Collected Works of Frances Trollope

by Frances Milton Trollope

  “I did,” replied Rosalind, “and my reasonings upon it are very consolatory; for if he has already found time and inclination to produce so great effect there, why should we fear that his labours of love here should prove more dangerous in their tendency?”

  “Very true. Nor do I see any reason in the world why the Mowbray is in greater peril than the Simpson, or the Fanny than the Louisa, — excepting that one widow is about twenty times richer than the other, and the little young lady about five hundred times handsomer than the great one.”

  At this moment the Mr. Cartwrights, father and son, were seen turning off from the regular approach to the house, towards the little gate that opened from the lawn; a friendly and familiar mode of entrance, which seemed to have become quite habitual to them.

  Rosalind, who was the first to perceive them, flew towards the door, saying, “You must excuse me for running away, Miss Cartwright. I invited that furbelow widow to stay on purpose to spare me this almost tête-à-tête meeting. I will seek the ladies and return with them.”

  “Then so will I too,” said Henrietta, hastily following her. “I am by no means disposed to stand the cross-examination which I know will ensue if I remain here alone.”

  The consequence of this movement was, that the vicar and his son prepared their smiles in vain; for, on entering the drawing-room, sofas and ottomans, footstools, tables, and chairs, alone greeted them.

  Young Cartwright immediately began peeping into the work-boxes and portfolios which lay on the tables.

  “Look here, sir,” said he, holding up a caricature of Lord B —— m. “Is not this sinful?”

  “Do be quiet, Jacob! — we shall have them here in a moment; — I really wish I could teach you when your interest is at stake to make the best of yourself. You know that I should be particularly pleased by your marrying Miss Torrington; and I do beg, my dear boy, that you will not suffer your childish spirits to put any difficulties in my way.”

  “I will become an example unto all men,” replied Jacob, shutting up his eyes and mouth demurely, and placing himself bolt upright upon the music-stool.

  “If you and your sister could but mingle natures a little,” said Mr. Cartwright, “you would both be wonderfully improved. Nothing with which I am acquainted, however joyous, can ever induce Henrietta to smile; and nothing, however sad, can prevent your being on the broad grin from morning to night. However, of the two, I confess I think you are the most endurable.”

  “A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, and a rod for the fool’s back,” said Jacob in a sanctified tone.

  “Upon my honour, Jacob, I shall be very angry with you if you do not set about this love-making as I would have you. Don’t make ducks and drakes of eighty thousand pounds: — at least, not till you have got them.”

  “Answer not a fool according to his folly, least he be wise in his own conceit,” said Jacob.

  Mr. Cartwright smiled, as it seemed against his will, but shook his head very solemnly. “I’ll tell you what, Jacob,” said he,— “if I see you set about this in a way to please me, I’ll give you five shillings to-morrow morning.”

  “Wherefore is there a price in the hand of a fool to get wisdom, seeing he hath no heart to it?” replied Jacob. “Nevertheless, father, I will look lovingly upon the maiden, and receive thy promised gift, even as thou sayest.”

  “Upon my word, Jacob, you try my patience too severely,” said the vicar; yet there was certainly but little wrath in his eye as he said so, and his chartered libertine of a son was preparing again to answer him in the words of Solomon, but in a spirit of very indecent buffoonery, when the drawing-room door opened, and Mrs. Simpson, Miss Richards, and Fanny Mowbray entered.

  It appeared that Rosalind and Miss Cartwright on escaping from the drawing-room had not sought the other ladies, but taken refuge in the dining-parlour, from whence they issued immediately after the others had passed the door, and entering the drawing-room with them, enjoyed the gratification of witnessing the meeting of the vicar and his fair parishioners.

  To the surprise of Rosalind, and the great though silent amusement of her companion, they perceived that both the stranger ladies had contrived to make a very edifying and remarkable alteration in the general appearance of their dress.

  Miss Richards had combed her abounding black curls as nearly straight as their nature would allow, and finally brought them into very reverential order by the aid of her ears, and sundry black pins to boot, — an arrangement by no means unfavourable to the display of her dark eyes and eyebrows.

  But the change produced by the castigato toilet of the widow was considerably more important. A transparent blond chemisette, rather calculated to adorn than conceal that part of the person to which it belonged, was now completely hidden by a lavender-coloured silk handkerchief, tightly, smoothly, and with careful security pinned behind, and before, and above, and below, upon her full but graceful bust.

  Rosalind had more than once of late amused herself by looking over the pages of Molière’s “Tartuffe;” and a passage now occurred to her that she could not resist muttering in the ear of Henrietta: —

  “Ah, mon Dieu! je vous prie, Avant que de parler, prenez-moi ce mouchoir” — &c.

  The comer of Miss Cartwright’s mouth expressed her appreciation of the quotation, but by a movement so slight that none but Rosalind could perceive it.

  Meanwhile the vicar approached Mrs. Simpson with a look that was full of meaning, and intended to express admiration both of her mental and personal endowments. She, too, had banished the drooping ringlets from her cheeks, and appeared before him with all the pretty severity of a Madonna band across her forehead.

  Was it in the nature of man to witness such touching proofs of his influence without being affected thereby? At any rate, such indifference made no part of the character of the Vicar of Wrexhill, and the murmured “Bless you, my dear lady!” which accompanied his neighbourly pressure of the widow Simpson’s hand, gave her to understand how much his grateful and affectionate feelings were gratified by her attention to the hints he had found an opportunity to give her during a tête-à-tête conversation at her own house a few days before.

  Nor was the delicate attention of Miss Richards overlooked. She, too, felt at her fingers’ ends how greatly the sacrifice of her curls was approved by the graceful vicar, who now sat down surrounded by this fair bevy of ladies, smiling with bland and gentle sweetness on them all.

  Mr. Jacob thought of the promised five shillings, and displaying his fine teeth from ear to ear, presented a chair to Miss Torrington.

  “I wish you would let us have a song, Miss Rosalind Torrington,” said he, stationing himself at the back of her chair and leaning over her shoulder. “I am told that your voice beats every thing on earth hollow.”

  His eye caught an approving glance from his father as he took this station, and he wisely trusted to his attitude for obtaining his reward, for these words were audible only to the young lady herself.

  “You are a mighty odd set of people!” said she, turning round to him. “I cannot imagine how you all contrive to live together! There is not one of you that does not appear to be a contrast to the other two.”

  “Then, at any rate, you cannot dislike us all equally,” said the strange lad, with a grimace that made her laugh, despite her inclination to look grave.

  “I do not know that,” was the reply. “I may dislike you all equally, and yet have a different species of dislike for each.”

  “But one species must be stronger and more vigorous than the others. Besides, I will assist your judgment. I do not mean to say I am quite perfect; but, depend upon it, I’m the best of the set, as you call us.”

  “Your authority, Mr. Jacob, is the best in the world, certainly. Nevertheless, there are many who on such an occasion might suspect you of partiality.”

  “Then they would do me great injustice, Miss Torrington. I am a man, or a boy, or something between both: take me for all in all, it
is five hundred to one you ne’er shall look upon my like again. But that is a play-going and sinful quotation, Miss Rosalind, like your name: so be merciful unto me, and please not to tell my papa.”

  “You may be very certain, Mr. Jacob, that I shall obey you in this.”

  “Sweetest nut hath sourest rind, — Such a nut is Rosalind.”

  responded the youth; and probably thinking that he had fairly won his five shillings, he raised his tall thin person from the position which had so well pleased his father, and stole round to the sofa on which Fanny was sitting.

  Fanny was looking very lovely, but without a trace of that bright and beaming animation which a few short months before had led her poor father to give her the sobriquet of “Firefly.” He was wont to declare, and no one was inclined to contradict him, that whenever she appeared, something like a bright coruscation seemed to flash upon the eye. No one, not even a fond father, would have hit upon such a simile for her now. Beautiful she was, perhaps more beautiful than ever; but a sad and sombre thoughtfulness had settled itself on her young brow, — her voice was no longer the echo of gay thoughts, and, in a word, her whole aspect and bearing were changed.

  She now sat silently apart from the company, watching, with an air that seemed to hover between abstraction and curiosity, Mrs. Simpson’s manner of making herself agreeable to Mr. Cartwright.

  This lady was seated on one side of the vicar, and Miss Richards on the other: both had the appearance of being unconscious that any other person or persons were in the room, and nothing but his consummate skill in the art of uttering an aside both with eyes and lips could have enabled him to sustain his position.

  “My sisters and I are afraid you have quite forgotten us,” murmured Miss Richards; “but we have been practising the hymns you gave us, and we are all quite perfect, and ready to sing them to you whenever you come.”

  “The hearing this, my dear young lady, gives me as pure and holy a pleasure as listening to the sacred strains could do: — unless, indeed,” he added, bending his head sideways towards her, so as nearly to touch her cheek, “unless, indeed, they were breathed by the lips of Louisa herself. That must be very like hearing a seraph sing!”

  Not a syllable of this was heard save by herself.

  “I have thought incessantly,” said Mrs. Simpson, in a very low voice, as soon as Mr. Cartwright’s head had recovered the perpendicular,— “incessantly, I may truly say, on our last conversation. My life has been passed in a manner so widely different from what I am sure it will be in future, that I feel as if I were awakened to a new existence!”

  “The great object of my hopes is, and will ever be,” replied the Vicar of Wrexhill almost aloud, “to lead my beloved flock to sweet and safe pastures. — And for you,” he added, in a voice so low, that she rather felt than heard his words, “what is there I would not do?” Here his eyes spoke a commentary; and hers, a note upon it.

  “Which is the hymn, Mr. Cartwright, that you think best adapted to the semi-weekly Sabbath you recommended us to institute?” said Miss Richards.

  “The eleventh, I think. — Yes, the eleventh; — study that, my dear child. Early and late let your sweet voice breathe those words, — and I will be with you in spirit, Louisa.”

  Not even Mrs. Simpson heard a word of this, beyond “dear child.”

  “But when shall I see you? — I have doubts and difficulties on some points, Mr. Cartwright,” said the widow aloud. “How shamefully ignorant — I must call it shamefully ignorant — did poor Mr. Wallace suffer us to remain! — Is it not true, Louisa? Did he ever, through all the years we have known him, utter an awakening word to any of us?”

  “No, indeed he never did,” replied Miss Louisa, in a sort of penitent whine.

  “I am rather surprised to hear you say that, Miss Richards,” said Rosalind, drawing her chair a little towards them. “I always understood that Mr. Wallace was one of the most exemplary parish priests in England. Did not your father consider him to be so, Fanny?”

  “I — I believe so, — I don’t know,” replied Fanny, stammering and colouring painfully.

  “Not know, Fanny Mowbray!” exclaimed Rosalind;— “not know your father’s opinion of Mr. Wallace! That is very singular indeed.”

  “I mean,” said Fanny, struggling to recover her composure, “that I never heard papa’s opinion of him as compared with — with any one else.”

  “I do not believe he would have lost by the comparison,” said Rosalind, rising, and walking out of the window.

  “Is not that prodigiously rich young lady somewhat of the tiger breed?” said young Cartwright in a whisper to Fanny.

  “Miss Torrington is not at all a person of serious notions,” replied Fanny; “and till one is subdued by religion, one is often very quarrelsome.”

  “I am sure, serious or not, you would never quarrel with any one,” whispered Jacob.

  “Indeed I should be sorry and ashamed to do so now,” she replied. “Your father ought to cure us all of such unchristian faults as that.”

  “I wish I was like my father!” said Jacob very sentimentally.

  “Oh! how glad I am to hear you say that!” said Fanny, clasping her hands together. “I am sure it would make him so happy!”

  “I can’t say I was thinking of making him happy, Miss Fanny: I only meant, that I wished I was like any body that you admire and approve so much.”

  “A poor silly motive for wishing to be like such a father!” replied Fanny, blushing; and leaving her distant place, she established herself at the table on which the tea equipage had just been placed, and busied herself with the tea-cups.

  This remove brought her very nearly opposite Mr. Cartwright and the two ladies who were seated beside him, and from this moment the conversation proceeded without any “asides” whatever.

  “At what age, Mr. Cartwright,” said Mrs. Simpson, “do you think one should begin to instil the doctrine of regeneration into a little girl?”

  “Not later than ten, my dear lady. A very quick and forward child might perhaps be led to comprehend it earlier. Eight and three-quarters I have known in a state of the most perfect awakening; but this I hold to be rare.”

  “What a spectacle!” exclaimed Miss Richards in a sort of rapture. “A child of eight and three-quarters! Did it speak its thoughts, Mr. Cartwright?”

  “The case I allude to, my dear young lady, was published. I will bring you the pamphlet. Nothing can be more edifying than the out-breakings of the Spirit through the organs of that chosen little vessel.”

  “I hope, Mr. Cartwright, that I shall have the benefit of this dear pamphlet also. Do not forget that I have a little girl exactly eight years three-quarters and six weeks. — I beg your pardon, my dear Louisa, but this must be so much more interesting to me than it can be to you as yet, my dear, that I trust Mr. Cartwright will give me the precedence in point of time. Besides, you know, that as the principal person in the village, I am a little spoiled in such matters. I confess to you, I should feel hurt if I had to wait for this till you had studied it. You have no child, you know.”

  “Oh! without doubt, Mrs. Simpson, you ought to have it first,” replied Miss Richards. “I am certainly not likely as yet to have any one’s soul to be anxious about but my own. — Is this blessed child alive, Mr. Cartwright?”

  “In heaven, Miss Louisa, — not on earth. It is the account of its last moments that have been so admirably drawn up by the Reverend Josiah Martin. This gentleman is a particular friend of mine, and I am much interested in the sale of the little work. I will have the pleasure, my dear ladies, of bringing a dozen copies to each of you; and you will give me a very pleasing proof of the pious feeling I so deeply rejoice to see, if you will dispose of them at one shilling each among your friends.”

  “I am sure I will try all I can!” said Miss Richards.

  “My influence could not be better employed, I am certain, than in forwarding your wishes in all things,” added Mrs. Simpson.

&nbs
p; Young Jacob, either in the hope of amusement, or of more certainly securing his five shillings, had followed the indignant Rosalind out of the window, and found her refreshing herself by arranging the vagrant tendrils of a beautiful creeping plant outside it.

  “I am afraid, Miss Rosalind Torrington,” said he, “that you would not say Amen! if I did say, May the saints have you in their holy keeping! I do believe in my heart that you would rather find yourself in the keeping of sinners.”

  “The meaning of words often depends upon the character of those who utter them,” replied Rosalind. “There is such a thing as slang, Mr. Jacob; and there is such a thing as cant.”

  “Did you ever mention that to my papa, Miss Rosalind?” inquired Jacob in a voice of great simplicity.

  Rosalind looked at him as if she wished to discover what he was at, — whether his object were to quiz her, his father, or both. But considering his very boyish appearance and manner, there was more difficulty in achieving this than might have been expected. Sometimes she thought him almost a fool; at others, quite a wag. At one moment she was ready to believe him more than commonly simple-minded; and at another felt persuaded that he was an accomplished hypocrite.

  It is probable that the youth perceived her purpose, and felt more gratification in defeating it than he could have done from any love-making of which she were the object. His countenance, which was certainly intended by nature to express little besides frolic and fun, was now puckered up into a look of solemnity that might have befitted one of the Newman-street congregation when awaiting an address in the unknown tongue.

  “I am sure,” he said, “that my papa would like to hear you talk about all those things very much, Miss Torrington. I do not think that he would exactly agree with you in every word you might say: but that never seems to vex him: if the talk does but go about heaven and hell, and saints and sinners, and reprobation and regeneration, and the old man and the new birth, that is all papa cares for. I think he likes to be contradicted a little; for that, you know, makes more talk again.”