Collected Works of Frances Trollope

by Frances Milton Trollope

  Never, perhaps, had any woman loved so often and so devotedly! Oh! she felt to the very centre of her soul that she deserved to be loved again, and the having failed of this well-merited reward, and that too through at least twenty years of unremitting though various affection, had left a bitterness of indignation at her heart, which poisoned all her hours, and rendered her life one mournful, long-drawn, love-lorn sigh. But now, how delightfully was all around her changed! What a rainbow radiance fell upon every thought of the future.

  Hope sprang aloft upon exulting wings;

  the bark that supported her slight figure, as she gracefully leaned over the taffrail, seemed wafted by breezes from heaven, and its sails filled by the soft sweet breath of love.

  Miss Matilda was, in her way, a great reader; she had dipped into several accounts of America, and she was quite aware how exceedingly the natives were behind-hand in all matters of grace and fashion. What an enormous advantage, therefore, would this give her over all the native daughters of the land! How certain did she feel that her knowledge of life, her elegant manners, her particularly small waist, and two or three new bonnets and dresses which she had bought at the bazaar two days before she set off, would place her in a position of immeasurable superiority above everybody that she was at all likely to be seen with! In short, her swelling heart felt no fears for the result; and the only thing approaching anxiety which crossed her mind was the question whether it would be best for her to accept the first man that offered, or wait a little to take the advantage of choice.

  Miss Matilda certainly did not mean to assimilate herself to a housemaid; nevertheless, having a general idea that a certain letter concerning Australia, which she had heard greatly admired, was somehow or other about America, she could not but recall with interest the historical fact therein mentioned, which records that marriageable females arriving from the motherland were so eagerly sought in wedlock there, that proposals were made to them as they approached the land through speaking-trumpets. Had this circumstance been recalled to the mind of Miss Matilda as one which had influenced her wish to leave England, it is highly probable that she would have rejected the suggestion with disdain, and have declared herself not such a fool as to take for earnest what was perhaps written in jest.

  It is, however, unquestionably certain that there had been moments in the course of the last ten years of Miss Matilda Perkins’s existence, during which this graphic image of abounding husbands had returned again and again to her fancy, throwing a sort of El Dorado halo around the name of America, which had not been without its effect.

  “I know it is put down there most likely in the way of a joke,” she had one day said to herself, in musing monologue; “but for all that, I dare say it means something. There is no fire without smoke.” And Miss Matilda looked at the map.

  But how could her wildest dreams at that time have painted the possibility of her ever traversing such a world of water? Yet here she was, beyond the possibility of a doubt, actually embarked on board a ship bound to America! The fact was so extraordinary, so astounding, so delightful, that sometimes it seemed to transcend all reasonable belief, and at others to elevate her spirits almost beyond the power of restraining them within proper limits. Such a delightful party too! Her most particular friend, a young married woman! proverbially the best of chaperons! And then, her husband so fond of her! Such happiness between them! continually suggesting to every one who saw them the dear idea of matrimony, as the easiest and surest mode of attaining perfect felicity! Can we wonder that the soul of Miss Matilda was swimming in bliss, as buoyantly as the ship was swimming upon the waters?

  And thus they made their way down “the majestic bosom of the Thames;” the only grumbling observation proceeding from the lips of poor Louisa. And that was not much; she only muttered to herself—” It is a long lane, they say, that has no turning; but, oh dear! it is a longer still that has got so many.”

  CHAPTER VII.

  WE will not a second time follow the O’Donagough — henceforth the BARNABY — family step by step, or rather knot by knot, across the Atlantic. After a safe and not particularly long passage, they arrived at the Balize, and being placed under the towage of a steamboat, began to make their way up the lordly, but gloomy-tempered Mississippi.

  “Thank God!” exclaimed Major Allen Barnaby — for it was thus he now commanded himself to be constantly designated—” thank God!” he exclaimed, as he sprung on shore on the handsome quay of New Orleans. “We have had a devilish fine passage; but I am not sorry it’s over.”

  “We are none of ns sorry it’s over, I dare say,” replied his portly lady, as soon as she had recovered her balance upon first finding both her feet once more on terra firma. “We are the very luckiest creatures upon God’s earth, that’s certain, major. How the sun shines, don’t it.”

  The facility with which it was probable “Mrs. Barnaby” would fall again into her old habit of calling her husband “major,” had, in truth, been one reason why her John William Patrick Allen O’Donagough Barnaby had chosen to assume that title in preference to every other — and the scheme answered completely; — for so naturally did she resume this appellation, endeared to her doubtless by the remembrance of the early days of her love, that from that time forward she was never known to blunder when addressing him, excepting that now and then at the name of Allen, which he had slipped in before that of Barnaby, as if to identify himself, she would come to a full stop.

  “And now, captain,” said the restored major, “can you lend us a lad just to take these few light articles that the custom-house gentlemen have done with, and show us the way to the boarding house you were talking about.”

  “Cæsar, cabin-boy, shall go along with ye,” replied the captain. “Only I’m thinking that Madam Carmichael will hardly, it may be, have place enough to put you all up, and without notice given too. But for all that, you had best go to her and say I sent you. She’ll be able, I expect, to get some of ye lodged out of the house if there is not room in it.”

  The whole party amounting, as we know, to half a dozen, were by this time collected in a knot, and ready to start. On the whole, perhaps, they did not present a very elegant coup-d’œil, but it is rarely that any ladies appear to advantage on arriving from a voyage. Yet they had all, save the poor, worn-out Miss Louisa, done the best they could towards restoring their appearance. Mrs. Barnaby had liberally refreshed her rouge, and put on a clean collar — but her “front” was sadly out of repair, being, in fact, entirely worn out, and permitting her copious locks of dappled gray to peep forth in various places from amidst the scanty sable, with which it was her object to conceal them. Madame Tornorino, however, certainly looked a great deal handsomer than she ever did before in the whole course of her life, for she was almost pale, and considerably thinner than before her voyage; but her costume was anything but in good repair, and she had not, like her mamma, thought it necessary to put on a clean collar. The hopeful, ardent-minded Matilda, was unhappily thinner than ever, and so pal that as she turned her eyes from her own cheeks, as shown to her o e at a time in the useful little glass set at the back of her hair-brush, as she turned her eyes from those pale cheeks to the glowing bloom on those of Mrs. Barnaby, she suddenly and secretly came to the resolution, that for the future she would herself (in a moderate way) take advantage of the aid which nature, with her usual provident kindness, has prepared for the fading carnations of females of delicate constitution. For the present, however, this was out of her power, as Mrs. Barnaby’s rouge was always locked up; but she thought that at the present moment she should lose little by the pallid delicacy, which, in consideration of her long voyage, could not but be interesting. She therefore gave all the care that circumstances would permit to other decorations. For bow was it possible she could tell who she might see? Not only did she put on a clean collar, but a clean cap too; yet she suffered her hair to fall somewhat too languidly on each side of her face, for it was a little out of curl. But oh! how she p
itied poor dear Mrs. Barnaby for having all her beautiful hair turning gray I and how heartily she thanked heaven in her heart of hearts, that not even her sister Louisa had a gray hair, which plainly showed it was not in the family, and gave her the most charming hope for her own future. So her gauze cap, with its pale pink bows, was set very far back on her head, and the bonnet which was lightly placed upon it had quite the air of a chapeau de jolie femme. The two gentlemen, also, had somewhat refreshed their toilets, in compliment to the character given of Mrs. Carmichael by her friend the captain, which was, that she was as first-rate a lady as any in the place, and “unaccountable smart to be sure.”

  With a light truck to convey such baggage as they were permitted to take from the ship, before the Custom-house had done its duty, the young negro, Cæsar, moved on before them, and the party followed under a broiling sun to the boarding-house.

  Excepting Don Tornorino, who luxuriated in the warmth like a humming-bird, the whole set felt ready to lie down and expire before they had traversed half the distance they had to go. But as the major strode resolutely on without flinching, the four ladies felt that they must stride resolutely on too, and they did so with a degree of enduring patience that did them honour. Fortunately, on arriving at the house of Mrs. Carmichael, they were desired to “walk into the keeping-room had they been turned from the door, the most of them felt quite certain that they should not have lived to reach another.

  It is almost worth while, however, to endure the fervid heat of a southern climate, for the sake of enjoying the delicious devices by which the ingenuity of that very clever creature, man, contrives to quench its terrors, and turn its very torment into luxury.

  The apartment into which Mrs. Carmichael’s negro footman showed the panting Europeans, was a room of some forty feet long, by twenty wide, and lofty in proportion. The expansive floor was covered by cool-looking matting, and round the walls were ranged a variety of sofas, formed for lounging in every possible attitude of Louisianian indolence. Four ample windows opened like folding-doom upon a balcony, rendered almost impervious to the light, by being on all sides surrounded by Venetian blinds; and on a table within the room stood one or two enormous decanters of water, with lumps of ice floating in them; tumblers of all sizes, about a dozen lemons, and abundance of sugar; while under the table stood a basket-covered flask of whisky, of a goodly size; a dozen or two of light cane-bottomed chairs were scattered about the room, lying upon many of which, as well as upon the tables and sofas, were a multitude of large feather-fans, the profusion of which might have struck the strangers as a whimsical peculiarity, had not their obvious utility been so very strongly felt.

  “My goodness gracious, what a heavenly place!” cried Patty, instantly taking possession of a sofa, throwing herself at full length upon it, and seizing upon the largest fan within her reach. “By your leave, ladies,” she added, taking off her bonnet, and tossing it upon the ground, “married women, you know, are always permitted to take liberties.”

  “What a blessing, to be sure, to come into a room like this, after such a walk,” said Mrs. Barnaby, carefully wiping her face, so as to remove as little of her rouge by the operation as possible. “I hope to goodness, major, we arn’t to stay in this horrid climate long. However, as long as we do stay, we can’t be better off than here, so you must loosen your purse-strings, if you please, if it should prove that the elegant lady the captain told us of happens to be rather upish in her prices.”

  “We’ll see about that, my dear,” replied her husband. “It will be a great object, to be sure, to get into a place where one can breathe. But money is money, remember, in America as well as in England.”

  “Il rappelle,” said the delighted Spaniard, “the soft atmosphere of Madrid.”

  “I am sure they must be a most delightful people,” cried Matilda, who, though not a married woman, had ventured to follow the example of Patty, and was both lying down and fanning herself without ceremony. “How irresistibly,” said she, “all this seems to suggest ideas of — in short, I am certain it must be a most domestic country from the evident care taken to make home agreeable.”

  As usual, poor Louisa spoke not. Indeed, she had hardly done so since she had left her native land, but gently, unobtrusively, and apart, she groaned.

  And now a sound was heard as of the approach of slippers too large for the wearer’s feet, and kept on by dint of shoving them onwards at each step, without venturing to raise them from the ground, and then the voice of hard and difficult breathing was perceptible, and then the door of entrance was darkened from side to side, as if a feather bed, exactly not too large to be pushed through it, was being thrust into the room. Of course, the twelve eyes of the new-comers were all turned towards the object thus appearing before them, and notwithstanding the obscurity of the apartment, they one and all very soon became convinced that huge and shapeless as was the approaching mass, it was nevertheless a human being, and moreover a woman.

  “Smart,” murmured Patty, in a voice not quite audible to the panting dame, “what could that fool of a captain mean?” And certainly, in Patty’s acceptation of the word, his application of it might seem strange enough.

  The person of Mrs. Carmichael, the dimensions of which were, seen in whatever direction she could be placed, very nearly six feet by four, was not only enormous in size, but so astonishingly out of all ordinary shape, as to make it no easy matter to clothe it at all. It is not very surprising, therefore, considering the prodigious bulk of every limb, whereby every movement became a labour, that Mrs. Carmichael should get into her clothes with as little labour and pains as possible. And then the heat! Poor Mrs. Carmichael suffered dreadfully from the heat, and certainly cared greatly less how her draperies looked in the eyes of others, than how they felt to herself. So her enormous white calico gown, with its colossal hanging sleeves, was fastened so loosely in the front by one single pin, as to create perpetual alarm in the bystanders, as to the stability of the investiture by which this very important portion of her covering was attached. There was, indeed, what might have been about a yard square of pink gauze loosely tucked in around the bust; but even this depended for its adhesion to the same aforesaid pin, and without it must have floated away into air still thinner than itself.

  Notwithstanding the immensity of Mrs. Carmichael’s person, it was not, as in the case of a preternaturally-expansive oak-tree, the result of advanced age, every year of which had added to its bulk. All the fat which had thus miraculously found a resting-place on the bones of Mrs. Carmichael, had been considerably less than forty years in collecting itself together, and had her face been finished by one chin, instead of three, and the rest of her features in less evident danger of being smothered, she would have been far from ill-looking. Excepting the pink gauze and the white robe already described, with the probable garment under it, together with her large slippers, and probable stockings, she was as much without the foreign aid of ornament as Eve herself. Stays she had none; she wore nothing on her head; nor was there the slightest reason whatever to suppose that she was embarrassed by anything more in the way of clothing than what has already been described.

  Excepting the hard breathing, and an occasional ejaculation expressive of fatigue from moving, Mrs. Carmichael uttered nothing for several minutes after she entered the apartment. Having at length made her way to the part of the room where Major Allen Barnaby stood fanning himself, she dropped down upon a large cane chair, without any arms, every part of which, back and all, became so completely invisible, that she seemed to have perched herself on a three-legged stool — having thus deposited her person, she fixed her soft eyes on the major’s face, and seemed to expect that he should speak first. But her heavy breathings gave her so much the appearance of being, as yet, unfit for any exertion, that her visitor was too polite to address her, and it was therefore Mrs. Carmichael herself who at last opened the conversation.

  “What is your pleasure, sir?” said she, in a voice which, notwithstandi
ng her want of breath, was harmonious, though somewhat drawling.

  “I have called, madam,” he replied, “at the request of our friend Captain Tims, to inquire whether you can accomodate our party with board and lodging.”

  Mrs. Carmichael eyed the numerous group very complacently.

  “For the whole kit of you, sir?” she demanded, with a smile as sweet as it was possible a smile could be from lips so overwhelmed by cheeks.

  “Yes, madam, for all of us.”

  “And for a goodish spell, sir?”

  “Very likely, madam; but that must depend on circumstances.”

  “Of course, sir, of course. Well then, I don’t know — I rather expect I might make it convene, provided any two of the ladies could lie together.”

  The two Miss Perkinses exclaimed at the same moment, “Oh, we can do that, ma’am, quite well.”

  “Well now I calculate it might be done then; but in course you’ll be wanting to see the rooms before you agree; and that’s what Black Jessy can do for you.”

  And so saying, she clapped her great soft hands together, and though the sound thus produced was rather a dumb one, it sufficed to bring a smart-looking negress into the room, who having received sufficient orders from her mistress, stepped lightly and not ungracefully forward to do her bidding, turning her face towards the strangers, and displaying her white teeth, as an invitation to them to follow her.

  This the “whole kit” did, though with some reluctance, perhaps at being obliged to put themselves in motion again. But the great large house was really as cool as it was possible a New Orleans house in the month of July could be, and they could hardly fail of being satisfied with the well ventilated rooms, clean mosquito bars and handsome wardrobes, which were displayed to them.