one of which all the minuter circumstances of Mrs. O’Donagough’s present and approaching greatness were voluminously rehearsed to Miss Louisa’s patient ear, while in the other, the younger ladies resumed the eclogue style, whispering rhapsodies respecting their beloved ones.

  The party altogether, however, produced more of the results wished for than generally happens where expectation has been so highly wrought — our poor Patty being, in fact, the only one disappointed essentially. Mr. O’Donagough had made up his mind to he equally well contented by Sir Henry Seymour’s showing symptoms of love-making to his daughter, or money losing to himself; and therefore, when he received six five-pound notes from the young baronet, together with a very cordial declaration of their having had an excellent rubber, he was not disappointed. His lady, too much occupied in “tasting her corners,” as she called devouring the compounds of grease and garlick of which she had superintended the preparation, to have time for closely watching the proceedings of her daughter and Sir Henry felt perfectly satisfied, because she perceived he was talking to her; and this, together with the unwearied admiration of Miss Louisa at everything she saw, and everything she heard, sufficed to make her declare that it was “a most delightful dinner-party.” Mr. Armondyle shared the winnings and the satisfaction of his host, being too well pleased at finding a new house to dine at, to permit his being critical at the dinner. Miss Louisa ate a great
deal of apple-pie and custard, to which she was particularly attached; felt conscious that she was a prodigious favourite with the Amphitronia of the feast; and, better than all, began to entertain very serious hopes that her poor, dear, darling, tender-hearted Matilda would get a husband at last, after all the quantity of cruel disappointments which the perfidious false-heartedness of men had made her suffer. Sir Henry Seymour was quite as well pleased as any of them. For while the skilful O’Donagough contrived to make him constantly remember his own near connection with General Hubert, he set him completely at his ease respecting Patty, whom the wily father spoke of as a mere child, but one greatly petted and beloved by Mrs. Hubert and her daughter. At the moment when this affectionate partiality was dwelt upon, Sir Henry Seymour might have been seen, had anybody watched him, to fix his eyes upon the object of it with a very naive expression of astonishment; but his own superlatively sweet temper succeeded, after a short struggle with Ms common sense, to convince him that it was all very natural, considering how very kind-hearted and affectionate the poor girl was, and how perfectly impossible it was for her to help being vulgar.

  But general as the satisfaction of the company seemed to he — for even poor Patty convinced herself, before the end of the evening, that the difference in Jack was only because there were so many plaguy people watching them — general as was this satisfaction, it was nothing in comparison to the heartfelt happiness of the lady and gentleman for whom the entertainment had been originally planned. The feelings of Mr. Foxcroft, who, as he meditated on the “independence” dwelt on by Mr.

  O’Donagough, became what might truly be termed desperately attached to the fair Matilda, were gratified in the greatest degree by perceiving that, however favourable the impression he had made upon her at Brighton, he had rather gained, than lost, by absence. For not even in the last trying moments when they had got wet through together on the Pier, had she shown such unequivocal marks of attachment, as when he trod upon her toe during that day’s dinner. Of the state of Miss Matilda herself it would really he difficult to speak at length without deviating from the necessary sobriety of prose; so elevating, entrancing, soul-subduing were the emotions which took possession of her during the ineffable two hours of their juxta-position at the dinner-table.

  Nothing, in short, could in all ways have succeeded better than this opening of the O’Donagoughs’ London campaign; and the busy future rose before the eyes of all, decked in the very brightest colours, and pregnant with all sorts of agreeable possibilities.

  CHAPTER XXVI.

  FROM the day of Mr. Foxcroft’s first London conversation with Mr. O’Donagough, he had completely made up his mind as to the line of conduct he should pursue respecting Miss Matilda Perkins, and for some time he strictly adhered to it. Circumstances afterwards occurred which occasioned some trifling change; but the principle continued the same, and no one, judging of his conduct in an unprejudiced manner, could possibly accuse him of inconsistency. To take a step so important in life as that of marriage, without making himself properly acquainted with the lady he was to wed, or rather, with all the most important circumstances respecting her, would have been an imprudence of which Mr. Foxcroft, with all his indiscretions, would have been quite incapable. He purposed, however, in the first instance, to assure himself that his tender passion would, beyond all doubt, be acceptable to the lady, if future inquiries should authorise a declaration of it; and this fact would certainly have been satisfactorily established in the judgment of a shyer man than the ex-lieutenant, by the manner in which his experimental advances had been received.

  Satisfied on this point, the next step in the process was to make a morning visit to the Miss Perkinses at their own dwelling, where, after having paid his compliments to them, without any apology for the liberty, and quite as a matter of course, he ventured to solicit a private audience of the elder sister, according to the mode in which it is usual to request leave to “speak a few words to a young lady’s papa.”

  In this case, as in all others of the kind, the proposal for such a conference announced the object of it to all the parties concerned. Even Miss Louisa, though not particularly rapid in her conclusions, experienced not the slightest doubt on the subject, and turning to her sister with great propriety of manner, she said, “Matilda, my dear, Captain Foxcroft wishes to speak to me upon a little business, I believe. Will you be so kind as just to go out of the room, my dear?”

  In her very inmost heart, perhaps, Miss Matilda might have thought that, considering all that had already passed between them, this ceremony might have been dispensed with; but, too happy at this near approach of the fulfilment of all her wishes to quarrel with trifles, she turned one look of blushing languishment upon her lover, and left the room.

  Mr. Foxcroft waited till the door was closed, and no longer; nothing in the slightest degree like embarrassment shook his nerves; he meant to make a straightforward proposal of marriage, subject to the possibility of being able to make up, by means of the lady’s fortune and his own, such an income as he thought might be sufficient to secure the happiness of the woman he adored. —

  Miss Louisa, who (from a sort of “mother-wit,” it must be presumed, for no circumstance of the kind had ever happened to her before) was quite aware of what was to follow, placed herself exactly in the middle of the sofa, looking a little more demure than usual, and making a movement with her right hand, which indicated that the gentleman was to place himself in a chair opposite, awaited his avowal with great decorum.

  “My dear Miss Perkins,” he began, with a sort of affectionate familiarity that seemed a foretaste of brotherly love, “my dear Miss Perkins, you must, I feel quite sure, have long ago discovered the state of my affections — you must be aware that I adore your sister.”

  “I certainly have thought, Captain Foxcroft,” replied Miss Louisa, blushing a little at the fervour of his expressions, “I certainly have fancied that I saw something like a little partiality.” —

  “Ah, my dear madam!” resumed the lover, “such measured language can but ill paint my feelings. But I will not pain your sensitive delicacy by dwelling too explicitly on the vehemence of a passion which our unfortunate sex has never been able to inspire in yourself. What I would first ask is, whether you think your charming sister, to whom I am too much a man of honour ever as yet to have confessed my love, has still a heart to bestow on me in return, and whether I may hope to receive in my behalf, the friendly approbation of yourself?”

  “Oh, dear me! as to myself, Captain Foxcroft, I am sure there is nothing whatever I would not do or say to secure the happiness of my dear sister Matilda in the married state; for it has, indeed, for a good many years, been my very greatest wish. Not, Captain Foxcroft, that this is to argue anything against her youngness, for I began to wish it when she was very young, because, I mean, of her great affectionateness of temper, and all that. And then, about her own heart, I think that, may be, if you were just to ask her yourself, it would perhaps he the best means of finding out what she thinks about you.”

  “So encouraged, my dear Miss Perkins, I may nerve my courage to the attempt. But, alas! before I can throw myself at her feet, the odious trammels of the world force from me another inquiry, hardly less necessary, such unhappily is the formation of society, than the first. Before I offer my hand in marriage to your sister, my dear Miss Louisa, it is absolutely necessary that I should ascertain from you whether our united incomes would amount to such a sum as I should deem sufficient for insuring the happiness of the woman I so fondly adore. My own resources are of the most fixed and unobjectionable kind; but I grieve to say that, ample as they are for my own expenditure, I cannot consider them sufficient to secure, without some trifling addition, such a degree of elegance in our establishment as I should wish my wife to enjoy. Will you tell me, then, with the same frankness with which I ask it, what is your sister’s fortune?”

  “I will tell you, sir, without any sort of deception whatever,” replied Miss L
ouisa, not, however, without some little symptoms of hesitation in her voice and manner. “Of course it is right and proper that you should know everything; for who has a right to ask, if it isn’t a gentleman who comes forward in such an honourable manner to offer to be her husband? But before I come to any particulars, I should just wish to say, that there is not a person in the world that would be happier upon quite a small little income than my sister Matilda. It stands to reason that I must know her if anybody can; and I am quite certain sure that if she had a good husband she would not care the least bit in the world about money, whether it was a little more or a little less.”

  “Charming, disinterested creature!” exclaimed Mr. Foxcroft, with great emotion. “But do you not perceive, my dear madam, that the less care her noble nature bestows upon such subjects, the more incumbent it is upon the husband she honours with her love to attend to them? Never should I forgive myself if I suffered the blind vehemence of passion to hurry me into a step that might bring privation and inconvenience upon her! No, Miss Louisa; on that point my mind is irrevocably made up. Nothing — not even the having to tear her lovely image from my bleeding heart — should induce me to commit an imprudence which, with my views upon the subject, must in my own conscience be classed as a crime. I beseech you, therefore, to end this terrible suspense by telling me, with all the openness you have promised, the exact amount of your sister’s fortune.”