Read Ebook: Dilemmas of Pride (Vol 2 of 3) by Loudon Mrs Margracia

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rom table; "Well, I am glad, Alfred, you have returned in time not to allow your beautiful heiress to be run away with. Willoughby has been paying fierce love in that quarter I assure you. However, I should hope that with his ninety thousand a-year of his own, he has no serious intention of interfering with your making so desirable a match."

Mrs. Dorothea had effected her exit by the time she finished her speech, so that fortunately no answer was required. An awkward silence however followed; for though all the ladies had by this time departed in various directions, Geoffery's presence precluded any thing like confidential conversation between the brothers.

Accordingly, with as much ease of manner as he could assume, he proposed to Willoughby and Geoffery that they should accompany him in a morning visit to Jessamine Bower.

"I suppose you forgot to ask Mrs. Dorothea's permission before you fall in love," murmured Geoffery aside to Willoughby, as they passed out; "how absurd it is of aunts and mothers to suppose that they are to dictate to young men in these matters; but women love to hear themselves talk."

Lady Palliser not being at home, Alfred was spared the trial of this first visit, and felt that the respite, even till evening, was a sensible relief.

Geoffery, after a vain effort to draw Willoughby to the billiard rooms, repaired thither himself; and the brothers, thus left to each other's society, wandered on into a quiet walk, and naturally fell into confidential conversation.

So well had Alfred hitherto acted his part, and so successfully did he during this interview conceal his emotions, that Willoughby was gradually led to open his whole heart, to dwell with enthusiasm on his attachment, and even to speak of his hopes. He would not have approached this latter part of the subject had he not at length mistaken Alfred's fortitude for indifference, and persuaded himself that prudential considerations must have been chiefly influential in tempting his brother to seek the hand of Caroline.

"I cannot tell you how happy you have made me, Alfred," he said, "by returning among us, and in such good spirits. And remember," he added, "that whenever and wherever you may fix your ultimate choice, it will be my joy to forward your views to the utmost of my power. Whatever settlement the lady's family shall require, you may command at my hands; I speak without limit."

Alfred made an evasive, but affectionate and grateful reply.

"There are cases," replied Alfred, with mournful solemnity, "which certainly require a more than common exertion of fortitude to carry us through the hour of trial. Impulses, however, of a sinful tendency must not only be resisted, but from the first they must be dismissed from our very thoughts; they must not be dwelt upon even to be condemned, lest our minds become, as it were, familiar with crime, and one barrier be thus broken down."

"Fortitude!--reason!" repeated Willoughby. "Alfred," he added, laying both his hands on his brother's shoulders, "I fear I am already in a delirium! I have intoxicating hopes, yet I know not if they are rational; for there are times when I conjure up fears and calculate chances, till breathless and with beating pulses I could almost rush on self-destruction as a refuge from the mere possibility of ultimate failure!" While uttering the words self-destruction, he looked wildly round for a moment, as if in search of the means.

Alfred was indescribably shocked: the painful surmise which, on less important occasions, had frequently crossed his imagination, now struck him with redoubled force. His sympathy with his brother, mingled as it was with the strange circumstances of his own case, became a sort of agony. "Why should you, my dear Willoughby," he said, "who can command every means of enjoyment this earth has to offer--why should you give way to dreams, so wild, so incoherent? Banish all such thoughts, and let me have at least the happiness of seeing you happy." An anxious inquiring look was Willoughby's only reply to this. He shrank unconsciously from seeking any unwelcome confession--a selfish feeling, of which he was not aware, secretly urging him to believe without probing too deeply, that Alfred was comparatively indifferent. In silence, therefore, the brothers now bent their steps homewards, Alfred reflecting the while on the peculiar cruelty of his fate; for if a miracle could now be wrought in his favour, and Caroline be restored to him all he had once believed her, his compassion for Willoughby, he felt, would render the remainder of his own life wretched. Yet how did his heart sicken at the thought of the scenes he must witness, the confidences he must hear, the thoughtless railleries he must parry, if he would act successfully the part which he felt it his duty to maintain: for why should he wantonly embitter for another the cup of joy which he was himself forbidden to taste; that other a brother whom he fondly loved--a brother who he knew loved him with the most enthusiastic affection? in short, in a futurity now become evidently unavoidable, he beheld, as it were, all the appalling apparatus of torture displayed before him, yet felt necessitated to submit his spirit to agony, with almost the stern fortitude of an Indian chief, yielding his limbs to the cruelty of his foes.

No sooner did he enter the drawing-room than his sisters began to teaze him, first about the length of his visit; and when they found he had not been admitted, one observed that a runaway lover did not deserve the favour of an audience; another asked archly, if he had commissioned Willoughby to take the sole charge of Caroline in his absence. Lord Darlingford, who was holding a skein of silk on the extended fingers of both hands for Jane to wind, being unconscious how painful the subject was to Alfred, said that he would not suspect Mr. Arden of conduct so imprudent, for that love-making by proxy was universally acknowledged to be extremely perilous.

Louisa declared that with her the lover who was present was always the favourite. Sir James, who was standing beside her, giggled, and drew a step nearer. An expression of disgust passed over her countenance, which, however, she concealed, by stooping closer to her scrap-book, into which she was writing some passionate lines given her by Henry, of the ardour of whose manner when he last repeated the said lines she was reflecting at the moment.

Madeline, whose heart was free, expressed openly the sentiment Jane had secretly thought, though not without one of those prophetic blushes which will suffuse the cheeks of even disengaged young ladies at the very anticipation of being one time or other in love in their turn.

Geoffery was still at the billiard table, where, with the assistance of Sir William Orm, he was engaged in plucking a new pigeon, no less a personage than the future head of the Salter family.

Mr. John Salter was a vain, vulgar, selfish fool; in natural clumsiness a caricature of John Bull personified, yet so determined to be French and Frenchified, and so proud of his travels to and through Boulogne, that the young men about the rooms, to whom he afforded infinite amusement, called him the Marquis. Sir William Orm, though he had long since cut the other members of the Salter family, sometimes did the young man the honour to win his money; while Geoffery Arden, and several other fashionables, granted him the privilege of a limited portion of their acquaintance on the same liberal terms. When the Misses Salter, however, saw their brother bow to one gentleman, speak to another, and walk with a third, their drooping hopes naturally revived.

"Who is that, John?--Has he much fortune--Is he married?--Couldn't you ask him to dinner some day?--And who is that? I never saw you speak to him before." Such were the questions and comments addressed by the young ladies to their hopeful brother, who never, however, took the trouble of giving them any satisfaction; his usual polite reply being, "If I choose to ask him to dinner, I won't wait for your leave you may depend upon it."

"Well," said Miss Salter to her sister, "if we get plenty of men acquaintance through John, we needn't much care about the ladies after all. It's the men we want you know."

"I know that," said Grace, "but I don't know that we shall get them: however we might have had both the ladies and the gentlemen, only for your improper conduct to Mrs. Dorothea. Isn't this Mr. Arden that John knows, her nephew; and Sir Willoughby Arden, and the other Mr. Arden both her nephews? besides, her knowing all the fine people; why she would have been the very best acquaintance in Cheltenham, if we had only kept her while we had her."

"Well, I wish you'd keep your temper I know, and not be always harping on that old story."

Miss Salter, who had just finished washing her hands, snatched up the basin, flung its contents in her sister's face, and effecting her retreat during the first consternation of the enemy, said, as she flounced out of the room, "except I changed it for yours."

Descending in haste, she encountered her brother, Sir William Orm, and Mr. Geoffrey Arden in the entrance hall. Astonished, delighted, and covered with smiles, she accompanied them into the drawing room; ere however they had time to be seated, in rushed Miss Grace, dripping from the shower bath so lately administered by her affectionate sister, and her eyes so blinded by the visitation of soap suds, that, alas, she saw not the strangers; but having heard her brother's voice as he crossed the hall, she poured forth her bitter complaints, sobbing violently, and relating the particulars of the assault perpetrated by Miss Salter. John laughed rudely--Sir William and Geoffery looked foolish--and Grace, having received a private hint from her sister, wiped her eyes, beheld the gentlemen, and after standing for a moment perfectly aghast, took her departure; while Miss Salter, in utter confusion, and with a countenance of the deepest mortification, yet trying to force a laugh, said it was very childish of Grace to take her silly jest amiss.

"You're such a pair of little innocent children, to be sure," said her brother with a sneer.

"Some people have a particular dislike to practical jokes," observed Sir William Orm.

"This is not the entertainment however that I brought my friends home to receive," continued the amiable Mr. John. "So I beg you'll keep your quarrels to yourselves, and order some dinner."

Mr. Salter entering at the moment Miss Salter made her escape, she flew first to the room to which her sister had returned to repair the injured adornments of her person, opened the door, thrust in her head, grinned a silent defiance, and slamming the door to again, ran down to Mrs. Johnson, to consult in providing a proper entertainment for guests so valuable, or rather so invaluable, as were two fashionable beaux. Hotels and pastry cooks were ordered to be laid under contribution, and no expense spared, let papa scold as he might. In cases of such vital importance, thought Miss Salter, people mustn't stick at trifles. She then ran up stairs again and in breathless haste, with the assistance of a housemaid changed her dress, and throwing on all the gold chains and bracelets she could muster, made her appearance in the drawing-room, looking however, as might have been expected, after so much exertion both mental and corporeal, not quite so cool as she could have wished. Whether, therefore, it was most to her relief or to her disappointment, when she found the gentlemen too much occupied to perceive her entrance, she was not able to define her feelings with sufficient accuracy to decide, although she had plenty of time for self-examination, having nothing to do during the full hour that dinner was delayed by the necessary additions, but to sit in perfect silence beside her sister on a sofa. The fact was, that the four lords of the creation had got to a rubber at whist and looked as if the slightest interruption would annoy them.

And young ladies, who have neither beauty nor fortune to recommend them, are obliged to be so amiable, that they learn to acquire an anticipative perception of what will be pleasing and soothing to the whims and tempers of those falsely important personages--bachelors. Alas! alas! for the dignity of the poor ladies! But this is only another of the many evil consequences of the monopoly of property; for that monopoly being generally vested in the male line, women are early taught that it is only by worshipping some golden calf, in other words some man of fortune, that they can hope to be restored to any participation, either in the comforts of domestic, or in the distinctions of public life. Were there but a little more justice laid in at the foundation of society, surely there would be less occasion for this heartless scramble, so revolting to almost all, while too many of those who were made for better things, find themselves necessitated by circumstances to join the throng, whose every movement and motives they despise; but as they cannot change the world, they are compelled to let the world change them; for tastes and feelings may be outraged, but dinners cannot be dispensed with.

How different an aspect would the world in a very short time present if that offspring of pride and prejudice, the unjust law of primogeniture, were abolished. The slaves of circumstances, whether men or women, would thus, without spoliation or revolution, be gradually emancipated, and the worship of wealth, that most universal and degrading of all idolatries, be put down. The standard of ostentation would be lowered, tis true; but the sum of human felicity would be increased, not only in a natural proportion, but still more through the medium of that ideal estimate which now poisons the very sources of peace. For then, not only would the number possessed of comfortable independence be much greater, but all those so blessed would learn to know themselves rich and feel themselves happy. Imagine then pride, prejudice, and famine thus banished from the world. Fancy this amended state of things to have existed for some centuries, and the happy generation then in being looking back on the records of our times. Would they believe what they read to be a grave statement of facts? Certainly not! On the contrary, they would be inclined to suppose the whole not only a work of fiction, but the conception of a madman's mind; so extravagant, so far removed from nature and probability would every action appear, so insufficient every motive, the sacrifices of realties to phantoms so egregiously inordinate, so hyperbolically absurd, that the feelings and adventures of personages so unlike themselves would find no fellowship with their sympathies. As well might we be expected to feel pious awe when we read of the gross idolatries of the ancient sage or modern savage. When, however, we look back on obsolete absurdities, or abroad on foreign follies, and find that when objects are removed from the artificial atmosphere of interests and habits we can discern them with distinctness, it seems not unreasonable to hope, that our mental vision is in itself perfect, and that therefore when the great luminary truth, which is gradually climbing the intellectual horizon, shall have arrived at its meridian, and dissipated the mists of prejudice, we shall behold with equal distinctness those objects, which lying in and around our homes and our times more intimately concern our happiness. Were all the world governed by rational, sufficient, and consistent motives, how few, comparatively speaking, would be the ills of life!

The objectors to the just division of paternal inheritance urge that the wellbeing of a state is best secured by the members of the community having as great a stake in the country as possible, and assert that such a division would lessen that now possessed by the heads of families. But is not the heartfelt happiness, the peaceful and joyous prosperity of the many, not only a greater stake than the ostentatious pride of the few, but one much more calculated to rouse when necessary the lion-spirit of national defence?

To those who would bring forward, as so many insurmountable objections, the thousand remote evils they think they can foresee, as the probable results of the system we thus advocate, we can only reply, that we do not pretend to understand the difficult science of political economy, we only know that what we recommend is just. Do justice then in all things we would say, not in the pride of opinion but on principle, and let the Allwise Disposer of the fates dispose of the consequences.

At dinner young Salter was vastly liberal of his father's wine, and called loud and often for Champaigne, sparkling bumpers of which had shortly the effect of so raising the spirits of his guests, that they began their usual merciless quizzing of the Marquis, as they styled their younger host; for, holding as they did, all the family in sovereign contempt, the presence of father and sisters was no sort of check. Indeed they rather seemed to expect that their easy familiarity would be received as a compliment by the whole domestic circle; nor were they far wrong in their calculations. Mr. Salter, honest man, thought that, as he had been at a great expense about his son's education and travels to foreign parts, it was no wonder that his said son should on his return home create a very great sensation. As for the young ladies, they were particularly well pleased; for John's getting so intimate with men of fashion must, they thought, lead to their receiving more or less attention.

"You import the silk for your own waistcoats, I suppose, Salter?" observed Sir William Orm, "there is nothing like it to be had in this country."

"I heard a lady--a lady of title too--say, no later than last night," chimed in Geoffery, "that she would give anything for a pair of slippers made out of one of the Marquis's waistcoats, they were all so perfectly beautiful."

"She don't mean to go barefooted till she gets them, I hope," replied the polite object of this delicate compliment.

"I suspect," said Sir William, "that it is the Marquis's own beauty which the lady has so associated with the patterns of the silks he wears that she knows not how to separate the ideas."

"Salter is certainly a fortunate fellow," rejoined Geoffery, "the ladies all admire him."

"Confess the truth now, Marquis," cried Sir William; "in round numbers at home and abroad, how many hearts do you think you have broken in your time?"

"I know better than to kiss and tell," answered young Salter conceitedly.

"That chain," said Geoffery, "which you wear in such graceful festoons, Marquis, must be either Venetian or Maltese, the workmanship is so exquisite. By-the-by, there was a lady last night admiring that too, and wishing so much you would make her a present of it."

"What," cried Sir William, "the ladies volunteering to wear his chains? you may well be vain, Marquis."

"They may volunteer to wear this that get it," said young Salter, looking down at the chain.

"You are a great fool, John," observed his father, "hanging money round your neck that way, that's paying no interest."

"Pardon me!" interrupted Sir William, "it is interesting to the ladies."

"He will be able to afford it to be sure," continued old Salter, "for which he may thank an industrious father. Why, gentlemen, when I began the world--confound it!" he cried, shoving back his chair violently, "what are you treading on my gouty foot for?"

Miss Salter, who knew too well what was coming, had tried to avert the impending evil by, not it would seem a gentle hint under the table. It had for many years of Mr. Salter's life been his boast that he had earned every shilling of his own fortune. "Any fool might belong to an old family," he would say, "but a man deserved credit, he thought, who could make a new one;" which as we have already hinted he was determined to do, by heaping all his wealth on the noble Marquis. On Mr. Salter's first coming to Cheltenham, however, his daughters had prevailed on him, much against his will, to be silent on this favourite topic; while they had flourished away from morning till night about family--respectable family--highly respectable family--old family--ancient family; till at length, by dint of retrograde movements, they had arrived, for aught we know, at coming in with the conqueror. But, alas, about this time Lady Flamborough jilted, and Ladies Whaleworthy and Shawbridge cut poor Mr. Salter, and so put him out of humour with all sorts of quality, as he called them, that he derived a species of consolation from suffering the full tide of his old notions to overflow once more both his soul and his conversation. In vain, therefore, was Miss Salter's hint, as well as many subsequent interruptions. "When I began the world," he recommenced, "the young man in the song who had but one sixpence was better off than I was. My father came by his death in a colliery you see in Cumberland, and left my poor mother with six of us upon the parish. I was big enough at the time, I remember, to lead a cart, so was apprenticed to a farmer, who moving some years after to a farm in Ayrshire, took me with him. There I picked up the knowledge of Scotch farming that afterwards made my fortune, and brought me a wife into the bargain, who, were she living, good woman, wouldn't believe her own eyes, that that there fine gentleman, and these here fine ladies were her own born children! Look here to be sure," he continued, pointing to Miss Salter's ornaments, "such chains, and rings, and bracelets, and nonsense; and if you'll believe me, gentlemen, the first pair of shoes ever her mother had on her feet I bought for her at Maybole fair, in Ayrshire. As for ornaments, we were married with a rush ring, and all the household furniture we possessed was a chaff-bed."

"Well, Mr. Salter," said Sir William, "I can only say that times are greatly changed for the better, and you have yourself to thank for it."

"Nothing would serve my daughters, when first we come to this vanity-fair," continued Mr. Salter, "but they must pass themselves off for ladies of high family, forsooth, and behave with impertinence to their betters, till they got themselves blown and cut too, as all that sail under false colours deserve to be. But let a man, I say, come forward with nothing but the truth in his mouth, and who shall despise him for having made his way in the world by honest industry?"

Geoffery here interrupted the discussion by rising to take his departure, pleading the ball at his aunt's, which he must attend, while Sir William Orm, finding there would be no chance of renewing the whist party, inveigled away the Marquis to the hazard-table. Mr. Salter, thus left to himself, was soon fast asleep in his chair; and his usual nap being prolonged by his unusual potations, it was a couple of hours before he found his way into the drawing-room. The disappointment of his daughters, on his making his appearance alone, may be imagined, when it is duly considered that they had waited tea, though we cannot say patiently, till near one o'clock in the morning for the gentlemen, of whose early retreat they were not aware.

So much for feeding illbred men of fashion, in the hope of securing in return what they have not to give--their politeness. After, therefore, expressing warmly their disapprobation of such rudeness, the Misses Salter had nothing for it but to retire to rest, venting on each other, 'till sleep closed their lips, the aggregate of spleen collected throughout the day from so many fruitful sources. Yet here were people whose more than common prosperity might have brought with it more than common happiness in their own line, had not silly ambition and idle vanity poisoned every fountain of attainable enjoyment, and created an inconvenient thirst for the springs of a land of which they were never likely to become naturalized citizens.

The Misses Salter had always heard their poor father say, that he had spared no expense in their education; they knew that they possessed accomplishments, and prided themselves on remembering what they had been made to read at school. But they knew not, for it came not within their sphere to know, that there is an education of early habits effecting the minutiae of outward bearing, and acquired it would seem, by the unconscious mimicry of infancy, the stamp of which no after-school discipline can yet either erase or bestow; and still less were they capable of comprehending, that there is a further education of refining sympathies and ennobling sentiments which, while as children of Adam we all share one first nature, bestows, in combination with that already named of early habits, a sort of second nature, on the privileged few, who from generation to generation have been reared, like exotics, amid the beautiful and beautifying blossoms of delicacy and feeling, sheltered from the rough winds of coarseness, the blighting atmosphere of necessity, and the cold ungenial climate of that almost justifiable selfishness unavoidably learned by those who have not only their own, but their family's imperious wants to supply by their individual anxious exertions.

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